The beginning of an article in today's WaPo by Lisa Rein and Josh White:
The Maryland State Police surveillance of advocacy groups was far more extensive than previously acknowledged, with records showing that troopers monitored -- and labeled as terrorists -- activists devoted to such wide-ranging causes as promoting human rights and establishing bike lanes.
Intelligence officers created a voluminous file on Norfolk-based People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, calling the group a "security threat" because of concerns that members would disrupt the circus. Angry consumers fighting a 72 percent electricity rate increase in 2006 were targeted. The DC Anti-War Network, which opposes the Iraq war, was designated a white supremacist group, without explanation.
One of the possible "crimes" in the file police opened on Amnesty International, a world-renowned human rights group: "civil rights."
If you've done nothing wrong, there's no need to read the whole thing.
Right?
(h/t: Steve Benen via John Cole)
NB: Link, from Steve's post, added to quoted material by me
2 comments:
Awww, who amongst us doesn't have an FBI file? It's a rite of passage for college students.
Besides, Maryland State troopers....??? I'd love to be arrested by a brownshirt.
Heh. In all seriousness, though, it's less that they these people have an FBI file than that it's keyed to "terrorist" in the database. How'd you like to be a guy named Muhammad whose deepest belief is in the goodness of bike lanes?
Oh, and something about illegal surveillance is jumping around the back of my mind, too.
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