Saturday, May 28, 2011
Steve Watson
Prisonplanet.com
May 27, 2011
Utah looks likely to be the next state to follow the example set by Texas in attempting to make TSA grope downs a felony.
Rep. Carl Wimmer, R-Herriman has introduced a bill into the Utah House of Representatives that would ensure TSA agents would have to abide by the same Fourth Amendment limits that police do when performing searches on Americans.
“It is a work in progress,” Wimmer told the Utah Daily Herald. “What it would do right now is simply say TSA agents are not exempt from the requirement of reasonable suspicion or probable cause to pat down a citizen.”
Like the bill that was recently unanimously passed in the Texas House, Wimmer’s legislation would make it an offense to touch the private parts of the person on the receiving end of the pat-down.
As we reported yesterday, the man who was instrumental in working with the federal government to sabotage the Texas bill was Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, a former CIA agent and establishment insider considered to be the wealthiest man in Texas politics.
The bill stalled in the Texas Senate, after the Department of Justice sent a letter threatening to impose a no fly zone over Texas and shut down Texas airports. The warning was nothing short of a federal blockade and an act of financial terrorism.
Rep. Wimmer, a long time champion of states rights, told the Utah Daily Herald that it is untrue that the federal government has supremacy over the state of Texas in the matter.
“The absolute overbearing audacity of the federal government in threatening Texas while Texas is trying to protect their citizens should really offend any red-blooded American,” Wimmer said, adding that the issue has been transformed from solely a Fourth Amendment concern to an assault on the Tenth Amendment and states rights.
As a former police officer, Wimmer is adamant that TSA agents should be held up to the same standards as law enforcement officers, and that law abiding citizens should not be subjected to personal searches without reason.“It does not feel like America when you are going through a TSA checkpoint at the airport,” Wimmer said.
Wimmer’s bill will be considered and debated in the new year when the 2012 legislative session begins in Utah.
Lawmakers in other states, including New Hampshire and California, have already looked into banning TSA gropedowns.
A number of other lobby groups, state and local authorities around the country have also resolved to either block the TSA body scanners or kick the TSA out of airports altogether, including New Jersey, where Republican state Senator Mike Doherty has vowed to push for legislation that will ban both the scanners as well as invasive groping techniques.
Should several more states follow the same example set by Texas, the TSA and the Justice Department will have a major job on their hands threatening half the country with no fly zones and convincing Americans that it is the prudent course of action.
Texans Revolt Against TSA Tyranny, Storm Capitol
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Steve Watson is the London based writer and editor for Alex Jones’ Infowars.net, and Prisonplanet.com. He has a Masters Degree in International Relations from the School of Politics at The University of Nottingham in England.
Labels: Steve Watson, Transportation Security Administration, TSA, Utah
Monday, February 28, 2011
Standard-Examiner
OGDEN -- Attempting a police omniscience seen in only about 20 U.S. cities, the Ogden Police Department is gearing up for a "real time crime center" to be operational soon after its Crime Blimp launches.
The center hopes to eventually be linked with the thousands of private and government security cameras around town, including the city's own inventory of some 200 cameras.
Utah Department of Transportation and Utah Transit Authority are already on board to share their cameras with Ogden police in the video center planned for soon-to-be-remodeled offices in the department headquarters.
Officials are shooting for an April launch date for the blimp, under construction by Weber State University's Utah Center for Aeronautical Innovation and Design, which will feed video to a fledgling version of the RTCC. They hope the center is fully operational by July...[Full Article]
Labels: blimp, security cameras, Utah
Thursday, January 27, 2011
BBC
A US military base that carries out tests to protect troops against biological attacks was locked down on Wednesday to resolve a "serious concern", officials have said.
The base in Dugway, Utah, reopened early Thursday to allow staff in and out. There were reported to be 1,200 to 1,400 people inside Dugway at the time.
Base commander Col William King said on Wednesday no-one was in danger.
No information was given on the nature of the problem...
[Full Article]
Labels: biological, U.S. Army, Utah
Homeland Security Newswire
The mayor of Ogden, Utah, wants to buy a blimp to help the city police fight crime; Mayor Matthew Godfrey says a blimp is "far less expensive to purchase and to operate than the other UAVs that are out there"; Godfrey envisions using a blimp "largely to patrol," and said that another benefit of the model being developed for Ogden is that its route can be pre-programmed; he also highlights the blimp's "deterrent factor"
T-Hawk's entry for police surveillance blimps // Source: suasnews.com
The Utah mayor who wants his town to use unmanned blimp to fight crime says that when it comes to the cost of a UAV, there is no beating blimps...
[Full Article]Labels: big brother, blimp, Ogden, police, police state, privacy, surveillance, Utah
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Utah State Trooper Punches Woman in the Face
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hcfJ-ePtS4
UHP investigating trooper who allegedly attacked woman
58-year-old Darla Wright had been spotted speeding on Washington Blvd. in Ogden when officers tried to pull her over. They managed to stop the woman using a pit maneuver.
Sgt. Davenport was then seen breaking the driver's side window, reaching into the car, and repeatedly punching the woman...
[Full Article]
Labels: police, police brutality, UHP, Utah, Utah Highway Patrol
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
(Reuters) - A proposed unmanned floating airship surveillance system is being hailed by city officials in Ogden, Utah as one way to fight crime in its neighborhoods.
"We believe it will be a deterrent to crime when it is out and about and will help us solve crimes more quickly when they do occur," Ogden City Mayor Matthew Godfrey told Reuters.
The airship entails military technology now available to local law enforcement, he said.
Godfrey floated the idea of a dirigible in the skies above Ogden for his city council members last week. The council is expected to vote on the measure in coming weeks.
He says the cost of the blimp is being negotiated but said it is more "cost effective" to operate than helicopters or fixed winged aircraft.
"We anticipate using it mainly at night. The cameras have incredible night vision to see with tremendous clarity daytime and nighttime. It will be used like a patrol car. It will be used to go and check things out and keep things safe," said Godfrey.
One person will be able to operate the system but Godfrey says it will also function on its own with programing directives...
[Full Article]Labels: big brother, blimp, surveillance, Utah
Thursday, January 6, 2011
DeseretNews.com
By Steve Fidel, Deseret News
CAMP WILLIAMS — Today's groundbreaking for a $1.5 billion National Security Administration data center is being billed as important in the short term for construction jobs and important in the long term for Utah's reputation as a technology center.
"This will bring 5,000 to 10,000 new jobs during its construction and development phase," Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said on Wednesday. "Once completed, it will support 100 to 200 permanent high-paid employees."
Officially named the Utah Data Center, the facility's role in aggregating and verifying dizzying volumes of data for the intelligence community has already earned it the nickname "Spy Center." Its really long moniker is the Community Comprehensive National Cyber-security Initiative Data Center — the first in the nation's intelligence community.
A White House document identifies the Comprehensive National Cyber-security Initiative as addressing "one of the most serious economic and national security challenges we face as a nation, but one that we as a government or as a country are not adequately prepared to counter." The document details a number of technology-related countermeasures to the security threat.
Hatch said Utah was chosen for the project over 37 other locations. He characterized the cyber-security center as the "largest military construction project in recent memory."
Hatch said he promoted Utah's favorable energy costs, Internet infrastructure, thriving software industry and proximity to the Salt Lake City International Airport in the bid process that ended up with Camp Williams earning the data center.
The Army Corps of Engineers is overseeing the project that is under contract to a joint venture between Big-D Construction in Salt Lake City, U.K.-based Balfour Beatty Construction and DPR Construction out of California.
"This project is going to give an opportunity for an awful lot of Utahns" who have seen construction jobs in Utah drop from 100,000 in 2008 to about 66,000 today, said Rob Moore, president and COO of Big-D and chairman of the Associated General Contractors in Utah. "My subcontractors, suppliers and vendors are very appreciative of the work that will be available on this project."
Grading work is already under way for the complex, which is scheduled to include 100,000 square feet for the data center and 900,000 square feet for technical support and administrative space. The center is designed to be capable of generating all of its own power through backup electrical generators and will have both fuel and water storage. Construction is designed to achieve environmentally significant LEED Silver certification.
"It is so unique and so intensive," Hatch said. "This will establish our state as one of the leading states for technology."
Labels: National Security Agency, NSA, Utah
Sunday, October 3, 2010
Israeli "Art Students" Asking Questions About NSA Data Center in Utah
SARATOGA SPRINGS, Utah (ABC 4 News) - Sales people working neighborhoods in Northern Utah County have been asking some odd questions that have nothing to do with making the sale. Folks are reporting that they're asking about the new National Security Agency's data center that is being built at Camp Williams.
The sales people say they're Israeli art students and are selling their works to raise money for a gallery. Some have even produced what appear to be legitimate Israeli passports.
So, why would art students be interested in an NSA data center?...
[Full Article]
Utah residents fear ‘Israeli art students’ prying into NSA data center
A local ABC affiliate in Salt Lake City, Utah has caused a stir online with a report suggesting that self-proclaimed Israeli art students, peddling their artwork from door to door, have been asking disturbing questions about plans to build an NSA data center in the area.
"These salespeople say they're Israeli students," ABC4 reporter Brent Hunsaker explained. "They even produce Israeli passports. They say they're selling their own artwork to raise money to open a gallery. So why would the Israeli art students want to know about the National Security Agency?"
According to Hunsaker, warnings about the students are being spread through blogs and church bulletins. One bulletin sent out to Mormon women even claimed that "federal law enforcement groups are actually investigating their ties to organized crime and terrorist groups."
There may, however, be less to the story than meets the eye.
The basis for the suspicions goes back to 2002, when a lengthy article at Salon described how Drug Enforcement Agency field offices were reporting that "young Israelis claiming to be art students and offering artwork for sale had been attempting to penetrate DEA offices for over a year. The Israelis had also attempted to penetrate the offices of other law enforcement and Department of Defense agencies."...
[Full Article][Webmaster - This was the same "modus operandi" that occurred immediately before 9/11 happened.]
Labels: espionage, National Security Agency, NSA, Utah
Sunday, February 21, 2010
PAST ARTICLES: Alphabet Agencies On The Move
Domestic Division Would Be Moved
The CIA has plans to relocate the headquarters of its domestic division, which is responsible for operations and recruitment in the United States, from the CIA's Langley headquarters to Denver, a move designed to promote innovation, according to U.S. intelligence and law enforcement officials...
...The main function of the domestic division, which has stations in many major U.S. cities, is to conduct voluntary debriefings of U.S. citizens who travel overseas for work or to visit relatives, and to recruit foreign students, diplomats and businesspeople to become CIA assets when they return to their countries. It was unclear how many CIA employees would relocate to Denver under the plan.
Although collecting information on U.S. citizens under suspicion for terrorist links is primarily an FBI function, the CIA may also collect information on citizens under limited circumstances, according to a 1981 executive order. The exact guidelines for those operations are spelled out in a classified document signed by the CIA director and approved by the attorney general...
...Colorado has become a major intelligence hub since Sept. 11, 2001.
The Denver suburb of Aurora is home to the little-known Aerospace Data Facility. Located inside Buckley Air Force Base, it has become the major U.S.-based technical downlink for intelligence satellites operated by the military, the National Security Agency and the National Reconnaissance Office, according to military and government documents obtained by William Arkin, author of "Code Names," a book about secret military plans and programs.
About 70 miles away, the U.S. Northern Command, based at Peterson Air Force Base, in Colorado Springs, is tasked with homeland defense and has been increasing its domestic intelligence work...
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Spies Like Us: NSA To Build Huge Facility In Utah
Hoping to protect its top-secret operations by decentralizing its massive computer hubs, the National Security Agency will build a 1-million-square-foot data center at Utah's Camp Williams...
...The NSA bills itself as the home of America's codemakers and codebreakers, but the Department of Defense agency is perhaps better known for its signals intelligence program, which is reported to have the capacity to tap into a significant amount of the world's communications. The agency also has been the subject of significant criticism by civil libertarians, who have accused it of unwarranted monitoring of the communications of U.S. citizens. The NSA's heavily automated computerized operations have for years been based at Fort Meade, Maryland, but the agency began looking to decentralize its efforts following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001...
Labels: Central Intelligence Agency, CIA, Colorado, Denver, National Security Agency, NSA, Salt Lake City, Utah
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