Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
It seems as though each day that passes makes it slightly more difficult to discern which team I’m supposed to be rooting for.
From the Washington Times:
Maryland troopers spied on activist groups
Protesters added to database of terrorist suspects
Shaun Waterman UNITED PRESS INTERNATIONAL
Friday, July 18, 2008Undercover Maryland state troopers infiltrated three groups advocating peace and protesting the death penalty — attending meetings and sending reports on their activities to U.S. intelligence and military agencies, according to documents released Thursday.
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The activist was identified as Max Obuszewski. His “primary crime” was entered into the database as “terrorism - anti govern(ment).” His “secondary crime” was listed as “terrorism - anti-war protestors.” The database is known as the Washington-Baltimore High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, or HIDTA.
And from the Washington Post
WHAT HAVE we learned from the Maryland State Police’s undercover spying program targeting peaceable groups opposed to the death penalty and the war in Iraq, other than that the police are prone to ludicrous misspellings? Well, here’s a sampling of the “intelligence” gleaned during 288 hours of police surveillance in 2005-06, in reports unearthed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Maryland:
· On Oct. 3, 2005, an undercover state police agent attending a meeting of activists ferreted out the fact that antiwar protesters were laying plans to distribute fliers at the Towson Town Center mall.
· On July 11, 2005, an officer attending an antiwar meeting held by “an activist named Bernie” and “five middle-aged women” discovered that in a protest held a week earlier at the National Security Agency, peaceniks shared cookies with NSA guards who issued them a citation for trespassing.
· On June 6, 2005, an agent who infiltrated an anti-death-penalty protest in Baltimore reported “no problems” at the event, attended by about 25 known and “currently unidentified recurrent death penalty protestors.”
We have a terrorist watch list that includes people who bake cookies for NSA guards? That’s the sound of Nero tuning his fiddle, folks.
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4 Responses to “Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?”
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I wonder how it is that the HIDTA is responsible for infiltrating peace activist groups and making such vapid allegations for a terror watch list? According to HIDTA’s online policy statement, there would appear to be some serious confusion at HIDTA as to what their mission really is.
Obuszewski is probably the happiest man on the planet. Being arrested (and then promptly released, of course) is pretty much the Holy Grail for these nuts. A quick Google of the guy’s name shows him to be a lifetime professional protester. While the Government should not be willy-nilly investigating every patchouli-reeking malcontent in the country, it’s probable that this guy popped up on their radar for reasons unrelated to “peaceful demonstration”. And eating cookies does not automatically preclude one from being a psychopath. I’m sure Dahmer enjoyed a soft-baked Toll House Butterscotch cookie from time to time.
Oh crap, I forgot to ask a question. Is WNL dead? An attempt to log on brings me to the hosting company’s site.
Oh, and don’t worry overmuch about the end of civilization because the coppers got some incomplete information. If Nero is fiddling, it’s because he recognizes that the penultimate development of a collapsing society is losing control of their borders. We’re well down that path already. Now if only the massive civil unrest and collapse of law-and-order would get here, we could call the whole thing done, and start over. Good luck to the pacifists then.
Who watches the watchers?…
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