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While I might have been in some ways sympathetic, the Panthers were a violent, armed, (Marxist-Lenninist) Communist radical group that had ambitions to overthrow some parts of governance, they got into shootouts with and killed police officers, voter indimidation etc.. You do understand it'd be very appropriate for the FBI to infiltrate such groups, as they indicating they are currently doing now with 'far right' and other radical groups, especially those with wepaons. Your characterization of 'assasination' is problematic. I wouldn't say Fred Hampton was so much assassinated. He and his buddies were involved in a shooting which killed police, very shortly thereafter the cops planned the raid to arrest them and two Panthers were killed. It seems that Fred was killed in cold blood. While this is obviously 'very illegal' - this is not the US Justice Department targetting someone, this is local Chicago/Oakland cops form of extra-judicial retribution for the gang killing of their colleagues. Again, not right, but something totally different what might be implied from 'assassination'. They killed cops, the cops got out of line and got revenge. Very notably - these acts caused national attention and there was an enormous reaction. Information was made public, there was public and political furor, transparency etc.. All of this is some time ago, when central oversight was harder, when the violence was much higher, and where groups of various kinds (aka local cops, local Panther groups) would act independently from central control. And in the grand scheme of 300 Million poeple, it's relatively small stuff. Also, it's a good reason for not having a single power like J Edgar Hoover in charge of anything. Finally, it should be noted that this was the start of the cold war, and the Soviets were absolutely funding totalitarian uprising around the world. Stalin direclty controlled 17% of the Bundestag during the Weimar. While obvoiusly not sufficient to cause 'The Big Bad Man' to rise, without it, 'The Big Bad Man' likely would have never existed. Afghanistan, Korea, Vietnam, Angola, Cuba, Chile, Nicaragua ... so much of the world ... was perturbed by very real, direct intervention from Soviet backed 'Marxist-Lenninist' groups. The 'Red Scare' was not a fantasty. It might have been overstated on some level, but it was a material 'existential' problem. The same, continued tactics by Russians have landed us in an 'almost war' for the West in Ukraine today. Russian spies are all over Germany, Putin has corrupted so many people in Europe including literally former German Chancellors, Austrian, Hungarian leaders - the FBI exists so that this does not happen so brazenly in the the US and allied nations. The FBI will step out of line again, just like all groups do, and there should be constant vigilance, but given the total independence of other branches, I'm not worried at all. There will always be whistleblowers, eventual transparency etc.. |