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Cringely on Domestic Eavesdropping
krygny writes "In this week's The Pulpit, Robert X. Cringely presents some interesting factoids he uncovered in his research into the NSA's domestic surveillance. He makes no judgements but offers some interesting stuff you might not have already known." From the article: "Intercepting communications for purposes of maintaining national security is nothing new. From before Pearl Harbor through 1945, EVERY trans-Atlantic phone call, cable and indeed letter was intercepted in Bermuda by the Coordinator of Information (COI) in the White House and later by the Office of Strategic Services (OSS). Sir William Stephenson revealed this in his autobiography, A Man Called Intrepid. They literally tapped the undersea cables and shipped all post to Europe through Bermuda, where every single call was monitored, every cable printed out, and every letter opened. FDR and Churchill needed intelligence and they took the steps they needed to get it."
Robert X. Cringely presents some interesting factoids he uncovered
I couldn't help but laugh when I learned, earlier today, that the word "factoid" technically refers to an untrue piece of information that is accepted as true due to repetition in the media.
In a profound stroke of irony, the incorrect definition of 'factoid' (a small piece of information) has become the prevailing one through repetition in the media.
xkcd.com - a webcomic of mathematics, love, and language.
The difference is, McCarthy was right.
Check out the Verona Project records if you don't believe me. Many of the people he questioned or wanted to question actually were Soviet agents.
I like you, Stuart. You're not like everyone else, here, at Slashdot.
http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2005/12/18/2214 52.shtml
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1553101/p osts
The project ECHELON was a collaboration between the American and British intelligence communties and authorized by the FISA court (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FISA_Court), not by Clinton; ECHELON also began operation well before 1992, when Clinton took office.
Fighting FISA goes hand in hand with Bush Sr. and his young boy.
Ex nihilo nihil fit.
The difference between us is I realize that both of us are rather fond of democracy; I (and other conservatives) just happen to realize Democracy takes some defending even if it means a few calls to known terrorists are tapped. Thus has it always been and always will be.
The sad thing is that you (or people very like you) are what drove me far away from Democrats and straight into the willing arms of the conservatives. At least I feel like I can work on getting important things like gay rights more highly thought of in conservative circles. Someone who claims that someone who protects Democracy is "The Enemy" is I've found someone who has reach the point where there is no reasoning with them. Yes, that's right - it's easier to get a southern baptist to accept gay people than it is to get a blowhard peace loving Democrat to accept that some times when foreign powers are actively trying to hurt U.S. interests that things need to get done.
And the number of people like me is growing, as witnessed by the 60% approval ratings for wiretapping actions that Bush enjoys.
The response will probably be something like "I intend to move out of the country if things get worse, blah blah blah blah blah". I honestly think that would be best for you as you are not going to be happy with the way the country is swinging. Where you will move to is a bigger question as the world swings to a rise in islamic fanaticism before it reduces in the distant future you are going to see some odd shit go down across the globe as other nations start to panic. I do not think U.S. actions are anywhere close to the worst case scenario for what can go terribly wrong when governments freak out.
I call "BullShit!" on the parent poster.
The ECHELON program is still being used today, except that the Bush regime has expanded it from it's original mission statement of "Intercepting Overseas CONINTEL" to "Intercepting ALL CONINTEL, Including Domestically Against American Citizens".
The US Senate committee that began (01/20/2006) investigating this illegally expanded program revealed that the Bush regime's CONINTEL program has been directed against domestic political opposition, including a Quaker anti-war group in Miami/Dade County.
These are not the actions of a democratically elected government sworn to uphold the US Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the rule of law. These are the actions of a regime that siezed power illegitimately in November 2000, and has been using the unchecked and expanding power of the Executive Branch to not only wage an illegal foreign war, but also to consolidate and maintain a totalitarian regime.
(This book was one of the first published after the Ultra secret, Colossus, Bletchley Park etc were declassified 30 years after WW2. It's a good read, full of fascinating information. For instance, did you know that Rommel's success was largely due to the U.S. State Department? It may still be one of the better single-volume histories of Allied intelligence during WW2. However it is not—how shall I put it?—a book that a good historian would use as a primary source.)
The book does say what Mr. Cringely says it does, but it's alarming to see him describe it as an autobiography.
From Article II (the presidency) of the US Constitution, the sections that define presidential authority:
Here are the parts related to Executive Orders:
"He shall from time to time give to the Congress information of the state of the union, and recommend to their consideration such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient;" . . . "he shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed, and shall commission all the officers of the United States."
In other words, he can recommend stuff to the legislature for consideration. Make orders to insure the laws are executed faithfully. And order his underlings to accomplish that task.
The only possible strech for this to be a law is if you believe this government is a dictatorship, in which case the legislature and the judiciary are his underlings and he can order them to do what he wants, with the power of the military behind him. Is this what you want?
Any sufficiently advanced influence is indistinguishable from control.
English subjects (a subject is like a citizen but without guns).
I'm tired of hearing this complete falsehood parrotted by people. English people are citizens of the UK and also citizens of the EU and citizens of the Commonwealth of Nations.
There may be an extremely small number of people that are British subjects due to legal technicalities, however none of them are English;they are people who were British subjects in 1981 despite not being from any country in the Commonwealth.
Please do not repeat ignorant statements as if they are fact. Are you English? Look on your passport. It says "citizen". Or just read the British Nationality Act 1981.
Read FISA itself: 50 USC 1809. The part that says "not authorized by statute".
6 wp.pdf
In other words, you'd be right, unless it's authorized somewhere else. Which the administration believes it is. And considering they went through all kinds of legal review, and modified the program at least once to address some legal concerns, flatly calling the surveillance "illegal" is wrong.
Read the full argument here (it's 42 pages long - that's lots of evidence to support the case that the surveillance is legal):
http://news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/nsa/dojnsa1190
The best you can say is that this is a pissing contest between lawyers.
Now you just substitute "divine grace" by "the founding fathers"
It is pretty embarassing that a sizeable part of the population in an enlightened country like the US whith a long democratic tradition suddenly adheres to such theories. If you want to know where such lunacy can end, look uzp terms like "Ermächtigungsgesetz"....
MMmmmm just one word of caution: for the last presidential election (which are two-round like you described in France), the 2 candidates to make it to the second round were Chirac and the far right Jean-Marie Le Pen (National Front), because the left's votes got spread over a lot of candidates, from Communists to Greens to several flavours of Socialists...
The outcome of that first round was a big surprise, and disapointment, to all the lefties. All moderates, from left or right, were left with no other choice than to vote or Chirac, who carried the second round with around 80%.
So, using the first round to vote for the candidate you like best, and waiting for the second to "vote useful" and make a compromise for your least-hated candidate, sometimes doesn't work.
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
Bruce Schneier has a good article explaining why you shouldn't be "bored"
c le/2006/01/16/AR2006011600779.html
http://www.schneier.com/essay-102.html
Al Gore does a good job covering the same ground (albeit a bit more verbosely) in his Martin Luther King day speech:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/arti
Sorry if I've passed on wrong information, but I'm American, did pay attention in Government class in high school, and do remember executive orders like that. I made a quick check on the internet (http://www.thisnation.com/question/040.html) and confirmed what I'd remembered. Now, your weird question: "Does a regulation written by an executive agency carry the same weight as a law passed by congress?" I don't know what a regulation is, but I certainly hope not. I'm not sure why you think my opinion matters -- I'm a computer programmer for fuck's sake. And your even weirder question: "How about George W. Bush's signing statements?" Uhh, how about those, indeed? If it's true, (and it certainly sounds believable these days) I do not think they would change the laws as they are passed by congress.
Actually the message was not missed - the US knew by the 4th of December that war with Japan was only a few days away - and orders were sent out for the destruction of decryption gear in the Philipines and Guam. What wasn't known was the exact time and place for the attacks.
There's a slight issue with timing here - from TFA, the intercepts begain before Pearl Harbor, but the US didn't declare war on Germany until December 11 and only after Germany declared war on the US. Had Hitler known that the Japanese had no intention of declaring war on the Soviet Union, he probably would not have declared war on the US and the majority of the people in the US had a strong aversion to getting into another war in Europe after the fiasco of WW1 (the US and the world would have been better off if the US stayed out - the "Spanish Influenza" may have stayed in western Kansas).
No, We the People will tell whether this was legal. It wasn't and isn't. As Cringley noted in his article, the taps were made without the authorization of the FISA court. It is the FISA court which covers exactly these kinds of things. Therefore they are illegal. There exists no special holes in the statutes for presidents who are too lazy, and no openings for things that do not meet the standard.
The very reason that we have a FISA court is to provide some oversight of the process itself and to ensure that the shotgun approach so favored by past presidents is not done.
It still shocks me that people are debating this or, worse yet, accepting Bush's half-assed lines about "inherent authority". These taps are a patent violation of both the letter and the Spirit of the FISA law. What the hell more do we need?
Having been in the intelligence community (though not NSA), I think it is clear why people are confused on this issue. The administration is treating the "war on terror" as a literal war on terror. Under that definition, the President can intercept these communications to suspected Al Qaeda members as part of a military campaign. Many of the people who are up in arms about this are viewing the "war on terror" as an extended police operation. FISA clearly applies to criminal investigations. It is generally accepted that military actions in war time are held to a different standard.
I believe the courts will probably uphold the administration's version, since they are in many cases, choosing to engage those on the other end of the communication with military (deadly) force. I think if they were just trying to arrest people and prosecute them, the administration's case would be far weaker.
I don't know that it is as clear cut as those on either side say. We'll have to wait for the courts to decide.