Whistleblower: NSA Has All of Your Email

mspohr writes with this excerpt from Democracy Now!: "National Security Agency whistleblower William Binney reveals he believes domestic surveillance has become more expansive under President Obama than President George W. Bush. He estimates the NSA has assembled 20 trillion 'transactions' — phone calls, emails and other forms of data — from Americans. This likely includes copies of almost all of the emails sent and received from most people living in the United States. Binney talks about Section 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act and challenges NSA Director Keith Alexander's assertion that the NSA is not intercepting information about U.S. citizens." The parts about National Security Letters in particular are chilling, even though the issue is not new.

Comments

anyone surprised?

[stoolpigeon]

if someone is - that would be shocking.

Re:anyone surprised?

[stoolpigeon]

I think the whole Bush/Obama thing is a total distraction - and it works for too many people. It's unfortunate it is in the summary because as I see it what is happening is the that the government is travelling further down the same path - regardless of which party controls which branch. The idea that Obama is better or worse is meaningless, by and large they are exactly the same. And if somehow Romney were to beat Obama in the next election, the largest difference would be the switch in which group was defending and which was attacking the administration -- over the very same actions.

Re:anyone surprised?

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

The mission was over. Saddam is dead.

The Iraq war goal was filled. We're still in Afghanistan. Why?

The truth is, our country has its own "business" that is seperate of who is in office. The puppet in office maintains the gov's business and rarely changes course. Obama said he would close Gitmo. It's still open.

Obama said he would give us a public option... he lied.

Republicans play to the religious crazy people. Democrats play to the sane people... the result is the same. Corporations and power rule all, and the policies created have nothing to do with the voters.

Re:anyone surprised?

[Alomex]

Obama is a disaster.

You have a rather curious definition of a disaster. Obama inherited a country at war (make that two wars) and in the worst depression since 1929, yet he has seemingly safely delivered us to the other side: the economy is picking up, we are out of Iraq and bin Laden is dead, all while battling a congress hell bent in destroying any and every action he wished to take.

If that is a disaster, then Bush must be the apocalypse.

Re:anyone surprised?

[Alan R Light]

Um, Obama only got out because the government of Iraq insisted we get out, and seeing as the US ostensibly invaded Iraq to give the Iraqis self-government, Obama couldn't very well dispute the wishes of that government. I don't give a whole lot of credit to Bush or Obama on that count.

Re:anyone surprised?

[Alomex]

If you cannot see the flaw in Ron Paul's simplistic solutions I don't know what to say.

"For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong. ---Henry Louis Mencken

Re:anyone surprised?

[anagama]

Bush went to war against Iraq, Obama got us out. Can you see the wee-bit of difference there? I can and I'm voting for Obama.

This notion you have is so misinformed it's appalling.

Obama did not leave, Obama got booted. Dec. 2011 marked the end of the Status of Forces Agreement negotiated by GWB. SOFA prevented the Iraqi government from local prosecution of US troops for crimes committed in Iraq. Prior to the expiration of SOFA, Obama tried to get it extended so that the troops could stay longer and avoid any risk of prosecution. Obama failed in those negotiations, in large part because the war crimes confirmed in the WikiLeaks cache, made it politically impossible for Iraqi politicians to extend SOFA.

In other words, you are giving Obama credit for ending the war in Iraq when he tried to EXTEND it. To put this in Slashdot car analogy form, that's like giving a drunk driver accolades for not killing anyone while driving home, despite being blitzed and despite intentionally swerving at oncoming traffic. That's not laudable, it's despicable even if the drunk accidentally missed everyone.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/26/obama-iraq_n_1032507.html

Finally, if Bradley Manning was the source behind the wikileaks cache, rather than the torture and persecution he is receiving under Obama, he should get a fucking Nobel because it is HE who got us out of Iraq.

http://www.salon.com/2011/10/23/wikileaks_cables_and_the_iraq_war/singleton/

If you're going to vote for Obama, and you really believe he's some sort of peace loving socialist, consider some of the issues here: http://nothingchanged.org/

Re:anyone surprised?

[anagama]

That's unmitigated bullshit.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/miles-mogulescu/ny-times-reporter-confirm_b_500999.html

This should be big news. Even while President Obama was saying that he thought a public option was a good idea and encouraging supporters to believe his healthcare plan would include one, he had promised for-profit hospital lobbyists that there would be no public option in the final bill.

As for Gitmo -- he's the commander in chief. That leaves two options: he's too weak to be president, or he lied in his campaign. Neither option is really all that awesome.

Re:anyone surprised?

[stoolpigeon]

I'm having trouble tracking down good numbers on over all 'troops on the ground' numbers - but it looks like you are right that over all numbers are dropping, especially in the last year to two years.

I still have concerns about our activity that extends well beyond the number of troops deployed. I wonder to what extent this reflects the ability to automate warfare and leave key actions to elite units. Our drone attack activity is way up - but of course this can't be compared to the past as the ability itself has been growing.

I hope you are correct that this points to a substantial difference in long term US policy but I (as is obvious) am very skeptical. I think it's unfair to say that under McCain that the same reductions could not have happened. And it's difficult to judge this based on politicians reactions to what Obama has done- and this strikes to the heart of my concern. Republicans attack Obama no matter what he does - not because of the action itself but because they want to try and see their party gain advantage. Democrats do the same. If a Republican President were dropping hell-fires all over the middle east, there would be some Dems plenty wound up.

They can't argue over substance because there isn't enough there. They are beholden to the same limited set of money brokers. So it's all flash and theater with personal profit as the ultimate goal.

Right now I don't live in the US. I've had the opportunity the last year to get a closer view of politics in another country. It pretty much looks the same. I see this as a part of the human condition. And so I don't think we can say it's the recent crop that are the problem, we need to look at building and improving systems to reign in this natural tendency towards corruption.

Right now I'd probably vote for Obama too - but only in the sense that it feels like a slightly lesser of the evils.

Re:anyone surprised?

[Zibodiz]

The thing that always bothers me is how people defend BO by comparing him to Bush. You're absolutely right, Bush was an apocalyptic failure. And so is Obama. And so will every president be, who is more concerned with politics or favors than he is with rights (personal, state, foreign international, and any other.)

Just my $.02 as a Libertarian.

Re:anyone surprised?

[Anonymous Coward]

Right now I'd probably vote for Obama too - but only in the sense that it feels like a slightly lesser of the evils.

Vote for a third party or bust. Anything else is in itself evil.

Re:anyone surprised?

[Anonymous Coward]

Or third option: he did try to close it but Congress vetoed the plan to close Gitmo without letting the terrorist loose.

There are three branches in our government and one can often estop the other, Commander-in-Chief or not.

Re:anyone surprised?

[binarylarry]

looks like we're at 150k total as of december 2011 (why didn't you mention that?)

Re:anyone surprised?

[SteveFoerster]

I've never understood this mentality. Your vote is mind-bogglingly unlikely to make the difference either way. What exactly do you have to lose by actually voting for the candidate you like the best?

i hope...

[ks9208661]

... they got all the spam as well.

Good...

[CrazyDuke]

Then they should have all those missing White House emails. ...oh, wait...

Just BCC customercare@nsa.gov on all emails

[trout007]

Save the taxpayers' money.

Protest, Send your Rep Everything

[arthurpaliden]

Protest like they did in Canada. Send the Ministers and your government representatives including the White House everything. For days they CCed them on every email, posted what they are doing to their members twitter accounts. After several days of having the Parliamentary mail and web servers taken to their knees the bill they were trying to introduce was 'sent to committee' (killed). People can make a difference