US planning to recruit one in 24 Americans as citizen spies
Nomen Nescio
US will have a higher percentage of citizen informants than the
former East Germany through the infamous Stasi secret police. The
program would use a minimum of 4 per cent of Americans to report
"suspicious activity".
.
Highlighting the scope of the surveillance network, TIPS volunteers
are being recruited primarily from among those whose work provides
access to homes, businesses or transport systems. Letter carriers,
utility employees, truck drivers and train conductors are among those
named as targeted recruits.
A pilot program, described on the government Web site
http://www.citizencorps.gov/, is scheduled to start next month in 10
cities, with 1 million informants participating in the first stage.
Assuming the program is initiated in the 10 largest US cities, that
will be 1 million informants for a total population of almost 24
million, or one in 24 people.
Historically, informant systems have been the tools of non-democratic
states. According to a 1992 report by Harvard University's Project on
Justice, the accuracy of informant reports is problematic, with some
informants having embellished the truth, and others suspected of
having fabricated their reports.
The Patriot Act already provides for a person's home to be searched
without that person being informed that a search was ever performed,
or of any surveillance devices that were implanted.
.
The creation of a US "shadow government", operating in secret, was
another Reagan national security initiative.
.
Ritt Goldstein is an investigative journalist and a former leader in
the movement for US law enforcement accountability. He has lived in
Sweden since 1997, seeking political asylum there, saying he was the
victim of life-threatening assaults in retaliation for his
accountability efforts. His application has been supported by the
European Parliament, five of Sweden's seven big political parties,
clergy, and Amnesty and other rights groups.
By Ritt Goldstein The Sydney Morning Herald. July 15 2002
This story was found at:
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/07/14/1026185141232.html
Joseph Hertzlinger
<nob...@dizum.com> wrote:
>The Terrorism Information and Prevention System, or TIPS, means the
>US will have a higher percentage of citizen informants than the
>former East Germany through the infamous Stasi secret police. The
>program would use a minimum of 4 per cent of Americans to report
>"suspicious activity".
I think it's an excellent idea for much of the American public to look
for "suspicious activity."
OTOH, the most obvious organization for terrorists and fellow
travelers to infiltrate is the Federal Government, so we Americans
should be given immediate access to classified material. We should be
wary of secrecy. It can enable enemies of freedom to flourish.
This even applies to the Current Unpleasantness. For example, many
government agencies have reacted by taking any discussion of threats
offline. Since The Enemy has been plotting for years, they probably
already know about those threats and even if they didn't it would take
them years to do anything. Taking any mention of the threats offline
will hamper the ability of ordinary citizens (the people who prevented
the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania from being used as a weapon and
the people who stopped Maxwell Stupid, the shoebomber) to come up with
countermeasures. Instead, we are supposed to let the goofballs in the
FBI, CIA, etc. to defend us.
But wait, there's more. Ralph Nader, the Arab American most likely to
be a real sleeper agent, went to great lengths to get Dubya elected.
Is there another sleeper agent in Dubya's staff? Was the same person
responsible for the criticisms of Israel, the word "crusade," the
phrase "Infinite Justice," and dropping food packages the same color
as bombs? Is the secrecy policy a matter of national security or is it
to enable moles to work undetected by reporters?
Even if the Feds haven't been infiltrated, deputizing spies will
merely provide them with more information than they can handle. A
single organization can't monitor that much information. That's why
everybody must have snooping devices. The CIA can't monitor wannabee
terrorists, their neighbors will have to do the monitoring.
If we look at the Current Unpleasantness, the government had the data
needed to catch the terrorists ahead of time but did not have the
manpower to analyze it. Once we get close to 300 million people on the
case...
Modern wars are fought with intelligence. Each of us is a member of
the unorganized militia and now we should regard each of us as a
member of the unorganized CIA.
This even applies to encryption. Supposedly, it is now a public
menace. If that's the case, we should ensure that decryption is as
widespread as possible. IOW, the DMCA must be repealed.
Joseph Hertzlinger
<nob...@dizum.com> wrote:
>The Terrorism Information and Prevention System, or TIPS, means the
>US will have a higher percentage of citizen informants than the
>former East Germany through the infamous Stasi secret police. The
>program would use a minimum of 4 per cent of Americans to report
>"suspicious activity".
For an example of how that will work in the real world, see
http://www.truthlaidbear.com/001214.html