We all want to catch the bad buys, right? And LEO need a lot of leeway to make us safe, right? And there are tough guidelines and protections built into the system to avoid abuse, right?
Turns out the feds or your local law enforcement officer don't need a shed of evidence to put you on a terrorist watch list. The feds say that neither "concrete facts' nor 'irrefutable evidence" are needed to designate someone as a terrorist:
"In determining whether a REASONABLE SUSPICION exists, due weight should be given to the specific reasonable inferences that a NOMINATOR is entitled to draw from the facts in light of his/her experience and not on unfounded suspicions or hunches. Although irrefutable evidence or concrete facts are not necessary, to be reasonable, suspicion should be as clear and as fully developed as circumstances permit,"
Wow! Rather than make a list of known terrorist the feds build a huge system believed to be able to predict the propensity of a person to commit a terror act. Like in the movie Minority Report they think they can tell who is going to be bad but in reality it is designed to sweep up anyone that bucks the system along with entire categories of people. Social media postings are enough to get you placed on a watch list or even the no fly list.
"Single source information," the guidelines state, "including but not limited to 'walk-in,' 'write-in,' or postings on social media sites, however, should not automatically be discounted … the NOMINATING AGENCY should evaluate the credibility of the source, as well as the nature and specificity of the information, and nominate even if that source is uncorroborated."
The document in the link above is not classified but US Attorney General Eric Holder wrote in an affidavit, that the Watchinglist Guidance "contains national security information that, if disclosed … could cause significant harm to national security."
