[Peace] Fwd:[ANSWER]: Call to Action: JUNE 29 - MARCH ON THE FBI in
jencart
jencart at mycidco.com
Tue Jun 4 20:26:29 CDT 2002
--------------------------------------------------------------
CALL TO ACTION:
Saturday, June 29 @ 12 noon
MARCH ON THE FBI AND JUSTICE DEPARTMENT
headquarters in Washington DC
Pennsylvania Ave. between 9th and 10th St. NW
- Say no to the FBI attacks on civil rights and civil
liberties
- Stand up against racism and racial and religious
profiling
- No new COINTELPRO
- Defend the Arab American, Muslim and South Asian
communities
- Stop the new witchhunt against political and religious
organizations
- Free Mumia Abu-Jamal, Leonard Peltier & all political
prisoners in the U.S.
- Money for jobs, education and healthcare - not
repression and war
The Bush administration announced in the last week of May that the FBI would be seizing vast additional powers to
spy on the people of the United States. We must act now to stop this assault on our rights.
These powers pose a grave danger to civil liberties and civil rights, and will - unless defeated by the people -
lead to a new round of persecution of people based on
their political or religious convictions.
There was no vote in Congress. No public referendum. No judicial review. George Bush, Attorney General John
Ashcroft and FBI director Robert Mueller decided to
unleash the FBI on people targeted by the Bush
administration - not because they have committed a crime, not because they are being investigated for a crime. They will be targeted because the government has determined that their political or religious views or affiliations
warrant surveillance, infiltration, and disruption of
their personal lives or the organizations to which they
belong.
Ashcroft and Mueller are adopting the tactics of the
vicious reign of J. Edgar Hoover's secret police tactics
that were used against unions, progressive groups, and African American, Latino and American Indian civil rights organizations. Tens of thousands of people lost their
jobs, were falsely imprisoned, were deported or went into exile and were subject to government harassment. Scores of political activists in the Black Panther Party, the
Young Lords Party and in many others movements were murdered by FBI COINTELPRO (counter-intelligence)
programs.
Pressure brought to bear on the government from the mass people's movements of the 1960s and 1970s eventually led to the government adopting new guidelines, purportedly designed to curb FBI abuse of people's rights. In fact,
this kind of FBI abuse has never stopped. What is new is that the FBI is overtly shifting from focusing on criminal investigations into focusing on counter-intelligence
programs - a code word for an attack on dissent and on political and religious organizations that Bush and
Ashcroft have decided should be targeted. Following on the heals of the Patriot Act - which has put the CIA back into the business of domestic spying - the FBI and the CIA are teaming up to conduct secret police activities.
Since September 11, 2001, thousands of Muslim, Arab
American and South Asian people have been subjected to the complete violation of their civil rights and civil
liberties. Charitable organizations have had their assets seized. Thousands have been illegally detained.
Educational institutions, homes and businesses have been raided. And the FBI has carried out a massive
interrogation campaign of people based on race, religion and ethnicity.
Bush, Ashcroft and the ultra-right are taking advantage of the so-called war on terrorism to beat back the First
Amendment and the Bill of Rights. They think that people will be frightened and intimidated and unwilling to carry
out a political mobilization to stop this attack on free
speech.
As Bush p
More information about the Peace
mailing list