Pining for the sixties--not

For those who missed the 60s or now pine for it (forgetting much of what it was like), take heart. Some of it is coming back. In the 60s it was commonplace for the FBI to surveil, investigate and keep dossiers on "groups" the government didn't like.

The AP has another such story, about thousands of pages of FBI records about civil rights, environmental and civil liberties groups--being kept in 2005. Two of the groups (the ACLU and Greenpeace) have taken legal action to force release of the reported 4000 pages related to the two organizations. The FBI wants until February 2006 to "process" the requests and until June 2006 to review them before responding and will not reveal the nature of the contents of the dossiers until then, if ever.

The ACLU's executive director, Anthony Romero, said the disclosure indicates that the FBI is monitoring organizations that are engaging in lawful conduct.

"I know for an absolute fact that we have not been involved in anything related to promoting terrorism, and yet the government has collected almost 1,200 pages on our activities," Romero said. "Why is the ACLU now the subject of scrutiny from the FBI?"

John Passacantando, Greenpeace's U.S. executive director, said his group is a forceful but peaceful critic of the Bush administration's war and environmental policies.

"This administration has a history of using its powers against its peaceful critics," Passacantando said. "If, in fact, the FBI has been deployed to help in that effort, that would be quite shocking."

The FBI isn't commenting on this, citing "the ongoing case." Sounds like they need help from professional liar Scotty McClellan, the White House Presshole.