CISPA's Sponsors Can't Keep Their Story Straight: If Snowden's Leaks Are False, How Do They Harm America?
from the keep-trying dept
We already discussed how bizarre it is to see NSA defenders trying to claim both that this story is nothing new and a huge danger to America, but that kind of thing continues. Witness two of Congress' biggest NSA defenders, Rep. Mike Rogers and Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger -- the two sponsors of CISPA -- try to claim that Snowden was both lying and exposing secrets that harm us all."He was lying," Rogers said. "He clearly has over-inflated his position, he has over-inflated his access and he's even over-inflated what the actually technology of the programs would allow one to do. It's impossible for him to do what he was saying he could do."So, um, if he's lying and the information he leaked is not true, then how is he doing "tremendous damage" to the country? I guess the "damage" could be to our reputation as a freedom loving country that respects the 4th Amendment and basic rights to privacy, but that doesn't seem to be what Ruppersberger is claiming.
"He's done tremendous damage to the country where he was born and raised and educated," Ruppersberger said.
"Some people are saying that he's a hero. He's broken the law," Ruppersberger said. "We have laws in the United States for whistle-blowers, for people that think there's an injustice being done. All he had to do was raise his hand. ... Under the whistle-blower law, he is protected. Yet he chose to go to China."Er... except we've seen exactly what happens to NSA whistleblowers who go that route. They get completely ignored and then charged with trumped up claims of leaking secrets anyway, and threatened with over 30 years in jail. It's pretty clear that just "raising his hand" doesn't work and actually puts you even more at risk. Furthermore, the current "whistle-blower" law is rarely used and even more rarely successful, with whistleblowers almost never winning their cases.
"I hope that we don't decide that our national security interests are going to be determined by a high-school dropout who had a whole series of both academic troubles and employment troubles," Rogers said.Yup. The best Rogers can do is try to smear the guy, rather than respond to what he actually leaked, which is apparently all lies, but threatens us all. Sorry, Rogers, but the story doesn't hold up.
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Filed Under: cispa, dutch ruppersberger, ed snowden, mike rogers
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That's right out of your playbook, Mikey. Attack the person while ignoring the merits of what he or she is saying. No wonder this stuff gets you all worked up. You would fit right in with these guys.
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FTFY. You're welcome.
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What does it say
What does it say about:
- The organization that hired him
- The government employee who approved his security clearance
Surely if he's as an underachiever as they're making him out to be, there's a high degree of incompetence involved for those who decided to allow him access to all of this.
When are THOSE idiots going to be identified as "national security risks?"
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Re: What does it say
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Re: What does it say
When you have no substantial argument(s), the standard fall back position is character assassination. Attack your opponent's character, friends, accomplishments rather than address the issue. This is SOP, sadly it works on some people.
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He was attacking the guy's tactics, not his character.
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So Mike, are you saying that whistleblowers should just not even try to report whatever wrongs they perceive through proper channels first? Are you OK with people just deciding for themselves what should remain classified? Do tell (although, of course, you won't).
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He argues like a dairy farmer.
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Bold move troll. A bold move.
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What was the name of that country again? Oh, yeah, the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA!
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That appears to be Mike's view. We don't really know though since he never bothers to discuss his views on the merits.
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I think that will be more fun AJ.
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Gutless wonder here dodges the statement, doesn't debate me on the stupidity of his comment.
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Did you even read the link that was in the text you quoted? Clearly not, or you'd realise how ignorant your comment sounds. Why would you choose a path that will have the exact opposite outcome that you want?
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He went right to the top - and just in time (imho). Last chance for alcohol.. "virtual spirits" if you will.
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2013/06/16/snowden-whistleblower-nsa-officials- roundtable/2428809/
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I'd trust most high school dropouts more than most congressmen
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I mean, how many times have we seen congressmen proudly admit that they have no understanding whatsoever of the subject they're writing laws about? Clearly, no experience is necessary to be a congressman. Congressmen are also not exceptionally wise or mature, as anyone who watches C-SPAN can tell you. Maybe I'm missing something, but offhand, I don't see any reason why they couldn't be replaced with laymen.
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I think you would have straight up cash for votes bribery rather than the campaign contributions we get now, so not much difference there, except more people would be bad at it so they'd get caught. So that might be an improvement. The people who don't take bribes would be voting generally from a position of benign ignorance rather that ignorance plus political self interest. Unclear how that would turn out.
The question is, who would the staffers be? If you left it the way it is now then they would be the ones with the real power, the ones taking the bribes, and the ones running Congress. The congresspeople would be figureheads. If you made the staffers randomly selected as well then they would mostly be bad at their jobs. Proposed legislation would probably be a mess. It would accidentally conflict with existing laws, would not contain what it needed to have to accomplish what it was supposed to, fail constitutional scrutiny, etc. I think on the whole it would be a disaster, just a different sort of disaster than the one we have now. Interesting idea though.
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This is the third time you have posted the same stupid incompetent dribble.
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Say it ain't so.
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Oh, right, because you like voting for the same. fucking. thing. year. after. year. I forgot.
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Something tells me they know a detail or two about the leaked items that have yet to be released. That, or they've been coached by someone who does.
Just a liiittle bit too eager to discredit Snowden, there. Not sure why they're bothering; anyone paying attention to what's going on is going to know offhand that Obama has attacked more whistleblowers than all the previous presidents put together.
Then again, I suppose that if the people in charge were actually competent, we wouldn't even be having this discussion in the first place, would we?
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Ed Snowden has committed the ultimate crime, made congress look stupid.
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FTFY.
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In other words, when people say that Rogers is "in bed with" the intelligence and spying communities, they mean it literally.
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Employment Troubles
Not for nothing, but that sounds like one helluva gig.
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Re: Employment Troubles
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/duke-grad-student-secretly-lived-in-a-van-to-escape-loan-deb t-194021112.html
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Obviously a person could lie, and yet leak a lot of sensitive documents at the same time. For example, he could lie about things he'd witnessed that went beyond the scope of the documents. An unstable or unprincipled person would be the most likely to do this. The alien enemy would be able to profit from the revelations in the documents while filtering the spoken claims.
Not that the Snowden leaks tell real enemies (terrorists or rival states) anything they didn't already know. The actual effect of the leaks is to inform the public and shift the debate. That's what's criminal, in the eyes of the government.
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Fuck me, this coming from Mr. Buck Rogers there LoL
The guy is an ex-cop sitting on the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (Chairman) and his wife Kristi Clemens Rogers, was previously President and CEO of Aegis LLC, a contractor to the United States Department of State for intelligence-based security services. Does any more of his relatives work for companies that he is chairing a committee?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Rogers_(Michigan_politician)
I take the troubled dropout word over his any day.
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not a bad comment from someone who was all for getting more and more surveillance implemented, just because his spouse is in that game.
Snowden is, in my opinion, nothing less than a hero and the more you hear about him doing harm to his country, the more you know what he has said is true and those decrying him are liars, not worthy of the positions they supposedly hold of representing the people!
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I'm going with Snowden being CIA to take a shot at NSA.
http://www.activistpost.com/2013/06/did-cia-give-nsa-documents-to-ed-snowden.html
Naomi Wolf: My Creeping Concern That The NSA Leaker Is Not Who He Purports To Be
http://www.cryptogon.com/?p=35659
Still more possible:
Multiplying scandals to hide the one scandal that could sink Obama
http://rinf.com/alt-news/breaking-news/multiplying-scandals-to-hide-the-one-scandal-that-co uld-sink-obama/42448/
At least don't fall for the first story ya hear.
And gotta admire Mike for tying it back to CISPA!
Take a loopy tour of Techdirt.com! You always end up same place!
http://techdirt.com/
Where Mike fights CISPA without mentioning major data sources Google and Facebook.
10:12:49[l-145-4]
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Re: I'm going with Snowden being CIA to take a shot at NSA.
http://www.zdnet.com/how-did-mainstream-media-get-the-nsa-prism-story-so-hopelessly-wrong-70 00016822/
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Re: I'm going with Snowden being CIA to take a shot at NSA.
I wonder what all these frothing sites will do next time (hopefully far away) a Rethuglican is voted in. Maybe have orgasms over some Rand/Paul clone.
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Basically, I think he's saying 'One kid lied about it all and caused all this trouble'.
He's lying, but that seems to be what he's saying.
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1) Lie to Congress - ok
2) Lie to American public - not ok
Ohhhh, wait a sec .... they do that all the time
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Rogers and Ruppersberger have learned from the Scientologists..
Scummy, unprincipled, and dishonest tactics then. Scummy, unprincipled, and dishonest tactics now.
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Wait... a... second...
It's The Milkman from Psychonauts!
http://youtu.be/GR-FwptzdOQ
Fixation on government secrecy, obsession with all things milk, it makes perfect sense now!
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So you dont understand, but WE DO !!
do you Masnick HONESTLY not understand that?? really !!!!
Apart from it being very sad you can not get your head around this, it is far worse that you expect therefore that no one else can work it out.
There does appear to be a lot of "if I cant understand it, then no one can"!!!
Fact is, it's not that hard, most can see this is not 'opposed' or self-contradictory statements.
Just because it's your opinion, does not make it right, yes you have a right to express your opinion, but that does not make it right or a fact.
The fact you cant understand something does not mean others with normal levels of intelligence and reasoning can understand something you admit you cannot.
I guess, you not understanding something is no barrier for you when it comes to commenting on it.
You probably don't understand that much about quantum mechanics either, that does not mean all transistors or CPU's will suddenly stop working!
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Re: So you dont understand, but WE DO !!
Show people.
If something is to sensitive for security purposes, show our Congressional representatives - there are certainly a few that would be happy to look at the program in detail and tell the American public if there is a problem.
De-classify interpretations of the law.
Allow tech companies to give us the numbers of orders they have received.
The NSA is not doing any of this.
Even if Snowden is lying about some things, enough of what he has said has been confirmed by the NSA to make the program suspicious enough to warrant a VERY close look and they do not want to give anyone that look.
That is a problem.
Instead of explaining their actions, they are jingling their keys in one hand about anti-patriotism and terrorism and using their other hand to try to get the lid back on the cookie jar.
It will be a very sad day if enough of the citizens of this country look at the keys long enough to allow them to get the lid back on.
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He was lying about what he was capable of doing
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Re: He was lying about what he was capable of doing
I don't think he was claiming to be able to spy on any of 7 billion people at will. It sounded to me like he was saying he could tap anyone's phone line in the US or intercept internet communications. The exact reach of the system on the internet is not clear and broadly not very important. If he could do even half of what he claimed that is horrible.
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