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Spy Industry Leaders Befuddled Over 'Deep Cynicism' of American Public
New submitter autonomous_reader writes: Ars Technica has a story on this week's Intelligence & National Security Summit, where CIA Director John Brennan and FBI Director James Comey had a lot to say about the resistance of the American public to government cyber spying and anti-encryption efforts. Blaming resistance on "people who are trying to undermine" the intelligence mission of the NSA, CIA, and FBI, John Brennan explained it was all a "misunderstanding." Comey explained that "venom and deep cynicism" prevented rational debate of his campaign for cryptographic backdoors.
Mr Fox feels misunderstood and would like to continue guarding the hen house.
Requiem for the American Dream
"You see, we thought that the Constitution doesn't apply to us. Why can't anyone understand that we're the good guys?!?"
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
Is personal, is not yours. Not allowed. Like you're not allowed to rape my girlfriend even if you say its for national security.
Not yours, never was, hands off.
... is concerned that we don't trust them, and don't really want them keeping tabs on us? I mean that would never happen! Next thing you'll tell me people are throwing tea in the ocean to protest their unelected government! Insanity!
"I don't think we've really tried to find answers yet because no one in the private sector has been properly incentivized."
They haven't been properly motivated. We'll help them come around to our way of thinking.
"These people look deep within my soul and assign me a number based on the order in which I joined" --Homer re:
I'll tell you who is undermining it. It's the NSA, the CIA, the FBI, and Homeland Security. They have already demonstrated, unequivocally, that they will happily fuck over every last man, woman and child, not just in the US, but around the entire planet, if they could get away with it. The list of abuses is already long, and at no point have they shown any interest in stopping.
The fact that they are accusing unknown people "trying to undermine" them, and that these people are "fueled by their adversaries" just tells you how completely and utterly out to lunch these dimwits are.
They don't seem to understand that, the tighter they squeeze their fist, the more that squeezes out from between their fingers.
The FBI engaged in a massive amount of illegal wiretapping. It was MASSIVE. It was also quite illegal--and completely unpunished. This was organized violation of civil rights--a plain crime.
The FBI engaged in massive surveillance of student demonstrators, including infiltrating student protest movements. This wasn't for suspicion of crime--this was for intelligence. That was plain wrong.
The FBI burgled--there is no other word for it--the office of Daniel Ellsberg and others. That is wrong.
Then there was FBI Director L. Patrick Gray and the Nixon coverup.
AND THEY ASK US WHY WE DON'T TRUST THEM NOT TO VIOLATE OUR CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT TO PRIVACY?
Oh, come on now...
Holy fuck, seriously?
So the spies and fascists who have been ignoring the Constitution and demanding technology can be less secure so they can fumble around like idiots claiming to make us more secure .. spying on Congress and lying about it ... coming up with the form of perjury known as "parallel construction" (which is perjury because it's intended to lie about if they had legally obtained information or probable cause, and to deny the opportunity to see the evidence) ...
Suddenly these fucking clowns are feeling all misunderstood and don't understand why there is hostility?
I'm sorry, this is Chairman Fucking Mao talking about counter-revolutionary elements who must be purged ... "Blaming resistance on "people who are trying to undermine" the intelligence mission" is code for "all those pinko commies who expect us to respect fucking civil liberties".
Every asshole fascist claims to be a patriot. They're still asshole fascists.
Yeah, right ... tell us another fucking lie.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
'Get up,' said O'Brien. 'Come here.'
Winston stood opposite him. O'Brien took Winston's shoulders between his
strong hands and looked at him closely.
'You have had thoughts of deceiving me,' he said. 'That was stupid.
Stand up straighter. Look me in the face.'
He paused, and went on in a gentler tone:
'You are improving. Intellectually there is very little wrong with you.
It is only emotionally that you have failed to make progress. Tell me,
Winston--and remember, no lies: you know that I am always able to detect
a lie--tell me, what are your true feelings towards Big Brother?'
'I hate him.'
'You hate him. Good. Then the time has come for you to take the last step.
You must love Big Brother. It is not enough to obey him: you must love
him.'
He released Winston with a little push towards the guards.
'Room 101,' he said.
I think that they are caught up in their own bullshit that they have forgotten how ''the man in the street'' thinks. Ie - they don't get out enough. They think that we all forget their 'little lies' and really believe that they are acting in our best interests. They talk mainly to each other, if you don't talk up the reality of the persistent threat to fellow NSA/.... people - then will you be looked on with suspicion or passed over for promotion ? The corporate 'yes' men will always tell their bosses what they think the bosses want to hear - many a large company has gone bankrupt or empire been overrun because of that.
I do believe that many of them are honourable people, but their viewpoint has become so skewed by the corporate culture that they have lost touch with reality; not that much different from those embedded in a religious community who end up thinking that the myths are true.
It is always possible that they are right and I am wrong - but I don't think so.
The United States was founded and structured around a deep cynicism towards government. I'm surprised members of the intelligence community haven't picked up a history book before.
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
You know ... you should be far more terrified of people who think they're doing the right thing, and fervently believe in all the crap they say.
Those people? Those fucking people are scary motherfuckers who will do anything if they can justify it to themselves. And if they can avoid getting caught, they'll do even more.
A bunch of people who sincerely believe in all the crap they do ... those people are dangerous, unhinged, and will simply do anything they feel they need to.
You can't have a free society protected by thugs who ignore the basic tenets of that free society. It just doesn't work. And they can't protect freedoms by taking them away.
At this point, they can either try to protect your lives, or your way of life ... but what they've been doing is incompatible with both.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
> I do believe that many of them are honourable people, but their viewpoint has become so skewed
You know, in a way, I do too; its just, I can't imagine how that could matter less when we know the road to hell is most easily paved with the best of intentions.
It doesn't matter how good they intend to be, or how honorable they are. What they are building, as a technological capability, is too powerful of a weapon to trust anyone with. Actions taken in secret audited in secret, regulated in secret.....
Once the gun is built, it is a matter of the will of the user where it is pointed. The only thing you can be sure of is, the owner will someday change. Policies will change.
Just imagine what happens if we wind back the clock to my parents 20s. What if, after the very first protest, police could identify the names and home addresses of all the social hub people in the community. What would our world look like today if every gay rights protest or every anti war protest just saw a string of quiet arrests for "drugs" or traffic stops that "got violent" and removed the very people who glued others together....
Who really looks at history and thinks this sort of power is safe to leave in the hands of those in power? When has any sort of power to silence opposition NOT been abused?
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
"Knowledge is power." Every government understands that. In the USA, so many businesses also know it, that most of the population knows it. PLUS, just about everyone in the USA is also told, "Power corrupts", and how important it is for citizens to be aware of what government officials are doing. There need be no cynicism in simple logic!
Now, if the government could prove it has a way to possess knowledge without becoming corrupted by the power it represents, the situation might be different. Good luck with that!
John Brennan was a career CIA analyst, focussing on the Middle East. James Comey was trained as a lawyer, and has been a law clerk, lawyer, and prosecuting attorney.
Neither one is qualified to participate in this discussion - they don't know enough about how encryption works. They need to step aside and let their technical "underlings" speak for them, if they really want to engage in a meaningful dialogue on this topic.
#DeleteChrome
This isn't "deep cynicism". This is the Founding Fathers' hard-won experience in freeing themselves from oppression.
The King, George III, used all kinds of tricks to keep opposition down. Warrantless searches, "general warrants", allowing them to root around your house and papers until they find something they can tag you with, which would be applied to uppity folks. Outlawing of speech. Outlawing or restriction of presses, the literal mechanical method of mass producing speech for distribution, a backdoor method of censorship. Using one particular popular denomination of one particular religion to stir outrage and knock down other opponents through religious laws.
These a d dozens of other concepts are not freaking cynicism!
Attention NSA leaders and politicians: You are constructing a panopticon (go look it up) that is literally more powerful than that which was cynically portrayed in "1984". With no mechanical methods to prevent, or even track its abuse, you cannot guarantes that the 1 out of 1000 agent who is a G. Gordon Liddy type won't abuse the spying to report on political opposition to his patron.
"Imagine a boot stamping on a human face...forever." Ancient Rome and Greece, 1930s Germany, these are democracies that handed over emergency power and The People never got it back.
The Founding Fathers knew the only way to guarantee (as far as such is possible) this cannot happen is to simply blanket forbid these powers to government. Now you want Eye in the Sky crap, too?
Yes I am sure you all fancy yourselves The Untouchables, but it's not you We, with our Founding Fathers hats, are worried about. It is those who would abuse these marvelous tools for dictatorship.
Do you think Putin, to whom you are selling Eye in the Sky to, won't abuse it to track opposition?
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
These people "may be fueled by our adversaries"
When you claim that your political enemies are being 'fueled' by enemies of the state, YOU are the one that is exhibiting "venom and deep cynicism", not your enemies.
The basic problem is that our intelligence enemies have paranoia as a primary job requirement. If you want to protect a country, you must assume the worst and think of the worst so that you can take steps to prevent it. But that does not mean your worst scenarios are true, or even likely. You have to recognize that because it is your job to assume the worst, it is totally reasonable for you to go way too far, and that government MUST reign in the intelligence group from doing so.
Because if your Espionage agency does not intentionally go too far, then they have failed to do their job. Similarly, if your government bows down to the Espionage people, that means the government has failed to do THEIR job.
In the ideal situation, working in Espionage should constantly complain about how the government won't let them take all the necessary steps to protect the people - while realizing that this is a GOOD thing.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
Why not "People who don't trust the people are surprised that the people doesn't trust them either."
Trust is a two way street.