Tag: police state

Intellipedia Off-Limits: NSA’s FOIA About-Face And Its Impact On Transparency

The National Security Agency (NSA) has recently changed its approach to handling Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests related to the internal collaborative platform, Intellipedia, which is used to share knowledge across and within the Intelligence Community (IC). Despite having released a long list of articles and category pages that reside within that system for well more than the last decade, the NSA is now issuing what’s known as a “Glomar response” to these requests, a response that refuses to confirm or deny the existence of any relevant documents. This has significant implications for transparency, as Intellipedia has been a valuable resource in the past for understanding the IC’s explorations and interests.

Intellipedia, similar to the concept of Wikipedia, is a system utilized by the IC that allows for the sharing of information among various intelligence agencies. The platform’s pages range from Unclassified to Top Secret, and any affiliate within the IC who obtains an account can create, edit, and update them.

Intellipedia is a project of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) Intelligence Community Enterprise Services (ICES) office headquartered in Fort Meade, Maryland. The NSA handles all FOIA requests relating to it as it serves as the “executive agent” of Intelink, an internal data sharing and collaboration site in which Intellipedia is a part.

In 2017, after a successful FOIA appeal, The Black Vault discovered that Intellipedia had 50,233 content pages within the Unclassified version; 114,502 content pages in the Secret version; and 124,815 content pages in the Top Secret version; millions of additional pages within those three systems that includes other wiki pages, talk pages, and redirects; and finally, the three systems hold more than 600,000 uploaded files for download. Those statistics have likely increased drastically since they were revealed in 2017.

Those millions of pages and files have now been locked out of even being acknowledged, let alone released by the NSA, even though in the past, a large amount of information from Intellipedia has been released in response to FOIA requests and published by The Black Vault. These previously released documents have provided invaluable insight into the IC’s focus and have offered countless useful leads for subsequent FOIA requests.

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The Bizarre Reality of Getting Online in North Korea

FOR 25 MILLION North Koreans, the internet is an impossibility. Only a few thousand privileged members of the hermit kingdom’s society can access the global internet, while even the country’s heavily censored internal intranet is out of reach for the majority of the population. Getting access to free and open information isn’t an option.

New research from South Korea-based human rights organization People for Successful Corean Reunification (Pscore) details the reality for those who—in very limited circumstances—manage to get online in North Korea. The report reveals a days-long approval process to gain internet access, after which monitors sit next to people while they browse and approve their activities every five minutes. Even then, what can be accessed reveals little about the world outside North Korea’s borders.

Documentation from the NGO is being presented today at the human rights conference RightsCon and sheds light on the regime with the most limited internet freedoms, which fall far below the restrictive and surveilled internet access in China and Iran. For millions of people in North Korea, the internet simply doesn’t exist.

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Georgia’s WEF Puppet Governor Brian Kemp Rolls Out Digital IDs for All Citizens

Georgia recently became one of at least 12 states that is rolling out new digital ID driver’s licenses, which of course is exactly what the globalists at the World Economic Forum have been clamoring for since the onset of their push for a “Great Reset,” where they basically digitize all of the basic functions in life, including the bodies of human beings.

Georgia joined the ranks of Arizona, Maryland and Colorado where digital IDs have already been implemented. Connecticut, Hawaii, Iowa, Kentucky, Mississippi, Ohio, Oklahoma and Utah are also in various stages of getting their digital ID programs up and running. See the whole list here.

If you recall, Georgia Governor Brian Kemp was an invited guest at the annual meeting of the globalist, elitist World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in January 2023. He traveled to Davos on the Georgia taxpayers’ dime along with Governor Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner, a slew of BlackRock executives and other high-rollers. He felt real important and told CNBC that he was there to “sell Georgia.”

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When did the Left go from Standing up to ‘The Man’ to becoming ‘The Man’?

“The Man” was the left’s bogeyman in the 1960s and 70s, representing establishment authority and oppression, from the Viet Nam war to the civil rights movement.

As the Urban Dictionary defines the term,

“The Man is the head of ‘the establishment’ put in place to ‘bring us down’. Though nobody has physically seen ‘the man’, he is assumed to be a male Caucasian between the ages of 25-40 and is rumored to have a substantial amount of acquired wealth, presumably acquired by exploiting those whom his ‘establishment’ is keeping down.”

Decades ago, The Man represented authority figures like Nixon, Kissinger, Hoover, and McNamara. In those days, Democrats and the left railed against The Man in music, protests, and activism.

But a funny thing happened in the 1990s as those Baby Boomers once protesting against The Man came of age, assuming prominent positions in society and government, in essence becoming The Man, the monster they once despised and railed against.

Looking back through history, the Nixon administration and its footnote the Ford administration was considered The Man, especially after the Viet Nam War and Watergate. The left tasted power during the Carter years, but also got a mouthful of fecklessness and misery. The country said “enough” and elected Ronald Reagan to two terms, and George HW Bush to a single term although his “kinder and gentler” approach to governance was more Carter than Reagan.

Then came Bill Clinton, the first Baby Boomer president. Clinton was against the Viet Nam war, dodging the draft, writing a letter in 1969 to an ROTC leader discussing “loathing the military”. From fighting The Man to becoming The Man as president, this was the turning point.

Hard core leftist activist actor Ron Silver inadvertently exemplified, revealed, and explained this transition during Clinton’s first inauguration,

At Clinton’s first inauguration, he saw military jets flying over the Lincoln Memorial, and was disgusted. Then he thought, “Those are our planes now.”

Instead of fighting the establishment and authority, the left became that which they were fighting. They now controlled the levers of power, including the evil CIA, FBI, DOJ, military, and other oppressive government agencies.

Democrats and the left had transitioned from standing up to The Man to becoming The Man.

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Why Are So Many Younger Americans Okay with Big Brother Monitoring Their Homes?

The good news is that “only” a minority of younger American adults favor Big Brother-style surveillance of our home life. The bad news is that we’re discussing this because it’s a disturbingly large share supporting such a totalitarian intrusion. Worse, the idea seems to be gaining acceptance. We either need to get a handle on what’s going on here, or else potentially suffer lives monitored by unblinking eyes of the state, imposed by popular demand.

“Americans under the age of 30 stand out when it comes to 1984‐​style in‐​home government surveillance cameras. 3 in 10 (29 percent) Americans under 30 favor ‘the government installing surveillance cameras in every household’ in order to ‘reduce domestic violence, abuse, and other illegal activity,'” the Cato Institute’s Emily Ekins and Jordan Gygi wrote last week. “Support declines with age, dropping to 20 percent among 30–44 year olds and dropping considerably to 6 percent among those over the age of 45.”

The survey in question focused on central bank digital currencies (CBDCs)—government-sponsored alternatives to such digital money as bitcoin. CBDCs would offer the convenience of digital payments, but potentially without privacy protections, and could empower the state to control what people buy and sell.

“Interestingly, more than half (53 percent) of those who support the United States adopting a CBDC are also supportive of government surveillance cameras in homes, while only 2 percent of those who oppose a CBDC feel the same,” add Ekins and Gygi. “This suggests there may be a common consideration that is prompted by both issues. Likely, it has to do with willingness to give up privacy in hopes of greater security.”

If that’s the case, it may be a growing willingness to prioritize security over privacy. Note not just the 29 percent support for in-home surveillance among the youngest cohort, but also the 20 percent support among those 30–44. Six percent support among older cohorts is the sort of random approval for any crazy idea that you’d expect to see in a population. The jump to 20 percent and then 29 percent looks like something different. But what?

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Texas police shoot dog after autocorrect sends them to wrong address

The Waco Police Department says it is “saddened” after its officers shot and killed a family pet when its officers responded to the wrong address.

On June 3, officers were called to respond to a burglary in progress. According to police, the 9-1-1 caller said that someone had kicked their door in and in the background the dispatcher could hear a male’s voice saying, “I’m not trying to hurt you.”

The call then disconnected.

Dispatchers entered the address into the system for the 3200 block of N. 20th Street A. The police department says the dispatch system autocorrected the address to the 3200 block of N. 20th Street, without the A, which is a different street nearby.

Police responded to the address “in good faith,” according to Waco PD.

When officers arrived they saw the back door was open, as the 9-1-1 caller had indicated.

As officers entered the apartment and announced their presence multiple dogs came running at the officers.

Waco Police say one of the dogs lunged at an officer twice and that one of the officers fired at the dog, hitting him.

The dog, Finn, was taken to an emergency medical clinic where he died.

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Biden Censorship Lawyers Say Questioning Masks And Vaccines “Often Won’t Be” Protected By First Amendment

The judge presiding over the lawsuit filed by Missouri and Louisiana, alleging collusion between the federal government and social media companies to censor certain viewpoints, is said to have asked if the Biden administration has ever read George Orwell’s 1984.

The transcript of the hearing is not yet available. However, Missouri’s Attorney General Andrew Bailey shared some of the statements made by Judge Terry A. Doughty.

“The federal government had a hard time convincing a judge last week that it hasn’t been working with and coercing social media companies to censor free speech,” Bailey tweeted.

“The judge asked the feds if they had ever read George Orwell’s 1984, pointing out the similarities between the case and the book,” he added.

Bailey also tweeted that Doughty asked the federal government about their views on protected speech.

“He asked if an American citizen questioning the safety or efficacy of masks or a vaccine was protected under the First Amendment,” Bailey recalled. “The feds’ answer? ‘It COULD be,’ but often won’t be.”

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Traffic cop sues city over ‘get-out-of-jail-free’ cards for NYPD friends and family

Mathew Bianchi became a Staten Island traffic cop in 2017, two years after joining the New York police department, assigned to enforcing traffic violations and issuing tickets. In the first two years on that beat, he received stellar performance evaluations.

But in November 2018 – a year into his career in the traffic unit – Bianchi issued a ticket to a civilian who held a New York City police department laminated courtesy card, an unofficial credential issued to NYPD officers based on their union affiliation that can then be distributed to family members and friends to carry with them.

What happened next is the subject of a lawsuit against the city and a police captain. According to Bianchi, who is Cuban-American, courtesy cards are used to maintain a system of impunity – a “get-of-jail-free card” for families and friends of NYPD officers to avoid traffic tickets, a growing source of revenue for the city.

Bianchi claims his superiors retaliated against him for his stance against the “corrupt” cards after he was warned by an official with the Police Benevolent Association, New York City’s largest police union, that he would not be protected by his union if he wrote tickets for people with cards. And if he continued, he’d be reassigned.

In some instances, the complaint said, Bianchi was reprimanded for writing a ticket to a relative or parent of an officer; in others, his commanding officer reviewed body-camera footage to see if he was giving motorists with cards a “hard time”.

“I see card after card. You’re not allowed to write any of them [up],” he told the Associated Press. “We’re not supposed to be showing favoritism when we do car stops, and we shouldn’t be giving them out because the guy mows my lawn.”

Bianchi told his precinct commander that he did not agree with the courtesy card policy and claims he was told: “Is it better to be right or better to be on patrol?” The lawsuit cites several instances where his NYPD colleagues complained about his ticket-writing, including on Facebook.

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Why prosecutors in WA are recharging a man police nearly beat to death

Moses Lake police nearly beat Joseph Zamora to death. Then he was charged with and convicted of assaulting an officer. He served a full prison term. Then Grant County prosecutors asked for the case to be dismissed. Then the state Supreme Court threw out Zamora’s convictions, because the prosecutor used racial bias during the trial.

It’s been more than six years since the beating that left Zamora in a medically induced coma in the ICU for a month, but Grant County prosecutors are reprosecuting him for the same alleged crimes. Even though Zamora already served a full prison sentence. Even though the same prosecutors previously asked to have the case dismissed.

The lingering question: Why? Why recharge a man when even if he is convicted, he wouldn’t serve any more time? Why recharge a man when the prosecutor previously wrote, “it is no longer in the interests of justice for the State to pursue this case?”

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Biden Admin is Preparing to Target Americans’ Gas Furnaces Amid Stove Crackdown

The Biden administration is expected to soon finalize regulations restricting which home gas-powered furnaces consumers are able to purchase in the future.

According to experts, the regulations — proposed in June 2022 by the Department of Energy (DOE) — would restrict consumer choice, drive prices higher and likely have a low impact on greenhouse gas emissions. The agency could finalize the rules targeting residential gas furnaces, which more than 50% of American households rely on for space heating, at any point over the upcoming weeks.

“This is a classic example of one size not fitting all,” Ben Lieberman, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, told Fox News Digital in an interview. “Every home is different, every homeowner is different and people are best off having a wide range of choices. They can work with their contractor to make the best decision for their home and their circumstances.”

“The efficiency standard would effectively outlaw non-condensing furnaces and condensing alternatives would be the only ones available,” Lieberman said. “Those are more efficient, but they cost more. And installation costs could be a big problem for some houses that are not compatible with condensing furnaces.”

Under the proposed regulations, DOE would require furnaces to achieve an annual fuel utilization efficiency (AFUE) of 95% by 2029, meaning manufacturers would only be allowed to sell furnaces that convert at least 95% of fuel into heat within six years. The current market standard AFUE for a residential furnace is 80%.

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