Rev. Heber Brown, III with Former Black Panther, Kathleen Cleaver

The first time I met Kathleen Cleaver was a November 2007 Black Panther Rank & File Symposium that the Maryland Institute College of Art put on. As my blog article from that day reveals; I was touched by the continuing flame of Cleaver’s passion for the same issues she put her body on the line for back in the Panther’s heyday.

Which is why I’m excited that she’s on her way to Baltimore once more. This time to talk about Cointelpro – the U.S. Government’s covert and illegal assault upon those individuals and groups that it deemed were a threat to national security. (sound familiar?)

There will also be a viewing and discussion of COINTELPRO 101 – an educational film about the FBI program.

This is a timely event and viewing given that Clint Eastwood is preparing to release a film about J. Edgar Hoover – the man who directed COINTELPRO and has federal buildings named after him today -authorized the harassment and in some cases outright assassination of Black people in this country.

If you’re in the Baltimore area, you don’t want to miss this event:

But what I’m really intrigued by is the revolutionary energy outside of the Democratic National Convention. Beyond the whitewashed theatrical production taking place on center stage every night, is a mass of people who are fed up with this oligarchical society and the fourth branch of its government – the media. Check out these clips of protests happening outside the building. (Note: there is some harsh language in some of the clips. If you don’t want to hear it – don’t click “play”)

FOX NEWS REPORTER GETS JACKED UP!

DEAD PREZ PUTS TRUTH TO MUSIC AT DNC!

POLICE SLAM CODEPINK PROTESTER!

IF THIS IS GOING ON OUTSIDE OF THE DNC, CAN YOU IMAGINE THE CARNAGE THAT WILL UNFOLD OUTSIDE OF THE REPUBLICAN NATIONAL CONVENTION!?!

There’s a reason why this story broke late Friday/early Saturday morning.  It’s called the politics of news placement.  The Fourth Branch of the Government (aka mainstream American media) knows that if you want to slip something by the American people; you don’t publish it on Monday morning.  You wait until Friday when people have their minds focused on weekend plans and are less likely to give energy to heavy news items. That’s not hard to do these days.  Americans by and large are terribly apathetic – choosing to dedicate more attention to the all-important question of who is the father of Anna Nicole Smith’s baby…and how can I forget – the American Idol “controversy”.  (We have no idea of what a controversy is.)

This reminds me of a poster from my 7th grade social studies class.  It read:

THOSE WHO DO NOT STUDY HISTORY ARE BOUND TO REPEAT IT

The “powers that be on earth” rely on the American public’s apathy about these types of issues and our collective amnesia concerning similarly related items from our history. 

Does anybody remember the FBI’s illegal Counter Intelligence Program also known as COINTELPRO?  Better yet – was anyone taught about this in high school?  college?

This program’s goal was to: “expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, or otherwise neutralize” the activities of these movements and their leaders.”  People like Martin Luther King, Jr. Malcolm X, Fred Hampton, Marc Clarke, and many others were assassinated with the support and active involvement of COINTELPRO agents.

A major investigation of COINTELPRO was launched in 1976 called the Church Committee.  The final report of the Church Committee concluded:

“Too many people have been spied upon by too many Government agencies and too much information has been collected. The Government has often undertaken the secret surveillance of citizens on the basis of their political beliefs, even when those beliefs posed no threat of violence or illegal acts on behalf of a hostile foreign power. The Government, operating primarily through secret informants, but also using other intrusive techniques such as wiretaps, microphone “bugs”, surreptitious mail opening, and break-ins, has swept in vast amounts of information about the personal lives, views, and associations of American citizens. Investigations of groups deemed potentially dangerous — and even of groups suspected of associating with potentially dangerous organizations — have continued for decades, despite the fact that those groups did not engage in unlawful activity. Groups and individuals have been harassed and disrupted because of their political views and their lifestyles. Investigations have been based upon vague standards whose breadth made excessive collection inevitable. Unsavory and vicious tactics have been employed — including anonymous attempts to break up marriages, disrupt meetings, ostracize persons from their professions, and provoke target groups into rivalries that might result in deaths. Intelligence agencies have served the political and personal objectives of presidents and other high officials. While the agencies often committed excesses in response to pressure from high officials in the Executive branch and Congress, they also occasionally initiated improper activities and then concealed them from officials whom they had a duty to inform.

Governmental officials — including those whose principal duty is to enforce the law –have violated or ignored the law over long periods of time and have advocated and defended their right to break the law.

So we have COINTELPRO and now it’s son called the PATRIOT ACT.  I wonder what the grandson of COINTELPRO will be named.  Oh well never mind.  Americans won’t be paying attention then either.

Our constitutional rights will continue to erode until the American people wake up, kill the “I’ll let someone else do it” attitude, and develope the courage to challenge the criminals that are running the country.