NSA's Talking Points Defending NSA Surveillance
techdirt.com
techdirt.com
Ha, look what source comes up for news when you google it: https://www.google.com/search?q=defect+to+China (ABC "News")
If anyone thinks that Western news isn't propagandist then there is your proof, right there, that they are. That isn't a real news story. It isn't in the public interest. It is just a character attack on the man and his family.
She wasn't even in the public eye.
Yes, it's devoid of information. Yes, it's not in the public interest to know. Yes, it comes at a cost to the person talked about that is disproportional to the gain the audience has from the information. Yes, she wasn't in the public eye.
But is this definite proof of propaganda? No.
More likely it's just yet another outgrowth of what happens when news organizations are competing for attention. It's histrionic. But, well, there's human nature for you.
[edit] As noted by a comment - I'm only pointing out a flaw in the OPs logic. This really might be propaganda, but OPs "proof" simply isn't one.
That's how shitty the "elites" are, they will go after anyone and everyone in their mad scramble to protect their golden gooses.
I read the fact about the pole dancing stuff and thought "Oh.". So there.
Once again - I completely follow the train logic and it could be that way. But it isn't necessarily proof for a theory about propaganda or "the elites".
I put the term in quotes because it's more of a mindset they seem to have than an objective qualifier.
Indeed, it is getting bizarre seeing people outraged that some truth about people is reported. Ms Mills identifies herself as a pole dancer. Snowden made banal online comments. Snowden dropped out of high school. These are not smears but are just interesting facts. They don't diminish either of them an iota in my eyes, but do add colour. A lot of people here seem to think these are deeply embarrassing facts that should remain hidden.
When the war logs leaked, I doubted that anyone would take the initial smears against Julian Assange seriously. I'm Swedish and the sexual misconduct allegations were a big conversation subject here.
After a while, I realised that though I wasn't impressed by the ad hominems, they really did work on the general public. Older relatives and friends who were not in tune with the particular issues of the leak were much more interested in stories about the people behind it. These stories require no expert knowledge; they're relatable. It's daunting for a layperson to try to judge who's right or wrong in issues like war or spying, but it's easy and familiar to judge people over the perceived wholesomeness of girls they're involved with. Thus, to my disappointment, these friends and relatives categorically dismissed anything about the war logs by referring to Assange's personal affairs.
Things like this are published to create negative associations; to cater to personal vanity (better-than-thou) and focus judgement on Snowden's character rather than the faceless institutions he ousted.
When Snowden bravely outed himself, the media was in a race to find as many details on him that they could. If they could find people saying that he saved kittens, they would report that. If they find people saying he dropped out of high school, they report that. If Ars Technica discovered that he posted there, of course they're going to capitalize on that and post summaries of the sorts of things he said.
It required no conspiracy or concerted attack. It happens for spree killers. It happens for "hackers". It happens for politicians. It happens for heroes.
I just don't buy the ad hominem/smear angle when the things reported thus far have been rather banal facts that thus far have gone uncontested.
Now if the NSA suddenly claimed that they found child pornography on his workstation, or mysterious women appeared claiming to have been raped by him, a serious consideration would be in order. That hasn't happened (yet, at least), and instead people are seemingly acting knowing and world-weary about absolutely standard media reporting.
In my view, neither the banality nor even the truth of the allegations are particularly important. The key reason I chose to file this as a ad hominem/smear is that it invites judgment of Snowden without pertaining to the contents of the leak or even the act of leaking.
I find this aspect and the fact that is obvious to most people, barbaric at best.
Also, are you sure you want to be googling "defect to China" given the recent disclosures? ;)
It is kinda relaxing, actually. Like the man on his way to a gulag in Doctor Zhivago, it is the only way to be truely free.
I just want to say to them "You're already on the List, we all are!"
Yes, I would prefer they stopped spying, but it won't change what I write for public consumption.
It's no BS, but it's our (USA's) fault if he does. Faced with no better choice he may decide that doing what pleases China beats a lifetime of Bradley Manning prison treatment.
USA should've bit the bullet and offered him immunity if he stopped leaking and surrendered himself at a US Embassy. That might have been the best of both choices, despite setting a bad precedent. The interesting part is that China gets all his info if they arrest him (or sneak in his room.) I hope he encrypted it and that China cannot decrypt it. I suspect that hundreds of agents from all major secret services are following every step of his. I'd bet every penny I have that every secret service worth their salt knew where he was since day one.
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/713590-fisa-business...
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/713592-nsa-internet-...
They're pretty much just defending that it's legal, which I think we can all sadly admit is true. I just don't think it's right, our government should not be keeping that kind of records on its citizens, or anyone.
Please, write to your senators, not all of them are convinced. If you are a foreigner, write to your legal representatives expressing your concern. If we are loud enough our government will listen. I believe that our government still listens to its people, but if we don't take action in democracy, our voice will be lost.
but that's the entire point. it isn't legal. the supreme law of the land is the Constitution and everything after it is inferior. I could careless what Congress passes or the NSA writes in its policy documents -- it's not legal. it's all very much illegal.
As I understand it (IANAL, I am not an American), the US government is only supposed to spy on people with a warrant, but in this case they got essentially a 'blank cheque' warrant that let them spy on everyone. Such a broad warrant is not due process, because the court is not able to consider the specifics of each case data might be used for before data is collected.
You are standing up for liberties and constitutional rights. And you can't have it both ways.
It's a good test for anyone against NSA collection:
If NSA proves that the data did stop terrorist attacks, will it be ok to intrude privacy then or put it another way are you ok with a terrorist attack on your country in exchange for your privacy ?
Yeah, I'm cool like that.
"When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. E.g. "That is an idiotic thing to say; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3."
> Why, then, have so many people, both in the Congress and the public been shocked at the extent to which the NSA is snarfing up data?
Because people ignore what they're being told. Eschelon and Carnivore have been around for a LONG time so none of this should be shocking.
Carnivore was supposedly designed to be deployed against people who are suspects for a particular reason already. While some of the ECHELON satellite intercept hardware and the existence of the UKUSA agreement is known, exactly what is intercepted does not appear to have been ever leaked, and so the public have never had any reason based on mainstream media reports that they personally are being spied on.
Many people might be happy for a scheme that involves criminals being monitored, because they never think it will apply to them. But those same people will be angry when they hear definitive proof that a government is filing away data on them even though they didn't do anything wrong.
It mystifies me why everyone is so focused on PRISM, there is zero logical basis - and I'm starting to suspect it's intentional that the most innocuous program is taking up the majority of media time.
They want the US to be actively preventing the next Boston Marathon bombing or 9/11. And are more than happy to give up a small amount of their own privacy in order to do so.
http://www.theatlanticwire.com/politics/2013/06/nsa-spying-p...
The thing is that these surveillance tools are never enough. They enhance them, and a terrorist act happens, and they start saying that they need more power to prevent something like that in the future. It's baloney.
The only way for them to prevent future crime is to turn the country into an Orwellian dystopia. The thing is that we don't even know how effective these surveillance programs are, since the gov't doesn't release any data. Any time questions of efficacy rise, 'they' say that these programs help catch terrorists, but they don't give any concrete data.
I for one am not all that upset about what these leaks have shown, and while I'd like for the companies who get ordered to hand over data to announce that they're doing so, I don't mind the actual transfer.
People just don't generally think in terms of, "Have Gmail/Facebook/HackerNews/Reddit, or have privacy."
I think it's time for a "truth and reconciliation" committee where we remove every sitting congress-person, the Obama Administration at large, and at least the top-level of bureaucrats involved.
One other thought I had is, was the H1-B thing in the immigration act a "payoff" to the same tech CEOs selling the world out? A cynical thought, but a cynical time indeed.
There are suspicions that this game has been played between Boing and Airbus (I overheard that the US was the spy, but being in Europe, my environment is biased).
Does anyone know how to do automated text comparison? It would be interesting to know who (politicians, reporters, etc) are simply parroting what the NSA tells them. Google kinda works for this but is pretty inefficient. Something like a plagiarism system would be perfect.
[1] https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/713590-fisa-business... (click on text button in upper left for raw text).