You know what we don’t have enough of lately? Truly terrible ideas.
So thank you, Daily Beast, for helping to unleash this one:
Other countries have domestic spy agencies to fight extremists at home. Does America need one, too? https://t.co/kwhCqRWyI3
— The Daily Beast (@thedailybeast) January 18, 2021
More from Jeff Stein:
What we had here was a failure to communicate. Again, on January 6—years after numerous investigations and study commissions picked apart the intelligence failures leading up to the September 11, 2001 terror attacks. Last week, America’s security agencies were again caught flat footed when another kind of militant wave, this time pro-Trump fanatics, stormed and trashed the citadel of American democracy, nearly executing what al-Qaeda had failed to do, destroy the U.S. Capitol.
Democrats in Congress are teeing up another round of investigations and commissions to get to the bottom of the January 6 insurrection, which will almost certainly revisit the thorny question of whether the U.S. needs an independent counter-subversion agency to infiltrate and neutralize armed domestic extremists, who are now threatening more attacks on or around the inauguration of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.
…
It’s deja vu all over again. In the wake of the 9/11 attacks, blue ribbon commissions stumbled all over each other to find out what went wrong, with all of them coming to more or less the same conclusions: U.S. intelligence was awash in reports on al-Qaeda, but “too often failed…to appreciate its collective significance in terms of a probable terrorist attack,” as the joint report of the House and Senate intelligence committees put it.
…
All find echoes in the events surrounding January 6. None dare say “wake-up call” or “lessons learned”—there’s been far too many of them over the decades. But one response to the 9/11 tragedy may well get renewed attention after the Capitol assault—especially if armed white nationalists are successful in carrying out more attacks in the coming days and weeks: The call for a secret police.
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Now, to be fair, Stein doesn’t necessarily endorse this idea. He’s just, you know, putting out there. And for what it’s worth, he’s not the first to entertain it:
NBC’s Jeremy Bash on the Capitol Hill rioters: “We’re going to have to reset our entire intelligence approach … We’re going to have to look at greater surveillance of them, the FBI is going to have to run confidential sources” pic.twitter.com/L2xgeUPhXE
— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) January 18, 2021
Yeah, this all sounds very promising.
Does this seem familiar to anyone else? https://t.co/SAlEkCD1Hw pic.twitter.com/REMypwAAQU
— Baz Jones (@bazyjonesy) January 18, 2021
You gotta hand it to the intel community; their ability to weaponize current events to disproportionately increase their budget and authority is unparalleled. https://t.co/IkU9IiictF
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) January 18, 2021
Yes. More surveillance of American citizens is the perfect start for a new administration. Great idea. ?
— The Masstronaut (@TMasstronaut) January 18, 2021
An overt, stated intent towards surveillance…
Patriot Act on steroids. https://t.co/Vw7zhjBzeB
— Jeff Carlson (@themarketswork) January 18, 2021
out:defund the police
in: fund the secret policethis is much better???
— Count Mo (@Mast3rmo) January 18, 2021
I agree, we should emulate China and have thought police send dissenters to camps
— Comfortably Smug (@ComfortablySmug) January 18, 2021
Nothing whatsoever could go wrong with this plan.https://t.co/OLeBXLRsyD
— Peter Cook (@_Peter_Cook) January 18, 2021
Definitely not.
I can't even imagine how badly this would be abused. https://t.co/iMEMIwylKh
— JJ MacNab (@jjmacnab) January 18, 2021
Maybe you don’t have to.
Hall of Fame of bad ideas right here. This is the good stuff, the playoff football. https://t.co/VqvSWTRLVg
— Seth Mandel (@SethAMandel) January 18, 2021
How it starts || how it goes, literally every time pic.twitter.com/weAOsH2sQA
— Seth Mandel (@SethAMandel) January 18, 2021
Welp.
It’s MLK day, guys. Maybe give him a Google and, you know, see if that answers your question about domestic surveillance operations https://t.co/cPhMpPWotS
— Emily Zanotti (@emzanotti) January 18, 2021
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