The War Against Dissent
by TChris
Is the FBI fighting a war against terror or a war against dissent? The LA Times reports on FBI documents showing that the agency "has spent resources gathering information on antiwar and environmental protesters and on activists who feed vegetarian meals to the homeless" -- not exactly prime targets in a "war" designed to protect the country from terrorist attacks.
The FBI justifies this war against protest by defining "terrorism" to include crimes against property, at least if the crime is politically motivated (a caveat that might save shopliter Claude Allen from being labeled a terrorist). As TalkLeft argued here, that definition distracts federal law enforcement from a meaningful attack on terror. But even accepting that any politically motivated crime constitutes terror, the FBI has shown less interest in true domestic terrorists who are motivated to bomb abortion clinics and gay bars, choosing instead to spy on Americans who are merely exercising their right to protest.
"Any definition of terrorism that would include someone throwing a bottle or rock through a window during an antiwar demonstration is dangerously overbroad," ACLU staff attorney Ben Wizner said. "The FBI will have its hands full pursuing antiwar groups instead of truly dangerous organizations."
ACLU attorneys say most violence during demonstrations is minor and is better handled by local police than federal counterterrorism agents. They say the FBI, which spied on antiwar and civil rights leaders during the 1960s, appears to be investigating activists solely for opposing the government.
The FBI insists that it only investigates crimes, not protest, but "the documents show that the FBI has monitored groups that were not suspected of any crime."
The murky connection that the federal government makes between some left-wing activist groups and terrorism was illustrated in a Justice Department presentation to a college law class this month.
An FBI counterterrorism official showed the class, at the University of Texas in Austin, 35 slides listing militia, neo-Nazi and Islamist groups. Senior Special Agent Charles Rasner said one slide, labeled "Anarchism," was a federal analyst's list of groups that people intent on terrorism might associate with.
The list included Food Not Bombs, which mainly serves vegetarian food to homeless people, and -- with a question mark next to it -- Indymedia, a collective that publishes what it calls radical journalism online. Both groups are among the numerous organizations affiliated with anarchists and anti-globalization protests, where there has been some violence.
Elizabeth Wagoner said she was one of the few students who objected to the groups' inclusion on the list. "My friends do Indymedia," she said. "My friends aren't terrorists."
Could the government's true purpose be to squelch dissent?
Denver-area activists said that since the surveillance documents became public, there had been a subtle chill, with some people avoiding protests for fear of ending up in an FBI file. Some activists think the FBI has been watching their groups to intimidate them.
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