America’s Total Surveillance State
Influential German magazine Der Spiegel accused America of being institutionally ‘paranoid’ last month and suggested the activities of spying agencies such as the NSA mean the US is ‘no longer a model of liberal democracy.’
“The United States cannot be compared with Nazi Germany or with China, Der Spiegel conceded, “Unfortunately, however, a paranoid democracy tends to use tools that are beneath a democracy, the tools of a dictatorship, and they include as much surveillance as possible.” (http://bit.ly/HLKBPn )
The article appeared just as Las Vegas officials insisted they wouldn’t be using the high tech spying functions of a new ‘Illuminating Concepts’ system which they’ve recently installed in the city, attached to Vegas’ street lights.
“Right now our intention is not to have any cameras or recording devices,” local official Jorge Servantes told reporters, “It’s just to provide output out there, not to get any feed or video feed coming back,” he insisted. (PrisonPlanet: http://bit.ly/1gzlX2R )
US authorities first began embracing surveillance technology in the 1950s through secret schemes such as Project MKULTRA’s Operation Midnight Climax in which they set up brothels in San Francisco and Marin and gave clients LSD without their knowledge then monitored their behaviour through two way mirrors.
“Several significant operational techniques were developed in this theater,” Wikipedia’s entry on Operation Midnight Climax explains, “including extensive research into sexual blackmail, surveillance technology, and the possible use of mind-altering drugs in field operations.”
