Amy Goodman: "America's Real Subversives: FBI Spying Then, NSA Surveillance Now"

[99th_Monkey]

America's Real Subversives: FBI Spying Then, NSA Surveillance Now
As the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington nears, let's not forget the history of agency overreach and abuse of power
July 26, 2013 * Common Dreams * by Amy Goodman

As the 50th anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington approaches, commemorating that historic gathering where Martin Luther King Jr gave his famous "I have a dream" speech, it is important to recall the extent to which King was targeted by the government's domestic spying apparatus. The FBI operation against King is one of the most shameful episodes in the long history of our government's persecution of dissenters.

Fifty years later, Edward Snowden, who is seeking temporary asylum to remain in Russia, took enormous personal risk to expose the global reach of surveillance programs overseen by President Barack Obama. His revelations continue to provoke worldwide condemnation of the US.

In a heavily redacted, classified FBI memo dated 4 January 1956 – just a little more than a month after Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a bus to a white passenger – the Mobile, Alabama, FBI office stated that an agent "had been assigned by [redacted] to find out all he could about Reverend Martin L King, colored minister in Montgomery and leader in the bus boycott … to uncover all the derogatory information he could about King."

The FBI at that time was run by its founding director, J Edgar Hoover, who was deploying the vast resources he controlled against any and all perceived critics of the United States. The far-reaching clandestine surveillance, infiltration and disruption operation Hoover ran was dubbed "COINTELPRO", for counterintelligence program.

The FBI's COINTELPRO activities, along with illegal operations by agencies like the CIA, were thoroughly investigated in 1975 by the Church Committee, chaired by the Democratic US senator from Idaho, Frank Church. The Church committee reported that the FBI "conducted a sophisticated vigilante operation aimed squarely at preventing the exercise of first amendment rights of speech and association." Among COINTELPRO's perverse activities was an FBI effort to threaten Martin Luther King Jr with exposure of an alleged extramarital affair, including the suggestion, made by the FBI to King, that he avoid embarrassment by killing himself.

Following the Church committee, Congress imposed serious limitations on the FBI and other agencies, restricting domestic spying. Among the changes was the passage into law of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (Fisa). Fisa compelled the FBI and others in the government to go to a secret court, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, in order to engage in domestic wiretapping.

Then came 11 September 2001, and the swift passage of the Patriot Act, granting broad, new powers of surveillance to intelligence agencies, including the FBI. Section 215 of that act is widely criticized, first for allowing the FBI to obtain records of what books people are signing out of the library. But now, more than 10 years later, and thanks to the revelations that have come from the Snowden leaks, we see that the government has used this law to perform dragnet surveillance on all electronic communications, including telephone "metadata", which can be analyzed to reveal intimate details of our lives, legalizing a truly Orwellian system of total surveillance.

In what is considered to be a litmus test of the potential to roll back the Obama administration's domestic spy programs, a bipartisan coalition of libertarian Republicans and progressive Democrats put forth an amendment to the latest defense authorization bill. Justin Amash, a Republican, and John Conyers, a Democrat, both of Michigan, co-sponsored the amendment, which would deny funding to the NSA to collect phone and data records of people who are not subjects of an investigation.

The White House took seriously the potential that its power to spy might get trimmed by Congress. On the eve of the debate on the Amash/Conyers amendment, House members were lobbied by NSA Director General Keith B Alexander, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, as well as by hawkish members of the congressional intelligence committees.

The amendment was narrowly defeated. A full bill that would similarly shut down the NSA program is currently in committee.

Thanks to Edward Snowden, and the journalists who are writing stories based on his whistleblowing, we now know that the Obama administration is collecting oceans of our data. Martin Luther King Jr was a dissident, an organizer, a critic of US wars abroad and of poverty and racism at home. He was spied on, and his work was disrupted by the federal government.

The golden anniversary of the March on Washington is 28 August. Deeply concerned about the crackdown on dissent happening under Obama, scholar Cornel West, professor at Union Theological Seminary in New York, wondered if "Brother Martin [King] would not be invited to the very march in his name."
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/07/26

[cantbeserious]

1. Thank You For Sharing

eom

[L0oniX]

2. This government is the enemy of most of the people...

including the ignorant ones.

[Savannahmann]

3. Doesn't she know she's falling for the Libertarian/Republican plan

At least that's the claim when the rest of us point out how wrong this is. OK, one of the claims.

Seriously for a moment. Spying on your citizens is not the way to govern this or any nation. True power comes from the consent of the governed. That means you have to do more than get more votes, as the lesser of two evils. We berate and belittle the Royals, but generally speaking, they have a much higher approval rating from British Citizens than our elected leaders do from us. I'm not saying we need a Royal Family, but at some point, you have to consider the consent of the Governed.

Spying on them to identify threats, and we all know the threats they mean, anyone disloyal to the current administration, is wrong. It's wrong now that they're focusing on RW loons, and it was wrong to infiltrate and break up Organize. It will be wrong when the next Rethug gets in office and turns their spying on us on the Left. We can't guarantee we'll be in charge forever more, and even if we are, because I don't march in lockstep with the Government's policies, I'll be targeted sooner or later. I'd rather choose never.

The problem with this level of spying is that sooner or later, we'll all be targeted.

[truedelphi]

16. Thank you. n/t

[WovenGems]

4. Big difference

The FBI kept folders on many folks. The NSA tracks communications between here and overseas. To stay off the shit list don't call a number on the watch list or you could get questioned by the feds.

[99th_Monkey]

5. I think real terrorists have knows that for a long time.

so what's the point again of monitoring ALL PHONE CALLS & EMAILS?

[Progressive dog]

10. They are now monitoring all calls and e-mails,

I did not know that.
Or maybe they're stealing metadata on all calls and e-mails and maybe that's worse than having several FBI agents following you (MLK) because (roll drums) it's not just data it's metadata.

[Aerows]

8. Good to know

that you are on board with answering a mis-dialed call, or making a mis-dialed call getting you dragged in for questioning by the feds. It's not like that could possibly be embarrassing for your family, put you on the no-fly list for no reason or jeopardize your career.

But that will never happen to you, so don't worry.

[rhett o rick]

18. First of all you dont know what all is being collected, compiled and analyzed.

From what Gen Clapper himself testified, they are collecting way more than you are trying to convince us here. What makes you think the NSA tracks only communications between here and overseas?? How do you know they dont track more. And maybe Booz-Allen collects data from everyone. Why are you carrying water for the conservatives here?

"To stay off the shit list don't call a number on the watch list or you could get questioned by the feds." I cant believe you wrote that. First of all that isnt true. People that protested with Occupy are on the list, even people that protested for "Move Your Money" are on the list. It's a big list. The Patriot Act says that anyone that interferes with corporations can be considered terrorists. That would put them on the list. Secondly, "be good and you wont have to worry", is the lamest argument ever.

I recommend you read the book, "They Thought They Were Free." They werent and neither are you.

[GiaGiovanni]

6. Goodman knows her stuff

and probably remembers most of it first hand.

[questionseverything]

7. she is a national treasure

..

[Doctor_J]

9. She's a racist who doesn't understand chess

and didn't get her pony.

[99th_Monkey]

11. Huh? Leave Amy alone.

I nominate this to win the "dumbest DU post of the month" award.

[IDemo]

12. Sarchasm

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=sarchasm

[99th_Monkey]

14. Sarcasm or Sour-chasm?

Sorry, sometimes it's hard to tell the diff. these daze ...

my bad.

[truedelphi]

13. K & R. n/t

[WHEN CRABS ROAR]

15. The question is, are you surprised by these revelations?

I remember the lurkers in cars, undercover cops, newspaper fires and infiltrators in the civil rights and anti-war movements.
My thoughts then and now are, why were we perceived as the threat to the country?

Here's what The Universal Declaration of Human Rights has to say about that.

http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/index.shtml

I'm glad to live in a community, that in a public election, voted against The Patriot Act.

[99th_Monkey]

17. Honestly I don't think that is "the question", but you know that.

Because you also said "why were we perceived as the threat to the country" <--THIS is "the question" imho