Telecom Immunity Bill Hides Spying Provisions 202
Corrupt notes an Ars analysis of the FISA bill of which the telecom immunity provision has been getting all the attention. Timothy B. Lee enumerates the ways in which the bill loosens current protections on domestic wiretapping and opens up whole new areas to government eavesdropping. "The legislation eliminates meaningful judicial oversight of eavesdropping between American citizens and foreigners located overseas, and effectively legalizes dragnet surveillance of domestic-to-foreign traffic. It stretches out the judicial review process so much that the government will in many cases be able to complete its surveillance activities before the courts finish deciding on its legality."
Judicial oversight (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Judicial oversight (Score:5, Insightful)
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Actually what it comes down to is, will it get to the right court.
Re:Judicial oversight (Score:5, Insightful)
When would the courts decide this? You are implying that there would be a trial.
Seriously? (Score:2, Insightful)
You think the intent is to gather evidence to take to court? For this rev of the executive branch? Seriously?
Re:Judicial oversight (30+ days of spying w/o) (Score:5, Insightful)
You're missing the point. The oversight process in this bill permits spying to take place for thirty days to four months before being forced to stop. The govt can spy for thirty days (plus the 1 week before submission of certification) even if judicial oversight rejects their case the moment it is presented.
The timeline assuming the agency's goal is maximizing the spying time:
0 day - spying begins without any preamble
1 week - Gov must submit certification for review
1-30 days + 1 week - judge must returns review
if judge objects
30 days after review- the govt must stop spying
unless they appeal to FISA
then they could have another 30 days
If the judges and courts have full queues that could push the whole thing to four months.
Assuming it gets rejected they presumably (IANAL) cannot use the evidence in court. Nonetheless they were legally empowered to look through your internet/telephone underwear drawer for over a month. How are you feeling about your 4th amendment rights now?
The article goes on to describe how the constraints make this law very easily abused to include spying upon americans for a wide variety of pretexts. That is the other half of the problem.
This is a terrible law even if you ignore autocracy being implemented by the telecom amnesty provisions.
Privacy Rights (Score:5, Insightful)
You are assuming the evidence is being used against you. As it turns out, if the cops illegally search you, and find evidence of wrongdoing on the part of someone else, that other person has no grounds to appeal the illegality of the search. Nor, unsurprisingly, do you have grounds to object to the search - the recourse for an illegal search is that the results cannot be used against you. Thus, you have no recourse if they're going after someone else.
Note that this is a double-edged blade; if they find something searching someone else's stuff on you, you have no recourse. Before this legislation the evidence could be thrown out because the telecom tap was illegal. Now, it's not.
Only overseas? (Score:2, Funny)
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America is becoming more like Sweden, and not in the good way.
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Well, I fully expect that AT&T et al will soon announce, for efficeny purposes, all calls/data will be routed through a station in Mexico/Canada. Hey, I bet the AG could then categorize them as "international" calls and spy on them!
Yello (belly) alert (Score:5, Interesting)
More murders are committed every year on American soil than all the American terrorist deaths in the 21st century. The difference between terrorism and ordinary murder is the intended victim - politicians.
It wasn't the world trade center or even the Pentagon that created the hysteria over terrorists. It was the plane that didn't make it out of Pennsylvania, the one aimed at Congress.
My government is run by cowards.
Re:Yello (belly) alert (Score:5, Funny)
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The difference between terrorism and ordinary murder is the intended victim - politicians.
This is a vast oversimplification. Try telling that to the families of those killed in a certain Israeli pizza shop or in the WTC.
I agree that we should not tolerate the constant creep in executive powers, all of which is being made in the name of national security, but let's not lose our perspective on the nature of terrorism either.
And about the FISA bill, make the effort, call your senators and let them know where you stand.
Re:Yello (belly) alert (Score:5, Insightful)
Wake the fuck up. Our senators don't give a flying shit about you and nor have they ever cared about what citizens believe. They are not there to represent you, me, or anybody, except they are there to represent the government of your state, nobody else. It is the house that represents you, not the senate. The house has already passed the law therefore the senate will just pass it as well since clearly the people that were suppose to represent us has failed us all.
Senators only care about one thing, money and power, and they're getting both with this bill. So, we're fucked and there is nothing we as citizens can do anything about it cause the government went corrupt a long time ago and it just continues to get bigger and bigger.
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Can't we, as citizens, vote?
When the corporate press convinces voters that a vote for any candidate not in either wing of the corporate party (Republican wing and Democratic wing) is wasted, you effectively have a one-party system.
As Mojo Nixon said in Burn Down the Malls, "you can vote for one fool or another". As the late Walt Kelly said via Pogo, "we have Tweedle dumb and Tewddle dumber".
The only vote wasted is a vote not cast. Any candidate on enough ballots to win should be in any debate and his/her vi
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Can't we, as citizens, vote?
We can. I do. It's been working great so far, hasn't it?
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Well, AC, since you're the self-appointed genius here, what do you suggest? All I can do is work within the framework of a representative democracy. I call and write my representatives and I try to vote the bums out every opportunity I get. What would you have me do? Stew, however uselessly, in my contempt for Washington? Or perhaps there's a bastille I ought to be storming?
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In a novel or story (can't remember its name, sorry), Robert Heinlein mentioned four boxes: Ballot, jury, ammo, and soap. Slashdot is the fourth box, as is the comments sections of the online editions of the mainstream newspapers.
Lets try and avoid the third box if we can.
Re:Yello (belly) alert (Score:5, Insightful)
let's not lose our perspective on the nature of terrorism either
We already did. Forty thousand people die on American highways every single year. Those deaths are no less traumatic to the families than the WTC deaths to those families, or those murdered by non-political murderers.
I want some of that homeland security money to go to guard rails.
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We already did. Forty thousand people die on American highways every single year. Those deaths are no less traumatic to the families than the WTC deaths to those families, or those murdered by non-political murderers.
There is a difference between a terrorists attack or murder and accidents. Accidents, while unfortunate, do not leave the grieving yearning for revenge. Grieving is bad enough, but adding the rage that comes from knowing that ones who killed your loved one still live and breathe just makes it that much worse.
I want some of that homeland security money to go to guard rails.
I agree that highways should get much more funding, but there is a highway fund for that. Rather than using national security money for that purpose, how about we eliminate something like corn, dairy
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I mean we need less spent on DHS and more spent on highways. And yes, I agree that subsidizing today's corporate farming (among other things) is stupidly wasteful.
Re:Yello (belly) alert (Score:5, Insightful)
The difference between terrorism and ordinary murder is the intended victim - politicians.
This is a vast oversimplification. Try telling that to the families of those killed in a certain Israeli pizza shop or in the WTC.
How is it a vast oversimplification?
Generally speaking, the entire point of terrorism is to further political or ideological goals.
Most people define terrorism by the motivation and intent of the attack, not by the scale.
As an example, the difference between terrorists (Beltway Snipers) and mass murderers (Columbine HS shootings) is entirely one of motivation and intent. Or another example would be hostage taking. What differentiates bank robbers who take hostages from Hezbollah or Hamas taking hostages? Why do we not call hostage-taking-bank-robbers terrorists?
The GP is 100% correct.
The difference between terrorism and ordinary murder is the intended victim - politicians.
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I live in the DC area and I very vividly remember what those three weeks of the Beltway snipers were like. But the snipers were not terrorists; they were spree killers. They had no political agenda or ideological goals. They may have had a terrorist-like effect on the DC area, and I'm sure they were thrilled by that, but mostly they were twisted fucks that got off on killing people.
In any case, I'm not entirely sure what your point is. You say yourself that terrorism is typically defined by the motivati
Re:Yello (belly) alert (Score:4, Informative)
According to wikipedia [wikipedia.org], "A series of trial exhibits indicated that Malvo and Muhammed were motivated by an affinity for Islamic Jihad."
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I live in the DC area and I very vividly remember what those three weeks of the Beltway snipers were like. But the snipers were not terrorists; they were spree killers. They had no political agenda or ideological goals.
The idealogical goal came out during the trials.
4th paragraph down http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beltway_sniper_attacks#Malvo_testimony [wikipedia.org]
In any case, I'm not entirely sure what your point is. You say yourself that terrorism is typically defined by the motivation or the intent of the attack -- and I agree with you on that -- and then in the next breath you then define terrorism as having to do with the intended victim. Which is it?
Both.
The politicians are victimized (harmed) every time their constituents get blown up or slaughtered because they (the politicians) refuse to accede to terrorists' political/ideological demands.
What politician was targeted in that Sbarro's in Israel?
Hamas' goal is the removal of the Israeli State. It isn't much of a leap to see that all Israeli politicians were the target of that attack, and every other attack.
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That trial didn't take place until 2006. The sniper shootings were in 2002, and I can tell you, when we were in the midst of it, very very few people regarded the sniper shootings as ideologically inspired terrorism. It may have been conjectured on occasion, but generally speaking, everyone including all the profilers and other "experts" on television thought we were dealing, if you recall, with some lone, white crackpot. To the Washington region, this was not terrorism in the same sense as we think of w
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Replying to my own post for purposes of correction, since I don't want to speak for another person's comments. I should have said that the initial contention was interpreted to be speaking corporeally rather than symbolically.
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Re:Yello (belly) alert (Score:5, Insightful)
This is a vast oversimplification. Try telling that to the families of those killed in a certain Israeli pizza shop or in the WTC.
That is a vast oversimplification as well. The fact that people died in the 9/11-attacks is very very tragic, but they were not the target of the attacks, they were collateral damage. I'm pretty sure the attackers didn't care about the deaths of "infidels", but they were attacking the symbols of Americanism (note that I'm not writing America/USA or Americans here). Collateral damage was acceptable for them. Just as it was when "the Coalition" invaded Iraq. Just as it has been in every major conflict.
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The problem with YOUR oversimplification is that with terrorism, collateral damage IS the political agenda furthering mechanism.
If they only wanted to blow the towers up, they could have done it at night. They WANTED the Americans dead. Go look at the video of Osama dancing during the newsplays of the day (9/11). He was happier than hell that it took out much more than he ever expected.
Sbarro? Yup, again, the terrorists could have blown it up when it was empty. Empty buildings don't scare politicians N
Re:Yello (belly) alert (Score:4, Insightful)
collateral damage IS the political agenda furthering mechanism
Sorry, but I disagree. At least in the 9-11 case. 9-11 was about the symbols. If it was about people, they would have flown all 4 planes into Skyscrapers and they would have done it at a slightly later time so all 4 buildings would have been packed with people.
If they only wanted to blow the towers up, they could have done it at night.
They could, but seeing they were mediocre pilots at best, it would have been a hell of a lot more difficult at night. In fact, having flown myself (gliding), I'm pretty darn sure they wouldn't have been able to hit the pentagon at night. VFR without a horizon, without clear ground sight, lots of blinking lights is and no proper training/experience, is rather a silly gamble.
He was happier than hell that it took out much more than he ever expected.
He was happy that the towers fell. No-one figured that would happen. The things were designed to survive a plane crashing into them. Skyscrapers normally don't collapse because of fire. I doubt the terrorist had the knowledge by which they knew the towers would fall.
Sbarro? Yup, again, the terrorists could have blown it up when it was empty.
I wasn't talking about Sbarro in my post, just 9-11. In all honestly, I don't even know that attack. But I believe that it refers to a attack in Israel. That's a different kind of Terrorism, which is much more about hatred between two civilian populations. The Terroists attack on 9-11 were about US hegemony, hence they attacked those symbols. If they wanted to attack civilians, they would have crashed a jet in the stadium during the Superball. Or they would have crashed all four jets in places with lots of people. If there would have been only 100 people working in the WTC, they still would have done the same.
Collateral damage in the case of the US led invasion is completely different.
Tell that to the families. Do you actually think they care whether family members die by a terrorist attack or a military attack?
Terrorism is designed to MAXIMIZE collateral damage, or the idiots with the bomb vests wouldn't fill them full of (insert small projectiles like nails, screws, etc here).
Some terrorism is, some terrorism isn't. Not all terrorism is the same. Read a good book about it. Look at some documentaries about the topic. (There is actually a good one about a terrorist group in Iraq. While being terrorists, they denounce the attacks on civilians f.i.).
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It was the plane that didn't make it out of Pennsylvania, the one aimed at Congress.
Admittedly off-topic, but I'm curious. You really think that the 4th plane was aimed at Congress? I've always assumed that it was a second striker for the Pentagon. The first Pentagon plane hit an area that was under repair and didn't house any top brass. That was easily obtained information - Something that I assume that the planners knew. But putting a second plane into the other side would have made a mess - Heavily populated especially during an evacuation due to the impact from the first plane. A
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Whether they fear death or fear loss of power, the cause and effect are both the same - we lose our rights because of their cowardice.
Re:Yello (belly) alert (Score:4, Funny)
And nations are made up of people so pathetic, idiotic and divorced from reality that they invent these sorts of conspiracy theories. I'm assuming you're a Muslim from a Middle Eastern country or one of the US's homegrown borderline paranoid schizophrenic conspiracy theorists. If the former, remember that your governments lie every bit as much, and you don't have the benefit of a free press. If the latter, go to your doctor and seek treatment, because you're very very ill.
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And nations are made up of people so pathetic, idiotic and divorced from reality that they invent these sorts of conspiracy theories.
What happens is that in the absence of credible news, people make up their own. It has nothing to do with being 'pathetic,' 'idiotic' or 'divorced from reality.'
It is similar to the way religions play the role of explainer of the unexplainable. Due to the government control of the media in most middle-eastern countries, the 'news' there is very unreliable and everybody there knows it. So they try to figure out a plausible explanation given what they know and believe.
The quality of news reporting in the w
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Oh come, on there's no meaningful correlation between conspiracy theories and the quality of journalism. The UFO lunatics and the JFK conspiracy dementicons, both decades old, should indicate that all that's required is an addictive personality and some deep-seated need to feel REALLY important with REALLY earth-shattering information that THE MAN wants to hide.
Re:Yello (belly) alert (Score:5, Funny)
Your government is the one who orchestrated all those planes craches in the first place.
Governments ares run by people even more deceptive than you could ever imagine.
...are you talking about the same people that couldn't even keep a simple blow-job quiet?
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Governments ares run by people even more deceptive than you could ever imagine.
...are you talking about the same people that couldn't even keep a simple blow-job quiet?
This comment just goes to show they could be more deceptive than you could ever imagine.
I don't buy the 9-11 conspiracy, but I absolutely believe that the guys in charge could orchestrate a blow job fiasco to distract us from other underhanded plans, while simultaneously making us view them as utterly incapable of running a giant conspiracy.
I'm not saying this is true, but it's plausible. If I was an evil overlord, I'd have a program to keep a constant stream of these fake situations flowing.
Re:Yello (belly) alert (Score:5, Insightful)
How about the billions in chasing phantom terrorists, waging two wars, creating the DHS, funding a massive wiretapping dragnet, new TSA security crackdowns, general security crackdowns, and plenty of pricey court cases arguing against the 4th Amendment.
Your pathetic attempt at distraction ignores the devastating cost of our overreaction.
Re:Yello (belly) alert (Score:5, Insightful)
And how many billions does it cost for those murders? 9/11 may have "only" killed 3,000 people, but it cost us several billion in clean-up, insurance, legal costs et al and sent our economy into a tailspin. All these pathetic analogies to deaths from bee-stings or bath-tub accidents or homicide ignore the devastating economic costs of terrorist attacks.
I would say that say "several billion" more than covers the clean-up, insurance and legal costs. While the hit to our economy is way into the trillions - how much have we wasted on Iraq alone, and then there is the sum of all the time wasted by TSA theatrics.
The difference is that the economic cost of terrorist attacks is largely self-inflicted - we do it to ourselves out of irrational fear. That's why the bee-sting and bath-tub death comparisons are apt -- they are meant to illustrate that our society does not have an irrational response to bees despite them killing more people than terrorists, so maybe we should get a grip and stop reacting irrationally to terrorism too.
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9/11 didn't send our economy into a tailspin. An ill-planned war, and greed (mortgage "investment") sent our economy into a tailspin. Nothing more, nothing less.
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9/11 didn't send our economy into a tailspin. An ill-planned war, and greed (mortgage "investment") sent our economy into a tailspin. Nothing more, nothing less.
Don't let the facts [wikipedia.org] get in your way of your politically motivated theory.
The attacks had a significant economic impact on the United States and world markets. The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), the American Stock Exchange, and NASDAQ did not open on September 11 and remained closed until September 17. When the stock markets reopened, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (âoeDJIAâ) stock market index fell 684 points, or 7.1%, to 8921, its biggest-ever one-day point decline.[162] By the end of the week, the DJIA had fallen 1,369.7 points (14.3%), its largest one-week point drop in history.[163] U.S. stocks lost $1.4 trillion in value for the week.[163] In New York City, there were approximately 430,000 lost job months and $2.8 billion in lost wages, which occurred in the three months following the 9/11 attacks. The economic effects were mainly focused on the city's export economy sectors.[164] The GDP for New York City was estimated to have declined by $27.3 billion for the last three months of 2001 and all of 2002. The Federal government provided $11.2 billion in immediate assistance to the Government of New York City in September 2001, and $10.5 billion in early 2002 for economic development and infrastructure needs.
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Moron, he didn't say it didn't have an economic effect at all. He said it wasn't responsible for the currently nose-diving US economy. And on that score, he's correct, as last I checked, no one in their right mind was attempting to link 9/11 to the current, ongoing American economic implosion.
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Make sure you keep your facts in scope.
The entirety of the damage to New York's GDP represents about 0.26% of the GDP for the country in 2001.
While it was definitely a measurable blip, the immediate effects of the attacks had no long-term effect on the country's economy as a whole. Reaction to the incident how ever, has been significant. And while I'm not a fan of the TSA, nor do I think of them as an especially effective anti-terror force, their creation and budget does work effectively the same as any pub
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The economic costs of 9/11 are due to overreaction, paranoia and fear. Furthermore, the economy was already in trouble by 2001, since the dot-com bubble had already begun to burst.
The truth is, as horrific as 9/11 was -- and certainly not to belittle the loss that the victims' families have had to deal with since that day -- it was still a drop in the bucket compared to the constant loss of life that we all accept as "the way it is." The difference is, when we get behind the wheel of
Slashdot community helped to keep a lid on it. (Score:2, Interesting)
I pointed this out in a recent story about revolts among the BO community, and was modded troll for daring to question the integrity of his holiness.
Thanks slashdot for helping them cover it up until it was too late.
Barack is incapable of evil, so supporting this like he is must be good, right?
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"...modded troll for daring to question the integrity of his holiness."
You are forgiven my son. [fist bump]
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www.pledgebank.com/AS-IF-Privacy
I drew the line on telecom immunity, although maybe I should not have been so specific. I would prefer if others would draw the line with me..
"I will Vote Third Party for President If Telecom Immunity Passes Into Law but only if 100,000 other registered voters will do the same."
BO? (Score:2, Funny)
Get some deodorant.
Mod parent up (Score:2, Insightful)
Having also been downmodded for critizing Obama, I think it's definitely time to end the witch-hunt against detractors that has begun to permeate this community.
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I've suffered the same fate from misguided moderators. It would be great if people realised that flamebait/troll/overrated does NOT mean 'I don't agree with this guy'.
Obama scares the hell out of me. He's no different, and possibly worse, than your average politican yet his followers seem to think he can walk on water and part the Red Sea. What really scares me is not that he's hoodwinked so many people though; it's his absoulte lack of experience combined with his absolute dishonest that scares me.
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I've suffered the same fate from misguided moderators. It would be great if people realised that flamebait/troll/overrated does NOT mean 'I don't agree with this guy'.
Obama scares the hell out of me. He's no different, and possibly worse, than your average politican yet his followers seem to think he can walk on water and part the Red Sea. What really scares me is not that he's hoodwinked so many people though; it's his absoulte lack of experience combined with his absolute dishonest that scares me.
I don't think he's absolutely dishonest, but he's misrepresenting himself as a "principled" person.
He's just like everyone else on the hill. He may not be a bush, but he's closer to clinton than he is to kennedy.
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What we need is a moderation "-1, I Don't Agree" that will let us override that to +/-0 in our preferences. That way they have something that will fit, will do the same thing, and will allow troll/flamebait to actuall function properly.
Hey, they added over/underrated - why not this?
Re:Slashdot community helped to keep a lid on it. (Score:4, Insightful)
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Mod this up people, this is far from troll.
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One of those was me deciding to post, and my +1 interesting going away.
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What are you so worried about? (Score:5, Insightful)
What do we have to be so darned worried about? It's not like the President would compile an "Enemies List" of people to wiretap, or something. This is America, right?
oh crap [wikipedia.org]
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Bill Gates, Microsoft CEO: Nixon hated MS-DOS.
21 is clearly the best.
On another note, This is America - where presidents make lists of American citizens to spy on, the House will hold hearings on who is unamerican and vilify whoever they have to to maintain control over the people through constant fear mongering. Its the American way!
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What do we have to be so darned worried about? It's not like the President would compile an "Enemies List" of people to wiretap, or something. This is America, right?
oh crap [wikipedia.org]
With respect to the fairness doctrine, I present the following:
FileGate [wikipedia.org]
The incident caused a firestorm of criticism because many of the files covered White House employees from previous Republican administrations, including top figures such as James Baker, Brent Scowcroft, and Marlin Fitzwater.
Is it just me? (Score:5, Insightful)
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</sarcasm>, just in case someone misses it
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>>Or are we just expecting that actionable intelligence will fall into our laps, like manna from heaven?
We fucking had actionable intelligence, so did everybody else. It told us that Iraq was NOT a threat. But, our benevolent dictator decided to lie to the American people to go get oil and make his buddies rich. How about, instead of wishing for actionable intelligence, you wish that the government would actually USE the intel they have APPROPRIATELY.
Fear is not a valid reason to do anything.
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Well, considering that Bletchley Park (and all the XX Committee efforts) were used in the interception and decryption of encrypted military communications from a country on the other side of a declared war, I don't see the comparison.
Perhaps you were thinking of the Mail Censor? People's post was read, any "secrets" redacted, and the letter forwarded.
Why is this different? Because it was international mail that was censored, and it was known to be happening (usually there was a nice big stamp "Cleared by th
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Bletchley Park, unless I am greatly mistaken, was set up to analyze intercepted data from a foreign power. Domestic wiretapping is an attempt to intercept data from, well, domestic signals. That is why Bush needs to go to the courts -- it is not an intelligence operation, it is a domestic police operation which requires judicial oversight.
So it's even worse than we thought... (Score:5, Insightful)
If people don't start swamping their representatives with letters, calls and e-mails telling them to strangle this evil piece of legislation in its cradle, a lot of the things that make the United States a place worth living in will start sliding away.
Bin Laden must be laughing himself sick. One terrorist act that kills fewer people than died every single day during WWII, and the US starts throwing the rights and freedoms its heroes bled and died for down the nearest toilet...with enthusiastic applause from hysterical soccer moms and authority-worshiping lackwits.
Re:So it's even worse than we thought... (Score:5, Informative)
And the most depressing thing is that he, himself, predicted it whie the rubble was still smoldering.
"I tell you, freedom and human rights in America are doomed. The US Government will lead the American people - and the West in general - into an unbearable hell and a choking life."
- Osama bin Laden [cnn.com], as quoted in his only post-9/11 interview, ca. November 2001, and as aired on CNN in early 2002.
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I think you misspelled "continue."
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Guess you missed all the demographic surveys offering fairly detailed profiles of people who lent significant swing support to the would-be goose-steppers. You were probably too busy trying to write ill-conceived rhetorical questions to do any research before you shot off your mouth.
"Anonymous Coward"...good description, though I lean more toward "F*ckin' moron".
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Checks and Balances (Score:5, Insightful)
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Hey, at least we have The System left. That's the most important part, right?
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When I was in school I learned that our government is a system of Checks And Balances.
Ah, you were not paying close enough attention. Our government is a system where checks tip the balance. Checks written to the re-election fund of each person in congress that is...
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A bill? with hidden provisions? (Score:2)
Im shocked I tell you, SHOCKED!
is this new? (Score:2)
Without having read the article: is that really new? The current FISA provision allows agencies to start wiretapping 72 hours before filing a request.
Dont trust them (Score:2)
Encrypt and use secure OSes. Yes, that will make evasdropping harder, but the bad guys already use these security technologies. This is not about catching ''terrorists'', this is specifically to evasdrop on normal citizens, for example to evaluate public opinion and identify people with unwanted views. Highly unethical (read: evil. These people can only hope that theire is no after-action evaluation after they die. They would all go to hell.), but politicians typically have no morals anyways, except for sho
12% Approval (Score:5, Insightful)
Here's an interesting stat, everybody tends to like (tolerate) their Senator and Congress Critter, however Congress and Senate have about a 12% overall approval rating.
These numbers really don't make sense, not at all. Each congress critter / senator is part of the whole and thus part of the problem for everyone who isn't part of that 12%.
FISA is just a symptom of the problem of overly complex and burdensome legislation. I'm sure there is SOME part of FISA that you (everyone) would agree is okay perhaps even needed, however that is over shadowed by all the parts that you (everyone) don't like, hate, despise or whatever.
Which is why, almost overwhelmingly, we don't like FISA as a whole. The process sucks, because just enough people like each part to get it included into the whole, but the whole is untenable.
This directly mirrors our view of congress, we like the part we voted for, but no the aggregate whole.
Personally, I'd like to see a new Constitutional Ammendment that every 8 to 16 years, the nation as a whole votes on all the congress critters and senators as an aggregate group, Yes / No. And if they get a "NO" then they (the aggregate whole lot) can never run for any office ever again (not even honorary town dog catcher), and lose whatever pension they might have coming.
It is time to clear out the deadwood.
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A constitutionally mandated 10 year sunset date on all laws should also be enacted. They cannot be renewed by simple riders either. The laws must be re-drafted from scratch.
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Wow, dude, that's a good idea, though I'd probably up it to 20 years, otherwise everything would just stop (hmmm...).
That's part of the point. Idle hands are the devil's playground.
Get realistic (Score:3, Insightful)
Personally, I'd like to see a new Constitutional Ammendment that every 8 to 16 years, the nation as a whole votes on all the congress critters and senators as an aggregate group, Yes / No. And if they get a "NO" then they (the aggregate whole lot) can never run for any office ever again (not even honorary town dog catcher), and lose whatever pension they might have coming.
Exactly who is going to enact such vindictive and short sighted legislation? That would be a great way to further expand the power of the executive branch so maybe Emperor Bush would be in favor. Darth Cheney would certainly approve.
Really, I think we already have enough cowardly, pandering, and/or dogmatic leadership as it is. Realistic term limits (say 12 years max in either branch of congress) would substantially accomplish your goals. Not that I expect those to ever get into law either.
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Exactly who is going to enact such vindictive and short sighted legislation? That would be a great way to further expand the power of the executive branch so maybe Emperor Bush would be in favor. Darth Cheney would certainly approve.
Please. At least the Executive branch has term limits.
Unfortunately there is no way Congress/State Legislatures will provide the 3/4 majority to amend the Constitution to limit the "ruling class image" of their own Senators and Representatives the way they did to the President.
Deadwood, clear the whole place. (Score:2)
The real fact is, people always think its the "other" guy that is the problem, their representative is the "good one". Just like when public school discussions come up, the one you send your kid too is the best, its not like those "other" schools.
While I don't favor the idea of removing choice from our voting ability, term limits make sense because we really have no choice. Being able to choose one side of the same coin over another is not a choice. Democrats and Republicans are most often the only peopl
People Want Action, Even Bad action (Score:4, Insightful)
Simple:
People want to see something done to protect them even when it isn't possible.
Politicians are doing exactly what they are supposed to do, get themselves re-elected by catering to those that elected them.
The sad fact is most people didn't elect them though, just a small, focused, and motivated groups. The squeaky wheel gets the grease.
Don't complain when they do this when your idea of participating in politics is going to vote.
That is the smallest part of participation.
It would be no different to say you ran a marathon after driving it in an SUV, getting out 10 feet in front of the finish line and crossing it. You didn't run a marathon and voting is just crossing the finish line of the political system. We are lazy.
People are pissed at special interest groups because a group of people pooled their money, hired lobbiest, and worked hard to get their agenda through.
A few Special Interest Groups
NRA
Teacher's Union
Pharmacutical Companies
Trade Unions
Your Local Church\Syna\Mosq\temp\etc....
The United Union of Gnome Collectors
International Union of Bloggers
Red Cross\Crescent
GLBA-ETC (can keep up anymore with them...)
PETA
Green Peace
Shriners
Masons
NAACP
Free Press Ascc.
WC3
EFF
YOUR EMPLOYER
Which one are you a member of? Want your voice silenced or ignored? Every time you hear them say that special interest groups have to go, don't forget some of the ones above...
If all the people complaining about special interest groups made thier OWN special interest group you'd dwarf the resources of all the others at $5 dollars a month. Informal servey at my local mall reveals the only people that complain about special interest groups involved in government, well, don't belong to one.
We get the government we deserve and right now we deserve little if anything.
Obama talks about change, but he's from the same democrates that have been running around for over a 100 years. What change was there? Mc Cain is a republican? Why keep flip-flopping between two parties that have shown in the last 100 years their primary goal is to grab more power for... well their own party.
Seriously, we have no one to blame for this except ourselves. If we want change we need to stop listening to money, advertisements, and nicely laid out speeches and catch phrases and start listening to reason. The time for 15 minutes attention spans needs to come to a halt!
'08 Looks like this:
Hillary: "Why the hell would I vote for a women that didn't have the balls to throw out her cheating husband after at least 12 years of infidelity. If you can tolerate a traitor in your marriage where else would you?"
Barack: "I've done little in congress, have no military campaign experience, and I am basically a closet socialist that lacks the balls to run as a socialist (not saying their bad). I'll bring change by following party lines and making sure that I keep my democrat backers happy..."
Mc Cain: .... .... .... I think we have a pulse.... "The tubes need to be regulated..." .... can we get a canidate that isn't a fossil? Please...
We have no sense of personal responsibility left as a nation and can't perform the most basic forms of critical thinking. We beg for Big Brother in our actions and expectations but condemn Big Brother in our words.
We compain about the cops when they are there and bitch about them never being around when they're not.
We have come to expect simple answers, simple solutions, in a world that has never been, nor ever will, be simple.
We have become a planet (not just to pick on the US) of hypocrite.
The environmental types complain about global warming and want ethanol but then bitch about people starving due to high food costs
The capitalist demand free market but work hard and making sure patents and copyright are enforced by the government rather then market forces.
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Facebook Groups to lobby Individual Senators (Score:4, Informative)
There is a group on facebook to lobby Senator Obama and follow-up groups to lobby every Senator individually:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=17961184023 [facebook.com]
Groups for Minnesota Senators Klobuchar and Coleman:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=17065979228 [facebook.com]
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=18283117073 [facebook.com]
Such concern for foreign communications... (Score:2, Interesting)
I'm surprised, these attempts by the Executive to ease their lives gets so much attention, when far grosser violations of the Executive/Judiciary powers have been accepted/condoned for decades.
The most glaring example is "licensing" in general, and licensing the drivers — taxpayers wishing to use the tax-payed public roads — in particular. The Executive government gives the licenses and is free to take them away — without any Judicial oversight and without having to convict the accused o
If we're upset enough (Score:3, Interesting)
Lets not vote for any congressman/senator that is in support. And lets stop using the telecoms in question. If its all of them, then so beit.
I know my congressman was actually against it, so I've got less work to do that most of ya'll. Get to it.
Re:nice work (Score:4, Insightful)
It's the government's own idiocy that jeopardizes security. They almost immediately abuse such laws to go after non terrorists. Maybe they should also ask for Telecom Throttling Immunity so they can secure enough bandwidth (a DOUBLING) to copy every data bit into analysis programs (hmmm ISP network stress overload coincidence?), and also secure Copyright Infringement Immunity to mass violate everybody's copyrighted content. I nominate the agency be honorably named ThePirateGov. They should also perhaps budget 999 TRILLION dollars a year to compensate for the government legal liability.
How are citizens supposed to keep their ears and eyes open for terrorism unless they upload and download *everything*, to make sure that every data bit isn't overlooked for possible terrorist activity? We can now clearly see that copyright and ISP throttling is aiding and abetting terrorist activity. How do we know there aren't secret terrorist plans in files named mileycyrus.mp3? Don't let the terrorists win -- end copyright now!
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How do we know there aren't secret terrorist plans in files named mileycyrus.mp3?
Which reminds me, they're also out to get the pedophiles(who just happen to be Vanity Fair [shallownation.com] and 80% of the world's population).
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Quite frankly, Miley Cyrus is too young for me. Children do not turn me on. Do I need to worry about being deviant now?
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How do we know there aren't secret terrorist plans in files named mileycyrus.mp3?
It would have to contain terrorist plans--it's certain no one wants it for the singing!
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Actually, her father (Billy Ray Cyrus) had the original terrorist plan. "Achy Breaky Heart" was meant to be distributed throughout the whole U.S. and sap our will to live, thus allowing the Confederate Hordes to finally rise again. Fortunately, Weird Al Yankovich warned us all ahead of time. Although it is still not as bad as the near o
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"I'm not a criminal"
How's that MP3 collection?
"I don't make repeated calls to foreign countries discussing illegal activities"
How do they know unless they listen in? Don't forget that many of those 800 numbers you call are international.