Some great bloggers don’t got a blog. They’ve got a DailyKos diary instead:
The training I attended, in 2004, was required of employees at my federal agency. The government contractor conducting the class provided an overview of terrorist groups and their methods. Then, we were informed that environmental and animal rights groups, including Greenpeace, PETA and others, were “terrorists.” Individuals who threw pies at government officials were labeled terrorists, too. All of them – Greenpeace and the pie-thrower included, were included in the same category as Al Qaeda, the terrorist group that killed thousands of Americans on September 11, 2001.
The trainers urged us to spy on such groups and any others that we considered suspicious to us. The guidelines were pretty flexible. Anyone who used certain words or phrases, like “direct action,” was fair game. We were urged to spy on people on the internet, at their offices and homes, by phone or in person, We were given a computer disk with information and tools we could use to locate their home addresses, track internet activity, obtain criminal records, credit histories and other personal information. What we did not receive was instruction in privacy laws or protecting the personal data we were urged to acquire.
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