POST CONSTITUTIONAL AMERICA .

STATES SELLING HIGHWAYS TO CORPORATIONS

STATELINE - Want to buy the Brooklyn Bridge? It's not for sale yet, but
the Indiana Toll Road and the Pocahontas Parkway outside Richmond, Va.,
recently were leased to the highest bidders. And if Texas Gov. Rick
Perry prevails, private firms will pay the Lone Star State $1.2 billion
for the right to build a $6 billion toll road from San Antonio to
Dallas. . .

Govs. Rod Blagojevich (D) of Illinois and Matt Blunt (R) of Missouri are
looking into auctioning off student loan portfolios. Blagojevich, who
won re-election in November, also is renewing a push to lease the state
lottery for $10 billion, promising the money will be spent on schools. .
.

In the Southwest, all eyes are on Texas as newly re-elected Gov. Perry
pushes his "Trans-Texas Corridor," a swath of toll roads, railways and
pipelines that would cost $183 billion to build over half a century.
Three of Perry's gubernatorial opponents lambasted the first phase of
the plan, in which a consortium of foreign firms has agreed to pay the
state $1.2 billion and spend $6 billion constructing a 300-mile toll
road between Dallas and San Antonio. (The deal is pending until
environmental studies are complete.)

Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell (D) in December asked private companies to
make their best offers to buy or lease the Pennsylvania Turnpike, which
links Philadelphia to Pittsburgh and was dubbed "America's first
superhighway" when it opened in 1940. New Jersey also is considering
leasing parts of its turnpike. Pennsylvania also is weighing whether to
turn to private firms to expand heavily traveled Route 322, the road to
State College, while New Jersey is mulling a sale or lease of the
173-mile Garden State Parkway and its 11 toll plazas, as well as the
47-mile Atlantic City Expressway from the Philadelphia suburbs.

Critics argue that private firms are apt to jack up tolls and fees
because they have to keep investors, not voters, happy. Others worry
that states will fritter away the upfront money. . .

http://www.stateline.org/live/details/story?contentId=169145

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CIA, MILITARY EXPAND SPYING ON U.S. CITIZENS

AGENCE FRANCE PRESSE - US Vice-President Dick Cheney has admitted that
the US military and CIA have been spying on the financial dealings of
Americans -- intelligence gathering normally authorized only by civilian
policing agencies. The New York Times broke the story, reporting that
the Department of Defense and Central Intelligence Agency had been using
"national security letters" to obtain the banking and credit records of
Americans and foreigners suspected of terrorist activities in the United
States. The US military and the CIA have long been restricted in their
spying activities inside the United States and are barred from
conducting traditional domestic law enforcement work in the country. . .
[Cheney] called the spying "a perfectly legitimate activity" . . .

Citing unnamed intelligence officials, The New York Times said the
Pentagon and CIA actions were part of an aggressive expansion by the
military into domestic intelligence gathering which is traditionally the
realm of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2007/01/14/070114153813.ahatfwm8.html

NY TIMES - "There's a strong tradition of not using our military for
domestic law enforcement," said Elizabeth Rindskopf Parker, a former
general counsel at both the National Security Agency and the C.I.A. who
is the dean at the McGeorge School of Law at the University of the
Pacific. "They're moving into territory where historically they have not
been authorized or presumed to be operating."

Similarly, John Radsan, an assistant general counsel at the C.I.A. from
2002 to 2004 and now a law professor at William Mitchell College of Law
in St. Paul, said, "The C.I.A. is not supposed to have any law
enforcement powers, or internal security functions, so if they've been
issuing their own national security letters, they better be able to
explain how they don't cross the line.". . .

In the United States, the Federal Bureau of Investigation has complained
about military officials dealing directly with local police — rather
than through the bureau — for assistance in responding to possible
terrorist threats against a military base. F.B.I. officials say the
threats have often turned out to be uncorroborated and, at times, have
stirred needless anxiety.

The military's frequent use of national security letters has sometimes
caused concerns from the businesses receiving them, a counterterrorism
official said. Lawyers at financial institutions, which routinely
provide records to the F.B.I. in law enforcement investigations, have
contacted bureau officials to say they were confused by the scope of the
military's requests and whether they were obligated to turn the records
over, the official said. . .

The Counterintelligence Field Activity office, created in 2002 to better
coordinate the military's efforts to combat foreign intelligence
services, has drawn criticism for some domestic intelligence activities.
The agency houses an antiterrorist database of intelligence tips and
threat reports, known as Talon, which had been collecting information on
antiwar planning meetings at churches, libraries and other locations.
The Defense Department has since tightened its procedures for what kind
of information is allowed into the Talon database, and the
counterintelligence office also purged more than 250 incident reports
from the database that officials determined should never have been
included because they centered on lawful political protests by people
opposed to the war in Iraq.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/14/washington/14spy.html?ei=
5094&en=203bd3d1f0cd9644&hp=&ex=1168750800&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print

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