Passport Files of Presidential Hopefuls Snooped

CNN is reporting on the widening brouhaha that began when Barack Obama's passport file was accessed illegally on three occasions beginning in January. Now it seems that John McCain's file was also snooped; and that last year Hillary Clinton's file suffered the same fate. Ars Technica nails the real importance of these breaches, saying that the Presidential hopefuls are "...currently providing the country with a very public lesson in why the 'privacy advocates' who oppose initiatives like Real ID and the executive branch's domestic surveillance programs should really be called 'democracy advocates.' In short..., the entire incident shows exactly why citizens' privacy is critical in a country where citizens compete with one another for control of the government."

Comments

What's private about passport records?

[cdrguru]

And how does passport records (assuming it is just entry & exit times) relate to Real ID in any fashion? Real ID is an attempt to eliminate the cartoon-drawing Driver's Licenses that some states hand out. Real ID is an attempt to eliminate the Mexican Government from "assisting" in getting Driver's Licenses to illegals.

The government folks are snooping goverment records all the time anyway. Just ask Hillary about the FBI and IRS records for political foes the last time she lived at the White House.

Re:What's private about passport records?

[Zeinfeld]

Yeah but it seems that Slashdot, CNet, Wired, and many other "technology" news sites often report on a lot of stories via a political opinion that is very left-wing and very unbalanced and has quite a bit of a spin on it. Even worse are Digg and Reddit websites in which most of the links voted to the first few pages are ultra-liberal in their opinions and anything not ultra-liberal gets dumped or moved to last on the list.

Or maybe they just print the facts as they see them and your brain refuses to acknowledge any data points that conflict with the right wing alternative reality you live in?

One theory is that Bush has dropped to 30% approval ratings because the left wing press have attacked him unfairly, another is that most people now concur with the left wing opinion that the man is a total incompetent abd that he bears a considerable amount of blame for the current economic situation and the fiasco in Iraq.

One theory is that the surge has succeeded and victory is possible. Another is that the insurgents believe that there is no need to fight as only an imbecile would now imagine that the US is going to continue spending a half trillion dollars a year there. If they are proved wrong for whatever reason they can always start fighting again.

One theory is that the sub-prime meltdown tells us that deregulated finance markets are not the cause. Another is that conservative think tanks would spew out any old nonsense if it provided political cover for their paymasters do to the US what the looters in Iraq did to the national museum.

Re:You are soooo right!

[dlanod]

Don't let the fact that you're male stop you impersonating Hillary Clinton. After all, it hasn't stopped Hillary.