thenewgreen: How private groups and individuals, such as Charles Koch, his son Chase Koch, Koch Industries and the Koch-funded American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) have hired off-duty cops—sometimes still armed and in uniform—to perform the private security functions of keeping undesirable people (e.g., reporters and activists) away. At one ALEC conference, off-duty officers, working on behalf of ALEC and the resort at which the conference was held, led on-duty, riot-gear-clad police in the pepper-spraying and arrests of several peaceful, law-abiding protestors.
Police officers should not be allowed to work in private security and have a job as a police officer. This is a clear conflict of interest. If I were to work a second job that was directly analogous to my primary job, and my primary employer found out... I would likelyHow “counterterrorism” personnel monitored the protest activities of citizens opposed to the “indefinite detention” language contained in the National Defense Authorization Act of 2012 (which is being challenged in court, in a lawsuit in which the CMD has filed an amicus brief).
-How did they monitor?How the FBI applied “Operation Tripwire,” an initiative originally intended to apprehend domestic terrorists through the use of private-sector informants, to its monitoring of Occupy Wall Street groups.
-How did they apply it? When reading the report that this piece is based on (a much better read btw), it appears they applied it to notify a mall in Gainesville FL that an occupy protest was likely to happen there. It turned out to be 9 people dancing and doing a chant.Operation Tripwire exists so that law enforcement and businesses can have a formal connection to share information. This is handy when stores sell things like chemicals or weapons etc. They can let law enforcement know of any strange activity.
I'm absolutely opposed to govt spying of citizens. I think the benefits don't justify the means. But if law enforcement looks at your FB page and sees you are planning a protest at a mall and then calls the mall to let them know in advance. I don't have a problem with that.