Posted on 03/21/2006 7:20:40 PM PST by Jay777
The American Civil Liberties Union is renewing its efforts to pry loose secret data about individuals and organizations that local governments consider potential terrorist threats.
After litigating the issue for nearly two years, the group's New Jersey chapter is filing requests under the state's Open Public Records Act, seeking information contained on applications for federal anti-terror funding. The applications list up to 15 "potential threat elements" _ individuals or groups that could be considered potential terrorist threats.
The ACLU is seeking the disclosure of the names of the individuals or groups, or failing that, the criteria used to select them for inclusion on the list.
"Sadly, we know that the federal government has recently spied on or targeted organizations, such as the Quakers and pro-peace groups, not because they pose a threat but rather due to their political beliefs," said Edward Barocas, the ACLU's legal director. "We want to make sure that our own New Jersey government officials are not doing likewise."
It's not the first time the group has sought the information. It filed an initial request with 50 New Jersey municipalities in April 2004.
Most responded that they had not filed such documents, but some claimed the records were exempt from disclosure on security grounds, or that the state Attorney General's Office had ordered them not to make the data public.
After the ACLU sued the Attorney General's Office, it said it had not instructed anyone to withhold the information.
That led the ACLU to send new requests for the information to nine municipalities: Edison, Linden, Middletown, Mount Laurel, Newark, Parsippany, Trenton, Wayne and West New York.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsday.com ...
Once She Who Must Not Be Named and her husband get their hands on the federal budget, there can be as many brownshirts as they wish.
Interesting...
I just started to read the "The Venona Secrets" by Herbert Romerstein and Eric Breindel.
I had no idea how badly infiltrated our government was by Soviet spies and sympathizers!
I think we all know here that the ACLU is a branch of the Communist party, as it was founded by them, and continues to work against the best interests of the United States.
The fact that they are petitioning the government for this information implies that they do not have high level functionaries in the government to steal this information for them, anymore.
A side question: given that the USSR is dead, who is directing the ACLU? Or are they a body without a head, and they just don't know this?
It aint gonna happen.
Sorry, after going back and rereading , they didn't sue. They only made requests.
If Hillary is elected President the ACLU will turn into prosecutors.
If we make law based on Hillary becoming President then it's time to just disband the entire government, because she can't be trusted with anything.
Frankly, she's far more dangerous in control of the IRS than with any anti-terrorist apparatus.
Thank you, and interesting question. There power comes from US...as we fund them with our taxes. Their head is an ideology that is far from dead. They may not have their claws within the government, but they are a "legal" group. Don't think they don't have spies that have not already stolen the info...it just can't be used in court against the government that way. They have to obtain it in a legal manner in order to use it in a legal manner.
The IRS has its own set of abuses. However, under the Patiot Act, all the president has to do is sign a finding that an organization is "terrorist" in nature, and its assets are confiscated. The anti-terrorist apparatus is just the kind of thing that Hillary would love to have under her control.
Hillary will not be President ever.
Maybe yes. May no. But do you think that Kerry, Gore or any other of that ilk would do differently? There are scores to settle with conservatives.
Good points. But I think if they had the information they would have leaked it to their co-conspirators in the press, don't you think?
Do you think that the ACLU and Islamofacists are working together in an "unholy alliance"? I worry about that...
Castro is a lawyer.
Gorbachev?
Rockefeller?
Soros?
Ahmed Huber?
Ramsey Clark?
Clintons?
Rose Law Firm?
Oh this could be interesting!
By the way, I'm originally from Alabama too.
I knew there was a reason I liked you! :D
Woo hoo! If you really like me you can be my new fan, and visit my blog daily! :P
Evidence please. Spying on can mean merely visiting their websites and reading their pamphlets. Or watching them as they demonstrate against their own country in a time of war. It does not have to mean, and it most likely does not in this case, "black bag" operations, or tapping their phones (unless they are calling or being called by foreign terrorist groups of course).
Well, if we are war with the Japanese, in alliance with the ChiComs, and some FReepers are out in the streets demonstrating against our involvement in that war, while at the same time making and receiving phone calls and emails to and from Japan, then I'd say President Hildebeast would be justified.
I bet it is, but we can't hobble our war effort because of it.
Of course, if we started actually prosecuting treason then it would be another story.
In the 1964 Stanley Kubrick film "Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb " the Russian Ambassidor is asked how his government got information that the United States was working on the "Doomsday Device" which led to fears that the Soviet Union would fall into a "Doomsday Gap" he said that their source was the New York Times. This isn't far from the truth. If something like this fictional device was being worked on by our government, it would be the New York Times working with that other leading liberal institution the ACLU which would be leading the charge to inform our enemies under the guise of the People's Right To Know.
These morons who actually have a belief that the government is out to deceive the people of the United States for the sake of deceiving them worry me. You know the type, the kind who parade around their homes with aluminum foil and wet towels wrapped around their heads because they believe agents of our government is trying to use a secret device which taps into their brain waves because only they have been enlightened to the government's diabolical plan.
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