The Secret Government Rulebook For Labeling You a Terrorist

[DamianTV]

http://news.slashdot.org/story/14/07/23/1954218/the-secret-government-rulebook-for-labeling-you-a-terrorist


The Obama administration has quietly approved a substantial expansion of the terrorist watchlist system, authorizing a secret process that requires neither "concrete facts" nor "irrefutable evidence" to designate an American or foreigner as a terrorist (https://firstlook.org/theintercept/article/2014/07/23/blacklisted/), according to a key government document obtained by The Intercept. ...The heart of the document revolves around the rules for placing individuals on a watchlist. "All executive departments and agencies," the document says, are responsible for collecting and sharing information on terrorist suspects with the National Counterterrorism Center. It sets a low standard—"reasonable suspicion"—for placing names on the watchlists, and offers a multitude of vague, confusing, or contradictory instructions for gauging it. In the chapter on "Minimum Substantive Derogatory Criteria"—even the title is hard to digest—the key sentence on reasonable suspicion offers little clarity.

(Embedded source link Copied...)

[susano]

I was listening to Mike Rivero, today, and he said we're in a total Zionist police and security state where the goal is that we all be contained and treated like the Israelis treat the Palestinians. I think he's spot on.

[Constitutional Paulicy]

https://prod01-cdn03.cdn.firstlook.org/wp-uploads/sites/1/2014/07/watchlist-cover.jpg
Here are the Watchlist Guidance documents... https://firstlook.org/theintercept/document/2014/07/23/march-2013-watchlisting-guidance/

The Secret Government Rulebook For Labeling You a Terrorist
By Jeremy Scahill and Ryan Devereaux 23 Jul 2014, 2:45 PM EDT


Over the years, the Obama and Bush Administrations have fiercely resisted disclosing the criteria for placing names on the databases—though the guidelines are officially labeled as unclassified. In May, Attorney General Eric Holder even invoked the state secrets privilege to prevent watchlisting guidelines from being disclosed in litigation launched by an American who was on the no fly list. In an affidavit, Holder called them a “clear roadmap” to the government’s terrorist-tracking apparatus, adding: “The Watchlisting Guidance, although unclassified, contains national security information that, if disclosed … could cause significant harm to national security.”

The rulebook, which The Intercept is publishing in full, was developed behind closed doors by representatives of the nation’s intelligence, military, and law-enforcement establishment, including the Pentagon, CIA, NSA, and FBI. Emblazoned with the crests of 19 agencies, it offers the most complete and revealing look into the secret history of the government’s terror list policies to date. It reveals a confounding and convoluted system filled with exceptions to its own rules, and it relies on the elastic concept of “reasonable suspicion” as a standard for determining whether someone is a possible threat. Because the government tracks “suspected terrorists” as well as “known terrorists,” individuals can be watchlisted if they are suspected of being a suspected terrorist, or if they are suspected of associating with people who are suspected of terrorism activity.


more here... https://firstlook.org/theintercept/article/2014/07/23/blacklisted/

[tangent4ronpaul]

The nomination system appears to lack meaningful checks and balances. Although government officials have repeatedly said there is a rigorous process for making sure no one is unfairly placed in the databases, the guidelines acknowledge that all nominations of “known terrorists” are considered justified unless the National Counterterrorism Center has evidence to the contrary. In a recent court filing, the government disclosed that there were 468,749 KST nominations in 2013, of which only 4,915 were rejected–a rate of about one percent. The rulebook appears to invert the legal principle of due process, defining nominations as “presumptively valid.”

Back of the envelope again...

Lets take the absurd assumption that this rate will not grow.
That life expectancy is 70

They are adding half a million ppl a year, so within your lifetime 35 million people will have been placed on the list.

Your chances of being classified as a known or suspected terrorist in your lifetime is 10%

That assumes the rate of nominations remains at 2013 levels, which it won't.

methinks we can add another scandal to Obama's booboo list... :rolleyes:

lets hope this catches on with social and news media.

But hay, look at the up side! You are three times more likely to be denied boarding an aircraft and being spied on than you are to have your door kicked in at 4:30 in the morning by a team of government assassins. That makes everything soo much better! :D /sarc

Actually, these levels are very consistent with levels of spying in East Germany under the Stazi.

-t

[Slave Mentality]

PUBLIC ENEMY NUMBER 1

http://banter.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/get_a_brain_morans.jpg

[Thor]

https://prod01-cdn03.cdn.firstlook.org/wp-uploads/sites/1/2014/07/blacklisted_title.jpg

But look at the big screen on the right, they are running WindowsXP. So it is bound to crash and fail.... at least we can take comfort in that.

[tangent4ronpaul]

But look at the big screen on the right, they are running WindowsXP. So it is bound to crash and fail.... at least we can take comfort in that.

And Micro$haft has stopped supporting XP, so any new security bugs...

-t

[AuH20]

It's interesting that on my last trip, the TSA gave me an extensive search and questioning session. Both to and from. This system is definitely in place. Like the document states (http://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1227228/2013-watchlist-guidance.pdf), one's presence at a particular rally or political conference could land you on this list. Social media posts could include you on as well. It's a very wide net they are casting.

[jbauer]

Sweet. I always wanted to be on "the list".

I ordered gardening books AND have a garden, voted 3rd party, store fuel. Attend political rallies. Etc Etc

Atleast now all my efforts will have accomplished getting "listed". Maybe my wife will let me quit flying.