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NSA Surveillance Heat Map: NSA Lied To Congress
anagama writes "NSA officials have repeatedly denied under oath to Congress that even producing an estimate of the number of Americans caught up in its surveillance is impossible. Leaked screenshots of an NSA application that does exactly that, prove that the NSA flat out lied (surprise). Glenn Greenwald continues his relentless attacks with another bombshell this time exposing Boundless Informant. Interestingly, the NSA spies more on America than China according to the heat map. Representative Wyden had sought amendments to FISA reauthorization bill that would have required the NSA to provide information like this (hence the NSA's lies), but Obama and Feinstein demanded a pure reauthorization of FISA, which they got at the end of 2012." And if you don't mind that you might have your name on yet another special list, you might enjoy this Twitter-based take on the ongoing news.
Absolutely nothing to nobody.
The United States of Apathy.
I hope you americans now realize what you let happen.
Inaction is no worse than active support.
Interestingly, the NSA spies more on America than China according to the heat map
I thought my eyes had fooled me, and I ended up re-read that sentence 5 times ...
What the fuck is going on ?
Did we elect the WRONG president ?
Yeah, but c'mon guys, he didn't lie about anything IMPORTANT. Like, y'know, whether he fucked or just fingered an intern...
"She [NSA spokesperson] added: "The continued publication of these allegations about highly classified issues, and other information taken out of context, makes it impossible to conduct a reasonable discussion on the merits of these programs.""
Oh. Oh really? Well, that's really a shame, given that you should have conducted a reasonable discussion on the merits of these programs BEFORE implementing them!
People might even be okay with these programs depending upon the nature of what's being done and the rationale for it. People already accept things such as the need for police to conduct wiretaps if the case is good enough for a judge to issue a warrant. But we're in a democracy. If you don't even talk to the people about this kind of widespread sweep, and get feedback on whether it is acceptable to them or not, then of course they're fricking angry when they find out how far you've gone without consulting them. This thing has long been suspected by plenty of people. It's not a big surprise. But why the hell are you surprised that it's a freaking mess to try to sort things out after the fact becomes official? I mean, I know the "act first, ask for forgiveness later" approach might be deeply engrained in the intelligence community, but you're talking about wholesale monitoring of people's communications. Of course there is going to to a be a lot of misinformation and confusion when you don't provide any information yourself about it. Deal with it. Properly. Please. Correct the inaccuracies.
This is one of those situations where if you don't get out in front of the thing with some factual and specific information promptly, then nobody is going to believe you even if you do tell the truth.
How can public relations people working for an intelligence agency be so clued out about how to handle this? Oh, there's misinformation? No kidding? And you think not saying how the program actually works will cure the problem? Bizarre.
Quantitative Easing: all the government bond which don't sell on the free market are bought by the Federal Reserve. This isn't a side effect of the QE. It is QE. As long as the Federal Reserve keeps buying excess debt, the interest rate is artificially low. This "debt" is then repaid with issuing more bonds and selling them to the FED through QE. This wouldn't be money printing if there was an interest on the debt. It would be a pyramid scheme, but not printing. BUT! Any interest paid to the FED is deposited in the Treasury as "profit". So FED buys Treasury bonds, Treasury repaid this debt with interest. Treasury gets back the interest from the FED as "FED's profit from interest on lending". End effect? Treasury borrows from the FED at 0%. What is called when you borrow money at 0%, never pay the principal and only pay the interest? It's not money printing? What is it, then?
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Democratic senator Ron Wyden: "Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?"
NSA Director James Clapper: "No sir, not Intentionally."
How do you reconcile Mr. Clapper's response with the Verizon court order?
"It is hereby ordered that [Verizon Business Network Services'] Custodian of Records shall produce to the National Security Agency all call detail records or ‘telephony metadata’ created by Verizon for communications (i) between the United States and abroad; or (ii) wholly within the United States, including local telephone calls,"
Mr. Clapper LIED. There's no way around it.