The NYPD’s lack of transparency and its CIA connections should concern everyone:
Associated Press reporters Matt Apuzzo and Adam Goldman started on the lack of transparency in the New York Police Department.
The two reporters expanded upon that reporting with their first book, “Enemies Within: Inside the NYPD’s Secret Spying Unit and bin Laden’s Final Plot Against America.”
“For the most part, they don’t respond,” Apuzzo, 34, said in an interview with The Huffington Post.
“I don’t think people are well-served by that. Even the NSA responds.”
“Even the CIA responds,” Goldman, 42, jumped in. “Even the FBI responds.”
The “public is not well-served by a police department that doesn’t allow you access to 911 calls or public records, police reports” and then “produces their own summaries of cases for you to look at, but doesn’t let you get access to the underlying documents,” Apuzzo added later.
“The NYPD is deciding what’s news,” Goldman said.
Except when the AP is breaking news about the NYPD.
“It was extremely surprising to us that putting a former CIA officer in charge of the NYPD intelligence division and creating what’s been created generated so little attention at the time,” Apuzzo said.
“Looking back, the decision to put somebody with no law enforcement experience in charge of hundreds of police officers is really an extraordinary move in the history of policing and deserved more attention than it got,” he said.
“There were all sorts of signs that the NYPD was going to build what it ultimately built and it didn’t get as much attention as it should’ve,” he continued. “That’s on all of us. For years, this went on and I think we only sort of realized what was being built now that we look back. I think we all should have been a little more curious at the time because it raises a ton of public policy questions about the role of police as intelligence gatherers.”
“Reporters constantly need to remind themselves to be deeply skeptical of what the government’s telling them, whether it’s the power structure here in DC or the power structure in New York,” Goldman said. “Just because Mayor Bloomberg says it, does not make it true. Just because Kelly says it, does not make it true.” (the public should be deeply skeptical of what the government’s telling them)
Apuzzo and Goldman, who have chimed in on Twitter about the double standard that seemingly guides the Obama administration’s decisions to investigate or ignore leaks, declined to comment on their personal situation. However, they spoke broadly about concerns over the public primarily getting information that has been filtered by the government.
“This administration is cracking down on people who talk to reporters when it’s not sanctioned by the government,” Apuzzo said. “And that’s just such a tremendous disservice to the public — that the only people willing to talk to reporters are those who have been blessed by official Washington.”
“What if we’re only getting the administration’s views on why we should bomb Syria,” Goldman said. “Didn’t we just go through this with Iraq?
“It’s just bad for democracy,” Apuzzo said.
“Right,” Goldman said.
“It’s just bad for everyone,” Apuzzo said.
“If we can’t reach out to people to get a more thorough understanding of why this country might, in effect, bomb another country,” Goldman said, “that’s serious.”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/03/ap-nypd-matt-apuzzo-adam-goldman_n_3861444.html
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http://massprivatei.blogspot.com/2013/09/dea-agents-urged-to-cover-up-use-of-nsa_4.html
“the decision to put somebody with no law enforcement experience in charge of hundreds of police officers is really an extraordinary move in the history of policing”
But if you’re not concerned with “law enforcement” or “policing”, and are instead preparing a domestic army, it all makes perfect sense.
And as for covering up the use of NSA intelligence, that’s to be expected.