NSA Leaker Revealed: Edward Snowden

[cashmcall]

The government is not spying on you.



In fact that is quite far fetched. And it is entirely not factual that any of these programs are "spying" on American citizens without probable cause and a court order to do so.



The 4th amendment protects the contents of your conservation without just cause -- but arguably does not protect the simple fact of the conversation. That is all that is being collected currently on the phone end of things.



They have not broken any law -- and your characterization of what is occuring is entirely false.

Oh Now I feel Better.... whether they have or have not broken the letter of Law..IMO they are going to far..The Bill of Rights is NOT a list of things the government GIVES us. It is a statement of things the government can NOT TAKE FROM US!!! Our rights are NOT NEGOTIABLE or OPTIONAL.

 

[BigRob]

If Snowden has anything else to release he'd better do it now because once he's in custody, and he will be, he's going into a black hole.

I think Snowden did the right thing. I admit I haven't checked but I'd be willing to bet that everything or almost everything Snowden leaked has already been on the Internet. By releasing official US documents to a reputable media outlet he took the info out of the realm of "conspiracy theory" and for that reason alone it was the right thing to do. Oh, and he will go to jail anyway.

Hopefully now that this is out there we can have a national discussion about what our government should be doing. I have a couple of observations:

1) Some in our government have said that what the NSA is doing is legal. My response is so f'ing what? No tyrant has ever broken the laws of their respective nations.

2) Some have said that once something is out on the Internet it's public and therefore fair game. My response is to a point. If you post something to Facebook or HOP then yes, once it's posted it's public, it's the same as writing a letter and then tacking it up on a bulletin board in the town square. However, that's not all our government is doing. They are also doing the equivalent of breaking into your home and reading letters you've put in a desk drawer, and breaking into a USPS truck and then picking out your letter to see who you're writing to. I suspect they're doing even more than that but there's no evidence of that yet so I'll leave that for a later date.

Your #2 statement is 100% false. The PRISM program cannot target American citizens...this is expressly spelled out by statute in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillence Act, Section 702.

 

[BigRob]

Oh Now I feel Better.... whether they have or have not broken the letter of Law..IMO they are going to far..The Bill of Rights is NOT a list of things the government GIVES us. It is a statement of things the government can NOT TAKE FROM US!!! Our rights are NOT NEGOTIABLE or OPTIONAL.

And not a single one of your rights has been violated!

 

[Centrehalf]

Your #2 statement is 100% false. The PRISM program cannot target American citizens...this is expressly spelled out by statute in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillence Act, Section 702.

I heard James Clapper on the radio today. It was a recording of testimony he gave in Congress. He was asked to give a yes or no answer regarding whether or not the NSA is spying on American citizens in America and he would not answer the question Yes or No, he did eventually stammer his way through some what ifs and then said it's not being done on purpose. I don't really care what the statute says, Clapper's response to me denoted guilt, he should not have needed to fly by the seat of his pants when formulating an answer to that very simple question. I'm going to go with what I see, read, and hear and the more I see, read and hear of Clapper, the less confident I am that our Intel community is doing things the right way. My opinion.

 

[BigRob]

I heard James Clapper on the radio today. It was a recording of testimony he gave in Congress. He was asked to give a yes or no answer regarding whether or not the NSA is spying on American citizens in America and he would not answer the question Yes or No, he did eventually stammer his way through some what ifs and then said it's not being done on purpose.

Because the statute expressly does not allow the intentional targeting of American citizens, however as he openly admits, there are times when some data from Americans gets swept up in this. There are safeguards in place, such as a FISA court with oversight to minimize as much American data being collected as possible, and then having judicial oversight if and when this data does get collected.

I don't really care what the statute says

We should all care what the law is --- shouldn't we?

Clapper's response to me denoted guilt, he should not have needed to fly by the seat of his pants when formulating an answer to that very simple question. I'm going to go with what I see, read, and hear and the more I see, read and hear of Clapper, the less confident I am that our Intel community is doing things the right way. My opinion.

Clapper's response was the only answer he could give. Whatever he said to that question was going to look bad, and he gave the least bad answer.

 

[cashmcall]

Clapper's response was the only answer he could give. Whatever he said to that question was going to look bad, and he gave the least bad answer.

There should be NO good or bad answers...Just the truth.. simple really..

 

[Gipper]

And not a single one of your rights has been violated!

Lets see now...a government that has been exposed for targeting and harassing conservative groups, has indicated right wingers, Christians and TP members could be terrorists, that covertly provided guns to drug gangs, that refuses to prevent all sorts of undesirables from walking across our southern border, who has failed to tell us where and what the president was doing during Benghazi, has lied repeatedly about Benghazi, who has covered up all sorts of shenanigans at the State Dept, whose AG and other administration officials have lied to Congress, whose HHS Sec does shakedowns of corporations for money, has purchased millions of rounds of hollow point ammo by domestic policing agencies, etc........

And we are to believe that this massive surveillance of Americans by the NSA is nothing to worry about and is legal. Apparently Statists believe. Not surprising really.

 

[BigRob]

There should be NO good or bad answers...Just the truth.. simple really..

The truth in this case is not simple -- and the nature of congressional hearings are such that he wouldn't be allowed to give a full explanation. Congressional hearings are good to have, but lets not lose sight of the fact that they are politicians looking to score political points.

 

[BigRob]

Lets see now...a government that has been exposed for targeting and harassing conservative groups, has indicated right wingers, Christians and TP members could be terrorists, that covertly provided guns to drug gangs, that refuses to prevent all sorts of undesirables from walking across our southern border, who has failed to tell us where and what the president was doing during Benghazi, has lied repeatedly about Benghazi, who has covered up all sorts of shenanigans at the State Dept, whose AG and other administration officials have lied to Congress, whose HHS Sec does shakedowns of corporations for money, has purchased millions of rounds of hollow point ammo by domestic policing agencies, etc........

And we are to believe that this massive surveillance of Americans by the NSA is nothing to worry about and is legal. Apparently Statists believe. Not surprising really.

Not going to defend Obama on any of these scandals except the NSA one. There is no evidence that PRISM is intentionally targeting Americans, and in fact that is expressly illegal under the statute. If this is the case, then people must be held accountable. But I have seen no proof this is true.

And in terms of the metadata from phones, I believe we already addressed that as well.

 

[cashmcall]

The truth in this case is not simple -- and the nature of congressional hearings are such that he wouldn't be allowed to give a full explanation. Congressional hearings are good to have, but lets not lose sight of the fact that they are politicians looking to score political points.

You and I agree on most things, So I have a simple question ..Are they going to far?

 

[Centrehalf]

Rob, I get where you're coming from but listening to the DNI stutter and stammer over what should have been a simple answer made me stop and pause. I don't have the same confidence as you that our public servants are obeying the law. I hope I'm wrong.

 

[cashmcall]

Rob, I get where you're coming from but listening to the DNI stutter and stammer over what should have been a simple answer made me stop and pause. I don't have the same confidence as you that our public servants are obeying the law. I hope I'm wrong.

I would have to agree with Rob...They may not have broken any laws, or a least none you could convict on... It depends on what your definition of what IS IS.....lol

 

[cashmcall]

BREAKING NEWS Tuesday, June 11, 2013 3:28 PM EDT​

A.C.L.U. Sues Obama Administration Over Collection of Phone Logs​

The American Civil Liberties Union on Tuesday filed a lawsuit against the Obama administration over its “dragnet” collection of logs of domestic phone calls, contending that the once-secret program — whose existence was exposed by a former National Security Agency contractor last week — is illegal and asking a judge to both stop it and order the records purged.
The lawsuit, filed in New York, could set up an eventual Supreme Court test. It could also focus attention on this disclosure amid the larger heap of top secret surveillance matters that were disclosed by Edward J. Snowden, a former N.S.A. contractor who came forward on Sunday to say he was the source of a series of disclosures by The Guardian and The Washington Post.

READ MORE »

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/12/us/aclu-files-suit-over-phone-surveillance-program.html?emc=edit_na_20130611

 

[BigRob]

You and I agree on most things, So I have a simple question ..Are they going to far?

I think that it is easy for us to say yes, they have gone to far. But I think that it is an incredibly difficult job to keep the country safe. Like it or not, 9/11 did change everything. No one in government wants to be the reason that happens again. It is not that they want to establish some dictatorial state, or read your emails, or whatever. I believe that they genuinely are concerned about making sure that this never happens again, and I believe they are genuinely concerned about protecting our rights -- after all, they are Americans too.

Clapper put out a fact sheet on PRISM which indicated that:

"Communications collected under Section 702 have yielded intelligence regarding proliferation networks and have directly and significantly contributed to successful operations to impede the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and related technologies

Communications collected under Section 702 have provided significant and unique intelligence regarding potential cyber threats to the United States including specific potential computer network attacks. This insight has led to successful efforts to mitigate these threats."

These people literally basically are fighting a war ever single day that they go to work. The world is a dangerous place, and knowing that there are terror networks out there attempting to acquire weapons of mass destruction, and then realizing it is your responsibility to prevent this is a mind blowing realization and responsibility. If the average Jow screws up at work, maybe a report doesn't get filed on time, but if these people screw up and a dirty bomb goes off in the New York subway or something, I think that is tough to deal with.

Going solely based on what has been made public to date about these programs, I am satisfied that they have not overstepped their authority in this regard. New developments might change my opinion of course, and I do think that down the road we are ultimately heading towards a Congressional reemergence. For now however, I believe they have done a pretty good job of respecting our rights while keeping the country safe.

 

[BigRob]

Rob, I get where you're coming from but listening to the DNI stutter and stammer over what should have been a simple answer made me stop and pause. I don't have the same confidence as you that our public servants are obeying the law. I hope I'm wrong.

In the same way I hope I am right. Going based on just what we know so far, I have to conclude that this is a legal program that respects our rights. That of course can change if different information comes to light.