Is the NYPD Worse Than the NSA? - Conor Friedersdorf - The Atlantic: The full story contains a lot more objectionable behavior, and after reading how the undercover officers operate it's easy to understand why the unit would cause Muslim-American mosque attendees, small-business owners and patrons, and students throughout the city to grow paranoid in their daily lives. And defenders of the program are unable to point to even a single case where it prevented a terrorist attack -- in fact, they can't even point to a terrorism-related arrest or prosecution.
Usually, when I write phrases like, "This is how a secret police force with files on innocent Americans starts," I'm issuing a warning about the future. But the NYPD literally started a secret police unit that began indiscriminately keeping files on innocent Americans. This isn't a warning about a slippery slope. It is an observation about ongoing abuse of civil liberties in America's biggest city.