Oh, but they couldn’t have spied on ME! Its the US government, so honest, so pure…
[quote]mmg_4 wrote:
Oh, but they couldn’t have spied on ME! Its the US government, so honest, so pure…
This is the key excerpt from that piece:
[i]What has not been publicly acknowledged is that N.S.A. technicians, besides actually eavesdropping on specific conversations, have combed through large volumes of phone and Internet traffic in search of patterns that might point to terrorism suspects. Some officials describe the program as a large data-mining operation.
The current and former government officials who discussed the program were granted anonymity because it remains classified.
Bush administration officials declined to comment on Friday on the technical aspects of the operation and the N.S.A.'s use of broad searches to look for clues on terrorists. Because the program is highly classified, many details of how the N.S.A. is conducting it remain unknown, and members of Congress who have pressed for a full Congressional inquiry say they are eager to learn more about the program’s operational details, as well as its legality.
Officials in the government and the telecommunications industry who have knowledge of parts of the program say the N.S.A. has sought to analyze communications patterns to glean clues from details like who is calling whom, how long a phone call lasts and what time of day it is made, and the origins and destinations of phone calls and e-mail messages.
Calls to and from Afghanistan, for instance, are known to have been of particular interest to the N.S.A. since the Sept. 11 attacks, the officials said.[/i] [Emphasis mine]
The two bolded points:
The first, is that this goes to the data-mining point I made earlier, and the point Judge Posner made in his opinion piece about how this program is less invasive to privacy than wiretaps would be.
The second, is that people are still leaking classified information.
seems the US government is slowly taking more and more control to the point of it being rediculous…people have to be more educated on issues instead of just taking in whats on CNN and what the politician say in their speach and in the end letting their fears lead them
everything is starting to look more and more like 1984 .
kinda spooky if ya look at it
silly human greed
[quote]Professor X wrote:
Lorisco wrote:
Professor X wrote:
Would someone mind explaining to me how this is “ok” to anyone? Expanding the powers of the NSA drastically in secrecy to where it now directly affects Americans is now acceptable?
Would you rather have all your loved ones die by a terrorist bomb than to have the government listen to a few conversations over the phone of American citizens? There have been many cases of US citizens who have plotted terrorists acts.
That doesn’t mean that the answer is to start monitoring anyone who is a possible “threat” without a warrant. Eventually, someone will use that against the American people. I would rather us not fork over individual rights just for the illusion of safety. If anyone in this country is walking around thinking they shouldn’t be on the lookout for suspicious activity themselves or if anyone believes they are truly “safe” as if there isn’t a risk in this country, they are idiots. The Oklahoma bombing was not related to Iraq. Iraq is NOT our only threat in this country. Just because it is a hot topic for right now doesn’t mean that is where all of our focus or expectations should be.
Giving away freedoms due to fear is a great way to lose them all, including any freedom we once thought we had.
This is an issue because it a gray area. If it was as cut and dry as many conservatives wish it were, there would be no discussion.[/quote]
You didn’t answer the question. Would you then be ok if one of your family died because we needed to wait to get a court order and it took too long and the crucial info was missed? So if your loved one died because the system was followed you would be ok with that?
You see it is very easy to sit back and state how our freedoms are being taken away until something happens to you or your family as a result of a “freedom-friendly” system. Then, everyone wants to know who didn’t do their job and how this could happen. You can’t have it both ways; total freedom with total protection. To have protection it requires some loss of freedom.
[quote]dennis3k wrote:
seems the US government is slowly taking more and more control to the point of it being rediculous…people have to be more educated on issues instead of just taking in whats on CNN and what the politician say in their speach and in the end letting their fears lead them
everything is starting to look more and more like 1984 .
kinda spooky if ya look at it
silly human greed[/quote]
Right, 1984. Things will be friggen crazy when we reach that year. Hell, we might even put a man on the moon by then!
The problem with governmental powers is that they are rarely rescinded.
I am not a left/right individual, so I couldn’t care less who is making these decisions to limit civil liberties.
What I fear is governmental surveillance used to chill speech. If everything you say or do is recorded, you would not do everything you want to do or say.
That is fine now if you are a Bush supporter. But what happens fifteen years from now if everyone who supported Bush in 2005 is considered a threat to national security? That is wrong, and evil, but it has happened in history (Germany, USSR, nearly everywhere where true power occurs.)
What if personal gun ownership was considered a threat to national security? That sounds absurd now, but it has happened in other countries in history.
These are a lot of “what ifs”, but if you desire freedom you must be vigilant.
I often wonder why people argue if something is legal or not. The legislature creates laws (and the executive branch can create binding executive orders,) yet they complain one side, or the other, is completely wrong. What if, in the future, the legislature created a law banning all worship of Christianity? of Muhammad? of Yahweh? That sounds ridiculous, but it has happened before.
Do I care if some guy’s phone is tapped when talking to someone in the Middle East? Not especially, today. I do worry about the person in the future who is discussing the current politics of the day and is considered a threat.
Politics change faster than you think (two Republican presidents create huge deficits in the past 25 years?) Condoning oppressive actions by any party is allowing those actions to happen to yourself faster than you can imagine.
The question is; why is anyone surprised by this?
[quote]Lorisco wrote:
You didn’t answer the question. Would you then be ok if one of your family died because we needed to wait to get a court order and it took too long and the crucial info was missed? So if your loved one died because the system was followed you would be ok with that?
You see it is very easy to sit back and state how our freedoms are being taken away until something happens to you or your family as a result of a “freedom-friendly” system. Then, everyone wants to know who didn’t do their job and how this could happen. You can’t have it both ways; total freedom with total protection. To have protection it requires some loss of freedom.
[/quote]
maybe the nation’s motto should be changed from “the land of the free and the brave” to “the land of the scared shitless and the spied on”…