[N] NYPD and the CIA

Dear Friends,

The Associated Press published an article entitled "With CIA help, NYPD built secret effort to monitor mosques, daily life or Muslim neighborhoods" (here).  It is hard to summarize the article.  The main points are that the NYPD with the help of former and current CIA officers and with funding from the federal government that is not subject to audit or oversight built a domestic spying program that clearly violates the prohibition on the CIA spying domestically, violates the FBI guidelines for their domestic intelligence gathering activities and violated the court settlement related to NYPD violations of civil rights during anti-war demonstrations.  The NYPD does not just conduct these intelligence gathering activities in the City of New York or even just in the State of New York.  These activities are conducted outside of the jurisdiction of the NYPD sometimes through the process of deputizing NYPD officers and other times without the knowledge of the FBI and local law enforcement. 

All these activities are justified by the need to keep New York safe from another terrorist attack.  The ends justify the means.  This program was started after 9/11 and therefore under the George W. Bush Administration, but it has been continued under the Obama Administration.  My wife believes that after President Obama was elected, he was told about all the illegal and immoral stuff that the government was doing and that the bureaucracy was going to continue all of them because that is the way it is and always has been.  President Obama, of course, could have done the right thing and held the people accountable for all the illegal activity and forced the federal government to act in accordance with the Constitution and the laws.  Unfortunately, he chose to continue to let the federal government continue to violate the Constitution and the laws.  As a result, he cannot hold those who authorized and acquiesced in these programs accountable for their actions because he is now just as guilty as they are.

Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal