Posted on 12/01/2001 8:12:17 PM PST by OKCSubmariner
The US Attorney General, John Ashcroft, was yesterday reported to be ready to relax restrictions on the FBI's powers to spy on religious and church-based political organisations.
His proposal, leaked to the New York Times, would loosen limits on the FBI's surveillance powers, imposed in the 1970s after the death of its founder J. Edgar Hoover.
The plan has caused outrage within the FBI itself with agents expected to act upon new surveillance powers describing themselves as 'very, very angry'.
The spying, wiretapping and surveillance campaign unleashed by Hoover against church and political groups was called 'Cointelpro', and was aimed mainly at the movement behind civil rights activist Martin Luther King, the Black Panthers, the anti-Vietnam war movement and, on the other wing, the Ku Klux Klan.
When the system was revealed, upon Hoover's death, restrictions were put on the security bureau, in the form of two sets of regulations pertaining to foreign-based and domestic groups. The rules forbade FBI agents from sending undercover agents into churches, synagogues or mosques unless they found 'probable cause or evidence' that someone in them had broken the law.
A Justice Department spokeswoman, Susan Dryden, said no final decision had been made on their reintroduction.
According to sources, the plan has caused a sharp rift within the department and the FBI. Ashcroft and the new FBI director, Robert Mueller, are pushing the plan eagerly, but there is strong opposition among officials inside both the bureau and the Justice Department.
Internal opposition to the plan will exacerbate an already fractious atmosphere in the FBI since President Bush took office.
Some agents told the New York Times that they considered any weakening of the guidelines 'a serious mistake', and that the Justice Department had 'not clearly described' the proposed changes. 'People are furious right now,' said one agent.
The changes would become part of what civil liberties groups regard as a dangerously changing legal landscape in the US: 1,200 people with connections to Islamic groups have been taken into custody, and Draconian security measures, such as wiretapping of lawyers, pushed through Congress.
Further plans are now afoot to seek out and interview some 5,000 immigrants, mostly Muslims, who have entered the US since January.
I agree with each and everyone of your observations about the EOs and the Patriot (sic) Act. I am happy to finally be able to say for the SECOND time in a month that I am once again PROUD of Special Agents of the FBI. First there was SA Dan Vogel speaking out about the OKC bombing, and now agents are rebelling against this action. Maybe the regular street agents are finally finding their voices against the machinations of the politically motivated suits in Washington and the militarizing behaviors of the tactical boys. We'll see.
You neglected to mention their vast knowledge and experience in running political campaigns and expertise in all things military (circa 1969).
Assuming you go to church, are you comfortable with a clandestine FBI presence in your congregation from now on? You never know whether your pew-mate might be a militia member or an anti-abort crazy, afterall.
The FBI agents "rebelling" are no doubt ones who did Clinton's bidding inside the FBI.
We are between a rock and a hard place.
If we leave the Mosques uninvestigatable, we leave Islamic terrorist cells in this country off limits and we allow the planning of future terrorist attacks to go forward unimpeded.
If AG Ashcroft goes forward with plans to monitor "religious" centers, one day - if another Clinton (perish the thought) ever made into the Presidency, we all KNOW what "religious" centers would become targets - and it would not be mosques holding suspected Islamic terrorists.
The same can be said for all the "emergency" measures that are being put into place in order to catch the terrorists and to prevent further acts of terrorism against America. Under the current President, these measures SHOULD be used against those ready to kill Americans to advance their terrorist causes. Under a Clinton II, these measures WOULD be used against people standing in the way of their power grabs....ordinary, every day Americans who love freedom and loathe tyrants like the Clintons and all Marxist/Leninist/Moaist/GlobalCommunists.
I ask - what do we do?
We do not find a way to monitor activity inside Mosques which house Islamic terrorist cells - and hundreds, thousands, if not millions of Americans could die as a result.
We do find ways to monitor these Mosques and, subsequently, discover and prevent future terrorist attacks by breaking up these cells - preventing the deaths of thousands if not millions of Americans - but a Clinton II comes to power and uses these emergency measures as just what they need to finally go after - with force - Christians who have been the "one group to stand in their way."
This is the quandary of our time, thanks to Sept. 11th and the Clinton Plague.
We must break up these American terrorist cells - even if it means monitoring Mosques (and, what if the FBI agents "rebelling" are ones who did Clinton's bidding and who KNOW where the terrorists are - in those Mosques - and who know that if we suveil these groups - the Clintons terrorist friends LOSE their BEST COVER?)
And, then, we must unite to do the hard work and earnest prayer necessary to defeat a Clinton II occurrance.
One last thought.
Since the Constitution is just so much trash paper to the Clintonistas already, and since they used murder/terrorist tactics against their enemies when they were in power (and, before, on their way TO power) - it seems to me that it won't matter what has happened beforehand with surveillance of religious groups or not. If Clinton II ever happens, the FBI will once again become their personal security force used against their enemies - not against the enemies of America. And it will be nightmare city time for the Christian - and other - "resistance to tyranny" movements ---whether or not any FBI policy changes have occurred.
(By the way - if the "rebel" FBI agents are Clintonistas - I would tell AG Ashcroft to proceed immediately with these plans - knowing they are squealing because they KNOW FOR CERTAIN these measures will find links between the Mosque based American terrorist cells - and the USA's leading Terrorists.......the ones who pardoned terrorists and embraced them and accepted money and support from them.)
Exactly.
It is time to stop coddling our "enemies within" - the real ones - that the Bush team is trying to root out and prevent from doing further harm to us in cahoots with the foreign born ones like Osama and Omar.
We live in a time AC - After Clinton. Before Clinton, while these dangers caused by employing these "anti-Constitutional" measures would be great, I would never have believed an American President could become an American Hitler....at least not in my lifetime. Now there is no question it could occur. It will take men and women of integrity and a clear respect for our Constitutional, individual rights and freedoms, in places of power to prevent such an occurance. It will take the effort of all of us who love freedom to work and pray to get them there.
Your confidence is very comforting, but what about if the next President will have different set of preferences?
ask david koresh. well...scratch that. he's dead.
Why not post that which is true and valid. I know it's a new concept, but give it a try.
These ongoing attempts to say that you know secrets about the OKC explosion are simply fiction or even worse, you think they are real.
Let's see your 22 secret videotapes of the actual explosion... or are they so secret no person is allowed to see them!
From FR Forum---- “ McVeigh diagrams ANFO bomb: Details show larger device than government official..”
link to FR forum discussion of WND article
"Jim Crandell, an inspector and former field agent for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, also denied knowledge of any other devices in the building.
"I can't comment at all on whether there might have been additional explosives in the building because I simply don't know," Crandell told WND. But, he said, it was ATF's policy "not to store explosives in any of our offices."
"We maintain explosives bunkers for" storage of explosive materials, he added, noting that ATF sometimes uses local storage facilities operated by local law enforcement agencies. He did say that the agency stored some of its own weapons at its offices, and he denied that ATF agents were tipped to the bombing the morning it occurred.
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