Heidi Boghosian is the executive director of the National Lawyers Guild and is the co-host of the weekly civil liberties radio show, Law and Disorder. In the first half, she discussed the state of surveillance and privacy in a rapidly advancing world. After 9-11, we began to see the ratcheting up of our surveillance state, she pointed out. Often, individuals think that surveillance makes them safer from criminal activity, but this is a myth, she argues. For instance, many so-called terrorist-related arrests turned out to be invalid. Law enforcement has shifted to a preemptive role rather than reacting to crime after it happens, and with the popularity of smartphones and devices in recent years, surveillance has moved into our own homes, she noted. This data mining has opened the door for possible data misinterpretation, false positives, and innocent people being swept up and vilified, she lamented.
Americans suffer from a kind of digital illiteracy, she suggested, and we haven't kept up with educating people about the risks of not protecting their data and how much information is being collected about us. With all this surveillance and data gathering, we are not only not safer, "but we are less free because we are being targeted [and] monitored," with protest groups being infiltrated and curtailed, and dissent quashed, she continued. In the post-9/11 era, "we're becoming a nation of citizen spies," but such efforts have to be employed judiciously so they don't infringe on the rights of others, Boghosian commented. The terrorism dynamic feeds on fear, and often, these efforts single out people who look different, she added.
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In the latter half, C2C's investigative reporter Cheryll Jones presented her interview with Congressman Tim Burchett of Tennessee, who recently participated in the UAP hearing held by the House Oversight Committee. The hearing featured military whistleblowers testifying under oath about mysterious UFO/UAP encounters and "biologics." Burchett spoke candidly about the stonewalling faced by elected officials in trying to uncover what the government really knows about whether we are alone in the universe and why the over-reaching UFO cover-up continues. He does not think UAPs are a security threat because if they wanted to harm us, they could have already done so.
Rep. Burchett believes it's time for the transparency of UFO files and that the hearing was a successful starting point. "The issue at hand, in my opinion," he told Cheryll, "is that there is an energy source within these craft that has no heat signature, that can travel at incredible high speeds, [and] defy our laws of physics." We can imagine that this "free energy" source would put the Pentagon out of business with its "worthless wars" in the Middle East over oil and shake up the billionaires' control of the economy, Burchett remarked, adding that that may be one reason why UFO information is kept secret. He expressed disappointment that since the hearing, attempts were made to discredit whistleblower David Grusch, a former USAF officer, with the release of his medical records showing that he was treated for PTSD.
News segment guest: Christian Wilde