If the drive toward a Global State can be similarly perceived as a dynamic social force, the ascendancy of the snitch in contemporary America exemplifies this pernicious trend. Although the framers of the Constitution presciently granted the accused the right to "be confronted with the witnesses against him," the pernicious doctrine of universal suspicion has long eroded this vital safeguard and elevated a once dishonorable act into a thriving cottage industry.

This unsettling phenomenon provides the basis for Snitch Culture: How Citizens Are Turned Into the Eye and Ears of the State (Los Angeles: Feral House, 2001), an explosive new book by veteran journalist Jim Redden which unflinchingly documents our emergent cult of betrayal.

Redden's book features a wealth of historical analysis and rich anecdotal material. Few readers will fail to be disturbed by the many vivid depictions of children being indoctrinated to snitch on their parents, government-connected "watchdog" groups infiltrating and discrediting political movements, global surveillance systems monitoring citizen communications, and horrifying tales of desperate offenders coerced into manufacturing evidence against the innocent at the behest of malevolent prosecutors.

Redden is no stranger to America's multifaceted national security state. Since he began writing for Oregon's underground press during the late 1960s, the prolific reporter has covered government covert operations in publications such as EYE, The Lobster, Willamette Week, and PDXS, the twice-monthly alternative publication he produced throughout the 1990s.

The seasoned writer has had a lifelong fascination with alternative political movements, and has also delved into the controversial milieu of violent Nazi Skinheads, paramilitary "Patriot" factions, black-clad anarchists, Lesbian S&M aficionados, and other denizens of America's sociopolitical fringe. He is currently working as Senior Staff Writer for the Portland Tribune, a new, twice-weekly newspaper in Portland, Oregon.

Shortly after his first book's release, Redden consented to an interview with Disinformation, in order to provide further insights into the many snitches in our midst.

Disinformation:What was the genesis of this particular project?

Redden: My own personal experiences, for starters. I first became aware of government informants in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when I started and worked on a number of underground newspapers opposed to the War in Vietnam. The largest was the Augur, published by a cooperative of left-wing political activists in Eugene, Oregon. The police routinely sent undercover officers to our weekly editorial meetings. We knew they were cops because they looked and acted like they were straight out of Dragnet. They had short hair, wore new jeans and dark sunglasses, and just sat in a corner saying nothing. It was funny, but, at the same time, it was obvious the police were keeping track of us.

I had a large, communal house a few blocks off the campus of the University of Oregon. It was near one of the regular routes for protest marches, and I let them assemble in the front yard. I would frequently come home and find men in dark suits on the front porch, writing down the names on the mailbox. People would take my picture in stores or as I was walking down the street. We assumed our phones were tapped.

At the time, I didn't mind the surveillance. It meant we were being heard. But looking back, I can see how easy it would have been for the government to arrest us on trumped up charges. We were seriously pissed about what was happening in Vietnam, and it wasn't unusual for someone to say something like, "We should blow up the selective service office," or something like that.

We weren't serious about it. We didn't have guns or bombs or anything like that. We were just frustrated and shooting off our mouths. But an informant could easily have encouraged our conversations, then had us arrested for conspiracy.

After the war ended, the left pretty much collapsed and I eventually went to work for Willamette Week, the leading news weekly in Portland, Oregon. I began doing true crime stories after a few years and began running across informants again. Some of them were obvious liars who had cut deals with the police to get out of trouble. But some of them were the only way that serious crimes got solved. I'm not talking about prostitution, drug use, or civil disobedience, which I regard as political and victimless crimes. I'm talking about murders, rapes, assaults, things like that. Crimes committed by dangerous people who need to be taken off the streets. Iıve interviewed and even become friends with the parents and siblings of murder victims who are desperate for someone to step forward and tell them who killed their children. I understand that law enforcement agencies have to rely on informants to solve such crimes, even if the snitches are not completely clean themselves.

Then, in 1991, I started my own paper, PDXS. Within a few months, the Randy Weaver and Branch Davidian fiascos prompted a lot of people to begin questioning the government. I started going to various meetings organized by people who considered themselves populists, patriots and militia members. Although most of them tended to be more conservative than me, I found them to be sincerely disturbed about the government's willingness to use military force against American citizens.

Then, at one meeting, a guy pulled me aside and asked if I wanted to form an underground cell and do something to retaliate against the government. He was obviously a cop, just like the ones who attended the newspaper meetings in Eugene, and I realized the government was infiltrating this new political movement, such as it was. From that point on, every time I saw a story about a militia group being busted for conspiring to overthrow the government, I looked to see if they have been infiltrated. And, sure enough, they all were, usually many months before their alleged plot was suppose to take place. And I had to ask myself, was, are groups seriously conspiring to break the law, or were they just shooting their mouths off, like my friends and I did on Eugene. I think it's significant that few if any of these alleged militia members were ever convicted of conspiracy.

PDXS never made any money, and I finally shut it down in early 1999. Adam Parfrey, the owner of Feral House, visited Portland a short time later. I had known Adam for several years, and we got together one day to see if there was anything I could write for him.

By coincidence, the day we met, the Portland school district announced it was going to begin paying students up to $1,000 to report classmates suspected of breaking the law or school rules. Adam was outraged about it. He thought the schools were teaching kids to fink, and we started talking about the sheer number of informants at work in America today, especially in the War on Drugs, which is essentially a war against inner-city African-Americans.