RELATED U.S. spy agency paper says fewer than 300 phone numbers closely scrutinized
Officials: NSA surveillance programs helped foil terror plots in 20 countries
That is a bunch of bunk....if they had been spying on who they were supposed to .....the Boston Bombers would have been caught before the bombing. The government is putting out all kinds of propaganda on how spying has helped, it is a LIE! Not a huge Palin fan but she is right on about this.
SARAH PALIN ON FIRE – BLASTS NSA: “Couldn’t Find Two Pot-Smoking Deadbeat Bostonians With Hotline to Terrorist Central” (Video)
Posted by Jim Hoft on Saturday, June 15, 2013, 1:42 PM
PALIN ON FIRE–
Sarah Palin spoke at the Faith and Freedom Coalition today in Washington DC. The popular former governor blasted Obama’s NSA and delivered the red meat:“Our government spied on every single one of your phone calls but couldn’t find two pot-smoking deadbeat Bostonians with a hotline to terrorist central in Chechnya. Really?… And it’s built an apparatus to sneak into all of the good guys’ communications but…whoopsi-daisy… It missed the Fort Hood murderer of our own troops despite this Islamic terrorist declaring his ideology in numerous army counselling sessions and on his own business cards. But, whoops, no red flags there. Really?”Nobody does it better than Sarah:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rl_Gz...layer_embedded
Here is Sarah’s whole speech.
I am trying to put together a list of secure email providers and search engines, here is what I have so far, if anyone knows of others please post.
SECURE SEARCH ENGINES AND EMAIL PROVIDERS
Search engines:
https://www.startpage.com/
Email Providers:
Hushmail
VaultletMail
Enigmail
Reagan.com - Personal Email
Dark Side Of The Prism No Restart
Dark Side of the Prism is a Firefox Add-on that provides a soundtrack for our surveilled internet meanderings.
Added June 14, 2013
If you have firefox the above is the link to the Dark side of Prism add on.
Dick Cheney defends NSA surveillance programs
CBS News - 9 hours ago
Former Vice President Dick Cheney, who played a key role in spearheading the government's expansion of surveillance authority in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, forcefully defended the legality and necessity of that surveillance on "Fox News Sunday," ...
Report: UK spies hacked foreign diplomats
USA TODAY - 1 hour ago
LONDON (AP) - The Guardian newspaper says the British eavesdropping agency GCHQ repeatedly hacked into foreign diplomats' phones and e-mails when the U.K.
Related Espionage » United Kingdom » United States National Security Agency »
Report: NSA docs reveal US spied on Russian president CBS News
New Leak Indicates US and Britain Eavesdropped at '09 World Conferences New York Times
Featured:GCHQ intercepted foreign politicians' communications at G20 summits The Guardian
Highly Cited:The laws that allow intelligence agencies to spy on foreign diplomats The Guardian
From United Kingdom:NSA leak reveal: US and Britain spied on Russians and other countries at ... Daily Mail
In Depth:New report: Britain spied on G-20 delegates in 2009 CNN
New NSA Leak Reveals US, UK Spied on G20 Summit
Sunday, 16 Jun 2013 06:28 PM
- Britai Britain , working with the United States' National Security Agency, intercepted phone calls and monitored computers used by officials
- taking part in two high-level international finance meetings in London in 2009, a British newspaper said on Sunday.
The latest report, leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, reveals that the U.S. specifically targeted Russian President Dmitry Medvedev's communication signals, or "meta-data," back to the Russian embassy in London.
The effort, however, apparently didn't apparently reveal much beyond "a change in the way Russian leadership signals have been normally transmitted," the Guardian reported.
According to the newspaper, the NSA documents stated that "this is an analysis of signal activity in support of President Dmitry Medvedev's visit to London. The report details a change in the way Russian leadership signals have been normally transmitted. The signal activity was found to be emanating from the Russian embassy in London and the communications are believed to be in support of the Russian president."
Specifically, the details of the intercepts were in a briefing document prepared by the NSA and shared with high-ranking officials from Britain, Australia, Canada and New Zealand.
The disclosure reveals the importance of "the U.S. spy hub at RAF Menwith Hill in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, where hundreds of NSA analysts are based," working alongside liaison officers from British intelligence, the paper concluded.
The Guardian said some delegates from countries in the Group of 20 - which comprises top economies around the world - used Internet cafes that had been set up by British intelligence agencies to read their emails.
The report Sunday was published hours before leaders of the Group of Eight countries - all of which are in the G20 - start a two-day summit in Northern Ireland.
The Guardian said it had seen classified documents that detailed secret monitoring by British intelligence of officials at a G20 leaders summit and a finance ministers' meeting in 2009 and suggested it had been sanctioned at a senior level by the government of former prime minister Gordon Brown.
The aim of the monitoring, which included tracing who was calling who, appeared to have been to get an edge in the meetings and targets included South Africa and Turkey, the report said.
A spokesman for Britain's foreign ministry declined to comment. The Labour party, which held power in 2009, was not immediately available for comment.
The Guardian this month reported details of surveillance by the NSA of phone records and Internet data in the United States.
http://www.newsmax.com/Newswidget/sn...n=widgetphase1
at the very basic level PRISM can be used to Blackmail every single politician; person of Influence; persons with financial assets until the Individuals that control the NSA gets the Desired result. I'm talking at the Local / State / Federal Level; Nationally as well as Internationally in every corner of the World. You are Incredibly Screwed and will be controlled from the Top to Bottom. That Desired result can be anything these leaders can possibly wish. Money Laundering will look like Childs Play / Old School Robbery when it comes to the Financial Markets and Blackmailing Financial Assets Managers.... OR .... The Blackmail of Chief Justices as in what happened to John Roberts
I agree prism is the tool that Soros will be using to rule the world, his puppet Obama right along side him. This travesty has to be stopped.
Leaker Snowden Rips Obama for All of His Broken Campaign Promises
Posted by Jim Hoft on Monday, June 17, 2013, 2:54 PM
Edward Snowden ripped Obama on Monday for all of his broken campaign promises.
The Politico reported:
NSA leaker Edward Snowden on Monday criticized President Barack Obama for empty promises in a wide-ranging online interview, saying that the president’s alleged failings influenced his decision to release the secret information on government surveillance.
“Obama’s campaign promises and election gave me faith that he would lead us toward fixing the problems he outlined in his quest for votes. Many Americans felt similarly. Unfortunately, shortly after assuming power, he closed the door on investigating systemic violations of law, deepened and expanded several abusive programs, and refused to spend the political capital to end the kind of human rights violations like we see in Guantanamo, where men still sit without charge,” Snowden said in a response to a question from a commenter on The Guardian’s website.
Snowden was responding to this question: “Why did you wait to release the documents if you said you wanted to tell the world about the NSA programs since before Obama became president?”
Snowden Appears Live on Guardian Website, Believes US Could Kill Him
http://www.newsmax.com/CMSPages/GetF...axsidesize=600Tom Grundy, an activist, blogger and co-organizer supporting Edward Snowden's campaign, browses the live chat with Snowden on the Guardian website from his house in Hong Kong on June 17.
Monday, 17 Jun 2013 03:22 PM
Edward Snowden, the self-confessed leaker of the documents revealing the National Security Agency's top-secret phone and Internet surveillance program, appeared suddenly online Monday and began answering questions live on the The British Guardian newspaper's website.
The Guardian was the newspaper that first reported Snowden's revelations of NSA monitoring.
The 29-year-old former NSA contractor, who is reportedly still in Hong Kong, began answering questions on why he revealed the agency's top-secret program at 11 a.m. Eastern Standard Time. There was no independent way for news services to determine that it was actually Snowden answering the questions.
But the commentator identified as Snowden talked about the media frenzy that has since ensued, and offered his thoughts on his now-uncertain future.
He also dismissed being called a traitor by several lawmakers as well as former Vice President Dick Cheney, who made the allegations in an interview on Fox News Sunday.
“Being called a traitor by Dick Cheney is the highest honor you can give an American, and the more panicked talk we hear from people like him... the better off we all are,” he said.
“This is a man who gave us the warrantless wiretapping scheme as a kind of atrocity warm-up on the way to deceitfully engineering a conflict that has killed over 4,400 and maimed nearly 32,000 Americans, as well as leaving over 100,000 Iraqis dead,” he said.
The live chat appeared on the the columnist page of Glenn Greenwald, the American reporter who broke the story after making contact with Snowden. Greenwald monitored the chat.
In his initial answers published on the website, Snowden avoided a specific question on the scope of documents he has in his possession, but he said he believed the federal government wants to either jail or murder him.
He also said he didn't reveal any U.S. operations "against legitimate military targets. ... I pointed out where the NSA has hacked civilian infrastructure such as universities, hospitals, and private businesses because it is dangerous."
"How many sets of the documents you disclosed did you make, and how many different people have them? If anything happens to you, do they still exist?" a questioner asked Snowden.
"All I can say right now is the U.S. government is not going to be able to cover this up by jailing or murdering me. Truth is coming, and it cannot be stopped," Snowden wrote.
http://www.newsmax.com/newswidget/snowden-live-guardian-nsa/2013/06...
Rep sparks confusion over claim NSA can wiretap without warrant
Published June 17, 2013
FoxNews.com
A Capitol Hill lawmaker sparked a string of conflicting statements about the limits of U.S. surveillance after claiming during a hearing last week that he was told officials can listen to phone calls without a warrant.
Rep. Jerrold Nadler made the comments during a hearing Thursday, but has since appeared to walk them back as the intelligence community denied the claim. Meanwhile, NSA leaker Edward Snowden continued to fuel the speculation on Monday when he claimed, during an online chat, that the “content” of Americans’ communications is accessible to some analysts without a warrant.
Earlier this month, Snowden, until recently an NSA contractor, disclosed information about the federal government’s widespread data collection on phone calls and Internet activities, including emails and text messages.
Such practices, in the aftermath of 9/11, were known to Washington lawmakers. But the depth and range shocked the public and at least some on Capitol Hill, who have tried to learn to what extent the government listens to conversations or reads emails and other messages without a warrant for the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court.
The latest controversy started late Saturday when the online tech publication CNET published a report on the New York Democratic congressman’s comments. According to CNET’s reading of the remarks, Nadler said he was told during a briefing that phone call contents could be accessed "simply based on an analyst deciding that."
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/06/17/congressman-remark-on-ns...
3 NSA veterans speak out on whistle-blower: We told you so:
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2013/06/16/snowden-whis...
CONGRESS: WHO THE HELL DO YOU PEOPLE THINK YOU ARE?
By: Devvy
June 2, 2013
NewsWithViews.com
Certified Mail Receipt: 7012 1010 0002 9855 8410
Colonel & Mrs. John B. Kidd
P.O. Box 1102
Big Spring, Texas 79721
June 1, 2013
Congressman Randy Neugebauer
1510 Scurry St. Suite B
Big Spring, TX 79720
Congressman Neugebauer:
Let me start off by saying I have been registered no party since 1996, so I have no political ax to grind.
As you are aware, the National Security Administration (NSA) is building a facility in Utah benignly called the Utah Data Center. $2 billion borrowed dollars since the people's purse is nearly $17 TRILLION dollars over drawn thanks to free spenders like you who pay no attention to Art. 1, Sec. 8 of the U.S. Constitution. More debt plus the interest slapped on our backs, our children and grand children for the rest of our lives.
You may have heard Comrade Mad Max Waters (Democratic/Communist Party USA) made the following statement:
“The President has put in place an organization with the kind of database that no one has ever seen before in life,” Representative Maxine Waters told Roland Martin on Monday. “That's going to be very, very powerful,” Waters said. “That database will have information about everything on every individual on ways that it's never been done before and whoever runs for President on the Democratic ticket has to deal with that. They're going to go down with that database and the concerns of those people because they can't get around it. And he's [President Obama] been very smart. It's very powerful what he's leaving in place.”
Many news sources like Wired.com have reported the purpose of that center:
(1) "Intercept, decipher, analyze, and store vast swaths of the world's communications as they zap down from satellites and zip through the underground and undersea cables of international, foreign, and domestic networks.
(2) "Flowing through its servers and routers and stored in near-bottomless databases will be all forms of communication, including the complete contents of private emails, cell phone calls, and Google searches, as well as all sorts of personal data trails—parking receipts, travel itineraries, bookstore purchases, and other digital “pocket litter.” It is, in some measure, the realization of the “total information awareness” program created during the first term of the Bush administration—an effort that was killed by Congress in 2003 after it caused an outcry over its potential for invading Americans’ privacy."
The U.S. Constitution has never been an impediment to you, Randy. Your voting record bears that out. You voted to eviscerate the Bill of Rights in 2005 when you voted to make the "Patriot" Act permanent. In 2006, you voted yes on allowing electronic surveillance domestically without a warrant. In 2006, you once again voted to shred the Constitution when you voted yes for the John Warner Defense Authorization Act. In 2011, you voted yes on extending the Patriot Act's roving wiretaps. And, the grand daddy of them all: The National Defense Authorization Act in 2012. You voted to allow American citizens to be detained indefinitely without a warrant - something the Founding Fathers would not have tolerated for a split second.
Please, don't insult my intelligence by trying to feed me the bull manure you feed the uninformed in this district about the nebulous "war on terror" that has become nothing but a massive money making machine for defense contractors and members of Congress that own stock in companies who profit from the phony "war on terror."
The Republican controlled Congress under Bush and the Republican controlled U.S. House of Representatives since he left office (with the exception of one two year period) is a duplicate of what Adolph Hitler did when the Nazi's controlled Germany. I'm a dedicated student of history, so I know what I'm talking about. With today's advanced technology, it's even more egregious.
My question is: Who the hell do you people think you are? What the "Utah Data Center" will be doing is a repeat of Hitler's Germany constantly tracking the movement of every citizen, their everyday whereabouts, activities and where we spend our money. A Republican controlled Congress and then the U.S. House side after Bush left office has done nothing but strip us of our God-given rights and stomp on states rights. Is it any wonder the approval rating for Congress is at about 11%?
After the Marxist usurper squatting in the White House signed the unconstitutional "stimulus" act, you people in the Outlaw Congress (yes, outlaws because you rob and steal from us the same as bandits did in the "old West") provided millions of dollars for doctors and health care providers to put people's medical records onto discs and make them available for yet another massive data base. Not mandatory, just here's bushels of money to offset the cost, send us the records. Know what I said? The hell you will. I wrote to my primary health care provider and the neurosurgeons who operated on me twice. I told them I do not want my medical records released to anyone in the U.S. government. If that was unacceptable to them, I would terminate my association with he/she and take MY medical records with me. I also wrote to the Rear Admiral who headed TriCare/Humana at the time with the same request. I was assured my records would not be released to any government agency for any reason without my explicit written permission.
As I constituent, I want you to respond in writing to my questions:
1. What type of information will the Utah Data Center will be collecting and storing? I want specifics like: cell phone records, email, cell phone records and conversations, any purchases a person makes, banking records, medical information and so forth.
There's no question such snooping will provide the potential for violating attorney client privilege, doctor to patient communications, husband and wife communications, communications via email between judges and other specific confidences that have always been held sacrosanct. I don't care how they encrypt, somone government - like the communist Chinese - manage to hack into computers in this country. They've been doing it and it will get worse.
2. Does any of the NSA's so-called mission include American citizens? Again, I don't want some Congress double-speak, I want to know if average, ordinary people like my husband and I who have never had a "brush" with the law will have our data and lives mined by that snooping agency and stored at the Utah Data Center.
If the answer to 2 is affirmative, I want you to tell me exactly where in the U.S. Constitution it gives you, the NSA or any other government snooping agency the right to collect data on my life and activities, record phone conversations or any other form of snooping?
None of the alphabet soup agencies can do what they're doing without the approval of Congress since they were created by an Act of Congress and Congress has direct over sight. If alphabet soup agencies are snooping on American citizens without our knowledge, they're getting away with it because you have done nothing to stop it. In this case, we the people intend to stop it by refusing to roll over and allow snoopers like the NSA to get away with it even it means going to court.
Signed,
Devvy Kidd
Let's see what he says for the record. As you can see, I sent the letter certified mail to Neugebauer's district office in my town, not to Washington, DC. That way old Randy can't say he never got my letter. Additionally, their offices in DC get flooded with thousands of pieces of mail every week. All 535 of them go back to their district offices for the weekend and their long, extended "breaks" and vacations, so my letter won't get lost in the Washington shuffle. Oh, and the number of days the House will be in session this year: 126 days. That's 4 1/2 months. They get paid for 12 months.
Killer of American jobs, Speaker of the House John Boehner, is paid $223,500 per year. That means we the people pay him $18,625 per month, 12 months a year for working 4 1/2 months.
'Rank and file' house and senate members - $174,000 per year. That means we the people pay professional, career hookers like Randy Neugebauer $14,500 per month, 12 months a year for working 4 1/2 months.
Oh, they squawk and insist they're "always working for you". True. Some committees do stay in Foggy Bottom for this and that periodically. But, in reality, they work for whoever pays the most for their favors. Both parties.
I'm also filing a FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) request with the NSA; certified mail. I want to know if they have any kind of file on me or my husband. I recommend you do the same as well. Snail mail your U.S. House member and ask them the same questions I did in my letter to Neugebauer; send it to their district office. You may not know it, but you can also file a FOIA with the FBI and get any file they have on you. Be sure to get your FOIA letter notarized or the FBI won't release it.
We the people must take a pro-active position and fight them on this as we did back in 2003. Bush, Jr., thought he could ram the “total information awareness” program down our throats because the evil doers count on the American people being unaware of what's going on or simply don't care about their freedom and liberty. Suddenly, more and more unconstitutional draconian bills become "law". The Marxist in the White House has only continued where his predecessors left off.
He who shouts the loudest gets the most attention and results.
By the way, if you don't know about the John Warner Defense Authorization Act, you can get an accurate report here:
"As with any act of Congress, the Posse Comitatus Act may be repealed by subsequent act of Congress. In the case of the Posse Comitatus Act, the John Warner National Defense Authorization Act of 2007, signed into law by President George W. Bush on October 17, 2006, amended the law by adding the following language: "The President may employ the armed forces to restore public order in any State of the United States the President determines hinders the execution of laws or deprives the people of a right, privilege, immunity, or protection named in the Constitution and secured by law or opposes or obstructs the execution of the laws of the United States or impedes the course of justice under those laws."
"Fortunately for our Republic and the rule of law that has kept us free, the sweeping changes made by the Warner Act were completely repealed by passage of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008. Accordingly, the present state of the applicable law governing the use of federal troops in matters of domestic law enforcement is the Insurrection Act of 1807."
If you are opposed to the NSA snooping into your life and keeping a data base on everything you say in private emails, snooping into your credit card records or debt card purchases, what books you read, hotels you stay at or any other part of your private life, write that letter. As for Google and other search engines: They are harvesting your data and selling it which is how they make their billions.
Well, they don't get it from me; I use startpage.com. I also never use Yahoo:
Yahoo to Users: Let Us Read Your Emails or -- Goodbye!
"As of June 1, all Yahoo email users are required to upgrade to the company's newest platform, which allows Yahoo to scan and analyze every email they write or receive. According to Yahoo's help page, all users who make the transition agree to let the company perform "content scanning and analyzing of your communications content" to target ads, offer products, and perform "abuse protection."
"This means any message that Yahoo's algorithms find disturbing could flag a user as a bully, a threat, or worse. At the same time, Yahoo can now openly troll through email for personal information that it can share or hold onto indefinitely. Gay and haven't come out yet? Yahoo knows. Having an affair? Your spouse may not know — but Yahoo does. Any interests, ailments or projects you'd rather not share? You're sharing them with Yahoo, perhaps forever.
"The new tracking policy affects more than just Yahoo account holders. Everyone who corresponds with a Yahoo email account holder will also have their own message content scanned, analyzed, and stored by Yahoo, even if they themselves have not agreed to Yahoo's new terms of service.
"Emailing through Yahoo means surrendering your privacy, whether it's your own account or your friend's," says Harvard-trained privacy expert Katherine Albrecht, who is helping to develop StartMail, an upcoming email service that will not scan its users' correspondence. "It's time we start paying attention to these policies, because they're growing more shockingly abusive every day," she added."
That means if you send me email with a Yahoo account, I'm going to delete it without opening it. I'm sorry, but if we don't stop the snoopers now, it will only get worse. Those "free" email accounts are more costly than people realize.If you value your privacy, don't put it off --- write your congress critter about NSA's new Utah Data Center and get your file from the FBI. You can bet they have one on you just because they've been getting away with it for decades because Congress has allowed it to go on and because we the people haven't shouted loud enough.
NSA Leaker: Analysts Receive Your Emails
http://cdn.breitbart.com/mediaserver...tbroadband.jpg
Print Article Send a Tip
by Breitbart News 17 Jun 2013, 10:44 AM PDT
On Monday, NSA leaker Edward Snowden suggested in an online interview with The Guardian (UK) that someone at the National Security Agency does indeed receive the content of your emails. “If I target for example an email address, for example under FAA 702, and that email address sent something to you, Joe America, the analyst gets it. All of it. IPs, raw data, content, headers, attachments, everything. And it gets saved for a very long time – and can be extended further with waivers rather than warrants.”
He added that he stands by his original accusation that he had the power to wiretap anyone, up to and including the president of the United States’ personal email.
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/06/17/NSA-leaker-readi...
NSA Leaker: Feds Subverting Democracy
http://cdn.breitbart.com/mediaserver...candal/NSA.jpg
by Ben Shapiro 17 Jun 2013, 10:28 AM PDT 3 post a comment
NSA leaker Edward Snowden blasted Congress’ willingness to sign off on massive federal surveillance of American citizens in an online interview with The Guardian (UK) on Monday. He said “there was no single moment” that made him want to leak news of the surveillance to the press. Instead, he said, “It was seeing a continuing litany of lies from senior officials to Congress – and therefore the American people – and the realization that Congress, specifically the Gang of Eight, wholly supported the lies that compelled me to act. Seeing someone in the position of James Clapper – the Director of National Intelligence – baldly lying to the public without repercussion is the evidence of a subverted democracy. The consent of the governed is not consent if it is not informed.”
He added that other leakers should step forward because “This country is worth dying for.”
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Governm...gress-informed
Petition in support of Snowden nears 81,000 signatures
Politics | Josh Peterson
http://cdn01.dailycaller.com/wp-cont...20-300x128.jpg
White House petition backing NSA leaker nears 100,000 signatures
Jailed Qwest CEO claimed that NSA retaliated because he wouldn’t participate in spy program
In court papers filed during his 2007 insider trading trial, former Qwest CEO Joseph Nacchio claimed that Denver-based Qwest was denied lucrative NSA contracts he believed to be worth $50-$100 million, after Nacchio refused to involve Qwest in a secret NSA program that he thought would be illegal.Subsequent reporting at the time revealed that it was a domestic wiretapping program in which the NSA wanted to snoop on Qwest’s vast telephone network without court orders.President George W. Bush’s administration has said that warrantless wiretapping only began after 9/11, as part of the NSA’s Terrorist Surveillance Program.
Sources familiar with the request to Qwest, quoted anonymously in the New York Times in 2007, “say the arrangement could have permitted neighborhood-by-neighborhood surveillance of phone traffic without a court order, which alarmed them.”Nacchio claimed that the NSA retaliated for his refusal by leaving Qwest out of a $2 billion NSA infrastructure program called Groundbreaker, which was split among numerous contractors, including Verizon.
Verizon, it was recently revealed, was required by court order to give the NSA telephone records from millions of its customer as part of a sweeping surveillance program.Nacchio revealed these details in court papers in an attempt to show that he didn’t dump Qwest stock in 2001 because he knew the company was going to post poor performance results in the future. Rather, he suspected the company would benefit from participating in Groundbreaker, which he discussed with NSA personnel in Washington D.C. on Feb. 27, 2001.
But Nacchio’s court filing says NSA officials also sought his participation in the other program, the details of which were redacted in the document, a motion for the court to allow Nacchio to testify about the meeting as part of his defense.“[O]ne purpose of bringing Messrs. Nacchio and [Qwest Senior Vice President James] Payne into the February 27, 2001 meeting was to [redacted] and stated that Qwest was subsequently denied any agency work as a direct result of Mr. Nacchio’s refusal,” the document reads.In an interview with prosecutors, a portion of which was included in the court filing, Payne said NSA officials would bring up the secret program frequently and that they “expressed disappointment” that Qwest wouldn’t participate.
“Nacchio said it was a legal issue and that they could not do something their general counsel told them not to do,” Payne said. “Nacchio projected that he might do it if he could find a way to do it legally.”“There was a feeling also,” he continued,” that the NSA acted as agents for other governmental agencies and if Qwest frustrated the NSA, they would also frustrate other agencies.
Ultimately, this argument wasn’t allowed in open court because the judge didn’t feel there was enough of a connection between the refusal to join the NSA program and Qwest not winning the Groundbreaker contract. Nacchio’s allegations didn’t come to light until the documents were unsealed six months after he was convicted in April 2007.He was found guilty on 19 counts of insider trading and sentenced to six years. He was also fined $19 million and ordered to forfeit $52 million he made on his stock trade.
Nacchio’s lawyer, Herbert Stern, did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.
http://dailycaller.com/2013/06/13/ja...n-spy-program/
Exclusive: Inside Account of U.S. Eavesdropping on Americans
This is back from Oct. 9, 2008.
The accounts of the two former intercept operators, who have never met and did not know of the other's allegations, provide the first inside look at the day to day operations of the huge and controversial US terrorist surveillance program.
"There is a constant check to make sure that our civil liberties of our citizens are treated with respect," said President Bush at a news conference this past February.
But the accounts of the two whistleblowers, which could not be independently corroborated, raise serious questions about how much respect is accorded those Americans whose conversations are intercepted in the name of fighting terrorism.
US Soldier's 'Phone Sex' Intercepted, Shared
Faulk says he and others in his section of the NSA facility at Fort Gordon routinely shared salacious or tantalizing phone calls that had been intercepted, alerting office mates to certain time codes of "cuts" that were available on each operator's computer.
"Hey, check this out," Faulk says he would be told, "there's good phone sex or there's some pillow talk, pull up this call, it's really funny, go check it out. It would be some colonel making pillow talk and we would say, 'Wow, this was crazy'," Faulk told ABC News.
Faulk said he joined in to listen, and talk about it during breaks in Back Hall's "smoke pit," but ended up feeling badly about his actions.
Much more at link:
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?...1#.Ub5mr5zzWuk
TUESDAY, JUNE 18
Komrades! The IRS scandal is no longer of importance to any of you
Yes Komrades, it is true. The regime has decided for you that this news is no longer important. Instead we will be showing you this clip of Gilligan's Island to properly instill within you the best way to live collectively and give all you have(nothing) to the Motherland. Be sure to take notes and memorize the Gilligan's Island clip below. After 48 hours you will hear, see and know nothing but what is best for your fellow komrades and the above all else, THE MOTHERLAND! PatriotUSA
Steer in: BC from I'm 41
******************************
Big Three Networks Have Stopped Reporting on IRS Scandal
By Warner Todd Hutson
Apparently the Big Three TV networks have decided that the IRS intimidation scandal is over and it seems that reporting on the issue has disappeared from the airwaves.
When the story first broke after IRS official Lois Lerner admitted that the taxing agency had unfairly targeted conservatives and Tea Party groups seeking a tax status, the Big Three jumped into the story with both feet. But now, only a month later, coverage of the matter has slowed to a trickle.
A new review by the Media Research Center of the first month of coverage of the IRS scandal shows that three quarters of the stories hit in the first two weeks after the news broke.
MRC analysts reviewed each of the morning and evening newscasts on ABC, CBS and NBC from May 10 through June 12 (ABC’s World News, Good Morning America, CBS’s Evening News and This Morning, and NBC’s Nightly News and Today show), and found 127 full stories, interviews or anchor briefs that focused on the IRS scandal. Analysts determined that 76 percent of the IRS stories were aired within the first two weeks, while 24 percent of the stories arrived in the latter period, a huge drop-off.
MRC found that CBS hit the story the most (49 stories), while NBC came in second (at 44), with ABC brining up the tail (with 34).
Finally, during the week of June 10, only one mention of the scandal was heard anywhere on network TV.
The main angle the Big Three took while reporting the IRS scandal was to note that it was damaging to Obama’s reputation and his presidency. Perhaps, then, it shouldn’t be a surprise that the networks completely dropped the story as quickly as possible to give Obama time to recover.
Source is here from CFP.
The motherland will now return you to our only scheduled program! This is INTENTIONALLY very short so you can immediately return to your assigned farm, factory, ministry of propaganda, institute of learning(Gulag), or mass graveyard to await your final assignment.
Be sure to bring your own gloves, shovel, rake or hoe. These were issued to you at birth along with your state issued decoder(tracking)chip permanently implanted on the back of left hand. DO NOT stop to think, talk independently or with other komrades. The welfare of the MOTHERLAND has been and will always be, the only matter of importance to any of you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Llcj_QRkVeU
Tags: Collectivism, Statist, Obama, Lapdog media, Propaganda, USSR, Soviet Union, KGB, East Germany, Stasi, Stalin, NSA, CIA, FBI. To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the Patriot's Corner. Thanks!
http://conservativeblogscentral.blog...longer-of.html
No, NSA Spying Did NOT Prevent a Terror Attack on Wall Street
http://www.zerohedge.com/sites/defau...cture-7813.jpg Submitted by George Washington on 06/18/2013 23:11 -0400
In response to the revelation that the NSA has been illegally spying on all Americans for more than a decade, NSA chief General Keith Alexander claimed that the spying prevented a terrorist attack on Wall Street and the New York subway.
There’s only one problem: the claim is completely false.
The Christian Science Monitor notes today:How much did this bad guy give Al Qaeda? $23,000 total.
According to officials at the House Intelligence hearing, this plan was caught when the NSA was using its Internet intercept authority to monitor the communications of a known extremist in Yemen.
This suspect, in turn, was in contact with an individual in the United States named Khalid Ouazzani. Thus warned, theFBI investigated Mr. Ouazzani through traditional law enforcement methods, and discovered a burgeoning plot to bomb the NYSE.
“Ouazzani had been providing information and support to this plot,” FBI Deputy Director Sean Joyce told lawmakers.
However, Mr. Ouazzani pleaded guilty to providing material support – in his case, money – to Al Qaeda, not to terror planning. His May 2010 plea agreement makes no mention of anything related to the New York Stock Exchange, or any bomb plot, notes David Kravets in Wired magazine.
Plus, Ouazzani’s defense attorney said Tuesday the stock market allegation was news to him.
“Khalid Ouazzani was not involved in any plot to bomb the New York Stock Exchange,” attorney Robin Fowler told Wired.
The other publicly-discussed disrupted terror plot – on the New York subway – was also not really due to government’s overbroad spying program.
The Associated Press reports:The Christian Science Monitor notes of the New York subway case:
Little was offered to substantiate claims that the programs have been successful in stopping acts of terrorism that would not have been caught with narrower surveillance. In the New York subway bombing case, President Barack Obama conceded the would-be bomber might have been caught with less sweeping surveillance.
In addition, the Guardian pointed out:
As to the New York subway plot, it was discovered not by analysis of vast amounts of Internet data of foreign users, but rather by old-fashioned police work, according to The Guardian ….
Indeed, top security experts say that mass surveillance does not help keep us safe.
Lawyers and intelligence experts with direct knowledge of two intercepted terrorist plots that the Obama administration says confirm the value of the NSA’s vast data-mining activities have questioned whether the surveillance sweeps played a significant role ….
Glenn Greenwald notes:Postscript: Mr. Ouazzani giving $23,000 to Al Qaeda is indeed a crime. He supported Al Qaeda, and was rightly prosecuted and convicted for that crime. But given that the American government has been providing arms, money and logistical support to Al Qaeda in Syria, Libya, Mali, Bosnia and other countries – and related Muslim terrorists in Chechnya, Iran, and many other countries – Mr. Ouazzani’s support for terrorism seems rather small in comparison.
This is just the same playbook that U.S. government officials have been using for the last five decades whenever anything gets done that brings small amounts of transparency to the bad conduct that they do in the dark. They immediately accuse those who brought that transparency of jeopardizing national security. They try and scare the American public into believing that they’ve been placed at risk and that the only way they can stay safe is to trust the people in power to do whatever it is they want to do without any kinds of constraints, accountability or light of any kind.
http://www.zerohedge.com/contributed...ck-wall-street
The Constitution Doesn't Guarantee Safety, It Guarantees Privacy
Obama says Americans can't have "100 percent security and 100 percent privacy".
Video and Article at the Page Link: http://www.activistpost.com/2013/06/...guarantee.html
Sen. Rand Paul: Clapper Should Be Fired or Forced to Resign
Tuesday, 18 Jun 2013 11:41 PM
By Paul Scicchitano
Republican Sen. Rand Paul called on President Obama to oust his embattled Director of National Intelligence on Tuesday, insisting that James Clapper told a “bald-faced lie” when he assured the Senate the administration was not collecting data on millions of Americans.
Appearing on Fox News' “On the Record with Greta Van Susteren,” the Kentuckian also said that President Barack Obama appears to be “losing the moral authority to lead the nation” based on the plethora of scandals facing his administration.
“The president is really hurting in a big way right now,” said Paul. “We had the IRS scandal. Then he targeted Fox reporters and AP reporters, the Benghazi investigation — no one was fired — and now we have this snooping where his director of national intelligence looks at the Senate and says, ‘I’m not keeping or collecting any Americans’ information.”
Clapper was testifying at a March Senate hearing in which he was asked whether the NSA collects any type of data on millions — or hundreds of millions — of Americans.
In recent days Clapper described his earlier response as “the most truthful or least untruthful manner” he could have answered the question.
Paul said he does not believe that Clapper will be able to bridge his credibility gap with lawmakers.
“I don’t know how he can regain his credibility when he lied outright to Congress,” said Paul, who cautioned that Americans should not be quick to judge NSA leaker Edward Snowden, who called national attention to NSA’s secret surveillance of phone calls and emails.
Paul had previously said that in some ways Snowden performed a “noble gesture,” but he reserved judgment as to whether the 29-year-old should be tracked down and brought to justice or honored for his act of civil disobedience.
http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/Sen...6/18/id/510641
Massive NSA Eavesdropping of Domestic Communications
Oh yes they are listening to our phone calls, Barry. (Note: Read Matt Vespa's update to this story. Rep. Nadler apparently misspoke.)I guess all the defenders of the NSA PRISM and phone-record surveillance programs will now try to tell us that this latest revelation, that the NSA listens in on our phone calls and monitors emails, text messages, and IM chats — all without a warrant — is the price we pay for preventing terrorist attacks.
Not only don’t they need a warrant, says the DoJ, but low-level analysts can make the decision to listen to our phone calls for any reason they want.
CNET:
The National Security Agency has acknowledged in a new classified briefing that it does not need court authorization to listen to domestic phone calls.The NSA has between 500,000 and one million numbers on their target list — perhaps more. All electronic communications belonging to these people are recorded.
Rep. Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat, disclosed this week that during a secret briefing to members of Congress, he was told that the contents of a phone call could be accessed “simply based on an analyst deciding that.”
If the NSA wants “to listen to the phone,” an analyst’s decision is sufficient, without any other legal authorization required, Nadler said he learned. “I was rather startled,” said Nadler, an attorney and congressman who serves on the House Judiciary committee.
Not only does this disclosure shed more light on how the NSA’s formidable eavesdropping apparatus works domestically, it also suggests the Justice Department has secretly interpreted federal surveillance law to permit thousands of low-ranking analysts to eavesdrop on phone calls.
Because the same legal standards that apply to phone calls also apply to e-mail messages, text messages, and instant messages, Nadler’s disclosure indicates the NSA analysts could also access the contents of Internet communications without going before a court and seeking approval.
The disclosure appears to confirm some of the allegations made by Edward Snowden, a former NSA infrastructure analyst who leaked classified documents to the Guardian. Snowden said in a video interview that, while not all NSA analysts had this ability, he could from Hawaii “wiretap anyone from you or your accountant to a federal judge to even the president.”
There are serious “constitutional problems” with this approach, said Kurt Opsahl, a senior staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation who has litigated warrantless wiretapping cases. “It epitomizes the problem of secret laws.”
The NSA yesterday declined to comment to CNET. A representative said Nadler was not immediately available. (This is unrelated to last week’s disclosure that the NSA is currently collecting records of the metadata of all domestic Verizon calls, but not the actual contents of the conversations.)
This isn’t “monitoring.” This isn’t “scanning.” This is eavesdropping — exactly what President Obama denied when he said “nobody is listening to your phone calls.” Oh, yes they are, Barry, and lying about it is about the most egregious breaking of trust with the American people that has occurred in your administration.
http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2013/06/16...ommunications/
A Map Of Where Drones Are Allowed In The U.S.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation releases the Federal Aviation Administration's drone authorization list. See who's allowed to fly drones in your neighborhood!
By Colin LecherPosted 02.08.2013 at 3:15 pm3 Comments
http://www.popsci.com/files/imagecac...s/dronemap.jpg The FAA's Drone List EFF
If you want to fly more than a hobbyist's drone in the United States, you have to get permission from the Federal Aviation Administration. We've know for a while about some drones--the ones keeping an eye on the U.S.-Mexico border, for example--but this list of applications through October 2012, obtained and mapped..., is the most up-to-date look at domestic-drone permissions we've got.
The list is broken down by "entities," places like colleges or local sheriff's offices that have applied to the FAA for a license to use drones. The 81 entities on the list, 20 more than on the first list we saw from the EFF, are mixed: a lot of drones are going to government agencies like police departments, a lot to universities and colleges, others to drone manufacturers, and one to an Indian tribal agency. For some reason, Ohio seems to have been granted a lot of permits in this round.
On this interactive map, you can find out what type of drones many applicants were authorized to use: We know the Nellis Air Force base in Nevada has a license to use an MQ-1 Predator drone, and the University of Colorado, Boulder, has a license to use a NexSTAR miniature UAS drone to do experiments into weather and wireless networks. But we don't know what everyone's allowed to use. The U.S. Army, for instance, has, permission to fly drones in the "general location" of the Pentagon. Type of drone? "Unknown."
What this list also doesn't tell us is how many drones are flying around or how many drones each entity is flying. Like, does the U.S. Army have some gigantic fleet of drones at the Pentagon? This doesn't say.
It's enough to make you downright paranoid, but the "stated objectives" included for some of the license applicants might ease your mind a little. Cornell University once used a home-brew drone for a science experiment, while California Fire Services formerly had permission to use drones for fighting wildfires.
But yeah, that whole Pentagon thing.
Check out the list here.
Congress Calls for Accelerated Use of Drones in U.S.
February 3rd, 2012 by Steven Aftergood
A House-Senate conference report this week called on the Administration to accelerate the use of civilian unmanned aerial systems (UAS), or “drones,” in U.S. airspace. The pending authorization bill for the Federal Aviation Administration directs the Secretary of Transporation to develop within nine months “a comprehensive plan to safely accelerate the integration of civil unmanned aircraft systems into the national airspace system.” “The plan… shall provide for the safe integration of civil unmanned aircraft systems into the national airspace system as soon as practicable, but not later than September 30, 2015.” The conference bill, which still awaits final passage, also calls for establishment of UAS test ranges in cooperation with NASA and the Department of Defense, expanded use of UAS in the Arctic region, development of guidance for the operation of public unmanned aircraft systems, and new safety research to assess the risk of “catastrophic failure of the unmanned aircraft that would endanger other aircraft in the national airspace system.” The Department of Defense is pursuing its own domestic UAS activities for training purposes and “domestic operations,” according to a 2007 DoD-FAA memorandum of agreement. (“Army Foresees Expanded Use of Drones in U.S. Airspace,” Secrecy News, January 19, 2012.)
Posted by Deb Simon atFriday, February 03, 2012
http://debsimonforcongress.blogspot....re-drones.html
Edward Snowden's live Q&A: eight things we learned
Key points from the whistleblower's responses to questions about the NSA leak
- Haroon Siddique
- guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 18 June 2013 07.47 EDT
http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/...nowden-010.jpgEdward Snowden seemed confident the public were on his side, but was less impressed with the media response to the NSA leaks. Photograph: AP
On Monday the whistleblower Edward Snowden gave an exclusive live Q&A to the Guardian to answer questions about the biggest intelligence leak in NSA history and revelations about government surveillance. Here are some key things we learned:
1. There is very little information on private individuals the intelli...
The reality is this: if an NSA, FBI, CIA, DIA [Defence Intelligence Agency], etc analyst has access to query raw SIGINT [signals intelligence] databases, they can enter and get results for anything they want. Phone number, email, user id, cell phone handset id (IMEI), and so on – it's all the same. The restrictions against this are policy based, not technically based, and can change at any time. Additionally, audits are cursory, incomplete, and easily fooled by fake justifications. For at least GCHQ, the number of audited queries is only 5% of those performed …2. Snowden waited to release the documents, hoping Obama would bring c...
If I target for example an email address, for example under FAA 702, and that email address sent something to you, Joe America, the analyst gets it. All of it. IPs, raw data, content, headers, attachments, everything. And it gets saved for a very long time – and can be extended further with waivers rather than warrants.
Obama's campaign promises and election gave me faith that he would lead us toward fixing the problems he outlined in his quest for votes. Many Americans felt similarly. Unfortunately, shortly after assuming power, he closed the door on investigating systemic violations of law, deepened and expanded several abusive programs, and refused to spend the political capital to end the kind of human rights violations like we see in Guantánamo, where men still sit without charge.3. He fears that the US will stop at nothing to silence him
All I can say right now is the US government is not going to be able to cover this up by jailing or murdering me. Truth is coming, and it cannot be stopped.4. Snowden is confident he has the public on his side
If the Obama administration responds with an even harsher hand against me, they can be assured that they'll soon find themselves facing an equally harsh public response.5. But he is less impressed with the media response
Initially I was very encouraged. Unfortunately, the mainstream media now seems far more interested in what I said when I was 17 or what my girlfriend looks like rather than, say, the largest program of suspicionless surveillance in human history.6. Encryption offers protection
Encryption works. Properly implemented strong crypto systems are one of the few things that you can rely on. Unfortunately, endpoint security is so terrifically weak that NSA can frequently find ways around it.7. He isn't too upset about being called a traitor by Dick Cheney
Being called a traitor by Dick Cheney is the highest honor you can give an American, and the more panicked talk we hear from people like him, Feinstein, and King, the better off we all are. If they had taught a class on how to be the kind of citizen Dick Cheney worries about, I would have finished high school.8. And if Snowden had been planning to defect to China he'd be petting...
The US media has a knee-jerk 'RED CHINA!' reaction to anything involving HK or the PRC, and is intended to distract from the issue of US government misconduct. Ask yourself: if I were a Chinese spy, why wouldn't I have flown directly into Beijing? I could be living in a palace petting a phoenix by now.
Read the full Q&A here.
Iceland approached by 'middleman' over possible Edward Snowden asylum
Journalist says he was asked by unnamed intermediary to notify Icelandic government that Snowden may want to seek asylum
- Reuters in Reykjavik
- guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 18 June 2013 13.37 EDT
http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/...dward--010.jpg Banner supporting Edward Snowden in Hong Kong. Photograph: Kin Cheung/AP
Iceland has received an informal approach from an intermediary who claims Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who exposed the US government's secret surveillance programs, wants to seek asylum there.
Snowden, the former employee of contractor Booz Allen Hamilton, who worked in an NSA facility in Hawaii, made world headlines after providing details of the program to the Guardian and Washington Post and then fleeing to Hong Kong.In a column in the Icelandic daily Frettabladid, WikiLeaks spokesman Kristinn Hrafnsson claimed that a middleman had approached him on behalf of Snowden.
"On 12 June, I received a message from Edward Snowden where he asked me to notify the Icelandic government that he wanted to seek asylum in Iceland," Hrafnsson, who is also an investigative journalist in Iceland, told Reuters.
The Icelandic government, which has refused to say whether it would grant asylum to Snowden, confirmed it had received the message from Hrafnsson."Kristinn Hrafnsson has contacted two ministries in an informal way but not the ministers. There has been no formal approach in this matter," a government spokesman said.
Hrafnsson declined to name the go-between to Reuters.
Snowden has mentioned Iceland as a possible refuge. Iceland has a reputation for promoting internet freedoms, but Snowden has said he did not travel there immediately from the United States as he feared Iceland could be pressured by Washington.
"Iceland could be pushed harder, quicker, before the public could have a chance to make their feelings known, and I would not put that past the current US administration," Snowden said in an online forum in the Guardian on Monday.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, holed up in the Ecuadorean embassy in London to avoid extradition to Sweden for questioning over allegations of sex crimes, visited Iceland several times in the run-up to some of the website's major releases. Assange denies any wrongdoing.WikiLeaks won a ruling this year in Iceland's supreme court against MasterCard's local partner. The court upheld a lower court's ruling that the payment card firm had illegally ended its contract with the website. Wikileaks' funding had been squeezed without the ability to accept card payments.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013...snowden-asylum
June 20, 2013 Will the Real Traitor Please Stand Up?
By Jonathon Moseley
Okay, who is the real traitor? Is Edward Snowden a heroic whistleblower or a traitor? Well, maybe Snowden is a bit of both. He is both a hero and a traitor, arising from different aspects of his dramatic actions. Snowden was a computer whiz and former Booz Allen contract employee handling secret work for the National Security Agency (NSA). If Snowden crosses over to revealing real substantive secrets to China and Russia, obviously that will be a horse of a different color.
But is another traitor Gen. Keith B. Alexander, Chief of the NSA, who testified before Congress on June 18? Gen. Alexander swore to uphold and defend the U.S. Constitution. Gen. Alexander shredded the Constitution and then deceived the U.S. Congress and the public about it on June 18.
On June 18, the NSA Director told us that "these programs" stopped specific threats of terrorism. Approximately 50 acts of terrorism were prevented. Whoa, there, cowboy! Yellow penalty flag on the field!
http://www.americanthinker.com/artic...ts/Snowden.pngWe're not talking about "these programs" -- but about one program in particular. Obviously, there are some NSA programs that are appropriate. Some NSA programs do exist that certainly helped stop terrorism. If you didn't catch that dishonest scam, you need to sharpen your bureaucracy recognition skills.
Alexander lumped together appropriate and effective NSA programs with inappropriately, offensively, and stupidly collecting all telephone calls of all American citizens indiscriminately. The NSA dog and pony show (Alexander brought a supporting cast of characters) tried to deceive Congress and the American people in order to justify the unconstitutional and inappropriate NSA surveillance that Edward Snowden revealed.
In effect, Alexander is arguing that anything and everything the NSA wants to do has to be accepted and supported, if there is something somewhere that the NSA does that helps keep the country safe. Everything goes. We are not allowed to make a distinction between some NSA activities which are more offensive than others.Alexander's team offered us a burlesque fan-dance striptease in the hearing. While saying they can't bare all, they tried to show enough leg in between the moving fans to keep the customers interested and the money flowing. Yet the examples prove how unconstitutional the NSA's intrusions into our privacy really are.
Every striptease glimpse the NSA and FBI offered underscored why they are scoundrels: They gave examples of international telephone calls across borders. Yet the surveillance program that Snowden exposed monitors purely domestic phone calls wholly within the United States.
They described situations in which there is probable cause to believe that a person is involved in terrorism, or talking to a known terrorist (across borders). Yet the surveillance Snowden exposed occurs without any probable cause. The NSA is snooping on everyone indiscriminately. So the glimpses they gave us were not a pretty sight. If there were probable cause, then there wouldn't be a controversy.
http://www.americanthinker.com/artic.../Alexander.pngA little old lady caller to C-SPAN asked the killer question: Have there been any prosecutions if the NSA detected and stopped 50 terrorist plots? You know the answer. Further, all of this highlights the difference between Obama and Bush. Bush's activities -- as far as we know -- only involved international phone calls across our borders and only focused on specific, identifiable individuals under suspicion. Obama's Administration is targeting the entire U.S. population (at least those with telephones).
President Barack Obama, leading student of Clintonian double-speak, tells us that we need to strike a balance between our privacy and keeping the country safe. We already struck that balance. It's called the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Our Founders struck a balance between privacy and national safety and protection from crime. The Fourth Amendment speaks eloquently for itself:The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.But Obama plays an old Clinton trick. When your violation of a rule is exposed, change the subject and demand a conversation about developing a new, perfect rule. Ignore the fact that you violated the existing rule, by talking about what the perfect rule might be.
Some are trying to cry "Look over there! A cloud shaped like a bunny!" to distract people from the real issues. Do you have privacy rights in telephone call data, since that data belongs to the telephone company?
Well, is your social security number private? Heck, yeah! But your social security number is issued to you by the U.S. Government, by the Social Security Administration. Yet it is very clear in the law that your SSN is private information that you have a right to have protected.Then on June 18 Alexander joined James R. Clapper, Jr., Director of National Intelligence, in committing perjury in a Congressional hearing before our very eyes. Snowden claimed that NSA technicians -- like him -- can listen in to anyone's telephone conversations any time they want. He announced this in his now-notorious news media interview from a Hong Kong hotel.
Yet on June 18, Gen. Alexander denied in the Congressional hearing that NSA staff can listen in on phone calls. Or did he? The Obama Administration is answering that question in terms of what is legally permitted -- not what is actually possible.
"You got the right answer to the wrong question!" legal consultant Norm ("Storm") Bradford loves to bellow. Notice the shell game: Snowden didn't say it was legally permitted. Snowden said he could do it -- technically (while he still worked as an NSA contractor). In response, the administration says it isn't legally allowed. They are not talking about whether it is technically possible.
It's a "Non-Denial Denial" perfected by the Clinton Administration. They are answering a question different from the one being asked. Such evasion can actually convince us that they have something to hide, that they are in fact guilty.
But then when pushed to the line, Alexander told a whopper, which snuck past most observers: When asked if it is technically possible, Alexander answered no. But let's recall that James Clapper told a similar flat-out lie to Congress on March 12, 2013, when he said the NSA isn't doing what Snowden now revealed that it is in fact doing.
On the one hand, they tell us, the NSA won't listen in to the content of telephone calls without a specific court order. So we know they can listen in to the substance of the phone call. But on June 18, Alexander said they are technically unable to listen in to the content of telephone calls. If you believe that, you probably have never heard of the Federalist Papers.The NSA and the Administration admit that if they get a court order, they are allowed to listen to the content of telephone calls. So it is possible. What Snowden says is clearly true. If the NSA got a court order, of course they are technically capable of listening in. So what's to stop an NSA technician -- like Snowden -- willing to ignore the law from listening in on anyone he wants?
Many say Snowden helped our enemies. Hogwash. Anyone engaged in terrorism, espionage, or crime already knew that the government can get a warrant -- based on probable cause -- to wiretap their phones and even plant a hidden microphone. This changes nothing for people engaged in "probable cause" eligible behavior. And, they will never know if the government is on to them.
So is Snowden a scoundrel or a political savior? When faced with the same violation of the U.S. Constitution, Edward Snowden chose the Constitution over his job and his life. Gen. Alexander chose his job over the Constitution. This is why Snowden inspires (hesitant) admiration. But perhaps there are no angels in this story.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2013/..._stand_up.html
Why NSA’s “Metadata” Collection Should Disturb You
http://connect.freedomworks.org/pict...6946?size=tiny By Daniel Amico on June 20, 2013
There is much confusion about the NSA’s secret surveillance program Prism. It doesn’t record the content of all of our private phone and other digital communications. Rather, it stores so-called “metadata” about them for future reference, in perpetuity. By its own admission, the federal government is collecting massive amounts of ‘metadata’ on every single American.
Metadata can actually reveal more about you than the actual content of your phone calls. The data points that are collected and stored in perpetuity are: call duration, call location, the number of both parties involved, time of the call, date of the call and other “unique identifiers.” Nowadays a private citizen can easily look up a number and find to whom it belongs. Don’t you think the NSA has a more effective listing system than the Yellow Pages that we have access to?
Integrated together, the collected metadata forms a very rich and informative pattern of communication. The content or purpose of calls can easily be deduced. Truly, the metadata the NSA is collecting should cause far more concern than if the government was simply recording every single phone call “for quality assurance purposes.”
Some hypothetical examples:
• They know you rang your Senator and Congressman right after taking a call from your local Tea Party Chairman, on the very same day the local Tea Party started a campaign to stop their state’s ObamaCare healthcare exchange. But of course there is no way NSA agents could possibly piece together your political affiliation from that information.
• They know you called your local school board more than you ever have, the very same month a new radical-progressive textbook was being imposed by Common Core. But no one could possibly guess what you could have been talking about; it was a private conversation, after all.
• They know you spoke to your parent’s nursing home late one night. Early the next morning, you called a funeral home and then three different local banks in quick succession, and then a lawyer who specializes in wills and estates. The purpose of all this call activity could not possibly be guessed at.
• And they would never analyze your metadata in conjunction with your internet search histories, which are provided to them by your internet service provider in bulk, rather than on a case-by-case with a warrant as the Fourth Amendment requires.
• And surely none of this information would ever make its way to the IRS.
Metadata helps the NSA create a map or network of associations for every citizen. All the agency has to do is open its data storage tanks and run some analysis. And the metadata is being stored forever. After all, why would the government throw away such a treasure trove? Why would it invest billions in hyper-advanced data storage facilities just to delete it all every year or so?
So, while Big Brother might not have the time to sort through all your information right now, that’s little comfort. If Big Brother ever wants to strip away your privacy and delve deep into your personal life, ALL the information he needs is right there at his fingertips.
TAKE ACTION: Tell Congress to stop NSA seizing of phone records
http://www.freedomworks.org/files/im...l/metadata.jpg
http://www.freedomworks.org/blog/dan...ld-disturb-you
Edward Snowden vs. the Sovietization of America
by Justin Raimondo — Antiwar.com
ot publicize their fight. It is a mugging that happens in the dark – the familiar modus operandi of all criminals.
The very court order giving the government carte blanche to monitor all the communications of Verizon – and, now we learn, of all major internet and phone service providers – was top secret classified information. Indeed, this is among the gravest of Snowden’s alleged “crimes” – leaking this Top Secret document, which is nothing more than a perfunctory court order, of the sort that are routinely public in any free society. This document was deemed so sensitive that only a very few High Muckamucks were given access to it – which has fueled speculation Snowden may have had help from someone higher up on the Soviet totem pole, perhaps some Lieutenant Commissar somewhere in the bowels of the NSA who had a pang of conscience….
We are told that the reason for all this secrecy is that we don’t want to let the “terrorists” in on how we’re tracking and fighting them. But the reality is that Al Qaeda and like minded groups are already aware we’re tracking them – though, on 9/11, it appeared they were tracking us, as Bill Safire pointed out in one of his last columns for the New York Times:
“A threatening message received by the Secret Service was relayed to the agents with the president that ‘Air Force One is next.’ According to the high official, American code words were used showing a knowledge of procedures that made the threat credible.”
Safire swore this was told to him by Karl Rove, who said the President was going back to Washington until the Secret Service “informed him that the threat contained language that was evidence that the terrorists had knowledge of his procedures and whereabouts.” As Safire put it:
“That knowledge of code words and presidential whereabouts and possession of secret procedures indicates that the terrorists may have a mole in the White House – that, or informants in the Secret Service, FBI, FAA, or CIA.”
Safire later disavowed this story, but I believed him the first time, and still do. Yet this knowledge went down the Memory Hole, along with Safire himself, and no one talks about it anymore – and the NSA sure isn’t talking. We still don’t know all the important facts about the catalyst for the all-pervasive surveillance our “war on terror” has conjured into being, let alone the invasions we’ve launched in its name. The Panopticon uncovered by Snowden is not some recent invention: it was born before the Bush administration – remember “Echelon”? – and has metastasized ever since.
It started under Bill Clinton, but in the post-9/11 atmosphere the tentacles of the Surveillance State grew like kudzu. For twelve years, the US government has been fighting a nameless enemy – it’s gone far beyond just Al Qaeda – using methods it refuses to reveal, but the events of the past few weeks have thrown back the curtain on the true nature of that struggle. Washington is waging war on those they consider the real enemy – the American people.
Why else would they vacuum up all the phone calls made in this country, and store them away for future reference? Why would they create a huge surveillance apparatus that employs tens of thousands of people and deploys sophisticated technologies on solving the “problem” of how to keep track of the movements, thoughts, and opinions of millions of Americans? And why would they keep the law itself – or, at least, their twisted “interpretation” of it – a state secret? This is the ultimate in authoritarianism – a secret law that you don’t even know you’re breaking (how can you know when it’s a secret?).
The Soviet empire is dead: only the ruins persist. Yet the system Lenin and his successors created lives on right here in America. “If you see something,” says Big Sis, “say something.” The KGB would’ve agreed wholeheartedly. So, you object to the government scooping up your phone calls and emails – what do you have to hide, comrade? Left-wing commentators, from Mother Jones to Talking Points Memo, are sliming Snowden like Pravda once slimed dissidents. Pro-government media are playing down the Snowden revelations – poor Rachel Maddow has to get really really creative in order to think up other stuff to cover – and Washington is just as united against Snowden as Moscow, circa 1930, was against “Trotskyite wreckers.” And then there’s this – the nagging suspicion that the former “community organizer” who sounds so reasonable, so intelligent, so positively Stevie Wonder-ish, is really an aspiring tyrant in the guise of an American President.
Such suspicions have previously been confined to the outer reaches of the political spectrum, where the Obama-is-a-secret-Muslim crowd hangs out. And, yes, we’ve already heard all about the Bill Ayers-wrote-his-books theory, and the other crap the neocons have been handing out to their easily indoctrinated followers in the official “conservative” movement. With the Snowden revelations, however, which show how the President – who campaigned in 2008 as a civil libertarian crusader – ratcheted up the Surveillance State into a smoothly humming Panopticon, the real face of Barack Hussein (yes, Hussein) Obama is revealed to the world.
And it isn’t pretty.
President Obama nationalized the auto and healthcare industries in his first term, to the applause of our pro-government “progressives”: now we learn he secretly nationalized the nation’s biggest internet service providers right under our noses, forcing them into the role of snoops – and the cheers from his progressive amen corner are deafening. Like Winston Smith at the end of George Orwell’s classic novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, they have suddenly discovered that they love Big Brother.
There are notable exceptions, which only prove the rule: Glenn Greenwald, the reporter and columnist who broke this story, and who exemplifies the old-fashioned liberal in the tradition of Randolph Bourne and Oswald Garrison Villard, has come under relentless attack from the all-too-familiar left-wing defenders of the Regime. And speaking of regime defenders: Chris Hayes has expressed some reservations, but lately taken to simply avoiding the topic of Snowden. Maddow has dropped all mention of it from her show (and these people wonder why their ratings are tanking). Good old Nat Hentoff is horrified, but since he came out, so to speak, as pro-life, liberals have given themselves a good reason not to listen to him anymore. Over at Fox, there is outright editorial dissonance, with commentators visibly torn between their kneejerk inclination to bash the President and their reflexively authoritarian-neoconservative instincts whenever “national security” is supposedly involved.
Is it, though? Some high mucka-muck recently testified before Congress that no less than fifty terrorist attacks worldwide were prevented due to the all-seeing Eye of Sauron the NSA, and yet every time they get specific it turns outthe case they point to could have been broken without this supposedly invaluable aid.
Think of it this way: our government has set up a system whereby an “analyst” can key in the right code and call up all your emails, all your phone calls, all the locations you’ve visited – and with whom – as far back as you care you imagine. Are we really supposed to believe they have done this in order to fight scattered bands of “terrorists” hiding out in caves somewhere in the mountains of Shitholistan?
If you believe that, you deserve to live in a Soviet America, comrade. Because that’s just where you’re headed.
NOTES IN THE MARGIN
So Andrew Sullivan has disappeared behind a pay wall, never to be seen or heard from again. There’s a lesson or two in there somewhere.
That was a tweet, actually, which I thought good enough to include as an addendum to this column. I’ll often tweet column ideas before they’re written – or, in this case, as I write – and you can check out my Twitter feed by goinghere. But please note that my tweets are sometimes deliberately provocative, often made in jest, and largely consist of me thinking out loud.
I’ve written a couple of books, which you might want to peruse. Here is the link for buying the second edition of my 1993 book, Reclaiming the American Right: The Lost Legacy of the Conservative Movement, with an Introduction by Prof. George W. Carey, a Foreword by Patrick J. Buchanan, and critical essays by Scott Richert and David Gordon (ISI Books, 2008 ).
You can buy An Enemy of the State: The Life of Murray N. Rothbard (Prometheus Books, 2000), my biography of the great libertarian thinker, here.
Read more by Justin Raimondo
- A Note to My Readers – June 16th, 2013
- Datagate and the Death of American Liberalism – June 13th, 2013
- Smear Brigade Goes After Snowden – June 11th, 2013
- Edward Snowden, American Hero – June 9th, 2013
- Police-State ‘Progressivism’ – June 6th, 2013
Edward Snowden vs. the Sovietization of America by Justin Raimondo — Antiwar.com.
http://www.theprogressivemind.info/?p=99605
Breaking: US Government Charges Edward Snowden With Espionage
Posted by Jim Hoft on Friday, June 21, 2013, 5:42 PM
NSA Leaker Edward Snowden Charged
http://1-ps.googleusercontent.com/h/...BAqVeBo3sf.jpg
The US government formally charged Edward Snowden with espionage in leaks about NSA surveillance programs. The charges were filed in the Eastern District of Virginia.
The Washington Post reported:
Federal prosecutors have filed a sealed criminal complaint against Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who leaked a trove of documents about top-secret surveillance programs, and the United States has asked Hong Kong to detain him on a provisional arrest warrant, according to U.S. officials.
Snowden was charged with espionage, theft and conversion of government property, the officials said.
Stop Watching US petition here:
https://optin.stopwatching.us/