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Journalist Sues NSA For Keeping Keith Alexander's Financial History Secret
Daniel_Stuckey writes Now the NSA has yet another dilemma on its hands: Investigative journalist Jason Leopold is suing the agency for denying him the release of financial disclosure statements attributable to its former director. According to a report by Bloomberg, prospective clients of Alexander's, namely large banks, will be billed $1 million a month for his cyber-consulting services. Recode.net quipped that for an extra million, Alexander would show them the back door (state-installed spyware mechanisms) that the NSA put in consumer routers.
This is an example of the perils of state and corporate power being merged. Fascism, according to Mussolini.
And yet he hasn't stopped it. In fact, he has explicitly defended and expanded the surveillance state. If he was against it, he would've stopped it by vetoing the Patriot Act extension. He's corrupt to the core and no amount of "But Bush!!!" will change that.
Derp. Welcome to America. As it's been this way since the days of Andrew Jackson. To state that the current state of affairs is Obama or Bush or any recent president's doing is very naive. People like you contribute to the problem.
Everyone knows that the government you see isn't what is calling the shots in this country.
"Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of the day."
Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States,
Theodore Roosevelt - An Autobiography, 1913 (Appendix B)
"A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is privately concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men [W]e have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated, governments in the civilized world - no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and the duress of small groups of dominant men."
Woodrow Wilson,
28th President of the United States, The New Freedom, 1913
"Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men's views confided to me privately. Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it."
Woodrow Wilson,
28th President of the United States, The New Freedom, 1913
"The individual is handicapped by coming face-to-face with a conspiracy so monstrous he cannot believe it exists. The American mind simply has not come to a realization of the evil which has been introduced into our midst. It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent."
J. Edgar Hoover,
The Elks Magazine, 1956
"Today the path to total dictatorship in the U.S. can be laid by strictly legal means We have a well-organized political-action group in this country, determined to destroy our Constitution and establish a one-party state It operates secretly, silently, continuously to transform our Government This ruthless power-seeking elite is a disease of our century This group is answerable neither to the President, the Congress, nor the courts. It is practically irremovable."
Senator William Jenner,
1954 speech
"The Rockefellers and their allies have, for at least fifty years, been carefully following a plan to use their economic power to gain political control of first America, and then the rest of the world. Do I mean conspiracy? Yes, I do. I am convinced there is such a plot, international in scope, generations old in planning, and incredibly evil in intent."
Congressman Larry P. McDonald, November 1975,
from the introduction to a book titled The Rockefeller File
Oh fuck it. God damn nothing but idiots on this site. Trusting, naive idiots spoonfed political propaganda that will always eat it up without question.
"Obama's America"? Really? Fucking moron.
So the REAL question is what WILL stop it. Saying that "This one is a bad person and did nothing to change it" doesn't work. Saying "The previous one did nothing to change it" doesn't work.
Voting for "The other party" doesn't work.
No, I do not have the answer, because if I did I would be giving it.
What must be done to change the status-quo with minimal violence or bloodshed is to unite people under common values, such as the massive & ongoing civil rights violations/infringements that most people agree are wrong, regardless of what political stripe they self-identify as.
Likewise, the militarization of domestic police forces and their gradual shift from a community law enforcement role to more resemble a national occupation force complete with armored vehicles and heavy crew-served weapons.
Start focusing on what we have in common, not what divides us. Despite what those with power would like you to believe, we have much more in common than we have differences. Those commonalities are also those of a much more fundamental and essential nature than our differences.
Extremely few on any side of the political spectrum in the US (barring government & MIC) wants an Orwellian surveillance//security/police state.
I'd have no problem at all standing side by side in public protests and demonstrations with almost anyone from TEA Party member to PETA and/or LGBT activist and beyond who also was willing to postpone our arguments for our common interests in a free and open society without mass domestic surveillance & data analysis and a militarized police force performing military-occupation and wealth-confiscation roles more than any sort of community-based & controlled "officer of the peace" roles.
Look, people, yes we have beefs over stuff *BUT*, unless we unite and curb government power and size, it won't matter because very soon none of us will have any choices about anything nor any meaningful rights at all.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
I think Obama's one of the best Republican Presidents ever. He's guided the country through a healthy if slow economic recovery. Convinced the democrats to implement the Republican health care plan. And continued the Republican lovefest with the patriot act and secret surveillance
Gotta love that site, too bad "doing something" is not the same as doing the right thing. Sure, hes done alot, what has he done to make the country better jack shit
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
Extremely few on any side of the political spectrum in the US (barring government & MIC) wants an Orwellian surveillance//security/police state.
How many people support DUI checkpoints, free speech zones, unfettered border searches, constitution-free zones, the TSA, the NSA's mass surveillance, protest permits, stop-and-frisk-type policies, unwarranted surveillance in general, or assassination of citizens without trial? They only have to be a supporter of one of them to be a supporter of a police state, and I can't tell you how many people I've personally conversed with that supported a number of those as long as it makes them feel safe. In 'the land of the free and the home of the brave,' freedom should be considered more important than safety, but I don't think most people see it that way.
And even if most people did see it that way, look at how many people changed their tunes directly after 9/11? If people are so weak and unprincipled that a disaster can make them give a bunch of power to the government, then all it takes is another disaster for the government to take advantage of, and we'll lose all that progress.
So either way, I'm not too optimistic.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.