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Senate Passes USA Freedom Act
schwit1 points out that the U.S. Senate has passed the USA Freedom Act by a vote of 67-32, sending it on to President Obama, who is expected to sign it into law. The bill removes mass metadata collection powers from the NSA, but also grants a new set of surveillance powers to replace them. Telecoms now hang on to that data, and the government can access it if they suspect the target is part of a terrorism investigation and one of the call's participants is overseas. "The second provision revived Tuesday concerns roving wiretaps. Spies may tap a terror suspect's communications without getting a renewed FISA Court warrant, even as a suspect jumps from one device to the next. The FISA Court need not be told who is being targeted when issuing a warrant. The third spy tool renewed is called "lone wolf" in spy jargon. It allows for roving wiretaps. However, the target of wiretaps does not have to be linked to a foreign power or terrorism."
Same as the Old Act.
I wanna get fooled again!
Watch the Law Closely as i cover it and mix the shells up....
Because most of the public's concern could have been ended with some tight language that said that under no circumstances can the NSA intelligence products or systems be used to support an ordinary criminal investigation and any such use by law enforcement constitutes a severe felony offense. Right or wrong, most of the public wouldn't care if the target was literally in the law, only those accused of espionage or terrorism. The public really lost its shit when it came out that ordinary drug dealers were being busted with NSA resources and the cops were lying their asses off to the courts.
"The FISA Court need not be told who is being targeted when issuing a warrant."
why the fuck not!
You didn't think the government was going to give up their addiction to surveillance crack that easily, did you?
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Not linked to terrorism = and anyone else we samn please
...
You kidding? It did tons of good. Did you see that thread the other day? People falling over themselves to talk about how great he was and how they wanted to vote for him. Some of those people are going to read this now and realize that the whole thing was just more grandstanding, but some are not. Not everyone sees every story, not everyone gets the whole picture, and as long as some people wind up with a perception of the shining hero then the song and dance has done some good.
... it's the goddam Freedom Act.
It's like calling it the "Save The Little Kitty Cats Act."
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
If our Congressmen had been in the Bundestag in the 1930s, they would have passed something like the "Freedom for Jews Act".
"The bill removes mass metadata collection powers from the NSA"
Unanimous 2nd circuit decision says no, original authors of the patriot act say no. Yet media completely ignores the issue and assumes without question patriot act authorized any such thing to begin with.
Third party doctrine predates the patriot act and Hayden goes around publically gloating Article II powers stemming from Bush era AUMF is the source of his authority.
Even if patriot act were left to expire wholesale without "USA Freedom Act" resurrection those against this FUD powered insanity were never even in the game.
yeah cause telco's won't enjoy passing the "service fee" downwards to poor shlubs that think they are the customers.
I thought the point of the NSA was that they were meant to protect domestic communications from external threats. If the target is not linked to external threats, how can it be justified?
Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
This will be a financial boon to the telecom industry. The black budgets are going to have to come up with money to pay for the storage and retrieval by the telcos. I expect this to be quite profitable for them. There are also going to be some nice contracts for redesigning the systems now that the stakeholders have changed.
He single-handedly blocked continuation of authorization of mass metadata collection. That's what he did. A whole hell of a lot more than any of those other pukes did. You don't see mass metadata collection being re-authorized by this new act, do you? That's right. It's not.
Yeah, this new act sucks. And guess what? It passed on the strength of democrats being in the tank by an absurd 43-1 margin. Republicans opposed it by 30-23.
Team America: World Police.
Seriously, though, we all know (or those of us with CT experience), that the only programs that have worked are those in the Middle East and nearby countries. Spying on Americans in America has proved very worthless. Traditional police investigations using targetted individual warrants and traditional police interrogation (not torture) have resulted in all the successes to date.
We need to stop wasting time on promoting Fear to justify wasting taxes on unneeded spying and focus on the true threats, which are not here.
That said, expect numerous false flag media reports over the next few weeks in a vain attempt to prove we should all live in Fear.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
He single-handedly blocked continuation of authorization of mass metadata collection.
That is not true.
The Freedom Act, nor any amendments that passed committee (none of them, to McConnell's dismay) allowed for that. The bill was designed to reform the metadata collection, and it did so.
Now don't get me wrong- it's awesome that he stood up and blocked this horse shit for 11 hours, but he didn't stop the tide, nor did he have the power to.
I find the overt references to 1984 to be too cliche. A more subtle homage would have been more appropriate. Less is more.
I have but one question to ask:
Where is the *FREEDOM* in that 'usa freedom act'?
In the words of Futurama: "My fellow Earthicans, we enjoy so much freedom it's almost sickening. We're free to choose which hand our sex-monitoring chip is implanted in. And if we don't want to pay our taxes, why, we're free to spend a weekend with the Pain Monster". That is really the only freedom you have.
God made the Idiot for practice, and then He made the School Board -- Mark Twain Look for http://Thebar.steelbeachca
Instead of making the names of our laws acronyms, we make the texts of the laws into rap lyrics. That should make everyone realize how important and official they are.
Nice to force companies to have to spend more money spontaneously to hang on to this data.
Nice clandestine tax on an entire industry.
Rand Paul seems like the best option. Too bad the presidential race is an American Idol contest.
This is why it needs to be mandatory for all congress people who vote for 'insert bill', how much money was donated by who/what causes... there to be publicly displayed... oh wait there will never be a law for that because it conflicts with their interests.
http://gamehacking.org/vb/threads/12747-nensondubois-codes http://twitter.com/nensondubois_
As I said in a previous thread, an alternative plan had already been laid out, so the old one could be allowed to die... with great public fanfare from Mr. Paul, and everybody comes out stinking like a rose. You are absolutely right, hardly anybody sees the big picture. That is what these little side shows are for. I can assure you that if he had any real power, he would not be biting these peoples' ankles. Once you hit the big time, you don't go around tipping apple carts. And it did accomplish nothing but bump up the ad rates on the TV news for a short while. The laws are back in place, as if the NSA needs authorization, and republicans and democrats will continue to dominate.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Now the phone companies can (outragously over) charge the NSA for handling it's customer tracking information service requests.
And bill for the increase in consultant manpower to handle the new processes.
Using a surplus government data center in Utah for cheap.
Wait until the consultants & employees start spying on their wives, husbands, girlfriends, boy friends, coworkers, ex's of all types, children, and any competetion.
Not just 1984, but totally global corporate warfare !
Wouldn't you like to play a nice game of chess ?
This is my opinion based on what little I know and understand of the rumors and lies Thanks, Randal
What part of what has been going on did you not understand?
Section 215 of the Patsiot Act, the one that authorized mass metadata collection, sunseted on Monday at 0000 hours because Rand Paul blocked Bitch McConnell railroading in a clean extension. It has been dead since then. Kaput. It was well on the way to being adjudicated unconstitutional anyway, but that has been 13 years coming, and still not 100% settled. Thanks to Rand Paul - and nobody else - that thing is now dead, regardless of whether the constitutionality is ever 100% settled.
It was dead Monday, and it is still dead. The Freedom Act did not re-enact it. Bitch was trying to sneak in an extension so it wouldn't have to be re-enacted, but the son of a bitch got his ass handed to him by Rand. It is no less dead after passage of the Freedom Act horse shit.
Spin it any way you want, the fact stands that an evil, bad bill failed Republican support 23-30 and won Democrat support 43-1. Period. Live with it.
There are plenty of people, Republicans and others, who want to stamp out islamists carrying on war against the US and all civilized parts of the world, but we don't want to trample the rights and protections of innocents to do it.
same place as Patriot in the patriot act.
shoved really far up your ass with a nightstick.
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
Actually, it's classic doublespeak, designed to shut down any debate or dissension. To oppose The USA Freedom act is to publicly come out against the USA and Freedom. Just like opposition to the PATRIOT act branded you an unpatriotic apple-pie-hating flag-burning radical.
It also speaks volumes about how brazen our so-called representatives have become. They don't even try hide it - It's right there in your face, and if you don't like it, too bad. There's nothing you can do about it.
...and the terrorists won AGAIN--without any terrorist attacks or attempts on U.S. soil in years.
Doublethink straight out of 1984.