Free Republic

The Department of Justice is concentrating on “far-right” groups in a new study of social media usage aimed at combatting violent extremism. The Justice Department’s National Institute of Justice (NIJ) awarded Michigan State University $585,719 for the study, which was praised by Eric Holder, the former attorney general, earlier this year. “There is currently limited knowledge of the role of technology and computer mediated communications (CMCs), such as Facebook and Twitter, in the dissemination of messages that promote extremist agendas and radicalize individuals to violence,” according to the NIJ grant. “The proposed study will address this gap through a series...

One of the primary contentions, yesterday evening, of Establishment Republicans and Democrats in defense of the NSA's massive data collection program, was that the program was not only free from abuse (something we know is not true), but that it's ultimately useful in targeting real threats to the American people; maybe not yesterday, maybe not today, but perhaps some day in the future it will ensnare an entire sleeper sell of Jihadists mid-phone call to Iran, giving an unsecured credit card number to their yellowcake suppliers. The data collection, you see, is done only on those whose backgrounds demand it....