WWTBAM Bored

Obama continues and expands Bush's massive spying program on the American public.

We are now in the fourth term of the most inept and anti-civil-liberties presidency in history. The man who would restore honor to our military and foreign policy, close Gitmo, and protect our civil liberties, is just continuing every bad Bush decision. And proving himself an incredible hypocrite in the process.

It's interesting how many Dems are willing to give Obama a free pass on this issue when they would have been jumping up and down if this story broke during the Bush years.

The only thing in Obama's favor is that the Republicans are continuing to prove themselves much worse.

silverscreenselect wrote:Obama continues and expands Bush's massive spying program on the American public.

We are now in the fourth term of the most inept and anti-civil-liberties presidency in history. The man who would restore honor to our military and foreign policy, close Gitmo, and protect our civil liberties, is just continuing every bad Bush decision. And proving himself an incredible hypocrite in the process.

It's interesting how many Dems are willing to give Obama a free pass on this issue when they would have been jumping up and down if this story broke during the Bush years.

The only thing in Obama's favor is that the Republicans are continuing to prove themselves much worse.

NYT wrote:“It cannot be used to intentionally target any U.S. citizen, any other U.S. person, or anyone located within the United States,” Mr. Clapper, the director of national intelligence, said in a statement, describing the law underlying the program. “Information collected under this program is among the most important and valuable intelligence information we collect, and is used to protect our nation from a wide variety of threats.”

I have no problem with that.

Bob Juch wrote:

NYT wrote:“It cannot be used to intentionally target any U.S. citizen, any other U.S. person, or anyone located within the United States,” Mr. Clapper, the director of national intelligence, said in a statement, describing the law underlying the program. “Information collected under this program is among the most important and valuable intelligence information we collect, and is used to protect our nation from a wide variety of threats.”

I have no problem with that.

You probably still believe in Santa Claus too.

Somehow, I doubt you'd have been this complacent if this revelation had occurred in 2007.

silverscreenselect wrote:

Bob Juch wrote:

NYT wrote:“It cannot be used to intentionally target any U.S. citizen, any other U.S. person, or anyone located within the United States,” Mr. Clapper, the director of national intelligence, said in a statement, describing the law underlying the program. “Information collected under this program is among the most important and valuable intelligence information we collect, and is used to protect our nation from a wide variety of threats.”

I have no problem with that.

You probably still believe in Santa Claus too.

Somehow, I doubt you'd have been this complacent if this revelation had occurred in 2007.

This first occurred in 2006 and has been expanded since then.

The USA PATRIOT Act of 2001 authorized this. It has a lot more that I disagree with and protested at the time the bill was introduced and since then.

What I find "interesting" is that the companies involved deny that it's happening but the director of national intelligence, James Clapper, admitted it does. Of course the companies are prevented by the Act from disclosing that.

Bob Juch wrote:What I find "interesting" is that the companies involved deny that it's happening but the director of national intelligence, James Clapper, admitted it does. Of course the companies are prevented by the Act from disclosing that.

What I find interesting is that with all this fact gathering on Americans' phone calls, emails, and web searches they did not or could not stop the Tsarnaev brothers who had been identifed and we were warned about by the Russians.

Given the IRS scandal, I suspect that under this administration the information is being reviewed and used for political purposes and not for protecting us.

BackInTex wrote:

Bob Juch wrote:What I find "interesting" is that the companies involved deny that it's happening but the director of national intelligence, James Clapper, admitted it does. Of course the companies are prevented by the Act from disclosing that.

What I find interesting is that with all this fact gathering on Americans' phone calls, emails, and web searches they did not or could not stop the Tsarnaev brothers who had been identifed and we were warned about by the Russians.

The problem isn't that we don't have enough information about potential terrorists, like the Tsarnaevs or the 9/11 bombers. It's that we don't know how to process the information we have. The solution isn't to gather more information, much of it completely useless for any anti-terrorism activity; it's to figure out how to do our processing better.

We are gathering information about people's Youtube and Facebook activities, their Google searches, even their GPS locations, not on warrants based on probable cause, but because we can. And we can use it against the Tea Party or the ACLU or anyone whose activities the current adminstration doesn't like.

Add that to the DNA database that the Supreme Court just rubber stamped and the government is rapidly getting an extremely accurate picture on a large percentage of the public. DNA isn't like fingerprints... a method of determining one person's identity. DNA can help identify a person's parents and children and siblings, as well as a wide variety of medical conditions the person may have or be likely to develop. And we're putting all that in the hands of increasingly partisan administrations that want to "keep us secure."

Obama blew a lot of hot air during the campaign about how concerned he was about liberties and he's doing more that Bush did to curtail them (although that's due in part to the rapidly increasing technological capabilities and amount of information available today on Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, etc. that weren't there five years ago).

This is something Hitler or Stalin would eagerly have done if they had better technology at their disposal.

BackInTex wrote:

Bob Juch wrote:What I find "interesting" is that the companies involved deny that it's happening but the director of national intelligence, James Clapper, admitted it does. Of course the companies are prevented by the Act from disclosing that.

What I find interesting is that with all this fact gathering on Americans' phone calls, emails, and web searches they did not or could not stop the Tsarnaev brothers who had been identifed and we were warned about by the Russians.

Given the IRS scandal, I suspect that under this administration the information is being reviewed and used for political purposes and not for protecting us.

You apparently missed that they were not gathering Americans' phone calls, emails, and web searches.

While the law that authorized this program was set to expire in 2012, Congress passed a re-authorization extending it to 2017.

Bob Juch wrote: You apparently missed that they were not gathering Americans' phone calls, emails, and web searches.

No, they were just gathering the records of every cell call made in the United States, and we'll probably find out they're getting every Google search, Facebook post, and Youtube view. And the GPS location of all those cellphones as well. And a whole lot of emails.

But they're only going after "known" terrorists. Sure. You bet.

Estonut wrote:

silverscreenselect wrote:Obama continues and expands Bush's massive spying program on the American public.

We are now in the fourth term of the most inept and anti-civil-liberties presidency in history. The man who would restore honor to our military and foreign policy, close Gitmo, and protect our civil liberties, is just continuing every bad Bush decision. And proving himself an incredible hypocrite in the process.

He resembles W in many ways...

Edited to change URL. This image is harder to find since the HuffPost story (and picture) started going viral.

It was bad when Bush did, it's ok if Obama does it seems to be the view. I'd argue that it was just bad.

If the IRS can target American citizens for holding political views; if the employees there can knowingly carry out that task - regardless of receiving such orders/instructions and from whom, then why would anyone think the national security/intelligence apparatus is much different?

Regardless of which party holds power, the government having and using such power is threatening.

It's all fun and games until they come for you.

Flybrick wrote:It was bad when Bush did, it's ok if Obama does it seems to be the view. I'd argue that it was just bad.

If the IRS can target American citizens for holding political views; if the employees there can knowingly carry out that task - regardless of receiving such orders/instructions and from whom, then why would anyone think the national security/intelligence apparatus is much different?

Regardless of which party holds power, the government having and using such power is threatening.

It's all fun and games until they come for you.

This makes four absentees in one week coming back.

Good to hear from you again.

silverscreenselect wrote:

Bob Juch wrote: You apparently missed that they were not gathering Americans' phone calls, emails, and web searches.

No, they were just gathering the records of every cell call made in the United States, and we'll probably find out they're getting every Google search, Facebook post, and Youtube view. And the GPS location of all those cellphones as well. And a whole lot of emails.

But they're only going after "known" terrorists. Sure. You bet.

No, they are gathering only details of calls made from the U.S. to other countries.

And "they" only targeted and harassed conservative groups and individuals using a tax enforcement - complete with the power to deprive an American of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, i.e., property - agency which is supposed to be entirely apolitical and enforce the rules for everybody.

And "they" only knowingly allowed 2,000 weapons to get into the hands of Mexican drug cartels with the resulting 200-400 Mexican deaths. But at least they weren't Americans. If you don't count the US Border Patrol and US DEA agents that is.

And "they" only targeted and killed three Americans overseas including one 16 yr old boy without any sort of due process. Simply because the President ordered it. al Alwacki (sp?) was a terrorist and I'm not sad that he's dead, but if this President can decide on his own that an American is to die, there is that quaint concept we have called due process that has been discarded. What is to stop the next one from deciding that the suspicious truck driving from Nogales needs to be zapped? Precedent has been set, just not within the US borders.

Same as the NSA surveillance. It's supposed to be against foreigners. Now we know many millions of us have our data being collected and are to trust "them" when assured no conversations/e-mails are being perused. It's just a "minor encroachment."

"They" are deciding how we live and even if we live.

But please, carry on.

Bob Juch wrote:

Campaign Slogans of Barack Obama in the USA

1. "Yes We Can"
2. “Change” versus “More of the Same”
3. "Vote for Change"
4. "Change We Can Believe In"
5. "Our Time for Change"
6. "It's about Time. It's about Change"
7. "Stand for Change"
8. "Organize for Change"
9. “We are the change we’ve been looking for. Change can’t happen without you.”
10. "I’m asking you to believe. Not just in my ability to bring about real change in Washington . I'm asking you to believe in yours."
11. "A leader who can deliver change"
12. "Change in America doesn't start from the top down. It starts from the bottom up."
13. “Obama Momma”
14. "Women for Obama"
15. "Obama for America "
16. "A New Beginning"
17. "Help me take back America "
18. "My President is Black"
19. "Eight [years] is Enough"
20. " America , we cannot turn back. We cannot walk alone."
21. "We must pledge once more to walk into the future."

Does any word jump out at you?

Estonut wrote:

Bob Juch wrote:

Campaign Slogans of Barack Obama in the USA

1. "Yes We Can"
2. “Change” versus “More of the Same”
3. "Vote for Change"
4. "Change We Can Believe In"
5. "Our Time for Change"
6. "It's about Time. It's about Change"
7. "Stand for Change"
8. "Organize for Change"
9. “We are the change we’ve been looking for. Change can’t happen without you.”
10. "I’m asking you to believe. Not just in my ability to bring about real change in Washington . I'm asking you to believe in yours."
11. "A leader who can deliver change"
12. "Change in America doesn't start from the top down. It starts from the bottom up."
13. “Obama Momma”
14. "Women for Obama"
15. "Obama for America "
16. "A New Beginning"
17. "Help me take back America "
18. "My President is Black"
19. "Eight [years] is Enough"
20. " America , we cannot turn back. We cannot walk alone."
21. "We must pledge once more to walk into the future."

Does any word jump out at you?

There's been change: they've gotten better at it.

Bob Juch wrote:
There's been change: they've gotten better at it.

That's more a result of more sophisticated technology and more sources of information (Facebook wasn't around in 2006 and Youtube wasn't nearly as well organized or widespread) than anything Obama has done.

Bob Juch wrote:There's been change: they've gotten better at it.

Which is the point.

And, no, not really. "They" have admitted to "inadvertant" content collection on innocent, non-targeted US citizens.

But "they" also didn't admit anything until it was leaked.

And "they" used an agency of the US government to deliberately target American citizens for harassment and unfair treatment via the IRS for simply having a different political view.

But we are supposed to blindly trust "them" when it comes to eavesdropping.

We are supposed to blindly trust "them" when they kill American citizens with no due process, simply by the order of the President.

Perhaps "they" have gotten better at it when some Americans simply accept such government actions with no protest, indeed even encouragement.

We are supposed to be comfortable that some Americans, employed by the government, willingly do any of this. "Just following orders" is a scary defense.

We get what we deserve.

Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD), the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, pledged to release transcripts of interviews with IRS officials that Republicans insist demonstrate that the agency’s targeting of conservative groups applying for 501(c)(4) status was directed by the Obama administration.

“I wrote Chairman Issa on Thursday and I wrote to him this morning. I want those transcripts to be released”, Cummings said. “I’m willing to come on your show next week with the chairman with the transcripts if he agrees to do that. If he doesn’t, I’ll release them by the end of the week”.

Cummings insisted that the interviews will prove that “the White House was not involved in this”, pointing out that the Cincinnati IRS manager of the screening group, a career veteran at the agency who identified himself as Republican, told investigators that Washington did not direct the targeting. “I do not believe that the screening of these cases had anything to do other than consistency and identifying issues that needed to have further development”, the individual told investigators according to portion of the transcripts released by the Democratic staff on the House Oversight Committee.

“Based upon everything I’ve seen the case is solved”, Cummings said. “And if it were me, I would wrap this case up and move on to be frank with you”.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-3460_162-57 ... te-in-d.c/

Right after 9/11, one of those publications that points this stuff out, probably/possibly Mother Jones but I'm not sure, pointed out that there were these gigantisaurous cables running into the US with overseas info & how easy it would be to tap them, & how one end of the conversation might be foreign entities but the other end would likely be American citizens in America, who the US govt had said they wouldn't tap. The discussion was of undersea cables because server farms were not the big point of focus way-back-then. The entity that proposed that this tapping was likely already underway didn't have absolute proof, but they had sources. People in the current uproar seem to have completely forgotten this early warning.

When is the next presidential election?

I don't think this is about elections but I do think it is about a federal government out of control yet controlling us:

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505263_162- ... tigations/

Flybrick wrote:I don't think this is about elections but I do think it is about a federal government out of control yet controlling us:

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505263_162- ... tigations/

That I have a problem with. I doubt there was any White House involvement but Ms. Clinton might have known about at least some of that.

House Speaker John Boehner called NSA leaker Edward Snowden a “traitor” who put Americans at risk by releasing classified information to the media.

“He’s a traitor”, the highest ranking Republican in the House of Representatives said in an extensive interview with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos. “The disclosure of this information puts Americans at risk. It shows our adversaries what our capabilities are. And it’s a giant violation of the law”.


http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/20 ... a-traitor/