usatoday.com — The National Security Agency has been secretly collecting the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans, using data provided by AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth, people with direct knowledge of the arrangement told USA TODAY.
May 11, 2006 View in Crawl 4
codestMay 11, 2006
To all the people saying "I've got nothing to hide, why should I care?", or the more presumptive, "Why do you care if you've got nothing to hide?"Look here's the deal folks, I'm not worried because I have something to hide, I'm worried because when people have power, they tend to use it. The ability to listen in on anyone?s phone conversations, or what have you, without supervision opens the door to allowing those in power to use this grand ability for their own personal gain.Let me paint a picture for you. Let?s say some Joe Politician has some good buddy over in the NSA that is sympathetic to Joes causes for one reason or another. Now let?s say that Joe Politician has some beef with some other politician (Rare I know, but it does happen). Joe, knowing Mr. NSA can gain access to pretty much anyone?s communications without anyone really having to know about it, asks his friend Mr. NSA to capture any or all information regarding such and such a person. Eventually they hear some dirt on the guy, leak it and ruin the guy?s career or what have you to their own benefit, grossly circumventing the democratic process.This is what has me worried.
sicksadworldnowMay 11, 2006
Heh, i heard there was little problems with the voting system lately...<a class="user" href="http://www.google.ca/search?q=bush+stole+election&start=0&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official">http://www.google.ca/search?q=bush+stole+election&start=0&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official</a>
Closed AccountMay 11, 2006
I agree...
tophertMay 11, 2006
Yes the greater part of the population in this country is fearfull. The perception of crime is way out of sync with the actual crime rate, and the perception of the danger of terrorism is mind bogglingly out of hand. One attack. ONE, and the whole country goes into hysterics. I can't believe that Americans, as a group are somehow more susceptible. I find that idea insulting as an American. Instead I would direct your attention to the news media. The sensationalist nature of which blows out of proportion all things scary. If you feel that you might die in a terrorist attack if you don't know that you're supposed to have lots of duct tape you're more likely to watch the news. If you're more likely to watch the news you're more likely to watch the commercials on the news. If you're more likely to watch the commercials on the news you're more likely to buy the crap those commercials are hawking, and so the capitalist system lives on in a circle jerk of consumerism. The people of this country are just like the people anywhere else. The difference is the system we find ourselves in.
theneed2knowMay 12, 2006
Hype, paranoia and ignorance will always trump facts& logic in the media.I spent over a decade in Intelligence, so I can speak on this with some actual knowledge behind me. NSA doesn't hunt Aliens, NSA doesn't spy on Americans or American corporations, NSA doesn't have secret agents. They are forbidden from any collection efforts against citizens or corporations without court order or where National Security is at risk, ie: an imminent terror threat being discussed. The rules in policies against that are deeply embedded in the culture. The reason the President relaxed some of the restrictions against listening to conversations where an American *might* be involved is because there's such a paranoid culture concerning this within the agencies that perform collection, that even if it's only suspected that one or more parties in a conversation or communication may be a threat to our security, monitoring will cease simply because it's suspected that one of the participants is a citizen. Any time a citizen is 'collected' as they put it, there's a huge pile of red tape and destruct procedures to follow - and no one wants that. So the relaxation of the policy was necessary to prevent needed intelligence from being dropped.This situation is similar. NSA doesn't have the time or manpower to listen to all your phone calls. Wake up. They are mining the data, looking for trends and indicators.The President makes decisions based on information 99.9% of us will never know about. it's very easy to throw stones , but you need to realize you don't know what they do and simply can't. Most of us don't have the need to know and couldn't handle it anyway.I realize my comments are pissing in the wind, but someone has to provide some framework for the rhetoric and paranoia.
klbclemMay 12, 2006
"They are forbidden from any collection efforts against citizens or corporations without court order..."Thats the point we have a perfectly secret court called called CALEA, the president didn't use this court to decide if a citizen can be tapped, the President used the guise of "National Security" to avoid going to court, just like he used the meating in Prague to ligitimize the invasion of Iraq so quickly after 911 (indeed the CIA said this information was incorrect yet 4 months later he still blamed it on faulty intel.)I understand that this means more paperwork for the president but it is NOT up to one man to decide if a person can be wiretapped. The people must decide, or a group of representitives in the form of CALEA must decide. I reallize the NSA could care less about my phone calls but the idea is that if the President can authorize a phonetap without any checks and balances than why not spy on his enemies. You can say that this would never happen all you want but there is a reason for having a system of checks and balances. The Germans believed their government would NEVER commit attrocities before (and after even) WWII, the Bosnains never saw the genocide comming until it was too late, do you think the Russians saw Stalin comming (and his excessive paranoia). People often don't realize there government is bad until its to late, and without checks and balances what is there to prevent us from becoming the next China or post WWII Russia, all it takes is a secretly evil president and some sheepish people in the NSA who are afraid of losing their jobs. The judicial branch (CALEA) must be able to check the presidents actions in order to preserve the rights of the people. It isn't that the President is evil, its that we as regular citizens might not know either way, and we as citizens are often willing to abandon our personal freedoms because of fear. Ideally the judiciaries would not be so foolish and could handle classified information better and therefore must be left 'in the loop'.
klbclemMay 12, 2006
Then the terrorists have won, you have forgotten "life, liberty, and the persuit of happieness". We may as well be China for all you care. Those who google the taliban are in danger of becoming influenced by terrories so we should start censorship too eh? Where does it stop?
smokedlMay 15, 2006
@mermIn the context you brought up it's important to note that this does in fact NOT work to stop terrorism. There are simple mathematical proofs for this. For instance see here:<a class="user" href="http://www.wired.com/news/columns/0,70357-1.html?tw=wn_story_page_next1">http://www.wired.com/news/columns/0,70357-1.html?tw=wn_story_page_next1</a>The people collecting this data are not stupid. They know this. So what do they really want it for?
smokedlMay 15, 2006
"No, but people are getting dumber."I'd like to reply to that with a quote from Thomas Jefferson:"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
skyman375May 16, 2006
<a class="user" href="http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/defense/1227842.html">http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/defense/1227842.html</a>For the idiots telling us to "do the research" on 9-11.