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Senators Want Secret Warrantless Wiretap Renewal
An anonymous reader writes "A group of Senators are meeting in secret today, while most people are focused on the 'debt ceiling' issue, in order to try to rush through a renewal of the FISA Amendments Act, which expressly allowed warrantless wiretapping in the U.S. The law isn't set to expire until next year, but some feel that the debt ceiling crisis is a good distraction to pass the extension without having to debate the issue in public. The meeting is being held in secret, but it's not classified, so people can demand to know how their Senator voted."
Welcome to the "new normal" in America, where "Citizen" is a term that is interchangeable with "Felon" or "Enemy".
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
At least one lawmaker from Colorado wanted a provision like this that was in the Patriot Act taken out.
LOL! Is this the "American Freedom" we secretly heard so much about when I was a youth growing up in Hungary during the Cold War?
Suddenly, it makes sense why all the senators and representatives are making so much noise about the debt ceiling instead of just voting to fix what should have been a relatively minor and uncontentious issue. To paraphrase Douglas Adams, the purpose of government is not to wield power, but to distract attention away from it.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
It's thoroughly inappropriate to be doing things like this in secret.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
in order to try to rush through a renewal of the FISA Amendments Act, which unconstitutionally allowed warrantless wiretapping in the U.S.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
warrantless anything is wrong and such acts should be punished for attempting, people should be burning with anger about this subject! Thanks for the info slashdot.
Welcome to America's Coward Politicians. Do not have the ballz to face the public on matters like this.
But, can stuff their pockets with money from Special Interest groups. I wonder how much money is "contracted" to AT&T to maintain the data collection tap for the federal government?
"A group of Senators are meeting in secret today, ".
Then why is the story on Slashdot?
Your first premise is wrong. There is NO U.S.A. It has collapsed. Your criminals-in-CONgress have simply decided NOT to
announce the collapse.
Yours In Krasnoyarsk,
K. Trout
I wonder if they cut the budget here. I'm neither a Democrat nor a Republican. We really need to work whatever powers we can away from big brother and with all haste. We need smaller government on several levels and if we don't get to it soon we never will.
You are all suspected terrorists. Where is that phone number for the local FBI office...
Fuck Congress and their contempt for the common man.
Anyone assassinated any of these senators yet for treason? I'm sure a jury of peers would find someone not guilty in doing so. Not that I'm advbo
Hiya.
Thank you for confirming that I am not a Tin Foil Hat for thinking this stuff is accelerating.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Please send all comments to 127.0.0.1.
THIS IS NOT A SECRET MEETING!!!
Yes, it's a closed meeting, but closed and secret imply two different things! Think, for just a second, about the response you would have to learning that courtroom was closed during a trial--in my case, it would be "that's interesting". On the other hand, consider how you would respond to learning that someone had been tried in secret--everyone should be outraged by this possibility.
I am decidedly against the FISA Amendments Act, but come on ! This kind of ridiculous FUD is more in line with what I expect from proponents of the act. It is a publicly scheduled meeting, even if it is closed to the public, of the Senate Intelligence Committee, not some back-room deal brokering by shadowy players. Take a chill pill, and join me in the fight against FUD in all its incarnations, not just the ones you disagree with.
You need to get these Washington weasels out of office, out of power and freeze the debt ceiling so there is no money for DHS, TSA and all the other 3- and 4- letter agencies that waste money and the Congress with its snout so deeply in the trough that Jefferson must be spinning in his grave.
Its the proof America is a failed state if the people wont stand together and tell them no.
I hate you.
A unique way to learn a language: http://languageloom.com
Let then know this is not slipping under the wire. Email the President as well. Calls are good too.
At the Legion of Doom...
Read The Shock Doctrine . Then weep. Then vote for anyone other than Republicans or Democrats.
"Never let a serious crisis go to waste. What I mean by that is it's an opportunity to do things you couldn't do before."
- Former White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel
They way things are going it doesn't make you a Tin Foil Hat to believe in this stuff, it just means you're paying attention. :/
Frame the NSA for wiretapping senators on the intelligence committee.
Wait... was that was in V for Vandetta? Damnit.
Default is not inevitable, we can balance the budget, but if we only do a short term debt limit increase the US AAA rating will drop and cost the US another 100 billion a year in interest, making it that much harder to balance the budget in the future. That is what Obama is trying to do. The republicans in the senate are holding our govornment hostage and their only offer is an extra trillion dollars in debt over the next 10 years.
Unfortunately, most voters in the States don't read the news, and a significant portion of those who do are the oh-well-I-dont-want-to-make-a-fuss type. Besides, Senators get reelected 90% of the time thanks to the magic of gerrymandering.
why? Ron Wyden is AGAINST warrentless wiretapping..I'll keep voting for him again and again. Not everyone on that list is for warrentless wiretapping. Ron Wyden has been fairly consistent in showing common sense.
Wyden to Oppose Cloture for Wiretapping Bill
http://wyden.senate.gov/newsroom/press/release/?id=627881b6-e9a2-417d-b140-b78fcd9640f9
Patriot Act- Congress Shouldn't Rush to Judgment (Again)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sen-ron-wyden/patriot-act-congress-shou_b_336504.html
How Can Congress Debate a Secret Law?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sen-ron-wyden/how-can-congress-debate-a_b_866920.html
Pick the worst thing they could vote for and double it. They will then justify the vote by saying it will have the exactly opposite effect from the one it really will have.
ever since the berlin wall....
Default IS inevitable, that's the point. Our only hope is massive cuts that Obama won't do in time to not default.
So that leaves us with a simple option: do we default NOW, before the debt gets WORSE, or do we default later, after owing EVEN MORE?
This is a no-brainer: we default NOW, and start working on fixing our financial problems NOW. Increasing the debt ceiling just puts off the inevitable default until later.
It WILL come. It's only a question of WHEN, and how BAD the problem will be.
After all of the shit-talking his supporters did against Bush, over this very issue, you mean to tell me that President Chocolate Jesus wants to keep this outrage around?
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Is a warrant really that hard to get? My local police station is now getting them for DUI suspects that refuse testing.
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How can they back a bill like this whilst simultaneously the Phone Hacking scandal continues unabated? Isn't this exactly the same thing, only on a grander scale?
Build a man a fire and he'll be warm for an hour. Set him on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.
If you believe Obama is actually trying to balance the budget, then all you need to do is look at what his plan actually entails to think otherwise. The same goes for Boener's plan. Both add over $7 Trillion in new debt over the next 10 years and spending levels continue to rise. If they were actually interested in balancing the budget, the would put us on a path to reduce spending and actually balance the budget, but all this is is a bunch of smoke and mirrors to make us think they're doing the right thing. In reality, all they're doing is continuing to expand the power of the federal government, the executive branch in particular. We need to return to Clinton administration levels of spending, adjusted for inflation of course. We can't keep the Obushma empire going.
1984 is NOT an instruction manual.
Seriously, I'm actually reading 1984 again, and the parallels are scary to what has been going on in the US post-9/11. And to imagine that Orwell came up with this in the late 40's and it's mirrored in today's USA, is literally unbelievable.
How much longer do you let this continue?
With you 100%, but it should be noted we're not that far off from Clinton levels of spending and will more or less reach it once we wind down our two land wars in Asia. We've cratered revenues, however. If we returned taxes to Clinton levels, we would have a small enough deficit that Republicans would be back to calling for tax cuts to prevent a surplus, instead of tax cuts for whatever reason they give now.
I'm pretty sure the act in question allows for temporary warrentless wiretap, IE "This is a time critical mission and we don't have time to get one but we still have to get one immediately afterwards".
The US really needs to stop thinking that it has to be the worlds police force and pull its troops out of places that it doesn't really need them. Iraq for one (let the new democratically elected government of Iraq decide what sort of military Iraq needs to defend itself).
Get out of Europe altogether (the cold war is over and the threat of the Russians are going to send fleets of tanks west is long gone and that's assuming they actually have any armies left after the collapse of their military)
Pull all the covert guys (including CIA and special forces) out of South America and stop trying to topple or influence governments in the region (be they democratic or otherwise)
Get out of Japan (the Japanese are unlikely to attack America again, not when the Americans spend so much money on Japanese electronics, automobiles and other products)
Stop spending so much money on expensive new toys like the F35 Lightning Joint Strike Fighter and start spending money on the kind of operations required to get intel on the bad guys, especially the terrorists. Stop spending money on ever more data collection (including tapping every phone and internet connection in the known world and dumping the contents of every storage device that passes through a US point of entry) and spend money on paying gurus to analyze the data to find the good bits.
You dont beat terrorists by shooting at them with Sidewinder missiles, you beat them by finding where they are through good intel and blowing up their camp with a few artillery pieces or bazookas.
You dont beat IEDs with massive radar installations that make radio telescopes look small, you beat IEDs with detector dogs, guys carrying metal detectors, bomb detection robots and bomb squad teams.
Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.
- Mark Twain
Conspiracy theories are nuts, but we really have to agree there are conspiracy facts: people with higher power will always try to conspire against any other people, it always seem to happen that way. There are no conspiracy theories, but it's just a fact that there as so many examples out there where politics is just a tool to fuck up citizens. I'm wondering how the hell those guys can do this hit without even alarming citizen. I think we have come to be 99% sheeps who will not question or not worry about this, 0.5% turning crazy because of knowing this, and 0.5% being the actual elite who fuck up everybody.
It's worse now.
During the sixties, the rebellious kids were from prosperous families, attended collages where the teachers had gone to school to avoid the draft and the distributed ownership of the media put anti war protests on T.V. every night.
Today, ten percent of the population collects 50% of the profits from the economy - a classic misalignment of rewards for work - similar to the ratios seen in feudal times, the royals vs. the peasants.
Rich families think long term. Look up 'neo con' for insights about how a few can control the mass of peasants by instilling fear of 'the boogerman' in the populace.
The consolidation of the media in the hands of a few pricks like Murdock means grass roots protests - ie: 1600 anti war protestors every month at Notre Dame in Indiana of all places, - never make it into the local much less national news.
Selling guns rather than butter is an easier contract to sell than a viable product to less wealthy folks.
We could have rebuilt every school in the country for the cost of the Iraq fiasco.
The politicians gave one years gross national product to their drinking buddies the bankers via bailout tricks.
Courts allow cameras to convict rather than adhering to our right to be confronted by the eye witness accuser.
Prisons and jails are run by rich guy owned corporations - these jails pay huge payrolls to YOUR local cops, who are thus beholden to those rich folks.
The rich pay 15% on capital gains, including profits from their private corporations owned by a doctor's or lawyer's office, factory owner's and stock holder's while the rest pay closer to 40% overall.
Exxon had 40% greater profits than the previous year plus the military burns a lot of fuel chasing the camel jockeys!
The problem is the under educated peasants drinking the Kool-Aid and believing the 'rich guy's line' about some outsider being a threat - this keeps the poor whites suspicious of the blacks, the Hispanics competing with the Chinese and the middle class feeling the pressure of the poor attempting to get enough resources to survive.
Barley literate U.S. citizens (ie: the U.S. has a 40% high school drop out rate) are so stupid they vote these rich guy puppet politicians into office based on fear of outsiders while being butt rapped by their 'betters - the rich' over and over again.
Rashama
Nice try. Protip: if you want to troll people, don't contradict yourself so much.
... that bitching on here isn't going to change a damned thing, right?
Don't forget the War on Drugs and the expansion of the ATF. Waco and Ruby Ridge weren't about corporate profits.
I notice how carefully you selected your beginning and supposed end dates for the plummet. It's still plummeting under Obama. He doesn't get a pass. If you believed his "hope and change" rhetoric during the campaign, you were gullible. If you still believe it you're just an idiot.
ah, this group is lead by Dianne Feinstein.
No surprise. Thanks a lot California for not voting her out of office years ago. Ugh.
He warned us about how parties would lead to the current situation in 1796.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Washington's_Farewell_Address
Complain about it on the internet and don't actually do anything.
Works every time.
I keep hearing about gay rights, but I still don't see any violations.
The constitution works like this. When congress passes a law that contradicts the constitution, and the executive uses that law to deny a citizen of some right... the court is supposed to overturn the law. Sometimes it's drawn out and frustrating, but in time the constitution wins. Eventually Judges will be born that weren't so spooked by 09/11 that they need a big strong police state to make them feel safe.
Is go to an EXISTING union, & ask for sponsorship. My father was a UAW union president & he told me the "ins-N-outs/mechanics" of how a NEW UNION gets started... that's pretty much it, according to he @ least (no labor expert here, always been "white collar" pretty much, though there HAVE been those times I was not of course).
* Personally, even though I have been MOSTLY "white collar" salaried in this field of computing? Well - I am ALL for someone starting up a "United Information Systems" workers union though... by ALL means.
(To be honest about it though? I'm afraid for work prospects IF I were to go & start one... the "infamous they" say that "blacklists" are against the law, but... face it - they DO exist, laws be damned!)
APK
P.S.=> This is the part of what you said that "got to me" & made me read your post in its entirety (because it IS truth):
"many decades ago (but less than a century) we *needed* the union movement to balance the power that the corporations had. it worked and we got 5 day work weeks. now, likely, you and I are in software or technology and we say "WHAT 5 day work week?". exactly. which is why we need unions for software and technology-based workers; and all businesses where the overly-powerful corporations get to dictate, essentually unquestioned, what we do, how we get paid and even IF we get fulltime benefits (healthcare, etc). if we had a progressive party or even members of left in the government, we'd see more balance. we might see worker rights increase instead of steadily decrease." - by TheGratefulNet (143330) on Thursday July 28, @11:13PM (#36917278)
What I've seen is THAT, almost to a tee, pretty much... & who gets the "bonuses & raises" (huge ones too)? Well... you know - the "leadership" that mostly hasn't even DONE THE JOB THEMSELVES, & yet they reap not only the "glory" in traderags, but also in paychecks + bonuses & "golden parachutes" etc./et al...
Yes, it's time for a change!
Simply because you CANNOT HAVE AN "ECONOMY" (let alone a successful growing & balanced one) with only the "1%-ers" who have 90% of the nation's wealth, & the majority of consumers with "hand-to-mouth" pay that only satisfies immediates (housing, utilities, & food, etc.) - disposable income on the part of the MAJORITY is necessary, & the majority IS the disintegrating "middle class" & lower income brackets also...
You'd *THINK* these maniacs @ the wheel now would understand that much "basic economics 101", & I think they do, because a child can pretty much... however, they are NOT running things - the "wealthy" are, & they have what I call a "virus of the spirit" (greed), & there is NEVER "enough" for them... & that's the MAJOR part of the problem!
I think it was Gov. Hughie Long who said:
"Go on, eat rich man - take all you want, but leave some for the rest of us"
He had it right... but, like most great men who DO "do well by others" (their constituencies)? They get smoked... JFK was another example thereof. This shit has to stop... somewhere, sometime, or things will really screw up!
Whatever happened to the wealthy that KNEW they were the "pillars of society" & from THEY, real change, effective change, took place... top-down? I see Mr. Bill Gates (King Billy as I call him out of respect) doing good things or trying to in education, but I can't really recall any others doing so!
... apk
That's actually not even remotely true. While yes, the wars are significant adding to our budget, we have significantly increased spending across the board. In 2000, we spent $1.77 trillion, 18.2% of GDP with a deficit of $0.04 trillion. Our 2011 budget is $3.83 trillion, 26% of GDP, with a deficit of $1.65 trillion. Adjusting the 2000 budget of $1.77 trillion to 2010 dollars would result in $2.22 trillion or $1.61 trillion less than we're currently spending. If we used the last Clinton budget and adjusted it for inflation, we'd have a deficit of $0.4 trillion in a year where tax revenues are at a relatively low level. So, not even close. Eliminating the entire military budget still lives us with a massive deficit, so we can't just blame this on the wars.
Warrantless wiretaps, yet another violation of our rights. Add it to the list of gov’t violations of our rights:
They violate the 1st Amendment by placing protesters in cages, banning books like “America Deceived II” and censoring the internet.
They violate the 2nd Amendment by confiscating guns.
They violate the 4th and 5th Amendment by molesting airline passengers.
They violate the entire Constitution by starting undeclared wars for foreign countries.
Impeach Obama, vote for Ron Paul.
(Last link of Banned Book):
http://www.iuniverse.com/Bookstore/BookDetail.aspx?BookId=SKU-000190526
Unless you plan to do something about it this time... It is the same ole BS they passed before. Nothing different except for the date, and the public did not do a thing but sit on their ass and twiddle their thumbs and watch the movie stars on the tv. The public doesn't care? I can't speak for all of them, but yes they had a rally about this, and you could count the attendants on your hands. The sorry good for nothing media didn't even cover it. They would lots rather cover BS on entertainers.
Here are my thoughts (on a couple brews, because it's Friday & because I felt like calming down because @ this point due to what I see around me lately & in the news)
Well... Man! I hate to say it, but... I think, finally, we MAY be "in trouble" in the USA, economically/financially - which IS going to "hit" everyone no matter WHO YOU ARE):
"I do believe there are blacklists." - by TheGratefulNet (143330) on Friday July 29, @05:09PM (#36927320)
Oh, that one I can answer - recruiters keep them. They don't publicize it, or they'd get fried, but they do... trust me on THAT much (from the inside I know)... after all - you are NOT the person they make coins from, though you'd *think so* possibly... it's the hirers that pay them typically (on contract, after 5-6 months, they get a payoff out of you etc., usually).
---
"I suspect I'm on one; more than one, I would even wager." - " - by TheGratefulNet (143330) on Friday July 29, @05:09PM (#36927320)
A pity... I've read your stuff here the past few months, & you seem to be a geniunely knowledgeable computer fiend as I call that type... but, IF you don't "play the game" by the "rules" (most men lead lives of silent desperation, etc.)?? You get "phased-out" man... it's really always been thus.
---
"and I believe everyone that 'stirs up trouble' will find that the jobs and offers kind of dry up, slowly over time." - " - by TheGratefulNet (143330) on Friday July 29, @05:09PM (#36927320)
Want to know HOW to "beat that game"? Save your coins, & I mean live REALLY LOW when you get a GOOD job (few & FAR between nowadays), & buy real-estate!
Rental incomes (especially off multiple properties) will keep you alive thru the "lean times", everytime... it's no big secret & real-estate folks call it being "an OWNER".
(It works! People, no matter WHO they are? Need a place to live... you as "the owner", always win!)
* Think about it as a "future reference" good piece of advice in fact... worked for me, but took ages for it to happen!
---
"It sucks. yes, it certainly does. when I run out of money, I'll be on the street (or something equally worse). and I guess at that point when I have nothing left, I'll be thinking in even more extreme terms." - by TheGratefulNet (143330) on Friday July 29, @05:09PM (#36927320)
No, don't think of yourself that way, & try to stay "positive"... again, I've read your writings here for a while now, but I rarely comment on them (sorry). You seem to be sensible enough, & knowledgeable enough, to get a job in the art & sciences of computing imo.
Yes, sometimes, it may NOT be "what you expected" or "what you are really worth" but... I think that you know your stuff well enough to get by until something better comes along!
(Keep your chin up, because where your head goes, your ass follows... it's VERY important!)
---
"if the 'job creators' (yeah, that's the new euphemism for 'rich republican motherfuckers') want to keep people in their place, they at least have to ensure they still have *income* or else there WILL be riots in the streets." - by TheGratefulNet (143330) on Friday July 29, @05:09PM (#36927320)
Yea, probably... like anyone? Self-preservation is KEY/PARAMOUNT/ #1, of course... & perhaps, JUST PERHAPS?? They think they are "right" (this is a real "stickler" imo, & what I tried to explain to my little niece the other nite about the film "X-Men 1st class"):
She asked me during the film:
"Who are the bad guys? Is it Magneto, is it Shaw, or is it Professor X not seeing how things really are??"
I told her this:
"They're ALL 'right' from their OWN point-of-view, & based on their own life experiences... each one believes 'he is right/correct'"
(I hope that came out ok, & you "catch
When I first saw this headline I thought it said "Senators Want Secret Warrantless Wiretap REMOVAL" and I was truly shocked...
But then I saw it was RENEWAL and realized that nothing had actually changed...