if fear sells, how long til we have the page two fear pinup?

[Guest guest]

THE SPIES WHO SHAG US

The Times and USA Today have Missed the Bigger Story -- Again

by Greg Palast

For Buzzflash

Friday, May 12, 2006

 

I know you're shocked -- SHOCKED! -- that George Bush is listening in on all

your

phone calls. Without a warrant. That's nothing. And it's not news.

 

This is: the snooping into your phone bill is just the snout of the pig of a

strange,

lucrative link-up between the Administration's Homeland Security spy network and

private companies operating beyond the reach of the laws meant to protect us

from

our government. You can call it the privatization of the FBI -- though it is

better

described as the creation of a private KGB.

 

********************

For the full story, see " Double Cheese With Fear, " in Armed Madhouse:

Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf and Other Dispatches from the Front Lines of the

Class

War. " ********************

 

The leader in the field of what is called " data mining, " is a company,

formed in 1997, called, " ChoicePoint, Inc, " which has sucked up over a

billion dollars in national security contracts.

 

Worried about Dick Cheney listening in Sunday on your call to Mom? That ain't

nothing.

You should be more concerned that they are linking this info to your medical

records,

your bill purchases and your entire personal profile including, not

incidentally,

your voting registration. Five years ago, I discovered that ChoicePoint had

already

gathered 16 billion data files on Americans -- and I know they've expanded their

ops at an explosive rate.

 

They are paid to keep an eye on you -- because the FBI can't. For the

government

to collect this stuff is against the law unless you're suspected of a crime.

(The

law in question is the Constitution.) But ChoicePoint can collect if for

" commercial "

purchases -- and under the Bush Administration's suspect reading of the Patriot

Act -- our domestic spying apparatchiks can then BUY the info from ChoicePoint.

 

Who ARE these guys selling George Bush a piece of you?

 

ChoicePoint's board has more Republicans than a Palm Beach country club. It was

funded, and its board stocked, by such Republican sugar daddies as billionaires

Bernie Marcus and Ken Langone -- even after Langone was charged by the

Securities

Exchange Commission with abuse of inside information.

 

I first ran across these guys in 2000 in Florida when our Guardian/BBC team

discovered

the list of 94,000 " felons " that Katherine Harris had ordered removed

from Florida's voter rolls before the election. Virtually every voter purged

was

innocent of any crime except, in most cases, Voting While Black. Who came up

with

this electoral hit list that gave Bush the White House? ChoicePoint, Inc.

 

And worse, they KNEW the racially-tainted list of felons was bogus. And when we

caught them, they lied about it. While they've since apologized to the NAACP,

ChoicePoint's

ethnic cleansing of voter rolls has been amply assuaged by the man the company

elected.

 

And now ChoicePoint and George Bush want your blood. Forget your phone bill.

ChoicePoint,

a sickened executive of the company told us in confidence, " hope to build

a database of DNA samples from every person in the United States ...linked to

all

the other information held by CP [ChoicePoint] " from medical to voting records.

And ChoicePoint lied about that too. The company publicly denied they gave DNA

to the Feds -- but then told our investigator, pretending to seek work, that

ChoicePoint

was " the number one " provider of DNA info to the FBI.

" And that scares the hell out of me, " said the executive (who has since

left the company), because ChoicePoint gets it WRONG so often. We are not

contracting

out our Homeland Security to James Bond here. It's more like Austin Powers,

Inc.

Besides the 97% error rate in finding Florida " felons, " Illinois State

Police fired the company after discovering ChoicePoint had produced test

" results "

on rape case evidence ... that didn't exist. And ChoicePoint just got hit with

the largest fine in Federal Trade Commission history for letting identity

thieves

purchase 145,000 credit card records.

But it won't stop, despite Republican senators shedding big crocodile tears

about

" surveillance " of innocent Americans. That's because FEAR is a lucrative

business -- not just for ChoicePoint, but for firms such as Syntech, Sybase and

Lockheed-Martin -- each of which has provided lucrative posts or profits to

connected

Republicans including former Total Information Awareness chief John Poindexter

(Syntech),

Marvin Bush (Sybase) and Lynn Cheney (Lockheed-Martin).

But how can they get Americans to give up our personal files, our phone logs,

our

DNA and our rights? Easy. Fear sells better than sex -- and they want you to

be

afraid. Back to today's New York Times, page 28: " Wider Use of DNA Lists is

Urged in Fighting Crime. " And who is providing the technology? It comes,

says the Times, from the work done on using DNA fragments to identity victims of

the September 11 attack. And who did that job (for $12 million, no bid)?

ChoicePoint,

Inc. Which is NOT mentioned by the Times.

" Genetic surveillance would thus shift from the individual [the alleged

criminal]

to the family, " says the Times -- which will require, of course, a national

DNA database of NON-criminals.

It doesn't end there. Turn to the same newspaper, page 23, with a story about a

weird new law passed by the state of Georgia to fight illegal immigration.

Every

single employer and government agency will be required to match citizen or

worker

data against national databases to affirm citizenship. It won't stop illegal

border

crossing, but hey, someone's going to make big bucks on selling data. And guess

what local boy owns the data mine? ChoicePoint, Inc., of Alpharetta, Georgia.

The knuckleheads at the Times don't put the three stories together because the

real

players aren't in the press releases their reporters re-write.

But that's the Fear Industry for you. You aren't safer from terrorists or

criminals

or " felon " voters. But the national wallet is several billion dollars

lighter and the Bill of Rights is a couple amendments shorter.

And that's their program. They get the data mine -- and we get the shaft.

**********

Greg Palast is author of Armed Madhouse: Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf?, China

Floats

Bush Sinks, The Scheme to Steal '08, No Child's Behind Left and Other Dispatches

from the Front Lines of the Class War, out June 6. You can order it now.

For more horror and humor from the War on Terror, listen to an excerpt from

Chapter

1 of Armed Madhouse, " Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf?

********************

What's gonna happen when the buses don't run

and what's gonna happen when the, winter comes

what are you gonna do,

what are you gonna do

when the oil runs out?

[Guest guest]

, fraggle <EBbrewpunx wrote:

>

> THE SPIES WHO SHAG US

> The Times and USA Today have Missed the Bigger Story -- Again

> by Greg Palast

> For Buzzflash

> Friday, May 12, 2006

>

> I know you're shocked -- SHOCKED! -- that George Bush is listening

in on all your

> phone calls. Without a warrant. That's nothing. And it's not news.

>

 

Excellent Post. Here is the source for it:

/messages

 

 

SOME Related Info.

There is a Journal for RFID ! All the latest developments in this

field. It is growing by leaps, bounds and expanding ! Several

companies are investing in this, it is such a huge effort. A lot is

still not commercialized and hidden it appears. When all this

comesout, it will be such a shock/amazement for all !! Explore the

jounrnal home page etc., well.

 

http://www.rfidjournal.com/article/archive/1/10

 

Two related MUST READS

 

RFID + Blink Technology (This can be extended to humans directly down

the road)

http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/blink3.htm

 

Biometrics

http://www.eff.org/Privacy/Surveillance/biometrics/

 

Regards,

 

Vijay

[Guest guest]

, " rvijay " <rvijay07 wrote:

>

 

> Excellent Post. Here is the source for it:

> /messages

>

>

 

Here is the actual source. Goofedup on this one:

http://www.buzzflash.com/contributors/06/05/con06189.html

[Guest guest]

hi viyaj

 

I also hear that hewlett pakard printers will have these things

on them, so that they will know which homes

they are in.

and some refrigerators too.

 

, " rvijay " <rvijay07 wrote:

>

> , fraggle <EBbrewpunx@> wrote:

> >