R.I. School Essay Brings in Secret Service

[DannyRock]

This is just unbelievable! Don't the SS have something better to do than pick on little boys?

R.I. School Essay Brings in Secret Service

Feb 02 2:34 PM US/Eastern

WEST WARWICK, R.I.

The Secret Service is investigating a seventh-grader who wrote a school essay that authorities say advocated violence against President Bush, talk show host Oprah Winfrey and others.

The boy's homework assignment for English class was to write what he would do on a perfect day. In addition to the president and Winfrey, the boy wrote that violence should be directed at executives of Coca- Cola and Wal-Mart, police and school officials said.

"His perfect day would be to see the destruction of these people," Schools Superintendent David Raiche said.

The Secret Service investigation is ongoing, but the essay may have been a "cry for help," said Thomas M. Powers, resident agent in charge in Providence. Threatening the president is a felony, he said.

Authorities would not identify the boy or his teacher or release a copy of the essay. He was not arrested, police Detective Sgt. Fernando Araujo said.

"It wasn't any detailed, minute-by-minute plan," Araujo said. "It didn't meet the criteria for a criminal charge."

The boy has been temporarily barred from school, but as a mental health rather than disciplinary precaution, Raiche said.

www.breitbart.com/news/2006/02/02/D8FH5TLGA.html

Now this one is even worse... Introducing the New Bush Youth Movement...

Marines recruiting 8-year olds

Thursday, January 5th, 2006

The Young Marines is a youth education and service programs for boys and girls, ages 8 through completion of high school. The Young Marines promotes the mental, moral, and physical development of its members. The program focuses on character building, leadership, and promotes a healthy, drug-free lifestyle. The Young Marines is the official youth program of the U.S. Marine Corps and the focal point for the Marine Corps’ Youth Drug Demand Reduction efforts.

www.rinf.com/columnists/news/marines-recruiting-8-year-olds

[DannyRock]

We've definitely been down this road before...




Hey, Kids: Spying Is Fun!

By Simon Maxwell Apter, TheNation.com. Posted February 11, 2006.

Using cartoons, games and kid-friendly websites, the federal intelligence community is seeking to win the hearts and minds of America's children.

Move over, McGruff. The trench-coated canine mascot of the National Crime Prevention Council has some youthful competition in the battle for the hearts and minds of America's children. Now in virtual training on the website of the National Security Agency are the CryptoKids, the code-makers and code-breakers of America's future.

The NSA, based at Fort Meade, Maryland, has seven CryptoKids in its trademarked menagerie, including Crypto Cat, versed in Navajo, the language of the storied code talkers of World War II; Decipher Dog, a cryptanalyst who learned the fine points of broadband networking from his stepmother, an NSA network engineer; T. Top, a turtle who knows how to design and build computers; and a language analyst named Rosetta Stone.

This Toys 'R' Us approach to spying is nothing new for the fifteen agencies that comprise the "intelligence community" of the US government, including the CIA, the NSA and the National Reconnaissance Office. In 1997 President Bill Clinton mandated that all government agencies set aside virtual space on their websites for child-friendly material. Today, these sites serve as recruiting portals for America's youth.

The CryptoKids were born in February 2004 within the bowels of Fort Meade and, according to Kwanza Gipson of the NSA public affairs office, were designed "strictly" to reflect only the official information contained within the main website. Of course, since the official stance of the agency concerning the recent warrantless wiretapping scandal has been to deny the program's illegality and to treat domestic spying as business as usual, this strict adherence to the office line conveniently recuses the CryptoKids from having to discuss the issue with children. After all, if General Michael Hayden insists that the program is not "domestic spying," as he did at the Washington Press Club recently, then what more could Sergeant Sam possibly add to the debate?

Moreover, as Gipson points out, "The site offers parents a safe, online environment in which their children can learn and play." Parents can be sure that, of all the voices on the Internet, at least the CryptoKids won't offer underage visitors any controversial information that could lead to a warrantless wiretap. A similar mentality prevails at other kid-friendly government sites.

At the National Reconnaissance Office's NRO Junior site, for example, an animated extra-terrestrial named Whirly Lizard shares stories--first-person accounts ostensibly written by anonymous children but eerily recited by adult voices. With all the sophistication of a Saturday-morning cartoon, these simplistic anecdotes are designed to boost patriotism and an interest in outer space. In a cyber-chapter titled "Proud to Be an American," an unidentified young author explains, "I have my teachers, my friends, my pet, my toys, my home, and my family. I have God to watch me. I love America. I love being me." Corey Corona, an NRO character named for the Eisenhower-era spy satellite, hosts a series of games including Catch, in which the player pilots a cargo plane and tries to intercept various robotic figures falling from outer space.

Cathy Bowers, a spokeswoman for the NRO, based just south of Washington-Dulles International Airport in Chantilly, Virginia, hearkens back to the educational push of the Sputnik era to explain the purpose of the NRO kids' site. "We need to have children understand the importance of space," she says, "to get them interested in careers in space, intelligence and government. We call space the 'Ultimate Vantage Point.'"

Sparking an interest in the cosmos for a target audience of kindergarteners, first- and second graders shouldn't be difficult. As Bowers points out, kids are already excited by outer space, especially by aliens. The twist here is translating that purely exploratory interest into a desire to spy on friends and neighbors. And ultimately, Bowers says, the website is about security. "It's all about protection," she says.

When asked about the warrantless surveillance that NRO-designed and -operated satellites enable, Bowers toes the intelligence community's line. "We stand behind the President," she says. "Everyone's trying to protect everyone else. Some degree of secrecy is required."

Back at CryptoKids virtual HQ, with a toothy, sugar-cube smile and a nineteenth-century electro-transmitter, an eagle named CSS Sam presides over Operation: Dit-Dah, one of the NSA's games for aspiring young snoops and narcs. Sam teaches Morse code and challenges players to decrypt various words and phrases. For those skeptical about the applicability of 160-year-old Morse code in the Internet age, Sam reminds them in a "fun fact" that "in the movie Independence Day, when all other ways of communicating had been destroyed, the survivors of the alien attack used Morse code to collaborate a counter-attack plan."

It's not just government snoop organizations that blur fiction and fact, imagination and reality on their child-friendly sites. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms website, for example, features the essay "I'm a Bomb Dog Now!"--a first-canine account by Truman, an explosives-sniffing Labrador retriever who works with ATF Special Agent Joe Harrington in New England. Truman's job is essential to national security, he says, because "sometimes people do bad things to try to hurt others. I can help stop that from happening, or, if it has already happened, I can find evidence to help law enforcement officers find out who did it so that the person can never do it again."

With cartoons, games and anthropomorphic animals, America's intelligence community is ensuring security for the next generation. How safe do you feel?

Simon Maxwell Apter, a former muffin baker from Oregon, is an intern at The Nation.

www.alternet.org/rights/31929/

[Swamp Gas]

Meanwhile, our beloved president is breaking the law and killing hundreds of thousands of people.

Something terribly wrong with this picture.

I remember the clamor in high school when they were attempting to bring in Dr. DeSousa's "Spit machine", that would tell if you smoked Pot in the last three days after you spit on a plate.

Everyone refused to do it if they brought it in, so it never took off the ground. Eventually DeSousa was exposed as a fraud. Probably a drunk.

I am hearing more and more of high school and college professors being told to not critisize Bush, even some getting fired over it.