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Comment by kevinalexbrown | Hacker News Reader

I've lived under surveillance before, so I feel my perspective might be somewhat appropriate. I won't comment on the specifics (uninteresting and irrelevant, had to do with where I was living). I won't even make a statement about whether it's justified in my case or in general. I'd just ask everyone here to do one thing:

Watch this, then ask yourself how you feel (if it doesn't go directly to 6:40, fastforward to it, then watch for 30 seconds):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwiUVUJmGjs&feature=yout...

I understand about various interpretations of "collect", "intercept", "analyze", etc. Just watch the video, and ask yourself how you feel. Please know that I'm not telling you how to feel, just providing a small snippet of a conversation. Why do you feel that way, and what does that feeling say about you, or your society?

Originally found in a comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5835025

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And my guess is the following video is an example of why the NYT is now saying that Obama no longer has any credibility on this issue:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6fnfVJzZT4

I would have voted for that guy (except for "FISA works!", but enh). I'd even be ok with ditching the 22nd if we could get that guy as President. I wonder what happened -- was it all a cynical ploy, or was there some secret (real or fake) information about how without wholesale monitoring we'd all instantly be destroyed, or what.

Big data is hard to ignore.

Its easy to say the right things from the outside but when you enter the sausage factory you see how the sausage is made and realize how hard/impossible it is to really change things

I cringed when he mentioned the National Security Letters. Didn't even realize he was supposed to be getting rid of those, too.

At a very minimum - this guy needs to be tried for perjury and removed from his post.

And millions of americans should sign a petition to have this happen.

If you're referring to online petitions then you needn't waste your time, there are already petitions to make sure this never happens.

It's called US Senate elections[1].

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Senate_elections,...

That bullshit called the Presidential elections? It's a dog and pony show.

There's a famous quote somewhere about where political power really comes from… I look to history (and present day actions) and it seems like a fitting solution to meaningful representation. Then again, years later we could be right back where we started…

Hint: The last bit I left out rhymes with "carol of the sun" ;)

I don't know what quote you are referring to, but here is my favourite one.

"You don’t know what order with freedom means! You only know what revolt against oppression is! You don’t know that the rod, discipline, violence, the state and government can only be sustained because of you and because of your lack of socially creative powers that develop order within liberty!" --- Gustav Landauer

It humbles me every time I read it, because to resist or to rebel against existing things is easy, at least for me.. but to actually put thought and effort into things "building a better world" in a sustainable and organized way, to be creative in co-operation and compromising with others, to get out of all these comfort zones, etc. It's a lifetime effort, and none of us will see all the fruits of it, or ever be sure the fruit won't be snatched up, so the default is to not even try, except a little bit here and there. It's like living hand to mouth, but in a political sense. It's all just reaction, and that sucks.

I don't think it is an easy thing to rebel in effective means… We americans like to cite the revolutionary war but forgetting that less than 1% of the population did any fighting [0], and even then there was massive outside nation state influence (ex: France.) Kinda similar to whats going on in syria now [1]… and other places in the past and present.

But I do agree with the literation of it being like living hand to mouth, but I think it goes far beyond being a political sense. Mortgages, paychecks, car loans, insurance, student loans, dead end jobs, that gadget we just have to have, endless media d̶i̶s̶t̶r̶a̶c̶t̶i̶o̶n̶s̶ entertainment, the food we eat… when do we, as a society (people from all backgrounds, sadly not all of us are invited to BBG 2013 and Google Zeitgeist in Watford) really give ourselves the time to think or push the boundaries outside current constructs to forge something transcendent?

[0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3EiSymRrKI4

[1]: http://www.cfr.org/qatar/tiny-qatars-big-plans-may-change-mi...

I totally understand that regarding the petitions and everything else - but John Q Public may not and seeing millions sign a petition that is ignored will hopefully cause a further awakening in people.

Did all the other ignored petitions cause any awakening?

Dog and pony show where the survellance state media gets paid.

I put up a petition along those lines a little while ago here: https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/cease-overbroad-su...

Enough signatures would be able to put pressure on the White House and gain an official response.

Official response meaning "We have reviewed the petition and have decided that our surveillance is not overbroad and will continue unchanged."

Consider the following from the article:

"Eventually Inspector General I. Charles McCullough III wrote Wyden a letter stating that it would violate the privacy of Americans in NSA data banks to try to estimate their number."

It would violate your privacy to find out if your privacy is violated. This sort of double-think should be in an Orwell novel, not in real life!

ahh petitions.

Lets make it an online petition, that way we don't even have to do anything than click and type and spread our online outrage instead of actually making this issue a big deal.

Petitions are easy. Its just a simple statement of your belief; but when they get big enough, we call them something else: ballots.

Wow. He's not even a good liar. You can see all sorts of soothing behavior and micro-expressions.

Contrast that to his direct confident demeanor when he's telling evasive truths.

Clapper is the Director of National Intelligence

Given all the contortions that politicians have to make just to get through the day, it wouldn't surprise me that Obama truly believes what he said back in 2007, but once he got into power he got an education on what the CIA/NSA is doing and he realized that either he can try to live up to these values and likely cause wildly unpredictable outcomes (some positive, some negative), or he can let it continue, given there were enough plausibly compelling reasons, despite the potential for abuse. thus - status quo reigns. truly change we can believe in, and a good example of how power corrupts. the military-industrial complex has a life of its own. thank you eisenhower.

I laughed at how incredibly shifty the General is when he "answers."

There was an interesting analysis at one point correlating what CEOs said when presenting their financial statements with whether those statements later suffered major negative revisions.

It would be interesting to have this automated and available in real time. (Of course people would learn the value of making it trigger level. But you can include whether the person by virtue of their position likely has that level of awareness...)

Seriously... You'd think of all the billions of dollars that go into military training they'd be able to put up a few bucks to teach this guy how to lie a little more believably

The guy probably hasn't had to worry about such things for decades. He's an operations bureaucrat, and probably someone above him decided they could afford to burn him if the shit hit the fan (and by this point, they probably already knew some shit was heading toward the fan).

More likely: He, and everyone else involved in this, know that it doesn't matter if everyone knows the answer is a lie - the likelihood of any negative consequences is pretty much zero. First, the odds that anyone will be able to provide sufficient proof to cause any problems is minimal, secondly, if they are: State secrets privilege. Poof goes that problem.

The only real challenge would be a massive public uproar suitably close to an election that someone needs to be sacrificed, and how likely is that really? It's not a surprise that this is happening; the only surprise is that anything resembling proof has leaked. What are the odds that this will suddenly tip the balance and cause sufficient lasting outrage?

I don't think we should extrapolate the N.S.A.'s true data collection policies based on one man's uncomfortability..

I've been monitored too, but did you really believe that all of the activities we do online weren't monitored...or do you just believe (like I did before I got convicted), that the gov won't bother with us.

This is just more reason why bills like CISPA need to be revised or blocked. The gov already knows what we do, but it just comes down to what they can prove in court.

I am not defending the program. But doesn't the program only collect data when there is a 51% percent confidence or greater that the source is foreign?

That's a bit slippery, but could be an explanation for his statement.

Gee, I deserve to be constantly monitored for daring to legally enter your entry in order to be a productive member of your society.

Thanks for that.

His body language give him away. That is why we have actors in position of power because they need to perform for the puppetiers in front of the gullible.

chailatte, your comment is dead. I think it triggered the beautiful prose filter.

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