Confronting the Growing Security State

What do we call a place where people are kept safe, with high security at
the walls and monitoring of every action within?
A prison, you say?
Think again. We're talking about the United States of America.

Carl Jarvis
----- Original Message -----
From: "S. Kashdan" <skashdan@scn.org>
To: "Blind Democracy List" <blind-democracy@octothorp.org>
Sent: Wednesday, June 26, 2013 7:23 PM
Subject: Confronting the Growing National (In)Security State


Confronting the Growing National (In)Security State



By Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers



Truthout, Wednesday, June 26, 2013





http://truth-out.org/news/item/17208-confronting-the-growing-national-insecurity-state?tmpl=component&print=1



The national security state dominates US foreign policy and now increasingly
domestic policy. It has become a behemoth, a monster with an insatiable
appetite that both looks for opportunities to expand and creates reasons to
justify its expansion. Driven largely by profit and geopolitical positioning
to control the world's resources, the national security state may finally be
overreaching to the point that people are seeing through the myth of they
hate us for our freedom and realizing that we are all being duped.



The United States is stuck in a cycle that it created by decades of military
intervention, war and economic hegemony. This has created a self-fulfilling
prophecy of growing insecurity that fuels the demand for more security. As
real and perceived threats against US security result in a national security
response of more military, more spying and more intervention, the consistent
response abroad is more threats to the security of Americans and attacks on
the US military and transnational US corporations. Reaction by the United
States is inevitably more security state violence. And the cycle continues
to spiral.



Real feelings of insecurity have been used to scare people in the United
States into accepting the growing erosion of our civil liberties. We are
taught to treat each other as potential terrorists and to be on the lookout
for threats. We are accustomed to being complicit with gross invasions of
our privacy as a trade-off for greater security. But this is an illusion, as
is the idea that if someone is not doing anything wrong, then this state of
hypervigilance doesn't affect them.



Now these illusions are being exposed. Four years ago, Pfc. Bradley Manning
was arrested for leaking documents on the wars and US foreign policy that
showed crimes, unethical behavior and abuses of power. The government
reacted harshly, held him in solitary for one year and sought to make an
example of him to frighten others from coming forward. These actions showed
how the government will abuse its power to cover up its own misbehavior. But
rather than deter, this abuse has led to more leaks.



As Glenn Greenwald writes, The more they overreact to measures of
accountability and transparency - the more they so flagrantly abuse their
power of secrecy and investigations and prosecutions - the more quickly that
backlash will arrive. In the more than three years since Manning's arrest,
there have been multiple leaks, including perhaps the most important, the
recent leaks by Edward Snowden. Intimidation is not working.



And the national dialogue is changing. Just as these whistleblowers had
hoped, people are questioning whether the national security state is
justified and just whose interests it represents. Coalitions of
organizations are forming to demand greater transparency and accountability,
and serious questions are being asked about the effects of a privatized
security state on democracy and the broader interests of the public.



The Dangerous National Security Spiral



Wars and military interventions occur out of the Office of the President,
which has become an imperial presidency that does not wait for Congressional
or UN approval. Fred Branfman, who exposed the illegal bombing of Laos and
the targeting of civilians by the United States during the Vietnam War, says
that since 1962, the United States has killed 20 million human beings, the
vast majority of them civilians, more than any other country in the world
during that time period.



This mass slaughter of people, and the displacement of an equal number who
were forced to flee their homes and often their countries, continues no
matter who is president. No doubt part of the problem is the mirage
democracy and managed elections in the United States which limit our
choices, but the bigger problem is the institution of the executive branch,
the vast military and intelligence apparatus, and ongoing foreign policy
that emphasizes intervention and domination rather than diplomacy. These
institutional forces need to be changed if we are to have any hope of
redirecting US relations with the world.



Branfman describes part of the dangerous cycle of the national security
state And today's U.S. executive branch policies pose an even greater
long-term threat to U.S. strategic interests, not only abroad but at home.
The evidence is overwhelming, including the statements by several dozen U.S.
national security experts cited at the end of my recent piece, that U.S.
leaders are not protecting national security but rather weakening it as
never before.



They are weakening security by creating more enemies every day. Branfman
points out that the Joint Strategic Operations Command (JSOC), essentially a
team of assassins operating on a global scale, is active in 60 countries.
Obama has used drones in many countries, most with which the United States
is not at war. This remote-control policing of the globe is increasing
hatred against the United States. A 2011 Pew poll shows 74 percent of
Pakistanis, 130 million people, regard us as their enemy. Branfman points
out, It makes no national security sense to be at war with 1.8 billion
Muslims.



Numerous officials have made similar points; retired General Stanley
McChrystal says every civilian the US kills creates ten enemies. Who are
these security-state-created enemies The tens of thousands families, friends
and neighbors of people killed in drone strikes or held without trial in
Guantanamo Bay or other secret prisons. They include the vast numbers of
people under drone surveillance and threat of attack in numerous countries
in Africa, the Middle East and East Asia. Also, this includes the people
threatened with full-blown war as the United States moves from the
destruction of Iraq to Afghanistan to Libya and now to Syria, with Iran and
North Korea in its sight and under threat, and even China being encircled
militarily in Obama's Asian pivot. The undermining of democracies throughout
the world adds to the problem, especially in Venezuela, Ecuador and Bolivia,
countries that have broken from US empire. The United States does not become
more secure by turning the people of the world against us.



As a result of this ongoing policy of intervention and domination, the US
security state apparatus has grown dramatically. This security state
includes not only government agencies but thousands of corporations that are
hard to distinguish from the government. The merger of corporations and
state is evident in the intelligence gathering apparatus, each entity
sharing information with the other. For example, a recent leak from Edward
Snowden on British intelligence's seizure of virtually every worldwide phone
call and Internet activity, reveals that it shares the information with
850,000 outside contractors, as well as the NSA.



There are important legal and moral issues that challenge all of these
policies, but Branfman points out, the security state apparatus is also
endangering us, undermining security and creating enemies. Further, It is
our government that is endangering our national security, not the
whistleblowers.



The security state is becoming more insecure itself as people in the United
States learn about the extent of domestic and global spying. This creates a
potentially volatile situation. Branfman says that No president has done
more to create the infrastructure for a possible future police-state than
President Obama. Branfman sees three ways that this infrastructure could be
used to escalate to a full police state that would destroy our democratic
ideals (1) another 911 type attack, (2) domestic unrest due to the economic
collapse and growing inequality; and (3) global disruption due to climate
change. These are all very real possibilities and one interesting thing
about each – current government policy not only fails to solve or minimize
these problems, it actually makes each worse.



The National Security State Used Against Americans



Thomas Drake, a former executive of the National Security Agency who became
a whistleblower and was accused of violating the Espionage Act says, We have
all become foreigners, all subjects of the surveillance state and it has
really very little to do with counter-terrorism. Further, the security
apparatus is treating the United States as a foreign nation consistent with
the Obama administration's claim that the whole world is a battlefield, and
that includes the United States.



Drake points out that he and his colleagues in the NSA showed the agency how
it could collect the data it needed to protect the United States from its
enemies, while at the same time operating within the limits of the
Constitution, consistent with the Fourth Amendment and protecting the
privacy of Americans. But, the NSA rejected that approach and instead
because of a perverse incentive to keep track of everyone, gathered all
information so that they would have it in case they needed it at a later
date. According to Drake, the NSA wants to own the Internet.



An East German expert, Drake says the Stasi would be drooling at what the US
surveillance state is doing with their collection of information. The full
review of how Americans are spied on is breathtaking. There is so much
information being gathered that the NSA is building a data facility in Utah
that will use as much energy as Salt Lake City to hold 100 years' worth of
worldwide communications, including phone and Internet communications. The
surveillance state has been building relatively consistently for 100 years.
With every advance in technology; the surveillance state has expanded to use
that technology.



What is the extent of monitoring The American government is in fact
collecting and storing virtually every phone call, purchase, email, text
message, internet search, social media communication and credit card
transaction. They also gather information about finances, health,
employment history, travel and student records, and virtually all other
information on every person in the United States. The British government
taps into trans-Atlantic cables to gather telephone and Internet traffic
which they share with NSA and corporations. In 2011, they collected 600
million telephone events each day.



Then there is the monitoring of the travel of Americans through a massive
surveillance system of CCTV cameras which could be upgraded with facial
recognition technology. In addition, the federal government has used drones
on Americans, 13 police departments are using them and 30,000 drones are
projected to be licensed in the United States in the next decade.



When we travel, our conversations will also be monitored as cities across
the country are quietly installing microphone-enabled surveillance systems
on public buses that would give them the ability to record and store private
conversations. Street lights are being installed that can spy in some
American cities. Cell towers and cell phones can track where your phone is.
And, phone companies responded to at least 1.3 million law enforcement
requests for cell phone locations in 2011. The government is pushing for
black boxes being installed in cars to track people.



When Americans travel they go through often abusive and always degrading,
invasive searches at airports, but the TSA is now moving beyond airports to
trains and sports stadiums, as well as deploying mobile scanners to spy on
people in many places. Related to this is expanding the geographic area for
border searches to 100 miles away from the border. When the government
conducts a border search it is not constrained by the Fourth Amendment.



And then there is the corporate side of the security state. Big companies
are giving data to the NSA and other government agencies in return for
special treatment. The NSA built a back door to all Windows software and the
FBI wants a backdoor to all software. Companies are creating new products
like bill boards that can watch you. And a recent patent application by
Verizon would allow your television to watch you, track what you are doing,
who you are with, what you're holding, and the mood you're in.



All of this is happening within the framework of law and congressional
oversight. But, as Thomas Drake says Oversight has been co-opted and
compromised, it is a kabuki dance. Secret surveillance is approved by secret
courts. Compromised congressional oversight includes gag orders to silence
elected representatives so they cannot tell their constituents what is going
on. It really inverts the system of justice, he says.



Former NSA official William Binney describes, in a USA Today interview, how
the oversight system fails to work saying, We tried to stay for the better
part of seven years inside the government trying to get the government to
recognize the unconstitutional, illegal activity that they were doing and
openly admit that and devise certain ways that would be constitutionally and
legally acceptable to achieve the ends they were really after. And that just
failed totally because no one in Congress or — we couldn't get anybody in
the courts, and certainly the Department of Justice and inspector general's
office didn't pay any attention to it. And all of the efforts we made just
produced no change whatsoever. All it did was continue to get worse and
expand.



Jesslyn Radack, an attorney with the Government Accountability Project,
tells USA Today not only did the system fail to respond, but more than that,
it was turned against them. … The inspector general was the one who gave
their names to the Justice Department for criminal prosecution under the
Espionage Act. And they were all targets of a federal criminal
investigation, and Tom [Drake] ended up being prosecuted — and it was for
blowing the whistle.



Radack calls the oversight system a rubber stamp, Congress has been a rubber
stamp . . . and the judicial branch has been basically shut down from
hearing these lawsuits . . . So the idea that we have robust checks and
balances on this is a myth. Further in 2012 the Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance (FISA) court approved 98 percent of the 1,856 applications for
surveillance and searches outright, with one withdrawn and 40 others
modified, which is consistent with its practice since it was founded in
1978. But still, President Obama describes the system of secret
surveillance, secret courts, secret congressional oversight and gag orders
it is transparent.



Making these already weak checks and balances weaker is the dishonesty of
intelligence officials and the inability of either courts or congress to
check their truthfulness. For example, Sen. Ron Wyden asked the director of
national intelligence, James Clapper, if there was mass data collection of
Americans. He said no. In USA Today Drake described that as This is
incredible dissembling . . . the oversight committee, unable to get a
straight answer because if the straight answer was given it would reveal the
perfidy that's actually going on inside the secret side of the government.
Binney added, It can't work the way it is because they have no real way of
seeing into what these agencies are doing. They are totally dependent on the
agencies briefing them on programs, telling them what they are doing. The
same is true for the FISA court.



Branfman says it more starkly saying We cannot trust government
spokespersons as they have been lying to us for 50 years. Indeed, the
dishonesty of government representatives has become so consistent that we
take it for granted when they lie to us, we expect it and accept it.
Further, when they get caught in a lie, they cover-up and if the cover-up
does not work they call it an aberration and blame a low-level official. He
explains that security state officials do not think it terms of truth in
lies, they think in terms of what do they have to say to support their
mission and enlarge their budget.



Nobody in the country is immune to this extensive monitoring. Of course we
know that FBI Director Hoover spied on President Kennedy and his brothers.
And NSA whistleblower Russ Tice revealed that members of congress, Supreme
Court justices and the young state senator Obama were spied on. And that is
why the spying affects all of us. Information that is collected on elected
officials, judges and the media can be used to make them 'behave' under
threat of losing their careers. This undermines democracy and the rule of
law.



How Do We Deal With and Dismantle the Security State



Thomas Drake reminds us that Senator Frank Church warned us in 1975 - when
the surveillance state was used against the American people, including
protesters. Can we pull ourselves out of the abyss Is it embedded in the
infrastructure of our society so deeply that we can't Drake is dedicating
his life to restoring the Constitution, privacy and the Fourth Amendment, so
he has not given up.



And, many Americans have not given up either. Over 200,000 people have
joined an effort to stop the spying at www.StopWatching.US, and more than
100 organizations have signed onto a letter calling for a congressional
investigation modeled on the Church Committee of the mid-70s. They describe
the spying as blanket data collection by the government [that] strikes at
bedrock American values of freedom and privacy. This dragnet surveillance
violates the First and Fourth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution, which
protect citizens' right to speak and associate anonymously and guard against
unreasonable searches and seizures… They seek to have the Patriot Act
repealed and officials who put this unconstitutional program in place held
accountable.



Another group is taking on CCTV cameras, seeking to create a data base
describing where they are. There have been incidents in the United States
and around the world of activists destroying CCTV cameras.



Others are sharing information on how to stop the security state from spying
on you. And some are providing detailed specific steps you can take to have
more private communications, as well as evaluating the tools available for
safer communication.



During our interview with them on Clearing the FOG, Thomas Drake and Fred
Branfman said that to end the security state, we need to build a mass
popular movement to challenge the system and demand that it ends. To
restore democracy Drake calls for maximum openness and transparency; and
real checks and balances in government. The government needs to be
re-chained to the US Constitution and the limits on searches and seizures.
It needs to stop violating the rights of Americans and people all around the
world.



Branfman believes this is an issue that the right and left of the American
political spectrum should join together on, recognizing we need a potent
political movement to challenge the entrenched security state. He sees the
only way we will be able to turn back the security state is through popular
ferment over the next decade.



Drake is heartened by Edward Snowden whom he describes as a classic
whistle-blower acting in the public interest. He notes that East Germany
collapsed from within and part of the reason was people in the security
state seeing they were on the wrong side. Now in the United States, he says,
people are seeing the initial outlines and contours of a very systemic, very
broad, a Leviathan surveillance state and much of it is in violation of the
fundamental basis for our own country — in fact, the very reason we even had
our own American Revolution. Snowden has helped to start the debate we have
needed to have since 911.



Edward Snowden showed the incredible power that one person has who is on the
inside and breaks ranks. A key ingredient of a strategy that will succeed in
shifting power is people on the inside switching to the side of the people.
When Bradley Manning leaked documents concerning the Iraq and Afghanistan
War, the Guantanamo Bay prisons and Foreign Service documents that showed
the operation of US empire around the world, the national security state
came down on him aggressively. Their goal was to scare others, but since his
arrest and abuse four years ago there have been many important national
security leaks, with Edward Snowden producing perhaps the most important.
While intimidation may work on some, others will be encouraged by their
abuse and every one person who blows the whistle makes a tremendous
difference.



Whistleblowing is critical to progress against a security state that is
undermining democracy. The actions of Manning, Snowden and others like them
will inspire a new generation of whistleblowers. Indeed, whistleblowing has
been democratized as relatively low-level techs gain access to critical
information. As Julian Assange says They are young, technically minded
people from the generation that Barack Obama betrayed. They are the
generation that grew up on the internet, and were shaped by it. While it may
seem impossible to safely blow the whistle in the US security state, in fact
it can be done. Here's a brief guide on how to safely expose crime and
abuse of government and big business by phone, email and mail.



We are confident that while some may be frightened by the security state,
others will feel that it is their duty to come forward with the truth. They
may do it anonymously, as many have, or they may do it publicly, as Edward
Snowden did, but they will come forward. In the end, the crimes will be
exposed and those participating in them need to know, they will be held
accountable.



As Edward Snowden said in answering questions posed by the public



Binney, Drake, Kiriakou, and Manning are all examples of how overly-harsh
responses to public-interest whistle-blowing only escalate the scale, scope,
and skill involved in future disclosures. Citizens with a conscience are not
going to ignore wrong-doing simply because they'll be destroyed for it the
conscience forbids it. Instead, these draconian responses simply build
better whistleblowers. If the Obama administration responds with an even
harsher hand against me, they can be assured that they'll soon find
themselves facing an equally harsh public response.



Julian Assange warns Obama and the security state adding And by trying to
crush these young whistleblowers with espionage charges, the US government
is taking on a generation, and that is a battle it is going to lose.



Now that the dangerous national security spiral is hitting home with mass
surveillance of Americans, and more and more are seeing that so-called
national security actually make us less safe and less free, the cycle can be
broken. Every American is now directly affected by the US security state,
and more and more will speak up and take action to end it. The popular
resistance that Drake and Branfman say is needed is starting to build. More
and more people are asking themselves the same question Manning, Snowden,
Branfman, Assange and others have asked what is my breaking point



You can listen to NSA Leaks, Spying and the Myth of National Security with
Thomas Drake and Fred Branfman on Clearing The FOG.





Kevin Zeese JD and Margaret Flowers MD co-host ClearingtheFOGRadio.org on We
Act Radio 1480 AM Washington, DC and on Economic Democracy Media and on
UStream.TVItsOurEconomy, co-direct It's Our Economy and are organizers of
PopularResistance.org. Their twitters are @KBZeese and @MFlowers8.

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