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Cooper said plenty of presidents dealt with critical speech, particularly in opposition to the Vietnam War and even the Iraq War. He said no president ever responded like this.

“We didn’t arrest them (due to their speech). We didn’t try to prevent them from being able to express themselves on campuses, and we didn’t try to prevent them from trying to enter into the public square,” he said. “This administration appears not to appreciate that lesson and says that the groups of people that are not within their particular perspective ought to be considered the very threat … that the real terrorist threat that comes internationally [presents].”

Project 21 is a very vocal critic of what it considers administration efforts to cloak liberal policies in the guise of racial equality. Cooper said devoting resources to stop threats based on racial prejudice is a solution in search of a problem.

“We’re particularly bothered by mixing together so-called domestic insurrectionists and racists. There is simply no anti-black or anti-minority underground movement in America that is threatening in any way the stability of our government or the stability of local governments. There is just nothing like that. That’s just a complete and total boogeyman,” said Cooper, who believes the Justice Department is fully aware of the reality.

“When we see this administration talking as if the real threat is that if you’re a young black male, you’re going to be shot, you’re going to be kidnapped or you’re going to be forced to prison without actually having any charges against you, there’s simply no evidence to show that,” he said.

Cooper said Holder could solve this debate by compiling a report showing the real number of racially motivated murders, kidnappings and bombings. He said that report will never come because he believes the real motivation for this committee and this policy is entirely political.

“In our organization’s view, this is done, particularly the racial component, to create the false impression to minority communities that it is the Obama administration that is here to help them and another reason why, with all of the economic failings that they have provided to Americans generally and minorities in particular, they should continue to consider giving away their vote to that particular administration,” Cooper said.

In addition to the political maneuvering he alleges is behind this committee, Cooper is also deeply frustrated that this effort diverts resources from what he considers more severe and realistic threats.

“We are still under a threat watch. We still have all of the security measures that we put in place after 2001. The period of 2001-2008 was a period in which we thwarted more than a few. Some of those have been made public. But many of those still have not made public. But what we’ve seen since the beginning of the Obama administration is that many of these attacks, whether they’re increasing or not, are being more effective. They’re actually happening,” Cooper said.

“To shift more resources away from the threat that’s real to this theoretical problem is harmful to the safety of Americans and is more about a political agenda than it is in protecting Americans.”

Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2014/06/now-thought-crime-is-terror-in-u-s/#vFEjOPCjEW7HFjfq.99

There was a time when advocating for allowing interracial marriage and black suffrage was considered "sharply different." Dissent is a crucial part of a healthy republic.

Gulags anyone? http://www.offthegridnews.com/2010/10/08/is-free-thinking-a-mental-illness/

They are getting scary. Policing thought is a dangerous precedent to set. I hate racist groups like the Ku Klux Klan but I would defend their right to their own misguided beliefs any time.

I don't think Obama needs to do this. Most people are utterly conditioned to be deferential and subservient to power. If he says the sun is shining and all is well, most people would believe him even if it was pouring with rain and the streets were burning.

In terms of the political system, the US is becoming more and more like the old Soviet Union: dragnet surveillance, war on terror, thought crime, torture etc;

We have gotten very Orwellian. The good news is that people are waking up to it.

I see no evidence of that. Snowden's revelations were met largely with yawns in the US. People are happy as tax cows, it's a comfortable life.

Comfortable but unfree.
One could say:

.

Why challenge the status quo when life is easy and comfortable?

No species on the planet is free. We are all bound by rules such as needing to consume food to sustain life. Higher living life form such as human takes more than necessary to live "happy".

I think Snowden did a great job at telling the world about this information.
The more people know about this, the better.

Most people already know the government is spying on them.

Snowden just give the population the proof they need, and I do not think he did it to serve the general public. More likely a personal glory thing.

You don't think a giant blackmail machine is dangerous? Just think for a moment. What might say...mafia do with such tools?

There is a difference between dragnet surveillance and spying.  What you write now online can affect your career in the future, your love life, your possibilities in the future, your business opportunities and your life.  Some humans have the ability to wiretap anywhere, and can go back 15 years in time. All your private conversations, everything critical you said, anything.. and they have the control of the media and interpretations. In other words, you are f****d if they want to.

He surely did not serve himself by leaving a 200.000 $ salary behind, think about it. That means he served the public, and is still doing so.

Not yet but people with contrary views, especially conservatives, seem to find themselves shut out of things like commencement speeches.  The decline of tolerance and increasing polarization of discourse in the US is very disconcerting.  The US system shuts down in the face of things like this as everyone vetoes everyone else, unlike parliamentary systems which can still function within their rules.

I wish Snowden would have chosen a different avenue for what he did, but I'm glad the US domestic surveillance efforts were disclosed.

So who cares about commencement speeches when the graduates are probably so focused on not tripping over a too-long graduation gown to remember what the speaker says anyway? What I'd worry about is people being shut out of lucrative careers because they've got the wrong kind of politics. Hollywood is full of stories like that.

It should be over with all those secrets who are being held by the government. They say the more we dont know the better, but i dont agree with that hypothese. I think people have the right to know what kinda shit is going on in the world.