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Born at the Crest of the Empire

Saturday, March 24, 2007

Red Squads

This NYTimes piece is horrifiying. In a method very reminiscent of the "Red Squads" of the sixties, NYPD conducted nationwide undercover surveillance supposedly because of the 2004 Republican convention. They then coordinated and desseminated that information to police departments throughout the country.

As atrocious as that is, they also went undercover into groups not tied to the convention whose sole "crime" appears to be that they were against the administration.
In at least some cases, intelligence on what appeared to be lawful activity was shared with police departments in other cities. A police report on an organization of artists called Bands Against Bush noted that the group was planning concerts on Oct. 11, 2003, in New York, Washington, Seattle, San Francisco and Boston. Between musical sets, the report said, there would be political speeches and videos.

“Activists are showing a well-organized network made up of anti-Bush sentiment; the mixing of music and political rhetoric indicates sophisticated organizing skills with a specific agenda,” said the report, dated Oct. 9, 2003. “Police departments in above listed areas have been contacted regarding this event.”....

In its preparations, the department applied the intelligence resources that had just been strengthened for fighting terrorism to an entirely different task: collecting information on people participating in political protests.


Who needs the Feds when the NYPD can coordinate nationally?

(Are they legally allowed to conduct surveillance out of state?)

9 Comments:

  • Mayor Moneybags Bloomberg has a little Bush in him. He's competent, of course, and he's smart, so that's not like Bushie. But he's a know-it-all and he's a sneaky bastard and he only cares about rich people and he's fucking w/ the stats to make his admin look better (Diane Ravitch noted on Huffingtonpost the other day how the Bloomberg school reform "successes" are all backed up by manipulated stats) and he never fires anybody who is incompetent (as long as that person is a CEO - little people get fired like THAT!)

    It doesn't surprise me that Bloomie uses the NYPD as his own personal KGB. As usual though, there's no political damage to him over this. He was barely mentioned in the article. It's as if Moneybags didn't sign off on the Big Brother tactics.

    By Blogger Reality-Based Educator, at 6:20 AM  

  • The one thing I wanted to add but don't know enough to do so securely is to point out the NYC/US govt connections. More than any other non-federal outfit, NYC has more cross ties to the federal homeland security folks than anyone else.

    (Also, I think I remember that NYC had, at least for awhile, an NYPD intelligence guy based in Israel working with their intel services.)

    I know next to nothing about NYC politics, although in Houston, there was also a stat fixing scandal about our schools that actually made it national because the guy who did it was a top Bush admin education guy.


    Mike

    By Blogger mikevotes, at 6:46 AM  

  • Yes, NYC sent cops abroad to study anti-terrorism techniques in various countries.

    The Wash Post, btw, reports that Mayor Moneybags is thinking about an independent run next year for president.

    By Blogger Reality-Based Educator, at 6:00 AM  

  • Yeah, I saw that, but he hasn't a chance. No existing organization. No reservoir of national support. No strategists/locals likely to flip from the other campaigns.

    The campaign would be he and his mone running alone.

    Mike

    By Blogger mikevotes, at 9:38 AM  

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