Pentagon “Accidentally” Spying on Protestors…Again?

The Department of Defense admitted in a letter obtained by NBC News on Thursday that it had wrongly added peaceful demonstrators to a database of possible domestic terrorist threats. The letter followed an NBC report focusing on the Defense Department’s Threat and Local Observation Notice, or TALON, report.

Acting Deputy Undersecretary of Defense Roger W. Rogalski’s letter came in reply to a memo from Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., who had demanded answers about the process of identifying domestic protesters as suspicious and removing their names when they are wrongly listed.

“The recent review of the TALON Reporting System … identified a small number of reports that did not meet the TALON reporting criteria. Those reports dealt with domestic anti-military protests or demonstrations potentially impacting DoD facilities or personnel,” Rogalski wrote on Wednesday.

[…]

Other documents obtained by NBC News show that the Defense Department is clearly increasing its domestic monitoring activities. One briefing document stamped “secret” concludes: “[W]e have noted increased communication and encouragement between protest groups using the Internet,” but no “significant connection” between incidents, such as “reoccurring instigators at protests” or “vehicle descriptions.” [“Pentagon admits errors in spying on protestors” (MSNBC)]

Are we really expected to believe that these are just mistakes with the system? I mean, come on! The U.S. Military has a history of spying on American dissenters. During Vietnam, the military used American soldiers to inflitrate the anti-war movement to spy on Americans exercising their Constitutional freedom of speech. I just find it hard to believe that given the current atmosphere of terror and bullying from the current administration that this wouldn’t be overlooked or even encouraged behavior again. After all, if the President can do it…

tags: politics, Conspiracy Theories, Pentagon, spying on Americans, protestors, TALON, NBC News, Defense Department

4 comments

1. on March 11, 2006 at 9:05 am

   Big Dog said:

   I do not have a problem with them sending soldiers into groups exercising their right to free speech as you mentioned about the Vietnam war. Those protest groups were responsible for blowing up things in America. Now one of them is an employee of the ACLU.

   I think it could be a mistake. The DOD looks at millions of things and this could be a mistake. But tell me, why are you so ready to believe it is not a mistake but you wrote nothing colling Hillary to task for “not knowing” Bill was working on behalf of Dubai. Come now do you think she really did not know?

   Or is this a bias. You seem to have theis military/conspiracy thing going on so perhaps you will believe anything they say about the military.

   I don’t care id they watch protest groups who are outside of places like military bases and Walter Reed Army Hospital. They should keep an eye on they to make sure they are not spying or causing trouble to our troops and their families. We have been through this before and what the government (or as you say the President) is doing is perfectly legal.

   The thing that worries me and should you though you did not touch on it is this from the story:

   One briefing document stamped “secret” concludes:“

   If it was stamped secret then it is classified and who ever released it committed a crime. That is the person who concerns me. It is also a crime for a news outlet to knowingly release classified information. They admitted that they broke the law. Now that is more of a problem than some mistake made by the DOD.

2. on March 11, 2006 at 10:03 am

   n. mallory said:

   I don’t talk about Hillary Clinton because I don’t like Hillary Clinton, but not to the point where she pisses me off, just to the point where I’d rather ignore her at the moment. Though admittedly, there seems to be a lot of communication issues in her marriage, which is none of my business.

   And, yes, I do have a military/conspiracy thing, which might be odd coming from the child of an army brat and an army Captain turned DOE manager. It just kind of comes naturally. I just believe there has to be some sort of balance between civil liberties and watchlists.

   I’m just wonder why reports of vegan groups, senior citizen anti-war protest groups, Quaker anti-war groups, etc. are ending up on these lists and aren’t being removed.

   I will admit that I agree with you on one thing. The fact that they had access to a “secret” document bothered me a good deal. Having had secret clearance in the past, I take that very seriously.

3. on March 11, 2006 at 10:10 am

   n. mallory said:

   You know, speaking of a horrible misuse of secret security clearance, I once convinced someone that the X-Files were real. People are so gullible.

   I never have talked about the actual stuff I read/saw while working on that job though. Most people would have found it horribly boring anyway.

4. on March 11, 2006 at 12:39 pm

   Big Dog said:

   My point though, is if Hillary can claim she did not know and the MSM buys that without question, why can it not be real that the DOD which has hundreds more people and is a puzzle palace can not make a mistake.

   The things is, if they were trying to hide something why not just take them off what ever list they were on and then deny they were ever on there? I mean it was the DOD who disclosed the latest information and they had to know people would think they were lying so if that is the case why not just take them off and lie about it (if they are lying to begin with).

   I think people get on lists for a numbe rof things like making bomb references or saying something suspicious. It takes forever to get someone off a list, it shouldn’t, but it does.

   You mean the X-files are not real?

Leave a comment

You must be logged in to post a comment.