With the amount of effort that the executive branch took in order to get this legislation, even going as far as attempting to invoke the states secret privilege [1], I wonder what sort of public outcry it would take to actually get this unconstitutional legislation off the books. Furthermore, if it could be done, I wonder what would become of the 10's of billions of dollars in facilities and equipment that have been squandered by the government to spy on its own people in the name of freedom.
I would love to hear ideas on how we can get this message out to the average population, and actually get them to care about it.
Sadly, I think a lot of people don't care. Which is almost more worrying than the legislation itself.
In my experience, the sad truth has been that most average people have responded to this issue by saying that they have nothing to hide and don't mind since it helps catch terrorists.
Normally, you could expect Republicans to oppose a big government program like this, but, as we all know, as soon as you say the word "terrorist", they're all suddenly in favor of big government and big spending.
> Normally, you could expect Republicans to oppose a big government program like this, but, as we all know, as soon as you say the word "terrorist", they're all suddenly in favor of big government and big spending.
It works on both sides of the aisle. I'm too embarrassed to count how many progressives I know who opposed the FISA wiretaps, the PATRIOT act, and Gitmo under Bush, yet bent over backwards to find ways to excuse Obama for taking each of those policies even further.
So as a Democrat whose opinions have evolved on the subject, it's not just blind partisanship. A lot of the fear-mongering about the PATRIOT Act that was waved around in 2001 just hasn't come to pass, and it has been watered down over time. The same thing with Guantanamo. The Supreme Court pretty much smacked down the Executive between 2004-2008, and the fears never materialized. This is the list of defense attorneys for the Guantanamo Bay detainees: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantanamo_Bay_attorneys#Guanta.... This isn't a big scary shadowy thing anymore--the place is crawling with lawyers now.
>A lot of the fear-mongering about the PATRIOT Act that was waved around in 2001 just hasn't come to pass
What? The PATRIOT act has almost exclusively been used for non-terrorist cases. I.e. we were lied to about what it was for. And if you think how Gitmo has been used "wasn't that bad" I'd like to know what would need to happen for you to think it actually was bad.
Sadder still, the press would be all over this if the Republicans were pushing it, instead they are complacent.
As a conservative I can say that in my experience that Republicans are rarely against big government. In the recent election many I know had to hold their nose as neither Romney nor Ryan were true conservatives.
I just called Feinstein's office and registered my opinion. According to the staffer, Feinstein supports the extension. Her office can be reached at (202) 224-3841.
I called Boxer's office as well. After dialing <3> to speak with a staffer, it rang several times and then hung up. (202) 224-3553.
I interned for my Congressman on Capitol Hill a few years ago. In my opinion, volume calling is the best way to actually get heard. Web forms, emails, faxes: much less so.
Feinstein has always been one of the best friends of the law enforcement lobby. Which has made her one of the most disappointing senators on issues of privacy, drug policy, etc.
It's especially disappointing given how out of line her beliefs are with certain areas of California, but that's what often happens when a massively diverse state elects a single representative democratically.
It's bills like this that make me hope that encrypted communications software like Silent Circle[1] becomes widespread. It's a good way to make large-scale wiretapping impossible.
>It comes from voters who are too apathetic or ignorant to understand the value of basic Liberty.
No it doesn't. Voters aren't complaining to government about this stuff. Someone else is pushing for this. These sorts of ideas don't come from nowhere.
>Any other finger-pointing is pretty meaningless.
No it isn't. If we know who's pushing for this we can possibly persuade them to stop. Politicians aren't going to stop if someone is donating to their campaigns and there isn't a massive public outcry, but a special interest pushing for this might be easier to reach (or, if they can't be reached, they can be exposed, increasing the chance of the kind of public outrage that politicians might actually react to).
> No it isn't. If we know who's pushing for this we can possibly persuade them to stop. Politicians aren't going to stop if someone is donating to their campaigns and there isn't a massive public outcry, but a special interest pushing for this might be easier to reach (or, if they can't be reached, they can be exposed, increasing the chance of the kind of public outrage that politicians might actually react to)
This is an oft-repeated but utterly wrong characterization of the political process. It fits a compelling narrative for some people, but it has no basis in reality.
Here is the basic truth: it takes neither public outcry or big donations to get politicians to do something like this. Wal-Mart, Lockheed, etc, don't need to grease any palms to get a Congressperson to jump at their command. No, all they have to do is use some magic words: "jobs," "terrorists," etc. Politicians are a deeply paranoid bunch. They are paranoid of being labeled "soft on crime" or "soft on terrorism" or "bad for jobs." And they are deeply paranoid about these things because they are trigger words for the public.
A good example of this is how Obama fell over himself to compete with Romney about who could be more pro-coal. Why did Obama swing so hard on that issue? Not for fear of losing donations. The "clean coal" lobby gave $240k to Obama's campaign. That's nothing in a campaign that raised over $1 billion. No, he did it because "anti-coal" is a buzzword, not just for people in coal mining states, but for blue-collar Democrats who equate "anti-coal" with "anti-industrial jobs" and the more liberal elements of the party.
The same thing is true of terrorism. There is not a huge public outcry saying "make us safer" but there doesn't need to be. Nobody wants to be painted as "pro terrorist" and the fear of terrorism is still a great way to get a project through the DOD or NSA.
Yeah, that is not going to have any effect. What the military-industrial-congressional complex wants, the military-industrial-congressional complex gets.
What extra-Constitutional kill list? I'm a strong proponent of civil rights, but the rhetoric around the issue is a bit ridiculous. The Constitution doesn't have all of these things you think are in there, and both Due Process and the extra-territorial application of the Constitution are much fuzzier concepts than your rhetoric contemplates.
The Constitution is not the be-all, end-all of what should limit governmental action. At the end of the day, we have a democratically elected government. And voters consistently elect people who believe in the god-given right of America to kill any foreigner who poses a threat to the country, with no process at all. Opposition to this policy is, like gun control, something Democrats abandoned at the national level with Clinton in order to keep the party from being swallowed up in obsolescence. I don't agree with it, but you can only fault a President so much for doing what people want him to do.
First, your "Take Action" link doesn't work. Second, I don't really care if "NSA's Supercomputers" are scanning my emails, text messages and even my phone calls. They're not really interested in my activities. Third, I'll let you in on a little secret, Its not just overseas communication!
I don't mean to pile on, but this comment reminds me of Eric Schmidt's comment that "if you don't have anything to hide, you have nothing to fear". There are at least a couple of things wrong with this sentiment:
(1) if you really believe that, then you would have no problem with a group of strangers searching your house, your bank records, safety deposit boxes, all your digital assets, etc. And by "etc" I mean also strip searching your family members or loved ones if "necessary". Did I go too far there? If so why? Because after all, "if you don't have anything to hide, you have nothing to fear". Who gets to decide how far is too far?
(2) And you might respond, "but these aren't strangers searching my stuff and family, these are duly authorized government officials." Well, duly authorized government officials are flawed human beings like all of us, and the ones doing the searching are most likely not elected by anyone.
And also, these people in power at the moment, whose motives you trust, will most definitely not be in power forever. One day, there will be authorities in power whose motives you don't trust at all, maybe for very good reasons. What then?
That's why the erosion of privacy rights is worth fighting.
Ouch! Please feel free to elaborate because I'm not sure exactly what you are disagreeing with.
I mean, are you saying that you believe that the people given the authority to invade your privacy always have good intentions? Because I don't believe that.
In the real world, these authorities are often driven by pressure to "find something", or to "make a quota", or to "prove our worth". And the results often harm innocent people.
>(1) if you really believe that, then you would have no problem with a group of strangers searching your house, your bank records, safety deposit boxes, all your digital assets, etc.
No, actually I wouldn't, because there's an entire freakin' universe of difference between cops searching your house, destroying things, having your neighbors wonder WTF is going on and having an open profile on a social network (which is what that oft-maligned quote was talking about)
Someone digging through your possessions (and strip searching your family, feckin' seriously?) is kind of not even similar to an email being picked up by an automated computer system.
Warrentless wiretaping is 'digging through your possessions'. It is 'strip searching your family'. This is not 'oops, I put my drunk picture public on Facebook.'
That email is stored. It is cataloged. It is cross referenced with every other email that is sent. It is referenced with every crime that is investigated that even remotely has the same keywords as that mail. It is indexed in relation to those you associate with and those they associate with. It is used to create a profile of every little subversive or thing you may ever be tangentially associated with and used against you.
This bill allows it to be done warentless because otherwise a warrent would be required.
To relate this to what you choose to put on a social networking site is not even in the same ballpark as what the NSA is doing here.
Indiscriminate wiretapping and data gathering is worse than targeted strip searching with probable cause. In the U.S., it's a violation of the Fourth Amendment.
Suppose that someday you run for office, or lobby for a cause, or run a prominent company. Suppose that you OR someone you love has something in their past they wouldn't want shared, OR which could be misconstrued in the press.
Suddenly, you learn that unless you drop out of the race, or stop lobbying, or withdraw from a business venture, you or someone you love will be publicly shamed, fairly or not.
Or worse than shamed: framed and locked up. We already threw out due process in cases related to terrorism, right?
Not plausible? Not with thousands of intelligence workers and officials, with information on everyone retained for decades, with the NSA working hard to break old encryption so that archived conversations can be made searchable in their databases? Not plausible for this administration or any future one?
That's a huge bet. I'm with the Founding Fathers and the 4th Amendment: the government has to be limited in its searches to specific cases with specific justification.
Here's the thing I've never understood about the "framed and locked-up" argument. If the government was going to go to frame me for being a terrorist, why would they need the giant wiretapping facility? All they need to do is hire a couple of interns to write a whole bunch of "Death to America!" emails and just tell the courts that I wrote them. They'd declare national security issues on why my lawyers can't see the network traces that "prove" that these emails came from my computer.
I guess I'm just saying that the government has been able to frame me a lock me up for over a hundred years. I don't see what this changes about that?
It's more palatable to the people if they can hang you with your own words. No one is going to care if they can 'prove' they saved the people from a danger.
On top of that, the people will be more willing to accept any 'proof' they intercepted when they know the government is intercepting everything.
Other people have already responded to you, but I think they've fallen into the common trap of assuming that privacy is about having something to hide. Yes, the data collected might be leaked by poor security, and yes, you might not want your neighbors installing cameras in your shower, but that's not the point.
In short: privacy is not about hiding things. It's about an exchange of power. A government with more information about your life is one with more power to make decisions about you. There are many reasons to oppose this:
* Chilling effects. People may be more afraid to conduct legal activities for fear they will be misconstrued and used against them by the government. ("Sorry, you can't fly anymore.")
* People are powerless to fight decisions the government makes on their behalf, because they do not know what data the government has collected, and all of it is secret. It's not Orwellian; it's Kafkaesque.
* Small bits of information gathered through surveillance can turn into much more interesting information about a person combined. You might not mind revealing each individual tidbit, but what about the picture they paint when combined?
There's more the the argument, which you can read in the article linked. Privacy is not just about secrecy.
You should care because it'll lead to removing your own personal freedom sooner than you think. It's been said that he who would give up his privacy to gain security deserves neither privacy nor security. And it's true. When you hand over your privacy, you hand over power to someone else to turn you into a "person with questionable character" or a criminal even if you never were either. Read Mr. Schneier here: http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2008/01/security_vs_pr... - his gist is that these all-encompassing activities don't buy us improved security. If they don't get us improved security, they're nothing more than a risk to individuals.
Ah! This is the crux. What if these efforts make you LESS safe?
The more people knowing where you are, how much money you have, etc, the easier it is to commit crime against you. You do have private information that keeps you safe.
This is why kids aren's supposed to tell strangers on the phone that they are home alone.
Which is more likely? You are injured in a terrorist attack or your information is leaked?
New account and first comment here, just to post that NSA can look at your e-mails if they want? I wonder if you're just someone working at NSA and FBI, and who's pushing for these laws. We know that they use "persona management" software to be part of the public conversation.
You shouldn't dismiss him/her out of hand. This is the way the vast majority of people feel. Until we overcome that, those of us who do care will never succeed in changing anything.
I would love to hear ideas on how we can get this message out to the average population, and actually get them to care about it.
Sadly, I think a lot of people don't care. Which is almost more worrying than the legislation itself.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_secrets_privilege#AT.26T_...