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A somewhat amazing- or at least it should be amazing, in a normal society it would be amazing- revelation occurred on a radio program today. The New York City National Public Radio affiliate WNYC has a show, the Brian Lehrer show, which consists mostly of political and other issues chats with guests. Today's guest was one
Mitchell
Silber, "director of Intelligence Analysis" for the New York Police Department (NYPD). Silber proved to be a typical apparatchik of the "counterterrorism" bureaucracy, low key in manner, not a rabble-rousing threat-monger of the private sector right (although the two are allied with one another and have numerous linkages). [1]
Silber was on to promote a book written under his name, "The Al Qaeda Factor: Plots Against the West." From his description, it's basically a rehash of various plots that have already been obsessively covered by the media (the shoe bomber, the underwear bomber, the Times Square bomber, London bombers, etc.)
Silber is a smooth operator, which makes him an effective mouthpiece for the secret police state.
About ten minutes into the interview, they took a call from a listener, who if he's not already on the U.S. shitlist, just put himself there with his angry call. A Muslim, he attacked the U.S. wars abroad and basically said "You carpetbomb entire Iraqi villages" and the orphans grow up "and take revenge, and then you call them terrorists."
Brian Lehrer cleared his throat and then blunted the question, rephrasing it as "are there things that the NYPD does, that the military-industrial complex does," like drone strikes, that "radicalize some people now, that have backlash effects, that you have to be careful of." (A reasonable "pragmatic" question for the U.S. side in the "terror war" to ask.)
Silber starts by conceding some "tactics are a double edged sword," than says drone strikes are effective "in taking top Al-Qaeda leadership off the battlefield," but "collateral damage" when you "take out" some Al-Qaeda target can cause a backlash, so there has to be "a cost-benefit analysis." Very clinical and calculating. A cunning guy, Silber says U.S. has to avoid "triggering events" that cause a radicalization. He's keen to make sure his "analytic cadre" and "our detectives" don't miss anything and be sure to pick up on something "that's triggering a radicalization we're unaware of." All this spying and surveillance he calls "keeping on eye on the trendlines."
So Lehrer asks if he or NYPD Commissioner Kelly ever spoke to the Feds and said the U.S. "war policy" "may actually endanger New York [City] more than protect it."
Silber replies: "You know we have ongoing and frequent conversations with the Federal Government on a variety of different levels. I think one of the things that we're useful in that we see these trendlines on the ground and we can [his emphasis] pass that to the Federal Government in essentially seeing an individual like an Anwar al-Awlaki we picked up someone like that and his radicalizing ability and passed that on to the Federal Government. So we are seeing trendlines at the local level and passing that on on a regular basis." I.e. fingering people addition to the Federal shitlists of the police state, which at a minimum means all records about you are searched, a life history of you constructed, and at the other extreme, your murder. So the NYPD is in the business of helping finger people for the U.S. to assasinate.
This is not mere "analysis." This is surveillance, harassment, persecution, entrapment, and assassination.
Lehrer then took a station break. He never asked Silber about this targetting of an American citizen for assassination based on "his radicalizing ability." In other words, the U.S. has a policy of killing anyone they regard as an enemy propagandist in the "war on terror."
Back from the break, Silber took a swipe at Samir Khan (another American citizen assassinated by drone) for writing an article about bombmaking and working on Inspire magazine (the Al-Qaeda agitprop publication). His point was that the danger is everywhere, since Khan came from Queens.
Neither Lehrer nor Silber even bother offering justification for killing people based on speech, if indeed loathsome speech, even "inciting" speech. Again, Lehrer sees no mention to discuss whether it's okay to kill people for publishing things the Government regards as potentially threatening.
So we really are in the realm of thought crimes here. And the U.S. Government is assasinating people it convicts in secret, convictions done by secret policemen in their lairs, for committing these thought crimes.
That should make anyone fearful, not just jihadists.
And "mistakes" happen. All the time. Lethal ones. But being a secret policeman or military assassin means never having to say you're sorry.
Of course, right wingers for years have had an extensive literature of bombmaking instructions, "How To Kill" books (there's a whole series of exactly that title), and nobody's assassinating them, or even "detaining" them.
Basically Silber is a technician of the secret police state, big on "data analysis" under a pretext of neutral, objective, non-ideological facts.
Which is a fraud, as Silber and his ilk definitely have an ideology. Furthermore, some of his "facts" aren't. Like claiming that the NYPD isn't infiltrating mosques (a well-established fact at this point) but is merely "following leads." (Lehrer didn't question or challenge this falsehood.)
Also there is the usual omission of significant facts leading to disingenuousness, for example a lame set-up in which the NYPD set up a loser-schlup (Jose Pimentel) to assemble a pipe bomb in an apartment rigged up with camera to which he was lured by an agent provocateur. It took the provocateur an entire year to goad and groom the victim to play his assigned role in this local production of Political Terrorism Theater. (The FBI rebuffs two attempts by the NYPD to have them join in the fun. Supposedly the reason was the FBI thought the case was weak- which is ironic, since the FBI does exactly the same thing all the time. Maybe they just didn't want to share credit with the NYPD, a more likely explanation.) Silber mentioned this "case" as part of his litany of "terrorist plots." Lehrer said nothing in demurral.
The point of the show apparently was to justify and reinforce the whole repressive regime of an endless "war on terrorism." Are there real threats? Of course. But promoting a freak-out every time some malcontent tries to plant a bomb is disproportionate and politically motivated. Almost daily people are blown up in places like Pakistan, Nigeria, Afghanistan. Other than the spectacular plane kamikaze attacks of 9/11/01, the casualties in the West of these attacks has never been more than a few hundred, and more often ZERO. Plus the foiled attacks have mostly been foiled by average citizens combined with the bungling of the terrorists.
And as to the extent of the threat, Silber sites two dozen New Yorkers who allegedly became jihadists. Two dozen, out of a population of 8 million people. Somehow that justifies a massive, permanent, secret police state.
In terms of our lives and liberties, we'd probably be better off completely ignoring this threat. Not that I recommend that course. There should be a balance between need to protect against real dangers, and our human rights, instead of hollow lip service to civil rights and law, which is all that exists now. For example, having radiation monitors checking incoming cargo is fine. No problem with that. Or keeping one's ears open and monitoring some people, as opposed to instigating "plots" that are creations of the Government staged for political gain and ongoing ideological indoctrination and fear-mongering.
1] Getting Good Intel, Brian Lehrer Show, WNYC, 1/30/12. WNYC has been playing games with accessing this program. That page doesn't play the episode. Here are alternative URLs to try that as of 6/16/16 lead to the segment. (The original URL was deleted by WNYC since I originally posted this.)
First try another station owned by WNYC, WQXR, which has the episode. Here is the URL of the WNYC podcast player you can also try. This podcast link has the title "NYPD Intel" but it's the same episode. NYPD Intel. Finally just search Mitchell Silber at WNYC.org or WQXR.org. When I tested the podcast for "Getting Good Intel," it plays a completely unrelated episode of the Brian Lehrer show!
Silber was on to promote a book written under his name, "The Al Qaeda Factor: Plots Against the West." From his description, it's basically a rehash of various plots that have already been obsessively covered by the media (the shoe bomber, the underwear bomber, the Times Square bomber, London bombers, etc.)
Silber is a smooth operator, which makes him an effective mouthpiece for the secret police state.
About ten minutes into the interview, they took a call from a listener, who if he's not already on the U.S. shitlist, just put himself there with his angry call. A Muslim, he attacked the U.S. wars abroad and basically said "You carpetbomb entire Iraqi villages" and the orphans grow up "and take revenge, and then you call them terrorists."
Brian Lehrer cleared his throat and then blunted the question, rephrasing it as "are there things that the NYPD does, that the military-industrial complex does," like drone strikes, that "radicalize some people now, that have backlash effects, that you have to be careful of." (A reasonable "pragmatic" question for the U.S. side in the "terror war" to ask.)
Silber starts by conceding some "tactics are a double edged sword," than says drone strikes are effective "in taking top Al-Qaeda leadership off the battlefield," but "collateral damage" when you "take out" some Al-Qaeda target can cause a backlash, so there has to be "a cost-benefit analysis." Very clinical and calculating. A cunning guy, Silber says U.S. has to avoid "triggering events" that cause a radicalization. He's keen to make sure his "analytic cadre" and "our detectives" don't miss anything and be sure to pick up on something "that's triggering a radicalization we're unaware of." All this spying and surveillance he calls "keeping on eye on the trendlines."
So Lehrer asks if he or NYPD Commissioner Kelly ever spoke to the Feds and said the U.S. "war policy" "may actually endanger New York [City] more than protect it."
Silber replies: "You know we have ongoing and frequent conversations with the Federal Government on a variety of different levels. I think one of the things that we're useful in that we see these trendlines on the ground and we can [his emphasis] pass that to the Federal Government in essentially seeing an individual like an Anwar al-Awlaki we picked up someone like that and his radicalizing ability and passed that on to the Federal Government. So we are seeing trendlines at the local level and passing that on on a regular basis." I.e. fingering people addition to the Federal shitlists of the police state, which at a minimum means all records about you are searched, a life history of you constructed, and at the other extreme, your murder. So the NYPD is in the business of helping finger people for the U.S. to assasinate.
This is not mere "analysis." This is surveillance, harassment, persecution, entrapment, and assassination.
Lehrer then took a station break. He never asked Silber about this targetting of an American citizen for assassination based on "his radicalizing ability." In other words, the U.S. has a policy of killing anyone they regard as an enemy propagandist in the "war on terror."
Back from the break, Silber took a swipe at Samir Khan (another American citizen assassinated by drone) for writing an article about bombmaking and working on Inspire magazine (the Al-Qaeda agitprop publication). His point was that the danger is everywhere, since Khan came from Queens.
Neither Lehrer nor Silber even bother offering justification for killing people based on speech, if indeed loathsome speech, even "inciting" speech. Again, Lehrer sees no mention to discuss whether it's okay to kill people for publishing things the Government regards as potentially threatening.
So we really are in the realm of thought crimes here. And the U.S. Government is assasinating people it convicts in secret, convictions done by secret policemen in their lairs, for committing these thought crimes.
That should make anyone fearful, not just jihadists.
And "mistakes" happen. All the time. Lethal ones. But being a secret policeman or military assassin means never having to say you're sorry.
Of course, right wingers for years have had an extensive literature of bombmaking instructions, "How To Kill" books (there's a whole series of exactly that title), and nobody's assassinating them, or even "detaining" them.
Basically Silber is a technician of the secret police state, big on "data analysis" under a pretext of neutral, objective, non-ideological facts.
Which is a fraud, as Silber and his ilk definitely have an ideology. Furthermore, some of his "facts" aren't. Like claiming that the NYPD isn't infiltrating mosques (a well-established fact at this point) but is merely "following leads." (Lehrer didn't question or challenge this falsehood.)
Also there is the usual omission of significant facts leading to disingenuousness, for example a lame set-up in which the NYPD set up a loser-schlup (Jose Pimentel) to assemble a pipe bomb in an apartment rigged up with camera to which he was lured by an agent provocateur. It took the provocateur an entire year to goad and groom the victim to play his assigned role in this local production of Political Terrorism Theater. (The FBI rebuffs two attempts by the NYPD to have them join in the fun. Supposedly the reason was the FBI thought the case was weak- which is ironic, since the FBI does exactly the same thing all the time. Maybe they just didn't want to share credit with the NYPD, a more likely explanation.) Silber mentioned this "case" as part of his litany of "terrorist plots." Lehrer said nothing in demurral.
The point of the show apparently was to justify and reinforce the whole repressive regime of an endless "war on terrorism." Are there real threats? Of course. But promoting a freak-out every time some malcontent tries to plant a bomb is disproportionate and politically motivated. Almost daily people are blown up in places like Pakistan, Nigeria, Afghanistan. Other than the spectacular plane kamikaze attacks of 9/11/01, the casualties in the West of these attacks has never been more than a few hundred, and more often ZERO. Plus the foiled attacks have mostly been foiled by average citizens combined with the bungling of the terrorists.
And as to the extent of the threat, Silber sites two dozen New Yorkers who allegedly became jihadists. Two dozen, out of a population of 8 million people. Somehow that justifies a massive, permanent, secret police state.
In terms of our lives and liberties, we'd probably be better off completely ignoring this threat. Not that I recommend that course. There should be a balance between need to protect against real dangers, and our human rights, instead of hollow lip service to civil rights and law, which is all that exists now. For example, having radiation monitors checking incoming cargo is fine. No problem with that. Or keeping one's ears open and monitoring some people, as opposed to instigating "plots" that are creations of the Government staged for political gain and ongoing ideological indoctrination and fear-mongering.
1] Getting Good Intel, Brian Lehrer Show, WNYC, 1/30/12. WNYC has been playing games with accessing this program. That page doesn't play the episode. Here are alternative URLs to try that as of 6/16/16 lead to the segment. (The original URL was deleted by WNYC since I originally posted this.)
First try another station owned by WNYC, WQXR, which has the episode. Here is the URL of the WNYC podcast player you can also try. This podcast link has the title "NYPD Intel" but it's the same episode. NYPD Intel. Finally just search Mitchell Silber at WNYC.org or WQXR.org. When I tested the podcast for "Getting Good Intel," it plays a completely unrelated episode of the Brian Lehrer show!
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