US planning to recruit one in 24 Americans as citizen spies

smh ^ | 7/15/2002 | Ritt Goldstein

[TLBSHOW]

US planning to recruit one in 24 Americans as citizen spies

The Bush Administration aims to recruit millions of United States citizens as domestic informants in a program likely to alarm civil liberties groups.

The Terrorism Information and Prevention System, or TIPS, means the US will have a higher percentage of citizen informants than the former East Germany through the infamous Stasi secret police. The program would use a minimum of 4 per cent of Americans to report "suspicious activity".

Civil liberties groups have already warned that, with the passage earlier this year of the Patriot Act, there is potential for abusive, large-scale investigations of US citizens.

As with the Patriot Act, TIPS is being pursued as part of the so-called war against terrorism. It is a Department of Justice project.

Highlighting the scope of the surveillance network, TIPS volunteers are being recruited primarily from among those whose work provides access to homes, businesses or transport systems. Letter carriers, utility employees, truck drivers and train conductors are among those named as targeted recruits.

A pilot program, described on the government Web site www.citizencorps.gov, is scheduled to start next month in 10 cities, with 1 million informants participating in the first stage. Assuming the program is initiated in the 10 largest US cities, that will be 1 million informants for a total population of almost 24 million, or one in 24 people.

Historically, informant systems have been the tools of non-democratic states. According to a 1992 report by Harvard University's Project on Justice, the accuracy of informant reports is problematic, with some informants having embellished the truth, and others suspected of having fabricated their reports.

Present Justice Department procedures mean that informant reports will enter databases for future reference and/or action. The information will then be broadly available within the department, related agencies and local police forces. The targeted individual will remain unaware of the existence of the report and of its contents.

The Patriot Act already provides for a person's home to be searched without that person being informed that a search was ever performed, or of any surveillance devices that were implanted.

At state and local levels the TIPS program will be co-ordinated by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which

was given sweeping new powers, including internment, as part of the Reagan Administration's national security initiatives. Many key figures of the Reagan era are part of the Bush Administration.

The creation of a US "shadow government", operating in secret, was another Reagan national security initiative.

[dennisw]

Sounds like a plan... LOL!

[weikel]

Dear god is this Soviet Russia or Nazi Germany?

[GaltMeister]

When they get tired of looking behind every tree for 'terrorists' they busybodies start looking at you. Come on down to the station with us, so you can explain your 'suspicious' behavior that has been reported .....

[mrsmith]

"the Terrorism Information and Prevention System - will be 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."

LOL! We've got to find a way to stop these people from reporting terrorists!

[weikel]

Your son has informed us that you have criticized our glorious leader Bush. Come with us. Ve have vays of making you talk.

[Dog Gone]

Huh? Giving people a toll-free number to call to report possible terrorists is scary?

I guess we'd all be safer if law enforcement had unlisted numbers?

[Doctor Stochastic]

TIPS

[Draco]

First of all, clicking on this article's source's web site reveals the source as anti-US. Just read other articles there about the war on terrorism being a front for world domination. Nothing wrong with disagreeing with US policy. But plenty wrong with crack-pot theories about 9-11 being a cover for world domination. The recruiting of one in twenty-four Americans as domestic surveillance. A paranoid leftist's fantasy. TLBSHOW, are you one of those one in twenty-four? Yipes.

[Dialup Llama]

This might sound scary but there are actually 300 million informants ready to call the cops if some guy is spotted messing with a water treatment plant and the like.

[veronica]

Sounds like a plan... LOL!

Where do I sign up? ;)

[weikel]

Yes which means this plan is just a step towards establishing a gestapo system.

[meyer]

But... But.... they didn't ask me...

[evolved_rage]

I think they give a free brown shirt and ceremonial dagger to the first million informants.

[dennisw]

Pic of the day.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/715892/posts

[Betty Jo]

veronica, you can sign up at the above link.

Draco, this is a US Department of Justice program, not a left-wing plam.

[gunshy]

Welcome to the new Third Reich. Brought to you by a supposed conservative republican. Hail Bush. Maybe there really is something to the idea of an anti-christ.

[TLBSHOW]

http://www.drudgereport.com/

click above source for this is front page news at drudge

lol

[MinuteGal]

I already have my decoder ring and two-way wrist radio. Semper paratus! Sign me up!

Leni

[TLBSHOW]

what we need is the new leader to lead us all. His name is

Dan Flagg!