Yes the funny part is the scientist they labeled as a terrorist is not a terrorist at all, but is a perfectly legitimate surveillance target. They not only have the wrong label for the wrong people, they have the wrong label for the right people.
As a followup to my original post we probably need two new .gov agencies not just one. One would focus on state level threats to the country like foreign nuclear scientists, pretty much the pre-1984 style CIA stuff, or at least the fraction of CIA activities that were actually legal. The other would be more police like and focus on nutty individual threats, that aren't national threats, more or less James Bond evil villain type stuff. Both groups might or might not "fit" under the same gov org. Probably neither fits under the existing 1984 organizations, and unfortunately no one is apparently working on those two problems, in favor of the much more exciting "stamp out political dissidents / implement Stasi/SS secret police in the USA" model.
As a followup to my original post we probably need two new .gov agencies not just one. One would focus on state level threats to the country like foreign nuclear scientists, pretty much the pre-1984 style CIA stuff, or at least the fraction of CIA activities that were actually legal. The other would be more police like and focus on nutty individual threats, that aren't national threats, more or less James Bond evil villain type stuff. Both groups might or might not "fit" under the same gov org. Probably neither fits under the existing 1984 organizations, and unfortunately no one is apparently working on those two problems, in favor of the much more exciting "stamp out political dissidents / implement Stasi/SS secret police in the USA" model.