Police state
TV

Though the Bush administration’s Terrorism Information and Prevention System (TIPS) is officially on hold until Congress reconvenes in September, steps have been taken to assure diligent citizens have someone to squeal to, while refashioning the U.S. into a comic-strip nation. Callers to the Department of Justice with hot tips on suspicious foreigners have been rerouted to Fox TV’s America’s Most Wanted.

“We’ve been asked to take the FBI’s TIPS calls for them,” an operator explained to salon.com reporter Dave Lindorff. The ACLU called the concept a “completely inappropriate and frightening intermingling of government power and the private sector,” musing that perhaps Candid Camera could handle federal video surveillance.

While TIPS was originally intended to gather information on the public via postal workers and cable guys, an anonymous DOJ official said the revised plan is now “absolutely discouraging” tips on activities inside private homes. :
-Scott Saxon