Professional Documents
Culture Documents
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This years resolution provides the perfect opportunity to justify a
political action centered on the discussion of RACE as surveillance
mechanisms funded by the federal government and carried out by
local law enforcement agents have disproportionately targeted
public dissent of racialized injustice. We offer a TOPICAL discursive
performance to speak out through the 1AC and start our protest with
OBSERVATION ONE: RACISM ABOUNDS
white supremacy is the UNAMED political system that guides the modern world. It is not
seen as political yet serves as the background against which other systems we see as
political are highlighted. What is needed is a GLOBAL THEORETICAL framework for
situating discussion of race and white racism that CHALLENGE white political philosophy.
We must recognize the POLITICAL SYSTEM of WHITE SUPREMACY
Mills, 97--Professor of Moral and Intellectual Philosophy at Northwestern
University(Charles W., Racial Contract, p. 1)//AK
White supremacy is the unnamed political system that has made the modern world
what it is today. You will not find this term in introductory, or even advanced, texts in political
theory. A standard undergraduate philosophy course will start off with Plato and Aristotle, perhaps say something
about Augustine, Aquinas, and Machiavelli, move on to Hobbes, Locke, Mill, and Marx, and then wind up with Rawls
and Nozick. It will introduce you to notions of aristocracy, democracy, absolutism, liberalism, representative
government, socialism, welfare capitalism, and libertarianism. But though it covers more than two thousand years
domination by which white people have historically ruled over and, in certain important ways, continue to rule over
nonwhite people-is
to feminist theorists' articulation of the centrality of gender, patriarchy, and sexism to traditional moral and political
What is needed, in other words, is a recognition that racism (or, as I will argue, global
white supremacy) is itself a political system, a particular power structure of formal
or informal rule, socioeconomic privilege, and norms for the differential distribution
of material wealth and opportunities, benefits and burdens, rights and duties. The
theory.
notion of the Racial Contract is, I suggest, one possible way of making this connection with mainstream theory,
since it uses the vocabulary and apparatus already developed for contractarianism to map this unacknowledged
system. Contract talk is, after all, the political lingua franca of our times.
Heitzeg 15 (Nancy A. Professor of Sociology & Critical Studies of Race and Ethnicity at St. Catherine
University. On The Occasion Of The 50th Anniversary Of The Civil Rights Act Of 1964: Persistent White Supremacy,
Relentless Anti-Blackness, And The Limits Of The Law Hamline University's School of Law's Journal of Public Law
and Policy Volume 36 Issue 1 Article 3 http://digitalcommons.hamline.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?
article=1011&context=jplp 7/18/15
The Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas (1954) is often used as the
benchmark for chronicling the start of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s. 39 The Courts unanimous rejection of Plessys
separate but equal provided a new Federal framework with which to challenge Jim Crow segregation on the state and local levels. It offered the
back drop for the Montgomery bus boycott, the resistance in Birmingham, Bloody Sunday, the voter registration drives of Freedom Summer, and
ultimately, passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, The Voting Right Act of 1965, the Fair Housing Act of 1968, and the 24th Amendment to the
Constitution.40While there was hope again that the law itself could be pressed into the service
of racial equality, those victories now seem bittersweet. Bell argues that the Brown
decision and the ensuing Federal legislation were silent covenants of interestconvergence, where perceived self-interest of whites rather than the racial
injustices suffered by Blacks have been the major motivation in racial-remediation
policies. 41 Judge Robert L. Carter, one of the attorneys who argued Brown goes further, . . .the fundamental vice was
not legally enforced racial segregation itself; this was a mere by- product, a symptom
of the greater and more pernicious disease -white supremacy. 42 Legally supported
segregation was uprooted without dislodging either white supremacy or antiBlackness, now cloaked in race-neutral rhetoric of color-blindness. The colorblind Constitution and the race-neutral requirement of Federal Civil Rights
legislation now serves as convenient cover for the persistence of institutionalized
racism. Racially coded but race-neutral rhetoric is widely used in debates over welfare reform,
affirmative action, and particularly law and order criminal justice policy; 43 in all these cases, the coded racial sub-text reads
clearly, and the resultant policies, while purportedly race neutral, have resulted in disproportionate harm to
people of color, especially African Americans . While race is now widely the
text/subtext of political debate, systemic racism still remains largely
absent from either political discourse or policy debates of all sorts, including those
related to criminal injustice. In the Post-Civil Rights Era, there has been a corresponding shift from de jure racism codified
explicitly into the law and legal systems to a de facto racism where people of color, especially African Americans, are
subject to unequal protection of the laws, excessive surveillance, police terror,
extreme segregation, a brutal and biased death penalty, and neo-slave labor via
incarceration all in the name of crime control . 44 Law and order criminal justice policies are all guided by
thinly coded appeals to white fears of high crime neighborhoods, crack epidemics, gang proliferation, juvenile super predators, urban unrest,
school violence, and more. In all these case, the sub-text reads clearly fear of brown and especially Black people. As before, law,
policing and punishment are central to the ongoing exclusion of Blacks from civic
life. Post slavery, the criminalizing narrative was a cultural feature of on-going efforts at oppression; from convict lease/plantain prison farms to
the contemporary prison industrial complex the control of black bodies for profit has been furthered by the criminal justice system. Slave
Codes become Black Codes and now Black Codes become gang legislation, three-strikes and the War on Drugs in the persistent
condemnation of Blackness. 46
As before, the criminal legal system is the primary mechanism for undoing the promised
protections of Federal Civil Rights legislation and constitutes again, the major affront to the fulfillment of the 13th, 14th and 25th Amendments.
The United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world , with a population of 2.3 million
behind bars that constitutes 25% of the worlds prisoners . 47 The increased rate of incarceration can be
traced to the War on Drugs and the rise of lengthy mandatory minimum prison sentences for drug crimes and other felonies. These policies have
proliferated, not in response to crime rate or any empirical data that indicates their effectiveness, due to newfound sources of profit for prisons. 48
As Brewer and Heitzeg (2008) observe: 45 The prison industrial complex is a self-perpetuating
machine where the vast profits (e.g. cheap labor, private and public supply and construction contracts, job creation,
continued media profits from exaggerated crime reporting and crime/punishment as entertainment) and perceived political
benefits (e.g. reduced unemployment rates, get tough on crime and public safety rhetoric, funding increases for police, and criminal
justice system agencies and professionals) lead to policies that are additionally designed to insure an
endless supply of clients for the criminal justice system (e.g. enhanced police
presence in poor neighborhoods and communities of color; racial profiling ; decreased
funding for public education combined with zero-tolerance policies and increased rates of expulsion for students of color; increased rates of adult
certification for juvenile offenders; mandatory minimum and three-strikes sentencing; draconian conditions of incarceration and a reduction of
prison services that contribute to the likelihood of recidivism; collateral consequences-such as felony disenfranchisement, prohibitions on
welfare receipt, public housing, gun ownership, voting and political participation, employment- that nearly guarantee continued participation in
crime and return to the prison industrial complex following initial release.) The 13th Amendment claim of abolition remains unfulfilled, as the
neo- slavery of the prison industrial complex becomes the current vehicle for controlling Black bodies for political and economic gain. The
remains true that ones moral conduct only emerges from a choice: one has to want it. It is a choice
among other choices, and always debatable in its foundations and its consequences. Let us say, broadly
speaking, that the choice to conduct oneself morally is the condition for the establishment of a human order for
accident that almost all of humanitys spiritual traditions counsel respect for the weak, for orphans, widows, or
strangers. It is not just a question of theoretical counsel respect for the weak, for orphans, widows or strangers. It is
not just a question of theoretical morality and disinterested commandments. Such unanimity in the safeguarding of
we have an interest in
banishing injustice, because injustice engenders violence and death. Of
the other suggests the real utility of such sentiments. All things considered,
course, this is debatable. There are those who think that if one is strong enough, the assault on and
oppression of others is permissible. But no one is ever sure of remaining the strongest. One day,
respect. Recall, says the bible, that you were once a stranger in Egypt, which means both that you ought to
respect the stranger because you were a stranger yourself and that you risk becoming once again someday. It is
In short,
the refusal of racism is the condition for all theoretical and practical
morality. Because, in the end, the ethical choice commands the political
choice. A just society must be a society accepted by all. If this contractual
principle is not accepted, then only conflict, violence, and destruction will
be our lot. If it is accepted, we can hope someday to live in peace. True, it is a wager, but the
stakes are irresistible.
an ethical and a practical appeal indeed, it is a contract, however implicit it might be.
This means that within the political calculations of policy justifications our
REVOLUTIONARY stance against racial injustice should prevail
WE EMBRACE THE CONCEPT OF REVOLUTIONARY SUICIDE TO
REDEFINE THE IMPACT CALCULUS TO EVALUATE THE DEBATE
The role of the judge is a revolutionary in the constant struggle of liberation
for oppressed groups and the role of the ballot is to embrace the possibility
of death to achieve the best hope for radical social change within the defined
community.
Revolutionary suicide is DISTINCT from reactionary suicide. One is selfmurder in response to social conditions that deprive one of human dignity
after being CRUSHED by oppressive forces that deny the right to live as
PROUD and FREE human beings. IMMOBILIZED by FEAR and DESPAIR one
reacts by taking their life, it is a spiritual death, a sense of hopelessness
against the POWER of America, a feeling that resistance against the state is
suicidal, REACTIONARY SUICIDE.
The other is an assault on the ESTABLISHMENT, opposing rather than
enduring the forces that lead to self-murder. It is accepting the possibility of
death for the probability of changing INTOLERABLE conditions. It is
NEWTON
1973
quiet desperation.
Yet all the while, in the heart of every Black, there is the hope that life will somehow
change in the future.
I do not think that life will change for the better without an assault on the Establishment , which
if premature death is the result, that death has a meaning reactionary suicide can never have. It is the price of selfrespect.
Revolutionary suicide does not mean that I and my comrades have a death wish; it
means just the opposite. We have such a strong desire to live with hope and human
dignity that existence without them is impossible. When reactionary forces crush
us, we must move against these forces, even at the risk of death. We will have to be
driven out with a stick.
Che Guevara said that
When Fidel Castro and his small band were in Mexico preparing for the Cuban Revolution, many of the comrades
had little understanding of Bakunins rule. A few hours before they set sail, Fidel went from man to man asking who
should be notified in case of death. Only then did the deadly seriousness of the revolution hit home. Their struggle
was no longer romantic. The scene had been exciting and animated; but when the simple, overwhelming question
of death arose, everyone fell silent.
Many so-called revolutionaries in this country, Black and white, are not
prepared to accept this reality. The Black Panthers are not suicidal; neither do we romanticize the
consequences of revolution in our lifetime. Other so-called revolutionaries cling to an illusion
that they might have their revolution and die of old age. That cannot be.
I do not expect to live through our revolution, and most serious comrades probably share my realism. Therefore,
the expression revolution in our lifetime means something different to me than it does to other people who use it.
I think the revolution will grow in my lifetime, but I do not expect to enjoy its fruits. That would be a contradiction.
The reality will be grimmer.
I have no doubt that the revolution will triumph. The people of the world will prevail,
seize power, seize the means of production, wipe out racism, capitalism,
reactionary inter-communalism-reactionary suicide. The people will win a new
world. Yet when I think of individuals in the revolution, I cannot predict their
survival. Revolutionaries must accept this fact, especially the Black
revolutionaries in America, whose lives are in constant danger from the evils of a
colonial society. Considering how we must live, it is not hard to accept the
concept of revolutionary suicide. In this we are different from white radicals.
They are not faced with genocide.
The greater, more immediate problem is the survival of the entire world. If the
world does not change, all its people will be threatened by the greed, exploitation,
and violence of the power structure in the American empire. The handwriting is
on the wall. The United States is jeopardizing its own existence and the existence
of all humanity. If Americans knew the disasters that lay ahead, they would
transform this society tomorrow for their own preservation. The Black Panther Party is in
the vanguard of the revolution that seeks to relieve this country of its crushing burden of guilt. We are determined
to establish true equality and the means of creative work.
of the late eighteenth century, the Russians of 1917, the Jews of Warsaw, the Cubans, the NLF, the North
Vietnamese-any people who struggle against a brutal and powerful force-are suicidal.
although homicide is the unlawful taking of life, and the third World is involved only in defense. Is the coin then
turned? Is the government of the United States suicidal? I think so.
PLAN:
The United States Federal Government shall CURTAIL any and all involvement in its
surveillance tactics initiated through FUSION CENTERS.
STEPHAN
2k15
The FBIs Response To Another Killer Cop Set Free? More Surveillance of Protestors; May 24; FBI gives ominous
press conference detailing their monitoring of #BlackLivesMatter; ALTERNET.ORG
http://www.alternet.org/fbis-response-another-killer-cop-set-free-more-surveillance-blacklivesmatter
The FBI's Response To Another Killer Cop Set Free? More Surveillance of Protestors FBI gives ominous
press conference detailing their monitoring of #BlackLivesMatter. On Thursday, FBI Deputy
Director Mark Giuliano gave a press conferenceabout how his agency was
preparing for the soon-to-be announced verdict for Michael Brelo, the white
Cleveland Police Officer charged with two counts of voluntary homicide for
shooting 49 bullets at two unarmed black victims, Timothy Russell and Malissa Williams, at least
two of which were fatal shots for each victim and many of which were fired as he stood on the hood of their car.
However, Giuliano mentioned nothing about the details of this case or how the FBI
may be mandated to investigate the state agents involved depending on the
outcome. Instead, he mentioned other activities in which the FBI was engaged in
the lead up to the Brelo verdict that are far outside of the FBIs mandates, and
possibly in violation of those mandates, against U.S. citizens engaged in First Amendment activity.
The FBI is charged with investigating Color of Law violations to prevent abuse of
authority by law enforcement officers and other officials like judges. In November of last
year, the Department of Justice announced that it had found the Cleveland Police
Department guilty of a pattern or practice of unreasonable and unnecessary use
of force. Considering this, one would think the FBI should have been preparing an
investigation into Color of Law violations by Officer Brelo and Judge John
ODonnell, who yesterday announced his decision that Officer Brelo was guilty of no
crime, before that verdict was announced. After all, police departments cannot establish patterns or practices of
unreasonable and unnecessary use of force without the entire criminal justice system being complicit in such
behavior. If the FBI had any such plan, Guiliano didnt mention it at his press
conference. What he did mention was that the FBI has been tracking the
movements of people protesting these types of miscarriages of justice around the
country, and that if the FBI became aware of any of those protesters going to
Cleveland, they would tell the Cleveland Police: When asked about local law enforcement's
concerns over protesters coming to Cleveland, Giuliano said, "It's outsiders who tend to stir the pot. If we have that
intel we pass it directly on to the PD, we have worked with Ferguson. We've worked with Baltimore and we will work
with the Cleveland PD on that very thing. That's what we bring to the game. The fact that the FBI is
using these infiltration measures as a sort of testing ground for the upcoming Republican
National Convention next year. Again, despite the throw-away assertions about how the FBI
respects "lawful first amendment activity" (it's unclear what unlawful first amendment activity
would be), their ethos is clear: prevent unrest at all costs and assuring Cleveland's
largely white power classes that everything will be business as usual regardless of
how many killer cops go free. It is now well documented that the FBI embedded
an informant named Brandon Darby in activist networks across the country in the lead
up to the 2007 Republican National Convention in Michigan to gather intel on, and
track the movements of, protesters: Mr. Darby carried out a thorough surveillance operation that
dated back to at least 18 months before the Republican gatheringprovided descriptions of meetings with the
defendants and dozens of other people in Austin, Minneapolis and St. Paul. He wore recording devices at times,
including a transmitter embedded in his belt during the convention. He also went to Minnesota with Mr. Crowder
four months before the Republican gathering and gave detailed narratives to law enforcement authorities of several
meetings they had with activists from New York, San Francisco, Montana and other places. Since then, within
activist communities it has been considered a given that the FBI embeds
informants within local organization in the run-up to large events such as the RNC, and
leaves them in place long after these events have left town to collect information
and to disrupt organizing efforts in other, more damaging ways. The chilling effect
that spying has on First Amendment activity is hard to overstate. People who worked
closely with Brandon Darby said that, The emerging truth about Darbys malicious involvement in our communities
is heart-breaking and utterly ground-shattering. The revelation that Darby was a federal informant sent
shockwaves through activists circles across the country, not just because he had worked with many groups in
various cities, but because it made the idea that other activists with whom we work may be informants,
provocateurs, or undercovers that much more real. After the 2004 RNC was held in NYC, many activists believed
that others activists were informants who were involved in protests exclusively to gather information and disrupt.
Those who have been deeply involved in activism in NYC since then know that this created a toxic
case, that would mean actively protecting citizens rights to travel between cities
with the intent of engaging in First Amendment activity, not tracking their
movements by legally dubious means that have a chilling effect on the First
Amendment and conveying those movements to a police force that the
Department of Justice has found guilty of a pattern or practice of unreasonable
and unnecessary use of force. Anyone traveling to Cleveland to protest the Brelo verdict is seeking to
gather in public space to reproach the government for civil rights grievances. For the FBI to interfere
with civic act through their information-gathering techniques and by passing that
information to police forces that cannot be trusted to use it without infringing on
peoples First Amendment rights is a clear violation of the FBIs own mandate. Had
the FBI wanted to help keep the peace after the Brelo verdict, they could have
lived up to their own mandates to publicly investigate the Cleveland criminal
justice system for its Color of Law violations and to protect the peoples right to
protest those violations against a proven, unnecessarily violent police force.
MOORE
2k15
Darnell-; Why Some Black Activist Believe They Are Being Watched by the
Government; June
http://mic.com/articles/119792/why-some-black-activists-believe-they-re-being-watched-bythe-government
The home of activist Patrisse Cullors was raided twice last year by law enforcement in Los Angeles. During one raid, officers told
Cullors they were looking for a suspect who had allegedly fled in the direction of her house. But neither time did Cullors believe the
officers had a strong rationale for invading her home. Instead, Cullors told Mic, she believed the raids were devised by police in
response to the public campaigning of Dignity and Power Now, a grassroots organization Cullors founded that advocates on behalf
of incarcerated people in Los Angeles. She also believes similar surveillance
Cleveland police officer involved in the shooting death of two unarmed black people, Giuliano addressed the potential for continued
used his powers as the FBI director to spy on black activists; as part of the counterterrorism COINTELPRO program in the 1960s
and '70s, the FBI tapped phones and embedded spies in organizations and movements, including the Black Panthers. It is also now
well-known that Martin Luther King, Jr. was extensively monitored by the FBI. "American
and racial profiling. At stake is the extent to which state surveillance measures,
whether they mean social media monitoring or following specific activists' actions, violate activists' First
Amendment Rights, particularly the right to peacefully protest. Keegan Stephan writes at
AlterNet, "For the FBI to interfere with civic act through their information-gathering
techniques and by passing that information to police forces that cannot be trusted
to use it without infringing on people's First Amendment rights is a clear violation
of the FBI's own mandate." Despite potential surveillance, activists are determined to continue their work. Their
continued quest for liberation should encourage contemporary activists following their example. "These allegations will not curtail the
movement and only provide further evidence of the embedded institutional inequities," Monica Dennis, an organizer with Black Lives
Matter in New York City, told Mic. "Furthermore, our movements are rooted in the black radical traditions of resilience and creative
resistance which simply means we are capable of quickly adapting and shifting despite external efforts to disrupt our organizing."
from AT&T and Walmart to public benefits programs and beat cops on the block, is as much a part of our
built environment as the streets covered in our blood. In a recent address, New York City
Police Commissioner Bill Bratton made it clear: 2015 will be one of the most significant years in the history of this
organization. It will be the year of technology, in which we literally will give to every member of this department
technology that wouldve been unheard of even a few years ago. Predictive policing, also known as Total
Information Awareness, is described as using advanced technological tools and data analysis to preempt crime.
It utilizes trends, patterns, sequences, and affinities found in data to make determinations about when and where
crimes will occur. This model is deceptive, however, because it presumes data inputs to be neutral. They arent. In
quality of life crimeslike selling loose cigarettes, the kind of offense for which
Eric Garner was choked to death. Without oversight, accountability, transparency,
or rights, predictive policing is just high-tech racial profilingindiscriminate data
collection that drives discriminatory policing practices. As local law enforcement
agencies increasingly adopt surveillance technologies, they use them in three primary ways:
to listen in on specific conversations on and offline; to observe daily movements of individuals and groups; and to
observe data trends. Police departments like Brattons aim to use sophisticated technologies to do all three. They
will use technologies like license plate readers, which the Electronic Frontier Foundation found to be
disproportionately used in communities of color and communities in the process of being gentrified. They will use
to use body and dashboard cameras, which have been touted as an effective step toward accountability based on
the results of one study, yet storage and archiving procedures, among many other issues, remain unclear. They will
use Stingray cellphone interceptors. According to the ACLU, Stingray technology is an invasive cellphone
surveillance device that mimics cellphone towers and sends out signals to trick cellphones in the area into
transmitting their locations and identifying information. When used to track a suspects cellphone, they also gather
information about the phones of countless bystanders who happen to be nearby. The same is true of domestic
drones, which are in increasing use by U.S. law enforcement to conduct routine aerial surveillance. While drones are
currently unarmed, drone manufacturers are considering arming these remote-controlled aircraft with weapons like
rubber bullets, tasers, and tear gas. They will use fusion centers. Originally designed to increase interagency
collaboration for the purposes of counterterrorism, these have instead become the local arm of the intelligence
community. According to Electronic Frontier Foundation, there are currently seventy-eight on record. They are the
clearinghouse for increasingly used suspicious activity reportsdescribed as official documentation of observed
behavior reasonably indicative of pre-operational planning related to terrorism or other criminal activity. These
reports and other collected data are often stored in massive databases like e-Verify and Prism. As anybody whos
ever dealt with gang databases knows, its almost impossible to get off a federal or state database, even when the
data collected is incorrect or no longer true .
target communities of color. One review of such reports collected in Los Angeles shows
approximately 75 percent were of people of color. This is the future of policing in America , and it
should terrify you as much as it terrifies me. Unfortunately, it probably doesnt, because my life is at far greater risk
than the lives of white Americans, especially those reporting on the issue in the media or advocating in the halls of
power. One of the most terrifying aspects of high-tech surveillance is the invisibility
of those it disproportionately impacts. The NSA and FBI have engaged local law enforcement
agencies and electronic surveillance technologies to spy on Muslims living in the United States. According to FBI
training materials uncovered by Wired in 2011, the bureau taught agents to treat mainstream Muslims as
supporters of terrorism, to view charitable donations by Muslims as a funding mechanism for combat, and to view
Islam itself as a Death Star that must be destroyed if terrorism is to be contained. From New York City to Chicago
and beyond, local law enforcement agencies have expanded unlawful and covert racial and religious profiling
against Muslims not suspected of any crime. There is no national security reason to profile all Muslims. At the same
time, almost 450,000 migrants are in detention facilities throughout the United States, including survivors of
torture, asylum seekers, families with small children, and the elderly. Undocumented migrant communities enjoy
few legal protections, and are therefore subject to brutal policing practices, including illegal surveillance practices.
system working perfectly as intended, to the detriment of all. The NSA could not
have spied on millions of cellphones if it were not already spying on black people ,
Muslims, and migrants. As surveillance technologies are increasingly adopted and
integrated by law enforcement agencies today, racial disparities are being made
invisible by a media environment that has failed to tell the story of surveillance in
the context of structural racism. Reporters love to tell the technology story. For
some, its a sexier read. To me, freedom from repression and racism is far sexier than the newest gadget
used to reinforce racial hierarchy. As civil rights protections catch up with the technological
terrain, reporting needs to catch up, too. Many journalists still focus their
reporting on the technological trends and not the racial hierarchies that these
trends are enforcing. Martin Luther King Jr. once said, Everything we see is a shadow cast by that which
we do not see. Journalists have an obligation to tell the stories that are hidden from
view. We are living in an incredible time, when migrant activists have blocked
deportation buses, and a movement for black lives has emerged, and when
women, queer, and trans experiences have been placed right at the center. The
decentralized power of the Internet makes that possible. But the Internet also
makes possible the high-tech surveillance that threatens to drive structural
racism in the twenty-first century. We can help black lives matter by ensuring that
technology is not used to cement a racial hierarchy that leaves too many people
like me dead or in jail. Our communities need partners, not gatekeepers. Together, we
can change the cultural terrain that makes killing black people routine. We can
counter inequality by ensuring that both the technology and the police
departments that use it are democratized. We can change the story on
surveillance to raise the voices of those who have been left out. There are no
voiceless people, only those that aint been heard yet. Lets birth a new norm in
which the technological tools of the twenty-first century create equity and justice
for allso all bodies enjoy full and equal protection, and the Jim Crow surveillance
state exists no more. - See more at: http://www.progressive.org/news/2015/03/188074/black-americasstate-surveillance#sthash.5PHCKHgM.dpuf
The plan SOLVES as fusion centers have generated controversy over loss of privacy
and the chill of free expression due to OVERREACH that is based on clever legal
strategies to avoid extant strictures on information sharing that CIRCUMVENT
traditional accountability measures. The BLAME GAME between Federal and State
law enforcement has allowed Congress to fund FUSION CENTERS to the tune of 500
million in federal grants
without concomitant gains in security. While many scholars have assumed that this network
represents a trade-off between security and civil liberties, our study of fusion centers suggests these goals are, in
congressional panels, journalists, and concerned citizens that interagency communications accord with relevant
laws and that information gathering is targeted and focused. n7 They claim that fusion centers raise few new privacy
concerns, n8 and that any privacy problems are well in hand. n9 They reason that any [*1444] given fusion center
employee must simply follow the privacy and civil liberties policy of his or her employer - be it a local, state, or
national agency.n10 DHS and local fusion center leaders claim their network only menaces criminals and terrorists,
not ordinary citizens. n11 Unfortunately, a critical mass of abuses and failures at fusion centers over the past few
years makes it impossible to accept these assurances at face value. Fusion centers facilitate a domestic
intelligence network that collapses traditional distinctions between law enforcement and foreign wars, between
federal and state authorities, and between government surveillance and corporate data practices. By operating at
consistently associated with anti-terror accomplishments, the new ISE might pose a tragic, yet necessary, choice
between security and liberty. However, a critical mass of cases, explored in detail in Part I, suggests that the lack of
In
2008, Minnesota law enforcement, working with the state's fusion center, engaged in
intelligence-led policing to identify potential threats to the upcoming Republican
National Convention ("RNC"). n12 Police deployed infiltrators to report on political
groups and tapped into various groups' information exchanges. n13 The fusion center spent
oversight of fusion centers is both eroding civil liberties and wasting resources. Consider two recent cases.
more than 1000 hours analyzing potential threats to the RNC. n14 A fusion center report, distributed to more than
1300 law enforcement officers, identified bottled water, first-aid supplies, computers, and pamphlets as potential
evidence of threats. n15 Another report warned law enforcement that demonstrators would "collect and stockpile
items at various locations ... . Anything that seems out of place [*1445] for its location could indicate the stockpiling
of supplies to be used against first responders." n16 Because the fusion center had advised police to be on the
lookout for feces and urine that protestors might attempt to throw during clashes on the street, police pulled over a
bus after noticing that it contained two five-gallon buckets in the rear. n17 What they found was chicken feed, not
feces. n18 Days later, at the convention, police arrested 800 people: Most of the charges were dropped or
Ginned up to confront a
phantom terror threat, the fusion center-led operations did little more
than disrupt a peaceful political protest. Fusion center overreach is not limited to Minnesota
downgraded once prosecutors reviewed the police allegations and activity.
n19
or notable events like those involving RNC. Over a nineteen-month period in 2004 and 2005, Maryland state police
conducted surveillance of human rights groups, peace activists, and death penalty opponents.
n20
As a result,
fifty-
three nonviolent political activists were classified as "terrorists ," including two Catholic nuns
and a Democratic candidate for local office. n21 A Maryland fusion center shared the erroneous terrorist
classifications with federal drug enforcement and terrorist databases, as well as with the National Security
Administration (NSA). n22 The ISE has yet to provide a systematic redress mechanism to remove misinformation from
databases spread throughout the networked environment or to address the stigma that can result from
misclassifications. Had the ACLU of Maryland not fortuitously discovered the fusion center's activities in connection
with an open records request, the political activists might have remained on these watch lists. In response to these
and other similar incidents, Bruce Fein, an associate deputy attorney general under Ronald Reagan, argued that
fusion centers conceive the business of gathering and sharing intelligence as "synonymous with monitoring and
disparaging political dissent and association protected by the First Amendment." n23 A fusion center official
confirmed Fein's concern by noting: [*1446] You can make an easy kind of a link that, if you have a protest group
protesting a war where the cause that's being fought against is international terrorism, you might have terrorism at
If a domestic
intelligence agency conducted such outrageous surveillance of innocent political
activists, ordinary institutions of oversight familiar from administrative law - such as judicial review and costbenefit analysis - could directly address the problem. n25 Yet misdirected surveillance
remains a concern, because it is unclear who exactly is responsible for these abuses
that protest. You can almost argue that a protest against [the war] is a terrorist act. n24
- state and local police or federal funders of fusion centers? The structure of the ISE poses important new
challenges to administrative law, a body of law built to address actions of individual agencies rather than the
interactions of a network of agencies. Since it focuses on individual agencies, traditional administrative law is illequipped to assure a network's accountability. Participants in fusion centers have often attempted to shift blame for
DHS officials insist that state and local authorities are ultimately
responsible for fusion center activities, even as they distribute grants and guidelines
that shape fusion center activity. n26 As state and municipal budgets contract due to
declining tax revenues and fiscal retrenchment, local officials may feel pressed to
feed information and find threats in order to maintain the flow of federal funding.
their shortcomings.
There are many reasons to worry about the types of influence and information exchange this relationship betokens.
Unlike centralized programs to which the privacy and civil liberties community could rapidly respond, fusion centers
should apply just as forcefully to agency interactions as they do to agency actions. Certain exchanges of
information between agencies should be monitored, even in a general environment of openness and collaboration.
[*1447] The argument proceeds as follows: Part I offers a comprehensive description of fusion centers, based on a
wide range of primary and secondary sources and litigation materials. Part II critiques the current operations of
fusion centers, concluding that the centers have eroded privacy and civil liberties without concomitant gains in
security. Fortunately, officials at the DHS (the main agency funding fusion centers) have begun to realize the scope
of these problems, as we describe in Part III.A. They are even beginning to recognize one of the central arguments
of this piece: that liberty and security are mutually reinforcing, because nearly all the problematic abuses at fusion
centers are distractions from their central anti-crime and anti-terror missions. However, there are still critical
shortcomings in DHS oversight of fusion centers, as we demonstrate in III.B: The agency is trying to apply a
twentieth-century model of agency accountability to twenty-first-century interagency coordination. The solution, we
argue in Part IV, is network accountability: technical and legal standards that render interactions between the parts
of the ISE subject to review and correction. n28 We advance protocols for auditing fusion center activities, including
"write-once, read-many" technology and data integrity standards. Legal redress mechanisms for inaccurate or
inappropriate targeting can be built on this foundation of data. Finally, in Part V, we promote standards of
interagency governance designed to hold the ISE accountable. Without objective performance standards, fusion
centers may consume an ever larger share of our security and law enforcement budget without demonstrating their
worth. Advances in interagency governance in other fields suggest new paths for network accountability in the
context of fusion centers. As they are presently run, fusion centers all but guarantee further inclusion of innocents
on watch lists and wasteful investigation of activists with no connections to crime or terrorism. n29 Fusion centers'
actions inconvenience both civilians and law enforcers, unfairly tarnish reputations, and deter legitimate dissent. In
this Article, we propose a framework for identifying and preventing future abuses. Principles of open government
inform our analysis throughout. A policy of de facto total information awareness by the government should be
complemented [*1448] by increasing accountability - specifically, the network accountability we define and defend
in this Article. I. Domestic Surveillance Partnerships: Fusion Centers and Beyond After 9/11, policymakers argued
that government agencies could have prevented the attacks if they had "connected the dots" by synthesizing and
analyzing available information. n30 Accused of incompetence, officials defended themselves by arguing that law
prevented cooperation among domestic law enforcement officials and military and foreign intelligence personnel. n31
In response, Congress established an "information sharing environment" that would anticipate threats and improve
the exchange of "terrorism information" among all levels of government, tribal entities, and the private sector. n32 To
orchestrate the ISE, the Department of Homeland Security, along with the Department of Justice (DOJ), coordinates
with state, local, and regional fusion centers to share, access, and collaborate on terrorism-related information. n33
According to DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano, fusion centers play a crucial role in "analyzing
intelligence ... sharing information, getting information out, and receiving information from" the public and private
This Part describes the central role that fusion centers play in our domestic surveillance
apparatus. [*1449] A. Fusion Center Operations State and federal law enforcement rarely
sectors.
n34
shared information and intelligence before 9/11. n35 Since then, Congress has
allocated over $ 500 million in grants to fusion centers to encourage
collaboration. n36 Fusion centers "co-locate under one roof" representatives of state and federal agencies to
"collect and share" information and intelligence. n37Although states and localities run fusion
centers, the federal government provides additional analysts, often from the DHS, the
FBI, the National Guard, and the Coast Guard.n38 Private entities have close ties with fusion centers as well. In DHS
Secretary Janet Napolitano's view, private firms "need to be prepared and trained and co-located" at fusion centers.
n39
Increasingly, this has meant that private firms send employees to work at fusion centers. n40 A Boeing intelligence
analyst, for instance, is employed full-time at the Washington Joint Analytical Center ("WJAC"). n41 Boeing enjoys
"real-time access to information from the fusion centers," while the center obtains Boeing's "mature intelligence
capabilities." n42 According to a [*1450] Boeing executive, the company hopes "to set an example of how private
owners of critical infrastructure can get involved in such centers to generate and receive criminal and anti-terrorism
intelligence." n43 Starbucks, Amazon, and Alaska Airlines have expressed interest in placing analysts at the WJAC. n44
role, they generate analyses on particular suspects or crimes. n47 In their strategic role, fusion centers use predictive
data-mining tools that search datasets to identify crime trends and patterns. n48 For example, the Dallas fusion
center analyzes "vast quantities of information" to "understand crime patterns and identify individuals and locations
that represent the highest threat to the community." n49 [*1451] Fusion centers' guiding principle is "the more data,
the better." n50 As fusion center officials note, "There is never ever enough information ... . That's what post-9/11 is
about." n51 To that end, fusion centers access public-and private-sector databases of traffic tickets, property records,
identity-theft reports, drivers' license listings, immigration records, tax information, public-health data, criminal
justice sources, car rentals, credit reports, postal and shipping services, utility bills, gaming, insurance claims, databroker dossiers, and the like. n52 Fusion centers mine information posted online n53 and footage from video cameras
installed by law enforcement, transportation, and corporate security departments. n54 For instance, the Port of Long
Beach's fusion center analyzes real-time videos from public and private cameras deployed at truck sites,
warehouses, and rail corridors. n55 An Arizona fusion center hopes to use "facial recognition technology" so that
fusion centers can analyze surveillance tapes. n56 Fusion centers assess tips from citizens n57 and suspicious activity
reports ("SARs"). n58
ACLU no date but cites 2012 American Civil Liberties Union, a national, nonprofit organization dedicated to upholding constitutional rights, over 500,000
members, and a legal assistance provider. (ACLU, More About Fusion Centers,
2012, https://www.aclu.org/more-about-fusion-centers?redirect=spy-files/moreabout-fusion-centers)//RP
Fusion centers are also the focal point for growing suspicious activity reporting
programs that encourage public reporting of innocuous everyday activities. The
Colorado Information and Analysis Center even produced a fear-mongering
public service announcement asking the public to report innocuous
behaviors such as photography, note-taking, drawing and collecting
money for charity as "warning signs" of terrorism. The George Washington
University Homeland Security Policy Institute published a survey of fusion center
employees in September 2012, which characterized suspicious activity reports as
white noise that impeded effective intelligence analysis. There is some good
news, however. The 2010 DHS Homeland Security Grant Program established a
requirement that fusion centers certify that privacy and civil liberties protections are
in place in order to use DHS grant funds. This is the first time DHS has
acknowledged its authority to regulate fusion center activities and it coincides with
the establishment of a new DHS Joint Fusion Center Program Management Office to
oversee DHS support to fusion centers. While these are only small steps, they are
BARNDT
2k7
Joseph-has been a parish pastor and an antiracism trainer and organizer for
thirty years, much of the latter work being done with Crossroads Ministry,
Chicago, which he directed for eighteen years; Understanding and
Dismantling Racism: The Twenty-First Century Challenge To White America;
pp.219-220
To study racism is to study walls. In every chapter of this book, we have looked at barriers and fences,
of color by subservience, powerlessness, and poverty are inhuman and injust; but the effects of
uncontrolled power, privilege, and greed that are the marks of our white prison inevitably destroy
white people as well.
To dismantle racism is to tear down walls . The walls of racism can be dismantled. We
are offered the vision and the possibility of
freedom. Brick by brick, stone by stone, the prison of individual, institutional, and
cultural racism can be destroyed. It is an organizing task that can be accomplished .
are not condemned to an inexorable fate, but
You and I are urgently called to join the efforts of those who know it is time to tear down, once and for
all the walls of racism.
build a multiracial and multicultural society without tearing down the walls of racism, this negative
CYRIL
founder and executive director of the Center for Media Justice 2k15
Malkia Amala-co-founder of the Media Action Grassroots Network, a national network of 175 organizations working
to ensure media access, rights, and representation for marginalized communities; Black Americas State of
Surveillance; THE PROGRESSIVE; April; http://www.progressive.org/news/2015/03/188074/black-americas-statesurveillance THANKS JP; DB LOVES YA
We can help black lives matter by ensuring that technology is not used to cement
a racial hierarchy that leaves too many people like me dead or in jail. Our communities
need partners, not gatekeepers. Together, we can change the cultural terrain that makes
killing black people routine. We can counter inequality by ensuring that both the technology and the
police departments that use it are democratized. We can change the story on surveillance to
raise the voices of those who have been left out. There are no voiceless people,
only those that aint been heard yet. Lets birth a new norm in which the
technological tools of the twenty-first century create equity and justice for allso
all bodies enjoy full and equal protection, and the Jim Crow surveillance state
exists no more.
SYSTEM IS RACIST
Prisons are the new Plantations, industry explodes after abolition of
slavery with the okay of 13 Amendment
Heitzeg 15 (Nancy A. Professor of Sociology & Critical Studies of Race and Ethnicity at St. Catherine
University. On The Occasion Of The 50th Anniversary Of The Civil Rights Act Of 1964: Persistent White Supremacy,
Relentless Anti-Blackness, And The Limits Of The Law Hamline University's School of Law's Journal of Public Law
and Policy Volume 36 Issue 1 Article 3 http://digitalcommons.hamline.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?
article=1011&context=jplp 7/18/15
In the aftermath of the Civil War, the passage of the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments seemed to promise an end the abolition of slavery, due process
and equal protection at both state and federal levels, and full citizenship via the franchise (at least for Black men). Angela Y. Davis, in Are
Prisons Obsolete?, traces
Heitzeg 15 (Nancy A. Professor of Sociology & Critical Studies of Race and Ethnicity at St. Catherine
University. On The Occasion Of The 50th Anniversary Of The Civil Rights Act Of 1964: Persistent White Supremacy,
Relentless Anti-Blackness, And The Limits Of The Law Hamline University's School of Law's Journal of Public Law
and Policy Volume 36 Issue 1 Article 3 http://digitalcommons.hamline.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?
article=1011&context=jplp 7/18/15
The Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas (1954) is often used as the
benchmark for chronicling the start of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s. 39 The Courts unanimous rejection of Plessys
separate but equal provided a new Federal framework with which to challenge Jim Crow segregation on the state and local levels. It offered the
back drop for the Montgomery bus boycott, the resistance in Birmingham, Bloody Sunday, the voter registration drives of Freedom Summer, and
ultimately, passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, The Voting Right Act of 1965, the Fair Housing Act of 1968, and the 24th Amendment to the
Constitution.40While there was hope again that the law itself could be pressed into the service
of racial equality, those victories now seem bittersweet . Bell argues that the Brown
decision and the ensuing Federal legislation were silent covenants of interestconvergence, where perceived self-interest of whites rather than the racial
criminal justice policies are all guided by thinly coded appeals to white fears of high crime neighborhoods, crack epidemics, gang proliferation,
juvenile super predators, urban unrest, school violence, and more. In all these case, the sub-text reads clearly fear of brown and especially
Black people. As before, law, policing and punishment are central to the ongoing exclusion of Blacks from civic life. Post slavery, the
criminalizing narrative was a cultural feature of on-going efforts at oppression; from convict lease/plantain prison farms to the contemporary
prison industrial complex the control of black bodies for profit has been furthered by the criminal justice system. Slave Codes become Black
Codes and now Black Codes become gang legislation, three-strikes and the War on Drugs in the persistent condemnation of Blackness. 46 As
before, the criminal legal system is the primary mechanism for undoing the promised protections of Federal Civil Rights legislation and
constitutes again, the major affront to the fulfillment of the 13th, 14th and 25th Amendments. The United States has the highest
incarceration rate in the world, with a population of 2.3 million behind bars that constitutes
25% of the worlds prisoners. 47 The increased rate of incarceration can be traced to the War on Drugs and the rise of lengthy
mandatory minimum prison sentences for drug crimes and other felonies. These policies have proliferated, not in response to crime rate or any
empirical data that indicates their effectiveness, due to newfound sources of profit for prisons. 48 As Brewer and Heitzeg (2008) observe: 45
The prison industrial complex is a self-perpetuating machine where the vast profits
(e.g. cheap labor, private and public supply and construction contracts, job creation, continued media profits from exaggerated crime reporting
and crime/punishment as entertainment) and perceived political benefits (e.g. reduced unemployment rates, get tough on
crime and public safety rhetoric, funding increases for police, and criminal justice system agencies and professionals) lead
to policies
that are additionally designed to insure an endless supply of clients for the
criminal justice system (e.g. enhanced police presence in poor neighborhoods and
communities of color; racial profiling; decreased funding for public education combined with zero-tolerance policies
and increased rates of expulsion for students of color; increased rates of adult certification for juvenile offenders; mandatory minimum and
three-strikes sentencing; draconian conditions of incarceration and a reduction of prison services that contribute to the likelihood of
recidivism; collateral consequences-such as felony disenfranchisement, prohibitions on welfare receipt, public housing, gun ownership,
voting and political participation, employment- that nearly guarantee continued participation in crime and return to the prison industrial
complex following initial release.) The 13th Amendment claim of abolition remains unfulfilled, as the neo- slavery of the prison industrial
complex becomes the current vehicle for controlling Black bodies for political and economic gain. The trend towards mass
Brewer and Heitzeg 08 (Rose- PhD in Afro-American & African Studies, professor at University of
Minnesota, Nancy A. Professor of Sociology & Critical Studies of Race and Ethnicity at St. Catherine University. The
Racialization of Crime and Punishment: Criminal Justice, Complex Color-Blind Racism, and the Political Economy of
the Prison Industrial American Behavioral Scientist Volume 51 Number 5. Jan. 2008
http://abs.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/51/5/625 7/19/15)
Indeed, if so-called civil justice is at the foundation of the persistent White supremacist
economic and political structure, then it is futile to call for only macro-level political
and legal remedies. It is, we will argue, this very civil justice that has been used in the service of a series of racial projects. It has
been used to enslave, to segregate, to mete out unequal punishments for comparable crimes on the basis of race. In the past, it has been used to
explicitly reify via the law the essentialist White supremacist paradigm. At present, civil justice has been at the
structures of racism first made possible by the legal benefits of what Harris (1993) called whiteness as property. Whiteness
produced both tangible and intangible value to those who possessed it: The concept of whiteness was premised on white supremacy rather than
mere difference. White was defined and constructed in ways that increased its value by reinforcing its exclusivity. Indeed, just as whiteness as
property embraced the right to exclude, whiteness as a theoretical construct evolved for the very purpose of racial exclusion. Thus, the concept of
whiteness is built on both exclusion and racial subjugation. This fact was particularly evident during the period of the most rigid racial exclusion,
as whiteness signified racial privilege and took the form of status property. (Harris, 1993, p. 116) Removing White
supremacy from the law did not, of course, erase its property benefits, nor
did a shift to color-blindness in the law eradicate racism. CRT offers a
critique of civil rights legal reforms by noting that they failed to
fundamentally challenge racial inequality. As Bell (2000) noted, the subordination of
blacks seems to reassure whites of an unspoken, but no less certain, property right in their
whiteness (p. 7). In the postcivil rights era, this subordination continues via color-blind
legal mechanisms, particularly criminal justice. (It should be noted that whereas all communities of color suffer from racism in
general and its manifestation in criminal justice in particular, Black has been the literal and figurative
counterpart of White. Anti-Black racism is arguably at the very
foundation of White supremacy [Bonilla-Silva, 2001, 2006; Feagin, 2000]. For this reason, in combination with the
excessive overrepresentation of African Americans in the criminal justice system and the prison industrial complex, our analysis will largely
focus on the ways in which the law has been a tool for the oppression of African Americans.)
Heitzeg 2011(Nancy A. Professor of Sociology & Critical Studies of Race and Ethnicity at St. Catherine
University Differentials in Deviance: Race, Class, Gender and Age the International Handbook of Deviant Behavior
http://minerva.stkate.edu/people.nsf/files/mina82vm3a/$file/differnetialsindeviancel.pdf 7/18/15
An alternative tradition in the sociology of deviance focuses on the relationship between deviant labeling and race, class, gender and age. The
concern here is less with differentials in deviant behavior but rather with differentials in social control. This approach begins with the questions
Who is labeled deviant and who has the power to create and apply the labels? Race,
class, gender and age are key components of the answer; these statuses give rise to power
or oppression and are central to labeling and social control. It is this theoretical tradition that provided
the most insight into the role that race, class gender and age play in the definition and control of deviance. This analysis has its roots in the early
works of both Marx and Durkheim as well as the later perspectives of Critical/Conflict theory, labeling, and functional-labeling theory, The initial
work relied heavily on the examination of the social class/class interests in shaping the law and its enforcement against the poor and created the
framework for further examination of inequality, power and labeling (Black 1989; Quinney 1970; Lauderdale 2003), Goofmans classic Stigma;
Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity (1963) expanded the discussion to race, and gender and age were included in analyses soon after.
These foundational perspectives lay the groundwork for understanding race,
and Miethe
1998) Media stereotypes relative to race, class gender and age become precursors
to social policies that escalate social control, leading to the medicalization of the redeemable
while middle and upper classes and criminalization for the poor and communities of color (Conrad and
Schneider 1998; Heitzeg 2009) Media has furthered the medicalization of deviance; epidemics of Disorders of Infancy Childhood and
Adolescence, Eating Disorders, self-mutilations, addictions, depression and suicide are a news cycle staple raising concerns especially for
youthful and females deviance (Birkland and Lawrence 2009; Ferrell and Websdale 1999; Males 1996; Weitz 2003). Perhaps mostly significantly
media endlessly regales the public with stories of crime -- drug epidemics, schoolshooting sprees, gang proliferation, and exaggerated accounts of violent crime,
most often with young men of color as the perpetrator . The research indicates that violent crime
and youth crime is dramatically over-represented, crime coverage has increased in
spite of falling crime rates, African Americans and Latinos are over-represented as
offenders and under-represented as victims, and inter-racial crime, especially crimes
involving white victims, is over-reported (Hancock 2001; Walker, Spohn, and Delone 2007). A large body of work
documents the relationship between race, class, gender and age and formal social control by the juvenile and adult
criminal justice systems. Topics of study include: racial profiling, increased police attention to youth gangs, the War on
Drugs, the proliferation of zero tolerance policies in schools and the shift towards punitive policies in juvenile justice, the school to prison
pipeline, the rise of mass incarceration and the prison industrial complex , the death penalty, and the proliferation of collateral
consequences for many felony convictions such as voter disenfranchisement, denial of Federal welfare, medical, housing or educational benefits,
accelerated time-lines for loss of parental rights, and exclusion from any number of employment opportunities (Brewer and Heitzeg 2008;
Heitzeg 2009; Mauer and Chesney-Lind 2002; Sheldon, Tracy and Brown, 2001; Zatz and Krejicker 2003). It is clear from the research that these
variables are indeed better predictors of arrest, criminal processing, sentencing, incarceration and execution than actual participation in criminal
A
brief glimpse into criminal justice statistics immediately reveals these intersections.
Despite no real statistical differences in rates of offending, the poor, the undereducated, the young and people of color are over-represented in at every phase of
the criminal and juvenile justice systems from arrest to death row . While 1 in 35
adults is under correctional supervision and 1 in every 100 adults is in priso n, 1 in every 36
Latino adults, one in every 15 black men, 1 in every 100 black women, and 1 in 9 black
men ages 20 to 34 are incarcerated (Pew 2008). The number of women incarcerated has increased tenfold during the
past two decades, and they are overwhelmingly women of color (BJS 2007). The race and class disparities are even greater for youth. Black
youth are two times more likely than white youth to be arrested, to be referred to
behavior may be. Again, the best analyses examine the intersection of race, class, gender and age and their relationship to social control.
race,
class gender and age may play a role in creating opportunities for deviant behavior,
their real significance is in shaping the differential direction of power and social
control. The intersection
Kayyali 14 Boardmember of the National Lawyers Guild S.F. Bay Area, former
member of the 2012 Bill of Rights Defense Committee Legal Fellow, and member of
the EFF activism team. (Nadia Kayyali, Why Fusion Centers Matter: FAQ, April 7,
2014, https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/04/why-fusion-centers-matter-faq)//RP
Do fusion centers increase racial and religious profiling? The weak
standards around SAR are particularly concerning because of the way they
can lead to racial and religious profiling. SARs can originate from
untrained civilians as well as law enforcement, and as one woman pointed out at
a BCOT event people who might already be a little racist who are 'observing' a
white man photographing a bridge are going to view it a little differently
than people observing me, a woman with a hijab, photographing a bridge.
The bottom line is that bias is not eliminated by so-called observed behavior
standards. Furthermore, once an investigation into a SAR has been initiated,
existing law enforcement bias can come into play; SARs give law enforcement a
reason to initiate contact that might not otherwise exist. Unsurprisingly, like most
tools of law enforcement, public records act requests have shown that people
of color often end up being the target of SARs: One review of SARs
collected through Public Records Act requests in Los Angeles showed that
78% of SARs were filed on non-whites. An audit by the Los Angeles Police
Department's Inspector General puts that number at 74%, still a shockingly high
number. A review of SARs obtained by the ACLU of Northern California also
show that most of the reports demonstrate bias and are based on
conjecture rather than articulable suspicion of criminal activity. Some of the
particularly concerning SARs include titles like "Suspicious ME [Middle Eastern]
Males Buy Several Large Pallets of Water" and "Suspicious photography of Folsom
Dam by Chinese Nationals." The latter SAR resulted in police contact: "Sac[ramento]
County Sheriffs Deputy contacted 3 adult Asian males who were taking photos of
Folsom Dam. They were evasive when the deputy asked them for identification and
said their passports were in their vehicle." Both of these SARs were entered into
FBI's eGuardian database. Not only that, there have been disturbing examples
of racially biased informational bulletins coming from fusion centers. A
2009 "North Central Texas Fusion Center Prevention Awareness Bulletin "
implies that tolerance towards Muslims is dangerous and that Islamic
militants are using methods such as "hip-hop boutiques" and "online social
networks" to indoctrinate youths in America.
https://pittfemtheorys12.wordpress.com/2012/04/18/securing-the-masses-ananalysis-of-the-inequalities-of-u-s-surveillance-and-documentation-systems/)//RP
My Imagine Otherwise project seeks to analyze and deconstruct the national
security system in the United States. Specifically, my project critiques surveillance
systems, and in particular, identity documents, that are used as a means of
securing the nation. Identity documents, and surveillance systems in general, are
used as a means of regulation of bodies. The current surveillance systems that
are being used are laden with racist and sexist ideologies, which hinder many
people. The inherent racism, sexism, and classism embedded in the
national security system does not allow for the security of bodies. Rather,
the current system allows for specific bodies to feel more secure, while
further marginalizing the majority of bodies. Through the current system,
people that hold socially and culturally powerful positions of race, class, gender, and
sexuality are free to move as they please, while other bodies that do not meet
the standards of American normativity are forced into specific spaces of
relative powerlessness. Surveillance systems, as well as the enforcement of
identity documents, are most prevalent in spaces of mobility. Spaces of mobility,
especially those of a transnational nature, are especially important to those
monitoring national security. It is assumed that national security is most threatened
in spaces of mobility, therefore, the regulation of such spaces are much higher than
may be true of a space that does not have the movement of bodies in and out of
the country. The hyperregulation of spaces of mobility, in terms of surveillance and
identity documents, leads to the marginalization of certain bodies from moving into
and out of countries. Through this project, I seek to reimagine a surveillance system
that does not focus on specific races, genders, sexualities, or classes, but that treats
all people in an equal manner. In doing so, I hope to create a system that will enable
a safer environment for all bodies as opposed to one that one protects one specific
type of body, and in doing so harms any body that does not meet the standards of
American normativity.
RACISM IMPACTS
Racism necessitates genocide and multiple forms of oppression.
Katz 97 - Katheryn Katz, Professor of Law, 1997, "The Clonal Child: Procreative
Liberty and Asexual Reproduction," Lexis-Nexis
It is undeniable that throughout human history dominant and oppressive
groups have committed unspeakable wrongs against those viewed as
inferior. Once a person (or a people) has been characterized as subhuman, there appears to have been no limit to the cruelty that was or will
be visited upon him. For example, in almost all wars, hatred towards the enemy
was inspired to justify the killing and wounding by separating the enemy
from the human race, by casting them as unworthy of human status. This
same rationalization has supported: genocide, chattel slavery, racial
segregation, economic exploitation, caste and class systems, coerced
sterilization of social misfits and undesirables, unprincipled medical
experimentation, the subjugation of women, and the social Darwinists'
theory justifying indifference to the poverty and misery of others.
laws response to racism, University of Miami Law Review, Sep, 42 U. Miami L. Rev.
127, LN]
The second purpose of this article is to examine racism as a crime, an offense
so deeply painful and assaultive as to constitute something I call "spiritmurder." Society is only beginning to recognize that racism is as devastating, as costly,
and as psychically obliterating as robbery or assault; indeed they are
often the same. Racism resembles other offenses against humanity whose structures are so deeply embedded in culture as to prove
extremely resistant to being recognized as forms of oppression. 7 It can be as difficult to prove as [*130] child abuse or rape, where the victim is forced to
convince others that he or she was not at fault, or that the perpetrator was not just "playing around." As in rape cases, victims of racism must prove that
they did not distort the circumstances, misunderstand the intent, or even enjoy it. On October 29, 1984, Eleanor Bumpurs, a 270-pound, arthritic, sixtyseven year old woman, was shot to death while resisting eviction from her apartment in the Bronx. She was $ 98.85, or one month, behind in her rent. 8
New York City Mayor Ed Koch and Police Commissioner Benjamin Ward described the struggle preceding her demise as involving two officers with plastic
shields, one officer with a restraining hook, another officer with a shotgun, and at least one supervising officer. All of the officers also carried service
revolvers. According to Commissioner Ward, during the course of the attempted eviction Mrs. Bumpurs escaped from the restraining hook [*131] twice and
wielded a knife that Commissioner Ward says was "bent" on one of the plastic shields. At some point, Officer Stephen Sullivan, the officer positioned
farthest away from her, aimed and fired his shotgun. It is alleged that the blast removed half of her hand, so that, according to the Bronx District
Attorney's Office, "[I]t was anatomically impossible for her to hold the knife." 9 The officer pumped his gun and shot again, making his mark completely
the second time around. 10 In the two and one-half year wake of this terrible incident, controversy raged as to whether Mrs. Bumpurs ought to have
brandished a knife and whether the officer ought to have fired his gun. In February 1987, a New York Supreme Court justice found Officer Sullivan not
guilty of manslaughter. 11 The case centered on a very narrow issue of language pitted against circumstance. District Attorney Mario Merola described the
case as follows: "Obviously, one shot would have been justified. But if that shot took off part of her hand and rendered her defenseless, whether there was
any need for a second shot, which killed her, that's the whole issue of whether you have reasonable force or excessive force." 12 My intention in the
following analysis is to underscore the significant task facing judges and lawyers in undoing institutional descriptions of what is "obvious" and what is not,
and in resisting the general predigestion of evidence for jury consumption. Shortly after Mr. Merola's statement, Officer Sullivan's attorney, Bruce Smiry,
expressed eagerness to try the case before a jury. 13 Following the heavily publicized attack in Howard Beach, however, he favored a bench trial. In
explaining his decision to request a nonjury trial, he stated: I think a judge will be much more likely than a jury to understand the defense that the
shooting was justified. . . . The average lay person might find it difficult to understand why the police were there in the first place, and why a shotgun was
employed. . . . Because of the climate now in the city, I don't want people perceiving this as a racial case. 14 Since 1984, Mayor Koch, Commissioner Ward,
and a host of [*132] other city officials repeatedly have described the shooting of Mrs. Bumpurs as completely legal. 15 At the same time, Commissioner
Ward has admitted publicly that Mrs. Bumpurs should not have died. Mayor Koch admitted that her death was the result of "a chain of mistakes and
circumstances" that came together in the worst possible way, with the worst possible circumstances. 16 Commissioner Ward admitted that the officers
could have waited for Mrs. Bumpurs to calm down, and that they could have used teargas or mace instead of gunfire. According to Commissioner Ward,
however, these observations are made with hindsight. As to whether this shooting of a black woman by a white police officer had racial overtones, he
stated that he had "no evidence of racism." 17 Commissioner Ward pointed out that he is sworn to uphold the law, which is "inconsistent with treating
blacks differently," 18 and that the shooting was legal because it was within the code of police ethics. 19 Finally, city officials have resisted criticism of the
police department's handling of the incident by remarking that "outsiders" do not know all of the facts and do not understand the pressure under which
officers labor. The root of the word "legal" is the Latin word lex, which means law in a fairly concrete sense -- law as we understand it when we refer to
written law, codes, and systems of obedience. 20 The word lex does not include the more abstract, ethical dimension of law that contemplates the
purposes of rules and their effective implementation. This latter meaning is contained in the Latin word jus, from which we derive the word "justice." 21
This semantic distinction is not insignificant. The word of law, whether statutory or judicial, is a subcategory of the underlying social motives and beliefs
from which it is born. It is the technical embodiment of attempts to order society according to a consensus of ideals. When society loses sight of those
ideals and grants obeisance to words alone, law becomes sterile and formalistic; lex is applied without jus and is therefore unjust. The result is compliance
[*133] with the letter of the law, but not the spirit. A sort of punitive literalism ensues that leads to a high degree of thoughtless conformity. This literalism
has, as one of its primary underlying values, order -- whose ultimate goal may be justice, but whose immediate end is the ordering of behavior. Living
solely by the letter of the law means living without spirit; one can do anything as long as it comports with the law in a technical sense. The cynicism or
rebelliousness that infects one's spirit, and the enthusiasm or dissatisfaction with which one conforms is unimportant. Furthermore, this compliance is
arbitrary; it is inconsistent with the will of the conformer. The law becomes a battleground of wills. The extent to which technical legalism obfuscates and
undermines the human motivations that generate our justice system is the real extent to which we as human beings are disenfranchised. Cultural needs
and ideals change with the momentum of time; redefining our laws in keeping with the spirit of cultural flux keeps society alive and humane. In the
Bumpurs case, the words of the law called for nonlethal alternatives first, but allowed some officer discretion in determining which situations are so
immediately life endangering as to require the use of deadly force. 22 This discretionary area was presumably the basis for the claim that Officer Sullivan
acted legally. The law as written permitted shooting in general, and therefore, by extension of the city's interpretation of this law, it would be impossible
for a police officer ever to shoot someone in a specifically objectionable way. [*134] If our laws are thus piano-wired on the exclusive validity of literalism,
if they are picked clean of their spirit, then society risks heightened irresponsibility for the consequences of abominable actions. Accordingly, Jonathan
Swift's description of lawyers weirdly and ironically comes to life: "[T]here was a Society of Men among us, bred up from their Youth in the Art of proving by
words multiplied for the Purpose, that White is Black and Black is White, according as they are paid. To this Society all the rest of the People are Slaves."
23 We also risk subjecting ourselves to such absurdly empty rhetoric as Commissioner Ward's comments to the effect that both Mrs. Bumpurs' death and
racism were unfortunate, while stating "but the law says . . . ." 24 Commissioner Ward's sentiments might as well read: "The law says . . . and therefore
the death was unfortunate but irremediable; the law says . . . and therefore there is little that can be done about racism." The law thus becomes a shield
behind which to avoid responsibility for the human repercussions of both governmental and publicly harmful private activity. 25 A related issue is the
degree to which much of the criticism of the police department's handling of this case was devalued as "noisy" or excessively emotional. It is as though
passionate protest were a separate crime, a rudeness of such dimension as to defeat altogether any legitimacy of content. We as lawyers are taught from
the moment we enter law school to temper our emotionalism and quash our idealism. We are taught that heartfelt instincts subvert the law and defeat the
security of a well-ordered civilization, whereas faithful adherence to the word of law, to stare decisis and clearly stated authority, would as a matter of
course lead to a bright, clear world like the Land of Oz, in which those heartfelt instincts would be preserved. Form is exalted over substance, and cool
rationales over heated feelings. But we should not be ruled exclusively by the cool formality of language or by emotions. We must be ruled by our
complete selves, by the intellectual and emotional content of our words. Governmental representatives must hear the full range of legitimate concerns, no
matter how indelicately expressed or painful they may be to hear. [*135] But undue literalism is only one type of sleight of tongue in the attainment of
meaningless dialogue. Mayor Koch, Commissioner Ward, and Officer Sullivan's defense attorneys have used overgeneralization as an effective rhetorical
complement to their avoidance of the issues. For example, allegations that the killing was illegal and unnecessary, and should therefore be prosecuted,
were met with responses such as, "The laws permit police officers to shoot people." 26 "As long as police officers have guns, there will be unfortunate
deaths." 27 "The conviction rate in cases like this is very low." 28 The observation that teargas would have been an effective alternative to shooting Mrs.
Bumpurs drew the dismissive reply that "there were lots of things they could have done." 29 Privatization of response as a justification for public
irresponsibility is a version of the same game. Honed to perfection by President Reagan, this version holds up the private self as indistinguishable from the
public "duty and power laden" self. Public officials respond to commentary by the public and the media as though it were meant to hurt private, vulnerable
feelings. Trying to hold a public official accountable while not hurting his feelings is a skill the acquisition of which would consume time better spent on
almost any conceivable task. Thus, when Commissioner Ward was asked if the internal review board planned to discipline Officer Sullivan, many seemed
disposed to accept his response that while he was personally very sorry she had died, he could not understand why the media was focusing on him so
much. "How many other police commissioners," he asked repeatedly, "have gotten as much attention as I have?" 30 Finally, a most cruel form of semantic
slipperiness infused Mrs. Bumpurs' death from the beginning. It is called victim responsibility. 31 It is the least responsive form of dialogue, yet apparently
the [*136] easiest to accept as legitimate. All these words, from Commissioner Ward, from the Mayor's office, from the media, and from the public
generally, have rumbled and resounded with the sounds of discourse. We want to believe that their symmetrical, pleasing structure is the equivalent of
discourse. If we are not careful, we will hypnotize ourselves into believing that it is discourse. In the early morning hours of December 20, 1986, three
young black men left their stalled car on Cross Bay Parkway, in the New York City borough of Queens, and went to look for help. They walked into the
neighborhood of Howard Beach, entered a pizzeria, ordered pizzas, and sat down to eat. An anonymous caller to the police reported their presence as
"black troublemakers." A patrol car came, found no trouble, and left. After the young men had eaten, they left the pizzeria and were immediately
surrounded by a group of eight to ten white teenagers who taunted them with racial epithets. The white youths chased the black men for about three
miles, catching them at several points and beating them severely. One of the black men died as a result of being struck by a car as he tried to flee across
a highway. Another suffered permanent blindness in one eye. 32 In the extremely heated public controversy that ensued, as much attention centered on
the community of Howard Beach as on the assailants themselves. A veritable Greek chorus formed, comprised of the defendants' lawyers and resident
after resident after resident of Howard Beach, all repeating and repeating and repeating that the mere presence of three black men in that part of town at
that time of night was reason enough to drive them out. "They had to be starting trouble." 33 "We're a strictly white neighborhood." 34 "What were they
doing here in the first place?" 35 [*137] Although the immensely segregationist instincts behind such statements may be fairly evident, it is worth making
explicit some of the presuppositions behind such ululations. Everyone who lives here is white. No black could live here. No one here has a black friend. No
white would employ a black here. No black is permitted to shop here. No black is ever up to any good. These presuppositions themselves are premised on
lethal philosophies of life. "Are we supposed to stand around and do nothing while these blacks come into our area and rob us?" 36 one woman asked a
reporter in the wake of the Howard Beach attack. A twenty year old, who had lived in Howard Beach all of his life, said, "We ain't racial. . . . We just don't
want to get robbed." 37 The hidden implication of these statements is that to be safe is not to be sorry, and that to be safe is to be white and to be sorry is
to be associated with blacks. Safety and sorrow, which are inherently alterable and random, are linked to inalterable essences. The expectation that
uncertain conditions are really immutable is a formula for frustration; it is a belief that feeds a sense of powerlessness. The rigid determinism of placing in
the disjunctive things that are not in fact disjunctive is a set up for betrayal by the very nature of reality. The national repetition that white neighborhoods
are safe and blacks bring sorrow is an incantation of powerlessness. And, as with the upside-down logic of all irrational incantations, it imports a concept of
white safety that almost necessarily endangers the lives as well as the rights of blacks. It is also an incantation of innocence and guilt, much related to
incantations that affirmative action programs allow presumably "guilty" blacks to displace "innocent" whites. 38 (Even assuming that "innocent whites"
were being displaced by blacks, does that make [*138] blacks less innocent in the pursuit of education and jobs? If anything, are not blacks more innocent
in the scheme of discrimination?) In fact, in the wake of the Howard Beach incident, the police and the press rushed to serve the public's interest in the
victims' unsavory "guilty" dispositions. They overlook the fact that racial slurs and attacks "objectif[y] people -- the incident could have happened to any
black person who was there at that time and place. This is the crucial aspect of the Howard Beach affair that is now being muddied in the media. Bringing
up [defendants' past arrest records] is another way of saying, 'He was a criminal who deserved it.'" 39 Thus, the game of victim responsibility described
above is itself a slave to society's stereotypes of good and evil. It does no good, however, to turn race issues into contests for some Holy Grail of
innocence. In my youth, segregation and antimiscegenation laws were still on the books in many states. During the lifetimes of my parents and
grandparents, and for several hundred years before them, laws prohibited blacks from owning property, voting, and learning to read or write. Blacks were,
by constitutional mandate, outlawed from the hopeful, loving expectations that being treated as a whole, rather than three-fifths of a human being can
bring. When every resource of a wealthy nation is put to such destructive ends, it will take more than a few generations to mop up the mess. 40 [*139] We
have all inherited that legacy, whether new to this world or new to this country. It survives as powerfully and invisibly reinforcing structures of thought,
language, and law. Thus, generalized notions of innocence and guilt have little place in the struggle for transcendence; there is no blame among the living
for the dimension of this historic crime, this national tragedy. 41 There is, however, responsibility for never forgetting one another's histories, and for
making real the psychic obliteration which lives on as a factor in shaping relations, not just between blacks and whites, 42 or blacks and blacks, 43 but
also between whites and whites. Whites must consider how much this history has projected onto blacks the blame for all criminality, and for all of society's
ills. It has become the means for keeping white criminality invisible. 44 The attempt to split bias from violence has been this society's most enduring and
fatal rationalization. Prejudice does hurt, however, just as the absence of prejudice can nourish and shelter. Discrimination can repel and vilify, ostracize
and alienate. White people [*140] who do not believe this should try telling everyone they meet that one of their ancestors was black. I had a friend in
college who having lived her life as a blonde, grey eyed white person, discovered that she was one-sixteenth black. She began to externalize all the
unconscious baggage that "black" bore for her: the self-hatred that is racism. She did not think of herself as a racist (nor had I) but she literally wanted to
jump out of her skin, shed her flesh, and start life over again. She confided in me that she felt "fouled" and "betrayed." She also asked me if I had ever felt
this way. Her question dredged from some deep corner of my suppressed memory the recollection of feeling precisely that, when at the age of three or so,
some white playmates explained to me that God had mixed mud with the pure clay of life in order to make me. In the Vietnamese language, "the word 'I'
(toi) . . . means 'your servant'; there is no 'I' as such. When you talk to someone, you establish a relationship." 45 Such a concept of "self" is a way of
experiencing the other, ritualistically sharing the other's essence, and cherishing it. In our culture, seeing and feeling the dimension of harm that results
from separating self from "other" requires more work. 46 Very little in our language or our culture encourages or reinforces any attempt to look at others
as part of ourselves. With the imperviously divided symmetry of the marketplace, social costs to blacks are simply not seen as costs to whites, 47 just as
blacks do not share in the advances whites may enjoy. [*141] This structure of thought is complicated by the fact that the distancing does not stop with
the separation of the white self from the black other. In addition, the cultural domination of blacks by whites means that the black self is placed at a
distance even from itself, as in the example of blacks being asked to put themselves in the position of the white shopkeepers who view them. 48 So blacks
are conditioned from infancy to see in themselves only what others who despise them see. 49 It is true that conforming to what others see in us is every
child's way of becoming socialized. 50 It is what makes children in our society seem so gullible, so impressionable, so "impolitely" honest, so blindly loyal,
and so charming to the ones they imitate. 51 Yet this conformity also describes a way of being that relinquishes the power of independent ethical choice.
Although such a relinquishment can have quite desirable social consequences, it also presumes a fairly homogeneous social context in which values are
shared and enforced collectively. Thus, it is no wonder that western anthropologists and ethnographers, for whom adulthood is manifested by the exercise
of independent ethical judgment, so frequently denounce tribal cultures or other collectivist ethics as "childlike." By contrast, our culture constructs some,
but not all, selves to be the servants of others. Thus, some "I's" are defined as "your servant," some as "your master." The struggle for the self becomes
not a true mirroring of self-in-other, but rather a hierarchically-inspired series of distortions, where some serve without ever being served, some master
without ever being mastered, and almost everyone hides from this vernacular domination by clinging to the legally official definition of "I" as meaning
"your equal." In such an environment, relinquishing the power of individual ethical judgment to a collective ideal risks psychic violence, an obliteration of
the self through domination by an all powerful other. In such an environment, it is essential at some stage that the self be permitted to retreat into itself
and make its own decisions with self-love and self-confidence. What links child abuse, the mistreatment of [*142] women, and racism is the massive
external intrusion into psyche that dominating powers impose to keep the self from ever fully seeing itself. 52 Because the self's power resides in another,
little faith is placed in the true self, that is, in one's own experiential knowledge. Consequently, the power of children, women and blacks is actually
reduced to the "intuitive," rather than the real; social life is necessarily based primarily on the imaginary. 53 Furthermore, because it is difficult to affirm
constantly with the other the congruence of the self's imagining what the other is really thinking of the self, and because even that correlative effort is
usually kept within very limited family, neighborhood, religious, or racial boundaries, encounters cease to be social and become presumptuous, random,
and disconnected. This peculiarly distancing standpoint allows dramas, particularly racial ones like Howard Beach, to unfold in scenarios weirdly unrelated
to the incidents that generated them. At one end of the spectrum is a laissez faire response that privatizes the self in order to remain unassailably
justified. At the other end is a pattern that generalizes individual or particular others into terrifyingly uncontrollable "domains" of public wilderness, against
which proscriptive barriers must be built to protect the eternally innocent self. The prototypical scenario of the privatized response is as follows: Cain:
Abel's part of town is tough turf. 54 [*143] Abel: It upsets me when you say that; you have never been to my part of town. As a matter of fact, my part of
town is a leading supplier of milk and honey. 55 Cain: The news that I'm upsetting you is too upsetting for me to handle. You were wrong to tell me of your
upset because now I'm terribly upset. 56 Abel: I felt threatened first. Listen to me. Take your distress as a measure of my own and empathize with it. Don't
ask me to recant and apologize in order to carry this conversation further. 57 This type of discourse is problematic because Cain's challenge in calling
Abel's turf "tough" is transformed into a discussion of the care with which Abel challenges that statement. While there is certainly an obligation to be
careful in addressing others the obligation to protect the feelings of those others gets put above the need to protect one's own. The self becomes
subservient to the other, with no reciprocity, and the other becomes a whimsical master. Abel's feelings are deflected in deference to Cain's, and Abel
bears the double burden of raising his issue properly and of being responsible for its impact on Cain. Cain is rendered unaccountable for as long as this
deflection continues because all the fault is assigned to Abel. Morality and responsiveness thus become dichotomized as Abel drowns in responsibility for
valuative quality control, while Cain rests on the higher ground of a value neutral zone. Caught in conversations like this, blacks as well as whites will
[*144] feel keenly and pressingly circumscribed. Perhaps most people never intend to be racist, oppressive, or insulting. Nevertheless, by describing zones
of vulnerability and by setting up fences of rigidified politeness, the unintentional exile of individuals as well as races may be quietly accomplished.
Another scenario of distancing self from the responsibility for racism is the invention of some great public wilderness of others. In the context of Howard
Beach, the specter against which the self must barricade itself is violent: seventeen year old, black males wearing running shoes and hooded sweatshirts.
It is this fear of the uncontrollable, overwhelming other that animates many of the more vengefully racist comments from Howard Beach, such as, "We're a
strictly white neighborhood. . . . They had to be starting trouble." 58 These statements set up angry, excluding boundaries. They also imply that the
failure to protect and avenge is bad policy, bad statesmanship, and an embarrassment. They raise the stakes beyond the unexpressed rage arising from
the incident itself. Like the Cain and Abel example, the need to avenge becomes a separate issue of protocol and etiquette -- not a loss of a piece of the
self, which is the real cost of real tragedies, but a loss of self-regard. By self-regard, I do not mean self-concept as in self- esteem; I mean that view of the
self that is attained by the self stepping outside the self to regard and evaluate the self. It is a process in which the self is watched by an imaginary other,
a self-projection of the opinions of real others, where "I" means "your master" and where the designated other's refusal to be dominated is felt as
personally assaultive. Thus, the failure to avenge is felt as a loss of self-regard. It is a psychological metaphor for whatever trauma or original assault that
constitutes the real loss to the self. 59 It is therefore more abstract, more illusory, more constructed, and more invented. Potentially, therefore, it is less
powerful than "real" assault, in that with effort it can be unlearned as a source of vulnerability. This is the real message of the attempt to distinguish
between prejudice and violence: names, as in the old "sticks and stones" ditty, [*145] although undeniably and powerfully influential, can be learned or
undone as motivation for future destructive action. 60 As long as they are not unlearned, however, the exclusionary power of such free-floating emotions
makes its way into the gestalt of prosecutorial and jury decisions and into what the law sees as crime, or as justified, provoked or excusable. 61 Law
becomes described and enforced in the spirit of our prejudices. 62 The following passage is a description of the arraignment of three of the white
teenagers who were involved in the Howard Beach beatings: The three defense lawyers also tried to case doubt on [the prosecutor's] account of the
attack. The lawyers questioned why the victims walked all the way to the pizza parlor if, as they said, their mission was to summon help for their car,
which broke down three miles away. . . . At the arraignment, the lawyers said the victims passed two all-night gas stations and several other pizza shops
before they reached the one they entered. [*146] A check yesterday of area restaurants, motels and gas stations listed in the Queens street directory
found two eating establishments, a gas station and a motel that all said they were open and had working pay phones on Friday night. A spokesman for the
New York Telephone Company, Jim Crosson, said there are six outdoor pay telephones . . . on the way to the pizzeria. 63 In the first place, lawyers must
wonder what relevance this has. Does the answer to any of the issues the defense raised serve to prove that these black men assaulted, robbed,
threatened or molested these white men? Does it even prove that the white men reasonably feared such a fate? The investigation into the number of
phone booths per mile does not reveal why the white men would fear the black men's presence. Instead, it is relevant to prove that there is no reason a
black man should walk or just wander around the community of Howard Beach. This is not semantic detail; it is central to understanding burdensomeness
of proof in such cases. It is this unconscious restructuring of burdens of proof into burdens of white over black that permits people who say and who
believe that they are not racist to commit and condone crimes of genocidal magnitude. It is easy to rationalize this as linguistically technical, or as
society's sorrow. As one of my students said, "I'm so tired of hearing the blacks say that society's done them wrong." Yet these gyrations kill with their
razor-toothed presumption. Lawyers are the modern wizards and medicine people who must define this innocent murderousness as crime. Additionally,
investigations into "closer" alternatives eclipse the possibility of other explanation. They assume that the young men were not headed for the subway
(which was in fact in the same direction as the pizzeria), and further, that black people must have documented reasons for excursioning into white
neighborhoods and out of the neighborhoods to which they are supposedly consigned. It is interesting to contrast the implicit requirement of
documentation imposed on blacks walking down public streets in Howard Beach with the implicit license of the white officers who burst into the private
space of Mrs. Bumpurs' apartment. In the Bumpurs case, lawmakers consistently dismissed the availability of less intrusive options as presumption and
idle hindsight. 64 This dismissal ignored the fact that police officers have an actual burden of employing the least harmful alternatives. In the context of
Howard Beach, however, such an analysis invents and imposes a burden on nonresidents to stay [*147] out of strange neighborhoods. It implies harm in
the presence of those who do not specifically "own" something there. Both analyses skirt the propriety and necessity of public sector responsibility. Both
redefine public accountability in privatized terms. Whether those privatized terms act to restrict or expand accountability is dichotomized according to the
race of the actors. Finally, this factualized hypothesizing was part of a news story, not an editorial. "News," in other words, was reduced to hypothesis
based on silent premises: they should have used the first phone they encountered; they should have eaten at the first "eating establishment;" they should
have gone into a gas station and asked for help; surely they should have had the cash and credit cards to do any of the above or else not travel in strange
neighborhoods. In elevating these to relevant issues, however, The New York Times did no more than mirror what was happening in the courtroom. In an
ill-fated trip to the neighborhood of Jamaica, in the borough of Queens, Mayor Koch attempted to soothe tensions by asking a congregation of black
churchgoers to understand the disgruntlement of Howard Beach residents about the interracial march by 1400 protesters through "their" streets. He asked
them how they would feel if 1400 white people took to the streets of the predominantly black neighborhood of Jamaica. 65 This remark, from the chief
executive of New York City, accepts and even advocates a remarkable degree of possessiveness about public streets. This possessiveness, moreover, is
racially rather than geographically bounded. In effect, Koch was pleading for the acceptance of the privatization of public space. This is the de facto
equivalent of segregation. It is exclusion in the guise of deep-moated private property "interests" and "values." In such a characterization, the public
nature of the object of discussion, the street, is lost. 66 Mayor Koch's question suggests that 1400 black people took to the streets of Howard Beach. In
fact, the crowd was integrated -- blacks, browns, and whites, residents and nonresidents of Howard Beach. Apparently, crowds in New York are subject to
the unwritten equivalent of Louisiana's race statutes (which provide that 1/72 black [*148] ancestry renders a person black) and to the Ku Klux Klan's
"contamination by association" standard ("blacks and white-blacks" was how one resident of Forsythe County, Georgia described an interracial crowd of
protesters there). On the other hand, if Mayor Koch intended to direct attention to the inconvenience, noise, and pollution of such a crowd in those small
streets, then I am sympathetic. My sympathy is insignificant, however, compared to my recognition of the necessity and propriety of the protestors'
spontaneous, demonstrative, peaceful outpouring of rage, sorrow, and pain. If, however, Mayor Koch intended to ask blacks to imagine 1400 angry white
people descending on a black community, then I agree, I would be frightened. This image would also conjure up visions of 1400 hooded white people
burning crosses, 1400 Nazis marching through Skokie, and 1400 cavalry men riding into American Indian lands. These visions would inspire great fear in
me, because of the possibility of grave harm to the residents. But there is a difference, and that is why the purpose of the march is so important. That is
why it is so important to distinguish mass protests of violence from organized hate groups that openly threaten violence. By failing to make this
distinction, Mayor Koch created the manipulative specter of unspecified mobs sweeping through homes in pursuit of vague and diffusely dangerous ends.
From this perspective, he appealed to thoughtlessness, to the pseudoconsolation of hunkering down and bunkering up against the approaching hoards, to
a glacially overgeneralized view of the unneighborhooded "public" world. Moreover, the Mayor's comments reveal that he is ignorant of the degree to
which the black people have welcomed, endured, and suffered white marchers through their streets. White people have always felt free to cruise through
black communities and to treat them possessively. Most black neighborhoods have existed only as long as whites have permitted them to exist. Blacks
have been this society's perpetual tenants, sharecroppers, and lessees. Blacks went from being owned by others, to having everything around them
owned by others. In a civilization that values private property above all else, this effectuates a devaluation of humanity, a removal of blacks not just from
the market, but from the pseudospiritual circle of psychic and civic communion. As illustrated in the microcosm of my experience at the store, 67 this
limbo of disownedness keeps blacks beyond the pale of those who are entitled to receive the survival gifts of commerce, the [*149] property of life, liberty,
and happiness, whose fruits our culture places in the marketplace. In this way, blacks are positioned analogically to the rest of society, exactly as they
were during slavery or Jim Crow. 68 There is a subtler level to the enactment of this dispossession. The following story may illustrate more fully what I
mean: Not long ago, when I first moved back to New York after some twenty years, I decided to go on a walking tour of Harlem. The tour, which took place
on Easter Sunday, was sponsored by the New York Arts Society, and except for myself, was attended exclusively by young, white, urban, professional, real
estate speculators. They were pleasant looking, with babies strapped to their backs and balloons in their hands. They all seemed like very nice people.
Halfway through the tour, the guide asked the group if they wanted to "go inside some churches." The guide added, "It'll make the tour a little longer, but
we'll probably get to see some services going on . . . Easter Sunday in Harlem is quite a show." A casual discussion ensued about the time that this
excursion might take. What astonished me was that no one had asked the people in the churches if they minded being stared at like living museums. I
wondered what would happen if a group of blue-jeaned blacks were to walk uninvited into a synagogue on Passover or St. Anthony's of Padua in the
middle of High Mass. Just to peer, not pray. My overwhelming instinct is that such activity would be seen as disrespectful. Apparently, the disrespect was
invisible to this well-educated, affable group of people. They deflected my observations with comments such as, "We just want to look"; "No one will
mind"; "There's no harm intended." As well intentioned as they were, I was left with the impression that no one existed for them whom their intentions
could not govern. 69 Despite the lack of apparent malice in their demeanor, 70 it seemed to me that to live so noninteractively is a liability [*150] as much
as a luxury. To live imperviously to one's impact on others is a fragile privilege, which depends ultimately on the inability of others to make their
displeasure known. Reflecting on Howard Beach brought to mind a news story from my fragmentary grammar school recollections of the 1960's: a white
man acting out of racial motives killed a black man who was working for some civil rights organization or cause. The man was stabbed thirty-nine times, a
number which prompted a radio commentator to observe that the point was not just murder, but something beyond. What indeed was the point, if not
murder? I wondered what it was that would not die, which could not be killed by the fourth, fifth, or even tenth knife blow; what sort of thing that would
not die with the body but lived on in the mind of the murderer. Perhaps, as psychologists have argued, what the murderer was trying to kill was a part of
his own mind's image, a part of himself and not a real other. After all, statistically and corporeally, blacks as a group are poor, powerless, and a minority. It
is in the minds of whites that blacks become large, threatening, powerful, uncontrollable, ubiquitous, and supernatural. There are certain societies that
define the limits of life and death very differently than our own. For example,
and under the proper circumstances, life may continue for some time after the body is carried to
its grave. 71 These non-body-bound, uncompartmentalized ideas recognize the power of spirit, or what we in our secularized society might describe as the
part of ourselves
is beyond the control of pure physical will and resides in the
sanctuary of those around us. A fundamental part of ourselves and
dynamism of self as reinterpreted by the perceptions of [*151] other. 72 These ideas comprehend the fact that a
example, when Bernhard Goetz shot four black teenagers in a New York City subway, an acquaintance of mine said that she could understand his fear
because it is a "fact" that blacks commit most crimes. What impressed me, beyond the factual inaccuracy of this statement, 76 was the reduction of
Goetz' crime to "his fear," which I translate to mean her fear. The four teenage victims became all blacks everywhere, and "most crimes" clearly meant
that most blacks commit crimes.
Bonilla-Silva 01 (Eduardo, PhD, professor of sociology at Duke University. White Supremacy and Racism in the Post-Civil
Rights era Page 195 Lynne Rienner Publisher 2001
The theory and analyses advanced here are an anathema to many whites (and to color-blind minorities as well as honorary whites). Agreeing with
my theory and substantive claims implies recognizing that all whites receive unearned benefits by virtue of being white and thus develop
defensive beliefs. Naysayers will rebuke my claims by arguing that they are not racist, by stating that I am making a fictitious category- that
of race- real, or by marshaling survey work showing whites tolerant racial attitudes or data comparing the status of blacks in the past with their
status today. Some may even suggest that blacks are racist too: or that the racial gap in the United States is fundamentally shaped by blacks
own cultural practices. Lastly, a group of commentators will point out that my analysis is divisive, arguing, Wouldnt it make more sense to
develop an argument based on class as the unifying factor? Although political disputes are never settled with data or rational arguments, I will
attempt to answer each of the counterarguments. First, from a structural point of view, race relations are not rooted in the balance between
good (non-racist) and bad (racist) whites or even in the struggle between racist actors (conscious of their racial interest) and race
militants (conscious of the need to oppose the racial status quo). The reproduction of racial inequality
transpires every day through the normal operation of society. Like capitalists and men, whites
have been able to crystalize their victories in institutions and social practices . This
implies that they do not need to be individually active in the maintenance of racial
domination. Instead by merely following the everyday rituals of the postmodern, whitesupremacist United States-living in a segregated neighborhood, sending their children to segregated
schools, interacting fundamentally with their racial peers, working in a mostly segregated job or if in an integrated setting, maintaining
superficial relation with the nonwhites etc.- they help reproduce the racial status quo. Of course, this does not mean that some actors in any
racialized social system are significantly more prejudiced than others. My point is that the reproduction of white supremacy does
not depend on individual racist behavior. Second, although all social categories are
constructed, after they emerge they become real in their consequences . The fact
that race, as with all social categories, is fluid does not mean that it does not
become a social fact. Crying that you are not white, or male, or black, or female does not change the fact of your social reality as
white, male, black, or female. Even those who claim to be race traitors receive advantages (many of which are invisible to them) just because of
the racial uniform they wear every day. The mean streets of the social world have a way of letting you know rather
quickly what you are rather than what you think or theorize you are. Hence, Tiger Woods may insist that
he is not black by Fuzzy Zellers joke when he won the Augusta Open was based on the stereotypes about blacks and not on Cablasasians.
Third, as I pointed out in Chapters 3 and 5, survey data on whites attitudes may be conveying false sense of racial tolerance and harmony. The
combination of socially acceptable speech and old questions that no longer tackle our contemporary racial dilemmas has produced an artificial
increase in racially tolerant responses among whites. Nonetheless, the same whites who state in surveys they have no problems with blacks and
do not care if blacks move in their neighborhoods and that it is great to have children from all racial backgrounds interacting in schools have very
limited and superficial relationships with blacks, live in white neighborhoods and more when blacks move in, and they have objected for over 40
years to almost all the government plans to facilitate school integration. Fourth, as far as the issue of black progress, I pointed out in Chapter 1
and in Chapter 4 that it is undeniable that blacks are better off today than during the slavery
past 30 years. Therefore, my point is not to deny that blacks have improved their standing in the United States but to draw attention to
the fact the new mechanisms that have emerged to maintain white privilege and which account for much of the contemporary black-white gaps.
Fifth, those who insist that blacks are poorer than whites because of their cultural
practices ought to consider the power dimension in the racial equation. Although
blacks can be prejudiced (many are anti-white, anti-Latino, or anti-Asian), since racial inequality is
based on systemic power and blacks do not have it in the United States, they are not
racist in this systemic sense. There is no theoretical reason why blacks (the socially constructed group of people that has
endured 500 years of white supremacy) could not become racist in this sense. However, substantively, this is an extremely unlikely event.
Given the global nature of white supremacy, it is almost impossible for an anti-white or black supremacy order to operate successfully. Even in
African countries where whites have lost political power (e.g. South Africa, Namibia, and Congo), the dictates of the global white supremacy (I
borrow the term from Charles W. Mills) and the economic might of Western nations limit these regimes and severely constrain their possibilities.
BARNDT
2k7
(Joseph-has been a parish pastor and an antiracism trainer and organizer for thirty
years, much of the latter work being done with Crossroads Ministry, Chicago, which he
directed for eighteen years; Understanding and Dismantling Racism: The Twenty-First
Century Challenge To White America; p.42)//AK
Thus, from the perspective of communities of color, the continuing presence of
racism in the twenty-first century is easy to detect. For those who do not directly
experience it, however, its presence is not so easily perceived . Whether it is described as
Bigfoot or as a velvet glove covering an iron fist, racism has become more hidden and
disguised, so that it is easy for white people to become convinced that it has gone
away, or at least that it is rapidly diminishing and disappearing . In fact, the very
effectiveness of the twenty-first century forms of racism is measure by its not being seen at work. So, the question
is how to expose racisms new disguises?
The critically important question for this book is how is it possible to see the new forms of the old racism that are
is to reveal the ways in which new forms of racism comprise the powerful continuation of racism in the twenty-first
century. Only as the eyes of each of us are opened as we begin to understand how racism functions in our society
today will we be able to devise new ways to oppose racism and dismantle it.
To put the question another way, How can we really know whether racial conditions are getting better or
worse? How can we know that racism is present, and how will we know when it is truly disappearing? Or, more
simply put, how do we measure change from racial injustice to racial justice? Are there common criteria and
standards of measurement that will produce agreement on the status of racial equality and inequality in our
society? It is important to have effective and consistent means of quantifying he presence, absence, and intensity
BARNDT
2k7
Joseph-has been a parish pastor and an antiracism trainer and organizer for thirty years,
much of the latter work being done with Crossroads Ministry, Chicago, which he directed
for eighteen years; Understanding and Dismantling Racism: The Twenty-First Century
Challenge To White America; pp.81-82)//AK
Racism takes all of us prisoner. Its ultimate design is to control and destroy everyone. Power3 is the third
and most powerful expression of racism. This is the most devastating and destructive power of
racism, because it subjects all of us to its will, people of color and white people alike.
You cannot cut the body of humanity in half and not have both halves bleed to death. The results of
racism are far more devastating and destructive than its hurting of people of color
(Power1) and benefiting of white people (Power2). In this, the greatest and worst expression of
racisms power, we can see its ability to make everyone serve its purposes, and to destroy everyones humanity in
the process. In Power3 we can see that racism is far more than actions of evil and greedy people; it is an evil and
destructive power in itself that has taken on its own self-controlling and self-perpetuating characteristics. At its
deepest level, racism is a massive system of intertwining and choking roots that wrap and wind themselves around
every person, institution, and manifestation of society. We need t explore how all of us-white people and people of
color alike-are imprisoned by this power and cannot easily set ourselves free. We need to see how all of us face
destruction as long as this evil power is at work to divide and take life from us.
Racism is able to make all of us-white people and people of color alike-cooperate
with it and participate in its workings. Each and every one of us is socialized to
become the person that racism wants us to become and to perform the function
that racism wants us to perform. Racism actually claims the power to shape our identity, to tell all of us
who we are, white people and people of color alike.
This socializing process is part of the identity formation that starts at the very beginning of each of our lives. Every white person is taught to behave
according to a racist societys standards for white people, and every person of color is taught to behave according to a racist societys standards for
As we examine Power3 more closely we will see the ways in which all of us-people of color and white people-are
Although racism is
destroying us all, it is designed to make people of color feel uncomfortable and hurt,
and to make white people feel comfortable and good. But ultimately, we are all
deceived, dehumanized, and destroyed by racism. To paraphrase Malcolm X, weve all been
imprisoned by racism. But we will also be clear that our prisons are very different.
misled, weve been had, weve all been took, hoodwinked, and bamboozled. We are all defined and controlled in
ways that threaten to destroy our very being. We will not fully understand racism until we recognize how all of us,
including white people and white society, are destroyed by white racism.
But in another, far greater sense, race is not a European import, but an American
invention. Race may not have been born here, but it came as an immigrant child, was adopted while still in
swaddling clothes, and raised from childhood as an American citizen. It was in the context of the
American colonial experience that race and racism were developed into the
uniquely American understanding we now have . Moreover, this made in America product was
to be then later exported worldwide with earth-shaping and earth-shaking implications and consequences.
From the beginning, the American colonies were designed in every aspect as
race-based societies, with all power and privilege belonging to European people,
who would soon thereafter be legally denoted as white. The ideology of race
evolved one step at a time, just one step ahead of the need to defend the rights and
privileges of white people and to deny the rights and privileges of all other s. A century
and a half later, when the colonies became the United States of America, this same
concept of race was nationalized and constitutitonalized.
Of course, race was not the only oppressive social classification in the colonies. There were other dominating
and repressive categories in this new society, transplanted and enhanced from the old. A rigid class system and
male authoritarianism were also automatically assumed and institutionalized. In addition, a religious hierarchy was
clearly established that resulted in various expressions of Christianity being placed in the top positions, and nonChristians, particularly Jews, at the very bottom. But the first qualifications for the elite and ruling class was white
skin, and while there was a powerful white hierarchy of men with money at the top, the vast majority of other white
people-both men and women-who did not find themselves on top identified with and maintained their loyalty to the
white ruling elite.
Red, Brown, Yellow, Black, and White. The shaping of the concept of race in the
American colonies, and later in the nation of the United States, produced our own
unique racial language, ideology, and practices . Colors were used not only to designate European
people as white people, but to name all the other races as they came into legal recognition. The European
designations previously known as Caucasoid, Negroid, Mongoloid, and Australoid became red, brown, yellow, black,
and white.
It is important to understand that the use of color-coding to describe racial identity was (and still is) politically
motivated and not literally or scientifically based on the color of individuals or groups. We have already stated
above that race cannot be defined by color. No individual matches any of the five colors in any literal sense, and no
group is consistently of one shade or hue.
But the use of colors to describe race accomplished quite effectively the political purpose that was intended.
That political purpose, encased in the legal structures and cultural worldview of our nation, was to enforce the clear
understanding that the resources of this country were reserved exclusively for white people. The other races-the
nonwhite people-existed for the sole purpose of serving the interests of white people. As has already been
described in greater detail in chapter 1, there were at first during the colonial period only three races, three colors:
white, red, and black. The American concept of race evolved primarily around these three:
European immigrants, soon to be known as white people, with a clear ideology of white supremacy
Indigenous natives, to be called red people and clearly denoted as nonhuman, uncivilized savages;
Imported African slaves, named black people and legally defined as less than human, merely property in
the context of chattel slavery.
Later, during the nineteenth century, after the United States became a nation, two more colors-yellow and brownwere incorporated into the national racial vocabulary
Brown, referring at first Mexicans and Puerto Ricans at the time of reterritorial annexantion, and later to
immigrants from other countries in Central and South America, and still later to Arab/Middle Eastern
peoples;
Yellow, describing at first Chinse laborers, and then to immigrants from all countries of Asia or from any
Pacific island west of San Francisco.
This color-coded construct of race that began in colonial America was then written
into the legal codes of the United States when we became a nation . They were enforced
by the courts, and became deeply imbedded in the social fabric of our nation . Everything
about life in the United States took on racial connotations and was separated by color. Then (as I already have
referred to in chapter 1) in 1790, two years after the ratification of the U.S. Constitution, the first Naturalization Act
was passed, which limited new citizenship to white people. The act stated that: any alien, being a free white
person, may be admitted to become a citizen of the United States
From that year until 1952, when the naturalization act was repealed, the United States was legally defined as a
the
court understood race as a scientifically determined designation . In the early 1920s,
when this no longer seemed viable, they changed to the basis of common
knowledge to establish the category of whiteness. During all this time, from the
standpoint of the Supreme Court, the five races of the United States were more
often than not reduced to two races: white and nonwhite . These two legal expressions clearly
white nation. The Supreme Court was given the responsibility of defining whiteness. Until the early 1920s,
meant that white stood for something and non-white stood for nothing. To be white was to have an identity of
worth to be nonwhite was to be worthless.
Before moving to some conclusions and to a proposed definition race for the reader to consider, there is one
final historical point to be made. It is extremely important to note that while many other changes took place during
the civil rights era in the 1960s and 1970s, the legal concept of race did not change .
People of color were and are victims of holocausts-that is, of great and widespread
destruction, usually by fire. The world as we knew and created it was destroyed in a
continual scorched earth policy of the white man. The experience of Jews and other
Europeans under the Nazis can teach us the value of understanding the totality of
destructive intent, the extensiveness of torture, and the demonical apparatus of war
aimed at the human spirit. A Jewish father pushed his daughter from the lines of
certain death at Auschwitz and said, "You will be a remembrance--You tell the story-You survive." She lived. He died. Many have criticized the Jews for forcing non-Jews
to remember the 6 million Jews who died under the Nazis and for etching the names
Auschwitz and Buchenwald, Terezin and Warsaw in our minds. Yet as women of
color, we, too, are "remembrances" of all the holocausts against the people of the
world. We must remember the names of concentration camps such as Jesus, Justice,
Brotherhood, and Integrity, ships that carried millions of African men, women, and
children chained and brutalized across the ocean to the "New World." We must
remember the Arawaks, the Taino, the Chickasaw, the Choctaw, the Narragansett,
the Montauk, the Delaware, and the other Native American names of thousands of
U.S. towns that stand for tribes of people who are no more. We must remember the
holocausts visited against the Hawaiians, the aboriginal peoples of Australia, the
Pacific Island peoples, and the women and children of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. We
must remember the slaughter of men and women at Sharpeville, the children of
Soweto, and the men of Attica. We must never, ever, forget the children disfigured,
the men maimed, and the women broken in our holocausts-we must remember the
names, the numbers, the faces, and the stories and teach them to our children and
our children's children so the world can never forget our suffering and our courage.
Whereas the particularity of the Jewish holocaust under the Nazis is over, our
holocausts continue. We are the madres locos (crazy mothers) in the Argentinian
square silently demanding news of our missing kin from the fascists who rule. We
are the children of El Salvador who see our mothers and fathers shot in front of our
eyes. We are the Palestinian and Lebanese women and children overrun by Israeli,
Lebanese, and U.S. soldiers. We are the women and children of the bantustans and
refugee camps and the prisoners of Robbin Island. We are the starving in the Sahel,
the poor in Brazil, the sterilized in Puerto Rico. We are the brothers and sisters of
Grenada who carry the seeds of the New Jewel Movement in our hearts, not daring
to speak of it with our lipsyet.
Peace is not the absence of a nuclear conflict for the comfort of the
white middle classPeople of Color face the holocaust daily
Omolade, 89 - (Barbara, 1989. 'We Speak for the Planet', in Adrienne Harris and
Ynestra King (eds.), Rocking the Ship of State: Toward a Feminist Peace Politics,
pp. 171-89.Boulder, CO: Westview Press)//AK
Pacifists such as Martin Luther King, Jr. and Mahatma Gandhi who have used
nonviolent resistance charged that those who used violence to obtain justice were
just as evil as their oppressors. Yet all successful revolutionary movements have
used organized violence. This is especially true of national liberation movements
that have obtained state power and reorganized the institutions of their nations for
the benefit of the people. If men and women in South Africa do not use organized
violence, they could remain in the permanent violent state of the slave. Could it be
that pacifism and nonviolence cannot become a way of life for the oppressed? Are
they only tactics with specific and limited use for protecting people from further
violence? For most people in the developing communities and the developing world
consistent nonviolence is a luxury; it presumes that those who have and use
nonviolent weapons will refrain from using them long enough for nonviolent
resisters to win political battles. To survive, peoples in developing countries must
use a varied repertoire of issues, tactics, and approaches. Sometimes arms are
needed to defeat apartheid and defend freedom in South Africa; sometimes
nonviolent demonstrations for justice are the appropriate strategy for protesting the
shooting of black teenagers by a white man, such as happened in New York City.
Peace is not merely an absence of 'conflict that enables white middleclass comfort,
nor is it simply resistance to nuclear war and war machinery. The litany of "you will
be blown up, too" directed by a white man to a black woman obscures the
permanency and institutionalization of war, the violence and holocaust that people
of color face daily. Unfortunately, the holocaust does not only refer to the mass
murder of Jews, Christians, and atheists during the Nazi regime; it also refers to the
permanent institutionalization of war that is part of every fascist and racist regime.
The holocaust lives. It is a threat to world peace as pervasive and thorough as
nuclear war.
BARDNT INTERNALS
Racism is an evil seed--historical context of its growth is essential in
understanding racism and taking the right steps toward reform
BARNDT
2k7
(Joseph-has been a parish pastor and an antiracism trainer and organizer for thirty
years, much of the latter work being done with Crossroads Ministry, Chicago, which he
directed for eighteen years; Understanding and Dismantling Racism: The Twenty-First
Century Challenge To White America; pp.13-15)
Racism is an evil weed sown long ago in the garden of humanity. Over centuries,
the evil weed has grown wildly, ensnaring healthy plants and covering the
landscaped pathways, creating a great maze, a labyrinth with twists and turns that
have led humanity astray. The complex and bewildering tangle of racism that still
entwines and traps us all today is rooted in the past, long before any reader of
these words was born.
The purpose of this book is to describe how racism functions in the United States in the twenty-first century, and
If we wish to
no
one can be blamed today for the evils perpetuated by their foreparents. However,
why should I be held responsible for what people did before I was born? There is a sense in which this is true;
We may not be responsible for the past, but how are we responsible for what is
happening now?
We cannot know the answers to these questions unless we know our history. It is simply impossible to understand
the role of that race and racism play in our lives today unless we know how we got here.
We are a people whose memories have been shortened by amnesia and anesthesia and whose
knowledge of history has been distorted. New generations of people have reached adulthood since
1960. Many have little awareness of the civil rights movement or of the legal system of institutional racism that
existed before that time. They have never known separate toilets and water fountains, segregated buses,
restaurants and accommodations, and all of the other insulting and exploitative indignities. This history dare not be
forgotten, particularly since it still exerts such a powerful influence over all of us.
In this initial chapter I want to lead readers through a bare outline of this history-a skeletal framework. Then, as
this book progresses, I will put flesh on these bones in a way of building an understanding of the path that leads
from the past to the present. Throughout this book readers will be asked to probe this history, learn more, and seek
to interpret it. We will explore how racism has gone thorough many changes and adaptions as it moved from its
We will discover,
however, that underneath the growing sophistication, the basic foundations
of racism have remained unchanged. The very same evil weed that was sown
centuries ago in the garden of humanity is still threatening us today.
brutal beginnings to a far more sophisticated, subtle, and dangerous means of oppression.
BARNDT
2k7
Joseph-has been a parish pastor and an antiracism trainer and organizer for thirty years,
much of the latter work being done with Crossroads Ministry, Chicago, which he directed
for eighteen years; Understanding and Dismantling Racism: The Twenty-First Century
Challenge To White America; pp.40-41)
To change the metaphor, these new forms of racism can also be described as a kicking foot. The Peoples
Institute for Survival and Beyond, the antiracism organization in New Orleans that I described in the introduction to
this book, has developed a Foot Identification exercise that demonstrates the power of racism. The purpose of
the exercise is to do a power analysis: that is, to portray how people of color experience the power of racism in
their daily lives.
the school system, retail stores, the employment system, the criminal justice system-the police, courts, and prisons-the health-care
system, the social service system, the church, the media, and so forth. Each of these systems is felt as a kicking foot, partly
because of the poor services they provide, but even more so because each of these systems and institutions is controlled from
Whether or not the community of color in this Foot Identification exercise is an African American ghetto, a
Latino/Hispanic barrio, a Native American reservation, an Asian American Chinatown or Little Saigon, or an Arab
The Bigfoot of
racism is quite real. The decision-making power that determines the daily life of
communities of color comes from the outside, and it decidedly disadvantages the people who
American Little Beirut, the results of the Foot Identification exercise are always the same.
BARNDT
2k7
(Joseph-has been a parish pastor and an antiracism trainer and organizer for thirty
years, much of the latter work being done with Crossroads Ministry, Chicago, which he
directed for eighteen years; Understanding and Dismantling Racism: The Twenty-First
Century Challenge To White America; pp.48-49)
This portrait of U.S. society depicts us as a people more conflicted than ever over the
subject of race and racism. Our nations inconsistent behavior is obvious, but not easy to comprehend or explain.
psyche. It is schizophrenia that leads us again and again into unresolved cyclical patterns of behavior.
In this first chapter I have sought to describe this continuously replaying cycle in the history of our nation. From
1492 to the present, this cycle moves repeatedly from racism, to resistance to racism, to new efforts to become a
racially just people, and then the cycle of the evil of racism begins again. Our present situation cannot be
understood outside of this cyclical history and all that it brings to our current situation. Our nation is today what
our history has made us; each component of this repetitive cycle is still playing out among us. The unfinished task
of resolving these contradictions is before us.
What does it mean for the United States to be faced with this unfinished task and
the dynamic of the cycle once again turning inexorably toward us? It can be seen as a
depressing repetition of history, holding little promise or possibility. Or it may be perceived as the sign of new
opportunities for struggle and change. It depends on where we stand. For those who have hoped and prayed for
these
are not so much indications of defeat as they are opportunities for a new beginning.
an end to complacency and longed for a new commitment to racial justice in our country and in our world,
The circles of history do not have to be vicious cycles in which we are condemned to face the same problems
and make the same mistakes over and over again. The continuing challenge to all of us, but especially to white
America, is to come to grips with this unfinished task and with the forces that seek to prevent us from taking the
next steps forward. Our challenge in this book is to analyze and understand, and to equip ourselves with what is
needed for a new way forward.
A new beginning for our nation starts with a renewed struggle for racial justice .
Looking back at the last half-century of reversals and regression, looking at the present moment of continuing racial
divisions and racism, and looking ahead to the call for a new moment in history, it is time for us to turn once again
to the reopening and creating of a yet wider path, a broad highway of justice through the maze of racism in
America.
Every program
imaginable has been created to help and heal people of color-everything from soup
kitchens to Head Start, all the programs of charity, all the programs of empowerment, and all the programs of equal opportunity,
inclusiveness and diversity.
Changing the Wrong People. There is no question that most, if not all, of these programs
accomplish some good. The question is whether they change the underpinnings of
systemic racism. Our erroneous fundamental assumption has been that if we pour enough money into
changing the victims of racism, they will catch up with us and will achieve a state of equality. But it isnt
happening. Why? Because we are trying to change the wrong people.
Racism is not only power over people of color. Racism also provides power for white
people. If we define racism as the misuse of systemic and institutional power, then the bottom-line question are:
Whos got the power? and Who is misusing power? The answer is obvious. In the United States, only one racial
group has the power to claim the major part of the land and resources for itself, as well as to impose its will upon
and exploit other racial groups. Power2 is racism at work for white people.
The most important issue in understanding racism is not what it does to hurt people of
what it does to help white people. Oppressing people of color is not the end goal of racism,
color, but
but only a means to its primary end of enriching white people. Providing power and privilege for the white society
is racisms central function and the main reason racism exists. Power 2 is the name I am giving to this second
aspect of racisms misue of power, and it is exponentially more powerful than Power 1. Power2 is the principal reason
racism exists.
For many white people, seeing racism from the perspective of Power 2 is quite new and often shocking. It is a
major turning point in understanding racism to become aware that the primary purpose and end-goal of racism is
not to hurt people of color, but to provide and maintain power and privilege for white people. Power 2 turns the focus
away from the victims of racism to a new focus on the people and institutions who are not only the cause of hurt for
people of color, but who also benefit from it. Power2 moves us from the question of how can we help them change
to the question of how we ourselves can be changed.
The Purpose of Oppression: To Gain Power and Privilege.
dominance, and to make certain that those who are oppressed serve the purposes of those who dominate .
For
example, the purpose of class oppression is to establish an elite societal group with
economic power and privilege, and to organize the rest of society so that the
energies of the lower classes support and help to maintain those with class
privilege. Likewise, the purpose of gender oppression, which in our society translates as male dominance, is to
establish power and privilege for men and to define the role of women in ways that their energies enforce and
support male power and privilege. The same is true of the oppression of one nation against another nation, which
serves the purpose of establishing the dominating nations power and riches, and using the energies of the
dominated nation to strengthen and serve the power and privilege of the oppressive nation.
Just as this is true of all other forms of oppression, it is also true of racism. The purpose of racism is to gain and
maintain, perpetuate and enforce power and privilege of one race over another. As we have seen in the history of
the evolving of the concept of race in the previous chapter, white racial supremacy was established as a means of
accruing control, authority, advantages, and benefits for members of the white race.
Those of us who are white find it very hard to recognize and acknowledge this, because we are accustomed to
our own happiness and lifestyle depending on these institutions and structures in their present form. Remember
the story of the Happiness Machine and the problem of its dross? No one has made us see that the forces
responsible for the problems of people of color in our society are the same forces that sustain our own lives. No one
has made us see that the condition of the minority of our citizens is a direct product of the majoritys struggle for
happiness. It is therefore not surprising that all of our effort to solve the problems in our communities of color have
caused so much frustration and met with so little success. We have tried to limit the effects of the dross of the
Happiness Machine without cutting off its flow. We have tried to help others to change without realizing that it
requires change in ourselves.
Solving the Right Problem. We have been trying to solve the wrong problem. In the United States, racism is
primarily a white problem. This conclusion will be traumatic for many readers of this book. It is difficult for us as
white people to grapple with the assertion that racism is a disorder of white people and not of people of color. If
this assertion is true, however, it changes dramatically the way we look at and attempt to solve the problem of
racism.
For years, we have been trying to change the wrong people. Even when we had
the best of intentions we were aiming in the wrong direction. The racial problem of
the United States is not a minority problem. It is a majority problem . The cause is in the
white society. The effects of racism that are felt in communities of color-the problems of African Americans, Native
Americans, Latinos/Hispanics, Asian Americans, and Arab Americans-are only the symptoms of our nations
sickness. Treating the symptoms without treating the cause will not heal the disease. All the programs in the world
aimed at changing the victims of racism will ultimately be useless if the institutions and structures that create and
control the conditions in the first place are not changed.
It is not, of course, that people of color do not need to change or do not want to change. Just the opposite is
true. However, we all too often assume their problems are caused by the victims themselves rather than the
institutions of victimizers. And we assume that the cure for their illnesses begins with them and needs to be
And then, to add the final blow, the cure is attempted by the very
institutions that created the problem in the first place.
administered by us.
It is as though an airplane were spraying poison gas over a city, causing the inhabitants to sicken and die. The
owners of the airplane neither admit to the poisoning nor promise to stop. They do, however, sign a contract to
develop an antidote for the gas. While the antidote is being developed, the gassing continues. When the antidote
is ready, the pilots are directed to spray it, together with the poison gas, when they fly over the city.
If we were to double or triple our efforts to bring about change for the victims of racism through increased
housing, better education, more employment, and other social improvements, we might achieve some statistical
progress. However, we would set two forces in the white society into even greater contradiction with each other:
the one that creates and perpetuates inhuman conditions, and the one that tries to correct the results.
The name of the problem that must be dealt with is white racism. It is the
misuse of power by systems and institutions in order to perpetuate white power and
privilege. And the only way to deal with it is by changing the systems and institutions of the United States that
Simply
changing attitudes are not enough. Helping the victims of racism is not enough .
are structured to benefit the white society and to dominate, control, and exploit people of color.
by changing and transforming white power and privilege will it be possible to make significant progress in
dismantling white racism.
Only
announced. The state police Commonwealth Fusion Center monitored social media,
which provided critical intelligence about protesters plans to try to disrupt traffic
on state highways, state police said. Though it was buried at the end of the Boston
Herald story, the use of fusion centers - deliberately set up for the purposes of
stopping terrorism - are, once again, being used to monitor peaceful domestic
dissent. 4. FBI Joint Terror Task Force was used to track #BlackLivesMatter
Minnesota. Just as with the California Highway Patrol, internal emails between local
police departments and federal authorities revealed the extent to which the
counter-terror apparatus was casually - and entirely turn-key - used on
#BlackLivesMatter. The Intercepts Lee Fang revealed in March: Why Was an FBI
Joint Terrorism Task Force Tracking a BlackLives Matter protest? Members of an FBI
Joint Terrorism Task Force tracked the time and location of a Black Lives Matter
protest last December at the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota, email
obtained by The Intercept shows The email from David S. Langfellow, a St. Paul
police officer and member of an FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force, informs a fellow task
force member from the Bloomington police that CHS just confirmed the MOA
protest I was talking to you about today, for the 20th of DEC @ 1400 hours. CHS is
a law enforcement acronym for confidential human source. In other words, these
emails revealed that not only was the FBI using its Joint Terror Task Force - an
entity that exploded post-9/11 in the name of fighting terrorism - but also using
paid informants who were undercover posing as protestors. Once again,
tactics and legal allowances created in the name of stopping terrorism are being
used, without any oversight or public debate, on entirely peaceful domestic
activism. 5. Emails reveal Missouri National Guard viewed Ferguson protestors as
enemy forces. The most haunting revelation may just be the latest, from CNN:
Missouri National Guard's term for Ferguson protesters: 'Enemy forces' As the
Missouri National Guard prepared to deploy to help quell riots in Ferguson, Missouri,
that raged sporadically last year, the guard used highly militarized words such as
"enemy forces" and "adversaries" to refer to protesters, according to documents
obtained by CNN. CNNs use of military speak aside (quell riots), the report clearly
shows those in charge viewed both rioter and protester alike as enemy combatants
and Ferguson as a war zone. What makes this, and the other above examples, so
pernicious isnt just the use of anti-terror language, legal authority, and apparatuses
on peaceful domestic activism, its the entirely casual nature with which its done.
Beyond a few PR tweaks, there doesnt seem to be, in any of these internal
documents, an ounce of doubt or hesitation as to whether or not using systems set
up ostensibly to combat al-Qaeda should be so quickly turned on domestic activism.
If all you have is a hammer, as the cliche goes, everything looks like a nail. Weve
given our hyper-militarized police and the FBI the hammer of coordinated mass
surveillance, infiltration, and monitoring in the name of fighting a phenomenon that
kills fewer people a year than bee stings, It was only a matter of time, therefore,
that mass protests would begin to look like a nail in the eyes of our paranoid, overequipped security officials.
Predictive
policing, also known as Total Information Awareness, is described as using
advanced technological tools and data analysis to preempt crime. It utilizes
trends, patterns, sequences, and affinities found in data to make determinations
about when and where crimes will occur. This model is deceptive, however,
because it presumes data inputs to be neutral. They arent. In a racially
every member of this department technology that wouldve been unheard of even a few years ago.
Just as stop and frisk legitimized an initial, unwarranted contact between police
and people of color, almost 90 percent of whom turn out to be innocent of any
crime, suspicious activities reporting and the dragnet approach of fusion centers
target communities of color. One review of such reports collected in Los Angeles shows approximately
75 percent were of people of color. This is the future of policing in America, and it should
terrify you as much as it terrifies me. Unfortunately, it probably doesnt, because my life
is at far greater risk than the lives of white Americans, especially those reporting
on the issue in the media or advocating in the halls of power.
Kayyali 14 Boardmember of the National Lawyers Guild S.F. Bay Area, former
member of the 2012 Bill of Rights Defense Committee Legal Fellow, and member of
the EFF activism team. (Nadia Kayyali, Why Fusion Centers Matter: FAQ, April 7,
2014, https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/04/why-fusion-centers-matter-faq)//RP
Do fusion centers increase racial and religious profiling? The weak
standards around SAR are particularly concerning because of the way they
can lead to racial and religious profiling. SARs can originate from
untrained civilians as well as law enforcement, and as one woman pointed out at
a BCOT event people who might already be a little racist who are 'observing' a
white man photographing a bridge are going to view it a little differently
than people observing me, a woman with a hijab, photographing a bridge.
The bottom line is that bias is not eliminated by so-called observed behavior
standards. Furthermore, once an investigation into a SAR has been initiated,
existing law enforcement bias can come into play; SARs give law enforcement a
reason to initiate contact that might not otherwise exist. Unsurprisingly, like most
tools of law enforcement, public records act requests have shown that people
of color often end up being the target of SARs: One review of SARs
collected through Public Records Act requests in Los Angeles showed that
78% of SARs were filed on non-whites. An audit by the Los Angeles Police
Department's Inspector General puts that number at 74%, still a shockingly high
number. A review of SARs obtained by the ACLU of Northern California also
show that most of the reports demonstrate bias and are based on
conjecture rather than articulable suspicion of criminal activity. Some of the
particularly concerning SARs include titles like "Suspicious ME [Middle Eastern]
Males Buy Several Large Pallets of Water" and "Suspicious photography of Folsom
Dam by Chinese Nationals." The latter SAR resulted in police contact: "Sac[ramento]
County Sheriffs Deputy contacted 3 adult Asian males who were taking photos of
Folsom Dam. They were evasive when the deputy asked them for identification and
said their passports were in their vehicle." Both of these SARs were entered into
FBI's eGuardian database. Not only that, there have been disturbing examples
of racially biased informational bulletins coming from fusion centers. A
2009 "North Central Texas Fusion Center Prevention Awareness Bulletin "
implies that tolerance towards Muslims is dangerous and that Islamic
militants are using methods such as "hip-hop boutiques" and "online social
networks" to indoctrinate youths in America.
Fusion centers perpetuate racial profiling.
Monahan 10, (Torin Monahan is a Professor of Communication Studies at The
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His research focuses on institutional
transformations with new technologies, with a particular emphasis on surveillance
and security programs, The Future of Security? Surveillance Operations at
Homeland Security Fusion Centers, June 2010,
http://publicsurveillance.com/papers/FC_Social_Justice.pdf)//JK
A terrorism threat assessment produced by Virginias fusion center surfaced in
2009 and sparked outrage because it identified students at colleges and universities
especially at historically black universitiesas posing a potential terrorist threat
(Sizemore, 2009). In the report, universities were targeted because of their diversity,
which is seen as threatening because it might inspire radicalization. The report says: Richmonds history as the
capital city of the Confederacy, combined with the citys current demographic concentration of African-American
residents, contributes to the continued presence of race-based extremist groups...[and student groups] are
recognized as a radicalization node for almost every type of extremist group (Virginia Fusion Center, 2009: 9).
Although the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and others have rightly decried the racial-profiling implications
of such biased claims being codified in an official document ,
interpretation that minority students will be and probably have been targeted for
surveillance. The report argues: In order to detect and deter terrorist attacks, it is essential that information
regarding suspected terrorists and suspicious activity in Virginia be closely monitored and reported in a timely
2009). Another threat-assessment report, compiled by the Missouri Information Analysis Center (MIAC), found the
modern militia movement to be worthy of focused investigation. The 2009 report predicted a resurgence in rightwing militia activities because of high levels of unemployment and anger at the election of the nations first black
president, Barack Obama, who many right-wing militia members might view as illegitimate and/or in favor of
stronger gun-control laws (Missouri Information Analysis Center, 2009). The greatest stir caused by the report was
its claim that militia members most commonly associate with 3rd party political groups.... These members are
usually supporters of former Presidential Candidate: Ron Paul, Chuck Baldwin, and Bob Barr (Ibid.: 7). When the
report circulated, many libertarians and Tea Party members took great offense, thinking the document argued
that supporters of third-party political groups were more likely to be dangerous militia members or terrorists. In
response, libertarian activists formed a national network called Operation Defuse, which is devoted to uncovering
and criticizing the activities of fusion centers and is actively filing open-records requests and attempting to conduct
tours of fusion centers. Operation Defuse could be construed as a counter-surveillance group (Monahan, 2006)
that arose largely because of outrage over the probability of political profiling by state-surveillance agents. Fusion
centers have also been implicated in scandals involving covert infiltrations of nonviolent groups, including peace-
The most
astonishing of the known cases involved the Maryland Coordination and Analysis
Center (MCAC). In response to an ACLU freedom of information lawsuit, it came to
light in 2008 that the Maryland State Police had conducted covert investigations of
at least 53 peace activists and anti-death penalty activists for a period of 14
months. The investigation proceeded despite admissions by the covert agent that
she saw no indication of violent activities or violent intentions on the part of
group members (Newkirk, 2010). Nonetheless, in the federal database used by the
police and accessed by MCAC, activists were listed as being suspected of the
primary crime of Terrorismanti-government (German and Stanley, 2008: 8). Although it
is unclear exactly what role the fusion center played in these activities, they were
most likely involved in and aware of the investigation . After all, as Mike German and Jay Stanley
(2008: 8) explain: Fusion centers are clearly intended to be the central focal point for
sharing terrorism-related information. If the MCAC was not aware of the information the state police
activist groups, anti-death penalty groups, animal-rights groups, Green Party groups, and others.
collected over the 14 months of this supposed terrorism investigation, this fact would call into question whether the
MCAC is accomplishing its mission.
(Ibid.). Connecticuts fusion center, the Connecticut Intelligence Center (CTIC), had conducted a threat assessment
for the event and had circulated photographs of Krayeske and others to police in advance (Krayeske, 2007). The
police report reads: The Connecticut Intelligence Center and the Connecticut State Police Central Intelligence Unit
had briefed us [the police] on possible threats to Governor Rell by political activist [sic], to include photographs of
the individuals. One of the photographs was of the accused Kenneth Krayeske (quoted in Levine, 2007). Evidently,
part of the reason Krayeske was targeted was that intelligence analysts,
were monitoring blog posts on the Internet and interpreted one of them as
threatening: Who is going to protest the inaugural ball with me?... No need to make
nice (CNN.com, 2009). According to a CNN report on the arrest, after finding that blog post, police began
digging for information, mining public and commercial data bases. They learned Krayeske had been a
Green Party campaign director, had protested the gubernatorial debate and had
once been convicted for civil disobedience. He had no history of violence (Ibid.). The
person who read Krayeske his Miranda rights and attempted to interview him in custody was Andrew Weaver, a
sergeant for the City of Hartford Police Department who also works in the CTIC fusion center (Department of
fusion centers, as long as terrorism is defined as coercive or intimidating acts that are intended to shape
Evidence
from the Maryland and Connecticut fusion center cases suggests that their
representatives are either involved in data-gathering and investigative work, or are
at least complicit in such activities, including illegal spying operations (German and
Stanley, 2008). The Connecticut case further shows that individuals working at fusion
centers are actively monitoring online sources and interviewing suspects, a
departure from the official Fusion Center Guidelines that stress exchange and
analysis of data, not data acquisition through investigations (U.S. Department of Justice,
2006). One important issue here is that fusion centers occupy ambiguous organizational positions . Many of
them are located in police departments or are combined with FBI Joint Terrorism
Task Forces, but their activities are supposed to be separate and different from the
routine activities of the police or the FBI. A related complication is that fusion center
employees often occupy multiple organizational roles (e.g., police officers or National Guard
government policy, any dissidence or political dissident is suspect to fusion centers (Fein, 2009).
members and fusion center analysts), which can lead to an understandable, but nonetheless problematic, blurring
of professional identities, rules of conduct, and systems of accountability. Whereas in 2010 DHS and the
Department of Justice responded to concerns about profiling by implementing a civil liberties certification
requirement for fusion centers, public oversight and accountability of fusion centers are becoming even more
difficult and unlikely because of a concerted effort to exempt fusion centers from freedom of information requests.
Another tactic used by fusion center representatives to thwart open-records requests is to claim that there is no
material product for them to turn over because they only access, rather than retain, information (Hylton,
2009). Although it may be tempting to view these cases of fusion center missteps and infractions as isolated
the flexibility of fusion centers affords the incorporation of xenophobic and racist beliefs. In 2009, the North Central
Fusion System produced a report that argued that the United States is
especially vulnerable to terrorist infiltration because the country is too tolerant and
accommodating of religious difference, especially of Islam. Through several indicators, the
Texas
report lists supposed signs that the country is gradually being invaded and transformed: Muslim cab drivers in
Minneapolis refuse to carry passengers who have alcohol in their possession; the Indianapolis airport in 2007
installed footbaths to accommodate Muslim prayer; public schools schedule prayer breaks to accommodate Muslim
students; pork is banned in the workplace; etc. (North Central Texas Fusion System, 2009: 4). Because the threats
to Texas are significant,
the fusion center advises keeping an eye out for Muslim civil
liberties groups and sympathetic individuals, organizations, or media that might
carry their message: hip-hop bands, social networking sites, online chat forums,
blogs, and even the U.S. Department of Treasury (Ibid.). Recent infiltration of peace
groups seems to reproduce some of the sordid history of political surveillance of
U.S. citizens, such as the FBI and CIAs COINTELPRO program, which targeted civil
rights leaders and those peacefully protesting against the Vietnam War, among others
(Churchill and Vander Wall, 2002). A contemporary case involves a U.S. Army agent who infiltrated a nonviolent,
anti-war protest group in Olympia, Washington, in 2007. A military agent spying on civilians likely violated the Posse
Comitatus Act. Moreover, this agent actively shared intelligence with the Washington State Fusion Center, which
shared it more broadly (Anderson, 2010).
American Civil Liberties Union today denounced the FBI's use of the
Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) to monitor, interrogate and suppress anti-war and other
political protesters and called on individuals who have been targeted for investigation to come forward. The
ACLU issued the public statement after an article in today's New York Times detailed actions taken by FBI agents
in Missouri, Kansas and Colorado to spy on and interrogate activists in advance of the
Democratic and Republican national conventions. "The FBI's intimidation and
interrogation of peaceful protesters brings back eerie echoes of the days of J. Edgar
Hoover," said Anthony D. Romero, ACLU Executive Director. "Resources and funds established to
fight terrorism should not be misused to target innocent Americans who have done
nothing more than engage in lawful protest and dissent." According to reports from
ACLU offices, law enforcement officials throughout the U.S. have been monitoring
the daily activities of various activists they believe are planning to protest major
national political events, including the upcoming Republican National Convention in New York, which is
expected to draw hundreds of thousands of protesters. In the days leading up to the Democratic National
men in their early 20's were subpoenaed to testify before a federal grand jury on July 29, the same day they
planned on protesting the Democratic convention. The men, who planned to drive to Boston with an activist group
based in St. Louis, first realized they were being targeted by the FBI when agents visited the homes of their parents
a week before the subpoenas. In addition to asking about easily accessible information such as current addresses,
the agents also asked the parents for information on their sons' political activities. The very next day, agents visited
the three men directly and asked them if they had any knowledge of individuals planning "criminally disorderly
behavior" at the national conventions, the presidential debates, the election or any other event. According to the
men, the surveillance increased after the visits, and conditions did not improve until after they contacted the ACLU.
"These young men are quite terrified by the experience of being targeted by the Joint Terrorism Task Force because
of their protest activities," said Denise Lieberman, Legal Director of the ACLU of Eastern Missouri. "The
FBI
JTTF visits
are an abuse of power, designed to intimidate these kids from exercising their
constitutional right to protest government policies and associate with others who want to protest
Despite the settlement, Denver's intelligence unit contributes two fulltime officers to the JTTF. "These
government policies," said Mark Silverstein, Legal Director of the ACLU of Colorado. The ACLU denounced JTTF
The ACLU said that there has been a noticeable increase in domestic spying on political protesters in recent years.
One of the most famous cases is the infiltration of the anti-war group Peace Fresno by a member of the Fresno
County Sheriff Department's Anti-Terrorism unit in 2003. Peace Fresno discovered one of its members had actually
been a government agent through an obituary published after his death in a motorcycle accident. The incident is
portrayed in Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 as an example of civil liberties violations in the post-September 11th
climate. The ACLU said it is continuing to monitor incidents of FBI intimidation and interrogation.
Kayyali 14 Boardmember of the National Lawyers Guild S.F. Bay Area, former
member of the 2012 Bill of Rights Defense Committee Legal Fellow, and member of
the EFF activism team. (Nadia Kayyali, Why Fusion Centers Matter: FAQ, April 7,
2014, https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/04/why-fusion-centers-matter-faq)//RP
Do fusion centers facilitate political repression?
Fusion centers have been used to record and share information about First
Amendment protected activities in a way that aids repressive police
activity and chills freedom of association.
A series of public records act requests in Massachusetts showed: "Officers
monitor demonstrations, track the beliefs and internal dynamics of
activist groups, and document this information with misleading criminal
labels in searchable and possibly widely-shared electronic reports." The
documents included intelligence reports addressing issues such internal
group discussions and protest planning, and showed evidence of police
contact.
For example, one report indicated that "Activists arrested for trespassing at a
consulate were interviewed by three surveillance officers 'in the hopes
that these activists may reach out to the officers in the future.' They were
asked about their organizing efforts and for the names of other
organizers."
Monahan 10,
2009). Another threat-assessment report, compiled by the Missouri Information Analysis Center (MIAC), found the
modern militia movement to be worthy of focused investigation. The 2009 report predicted a resurgence in rightwing militia activities because of high levels of unemployment and anger at the election of the nations first black
president, Barack Obama, who many right-wing militia members might view as illegitimate and/or in favor of
stronger gun-control laws (Missouri Information Analysis Center, 2009). The greatest stir caused by the report was
its claim that militia members most commonly associate with 3rd party political groups.... These members are
usually supporters of former Presidential Candidate: Ron Paul, Chuck Baldwin, and Bob Barr (Ibid.: 7). When the
report circulated, many libertarians and Tea Party members took great offense, thinking the document argued
that supporters of third-party political groups were more likely to be dangerous militia members or terrorists. In
response, libertarian activists formed a national network called Operation Defuse, which is devoted to uncovering
and criticizing the activities of fusion centers and is actively filing open-records requests and attempting to conduct
tours of fusion centers. Operation Defuse could be construed as a counter-surveillance group (Monahan, 2006)
that arose largely because of outrage over the probability of political profiling by state-surveillance agents. Fusion
centers have also been implicated in scandals involving covert infiltrations of nonviolent groups, including peace-
The most
astonishing of the known cases involved the Maryland Coordination and Analysis
Center (MCAC). In response to an ACLU freedom of information lawsuit, it came to
light in 2008 that the Maryland State Police had conducted covert investigations of
at least 53 peace activists and anti-death penalty activists for a period of 14
months. The investigation proceeded despite admissions by the covert agent that
she saw no indication of violent activities or violent intentions on the part of
group members (Newkirk, 2010). Nonetheless, in the federal database used by the
police and accessed by MCAC, activists were listed as being suspected of the
primary crime of Terrorismanti-government (German and Stanley, 2008: 8). Although it
is unclear exactly what role the fusion center played in these activities, they were
most likely involved in and aware of the investigation . After all, as Mike German and Jay Stanley
(2008: 8) explain: Fusion centers are clearly intended to be the central focal point for
sharing terrorism-related information. If the MCAC was not aware of the information the state police
activist groups, anti-death penalty groups, animal-rights groups, Green Party groups, and others.
collected over the 14 months of this supposed terrorism investigation, this fact would call into question whether the
MCAC is accomplishing its mission.
partnerships between fusion centers and law enforcement was revealed with the
2007 arrest of Kenneth Krayeske, a Green Party member in Connecticut. On January 3, 2007,
Krayeske was taking photographs of Connecticut Governor M. Jodi Rell at her inaugural parade. He was not
engaged in protest at the time. While serving as the manager of the Green Partys gubernatorial
candidate, he had publicly challenged Governor Rell over the issue of why she would not debate his candidate
(Ibid.). Connecticuts fusion center, the Connecticut Intelligence Center (CTIC), had conducted a threat assessment
for the event and had circulated photographs of Krayeske and others to police in advance (Krayeske, 2007). The
police report reads: The Connecticut Intelligence Center and the Connecticut State Police Central Intelligence Unit
had briefed us [the police] on possible threats to Governor Rell by political activist [sic], to include photographs of
the individuals. One of the photographs was of the accused Kenneth Krayeske (quoted in Levine, 2007). Evidently,
person who read Krayeske his Miranda rights and attempted to interview him in custody was Andrew Weaver, a
sergeant for the City of Hartford Police Department who also works in the CTIC fusion center (Department of
fusion centers, as long as terrorism is defined as coercive or intimidating acts that are intended to shape
Evidence
from the Maryland and Connecticut fusion center cases suggests that their
representatives are either involved in data-gathering and investigative work, or are
at least complicit in such activities, including illegal spying operations (German and
Stanley, 2008). The Connecticut case further shows that individuals working at fusion
centers are actively monitoring online sources and interviewing suspects, a
departure from the official Fusion Center Guidelines that stress exchange and
analysis of data, not data acquisition through investigations (U.S. Department of Justice,
2006). One important issue here is that fusion centers occupy ambiguous organizational positions . Many of
them are located in police departments or are combined with FBI Joint Terrorism
Task Forces, but their activities are supposed to be separate and different from the
routine activities of the police or the FBI. A related complication is that fusion center
employees often occupy multiple organizational roles (e.g., police officers or National Guard
government policy, any dissidence or political dissident is suspect to fusion centers (Fein, 2009).
members and fusion center analysts), which can lead to an understandable, but nonetheless problematic, blurring
of professional identities, rules of conduct, and systems of accountability. Whereas in 2010 DHS and the
Department of Justice responded to concerns about profiling by implementing a civil liberties certification
requirement for fusion centers, public oversight and accountability of fusion centers are becoming even more
difficult and unlikely because of a concerted effort to exempt fusion centers from freedom of information requests.
Another tactic used by fusion center representatives to thwart open-records requests is to claim that there is no
material product for them to turn over because they only access, rather than retain, information (Hylton,
2009). Although it may be tempting to view these cases of fusion center missteps and infractions as isolated
Fusion System produced a report that argued that the United States is
especially vulnerable to terrorist infiltration because the country is too tolerant and
accommodating of religious difference, especially of Islam. Through several indicators, the
Texas
report lists supposed signs that the country is gradually being invaded and transformed: Muslim cab drivers in
Minneapolis refuse to carry passengers who have alcohol in their possession; the Indianapolis airport in 2007
installed footbaths to accommodate Muslim prayer; public schools schedule prayer breaks to accommodate Muslim
students; pork is banned in the workplace; etc. (North Central Texas Fusion System, 2009: 4). Because the threats
to Texas are significant,
the fusion center advises keeping an eye out for Muslim civil
liberties groups and sympathetic individuals, organizations, or media that might
carry their message: hip-hop bands, social networking sites, online chat forums,
blogs, and even the U.S. Department of Treasury (Ibid.). Recent infiltration of peace
groups seems to reproduce some of the sordid history of political surveillance of
U.S. citizens, such as the FBI and CIAs COINTELPRO program, which targeted civil
rights leaders and those peacefully protesting against the Vietnam War, among others
(Churchill and Vander Wall, 2002). A contemporary case involves a U.S. Army agent who infiltrated a nonviolent,
anti-war protest group in Olympia, Washington, in 2007. A military agent spying on civilians likely violated the Posse
Comitatus Act. Moreover, this agent actively shared intelligence with the Washington State Fusion Center, which
shared it more broadly (Anderson, 2010).
Redden 13 (Molly Redden is a writer for the New Republic which years of
journalism experience, Is the Chilling Effect Real New Republic,
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/113219/doj-seizure-ap-records-raises-questionchilling-effect-real)
Since news broke Monday that the Justice Department had secretly accessed the
phone records of Associated Press reporters and editors over a two-month period
likely as a result of its anonymously sourced story on a foiled al Qaeda plot to blow
up a U.S.-bound planeno watchwords have gotten more exercise than chilling
effect. A bevy of lawmakers, such as Sen. Mark Udall, of the Select Committee on
Intelligence, and Sen. Richard Blumenthal, of the Judiciary
Committee, have invoked the phrase in calling for the DOJ to justify its actions,
while pundits have used it to denounce the same actions as unconscionable: Not
only is it chilling, it is stupid, the National JournalsRon Fournier told the hosts of
MSNBC's Morning Joe. The APs own story on the probe paraphrases an ACLU
lawyer saying that journalists may be cowed out of chasing down national security
leads in the face of government scrutiny. But does federal overbearance really have
a chilling effect? Apparently so. New York Times reporter Eric Lichtblau told me in
an email that, after writing a Pulitzer Prizewinning series of stories with James
Risen that revealed major clandestine counterterrorism programs under Bush,
like warrantless wiretaps, I heard from various news sources that the FBI had been
monitoring my phone and Internet communications with certain people as part of its
leak investigation into our NSA story. Nearly every national security reporter
reached Tuesday had a similar story to tell, as do plenty of their peers. Lichtblau
said that subpoena threats from the DOJ were the trigger that caused him to quit
writing national security stories in the closing days of the Bush administrati on.
When I initially moved off the Justice Department beat in 2009, part of the thinking
there was the threat of the subpoena, he said, adding to what hed written in his
email: While the Justice Department never made good on the threat, it certainly
made it more difficult to do my job in dealing with confidential sources when you
realize you may be forced to testify before a grand jury or risk going to jail to
protect a source. Rather than roll the dice with incoming Attorney General Eric
Holder, Lichtblau decided to cover money-and-politics instead.
I KNEW ABOUT COINTELPRO AND its infiltration of the Black Panthers and the
American Indian Movement. I followed the revelations of recent NYPD spying
on Muslim communities and activists. And in New Orleans, I had directly
experienced the damage created by Brandon Darby an FBI informant who
posed as an activist and created conflict when he moved here shortly after
Hurricane Katrina. Still, finding out that the NYPD had a file on me didn't
exactly make my day It was invasive. It was wrong. And it made me want to
fight back. Here's what happened. Back in 2008, a People's Summit was
organized in New Orleans as a grassroots response to a meeting here of the
leaders of the United States, Mexico, and Canada where they pledged to
expand "security cooperation" as part of the North American Free Trade
Agreement (NAFTA). Activists from across the hemisphere came together to
present an alternative vision of globalization, one that empowered
communities rather than corporations. Local groups also participated,
including an anti-racist training organization called the People's Institute for
Survival and Beyond, the New Orleans Workers' Center for Racial Justice,
and the local chapter of the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement. The gathering
consisted mostly of panels, workshops, and discussions, with a couple
of protest marches. There was street theater from local day laborers,
testimony from Mexican and Canadian workers, and links drawn between the
profiteering after Hurricane Katrina and the exploitation that NAFTA
encouraged. Although there were some street protests, none had more than
a few hundred participants, and there were no arrests, not even
of the symbolic kind. It was an exciting and educational gathering, but there
was nothing to justify the involvement of any police force. The only danger
was the threat of ideas. And yet the NYPD sent agents down to watch people
and write up a report. They mentioned me by name, saying I led a discussion
on Palestine and called for an international boycott of Israeli goods. They also
cited organizations I had worked with in the past, such as the International
Solidarity Movement. The NYPD report was inaccurate: It described me as an
organizer of the protests, when, in fact, I was just another participant. It
identified me as one of the main speakers, when, in fact, I introduced a film
at an arts festival that ran concurrently with the summit. I couldn't help
wondering, "Why me? And why this gathering?" I also wondered, "What else
about me is buried in files somewhere?" My mind went back
to the undercover cop Darby. He pitted longtime organizers against each other.
He seemed to reserve special scorn for women and LGBTQ activists. He undermined
organizing, usurping projects from others and working to redirect funding away from
local community leaders. I was not particularly close to Darby, but I had many
interactions with him and should have seen - and stood against - the effect he was
Kayyali 14 Boardmember of the National Lawyers Guild S.F. Bay Area, former
member of the 2012 Bill of Rights Defense Committee Legal Fellow, and member of
the EFF activism team. (Nadia Kayyali, Why Fusion Centers Matter: FAQ, April 7,
2014, https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/04/why-fusion-centers-matter-faq)//RP
SARs do no meet legally cognizable standards for search or seizure under
the Fourth amendment. Normally, the government must satisfy reasonable
suspicion or probable cause standards when searching a person or place
or detaining someone. While SARs themselves are not a search or seizure, they
are used by law enforcement to initiate investigations, or even more
intrusive actions such as detentions, on the basis of evidence that does
not necessarily rise to the level of probable cause or reasonable suspicion.
In other words, while the standard for SAR sounds like it was written to
comport with the constitutional standards for investigation already in
place, it does not.
In fact, the specific set of behaviors listed in the National SAR standards include
innocuous activities such as:
taking pictures or video of facilities, buildings, or infrastructure in a manner that
would arouse suspicion in a reasonable person, and demonstrating unusual
interest in facilities, buildings, or infrastructure beyond mere casual or professional
(e.g. engineers) interest such that a reasonable person would consider the activity
suspicious. Examples include observation through binoculars, taking notes,
attempting to measure distances, etc.
These standards are clearly ripe for abuse of discretion.
VIOLATES PRIVACY
Fusion Centers majorly violate America privacy in five ways.
ACLU no date but cites 2012 American Civil Liberties Union, a national, nonprofit organization dedicated to upholding constitutional rights, over 500,000
members, and a legal assistance provider. (ACLU, More About Fusion Centers,
2012, https://www.aclu.org/more-about-fusion-centers?redirect=spy-files/moreabout-fusion-centers)//RP
Fusion centers were designed to organize localized domestic intelligence
gathering into an integrated system that can distribute data both horizontally
across a network of fusion centers and vertically, down to local law enforcement
and up to the federal intelligence community. These centers can employ officials
from federal, state and local law enforcement and homeland security agencies, as
well as other state and local government entities, the federal intelligence
community, the military and even private companies, to spy on Americans in
virtually complete secrecy.
We found that while fusion centers vary widely in what they do, but five
overarching problems with these domestic intelligence operations put
Americans' privacy and civil liberties at risk:
1
identified, so in July 2008 we published a follow-up report. Today there are at least
77 fusion centers across the country receiving federal funding.
Since these ACLU reports were published, a number of troubling intelligence
products produced by fusion centers have leaked to the public:
The same month, but on the other side of the political spectrum, a Missouri
Fusion Center released a report on "the modern militia movement" that
claimed militia members are "usually supporters" of third-party presidential
candidates like Ron Paul and Bob Barr.
taking place fast enough and fusion centers and the risks they pose only
continue to grow.
In October 2012, the Senate Homeland Security Committee Permanent
Subcommittee on Investigations released a highly critical report on fusion centers,
revealing that public officials claims about their effectiveness were not accurate,
that federal funds designated for fusion centers were not properly accounted for,
and that intelligence analysts and reports officers lacked sufficient training and
often produced reports that infringed on civil rights. In response, the conservative
Heritage Foundation called for cutting back the number of fusion centers. With
ample evidence of abuse, the time has come for Congress and your local
government representatives to act by cutting off funds to fusion centers that do not
have a narrowly-tailored law enforcement mission, strict guidelines to protect
Americans privacy, and independent oversight to prevent abuse.
Court put it in perhaps its most important free speech decision of the twentieth century, New York Times Co. v.
even if society must endure some of that speechs undesirable consequences. Intellectual-privacy theory explains
why we should extend chillingeffect protections to intellectual surveillance, especially traditional-style surveillance
Professor Timothy Macklem argues that [t]he isolating shield of privacy enables people to develop and exchange
For
better and for worse, then, privacy is sponsor and guardian to the creative and the
subversive.91 A meaningful measure of intellectual privacy should be erected to
shield these activities from the normalizing gaze of surveillance. This shield should
be justified on the basis of our cultural intuitions and empirical insights about the
normalizing effects of surveillance. But it must also be tempered by the chillingeffect doctrines normative commitment to err on the side of First Amendment
values even if proof is imperfect. Despite often displaying an intuitive understanding
that surveillance might be potentially harmful, courts have struggled to understand
why. This absence of clarity has led to courts misunderstanding and diminishing privacy
interests that conflict with other values. When faced with balancing a vague and poorly
articulated privacy right against state interests such as the prevention of terrorist
ideas, or to foster and share activities, that the presence or even awareness of other people might stifle.
attacks, surveillance tends to win. Courts also make the mistake that the ACLU v.
NSA court made and cast surveillance as solely a Fourth Amendment issue of crime
prevention, rather than as one that also threatens intellectual freedom and First Amendment
values of the highest order.92 Other decisions mirror the mistake of the Al-Haramain court in concluding that
preventing secret surveillance is less important than inconveniencing the executive branch.93 Additionally, some
courts can make the mistake that the Clapper Court made, refusing to recognize as justiciable harms the costly
measures that people must adopt to shield their communications from government surveillance.94 Shadowy
regimes of surveillance corrode the constitutional commitment to intellectual freedom that lies at the heart of most
purely intellectual surveillance are thankfully rare, but the coercive effects of monitoring by our friends and
acquaintances are much more common. We are constrained in our actions by peer pressure at least as much as by
the state. Moreover, records collected by private parties can be sold to or subpoenaed by the government, which
(as noted above) has shown a voracious interest in all kinds of personal information, particularly records related to
condition, or visits embarrassing web sites, or has cheated on his expenses or his taxes. All of us have secrets we
would prefer not be made public. Surveillance allows those secrets greater opportunities to come out, and it gives
the watchers power that can be used nefariously. The risk of the improper use of surveillance records persists over
time. Most of the former communist states in Eastern Europe have passed laws strictly regulating access to the
surveillance files of the communist secret police. The primary purpose of such laws is to prevent the blackmail of
political candidates who may have been surveilled under the former regime.101 The experience of these laws
reveals, moreover, that the risk of such blackmail is one that the law cannot completely prevent after the fact.
Professor Maria Los explains that [s]ecret surveillance files are routinely turned into a weapon in political struggles,
seriously undermining democratic processes and freedoms.102
Jaycox and Timm 12 Legislative Analyst for EFF concerning civil liberties
and surveillance law, and co-founder/executive director/journalist of the Freedom
Press Foundation. (Mark Jaycox and Trevor Timm, New Senate Report:
Counterterrorism "Fusion Centers" Invade Innocent Americans Privacy and Dont
Stop Terrorism, October 9, 2012 https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/10/new-senatereport-confirms-government-counterterrorism-centers-dont-stop)//RP
An entire section of the Senate report is dedicated to Privacy Act
violations and the collection of information completely unrelated to any
criminal or terrorist activity in the HIRs. In one instance, a DHS intelligence
officer filed a draft report about a US citizen who appeared at a Muslim organization
to deliver a day-long motivational talk and a lecture on positive parenting. In
another, one intelligence officer decided to report on two men who were fishing at
the US-Mexican border. A reviewer commented, Ithink that this should never
have been nominated for production, nor passed through three reviews. A report
was even initiated on a motorcycle group for passing out leaflets informing
members of their legal rights. A reviewer commented, "The advice given to the
groups members is protected by the First Amendment."
Over and over again the Senate report quotes reviewers chastising DHS
officials for recording constitutionally protected activities and for
publishing such reports. One reviewer wrote, The number of things that
scare me about this report are almost too many to write into this [review]
form." In some cases, DHS retained cancelled draft reports that may have
contained information in violation of the Privacy Act for a year or more
after the date of the reports' cancellation. Worse, the intelligence officials
responsible "faced no apparent sanction for their transgressions."
While its commendable the Senate exposing these civil liberties violations, the
problems detailed in the report are not new. Since the government started its
various information sharing programs after 9/11, media organizations have
Youn 13 (Monica Youn is a Yale law school grad who formerly directed the
campaign finance reform project at the Brennan Center for Justice and is a member
of the bar of the Supreme Court of the United States. The Chilling Effect and the
Problem of Private Action 10/29/13,
http://www.vanderbiltlawreview.org/content/articles/2013/10/Youn_66_Vand_L_Rev_1
473.pdf)
First, the positive-rights account of the chilling effect concept tends to understate
the extent to which governmental chill cases embody and advance the negative
values of the First Amendment. In those cases, as explained above, the chilling
effect stems from the governments violation of a First Amendment rule. Thus, as
the concept of the chilling effect in governmental chill cases has developed, it has
not merely helped advance such positive values as autonomy and self-government.
It has also, crucially, performed a negative-rights function, providing a means for
courts to police and prevent governmental violations of First Amendment norms. As
we saw in our brief survey of the McCarthy-era and civil rightsera cases, invidious
governmental motivation that we would now consider viewpoint discrimination was
apparent on the record in many of these seminal governmental chill cases. But even
in cases where no such animus was present, the Court repeatedly emphasized the
principle that defective laws violate the First Amendment, not merely because they
unnecessarily impoverish public discourse, but also because they provide tools by
which unscrupulous officials might suppress disfavored viewpoints or groups. The
McCarthy era and the civil rights era provided ample historical examples that
governmental officials should not be trusted with such tools, even where such tools
were neutral on their face and did not purport to regulate expression. Even beyond
the possibility of invidious or potential chill, there are good reasons for rules against
government actions that inadvertently deter disproportionate amounts of speech.
We do not want governmental regulators to be so insensitive to First Amendment
values that they indirectly impose disproportionate burdens on speech; nor do we
want the drafters of regulatory rules to be so careless that they unintentionally
sweep significant amounts of protected speech in with other targets of regulation.
Although in a governmental chill case a court may not necessarily be shielding the
exercise of First Amendment rights against direct regulation or suppression, the
court still has an important negative role to play in such regulation or suppression
through indirection or inadvertence.
Hanley 9 [Delinda, news editor of WRMEA, FBI Agent Provocateurs and Fusion
Centers, Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, a non-partisan news
publication, July 2009, http://www.wrmea.org/2009-july/fbi-agent-provocateurs-andfusion-centers-boys-gone-wild.html] MG
AMT chairman Dr. Agha Saeed cited provocative domestic practices and civil rights
abuses which began during the Bush administration but which continue today.
These abuses include mistreating Muslim activists, including Dr. Sami Al-Arian (see
p. 58); labeling as unindicted co-conspirators such respected mainstream Muslim
organizations as CAIR and the Islamic Society of North America in connection with
trials of Muslim charities; and sending FBI agents and informants into mosques to
spy on worshippers. In one notorious case, the FBI hired convicted felon Craig
Monteilh to spy on mosques in Orange County, California from early 2006 through
late 2007. (While he was collecting thousands of dollars for his FBI work inside
mosques, Monteilh conned two women he met at the gym out of nearly $150,000 in
elaborate pharmaceutical scams.) Ahmadullah Niazi, a 34-year-old Afghan
immigrant, and another member of the Islamic Center in Irvine, CA, reported the
con artist to the FBI in June 2007, claiming that Monteilh was espousing terrorist
rhetoric and trying to draw them into a plot to blow up shopping malls and other
buildings. When the FBI refused to investigate, Islamic Center leaders realized
Monteilh must be an agent provocateur, and won a restraining order to prevent him
from returning to the mosque. An FBI agent allegedly told Niazi that the agency
would make his life a living hell if he did not become an informant. Sure enough,
the FBI arrested Niazi on Feb. 20 of this year and charged him with perjury and
passport fraud. The following day Monteilh bragged to the Los Angeles Times that
he was the paid informant who had helped nab Niazi. Another recent FBI sting,
which captured headlines and fueled Islamophobic fires across the country,
involved the June 23, 2006 arrest of the Liberty City Seven, named for the poor,
predominantly Haitian and African-American Miami suburb where the targeted men
lived. Prosecutors accused the seven radical African-American Muslims of
plotting to attack Chicagos Sears Tower and other U.S. buildings. The defendants,
who turned out to belong to a Moorish religion blending Christianity and Islam, said
they thought they were tricking an al-Qaeda member into giving them $50,000.
Defense lawyers portrayed the case as a FBI sting operation and the ensuing arrests
as a play for publicity to highlight the governments campaign against domestic
terrorism. The arrests were announced in Washington, DC at a press conference
hosted by then-Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, giving them maximum news
exposure. It took three trials, three juries and nearly three years, but on May 12
federal prosecutors finally succeeded in gaining convictions of five of the men. What
other elaborate sting operations are under way? Who else is providing special
surveillance of Muslim Americans? In May 2006, seeking to allay fears of FBI spying
in their community, 11 Muslim American leaders, mosques and local organizations
filed a joint Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. They asked for all FBI
Frank Gaffney, Joe Kaufman, or Alan Dershowitz. Are reports generated by think
tanks like the Center for Security Policy, the Middle East Forum, the Israel Project,
and Hudson Institute feeding fusion centers? Just who and what countries have
access to fusion center computer systems? This writer doesnt want to offend the
Department of Homeland Security, the FBI or even fusion centers (and end up with
a hefty personal file). Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, staff appreciated
being able to call on the FBI when our offices were broken into and a safe destroyed
in November 2006. Staff also asked, and received, FBI help when we received a
threatening e-mail during the recent AIPAC conference in Washington, DC. However,
most Americans believe authorities should stick to investigating criminal and violent
activities, and not wage a war on Muslim Americans and others engaged in
constitutionally protected civil rights advocacy and peaceful political activities.
President Obama would be well advised to visit an American mosque and listen to
the Muslims next door.
Walker 12 [Jesse, books editor of Reason magazine, published in the New York
Times and The Washington Post, Fusion Centers: Expensive, Practically Useless,
and Bad For Your Liberty, Reason magazine, libertarian publication, 10/3/12,
http://reason.com/blog/2012/10/03/fusion-centers-expensive-practically-use] MG
The Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs has just
released a report [pdf] on the "fusion centers" that pepper the law-enforcement
landscape -- shadowy intelligence-sharing shops run on the state and local level but
heavily funded by the federal Department of Homeland Security. It is a devastating
document. When a report's recommendations include a plea for the DHS to "track
how much money it gives to each fusion center," you know you're dealing with a
system that has some very basic problems. After reviewing 13 months' worth of the
fusion centers' output, Senate investigators concluded that the centers' reports
were "oftentimes shoddy, rarely timely, sometimes endangering citizens' civil
liberties and Privacy Act protections, occasionally taken from already-published
public sources, and more often than not unrelated to terrorism." One report offered
the vital intelligence that "a certain model of automobile had folding rear seats that
provided access to the trunk without leaving the car," a feature deemed notable
because it "could be useful to human traffickers." Others highlighted illegal
activities by people in the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment (TIDE)
database, which sounds useful until you hear just what those people did that
attracted the centers' attention. One man was caught speeding. Another shoplifted
some shoes. TIDE itself, according to the Senate report, is filled not just with
suspected terrorists but with their "associates," a term broad enough to rope in a
two-year-old boy. Nearly a third of the reports were not even circulated after they
were written, sometimes because they contained no useful information, sometimes
because they "overstepped legal boundaries" in disturbing ways: "Reporting on First
Amendment-protected activities lacking a nexus to violence or criminality; reporting
on or improperly characterizing political, religious or ideological speech that is not
explicitly violent or criminal; and attributing to an entire group the violent or
criminal acts of one or a limited number of the group's members." (One analyst, for
example, felt the need to note that a Muslim community group's list of
recommended readings included four items whose authors were in the TIDE
database.) Interestingly, while the DHS usually refused to publish these problematic
reports, the department also retained them for an "apparantly indefinite" period.
Why did the centers churn out so much useless and illegal material? A former
employee says officers were judged "by the number [of reports] they produced, not
by quality or evaluations they received." Senate investigators were "able to identify
only one case in which an official with a history of serious reporting issues faced any
consequences for his mistakes." Specifically, he had to attend an extra week of
training. Other issues identified in the Senate report: Some of the fusion centers
touted by the Department of Homeland Security do not, in fact, exist. Centers
have reported threats that do not exist either. An alleged Russian "cyberattack"
turned out to be an American network technician accessing a work computer
remotely while on vacation. DHS "was unable to provide an accurate tally of how
much it had granted to states and cities to support fusion centers efforts." Instead it
offered "broad estimates of the total amount of federal dollars spent on fusion
center activities from 2003 to 2011, estimates which ranged from $289 million to
$1.4 billion." When you aren't keeping track of how much you're spending, it
becomes hard to keep track of what that money is being spent on. All sorts of
dubious expenses slipped by. A center in San Diego "spent nearly $75,000 on 55
flat-screen televisions," according to the Senate report. "When asked what the
televisions were being used for, officials said they displayed calendars, and were
used for 'open-source monitoring.' Asked to define 'open-source monitoring,' SDLECC officials said they meant 'watching the news.'" The report is also filled with
signs of stonewalling. A "2010 assessment of state and local fusion centers
conducted at the request of DHS found widespread deficiencies in the centers' basic
counterterrorism information-sharing capabilities," for example. "DHS did not share
that report with Congress or discuss its findings publicly. When the Subcommittee
requested the assessment as part of its investigation, DHS at first denied it existed,
then disputed whether it could be shared with Congress, before ultimately providing
a copy." And then there's the matter of mission creep. Many centers have adopted
an "all-crime, all-hazards" approach that shifts their focus from stopping terrorism
and onto a broader spectrum of threats. You could make a reasonable case that this
is a wiser use of public resources -- terrorism is rare, after all, and the DHS-driven
movement away from the all-hazards approach in the early post-9/11 years had
disastrous results. Unfortunately, the leading "hazards" on the fusion centers'
agenda appear to be drugs and illegal aliens. At any rate, the DHS should stop citing
the centers as a key part of America's counterterrorism efforts if those centers have
found better (or easier) things to do than trying to fight terror.
Isikoff 12 NBC Reporter graduated from Washington University in St. Louis with
a B.A. and received a master's degree in journalism from Northwestern University's
Medill School of Journalism. (Michael Isikoff, Homeland Security 'fusion' centers spy
on citizens, produce 'shoddy' work, report says, October 2, 2012,
http://investigations.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/10/02/14187433-homeland-securityfusion-centers-spy-on-citizens-produce-shoddy-work-report-says?lite)//RP
The ranking Republican on a Senate panel on Wednesday accused the
Department of Homeland Security of hiding embarrassing information
about its so-called "fusion" intelligence sharing centers, charging that the
program has wasted hundreds of millions of dollars while contributing
little to the country's counterterrorism efforts. In a 107-page report released
late Tuesday, the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations said that
Homeland Security has spent up to $1.4 billion funding fusion centers -- in
effect, regional intelligence sharing centers-- that have produced "useless"
reports while at the same time collecting information on the innocent
Sanchez 12 Former Washington Editor for Ars Technica, Senior Fellow at the
Cato Institute, graduate in Political Science from New York University. (Julian
Sanchez, Our Broken Panopticon: Senate Report Finds Fusion Centers Expensive &
Useless, October 4, 2012, http://www.cato.org/blog/our-broken-panopticon-senatereport-finds-fusion-centers-expensive-useless)//RP
For years, top officials at the Department of Homeland Security have touted fusion
centersdesigned to share security information between state, local, and federal
government agencies as a vital tool for strengthening homeland security, a
proven and invaluable tool, and one of the centerpieces of our counterterrorism
strategy. But a blistering new bipartisan Senate report paints a radically
different picture, exposing these centers as a costly boondoggle that
flouted civil liberties safeguards, lacked basic accountability, and
produced intelligence that was overwhelmingly useless or irrelevantor
as one particularly candid official put it, a load of crap.
How costly are they? Incredibly, DHS cant even say for certain: Estimates of
federal spending on the centers range from $289 million to $1.4 billion.
Given that most states had a distinct shortage of real terrorists to keep tabs on,
much of that money went to purposes utterly unrelated to actual
counterterrorism analysis. One center blew $75,000 on dozens of flat-screen
televisions, supposedly for an intelligence training program that never materialized.
Now the TVs are being used to display calendars, and for open-source
monitoringalso known as watching the news. Other popular purchases
included Sport Utility Vehicles, laptops, and high tech surveillance toys for ordinary
law enforcementmany of which were then given away to other local government
agencies.
How useless are they? One official estimated that 85 percent of the
reports they produced were of no benefit whatever, and the large majority
of reports were unrelated to terrorism. Most of these werent published or
circulated for months, and they often just regurgitated information from
public press reports. Almost all these reports came from centers in just three
states: Most of the 77 fusion centers produced little or nothing at all. Sorry,
make that 68 fusion centersit turns out the official DHS tally included
several that didnt actually exist.
Unsurprisingly, DHS struggled to identify a clear example in which fusion
center intelligence helped identify any actual terroristsand indeed, may
have hampered effective counterterrorism by clogging the intelligence
arteries with predominantly useless information. To keep justifying those
millions of taxpayer dollars, however, DHS touted bogus success stories, like a
report that sowed panic over a Russian cyberattack on a citys water systema
cyberattack that had never happened. When internal assessments began to reveal
the ineffectuality of fusion centers years ago, DHS hid the results from Congress
and kept on praising them publicly.
Of course, civil liberties groups have been warning for years that fusion centers
are more likely to facilitate improper monitoring of citizens than
legitimate security goals. And the Senate report shows they had reason to worry.
One key DHS official revealed a disturbing view of he value of intra-agency
cooperation when he noted that We had fire [departments] one of the few
people who can enter your home without a warrant is a firefighter. One notorious
fusion center report suggested that Libertarian Party members, Ron Paul supporters,
and individuals flying the Gadsden Flag popular with Tea Partiers were likely to be
violent extremists. Many reports were shelved because they documented only
innocent, protected First Amendment activitybut the information in them was
often retained anyway, in potential violation of the Privacy Act.
SURVEILLANCE BAD
FBI Surveillance a Suicide Pact Which Destroys the US Government
and the FBI
Cooper 09 He is a graduate of Amherst College and Duke University Law School, he served as a federal
district court judicial clerk, practiced law, and was a teaching assistant at Harvard University, he has taught
Constitutional Law, Criminal Procedure, Criminal Law, and Race, Gender & Law. ( "Surveillance and Identity
Performance: Some Thoughts Inspired by Martin Luther King" 4-1-2009 )
http://lsr.nellco.org/suffolk_fp/55 //DJ
A novel way of thinking about the FBIs surveillance of King is that the FBI had a
suicide pact with King. The FBI had offered King a onesided deal : destroy yourself
or we will use our surveillance to destroy you . It may be, however, that this suicide
pact was not so one-sided. The FBI may have been destroying itself at the same
time it tried to destroy King.1 In the mid-1970s, the Church Committee would reveal the nature of the
FBIs 1960s surveillance activities. Revelation of the FBIs surveillance of King was a centerpiece of the Church
Committees criticisms of the FBI.
government special is its commitment to the self-actualization of its citizens .8 Selfactualization is the process whereby people create their own identity by means of experimenting with different
behaviors. It is possible for people to live in an environment that is more or less alienating to the way in which they
perform their identities. Performativity scholars such as Devon Carbado and Mitu Gulati say that people can have
an internal sense of self that is distinct from the identity that others attribute to them. 9 Kenji Yoshino emphasizes
that individuals may self-actualize but only when they are generaally free to perform their external identity in ways
that are consistent with their internal senses of self without fear of repercussions. 10 I argue that while the internal
sense of self is not more real than the performance of the self, allowing people to make their internal and performed
As technology increase so is the power of the government. One thing is very clear
that, overspying will dampen the growth of the nation and of an individual. The
effect of surveillance will now be more effective as compare to earlier attempts of
surveillance. The people will feel safe. But the biggest disadvantage is as the power
of the government increase due to developments in the field of the technology ,
there are much more chances of any kind of societal change being halted . If the
government can monitor and stop one major movement they can influence and
deter the masses from further radical ideology. In this lies the ethical violation .
Government of every state should try to work in accordance with the lines of proper
and ethical surveillance. The democratic system needs free political participation
and radical movements in order to progress. People should also understand the
importance of surveillance in the modern society. If the unethical practices of
government surveillance are not kept in check into the future, the ideologies of
freedom of speech and the power of the people be lost forever. Government has the
ultimate responsibility for the protection of its citizen and upholding the values of
the country on which it was founded upon.
the chance of social and political change. The status quo has been set and history
has shown near-perfect success of intrusion and destruction of political and social
movements by a number of surveillance maneuvers and programmes. Not only
does wide-ranging government surveillance dampen political participation but also
presents ethical desecrations
SOLVENCY EXTNS
swept aside in the 1980s with the War on Drugs and, especially, later with the War
on Terror. While significant sections of the public may have consented to
the security state, those who have been among its greatest victimsthe
radical Left, antiwar activists, racial justice and Black liberation
campaigners, and opponents of US foreign policy in Latin America and the
Middle Eastunderstand its workings. Today, we are once again in a period of
revelation, concern, and debate on national security surveillance. Yet if real
change is to be brought about, the racial history of surveillance will need
to be fully confrontedor opposition to surveillance will once again be
easily defeated by racial security narratives. The significance of the Snowden
leaks is that they have laid out the depth of the NSAs mass surveillance with the
kind of proof that only an insider can have. The result has been a generalized
level of alarm as people have become aware of how intrusive surveillance
is in our society, but that alarm remains constrained within a public
debate that is highly abstract, legalistic, and centered on the privacy
rights of the white middle class. On the one hand, most civil liberties
advocates are focused on the technical details of potential legal reforms
and new oversight mechanisms to safeguard privacy. Such initiatives are
likely to bring little change because they fail to confront the racist and
imperialist core of the surveillance system. On the other hand, most
technologists believe the problem of government surveillance can be fixed
simply by using better encryption tools. While encryption tools are useful in
increasing the resources that a government agency would need to monitor an
individual, they do nothing to unravel the larger surveillance apparatus. Meanwhile,
executives of US tech corporations express concerns about loss of sales to foreign
customers concerned about the privacy of data. In Washington and Silicon Valley,
what should be a debate about basic political freedoms is simply a question of
corporate profits. Another and perhaps deeper problem is the use of images of
state surveillance that do not adequately fit the current situationsuch as George
Orwells discussion of totalitarian surveillance. Edward Snowden himself remarked
that Orwell warned us of the dangers of the type of government surveillance we
face today. 70 Reference to Orwells 1984 has been widespread in the current
debate; indeed, sales of the book were said to have soared following Snowdens
revelations. 71 The argument that digital surveillance is a new form of Big Brother
is, on one level, supported by the evidence. For those in certain targeted
groupsMuslims, left-wing campaigners, radical journalistsstate
surveillance certainly looks Orwellian. But this level of scrutiny is not faced by
the general public. The picture of surveillance today is therefore quite different from
the classic images of surveillance that we find in Orwells 1984, which assumes an
undifferentiated mass population subject to government control. What we have
instead today in the United States is total surveillance, not on everyone,
but on very specific groups of people, defined by their race, religion, or
political ideology: people that NSA officials refer to as the bad guys. In
March 2014, Rick Ledgett, deputy director of the NSA, told an audience: Contrary
to some of the stuff thats been printed, we dont sit there and grind out metadata
profiles of average people. If youre not connected to one of those valid intelligence
targets, you are not of interest to us. 72 In the national security world,
Changing focus from crime solves Racism in Justice Systemrequires Policy and Grassroots Organizations
Brewer and Heitzeg 08 (Rose- PhD in Afro-American & African Studies, professor at University of
Minnesota, Nancy A. Professor of Sociology & Critical Studies of Race and Ethnicity at St. Catherine University. The
Racialization of Crime and Punishment: Criminal Justice, Complex Color-Blind Racism, and the Political Economy of
the Prison Industrial American Behavioral Scientist Volume 51 Number 5. Jan. 2008
http://abs.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/51/5/625 7/19/15)
The call for social justice is an implicit call for solutions, a call for remedies, a call for action (Coates, 2004, p.
850). As we have seen, the
exposed and abolished. Reform is insufficien t; there can be no compromise with capitalism.... There can be no
compromise with racism, patriarchy, homophobia and imperialism (Marable, 2002, p. 59). The work of justice must begin
at the micro level; it must emerge from the grass roots . Drawing links between the movements to abolish
slavery and segregation, Davis (2003) asked us to imagine the abolition of prisons and the creation of
alternatives to mass incarceration with all its racist and classist corollaries. Davis (1998b)
identified three key dimensions of this workpublic policy, community organizing, and
academic research: In order to be successful, this project must build bridges between academic work, legislative and other policy
interventions, and grassroots campaigns calling, for example for the decriminalization of drugs and prostitution, and for the reversal of the present
proliferation of prisons and jails. (pp. 71-72) Much of this work is in progress. Organizations such as The Sentencing Project
(http://www.sentencingproject.org/), the Prison Moratorium Project (http://www.nomoreprisons.org), Critical Resistance
(http://www.criticalresistance.org), Families Against Mandatory Minimum Sentencing, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and the
Prison Activist Resource Center (http://www.prisonactivist.org) have successfully linked a large and growing body of research with a critique of
current practices and a call for legislative and policy change. But this latest abolition movement faces a unique challenge. The paradigm
of color-blind racism must be exposed before the deep connections between race,
crime, and political economy become transparent . Hegemonic media coverage and misrepresentations about
the reality of crime and criminal justice must be countered by multiple voices (Davis, 2003; Entman & Rojecki, 2000; Sussman, 2002). As
long as the public course centers on crime not race, class, or gendered racismthe true role of
criminal justice and the prison industrial complex in preserving White supremacy in the context of advanced
capitalism remains invisible.
Key to Democracy
Capitalism Drives world- Prevents Questioning of governments and
Corporations Actions- Iraq/Afghanistan War Proves
Giroux 15 (Henry A. Doctorate in Education McMaster University Chair for Scholarship in the Public Interest.
Domestic terrorism, youth and the politics of disposability Philosophers for Change April 21, 2015
http://philosophersforchange.org/2015/04/28/domestic-terrorism-youth-and-the-politics-of-disposability/ 7.19.2015
The danger is that a global, universally interrelated civilization may produce barbarians from its own midst by forcing millions of people into
conditions which, despite all appearances, are the conditions of savages. Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism Following Hannah
Arendt, a dark cloud of political and ethical ignorance has descended on the United States .[1] Thoughtlessness has
become something that now occupies a privileged, if not celebrated, place in the political landscape and the mainstream cultural apparatuses. A
new kind of infantilism now shapes daily life as adults gleefully take on the role of unthinking children and children are taught to be adults,
stripped of their innocence and subject to a range of disciplinary pressures designed to cripple their ability to be imaginative.[2] Under such
circumstances, agency devolves into a kind of anti-intellectual cretinism evident in the babble of banality produced by Fox News, celebrity
culture, schools modeled after prisons and politicians who support creationism, argue against climate change and denounce almost any form of
reason. The citizen now becomes a consumer; the politician, a slave to corporate money and power; and the burgeoning army of anti-public
intellectuals in the mainstream media present themselves as unapologetic enemies of anything that suggests compassion, a respect for the
commons and democracy itself. Education is no longer a public good but a private right, just as critical thinking is no longer a fundamental
necessity for creating an engaged and socially responsible citizenship. Neoliberalisms disdain for the social is no longer a quote made famous by
Margaret Thatcher. The public sphere is now replaced by private interests, and unbridled individualism rails against any viable notion of
solidarity that might inform the vibrancy of struggle, change, and an expansion of an enlightened and democratic body politic. One outcome is
that we live at a time in which institutions that were designed to limit human suffering and indignity and protect the public from the boom and
bust cycles of capitalist markets have been either weakened or abolished.[3] Free market policies, values and practices, with their now
unrestrained emphasis on the privatization of public wealth, the denigration of social protections and the deregulation of economic activity,
influence practically every commanding political and economic institution in North America. Finance
live in an era in which there is near zero tolerance for democratic protest and infinite
tolerance for the crimes of bankers and government embezzlers which affect the lives of millions.[ 12] This
is certainly true of the United States. How else to explain the FBIs willingness to label as a terrorist threat youthful
activists speaking against corporate and government misdeeds, while at the same time the Bureau refuses to press
criminal charges against the banking giant HSBC for laundering billions of dollars for Mexican drug cartels and terrorist groups linked to alQaeda?[13] If youth were once the repository of societys dreams, that is no longer true. Increasingly, young people are viewed as a public
disorder, a dream now turned into a nightmare. Many
of youth to the larger social order, all too evident by the upsurge of zero-tolerance laws, along with the expanding reach of the punishing state in
both the United States and Canada.[14] When
disrepute and we tend to be proud of what we should be ashamed of .[18] For instance, politicians such as former Vice
President Dick Cheney not only refuse to apologize for the immense suffering and displacement they have imposed on the Iraqi people, but they
seem to gloat in defending such policies. Doublespeak takes on a new register as President Obama
Giroux 15 (Henry A. Doctorate in Education McMaster University Chair for Scholarship in the Public Interest.
Domestic terrorism, youth and the politics of disposability Philosophers for Change April 21, 2015
http://philosophersforchange.org/2015/04/28/domestic-terrorism-youth-and-the-politics-of-disposability/ 7.19.2015
In North America, we
people and others can use new technologies, develop democratic social formations,
and enact forms of critical pedagogy and civil disobedience necessary for addressing the antidemocratic forces that have been corrupting North American political culture since the 1970s. Young people have shown
that austerity policies can be defeated; state violence can be held accountable;
collective struggles are worthwhile; and specific and isolated protests can be transformed into broad social movements
that pose a fundamental challenge to neoliberal ideologies and modes of governance.[39] Current protests among young
people in the United States, Canada and elsewhere in the world make clear that demonstrations
are not indeed, cannot be only a short-term project for reform. Young people need to enlist all generations to
develop a truly global political movement that is accompanied by the reclaiming of public spaces, the progressive use of digital technologies, the
development of new public spheres, the production of new modes of education and the safeguarding of places where democratic expression, new
civic values, democratic public spheres, new modes of identification and collective hope can be nurtured and developed . A formative
representative, electoral democracy. In another influential theorization, Bernard Manin observed that the
democracy of the modernsthat is, contemporary democracy as a system that governs territories of large
dimensionsis fundamentally representative democracy: decisions are made by representatives, through
standardized procedures, that are supposed to guarantee equality among citizen-voters and (electoral)
control change in time: while in party democracy, participation happened mainly within and throughout political
parties (Manin 1995), in a contemporary democracy of the public, social movements acquire increasing relevance
development of ideas and practices of democracy (della Porta 2009a). Democratic control acquires a special
meaning given the perceived challenge of adapting democratic conceptions and practices to the increasing shift of
(Marchetti 2008; della Porta 2009b). Social movements, however, do not only ask to increase transparency; they
theories of representative democracy have focused on electoral arenas, theories of participatory democracy have
For the New Left, the emphasis is on direct democracy and self-organization, while
the solidarity groups and new social movement organizations stress the
prefigurative role of participation as a school of democracy. Similarly, searching for
coherence between their criticism of existing democratic institutions and their internal practices, the organizations
emerging with the Global Justice Movement elaborate counter-models that combine concrete proposals of reform
principles of delegation and majority votes, conceptions of democracy have always balanced such principles with
respect for high-quality debate oriented toward the public good. With some different emphasis, in normative
political theory, deliberative democracy refers to decisional processes in which, under conditions of equality,
inclusiveness, and transparency, a communicative process based on reason (the strength of a good argument) is
able to transform individual preferences, leading to decisions oriented to the public good (della Porta 2005). In the
conception of deliberative democracy, particular attention is given to the discursive quality of democracy with an
emphasis on four elements: the transformation of preferences, the orientation to the public good, the use of
arguments, and the development of consensus. While representative democracy is based upon the aggregation
(through vote or negotiation) of exogenously generated preferences, deliberative democracy is defined as oriented
to preference (trans)formation. In deliberative processes, initial preferences are transformed during the
confrontation with the points of view of others in order to reach a common understanding of the public good (Young
1996). This requires the deliberative process to take place under conditions of plurality of values, where people
have different perspectives but face common problems. This should be achieved through rational argumentation,
based on the exchange of reasons: people should be convinced not by the use of hard power, but by the force of
the better argument (Elster 1998). In particular, deliberation should be facilitated by horizontal flows of
communication, multiple contributors to discussion, wide opportunities for interactivity, confrontation on the basis
of rational argumentation, and attitude to reciprocal listening (Habermas 1996). Recognition of others' reasons
allows for the building of consensus, so that decisions can be reached by convincing others of one's own argument.
They are therefore legitimate in as far as they are approvable by all participantsin contrast with majority-rule
(Mansbridge 1996). Sometimes explicitly but more often not, many social movement organizations have adopted
deliberative norms (della Porta 2009a, 2009b). First of all, they stress that, given a complex reality, no easy solution
is at hand or can be derived from big ideologies. Many conflicts must therefore be approached by reliance on the
The notion of a
common good is often recalled (for example, water as a common good), but also democracy
should be constructed through communication, exchanges of ideas, and knowledge
sharing. The value of discussion among free and equal citizens is mirrored in the
positive emphasis on diversity and inclusion, but also in the attention paid to the
development of structured arenas for the exchange of ideas, with the
experimentation with some rules that should allow for horizontal flows of
communication and reciprocal listening. In particular, consensus is increasingly mentioned as a
general value as well as an organizational principle in internal decision making (della Porta 2009a). In fact,
even though social movements have stressed conflict as a dynamic element in
society, they tend increasingly to balance it with a commitment to values such as
respect for diversity, dialogue, and mutual understanding. Consensus is presented
as an alternative to majoritarian decision making, which is accused of repressing
and/or alienating the minorities. Through consensual decision making, instead, not
only would legitimacy increase with participants' contributions to decisions, but the
awareness of different points of view would also help in working on what unites,
constructing a shared vision while respecting diversity. In particular in the Global Justice
potential for mutual understanding that might develop in an open, high-quality debate.
Movement, consensus spread transnationally, thanks to the symbolic impact and concrete networks built around
the Zapatistas' experience, and the successive adoption of consensual principles and practices in the Social Forum
process (Smith et al. 2007; della Porta 2009b). Dedicated publications, workshops, and training courses helped the
diffusion of consensual practices. Here as well, multiple meanings attached to consensus. In particular, when
coupled with an assembleary, horizontal tradition, consensual decision making is perceived as a way to reach a
collective agreement that reflects a strong communitarian identity. This vision, particularly widespread among small
and often local groups within the autonomous tradition, resonates with an antiauthoritarian emphasis and an
egalitarian view. Group life assumes here mainly a prefigurative value. An alternative, more pragmatic view is
spread in the emerging networks. Here, consensual decision making is accompanied especially by an emphasis on
diversity and the need to respect it, but also to improve mutual understanding through good communication.
Time has long passed to DEFUND fusion centers that use their SURVEILLANCE to
target INNOCENT individuals and peaceful protestors. Fusion Centers are the
HEART of unjust in-community covert persecution of social justice movements
which is an abuse of power and corruption of democracy
centers data bases. [Read the PDF] Civil servants, firefighters, police officers,
corporate employees and others are being paid to collect data by spying every day
on innocent people. All that information then goes into the secret data bases. They
communicate in code, according to the ACLU, as TIs have been saying for over a
decade. YOU ARE BEING MONITORED 24/7/365. EVERYTHING you say,
describes a TI on the website Tortured America. EVERY MOVEMENT you make.
EVERY phone call. EVERY internet/electronic communication and activity.
EVERY transaction. EVERY breath you take. All of your habits have been
analyzed. EVERYTHING about you is being analyzed. THIS IS LITERALLY THE
MOVIE Eagle Eye and YOU are the target. Secretary of Homeland Security
Napolitano testified that DHS is committed to having an officer in each fusion
center. Most fusion centers work with representatives of the private sector,
particularly industries related to so-called critical infrastructure and key resources.
Most fusion centers have not even identified their physical location. Instead, many
simply provide a mailing address that leads to a post office box or generic
government building. Think your state and thus your community is immune to this
hidden abuse and that TIs are fabricating their persecution. Think again. One
gangstalking website has listed fusion centers and their addresses. The U.S..
Fusion Centers are using their vast counter-terrorism resources to target
the domestic social justice movement as a criminal or terrorist
enterprise, said PCJF Executive Director Mara Verheyden-Hilliard. This is an
abuse of power and corruption of democracy.
ACLU no date but cites 2012 American Civil Liberties Union, a national, nonprofit organization dedicated to upholding constitutional rights, over 500,000
members, and a legal assistance provider. (ACLU, More About Fusion Centers,
2012, https://www.aclu.org/more-about-fusion-centers?redirect=spy-files/moreabout-fusion-centers)//RP
Fusion centers are also the focal point for growing suspicious activity reporting
programs that encourage public reporting of innocuous everyday activities. The
Colorado Information and Analysis Center even produced a fear-mongering
public service announcement asking the public to report innocuous
behaviors such as photography, note-taking, drawing and collecting
money for charity as "warning signs" of terrorism. The George Washington
University Homeland Security Policy Institute published a survey of fusion center
employees in September 2012, which characterized suspicious activity reports as
white noise that impeded effective intelligence analysis.
There is some good news, however. The 2010 DHS Homeland Security Grant
Program established a requirement that fusion centers certify that privacy and civil
liberties protections are in place in order to use DHS grant funds. This is the first
time DHS has acknowledged its authority to regulate fusion center activities and it
coincides with the establishment of a new DHS Joint Fusion Center Program
Management Office to oversee DHS support to fusion centers. While these are only
Jaycox and Timm 12 Legislative Analyst for EFF concerning civil liberties
and surveillance law, and co-founder/executive director/journalist of the Freedom
Press Foundation. (Mark Jaycox and Trevor Timm, New Senate Report:
Counterterrorism "Fusion Centers" Invade Innocent Americans Privacy and Dont
Stop Terrorism, October 9, 2012 https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/10/new-senatereport-confirms-government-counterterrorism-centers-dont-stop)//RP
The Department of Homeland Securitys 70 counterterrorism "fusion centers"
produce "predominantly useless information," "a bunch of crap," while
"running afoul of departmental guidelines meant to guard against civil
liberties" and are "possibly in violation of the Privacy Act."
These may sound like the words of EFF, but in fact, these conclusions come from
a new report issued by a US Senate committee. At the cost of up to $1.4 billion,
these fusion centers are supposed to facilitate local law enforcement sharing
of valuable counterterrorism information to DHS, but according to the report,
they do almost everything but.
DHS described its fusion centers as "one of the centerpieces of [its]
counterterrorism strategy" and its database was supposed to be a central repository
of known or "appropriately suspected" terrorists. In theory, local law enforcement
officers, in conjunction with DHS officials, conduct surveillance and write up a report
known as a Homeland Intelligence Report (HIR)for DHS to review. If credible,
DHS would then spread the information to the larger intelligence community.
Yet, the Senate report found the fusion centers failed to uncover a single
terrorist threat. Instead, like so many post-9/11 surveillance laws passed under
the vague guise of national security, the system was overwhelmingly used for
ordinary criminal investigations, while at the same time facilitating an egregious
amount of violations of innocent Americans rights.
Sanchez 12 Former Washington Editor for Ars Technica, Senior Fellow at the
Cato Institute, graduate in Political Science from New York University. (Julian
Sanchez, Our Broken Panopticon: Senate Report Finds Fusion Centers Expensive &
Useless, October 4, 2012, http://www.cato.org/blog/our-broken-panopticon-senatereport-finds-fusion-centers-expensive-useless)//RP
For years, top officials at the Department of Homeland Security have touted fusion
centersdesigned to share security information between state, local, and federal
government agencies as a vital tool for strengthening homeland security, a
proven and invaluable tool, and one of the centerpieces of our counterterrorism
strategy. But a blistering new bipartisan Senate report paints a radically
different picture, exposing these centers as a costly boondoggle that
flouted civil liberties safeguards, lacked basic accountability, and
produced intelligence that was overwhelmingly useless or irrelevantor
as one particularly candid official put it, a load of crap.
How costly are they? Incredibly, DHS cant even say for certain: Estimates of
federal spending on the centers range from $289 million to $1.4 billion.
Given that most states had a distinct shortage of real terrorists to keep tabs on,
much of that money went to purposes utterly unrelated to actual
counterterrorism analysis. One center blew $75,000 on dozens of flat-screen
televisions, supposedly for an intelligence training program that never materialized.
Now the TVs are being used to display calendars, and for open-source
monitoringalso known as watching the news. Other popular purchases
included Sport Utility Vehicles, laptops, and high tech surveillance toys for ordinary
law enforcementmany of which were then given away to other local government
agencies.
How useless are they? One official estimated that 85 percent of the
reports they produced were of no benefit whatever, and the large majority
of reports were unrelated to terrorism. Most of these werent published or
circulated for months, and they often just regurgitated information from
public press reports. Almost all these reports came from centers in just three
states: Most of the 77 fusion centers produced little or nothing at all. Sorry,
make that 68 fusion centersit turns out the official DHS tally included
several that didnt actually exist.
The terrorist label makes these activist groups an enemy of the state
Murky International Definition of Terrorism Allows FBI to label Nonviolent Protesters as Terroristsand to legally subject them to
Domestic Surveillance in the Name of National Security
Greenberg 03 (Ivan, PhD, author of "The FBI and the Making of the Terrorist Threat." Everyone is a
Terrorist Now: Marginalizing Protest in the U.S. Radical Criminology: No 2 (2013)
http://journal.radicalcriminology.org/index.php/rc/article/view/23/html 7/20/15 LP)
Political policing (or state "high policing") usually is defined as activity which is directed, through surveillance
and counterinsurgency, to control particular groups and communities . It is not deviant behavior but a core
function of government to protect a political regime. In the U.S. context, the practice has deep historical roots and almost
always is done secretly because it undermines the intention of the First
Amendment, which protects free speech and assembly . Until the mid-1970s, most American political policing was directed against
actors identified as "subversive." Afterwards, the category of "terrorism" became the legal basis for most
domestic security investigations.2 While this change from subversion to terrorism was intended to reduce government spying, one effect has been stigma and marginalization:
the labeling of protest as terrorism undermines the legitimacy of a wide range of
political expression. In the era of the "war on terror" against radical Islam, the concept of what constitutes terrorist activity is thoroughly confused. The American
state deliberately makes little distinction between fighting violent terrorism with
overseas roots and fighting peaceful, legal, domestic political activity . In the FBI's
view, terrorists are found everywhere there is disagreement and conflict in society .
Indeed, the very act of criticizing the government outside of a protest movement can
result in being labeled a terrorist. Even though American radicals rarely commit crimes, the FBI claims they pose a major challenge to peaceful order in society. The
the U.S. government touts the threat as a top danger to the nation. It needs terrorists to exist and wants
America to face a terrorist threat. If there is no real threat, they must fabricate one.
This fabrication allows the FBI to surveil and attack oppositional political formations .
absence of violent acts,
Since there are so few real terrorists, the government has built up a phony threat, a ghost of a menace, a "scare" that does not have much grounding in reality. It serves conservative political interests. In its effort to contain dissent, the
American government benefits that definitions of terrorism vary widely. In both academic and government discourse, a consensus does not exist about what terrorism involves, which has allowed powerful interests to distort terrorism
debates. In academic discourse, Lisa Stampnitzky notes, "One of the most oft-noted difficulties has been the inability of researchers to establish a suitable definition of the concept of 'terrorism' itself, with the result that practically
Moreover, governments in several nations "redefined longstanding armed conflicts as part of the 'global war on terror' for internal political purposes or to gain international support." For example, Russia views the conflict in Chechnya
as a struggle against international terrorists, not as a separatist conflict. In considering the U.S. conflation of dissent with terrorism, it is useful to consult the new field of Critical Terrorism Studies (CTS). CTS adopts the view that
existing counter-terror policies often serve the interests of hegemonic power structures to maintain the status quo. Terrorism is a social construction and different groups and forces in society conceptualize it differently. CTS casts a
critical eye on state power both as a perpetrator of political violence and for manufacturing ideas contrary to emancipatory objectives. In the debut issue of Critical Studies on Terrorism in 2008, the editors outlined a series of topics
that had received scant attention, including: the role of state terrorism; the effects of the war on terror on poor peoples; the cultural construction of terrorism; and the "ideographic qualities" of the terrorism label.
investigating or collecting or maintaining information on United States persons solely for the purpose of monitoring activities protected by the First Amendment or the lawful exercise of other rights secured by the Constitution or laws
A fuller statement of the FBI's alleged respect for legal and Constitutional rights is contained in a Bureau document distributed to its personnel: the Domestic
Investigations and Operations Guide (DIOG). Strong civil liberty protections are outlined, as if an attorney from the American Civil Liberties Union
(ACLU) had written these sections. Nearly 20 pages of DIOG are devoted to "Privacy and Civil Liberties, and Least Intrusive Methods." The document states: Protecting the public includes protecting their rights and
of the United States."
liberties. FBI investigative activity is premised upon the fundamental duty of government to protect the public, which must be performed with care to protect individual rights and to ensure that investigations are confined to matters of
Assuming a lawful intelligence or evidence collection objective, an authorized purpose, strongly consider the method (technique) employed to achieve that objective that is the least intrusive available (particularly if there is the
A
second important FBI document, the "FBI Agents Legal Handbook," outlines
restrictions on uses of informers. This is not a minor matter since informers function as a key undercover spying
tool. The FBI cannot direct these "human assets" to act in ways that are forbidden
for other FBI personnel. The Handbook states: Although informers are private individuals in the sense that they are not commissioned representatives of the government, they are considered
potential to interfere with protected speech and association, damage someone's reputation, intrude on privacy, or interfere with the sovereignty of foreign governments) while still being operationally sound and effective.
agents of the government when performing informant-related tasks.As such, they are subject to the same legal restrictions that govern the conduct of Special Agents. It follows that if the informant's contemplated action would be
illegal or unconstitutional if performed by a Special Agent, it is also impermissible if performed by the informant. FBI public documents echo these private ones. In the document, "Our Responsibility to Protect Civil Liberties," the
FBI states: The FBI is committed to carrying out its mission in accordance with the protections provided by the Constitution. FBI agents are trained to understand and appreciate that the responsibility to respect and protect the law is
the basis for their authority to enforce it. The FBI puts a premium on thoroughly training our special agents about their responsibility to respect the rights and dignity of individuals.
these Guidelines, Handbooks, and public pronouncements carry little weight . The FBI
subverts them by calling everyone terrorists and by claiming the threat is severe or
imminent. It is official dishonesty in secret documents that few outside the FBI can
access. Unaccountability is integral to the mislabeling of political activity. As part of the "criminalization of dissent,"
associating speech and writing, as well as peaceful social action, with terrorism
functions to discredit subjects. The state smears political opponents as dangerous
and disloyal in order to marginalize them. Although subjects of FBI terrorism investigation often are not arrested, the investigations allow the government to
collect intelligence to be used to undermine social movements based, for example, on anti-war, anti-capitalist, or anti-globalization politics. The USA Patriot Act (2001) codified a loose definition of terrorism
in federal law. Section 802 created the federal crime of "domestic terrorism " to cover "acts
dangerous to human life that are in violation of the criminal laws of the U nited States or of
any State." A terrorist act consisted of any effort "to intimidate or coerce a civilian population" or "to influence the policy of government by intimidation or coercion." The precise meaning of intimidation and coercion
11
remains unclear. The FBI has viewed peaceful civil disobedience as terrorism .
Despite the Patriot Act, disagreement exists
within the government about what constitutes terrorist behavior. In 2010, the Office of the Inspector General at the Justice
Department reviewed FBI surveillance of five domestic political advocacy groups
and found the FBI misapplied the terrorism classification. The Bureau "relied upon
potential crimes that may not commonly be considered as 'terrorism' (such as trespassing or vandalism)
and that alternatively have been classified differently , such as under the classification for crimes on government reservations." 12
Moreover, the vast majority of criminal charges brought by the FBI for terrorism do not
hold up in court. In 2008, government prosecutors declined to bring charges against
73 percent of the criminal cases referred to them for terrorism, up from 61 percent
in 2005. Syracuse University's TRAC research group found: "Federal agencies can't seem to agree on who is a terrorist and who is not. The failure has potentially serious implications, weakening efforts to use the criminal
13
law to combat terrorism and at the same time undermining civil liberties."
This uneven approach points to a pattern of abuse. Falsely charging
a person with terrorism, even if prosecution fails, is a form of state harassment . It also is one
way the FBI manipulates public opinion to build up the gravity of the threat. Arrests make headlines and the public is led to believe a
grave danger exists. By contrast, the dismissal of charges rarely makes headlines ; and
the pattern of overcharging rarely is discussed in popular media discourse. Under the banner of fighting terrorism, U.S. intelligence agencies monitor popular websites, blogs, and message boards unrelated to specific groups and
DHS) has taken the lead in a program called "Social Networking/Media Capability." DHS
tracked dozens of popular sites to identify criticism of U.S. policies. They call it
"situational awareness": popular opinion about news events that "reflect adversely"
on the U.S. government. As one prominent example, DHS conducted mass monitoring of Facebook to "capture public reaction" regarding the possible relocation of Guantanamo terror
individuals. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (
detainees to a prison in Michigan. DHS also monitored the comments section to articles in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and the HuffingtonPost looking to identify criticism of the intelligence community. Other websites
under surveillance include: Twitter, Hulu, MySpace, YouTube, Flickrm Wikileaks, Drudge Report, ABC News, Wired, Cryptome, Jihad Watch, and Informed Comment. DHS employs analytical computer software in its monitoring,
which relies on hundreds of key words and search terms to detect controversial political expression. The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) reports that the list includes "vast amounts of First Amendment protected speech
that is entirely unrelated to the Department of Homeland Security mission to protect the public against terrorism and disasters."
15
Fifty-six words or terms are listed under the category of "domestic security."
16
17
of 'terrorism threats' that these dossiers included articles, speeches, and books?
The state strategy of calling everyone a terrorist is underappreciated in U.S popular consciousness. On the one hand, there may be general timidity to
directly challenge the dominant ideas and practices of the intelligence community, fearful that such criticism might prompt state countermeasures. The FBI, for example, has a long history of tracking its critics. On the other hand, it is
shelters and care facilities for mentally ill individuals and drug users either close or have to turn people away. The aforementioned people account for a large percentage of the transit crime in the County of Los Angeles On 10-19-
a peaceful protest by the 'Occupy Wall Street' movement occurred on a Blue Line
train. [Text redacted] stated the protesters had all purchased tickets and were all cooperative . [Text
redacted] is concerned however about what may happen if the 'Occupy Wall Street'
protesters mix with the more violent individuals upset about the alleged
mistreatment of prisoners in the LASD jails . 19 In retrospect, the eventual police
crackdown on the Occupy movement seems predictable since authorities have
come to view protest through a prism of terrorism . The prospect of widespread repression in America hangs large before the people.
2011
Washington Post 8 [Lisa Rein, Md. Police Put Activists' Names On Terror
Lists, Washington Post, 10/8/08, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2008/10/07/AR2008100703245.html?sid=ST2008100703347]
MG
The Maryland State Police classified 53 nonviolent activists as terrorists and entered
their names and personal information into state and federal databases that track
terrorism suspects, the state police chief acknowledged yesterday. Police Superintendent Terrence B.
Sheridan revealed at a legislative hearing that the surveillance operation, which targeted opponents of the death
penalty and the Iraq war, was far more extensive than was known when its existence was disclosed in July. The
department started sending letters of notification Saturday to the activists, inviting them to review their files before
they are purged from the databases, Sheridan said. "The names don't belong in there," he told the Senate Judicial
to apologize to the activists for the spying, assailed in an independent review last week as "overreaching" by law
enforcement officials who were oblivious to their violation of the activists' rights of free expression and association.
who has used that term has ever met a spy," he told the committee. "What John Walker did is spying," Hutchins
said, referring to John Walker Jr., a communications specialist for the U.S. Navy convicted of selling secrets to the
Soviet Union. Hutchins said the intelligence agents, whose logs were obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union
of Maryland as part of a lawsuit, were monitoring "open public meetings." His officers sought a "situational
awareness" of the potential for disruption as death penalty opponents prepared to protest the executions of two
men on death row, Hutchins said. "I don't believe the First Amendment is any guarantee to those who wish to
disrupt the government," he said. Hutchins said he did not notify Ehrlich about the surveillance. Ehrlich spokesman
Henry Fawell said the governor had no comment. Hutchins did not name the commander in the Division of
Homeland Security and Intelligence who informed him in March 2005 that the surveillance had begun. More than a
year later, after "they said, 'We're not getting much here,' " Hutchins said he cut off what he called a "low-level
operation." But Sen. James Brochin (D-Baltimore County) noted that undercover troopers used aliases to infiltrate
organizational meetings, rallies and group e-mail lists. He called the spying a "deliberate infiltration to find out
every piece of information necessary" on groups such as the Maryland Campaign to End the Death Penalty and the
Baltimore Pledge of Resistance. When Hutchins called their members "fringe people," the audience of activists who
filled the seats in the hearing room in Annapolis sighed. Laura Lising of Catonsville, a member of the Baltimore Coalition Against
the Death Penalty, received her notification yesterday. She said she wants a hard copy of her file, because she does not trust the police to purge it.
"We need as much protection as possible," she said. Both Hutchins and Sheridan said the activists' names were entered into the state police
Terror Turns
The war on terror has worsened U.S. security it was an effort of
the military industrial complex, has cultivated resentment of the US
and resulted in more terrorism
Johnson, Professor and CIA consultant, 04
(Chalmers, "Blowback: The Costs and Consequences of American Empire", Edition 2,
p. 30//ejh)
The two wars that the United States launched preemptively were the pet projects of
special interest groups that used the attacks of 9/11 as a cover to hijack American
foreign policy and implement their private agendas. These interest groups include
the military-industrial complex and the professional armed forces, close American
supporters of and advisers to the Likud Party in Israel, and neoconservative
enthusiasts for the creation of an American empire. This latter group, concentrated
in right-wing foundations and think tanks in Washington D.C., is composed of
chicken-hawk war lovers (that is, soi-disant military strategists with no experience
of either the armed forces or war) who seized on the national sense of bewilderment
after 9/11 to push the Bush administration into conflicts that were neither relevant
to nor successful in destroying al-Qaeda. Instead, the wars accelerated the
recruitment of more suicidal terrorists and promoted nuclear proliferation in
countries hoping to deter similar preemptive attacks by the United States. Two
years after 9/11, America is unquestionably in greater danger of serious terrorist
threats than it has ever been before.
Rashi, 14freelance journalist and writer for the Huffington Post (Tanjil, 3/16/14,
"The Muslims are Coming!, by Arun Kundnani", Financial Times,
www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/2/af5ef4c6-aa15-11e3-8bd6-00144feab7de.html)//twemchen
**edited for language
In The Muslims are Coming!, a critique of counterterrorism policy by Arun Kundnani, the wests domestic war on
terror at times resembles a Greene novel populated by a cast of counterterrorism warriors even unlikelier than a
Dallas to Dewsbury, West Yorkshire, this book is the most rigorous account yet of this familiar argument, which
British film-maker Adam Curtis called the power of nightmares. Kundnani shares Curtiss view, too, that
Giroux 15 (Henry A. Doctorate in Education McMaster University Chair for Scholarship in the Public Interest.
Domestic terrorism, youth and the politics of disposability Philosophers for Change April 21, 2015
http://philosophersforchange.org/2015/04/28/domestic-terrorism-youth-and-the-politics-of-disposability/ 7.19.2015
the war on terror comes home, public spaces have been transformed into war
zones, and the militarized police forces have taken on the role of an occupying
army, especially in poor neighborhoods of color. Acting as a paramilitary force, the police
have become a new symbol of domestic terrorism, shaking down youth of
color by criminalizing a multitude of behaviors. This was especially true in the stop-and-frisk
policies so widespread under former Mayor Michael Bloomberg in New York City. In Ferguson, Missouri, the
entire population was criminalized in what can only be described as a racist
shakedown. As David Graeber puts it, The Department of Justices investigation of the
Ferguson Police Department has scandalized the nation, and justly so. But the departments
institutional racism, while shocking, isnt the reports most striking revelation.
More damning is this: in a major American city, the criminal justice system
perceives a large part of that citys population not as citizens to be
protected, but as potential targets for what can only be described as a shake-down
operation designed to wring money out of the poorest and most vulnerable by any
means they could, and that as a result, the overwhelming majority of Fergusons citizens
had outstanding warrants.[29] The rise of the punishing state and the war on
terror has emboldened police forces across the United States, and in doing so feeds their use of
racist violence against young people resulting in what has been called an
epidemic of police brutality. Sadly, even young children of color are not
immune from such violence, as the killing of Tamir Rice on November 22,
2014, by a White policeman has made clear. Even more tragic is the fact that the City of Cleveland tried
to blame the 12-year-old boy for his own death.[30] Rice was holding a BB gun
when he was shot to death by a police officer judged unfit for duty in 2012. The killing of Black men
has taken on the image of a cruel sport promoted by police forces
that now hype the lawlessness and extreme violence that has
replaced any viable notion of democratic idealism. Between January 2012 and
December 2014, 38 unarmed Black men have been killed by the police.[31] Many people in the United
States now live in a culture that is not only being increasingly militarized, but
also supports a growing indifference to such cruelty, reinforced by a notion of
exaggerated self-reliance, rugged individualism and privatization, all of which
As
renders group solidarities repugnant and reinforces the idea that care for the other is both a pathology and a
it should come as no surprise that the United States currently has more
police, prisons, spies, weapons and soldiers than at any other time in its
liability. Hence,
history
this coupled with a growing army of the unemployed and incarcerated. In addition, the militaryindustrial complex now joins hands with the entertainment industry in producing everything from childrens toys to
video games that both construct a militarized form of masculinity and serve as an enticement for recruitment. In
fact, more than 10 million people have downloaded Americas Army and its various updates, including the more
recent, Americas Army: Proving Grounds, a first-person shooter computer game the US Army uses as a
described as the demand for not only the disappearance of colonialism but also the disappearance of the colonized
Swayamsevak Sangh in India. In practice, as these movements began to increase their influence in the 1970s, they
tended toward stabilizing the social inequalities left behind by colonialism. They campaigned for conservative
positions on gender relations and mobilized support through agitation against minorities, whether it was the
Ahmadiyya minority in Pakistan or the Copt minority in Egypt. They bore little resemblance to Fanons hopes of
The
appeal of these movements to some young Muslims who were living as minorities in
Britain in the 1990s therefore seems hard to explain at first . The political program of HT, for
setting afoot a new man in the aftermath of colonialism that would offer new models for humanity.(3)
instance, had little to say about Britain itself. Before the Rushdie affair, HTs UK-based leadership did not even
target British-born Muslims for recruitment, preferring to focus on visiting Arab students and professionals who
might participate in an HT-led coup dtat on their return home. Such a program was of little practical relevance to
minority Islam in a secular Western state such as Britain.(4) HTs success in this period rested not on its political
program as such but on its ability to act as a vehicle for a new kind of globalized Islamic identity. As the French
scholar Olivier Roy has argued, this notion of a globalized Islam is not the product of any specific Islamist
organization but a broad sociological trend that has developed across Europe as a result of racism, migration, and
globalization.(5) Young Muslims felt alienated not only from the racism of the wider society, but also from the
inward-looking mosque life of their parents, which was centered upon specific ethnic identities (for example,
Sylheti, Gujarati, or Mirpuri) and mingled Islam with South Asian folk traditions. The idea of identifying with the
global ummah proved an attractive third alternative to either assimilating into a racist society or following the
inherited religio-cultural traditions of their parents. The version of Islam that suited this approach was one that was
delinked from the ethnic folk practices drawn from South Asia (such as reverence for holy men, or pirs); these were
to be stripped away on the grounds of their being impure accretions that had contaminated the original universal
message of Islam. While their parents had imbibed their religion through an oral tradition bound up with South
Asian languages and poetry, the new, globalized Islam was at home in English and on the printed page (and later,
the Internet). It was this concept of a globalized Islam rather than a Pakistani Islam or a Bangladeshi Islam that
appealed to some young British Asian Muslims in the 1990s, whether it led to the ranks of HT or, as for Farasat, to
Through these new Islamic movements, young Muslims thus carried out their
own globalization, transcending inherited ethnic and national belongings in favor of
an allegiance to the global Islamic community . As new immigrant communities from Somalia,
Salafism.
Afghanistan, Algeria, and Iraq began to form in the UK during the 1990s, the idea of a global Islam, as opposed to a
mosaic of ethnicities, made all the more sense. The world was now pictured differently.
The South Asian neighborhoods of Britain and the original towns and villages of South Asia from which communities
had migrated remained the central axes of young Muslims mental geography. But alongside them came a growing
knowledge of other parts of the world where the ummah was oppressed: Palestine, Chechnya, Kashmir, Bosnia,
Kosovo, and Iraq. In principle, all the struggles for justice of Muslims around the world were to be regarded as
equally important. Ultimately, there was no homeland and no diaspora but a global Islamic consciousness
unbounded by geography. This new sense of identity was fundamentally political: It provided a new language for
describing injustice and offered a way of filling the void opened up by the decline of the Left. It countered the
globalization of capitalism not with a return to local tradition but with a transnationalism of its own.There was a
range of ways in which this trend manifested. For some, having stripped Islam of South Asian cultural accretions, it
was easier to establish a sense of belonging as a Muslim in Western society. This was the model offered by
reformists such as the Swiss philosopher Tariq Ramadan, who emphasized the need to apply Islams universal
principles to the specific context of when and where one lived. By going back to the original sources, Ramadan
argued, universal Islamic values, after being separated from the particular immigrant cultures with which they had
become bound up, are found to be broadly compatible with liberalism. This then provided an Islamic basis for active
citizenship and engagement for social justice rather than isolation or a one-sided adaptation to British cultural
norms.(6) The unities between Muslims and others in the movement against the 2003 Iraq war rested on this
assumption, that Islamic and liberal values could be aligned on specific political struggles. For others, like Farasat
Latif, the path led to literalism and the attempt to model ones life as closely as possible on the Prophets. While
both of these approaches involved issues of identity, they could only be fully understood in the context of a political
history of racism, the decline of leftist politics, and Western neocolonialism.
Collaboration between fusion centers and EOCs enables both to carry out their individual missions more efficiently.
Fusion Center Overview As described in the National Strategy for Information Sharing ,
communication, resource allocation and tracking, and information collection, analysis and dissemination related to a
specific incident. EOCs help form a common operating picture during an incident, provide external coordination to
on-scene command, and secure additional resources. EOCs also facilitate the sharing of all-hazards operational
information and other subject matter expertise in support of incident management and response activities. While
EOCs generally coordinate activities related to specific incidents, fusion centers support ongoing prevention
activities and maintain situational awareness of the threat environment.
Sanchez 12 Former Washington Editor for Ars Technica, Senior Fellow at the
Cato Institute, graduate in Political Science from New York University. (Julian
Sanchez, Our Broken Panopticon: Senate Report Finds Fusion Centers Expensive &
Useless, October 4, 2012, http://www.cato.org/blog/our-broken-panopticon-senatereport-finds-fusion-centers-expensive-useless)//RP
How useless are they? One official estimated that 85 percent of the
reports they produced were of no benefit whatever, and the large majority
of reports were unrelated to terrorism. Most of these werent published or
circulated for months, and they often just regurgitated information from
public press reports. Almost all these reports came from centers in just three
states: Most of the 77 fusion centers produced little or nothing at all. Sorry,
make that 68 fusion centersit turns out the official DHS tally included
several that didnt actually exist.
Unsurprisingly, DHS struggled to identify a clear example in which fusion
center intelligence helped identify any actual terroristsand indeed, may
have hampered effective counterterrorism by clogging the intelligence
arteries with predominantly useless information. To keep justifying
those millions of taxpayer dollars, however, DHS touted bogus success
stories, like a report that sowed panic over a Russian cyberattack on a
citys water systema cyberattack that had never happened. When internal
assessments began to reveal the ineffectuality of fusion centers years ago, DHS
hid the results from Congressand kept on praising them publicly.
Of course, civil liberties groups have been warning for years that fusion centers
are more likely to facilitate improper monitoring of citizens than
legitimate security goals. And the Senate report shows they had reason to worry.
One key DHS official revealed a disturbing view of he value of intra-agency
cooperation when he noted that We had fire [departments] one of the few
people who can enter your home without a warrant is a firefighter. One notorious
fusion center report suggested that Libertarian Party members, Ron Paul supporters,
and individuals flying the Gadsden Flag popular with Tea Partiers were likely to be
violent extremists. Many reports were shelved because they documented only
innocent, protected First Amendment activitybut the information in them was
often retained anyway, in potential violation of the Privacy Act.
COURTS SOLVENCY
Current constitutional interpretations on the justifications of
surveillance is outdated judicial action is key
Rushin 11 PhD student at the University of California, Berkeley, Jurisprudence
and Social Policy Program; J.D., University of California, Berkeley Law School
(Stephen Rushin, Perspectives of judicial actions for Surveillance, THE JUDICIAL
RESPONSE TO MASS POLICE SURVEILLANCE, 2011, http://illinoisjltp.com/journal/wpcontent/uploads/2013/10/Rushin.pdf)//JM
Law enforcement technology has become ubiquitous in the urban landscape. Closed
circuit surveillance cameras indiscriminately record individuals physical
movements.1 Facial recognition software compares images of passing pedestrians with extensive databases of
suspected criminals.2 Red light cameras capture photographs of traffic violations. The National Security
Agency (NSA) logs phone calls made by millions of citizens across the country in
hopes of identifying suspected terrorist activity.3 And automatic license plate
recognition (ALPR) systems, already in use in various jurisdictions across the country, digitally read
and record the license plates of passing automobiles into expansive databases. 4
Indeed, we live today in an increasingly digitally efficient investigative state a state
where law enforcement can both observe and record information about our
whereabouts in an unprecedentedly efficient manner. The retention of surveillance
data raises many serious constitutional concerns. But Fourth Amendment doctrine
on search and seizures reflects outdated assumptions about the once-limited
capabilities of public surveillance technologies and is, therefore, ill-equipped to deal
with the challenges posed by the digitally efficient investigative state. The existing
Fourth Amendment doctrine on surveillance technologies focuses primarily on three
issues: (1) whether a person had a subjective expectation of privacy, (2) the socially
objective reasonableness of that expectation of privacy, and (3) the relative
intrusiveness of the supposed privacy violation.5 The Supreme Court has also drawn
a distinction between presumptively constitutional technologies that merely
improve the efficiency of legitimate law enforcement, like digital tracking devices, and
unconstitutional technologies that give law enforcement an intrusive, extrasensory ability, like heat sensors.6
Under this framework, the warrantless use of most surveillance technologies and
the collection of personal data fits comfortably within constitutional doctrine after all,
a person does not have an objectively reasonable expectation to privacy when driving her car or walking on a public
sidewalk. The recording of a persons movements in public is not especially intrusive and certainly does not provide
police with any intrusive, extrasensory abilities beyond mere observation. A recent Seventh Circuit case engaged in
just this type of analysis, when it found that the warrantless use of global position system (GPS) surveillance by law
enforcement did not violate the Fourth Amendment.7 There, Judge Posner and the Seventh Circuit concluded that
GPS monitoring of a single suspect without a warrant does not amount to wholesale surveillance. 8 But Posner
quickly pointed out, Technological progress poses a threat to privacy by enabling an extent of surveillance that in
earlier times would have been prohibitively expensive . . . . Should government someday decide to institute a
efficient investigative state, it should only be the beginning of a broader re-conceptualization of our Fourth
Amendment doctrine. I argue, in particular, that we ought to reassess our presumption that individuals have no
reasonable expectation to privacy in their public actions. In total, I hope to make two contributions with this Article,
one descriptive and one normative. Descriptively, I build a comprehensive account of the digitally efficient
investigative state, and normatively I contend that the courts must establish a new doctrinal path to regulate this
technological order
The plan is the only way to solve for violations of minorities rights
and inadequate laws concerning domestic surveillance
Rushin 11 PhD student at the University of California, Berkeley, Jurisprudence
and Social Policy Program; J.D., University of California, Berkeley Law School
(Stephen Rushin, Perspectives of judicial actions for Surveillance, THE JUDICIAL
RESPONSE TO MASS POLICE SURVEILLANCE, 2011, http://illinoisjltp.com/journal/wpcontent/uploads/2013/10/Rushin.pdf)//JM
the courts should
craft a judicial response that permits the use of surveillance technologies for some
criminologically advantageous activities like observational comparison, but limits
the unregulated data retention without reasonable suspicion. Further, I contend that the
judiciary is well positioned to make this careful calculation, which admittedly
requires the balancing of social values such as privacy and law enforcement
efficiency. Overall, I conclude a judicial solution handed down by the courts would best
safeguard citizenry, particularly certain discrete and insular minorities , from
the threats posed by other emerging surveillance technologies. A. The Judicial Response
The courts should craft a regulation that limits surveillance technologies in three
ways. First, the courts should require police to have a legitimate, articulable law
enforcement purpose before identifying any surveillance data. This would require police to
Given the ominous implications of the digitally efficient investigative state, I argue that
identify a legitimate purpose for cross-referencing license plate data or facial recognition photographs with other
law enforcement to demonstrate a particularized suspicion of criminal wrongdoing based on specific and
articulable facts combined with rational inferences. 323 Conversely, the courts should continue to permit the
use of surveillance technologies for observational comparison, given that observational comparison only identifies
an individual in surveillance data when the data has been digitally matched to a database of known or suspected
criminals.324 Hence, this recommended response would distinguish between mere observational comparison and
capability and an indiscriminate data retention capability.326 Police use the observational comparison capability to
read passing license plates and then search for matches with active hotlists. 327 Once the ALPR system matches a
license plate to a known offender, the ALPR system can cross-reference this plate with other databases to identify
the suspected culprit. Observational comparison does not implicate any particular Fourth Amendment concerns
data is only retained and identified for cars matching a criminal database.328 Conversely, the indiscriminate data
collection capability allows some ALPR systems to record the license plate, time, and location of every passing
vehicle into an expansive database.329 This information can then be cross-referenced to other databases to
identify the suspected driver of each car, and record that drivers movements into a surveillance database. It is not
inconceivable that, with an extensive network of ALPR cameras in a given community, law enforcement could
by limiting the
retention of data and requiring a legitimate law enforcement purpose before crossreferencing license plate numbers to identify drivers, this judicial response would
prevent ALPR from transforming into a tool of mass surveillance. In my view, this
judicial regulation recognizes both the potential harms and benefits of the digitally
efficient investigative state and strikes a fair balance. First, this proposed regulation
ensures that the these technologies will not be utilized to unfairly target unpopular
minoritiesin fact, by distinguishing between observational comparison and
indiscriminate data collection, the courts could ensure that these technologies are
used primarily to reign in police discretion, thereby limiting implicit bias. As discussed
supra Part I.D.1, when limited to observational comparison, ALPR and facial recognition
software can actually reduce the likelihood of racial or ethnic profiling. But, as detailed
compile a fairly comprehensive record of an individuals day-to-day movements. Thus,
supra Part I.D.2, indiscriminate data collection capabilities of the digitally efficient investigative state can permit
similar regulations on police technologies. The proposed judicial response bears some resemblance to legislative
limits on surveillance technologies passed in Virginia, Maine, and New Hampshire. The New Hampshire law limits
law enforcement surveillance to specific investigations of criminal wrongdoing and bars the retention of surveillance
data except for a few, specific situations.330 Maine, by contrast, has regulated ALPR technology explicitly by
limiting data retention to 21 days and regulating ALPR usage more broadly.331 This response also closely mirrors a
recent German Federal Constitutional Court decision, which found that some parts of a German law authorizing the
use of ALPR violated the right to privacy.332 The German court held that the retention of any digital data that was
not predestined for a specific use was too indiscriminate as to violate German Law.333 The German court expressed
concern that without limitations, the use of ALPR amounted to complete surveillance. 334 Law enforcement
organizations, namely the IACP, have also recommended that departments take steps, like transparent data
retention policies, to ameliorate privacy concerns over surveillance data aggregation. 335 Once more, this judicial
response mirrors the principles laid out in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)
privacy guidelines. 336 Namely, this proposal requires that digital data collection on public movements abide by the
OECDs purpose specification principle, which states that the purposes for which personal data are collected
should be specified not later than at the time of data collection. 337 Thus, there is both domestic and international
Third, the
distinction between observational comparison and indiscriminate data aggregation
comports with the underlying values of the Fourth Amendment. Regardless of the eventual
precedent for this kind of judicial response to limit the efficiency of investigative technologies.
holding in Jones, the Maynard decision offers persuasive application of the Katz doctrine to surveillance
technologies.338 The court first determined that the totality of a persons movements in public were not actually
exposed to the public.339 As the court explained, in determining whether something is exposed to the public[,]
as that term was used in Katz[,] we ask not what another person can physically and may lawfully do, but rather
what a reasonable person expects another might actually do. 340 Put differently, a person might reasonably
expect a stranger to view any discrete action taken in public, but, the whole of a persons movements over the
course of a month is not actually exposed to the public because the likelihood a stranger would observe all those
movements is not just remote, it is essentially nil. 341 In applying a mosaic theory, the D.C. Circuit noted that
that long-term surveillance of an individual reveals important and intimate details about their behaviors.342 And
because GPS surveillance is incredibly efficientthe marginal cost of each additional day of data aggregation with
GPS tracking is effectively zeroGPS technology is thus a heretofore unknown type of intrusion requiring
judicial regulation.343 The Maynard courts reasoning, while controversial in the context of the surveillance of a
single individual, is extremely compelling when applied dragnet technologies like ALPR and surveillance cameras
with facial recognition. As data collection costs decrease, law enforcement has every incentive to aggregate as
much potentially useful data as possible. Indeed, as the Maynard court recognized, Prolonged surveillance reveals
types of information not revealed by short-term surveillance, such as what a person does repeatedly, what he does
not do, and what he does ensemble. 344 Just as a person does not reasonably expect that the totality of her
movements within an automobile to be monitored by GPS, she also reasonably expects to be free from continuous
and pervasive monitoring by ALPR or facial recognition software. Even in public, we carry an expectation that our
movements remain disconnected and anonymous.345 Hence,
ought to permit law enforcement to retain data. This is omission is purposeful. As the IACP has properly recognized,
any policy limiting data retention raises serious public policy concerns.346 For example, we may prefer more liberal
data retention policies for surveillance around national monuments and critical infrastructures in recognition of the
threat posed by terrorism.347 Further, there is a dearth of social science research on the changing usefulness of
surveillance data over time. Nonetheless, without regulation, departments have little incentive to self-regulate.
While it may be difficult for the courts to craft a uniform national rule on data retention, the courts can at least
require that departments, or conversely state legislatures, articulate clear data retention policies. This would permit
states and localities to consider the unique criminological needs for data retention in their jurisdiction in crafting
regulations, while preventing the indiscriminate collection of all data. Admittedly, this suggested judicial response is
a major doctrinal shift and requires the courts to break away from established Fourth Amendment doctrine. But the
digitally efficient investigative state poses too many serious and constitutionally relevant threats for the judiciary to
simply defer to legislative arrangements. Scholars have often argued that the legislature is better suited to assess
the proper balance between privacy and security.348 At least in the narrow field of police surveillance technologies,
I disagree. In the next section, I argue that the courts are the best-positioned actor to address the issues implicated
by mass data collection.
Americans are the individuals most at risk of indiscriminate surveillance data collection and subsequent fishing expeditions.
Admittedly, Kerr points out that Congress has frequently acted on its own initiative to protect privacy against the threat of new
technology. 354 This descriptively suggests that Congress has been more receptive to the evolving privacy concerns than the
courts. No doubt, Kerr is correctcourts have been predictably deferential and restrained in regulating law enforcement
technologies. But this does not mean that the courts are not institutionally competent to create Fourth Amendment policy,
particularly when data collection and surveillance raise delicate majoritarian concerns that cannot be adequately addressed by the
legislature. Kerr rejects the majoritarian critiques of legislative arrangements by claiming that since [p]rivacy and security may be
considered public goods, shared equally by the public, and both law enforcement interests and victims of crime may lobby the
legislature, the judicial arrangements offer no substantial benefits over legislative arrangements.355 Kerr also dismisses Drippss
majoritarian concern by noting that new technologies will tend to target users of new technologies. 356 These users are
disproportionately elite, meaning that their interests should be well represented in the legislature. Hence, Kerr believes that Drippss
concern that minorities will be underrepresented and marginalized in the political process is unwarranted. But Kerrs logic, while
California has accused the FBI of targeting religiously devout Muslim-Americans for surveillance, without any particularized suspicion
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has filed a class action
complaint against the FBI in the Central District of California alleging that the FBI
used an informant to indiscriminately collect personal information on hundreds
and perhaps thousands of innocent Muslim Americans in Southern California . . . . [T]he
of wrongdoing.357
FBI did not gather the information based on suspicion of criminal activity, 354. Id. at 855. 355. Id. at 88485. 356. Id. at 887. 357.
See, e.g., Patrik Jonsson, Muslim Group Sues FBI over Surveillance at California Mosque, CHRISTIAN SCI. MONITOR (Feb. 23, 2011),
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Justice/2011/0223/Muslim-groupsues-FBI-over-surveillance-at-California-mosques; see also Jennifer
Medina, Suit Accuses F.B.I. of Spying at Mosques in California, N.Y. TIMES, Feb. 25, 2011, at A17. 324 JOURNAL OF LAW, TECHNOLOGY
it seems
highly improbable that elites in the legislature will be responsive to the privacy
concerns of these unpopular minority needs. Muslim Americans, as an example, are also chronically
underrepresented in the legislative branch. 359 Unpopular minorities are, therefore, unable to protect
their right to be free from pervasive surveillance through legislative compromises.
This represents a structural flaw in our decentralized federal system, one that can
only be remedied by judicial action. The judiciary is the most institutionally
competent actor to address the majoritarian concerns raised by mass surveillance
and data collection.
& POLICY [Vol. 2011 [but] instead it gathered the information simply because the targets were Muslim. 358 Further,
Concerns that the courts cant solve are illegitimate they still wont
undermine the courts ability to solve
Rushin 11 PhD student at the University of California, Berkeley, Jurisprudence
and Social Policy Program; J.D., University of California, Berkeley Law School
(Stephen Rushin, Perspectives of judicial actions for Surveillance, THE JUDICIAL
RESPONSE TO MASS POLICE SURVEILLANCE, 2011, http://illinoisjltp.com/journal/wpcontent/uploads/2013/10/Rushin.pdf)//JM
Second, the so-called judicial information deficit 360 should not deter the courts
from creating policy to address mass surveillance concerns. The proliferation and
use of mass surveillance technologies has stabilized to a point that judicial action
would be appropriate. In arguing that the judiciary lacks the skills and competence to create broad Fourth
Amendment policy, skeptics have commonly levied three arguments: (1) unlike the legislature, the courts lack the
physical and administrative resources to craft a comprehensive policy; (2) judges are not technologically
sophisticated enough to create technology policy; and (3) once crafted, judicial technology policies rarely hold up in
different factual scenarios.361 As I demonstrate below, the limited judicial response offered in this Article will hold
up against these three legitimate critiques. To begin with, skeptics allege that legislations can more carefully
analyze a problem, investigate potential solutions, impanel experts, and make farreaching, nuanced policies.362
Unlike the legislature, which may command the resources of an extensive bureaucracy . . . a judge is generally
limited to a secretary and one or two recent law school . . . [graduate clerks]. 363 Kerr has thus argued that the
courts simply do not have the resources to engage in this kind of careful analysis necessary to develop a
comprehensive and responsive policy on Fourth Amendment technologies.364 On its face, this type of analysis is
persuasive, especially considering the fact that the courts lack the funding to do sweeping investigations into the
efficacy of an emerging technology. Nonetheless, this logic ignores a pivotal tactic used by courts in previous
iterations of successful policymakingthe adoption of standards already implemented by other institutions.365
Malcolm Feeley and Edward Rubin explained that when the courts attempted to create extensive judicial policy 358.
Class Action Complaint at 1, Fazaga v. Fed. Bureau of Investigation, No. SACV11-00301 (C.D. Cal. Feb. 22, 2011).
359. See Ellison to Swear on Jeffersons Quran, MILWAUKEE J. SENTINEL, Jan. 4, 2007, at 6A (stating that
Congressman Keith Ellison was the first and only Muslim American elected to Congress in U.S. history in 2006). 360.
Kerr, supra note 348, at 875. 361. Id. at 87577. 362. Id. at 88182. 363. MALCOLM M. FEELEY AND EDWARD L.
RUBIN, JUDICIAL POLICY MAKING AND THE MODERN STATE 307 (1998). 364. Kerr, supra note 348, at 85859. 365.
MALCOLM M. FEELEY & EDWARD L. RUBIN, supra note 363, at 307. No. 2] MASS POLICE SURVEILLANCE 325
regulating American prisons, judges turned to the American Correctional Association and the Federal Bureau of
Prisons.366 Indeed, [F]ederal judges turned to these standards because they wanted to impose detailed,
administrative-style rules of any sort but lacked the resources to design the rules themselves. 367 Unlike the
prison reform context described by Feeley and Rubin, where the courts created extensive and detailed policy, the
judicial response I argue for in this Article does not require extensive investigation or uniform implementation. I
merely argue for a judicially mandated floor, which establishes the minimum amount of regulation required for
argued that judges are not as technically sophisticated as the legislature. Judges often rely on the crutch of
questionable metaphors to aid their comprehension of complex technology cases, meaning that it is easy for
judges to misunderstand the context of their decisions and their likely effect when technology is in flux. 370 But
in
the unique situation outlined in this Article, judges do not need to be experts in
these technological fields to understand the capabilities of technologies like ALPR
and facial recognition software. The danger I discuss in this article is that police will keep a digital
dossier of every single persons movements. This type of monitoring would facilitate fishing expeditions, increase
There is
little reason to believe that, with the assistance of knowledgeable advocates, judges
could not sufficiently understand the potential harms posted by digitally efficient
investigative technologies to develop a coherent constitutional floor of protection.
And even though the legislature has a broader array of resources at its disposal, the
legislature is an unsatisfactory avenue to protect the unique countermajoritarian
issues at stake. Finally, some scholars have contended that judicial regulations of 366. Id. 367. Id. 368. See
the likelihood of corrupt behavior by law enforcement, and facilitate some types of racial profiling.
supra Part V.A. (describing judicial responses to legislative limits on police technologies). 369. See H.B. 454, 2002
Gen. Assemb., 2002 Sess. (Va. 2002) (implementing the restricted use of facial recognition technology in Virginia);
see also Facial Scan: Beachs Use Restricted Under Bill Approved by House, THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT & LEDGER STAR,
Feb. 13, 2002, at B4 (describing Virginias facial recognition technology bill). 370. Kerr, supra note 348, at 87576.
326 JOURNAL OF LAW, TECHNOLOGY & POLICY [Vol. 2011 emerging technologies rarely hold up in different factual
scenarios. Under this rationale, critics of this judicial response may contend that while this protection could work
when applied to ALPR or facial recognition software, it would not necessarily be a workable standard for future
technological developments. This view certainly has merit. By the time the courts decide how a technology should
be regulated . . . the factual record of the case may be outdated, reflecting older technology rather than more
recent developments. 371 Stuart Benjamin has argued that rapidly changing facts weaken the force of stare
decisis by undermining the stability of precedents. 372 This provides a forceful case against judicial
micromanagement of emerging technologies. But the judicial response argued for in this Article is sufficiently broad
to avoid the predictable antiquation of other, narrower judicial solutionsit merely distinguishes between
observational comparison and indiscriminate data collection, while broadly regulating the identification of data and
interactions with private data aggregators. The collection of extensive, indiscriminate surveillance data is a
The development
of digital dossiers is not a trending fad that will simply disappear in the near future.
We should not expect the legislature to step in and address a problem that may
disproportionately affect unpopular minorities. The Court has long recognized that,
when making policy in the field of emerging technologies, the rule we adopt must
take account of more sophisticated systems that are already in use or in
development. 373 The judicial response presented does not prevent the use of
surveillance technologies for observational comparison, but merely offers a
sufficiently broad and generalized constitutional limit on indiscriminate data
collection, which can be reasonably exported and applied to future, more
sophisticated technologies. Once more, critics of judicial policymaking seem tacitly concerned that the
widespread, pervasive occurrence common amongst countless investigative technologies.
limited applicability of judicial rules in the future will weaken the force of stare decisis, thereby undermining the
judiciarys legitimacy. But nothing could further de-legitimize the judiciary more than a failure to serve its
Omolade, 89 - (Barbara, 1989. 'We Speak for the Planet', in Adrienne Harris and
Ynestra King (eds.), Rocking the Ship of State: Toward a Feminist Peace Politics,
pp. 171-89.Boulder, CO: Westview Press)//AK
Pacifists such as Martin Luther King, Jr. and Mahatma Gandhi who have used
nonviolent resistance charged that those who used violence to obtain justice were
just as evil as their oppressors. Yet all successful revolutionary movements have
used organized violence. This is especially true of national liberation movements
that have obtained state power and reorganized the institutions of their nations for
the benefit of the people. If men and women in South Africa do not use organized
violence, they could remain in the permanent violent state of the slave. Could it be
that pacifism and nonviolence cannot become a way of life for the oppressed? Are
they only tactics with specific and limited use for protecting people from further
violence? For most people in the developing communities and the developing world
consistent nonviolence is a luxury; it presumes that those who have and use
nonviolent weapons will refrain from using them long enough for nonviolent
resisters to win political battles. To survive, peoples in developing countries must
use a varied repertoire of issues, tactics, and approaches. Sometimes arms are
needed to defeat apartheid and defend freedom in South Africa; sometimes
nonviolent demonstrations for justice are the appropriate strategy for protesting the
shooting of black teenagers by a white man, such as happened in New York City.
Peace is not merely an absence of 'conflict that enables white middleclass comfort,
nor is it simply resistance to nuclear war and war machinery. The litany of "you will
be blown up, too" directed by a white man to a black woman obscures the
permanency and institutionalization of war, the violence and holocaust that people
of color face daily. Unfortunately, the holocaust does not only refer to the mass
murder of Jews, Christians, and atheists during the Nazi regime; it also refers to the
permanent institutionalization of war that is part of every fascist and racist regime.
The holocaust lives. It is a threat to world peace as pervasive and thorough as
nuclear war.
TOPICALITY ANSWERS
T: ITS
WE MEET: THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT FUNDS FUSION CENTERS TO
SECRETLY COORDINATE INTEL GATHERING AND THEN SENDS OUT
TO LOCAL LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENTS TO ACT UPON
Waxman 9 [Matthew, American law professor at Columbia University, Police and
National Security: American Local Law Enforcement and Counterterrorism After
9/11, Journal of National Security Law & Policy, Vol. 3, p. 377] MG
While the decentralized structure of U.S. policing offers several advantages when it comes to combating terrorism,
it also creates organizational challenges. To begin with, that local police agencies command large numbers of
personnel intimately familiar with their local communities makes them a valuable asset for fulfilling
counterterrorism functions but creates an enormous complication in return. How should these resources be
coordinated across thousands of local agencies and with the federal government? Counterterrorism cooperation
thousands of separate agencies together efficiently is not simply one of scale. Heterogeneity also magnifies the
complexity. Local police jurisdictions differ greatly in features such as population size and density, ethnic
composition, geography, urbanization, sitting of high-profile targets, civic culture, and political orientation.48 Local
police forces vary in terms of size, resources, capability, operating procedures, equipment, and day-to-day
priorities, not to mention variations in local laws, including those regulating police conduct.49 In terms of size, for
example, the 46 largest metropolitan police forces (out of a total of over 13,000 state and local forces) account for
over a third of all police officers nationwide, while there are also nearly 800 local police agencies that have just one
officer.50 Consider also the unique threats that New York City faces, for example, as a densely populated, ethnically
diverse home to much of the U.S. and global private financial system.51 In countries with national police forces,
such as France, the organizational challenge of coordinating local counterterrorism police efforts is eased through
centralized and hierarchical command.52 Although the United Kingdom does not have a single national police force,
its local police forces are linked to each other and to national counterterrorism efforts through standardized
institutional mechanisms. Each individual police force in the United Kingdom, for example, until recently had a
special branch whose primary duties were to prosecute and assist in counterterrorism and counterintelligence
operations. Before recent reforms further centralized British counterterrorism policing,53 these units interacted
directly with MI5 (the Security Service, which deals with domestic intelligence) and MI6 (the Secret Intelligence
Service, which deals with intelligence abroad).54 The United States cannot rely on such formal hierarchical
command or uniform institutional mechanisms to link together the countrys massive policing network. The
Constitution was designed so that the federal government may not directly control local law enforcement agencies.
In Printz v. United States, the Supreme Court held unconstitutional a federal statutory provision that required local
law enforcement officials to assist in conducting background checks prior to issuance of gun permits. The case
law enforcement issues, such as narcotics trafficking and gang or organized crime activity, that have national and
international dimensions, and require information sharing and coordination among federal and local police
agencies.57 Counterterrorism, however, differs in size and complexity.
9/11 Commission Act, requires the President to take action to facilitate sharing of terrorism-related information
The Department of Homeland Security funds stateoperated fusion centers to synthesize law enforcement and investigative
information. Unlike the JTTFs, which help manage operations of participating agencies, the fusion
centers operate as information clearinghouses. Similarly, the Justice Department has established
new programs such as a National Data Exchange, to enable federal law enforcement
and intelligence officials to examine quickly huge quantities of state and
local public records.60 The FBI recently launched a new system for sharing tips
about possible terror threats with local police agencies .61 The idea behind these
programs is to build an information sharing framework that supports an effective
and efficient two-way flow of information enabling officials at all levels of
government to counter and respond to threats. 62 The problem is not merely to collect and
pass on more informational dots, but to make sense of them in ways that can be
acted on effectively. Indeed, the more dots that are collected, the harder it may
be to analyze and prioritize them. It remains to be seen how effective these information networking efforts will
among federal, state, and local entities.59
be. They are not yet fully developed; technology continues to change rapidly; and reliable data on their use are
sparse. Some dangers are evident already, however. First, the expansion of an information-sharing network
magnifies some privacy risks, especially personal information collected in one locale is distributed more widely and
to other levels of government.63 In some jurisdictions, civil liberties advocates have complained about the lack of
adequate mechanisms to regulate government information-fusion activities, and this has sometimes helped to
prompt oversight reforms.64
result they have sometimes been described as state police intelligence units on
steroids.18 But exactly who is providing those steroids is key to determining who
will control them in the future. Fusion centers are still primarily staffed and funded
by state authorities, but:
The federal government is playing an essential role in the
Center (MCAC), was initiated and led by federal authorities and was
only recently turned over to the control of state officials.
Thirty percent of ostensibly state-controlled fusion centers are
T: SURVEILLANCE
Fusion Centers are a major aspect of the surveillance state.
Kayyali 14 Boardmember of the National Lawyers Guild S.F. Bay Area, former
member of the 2012 Bill of Rights Defense Committee Legal Fellow, and member of
the EFF activism team. (Nadia Kayyali, Why Fusion Centers Matter: FAQ, April 7,
2014, https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/04/why-fusion-centers-matter-faq)//RP
While NSA surveillance has been front and center in the news recently, fusion
centers are a part of the surveillance state that deserve close scrutiny.
Fusion centers are a local arm of the so-called "intelligence community," the
17 intelligence agencies coordinated by the National Counterterrorism Center
(NCTC). The government documentation around fusion centers is entirely focused
on breaking down barriers between the various government agencies that collect
and maintain criminal intelligence information.
Barriers between local law enforcement and the NSA are already weak. We know
that the Drug Enforcement Agency gets intelligence tips from the NSA which are
used in criminal investigations and prosecutions. To make matters worse, the source
of these tips is camouflaged using parallel construction, meaning that a different
source for the intelligence is created to mask its classified source.
This story demonstrates what we called one of the biggest dangers of the
surveillance state: the unquenchable thirst for access to the NSA's trove of
information by other law enforcement agencies. This is particularly concerning
when NSA information is used domestically. Fusion centers are no different.
In fact, in early 2012, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court approved the
sharing of raw NSA data with the NCTC. The intelligence community overseen by
the NCTC includes the Department of Homeland Security and FBI, the main federal
fusion center partners. Thus, fusion centersand even local law enforcement
could potentially be receiving unminimized NSA data. This runs counter to the
distant image many people have of the NSA, and it's why focusing on fusion centers
as part of the recently invigorated conversation around surveillance is important.
definition carefully, you will able to understand clearly what surveillance actually is and what their features are. This
definition can be divided into three parts, they are
Domestic
Fusion Centers are used for domestic intelligence gathering.
ACLU no date but cites 2012 American Civil Liberties Union, a national, nonprofit organization dedicated to upholding constitutional rights, over 500,000
members, and a legal assistance provider. (ACLU, More About Fusion Centers,
2012, https://www.aclu.org/more-about-fusion-centers?redirect=spy-files/moreabout-fusion-centers)//RP
Fusion centers were designed to organize localized domestic intelligence
gathering into an integrated system that can distribute data both horizontally
across a network of fusion centers and vertically, down to local law enforcement
and up to the federal intelligence community. These centers can employ
officials from federal, state and local law enforcement and homeland security
agencies, as well as other state and local government entities, the federal
intelligence community, the military and even private companies, to spy on
Americans in virtually complete secrecy.
Curtail
A reduction of a programs budget is a curtailment.
POLITIX ANSWERS
T:
THE SENATE HAS ISSUED REPORTS QUESTIONING THE FUNDING OF FUSION CENTERS
Walker 12 [Jesse, books editor of Reason magazine, published in the New York
Times and The Washington Post, Fusion Centers: Expensive, Practically Useless,
and Bad For Your Liberty, Reason magazine, libertarian publication, 10/3/12,
http://reason.com/blog/2012/10/03/fusion-centers-expensive-practically-use] MG
The Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs has just released a report [pdf]
on the "fusion centers" that pepper the law-enforcement landscape -- shadowy intelligence-sharing shops
run on the state and local level but heavily funded by the federal Department of Homeland
Security. It is a devastating document. When a report's recommendations include a plea
for the DHS to "track how much money it gives to each fusion center," you know you're
dealing with a system that has some very basic problems. After reviewing 13 months' worth of the fusion centers'
of automobile had folding rear seats that provided access to the trunk without leaving the car," a feature deemed
notable because it "could be useful to human traffickers." Others highlighted illegal activities by people in the
Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment (TIDE) database, which sounds useful until you hear just what those
people did that attracted the centers' attention. One man was caught speeding. Another shoplifted some shoes.
TIDE itself, according to the Senate report, is filled not just with suspected terrorists but with their "associates," a
term broad enough to rope in a two-year-old boy. Nearly a third of the reports were not even circulated after they
were written, sometimes because they contained no useful information, sometimes because they "overstepped
legal boundaries" in disturbing ways: "Reporting on First Amendment-protected activities lacking a nexus to
violence or criminality; reporting on or improperly characterizing political, religious or ideological speech that is not
explicitly violent or criminal; and attributing to an entire group the violent or criminal acts of one or a limited
number of the group's members." (One analyst, for example, felt the need to note that a Muslim community group's
list of recommended readings included four items whose authors were in the TIDE database.) Interestingly, while
the DHS usually refused to publish these problematic reports, the department also retained them for an "apparantly
indefinite" period. Why did the centers churn out so much useless and illegal material? A former employee says
officers were judged "by the number [of reports] they produced, not by quality or evaluations they received."
Senate investigators were "able to identify only one case in which an official with a history of serious reporting
issues faced any consequences for his mistakes." Specifically, he had to attend an extra week of training. Other
issues identified in the Senate report: Some of the fusion centers touted by the Department of Homeland Security
do not, in fact, exist. Centers have reported threats that do not exist either. An alleged Russian "cyberattack"
DHS
"was unable to provide an accurate tally of how much it had granted to states and
cities to support fusion centers efforts." Instead it offered "broad estimates of the total
amount of federal dollars spent on fusion center activities from 2003 to 2011, estimates which ranged from
$289 million to $1.4 billion." When you aren't keeping track of how much you're spending, it becomes
turned out to be an American network technician accessing a work computer remotely while on vacation.
hard to keep track of what that money is being spent on. All sorts of dubious expenses slipped by. A center in San
Diego "spent nearly $75,000 on 55 flat-screen televisions," according to the Senate report. "When asked what the
televisions were being used for, officials said they displayed calendars, and were used for 'open-source monitoring.'
Asked to define 'open-source monitoring,' SD-LECC officials said they meant 'watching the news.' "
The report
is also filled with signs of stonewalling. A "2010 assessment of state and local fusion centers
conducted at the request of DHS found widespread deficiencies in the centers' basic counterterrorism informationsharing capabilities," for example. "DHS did not share that report with Congress or discuss its findings publicly.
When the Subcommittee requested the assessment as part of its investigation, DHS at first denied it existed, then
disputed whether it could be shared with Congress, before ultimately providing a copy."
Many centers have adopted an "all-crime, all-hazards" approach that shifts their
focus from stopping terrorism and onto a broader spectrum of threats. You could make a reasonable case that this is
a wiser use of public resources -- terrorism is rare, after all, and the DHS-driven movement away from the allhazards approach in the early post-9/11 years had disastrous results. Unfortunately, the leading "hazards" on the
Obama wanted the freedom act. A bilateral victory gave him political
capital.
New York Times 15, American daily newspaper, won 117 Pulitzer Prizes,
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/04/us/winning-surveillance-limits-obama-makes-program-own.html,
Now, after successfully badgering Congress into reauthorizing the program, with
new safeguards the president says will protect privacy, Mr. Obama has left little
question that he owns it. The new surveillance program created by the USA
Freedom Act will end more than a decade of bulk collection of telephone records by
the National Security Agency. But it will make records already held by telephone
companies available for broad searches by government officials with a court order.
Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, walking to the Senate floor on
Tuesday. The Senate has cleared the final procedural hurdle blocking a bill meant to
rein in government surveillance. U.S. Surveillance in Place Since 9/11 Is Sharply
Limited JUNE 2, 2015 Senator Richard Burr, a Republican from North Carolina and
chairman of the Intelligence Committee, in Washington on Monday. Surveillance Bill
Awaits Verdicts on Amendments From Hawks in Senate JUNE 1, 2015 The reforms
that have now been enacted are exactly the reforms the president called for over a
year and a half ago, said Lisa Monaco, the presidents top counterterrorism adviser.
She called the bill the product of a robust public debate and said the White House
was gratified that the Senate finally passed it.
New York Times 15, American daily newspaper, won 117 Pulitzer Prizes,
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/04/us/winning-surveillance-limits-obama-makes-program-own.html,
enforcement abuses.6 Both views were displayed, for instance, when the New York City Police Department (NYPD)
prepared for the 2004 Republican National Convention by deploying undercover officers across the country to
conduct covert surveillance of suspected protesters, including members of religious groups and anti-war
organizations. David Cohen, a former deputy director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and now Deputy New
York City Policy Commissioner for Intelligence, proclaimed that [g]iven the range of activities that may be engaged
in by the members of a sleeper cell in the long period of preparation for an act of terror, the entire resources of the
NYPD must be available to conduct investigations into political activity and intelligence related issues.7 Civil
liberties groups expressed outrage and brought suits against the city alleging widespread rights abuses and political
This tension between civil liberties and state security measures lies at the
heart of national security law. By national security law, I mean regulation of coercive government
harassment.8
powers wielded to protect the state, including against external military threats as well as internal efforts to
undermine government. While there are some particular features that pertain to local policing, the substantive issue
of balancing investigatory and coercive state powers against rights and freedoms is certainly not unique to local
local police departments across the country.10 Another source puts the number of state and local police agencies
geographically dispersed as the local populations they serve. Terrorism was by no means a new problem for the
United States in 2001, nor were state and local governments uninvolved in the counterterrorism effort before then.
The 1990s alone saw the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, the Oklahoma City bombing, and the series of attacks
by Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski. Many states in the 1990s enacted criminal statutes against terrorist activity
that mirror federal criminal laws.12 Until the September 11 attacks, however, terrorism within the United States
was not a priority issue at any level of government .
only about half of local police agencies had contingency plans for dealing
with terrorist threats. About 40 percent of municipalities reported never having had contact with federal
agencies regarding terrorism issues.15 The September 2001 attacks, followed soon after by anthrax
attacks in the postal system, generated new urgency in counterterrorism efforts and stimulated
information-sharing throughout the U.S. government system . Changed threat
perceptions also resulted in major federal and state bureaucratic restructuring. At the
federal level this mobilization included vastly increasing the FBIs emphasis
on domestic counterterrorism through structural changes and increasing the
personnel dedicated to this mission.16 Congress created the new Department of Homeland Security, which
consolidated nearly two dozen federal agencies and assumed responsibility for protecting U.S. territory from
terrorist attacks and responding to natural disasters.17 Perhaps most controversially, even the Department of
Defense expanded its efforts to identify suspected terrorists and other threats within the United States, until civil
the perceived terrorist threat after September 11 that pushed the counterterrorism agenda down to local levels of
government, including to within the police agencies; it was also the sense that major national vulnerabilities once
again existed at home, with threats materializing or operating inside U.S. borders. The September 11 attacks left
the government at all levels federal, state and local worried about gaps in their capabilities to piece together
and neutralize terrorist plots. Many of the dots comprising the September 11 plot sequence occurred within the
United States, including flight instruction by several of the eventual hijackers and traffic violation stops of two of
them by state police. Perhaps, it followed, the attacks could have been averted with better systems and policies to
discern, analyze, and act on such dots throughout the country, ultimately uncovering the plot.20 The September
11 attacks also created a national sense of fear that al Qaeda and its allies were in the process of unleashing a
campaign of additional attacks using sleeper cells embedded in American communities, and awaiting orders or
opportunities to strike.21 A number of alleged al Qaeda cells in the United States have been arrested and
prosecuted in the years since the September 11 attacks, including the Lackawanna 6 (a half-dozen YemeniAmericans living near Buffalo, New York, convicted of providing material support to al Qaeda)22 and a Miami-based
group allegedly bent on destroying Chicagos Sears Tower.23 Most recently, federal agencies arrested and charged
Najibullah Zazi, an Afghan immigrant who allegedly trained in an al Qaeda camp in Pakistan and planned to
detonate bombs within the United States.24 In retrospect, the sophistication and potential effectiveness of many of
the thwarted cells has been called into doubt, and the partial disruption of al Qaedas leadership apparatus in
Afghanistan and Pakistan has sewn doubt as to whether al Qaeda still poses a major threat of attack inside the
United States.25 But the reduced worry of centrally commanded or supported al Qaeda cells inside the United
States has been replaced by additional concerns about locally rooted, organizationally autonomous radical
extremists who might plan and carry out terrorist attacks in the name of a broader al Qaeda-inspired agenda.26 As
a result of these emerging threats, local police agencies have played a number of expanded counterterrorism roles
in recent years.27 These include criminal law enforcement, public protection, emergency response, and intelligence
gathering. Most criminal prosecutions for crimes directly related to terrorism are investigated and prosecuted at the
federal level.28 Federal investigative and prosecutorial capabilities are vast and sophisticated, while federal
antiterrorism statutes and the high profile of such crimes push the prosecution of terrorism crimes at the federal
police agencies responsibilities for providing protection of possible target sites, public education and awareness,
and emergency response have grown considerably.30 An extensive survey in 2002 by the U.S. Conference of
Mayors details the significant financial and personnel costs of these efforts at the municipal level, especially within
local police departments.31 A 2005 survey of state and local police agencies by the International Association of
Chiefs of Police further documents significant changes in operational capacity, mission focus, and program
the most important as well as controversial national security role for police,
however, is intelligence collection.33 Following exposure of abusive law enforcement surveillance
resourcing.32 Perhaps
tactics during the 1950s to 1970s, many police agencies dismantled their intelligence collection units altogether.34
agencies created intelligence analyst positions and assembled new units dedicated
to countering terrorism.37 The difficult organizational, accountability and functional challenges this role
creates for the nationwide policing system are explored in the next three Parts.
A2: CAPITALISM K
conjunction with a major story in the New York Times that is based on the 4,000 pages of government documents
uncovered by the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund (PCJF) during a two-year long investigation. The newly published
documents reveal the actual workings of the Fusion Centers created ostensibly to coordinate anti-terrorism efforts
following the September 11, 2001, attacks in collecting and providing surveillance information on peaceful
The new documents roll back the curtain on the Fusion Centers and show the
communications, interactions and emails of a massive national web of federal agents,
officials, police, and private security contractors to accumulate and share
information, reporting on all manner of peaceful and lawful political activity that
took place during the Occupy Movement from protests and rallies to meetings and
protestors.
educational lectures. This enormous spying and monitoring apparatus included the Pentagon, FBI, DHS, police
also that while these 4,000 pages offer the most significant and largest window into the U.S. intelligence and law
enforcements coordinated targeting of Occupy, they can only be a portion of what is likely many more tens of
thousands of pages of materials generated by the nationwide operation. Until now the role of the Fusion Centers in
their application of anti-terrorism authority and resources has been shrouded in secrecy. In 2012, the Senate issued
an investigative report on the Fusion Centers that The Washington Post described as revealing pools of ineptitude,
waste and civil liberties intrusions. The Department of Homeland Security immediately dismissed and condemned
the report and defended the fusion centers, saying the Senate investigators relied on out-of-date data, from 2009
and 2010, and prior years of materials. The public was not privy to the records underlying that investigation,
however, the documents that the Senate reviewed predated the documents that the Partnership for Civil Justice
Fund has obtained and made public. The newly released documents show that the Department of Homeland
Securitys representations were far from true, that the conduct of the Fusion Centers continued unabated. The
the
Fusion Centers in the Fall of 2011 and Winter of 2012 were devoted to
unconstrained targeting of a grassroots movement for social change that was
acknowledged to be peaceful in character. The documents reveal that the police chiefs of
major U.S. cities created an Emerging Issues Subcommittee to identify, research
and document trends or activities that may threaten public safety for
communication to the nationwide network of Fusion Centers and that The first
issue the committee is working is the Occupy Movement . The documents show that the Major
Cities Chiefs (MCC) efforts to increase situational awareness and promote public safety required twice a weekproduced bulletins on the Occupy Movement. At the present time it is our intention to utilize the services of the
Southern Nevada Counter Terrorism Center to collect, analyze and disseminate bulletins twice a week. The
distribution list for these Fusion Center-issued bulletins includes virtually every single Fusion Center in the United
States. Investigating Terrorism in Boston: The Boston Regional Intelligence Center Monitored and Catalogued
Occupy-Associated Activities from Student Organizing to Political Lectures In the Fall of 2011, the Boston Regional
Intelligence Center (BRIC) devoted significant resources including deployment of intelligence analysts to a detailed
monitoring and cataloging operation, issuing twice-daily Situation Awareness Bulletins on Occupy Boston. We
have obtained over 1,200 pages of these bulletinswhich have not been previously disclosed. We need your help!
PCJF attorneys have worked for years to expose the governments use of counter-terrorism authority to carry out
illegal spying on peace and social justice movements, including the Occupy movement. Please make an urgently
needed tax-deductible contribution to support these efforts in defense of freedom, dissent and constitutional rights.
The BRIC intelligence analysts monitored Occupy activists Twitter accounts and poured over Facebook pages
constantly reporting and then repeatedly providing updates on the number of people who may have indicated they
would be attending any event or lecture. The BRIC documents catalogued plans and meetings, including labor
rallies and activities by nurses, the Professional Fire Fighters of Massachusetts (AFL-CIO), and Verizon workers;
student organizing and meetings at Boston University, Suffolk, Harvard, Tufts and throughout the area (Analyst
Notes: Tufts students are organizing a group to go to Dudley Square to show support for the Occupy the Hood As
of 3:00 p.m. on 20 October 2011, 35 people are listed as attending, 9 maybes on the Facebook event page);
speakers, authors, personalities and lecturers, including Noam Chomsky, writer/director David Rothauser (Analyst
note: It is unknown at this time if Rothauser is a known/respected figure within the anarchist movement), Bill
McKibben (Analyst note: [he] organized a sit-in near the White House in August of this year to protest
construction of a pipeline.), Russell Simmons, Van Jones, Brian Wilson of VFP, representatives from the National
Lawyers Guild, the National Police Accountability Project and the ACLU-Mass. From musical concerts to womens
caucus meetings, to yoga, to meetings and lectures on college campuses nothing was outside the purview of the
Boston Fusion Centers supposed anti-terrorism and anti-crime mandate and vast resources. The PCJF had
previously obtained and exposed a handful of documents of a different nature showing BRICs reporting on Occupy,
which investigative reporter Michael Isikoff of NBC News noted in an article Unaware of Tsarnaev warnings, Boston
What was less known from the earlier documents but revealed in the
new massive BRIC document release was the immense scope and intensity of hour-by-hour
reporting on the Occupy Movement indicating not only an interest but an actual
preoccupation with intelligence gathering on all manner of political
speech, meeting, thought and expression affiliated with Occupy. The Boston Police
counterterror unit tracked protesters.
Department stated in 2012, according to The Boston Globe, that the Boston Regional Intelligence Center does
not conduct surveillance on protest groups without reason to believe they are tied to crime or terrorism. An email,
in the newly released documents, from a high level official in the Washington Regional Threat and Analysis Center
(D.C. Fusion Center) in December of 2011, and sent to D.C. police officials, states: I just received a call from the
City of Boston. I was informed that a group of 15-20 Occupy Boston members and other activist group members
departed Boston by bus this morning on their way to the District for a Week of Action. According to the caller, none
of the people are known to be troublemakers. Pentagon and Dept. of Defense Worked Through Fusion Centers to
Street was the Pentagons agency that specializes in countering weapons of mass destruction worldwide. The
Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), whose official mission is to address the entire spectrum of chemical,
biological, radiological, nuclear and high yield explosive threats, regularly used the Fusion Centers as the vehicle to
share information on the Occupy Movement. This Pentagon agency that exists to counter threats from weapons of
mass destruction circulated material on Occupy including, for example, one document with the subject line: FW:
Alert Update! Chicago What Police Should Be Learning From The Occupy Protests. This document shows in an
email chain that this article was initially circulated through the subscription website activistmap.com, which is billed
as the Domestic Terrorism Tracking System. The keywords associated with this Domestic Terrorism Tracking
System include: anarchist(s), animal rights, environmentalist, protesters, socialist(s), communist(s), civil
disobedience, social justice and global justice, among others. Another example of information circulated from the
Pentagons WMD agency was about plans for peaceful protests in Washington, D.C, in early December 2011
including a national prayer vigil with unemployed folks and faith leaders that was to be followed by a mass
march on Congressional leaders. In one document, an Intelligence Research Specialist with the Threat Analysis
Center at the Pentagons Force Protection Agency forwards the advice that anyone having an Occupy Wallstreet
type problem in their city could set up a surveillance operation using social media to maintain constant review of
all Twitter tweets and Facebook postings about Occupy Wall Street. Her email circulates the advice that to
constantly monitor the social media communications of Occupy activists: you set up a computer and someone to
monitor it, they simply type in site:twitter.com occupy city here and they will get feeds of people posting about
the occupy movement in that city. Same goes for Facebook. Use facebook.com occupy city here and all of the
facebook postings appear. A very handy intel gathering tool. If they have a dual screen set up like I do you can have
both open and simply hit refresh every so often and you get the new tweets and postings from the sites. The
Fusion
Centers and their personnel even conflate their anti-terrorism mission with a need for
intelligence gathering on a possible consumer boycott during the holiday season.
Terrorist Threat to U.S. National Security: Black Friday Consumer Boycotts The documents reveal that
There are multiple documents from across the country referencing concerns about negative impacts on retail sales.
The Executive Director of the Intelligence Fusion Division, also the Joint Terrorism Task Force Director, for the D.C.
Metropolitan Police Department circulated a 30-page report tracking the Occupy Movement in towns and cities
across the country created by the trade association the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC). He
directed that the recipients of the document, who included top staff at the Washington, D.C. Fusion Center,
develop a one page product that we can send to our District Commanders to make them aware of the potential
threat. The ICSC report detailing Occupy Black Friday threats includes images of Sample Anti-Black Friday Icons
and Posters with slogans urging people to buy local or do your shopping at a small independent merchant. The
report identifies among Specific Known Threats buy nothing day tactics which might be used by Occupy and
other protesters including credit card cut ups, free non-commercial street parties, and alternative mass green
transport activities. Additional Specific Known Threats in the report are identified by individual Occupy locations
from Occupy Bee Cave, Texas (Assessment Aim: to educate how military spending has affected the economy
consistent with anti-war agenda of the group) to Occupy Seattle (Assessment leafleting likely in order to draw
attention). The intelligence reporting and communications apparatus was in full throttle over potential Occupy
Black Friday boycotts. One sample document issued from the Baltimore police shows a distribution list ranging from
the Maryland Fusion Center, the FBI, the DHS, the Middle Atlantic-Great Lakes Organized Crime Law Enforcement
Network, the Secret Service, the NYPD and other city and state law enforcement, the manager of corporate security
for an energy company, university personnel, and the Federal Reserve. The counter-terrorism documents contain
multiple references to Black Friday boycotts as well as potential negative impacts on retails sales. Lets Go Down to
Occupy Encampment to hear some tunes and get laid: Communication from Washington, D.C. Fusion Center
Official to Maryland Fusion Center Official One document reveals the shared communications about Occupy
between an anti-terrorism official from the Baltimore Police Department who is assigned to the Maryland Fusion
and an official (and private contractor) with the Washington Regional Threat Analysis
Center. The Baltimore police official, who also circulated through the Fusion Centers hostile and false anti-Occupy
Center
materials published by a politically conservative group, says in response to the D.C. officials suggestion that they
should go to Baltimore Occupy events and hear some tunes and get laid that Im all over thatfor Halloween I
am going as a Occupy protestorBaltimore Sunday and Annapolis Monday [ellipsis in original]. Scared When the
Occupy activists speculate about the role of the Fusion Centers in the crackdown on Occupy through social media.
The Deputy Director of the Washington Threat and Analysis Center sent an email to fusion center partners titled
Open Source Media Discussing Fusion Centers and Crackdowns on the Occupy Movement about articles
referencing possible fusion center involvement in coordinating police response and subsequent violence. She
warns, Although at this time these references to fusion centers and Occupy seems to be compartmentalized I
wanted to make you aware of these references in case the national news media begins speculating about fusion
center involvement. This Fusion Center director sent out an Excel file of about 2700 open source news items from
the last 24-48 hours containing Occupy created by her friend who publishes globalincidentmap.com (and the
previously described activistmap.com). A small sampling of the tweets are included in the text of the email, many of
which are about Pacifica radios flagship show Democracy Now having broadcast discussion on the possible
involvement of the Fusion Centers in the crackdown on the Occupy Movement. Watching the PCJF Documents
released to us show that one DHS Commander subscribes to the Partnership for Civil Justice Funds constituent
emails through his personal email account, forwards our emails to his Department of Homeland Security account
and then circulates them on to other law enforcement personnel. Among our emails meriting Homeland Security
importance was an announcement that filmmaker and author Michael Moore was supporting our public advocacy
campaign calling on the Manhattan District Attorney to drop the charges against the 700 peaceful protestors who
had been mass arrested on the Brooklyn Bridge on October 1, 2011 (the PCJF is also litigating the class action
constitutional rights suit from those arrests.) A Well-Funded Surveillance-Industrial Complex on a Mission to Justify
its Exponential Funding The documents reveal a feverish urgency to collect and share as much information as
possible on any manifestation of protest. The Deputy Director of the Washington Regional Threat and Analysis
Center, the Fusion Center in Washington, D.C., circulated a constituent email from the anti-war organization
ANSWER Coalition endorsing a demonstration by postal workers outside the National Press Club against layoffs and
post office closings. Other documents show the intensity of communications between the various local and regional
Fusion Centers who seem to be frantic to publish regular Occupy product that can be shared with other agency
officials, local police officials and a large seemingly duplicative network of Fusion Center POCs (Point of Contact)
who are similarly tasked to produce and receive similar reports. The focus of this large, duplicative reporting
apparatus concerns even the most trivial details about the smallest activity. For example, the Nashville-based
Fusion Center Point of Contact, in one of many such documents, asks other Fusion Centers around the country to fill
out an elaborate reporting form to compile a report to Nashville police chiefs the next day. The agent requests
information from officials in the Washington, D.C., Fusion Center because Ive been tasked to produce an overview
of Occupy movement activities in various cities around the nation, to be disseminated to all our [Nashville] Chiefs
tomorrow morning at 1000 hrs. The Nashville requestor asks for detailed information from the other cities: were
there marches in Occupy activities, were there signs and banners, identification of specific political issues raised,
did the activists give interviews to the media, did they hold regular General Assembly meetings, did local law
enforcement agencies communicate with local civil rights organizations, and did dealing directly with these
Center representative replies that she is working on a product that I plan on having out by Thursday. Throughout
the documents, which contain even more information than highlighted here, the constant effort for product to be
written and reviewed is strongly suggestive that the officials themselves feel pressed to justify the large funding
surveillance corporations that apparently have contracts with or provide subscription services to law enforcement
personnel and who also monitor and provide information on protest activities, another improper mass diversion of
taxpayers funds. Many of the private contractors have cycled in and out of government employment, and the
documents show that there are personnel using government email addresses, including fbi.gov suffixes, who
The fact that the Fusion Centers and this same cast of
government and private sector actors reflexively went into full throttle against a
peaceful protest movement demonstrates not only institutional hostility to a
grassroots movement for social justice but the hollowness of their stated mission of
combating terrorism. The Fusion Centers are Incompatible with Democracy and Must Be Ended The new
Fusion Center documents demonstrate the workings of a self-perpetuating
Surveillance-Industrial Complex. In the name of fighting terrorism, and with everregular admonitions to the American public that these institutions must be given a
blank check in the name of national security, a limitless funding stream flows from
actually are private contractors.
the American people into the pockets of those who profit and benefit from this
system. These documents reveal what our money is being wasted on and, critically,
how it is being used in derogation of our fundamental rights and liberties. The
people of the United States do not want to live as a nation under constant
surveillance, targeted by government counterterrorism and intelligence agencies
when they engage in the exercise of basic rights to free speech. The American
people have the right and ability to decide the nature of the society in which they
live. We are calling on elected officials to defend the Constitution and democratic rights by defunding and ending
the Fusion Centers. Take action and join the campaign to end the Fusion Centers now!
Case
Crime Prevention
Turn -- Fusion centers key to crime preventionthey facilitate
intergovernmental information-sharing
DHS 15 [Department of Homeland Security, State and Major Urban Area Fusion
Centers, DHS.gov, 7/6/15, http://www.dhs.gov/state-and-major-urban-area-fusioncenters] MG
fusion centers (fusion centers) serve as focal points within the state and
for the receipt, analysis, gathering, and sharing of threat-related information
between the federal government and state , local, tribal, territorial (SLTT) and private sector
partners. Located in states and major urban areas throughout the country, fusion centers are uniquely
situated to empower front-line law enforcement, public safety, fire service,
emergency response, public health, critical infrastructure protection, and private sector security personnel
to understand local implications of national intelligence, thus enabling local officials to better
protect their communities. Fusion centers provide interdisciplinary expertise and
situational awareness to inform decision-making at all levels of government. They
conduct analysis and facilitate information sharing while assisting law enforcement and
State and major urban area
local environment
homeland security partners in preventing, protecting against, and responding to crime and terrorism. Fusion centers
are owned and operated by state and local entities with support from federal partners in the form of deployed
personnel, training, technical assistance, exercise support, security clearances, connectivity to federal systems,
technology, and grant funding. The Current Threat Environment and Role of Fusion Centers in National Security Both
at home and abroad, the United States faces an adaptive enemy in an asymmetric threat environment. Events since
May 2009 have demonstrated that the threat to the homeland is not abating. The National Network of Fusion
Centers (National Network) is uniquely situated to empower front-line law enforcement, public safety, emergency
response, and private sector security personnel to lawfully gather and share information to identify emerging
threats. The national security enterprise must reach beyond the capabilities of the federal government and national
Intelligence Community to identify and warn about impending plots that could impact the homeland, particularly
when the individuals responsible for the threats operate within the United States and do not travel or communicate
with others overseas. By building trusted relationships and collaborating with SLTT and private sector partners,
fusion centers can gather and share the information necessary to pursue and
disrupt activities that may be indicators of, or potential precursors to, terrorist activity.
With timely, accurate information on potential terrorist threats, fusion centers can directly contribute to and inform
investigations initiated and conducted by federal entities, such as the Joint Terrorism Task Forces led by the Federal
Bureau of Investigation. According to the 2010 National Security Strategy (PDF, 60 pages - 1.52 MB), the federal
government must continue to integrate and leverage fusion centers to enlist all of our intelligence, law
enforcement, and homeland security capabilities to prevent acts of terrorism on American soil. Efforts to protect the
homeland require the timely gathering, analysis, and sharing of threat-related information. Fusion centers provide a
mechanism through which the federal government, SLTT, and private sector partners come together to accomplish
this purpose. Beginning in 2003, the federal government, in cooperation with state and local entities, published
guidance to enable fusion centers to operate at a baseline level of capability and to form a robust and fully
integrated National Network. The National Network allows the federal government, SLTT, and private sector
partners to participate as full contributors to, and beneficiaries of, the homeland security enterprise. This strategic
vision can be realized only when fusion centers demonstrate institutionalized levels of capability that enable
efficient and effective information sharing and analysis across the National Network. This will help link the federal
government with SLTT and private sector entities to more effectively share information. Given the evolving threat
environment, it is vital that fusion centers quickly achieve their roles, as explained in the National Strategy for
Information Sharing (NSIS), as the focal points within the SLTT environment for the receipt, analysis, gathering, and
sharing of threatrelated information. Enhancing Department Resources to Support Fusion Centers The Department
of Homeland Security (DHS) has expedited the deployment of resources to fusion centers to enhance their ability to
perform their mission. The DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis (I&A), the Department's lead for support to fusion
centers, has deployed over 90 personnel, including Intelligence Officers and Regional Directors, to the field. I&A also
worked aggressively to deploy Homeland Secure Data Network (HSDN) to over 60 fusion centers. HSDN provides
SECRET-level connectivity to enhance the ability of state and local partners to receive federally generated classified
threat information. Additionally, the Department significantly expanded training and technical assistance
opportunities for fusion center personnel. Through its long-standing partnership with the Department of Justice
(DOJ), the Department has conducted more than 300 training and technical assistance deliveries, workshops, and
exchanges on topics including risk analysis, security, and privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties since 2007. By
providing these resources, the Department supports fusion centers to address some of the nation's most significant
homeland security challenges. Expanding the Nationwide Suspicious Activity Reporting (SAR) Initiative (NSI) A Call
to Action: A Unified Message Regarding the Need to Support Suspicious Activity Reporting and Training To provide
guidance regarding how and where to report suspicious activities, state, local, and federal agencies worked
collaboratively to develop a Unified Message that provides clear guidance regarding how to report suspicious
activities, encourages agencies to work with DHS to utilize the "If You See Something, Say Something" campaign,
and emphasizes the importance of training frontline personnel. The Department is working closely with the DOJ-led
Nationwide Suspicious Activity Reporting Initiative Program Management Office to establish a standard process to
identify and report suspicious activity in jurisdictions across the country. Under the leadership of I&A, the
Department has made it a priority to participate in and support the implementation of the NSI while also integrating
SAR processes across the National Network of Fusion Centers. The integration of NSI within both the Department
and the fusion centers is a key element of fusion center outreach to law enforcement at all levels of government.
The Department has also launched the "If You See Something, Say Something" campaign in order to engage the
public to identify and report indicators of terrorism, crime, and other threats. The Path Ahead Working closely with
interagency partners and Fusion Center Directors, the Department supports an annual nationwide, in-depth
assessment of fusion centers to evaluate their capabilities and to establish strategic priorities for federal
government support. The assessment focuses primarily on four Critical Operational Capabilities (Receive, Analyze,
Disseminate, and Gather) and four Enabling Capabilities (Privacy/Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Protections,
Sustainment Strategy, Communications and Outreach, and Security) as well as additional priority areas for the year.
Leveraging data collected from the Annual Fusion Center Assessment, the Department coordinates efforts to build
Emergency Response
Fusion centers key to emergency responsemost centers have an
all-hazards focus
In the law enforcement and intelligence arena, the push has been to get various
agencies effectively sharing information and working in tighter coordination something they didn't always do before 9/11. This led to the creation of what the
law enforcement community calls the "fusion center." Though most think of
homeland security intelligence functions when they think of the fusion
center, the concept has always included an all-hazards approach, according
to Andrew Lluberes, director of communications for the Intelligence and Analysis
Office of Public Affairs, of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS). "The
concept of the fusion center is to give the federal government and the states an
opportunity to share information and intelligence, and that's not limited to
terrorism," Lluberes said. "DHS's jurisdiction obviously includes terrorism, but a lot
of other things as well: natural disasters chemical, weapons of mass destruction and
just basic law enforcement." Lluberes said some past natural disasters, such as
Hurricane Katrina, didn't have the benefit of working fusion centers. However, he
said fusion centers are beginning to mature and emergency managers will benefit
from their existence. "As a conduit to share information and intelligence, they
certainly would be used in a future natural disaster," said Lluberes. According to the
DHS, there are nearly 60 fusion centers nationwide and more are being formed.
Each has unique characteristics because of local priorities and concerns. A fusion
center in Arizona or Texas, for example, might involve Immigration and Customs
Enforcement or Drug Enforcement Administration officials because of their proximity
to the Mexican border. Though most fusion centers concentrate on law enforcement
and homeland security matter, their operations can provide lessons for EOC
managers. Fusion of Data The ultimate goal of any fusion center is to prevent
terrorist attacks and to respond to natural disasters and man-made threats quickly
and efficiently. But as a Congressional Research Service report also noted, there is
no one model for how a center should be structured. Although many of the centers
initially had purely counterterrorism goals, most have gravitated toward an allcrimes and even a broader all-hazards approach. "Data fusion involves the
exchange of information from different sources - including law enforcement, public
safety and the private sector - and, with analysis, can result in meaningful and
actionable intelligence and information," noted a Department of Justice guidelines
paper. "The fusion process turns this information and intelligence into actionable
knowledge. Fusion also allows relentless re-evaluation of existing data in context
with new data in order to provide constant updates. The public safety and privatesector components are integral in the fusion process because they provide fusion
centers with crime-related information, including risk and threat assessments, and
subject-matter experts who can aid in threat identification." Indeed, it's this
informational process that extends the role of the fusion center from an
antiterrorism focus to general law enforcement and perhaps other emergencies and
disasters. One such fusion center is Chicago's Crime Prevention Information Center
(CPIC), which works on the antiterrorism initiative, and general law enforcement.
The center allows rapid discovery of possible crimes by recording sounds, such as
gunshots, and showing police their exact locations on a computer screen. About 30
full-time detectives, police officers and supervisors staff CPIC. Each of the 35
suburban departments working with the center lends officers to help field calls for
information. Additionally representatives from the FBI, Cook County Sheriff's Office
and other federal agencies provide liaison personnel to the center. According to
Chicago Police Cmdr. David Sobczyk, head of the Deployment Operations Center, of
which CPIC is an extension, focusing both on crime and terrorism strengthens the
antiterrorism mission. Not only are everyday crimes sometimes precursors to a
terrorist attack, but more importantly, having a center that is constantly being
exercised 24/7 by responding to actual public safety incidents only makes staff
more skilled and effective in dealing with a terrorist threat. This combined mission
focus is evident as soon as one enters the CPIC room. As well as computer screens
on the walls, there are TVs that show streams of news 24/7 from American and
overseas news channels, from places like Israel, China or Arab states. While it
continues to evolve and is improving all the time, the $1 million CPIC - funded with a
homeland security grant, through seized drug money and from the Chicago PD's
operational budget - has become a model for other jurisdictions. This prompted the
DHS to engage Sobczyk to give presentations on CPIC to other law enforcement
entities around the country.
centers has been exponential and regrettably in many instances it has produced an ill-planned mishmash rather
than a true national system that is well-integrated with existing organizations like the FBI-led Joint Terrorism Task
Forces, Leiter wrote in an email when asked about the report. In its response to the Senate panel , Homeland
Security said that the canceled reports could still be retained for administrative purposes such as audit and
oversight. The report cited multiple examples of what it called fusion center reports that had little if any value to
counterterrorism efforts. One fusion center report cited described how a certain model car had folding rear seats to
the trunk, a feature that it said could be useful to human traffickers. This prompted a Homeland Security reviewer
to note that such folding rear seats are featured on MANY different makes and model of vehicles and there is
nothing of any intelligence value in this report. Another fusion center report, entitled Possible Drug Smuggling
Activity, recounted the experiences of two state wildlife officials who spotted a pair of men in a bass boat
operating suspiciously in the body of water off the U.S.-Mexico border. The report noted that the fishermen
avoided eye contact and that their boat appeared to be low in the water, as if it were laden with cargo with high
winds and choppy waters. The fact that some guys were hanging out in a boat where people normally do not fish
MIGHT be an indicator of something abnormal, but does not reach the threshold of something we should be
reporting, a Homeland Security reviewer wrote, according to the Senate panel. I think that this should never
have been nominated for production, nor passed through three reviews. In the Homeland Security Departments
FBI/Police Answers
bias. Erich Von Almen, a sergeant in the St. Louis County Police Department, is
assigned to the city of Jennings, right next door to Ferguson. Like Ferguson, Jennings
is predominantly African-American. "There are a few Caucasians that still live here,"
Von Almen says. Von Almen himself is white, as are most police officers here. That's
another way Jennings is like Ferguson: White cops patrol black neighborhoods. Von
Almen was keenly aware of that right after the shooting of Michael Brown. "It was a
little tense," he says, but "I was, I guess, pleasantly surprised" by the relative calm.
Did anyone call him a racist? "No," he says, then hesitates. "Well, let me say this:
No more than during, quote-unquote, normal times." Jennings has something else in
common with Ferguson. Darren Wilson, the Ferguson officer who shot Michael
Brown, used to work in Jennings. But three years ago, scandals prompted the city to
disband its police department and fire its officers including Wilson. The city then
switched to county police, and Von Almen says they're turning things around in
Jennings. "If there's a violation, whether it's something as simple as ... an
outstanding warrant or a traffic violation, there's a zero-tolerance policy,"
he says. "And the good citizens of the precinct that we patrol appreciate
that, because it has had a very positive impact on crime stats." But here's
the thing: Jennings is predominantly black, so if the cops here are showing
zero tolerance, it can't help but feel like racial profiling to the residents.
Von Almen says he gets that, but insists the zero tolerance policy is colorblind.
"For example, there's a big heroin trade down here. And a lot of white people
come, and they get stopped," he says. "And they all say the same thing: that they
were stopped because they were white in a black area." The difference is that black
people who feel under scrutiny are in their own neighborhoods, not coming in from
elsewhere. Young black men, especially, say they have to do everything perfectly to
avoid trouble with the police. That's something even some white officers say they
recognize. "Even if there's not any truth to it, the fact that the perception is out
there sort of becomes the reality," says Jeff Roorda, a retired cop. Now a business
manager for the St. Louis Police Officers Association, he's also a state
representative. "We put police where crime is, and we saturate areas where
we're trying to displace crime," Roorda says. "And through no fault of their own,
a lot of young black men are right in the middle of that."
seem encouraging that the FBI has recently begun to embrace community
partnerships as a way to counter radicalization, as recommended in a White
House strategy paper published in August. But while these partnerships provide the
FBI with another layer of intelligence, they also raise questions about who, exactly,
should represent the Muslim community in dealings with the governmentand
how those dealings affect the freedom of speech and assembly of other MuslimAmericans, including those who may object to US foreign policy and Islamist
violence alike. In May of last year, FBI agents in Houston hurriedly organized
a lunch meeting with about thirty leaders of the citys Muslim community.
Faisal Shahzad, a Pakistani-born US citizen from Connecticut, had just
attempted to car-bomb Times Square. The agents informed the leaders
who had gathered at an Indian restaurant that, in the wake of the attempted attack
in New York, the FBI would be visiting Muslims in the Houston area to gain more
information on the potential radicalization of young people in the community. The
meeting had been coordinated by Ghulam Bombaywala, a local PakistaniAmerican businessman and close associate of the FBI. Those present were
shown FBI slides purporting to explain the process of radicalization and the warning
signs to look out for. The meeting was typical of attempts by FBI field offices across
the country to cultivate relationships with people they describe as centers of
influence in Muslim communities. In its position paper the Obama administration
heralds community partnerships as the governments chief means of countering
radicalization among American Muslims. Bombaywala is a strong supporter of a
partnership approach, and over the past few years he has built up close
friendships with local FBI agents working on counterterrorism. Having run a
successful chain of restaurants in the 1990s, he got involved in community
activism after 9/11, believing that Muslim leaders and the FBI had a
shared interest in preventing the radicalization of the young. As a key
source of private funding for mosques in the Muslim community, he encourages
imams to look out for unfamiliar young people who suddenly turn up and join the
congregation, for those who stop attending and appear to drop out of their social
network, and for those who change their appearance. The FBI is really helping
us to know what to look for, he says. If you see someone changing overnight,
growing a big beard and starting to wear different clothes, we need to find out what
is happening. Maybe that kid needs some help. Bombaywala adds, You never
know if somebody is giving him bad advice.
FBI/Police Justified/Monitored
FBI employees are law enforcement whistleblowers and recognize
their role in a democracy.
The quality of police training has increased in recent years; they are
being held to a standard of reasonability.
is that
when organizers take shortcuts and rely too much on more distant forms of
interaction, the organizations become less powerful. They become less powerful
because the people who claim to lead them have done less to earn the entitlement
to represent those on whose behalf they speak. This is a weakness that
governmental and corporate officials sense at once, and exploit to their advantage.
Ernie calls the power that resides in a citizens organization relational power, by
which he means power that depends on the quality of the interactions among
people, rather than on thigs like guns and money. Face to face interaction matters in
large parts because it is the main context in which representative authority in a
democratic organization can be earned.
College of Legal Studies (CoLS), University of Petroleum and Energy Studies (UPES)
(Surveillance: from history till present, Rishabh Shrivastava) http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?
abstract_id=2351996 //DJ
In US law, the chilling effect refers to the stifling effect that vague or overbroad
laws may have on legitimate speech and activity typically protected by the First
Amendment24. In past US history the chilling effect has been used in court cases
as evidence against certain government surveillance tactics. In the Supreme Court
case25, the chilling effect was used as a basis for getting a preliminary injunction
brought against the FBI. In recent years the chilling effect has taken on a much
bigger role in American society, not only through increased government surveillance
deterring political participation, but through a broad range of social functions as
well. Simple examples will show that social internet networks such as Twitter and
Facebook are having detrimental effects to peoples willingness to present
information about themselves or their views. Some users of these networks have
lost their jobs or have been forced to censor what they publish in fear of what
ramifications it may have on their job status or future wellbeing. The enormous
amount of voluntary and involuntary personal information that can be tracked and
monitored in todays information age is causing people to give into the chilling
effect in both political and social arenas.
Joh is a professor of law at the U.C Davis School of Law (Privacy Protests: Surveillance evasion and
Fourth Amendment Suspicion Elizabeth E. Joh, August 1st, 2013) http://www.arizonalawreview.org/pdf/554/55arizlrev997.pdf //DJ
The police tend to think that those who evade surveillance are criminals . Yet the
evasion may only be a protest against the surveillance itself. Faced with the growing
surveillance capacities of the government, some people object. They buy burners (prepaid
phones) or freedom phones from Asia that have had all tracking devices removed, or they hide their smartphones
in ad hoc Faraday cages that block their signals. They use Tor to surf the internet. They identify tracking devices
with GPS detectors. They avoid credit cards and choose cash, prepaid debit cards, or bitcoins. They burn their
These are
all examples of what I call privacy protests: actions individuals take to block or to
thwart government surveillance for reasons unrelated to criminal wrongdoing.
Those engaged in privacy protests do so primarily because they object to the
presence of perceived or potential government surveillance in their lives. How do we tell
garbage. At the extreme end, some live off the grid and cut off all contact with the modern world.
the difference between privacy protests and criminal evasions, and why does it matter? Surprisingly scant attention
has been given to these questions, in part because Fourth Amendment law makes little distinction between ordinary
criminal evasions and privacy protests. This Article discusses the importance of these ordinary acts of resistance,
their place in constitutional criminal procedure, and their potential social value in the struggle over the meaning of
privacy
Adam Gabbatt is a writer/presenter for the Guardian, based in New York. He won a journalism
bursary from the Scott Trust, the company that owns the Guardian, in 2008. (Protestors Rally for the day we fight
back against mass surveillance, February 11th, 2014, Adam Gabbat)
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/11/day-fight-back-protest-nsa-mass-surveillance //DJ
Reitman told the Guardian that over 100,000 people had signed an international
petition opposing mass surveillance within a few hours of its launch. Electronic Frontier
Foundation, which fights for online free speech and privacy, organized the day of protest with civil liberty
campaigners Demand Progress and a coalition of prominent organizations and websites including Reddit,
Greenpeace, ACLU, Tumblr and Amnesty International. Anonymous showed support for the action, with a lengthy
statement protesting this police state nightmare, as did, perhaps less obviously, Google, which emailed members
of its Take Action web freedom group encouraging them to take part. Google, Yahoo and Facebook revealed the
extent of the data they had been forced to hand over to US government authorities earlier this month. The
disclosures showed that between them the internet giants had disclosed details pertaining to tens of thousands of
accounts. Google, Yahoo, Facebook, Microsoft and others are behind the Reform Government Surveillance
push which calls for governments around the world to have their ability to monitor users information limited.
T.J. O'Hara is an internationally recognized author, speaker and strategic consultant in the
private and public sectors. In 2012, he emerged as the leading independent candidate for the Office of President of
the United States.
(Is it time tor repeal the first amendment TJ OHara) http://www.commdiginews.com/politics-2/is-it-time-to-repealthe-first-amendment-13479/ //DJ
Repeal the First Amendment a radical suggestion? Given our ever increasing
tendency to ignore it, perhaps the suggestion is not that far-fetched. Its not as if we
havent put mistakes in the Constitution before . Prohibition is the most obvious example. The
Eighteenth Amendment was passed on January 16, 1919, and repealed by the Twenty-First Amendment on
December 5, 1933. In comparison, the First Amendment has had a much longer run. The ban on alcohol was
property without any open presentation of religious symbols were a tacit endorsement of atheism by the
government? Since atheism is effectively an unsubstantiated belief, isnt it just a different form of religion, although
to exercise its faith, but doesnt want laws passed that would permit those whose faith differs to have the choice to
exercise theirs as freely. Lets pray or not that we can resolve this dichotomy. Next, the First Amendment
states that Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech. The more fanatical members of our
society seem to prefer to interpret this to mean that you have the right to express your opinion as long as it concurs
with theirs. Both political extremes attack each other with an embarrassing litany of derogatory names and terms.
Racist, sexist, terrorist, homophobe, Islamaphobe, anti-Semite, anti-Christian, anti-American, anti-Hispanic, antiimmigrant, anti-poor, anti-middle class, etc. are among the more common personal assaults we hear levied against
denigration of the concept of freedom of speech does not reside singularly among
individuals. A degree of contributory negligence can be assigned to todays media.
The First Amendment provides that Congress shall make no law abridging the
freedom of the press. Congress, for the most part, has complied. However, an
implicit responsibility is attached to this unique freedom; an expectation that such
right be exercised with good judgment and generally without cumulative bias. With
increasing regularity, our media has chosen to ignore such responsibility. Profit has
begun to prevail over principle within the traditional press almost to the degree it
has interfered with our political system. Media outlets pander to those who pay the
bills. They struggle to present the facts and to respect our ability to form our own
opinions. Instead, they tell us what we must believe; spinning the particulars in a
way that conforms to those of the political master they have chosen to serve. Even the
non-political news we receive has drifted heavily towards improving ratings rather than disseminating information.
Stories are sensationalized and abhorrent behavior is glorified, yet we are surprised when tragic events are
repeated. We fail to see the nexus between pathological behavior and the attention we give to those who
demonstrate it. Additionally, our press enthusiastically expands upon catastrophic incidents and provides every
graphic detail possible. Then, it creates its own embellishments by trotting in experts whose tangential knowledge
of the situation is so far removed as to render their opinions meaningless. However ,
erected enormous economic and petitioning barriers to entry that effectively preclude anything other than an
infrequent challenge by an independent or third-party candidate. They have applied similar obstacles to the
greedily exert influence over the system, please recognize that the opportunity for such exploitation does not exists
without a willing person or organization on the other end of the transaction. Also keep in mind that those who
benefit from the flow of money also draft the legislation that determines whether such interference is acceptable.
Grassroots Organizations/Riots
Answers
Riots Bad
Rioting solves no problems. It only harms the communities and the
people in it where the rioting is occurring. Ferguson proves.
The protests were peaceful. And, for the most part, so were
the numerous protests nationwide. But not in Ferguson . As I wrote this, the city of Ferguson and
the people of Ferguson continued to watch fires burn some of their businesses, cars
and city streets. To help further protect the citizens and the businesses from more
looting, vandalism and violence, hundreds of additional National Guard troops were
called in, nearly tripling the number of original troops requested by Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon. In addition to
protecting lives and property, the governor wants peace. And so do the residents of
Ferguson. But many also want what can't be given back: their businesses, jobs and
livelihood. On my way home, I heard story after story on the radio of people in Ferguson angry
at the reaction to the grand jury's decision . One woman has worked in her business for two
the highway here in Los Angeles.
generations. Some young students, who work at a pizza chain, wonder how they'll pay for their next semester
without the part time job they had. One man cried, wondering how he would rebuild a business it took his whole life
to create. Others worried about how they would buy Christmas gifts for their children without jobs.
How would
they pay their employees or mortgages, or put food on the table? I am not an AfricanAmerican. I am white. I will never understand the anger that so many feel in the black community. I can walk in
color, and those who feel the black community is ridden with crime and violence. Why do some in the AfricanAmerican community play into the false and negative stereotypes of these hateful groups ?
the community. There need to be officers that walk a beat again, and get to know
the people they have pledged to serve and protect. It will take time, but it is possible to repair
and restore trust lost between these two groups. Our nation, especially law enforcement, needs
to take a good hard look at racial profiling . We need to listen to the pain and the experiences of
black men, both young and old. Now, many will say that the Civil Rights movement involved great civil unrest, and
that is why the Civil Rights Act came about. But I disagree. The actions of a tiny black woman who refused to give
up her seat, and the four young men who sat down at an all-white lunch counter and refused to leave until they
were served spoke volumes, sparked a movement and, eventually, led to change. They also led to a great leader
being born, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King. The actions of Rosa Parks and those four men in Greensboro were
rioting or violence is "correct" or "wise," any more than a forest fire can be "correct" or "wise. There
are people who could really use to absorb this critiquemost particularly, the white conservatives who vilified
Rawlings-Blake with a lazy, ungenerous interpretation of her initial, clumsy remarks on how the criminal element
first gained a foothold among the peaceful protestors. But if youre Rawlings-Blake, or a Baltimore community
leader, let alone a member of Freddie Grays family, Coates polemic, and a profusion of similar sentiments, are
metaphorical account of
events that treats rioters and their victims as little more than reagents thrust into
contact with one another by larger forces. Most of the people whom Coates has critiqued, such as
beside the point. Coates has combined a poignant tu quoque fallacy with a
the mayor, surely share his view that what happened to Gray is a travesty, if not with his argument that it was a
consequence of a political decision to prioritize the protection of police officers charged with abuse over the
citizens who fall under its purview. To ask them, in essence, What about Freddie Gray? is to misunderstand how
Rawlings-Blake and those who share her views conceptualizeand compartmentalize the
issues of police
abuse and the violent unrest that often follows. The rioters in Baltimore didnt direct
their actions exclusively at agents of the state. In addition to targeting at least one
widely televised police car, they also vandalized property, some of which is surely
owned by supporters of the Black Lives Matter movement, and assaulted fellow
citizens, including journalists. These crimes aren't comparable to unjustified police
killings, but they are crimesnot uncontrollable, natural phenomena. There is no
contradiction between believing that Gray was murdered and believing that beating
up innocent bystanders is wrong. To suggest that Rawlings-Blake is engaged in some kind of con is to
make a category error on two levels: First, by treating the two forms of violence as if they could,
practically speaking, be combatted with similar levels of effort; and second, by
drawing a kind of equivalence between the rioters and lawless police officers . Relative
to the extremely thorny problem of police abuse, putting down a riot is easy. If it seems convenient for people like
Rawlings-Blake and President Barack Obama (who also called the rioters thugs) to train
their acute efforts on the rioters, thats in part because it is convenientwhich is to say, it's easier to address
community thanks to his race, exacerbating racial tensions. Hes currently at risk of
recall. The same is not true in Baltimore, where Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake
runs the show. Rawlings-Blake, who is black, said a month ago, To this day, if I go
out with a mixed crowd, people are automatically suspicious, questioning: How do
you know this person? We have a long way to goBaltimore, like many other cities,
still faces the challenges of racism. As the riots spun out of control, she infamously
commented, Its a very delicate balancing act, because, while we tried to make
sure that they were protected from the cars and the other things that were going
on, we also gave those who wished to destroy space to do that as well. That didnt
stop the riots. The Disproportionate White Power Structure Myth. The nation
watched the recent local elections in Ferguson, Missouri, of the City Council with
baited breath. Thats because the media suggested that the power structure in
Ferguson, being disproportionately white, had somehow contributed to shadowy
racism within the city. The Washington Post complained, while Ferguson is 67
percent black, five of the six council members and the mayor are all white. Not so
in Baltimore, where the nine of the 15 council members are black. The mayor is
black. The police chief is black. Baltimore burns anyway. The Not Enough
Government Myth. In Ferguson, the media and governmental actors suggested that
lack of governmental intervention led to the riots. Education Secretary Arne Duncan
wrote an open letter in December 2014 suggesting just that: We should take away
from Ferguson that we need a conversation to rebuild those relationships,
throughout the country, and that need is urgent. It needs to involve everyone our
young people, our parents, our schools, our faith communities, our government
officials, and the police. It needs to happen now. Lack of government is not the
problem in Baltimore. Every single member of the Baltimore City Council is a
Democrat. All 15 of them. The mayor is a Democrat. Baltimore has not had a
Republican mayor since 1967. The tax rates in Baltimore are astronomical; the city
carries the fourth highest tax rate of any city in the nation. The poverty rate within
the city is nearly 25 percent. Households in Baltimore earn approximately 56
percent of the overall state average. Crime rates, of course, are out of control.
Modern race riots do not occur because of the supposed white superstructure or a
legacy of governmental underservice. They occur because valueless rioters act in
valueless ways. Baltimore is evidence that glossing over lack of values with leftist
pabulum about social justice doesnt stop cities from burning.
Offcase
Economy Riots DA
The U.S. has lost billions from race riots, and other countries prove it
will lose more to loss of tourism. Also, previous results prove that
rioting only makes the government pass more oppressive laws.
nervous. Rothschild supposedly said that it was wise to "buy on the sound of
cannons, sell on the sound of trumpets," but most investors to not share that
sentiment. Although the Thai stock market has recovered strongly this year,
investors saw a 10% drop while the rioting was going on. Looking at it more broadly,
rioting raises investors' uncertainty and leads them to increase the risk premium
they assign to securities in that country - all of which spells lower prices in the short
term. Moreover, while Thailand no doubt benefited from its reputation as a peaceful
and relatively orderly country, countries with chronic troubles risk getting labeled as
"basket cases" and virtually eliminated from serious consideration as investment
destinations. Rioting also has a distinct impact on tourism - a vital industry and
source of capital for many riot-prone economies. Sane vacationers do not want to
arrive in the middle of a riot and will steer clear of areas with a recent memory of
these troubles. China reported that disturbances in Xinjiang in 2009 led almost
85,000 travelers to cancel trips to the area, while Thailand has seen a big drop in
tourism since its political troubles turned violent this spring. Perversely, though,
there has been a rise in so-called "riot tourism" - activists actually seeking out
hotspots and traveling there with a hope of getting involved in disturbances. Suffice
it to say, this is certainly not the kind of tourism that countries want to see or
encourage. By and large, there is very little evidence that rioting "works" in the
sense of leading to any lasting redress of grievances. If anything, many
governments tend to respond to riots by enacting more draconian laws and beefing
up the budgets of those charged with suppressing trouble. When governments do
respond, it usually just with temporary solutions designed to pacify the protesters
and get them off the streets; vague promises of redress, government-sponsored
reforms, or temporary subsidies (particularly in the case of food or fuel riots) will
often mollify the crowds, but seldom lead to any lasting improvement in the quality
of life of the people. That said, there are some in Europe who believe that the Greek
government successfully manipulated other European governments with its riots.
Although the Greek government did not apparently encourage these riots, they
certainly did help when they brought up the issue of German war reparations, nor
were they hesitant in hinting that the riots could threaten the very stability of the
government and democracy in Greece. In contrast, Ireland was much calmer and
ended up with a much less favorable bail-out package - suggesting, perhaps, that
there could be strategic value for the next country to allow matters to get more out
of hand before finalizing a deal with the IMF. Riots are almost never the cause or
start of a problem, they are almost always the end of the story and an expression of
frustration that the government is not meeting the needs of the people (whether
those needs are realistic or not). That said, they can have serious long-term
consequences. Investors do not want to place their money in harm's way, and
businesses steer clear of areas where the safety of their capital, their employees
and their customers is at risk. All in all, riots benefit no one but the demagogues
who often egg them on, and there can be some serious economic repercussions, as
well as the unacceptable cost of human lives.
The most important financial center in the world? A fabled place of silver spoons
and golden parachutes? A hub of cut-throat capitalism? Or all of the above. Wall
Street is many things to many people, and the perception of what it really is
depends on who you ask. Although peoples views of Wall Street may differ widely,
what is beyond dispute is its enduring impact not just on the American economy,
but on the global one. Wall Street physically takes up only a few blocks that amount
to less than a mile in the borough of Manhattan in New York City; however, its clout
extends worldwide. The term Wall Street was initially used to refer to the select
group of large independent brokerage firms that dominated the U.S. investment
industry. But with the lines between investment banks and commercial
banks having been blurred since 2008, Wall Street in current financial parlance is
the collective term for the numerous parties involved in the U.S. investment and
financial industry. This includes the biggest investment banks, commercial banks,
hedge funds, mutual funds, asset management firms, insurance companies, brokerdealers, currency and commodity traders, financial institutions and so on. Although
many of these entities may have their headquarters in other cities such as Chicago,
Boston, and San Francisco, the media still refers to the U.S. investment and financial
industry as Wall Street or simply The Street. Interestingly, the popularity of the
term Wall Street as a proxy for the U.S. investment industry has led to similar
Streets in certain cities where the investment industry is clustered being used to
refer to that nations financial sector, such as Bay Street in Canada and Dalal Street
in India. The U.S. is the worlds biggest economy, with 2013 gross domestic product
(GDP) of $16.80 trillion, comprising 22.4% of global economic output. It is almost
twice the size of the second-biggest economy, China (2013 GDP = $9.24 trillion). In
terms of market capitalization, the U.S. is the worlds biggest by some distance,
with a market value of $23.6 trillion dollars (as of September 23, 2014) that
comprises 36.3% of global market capitalization. Japans $4.6-trillion market is a
distant second, with just over 7% of global market cap. Wall Street has such a
significant impact on the economy because it is the trading hub of the biggest
financial markets in the worlds richest nation. Wall Street is home to the venerable
New York Stock Exchange (now called NYSE Euronext), which is the undisputed
leader worldwide in terms of average daily share trading volume and total market
capitalization of its listed companies. Nasdaq OMX, the second-largest exchange
globally, also has its headquarters on Wall Street. Street firms together control
trillions of dollars in financial assets, while New York is the second-largest trading
center in the foreign exchange market, where daily trading volumes exceed $5
trillion. Wall Street affects the U.S. economy in a number of ways, the most
important of which are Wealth Effect: Buoyant stock markets induce a wealth
effect in consumers, although some prominent economists assert that this is more
pronounced during a real estate boom than it is during an equity bull market. But it
does seem logical that consumers may be more inclined to splurge on big-ticket
items when stock markets are hot and their portfolios have racked up sizeable
gains. Consumer Confidence: Bull markets generally exist when economic
conditions are conducive to growth and consumers and businesses are confident
about the outlook for the future. When their confidence is riding high, consumers
tend to spend more, which boosts the U.S. economy since consumer spending
accounts for an estimated 70% of it. Business investment: During bull markets,
companies can use their pricey stock to raise capital, which can then be deployed to
acquire assets or competitors. Increased business investment leads to higher
economic output and generates more employment. The stock market and the
economy have a symbiotic relationship, and during good times, one drives the other
in a positive feedback loop. But during uncertain times, the interdependence of the
stock market and the broad economy can have a severely negative effect. A
substantial downturn in the stock market is regarded as a harbinger of a recession,
but this is by no means an infallible indicator. For example, the Wall Street crash of
1929 led to the Great Depression of the 1930s, but the crash of 1987 did not trigger
a recession. This inconsistency led Nobel laureate Paul Samuelson to famously
remark that the stock market had predicted nine of the last four recessions. Wall
Street drives the U.S. equity market, which in turn is a bellwether for the global
economy. The 2000-02 and 2008-09 global recessions both had their genesis in the
U.S., with the bursting of the technology bubble and housing collapse respectively.
But Wall Street can also be the catalyst for a global expansion, as is evident from
two examples in the current millennium. The 2003-07 global economic expansion
commenced with a huge rally on Wall Street in March 2003. Six years later, amid
the biggest recession since the 1930s depression, the climb back from the economic
abyss started with a massive Wall Street rally in March 2009. Prices of stocks and
other financial assets are based on current information, which is used to make
certain assumptions about the future that in turn form the basis for estimating an
assets fair value. When an economic indicator is relaeased, it would usually have
little impact on Wall Street if it comes in as per expectations (or whats called the
consensus forecast or analysts average estimate). But if it comes in much
better than expected, it could have a positive impact on Wall Street; conversely, if it
is worse than expectations, it would have a negative impact on Wall Street. This
positive or negative impact can be measured by changes in equity indices like the
Dow Jones Industrial Average or S&P 500, for instance. For example, lets say that
the U.S. economy is coasting along and payroll numbers to be released on the first
Friday of next month are expected to show that the economy created 250,000 jobs.
But when the payrolls report is released, it shows that the economy only created
100,000 jobs. Although one data point does not make a trend, the weak payroll
numbers may lead some economists and market-watchers on Wall Street to rethink
their assumptions about U.S. economic growth going forward. Some Street firms
may lower their forecasts for U.S. growth, and strategists at these firms may also
reduce their targets for the S&P 500. Large institutional investors who are clients of
these Street firms may choose to exit some long positions upon receiving their
lowered forecasts. This cascade of selling on Wall Street may result in equity indices
closing significantly lower on the day. Most medium to large-sized companies are
covered by several research analysts who are employed by Wall Street firms. These
analysts have in-depth knowledge of the companies they cover, and are sought
after by institutional buy side investors (pension funds, mutual funds etc.) for
their analysis and insights. Part of analysts research efforts are devoted to
developing financial models of the companies they cover, and using these models
to generate quarterly (and annual) revenue and earnings per share forecasts for
each company. The average of analysts quarterly revenue and EPS forecasts for a
specific company is called the Street estimate or Street expectations. Thus,
Global economic collapse will end in nuclear war, and kill almost 5
billion.
Kemp 10 - Director of Regional Security Programs at the Center for the National
Interest. He served in the White House during the first Reagan administration as
Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs and Senior Director
for Near East and South Asian Affairs on the National Security Council Staff. He
received his Ph.D. in political science at M.I.T. and his M.A. and B.A. degrees from
Oxford University. (Geoffrey, The East Moves West: India, China, and Asias Growing
Presence in the Middle East, p. 233-4)//JL
The second scenario, called Mayhem and Chaos, is the opposite of the first
scenario; everything that can go wrong does go wrong. The world economic
situation weakens rather than strengthens, and India, China, and Japan suffer a
major reduction in their growth rates, further weakening the global economy. As a
result, energy demand falls and the price of fossil fuels plummets, leading to a
financial crisis for the energy-producing states, which are forced to cut back
dramatically on expansion programs and social welfare. That in turn leads to
political unrest: and nurtures different radical groups, including, but not limited to,
Islamic extremists. The internal stability of some countries is challenged, and there
are more failed states. Most serious is the collapse of the democratic government
in Pakistan and its takeover by Muslim extremists, who then take possession of a
large number of nuclear weapons. The danger of war between India and Pakistan
increases significantly. Iran, always worried about an extremist Pakistan, expands
and weaponizes its nuclear program. That further enhances nuclear proliferation in
the Middle East, with Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Egypt joining Israel and Iran as
nuclear states. Under these circumstances, the potential for nuclear terrorism
increases, and the possibility of a nuclear terrorist attack in either the Western
world or in the oil-producing states may lead to a further devastating collapse of the
world economic market, with a tsunami-like impact on stability. In this scenario,
major disruptions can be expected, with dire consequences for two-thirds of the
planets population.
showing that economic decline and use of force are at least indirectly correlated.
Argentinas war in the Falkland Islands is an oft-cited example of a diversionary
tactic (Boehmer 2007; Oakes 2006). Similar to the earlier discussion on lateral
pressure theory, specialisation may also lead to asymmetric growth between
countries, impacting their respective appetites for conflict as growing economies
search for new resources to drive future growth. This particular notion has grown
popular among some US commentators sceptical of Chinas global search for
resources in recent years. This topic will be explored in later chapters.
Terror DA
Links
*Fusion centers key to solve terrorismgenerate leads for FBI
investigations and coordinate information flow
Phillips 12 [Leslie, senior intelligence advisor for the U.S. Senate Homeland
Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, Fusion Centers Add Value to the
Federal Government Counterterrorism Efforts, U.S. Senate Homeland Security and
Governmental Affairs Committee, 10/3/12,
http://www.hsgac.senate.gov/media/fusion-centers-add-value-to-federalgovernment-counterterrorism-efforts] MG
WASHINGTON Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Joe Lieberman, ID-Conn.,
Wednesday reacted critically to a subcommittee report on fusion centers. I strongly disagree with the reports core
assertion that fusion centers have been unable to meaningfully contribute to federal counterterrorism efforts,
Lieberman said. This statement is not supported by the examples presented in the report and is contrary to the
of inappropriate use of homeland security grant funds and accurately notes that FEMA has struggled to account for
how homeland security grant funds are allocated and used, a longstanding concern of mine. But the report also
examines one narrow aspect of fusion center operations, the formal intelligence reporting process. Does not
examine support provided by the Department of Homeland Security in the form of training and access to classified
in their state or region. Does not look at the important and positive role that the FBI plays in supporting fusion
vast majority of the fusion centers in the last few years. Some fusion centers are still underdeveloped, but the vast
majority effectively partner with federal agencies in preventing terrorism and addressing other important national
security and public safety missions. The September 11, 2001, terror attacks demonstrated the urgent need for the
federal government to improve its information sharing and coordination with state and local governments including
partnered with the local FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force on this investigation. Rezwan Ferdaus. Ferdaus is a
homegrown violent Islamist extremist was arrested in 2010 in Boston, and planned to attack the Pentagon and the
Capitol with remote control small planes attached to explosives. The Massachusetts state fusion center was credited
with making a significant contribution to the investigation. Seattle military recruiting center plot. In 2011, two
homegrown violent Islamist extremists were arrested in Seattle for planning to attack a military recruiting center .
The initial lead in this case came from a Seattle Police Department informant, and
the investigation was jointly coordinated by the FBI and state and local agencies at
the Washington State Fusion Center.
enforcement agencies can afford to dedicate units to study and track terrorist and other organized criminal
activities. Along with financial concerns, routine law enforcement caseloads normally take precedence for many
municipal agencies. Yet the importance of intelligence and the exchange of information among agencies cannot be
dismissed.
Fusion centers combine multiple agencies in one location, pooling resources and
personnel in order to share information and develop intelligence about criminal
activities. Information collected by agencies is collated and analyzed, producing
actionable intelligence for dissemination to other law enforcement agencies. An
integral part of the fusion center concept is developing and disseminating intelligence,
rather than simply collecting and storing information or serving as a case support
center. Collaboration encourages a coordinated and organized response to terrorist
and other criminal activity throughout the target jurisdiction, diminishing gaps in
interagency communication and intelligence. Specific guidance has been developed and published
to assist agencies with information sharing and with establishing fusion centers. Published documents include the
following: The National Criminal Intelligence Sharing Plan (NCISP) is a blueprint for law enforcement administrators
building their intelligence capabilities.1 Law enforcement officials from local, state, tribal, and federal agencies
constructed recommendations. The National Strategy for Information Sharing, published in October 2007, focuses
on reviewing and improving the sharing of homeland security and law enforcement information related to terrorism
with federal, state, local, and tribal entities; the private sector; and foreign partners as well as protecting
information privacy and rights.2 This report outlines the current information sharing environment and the crossagency challenges of collecting, processing, and analyzing all-crimes information to develop and share intelligence
while simultaneously safeguarding civil rights. Fusion Center Guidelines: Developing and Sharing Information and
Intelligence in a New Era contains guidelines to assist in the successful development of fusion centers.3 Fusion
centers embody collaboration. They benefit the law enforcement community by providing agencies with resources,
benefits to global information sharing in an environment where it can be difficult even to share information locally.
In addition to other critical functions, fusion centers provide a conduit for integrating, analyzing, and disseminating
intelligence. State fusion centers across the United States maximize local knowledge of potential terrorist suspects,
vulnerabilities, and trends, and communicate that information to the appropriate federal partners. The intelligence
component of fusion centers is the foundation for successful data integration and exchange. Fusion centers produce
results. One long-term example of a successful intelligence repository and analysis center is the New York/New
Jersey High Intensity Drug Trafficking Center, which serves as an information hub for law enforcement agencies in
Tips about drug and criminal activity in the New York City
region are tracked and analyzed by investigators and analysts. The pooling of intelligence
the New York City/New Jersey area.
data in a central location has proven to be a key factor in identifying those individuals and organizations that may
be furthering, facilitating, or carrying out criminal and terrorist activity in New York City. In particular, members of
the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Joint Terrorism Task Force are assigned on a full-time basis to
Politics DA
Plan Unpopular
Plan unpopular because DHS support highbipartisan support
proves
expenditures properly and the facilities have not produced useful intelligence to support federal
counterterrorism efforts, the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations found.
An advance copy of the report was provided to Government Executive. Indeed, the intelligence reports that the centers provided on suspicious
behavior at the local level are occasionally taken from already published public sources and more often than not unrelated to terrorism, the
report said. The
combined majority and minority report, signed by Sens. Carl Levin, D-Mich., and Tom
Coburn, R-Okla., said a two-year committee probe Coburn led found that some fusion centers have gone years without a
physical presence -- such as a planned facility in Philadelphia -- and without filing any intelligence reports. Others have operated for
years without having DHS personnel on-site to report counterterrorism information, effectively cutting the centers off from the larger DHS
terrorism-related intelligence efforts, said the report, titled Federal Support and Involvement in State and Local Fusion Centers. Many of the
fusion centers have not made counterterrorism an explicit priority and some have de-emphasized counterterrorism in favor of more traditional
public safety and anti-crime work, the report said. Claims that DHS made did not always fit the facts and in no case did a fusion center
make a clear and unique intelligence contribution that helped apprehend a terrorist or disrupt a plot. Worse, three other incidents examined . .
.raised the possibility that
report argued, too often inappropriately characterize fusion centers as successes and call them the linchpin of the U.S.
counterterrorism strategy. DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano, testifying in September 2011 to the Senate panel on the 10th anniversary of the Sept.
11 terrorist attacks, said, seventy-two recognized fusion centers serve as focal points for the receipt, analysis, gathering and sharing of threatrelated information among the federal government and state, local, tribal, territorial and private sector partners. She added, the intelligence
community is able to identify the common threads that can tie a seemingly minor crime to the larger threat picture -- an important step that helps
us to identify individuals such as the hijackers, many of whom were apprehended by law enforcement for routine traffic violations prior to 9/11.
would radically alter how the NSA does business. But according to early reports,
Obama will only be implementing small reforms. He will punt the bigger decisions to
Congresswith the hope of partially appeasing lawmakers, voters, privacy
advocates, and the national security community. From the looks of it, pretty much
everyone is going to be mad at him.
States CP
Text: The 50 State Governments should <<do the plan>>.
States Key
Police brutality is a result of local agencies ordering themnot the
federal government
There's a sign on Jonathan Stickland's desk that reads: "Don't steal. The
government hates competition." These days Stickland, a Texas state representative,
isn't spending most of his time worrying about the government "stealing" through
high taxes or onerous regulation - standard political fare for the kind of
conservatives who populate the state capitol in Austin. Instead his cause has been
what he sees as government theft of privacy - the unlawful acquisition by the
National Security Agency of personal information in the form of metadata about
electronic communications by US citizens. The particular target of his ire is the Texas Cryptologic
Center, an NSA facility located near San Antonio. He has proposed a state law cutting off the building's access to
public utilities - water and electricity - until the agency ceases what he says is unconstitutional warrantless data
"I believe the first role of government is to protect the personal rights and
liberties of its citizens," says the Republican, who has represented a district near
Dallas for two years. "Before we build a road or anything else, we have to ensure
that those exist for every Texan." "I believe that it is my responsibility as a
representative at the state level to fight against that kind of tyranny," he continues.
"Whether it's from the federal government or a foreign entity, it doesn't matter."
The Texas bill is just one of the most recent examples of a growing movement
among states - both liberal and conservative - to end government support for NSA
facilities. Last year California became the first to pass what's been called a Fourth Amendment Protection Act.
collection.
Its law prohibited the state from providing support to a federal agency "to collect electronically stored information
or metadata of any person if the state has actual knowledge that the request constitutes an illegal or
unconstitutional collection". This year 15 other states have introduced some kind of anti-NSA legislation, including
politically diverse locations like liberal Washington and Maryland and conservative Oklahoma and Mississippi. The
movement has been championed by the Tenth Amendment Center and its OffNow coalition, which provides support
and model legislation to politicians like Stickland interested in challenging the NSA. According to Mike Maharrey,
communications director for the centre, the California law, with its "actual knowledge" provision, is significantly
He says they
came up with the suggested legislation because they don't trust the US
Congress to do anything to keep the NSA in check. The Patriot Act, which
authorises the NSA surveillance programme, is up for renewal in May, and
Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has already
proposed that it be extended to 2020. "I'm not really faithful in things that
are going on in Washington, DC," he says. "People can make a difference
more rapidly and more readily at the state level."
weaker than they had hoped - but a good first step in the nation's most populous state.
critical operational capabilities across the statewide fusion process with other
recognized fusion centers. Furthermore, primary centers are the highest priority for the allocation of
available federal resources, including the deployment of personnel and connectivity with federal data systems.
"I believe the first role of government is to protect the personal rights and
liberties of its citizens," says the Republican, who has represented a district near
Dallas for two years. "Before we build a road or anything else, we have to ensure
that those exist for every Texan." "I believe that it is my responsibility as a
representative at the state level to fight against that kind of tyranny," he continues.
"Whether it's from the federal government or a foreign entity, it doesn't matter."
The Texas bill is just one of the most recent examples of a growing movement
among states - both liberal and conservative - to end government support for NSA
facilities. Last year California became the first to pass what's been called a Fourth Amendment Protection Act.
collection.
Its law prohibited the state from providing support to a federal agency "to collect electronically stored information
or metadata of any person if the state has actual knowledge that the request constitutes an illegal or
unconstitutional collection". This year 15 other states have introduced some kind of anti-NSA legislation, including
politically diverse locations like liberal Washington and Maryland and conservative Oklahoma and Mississippi. The
movement has been championed by the Tenth Amendment Center and its OffNow coalition, which provides support
and model legislation to politicians like Stickland interested in challenging the NSA. According to Mike Maharrey,
communications director for the centre, the California law, with its "actual knowledge" provision, is significantly
He says they
came up with the suggested legislation because they don't trust the US
Congress to do anything to keep the NSA in check. The Patriot Act, which
authorises the NSA surveillance programme, is up for renewal in May, and
Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has already
proposed that it be extended to 2020. "I'm not really faithful in things that
are going on in Washington, DC," he says. "People can make a difference
more rapidly and more readily at the state level."
weaker than they had hoped - but a good first step in the nation's most populous state.
Courts CP
1NC
Text: The United States Supreme Court should substantially curtail
domestic surveillance by using judicial activism when reinterpreting
the fourth amendment doctrine.
Current constitutional interpretations on the justifications of
surveillance is outdated judicial action is key
Rushin 11 PhD student at the University of California, Berkeley, Jurisprudence
and Social Policy Program; J.D., University of California, Berkeley Law School
(Stephen Rushin, Perspectives of judicial actions for Surveillance, THE JUDICIAL
RESPONSE TO MASS POLICE SURVEILLANCE, 2011, http://illinoisjltp.com/journal/wpcontent/uploads/2013/10/Rushin.pdf)//JM
Law enforcement technology has become ubiquitous in the urban landscape. Closed
circuit surveillance cameras indiscriminately record individuals physical
movements.1 Facial recognition software compares images of passing pedestrians with extensive databases of
suspected criminals.2 Red light cameras capture photographs of traffic violations. The National Security
Agency (NSA) logs phone calls made by millions of citizens across the country in
hopes of identifying suspected terrorist activity.3 And automatic license plate
recognition (ALPR) systems, already in use in various jurisdictions across the country, digitally read
and record the license plates of passing automobiles into expansive databases. 4
Indeed, we live today in an increasingly digitally efficient investigative state a state
where law enforcement can both observe and record information about our
whereabouts in an unprecedentedly efficient manner. The retention of surveillance
data raises many serious constitutional concerns. But Fourth Amendment doctrine
on search and seizures reflects outdated assumptions about the once-limited
capabilities of public surveillance technologies and is, therefore, ill-equipped to deal
with the challenges posed by the digitally efficient investigative state. The existing
Fourth Amendment doctrine on surveillance technologies focuses primarily on three
issues: (1) whether a person had a subjective expectation of privacy, (2) the socially
objective reasonableness of that expectation of privacy, and (3) the relative
intrusiveness of the supposed privacy violation.5 The Supreme Court has also drawn
a distinction between presumptively constitutional technologies that merely
improve the efficiency of legitimate law enforcement, like digital tracking devices, and
unconstitutional technologies that give law enforcement an intrusive, extrasensory ability, like heat sensors.6
Under this framework, the warrantless use of most surveillance technologies and
the collection of personal data fits comfortably within constitutional doctrine after all,
a person does not have an objectively reasonable expectation to privacy when driving her car or walking on a public
sidewalk. The recording of a persons movements in public is not especially intrusive and certainly does not provide
police with any intrusive, extrasensory abilities beyond mere observation. A recent Seventh Circuit case engaged in
just this type of analysis, when it found that the warrantless use of global position system (GPS) surveillance by law
enforcement did not violate the Fourth Amendment.7 There, Judge Posner and the Seventh Circuit concluded that
GPS monitoring of a single suspect without a warrant does not amount to wholesale surveillance. 8 But Posner
quickly pointed out, Technological progress poses a threat to privacy by enabling an extent of surveillance that in
earlier times would have been prohibitively expensive . . . . Should government someday decide to institute a
That time has come. The digitally efficient investigative state comes dangerously
close to wholesale surveillance. The unregulated use of these emerging
technologies may incentivize police fishing expeditions, facilitate racial profiling,
and corrode any notion of public anonymity. And the legislative branch has not
acted to address the tangible harms posed by this new technological order. In wake of
the legislative inactivity, I argue that it is finally time for the courts to break from the previous
doctrinal trend and act decisively to regulate the efficiency of police surveillance
technology. While a judicial response may help ameliorate some of the pressing concerns raised by the digitally
efficient investigative state, it should only be the beginning of a broader re-conceptualization of our Fourth
Amendment doctrine. I argue, in particular, that we ought to reassess our presumption that individuals have no
reasonable expectation to privacy in their public actions. In total, I hope to make two contributions with this Article,
one descriptive and one normative. Descriptively, I build a comprehensive account of the digitally efficient
investigative state, and normatively I contend that the courts must establish a new doctrinal path to regulate this
technological order
2NC: AT Perms
The CP is the ONLY way to solve for violations of minorities rights
and inadequate laws concerning domestic surveillance
Rushin 11 PhD student at the University of California, Berkeley, Jurisprudence
and Social Policy Program; J.D., University of California, Berkeley Law School
(Stephen Rushin, Perspectives of judicial actions for Surveillance, THE JUDICIAL
RESPONSE TO MASS POLICE SURVEILLANCE, 2011, http://illinoisjltp.com/journal/wpcontent/uploads/2013/10/Rushin.pdf)//JM
the courts should
craft a judicial response that permits the use of surveillance technologies for some
criminologically advantageous activities like observational comparison, but limits
the unregulated data retention without reasonable suspicion. Further, I contend that the
judiciary is well positioned to make this careful calculation, which admittedly
requires the balancing of social values such as privacy and law enforcement
efficiency. Overall, I conclude a judicial solution handed down by the courts would best
safeguard citizenry, particularly certain discrete and insular minorities , from
the threats posed by other emerging surveillance technologies. A. The Judicial Response
The courts should craft a regulation that limits surveillance technologies in three
ways. First, the courts should require police to have a legitimate, articulable law
enforcement purpose before identifying any surveillance data. This would require police to
Given the ominous implications of the digitally efficient investigative state, I argue that
identify a legitimate purpose for cross-referencing license plate data or facial recognition photographs with other
law enforcement to demonstrate a particularized suspicion of criminal wrongdoing based on specific and
articulable facts combined with rational inferences. 323 Conversely, the courts should continue to permit the
use of surveillance technologies for observational comparison, given that observational comparison only identifies
an individual in surveillance data when the data has been digitally matched to a database of known or suspected
criminals.324 Hence, this recommended response would distinguish between mere observational comparison and
capability and an indiscriminate data retention capability.326 Police use the observational comparison capability to
read passing license plates and then search for matches with active hotlists. 327 Once the ALPR system matches a
license plate to a known offender, the ALPR system can cross-reference this plate with other databases to identify
the suspected culprit. Observational comparison does not implicate any particular Fourth Amendment concerns
data is only retained and identified for cars matching a criminal database.328 Conversely, the indiscriminate data
collection capability allows some ALPR systems to record the license plate, time, and location of every passing
vehicle into an expansive database.329 This information can then be cross-referenced to other databases to
identify the suspected driver of each car, and record that drivers movements into a surveillance database. It is not
inconceivable that, with an extensive network of ALPR cameras in a given community, law enforcement could
compile a fairly comprehensive record of an individuals day-to-day movements. Thus,
by limiting the
retention of data and requiring a legitimate law enforcement purpose before crossreferencing license plate numbers to identify drivers, this judicial response would
prevent ALPR from transforming into a tool of mass surveillance. In my view, this
judicial regulation recognizes both the potential harms and benefits of the digitally
efficient investigative state and strikes a fair balance. First, this proposed regulation
ensures that the these technologies will not be utilized to unfairly target unpopular
minoritiesin fact, by distinguishing between observational comparison and
indiscriminate data collection, the courts could ensure that these technologies are
used primarily to reign in police discretion, thereby limiting implicit bias. As discussed
supra Part I.D.1, when limited to observational comparison, ALPR and facial recognition
software can actually reduce the likelihood of racial or ethnic profiling. But, as detailed
supra Part I.D.2, indiscriminate data collection capabilities of the digitally efficient investigative state can permit
similar regulations on police technologies. The proposed judicial response bears some resemblance to legislative
limits on surveillance technologies passed in Virginia, Maine, and New Hampshire. The New Hampshire law limits
law enforcement surveillance to specific investigations of criminal wrongdoing and bars the retention of surveillance
data except for a few, specific situations.330 Maine, by contrast, has regulated ALPR technology explicitly by
limiting data retention to 21 days and regulating ALPR usage more broadly.331 This response also closely mirrors a
recent German Federal Constitutional Court decision, which found that some parts of a German law authorizing the
use of ALPR violated the right to privacy.332 The German court held that the retention of any digital data that was
not predestined for a specific use was too indiscriminate as to violate German Law.333 The German court expressed
concern that without limitations, the use of ALPR amounted to complete surveillance. 334 Law enforcement
organizations, namely the IACP, have also recommended that departments take steps, like transparent data
retention policies, to ameliorate privacy concerns over surveillance data aggregation. 335 Once more, this judicial
response mirrors the principles laid out in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)
privacy guidelines. 336 Namely, this proposal requires that digital data collection on public movements abide by the
OECDs purpose specification principle, which states that the purposes for which personal data are collected
should be specified not later than at the time of data collection. 337 Thus, there is both domestic and international
Third, the
distinction between observational comparison and indiscriminate data aggregation
comports with the underlying values of the Fourth Amendment. Regardless of the eventual
precedent for this kind of judicial response to limit the efficiency of investigative technologies.
holding in Jones, the Maynard decision offers persuasive application of the Katz doctrine to surveillance
technologies.338 The court first determined that the totality of a persons movements in public were not actually
exposed to the public.339 As the court explained, in determining whether something is exposed to the public[,]
as that term was used in Katz[,] we ask not what another person can physically and may lawfully do, but rather
what a reasonable person expects another might actually do. 340 Put differently, a person might reasonably
expect a stranger to view any discrete action taken in public, but, the whole of a persons movements over the
course of a month is not actually exposed to the public because the likelihood a stranger would observe all those
movements is not just remote, it is essentially nil. 341 In applying a mosaic theory, the D.C. Circuit noted that
that long-term surveillance of an individual reveals important and intimate details about their behaviors.342 And
because GPS surveillance is incredibly efficientthe marginal cost of each additional day of data aggregation with
GPS tracking is effectively zeroGPS technology is thus a heretofore unknown type of intrusion requiring
judicial regulation.343 The Maynard courts reasoning, while controversial in the context of the surveillance of a
single individual, is extremely compelling when applied dragnet technologies like ALPR and surveillance cameras
with facial recognition. As data collection costs decrease, law enforcement has every incentive to aggregate as
much potentially useful data as possible. Indeed, as the Maynard court recognized, Prolonged surveillance reveals
types of information not revealed by short-term surveillance, such as what a person does repeatedly, what he does
not do, and what he does ensemble. 344 Just as a person does not reasonably expect that the totality of her
movements within an automobile to be monitored by GPS, she also reasonably expects to be free from continuous
and pervasive monitoring by ALPR or facial recognition software. Even in public, we carry an expectation that our
movements remain disconnected and anonymous.345 Hence,
Katz
and follows the persuasive reasoning of the Maynard decision. Fourth, the proposed
limitation on data retention protects the criminological and evidentiary benefits of
limited data retention, while also recognizing the retained datas loss of value over
time. The recommended judicial response is admittedly vagueI do not specify an exact length of time the courts
ought to permit law enforcement to retain data. This is omission is purposeful. As the IACP has properly recognized,
any policy limiting data retention raises serious public policy concerns.346 For example, we may prefer more liberal
data retention policies for surveillance around national monuments and critical infrastructures in recognition of the
threat posed by terrorism.347 Further, there is a dearth of social science research on the changing usefulness of
surveillance data over time. Nonetheless, without regulation, departments have little incentive to self-regulate.
While it may be difficult for the courts to craft a uniform national rule on data retention, the courts can at least
require that departments, or conversely state legislatures, articulate clear data retention policies. This would permit
states and localities to consider the unique criminological needs for data retention in their jurisdiction in crafting
regulations, while preventing the indiscriminate collection of all data. Admittedly, this suggested judicial response is
a major doctrinal shift and requires the courts to break away from established Fourth Amendment doctrine. But the
digitally efficient investigative state poses too many serious and constitutionally relevant threats for the judiciary to
simply defer to legislative arrangements. Scholars have often argued that the legislature is better suited to assess
the proper balance between privacy and security.348 At least in the narrow field of police surveillance technologies,
I disagree. In the next section, I argue that the courts are the best-positioned actor to address the issues implicated
by mass data collection.
Only the courts can solve the other branches are influenced to
much about politics
Rushin 11 PhD student at the University of California, Berkeley, Jurisprudence
and Social Policy Program; J.D., University of California, Berkeley Law School
(Stephen Rushin, Perspectives of judicial actions for Surveillance, THE JUDICIAL
RESPONSE TO MASS POLICE SURVEILLANCE, 2011, http://illinoisjltp.com/journal/wpcontent/uploads/2013/10/Rushin.pdf)//JM
First, the courts are structurally well positioned within our decentralized federal
system to address the national concern of mass surveillance. The courts are the
most nonpartisan actor capable of protecting the rights of the disadvantaged and
politically unpopular. If the courts defer to legislative arrangements, surveillance
technologies will be regulated inconsistently across jurisdictions. The digitally efficient
investigative state is no longer a localized phenomenon, but an increasingly national, centralized system. The judiciary is
the most appropriate branch to develop a national solution that would be applicable
to all law enforcementlocal, state, and national. By grounding the judicial remedy in the
Fourth Amendment, the judiciary can ensure that every person has a reasonably
consistent expectation to privacy in the aggregation and sharing of personal data
across jurisdictional lines. 348. See, e.g., Orin S. Kerr, The Fourth Amendment and New Technologies: Constitutional
Myths and the Case for Caution, 102 MICH. L. REV. 801, 807 (20032004). 349. Id. 350. Id. at 807, 85787. 351. Id. at 886
(discussing Dripps theory); Donald A. Dripps, Criminal Procedure, Footnote Four, and the Theory of Public Choice; Or, Why Dont
Legislatures Give a Damn About the Rights of the Accused? 44 SYRACUSE L. REV. 1079, 108890 (1993). 352. Dripps, supra note
Americans are the individuals most at risk of indiscriminate surveillance data collection and subsequent fishing expeditions.
Admittedly, Kerr points out that Congress has frequently acted on its own initiative to protect privacy against the threat of new
technology. 354 This descriptively suggests that Congress has been more receptive to the evolving privacy concerns than the
courts. No doubt, Kerr is correctcourts have been predictably deferential and restrained in regulating law enforcement
technologies. But this does not mean that the courts are not institutionally competent to create Fourth Amendment policy,
particularly when data collection and surveillance raise delicate majoritarian concerns that cannot be adequately addressed by the
legislature. Kerr rejects the majoritarian critiques of legislative arrangements by claiming that since [p]rivacy and security may be
considered public goods, shared equally by the public, and both law enforcement interests and victims of crime may lobby the
legislature, the judicial arrangements offer no substantial benefits over legislative arrangements.355 Kerr also dismisses Drippss
majoritarian concern by noting that new technologies will tend to target users of new technologies. 356 These users are
disproportionately elite, meaning that their interests should be well represented in the legislature. Hence, Kerr believes that Drippss
concern that minorities will be underrepresented and marginalized in the political process is unwarranted. But Kerrs logic, while
California has accused the FBI of targeting religiously devout Muslim-Americans for surveillance, without any particularized suspicion
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has filed a class action
complaint against the FBI in the Central District of California alleging that the FBI
used an informant to indiscriminately collect personal information on hundreds
and perhaps thousands of innocent Muslim Americans in Southern California . . . . [T]he
of wrongdoing.357
FBI did not gather the information based on suspicion of criminal activity, 354. Id. at 855. 355. Id. at 88485. 356. Id. at 887. 357.
See, e.g., Patrik Jonsson, Muslim Group Sues FBI over Surveillance at California Mosque, CHRISTIAN SCI. MONITOR (Feb. 23, 2011),
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Justice/2011/0223/Muslim-groupsues-FBI-over-surveillance-at-California-mosques; see also Jennifer
Medina, Suit Accuses F.B.I. of Spying at Mosques in California, N.Y. TIMES, Feb. 25, 2011, at A17. 324 JOURNAL OF LAW, TECHNOLOGY
it seems
highly improbable that elites in the legislature will be responsive to the privacy
concerns of these unpopular minority needs. Muslim Americans, as an example, are also chronically
underrepresented in the legislative branch. 359 Unpopular minorities are, therefore, unable to protect
their right to be free from pervasive surveillance through legislative compromises.
This represents a structural flaw in our decentralized federal system, one that can
only be remedied by judicial action. The judiciary is the most institutionally
competent actor to address the majoritarian concerns raised by mass surveillance
and data collection.
& POLICY [Vol. 2011 [but] instead it gathered the information simply because the targets were Muslim. 358 Further,
Concerns that the courts cant solve are illegitimate they still wont
undermine the courts ability to solve
Rushin 11 PhD student at the University of California, Berkeley, Jurisprudence
and Social Policy Program; J.D., University of California, Berkeley Law School
(Stephen Rushin, Perspectives of judicial actions for Surveillance, THE JUDICIAL
RESPONSE TO MASS POLICE SURVEILLANCE, 2011, http://illinoisjltp.com/journal/wpcontent/uploads/2013/10/Rushin.pdf)//JM
Second, the so-called judicial information deficit 360 should not deter the courts
from creating policy to address mass surveillance concerns. The proliferation and
use of mass surveillance technologies has stabilized to a point that judicial action
would be appropriate. In arguing that the judiciary lacks the skills and competence to create broad Fourth
Amendment policy, skeptics have commonly levied three arguments: (1) unlike the legislature, the courts lack the
physical and administrative resources to craft a comprehensive policy; (2) judges are not technologically
sophisticated enough to create technology policy; and (3) once crafted, judicial technology policies rarely hold up in
different factual scenarios.361 As I demonstrate below, the limited judicial response offered in this Article will hold
up against these three legitimate critiques. To begin with, skeptics allege that legislations can more carefully
analyze a problem, investigate potential solutions, impanel experts, and make farreaching, nuanced policies.362
Unlike the legislature, which may command the resources of an extensive bureaucracy . . . a judge is generally
limited to a secretary and one or two recent law school . . . [graduate clerks]. 363 Kerr has thus argued that the
courts simply do not have the resources to engage in this kind of careful analysis necessary to develop a
comprehensive and responsive policy on Fourth Amendment technologies.364 On its face, this type of analysis is
persuasive, especially considering the fact that the courts lack the funding to do sweeping investigations into the
efficacy of an emerging technology. Nonetheless, this logic ignores a pivotal tactic used by courts in previous
argued that judges are not as technically sophisticated as the legislature. Judges often rely on the crutch of
questionable metaphors to aid their comprehension of complex technology cases, meaning that it is easy for
judges to misunderstand the context of their decisions and their likely effect when technology is in flux. 370 But
in
the unique situation outlined in this Article, judges do not need to be experts in
these technological fields to understand the capabilities of technologies like ALPR
and facial recognition software. The danger I discuss in this article is that police will keep a digital
dossier of every single persons movements. This type of monitoring would facilitate fishing expeditions, increase
There is
little reason to believe that, with the assistance of knowledgeable advocates, judges
could not sufficiently understand the potential harms posted by digitally efficient
investigative technologies to develop a coherent constitutional floor of protection.
And even though the legislature has a broader array of resources at its disposal, the
legislature is an unsatisfactory avenue to protect the unique countermajoritarian
issues at stake. Finally, some scholars have contended that judicial regulations of 366. Id. 367. Id. 368. See
the likelihood of corrupt behavior by law enforcement, and facilitate some types of racial profiling.
supra Part V.A. (describing judicial responses to legislative limits on police technologies). 369. See H.B. 454, 2002
Gen. Assemb., 2002 Sess. (Va. 2002) (implementing the restricted use of facial recognition technology in Virginia);
see also Facial Scan: Beachs Use Restricted Under Bill Approved by House, THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT & LEDGER STAR,
Feb. 13, 2002, at B4 (describing Virginias facial recognition technology bill). 370. Kerr, supra note 348, at 87576.
326 JOURNAL OF LAW, TECHNOLOGY & POLICY [Vol. 2011 emerging technologies rarely hold up in different factual
scenarios. Under this rationale, critics of this judicial response may contend that while this protection could work
when applied to ALPR or facial recognition software, it would not necessarily be a workable standard for future
technological developments. This view certainly has merit. By the time the courts decide how a technology should
be regulated . . . the factual record of the case may be outdated, reflecting older technology rather than more
recent developments. 371 Stuart Benjamin has argued that rapidly changing facts weaken the force of stare
decisis by undermining the stability of precedents. 372 This provides a forceful case against judicial
micromanagement of emerging technologies. But the judicial response argued for in this Article is sufficiently broad
to avoid the predictable antiquation of other, narrower judicial solutionsit merely distinguishes between
observational comparison and indiscriminate data collection, while broadly regulating the identification of data and
interactions with private data aggregators. The collection of extensive, indiscriminate surveillance data is a
widespread, pervasive occurrence common amongst countless investigative technologies.
The development
of digital dossiers is not a trending fad that will simply disappear in the near future.
We should not expect the legislature to step in and address a problem that may
disproportionately affect unpopular minorities. The Court has long recognized that,
when making policy in the field of emerging technologies, the rule we adopt must
take account of more sophisticated systems that are already in use or in
development. 373 The judicial response presented does not prevent the use of
surveillance technologies for observational comparison, but merely offers a
sufficiently broad and generalized constitutional limit on indiscriminate data
collection, which can be reasonably exported and applied to future, more
sophisticated technologies. Once more, critics of judicial policymaking seem tacitly concerned that the
limited applicability of judicial rules in the future will weaken the force of stare decisis, thereby undermining the
judiciarys legitimacy. But nothing could further de-legitimize the judiciary more than a failure to serve its