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Banned
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Remember what happened at FEMA,and at the CIA, and at the DOJ? Here is a spotlight on the FBI:
Quote:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...011103665.html
...Bassem Youssef, a decorated FBI supervisor who was born in Egypt and speaks fluent Arabic, also said jealousy, discrimination and flawed directives hinder the FBI's attempts to fight terrorism.
"The FBI has publicly stated that <h3>expertise in working counterterrorism matters, and cultural understanding of the Middle East and the radical Islamic groups, as well as the language, are not necessary to run the counterterrorism division,"</h3> said Youssef, speaking publicly for the first time on the subject Saturday at an American Library Association meeting.
Youssef, 49, the highest ranking Arab-American agent, has a discrimination lawsuit pending against the bureau. He has also raised concerns about the FBI's alleged misuse of warrantless searches.
Youssef canceled plans to deliver prepared remarks, after what his lawyer called FBI censorship and threats of disciplinary action, and instead answered questions from the audience.
FBI spokesman Richard Kolko said speeches are reviewed to protect employees and classified information, but that the agency respects its employees' First Amendment rights. .....
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Surely they are not fighting for "the right" to come home to live the rest of their lives in a "police state", are they? Wouldn't they want to know that the FBI promotes the most qualified agents to lead the bureau in fighting "the war of terrorism"?
Quote:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...011103665.html
FBI Picks Terrorism Expert to Lead Agency's National Security Sector
By John Solomon
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, January 12, 2008; A02
The FBI named a career-long expert in terrorism to its top national security job yesterday as one of its own agents went public with allegations that the bureau still lacks the experience and skills needed to effectively combat terrorists.
Agent Bassem Youssef, a whistle-blower who alleged he was passed over for promotions after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, said in an <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/12/AR2008011202317.html">interview with The Washington Post</a> that counterterrorism agents and their managers still lack basic knowledge about Middle Eastern culture, Arabic language and terrorist mind-sets.
In some cases, Youssef said, that lack of knowledge has caused agents to investigate people they should not, by claiming emergency circumstances. As a result, he added, they are missing others who should be under scrutiny. Youssef currently oversees a headquarters office involved in the gathering of phone records in counterterrorism cases.
"We are . . . really misreading the investigations and the motives and the threats. We're looking at this case as something that is an emergency and exigent when it really isn't," Youssef said. FBI officials disputed Youssef's claims.
....In the aftermath of Sept. 11, the FBI promoted numerous managers to top counterterrorism jobs who had more experience investigating crimes than fighting terrorism, prompting criticisms from both Congress and its own ranks.
Youssef was among those inside the FBI to raise concerns. A decorated counterterrorism agent in the 1990s who was singled out for praise by then-FBI Director Louis J. Freeh, Youssef was passed over for promotions after the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon and pursued a discrimination lawsuit.
As a result of Youssef's litigation, several of the bureau's top terrorism managers acknowledged in depositions that they had limited experience in terrorism or limited knowledge of Middle Eastern culture before taking their jobs. <h3>An internal investigation eventually substantiated Youssef's claims that the FBI retaliated against him.</h3>
Youssef was scheduled to speak publicly today about the FBI at the American Library Association's meeting in Philadelphia. His lawyer accused the FBI of refusing to let him deliver a speech there, but bureau officials said they simply asked Youssef to put his planned remarks through a standard clearance process. Instead of giving a speech, Youssef plans a question-and-answer session.
Youssef said that in 2005 his entire office was diverted to work on the "Coyote Runner" case in which raw intelligence suggested Iraqi agents were being smuggled across the Mexican border for some sort of dirty-bomb plot. The intelligence proved wrong, and Youssef said he tried to tell his boss at the beginning that the tip was suspect, but he was overruled.
Miller said the FBI decided not to engage in "guesswork" about the suspect intelligence and instead chose to investigate to ensure that the plot was not real.
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At the Librarian's Association meeting on friday, Bassem Youssef attempted to answer question, since the FBI prohibited him from addressing the group,unless the FBI could edit (censor) his speech, before he gave it:
Quote:
http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t...cid=1126207948
At ALA Midwinter, Arab-American FBI Agent Says Agency Cuts Corners
Norman Oder -- Library Journal, 1/12/2008
* First appearance at public forum
* Says FBI lax on National Security Letters
* Suggests gag order isn’t wise
In his first appearance at a public forum (though he has done media interviews), Bassem Youssef, the highest-ranking Arab American agent in the FBI, this morning offered a careful but impassioned indictment of current FBI practices in the war on terror, warning that the FBI is cutting corners to acquire data without supporting the human intelligence that would be more effective. He had been scheduled to present a speech at the American Library Association (ALA) Midwinter Meeting in Philadelphia, but after the FBI got wind of an ALA press release, he was limited to answering questions and was sometimes cautioned by his attorney, Stephen Kohn, not to offer more details.
Youssef, who noted that he was speaking for himself, not the FBI, explained how FBI standards have become less stringent in overseeing what may become fishing expeditions for information. Before 9/11 and the USA PATRIOT Act, he said, National Security Letters (NSLs)—which do not require judicial oversight, as do subpoenas—had to be authorized by an official at FBI headquarters. After the Patriot Act, however, NSLs could be authorized by the Special Agent in Charge at FBI field offices. “That diffused it, in terms of authority,” he said.
NSLs, Youssef, explained, <h3>allow the FBI to search the “community of interest” of a target—essentially anyone the person calls. “If there’s an assumption that all their contacts are bad contacts, we’re in big trouble.”
</h3>
Shunted aside?
Youssef, who immigrated to the United States with his family from Egypt, had been lauded for work in the 1990s, but after he complained that his skills were not being used following the 9/11 attacks, he was shunted aside and has sued for discrimination. (The Department of Justice’s Office of Professional Responsibility, in a preliminary investigation, found grounds to believe that Youssef’s disclosures to the FBI director contributed to his not being placed in a department investigating international terrorism.) “All I’ve ever wanted to do was be a good FBI agent…and arrest terrorists,” Youssef told the audience.
Youssef was moved from counterintelligence to head the Communications Analysis Unit, supervising 50 agents. “As easy as it was to get an NSL for warrantless searching, the FBI wasn’t even doing that,” his lawyer explained. “Instead, they were relying on a very narrow exception known as exigent circumstances, where they need nothing—nothing!”
FBI officials, Kohn said, told Youssef that an exigent circumstance meant “we need it promptly. <h3>We now know that the definition provided was a false definition, because exigent circumstances require life-threatening or imminent [danger].”</h3>
Gag order OK?
Attorney Tom Susman, a consultant to ALA’s Washington Office, asked Youssef whether he thought the gag order accompanying NSLs, which prohibits targets—such as the four “John Doe” librarians in Connecticut—from revealing that an investigation is ongoing, was “in all cases fully justified.”
“There’s so much I can’t get into,” replied Youssef. “But I can say that it takes an official who’s got the expertise and experience to justify” whether such a gag order is necessary.
“Would it make it less effective if there were more central control?” Susman followed up.
Obtaining telephone, library, and email records in counterterrorism investigations, Youssef responded, requires expertise. He gave the hypothetical example of an FBI official who has worked only organized crime. “You could imagine what sort of abuse might happen as a result.”
“If the person signing the NSL hasno real basic understanding of terrorism,” Kohn continued, “what gives them the qualification for signing for warrantless searches for thousands of Americans?”
Depressing or inspiring?
<h3>One questioner in the audience called the session “the most depressing 45 minutes,” while another, later on and after Kohn urged attendees to support the work of the National Whistleblowers Center, said that Youssef’s willingness to press on was inspiring.</h3>
“I’m a strong believer in God,” Youssef responded, explaining the source of his fortitude. “I believe that God is a righteous God. Jesus Christ is my lord, and I live for him.” Later, at the end of the session, he got a standing ovation.
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I am depressed because I am wondering if the repression is far enough along now, to insure.....I guess we have only to wait until after the voting in november to see if the rise of the new police state is to guarantee that the permanent supremacy of one political party is accomplished.
Last edited by host; 01-13-2008 at 12:49 AM..
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