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In fact, it was such a rush job that Janet Napolitano couldn’t wait to resolve the obvious civil-liberty concerns raised by her own lawyers before shoving it out the door. Napolitano would later have to backtrack on the exact same language flagged by the attorneys by claiming that she didn't specifically approve the report issued by her office and that she would have changed the language in hindsight. She had the opportunity to fix it before its release, but the completely threadbare report was deemed such a high priority that it went out anyway.Glenn Beck was called a kook for saying that the Obama administration was threatening civil liberties. Now John Ziegler gets handcuffed for the crime of journalism and Team Obama is turning Homeland Security loose against dometic political opponents. Who's the kook now?
Now, what could have triggered that? Anyone know of events occurring just after April 7, 2009, that such an assessment could have painted as radical, extremist, and threats to national security? Hmmm.
UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers! You might be a right-wing extremist if . . . you're blogging from the Alabama home of reactionary novelist Tito Perdue.
Let me begin by establishing my bona fides as a firm opponent of Obama and the ideologues currently in charge of the Democratic Party. Just before the November election, I had this to say about Obama:
ReplyDelete"He is exactly the sort of person the Framers had in mind when they put so many checks and balances into the Constitution. Today, most of those checks – those negative feedbacks – have been eliminated. Obama will have more scope for a malign ambition that any President in U.S. history."
With respect to John Ziegler's run-in with USC campas cops, while the event was certainly ironic, no one's rights - certainly not Ziegler's - were infringed. USC is a private university. While any university, private or public, should welcome all viewpoints, USC has no obligation to do so. In this case USC's private property rights trump Ziegler's desire to engage in news gathering.
You are... They're getting those who oppose this massive expansion of government, massive spending, etc. to be tied in with those on "the right".
ReplyDeleteThis game of sleight of hands is classic politics at its best. Obama's team consistently distracts, shifts criticisms and causes groups to turn on each other, all the way seemingly staying above the fray. I'm pretty impressed with their cunning, if not disappointed in what it means for us all.
We are, obviously.
ReplyDeletePolitics is a game of power and we are out of power in 2 of the 3 branches. Anything we say now will be met with derision and scorn. Get used to it and keep fighting.
Zeiger isn't a good example of this. The University of Southern California is a private institution so they had the right to tell him to leave the campus. FIRE gives USC a red light for freedom of speech. I also go to a private university and we also get a red light from FIRE.
ReplyDeleteZeiger also wasn't a member of the university so "Freedom of Speech" according to USC only applied to the enrolled or employed members.
Are you a Rightwing Extremist?
ReplyDeleteHave you hesitated about joining a Rightwing Extremist organization or group?
Then I invite you to consider C.A.R.E. The Council of American Rightwing Extremists.
http://nomayo.mu.nu/do_you_c.a.r.e.
Glenn Beck may have been right, but he's still pretty kooky.
ReplyDeleteYou see all those markings that say "For Offical Use Only" and "Law Enforcement Sensitive"?
ReplyDeleteThis was not a product for official release. This was a leaked document.
It is even worse than what anyone says here, prior to nappy Napo releasing this report she told Congress the new term for terrorist attacks is Man made catastrophe now think a minute what does the left claim is a man made catastrophe that threatens the entire planet and will destroy it in five to ten years? Think Al Gore, that's right Global Warming so if you appose the idea of AGW and you violate the EPA CO2 level mandates that are soon to be out then you are the equivalent of a terrorist and off to Gitmo or it's replacement you go! The American people have made the worst mistake in the history of this country by electing Obama I just hope in 2010 we at least correct it partially by putting a leash on his power.
ReplyDelete"This was not a product for official release. This was a leaked document."
ReplyDeleteGosh, it makes me feel so much better, knowing that I wasn't really supposed to know about it.
Kolohe, what else do you suppose they don't want me to know about? (And can I count on the NYT to release secret documents from the Obama Administration the way the did from the Bush Administration?)
I did misread this and Morrissey's actual point. I thought it was that these memo's were 'released' to draw (the public's) attention *away* from the tea parties. But that was an earlier post on Reynold's site.
ReplyDeleteMr. McCain and Morrisey seem to be saying that this memo was released to *local law enforcement officials* - it's actual intended audience - in time to cover the tea party protests. While more plausible, it's still rather conspiratorial for my tastes.
The memo was overall rather banal, filled with the obvious and trivial - like most such memos (see also, that Mo State police memo). It is the product of bureaucratic plodding, not sinister plans to stifle dissent. Some dude or gal went through wikipedia, talked to some 'old timers' that had been in the Bureau for a decade and a half, threw a lot of stuff together, and called it the day.
Rock Bottom at Ballston Commons mall has (had?) dollar drafts on Wednesday. And it's a target rich environment, regardless of your preference. So you answer the boss's email and get going to more important things.
Finally, I would count on wikileaks to increase as a decent source. And no kidding Alex Jones digs up some good stuff. But ONLY read the primary sources, do not pay attention to commentary over there. That way lies madness.
"The memo was overall rather banal, filled with the obvious and trivial - like most such memos (see also, that Mo State police memo). It is the product of bureaucratic plodding, not sinister plans to stifle dissent. Some dude or gal went through wikipedia, talked to some 'old timers' that had been in the Bureau for a decade and a half, threw a lot of stuff together, and called it the day. --- Kolohe"
ReplyDeleteSo in other words, someone didn't do their job, just threw their own biases and prejudices against those who disagree with them into print and threw it out there to mollify their political boss with her own agenda? No fact finding, no true analysis, just a mish mash of "facts" that they already knew from their professors at Harvard, and opinions that Mommy and Daddy and the lefty Professor they always wanted to sleep with imprinted on them about Joos, and military types, and Klansmen. You know, the evil folks you always see on TV. Because Lord knows, that is where the Truth lies. In Hollywood scripts.
Sounds like you gave this all the analysis worthy of a 15 minute coffee break at Columbia. The military intelligence types I worked with, and my CIA/FBI buddies from long ago could crap better analysis and factfinding in a ten minute bull session than this report was worth, but I wouldn't use it to conduct law enforcement operations, or military planning.
You are just as lazy as the airhead who wrote this report. It's wrong, and it has an agenda. It is designed to cover LEOs when they arrest ordinary folks at the behest of their political bosses. The same LEOs that we want to be apolitical are now going to be used just like the CIA/FBI were for Nixon's dirty tricks squads. Welcome to 1984.
Subsunk
California recognizes the state constitutional right to speak and assemble on private property as long as the speech is political.
ReplyDeletePruneyard Shopping Center v. Robins, 447 U.S. 74 (1980).
"You are just as lazy as the airhead who wrote this report"
ReplyDeleteUm not seeing how my analysis actually contradicts anything you wrote in the first paragraph.
"The military intelligence types I worked with,"
As have I; based on your handle, we're in the same business (I may be on the other side, as I try to assiduously avoid the situation described by your handle; at least for US boats). I read intel reports every single day. Anything that unclas is almost invariably banal - ok maybe that's not quite fair. Mainly because it's open source and I read to much on the internet anyway, I find them banal because I am already normally aware of the issue and likely have even read the source article. (as an aggregator, the open source collections are quite a time saver however)
Anything good has a classification on it. And even those (rightly) consists of caveats and couched in terms of possibilities/probabilities not outright predictions.
Last, this document is an intel document. Intel documents do not set policy. Intel types perform a valuable service but they all ultimately 'staff' positions. Policy is set by 'command' positions. 'Line officers' who
put the blame on a 'staff officers' for their own malfeasance are beneath contempt. Not to say that it doesn't happen.
I think even if fears of the dictatorial tendencies of "Il Dufe," "Napoleonitano," and the rest of the administration ultimately prove warrantless, you can't be too much on your guard when dealing with statists, especially statists with actual control of the State. If they've made careers of advancing the power of the State and diminishing the freedom of the individual, why on earth would be trust them with our liberty? As the bumper sticker says, "If you want to take my gun, why would I trust you?"
ReplyDelete"Napoleonitano," excellent.
ReplyDeleteShe apologized on TV for the veterans and the catholics. What about the rest and where is the revised DHS bulletin?