Yes Virginia, the NSA has your phone records

I agree with the latter statement.

Here’s several reasons why NSA surveillance is wrong and wrongheaded, regardless of the seduction of the latter quote:

1. It’s illegal and unconstitutional. Legal types can disagree but then again they’re paid to and despite the promise of billable hours, the administration is ignoring the legal means to spy, snoop, and surveil Americans. And whatever justifications, theese activities violate the 4th amendment.

2. It’s inefficient. Creating a mammouth database is a poor use of resources.

3. It’s ineffective. The best intelligence remains human – the state will discover what it wants to when people rat out their friends. Works like a charm every time.

4. It’s bound to have unintended consequences.Government suits will end up fucking up the lives of thousands of Americans who have nothing to do with terrorism or criminal wrongdoing. Evidence from TSA and DHS already indicates that these outfits are little more than Keystone Cops.

5. Actually, this kind of surveillance will bound to be used in circumstances and for purposes far removed from stalking the wily terrorist. These programs, once institutionalized, will be for whatever officials deem useful.

In sum, this kind of surveillance is a waste of money, promises all manner of abuse, and won’t deliver the goods.

On the other hand, Americans are getting a hard on for a good old fashioned police state. So give ‘em what they want. This way they’ll get both a strongman government and a terrorist all wrapped up in one.

the government has been spying on us more and more since the end of wwii. it’s only become more prominent now because of all the corruption in the system, and the media’s devotion to anything.
Personally, i dont care, i dont think something like 1984 will happen, or even the government form from v for vendetta.
I do think that there should be some survalance, but it shouldnt go too far.

The problem I have is that the government didn’t need to spy on us. It just needed to properly LISTEN it its OWN PEOPLE. We had everything we needed in order to prevent 9-11. It was the broken intel community that was the real problem. Terrorism is being used as a tool for our government to gain more control over us citizens.

Will I complain next time there’s an attack? YES. I will complain that the government STILL hasn’t fixed the issues uncovered by the 9-11 commission and instead used terrorism as a way to instill fear in US citizens, confusing us and gaining more power.

5 years ago I NEVER would have believed what I just wrote, but that’s where the evidence and government behavior point.

“Those who would sacrifice liberty for safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” – Ben Franklin

I disagree with this : “if you truly have nothing to hide, what is the point?” Most people have nothing to hide. So the government will then have the power to spy on everyone. Most citizens are normal citizens. So using that phrase to justify spying is null. Using this phrase, the federal government can get more and more power a little at a time. This is scary. It’s kind of like the Supreme Court. They have the smallest portion of the Constitution that describes the 3 branches of government. The largest portion is delegated to the legislation. Yet, the Supreme Court has become one of the most powerful entities in the US. They have become a maker of laws when they are supposed to be a judge of laws.

-matt

PS – the exact quote is:
“They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
-Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759

I knew it was something along those lines…. sorry Ben ;)

in a radio interview with some FBI official, he as well said its very easy to get phone tap under the FISA? law, and that judges easily give those out.

If America’s leaders would just stop trying to police the world and/or “Push America’s Democratic Agenda” America wouldn’t have so many enemies to begin with.

What has happened here is what I tend to call the “Frog in Hot Water Effect” Put a frog in a pot of water, and slowly increase the heat, the Frog will not jump out because the temperature increase has been steady and manageable, but once the water is way to hot, the frog is too weak to attempt to jump out.

Our politicians have gone unchecked by our poorly educated public; the politicians have been allowed to slowly implement their personal moral agendas, which have resulted in the slow but steady progress of removing the public’s freedoms and liberties under the guise of security.

Our nation remains in constant conflict and fear by our own politicians and news media. If it’s not some country wanting to attack us, it’s the threat of some unlikely health global pandemic, or another nation wanting to develop nuclear technology; who probably just seeking a solution to provide more efficient energy to its nation anyhow. I mean honestly, can we trust the Intelligence, and our current administration? Is Iran really trying to bomb us, or is this just another excuse to pick a fight and further tighten the liberties of the American Public.

The United States Is Becoming Exactly What It Set Out To Fight Against.

I absolutely agree with the first statement (btw I am actually from Britain, not America but we face a similar debate about ID cards).

People often do not seem to understand that terrorists what to provoke a reaction from a government. As the first statement says a terrorist has succeeded if the government takes away it’s citizens civil liberties in reaction to it.

The second statement says “if you truly have nothing to hide, what is the point”. This relies on the assumption that the government (or any future governments) will act responsiby with this information. We cannot rely on this fact always being true, and I don’t even believe we can rely on the current governments in both Britain and the USA not abusing their powers. Let us think of a hypothetical situation.

The republicans are in power, and the leader of the democrats is having an affair with someone. This affair is not in any way currently, or going to affect his work, and is simply a personal issue. Then, by spying on phone conversations, the republicans find out about this. Even though it is not a criminal offense it would be possible for the republicans to discredit this politician, and the democrats, using this information. This is why you cannot just say you have nothing to hide if you are not doing anything wrong.

Finally I would just like to say that I have never criticised the government for a terrorist attack as I understand the difficulty of preventing them, as well as the importance of not giving up civil liberties to prevent them. They may be bad, but at the same time one must realise that a huge number more peple have been killed in the Iraq war (I’m talking about normal Iraqis, not just insurgents or soldiers) or in car accidents. If we take the example of car accidents we chose not to get rid of cars because we think the benefits outweigh the weaknesses. We must take the same view with terrorism: Surely it is more important to keep our civil liberties than to slightly increase the chances of preventing terrorist attacks.

exactly. so you have to wonder what the government could possibly be doing if theyre too afraid to bring their shit to a court that has never denied them anything.

LIke some of the commenters have said, I don’t think the US has resources to handle the massive volume of data streaming in. I know they use supercomputers to sift through some data, but there is still a lot to go through. I can’t wait for AI so that the analysis to get fully automated..