Unfortunately, I missed the NBC Nightly News broadcast yesterday where it was revealed that over 1,500 incidents had been reported to the Department of Defense, most of which turned out to be utterly stupid.

But out of those threats, gathered by the Counterintelligence Field Activity, very few have much of anything to do with actual threats to the nation.

Instead, the database, which contains reports such as those called in to the DOD’s 1-800-CALL-SPY hotline, contains almost 50 anti-war meetings or protests, such as an anti-war meeting held by Quakers last year.

And the danger?

One “incident” included in the database is a large anti-war protest at Hollywood and Vine in Los Angeles last March that included effigies of President Bush and anti-war protest banners. Another incident mentions a planned protest against military recruiters last December in Boston and a planned protest last April at McDonald’s National Salute to America’s Heroes — a military air and sea show in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

The Fort Lauderdale protest was deemed not to be a credible threat and a column in the database concludes: “US group exercising constitutional rights.” Two-hundred and forty-three other incidents in the database were discounted because they had no connection to the Department of Defense — yet they all remained in the database. . . .

Two years ago, the Defense Department directed a little known agency, Counterintelligence Field Activity, or CIFA, to establish and “maintain a domestic law enforcement database that includes information related to potential terrorist threats directed against the Department of Defense.” Then-Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz also established a new reporting mechanism known as a TALON or Threat and Local Observation Notice report. TALONs now provide “non-validated domestic threat information” from military units throughout the United States that are collected and retained in a CIFA database. The reports include details on potential surveillance of military bases, stolen vehicles, bomb threats and planned anti-war protests. In the program’s first year, the agency received more than 5,000 TALON reports. The database obtained by NBC News is generated by Counterintelligence Field Activity. — NBC

CIFA is part of the Department of Defense’s overall strategy to develop a domestic intelligence capability, which includes setting up a network of spies in the U.S.

Besides the real problem of the database itself, there is the very real problem of stupid Americans calling in these complete non-threats. Consider this example:

But most important, the database includes hundreds upon hundreds of incidents that are not only labeled “not credible” but also are absurd indicators of any kind of threat. An example:

• August 2004, Atlanta, Georgia, a Navy enlisted man is arrested for driving under the influence by the Cobb County Police Department “and upon search of vehicle, discovered a picture of Usama bin Laden displayed as a screensaver on E-4’s cellular telephone.”

The database is jammed packed with these types of silly reports. I’ve already written about CIFA’s concern about stolen or lost identification cards; the database includes 109 incidents — that’s almost 10 percent — where military people mostly report losing their IDs.

Anybody out there have kids who perhaps conduct this “suspicious activity”? 1-800-CALLSPY, and I’m not kidding: The 902nd Military Intelligence Group is standing by.

One after another, over and over, potential surveillance, “solicitation” of military wives, crank bomb threats, girls trying to get onto military bases to see their boyfriends without ID, that is the stuff of CIFA’s “suspicious activity” database.

None of these incidents go anywhere. There is not one case where the “subject” is found to be an actual threat.

Welcome to Rumsfeld and Cheney’s world of “actionable intelligence” where no scrap of information is too trivial, where the “dots” must be connected to find the next hijack conspiracy, where the seemingly innocent in bars and strip joints and mosques and college campuses and Quaker meeting houses could be the next Jose Padilla or Mohamed Atta. — William M. Arkin

There are at least two ways this can end. One is with a military police state. Another is with a civilian police state, supported by the military. I’d like what’s behind door number 3, please.