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Photocopying Michelle Obama's Diary, Just In Case
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Conor Friedersdorf has a good (and humorous) read in the Atlantic about the analogy that President Obama has settled on to explain his theory of the NSA surveillance controversy to reporters. 'The question is how do we make the American people more comfortable?' Obama said. 'If I tell Michelle that I did the dishes ... and she's a little skeptical, well, I'd like her to trust me, but maybe I need to bring her back and show her the dishes and not just have her take my word for it.' The analogy has been widely panned, and for good reason. Friedersdorf writes that he has come up with a much better analogy. What if 'Barack snuck into Michelle's closet one day, dug through her belongings until he found her diary, and photocopied it. Then he replaced the original, locked the copy in his desk, and didn't think about it much until she found out months later and furiously confronted him.' Admittedly, it isn't a perfect analogy either says Friedersdorf, 'but it comes a lot closer than Obama did to capturing the actual stakes in this debate, and the reason so many Americans are angry at him.'"
In related news, Snowden's father disagrees that his son isn't a patriot: "My son has spoken the truth, and he has sacrificed more than either the president of the United States or Peter King have ever in their political careers or their American lives. So how they choose to characterize him really doesn't carry that much weight with me."
The analogy would be better if the diary was left out in the open, but closed, mind you, for everyone to see. You still shouldn't open it, but it is sitting right there and not locked up.
Or everyday the diary was handed off to a random member of the public to hold on to... and not open, of course.
Peter King's new found love of all things counter-terrorism is refreshing news, considering his well known support of the IRA.
He used a Xerox
"I have downloaded hundreds and hundreds of records, why would I care if somebody downloads ours?" Robin Pecknold
PATRIOTISM, n.
Combustible rubbish ready to the torch of any one ambitious to illuminate his name.
In Dr. Johnson's famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last resort of a scoundrel. With all due respect to an enlightened but inferior lexicographer I beg to submit that it is the first.
Be wary when the word "patriotism" is being used. Whatever precedes or follows usually clocks in very high on the bullshit scale. It feels like it's being used to trigger a killswitch in the human mind.
20 minutes into the future
Obama requests a sworn person to have a look at Michelle's diary + contacts etc..., then make a copy kept in a private and secure place for sometime, and only report to him if there is something suspicious. Looks closer to reality...
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
George Washington was declared a "traitor" by the British Crown and Government.
George Washington is considered the "Father of his country" by properly educated USA citizens.
See any correlation?
As a USA citizen (at least until this is posted), the younger Mr. Snowden did us a favor. The display of the Federal Government's illegalities and corruption is always a good thing. Without Mr. Snowden's release of this evidence of illegal activity, we would suspect the Federal Government's unconstitutional and illegal activities. With this evidence, we now know of the corruption, illegalities and immorality of the USA Federal Government and its Directors.
Thank God for Pvt. Manning and Mr. Snowden.
Regrettably, whistleblowing always (and everywhere) carries a heavy price for the whistleblower.
Did he use a Xerox photocopier?
And if so, after looking at the copies he made did Barack later confront Michelle over discrepancies between things that she told Barack, vs what he read he read in said copies? Or did he convene a secret panel that just charged, convicted and sentenced her (queue drone strike), without her getting a chance to defend herself?
(man .. I was going for funny, so how the hell did I end up in such a dark place?)
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
This is like when the NSA illegally spies on US citizens.
My point: some things don't need an analogy. This is one of them.
If I were to give it an analogy, I believe this would be the most fitting...
The NSA's surveillance program is like Soylent Green. Both are just so, so wrong.
If telling the truth about illegal activities is treason, I wonder what lying to the American public is in your book.
Analogies are valuable teaching tool to visual complex mechanisms by relating them to a hopefully familiar form. This situation needs none. It's not very complex and everyone who reads up on it should know what's going one. In this case, the analogy ceases to be a teaching tool in this instance but a propaganda weapon in how it is cast. And worse than that, it's a propaganda weapon on the 4th grade level. If that is the average level of the electorate, forget about having a democracy or a democratic republic.
If telling the truth about illegal activities is treason, I wonder what lying to the American public is in your book.
Unfortunately, it's called "The American Way" and is steeped in a very long tradition.
Heroes do not renounce their citizenship and seek asylum amongst foreign intelligence communities.
Heroes do. It's called asylum. And it's considered a human right.
You write it up, it gets sent only to the addresses you specify, and there's no third party that gets a copy of the email (it's not like speaking in a room with a third party presence).
The closest physical analogy to sending an (unencrypted) email is sending a post card. Sure, it's intended for only one recipient but a bunch of people and/or organizations have to handle it along the way to get it there. Only someone who is quite naive would believe that none of the people in the delivery chain would ever read the post card. Most won't care but there is no reason to presume that the "privacy" of the message will be respected. Email in general has rather little in the way of privacy rights and until it does have such legal backing you should behave accordingly.
Don't get me wrong, I think the actions of the NSA are clearly illegal and a violation of our fourth amendment rights but I think people are pretty naive about just how private emails really are in practice. If you wouldn't send the information on a post card you probably shouldn't send it on an email either.
You can rate him whatever you want. Your opinion is meaningless.
If exposing illegal activities that our country did rates him a scumbag by you, then you're not worth much to the country anyway.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
"I called for a thorough review of our surveillance operations before Mr. Snowden made these leaks. My preference - and I think the American people's preference - would have been for a lawful, orderly examination of these laws; a thoughtful, fact-based debate." - Obama
Mr. President, how are we supposed to have a thoughtful, fact based debate about programs which are so secret nobody knew about them until a whistle blower revealed them directly to the public. About a court who's orders are so secret that entire companies shut down when the thread of an order looms, and they can't even say what the threat was.
Without transparency, there can be no debate. Without Snowden, there would be no transparency on this issue.
Are you not one of the above? Then you deserve to not be spied on in your home, on the internet, in your telephone calls, emails, or physical mail. Period. The government needs to bugger off.
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
If it's really a surprise to you that one must swear an oath and sign a contract to maintain a TS/SCI clearance, then explaining it probably won't help, but, believe it or not, you do have to promise to keep secret data secret before being granted access to that data.
I believe you also swear to uphold the constitution, and a few other things that in this case appear to be in conflict with keeping data secret. Snowden didn't pull a Manning and dump a bunch more data than he could possibly have vetted himself; he has kept all data secret except that which he felt was not in the national interest to keep secret. He shouldn't be allowed to work for the US government again, but he does seem to have done a decent job of upholding all his agreements and promises to the best of his ability, in order of priority.
It must be an awful life to wake up every morning pissing in your boots afraid that those eeeevvviiilll terrorists are going to come and blow you up in your home. ...so afraid that you will let your elected officials and their minions violate the very Constitution they swore to protect and defend. ..so afraid that you will denounce your betters as scumbags. ..so afraid that you repeatedly post as an anonymous coward all over Slashdot to avoid your betters' (I can't really say peers') condemnation over your ignorance and cowardice.
Those of us that are educated enough to remember Watergate know what life was like when Americans had the backbone to rein in governmental excess. And those of us educated enough to remember McCarthy know what bogeyman witch hunts do to the civil rights and liberties of the people. I wouldn't expect your education level to be high enough to understand either.