Return-Path: <sentto-279987-5136-1028695842-fc=all.net@returns.groups.yahoo.com> Delivered-To: fc@all.net Received: from 204.181.12.215 [204.181.12.215] by localhost with POP3 (fetchmail-5.7.4) for fc@localhost (single-drop); Tue, 06 Aug 2002 21:53:07 -0700 (PDT) Received: (qmail 6989 invoked by uid 510); 7 Aug 2002 04:49:26 -0000 Received: from n11.grp.scd.yahoo.com (66.218.66.66) by all.net with SMTP; 7 Aug 2002 04:49:26 -0000 X-eGroups-Return: sentto-279987-5136-1028695842-fc=all.net@returns.groups.yahoo.com Received: from [66.218.66.95] by n11.grp.scd.yahoo.com with NNFMP; 07 Aug 2002 04:50:42 -0000 X-Sender: fastflyer28@yahoo.com X-Apparently-To: iwar@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_0_7_4); 7 Aug 2002 04:50:41 -0000 Received: (qmail 21220 invoked from network); 7 Aug 2002 04:50:41 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.66.217) by m7.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 7 Aug 2002 04:50:41 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO web14508.mail.yahoo.com) (216.136.224.71) by mta2.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 7 Aug 2002 04:50:41 -0000 Message-ID: <20020807045041.88174.qmail@web14508.mail.yahoo.com> Received: from [68.100.117.19] by web14508.mail.yahoo.com via HTTP; Tue, 06 Aug 2002 21:50:41 PDT To: iwar@yahoogroups.com In-Reply-To: <200208070355.g773tf925062@red.all.net> From: "e.r." <fastflyer28@yahoo.com> X-Yahoo-Profile: fastflyer28 Mailing-List: list iwar@yahoogroups.com; contact iwar-owner@yahoogroups.com Delivered-To: mailing list iwar@yahoogroups.com Precedence: bulk List-Unsubscribe: <mailto:iwar-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com> Date: Tue, 6 Aug 2002 21:50:41 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Re: [iwar] [fc:Ashcroft's.Master.Plan.to.Spy.on.Us] Reply-To: iwar@yahoogroups.com Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable X-Spam-Status: No, hits=-1.5 required=5.0 tests=IN_REP_TO,FROM_ENDS_IN_NUMS,SOCIAL_SEC_NUMBER,SUPERLONG_LINE version=2.20 X-Spam-Level: On the AG: This guy is frightening, but take heart in the fact that all three branches of government NEVER agree on much. Mr. Ashcroft may be the only powerful man who lost his elected role in government to a dead guy. The worrisome part is he has greater power as the AG than he did as a Senator. The good people of Missouri were sending all American's a foreboding message by voting against his then dead opponent, Essentially-do not trust this man. If he was fighting for racical segregation to continue in Missouri into the 1980's, this is not on a mission from GOD. He may think so, but whatever mission he is on I have never see in the Bible, or the Constution of this country. He is a political loose cannon that believes his own press. The FBI was involved in domestic spying in the 60's and 70's and that came to an abrupt halt when the Church Hearing met. The Intelligence Community was told to quit violating the Constutional right s of all American's and do the job of being concerned about the threat that foreign nationals pose to the US-IN SOME VERY LIMITED CASES. Mr Ashcroft has begun to look as unreasonable as did Bill Casey-Reagan's CIA Director and I hope that his continual transgressions onto the rights of American's gets him tossed out of office. Fred Cohen wrote:Ashcroft's Master Plan to Spy on Us Nat Hentoff Village Voice Friday, 2 August, 2002 'Citizens Will Not Become Informants' The July 17 editorial in The Boston Globe--not one of my columns in the Voice--was headlined, "Ashcroft vs. Americans." It began: "Operation TIPS--The Terrorism Information and Prevention System--is a scheme that Joseph Stalin would have appreciated. Plans for its pilot phase, to start in August, have Operation TIPS recruiting a million letter carriers, meter readers, cable technicians, and other workers with access to private homes as informants to report to the Justice Department any activities they think suspicious." This newest John Ashcroft battle plan in the war on civil liberties would have us join the citizens of China, Cuba, Kazakhstan, and other countries where there is ubiquitous surveillance for signs of disloyalty to the state. Not only Joseph Stalin but also George Orwell would have understood what John Ashcroft had in mind. As The Boston Globe went on to say, "Ashcroft's informant corps is a vile idea not merely because it violates civil liberties . . . or because it will sabotage genuine efforts to prevent terrorism by overloading law enforcement officials with irrelevant reports about Americans who have nothing to do with terrorists. Operation TIPS should be stopped because it is utterly anti-American." I was first alerted to Operation TIPS by Matt Olson in Isthmus, a lively alternative paper from Madison, Wisconsin. Then the May issue of The Progressive--a national monthly magazine also out of Madison--ran the full story by Bill Berkowitz, a regular contributor to Working Assets' workingforchange.com. This time, John Ashcroft was so confident of public applause for his plan to smoke out the lurking terrorist "sleepers" among us that he didn't keep it secret. On May 29, on the government Web site (www.citizencorps.gov/tips.html) there it was! Meet Big Brother: "A nationwide program giving millions of American truckers, letter carriers, train conductors, ship captains, utility employees, and others a formal way to report suspicious terrorist activity. Operation TIPS, a project of the U.S. Department of Justice, will begin as a pilot program in 10 cities that will be selected. . . . Everywhere in America, a concerned worker can call a toll-free number and be connected directly to a hotline routing calls to the proper law enforcement agency or other responder organizations." By July 16, that government Web site had removed the listing of specific kinds of worker-informants who would be watching us, but it noted that all the tipsters had to do was "use their common sense and knowledge of their work environment to identify suspicious or unusual activity." There was no definition of "suspicious" or "unusual." The president endorsed Operation TIPS, as did Homeland Security's Tom Ridge and Senate Republican Minority Leader Trent Lott. The ACLU, of course, opposed Operation TIPS. As usual, there was no word of alarm from Tom Daschle or Dick Gephardt. But Democratic congressman Dennis Kucinich, ranking Democrat on the Government Oversight Committee's National Security Oversight Subcommittee, told Bill Berkowitz in The Progressive: "It appears we are being transformed from an information society to an informant society." Where were Al Gore, John Edwards, John Kerry, Joe Lieberman, Charles Schumer, and Hillary Rodham Clinton? Suddenly, however, Operation TIPS seemed to crash. On July 19, Ellen Sorokin reported in The Washington Times that a prominent conservative, "House Majority Leader Dick Armey, in his markup of legislation to create a Homeland Security Department . . . scrapped a program that would use volunteers in domestic surveillance." The Postal Service, in part because of the pressure from its unions, had already refused to permit its letter carriers to participate in Operation TIPS. What follows is from Dick Armey's markup on the "Freedom and Security" section of the Homeland Security Bill. He wrote: "Because the [Homeland Security] Department has a singular mission of protecting the freedoms of Americans, specific legal protections will ensure that freedom is not undermined. . . . Citizens Will Not Become Informants. To ensure that no operation of the Department can be construed to promote citizens spying on one another, this draft will contain language to prohibit programs such as ‘Operation TIPS.'" Armey also canceled a cherished Bush-Ashcroft anti-terrorism weapon, a national ID card. Wrote Armey: "The federal government will not have the authority to nationalize drivers' licenses and other ID cards. Authority to design and issue these cards shall remain with the states. The use of biometric identifiers and Social Security numbers with these cards is not consistent with a free society." Also, Armey--described in The Almanac of American Politics 2002 as often driving a pickup truck, wearing cowboy boots, and quoting country music lyrics--established, in his markup of the Homeland Security Department bill, "A Privacy Officer. Working as a close adviser to the Secretary, this officer will ensure technology research and new regulations from the Department respect the civil liberties our citizens enjoy. This is the first-ever such officer established by law in a cabinet department." (Emphasis added). Despite Dick Armey's rejection of the Bush-Ashcroft plan for what conservative Republican Bob Barr calls an official "snitch system," the Department of Justice declared that Operation TIPS will continue. I called Ashcroft's spokeswoman, Barbara Comstock, and she explained that since the Senate was still debating its version of the Homeland Security Department bill, Armey's revisions had not become law; and until--if and when--they are enacted, Operation TIPS will go forward. Next week: How Vermont senator Patrick Leahy tried to get Armey's rejection of Big Brother into the Senate bill, but was betrayed by Joseph Lieberman and Tom Daschle. We may not know until September, when the Senate returns, if we are all under government surveillance. ------------------ http://all.net/ Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ --------------------------------- Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Will You Find True Love? Will You Meet the One? Free Love Reading by phone! http://us.click.yahoo.com/it_ffB/R_ZEAA/Ey.GAA/kgFolB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> ------------------ http://all.net/ Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.2 : 2002-10-01 06:44:32 PDT