NSA Boss Asks Congress For Blanket Immunity For Companies That Help NSA Spy On Everyone
from the but-of-course dept
This will come as no surprise to anyone, but NSA boss General Keith Alexander is pestering Congress for a new law which would provide blanket immunity for companies helping the NSA collect data on everyone.Gen. Keith Alexander has petitioned Capitol Hill for months to give Internet service providers and other firms new cover from lawsuits when they rely on government data to thwart emerging cyberthreats.Basically, he's arguing that if the NSA orders companies to do something illegal, the companies shouldn't be liable for that. There's some logic behind that, because when you get an order from the government, you often feel compelled to obey. But, of course, the reality is that this will give blanket cover for companies voluntarily violating all sorts of privacy laws in giving the NSA data. And, theoretically you could then sue the government over those violations, but we've seen in the past how well that goes over. First, the courts won't give you "standing" if you can't prove absolutely that your data was included. Then, if you get past that hurdle, the government will claim "national security" or sovereign immunity to try to get out of the case. And, even if it gets past all of that, and you win against the government, the feds shrug their shoulders and say "now what are you going to do?"
And, of course, rather than narrowly target this immunity, it appears that Alexander would like it as broad as possible.
One former White House aide told POLITICO that Alexander has been asking members of Congress for some time to adopt bill language on countermeasures that’s “as ill-defined as possible” — with the goal of giving the Pentagon great flexibility in taking action alongside Internet providers. Telecom companies, the former aide said, also have been asking Alexander for those very legal protections.Given the revelations of the past few weeks, this seems like the exact wrong direction for Congress to be heading. We should want companies to push back against overaggressive demands from the government for information. Giving them blanket immunity would be a huge mistake and only enable greater privacy violations.
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Filed Under: blanket immunity, immunity, keith alexander, nsa, nsa surveillance, spying, tech companies
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"Wheeeeeeee" thud
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That's what CISPA is for! And YOU'RE against it!
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Re: That's what CISPA is for! And YOU'RE against it!
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Re: That's what CISPA is for! And YOU'RE against it!
Hint: we don't want our private data shared with the government.
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Redux of stupid
After the last 3 weeks, there is simply no reason for anyone to even consider the idea of immunity for anyone, or any company participating in this illegal program.
The first time was enough.
There should be prosecutions beginning now and sparing nobody at all.
Then they should shut down the entire program and fire everyone in it. Too bad for them to be unemployed, but it sucks to be you, doesn't it?
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Re: Redux of stupid
right...we are still waiting for the investigation to conclude as to how and why the housing crisis happened so we can start throwing people in jail
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Re: Re: Redux of stupid
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Why doesn't he ask for immunity on Clapper's statement to Wyden?
… then why doesn't he ask for immunity for his boss? Doesn't DNI James Clapper's least untruthful response need some immunity? C'mon Gen Alex—get some immunity for Gen. Clapper!
If you're going to ask… ask for the moon. And in that spirit, just ask for immunity for anyone who's ever intentionally made an “untruthful” statement testifying before Congress.
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Links?
Would have been nice to have links in this section. You're slipping, Mike... ;)
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Something smelly this way comes
What could possibly go wrong?
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Re: Something smelly this way comes
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How about this instead...
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Wanna tell us what happened with Qwest and why when the CEO refused without a court order to co-operate he wound up in jail and all government contracts were cancelled with Qwest?
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2007/10/qwest-ceo-nsa-punished-qwest-refusing-participate-illegal- surveillance-pre-9-11
Why aren't we talking about illegal government actions here instead of granting post immunity?
What it looks like to me is we have a rabid government gone crazy and they need less authority not more.
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I suppose this time it will also include immunity for lying to congress.
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Godwin's Law
You see, the people were distracted by their unelected "leader", a man who was chosen for the position by the elites. He wasn't supposed to be there. Many citizens claimed he had no right to the powers he coveted. But he knew... They'd all be punished in the end. They dismissed him as a simpleton. He had simple, inflammatory rhetoric and knew how to have passionate speeches. But even his younger days in the occult didn't stop his rise to power. For this gentleman knew...
He knew the terrorist was going to strike (just not where or when). So when an aide brought him word that the nation's most prestigious building was ablaze, he verified that it was the terrorist who had struck and then rushed to the scene and called a press conference.
You are now witnessing the beginning of a great epoch in history.
"The fire is beginning."
That fire was used not to declare war on a nation but a tactic: terrorism. This terrorism had to have originated with a group of people of Middle Eastern origin who rationalized their acts using religion.
Two weeks later, suspected allies were held in prison and patriotism erupted everywhere with the leader's flag. Within four weeks of the attack, the nations leader had pushed through legislation - in the name of fighting terrorism and the philosophy that spawned it - which suspended constitutional guarantees of free speech, privacy, and habeas corpus. Now police could intercept mail and wiretap phones; terrorists could be imprisoned without specific charges and no access to lawyers. Police could sneak into people's homes without warrants if the cases involved terrorism.
And people went along because he promised sunset provisions.
But the people got gradual increases in state sponsored terrorism. More people began to be arrested for suspicious acts. Pretty soon, the nation was referred to as "the homeland" in 1934. The beginning of an us-vs-them mentality pursued.
Then the push for more military war powers began. His argument? "Any international body that didn't act first and foremost in the best interest of his own nation was neither relevant nor useful. He withdrew his country form the League of Nations in October 1933 and negotiated a separate naval armaments agreement with Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs Anthony Eden in the United Kingdom to create a worldwide military ruling elite.
To get the evangelicals of his country he proclaimed a need for a revival of the Christian faith across his nation with his "New Christianity". Every man in the growing army wore a belt buckle that declared Gott mit uns - God is with us- and most of them fervently believed it was true.
Within a year of the attack, the nation's leader began to coordinate various local police and federal agencies around the nation around Middle Eastern terrorism. What would eventually occur is that this national agency that was mandated to protect the security of the homeland, dealt with the press and had them at their disposal. They asked people to phone in suspicious neighbors.
And yet, that program began to grab opposition politicians and celebrities who dared speak out. Then the thirst for more power began... He reached out to industry and forged an alliance with them by bringing former executives of the nation's largest corporations into high government positions. Government money poured into corporate coffers to fight the war against terrorists in the homeland and to prepare for wars overseas. Powerful alliances with industries culminated into one of the first large-scale detention centers for enemies of the state.
And yet, voices began to dissent.
Students started an active program against him called the White Rose Society and leaders of neary nations were speaking out against his bellicose rhetoric.
So he created a diversion to get away from the crony capitalism he'd implemented, the questions of his illegitimate rise to power, and the civil libertarians who voiced concerns about the people being held in detentions without due process or access to attorneys or family.
And so, Adolf Hitler began his grandstanding for war. He claimed the right to strike preemptively in self defense. Months of lobbying and international debate ensued and he was allowed to annex Austria. To deal with the damage, Hitler and his "friends" in the radio began a campaign to equate him and his policies with patriotism and the nation itself. If you questioned him, you were labeled unpatriotic, "anti-German," or "not a good German" while you were aiding the enemies of the state by failing in the patriotic necessity of supporting the nation's valiant men in uniform. It was the most effective ways to stifle dissent and pit wage earning people against the intellectuals and liberals critical of his policy.
And so to divert attention away from his policies, he focused the nation on war. There was violence against liberals, Jews, and union leaders and the epidemic of crony capitalism was producing empires of wealth in the corporate sector but threatening the middle class's way of life.
Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain told his people that giving in to this leader's new first-strike doctrine for a second time would bring "peace for our time".
A year later, to the week, Hitler invaded Czechoslovakia. Germany was fully at war and all internal dissent suppressed in the name of national security.
By the way... The office for the security of the homeland? That was the schutzstaffel. We know it in the US as the SS.
The US has been going down the same fascist path as other nations with the very same results... We created an aristocracy with Reagan, fought wars while eliminating public services under both Bushes, attacked our poor with crippling poverty under Clinton and Obama, while turning our democracy into a police state for the past 40 years.
Tread lightly... Our republic cannot stay on this path without dire consequences in the near future.
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UPCOMING TOMORROW: House Intelligence Committee Hearing
United States House of Representatives, Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence: webpage for hearing.
(H/T Fox News )
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Re: UPCOMING TOMORROW: House Intelligence Committee Hearing
Pathetic
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Re: Re: UPCOMING TOMORROW: House Intelligence Committee Hearing
No.
If anything, it promotes C-SPAN: Head of NSA Meets with Hse. Intel Cmte. (Scheduled today, 10am)
But these days, you can usually watch Congressional hearings webcast directly from the committee website, if you'd rather.
Does it bother you that I habitually credit my sources? You think rudeness is better?
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Re: Godwins' Law
Give depth to the picture: Germany was in the grip of a devastating depression, with civil anarchy as a theme. There were no good leaders, no cohesive groups or mindset.
It had been suffering from it's utter defeat in WWI, and had been punished excessively by the Allies for its' role in starting that war. The reparations the country made to the Allies were crippling the economy to the point of utter exhaustion.
Hitler was 'selected' by the people because they were desperate for a leader who would lead them out of a economic misry so vast that the money would change value in hours.
Add to that the substrata of hatred towards one select group as the reason for their misery, and you have a country that was ready to give any man who had their hearts and minds in his speeches.
Do not make the mistake of comparing this time with that. There are no Gestapo agents busting down doors to find the nearest Jew to put into concentration camps. There are no detention centers for intellectuals.
While this administration has much to account for, that one compares it to Hitler's in retrospect is utter recklessness.
The NSA does have too much power, and true, it has been used recklessly and without checks on it.
But to pander to the view that we're going to turn into Nazi Germany because of it is sheer utter intellectual posturing and false straw man argument.
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Re: Re: Godwins' Law
Do not make the mistake of comparing this time with that.
Ok... But let's do the exact opposite and see if there are parallels.
Germany was in the grip of a devastating depression, with civil anarchy as a theme.
How is that different from the US being gripped with punishing austerity in their sixth year while we give more money to the rich and leave the scraps for the rest of the nation?
There were no good leaders, no cohesive groups or mindset.
Communists were banned from influencing the government and their exclusion lead to extreme conservatism by the libertarians of the time. I try to keep partisanry out of the example, but it still explains the basic gist of corporatism that is currently going on in our country today.
The reparations the country made to the Allies were crippling the economy to the point of utter exhaustion.
No question. But look at our economy sputtering along when the rich could be taxed to provide better public services. Look at the demagoguery between liberals and conservatives in keeping a corrupt and unequal system of governance that is exhausting the people itself.
Hitler was 'selected' by the people because they were desperate for a leader who would lead them out of a economic misry so vast that the money would change value in hours.
True. And that's why austerity is so dangerous even in the country now. It makes people desperate to find blame with the weakest people of a nation and works to find scapegoats and con artists in positions of power.
Add to that the substrata of hatred towards one select group as the reason for their misery, and you have a country that was ready to give any man who had their hearts and minds in his speeches.
And how is that any different from the US and their degradation of blacks in the Drug War, the peonage system we've used since the Civil War, or the fact that we have plenty of people that have felt the effects of influential speakers in making life harder for people all around?
There are no Gestapo agents busting down doors to find the nearest Jew to put into concentration camps.
Try being black and having law enforcement break down your door with no-knock warrants. We have more people killed by police officers every day than were ever killed by terrorism.
There are no detention centers for intellectuals.
Aaron Schwartz' prosecution says otherwise. We don't detain the financially wealthy. We detain and subject everyone else to harsher fates for doing nothing other than being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
The NSA does have too much power, and true, it has been used recklessly and without checks on it.
And all I've done is show the history of the 30s, which others have not learned. I stand by the view that if we move further to extreme conservatism, we will see fascism arise in the US. And that will be the utter end of the democratic experiment that began in 1776. Personally, I believe that there can be a new democratic experiment. It just means that our institutions will have to be changed considerably to allow more democracy than what the Founders ever intended. No electoral college. No 3/5th Compromise. No loss of votes for all American citizens.
But to pander to the view that we're going to turn into Nazi Germany because of it is sheer utter intellectual posturing and false straw man argument.
Nope. Just as we can learn about history to prevent it, so too can we learn to avoid the mistakes of even Germany and its bout with fascism. I stand firm that this was created to show how our history has progressed for the past 40 years. Maybe you don't agree. But with parallels in how we treat minority groups, it's time to recognize that we are dangerously close to the brink of our own destruction and that's difficult to accept but a desperate conversation needed right now.
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I find it interesting that a General is requesting this....
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FTFY
(ps: there anything that can be done to enable <strike> tag?)
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What this action reads like in body language is; There is so much more spying and whatever violations of the Constitution involved that MORE blanket hall-passes are necessary. As if that was needed in this mad schoolhouse already taken over by the kids.
Lets imagine a potential worst case scenario. By leaks we already know that Microsoft, Google and AOL (Mozilla) have been infiltrated/subverted by NSA moles/equipment/force/threats. These three tech giants control the three main browsers that the majority of the worlds users use.
So far all we know about is the particularly nasty habit of the NSA's bulk data gathering ninja technique. Nothing was admitted about back doors deliberately put into the original manufactures programs. (the trojan method) Many hints of this but no admission.
Certainly I do not know for sure but what about that China scandal a few years ago where Google claimed espionage. For all we know this might have been the NSA using China as a dupe since its so easy to spoof a IP address.
The current low/zero level of credibility in the Bush-Obama administrations and the NSA lead to any sort of wild scenario one can imagine. Here we have a case where the lack of transparency in the current administration and its agencies only create more doubt and mistrust.
Gen. Alexander said ISP's “and other firms”. This meas that the NSA letters of national security did not cover their asses! A lot potential political shrapnel to think about there.
“,adopt bill language on countermeasures that’s “as ill-defined as possible” —“ This is just icing on the cake. Its been normal procedure for any special-interest-group to write the law/bill/act in some way that only benefits the industry/agency that desired/campaign-donated/supported/asked (for) it.
Of course its obvious that any elected official that supported this, way over the top request, is too far down the rabbit hole to be considered a real defender of the Constitution. That person(s) has most likely given up the safety an security of freedom and liberty for shadows and ghosts.
–
Reactionary,
Agreement that its a sad sign that there have been not hearings on the actions of the current administration and the NSA. Prosecutions should be in order. At the very least pensions should be forfeited for not defending the Constitution. (their job)
Since its not the first time some real punitive actions might be warranted. So far the only thing scheduled is the NSA “briefing”. (hahaha) What value does testimony from some agency with no trust level to speak of matter?
The analogies to early Germany pre war history are very concerning. Compelling historical precedence is telling a repent saga of past blunders and mistakes.
When party A mostly equals B and both start to seem incapable of defending the Constitution then party C (or D etc) start to look viable.
Just reading on the supposed House Intelligence Committee Hearing coming up does not sound to Constitutionally healthy when reading the media advisory. Of course if it was written by Fox news...
Jay an FM Hilton has some interesting points and historical correlations to make. You both recognized the economic historical comparison as both the current US and Germany were in economic tough times. Germany was in a lot worse shape but US economic future does not look good either. (now if we had invested all that wasted NSA money in a Space Program or something more tangible...)
And finally; Mr. Hilton. (best Mr. Johnson from the Matrix voice)
In this day and age what we have to compare with the Gestapo and SS is the criminalization of lifestyles. We have the DEA and ATF and other weirdly named agencies. Lately the NSA makes the FBI look like heroes.
Want/need to purchase your prescriptions from another country because your could not afford the 5x price your local pharmacy charged? Jail and broken down doors with guns pointed at your wife and kids (and its likely they will be thrown out into the street when you loose your job)
Want to grow medicinal spices in your back yard? Jail and broken down doors with guns pointed at your wife and kids (and its likely they will be thrown out into the street when you loose your job)
Wanna watch dirty porn that some group finds unpleasant? Jail and broken down doors with guns pointed at your wife and kids (and its likely they will be thrown out into the street when you loose your job) Also there will be porn trolls to sue and ridicule you and your family to a likely early death.
Wanna download movies, research and TV shows? Jail and broken down doors. Or at least threats for 10 years in jail leading to suicide because of the legal pressure. And more copyright trolls to force you into submission and financial ruin.
Think the US does not persecute religions/race? Try asking a Arab/Indian decent looking person how difficult it is to get by a TSA inspection.
And. Those were just the jail term motivations on lifestyles. We have taxes and other fines for the rest?
Wanna dance in a bar in the state of Washington? That bar will be taxed a few extra thousand dollars and fined for actually letting people dance in its establishment.
Wanna unlock your iphone? (oops, this one should have been under the jail term list above.)
(on and on)
Wanna deny all this? Try. The US already jails around 5% of its population for lifestyle crimes. This is about 300-700% more than other countries. In more explicit terms the Drug (and other lifestyle) war(s) have economically crippled the US already.
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Cannot be done...
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retroactive immunity is unconstitutional
Just to be different lets just stick with the rule of law as dictated by the United States Constitution.
Ex post facto laws are expressly forbidden by the United States Constitution in Article 1, Section 9, Clause 3.
Therefore since these companies have clearly committed crimes along with the government they should be prosecuted along with the government.
I mean come on now if what they are doing wasn't illegal they would not need blanket immunity now would they?????
Good grief
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Immunity?
After the fact is better. It looks like people at least tried to do something about it but were circumvented.
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Something best explained
It's Ms. Hilton to you..and everyone else.
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Immunity for Whistleblowers
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FUCK NSA
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Correction; the Mr Johnson voice was supposed to be a Agent Smith voice from the movie The Matrix. (The Wachowski Brothers, of Babylon 5 fame) The neutral, almost robotic, yet still human, monotone voice that seemed critical of everything human. Used in an anti-ironic manner.
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NSA Boss
Why should the telecoms and their ilk get blanket immunity for following illegal orders?
We've already set the precedent.
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That's a military coup
That's what a military coup is.
You might think Obama is in charge, but General Keith Alexander has bypassed him already, it's Gen Alexander that runs the show now.
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