[FYI] (Fwd) FC: U.S. creates (another) surveillance office run by J. Poindexter

["Axel H Horns" <horns@ipjur.com>]

------- Forwarded message follows -------
Date sent:      	Tue, 19 Feb 2002 00:03:52 -0500
From:           	Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com>
To:             	politech@politechbot.com
Subject:        	FC: U.S. creates (another) surveillance office run by J. Poindexter
Send reply to:  	declan@well.com




http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4358017,00.html

   No more Mr Scrupulous Guy
   How one of the two brains behind the Iran-Contra scandal this week
   became one of America's most powerful men

   John Sutherland
   Guardian

   Monday February 18, 2002

   Last Wednesday something strange happened. The American population
   was instructed to panic. Place themselves, that is, on a state of
   highest vigilance. Some cataclysmic act of terrorism would happen -
   within hours. But nothing terrible happened. Something creepy did.
   On Thursday there was an inconspicuous news item. John M Poindexter
   had been appointed to head a new agency "to counter attacks on the
   US", such as Wednesday's no-show. It is equivalent, in British
   terms, to Jeffrey Archer being made chancellor of the exchequer.

   The agency which Poindexter will run is called the Information
   Awareness Office. You want to know what that is? Think, Big Brother
   is Watching You. IAO will supply federal officials with "instant"
   analysis on what is being written on email and said on phones all
   over the US. Domestic espionage. You want to test it out?
   Text-message any American friend, "Bmb OK. Allah gr8".

   The IAO is one of two new offshoots of the Pentagon-based Darpa -
   the Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (it's venerable
   ancestor, Arpa, invented the internet). The other new agency is
   called the Information Exploitation Office. Its mission is to
   supply similarly instant analysis about overseas enemy targets. IEO
   will employ the computerised sensor networks that have proved so
   successful in Afghanistan. And, from now on, America - with IEO
   guiding its smart weaponry - will launch sneak attacks. No more Mr
   Nice Guy.

   IOA and IEO will get a big chunk of the $48bn of the taxpayers'
   money George Bush is pumping into his war on the evildoers. Never
   again will it be said that US intelligence agencies went to sleep
   on the job - or that they were too careful about the American
   citizen's civil rights to do that job. No more Mr Scrupulous Guy.

   Poindexter is frighteningly smart and very unscrupulous. He
   graduated top of his class at the Naval Academy in 1958 and went on
   to a PhD in physics at the California Institute of Technology. He
   returned to uniform as America's best-educated sailor. He wasn't a
   desk warrior. Poindexter commanded missile destroyers. He won
   medals to hang alongside his academic diplomas. He is the model for
   Tom Clancy's hero, Jack Ryan.

   [...]




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