Police State 101

Recently a friend of mine said he was more a "law and order" type and he was gratified by the police lining the streets during the anti-war protests here in Chicago. I agreed that they needed to be there to preserve order because I love my city and don't want to see anyone going on a rampage and breaking windows, setting fires, etc. I then told him that in the 60's a lot of the pure anarchy type moments were caused by government agents who had actually infiltrated the groups. The acts of violence were meant to paint the protestors as hypocrites and discredit the message. My friend said those were different times. That couldn't happen today.

Today I read this. I guess when you have a backwards group of leaders, it's possible to repeat the mistakes of the past.

A recent open meetings forum in Three Oaks was apparently too open for the FBI.

A St. Joseph federal agent challenged Chellie Pingree’s criticism of the Patriot Act and tried to track down the head of the national non-partisan group Common Cause to set her straight.

“When the country has far more pressing security and terror concerns, we question the FBI using precious resources hounding leaders of two of the most distinguished citizen advocacy organizations in the country,” Pingree and Gilbert wrote in a letter this week to FBI Director Robert Mueller.

“Is this the kind of behavior citizen activists can expect from the FBI? To us, it smacks of intimidation,” they said in their Tuesday letter.

We need to keep an eye on this. Our government under this President has proven they will go as far as we allow them to go, sometimes further than the law actually allows. Outrage is all they understand and/or respond to. This type of thing proves that even though 9 times out of 10 they piss me off, the ACLU absolutely deserves our support. I hope they get involved in this case, at least to look into the possible abuse of power aspects of what occurred.

PS. I'm on vacation this week enjoying time with my son. Updates here will be less frequent than normal.