Was the detention of a Brazilian citizen at Heathrow done at the behest of the Obama Administration ? Is journalism now viewed as a terrorist occupation? Are news organizations now to be viewed as integral parts of terrorist organizations ? Does the ”War on Terror” mean that consorting with a journalist who interviewed NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden is reason enough to be treated like a terrorist while traveling as a commercial airline passenger through an international airport ?
While in transit from Germany to Brazil, David Miranda, a Brazilian citizen and a close associate or “partner” of Glenn Greenwald, was detained at Heathrow for nine hours under the British Terrorism Act by operatives of the British GCHQ (the British equivalent of the NSA). Greenwald was the reporter who interviewed Edward Snowden, the former contractor for the National Security Agency who exposed NSA programs of large scale surveillance of Americans (See “Guardian newspaper ordered to destroy files, claims editor” by Hannah Kuchler, Helen Warrell & news agencies, updated 8/20/13, Financial Times [http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/a3e35152-08a6-11e3-ad07-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2cUN1XuOG]).
Here’s how the event was reported in the Guardian: “On Sunday morning David Miranda, the partner of Guardian columnist Glenn Greenwald, was detained as he was passing through Heathrow airport on his way back to Rio de Janeiro, where the couple live. Greenwald is the reporter who has broken most of the stories about state surveillance based on the leaks from the former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. Greenwald's work has undoubtedly been troublesome and embarrassing for western governments. But, as the debate in America and Europe has shown, there is considerable public interest in what his stories have revealed about the right balance between security, civil liberties, freedom of speech and privacy. He has raised acutely disturbing questions about the oversight of intelligence; about the use of closed courts; about the cosy and secret relationship between government and vast corporations; and about the extent to which millions of citizens now routinely have their communications intercepted, collected, analysed and stored” (See “David Miranda, schedule 7 and the danger that all reporters now face — As the events in a Heathrow transit lounge – and the Guardian offices – have shown, the threat to journalism is real and growing” by Alan Rusbridger, 8/19/13, The Guardian [ww.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/aug/19/david-miranda-schedule7-danger-reporters]).
Government officials both in London and Brazil quickly became involved.
On Sunday, a representative of the Brazilian government said that Brazil had “grave concerns” about the detention of one of its citizens under the British Terrorism Act, while that Brazilian national was in transit from Germany to Brazil.
Keith Vaz, a Labor Member of the British Parliament and chairman of the House of Commons Home Affairs Committee, wrote to Scotland Yard asking for a “clarification” of its use of the Terrorism Act and also whether the Act had been used “at the behest of another government”. In reply, the London Metropolitan Police Department indicated that a 28-year-old man had been detained at Heathrow at 8.05am on Sunday under Schedule 7 of the 2000 Terrorism Act. According to the Met, he was not arrested and was released at 5pm the same day. Yvette Cooper, “Shadow Home Secretary,” said that any suggestion that the government’s terror powers were being misused had to be investigated.
The Guardian made these conclusory observations, “We are not there yet, but it may not be long before it will be impossible for journalists to have confidential sources. Most reporting – indeed, most human life in 2013 – leaves too much of a digital fingerprint. Those colleagues who denigrate Snowden or say reporters should trust the state to know best ...may one day have a cruel awakening. One day it will be their reporting, their cause, under attack. But at least reporters now know to stay away from Heathrow transit lounges."
4 comments:
Dud.
Newspapers, Radio, Television and The Web.
They are all blind to the war which is worldwide and instead of helping their country they mock it the newspaper, the radio, television and the web.
Does this make sense, the United States of America is doing the best job it can.
In my thoughts this does not make sense at all.
Your country and the man and woman that are in the intelligent game are doing what they have to do to protect all American Citizens.
Not just a select few
Hundreds of thousands, perhaps into the millions, of "Americans" of all descriptions are engaged in the collection, storage and mining of data for "THE GOVERNMENT" --- a huge number of those "Americans" are government employees and/or contractors, many others with no known connection to the government have been willingly complicit with the government as part of their very lucrative method of doing business.
However, a only relative few in government (and perhaps some completely outside of OUR government) have the wherewithal to collect store and mine data on the scale that it is being done by the NSA --- data on virtually all electronic communication on earth and in space around the earth. The acres and acres of NSA supercomputers at Ft. Meade are now no longer enough to do the job. AND the NSA is only one of the agencies of government that is mining data.
All the agencies associated with Obamacare and several other Obama social, economic and law enforcement programs are geometrically and even logarithmically increasing their capacities to collect, store and mine data on Americans. The next big thing is passing the laws and changing the regs so that all of these separate data bases can be interconnected -- even to the point of inter-agency interactivity.
A relative handful of whistleblowers and overseers have disclosed that the administrative safeguards and controls that are now in place are not nearly adequate to prevent or even keep track of abuses at the NSA. Equally damning, it is now clear that legislative and judicial oversight hardly exists beyond the fig leaf of pro forma appearance -- largely for legalistic insulation and as public relations chaff. In recent years, different whistleblowers and overseers have shown that there is neither the independent investigative authority nor the Executive, Legislative or Judicial inclination to supervise and police agencies as diverse as the IRS, the SSA, Homeland Security, the DOJ, the CIA, the DOD and the State Department.
Remember, it has been widely discussed and even bragged about that the Obama Campaigns of 2008 and 2012 heavily used mined data to micro-target many individuals and groups to win those elections in several key closely-contested states.
Picture, if you will, what can be done with access to ALL DIGITAL DATA ON ALL AMERICANS if some manipulator(s) were to employ the ever-improving and increasing algorithms that are more and more capable of predicting what individuals will think or react to various stressors or other inputs. That would be something like a permanent democratic government by Psy-Ops --- or as Orwell called it in 1948/"1984" --- "Big Brother" ....
BACKFILL:
“Long Ago and Far Away”
This isn’t the first time that the Anglo-American “Special Relationship” has resulted in the special treatment of individuals considered dangerous to “the Crown” and it’s secret dealings with the United States. An early victim was Tyler Kent, and by indirection U.S. Ambassador Joseph Kennedy.
Early in World War II, Tyler Gatewood Kent was a U.S. diplomat holding the post of “Cipher Clerk” at the U.S. Embassy in Mayfair under Ambassador Joseph P. Kennedy. Well-born and well-connected Kent was originally posted to the first U.S. Embassy to the Soviet Union under Ambassador William C. Bullitt. However, with whispers that he was consorting with Soviet spies – an obvious “honey pot” deal – he was shipped to London, where somebody could keep an eye on him. That turned out to be a special group at MI-5 under Maxwell Knight.
On or about May 18, 1940, a delegation of high MI-5 officers met with the U.S. Ambassador Joseph Kennedy, with an offer that he could not refuse. Kennedy would waive Kent’s diplomatic immunity and Kent would be secretly arrested and tried by the British for violations of the British “Official Secrets Act.” The “deal” was made and Kent was arrested at his apartment on May 20th by Maxwell Knight personally and members of the Special Branch of Scotland Yard. What was Kent accused of ? Copying coded U.S. Embassy documents and communications and passing them onto the Germans through anti-Soviet Russian agents and through the Italian Embassy, which had not yet closed in London. On May 31st, after 11 days of secret arrest, the US State Department announced that Kent had been fired and "detained by order of the Home Secretary". The U.S. State Department did not say that Kent had been arrested under the British Official Secrets Act because several of the U.S. coded documents were secret communications between President Roosevelt and soon-to-be Prime Minister Winston Churchill, then Lord of the Admiralty, and involved the future U.S. involvement in the war. Also not mentioned was that Kent was secretly making copies of the Churchill-Roosevelt communications for Senator Burton Wheeler, a Democrat and the leading isolationist in the U.S. Senate.
On November 7th, 1940, after a secret trial in the Old Bailey, Kent, a U.S. diplomat was sentenced to seven years for his violation of the British Official Secrets Act for copying and distributing U.S. documents. Immediately at the end of the war, Kent was released from prison and secretly put aboard a ship for the United States. Upon his arrival in the U.S., Tyler Kent was a free man and never prosecuted for anything that happened in London while he was at the U.S. Embassy.
Ambassador Joseph Kennedy is reported to have ended his career in government and politics when showed a copy of the British security file on Kennedy’s time in London, including his dealings with Tyler Kent and others.
Fantastic History Lesson
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