"With military-grade equipment available for the cost of pick-up, police forces have been stocking up. While some of that equipment appears actually to have been used in post-hurricane relief work, most of it is better suited for SWAT raids, intimidating protesters, and killing people."
"Trump has done nothing to wrest control of the government from the Deep State, that shadowy elite group of powerbrokers and corporations who call the shots in Washington. Trump has done nothing to prevent the government from continuing to plunder and steal from the American taxpayer. In fact, his administration has paved the way for even more theft in the form of civil asset forfeiture. Trump has failed to end the government’s endless wars. To the contrary, he has fallen in line with the military industrial complex. Most of all, Trump has proven to be as deaf, dumb and blind as every president before him when it comes to the plight of the citizenry."
"The declassified memos and briefings from NSA confirm that this was more than just an intimidation tactic or a passing thought - the NSA had truly wanted to jail a journalist for his use of public records. When the Agency determined that this was unlikely to happen, they moved on to exploring other legal avenues which could be used to punish Bamford for his FOIA work."
"Jihadis have claimed unemployment benefits and family allowance for years while living in Syria. Over the past five years, some 500,000 euros ($583,200) have gone directly from the French taxpayers to the terror group, according to the report. Other European countries have uncovered similar problems. Close to every person who left Sweden to fight for terror groups in the Middle East received welfare, according to a government report."
"It fixes the 'backdoor search loophole,' which now allows warrantless searches of the NSA-collected contents of Americans’ communications. It extends broad oversight powers to an independent agency. It guarantees the end of a controversial type of data search (called “about” searches) that the NSA suspended earlier this year. It improves judicial oversight of the government’s surveillance regime. It provides better transparency and requires stricter reporting."
"The change last year to a Department of Defense manual on procedures governing its intelligence activities was made possible by a decades-old presidential executive order, bypassing congressional and court review. The new manual, released in August 2016, now permits the collection of information about Americans for counterintelligence purposes 'when no specific connection to foreign terrorist(s) has been established,' according to training slides created last year by the Air Force Office of Special Investigations (AFOSI)."
"It is time to cease venerating a federal agency whose abuses have perennially menaced Americans’ constitutional rights. Otherwise, the FBI’s vast power and pervasive secrecy guarantee that more FBI scandals are just around the bend."
"Everyone will ignore the real victims of Operation Cross Country: the vulnerable women and girls tricked, frightened, robbed, detained, arrested, incarcerated, and otherwise mistreated by police and federal agents as part of this sick charade that claims to help them."
"If you’re traveling back to the US on or after Thursday, expect a broad range of new measures, including short interviews. According to Airlines for America, the new policies will affect 325,000 airline passengers on about 2,000 commercial flights arriving daily in the US. Those figures include flights on 180 airlines from 280 airports in 105 countries. That’s a whole lot of people on a significant number of flights, so be aware that you may experience more delays than usual. Lufthansa said that travelers could expect to encounter short interviews at check-in or at the gate, and passengers on Lufthansa’s Swiss should check-in at least 90 minutes before departure."
"If you are black and angry about police violence, you are a potential terror threat. Or so says a newly released FBI Intelligence Assessment that concocts a non-existent movement they dub 'Black Identity Extremists.' According to the assessment, 'premeditated, retaliatory lethal violence against law enforcement' has been spurred on by 'Black Identity Extremist (BIE) perceptions of police brutality against African Americans.' The problems with this report are manifold. First, and foremost, it places the blame for violence on actual concerns with police brutality and racial justice, thus delegitimizing dissent."