Yet another report of yours that would make a great black comedy if weren’t so frightening. I’d like to get inside of the brains of the geniuses who write this stuff. (And escape very quickly.) Instead of proving homeland (how I loathe that word) security for the people they purport to protect, these paranoid menaces are spending billions of taxpayer dollars coming up with new ideas every day for ways to arrest them (or worse). George Orwell is spinning in his grave.
I'm concerned about the terms they use like "force protection". Obviously a military term. When Tom "bagman" Homan gave his press conference after they got rid of the neo-nazi uniform enthusiast he told the journalists that some of his people were tired because they've been "in theater" for 2 to 3 months. That's definitely a military term referring to a theater of war. Do they really think they are waging a war against the American people? No wonder people are getting killed. It's all wrong from the top down. There would be no resistance to them pulling out actual l violent criminals who are undocumented. People across the political spectrum would applaud it. Clearly that's not the "mission".
Can we estimate how many taxpayer dollars are spent per reddit thread? Is this a better return on investment compared to facebooks or 4chans? What about the bandwidth/storage associated with this monitoring? Does it vary for text posts, images, or decoded references to Minecraft?
This tax season I’d love to understand which federal agency is most efficient at turning my hard earned cash into harvested memes.
Some basic questions here, Ken. Is it right to call it spying when the info being discussed is publicly published with the author’s handle? The person’s post is about protesting in front of a Border Patrol station. Has there been trouble during some ICE stations protests? Not all of course, but some. Should the Border Patrol and ICE not read public bulletin boards, but instead simply wait to be surprised by a large group of people gathering in front of their station? It’s not like that report then goes on to say, “we then issued a subpoena to Reddit to produce either the person’s identity or their IP address, and we now know it’s John Smith living at the following address in Richardson, Texas. Send out a team to bug his house and collect all mail arriving at his residence.” I mean come on now, it would be derelict for the Border Patrol or any law enforcement organization, during any sort of unrest over their agency’s actions, to not try to foresee threats coming, especially ones in public forums. It’s not like this was some sort of private forums.
How many times have law enforcement agencies been ripped for not having foreseen events or crimes where those were posted in advance of the event or crimes happening for all to read? How about all those kids who get together to do burnouts with their cars at various locations, should law enforcement not read the public postings of where they are planning those? Should they not pay attention to the poster of the info?
Let’s call foul (or spying) when foul (or spying) happens, not just because we don’t like the other side 😉
It's spying because it's not predicated on any evidence of a crime being committed. Law enforcement isn't supposed to just poke around in things without suspicion of a crime
So here’s the thing, today it’s pretty straightforward to set notifications any time your name (or your organization’s name) comes up across social media. Every company now sets such alarms to keep up with what people are randomly saying about them. Given the violence that has come to their stations under the guise of peaceful protests, why wouldn’t they keep track of those? A crime may not have been discussed, but from what you showed, the Border Patrol didn’t take any physical action against this individual, nor went far enough to identify them in meat space. So, I’m still not sure what is wrong about Border Patrol reviewing publicly published posts 🤔
There’s always someone to jump in to justify these actions. Absolutely astonishing… you know they’re killing Americans in the street, right? You think it’s okay to spend taxpayer money building out profiles of Americans exercising their 1st amendment rights, not suspected of crimes? This is borderline thought police shit. Let me guess you probably think that “both sides” have their issues. An enlightened centrist with an appetite for boot
The old saying that if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail certainly applies here. If you are an agent of authority, everything looks like a threat with the additional incentive that "doing a good job" means finding threats, real or not.
This is why the supposed "antisemitism in America" theme is so easily abused. Talk it up as a big deal and there will surely be the most minor things reported as major. Meanwhile, and this is part of the program, Israel's atrocities in the WB and continued killing in Gaza have disappeared from MSM.
There is all the fear by authority/power of what may get out to the public resulting in direct censorship or behind the scenes censorship as with Larry Ellison/his son/Bari Weiss/Tony Dokoupil. We the people should be the ones in the know about a transparent government, our servant answering to us, not keeping us in the dark and oppressing us.
There is a fight for the soul of the internet. Will it free the people in its fabulous ability to allow individuals to communicate without gatekeeping or will its ability to destroy all privacy allow authority to sit as judge on everything we say to each other with not a single one of us able to tell if authority is listening? Authority would love to stop individuals before they arrive at a protest.
Think of all the intelligence operations Ken recently listed and how every one of them has mission creep. Data centers are sprouting like mushrooms and most of what they will be doing will not be helping kids do their homework or allowing the curious to know when the grocery store closes for the day. They will be making business more profitable and government more intrusive.
None of this is surprising. This is what they will do with a huge budget of taxpayer dollars.
What caught me is that the consider "reputational risks that warrant continued monitoring". Truly a paranoid agency.
Would be funny if it wasn’t so scary
It can be both!
ICE outing themselves screaming for mods.
lol DHS = forum guys
I honestly don't know if I would be more scared or embarrassed if I read ICE's intel readout on my reddit use
Yet another report of yours that would make a great black comedy if weren’t so frightening. I’d like to get inside of the brains of the geniuses who write this stuff. (And escape very quickly.) Instead of proving homeland (how I loathe that word) security for the people they purport to protect, these paranoid menaces are spending billions of taxpayer dollars coming up with new ideas every day for ways to arrest them (or worse). George Orwell is spinning in his grave.
Thanks, Ken.
thanks Susan!
They should rename DHS DoP: Department of Paranoia. Mental health professionals would have a field day with these people.
This is what happens when you get a shit ton of money to look for threats that don't exist.
I'm concerned about the terms they use like "force protection". Obviously a military term. When Tom "bagman" Homan gave his press conference after they got rid of the neo-nazi uniform enthusiast he told the journalists that some of his people were tired because they've been "in theater" for 2 to 3 months. That's definitely a military term referring to a theater of war. Do they really think they are waging a war against the American people? No wonder people are getting killed. It's all wrong from the top down. There would be no resistance to them pulling out actual l violent criminals who are undocumented. People across the political spectrum would applaud it. Clearly that's not the "mission".
Can we estimate how many taxpayer dollars are spent per reddit thread? Is this a better return on investment compared to facebooks or 4chans? What about the bandwidth/storage associated with this monitoring? Does it vary for text posts, images, or decoded references to Minecraft?
This tax season I’d love to understand which federal agency is most efficient at turning my hard earned cash into harvested memes.
Thanks Ken! Many of us are glad that you are still working and helping us all stay informed. Much appreciated.
Some basic questions here, Ken. Is it right to call it spying when the info being discussed is publicly published with the author’s handle? The person’s post is about protesting in front of a Border Patrol station. Has there been trouble during some ICE stations protests? Not all of course, but some. Should the Border Patrol and ICE not read public bulletin boards, but instead simply wait to be surprised by a large group of people gathering in front of their station? It’s not like that report then goes on to say, “we then issued a subpoena to Reddit to produce either the person’s identity or their IP address, and we now know it’s John Smith living at the following address in Richardson, Texas. Send out a team to bug his house and collect all mail arriving at his residence.” I mean come on now, it would be derelict for the Border Patrol or any law enforcement organization, during any sort of unrest over their agency’s actions, to not try to foresee threats coming, especially ones in public forums. It’s not like this was some sort of private forums.
How many times have law enforcement agencies been ripped for not having foreseen events or crimes where those were posted in advance of the event or crimes happening for all to read? How about all those kids who get together to do burnouts with their cars at various locations, should law enforcement not read the public postings of where they are planning those? Should they not pay attention to the poster of the info?
Let’s call foul (or spying) when foul (or spying) happens, not just because we don’t like the other side 😉
It's spying because it's not predicated on any evidence of a crime being committed. Law enforcement isn't supposed to just poke around in things without suspicion of a crime
So here’s the thing, today it’s pretty straightforward to set notifications any time your name (or your organization’s name) comes up across social media. Every company now sets such alarms to keep up with what people are randomly saying about them. Given the violence that has come to their stations under the guise of peaceful protests, why wouldn’t they keep track of those? A crime may not have been discussed, but from what you showed, the Border Patrol didn’t take any physical action against this individual, nor went far enough to identify them in meat space. So, I’m still not sure what is wrong about Border Patrol reviewing publicly published posts 🤔
There’s always someone to jump in to justify these actions. Absolutely astonishing… you know they’re killing Americans in the street, right? You think it’s okay to spend taxpayer money building out profiles of Americans exercising their 1st amendment rights, not suspected of crimes? This is borderline thought police shit. Let me guess you probably think that “both sides” have their issues. An enlightened centrist with an appetite for boot
I realize you’re ideologically driven, but the relevant rights under the 1A are:
• Abridging the freedom of speech (protecting expression from government censorship, with narrow exceptions defined by courts).
• Abridging the freedom of the press (protecting publication and media from government censorship, including most prior restraints).
• Abridging the right of the people peaceably to assemble (to gather in groups for protests, meetings, and other peaceful purposes).
What Ken shared did not violate (or abridge) any of these 3 guarantees.
As for killing people, try to stay focused and stop begging the question, as that’s not what’s at issue in Ken’s post.
The old saying that if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail certainly applies here. If you are an agent of authority, everything looks like a threat with the additional incentive that "doing a good job" means finding threats, real or not.
This is why the supposed "antisemitism in America" theme is so easily abused. Talk it up as a big deal and there will surely be the most minor things reported as major. Meanwhile, and this is part of the program, Israel's atrocities in the WB and continued killing in Gaza have disappeared from MSM.
There is all the fear by authority/power of what may get out to the public resulting in direct censorship or behind the scenes censorship as with Larry Ellison/his son/Bari Weiss/Tony Dokoupil. We the people should be the ones in the know about a transparent government, our servant answering to us, not keeping us in the dark and oppressing us.
There is a fight for the soul of the internet. Will it free the people in its fabulous ability to allow individuals to communicate without gatekeeping or will its ability to destroy all privacy allow authority to sit as judge on everything we say to each other with not a single one of us able to tell if authority is listening? Authority would love to stop individuals before they arrive at a protest.
Think of all the intelligence operations Ken recently listed and how every one of them has mission creep. Data centers are sprouting like mushrooms and most of what they will be doing will not be helping kids do their homework or allowing the curious to know when the grocery store closes for the day. They will be making business more profitable and government more intrusive.