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Ear to the Ground

FBI Coming to a Public Location Near You

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Posted on Sep 13, 2008
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fbi.gov

The Justice Department was dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s on Friday on a new set of rules designed to help FBI agents zero in on potential national security threats within the U.S., allowing them to gather information in public places—and even conduct interviews—without identifying themselves. 


Los Angeles Times:

The officials said the new rules would also make it easier for the FBI to collect intelligence on the activities of foreign governments in the United States.

In assessing possible terrorist threats, agents now are limited to conducting interviews and gathering data through public sources, such as the Internet. The changes would allow them to conduct physical surveillance in a public location, recruit and deploy informants, and conduct interviews without identifying themselves.

The officials said those methods are already permitted in criminal cases. They said agents would be unable to use methods such as physical searches or wiretaps, which are limited by statute or require court approval.

Privacy and civil liberties advocates, who were briefed on the rules Friday by Justice Department officials, said they feared that agents would use such factors as ethnicity or religion as the basis for a threat assessment.

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By jackpine savage, September 14, 2008 at 8:21 pm #

I’ll raise you an analogy, purplewolf.  This is a lot more like Stalin’s USSR, or life in the DDR.  Come to think of it, wasn’t an ex Stasi officer given a high ranking job in the DHS?

I’d also like to second Outraged’s assessment of Folktruther’s post.

Report this

By Folktruther, September 14, 2008 at 2:48 pm #

Be my guest, Outraged. Take anything you want.  Remember, talent only borrows, genius steals.

Report this

By purplewolf, September 14, 2008 at 2:08 pm #

This is an updated version of the Salem Witchcraft Trials from our soiled past. Don’t like your neighbors? Drum up some false accusation against them, make a few well placed phone calls - wait, you don’t even have to go that far, as all the phone lines are monitored already - get your beer and munchies and sit back and watch our incompetent agents doing their jobs to keep us safe by beating up your neighbors. Better that that fake “reality TV” that is passed off as real. At least you know when you see it, it is not scripted.

If these agencies were at all efficient, they would have raided those in power already and exposed them for what they really are, as they are the ones who have orchestrated this whole mess from the get-go. It continue to allow them to further this madness makes these agencies equal partners in the crimes carried out by the very people whom they should protect the world from.

Welcome to the Police States of America, brought to you by the Bush Administration.

FBI = FABRICATED BULLSHIT INC. ver.2008

Report this

By Outraged, September 14, 2008 at 4:17 am #

Re: folktruther

I hope you don’t mind but your comment is so extremely concise and valid, I going to repost it with emphasis.  I hope you don’t mind.  Very good comment.

“Turning the FBI into a full-fledged secret police, with Dem leader silence which gives consent, follows naturally from the other police state tactics.  After a pre-emptive attack on journalists, assisted by the Dem mayor of ST Paul, Chris Coleman, it is apparent that there is no real resistence to a secret police spying on the American people among Dem leaders.  Even if they are the ones spied on.

The population must understand that the Dem-Gop coalition BOTH support a police state, to rule during the comming debt induced economic collapse and the Terrorist wars that will be expanded no matter who wins the election.

The election is political theater to distract the population from opposing the policies of both parties, and the ruling class that finances them.  If St Paul was a window on our future, it has just been opened wider.

Report this

By Folktruther, September 14, 2008 at 2:22 am #

Turning the FBI into a full-fledged secret police, with Dem leader silence which gives consent, follows naturally from the other police state tactics.  After a pre-emptive attack on journalists, assisted by the Dem mayor of ST Paul, Chris Coleman, it is apparent that there is no real resistence to a secret police spying on the American people among Dem leaderss.  Even if they are the ones spied on.

The population must understand that the Dem-Gop coalition BOTH support a police state, to rule during the comming debt induced economic collapse and the Terrorist wars that will be expanded no matter who wins the election.

The election is political theater to distract the population from opposing the policies of both parties, and the ruling class that finances them.  If St Paul was a window on our future, it has just been opened wider.

Report this

By samosamo, September 13, 2008 at 8:06 pm #

Now that South American countries have started kicking the U.S. out their country, the U.S. has to start looking for ‘subversives’ somewhere and what better place than our own back yards.
Oh, hope for a better congress next year, one that will exercise the oversight and investigations to stop this insane madness. Hell, the fbi office in washington dc is right there amongst the most dangerous secruity threats to this country, why spread out more than they already are, being that they are in every state and major city in the U.S.?

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By troublesum, September 13, 2008 at 7:29 pm #

Maybe some foreign power will invade our country and convert us to democracy.

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By jackpine savage, September 13, 2008 at 7:04 pm #

Oh joy, our very own, budding police state…just in time for economic upheaval.

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