I want to commend Matt Taibbi’s latest post on the FBI to your attention. Here’s a snippet:
The transformation of the FBI back into a J. Edgar Hoover-style domestic spy service with sweeping political ambition has been a long-developing story, obscured by a political anomaly. In the first phase of this nightmare, between 2001 and 2016, the post-9/11 Bureau used the pretext of an enhanced counterintelligence mandate to throw off some mild restraints that had been placed on it the last time it had to be slapped down, i.e. after the Church Committee hearings in the 1970s. The second phase of its transformation took place after the election of Donald Trump, when the Bureau remade itself on the fly as a kind of government-in-exile, empowered by an outpouring of public and media support to view itself as a counterweight to the Trump government.
In addition to Mr. Taibbi’s main complaint which is that the FBI’s becoming a sort of Stasi is an irresistible temptation, I believe there are other issues which deserve some reflection. When the FBI was founded and empowered more than a century ago, the federal government was small and manageable. Now there are nearly 70 different agencies in different departments that are armed and have police powers. Consequently, not only is the is the FBI dangerous to a liberal democratic order, it is redundant and its authority overlaps with scores of other agencies.
Completely unsubstantiated claims for the most part. There is no evidence that it turned into a Hoover type organization. What we do know is that under the influence of Bush and the GOP Congress the FBI, under their direction, began investigating lots of Americans because they were directed to look for terrorism. Many people warned against that but Bush and the GOP continued to support it. To be fair it was largely maintained by Obama as the fear of Muslims outweighed liberty concerns.
Steve