The Bushist Police State and Interlibrary Loan
"Alice: While you talk, he's gone!
More: And go he should, if he was the Devil himself, until he broke the law!
Roper: So now you'd give the Devil benefit of law!
More: Yes. What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?
Roper: I'd cut down every law in England to do that!
More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you - where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country's planted thick with laws from coast to coast - man's laws, not God's - and if you cut them down - and you're just the man to do it - d'you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake."
-Robert Bolt, "A Man for All Seasons"
Cole: I hate al-Qaeda. Its "values" are the diametric opposite of virtually everything I stand for. I would like to see al-Qaeda and all the little al-Qaeda wannabes planning out the killing of innocent civilians broken up, their members arrested and put away for a very long time. I consider our FBI and CIA officials and case officers working on this problem to be great heroes in a noble struggle and I only hope my own work on understanding religious extremism is of any use to them in it.
But you can't get at al-Qaeda by having an auto-da-fe for the US Constitution, and even if you could, it would be a hollow victory, because it is the values of the Bill of Rights that al-Qaeda would like to see subverted.
There is a vicious playfulness in Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri in this regard. They consider the US to have been a bulwark of heavy-handed authoritarian regimes in the Muslim world that have summarily arrested Muslim activists, tossed them in jail without proper trials (or via courts-martial), tortured them, and executed them with no due process. They knew very well that an event like September 11 would provoke the US government to close off civil liberties for Americans, because they had seen similar things happen in the Middle Eastern countries they had tried to subvert. Bin Laden said after 9/11, "We have caused them to taste a little bit of the calamities that have been befalling the Muslims for the past 80 years" or words to that effect. Part of what he was referring to was the authoritarian states, like those of Attaturk and Abdul Nasser, that were founded after the abolition of the Islamic Caliphate in 1924. (Fundamentalist Muslims often consider the caliphate, a sort of equivalent of a Sunni Muslim papacy, to be a guarantor of social justice).
Their point of view on this matter is ahistorical and bizarre. The caliphate had lapsed with the Mongol invasion in 1258 and the Ottoman sultans only seriously began claiming also to be caliphs around 1880, and most Muslims did not even accept the claim, though it was popular among Muslims in colonized British India. Nor was the late Ottoman empire exactly a fount of social justice, though it had "liberal" moments of constitutionalism and parliamentarism in 1876-78 and in 1908-1912, which the Ottoman sultan-caliph Abdul Hamid II actually opposed!
But it may well be that Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri, whom Bush doesn't seem very interested in capturing, have had the last laugh. Their monstrous "theatrical" terrorism on a large scale has paralyzed the US political and judicial elite in the face of Cheney's and Bush's New American Empire, an Empire in which the US Constitution has been turned into a dead letter.
Those same FBI and DHS agents who are heroes when they take on al-Qaeda directly are in danger of becoming double agents for Bin Laden when they are tempted by all the new prerogatives offered them by King George III (isn't he our third George?) to sidestep the Bill of Rights, due process and the rule of law.
The below turns out to be based on a hoax. But it is one of those hoaxes that actually bespeaks an all too vivid reality, which is that the so-called PATRIOT act does allow US security agencies to secretly examine the library requests of patrons, and the Bush administration has vastly expanded its surveillance of Americans without a court warrant.
Cole: I have personal knowledge of DHS folks visiting intellectuals over books. I know an Arab-American professor who was doing development work in the Middle East who shipped back some Arabic books, some of them on water and sewage systems. These were intercepted at customs and he received a visit from two agents who questioned him about the books. They were, of course, innocuous, and he had been working on a USG contract!
The below is retracted.
My colleague Andras Riedlmayer writes:
"It's not just the NSA engaging in wholesale monitoring of phonecalls. Now we find out that Bush's Department of Homeland Security also monitors interlibrary loan requests from college libraries, and checks them against a "watch list" of supposedly dangerous books. And if there's a match, they take action -- as in the case of a student at U. of Massachusetts at Dartmouth, taking a class on fascism and totalitarianism, who'd requested a book for a research paper.
The Homeland Security found the title sufficiently worrisome to send two agents to pay a visit to the student at his parents' home and question him. They did not let him have the book.
The two professors involved in this case are Brian Glyn Williams, associate professor of Islamic history at UMass Dartmouth, and his colleague Robert Pontbriand, who teaches modern European history.
It makes the 1950s look like halcyon days. Consider -- an American citizen who has committed no crime is flagged for (a.) having travelled abroad, and (b.) for having checked out a book on the Department of Homeland Security's "watch list" of forbidden or dangerous titles, as revealed by the government's secret monitoring of library circulation transactions. All this without probable cause, a search warrant or any semblance of due process.
Now I'll tell you something (even though I'm sure the Homeland Security aparatchiks are probably reading your e-mails and mine, stupid un-American bastards that they are): I not only own a copy of Mao's Little Red Book, I happen to own one that's in Arabic. And I also own several copies of the Qur'an (the same book read by Osama and a billion other "potential terrorists"). And I've traveled abroad, too (Egypt, Macedonia, Kosovo, Bosnia, The Hague, to name just some of the more suspicious places...).
And why would our government care to know about any of this? Because they hate our freedoms!
Yrs.,
feeling more than a bit alarmed about what this country is turning into
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The Standard Times (New Bedford, MA)
December 17, 2005
Agents' visit chills UMass Dartmouth senior
By AARON NICODEMUS, Standard-Times staff writer
NEW BEDFORD -- A senior at UMass Dartmouth was visited by federal agents two months ago, after he requested a copy of Mao Tse-Tung's tome on Communism called "The Little Red Book."
Two history professors at UMass Dartmouth, Brian Glyn Williams and Robert Pontbriand, said the student told them he requested the book through the UMass Dartmouth library's interlibrary loan program.
The student, who was completing a research paper on Communism for Professor Pontbriand's class on fascism and totalitarianism, filled out a form for the request, leaving his name, address, phone number and Social Security number. He was later visited at his parents' home in New Bedford by two agents of the Department of Homeland Security, the professors said.
The professors said the student was told by the agents that the book is on a "watch list," and that his background, which included significant time abroad, triggered them to investigate the student further.
"I tell my students to go to the direct source, and so he asked for the official Peking version of the book," Professor Pontbriand said.
"Apparently, the Department of Homeland Security is monitoring inter-library loans, because that's what triggered the visit, as I understand it."
Although The Standard-Times knows the name of the student, he is not coming forward because he fears repercussions should his name become public. He has not spoken to The Standard-Times.
The professors had been asked to comment on a report that President Bush had authorized the National Security Agency to spy on as many as 500 people at any given time since 2002 in this country.
The eavesdropping was apparently done without warrants . . .
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posted by Juan Cole @ 12/18/2005 11:58:00 PM
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17 Comments:
In the past few years, whenever anyone said that the CIA (and possible other US government agencies) were reading my email, I always said: Good, maybe they will learn something.
Now, the issues of detention without charges, and guilty until proven innocent, no trial available and using torture to get the evidence to "convict" someone..
now that is very, very, very bad.
We are losing our country, and some of us have been seeing this coming for over three years.
We have to get US troops out of the middle east and the vast majority of the elected US officials out of DC.
I almost bought a copy of Mao's "Little Red Book" a few years ago. There's a little bookstore here (Singapore) that has them for sale, along with other paraphernalia from the Cultural Revolution days. Unfortunately, the LRB on sale was a little too pricey for me at the time. (It's prolly still available at the store.)
(I also recall my 9th grade Social Studies teacher showing us his copy in class, back in the 70s. I wonder if he'd be considered subversive now for owning it.)
I've been wondering for months (years?) when someone would pull out this quotation from "A Man for all Seasons". While the historic Thomas More has, at least for me, lost a good bit of his shine, Bolt's fictional character still towers over the current political discourse. This snippet echoes, with startling accuracy, the dilemma that faces our country today.
And while I'm here, tremendous plaudits to Juan Cole for his amazing and consistent efforts to inform us all on issues surrounding the Middle East, US foreign policy, and Islam.
On internal spying
Let us make something clear. Suppose some conventional criminal who has nothing to do with terrorism wants to use e-mail for his purposes. Then he really does not care whether it is NSA, FBI or local cops who are are spying on him! Also, he does not care whether they have a proper warrant or not. His real concern is to keep his operational info confidential! But in this, technically, criminals are not different from law abiding citizens who want to keep their credit card info secure.
That is, all criminals, mafiosi and terrorists have to do to protect their communications against law enforcement is to follow regular secularity rules and use tools which are 100% open and available on the Net for everybody to use.
What is worse, modern technology allows practically unbreakable codes, so NSA cannot do much to decrypt properly protected electronic messages.
The conclusion is, neither Patriot Act nor any reasonable eavesdropping legislation can disrupt properly organized criminal communication networks. Argumentation that eavesdropping legislation needs to be kept secret is technically bogus, that's pure politics and ideology.
1. JAMES RISEN, ERIC LICHTBLAU. Bush Secretly Lifted Some Limits on Spying in U.S. After 9/11, Officials Say
"This is really a sea change," said a former senior official who specializes in national security law. "It's almost a mainstay of this country that the N.S.A. only does foreign searches."
The White House asked The New York Times not to publish this article, arguing that it could jeopardize continuing investigations and alert would-be terrorists that they might be under scrutiny. After meeting with senior administration officials to hear their concerns, the newspaper delayed publication for a year to conduct additional reporting. Some information that administration officials argued could be useful to terrorists has been omitted.
2. Wiki on eavesdropping
We tend to forget that as recently as 40 years ago there was a legal and open police state in the United States. I'm talking about the segregated South and its virtual total control over the social and economic conditions of blacks. Blacks who were prohibited from voting.
This police state was enforced by the state governments and local governments. No politician or judge could expect to be elected if he or she opposed the status quo.
The US congress and many administrations turned a blind eye to this situation, and there was little public outcry from states outside the South.
Many of today's powerful politicians have their roots in the "status quo" South. They were comfortable with the police state, or were raised in families and white communities that were comfortable.
I bring this up because I think there is broadly held notion that the US has a long history of tolerance, personal freedom, individual rights, and infinite rectitude. Like there is a USA DNA created at the time of the Revolution.
Given the real history of the US, especially the South, one can see that finding political support for secret prisons, unauthorized suveillance, torture, rendition, etc is not like looking for a needle in a haystack. When looking in the right stack, its more like finding hay in a haystack.
Bush was not alone.
Part of the difficulty with preventing encroachments on constitutional liberties (I prefer that phrase to the elastic and essentially meaningless "civil liberties" preferred by the left) is a fundamental lack of understanding of the charter among
Americans. Congress attempted to address that some years ago with "Constitution day", but seemingly little progress has been made.
The most obvious example of this lack of understanding is, to me, the phrase repeated again and again by the President that he is the "commander in chief." While technically correct, a review of Art. II, Sect. 2 shows that he is, specifically, "Commander-in-chief of the Army and Navy" and of the militia when it is in service of the United States. He is NOT Commander in chief of the United States. The U.S. has no commander in chief, only its military does.
The President is not the C in C of ordinary Americans to where we must obey his instructions and accept his judgment without dissent or salute the flag and charge into the guns without "reason[ing] why", but simply to "do and die." Yet, President Bush invoked his status as Commander in Chief to support his approval of domestic spying without court order. While I do not know the specifics of each case to be able to render an opinion on the propriety of that action, I do know that his status as Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy cannot grant him any authority to authorize spying by the CIA and FBI or DHS (the last time I checked, none of which were in the Dept. of the Army or Navy).
Americans accept this assertion of status as Commander in Chief without knowing "Commander" of what. While officeholders and others may know the distinction (no guarantee, there), our public discourse does not acknowledge it so, understandably, ordinary Americans do not consider it in how they should respond to executive actions in the "War on Terror."
A little learning of the Constitution--the powers delegated therein being more important to know even than the much-heralded Bill of Rights--would do much for preventing the Imperial Presidency.
Professor, re: the UMAss student.
boingboing has something up about this.
Without minimizing or excusing the shocking and (IMHO pptentialy treasonous) illegal behavior of the President and the Administration, I suspect this story about Mao's book is a hoax.
Why would a library request form require a SS#?
Why hasn't the reporter talked to the student in question, instead of just the professors?
Surely people study and buy this book all the time; you can buy it anywhere. Why this student, this time?
Let's test this. Let's get everyone in the blogosphere to either buy the LRB on Amazon or request it from a library, and see what shakes out.
Adam
The next question is if the President has made lists of political enemies. I think the Ashcroft prosecutions came up more or less empty except for a few immigration violations.
Since we now learn that agencies can tap your phone, intercept your mail, and review your emails and library tastes, the question is when is someone an enemy of the state and when is someone the enemy of an elected official.
Since this Administration holds that it may seize an American citizen and hold him without access to an attorney or access to other constitutional rights, can torture of American citizens be far behind?
Most chilling of all is this Administration's assertion that due to 9/11, the President is free to disregard any law he pleases so long as it is in defense of the Homeland. Condie Rice's attempts to justify this behavior is embarrassing as is Colin Powell's complaints about the EU's hypocrisy regarding the CIA's gulag. We must clean our own house before we criticize others too much.
There's talk that it might be a hoax.
thank you juan cole for all of the blogging and important references to middle eastern culture. we would be forever searching for much of the information you graciously share. who knows, just by researching middle eastern culture and buying a plane ticket to vacation in egypt, you could end in being wire tapped, arrested and shipped to god knows where! welcome to the usa, where we take our prisoners anyway and anywhere we want! no courts, no attorneys, no exit!
I guess the irony of the student having this experience while doing research for a class on fascism and totalitarianism is too obvious to mention.
I don't know about irony, but the old folk singer Tom Lehrer once said that all comedy died the day Henry Kissinger won the Nobel Peace Prize.
For my money, I'd just like to note the comical absurdity of President George W. Bush trying to make co-conspirators out Representative Nancy Pelosi and Senator Jay Rockefeller for "knowing" about his crimes but remaining silent about them. Any such allegations (though meaningless in and of themselves) would of course apply to the Republican chairmen of the respective House and Senate committees who also said nothing about what they knew. Not that any of this has anything to do with what the President did on his own responsibility.
The logical fallacy here (whether broadly or narowly applied) traditionally goes by the Latin name: Tu QuoQue, or "you do it, too!" Colloquially, we usually just call this the "misery loves company" argument. If true, this fallacy would have a bizarre result; for (1) since President Bush has openly testified to the world that he did indeed break the existing laws of our country (and fully intends to go on breaking them), and (2) since "witnesses" to a crime must in his judgment become "equally" as "guilty" as the crime's perpetrator, then (3) he thus stands doubly damned by his own mouth: (a) for committing his crime and (b) bearing witness himself to it.
None of this absurdly fallacious "reasoning" applies to anyone of any party on any intelligence committee in Congress, for -- again, as Bush himself has inconsistently argued -- such persons take oaths of confidentiality which if broken by "leaking" "secret," "classified" "information" would immediately receive a torrent of abusive accusations by the very people who now wish to make of such required reticence a "crime."
Bush himself says that people shouldn't talk of such things as those things that he does -- unless, of course, not talking about them makes not talking the equivalent of his own willful contravention of the Fourth Amendment's unequivocable protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.
Bush always says he doesn't want any leaks of "unauthorized" information. Now, however, he apparently regrets that at least two Democrats in Congress didn't do some leaking that would have presumably stopped him before he broke the law again and again. This conflicted moron really needs some competent help.
"A lawyer who defends himself in court has a fool for a client," so the saying goes. Any competent attorney would have advised George W. Bush not to publicly and proudly testify to his own crimes. In stupidly volunteering to serve as his own defense counsel and the future prosecution's chief witness, President Bush has proven that he has not only a fool for a client, but a fool for a lawyer as well.
Open Trials wrote: "Why would a library request form require a SS#?"
Back in the day (late 80s), my university used SSNs for the student ID number. They have since changed that policy; however, could the possibility exist that other universities still follow that policy? I have no idea what UMass's policy actually is; I merely bring up the alternative for consideration.
And, yes, I understand it may have been a hoax. :)
I hope you, as an expert on Shi'ism, don't have any bias against Sunnis :)
I don't think you can claim that the desire for the Caliphate is "ahistorical and bizarre." Even moderate Sunnis would like to see one in the world today, I don't know one who wouldn't. Yes, your point about some Caliphs being corrupt is correct, but that doesn't ruin the whole idea of a caliphate. In that sense, it's like Catholicism where there were corrupt leaders in history, but the office still has credibility and leadership. (Sunnis don't believe in infallible leaders, however)
Sunnis believe that a number of the caliphs were "rightly guided" aka 'al khilafah ar-rashidun.' I should also point out that Sunnis believe that the judgement day will not come to pass until the Mahdi becomes the caliph of the Islamic state and battles the anti-Christ (Dajjal). It's not some medieval extremist fantasy, but far more mainstream and rational than you make it out to be.
It most likely was a hoax.
Apparently Bogus: Homeland Security Visited Student Who Ordered Mao’s “Little Red Book”
UMass Dartmouth statement on "Little Red Book"
UMass Dartmouth spokesman John Hoey issued this statement:
"University of Massachusetts Dartmouth officials are investigating reports that a student at the university was visited by officials from Homeland Security after the student requested a copy of Chairman Mao's "Little Red Book." UMass administrators have interviewed the student who has requested that his identity be shielded, and the University is complying with that request.
"At this point, it is difficult to ascertain how Homeland Security obtained the information about the student's borrowing of the book. The UMass Dartmouth Library has not been visited by agents of any type seeking information about the borrowing patterns or habits of any of its patrons and did not handle the request for the book in question. The student has indicated that another university library processed the request.
"The UMass Dartmouth library has established policies for handling requests under the Patriot Act and has taken every lawful measure possible to protect the confidentiality of patron records."
The Library subscribes to the American Library Association Library Bill of Rights and was a signatory to the MCCLPHEI (Massachusetts Conference of Chief Librarians of Public Higher Educational Institutions) resolution on the USA Patriot Act submitted to the Massachusetts Civil Liberty Union in 2003.
UMass Dartmouth Chancellor Jean F. MacCormack said, "It is important that our students and our faculty be unfettered in their pursuit of knowledge about other cultures and political systems if their education and research is to be meaningful. We must do everything possible to protect the principles of academic inquiry."
The 27 Dec 2005 posting about the 10 myths contains an error, namely myth 3. Myth 3 is not a myth it is reality. It is a myth only if war is defined as combat between heavily armed organized armies fighting pitched battles that determine winners and loosers(this is what "in the field" usually means). This is basically a western concept, originating in Ancient Greece where battles were between heavily armed citizen soldiers called hoplites. The reason this has become standard practice is that it stops wars from becoming a protracted affair that destroys both sides. Of course no Iraq guerrila force is a match for US forces in a pitched battle. But nobody can force the Iraqi resistance to follow a western mandated war philosophy. Usually these kind of wars end when the strong side butchers the weak one or the strong side disintegrates due to the costs incured by war. So they well keep this up until the US army cracks up from stress and financial pressure ( I consider mass butchery unimaginable although the Brits gssed the Shiites within leaving memory) This moment seems to be pretty close and when this happens the US army will simply disintegrate. I suspect that the US command knows that and they are trying to find excuses to move most of the US force out of the country. Whether this will succeed without an Iraqqi civil war is open to question
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