U.S. Officials Claim Credit for Stopping Another Terror Attack Created by the FBI Nearly every major post-9/11 terrorism-related prosecution has involved a sting operation, at the center of which is a government informant. In these cases, the informants — who work for money or are seeking leniency on criminal charges of their own — have crossed the line from merely observing potential criminal behavior to encouraging and assisting people to participate in plots that are largely scripted by the FBI itself. Under the FBI’s guiding hand, the informants provide the weapons, suggest the targets and even initiate the inflammatory political rhetoric that later elevates the charges to the level of terrorism. – From Glenn Greenwald’s piece: Latest FBI Claim of Disrupted Terror Plot Deserves Much Scrutiny and Skepticism The “war on terror” is the best thing to happen to power hungry politicians since a fire of questionable origin destroyed the Reichstag building in Berlin on February 27, 1933. Not only does the “war on terror” represent big business for shady crony capitalists, it gives politicians, i.e., professional authoritarians, an excuse to destroy civil liberties and implement a total surveillance system to ensure the plebs don’t get out of line. This is not just an unfortunate trend that has developed organically due to a dangerous world, these are the goals of the oligarch class and they will do whatever it takes to achieve them. This is where the “war on terror” and constant fear-mongering comes into play. There’s only one small problem. In the absence of real terror attacks in the U.S., it’s difficult to keep the stupid serfs shivering in a corner in the fetal position. Enter fake terrorist attacks; funded, created and planned by the FBI. If you were getting your news from the mainstream media in January, you were no doubt barraged by headlines about a dangerous plot to bomb the U.S. Capitol building. Headlines such as this one from MSNBC: US terror plot foiled by FBI arrest of Ohio man. Or what about this one from the Wall Street Journal: Ohio Man Charged With Plotting ISIS-Inspired Attack on U.S. Capitol. Sounds really scary, right? Makes you relieved that the U.S. government in on the case! There’s only one slight problem. How can you foil a plot that was planned by the FBI itself? For example NBC News reports that: An Ohio man who allegedly wanted to set up an ISIS cell in the U.S. was arrested Wednesday and accused of planning to attack the U.S. Capitol. But U.S. officials told NBC News the man was dealing with a government informer working undercover the entire time and was never in a position to carry out his plan.Again, how can you foil an attack that never could have occurred in the first place? Christopher Lee Cornell, 20, of Green Township, near Cincinnati, was arrested after he bought two M-15 semi-automatic rifles and about 600 rounds of ammunition as the undercover operative watched, according to an FBI affidavit.Yeah, until the FBI showed up. Turns out the FBI is better at radicalizing Muslims to violence than any genuine terror network on planet earth. NBC News even mentions another example (there are many) of FBI entrapment. In 2011, Rezwan Ferdaus, of Ashland, Massachusetts, was charged with plotting to attack the Capitol and the Pentagon with a remote-controlled aircraft filled with plastic explosives. He was sentenced to 17 years in prison. He, too, was dealing with undercover agents the whole time.Glenn Greenwald chimed in on this whole charade in his usual incisive manner. Here are some excerpts from his piece (I strongly suggest you read the entire thing): The alleged would-be terrorist is 20-year-old Christopher Cornell, who is unemployed, lives at home, spends most of his time playing video games in his bedroom, still addresses his mother as “Mommy” and regards his cat as his best friend; he was described as “a typical student” and “quiet but not overly reserved” by the principal of the local high school he graduated in 2012.Yes, we are conveniently reminded of the dangers via fake terror attacks concocted by the FBI. The known facts from this latest case seem to fit well within a now-familiar FBI pattern whereby the agency does not disrupt planned domestic terror attacks but rather creates them, then publicly praises itself for stopping its own plots.This guy can’t even make a plan to leave his mom’s house let alone plot a terror attack against the U.S. Capitol. Having crazed loners get guns and seek to shoot people is, of course, a threat. But so is allowing the FBI to manufacture terror plots: in the process keeping fear levels about terrorism completely inflated, along with its own surveillance powers and budget. Ohio is a major recipient of homeland security spending: it “has four fusion centers, more than any other state except California, New York and Texas. Ohio also ranks fourth in the nation (tying New York) with four FBI Joint Terrorism Task Forces (JTTFs).”Something has to be done to justify all that terrorism spending. For all those law enforcement agents with little to do, why not sit around and manufacture plots to justify those expenditures, giving a boost to their pro-surveillance ideology to boot? Media outlets have a responsibility to investigate the FBI’s claims, not mindlessly repeat them while parading their alarmed faces and scary graphics. My friends at Activist Post poignantly added their two cents: The FBI initially found a patsy by trolling Twitter for support of ISIS. That’s exciting because finding someone retarded enough to admit support for murderers is really difficult. Then they sent an in-house jihadist to team up with the patsy to plan a grand terror attack on the nation’s Capitol. Heroically, the moment the 20-year-old patsy said he would “go forward with violent jihad” the FBI steps in and declares a victory in the war on terror. Well, the only reason this story exists at all is to make the public feel that there are genuine terror threats targeting the US Capitol. That is then used to justify spying on the Internet and funding the huge terrorism-industrial complex that has nothing better to do than make up the reasons to keep giving them money.That last line is particularly important, particularly since U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron is now pleading the Obama Administration to support his insane agenda on encryption. The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday that: British Prime Minister David Cameron plans to lobby President Barack Obama this week to more publicly criticize U.S. technology companies, such as Facebook Inc., that offer encrypted communications that can’t be unscrambled even with a court order, two people familiar with the matter said.A meeting of the minds this surely will not be. In any event, I can guarantee you banning encryption will stop terrorists from using encryption as much as banning guns stopped terrorists from using guns to carry out their recent attacks in Paris. Or as much as the ban on drugs has stopped drug use. These laws are not directed at criminals or terrorist, they are intended to keep the plebs under perpetual surveillance. Just in case you had any doubt that the U.S. government could care less about cyber crimes, witness the fact that no one at the CIA will be held responsible for breaking into Senate computers and seemingly violating the Constitution. The Washington Post reports that: An internal CIA panel concluded in a report released Wednesday that agency employees should not be punished for their roles in secretly searching computers used by Senate investigators, a move that was denounced by lawmakers last year as an assault on congressional oversight and a potential breach of the Constitution.How cute, Feinstein is “disappointed.” If you or I did this we would be locked up in solitary for the rest of our lives faster than you can say CIA torture. The Bayh-led panel was set up after that fight had burst into public view. The panel was charged with determining whether any of the five CIA employees identified in the IG’s report should face discipline. But the “accountability review board” concluded that the CIA-Senate arrangement was so convoluted that the panel could find no clear rules on how the shared computer system was to be run, let alone whether any rules had been violated. In addition to Bayh, the panel included former White House counsel Robert F. Bauer and three senior CIA officers who have not been identified.Unsurprisingly, some “hackers” are more equal than others. Source URL |