The group she belonged to advocated attacking key US military and corporate targets and leading a growing people's war. That sounds like an organization dedicated to violent overthrow of the government to me.
Based on an anonymous Wiki that also tries to prove that Obama was a Communist? http://keywiki.org/Barack_Obam...
And those of us who read the article also might doubt the objectivity and judgment of the special agent who thinks beating up liberal college professors is funny (and destroyed his notes):
In her 11 August response, Barr questioned whether the special agent who conducted the investigation “can be an impartial evaluator of academic scientists, or anyone with liberal political beliefs.” As evidence, she points to a posting on a blog maintained by the agent, a veteran who served in Iraq, and his family. The item is a copy of a popular Internet meme about an incident that supposedly took place in an introductory college biology course.
According to the story, a “typical liberal college professor and avowed atheist” declares his intent to prove that there is no God by giving the creator 15 minutes to strike him from the podium. A few minutes before the deadline, a Marine “just released from active duty and newly registered” walks up to the professor and knocks him out with one punch. When the professor recovers and asks for an explanation, the Marine replies, “God was busy. He sent me.”
'Read TFA'? The one that is favorably disposed towards her and does zero reseach, analysis, or reporting of the root issue, which is the status and relationships of the organizations to which she belonged?
I really have to respond to this because I read Science every week and I know some of the reporters. So let me give you a quick lesson in Journalism 101.
Jeffrey Mervis, who I've been reading for years, didn't do "zero research." If you read the article again http://news.sciencemag.org/peo... and count the number of people he either interviewed or attempted to interview, you'll see that he either quoted or got a no comment from every government agency and from as many people who knew her as he could reach by deadline. He interviewed two lawyers who specialize in security clearances.
The next time you look at one of those so-called news sources on the Internet, see whether they interview people on both sides, or talk to experts like lawyers.
Were you ever affiliated with an organization that was affiliated with an organization that advocated the violent overthrow of the government?
No, that's not the best ref. They don't even explicitly state that the New Movement espoused violence, and they quote an unverifiable, undated pamphlet that may or may not represent their actual position.
And who puts that wiki out? Where are they coming from? Their entry on Obama and the Communist Party http://keywiki.org/Barack_Obam... may give you an idea.
I wouldn't be surprised if the agent who interviewed her was getting his information from Wikis like that.
You realize you're accusing a scientist of belonging to a violent organization based on an anonymous wiki that is also accusing Obama of being a Communist.
But what the "overthrowers" fail to realize, is the reason there is little difference between the parties, is that both have coalesced around the median opinion of the voting public. Our government is about what we, on average, want. America is a prosperous country, that mostly respects individual rights. So any advocates of global socialist utopia, anarcho-syndicalism, or whatever, will have a hard time convincing many people that they can do better.
Not true. There were majorities in favor of single payer health care, for example. But when the Democrats got their chance for health care, they followed the interests of their big financial contributors. Rahm Emanuel, Obama's point man on health reform, was the Democratic Party's big money man.
What they actually do is broker a deal between the big interests -- the health insurance companies, the drug companies, the big employers, the big hospitals, etc. -- according to their campaign contributions. The average citizen doesn't have much input.
Do you think Obamacare is the median opinion?
Again, baloney. The US constitution explicitly enumerates your right to *peaceably* advocate for the overthrown of the US government. The background check forms ask about *violent* overthrow.
Who decides when an organization is advocating "peaceably" or "violently"?
During the McCarthy days they put the editors of the Daily Worker in jail for publishing what the House Un-American Activities Committee concluded was advocating the violent overthrow of the government. And what 2 Supreme Court justices concluded was constitutionally protected activities. So Supreme Court justices can disagree. And it turned out afterwards that HUAC was misrepresenting a lot of documents -- that is, "lying."
In this case, Valerie Barr was fired because the agent accused her of not mentioning two organizations, one of which was opposed to the Vietnam war, the other of which supported Puerto Rican independence. First, there's no clear evidence that she was a member. There were lots of organizations like that and baking cookies for a meeting doesn't make her a member.
You tell me -- what's the evidence that either of those two organizations were violent? If you read the article again, you'll see that the Office of Personnel Management only said that those organizations were affiliated with violent organizations. Nobody accused them of being violent.
It seems to be the subjective assessment of an agent who thinks it's funny to beat up liberal college professors.
And we don't know what happened because the agent conveniently destroyed his notes after he wrote up his accusations, and they conveniently don't record their interviews.
Of course, we don't know for sure what happened, because the agent conveniently didn't record his interview and destroyed his notes after he wrote up his report.
You did read the article, didn't you? For your convenience, here's the link. http://news.sciencemag.org/peo...
Russia or USSR or the Soviet Union is notoriously more violent against all kinds of people, including their own people, than the USA or any of its past governments ever were.
Except for negroes and indians. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
The 2nd amendment, right to self defense, is there for the very purpose of allowing the people to violently overthrow a corrupt government that has failed them.
Where does it say that its purpose is to allow the people to violently overthrow a corrupt government?
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
How about those guys who go around with Confederate flags on their pickup trucks?
The Confederacy did a good job of attempting to overthrow the government by force and violence.
"Aha! You're driving around with a Confederate flag on your fender. You're supporting an organization dedicated to the overthrow of the government by force and violence. You lied on your application. No security clearance for you."
I know lawyers who dealt with this, and I know people who went to jail over this.
How do you know whether an organization is "dedicated to the violent overthrow of the US government?"
Government agencies used to give a list of organizations, and ask whether people were on it. Otherwise, the question is too subjective to establish whether somebody is "lying."
How do you define "belonged"?
Pete Seeger supported the Communist Party, but he never joined it. He could honestly say that he never "belonged."
Just because she baked cookies for the Committee Against Genocide and the New Movement in Solidarity with Puerto Rican Independence, that doesn't mean she "belonged." In fact nothing in the article says she "belonged" to the organization. So you ought to re-read the article.
In fact, nobody knows what the questions were, because the agent didn't record it, and destroyed his notes afterwards.
Given that agent's hostility towards "liberal college professors," it's reasonable that he distorted her answers. There were many cases, especially during the McCarthy days, when a government witness would claim somebody had said something, and memos in the government's files would show that he never said it. Why do you think they don't record their interviews, the way Verizon customer service does?
It's a he said/she said deal in which the special agent who was responsible for the interview didn't make a recording of the interview, and destroyed the notes afterwards. The agent just gave his own subjective impression of what she said. Why don't they make recordings?
It's also an interview by an agent who thinks it's funny to beat up liberal professors. I wouldn't trust him to make fair judgments about "liberals." He shouldn't be working in government.
FTA:
http://news.sciencemag.org/peo...
Barr was given a chance to appeal NSF’s decision, and on 11 August she submitted a letter stating that OPM’s summary report of its investigation “contains many errors or mischaracterizations of my statements.” (As is standard practice, agencies receive only a summary of the OPM investigation, not a full report, and lawyers familiar with the process say that an agent’s interview notes are typically destroyed after the report is written.)...
In her 11 August response, Barr questioned whether the special agent who conducted the investigation “can be an impartial evaluator of academic scientists, or anyone with liberal political beliefs.” As evidence, she points to a posting on a blog maintained by the agent, a veteran who served in Iraq, and his family. The item is a copy of a popular Internet meme about an incident that supposedly took place in an introductory college biology course.
According to the story, a “typical liberal college professor and avowed atheist” declares his intent to prove that there is no God by giving the creator 15 minutes to strike him from the podium. A few minutes before the deadline, a Marine “just released from active duty and newly registered” walks up to the professor and knocks him out with one punch. When the professor recovers and asks for an explanation, the Marine replies, “God was busy. He sent me.”
That agent may have served in Iraq, but he didn't serve to protect our freedom. He served to come back and establish a police state that's starting to adopt a lot of the characteristics of the Soviet Union.
There have been many prosecutions in which the government's star witness testified about the defendant's statements, and then the defense attorney found a tape and it turned out the defendant didn't say anything like that at all.
There's one reason why criminal investigators don't use recordings: So they can make up things and the defendant can't disprove them.
Here's some anecdotal evidence. http://boingboing.net/2014/09/...
The vast majority of people who go to prison for weed are non-violent offenders.
Frankly, non-violent offender shouldn't go to jail. They should be fined, work weekend crews and be monitored. But they didn't hurt anyone, so don't lock them up. It's just a huge waste of money and potential.
The goal should be to get them so they don't do it again.
Why should people who go to prison for weed get fined, work weekend crews and be monitored?
We don't do that to people who sell tobacco.
The vast majority of people who go to prison for weed are non-violent offenders.
Can you provide a citation for that? I've known a few guys that got busted for minor possession, not a one resulted in even an overnight jail stay.
I had a few friends who were busted in college for small-time grass dealing and served terms of about 6 months.
More recently, in New York City, the stop-and-frisk laws, which a court found was illegal, were used to sweep in thousands of people busted for possession. The cases were almost impossible to get dismissed. I don't believe that it was an accident that the prosecutors scheduled a hearing at the same time the arresting officer was unavailable on "vacation." As a result defendants get worn down and take a plea bargain. As a result, they're not eligible for tuition aid, many jobs, public housing, and a lot of other government benefits.
Guess what race most of them are.
Any given program will expand to fill available memory.
