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Eavesdropping Didn't Help Uncover Terrorist Plot
crymeph0 writes "Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell asserted that the 'Protect America Act,' which frees the intelligence community from pesky things like judicial oversight while they eavesdrop on international conversations, was used to good effect in exposing the recently foiled terrorist plot to bomb US military facilities in Germany. Not so, according to other, anonymous, intelligence community officials. McConnell was forced to admit his errors in a phone call to Sen. Joe Lieberman. Turns out the military got wise to the bad guys months before the law was passed, simply due to alert military guards noticing odd behavior by some passers-by, a.k.a. good old fashioned police work."
If you honestly believe that McConnell didn't know he was full of shit when he made that statement, I have several bridges to sell you.
Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.
--Benjamin Franklin
Your user name is very appropriate.
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
I said "yeah, suuure" the first time I read his statement that eavesdropping foiled a terrorist plot. Did any news outlets actually regurgitate his message without checking out the facts? Are those same news outlets now conveying the truth?
"Would you rather have silent eavesdroppers or armed soldiers watching your every move?"
No, I want neither. I want the government to be able to protect me without stepping all over my rights as a person. It's too easy for Government officials, police, etc to sidestep the controls we have NOW.
America did learn a lot from WWI/WWII, they already make the Gestapo and the SS look like bloody amateurs.
The big headlines were that surveillance helped beat the terrorists. This will not make headlines.
Mission accomplished: Americans are more likely to believe that the Bill of Rights is helping the terrorists win.
This seems like as good a time as any to remind ourselves about EFF's http://stopthespying.org/ web site. McConnell did not just lie to the press. He had to call Senator Lieberman to "clarify" his testimony because he lied to Congress. It hardly needs to be restated to this audience that we can tell when these guys are lying because their lips are moving, but it is worth remembering that there's something that we can and should be doing right now, which is backing up the EFF efforts.
This government (and not just this administration) has gotten very good at gaming the news cycle to mislead the citizenry into supporting some pretty vile stuff. The frustrating thing is that none of the things we have been led to do (warrantless wiretapping, waterboarding and Guantanamo) have been the least bit effective at actually solving crimes, preventing terrorist attacks or bringing the a guilty to justice. Every expert knows this, anybody who reads the experts knows this and a large segment of the population, the majority of the GOP presidential candidates, as well as Congressmen of both parties and 10% of the Slashdot community, won't believe the truth. The most effective solutions to the problem were already in place before 9-11. The failures were HUMAN failures, we already knew all the parts, we didn't connect the dots. Keeping a man in sensory deprivation for a month will break a man - it won't connect the dots. Filtering the internet traffic for keywords makes more dots, but it doesn't connect any. Over the last 6 years we haven't made ourselves any safer - only more depraved.
I have nothing to hide. So, why are you spying on me?
...we will have to fight them at home" is a lie too?
Or does Germany not count because it's not US soil?
-- Boycott Shell
I'd actually rather have them watching the bad guys' every move.
GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
One guy who works for the intelligence agency stated something that was false (either being an idiot by too quick to want to state something or possible boldly lying about it)and 4 people from the intelligence agency corrected him. So by that standard the "Bush Administration" is more truthful on the order of 4 to 1.
I'm just waiting for folks at MoveOn.org to take out a full size political add in a major American newspaper, subsidized mostly by said newspaper, claiming that Bush himself told this guy to claim it was the "Protect America Act".
When will there be politicians worth voting for?
You're right. In fact, this just proves it hasn't gone far enough. What we need is a police officer in every household, whose board and food is paid for by the residents, who are under constant supervision with cameras, hidden microphones, and bugs on every line. That should keep those pesky terrorists at bay, and after all, if you have nothing to hide, why are you worrying?
Screw the rules, I have green hair!
all of us.
meanwhile, back at the debacle we lovingly call man'kind', yOUR fearful corepirate nazi, southern baptist 'leaders' continue to develop more&more cruel & unusual ways to create additional debt & disruption for most of US, while our fellow humans across the water continue to explode by yOUR $hand$.
infactdead corepirate nazis still WAY off track
(Score:-1, Offtopic)
by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 01, @09:35AM (#20433195)
it's only a matter of time/space/circumstance.
previous post:
mynuts won 'off t(r)opic'???
(Score:-1, Offtopic)
by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 30, @10:22AM (#20411119)
eye gas you could call this 'weather'?
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8004881114646406827 [google.com]
be careful, the whack(off)job in the next compartment may be a high RANKing corepirate nazi official.
previous post:
whoreabull corepirate nazi felons planning trips
(Score: mynuts won, robbIE's 'secret' censorship score)
by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01, @12:13PM (#20072457)
in orbit perhaps? we wouldn't want to be within 500 miles of the naykid furor at this power point.
better days ahead?
as in payper liesense hypenosys stock markup FraUD felons are on their way out? what a revolutionary concept.
from previous post: many demand corepirate nazi execrable stop abusing US
we the peepoles?
how is it allowed? just like corn passing through a bird's butt eye gas.
all they (the nazi execrable) want is... everything. at what cost to US?
for many of US, the only way out is up.
don't forget, for each of the creators' innocents harmed (in any way) there is a debt that must/will be repaid by you/US as the perpetrators/minions of unprecedented evile will not be available after the big flash occurs.
'vote' with (what's left in) yOUR wallet. help bring an end to unprecedented evile's manifestation through yOUR owned felonious life0cidal glowbull warmongering execrable.
some of US should consider ourselves very fortunate to be among those scheduled to survive after the big flash/implementation of the creators' wwwildly popular planet/population rescue initiative/mandate.
it's right in the manual, 'world without end', etc....
as we all ?know?, change is inevitable, & denying/ignoring gravity, logic, morality, etc..., is only possible, on a temporary basis.
concern about the course of events that will occur should the life0cidal execrable fail to be intervened upon is in order.
'do not be dismayed' (also from the manual). however, it's ok/recommended, to not attempt to live under/accept, fauxking greed/fear/ego based pr ?firm? scriptdead mindphuking hypenosys.
consult with/trust in yOUR creators. providing more than enough of everything for everyone (without any distracting/spiritdead personal gain motives), whilst badtolling unprecedented evile, using an unlimited supply of newclear power, since/until forever. see you there?
I am glad the plot was stopped. However why is it assumed that when I use someone else's network that my conversation is secure? If I hand someone a sheet of paper with stuff written on it what guarantee do I have that the person transporting it for me will not sneak a peek at what is written on the sheet of paper. Why is the phone company any different it is their network. Does it make it right that the phone network hands over control to the government not exactly. However if you are put in that position of telling the government no, and then 3000 people dieing because of your choice could you handle that? I know they should have to ask permission before listening to people's phone calls but I doubt we have the man power to listen to everyone. Also who passed this law because I thought the Democrats control congress.
I smoked pot once. But I DID NOT inhale. Will you hire me?
Given the reasoning here it is now safe to say that enough data has come out about the whole thing to be finally worth kdawson's time to put it up on the front page.
I like a lot of the science/tech stuff kdawson puts up but the finger in the politics/yro side is far too slanted for my taste. And I don't mean looking with a critical eye or even looking through colored-glasses. It's downright looking through a kaleidoscope.
Suggestion: we can filter editors in our preferences: can we gain functionality to filter out on a criteria of (editor & category) instead of just a blanket editor?
Where'd you get the bridges?
"which frees the intelligence community from pesky things like judicial oversight while they eavesdrop on international conversations,"
The core of the Patriot act is not intelligence gathering but sharing. This was prompted because different agencies had information about 9/11 which, had they been able to share that information, they would have been far more likely to prevent the attack. There were situations where one person down the corridor from another couldn't share their notes.
Lacking hard evidence to go by, let's give privacy advocates the benefit of the doubt and say that in principle Patriot overreaches. The fact remains that the core of it is reform of our intelligence operations that was prompted by a very real attack and any reforms need to preserve the codification of that hard won lesson.
I'd actually rather have them watching the bad guys' every move.
Tell me something. How would they be able to know who the "bad guys" were in the first place? How would they be able to decide that you or I am not worth monitoring because we don't pose a threat, but that Ahmed and Yasir and their connections are worth investigating?
The real question isn't whether he was forced to admit it, the real question is whether Fixed News has reported this If they didn't report it then it's simply the left-wing media trying to undermine our security by supporting the terrorists.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
"McConnell was forced to admit his errors in a phone call to Sen. Joe Lieberman."
Thus say anonymous intelligence community sources who were eavesdropping on the phone conversation. It has been confirmed that eavesdropping doesn't work.
What those who want activist courts fear is rule by the people.
Exactly. This is a case of open mouth, insert foot. McConnell was lying deliberately because TPTB want this law badly, and they'd like it to permanent, thank-you-very-much. McConnell lied in his statement towards that end, without knowing that public statements had already been made, according to TFA, by American and German intelligence working the case. Once he was told, "uhhh, sir, but they already said they used old-fashioned police work!" he had to back-pedal.
They'll say anything to try to garner the support of Congress and the American people to have unwarranted spying going on this country. Pay attention people, this is your Constitional rights that they are messing with here. Write your Congresscritter. Write the newspapers. E-mail Robin Meade. Do whatever it takes to let them know that you don't want your Constitutionally-protected rights taken away from you.
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...to odd behavior, anywhere, anytime. There is no reason to suspect me of anything.
Dammit, this is the slippery slope to fascism!
Next thing you know I'll be asked to show my papers when I behave oddly.
Police state, here we come. No one can safely act odd again.
In Soviet Russia the Odd ask for your papers!
Oh...and this is all Bush's fault.
Tell me something. How would they be able to know who the "bad guys" were in the first place?
They have beards, goatees or moustaches. For examples see Roger Delgado as Dr Who's The Master, Ming the Merciless or Spock in the alternate universe. Continually stroking the beard is a dead giveaway.
How would they be able to decide that you or I am not worth monitoring because we don't pose a threat, but that Ahmed and Yasir and their connections are worth investigating?
Ahmed & Yasir aren't bad guys. ok, so they sold some bad meat one time... but their deli is the best value in town.
It is banned by the third amendment to the US constitution:
Since we are fighting a war in Afghanistan, war in Iraq, war on terror, and a domestic war on drugs, they have to pass a law first.
Insert Generic Sig Here:
"Leftists"? At one time the right stood for a smaller, less intrusive government. Funny how things change, isn't it?
Rather than watch everyone and keep adding names to the "people we don't think are terrorists today", they'd look for specific activities. "Follow the money."
In your scenario, what happens when the bad guy isn't doing anything bad during the time that he is being monitored?
We have over 300 million people here. The number of false positives in your plan would mean that we couldn't track any of the bad guys. We'd have spent all the money on following innocent people.
Now I want to know why, though the NY Times knew McConnell was lying, it didn't report that in that important original story.
And what will Lieberman, the Republican pretending to be a Democrat, do to a lying spook like McConnell? There's got to be a punishment for being a bad liar, even if we expect spooks like McConnell to lie. We expect them to do it competently. This clown is just another Bush chump who can't even lie straight.
--
make install -not war
No he is saying the the system as it stands actually works. It does not need draconian powers.
Undetectable Steganography? Yep, there's an app fo
You mean the government lied to the American people to garner support for its policy!? NO WAY!!!! OMG LRN2CANADA!
Living With a Nerd
I'd take the armed soldiers, because than I would know for sure liberty is dead and what to do about it.
" a.k.a. good old fashioned police work."
When I read that I heard in the voice of Chief Wiggum: "That's some good work, Lou!"
Sig it.
I doubt this will get much media coverage. Not just because of the government ties with media, but unfortunately "Security staff doing their job" doesn't get viewers as much as "New law catches terrorists does". People would rather believe a lie that makes them feel a tiny bit safer than the truth that all the security in the world will not end terrorism.
I am a free slashdotter. I will not be modded, blogged, DRM'd, patented, podcasted or RFID'd. My life is my own.
I'ld rather have policemen or armed soldiers standing on every street corner - at least then I know when I'm being watched.
They have beards, goatees or moustaches.
That's not true, though. They could just be fashion rejects from the late 90s.
In Germany, Schäuble and his accompanying professional paranoiacs saw this as the clear reason that implementing the total surveillance system he has in mind for the net is the key to foiling terrorist plots.
One reporter dared to be so indiscreet to ask the question whether the fact that that attack was avoided isn't proof that the current ways of dealing with the threat are adequate.
And there was silence. Next question please?
It's funny that this avoided terrorist attack proves both, that the (questionable) systems implemented are good for us, and that the (questionable) systems they want to implement are critical because current systems are just not enough. Now, which one is it?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
I hope you realize that by selling bridges, you authorize buyers to destroy them (they can destroy their property, right)?
Therefore, offering bridges that you do not own is supporting terrorism.
I'ld rather have policemen or armed soldiers standing on every street corner - at least then I know when I'm being watched.
Q: How do you know when a politician is lying?
A: His lips are moving.
Q: Under a system of constant monitoring, how do you know when you are being watched?
Which is why Benjamin Frankin's statement about those who value security over freedom end will end up having neither is so prescient.
...Open Source isn't the only answer -- but it's almost always a better value than the alternatives...
So if I understand you correctly, you're saying the USA PATRIOT act isn't all bad, that there are some babies in it that shouldn't be thrown out with the collective bathwater?
If that's the case, then I agree with you in principle. Information sharing in this case is most likely a good thing, provided that the information was gathered ethically and legally in the first place. Sadly, while the current gang of idiots is running things, that cannot be assured, and therefore IMHO the whole thing should be scrapped in favor of a new act that explicitly defines what kinds of information can be shared and how said information should be acquired.
What needs to be remembered here is that with every erosion of our civil rights, those who would seek to destroy our way of life through acts of terror realize a victory without ever 'firing a shot', so to speak. Privacy, while perhaps not explicitly laid out in the Constitution (and that's debatable under some interpretations of the Fourth Amendment) should be protected in the name of Americans who have fought, bled, and died to ensure our rights (not to mention the civilians caught in the crossfire, both domestically and abroad).
Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.
As, I suppose, is yours.
You want liberty and democracy, you have to find a moderate.
...Open Source isn't the only answer -- but it's almost always a better value than the alternatives...
What makes you think that it would be impossible to pass a law like that? Other unconstitutional laws have already been passed, including the one that underlies the subject we're talking about right now. I'm sure that at some point down the road, as things continue to erode, it will become something that people might want in order to "feel safer". All that's really needed (in America, anyway, if recent history serves) is some sort of scare story.
Screw the rules, I have green hair!
His mouth is moving...
No, really. This is why there is ZERO point listening to what these people say about anything. When they talk, I just think:
Get out of here! Go on! I don't believe it. You don't say! Really?! Get out of here! Go on. I don't believe it. You don't say? Get out of here! I told you that bitch crazy!!!
Well, you know what? Looking at the other candidates, I think Ron Paul is better than anyone else one the list, including Fred Thompson, Hillary, Obama, and Giuliani. Hillary is a power-hungry sociopath, Obama is too wet-behind-the-ears to win, Fred is a Washington insider who's been in and out of the intelligence community for decades, and Giuliani is a hard right-winger.
Paul at least never voted for the war and Iraq, has been vocal about pulling troops out of Iraq, has never voted for a Congressional pay raise, and has never voted to extend the power of the executive branch. He's the closest thing to a libertarian (small 'l') that I've seen running. No, I won't vote for the Libertarian candidate, because, well, the Libertarian Party and I have parted ways on wayyyyy too many issues.
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What lie??
According to the dictionary "A lie is a statement made by someone who believes or suspects it to be false, in the expectation that the hearers may believe it." This is not the progessive definition where a lie is saying something and then later it proves to be wrong.
Actually reading the full report, requires multiple source since the MSNBC does not contain it, shows he said it, he was then corrected, he then informed Congress and the press(since the comment was made in a public forum) that he had made a mistake and what the correct response should of been. All in a timly manner without any method of tring to hide it.
You don't know who the bad guys are when it comes to potential terrorists, any more than you know who is a wife-beater, a tax cheat, a rapist, or any other malfeasant character. When I walk down the street, how do I know the next person I meet isn't going to pull out a knife and stab me? Either you have to be paranoid, assume that everyone is guilty, then start exonerating/condemning people, or you have to assume everyone is decent, and start looking for overt signs that they are not. I say overt, because the 9/11 hijackers did a pretty good job blending in to their surroundings, and only certain aspects of their behavior (e.g. riding in a jumbo jet flight simulator and telling an instructor they only wanted to learn how to fly it, not land it) marked them as suspect. Whould surveillance have tipped anyone off? Sure... if anyone had actually known where they were.
Look, you have to pick your poison. I don't want to live in a police state. I don't like the idea that people I do not know and have no idea if I can trust are watching me, listening to me, judging me. I'm not the world's best person -- I do bad things. Does that make me a potential terrorist? No. But while someone in the government is busy wasting time watching me, the guy five cities away with a bomb-making factory in his garage is getting busy. The Oklahoma City Bombing should have taught us that ultimately it's futile to think you can see things like this coming. If someone is determined enough, fanatical enough, and smart enough, they will get past any kind of spying/surveillance you can think of.
GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
Judicial oversight of spying is not a "constitutional right." To the degree that the spying is for military intelligence rather than criminal prosecution, the ABSENCE of judicial oversight is a "constitutional right."
May the Maths Be with you!
There is an old chemical observation usually attributed to the arab alchemists of the middle ages.
"Like dissolves in like".
Considering that their greatest friend and ally was known as Tony Bliar waddaya expect?
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
Ba-doom PSHHH!
I just pooped your party.
Does his signature really invalidate what he said?
Any better suggestions for people to vote for?
Oh come on. They were going after military people and military installations. I would fully expect to be watched by armed soldiers if I was sneaking around a military base or military people. I'm sorry but the only time the military/police isn't a good thing is when individual members are doing bad things, or in happy fantasy land where everyone holds hands and sings in perfect unison without finding ten million reasons to want to kill eachother.
Even the larger fiascos boiled down to a few individuals making piss poor decisions, and others not having the integrity to stand up to it. Which by the way, they do teach in the military, you only have to follow legal orders, so its your own damned fault if your commander tells you to do something illegal and you do it.
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
Would you rather have silent eavesdroppers or armed soldiers watching your every move?
And how exactly did you establish that these are the only two alternatives?
Oh, come on. You're telling me that you believe that the Director of National Intelligence, who has been on record has vehemently defending the unwarranted wire taps, didn't know how a long-term intelligence operation conducted in Germany with the help of the German government went down?
I live in Florida. I've got acres and acres of swamp land down South of me that I'd like to sell you.
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The guy that they convicted of abetting the 9/11 hijackers -- I forget his name. They wanted to spy on him, but it was mostly hunch, not enough for a warrant. If they had been able to eavesdrop, they very likely could have gotten enough of a heads-up to stop it.
I don't think the Bush family dog lies about where he shit on the lawn. But I could be wrong.
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
This particular issue isn't about the Patriot Act, it's the "Protect America" act. And it's not about intelligence sharing between agencies. Actually the U.S. military shared intelligence pretty well with German authorities, not even a domestic agency, in this case. This issue is about the government overreaching its constitutional limits in eavesdropping on private conversations.
I actually do agree with you that our agencies need to share more intelligence more efficiently. After all, if the CIA sees J.Q. Terrorist get on a plane in London headed for the U.S., shouldn't they inform the FBI of the potential threat he now poses inside their jurisdiction?
It should be illegal to say that freedom of speech should be limited.
I'd like to agree with you but you're going to vote for that massive bigot Ron Paul which basically puts you in the same boat as the rest of this administration and their lackeys.
But of course! C'mon, if you look close enough you'll see, some are stealing too!
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
"New law catches terrorists does"
In his old age, Yoda's grammar worse and worse has gotten.
From the prior thread: "I don't believe a single damned thing these guys say anymore."
http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=294029&threshold=-1&commentsort=0&mode=thread&cid=20554673
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."
WARNING: Trick question.
--- Grow a pair, liberals... stop letting the Republicans bully you!
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Don't write to your congresscritter Put down that pen! Close that word processing program! Forget all that happy crap you learned in civics class about sharing your views with your "representative." You don't have a representative any more. You merely have someone who thinks he or she is your "leader," unfettered by either your opinions or the Constitution.
Marx was wrong: religion isn't the opiate of the masses, in modern America, the drug that keeps us numb, dumb and well-behaved is a belief that we can still make a difference by politely voicing our views to our would-be rulers and owners.
Other quotes from the book, here.
Assuming he wasn't lying about being the 20th hijacker because he was feeding his own ego. I have never seen or read anything that indicates the Government had phone records indicating that the 9/11 group communicated with each other by phone on a regular basis. If they did, they might have done it through pay phones. Even if you know who the bad guys are, it doesn't mean you're going to learn anything by listening to them.
GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
it is the fact that ALL of the info is legally required to be shared with the DOJ and the president. And yes, they do turn over ALL of it. Don't u remember when the PATRIOT act was passed? About 2 months after that a major drug group from South America was broken up. How exactly do you think that it occured? Likewise, about 6 months after it passed a number of dems were being watched. Exactly how do you think that Jefferson was known to be tracked and caught?.But how many pubs were tracked even though they had an obvious network of illegal behavior that bordered on being an illegal gang. Every last one of those bastards were caught because of other means. No, the PATRIOT act is about as evil as they come. It needs to be stopped. The president and all the presidents men need to go to prison; preferably, Levinworth.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Congress has to vote to stop a pay raise. If no vote is taken, the pay raise is AUTOMATIC
And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
John 8:32(King James Version)
Mr Dean worked for Nixon and was part of the watergate consperacy. He is a tried and true conservative. Yet, he believes that most of today's "republicans" have more in common with Nazi's than they do with republican ideals. Considering that even Nazi's could balance the budget, I would say that they have more in common with the Soviets. Even the gulag, the deficits, the invasions because of resources, the lies, the spying, etc. is much more soviet than Nazis.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
They believed that *before* they got in power.
IOW it was a standard campaign promise.
In my honest opinion, it'll come to killing, probably a civil war, before we see a smaller government, and that would depend on which side wins.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
what do you mean "some"? I would guess most, if not all.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I have no doubt that there are still American voters who unquestioningly believe everything the Bush administration tells them.
:-(
Push the button, it's time for the cockroaches to have a go.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
Your troll is weak, but I feel like trolling too.
Blar.
I didn't know that. Thank you for making things clearer.
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And with statements to the effect of being "One Bomb away from those pesky courts" It wouldnt shock me in the least if in the next 2 years they got their way through a "missed opportunity."
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
"New law catches terrorists does"
In his old age, Yoda's grammar worse and worse has gotten.
What's wrong with that sentence? A new law was passed that enabled police to capture female deer intent on destroying America...
...sometimes, in order to hurt someone very badly, you have to tell that person terrible lies. - PA
Most sarcasm escapes you, doesn't it?
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
That was written 10 years ago. You sure it's still not time for the revolution yet? *raised eyebrow*
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Walk with Music;
Actually the FBI and the CIA had a pretty good idea who the suspected terrorists were (this was part of the investigation of the Cole bombing). The CIA had bugged some of their conversations while they were in the Philippines (I think). Unfortunately the CIA did not tell the FBI that some of those suspected terrorists were in the US. If they did FBI would have no problems obtaining proper warrants.
This is all described in the book "The Looming Tower" - I strongly recomend it. Even though the end is heartbreaking.
...richie - It is a good day to code.
Not really. His nickname isn't too long by /. standards.
Based on the false dichotomy presented in your analogy, however, I'd say he has a point about yours.
Tags != Comments, and -1 (Troll) != -1 (I Would Respond Angrily To This Poster So They Must Be Trolling)
the point is, if he didnt know how the operation went, how could he comment on its details?
..inconvenient at the trial
he either:
1. lied about knowing the operation specifics
2. lied knowing the operation specifics
3. thought he knew the specifics but misinterpreted the report (which in his job may be the worst)
4. didnt lie, but the wiretaps are illegal in germany and would be
Duh, they have middle-eastern names. Hasn't Fox News managed to convince us all by now that middle-eastern Muslims are the ones who we should be scared of because they blow things up? Like the Oklahoma federal building?
Find environmentally and socially responsible products on http://buy-right.net
Yeah, but we shut down all subsequent threats from those groups by arresting and holding without trial at Gitmo all of those ex-military Christian guys with crewcuts. Remember?
"I guess the moral of the story is, don't paint your airship with rocket fuel." -- Addison Bain
I prefer to deal with an adversary I can see
A goal is a dream with a deadline
Do you have a source for this little gem in your sig? You always want to provide a source for such things, especially when they sound that ludicrous.
After all, studies show that 87% of Americans uncritically accept fabricated statistics.
Tags != Comments, and -1 (Troll) != -1 (I Would Respond Angrily To This Poster So They Must Be Trolling)
According to the dictionary "A lie is a statement made by someone who believes or suspects it to be false, in the expectation that the hearers may believe it."
Yes, and since the actual information regarding the case is clear that unwarranted surveillance had nothing to do with it, this means that either:
1) he was aware of the actual circumstances of the case, yet still claimed surveillance was the key or
2) he was (inexplicably for a man in his position) completely ignorant of the circumstances of the case, and just plain made up the fact that surveillance was involved.
If you make something up on the spot that supports your political agenda, do you usually suspect that what you made up is false? Yes, of course you do. And so does he. So he was lying.
The only thing he was merely wrong as opposed to lying about was whether the truth had already been made public. It had been made public, and that, and only that, is why he retracted his statement. He either knew what he said was wrong, or he knew it was not based in fact. Either way, that's a fucking lie.
I swear, the way people try to weasel out of being caught lying is as sad and reprehensible as the lies themselves.
The enemies of Democracy are
You want liberty and democracy, you have to find a moderate.
define "moderate", please. by some countries' government philosophies, the US government is so far right, that a radical left candidate would be "moderate".
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
And that, ultimately, is what our wealthy, coddled society has produced; a couple of generations of people with no sense of proportion, who love to watch vicarously through entertainment and the weekly news the real and imagined sufferings of others, but are utterly incapable of accepting that the world can be a dangerous place, and no amount of supposed government protection or vigilance will ever produce the results that they want.
Previous generations, spanning thousands of years, lived a life much closer to the edge. Diseases, famines and wars were ever present. Life was frequently short and happiness was largely measured in getting some of your offspring beyond childhood. I'm not saying that's the way we should live, but we are a spoiled, detached civilization that has expectations beyond all reality. There are always going to be enemies inside and outside the gates, there are always going to be self-righteous lunatics ready to sacrifice innocent lives in the name of whatever cause strokes their egos and madness.
That's not to say that government and society as a whole doesn't have a role to play in trying to catch bad guys, and if possible, prior to some attack. But the failures of 9-11 and other terrorist attacks appear to be more about failures and ineffeciencies in the intelligence community rather than because previous legislation was to weak. But I think it is beholden on all politicians and bureaucrats to tell the truth; we cannot absolutely guarantee your safety from killers, toxic toys, storms and just plain old bad luck.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Supposedly he was "overwhelmed with information and merely mixed up his facts". Fine.
So, by implication, what was the other attack that really was foiled by the new law -- the one that he confused with the recent one in Germany? Or are there no valid examples at all?
When 900 years you reach, speak as well you will not.
I'm actually pretty sure he voted against the law making those pay raises automatic too.
This sig has not been evaluated by the FDA. It is not designed to diagnose, treat, prevent, or cure any disease.
Looks like your troll is weaker - no "+1 Insightful" mod yet.
What?
Don't worry, the White House already have microphones recording everything inside.
What if Tetris was invented by Nazis?
Do you believe that President Bush knew about in advance or had anything to do with the 9/11 attacks?
Do you think there wasn't any wiretapping surveillance involved in apprehending the attempted terrorists in Germany? You don't tap someone's phone unless you have a reason to listen.
Eavesdropping didn't catch them because since the terrorists know their calls are monitored, they have to find other channels for communication.
And the democratic party was also for "separate but equal" and limiting civil rights of colored people*.
Only a few things remain the same in politics: Its a dirty game, and everyone lies. Everything else changes with time.
*Yes, I know its not politically correct. When the NAACP quits calling themselves "Colored" I'll change as well.
I resemble that remark. Also the new Master (John Simm) is clean shaven.
Jebus has a beard so saying nasty things about men with beard makes (Bearded) Baby Jebus cry!
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
Please hold me. I feel so warm inside.
Maybe if he eavesdropped on himself, he would have known the truth earlier.
I hope a lot of is made of this. It seems to me that every time a bust is made, they give credit to whichever government policy is most controversial at the time. Then later it turns out the new law had nothing to do with it, and very often the accused are not guilty anyways. It would be nice to have a list of examples in one place, I wonder if anybody is collecting them?
No, no. You misunderstood. The new law caught female deer suicide bombers.
Let's begin with asserting that the year is 2007 and that it is widely known that phones are tapped.
Let's then use a 12-year-old terrorist as an example:
- Even a 12-year-old would be paranoid enough to STFU about stuff like this on the phone.
- Even a 12-year-old would be paranoid enough to STFU about stuff like this on e-mail. If he has watched more than ONE movie that touches this subject, and talked to ANYONE else about this, he will also know that using encryption doesn't help(acres, NSA) and draws attention.
So, what can one get out of evesdropping like this?- Industrial secrets, corporate people hasn't become as paranoid as the should, yet.
- Possibilities to map the opposition.
- A means to convince the people that one actually is doing something to lessen the terrorist threat and that there is a way to combat terrorism except to change a completely fucked up foreign policy? And that one isn't from Venus?
*sigh*Baboons are cute.
Locals, FBI, CIA ... field personnel (the pack-Mules & worker-Bees) provided content of interest well prior of 911 attack+disaster, but management (the source of all/most government employee urban-legends) failed to be functionally capable leaders and proved themselves to be ineffective managers.
... many) and far less government pack-Mules & worker-Bees to keep US safe and informed.
The front line folks doing the job are not politicians or career managers, and they don't get promoted for doing a great job.
I remember on fed-manager saying "We can't promote her, we need someone that can do the job.", Lucky for US she got a promotion and another job with a different government organization. Fed-management is only about 33% capable, but the Mules&Bees (M&B) are far more professional and patriotic getting the job done.
Less Career-Managers (CM), PowerPoint-Scientist/Engineers (PP-SE) [acronyms, sound right] and far more pack-Mules & worker-Bees will always improve government performance. However, the solution for the past decades has bees more CM PP-SE and contractors (Halliburton, Blackwater
Unaccountable leaders are masters, and unrepresented people are slaves. How do US and EU fare?
Er, wait...
Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
That's because Yoda is German, and we're getting the Babelfish translation of what he says.
Since the information exchange between the U.S. and Germany took place before the "Protect America Act" was even passed, I'd have to say that if Mr. McConnel knew anything about the case (like when it happened) then he must have known that said Act had nothing to do with catching the terrorists, and was therefore lying. And if he didn't know anything about the case, then he was just making shit up but acting like he actually knew which is still lying.
I'm not really concerned with the other details, other than that they prove that we can catch terrorists without this crazy Orwellian Act.
The enemies of Democracy are
McVie isn't an Arabic name.
Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
...but:
The issue at hand, which is commonly misunderstood, is that:
- Monitoring for foreign communications does not require, should not require, and will never require, a warrant, which brings us to:
- Monitoring of foreign communications where both ends are outside of the United States, but where the passage of the traffic through equipment within the United States is incidental should not require a warrant;
- Monitoring of communications where the target of said monitoring is (reasonably* believed to be) outside of the United States should not require a warrant, regardless of where the other end of the communication is (even if within the United States);
- Monitoring of US citizens as targets within the United States requires a warrant, and always has.
These capabilities should absolutely exist under the next administration as well. The United States has always had the ability to collect foreign intelligence without a warrant, and that should always be so. Whether one end of the conversation is within the United States, or neither end is but the traffic incidentally travels through equipment physically within the United States, is - and should be - irrelevant.
That is not to say that the so-called Protect America Act of 2007, the six-month temporary legislation which allows this, is perfect, or isn't overly broad. But the capability to continue collecting foreign intelligence without being encumbered by FISA is crucial. Then you might ask, "Well, where are the checks and balances, then?!" Indeed, where are the checks and balances for any foreign signals intelligence collection? Should all foreign SIGINT now go through a court and warrant process, just to "make sure" it's "really" foreign SIGINT? If you believe so, you're woefully misguided.
For a very brief and overly simple overview of the issues this addresses, see this Newsweek article.
* "Reasonable" has a standard here - it's not just someone making an arbitrary assertion. Since in today's electronic world it is virtually impossible to guarantee beyond a shadow of any doubt that a particular target may be outside of the United States, it must be reasonable to believe that they are. I know people like to think that the attorney general can just "declare" someone as being outside of the US, and commence monitoring. No. They must, by all appearances, actually appear and be believed to be outside of the United States by any reasonable assessment. And again, let me guess: "But where are the checks and balances?" To repeat, where are any such "checks" any any other foreign intelligence gathering? The difference here is that sometimes, traffic may be increasingly traveling through the United States. Instead of choosing to be hamstrung in foreign SIGINT collection just because major communication trunks happen to pass through the US, I'd choose the option of using that to our advantage. It's flat out foolish not to.
Disclaimer: much of this is culled from a previous post of mine in a previous article, but this is precisely on-point. Foreign SIGINT should not require a warrant if the target of the monitoring is already outside the United States, and especially if both endpoints of the communication are outside of the United States, regardless of the path the traffic takes. I guess I can keep going in circles with the inevitable, "Yes, but how do we really know that the situation is as you described it without the oversight of a court?" How do we know that for ANY intelligence gathering? Should all intelligence gathering of all types now go through a warrant process? Ridiculous. And on top of all of this, if you just think that administration officials are going to lie and ignore any and all laws anyway, then what difference does any wording of any law really make?
Try to at least imagine the opposing viewpoint to your own.
I keep hearing this whooshing sound. Maybe it's a flight of Tu-160s off to drop strategic bombs on a carrier battle group.
Oh, and it's McVeigh.
Find environmentally and socially responsible products on http://buy-right.net
Unlike the douchebags who told us this honorless 'war' would take 6 months tops, and cost much less than $200 Billion.
Blar.
I'm sorry but the only time the military/police isn't a good thing is when individual members are doing bad things, ...
Like when some individuum sends the military into some strange foreign land to find virtual weapons?
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
Are you actually claiming 9/11 happened because different agencies weren't allowed to talk to each other, and not because the Bush administration ignored them?
Lars T.
To the guy who modded me down from perfect to terrible Karma - Apple haters still suck
It is nice to see, that politicians are the same all over the world. Here in Germany every press conference about that foiled plan is somehow connected with that stupid idea of an "official trojan" while nobody can explain why and how it would have helped.
Trust me, they think watching you is just as much a waste of time as you do. The ego connected with paranoia never ceases to amaze me.
This space intentionally left blank.
Great post!
This is something that a lot of people in our society just don't understand. I found myself having to tell this basic premise to my parents the other day. They were stating how we should want our government to protect us from the "evil terrorists" and how it is ok that we have all these extra security measures in place (on the anniversary of 9/11) to help catch these guys. They said, "isn't it worth it to spend(waste) all this extra time and money just to keep something like 9/11 from happening again?" I stated that "I just want my freedoms back. We're all going to die sometime. I'll take my freedoms back even if that means a slightly higher risk of being blown up by the next terrorist attack!"
We're at least 1000 times more likely to die in a car wreck then by some terrorist and I don't want to live my life in fear of the boogie man around the next corner.
We have four boxes with which to defend our freedom: the soap box, the ballot box, the jury box, and the cartridge box.
Does the CIO and/or CEO of the company that you work for know exactly what tables you're using to create a report that they're looking at when reporting to shareholders? Probably not. If they do want the information, do you think they're going to directly ask you or ask someone that's on the next lower level in the chain of command? Unless it's a pet project, executive types rarely know the intimate details of what's happening in the trenches.
the good ground has been paved over by suicidal maniacs
I love it! I agree with almost everything you write.
Unless it's a pet project, executive types rarely know the intimate details of what's happening in the trenches.
And thus they don't comment on those details. I agree that it is possible that he had no idea what actually went on in the investigation. Yet if that's the case and he didn't know, then he must surely know he didn't know, therefore when he made the statement he was pretending that he knew and making up a story that supported his political agenda, and therefore he was lying.
The enemies of Democracy are
No. And I'd bet that far, far more than 39% of Democrats agree with me on this one, despite the GGP's sig. One gets exposed to a great deal of the "9/11 truth" crowd living in a Vermont college town. Yet they're a fringe minority even in this wackiest of East Coast states, which is a natural consequence of positing "evidence" that varies from unsubstantiated allegation to unabashed falsehood.
It's sad, to me, that we have a president so morally bankrupt that some people will believe any conspiracy ascribed to his administration.
Tags != Comments, and -1 (Troll) != -1 (I Would Respond Angrily To This Poster So They Must Be Trolling)
"Imagine" the opposing viewpoint to my own? I've been watching it ravage my liberties, and my neighbors', for at least 6 long years. Don't try to pretend that you're starting out this conflict of rights vs liberty in you long attempts to frame the debate the way you'd like everyone to see it.
There are two issues here, not just the one you'd like to compartmentalize into.
One is indeed whether the government can wiretap people. There is a very clear law, that has been regularly updated to keep pace with both technology and threats, the FISA. It is already an exception to the Constitutional requirement for any wiretap to be allowed by a warrant after evaluation by a judge under Congress' laws, to ensure the Executive doesn't just wiretap whoever it wants. Any wiretap without a warrant is by definition not reasonable. The FISA makes an exception to the usual requirement that the evidence on which the warrant is based be subject to argument, making the court hearing it and the proceedings secret.Then it makes another exception, a really extraordinary one, that allows warrants to be obtained even after the wiretap, for 72 hours. In other words, legalizing warrantless wiretaps to accommodate emergencies, after which the wiretappers can get a warrant on evidence they already had, or, if they really took a gamble without evidence but on a "hunch" that proved correct, with the contents of the 72 hours of the tap. The Executive even gets to assign the secret members of the FISA court, and its chief judge.
That court issued something like 18,000 authorizations, and rejected something like 20, in the year before Bush started ignoring it. But there weren't really 18,000 emergency terrorist threats, or anywhere near the number of wiretaps the FISA court has issued in its 30 years of operation. It's easy to convince that court. Too easy already, given that its procedures are unconstitutional, but there are emergencies and we tend to err on the side of caution when "national security" is invoked. At least the FISA is a way to track the circumventions of the Constitution - and therefore, the abuse of our rights by our government we create to protect them. So we can try for overall oversight down the road, even if "a few eggs are broken to make the omlet" along the way.
Of course, there's a bigger issue: these rights are inalienable, not given by the Constitution or any other feature of being American (or just living here). So violating those rights abroad, for US citizens or foreigners, also violates the rights that are America's basic ideology. But we make the exception to protect ourselves more easily, quickly and cheaply, rationalized on the grounds that we create our government here to protect our rights; foreigners can create their own governments to protect their rights if they want. But of course the accumulated rights abuses abroad have made it that much easier for our enemies to recruit allies and attack us. The tradeoff is probably a losing one, when our greatest threats are terrorists, and we're alienating even our allies.
The undeniable issue here is that Bush has ignored even the easy FISA court. So there's no oversight. Instead, there's lawbreaking by the Executive, as has been found even after due process in binding Federal court with proper jurisdiction. Violating the Constitution, and then breaking the FISA. Even the 4th Amendment that's being broken is itself an extra statement of what's already implicit in the Constitution, just like the rest of the Bill of Rights. That's how important our right to privacy is. And how likely is an abusive ruler to violate it.
The other issue is that Bush cannot be trusted with this power. The FBI, for example, lied to Congress when reporting that there were no reported examples of their abusing the Patriot Acts, but there were indeed hundreds. The guy running these wiretaps, Alberto Gonzales, led a career of lying to Congress, hounded out j
--
make install -not war
Jerry: So George, how do I beat this lie detector?
George: I'm sorry, Jerry I can't help you.
Jerry: Come on, you've got the gift. You're the only one that can help me.
George: Jerry, I can't. It's like saying to Pavorotti, "Teach me to sing like you."
Jerry: All right, well I've got to go take this test. I can't believe I'm doing this.
George: Jerry, just remember. It's not a lie... if you believe it.
Just a guess here but I think it's likely the men were spotted acting suspiciously while scouting a military post. So the soldiers were likely in their designated play area.
A similar war story from my own experience: Back in the 80's I was a grunt in the US Army in Germany. I was hung over and trying to take a nap in the drivers seat of my M577 with the hatch mostly closed in the motor pool during lunch. Pretty much the rest of the post was in the barracks watching "Days of Our Live's" or one of those soaps. I was pretty much invisible but I could still see around me well. I see a civilian just outside the motor pool fence taking pictures of the newly arrived state of the art M901 ITVs. In my hang over stupor the coherent thought that something ain't right about that managed to sneak to the surface. Then my conscience started harassing me telling me I really should check this out. So I shook off the stupor and followed the guy after he left. He headed towards the back of the post where you aren't suppose to have egress or ingress to the post (unless you're drink as shit coming back from downtown after the foose gate is closed and you're climbing the fence in the back 40 to avoid the dickhead MP's at the main gate) and where civilians have no business going anyway. I jog over to battalion HQ and reported what I had seen. The MP's caught the guy climbing the fence trying to get out the back of the post. He was a German national who had no authorization to be on post in the first place.
Who is John Galt?
...and don't automatically dismiss anything that disagrees with my own personal opinion or points of view as "lies".
But it's humorous that you seem to.
One is indeed whether the government can wiretap people.
Replace "people" with "American citizens, permanent residents, and/or persons with a legal status within the United States", because they're two very, very different things, and you seem to conflate the two.
There is a very clear law, that has been regularly updated to keep pace with both technology and threats, the FISA. It is already an exception to the Constitutional requirement for any wiretap to be allowed by a warrant after evaluation by a judge under Congress' laws, to ensure the Executive doesn't just wiretap whoever it wants. Any wiretap without a warrant is by definition not reasonable. The FISA makes an exception to the usual requirement that the evidence on which the warrant is based be subject to argument, making the court hearing it and the proceedings secret.Then it makes another exception, a really extraordinary one, that allows warrants to be obtained even after the wiretap, for 72 hours. In other words, legalizing warrantless wiretaps to accommodate emergencies, after which the wiretappers can get a warrant on evidence they already had, or, if they really took a gamble without evidence but on a "hunch" that proved correct, with the contents of the 72 hours of the tap. The Executive even gets to assign the secret members of the FISA court, and its chief judge.
The main purpose of FISA is to govern the collection of foreign intelligence within the United States, and explicitly restrict and control application of surveillance of US citizens within the United States.
Foreign intelligence collection where the target, and sometimes indeed both endpoints of a communication, are outside of the United States should not require a warrant.
Of course, there's a bigger issue: these rights are inalienable, not given by the Constitution or any other feature of being American (or just living here). So violating those rights abroad, for US citizens or foreigners, also violates the rights that are America's basic ideology. But we make the exception to protect ourselves more easily, quickly and cheaply, rationalized on the grounds that we create our government here to protect our rights; foreigners can create their own governments to protect their rights if they want. But of course the accumulated rights abuses abroad have made it that much easier for our enemies to recruit allies and attack us. The tradeoff is probably a losing one, when our greatest threats are terrorists, and we're alienating even our allies.
That's a philosophical and ideological issue. If you believe we need court oversight and a warrant process for foreign intelligence collection, that's fine. It just runs counter to the very purposes and functions of intelligence, and would put the United States at a distinct disadvantage with respect to how other nations, including adversaries, collect intelligence. Our Constitution and the beliefs within it applies, by definition, to our own citizens and by extension to other persons with a valid legal status within the United States. To argue that it should apply to everyone on earth flies in the face of the current state of affairs of the world and the very notion of nation-states.
The undeniable issue here is that Bush has ignored even the easy FISA court. So there's no oversight. Instead, there's lawbreaking by the Executive, as has been found even after due process in binding Federal court with proper jurisdiction. Violating the Constitution, and then breaking the FISA. Even the 4th Amendment that's being broken is itself an extra statement of what's already implicit in the Constitution, just like the rest of the Bill of Rights. That's how important our right to privacy is. And how likely is an abusive ruler to violate it.
Foreign signals intelligence collection should, fundamentally, never require a warra
Unless the powers are SPECIFICALLY OUTLINED in the Constitution, they are NOT allowed to the federal government. THAT is how it works. The Constitution is not a limitation and numeration of our rights. We do not get our rights by fiat of the government. They get their rights from our willingness to be governed. OUR rights are inalienable and come from the fact that we are human and alive.
It was a survey from Rasmussen Reports back in May. You can find the full results from places like this as well as many other place on the internet.
"I told you so:"
Maybe, but when that's your standard response to every post that involves any kind of person that is even remotely associated with a Republican, you can't really claim much foresight. I suppose one day those guys screaming that "ARMAGEDDON IS COMING!!!!" will eventually be right too.
Broken clock and all that.
Then of course there's the fact that you're an intolerable, raving nutjob, with a long history of verbally assaulting anyone who doesn't kowtow to you. I have a strong suspicion you'll do the same to me, for no reason than because I was man enough to respond to your ranting by calling it what it is.
I guess the point is, you may have been right, but no one cares. And that's not going to change no matter how much you verbally abuse us.
I hope you aren't trying to blame the military for following legal orders based on really shitty foreign policy. The constitution says the US will have a military controlled by the public. Which is why the Commander in Cheif is an elected civilian. Now you can bitch and moan all day about how "he stole the election" or whatever, but he is a civilian, and the other civilians aren't doing a damned thing about it. Trust me, you don't want the military doing anything about it themselves. You want a military that obeys orders from the elected leaders...period. Anything else is a military coup and I think there have been enough of those around the world to know how that turns out. People are much better off standing up and controlling the civilians in charge, because if the military was in charge it wouldn't be so simple.
I am tired of hearing the military blamed for the craptastic foreign policy of our elected civilian leaders. The military has restored more water, power, medical, and educational systems in Iraq than Saddam did. The military is in a really shitty situation trying to do the best they can, getting blown the fuck up, psychologically torn apart (PTSD, the highest suicide rate in 20 something years, and the people snapping and doing other deranged things). The civilians don't seem to give a shit because they won't actually do anything about the ass clowns of leaders they have elected other than cry and whine about how bad they are and talk about how soldiers are demons for anything that bad happens without ever looking at anything positive that they do, or bothering to understand that a warzone is a psychological nightmare that has been extended from 6mo to 12mo to 15mo to 18mo etc etc.
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
Once again, let me point out this wasn't putting soldiers on the street. This was putting soldiers on a military installation and then letting them catch bad guys that try to sneak around the military installation. I think this is WAY better than the surveillance crap Mr. Numb Nuts was claiming saved us all so he could push farther forward with it. Also, I might remind you that most of these soldiers actually do go home and take their uniform off. They live in the same community and are trained to be constantly aware of people doing suspicious things around them. So rather than going off about the soldiers on the street everywhere maybe you should be happy that these guys were aware enough to catch them before they blew up some place on the town that a bunch of Americans happen to hang out, because you can bet your ass it would have killed alot of people other than those soldiers. Or maybe just be happy that it wasn't the super invasive spying agenda that caught it.
I didn't once say that I support a militaristic/police state environment to prevent this. I support the military and police that already exist and are a necessity to a safe society being trained and aware to spot this sort of thing without massive surveillance society crap like wiretaps and the like. I would really like people to meet their fucking neighbors and know what is out of place in their neighborhoods, because in every neighborhood that actually watches out for each other instead of just relying on the police...low crime rates...less police presense...I don't know what there isn't to like here. Just because normal people like you and I don't have ten million reasons to kill people does not mean there aren't a lot of sick fucks out there that do. Your argument there basically entails "The rape victim must be lying because I wouldn't rape anyone that means noone would". Look, I would love for the world to completely disarm and have a big group hug and say "Well fuck guys, I'm really sorry we have been trying to kill each other over stupid shit for so long." But that isn't going to happen, and when you lose the ability or will to defend yourself someone is going to put a bullet in your dome and take your shit or otherwise oppress and abuse you, hooray for human nature.
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
Medved needs a rudimentary Math Class Yes, thirty five percent said yes. The twenty six percent that said they weren't sure certainly can't be lumped in with the thirty five percent unless you don't understand math and statistics at all. That supposition is totally bogus. With the thirty five percent, isn't that about the same percentage that feels that Bush can do absolutely no wrong? Works both way folks.
If FireFox thinks it is spelled correctly, it is good enough for me. I don't need to spell, that is what the technical writer is for.
Blar.
Correct me if I am wrong, but FISA- wiretapping started in the 70s. And the Bush version as far back as several years and the original Patriot Act.
where in the poll question is 'participation' mentioned, or did you just make that part up? or are you so stupid that you think that having some foreknowledge of something is the same as doing it yourself?
I'm curious. Why do you think that the Director of National Intelligence has so vehemently defended the unwarranted wire taps? It's not like he can take over the world. For that matter, it's likely that as soon as another Prez comes into office, he'll be out. Why do you think that so many in Washington believe that unwarranted wire taps are a good thing, as opposed to having to get a warrant for each and every one?
There is no "I disagree" mod for a reason. Flamebait, Troll, and Overrated are not substitutes.
Looks like I misunderstood you, then. I completely agree with your point about people getting to know their neighbours. Living in a city is no excuse not to know the people who live around you. What's really killing us is total anonymity. We're afraid to talk to each other. We're afraid to even acknowledge others around us. That leads to people being afraid to act out to help someone in danger. Thing is there's no easy way to profile a criminal before he acts. Relying too much on that just brings out prejudices that people aren't always aware are there. I'm saying we should take a better look at why people are acting out in criminal ways. It's easy to label people off as 'sick fucks' and lock them up. I think if you look closer at these 'sick fucks' you'll find out they often started out as normal as me and you. There's a lot to be said for the power of the situation. Child abusers are often abused as children themselves. Criminals often resort to crime out of desperation and a lack of options, not because of some innate 'badness.' Not saying everyone's a saint, just that maybe there are bigger things to look at in terms of improving social welfare.
FTA:
That's why I buy AMD.
Similar to the upcoming US election results
Because they've watched too much 24 and the like. First, I think a lot of these politicians honestly think some guy gets in a situation where he's, like, 5 minutes from averting disaster, and HAS to have the power to behave unconstitutionally
Second, power. OK why does anyone want power? If you're rich already, why would ANYONE want to have more power and run things? I don't know, human nature I guess. The Director of Nat'l Intelligence etc. are human, so they seek more power.
Third, people just forget the spies will be people too. That is, it just won't occur to them that without ANY oversight, they will just use these warrantless spying powers to spy on ex-wives, political opponents, and so on.
Fourthly, the whole nature of a police state.. I think even the people who claim they want this program don't want a police state.. but, the whole nature of a police state is the thought and possibility that maybe you're being watched at all times, maybe you aren't. The people who want this program are enabling a police state whether they think they are or not.
So that's why my Pharmascist has a big sign saying "According to the PATRIOT ACT. You cannot buy Psuedophederine. Thank you, come again."
Now I know, they were only doing it because they were concerned about sharing intelligence.
...before making such incredibly asinine statements. I suggest reading up on (but not limited to) the following:
1: The first ten amendments of the US Constitution,
2: The past, oh, TWO HUNDRED YEARS or so of judicial precedent, and
3: The definition of "common carrier"
And perhaps you'll then realize why your statements are not merely stupid, but ignorant to an amazing degree. Perhaps. I don't hold out a lot of hope, but maybe you'll surprise us.
But did anyone stop to ask themselves, "Why did we create those anti-sharing rules in the first place?" No. As far as the American public is concerned, those rules just magically wrote and adopted themselves.
Without those laws, it was easy for the FBI to get information on Americans living abroad (information that should have required a warrant). They'd just nudge the CIA and say, "Buddy, do me a solid." The CIA, for its part, could get information from the FBI that it wasn't allowed to collect. Such abuses were far from theoretical.
Certainly, there is information that the FBI and CIA were allowed to exchange, and I suspect that those sharing programs weren't run nearly as effectively as they could have been. They could have improved the flow of intel between the agencies without touching the wall.
I don't think 9/11 happened because the FBI wasn't able to trade certain kinds of data with the CIA. I think it happened because the Bush administration didn't take terrorism seriously. Bin Laden was Clinton's white whale, an obsession the new administration found silly, until it was too late.
Had Bush treated the "Bin Laden determined to attack inside the U.S." memo as vigorously as Clinton treated the reports surrounding the foiled Millennium Bombing, I don't think 9/11 would have happened.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
1. Poor punctuation - Periods where question marks should be, and nothing where commas should be, resulting in run-on sentences. Run-on sentences and absent question marks both encourage you to keep reading without stopping to think, which is important when a conservative is trying to get their point across.
2. Poor spelling - Spelling errors are a fact of life, nobody's perfect. But strategic use of syntax errors can distract you from logical problems in the post.
3. An Ultimatum - A choice between the idea the conservative doesn't like and something unthinkable, or socially unacceptable. Would you like (premise A) or would you like people to die/the communists/terrorists to win!?!?!?
3. Blame-shifting - Shift the blame for a problem to a liberal group, again a distraction tactic. People will be caught up in the ensuing correctional argument instead of criticizing the original post. No factual basis is needed, but an easy way to confuse the reader is to shift the blame to the past actions of a liberal group. This also increases the amount of research needed to make an informed rebuttal and therefore reduces the chance of such a reply being made.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
That would be my point. Everything changes in politics except the dirtiness of the game and the lying.
Thanks for proving, with your citation, that your signature is pure slander. Participated? What utter horseshit.
I know a lot of conservatives think that their values aren't represented in government, but it sure seems to me like we've got one filled with paranoid fascist enablers who can't even be troubled to read, so what's the complaint?
Tags != Comments, and -1 (Troll) != -1 (I Would Respond Angrily To This Poster So They Must Be Trolling)
When will there be politicians worth voting for?
When you will know who Ron Paul is and what he stands for: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_positions_of_Ron_Paul#Domestic_surveillance That was not offtopic: That link goes to the politics of domestic surveillance in a thread about domestic surveillance in reply to a post about its politics.You can't take the sky from me...
Whoever modded me down obviously doesn't get the joke. The string of comments all related to the poster's name. Bozzio is a famous drummer. Bozzio the user posted a drum-related joke.
/.!
Jesus folks, think before you mod. Give people some credit, man. If somebody posts something that isn't obviously trolling or flamebait, then there is most likely a good reason behind the post. The reason might conflict with your opinions or sense of humour, but that doesn't mean it's wrong!
That's the last time I use onomatopoeia on
9/11 happened because of some crazy, pissed-off Muslims. What are you, some kind of retard?
Dark Reflection
And he had this to say about his testimony:
The man's either a jacakass loose cannon, or he's deliberately lying. Neither option paints him in a good light. And odds are, he's merely lying.
The fact that this got a troll rating is just a testament to the sheer number accounts on Slashdot that are controlled by crazy fucking radical Bush supporting wingnuts.
Except of course that the Democratic party is no longer racist, whereas the GOP is still trying to have it both ways with the "small government" mantra. But then, that was always more of a marketing slogan anyway. What they really want is to get rid of some regulation* and social spending, but baby, bring on those pork barrel projects and military spending. Phil Gramm, for example, spent much of his career railing against "big government", yet bragged that "I'm carrying so much pork, I'm beginning to get trichinosis."
*Big business has no problem with big regulation if it's in their favor. i.e. pharma getting their ban on importing drugs from Canada.
Unfortunately the CIA did not tell the FBI that some of those suspected terrorists were in the US. If they did FBI would have no problems obtaining proper warrants.
The CIA didn't need to tell the FBI. It was all laid out on a silver platter on Bush's desk: Bin Laddin determined to strike the U.S., and that he might use planes to do so. He could have taken five minutes to direct the FBI to look out for suspects, tell the FAA to watch out for suspicious activity, and tell NORAD to come up with a plan for forcing down planes. Instead he blew it off.
An interesting anagram of "BANACH TARSKI" is "BANACH TARSKI BANACH TARSKI"
The survey asked if Bush knew about the attacks in advanced, from what we know the information about the planned attacks were only known by a core group of people. So for Bush to know about it he had to of "shared in something" with the doers and that is the definition of participate.
No, not at all. See, if it supports your agenda, and your agenda is right, it's probably right too. It's more self-deception than outright lying, because even lying requires you to be honest with yourself.
In Repressive Burma, it's not just your connection that dies. slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=314547&cid=20819199
So the US intelligence is run by crazy, pissed-off Muslims. Thanks for the confirmation.
Lars T.
To the guy who modded me down from perfect to terrible Karma - Apple haters still suck
It was a survey from Rasmussen Reports
So I looked at your reference. Even if I believed the survey, what this actually said was:
What a fucking ludicrous "in other words".Those that believe Bush "knew in advance" don't think he "participated", they just think he was an idiot and ignored the warnings or didn't act fast enough.
Have you stopped beating your wife?
No, he's referring to female terrorist deer.
...richie - It is a good day to code.
I see you also missed the entire point -- politics and platforms change. The democrats are no longer anti-civil rights. Some republicans are. The republicans, as a whole, are no longer really for smaller government. The only constants in politics are change, and lies.
This is bit of 20/20 hindsight.
Hardly; it's more like a bit of a lazy, incompetent president. Taking Bush to task for not doing anything in the face of point-blank warnings is no more "20/20 hindsight" than asking him why he decided to keep reading My Pet Goat rather than getting on the phone when planes started hitting buildings. This wasn't a fluke: the exact same thing happened four years later, when he received point-blank warnings on Katrina and ignored those as well. Bush doesn't care about what he doesn't know about. And he doesn't know about much. At least Reagan could delegate.
The particulars of the attack were not known (I know there was speculation).
Insofar as alerting the FBI, the FAA, and NORAD, yes they were: Bin Laddin determined to strike the U.S., and that he might use planes to do so. It would have taken minutes for an FAA official to write a memo telling staff to report suspicious activity, and a few minutes for a NORAD commander to prepare a plan to force down planes over probable target cities, which would certainly include DC and NYC. The morning of 911, the FAA notices that three large planes are missing, which certainly counts as "suspicous", and calls the SOD, who calls NORAD, who starts tracking planes and scrambles a few fighter jets. We might not have been able to prevent the hijackings, but we certainally could have prevented them from hitting the WTC and the Pentagon.
No, the self-deception is in telling yourself that it's okay to make up facts that support your agenda because your agenda is right. Only the truly deranged delude themselves into thinking that they aren't making things up. I do not believe for a second that the Director of National Intelligence is that kind of deranged person. He may have believed he was doing the right thing by pushing his agenda, but he was lying to do it and was definitely aware of it.
The enemies of Democracy are
I see you don't know how to read. I am perfectly aware that platforms change. What you completely missed was how the GOP tries, and has always tried, to have it both ways on "small government." Whereas the Democratic party does not simultaneously pander to the NAACP and the KKK.
Criminals (not the oops I screwed up once on something minor type) are dysfunctional and in the animal kingdom would be killed off. To me the guy who steals from the 401k and the guy who takes your car at gunpoint aren't different. The 401k guy is just more of a coward. They still have the same thing wrong in their head that allows them to make the decision that preying on their own kind is acceptable. I don't buy for one second "they were abused too" or "they were in a hard place". I have known lots of people who have been abused that have never done that, and of the people that I know who have abused children, none of them were abused themselves. I have known a ton of people who have been in really hard places that didn't turn to crime. (Now mind you, I don't really call stealing food from a grocery store criminal, its illegal, but not the same as stealing the jewelry to sell for drugs, guns, or whatever else you may want at the moment). Stealing to survive is not at all the same as stealing to have what you want, and stealing to survive is such an overplayed card that its becomming worthless for the people who actually ARE trying to survive.
It may sound heartless and cold, and quite frankly I have a hard time accepting it completely, but we have done this to ourselves because we strive to be better. The people striving to be better refuse to remove the ones that need to be removed from the gene pool. Through being more socially aware, through better medical technology, we bypass natures way of dealing with the diseased and disabled. Again, I don't subscribe to the kill em all theory, and human compassion is an important develeopment, but these are the problems it causes. I do believe in the death penelty in certain cases, but I'm still wary of allowing the government to execute citizens. I see absolutely no reason to "rehabilitate" someone who has been raping a 5yr old girl, nor do I see any reason to waste my tax dollars that could be used to help someone by supporting him living in our prison system. I would just as soon as spend the $0.20 for the bullet to make damned sure he can't do it again or further drain resources from our society. The cost no one seems to catch on is the cost of leaving this guy locked away forever or "rehabilitating" him FAR exceeds his value to society and that time/money/resources could be used to feed multiple families, put many kids through school, clean up our streets, and have a much higher net gain for society as a whole.
That said, profiling is extremely difficult. It does work, but its not a sure thing by any means, there are always exceptions. Look at all major serial killers. Perfect freaking neighbors, members of the church, great with kids (until they raped them, killed them, and buried them under the floor). This is where that human factor comes in rather than vast networks of spy equipment. It takes people knowing people to really stop this stuff.
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
"It would be nice to have a list of examples in one place, I wonder if anybody is collecting them?"
I hear the Library of Congress has a complete set...
No, that falls under my point about lies.
But again you missed that part.
I think we need to make some cool James Bonds Shit. Get us a Mr.Q or something. With spies and agents like that terrorist would not be an issue. I know this because I am in top secret agent training right now. I am currently playing 007 agent under fire and learning alot. Give me a couple of years and I will be the best agent ever. 008 thats me
you think one person can stop terrorism?
No, that falls under my point about lies.
Brilliant, I'll start making simplistic general statements and then insist that any issues were covered by those one-sentence statements.
But again you missed that part.
Again, not so much. I invite you to name an issue that the Democrats are as full of crap on as the GOP is about "small government."
Balanced Budget.
They're all over it, but they're nearly as big of spenders ad the GOP is. And yes, the GOP is also lying when they say they want a balanced budget.
But whatever, you have your opinion, which apparently is that the democrats are some noble knight in shining armor here to save the country, and I have mine, which is that both parties are corrupt, and full of lying assholes. Debating further is pointless, so lets agree to disagree.
Balanced Budget. They're all over it, but they're nearly as big of spenders ad the GOP is. And yes, the GOP is also lying when they say they want a balanced budget.
Sorry, try again. Who was the last president to have balanced the budget? And if Florida had completed a statewide recount in 2000, we might still have one.
But whatever, you have your opinion, which apparently is that the democrats are some noble knight in shining armor here to save the country
Straw man. I and many other democrats were beyond pissed that the Democrats in Congressed caved on the FISA bill this summer, for example. I was so pissed at Webb in particular that I asked for a refund of my campaign contribution along with his resignation. However, 27 Democrats voted against it, compared to zero Republicans. The Democratic party has a lot to improve on, but they aren't even on the same planet of incompetence and corruption that the GOP dwells on.