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  Violynne (profile), 18 Dec 2015 @ 11:03am

  
  

  Of the 316, two probably read the bill.
  
  This is with +/-2 margin of error.

  [ link to this | view in chronology ]

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    Anonymous Coward, 18 Dec 2015 @ 11:11am

    
    

    Re:

    Oh many of them maybe read 2 or 3 pages, maybe even a section.
    
    But good luck finding one who read the entire thing!

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]

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    Anonymous Coward, 18 Dec 2015 @ 2:11pm

    
    

    Re:

    Nah, they just knew it was tied to the NASA funding.

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    Anonymous Coward, 19 Dec 2015 @ 3:50pm

    
    

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    Of course Pelosi had to vote for it to find out what's in it.

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]

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    tqk (profile), 20 Dec 2015 @ 12:18pm

    
    

    TL;DR.

    This is hardly a surprise ...

    
    TL;DR, fully expected, holy crap Congress is dysfunctional. You should be angry.
    
    Me, I'm listening to a Canadian reading me a quote from a woman's Facebook page extolling the wonders and virtues of PM Trudeau allied to David Suziki, and I'm trying not to puke listening. I feel like I already survived this about thirty years ago, so why's it happening again so soon?
    
    Did I write that out loud? :-P

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]

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  Anonymous Coward, 18 Dec 2015 @ 11:03am

  
  

  Any idea if this affects foreigners? I'm assuming that they had no rights to begin with. Will this make them worse off from a privacy perspective, since now some companies will be actively coughing up info?

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    Anonymous Coward, 4 Jan 2016 @ 6:48am

    
    

    Re:

    The answer is yes, it will be worse for foreigners. If you're in the EU, the protections afforded to you by the Data Protection Directive and national laws are now meaningless. Only model contract clauses (http://ec.europa.eu/justice/data-protection/international-transfers/transfer/index_en.htm) protect you, and these allow transfers of data to US processors and controllers. It's unclear whether national data protection authorities will be able to enforce non-participation in CISA for data and companies signing model contract clauses with EU companies.

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]

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  Anonymous Coward, 18 Dec 2015 @ 12:47pm

  
  

  Disappointed that my rep voted Yea, but I'm more ticked at the speech Obama gave in which he praised the lack of 'ideological riders'. Yeah, ok buddy. You know full well what you were just handed.

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  Anonymous Coward, 18 Dec 2015 @ 1:34pm

  
  

  Well fuck it. Why even bother having a Congress anymore if they're just going to throw all their toxic wish list items into an unrelated, must-pass funding bill. Just start off with the next funding bill and dump all the other bills into that.
  
  FFS, this isn't democracy.

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    Anonymous Coward, 18 Dec 2015 @ 2:16pm

    
    

    Re:

    Agreed. But remember that this in theory, a democratic republic answerable to the people. It appears at this point it is more akin to a corporate oligarchy hybrid that presents itself in those ideals and traditions of what the country was founded upon while pursuing an agenda in contrast to the will of the people. Conclusion of an experiment indeed. Too bad it failed in such a short time.
    
    Maybe next time, the following government will get it right.

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    qw, 19 Dec 2015 @ 12:25am

    
    

    Re:

    FFS, this isn't democracy.

    
    
    Unfortunately, it is.
    
    This is the very essence of representative democracy. We elect, with various levels of abstraction, representatives to make decisions like these on our behalf.
    
    Consider this a decision made.
    
    Given the lack of real alternatives come voting time, the real surprise is our eternal optimism about what kind of a job they'll make of it.
    
    As the famous paraphrase of Churchill goes: Democracy is the worst political system, except for all the others.

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  Anonymous Coward, 18 Dec 2015 @ 2:21pm

  
  

  The government is so concerned with finding bad guys that they're blind to the fact that what they are doing is not something good guys would do.

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    Anonymous Coward, 18 Dec 2015 @ 6:06pm

    
    

    Re:

    the goal is to find the dissenters not the criminals. It has next to nothing to do with combatting terrorism. If that was true these types of laws would not be continuously abused to arrest and detain everything but terrorists.

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  Anonymous Coward, 18 Dec 2015 @ 3:37pm

  
  

  Once again...

  My rep (Lamalfa) voted the way I hoped he would (I try to email him every time there's a nasty bill coming up for vote).
  
  I just wish there were more reps out there who actually gave enough shits to do right by their constituents.

  [ link to this | view in chronology ]

• 

  Anonymous Coward, 18 Dec 2015 @ 5:50pm

  
  

  A few links for those looking to prepare for the coming storm:
  
  Torrentfreak's 2015 review of VPN services.
  
  The Tor Project. Tor isn't perfect, but it's definitely the most accessible darknet. Those more technically-minded might want to look into I2P, and possibly IPFS.
  
  Surveillance and censorship will only increase in the coming years. It'd be a good idea to get access to the dark web now, while those project websites can still be accessed over the regular web.

  [ link to this | view in chronology ]

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  Anonymous Coward, 18 Dec 2015 @ 6:01pm

  
  

  I wonder if any of this involves using the police to kick in doors and drag people off in the middle of the night never to be seen again at worst or dragged to prison without trial best case like France has been doing to nonviolent protesters and dissenters against how their government is running things.

  [ link to this | view in chronology ]

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  Anonymous Coward, 18 Dec 2015 @ 7:14pm

  
  

  Remember this was passed during a wave of terror alerts and threats not seen since Bush's 04 election. In case you forgot the telcomm spying-immunity bill also passed during heightened terror alerts that evaporated shortly after that vote. They can be very convincing if you suspect the alphabet agencies won't hesitate to do another San Bernardino this time closer to home if the vote fails.
  
  Sanders voted against this bill and coincidentally (or not) now has his own tech issues with the DNC blocking voter data access over the vendor's own repeat error (said vendor founded by Clinton's 08 campaign tech chief). I wonder if that's being mentioned among the other campaigns as what happens to Presidential candidates who "nay" the NSA.

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  Anonymous Coward, 19 Dec 2015 @ 5:28am

  
  

  Thanks Techdirt!

  For the names. Is that href-able from a fed page? It would be nice to be able to get the tally from a click in other articles.

  [ link to this | view in chronology ]

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  Anonymous Coward, 20 Dec 2015 @ 1:55pm

  
  

  I'm under cyber/biological/chemical attack. Due to ISIL crap, it became a good idea

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