The Beginning of American Political Profiling

Many moons ago, we knew someone who worked in the credit card industry. He told us fascinating stories. The company he worked for serviced a number of banks that were too small to support their own credit card infrastructures, so they had a kind of umbrella organization. Part of their job was to help their customers add new, well-to-do clients to the rolls of credit card holders. Mind you, this was way before the Internet era. No smart phones, browsers, websites from where to glean information from. Today this is a much simpler process.

Their task was to find them new customers. Not the ones who already owned mansions or spent lavishly using credit cards in their possession. So how did they go about doing it? They purchased consumer data from outside marketing companies. All sorts or data, lists of magazine subscribers and lists of known U.S. passport holders. Lists of people who stayed in certain hotel chains, data from people who warranty-registered new products they bought (remember those little cards to be filled out and mailed back to the manufacturers)? They had a lot of questions answered about one’s lifestyle. All of that went into individual profiles in huge marketing databases. The marketing companies clients, like that organization we mentioned, bought information based on specific criteria they defined. They were called “selective solicits.” Example:  “we want data on U.S. passport holders who are also subscribers to the “Town and Country” magazine”. What’s the connection you may ask? There was one. Someone someplace figured out that certain people in this category would think nothing of flying over to France for a dinner at “Maxim’s,” famous Parisian restaurant, and come back home the next day. They were good candidates for new credit card offers. There were many such criteria, but we vividly remember that one. The information was collected, addresses matched, letters printed and mailed. Voila, welcome new clients.

Why have we brought this up? Well, it looks like our own government is now engaged in these “selective solicits” for political purposes. To be fair, they have always done that for intelligence gathering. Back in the aftermath of 9/11 all American banks had to yield data about clients and their private finances. They were looking for any signs of suspicious money moves to and from Islamic countries and left no stone unturned. Everyone was scared of terrorism; anything to be done to protect our lives was de-facto accepted by the society (anyway, most of us knew nothing of what was going on behind the scenes).

But that was “international”. We no longer seek out just enemies outside of our borders. We have “terrorists” in our midst. People who disagree, who have an alternate point of view and care little for the Democratic Party demagoguery that permeates the halls of power and mass media.

Well, Bank of America just handed over customer data to the U.S. Federal Government following the Capitol riot. Those who went peacefully marching around Washington DC in January and were on the streets when ANTIFA elements, in carefully planned and executed provocation, broke into our Capitol building. Most of you know the story. Now everyone is a suspect. Bank of America has 60 million customers. The FBI requested and received data on people who used their credit cards in or around Washington, DC. Here’s who they were after: 

– Customers confirmed as transacting, either through bank account debit card or credit card purchases in the Washington, D.C. area between Jan 5 and Jan 6.

– Purchases made for Hotel/Airbnb RSVPs in DC, VA, and MD after Jan 6.

– Any purchase of weapons or at a weapons-related merchant between Jan 7 and their upcoming suspected stay in the Washington, D.C. area around Inauguration Day. (*Glock-themed T-shirt buyers are also suspects – Eric)

– Airline related purchases since Jan 6.

We are almost certain other domestic banks were approached for the same information. Our law enforcement wants to know who went to Washington D.C. in support of President Donald Trump. The net is very broad and you, our readers, may well be caught up in it because you fit the criteria outlined above, or perhaps any other particular criteria to subsequently be employed.

Yeah, we heard. They are only after the “violent elements” in our society. The ones they are talking about on TV, the bad dudes, with propensity to commit assaults, break-ins, prepared to commit real crimes against out institutions and the government of the United States. But you know what? Nothing in the above “selective solicit” spells out those details. Fit whatever the undetermined profile is and you’re a suspect. Some red flags will go up on your many public records as well as some of your private ones somewhere in our electronic universe. You may be visited by federal agents who would question you on your political choices, gun ownership, income sources, friends’ names or whatever else they might be interested in. Those questions need to be answered truthfully since it’s considered a felony with serious prison sentences to lie to any U.S. federal agent.  And even if they don’t detain you as a suspect, don’t for a minute think this is the end of your troubles. Actually, it may be a beginning. Depending on the follow-up orders coming from the very top of our government, simple verifications can turn into something a lot more sinister. And who’s going to stop them? Donald J. Trump?

We really hate to spell out all this “doom & gloom”. We enjoy cheerful and easy-going living as much as anyone in our turbulent times and world. We do yearn to live free and care-free (OK, almost care-free), as before the current circus began a year ago. A policy of political persecution in America was the most distant and impossible consideration to come to mind. It is now here, in our midst. It started, thanks to the Democratic Party’s usurpers in power. They are scared and intend to wield the heavy club over any “Right” head. It’s not about to stop, the spring of their fear is wound very tightly. It can cause destruction if it snaps and becomes undone.  The Democratic Party is capable of unleashing THEIR fear and contemptible hate against the nearly the entire population of the United States to provoke them into silence and submission.

Everyone is a suspect. That big “solicit” is going to look at your Facebook and Twitter profiles, purchases you make, places you live, your friends and their political affiliations, phone calls to flagged numbers, emails on big tech’s clouds, phone location data, connections to known “right wing” hangouts, your donations, what you read and the car you drive, spending patterns, registered party affiliation, past travel, internet text postings, videos and photos. Your life’s data is out there.  Most people carry their entire life on their cell phone. All they need are the orders from above. Seeking the federal or local court’s permission to wiretap or to obtain a search warrant is swept away under a group of anti-terrorism federal laws giving unparallel, in American history, power to law enforcement to attack and suppress and person or group of people labeled as “Terrorist” either foreign or domestic. Anyone or group the high powers deem to be “Terrorist” in America, even a U.S. citizen has all his U.S. Constitutional rights forfeited.

Our Department of Defense is now starting to purge the entire U.S. military of what they call “political extremists”. No one has defined exactly who or what that means. The word “purge” reminds us of the past Communist purges elsewhere and is scary as hell.

Can we, as individuals, do anything about it? Most likely not, certainly NOT with violence that would play right into the hands of those stealing our rights like they stole our votes.  Few of us, if any, would change our lives and lifestyles because some computer programs may be pointing at us in that huge “needle in the haystack” search. But no one is immune to the big “fishing expedition” our U.S. government launched now as they sail out with baited hooks!

Political witch-hunts will be very costly for our collective morale and sanity. They will further contribute to tensions already brewing to a near boiling point in our midst. We don’t need this, now or ever.  America will always endeavor to be the land of the free and the home of the brave.