Anti-Terror Trainers Blocked

[SF-TX]

If the claims are true, I am anxious to see who the administration considers an acceptable 'teacher' of Islamic history and doctrine. I'm sure CAIR has some qualified propagandists.. Excuse me, instructors.

In the article Mr. Coughlin's last name is misspelled.

ANTI-TERROR TRAINERS BLOCKED

The CIA and Department of Homeland Security abruptly canceled a conference in August on homegrown U.S. radical extremism in what officials close to the issue say was an effort to block two conservative anti-terrorism experts from presenting their views.

The conference was slated for Aug. 10 through 12 at agency headquarters in McLean and was to have been hosted by the CIA Threat Management Unit. It was organized by the intelligence subcommittee of the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments.

“The conference topic is a critical one for domestic law enforcement, and the sponsors — in partnership with the Department of Homeland Security — have decided to delay the conference so it can include insights from among other sources, the new National Strategy for Counterterrorism in an updated agenda,” wrote CIA police officer Lt. Joshua Fielder in an email announcing the postponement in early August.

According to people close to the conference, the event was ordered “postponed” after Muslim advocacy groups contacted the Department of Homeland Security and the White House about the scheduled speakers, who included Stephen Caughlin and Steve Emerson, both specialists on the Islamist terror threat.

Mr. Caughlin, a former Pentagon Joint Staff analyst, is one of the most knowledgeable counterterrorism experts specializing in the relationship between Islamic law and terrorism.

Mr. Emerson, head of the Investigative Project on Terrorism, is a leading expert on Islamic violent extremism, financing and operations.

The Department of Homeland Security did not return a call seeking comment.

CIA spokeswoman Marie Harf said she did not know if Mr. Caughlin or Mr. Emerson will be speakers when the conference is rescheduled at some future date.

“The goal is clear and important — to ensure that conference participants receive material that is as current and comprehensive as possible to support the essential mission of safeguarding Americans here at home,” she said in a statement nearly identical to language used in Lt. Fielder’s email.

One intelligence official said the conference was stopped after the White House learned that Mr. Caughlin and Mr. Emerson were speaking.

This official said that to prevent the two experts from taking part in future conferences, the administration is drafting new guidelines designed to prohibit all U.S. government personnel from teaching classes on Islamic history or doctrine.

The new rules also will seek to prohibit the use of federal funds to pay contractors for such training.

Another official familiar with the conference denied that the postponement was abrupt or in reaction to specific speakers.

“The goal — an entirely appropriate one — is to ensure that an important issue is addressed in the most informative and accurate way possible,” this official said.

“This is a big deal,” former FBI counterintelligence agent David Major said of the postponement.

If new guidelines are used to block experts like Mr. Caughlin and Mr. Emerson, “we will be in ‘1984’ with ‘Newspeak’ on our society in total violation of the First Amendment,” Mr. Major said, referring to George Orwell’s classic novel, in which simplified language is used as a tool to support totalitarian rule.

Matthew Chandler, a DHS spokesman, said the conference will be rescheduled.

“The conference topic is a critical one for domestic law enforcement, and the sponsors decided to delay the conference so it can include insights from, among other sources, the new national strategy for countering violent extremism,” Mr. Chandler told Inside the Ring.

Mr. Chandler said the department along with the National Counterterrorism Center, Justice Department and FBI are developing training programs “focused primarily on better preparing front line law enforcement personnel to identify those behaviors and indicators associated with terrorism-related criminal activity.”

“Equally important is ensuring that the input state and local law enforcement is received so that conference participants receive material that is as current and comprehensive as possible to support the essential mission of safeguarding Americans here at home,” he said.

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[Pete]

Nothing to see here folks, move along.

[SF-TX]

It seems the claims in the previous article may be accurate.

DOJ Official: Holder ‘Firmly Committed’ To Eliminating Anti-Muslim Training

Ryan J. Reilly October 19, 2011, 2:50 PM

Attorney General Eric Holder is “firmly committed” to nixing anti-Muslim material from law enforcement training, former U.S. Attorney for the District of Oregon, Dwight C. Holton said Wednesday.

Holton, who was U.S. Attorney when the FBI arrested the so-called Christmas tree bomber, said that he spoke specifically with Holder about the “egregiously false” training that took place at the FBI’s training headquarters at Quantico and at a U.S. Attorney’s office in Pennsylvania, which was first reported on by Wired.

“I want to be perfectly clear about this: training materials that portray Islam as a religion of violence or with a tendency towards violence are wrong, they are offensive, and they are contrary to everything that this president, this attorney general and Department of Justice stands for,” Holton said. “They will not be tolerated.”

The training materials, Holton said, “pose a significant threat to national security, because they play into the false narrative propagated by terrorists that the United States is at war with Islam.”

Holton said that he spoke about the issue with Holder directly when he was out in Oregon.

“He is firmly committed to making sure that this is over,” Holton said. “Now the reality is it is going to take a bit to go back and figure out what trainings have happened in the past that we need to go back and fix — we’re a big organization, we’ve got lots going on with lots of people and lots of contractors — but Attorney General Holder is firmly committed to it, and we’re going to fix it.”...

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[Team Sergeant]

Originally Posted by SF-TX

It seems the claims in the previous article may be accurate.

You've got to be kidding me, didn't you get the memo?

Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano has already stated, for the record, it's the "white guys" that are the greatest threat to this nation.......

[SF-TX]

Yes, I received the memo. I thought it was a joke.

[greenberetTFS]

Holder makes me sick to my stomach!...........

Big Teddy

[ddoering]

Originally Posted by Team Sergeant

You've got to be kidding me, didn't you get the memo?

Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano has already stated, for the record, it's the "white guys" that are the greatest threat to this nation.......

In the end she may be right.......

[bubba]

Only if you prescribe to the train of thought that "they" are in charge, not "we".........

[T-Rock]

Nothing to see here folks, move along.

That Stephen Coughlin guy sure is a "Christian zealot with a pen"

Where's Hesham now..., working for Holder

[SF-TX]

Robert Spencer on this issue:

It has been a long time coming, but the Obama Administration has now officially banned the truth. Deputy U.S. Attorney General James Cole declared Wednesday at a conference in Washington that he had “recently directed all components of the Department of Justice to re-evaluate their training efforts in a range of areas, from community outreach to national security.” This “reevaluation” will remove all references to Islam in connection with any examination of Islamic jihad terror activity. The Obama Administration has now placed off-limits any investigation of the beliefs, motives and goals of jihad terrorists...

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[Badger52]

They will forever trot out Oklahoma City as proof that profiling pit bulls is wrong and that every 20 years a golden retriever bites someone. But then it's no surprise, since a white guy is the only person that can be found guility of a hate crime. Heinrich Holder said so.