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might german is joining us from washington
d_c_ national security puppet capital policy
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council for the american civilization and
he was an f_b_i_ agent specializing in domestic
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counter-terrorism for uh... many years mike
talk about your assessment of this widening
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dragnet and its consequences
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well i think part of the problem with his
uh... is sort of the scope of this investigation
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of the aggressive tactics that are being used
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when there isn't
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uh... any public evidence to suggest these
people pose a threat in fact the f_b_i_ spokesman
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said immediately after the race
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that there was an attractive the community
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sort of leads to a question of why they're
there is this nationwide
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your early morning raids as if the uh... these
are
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are mafia groups when
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you know it's clear from the cereals that
are being seized the materials that are being
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are requested in the search word turns their
public
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that a lot of this is association or information
that's being requested address books computer
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records uh... literature and advocacy materials
first-amendment uh... sort of uh... material
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so uh... this creates a huge chill beyond
these activists or their associates to the
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entire advocacy community where
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you know again these people as as already
stated have
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long's standing advocacy uh... histories
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you know our organizers know a lot of people
in the community
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uh... so it became creates a chill throughout
any it damages our democracy because people
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start to be afraid
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of purchasing katie in the political process
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and and that really is a huge problem of the
on the you know the scope of just the individuals
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involved in this case and you know the fact
that uh... f_b_i_ is doing this with that
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you know in using terms like terrorism uh...
x's to describe these individuals
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creates a huge chilling effect that we really
have to be concerned about
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like i wanted to ask you uh... i don't know
if it's exactly related but new details on
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how the
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united states uh...
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has assembled a vast domestic intelligence
apparatus to collect information about americans
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using the f_b_i_ local police state homeland
security officers and military criminal investigators
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another washington post expose on this the
f_b_i_ operating a massive database known
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as guardian with the names and personal information
of thousands of u_s_ citizens and residents
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who've never committed a crime but were reported
to have acted suspiciously by a local police
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officer or a fellow said ascend the database
containing over a hundred sixty thousand suspicious
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activity files despite the sweeping size of
the database the washington post reports the
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f_b_i_ says it's resulted in only five arrests
and no convictions in addition the poster
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reveals the f_b_i_ storing ninety six million
fingerprints in clarksburg west virginia
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and the post also reports that local law enforcement
agencies have begun using surveillance equipment
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designed for war zones in memphis tennessee
some police patrol cars now contain military
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grade infrared camera second snap digital
images of one license plate after another
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while analyzing each almost instantly uh...
like german ang you have worked in counter-terrorism
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for years before being at the a_c_l_u_ from
nineteen eighty two two thousand four what's
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going on here what are the dangers with us
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uh... well you know be you might remember
a program called total information awareness
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that was uh... it good started right after
nine eleven in the idea was that we can just
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grab all the available data that's out there
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somehow will be able to add to manage it in
a way that will know everything that's happening
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and while congress killed that specific program
that idea never disappeared
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and the f_b_i_ appears to be a at the center
of one of these
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expansive collection program is called e-card
in is the new one guardian is one that's been
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in
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been around for a while
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uh... but now there's a new wendy karti units
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part of a nationwide suspicious activity reporting
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uh...
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program
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that encourages
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state local law enforcement agencies as well
as the general public
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to report
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behaviors that they describe as inherently
suspicious in these include things like
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uh... taking notes drawing diagrams taking
measurements
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taking photographs or video are so course
these there are benign
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uh... activities that have no inherent suspicion
uh... regarding them
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so what were concerned with is what people
will really be reporting is people that
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because of their own personal bias
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are already suspicious of you know won't be
everybody who's taking notes it's only going
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to be that that person who wears religious
card that they are are
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you know uh...
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uh... religiously biased against or
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you know a person of assisted her racer era
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nationalities so
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uh... what this allows this sort of uh...
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reduction in standards allows the collection
of material against people who are not even
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suspected of being involved in wrongdoing
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and that is it is really an open door to abuse
and and we have uh... freedom of information
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act request outstanding
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uh... for the guardian program
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uh... worked were interested in a lot of different
new f_b_i_ program if there's a debate in
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management program
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uh... which purports to allow the f_b_i_ did
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to collect racial and ethnic demographic information
and map our communities across the nation
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by race and ethnicity
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so this this again the suspicion list collection
of information
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is busy huge and growing problem in all this
data
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conscious is being warehoused literally having
that's what they call it the investment data
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warehouse
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four any kind of of abuse that might occur
later and of course
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uh... you know the the a_c_l_u_ is already
documented
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uh... these types of spying operations being
directed against political advocacy
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in thirty three straight states across the
nation in fact when when uh... them latest
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washington post report came out
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one of the uh...
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uh... intelligence collection operations are
focused on was the tennessee fusion centers
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and and one of our uh...
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legal fellows
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became interested in upon reading the article
and went to the website
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and sure enough one of the suspicious activities
reported on the website was an eighth a c
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l_ u_ advocacy efforts
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uh... regarding
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uh... this celebration of of
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religious uh... uh... activity since in public
schools
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uh... so clearly there collecting information
about
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uh... political advocacy and how this is part
of it
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part of a larger problem across the country
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well michael i'd like to ask you to uh...
did this is not the first time
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well legal dissident groups united states
and
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uh... and of course back in the nineteen twenties
you know the palmer raids it was all kinds
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of governmental attempts around all people
who were involved in what is normally legal
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all but i dont decision of politics also of
one kind or another on this uh... o how come
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there is so little outcries uh... in the general
population of these enormous so uh... attempts
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by the government to take away civil liberties
and to add to spy on on the citizens
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uh... you're you're exactly right barry barry
is eight-year-old long history of abuse of
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secret
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uh... domestic intelligence powers
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and that's why after the church committee
uncovered those abuses in the nineteen seventy's
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there were guidelines put in place the attorney
general guidelines that required a reasonable
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suspicion of wrongdoing
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before the f_b_i_ could start aggressive investigations
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and those are the standards that i operated
on dude doing domestic terrorism investigations
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and i found they were very helpful that what
he did is it helped me focus on people who
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are actually doing bad things
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rather than people who were saying things
that that i didn't like her did agree with
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and that that that helped me use my resources
in uh... in an efficient way
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to target the people were doing bad things
unfortunately act not eleven those standards
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have been
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uh... diluted significantly to wear now the
f_b_i_ literally requires no factual predicate
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how to start an investigation ominous far
east as the public outrage but a huge part
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of the problem is again these activities are
taking place in secret
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so it's hard to know
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uh... how their impacting any particular group
or individual
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and that's why we set up a website
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uh... the spy files website a_c_l_u_ dot org
slash five files where were collecting a lot
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of this material
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october and you know it's not just the f_b_i_
that's fine arts department homeland security
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is the department of defense
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its state and local law enforcement agencies
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that are involved in these activities
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so that i do you know this washington post
story i think will be a big help
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said to let people know that uh...
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you were innocents doesn't protect you anymore
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that there would be a canoe literally start
collecting information
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on any one end and you know we had a recent
case in maryland ah... where the maryland
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state police were scott spying on political
activist and walking away the activist
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said something very interesting to me she
said you know i was a
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vietnam war protester
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so when i became an anti-war protester at
again
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you know if you with the recent conflicts
uh... i kind of assumed that the government
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would be spying on me but when i finally got
those records back which scared me more than
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anything
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was that not much of the information was wrong
they had their demonstrations i i was in that
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they had to be associated with groups i wasn't
associated with and that scared me more because
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now my doing everything right and and not
being involved
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in violence wasn't going to protect me from
there
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terrorists and and i could be associated with
things that i wasn't actually doing we only
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and that's really a big part of the problem
is
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we only have thirty seconds but i wanted to
go back to colleen rowley another f former
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f_b_i_ agent
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and i were a lady issue
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and and it's wiki leaks you have signed on
the long with a number of other people like
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uh... larry wilkerson the former chief of
staff
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of the secretary of state colin powell and
uh... dan ellsberg and british intelligence
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and plea catherine gone
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to a letter that says wiki leaks test he's
the genie out of transparency added a very
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opaque bottle
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and powerful forces in america who fried and
secrecy or trying desperately to staff the
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genie back in
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as we wrap up this discussion let's end up
on wiki leaks colleen
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well i think there is a big party in between
uh... transparency in knowing what your government
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is doing and what we just heard my german
mention which is
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for these infiltration without factual justification
of advocacy group
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uh... the minneapolis
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seemed to have and a lot from that lead up
to the republican national convention in a
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protest where they they complete targeted
at protesters and i think that if we had more
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transparency in we had waived of people telling
the truth about what's going on we would not
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actually see the pregnant by barry afraid
we're doomed to repeat that terrible history
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of the core intel pro era and the house on
american activities well we're gonna have
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to leave it there colleen rowley uh... and
my term in both former f_b_i_ agence ad calling
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rally whistleblower name time person of the
year in two thousand to ninety rm in now with
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the a_c_l_u_
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thanks so much for being with us
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uh... when we come back we'll be in san francisco
with roberto lovato talking about one of the
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bills that didn't get passed by the uh...
lame duck senate and it's the issue and immigration
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ended remax stay with us