No Surprise Here: NSA Abused Surveillance Powers
from the but-of-course-they-did dept
This will comes as little surprise to most people, but it turns out that the NSA has been abusing its surveillance powers, collecting significantly more information than they are allowed to by Congress. Of course, we got a hint of this last year when an NSA whistleblower revealed how the NSA regularly tracked information it wasn't supposed to be tracking. And, of course, we've yet to see a secretive gov't program yet that hasn't been abused in some way. National Security Letters? FBI abused it. Warrantless wiretapping? Abused. So we should certainly be questioning why the administration is claiming that there shouldn't be oversight over any such programs, when history has shown that they have been, and will continue to be, abused.
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Filed Under: abuse, nsa, surveillance
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Nothing to see here
Keep on looking at us like that and we'll tase your ass. You can trust us, after all... well... take it from us, you can trust us
Change you can believe in*
*subject to terms and conditions, offer may be altered at any time without notice, beliefs may vary
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Re: Nothing to see here
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Re: Re: Nothing to see here
In what way? NSA, Police and FBI constantly abusing powers and the new administration stating they don't need oversight?
Certainly sounds like business as usual - meet the new boss same as the old boss
no oversight = look away (or has the same effect anyway)
Go on enlighten me, what did I miss that was so insightful you couldn't fit it into a one line reply
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Re: Nothing to see here
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Re: Re: Nothing to see here
You saw it - he asked for it. I was just doing my duty... err... following orders or something
He SAID the words!
Goddamn free speaking commies
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Is it really a big deal
Unless you have some reason to be tapped, no one is going to waste the time and money it would cost to do so... you're just not that interesting.
The NSA (and other agencies) have a weighty task. We talking about some serious consequences for failure on their part, and unfortunately, those consequences directly effect our lives.
Besides, even if they are surveillancing American citizens, they can't take action against a suspect without following due process -except for possibly extraordinary rendition, which is, by definition, extraordinary. And again, realistically, the stakes are pretty high, and they aren't going to risk the time, money, and bad pr for no reason.
Bottom line: suck it up.
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Re: Is it really a big deal
It's people like you who continued to give up freedoms in Nazi Germany that led the way to secret police, rounding up of ethnic peoples and finally genocide.
If you keep looking the other way, trying to justify giving up your freedom and it WILL BE TAKEN AWAY FROM YOU.
Oh, it will sound like a good reason... keep you safe, stop terrorism, save the children, save the planet, or whatever "feel good" cause they invent to strip you of your freedom.
So roll over and play dead if you want. It will be the truth sooner than you think as you are systematically stripped of your freedoms.
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Re: Re: Is it really a big deal
Also, I appreciate seeing comments that aren't all the same sarcastic opinion echoed from the article 20 times in 15 different ways.
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Re: Re: Re: Is it really a big deal
Yeah, because a lot of that supposed Nazi stuff never even happened in the first place. Why would their government have cared if someone was Jewish or not? Answer: they wouldn't. They had much more important issues to deal with, like WWII, than peoples personal religious beliefs. All these people that are just soooo scared of the big bad government should just put their tin foil hats on and go hide in the woods, preferably in the middle of hunting season.
Also, I appreciate seeing comments that aren't all the same sarcastic opinion echoed from the article 20 times in 15 different ways.
Me too. I really appreciate reading sensible comments like Bob's. People who don't trust the government must have something to hide.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Is it really a big deal
Try this one - if you have nothing to hide why not walk down the street minus your clothes we're all the same underneath after all
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Re: Is it really a big deal
It's not what I'm doing today that I'm afraid someone will find odds with.
It's what that I may have done yesterday that was totally OK, but it won't be tomorrow.
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Re: Is it really a big deal
True, the No Such Agency and the CIA does have a weighty task -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip
http:// en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mkultra
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cointelpro
Unfortunately, that task seems to have little to nothing to do with our well being. But what's Obama to do? The last guy that tried to castrate the intelligence community, Kennedy, didn't fair so well.
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Re: Is it really a big deal
Just because it's not a big deal to you, directly, does not mean that it's not a big deal to someone who is in some way connected to you and everyone else.
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Re: Is it really a big deal
What is happening is computers go over ALL conversations, pick out keywords, and flags them for review.
Call someone and say nothing but anthrax, explosives, etc, etc.
"They can't take action against a suspect without following due process"
With the above mentioned, you can be deemed a terrorist, or enemy combatant, shipped off to one of our gulags, and it would be all legal. There's your due process.
"bad pr" Dont kid yourself. You would be taken away and no one but your family would know, and no one would listen.
Suck it up? - what a fool.
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And yes, of course; it's being abused.
Unfortunately, that task seems to have little to nothing to do with our well being. But what's Obama to do? The last guy that tried to castrate the intelligence community, Kennedy, didn't fair so well.
Yep, true enough. He was 'taken care of'.
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NSA's goal
The law of the land will be like a castle made of sand.
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Novel Idea
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Its beyond your pay grade
You can call me an idiot, you can say I'm a fool, but the fact of the matter is, you're talking about something about which you don't know pertinent details.
I'm sorry. Have you devised a way to identify and analyze relevant chatter between known and suspected terrorist operatives inside and outside of the country. Are you able to draw a correlation from that analysis to clear and present threats to national security?
No? Then maybe you don't know what they should or should not be allowed to do, and maybe the news of the NSA's 'abuse' of power is spin created by the liberal media who has clearly decided what you should think about this particular topic.
Or maybe they just know they can make a buck off of stupid fear mongers.
Take it easy Dale Gribble, THEY are not out to get you.
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Re: Its beyond your pay grade
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Blah blah blah trust your government blah
A. No, and apparently neither are the intelligence agencies, or else they would have been more successful in stopping terrorist attacks, identifying the capacity of weapons of mass destruction, and keeping us from sending SCUDs into asparin factories.
B. If the dangers were clear and present, we wouldn't be having this discussion because the unintelligence agencies would know WHOM to direct their activities (this assumes that they don't know, which is BS. There IS NO real threat, relatively speaking, and the NSA/CIA/FBI is doing exactly what it intends to do: spying on the American public).
C. None of this matters anyway, because law enforcement agencies are not allowed to obtain wiretaps w/o a warrant, or else they must obtain a warrant quickly after beginning a necessary wiretap. The abuses mentioned in this article fall under that category, are illegal, and should (but won't) be stopped.
Fascism, thy name is America
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Government workers are people too
Are you a tory? A nazi? A communist? A terrorist?
OR GOD FORBID... a socialist???
That kind of fearmongering that gets repeated over and over always places the government in the "trustworthy" role. Do you really trust the people working in the government??
I trust them a lot less than I trust my neighbor, but I still close my blinds at home.
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After COINTELPRO, some people still think the Feds are the good guys
The FBI and local police illegally carried out surveillance citizens exercising free speech for over a decade, planted false rumors, committed felonies that were blamed on legal organizations and then, when exposed and ordered by courts to desist and destroy illegal files, handed them off to right-wing private armies to be computerized (which they were also caught doing).
Look a little further back, when in the 60's a plan was laid before the Joint Chiefs of Staff to blow-up John Glenn's Mercury rocket on the launch pad and blame it on Castro, thereby securing overwhelming public support for a full scale invasion of Cuba.
If that seems like ancient history to some, ponder Donald Rumsfeld scheduled to appear before Congress on Sept. 11 to explain a $2 trillion hole in the Pentagon budget. Needless to say, instead of grilling him with questions about this unbelievable loss, he was showered with money to hunt down the vicious terrorist who blew-up the World Trade Ctr.
Wow. I'm sure glad the government gets to listen in on all our conversations...
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NSA
Total lack of transparency (ACTA?) is absolute power - and again, as Kissinger pointed out, "absolute power corrupts absolutely".
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Eric Carlson pedofied me behind prison walls and then framed me as a pedophile on march 26th 2007, I caught the crime on a audio recorder I put in Joan's purse.
there were people in authority helping them with this and nobody in authority will help they pretend nothing happened and refuse to investigate this.
Eric Carlson changed his hair color and his name to Gashel and Clackamas Walmart was hiding him from my Family by pretending He's someone else but this is not hidden, only ignored by the authority's and media
I'm disabled from being poisoned and the hospitals refuse to admit I'm poisoned.
My Family is in danger from these people and I have no other recourse but to make these charges public.
My name is Terry Wagar,I'm from Portland Oregon and I'm backing up these charges.
I have been threatened with harassment charges by a Sargent Walker, She is a Portland Police officer stationed at the OHSU hospital, for the non crime of reporting a multi murder conspiracy within that hospital.
They dont give a s4!t Joan and Eric was poisoning a plasma donor!
And how many god damn John Ray's in authority are there in portland oregon!
You damn serial killer.
Where did Mrs Dash keep her stash? in A Garlic Salt Shaker!
What did Doubleclick do with his Dick? You Pedo!
Why you hiding A body double for Clackamas Walmart?
Cover this up Sgt Walker!
We have our Witch hunts right here in Portland Oregon, and they use it to justify murder.
The Authority's call it "Pedofied" it means they just run around spreading rumors about someone they want dead, they label that person A pedophile, turning hundreds of people against that person overnight.
It makes it easy to get volunteer's to lie for them so they can murder off that person.
And no one complains, thinking to themselves "One less pedophile to worry about.
http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2009/04/390861.shtml
It's A great responsibility to report A crime the Authority's don't want reported!
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I'm Communicating
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