Paul Craig Roberts (via LRC) comments on FBI raids on antiwar activists:

“On September 24, Jason Ditz reported on Antiwar.com that “the FBI is confirming that this morning they began a number of raids against the homes of antiwar activists in Illinois, Minneapolis, Michigan, and North Carolina, claiming that they are ‘seeking evidence relating to activities concerning the material support of terrorism.’”

Now we know what Homeland Security (sic) secretary Janet Napolitano meant when she said on September 10: “The old view that ‘if we fight the terrorists abroad, we won’t have to fight them here’ is just that – the old view.” The new view, Napolitano said, is “to counter violent extremism right here at home.”

“Violent extremism” is one of those undefined police state terms that will mean whatever the government wants it to mean. In this morning’s FBI’s foray into the homes of American citizens of conscience, it means antiwar activists, whose activities are equated with “the material support of terrorism,” just as conservatives equated Vietnam era anti-war protesters with giving material support to communism.

Anti-war activist Mick Kelly whose home was raided, sees the FBI raids as harassment to intimidate those who organize war protests. I wonder if Kelly is underestimating the threat. The FBI’s own words clearly indicate that the federal police agency and the judges who signed the warrants do not regard antiwar protesters as Americans exercising their Constitutional rights, but as unpatriotic elements offering material support to terrorism.

“Material support” is another of those undefined police state terms. In this context the term means that Americans who fail to believe their government’s lies and instead protest its policies, are supporting their government’s declared enemies and, thus, are not exercising their civil liberties but committing treason.

As this initial FBI foray is a softening up move to get the public accustomed to the idea that the real terrorists are their fellow citizens here at home, Kelly will get off this time. But next time the FBI will find emails on his computer from a “terrorist group” set up by the CIA that will incriminate him. Under the practices put in place by the Bush and Obama regimes, and approved by corrupt federal judges, protesters who have been compromised by fake terrorist groups can be declared “enemy combatants” and sent off to Egypt, Poland, or some other corrupt American puppet state – Canada perhaps – to be tortured until confession is forthcoming that antiwar protesters and, indeed, every critic of the US government, are on Osama bin Laden’s payroll.

Almost every Republican and conservative and, indeed, the majority of Americans will fall for this, only to find, later, that it is subversive to complain that their Social Security was cut in the interest of the war against Iran or some other demonized entity, or that they couldn’t have a Medicare operation because the wars in Central Asia and South America required the money.

Americans are the most gullible people who ever existed. They tend to support the government instead of the Constitution, and almost every Republican and conservative regards civil liberty as a coddling device that encourages criminals and terrorists.

The US media, highly concentrated in violation of the American principle of a diverse and independent media, will lend its support to the witch hunts that will close down all protests and independent thought in the US over the next few years. As the Nazi leader Joseph Goebbels said, “think of the press as a great keyboard on which the Government can play.”

An American Police State was inevitable once Americans let “their” government get away with 9/11. Americans are too gullible, too uneducated, and too jingoistic to remain a free people. As another Nazi leader Herman Goering said, “ The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. Tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peace-makers for lack of patriotism and for exposing the country to danger.”

This is precisely what the Bush and Obama regimes have done. America, as people of my generation knew it, no longer exists.”

My Comment

I admire Paul Craig Roberts for his willingness to articulate things in a forthright manner. But reading the reports on the net so far, I think it’s wise to wait a bit to figure out what exactly is going on here first.

So, I’ll just note the following, from this article:

Mick Kelly, one of several activists whose homes were raided, played a central role in protests at the Republican National Convention in 2008, so we are talking, in his case, about someone who organized a confrontational demonstration and didn’t just make an oral or print statement [not that that isn’t protected by the Bill of Rights, as well].

Kelly is a member of/associated with a group called the Freedom Road Socialist Organization, whose website states the following:

“Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO) is a revolutionary socialist and Marxist-Leninist organization in the United States. The members of Freedom Road are very active in movements fighting for justice, particularly in labor, oppressed nationality, anti-war and anti-imperialist, and student movements. Freedom Road is characterized by our understanding of national oppression in the United States. Freedom Road was founded in 1985 with the merger of 3 groups that were born in the New Communist Movement of the 1970s.  Since then other groups and many new activists have joined our ranks. “

A member of the executive committee and a leader in the student wing of the group writes the following in an article:

“The central task of Marxist-Leninists in the United States today is to build a new Communist Party on a Marxist-Leninist basis. Without a Party guided by the most advanced revolutionary theory it is impossible for the working class to take power and build socialism, which is so desperately needed. Like so many students before them, we want students who join Freedom Road Socialist Organization to transform themselves and eventually to go into the working class and the masses of the oppressed nationalities to help lead the class struggle. Mao Zedong once asked, “How should we judge whether a youth is a revolutionary? How can we tell? There can be only one criterion, namely, whether or not he is willing to integrate himself with the broad masses of workers and peasants and does so in practice. If he is willing do so and actually does so, he is revolutionary.”(11) This was true when Mao Zedong said it in 1939 and it is true today.”

The FBI is apparently looking for more information on trips Kelly is supposed to have made on behalf of this outfit. The trips were, reportedly, to countries like Palestine and Colombia. The FBI is looking for any evidence that support was provided to terrorist groups like FARC in Colombia or Hezbollah (Lebanon) or the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestinian.

What is interesting is that there’s no longer any pretense that “Homeland Security” refers to defense against those who committed the attack on 9-11 or to defense against Islamic jihad. “Homeland Security” apparently entails attacking any supporter of any group that stands in the way of US government (as opposed to American) interests anywhere in the world.

It’s a conveniently flexible definition.