Two of the principal mechanisms by which the rulers of 20th century police states maintained their control over their people were the file and the internal passport. These governments kept a cumulative file (called the dangan in Communist China) on every individual's performance and attitudes from school years through adult employment. Citizens carried an internal passport or "papers" that had to be presented to the authorities for permission to travel within the country, to take up residence in another city, or to apply for a new job.
These two methods of personal surveillance -- efficient watchdogs that prevented any emergence of freedom -- required an army of bureaucrats fortified by a Gestapo, a Stasi or a KGB, plus the ability to commandeer an unlimited supply of paper and file folders. Technology has now made the task of building personal files on every citizen, and tracking our actions and movements, just as easy as logging onto the Internet.
Unknown to most Americans, coordinated plans are well underway to give the Federal Government the power to input personal information on all Americans onto a government database. The computer will record our school, business, medical, financial, and personal activities, and track our movements as we travel about the United States.
These plans were authorized by the so-called conservative Congress and are eagerly implemented and expanded by the Clinton Administration liberals. They plan to force all Americans to carry an I.D. card linked to a federal database, without which we will not be able to drive a car, get a job, board a plane, enter a hospital emergency room or school, have a bank account, cash a check, buy a gun, or have access to government benefits such as Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid.
Putting all that information on a government database means the end of privacy as we know it. Daily actions we all take for granted will henceforth be recorded, monitored, tracked, and contingent on showing The Card.
Legislative authority for these dramatic changes in what we endearingly call the American way of life was buried in two bills passed by Republicans and signed by Bill Clinton in 1996: the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, and the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reform Act (known as welfare reform).
The illegal immigration law prohibits the use of state driver's licenses after Oct. 1, 2000 unless they contain Social Security numbers as the unique numeric identifier "that can be read visually or by electronic means." (Section 656(b)) The act requires all driver's licenses to conform to regulations promulgated by the Department of Transportation, which published its proposed regulations on June 17. (Federal Register, vol. 63, no. 116, pp. 33219-33225)
The illegal immigration law orders the Attorney General to conduct pilot programs in at least 5 states where the state driver's license includes a "machine-readable" Social Security number. (Section 403(c)) The law also orders the development of a Social Security card that "shall employ technologies that provide security features, such as magnetic stripes, holograms, and integrated circuits." (Section 657(a)) A "smart card" with these technologies can contain a digitized fingerprint, retina scan, voice-print, DNA print, or other biometric identifier, and will leave an electronic trail every time it is used.
The law orders "consultation" with the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators. AAMVA, a pseudo-private, quasi-government organization, has long urged using driver's licenses, with Social Security numbers and digital fingerprinting, as a de facto national I.D. card that would enable the government to track everyone's movements throughout North America.
The welfare reform law requires that, in order to receive federal welfare funds, states must collect Social Security numbers from applicants for any professional license, occupational license, or "commercial driver's license." (Section 317) The Balanced Budget Act of 1997, in the guise of making "technical corrections" to welfare reform, deleted the word "commercial," thereby applying the requirement to all driver's license applicants, and even added "recreational" (hunting and fishing) licenses.
Another provision of welfare reform requires employers, since Oct. 1, 1997, to transmit the name, address, and Social Security number of every new worker to a Directory of New Hires. This is supposed to help track deadbeat dads, but the information is collected from all new workers (regardless of whether they are deadbeats or even dads) and maintained for 24 months.
The "instant background check" established by the 1993 Brady Act takes effect nationwide on Dec. 1. Under this system, prospective handgun buyers must be screened against a database of convicted criminals. But the new national I.D. card will make it easy to keep a database of gun buyers, too, which some states reportedly are doing already. Although the Brady Act forbids federal agencies from using the instant check system to register firearms, the FBI says it plans to keep records of prospective handgun buyers for 18 months.
A few states have already quietly legislated acquiescence in the new federal requirements, but fingerprinting and smart cards have stirred an uproar in others. Most Americans have never been fingerprinted and look upon it as something that happens only to criminal suspects.
The New Jersey Legislature recently abandoned efforts to pass Governor Christine Whitman's high-tech driver's license called "Access New Jersey." It was designed to contain a computer chip with 100 electronic keys capable of storing large amounts of personal data. It would leave an electronic trail each time the card was used to cash a check, make a purchase, pay a toll, check out a book, get insurance authorization to see a doctor, or used for identification, all identified by Social Security number. These new federal laws effectively overturn the 1974 Privacy Act, which declared that "It shall be unlawful for any Federal, State or local government agency to deny to any individual any right, benefit, or privilege provided by law because of such individual's refusal to disclose his Social Security account number." On the pretext of catching illegal aliens, welfare cheats, deadbeat dads, and criminals, these laws will subject law-abiding Americans to the police-state apparatus of national I.D. cards linked to coordinated government databases.
Any settlement between "Big Tobacco" and various state governments would cement in place two destructive precedents: that government has the "right" to control virtually all that we consume and that individuals need not be held responsible for their own foolish behavior (like smoking) as long as a corporation with deep pockets can be blamed instead.
Tobacco has become the most politically incorrect of all products, but so-called public health "activists" are already targeting the beer, wine, liquor, fast food, soft drink, beef, and other industries for similar attacks. Once a tobacco "settlement" is reached only the naive would believe that the same politicians, bureaucrats, trial lawyers, and public health activists who have orchestrated the anti-smoking campaign -- and have benefited financially from it -- will not declare a new "war" on other politically-incorrect products.
Furthermore, if it is "legitimate" for government to control what we put into our bodies, one has to wonder why it isn't even more important for government to control what goes into our minds. If we can't be trusted to consume sensibly, how can we be trusted to think the right thoughts, read the right literature, attend the right movies and plays, and vote for the right political candidates? It's an awfully slippery slope.
Smoking is an unhealthy and dangerous habit. But so are many other things; life itself is full of peril. In a free society we citizens ought to have the right to decide for ourselves which risks to take and which to avoid -- and to take full responsibility for the consequences of our actions.
Children should not take up smoking, but learning about healthy lifestyles is the primary responsibility of parents, not the Nanny State, which can only undermine parental responsibility and authority.
Americans have a right to do stupid things, as our politicians demonstrate for us on a daily basis. What is at issue here is whether we wish for our government to treat us as responsible adults or as child-like wards of the ever-encroaching Nanny State.
NOTE: This morning's news announced a plan for ALL banks to make "accounts" available to American's receiving ANY/ALL forms of money from the FEDERAL government (SOCIAL SECURITY, RETIREMENT ETC. ETC.), and currently do not have a bank account. They claim 10 million Americans are without bank accounts, and the FDIC is "suggesting" those new accounts be set up with a 3.00 monthly fee with no minimum balance for all Americans who cannot afford and do not currently to do business with a bank! They also mentioned that REGULATIONS will be available in the spring! This bit of news will REALLY strike home after you read the following article.
Dear Friends:
I have just finished analyzing a 29-page document obtained from an U.S. Congressman who, for the moment and at his request must remain anonymous.
The document is a Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) document and is entitled "Minimum Security Devices and Procedures and Bank Secrecy Act Compliance."
To set the tone for the following discussion let me remind you that since January 1992, the Federal Government has set its sights on establishing federal controls over EVERY ASPECT of every individual Americans personal life and liberties. For example;
1. The federal government has established "PROFILES" for various so-called criminally inclined personalities. Now as one travels about the country, especially in air ports, the government spies look you over and if you happen to resemble one of those criminally inclined personality profiles, in appearance, conduct or mannerisms, YOU are taken into police custody and then you are required to prove that you are indeed not a criminal or even a potential criminal.
2. Even our school children are now being "profiled" so that the federal government can identify those children who, in the opinion of certain government agents, require psychological evaluation and subsequent psychological treatment (reprogramming) in order to instill in that child "government standards of behavior" to prevent that child from committing criminal acts later in life (so they think).
3. NOW --- NOW the Federal Government, working through the FDIC, plans to "PROFILE YOUR PERSONAL FINANCIAL ACTIVITIES."
The following is direct quote from the first page of FDIC document (6174-01) (12 CFR Part 326) Notice of proposed rule making.
"SUMMARY: The FDIC is proposing to issue a regulation requiring insured nonmember banks to adopt and maintain "Know Your Customer" programs. As proposed, the regulation would require each nonmember bank to develop a program designed to determine the identity of its customers; determine its customers' sources of funds; determine the normal and expected transactions of its customers; monitor account activity for transactions that are inconsistent with those normal and expected transactions; and report any transactions of its customers that are determined to be suspicious, in accordance with the FDIC's existing suspicious activity reporting regulation. ---"
The things to be very concerned about in this case are the PROFILE PARAMETERS that in turn define the various limits that when exceed, qualify as an exception to the norm and thus must be reported to another federal agency, as a suspicious transaction. There is virtually no limit to the number or type of profile parameters that can be established. For example, is the customer an 8-foot tall white male weighing in excess of 400 pounds or is the customer a four-foot tall black female weighing less than 90 pounds. The question or questions (and there are many questions) then becomes, who will be responsible for establishing, defining and controlling the limitless number of possible profile parameters? Who will be responsible for adding, changing and deleting established profile parameters? Who will be responsible for insuring that this awesome and massive capability will not be misused and abused by the various departments of the Federal Government. In other words, is the 8 foot tall white malean exception to the norm or is the 4 foot tall black female the exception or, are both the upper limit and the lower limit considered as an exception to the norm. How about all those in between?
As noted in the quoted SUMMARY of the document identified above, the "key operative statements" are as follows;
1. Identify its customers.
2. Determine its customers' source of funds.
3. Determine the normal and expected transactions of its customers.
4. Monitor account activity for transactions that are inconsistent with those normal and expected transactions.
5. Report any transactions of its customers that are determined to be suspicious ---.
Before we briefly examine the five individual requirements noted above, and so that you will understand where"I" am coming from, please be aware of the fact that, in addition to being a Baptist Preacher, I have been a Data Processing Systems Analyst for some 48+ years. At least half of that time was spent working for the Federal Government, designing and installing total Data Processing Facilities, from the Presidents Battle Staff, to the Congress, to the Department of defense, to the local Church name and address data base. I have written and taught several college courses; (a) Management of Data Processing Facilities and (b) Systems Analysis. One of the first things that I always tell the new students in my Systems Analysis class is "In the field of electronic data processing, your only limitation is you own imagination. If you can rationalize it in your mind, 'electronic' data processing can do it."
Now, given that background and qualifications let me tell you, in no uncertain terms, -- I know exactly what the Federal Government is up to. I know exactly what information they are looking for; I know exactly how to get that information and I know exactly how they plan to eventually use that information.
Requirement #1: Identify its customers. I have no problem with this requirement so long as that identifying information is limited to name, mailing address and an account number generated by the "local" financial institution and assigned to a particular account to provide unique identification, but absolutely nothing more.
Requirement #2: Determine its customers' source of funds. This I have a BIG problem with. Even though the government would like for you to believe that this requirement is related to identifying "possible" illegal money laundering by drug traffickers, that is not the only reason they want to know the source of your finances. Remember now, the ultimate objective of the vast majority of government regulations and programs are directed at controlling the "individual." This item required that you advise the bank of all the sources that you will be receiving money from that you will be depositing in this particular account. We will expand this item in more detail below.
Requirement #3. Determine the normal and expected transactions of its customers. For purposed of this discussion we will consider only four primary parameters related to deposits and withdrawals against this particular account.
First: When you established a new checking account you will be required to identify the number of deposits you expect to make each month and the average amount of each deposit. For example (a) military retirement pay = $2,000.00, (b) Social Security Income = $400.00, (c) Rent from income property = $750.00, (d) Interest from stocks & bonds = $ 300.00, and so on.
Second: You will be required to identify the number of withdrawals you expect to make each month from this account and the estimated amount of each withdrawal. For example; (a)Mortgage payment = $800.00,(b)Car Payment = $250.00,(c)College tuition = $1,000.00).
Once the average number of deposits and the average amount of each deposit has been determined and the average number of withdrawals and the average amount of each withdrawal has been established, it will be very easy to identify all transactions, in and out, that exceed the established norms for this particular account. For example should you find a paper bag on the side of the highway containing 10,000 well used one dollar bills, or Aunt Sue passed away and left you 10,000 well used one dollar bills and you deposited that windfall in your checking or savings account, that would immediately be detected as exceeding the established norms for your account.
Requirement #4. Monitor account activity for transactions that are inconsistent with those normal and expected transactions. This requirement establishes the requirement that each financial institution establish a procedure to monitor your financial accounts on a regular basis for any transactions that exceed the established norms as illustrated above.
Requirement #5. Report any transactions of its customers that are determined to be suspicious ---. This requirement requires that all financial institutions immediately report any and all suspicious transactions detected as a result of deposits or withdrawals that exceed the established norms for your account.
As I was reviewing the aforementioned FDIC document, as quoted above, I called a long time friend of mine who is vice president of a local bank that I do business with. I ask my vice president friend to identify the government agency(s) to which he would report such a suspicious transaction. His response was, the IRS and the FBI, at the national level.
My friends, as a long time ADP/EDP Systems Analyst I want you to pay particular attention to the following.
Whenever a good and successful Information (Data) Processing Systems Analyst designs a large scale information processing system, such as what we have been talking about above, he will ALWAYS allow for future expansion of "existing" applications and processing capabilities and his design work will also allow for "additional" applications and processing capabilities to be added with a minimum of additional effort and cost.
Based on my 48+ plus years in the business, let me tell you what you can expect in the very near future if the proposed "rulemaking" provisions as defined in the FDIC document identified above are allowed to be implemented. Please, read the following very carefully because it lays out the route our government is taking toward a cashless society as required by the design of a one world government under the United Nations.
1. PRESENTLY ALL recipients of military retirement pay MUST have a bank account into which their monthly retirement pay is electronically transferred. The government will no longer pay individual retirees directly, or send their retirement pay to a home address. This is part of an over all plan to extended more absolute control over the individual. It has absolutely nothing to do with economy as the government would have you to believe.
2. In the very near future look for legislation that will "require" ALL government employees, federal, state and local, to have a bank account into which their salary will also be electronically transferred, just like the retired military. In as much as most government employees already have the direct deposit option available, it requires only very simple legislation to complete this phase of the plan.
3. Next you will see legislation that will outlaw the direct payment of all wages or salaries to any individual, by an employer. All employees who work for a wage or salary, will also be required to have a bank account into which the employer will be required to direct deposit their salary. And once again the legislation necessary to accomplish phase of the plan is very simple and easy to implement, simply because most business would welcome the reduced payroll cost.
The government's objective here is to eventually make the local financial institution the only source of legal tender for the individual. At this point and for the purpose of this paper, legal tender is defined as dollars, debit cards or other credit cards. When objectives 2 & 3 above have been fully accomplished, it will then be a very simple matter to implement the rest of the plan. Let me explain it this way. The total plan equates to $1.00 (One dollar). When steps 2 & 3 have been fully implemented, as step 1 has already been accomplished, that will equate to $.95 cents of that $1.00. The rest of the plan equates to only 5 cents out of that one dollar.
And just what is the rest of the plan? It's very simple.
After steps 1, 2 and 3 as noted above have been fully implemented, the only thing left to do then would be to outlaw all cash transactions and require all transactions now involving cash, be accomplished through the use of checks or smart cards followed by the eventual elimination of the checks.
At that point the federal government can then trace, track AND CONTROL ALL TRANSACTIONS, simply because all transactions will then be processed by massive computer systems controlled by the federal government. Given the above accomplishments and current electronic capabilities, the ability to exercise absolute control over "individuals" provided by the additional five cents noted above are absolutely mind boggling.
There are many, many more reasons that all Americans should and must oppose implementation of the five(5) requirements identified above.
There are TWO things that every American should do, immediately.
First: All Americans should send a letter to the FDIC expressing their STRONG objection and opposition to the plan to PROFILE individual bank accounts for what ever purpose. The FDIC will be accepting public comments until December 27. Send your comments to:
Robert E. Feldman, Executive Secretary
Attention: Comments/OES, FDIC
550 17th Street, NW
Washington, DC 20429
Be sure to include the following information at the top of your letter:
6374-01
FDIC 12 CFR 326
Minimum Security Devices and Procedures and Bank Secrecy Act Compliance
Notice of proposed rulemaking
Second: All Americans should immediately destroy ALL debit cards and credit cards and revert to using cash (dollars) in all business transactions instead of checks, debit cards and credit cards.
Please forward this alert to the maximum extent possible.
Curt Tomlin
Major USA Ret
"During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act." - George Orwell
Speaking at U.N. climate talks in Buenos Aires, ministers from the European Union also opposed the United States, which wants to achieve most of its emissions cuts by buying pollution permits abroad rather than cracking down on factories and cars.
The marathon Buenos Aires talks, which started Nov. 2 and end on Friday, were intended to work out how to implement a pledge made last year by developed countries in Kyoto, Japan, to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by 5.2 percent from 1990 levels by 2008-2012.
But U.S. insistence that developing countries take more action to fight global warming and U.S. differences with the European Union have threatened to derail negotiations.
Taking fire from all sides except a band of heavy polluters such as Australia and Russia, the United States stood fast in demanding a free-market approach to global greenhouse gas cuts, including unrestricted international trade in permits to pollute.
Washington argues that such mechanisms will provide the fastest, most cost-effective method of slowing climate change.
"It should be clear that we cannot afford a system that makes reduction of a ton of carbon more expensive than it needs to be," top U.S. climate official Stuart Eizenstat told the conference.
Scientists believe that fossil fuel emissions have led to a gradual warming in the earth's atmosphere. Left unchecked, they fear higher temperatures will melt the polar ice caps, raise sea levels and cause famine, drought and the spread of disease.
Some of the toughest language of a draining day of more than 100 speeches came from China's delegate Liu Jiang. Without naming the United States, he lashed out at the U.S. position by quoting a favourite phrase of Eizenstat.
"The inequity between the developed countries' luxury emissions and the developing countries' survival emissions must be redressed. It will not do to use the pretext of 'a global issue needs a global solution'," Liu said.
"China is willing to make more contributions to addressing climate change, but she is faced with tremendous practical difficulties," he said, citing the country's large population and low per-capita income.
India accused rich countries of failing to keep promises of concrete action to fight climate change and said it was too poor to take such steps itself.
"India's primary concern remains the removal of poverty and freedom from hunger and disease," said India's Environment Minister Suresh Prabhu.
But a minority of developing countries, notably U.S. ally Argentina, are considering some voluntary limits on emissions. The European Union further isolated Washington by repeating a call for the United States to make most of its pollution cuts domestically.
"The will to change direction is not evident in all quarters," said European Commissioner of the Environment Ritt Bjerregaard. "We must reduce our carbon dependency. There is no way to avoid that."
Eizenstat announced that United States was finally signing the Kyoto Protocol, the last major industrialized country to do so. The treaty must still be ratified by the Senate, most of whose members say they will reject it in its current form.
As the big powers slugged it out, tiny Micronesia said that global warming would "bring total and permanent destruction to our homeland" from flooding caused by rising sea levels.
"Global warming will destroy us forever, and by the time that happens, the rest of the world will be on an irreversible track toward devastation. It is inconceivable that all the nations of the world ... could allow this to happen," Micronesian Vice President Leo Falcam told the summit.
Another scheme involved the creation of "cloned checks." In one case cited by the GAO, a taxpayer's check for $590,000 was stolen from a tax return processing center. The thief then took the bank and account numbers from the valid check and used the information to create multiple fraudulent blank checks.
"These cloned checks were made payable in smaller amounts to avoid raising suspicion," reported the GAO, the congressional watchdog agency. Several of the checks were cashed before being discovered by the taxpayer.
IRS officials did not take issue with the GAO report, but stressed that field offices undergo regular security checks and that efforts are underway to strengthen the screening of job applicants in an effort to ensure that people with criminal convictions are not hired to work in sensitive areas.
"We are aware that there are instances where people embezzle or clone checks, but we don't think it is widespread," said an IRS official, who spoke on condition she not be identified.
The GAO report also underscores longtime problems at the IRS, which operates with antiquated computer systems. For the last decade, the IRS has struggled to modernize its financial management operations while coping with the sheer scale of its annual task -- collecting more than $1.6 trillion in tax revenue and processing more than $140 billion in tax refunds.
On a systemic level, for example, GAO found that the IRS general accounting ledger "cannot routinely generate reliable and timely financial information." This prevents the agency from being able to track tax receipts properly, the GAO said.
The IRS also continues to have trouble tracking and accumulating unpaid assessments -- taxes that IRS has recorded as owed to the government by taxpayers but for which payment has not yet been received. As a result, the GAO found that the IRS pursued collection from taxpayers even after the amounts owed had been paid.
In other cases, the GAO found, some tax refunds should not have been issued and some refunds were issued for incorrect amounts. The GAO did not report a total of unduly paid refunds.
A visit by the GAO auditors to four of the 10 IRS service centers and their review of IRS documents also found problems that had little to do with computerized financial management systems and could be quickly fixed with new operating procedures.
At one IRS center, for example, GAO auditors "observed the payments of checks and cash were being accepted in the lobby area by the security guard, who should not have been authorized to accept receipts. We also observed the guard did not log in the payments or provide the taxpayers with a receipt."
Later, the GAO team heard a taxpayer complain to the guard that her account was in default because a hand-delivered payment ended up being "returned to her by mail with postage due."
At the four IRS centers, which were not identified, GAO found that employees could bring their personal belongings into areas where mail was sorted and opened. IRS records showed that nine of 80 theft cases identified from January 1995 to July 1997 involved employees who had put stolen checks and cash into duffle bags, purses or lunch boxes, the GAO said.
The GAO recommended that the IRS consider installing surveillance cameras to monitor staff when they are sorting and opening mail and when they are processing checks and cash sent in by taxpayers. GAO also suggested that the agency provide lockers for employees so they can store personal items outside processing areas.
The IRS official said the agency was reexamining procedures at tax processing centers as a result of the GAO report. Each center already has a security plan and efforts are underway to increase security and limit access to areas that handle taxpayer remittances, the official said.
In its review of IRS operations, the GAO found that some checks attached to tax returns were overlooked by employees and inadvertently forwarded to other IRS offices that post tax data and examine returns. At one service center, 14 checks worth $171,000 were overlooked by mail sorters in one day.
"These overlooked receipts are more susceptible to theft," GAO noted.
In addition, when other IRS offices discover and return such checks, bank deposits are delayed by three to five days, costing the government interest income. "An IRS study at one service center found that over a four-week period, this time delay resulted in about $1 million interest lost on deposits," the GAO said.
"Federal tax revenues, which represent over 90 percent of the federal government's revenues, dwarf most other financial activities undertaken by any single entity, public or private, in the world," the GAO said. "Therefore, it is imperative that IRS establish strong financial management and internal controls to effectively carry out its mission."
The National Governors Association would like to have a national ID system, and plans to work with the White House to reinstate Executive Order 13083 to make that a reality.
The bipartisan NGA is claiming much of the credit for stopping Executive Order 13083, but they also plan to help craft a revised version of the order that will alter the relationship between states and the federal government.
An internal document used by the NGA to inform all governors of their goals and objectives was made available to WorldNetDaily, along with a "Fact Sheet on Federalism" used by the White House staff. Both documents were provided by a Republican source.
Each document shows that both the White House, and the nation's Governors, plan to put the currently suspended executive order into effect.
"This is because of demands by citizens, businesses, and the federal government to make all government more accessible and open," claims the NGA. "Pressures for uniformity and simplification come from globalization in trade and telecommunications policy, regional environmental quality solutions, and a greater need for some type of personal identification mechanism to combat fraud, crime, illegal immigration, and mismanagement of funds.
Congress passed the "Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996," which authorized the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration of the Department of Transportation to establish a national ID system through the use of driver's licenses. Those guidelines are spelled out in Section 656 (b) of the act. They include the use of Social Security numbers on all licenses, and in all data bases beginning Oct. 1, 2000.
The act also calls for digitized biometric information to be a part of each license, or "smart card." The biometric information will include fingerprints, retina scans, DNA prints, and other similar information.
Thousands of letters of protest were received by the Department of Transportation during a public comment period, which concluded in October. The exposure of the plan in WorldNetDaily, and the outcry that followed, prompted Congress to place a moratorium on the national ID, as well as the medical ID law.
Congress included three clauses in the omnibus appropriations bill to withhold funds for implementation of the national ID, medical ID and Executive Order 13083. Apparently the governors are not pleased with those actions, according to their document.
The documents obtained by WorldNetDaily clearly show that the NGA would like to facilitate a national ID system, and the organization believes Executive Order 13083, with some revisions, is needed to facilitate that.
David M. Bresnahan (David@talkusa.com) is a contributing editor of WorldNetDaily.com, is the author of "Cover Up: The Art and Science of Political Deception," and offers a monthly newsletter "Talk USA Investigative Reports."
Within minutes, the 22-year-old landscaper, soccer coach, father of two and -- at the time -- suspected drug dealer was dead. His body was hit with 12 bullets, nine of them in his back. No drugs were found.
A grand jury refused to indict the six officers for murder, charging only one with trespassing. They did lose their jobs, with Police Chief Clarence Bradford saying it was the most "egregious" case he'd ever seen.
Now Oregon's family has filed a federal lawsuit against the city and the officers, claiming they violating Oregon's civil rights by illegally entering his home July 12 and acting as "judge, jury and executioner."
"This shooting, this killing, was totally unjustified and constituted clear excessive use of force," said Richard Mithoff, an attorney for the family.
The lawsuit filed Tuesday alleges the shooting resulted from "failed" city policies that allowed the officers to rely on unauthorized informants and use different standards in raiding homes in poor, minority neighborhoods. The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages. In a letter sent to the city last month, the family's attorneys offered to settle all claims for $35 million.
City Attorney Anthony Hall said he is reviewing the lawsuit.
"It is the view of every city official that this is an extraordinarily tragic situation, not a good day for the city in terms of the incident itself, and it's regrettable," Hall said.
Oregon, 22, came to Houston from his native Michoacan, Mexico, in 1990. His mother, Claudia Navarro Pineda, is a legal permanent resident in Houston and had filed petitions for permanent residency status for all her children, including Oregon, who had worked for a landscaping business.
"I don't want another mother to go through what I am going through," she said after the lawsuit was filed.
An attorney for the fired officers did not return a message from The Associated Press. Hans Marticiuc, president of the Houston Police Officers Union, said the trial of the one officer charged with trespassing will reveal another side of the story.
"There's always a question as to the entry and the search and seizure. But that being put aside, even on an unlawful arrest, state law does not allow anyone to use deadly force against an officer," he said.
The Federal Communications Commission released a proposal last week for implementing the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA), a measure that requires telephone companies to provide law enforcement with access to digital call information. But the report left untouched the issue of whether the FBI would get new powers to tap Net calls. An FCC staffer, who asked to remain anonymous, said the question of how Net calls will be treated remains wide open, and may be decided during another round of public comments.
Congress passed CALEA in 1994, after law enforcement officials complained that digital technology undermined their ability to tap telephone lines. The bill was intended to give the FBI and other police agencies the same access to digital communications that they already have to traditional phone lines. Yet the technological landscape has changed since Congress' action. Voice transmissions using Internet technologies have moved from hobbyists' basements and into the corporate mainstream. Companies like Qwest are building whole business strategies around Net-based telephony, while the amount of data traffic on public networks has soared. The FBI wants access to these Net calls, and the leading industry proposal being reviewed by the FCC allows this. But civil liberties groups warn that this access goes beyond the original law's bounds, which don't apply well to Internet communications. "Congress said very explicitly that the CALEA law was not intended to apply to Internet communications," said Barry Steinhardt, president of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. "Over the long term this is the ability to get packet-switched data, not just voice information."
The sticking point lies in the way that law enforcement gets its power to tap lines, and in the way that permission fails to translate into the world of the Internet. Many people associate a wiretap with a listening post able to overhear the entire content of a call. This type of tap requires a law enforcement agency to meet a fairly high standard of evidence, to show it needs access to a certain phone line. But the vast majority of wiretaps fall into a category known as "tap and trace," in which phone companies give up information about a call's origin and destination without giving officials access to the actual call. This type of access is much easier for law enforcement officials to obtain, as they don't require evidence as strong as what is needed for standard wiretaps.
The "tap-and-trace" system doesn't carry over well to Net calls, which are broken down and transmitted in individual packets of information. Telephone company officials say it is impossible, at today's level of technology, for telephone carriers to hand over the header information in these packets--which would identify the call's origin and destination--without also handing over the actual content of the call itself.
"For us it's impossible to do just the one thing," said Grant Seiffert, vice president of governmental relations for the Telecommunications Industry Association. "Once you've opened the can of worms, the whole can stays open."
The EFF, along with the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT), the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the Electronic Privacy Information Center(EPIC), have lobbied the FCC hard to keep Net calls out of the wiretapping law for this reason.
"The FBI is saying, 'Trust us, give us the whole message and we'll strip out the call content,'" Steinhardt said. "We just don't trust them." For its part, the FBI says it needs access to the Net calls, or criminals will be able to hide in the telecommunications loophole. Officials have repeatedly said they will not violate court orders to look at the content of calls or data messages
The argument doesn't sway civil liberties groups. "If it's not feasible, the telcos shouldn't have to hand the information over," Steinhardt said. "[The FBI] shouldn't be given access to information they're not entitled to."
Comments on the issue of tapping Net calls, as well as the rest of the FCC's digital wiretapping plan, are due December 14. Telephone companies are not required to comply with the CALEA provisions until June 30, 2000.
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