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--></style><title>Homeland Security at work in
Boise</title></head><body>
<div><tt>All,</tt></div>
<div><tt><br></tt></div>
<div><tt>The following is from one of the best political blogs in the
country: Randy Stapilus' Ridenbaugh Press out of Boise. I visit there
daily.</tt></div>
<div><tt><br></tt></div>
<div><tt><font
color="#000000">http://www.ridenbaugh.com</font></tt></div>
<div><tt><br></tt></div>
<div><tt>Mark Solomon</tt></div>
<div><tt>*************</tt></div>
<div><tt><br></tt></div>
<div><tt><font color="#000000">Secretive police, policing speech<br>
by Randy Stapilus <br>
<br>
Homeland Security is a lousy name purely for its connotations: It
echoes too near the old German "fatherland" and Russian
"motherland" (or "fatherland"). The eeriness factor multiplies
when it generates cases like that of Dwight Scarbrough in Boise.<br>
<br>
That story, told inthe current Boise Weekly (and highlighted well in
the current Boise Guardian), is enough to make anyone wonder whose
security is being protected. The dividing line, apparently, has to do
with who you vote for.<br>
<br>
The full story (including tape conversation transcripts), well worth
reading, is in the Weekly. (A number of comments have been posted to
it; none indicate any sort of rebuttal of the facts presented.)
Briefly: Scarbrough, who is a veteran and also anti-war and critical
of the Bush Administration, is also a federal employee at the west
Boise federal center near Overland Road and Interstate 84. His vehicle
is splattered with stickers reflecting his views. As a federal
employee, he is not allowed to campaign on work time or in the office,
and hasn't been accused of that. Like everyone else, he isn't
allowed "Posting or affixing signs, pamphlets, handbills or flyers
on federal property", but then most people wouldn't consider
driving a car into a parking lot to constitute "posting or
affixing." Homeland Security apparently isn't like most people,
and (provoked by who or what, we do not know) sent a couple of agents
around to Scarbrough. His free exercise of speech on his personal
motor vehicle, he was told, would have to go.<br>
<br>
Scarbough has been battling this, and the American Civil Liberties
Union has gotten involved. Again, read the Weekly for the whole tale.
But circle back around for four other points:<br>
<br>
First. Is there any record of Homeland Security demanding similar
removal of pro-Bush or pro-war signage? Any at all? Even once? A Boise
federal building parking lot surely has a few Bush bumper stickers in
evidence; were the owners of those vehicles similarly confronted?
(We'd give them a bye - for consistency if nothing else - if the
agents similarly confronted the owners of all other vehicles in the
lot containing any sort of sticker. Why should stickers for rock bands
or TV shows be exempt?)<br>
<br>
Second. Scarbrough was confronted not per se as a federal employee,
but rather someone who - presumably - had "posted or affixed"
signage on federal property by virtue of driving onto it and parking
there. This had nothing to do with his employment, only with the
vehicle he drove. Does that mean anyone who has similar kinds of
signage on their vehicle - or even a worn-out Kerry/Edwards sticker on
their bumper - and parks on federal property (how about, say, within a
national forest or on BLM land) can expect a similar visit from
Homeland Security? And if not, why, exactly, not?<br>
<br>
Third. Under which of the DHS six agenda points does shutting down
Scarbrough's free speech fit? The closest fit might be "increase
overall preparedness" - if that is, you take a really dark view of
what the agency is preparing for.<br>
<br>
Fourth. The spookiest part of the Weekly story came at the end, when
the reporter was trying to track down the mysterious Boise Homeland
Security office (the federal flavor, not the state). Here is what he
wrote about that:<br>
<br>
I was only able to confirm the location of the
office after asking the security officer at the Natural Resource
Complex, whose job (ostensibly, at least) it is to enforce the rules
concerning pamphlets, dogs and other controlled substances on federal
property. He would not comment about the incident, saying, "If this
is about what I think it's about, I'm not allowed to say nothing."
He referred me to "FPS, Federal Courthouse, Department of Homeland
Security," to find someone who would be able to comment. When I
asked who I should say referred me, he covered his nameplate with his
hand.</font></tt></div>
<div><tt><font color="#000000"><br>
The "office," once I found it, wasn't much of
an office at all, from a service perspective. The door was locked and
there was neither a receptionist nor a desk at the front window. When
I rang the doorbell, a woman emerged from a nearby cubicle and spoke
to me through a tennis-ball-sized hole in the window. She would not
confirm the name or identity of the officers, nor their badge numbers
(Scarbrough, of course, had written them all down). I slipped a
business card through the hole, and by press time, no one had called
me back.<br>
<br>
However, when I tried the number provided by the
U.S. Marshals, Terry Martin at the Federal Protection Service was able
to confirm that the officers identified by Scarbrough did, in fact,
work for Homeland Security. He then referred me to the Department of
Homeland Security's media spokesman in Texas, who had not responded
by press time to my request for information about the incident, or
about any change in federal law concerning stickers on vehicles in
federal parking lots.<br>
<br>
The former Senator Steve Symms used to sign off his letters with,
"Yours for a free society." Welcome, Steve, to the society of
Homeland Security, where government is becoming too elusive for anyone
to take a bite out of it.<br>
file under Idaho</font></tt></div>
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