In the 1970s and 1980s, my father, Sam Merrill, had an interview segment on a local radio show in New York City—Direct News. When he passed away, he left a crate full of vinyl records, each with one radio show. I’m digitizing and archiving his interview segments here.
In this segment, my dad interviews Morton Halperin about CIA recruitment & operation on college campuses. Boy, has not much changed. The 60s and 70s were paranoid times for activists, but for the government, too. Suspicion ran in both directions. These are days of campus activism, too, and I do not doubt that U.S. intelligence are on college campuses today.
In this segment, Halperin brushes off my dad’s suggestion that universities are afraid of having their federal funding cut. Well, they’re afraid now.
Halperin is still alive. Before this interview, he was wiretapped by Henry Kissinger, as my dad mentions. He had recently published The Lawless State: The Crimes of the U.S. Intelligence Agencies. After this interview, he directed the ACLU’s D.C. office, where he worked on legislation from immigration reform to civil liberties to press rights. He served in both Clinton and Obama administrations.
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