Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Senators Want Secret Warrantless Wiretap Renewal

Posted by timothy on from the hey-who-can-blame-'em? dept.

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."

41 of 198 comments (clear)

  1. And You Know They Will Get It! by Jeremiah+Cornelius · · Score: 5, Insightful

    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..."
    1. Re:And You Know They Will Get It! by somersault · · Score: 2

      Does that make Iran and North Korea member states?

      --
      which is totally what she said
    2. Re:And You Know They Will Get It! by slick7 · · Score: 2

      Welcome to the "new normal" in America, where "Citizen" is a term that is interchangeable with "Felon" or "Enemy".

      How else are the career criminal politicians going to keep tabs on the voters that hate their guts.

      --
      The mind conceives, the body achieves, the spirit manifests.
    3. Re:And You Know They Will Get It! by Compaqt · · Score: 2

      Where's Rand Paul when you need him?

      --
      I'm not a lawyer, but I play one on the Internet. Blog
    4. Re:And You Know They Will Get It! by hairyfeet · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I'm just glad my grandfather who fought against this kind of shit in WWII isn't around to witness this shit. WTH has happened to this country? When you have BOTH parties voting AGAINST the people while at the same time practically tripping over themselves to give away the future of this country to special interests for literally pennies on the dollar?

      This is why I'm making a call out to every one here at /. since WE are the geeks, the smart ones, the ones our friends and relatives and coworkers listen to I urge EVERY SINGLE ONE HERE to not only vote Green and New Whig straight down the ticket but do everything in your power to get everyone you possibly can to do so as well.

      A true multi party system is the only chance this country has short of our own Arab Spring and it is clear that BOTH the Ds and the Rs are not gonna listen to the will of the people. The New Whig Party is made of Iraq vets thinking we should get our boys home and the Greens believe in a true safety net for the poor along with affordable housing and health care, things I bet many here would support.

      So let us change the system, so that horseshit like this won't be the status quo. I'll even give out a slogan for free "A vote for a Democrat or Republican is a wasted vote" because that is EXACTLY what it is, as they no longer listen to the will of the people. So vote Whig and Green, and push everyone in your sphere of influence to do so as well. Let 2012 be a REAL case of "Hope & Change" and not just more empty slogans!

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
    5. Re:And You Know They Will Get It! by redemtionboy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      No Libertarian? Regardless, we will never have more than a two-party system until we change the election system. A pure first-past-the-post system will only support 2 parties. If you want more parties you need to eliminate primaries and move to a two-tier run off election system. All candidates are thrown in the ring for the first election, and unless one candidate gets more than 50% of the vote, the top two candidates return for a second election. This election system takes emphasis off of parties and more on the individuals running. Granted, it's not a perfect system, but it's a hell of a lot better than what we've got or a proportional representation system. If you want to see this change happen, it needs to move from the ground up, starting with city elections and moving to statewide. You must first cripple the beast before you attack it.

    6. Re:And You Know They Will Get It! by redemtionboy · · Score: 2

      It's a shame how one state can house both Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul. Hopefully the old turtle will be out of office next election. There aren't many who attempt to expand the powers of the executive branch on the level of Mitch, and we'll be better off without him.

  2. LOL! American Freedom! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    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?

    1. Re:LOL! American Freedom! by Reverand+Dave · · Score: 2

      It's true. Starting in the 80's American freedoms and liberties started taking a backseat to corporate profits. From 80-00 It was a slow decline but from 00-08 it was pretty much a raging plummet.

      --
      I got here through a series of tubes
    2. Re:LOL! American Freedom! by Nadaka · · Score: 4, Insightful

      If we don't collapse economically thanks to the US senate, there is some small hope that justice and liberty can be restored in time. America needs a valid liberal progressive party instead of the conservative democrats and regressive republicans.

    3. Re:LOL! American Freedom! by aekafan · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Hell, I think we would be much better off if we were forced to default. What most call collapse would economically force us to pull our military c**k out of the worlds ass and take care of issues at home. I cheer the coming default, which will happen no matter what Washington does, and I hope those D.C. bastards burn for it.

    4. Re:LOL! American Freedom! by TheGratefulNet · · Score: 3, Informative

      I've been listening to more and more old style folk music (pete seeger, woody guthrie, that era of true progressive lefties) and if you hear the 'fight' in their words and songs and compare to what the right calls 'liberal', you'd see that there are no liberals left in politics or in any kind of power.

      if you mention 'unionize' to most people, they look at you like you've said a naughty word. yet, 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.

      if you have not heard those old folk and freedom songs, give them a listen. look into almanac singers, the weavers, pete seeger, joan baez. they all had a deep feeling for our country and were real patriots. they'd all be extremely ashamed (those that are still living, I'm sure they are ashamed) of what the US has become. we made so much progress in the 60's, only to reverse and actually lose ground in this decade.

      we need more rebellion and more public show of dissatisfaction with our so-called leaders.

      listen to some of those old songs and put them into today's context and you'll see that we're going thru the same kinds of repression again and again. we have to fight it, again and again, too, it seems.

      --

      --
      "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
    5. Re:LOL! American Freedom! by 517714 · · Score: 2

      Dwight D. Eisenhower warned us in 1961: http://www.h-net.org/~hst306/documents/indust.html

      --
      The US government have made it clear that we have no inalienable rights; any we do not defend vigorously will be taken.
  3. That explains everything. by dgatwood · · Score: 4, Insightful

    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.

    1. Re:That explains everything. by TaoPhoenix · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I need some input from the Lawn Crowd, did it feel like this in the Watergate days? I'm getting the horrible feeling that after a nice quiet 90's with nothing but a fun little sex scandal we're seeing a whole different class of nastiness today.

      --
      My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
    2. Re:That explains everything. by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Suddenly, it makes sense why all the senators and representatives are making so much noise about the debt ceiling

      No, not really. Despite what many on slashdot think, warrantless wire-tapping isn't terribly controversial with the most of the US. Remember, the only time we hear about public discontent with the TSA is when they grope a baby or a grandmother - the bullshit constitutional smokescreen of "administrative searches" isn't even mentioned, much less questioned. No one is getting groped over the phone, so most people don't give a damn.

      I wouldn't be surprised to find that this meeting had been scheduled months in advance. But even if it wasn't, it's just opportunism to schedule it now, not the cause of the debt ceiling fiasco, just a side-effect.

      --
      When information is power, privacy is freedom.
    3. Re:That explains everything. by the+eric+conspiracy · · Score: 5, Interesting

      It was much worse in the Wategate days. You could tell Nixon was a meglomaniac who might start a nuclear war or conduct a coup d'etat to stay in power.

      Congress pretty much rallied together to rid the country of this madman.

      The current budget stuff is pretty sickening, but really is a throwback to earlier times in the republic when politics was pretty disgusting as a normal way of life. It isn't the same level of insanity as having a completely deranged President.

    4. Re:That explains everything. by Philip+K+Dickhead · · Score: 4, Informative

      I need some input from the Lawn Crowd, did it feel like this in the Watergate days? I'm getting the horrible feeling that after a nice quiet 90's with nothing but a fun little sex scandal we're seeing a whole different class of nastiness today.

      No, it wasn't like this.

      Watergate was a relatively singular event, which elicited widescale public outrage. You couldn't go anywhere without it being a topic of convesation and dispute.

      This is one of ten-thousand such outrages, perpetrated over the past decade. Like most of them, people don't know of it happening, or why it might even be wrong.

      Sleep tight, America.

      --
      "Speaking the Truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act." -- George Orwell
    5. Re:That explains everything. by TheGratefulNet · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I disagree, I don't think it was worse in the watergate days.

      the wholesale cut-out of personal freedoms - WORLD WIDE (yes, the US controls the intertubes. this is news to you? all core routers go thru US owned datacomm centers, dummy; and every one of them that is on the backbone has taps for (cough) calea use. and other things.

      watergate only fucked over the US and not really citizens, but it was mostly politicians doing the hurting to each other.

      this stuff we have now is them doing it to US.

      far, far worse for us all. its the sell-out of privacy, in official terms!

      and yes, I was around in the nixon days; as a child but still was very aware of the tv coverage and even what we were discussing in school. it was still ok to discuss current events in school, back then.

      --

      --
      "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
    6. Re:That explains everything. by TheGratefulNet · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I hated nixon. of course.

      but I still see that as limited damage compared to world-wide surveillance that now passes as 'ok'.

      not only is there more spying, but it feels a lot less 'free', now, than it did back then. just in general. we always talked about 'the russians' and how they were a 'papers please' kind of society and government. but today, them is us! the things we held up as differentiating are no longer. I see that much, much worse.

      --

      --
      "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
    7. Re:That explains everything. by littlewink · · Score: 2

      It is far, far worse today. The Watergate scandal was clearly limited to the executive branch of government and to a handful of men in the President's innermost circle. The danger to our democracy was clearly limited. There was no danger of a war.

      Today we have tens of thousands of employees with secret and top secret security clearances (and I doubt the validity of their background checks also) who are monitoring, following, performing "sneak and peek" operations on U.S. citizens not in the pursuit of terrorist activities as the law specifies but instead for any activity whatsoever . The decision whether to monitor or not is made by an agent, not by a judge. Although approval is given by FISA "judges", they are a rubber-stamp mechanism: I know of no refusal of a request to monitor by a FISA judge. "Judicial" approval is given after the monitoring begins anyway.

      The U.S.A. is now a Stasi state with monitoring capability that the Stasi could only dream of: voice-recognition technology combined with AI narrative-comprehension software plus real-time processing and archiving brings us the world of the novel 1984 in 2011. Privacy now exists only in your mind.

      Can anyone show, is anyone concerned, that some of the capture information is misused? Since NSA captures all of Goldman Sachs e-mails, phone calls, faxes, cables, wires, and cellphones, then can anyone assure me that there is not someone in NSA taking financial advantage of what they monitor? Or passing that information to an outside party? The financial information monitored is worth trillions. The social information monitored can bring down candidates, be used to blackmail politicians, attorneys, and company and government officials.

      We need to tear down the domestic intelligence operations just as badly as we need to bring deficits under control. In fact, the former is far more dangerous to a free nation than debt.

  4. Which Senators was in the secret meeting? by Svartalf · · Score: 2

    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
    1. Re:Which Senators was in the secret meeting? by nschubach · · Score: 5, Informative

      FTA:

              Dianne Feinstein, California (chair)
              Saxby Chambliss, Georgia (vice chair)
              John D. Rockefeller IV, West Virginia
              Olympia J. Snowe, Maine
              Ron Wyden, Oregon
              Richard Burr, North Carolina
              Barbara A. Mikulski, Maryland
              James Risch, Idaho
              Bill Nelson, Florida
              Daniel Coats, Indiana
              Kent Conrad, North Dakota
              Roy Blunt, Missouri
              Mark Udall, Colorado
              Marco Rubio, Florida
              Mark Warner, Virginia

      --
      Every time I start to have faith in humanity, I ruin it by driving to work between 7 and 8 am.
    2. Re:Which Senators was in the secret meeting? by somersault · · Score: 4, Funny

      Not all of them support the warrantless wiretaps

      [secret citation needed]

      --
      which is totally what she said
    3. Re:Which Senators was in the secret meeting? by Doctor_Jest · · Score: 2

      At least one "For the People" caucus asspile (Feinstein) is for it... because she's the chair. She also hates the 2nd Amendment... Freedom of Speech (If someone wants to call a gay person a fanny bandit, goddamnit, he should have the right to do so...) :)

      But then again, she's a Senator... that means she's more out of touch than Helen Keller on acid.

      --
      It's the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.
    4. Re:Which Senators was in the secret meeting? by Jafafa+Hots · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Seeing as warrantless wiretapping is clearly unconstitutional, it's thoroughly inappropriate to be doing it at all.

      --
      This space available.
    5. Re:Which Senators was in the secret meeting? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      TFA good enough for you? No one reads it, so it might as well be secret :P

      Anyway, it singles out Wyden and Udall as opposing the wiretaps, and there could be others too, since that list just consists of everyone on the committee.

    6. Re:Which Senators was in the secret meeting? by TheGratefulNet · · Score: 2

      Warrantless wiretapping for national security purposes has been found Constitutional by courts repeatedly.

      hands up, all here, who consider this an example of 'people giving themselves power'.

      yeah, the government assigns itself a lot of self-importance and overrides the rights and will of the people.

      well, color ME surprised!

      --

      --
      "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
    7. Re:Which Senators was in the secret meeting? by Bob+the+Super+Hamste · · Score: 2

      The "Christmas tree bomber" incident in Oregon is a really piss poor example to use since it was the suspects own father who turned the suspect over to the FBI who decided that they would use him as a patsy and provide him with the support and materials needed. Now granted they provided defective materials and incompentent support but they just kept stringing the suspect along instead of stopping it there. They then arrested the suspect with his defective bomb, provided by the US government, and wow now we have some great PR since he had a bomb and was going to a public event. Same thing with "Operation Fast and Furious" but that one appears to have failed miserably.

      --
      Time to offend someone
  5. FTFY by Hatta · · Score: 4, Insightful

    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!
    1. Re:FTFY by Hatta · · Score: 2

      Nonsense. The Supreme Court is composed of fallible (and corruptible) human beings. If you believe in the rule of law, and not men, they cannot simply change the constitution by disregarding what the constitution actually says. When the Supreme Court fails in their obligation to uphold the constitution, it doesn't make unconstitutional acts constitutional, it makes the US government illegitimate.

      --
      Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
  6. Awful, by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    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.

  7. ugh... by pak9rabid · · Score: 2

    Fuck Congress and their contempt for the common man.

    1. Re:ugh... by TheGratefulNet · · Score: 3, Interesting

      sigh.

      its not about ballot box; that obviously does not work.

      its not about soap box; they don't listen to us.

      its not about ammo box; their guns are bigger than ours

      you know what its about? IGNORE THEIR SO-CALLED LAWS.

      they ask for it and so we give it to them. they have ruined the respect of the rule of law; so we are not obligated to follow their made-up bullshit laws.

      yes, you risk 'problems' in life; but so did so many patriots in our past. be patriotic and IGNORE CONGRESS' LAWS.

      we already ignore the copyright bullshit. we copy things 'right', actually (lol), but we don't follow bullshit made-up laws.

      civil disobedience: we have a long history of it. its needed, now, folks.

      --

      --
      "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
    2. Re:ugh... by FiloEleven · · Score: 2

      Civil disobedience is not ignoring the law. Civil disobedience is flagrantly and publicly violating the law with the full knowledge of and the willingness to accept the consequences of doing so. This is why demonstrations are most often done en masse--one guy publicly violating the law is a nutjob or a nuisance; several hundred create a spectacle that is much harder to ignore, strengthening the demonstrators' chances to land in the spotlight and hopefully find widespread support for their cause.

      Don't kid yourself into thinking that downloading stuff for free that you must legally pay for is an act of civil disobedience. It isn't. It is only ignoring the law. For it to become civil disobedience you would have to sit with your laptop on the courthouse steps with a sign saying, "I am downloading MGM's entire library and not paying them one red cent," preferably in the company of a few dozen others doing the same thing.

      --
      Your brain is not a computer.
    3. Re:ugh... by artor3 · · Score: 2

      Civil disobedience is a great way to effect change, it's true, but it really can't be applied to warrantless wiretapping. Hell, for us to "ignore" their laws about wiretaps is exactly what they want.

      If you want to change this, you need to vote for the most liberal candidate in every election. For the purposes of this post, I'm talking about liberal in terms of civil liberties. Don't worry about their views on economics or foreign policy or whatever, if your main concern is civil rights. Usually, there aren't any that are actually liberal. Don't make the mistake of thinking Democrat = liberal... with few exceptions, Democrats these days are far to the right of Republicans from a few decades ago. But vote for the candidate furthest to the left, and start dragging the overton window back to the realm of sanity.

      The forces that be rely on your apathy to allow them to keep dragging the window further and further into fascist territory. They expect you to get tired and depressed and give up. Don't.

      Don't expect results in the next twenty or thirty years. It took decades to corrupt the government this far, and it will take decades to fix. It may not even happen in your lifetime. But if you don't fight at every opportunity, it will continue to get worse indefinitely.

    4. Re:ugh... by bky1701 · · Score: 2

      He practically founded the movement during the last election, and his son is its current ringleader. The guy doesn't care about personal rights. Not one bit. Look at his stances on abortion and gay rights if you really want to know. He has a lot of rhetoric about leaving things to the states, but ultimately that means repealing the few protections that the federal government gives citizens, and letting states like Arizona implement whatever unconstitutional laws they like. Balkanization of the US, which has been a fairly stable republic since the civil war, isn't a noble or liberal goal in any sense.

      This is coming from someone who actually supported Ron Paul, until the Tea Party arose and I saw what him and his kin actually support. No more. I am a party-line Democrat until the Republicans show they actually care about anyone other than the christian elite.

      --
      Great Intellect...
  8. Email your Senators today by StillNeedMoreCoffee · · Score: 2

    Let then know this is not slipping under the wire. Email the President as well. Calls are good too.

  9. Phone Hacking by TheBiGW · · Score: 2

    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.
  10. Re:Mod parent up by redemtionboy · · Score: 3, Interesting

    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.

  11. Dear US government: by cbope · · Score: 2

    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?