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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.
...that these men are just acting. They cant be that naive that they dont understand the resistance to their designs.
--- I was far from home, and the spell of the Eastern sea was upon me. -Lovecraft-
... 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:
He sees it perfectly clearly when he states, "because of people who are trying to undermine" the mission of the NSA, CIA, FBI and other agencies. This is because their mission is to protect the Government, not the people.
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.
We have as President a lying demagogue who ran against "warrantless wiretaps" and "unconstitutional acts" whilst a candidate, but once in office went far beyond what his predecessor did.
Even Bush II didn't have "extrajudicial killings" of US citizens.
Why would us peons be cynical?
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 what we are seeing here is progress, albeit slow and with a long road ahead. Their stated purpose of having a dialogue is, in itself, an important and positive step forward. Comey's remark on skepticism being fair, but cynicism being problematic, is reasoned and nuanced. I think this is a good sign that the intelligence community is starting to grapple with the need for open discussion, and is making a case towards that end.
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".
Seems to me that many of the problems organizations like the FBI think they face stem more from the change from law enforcement to crime prevention. Crime prevention requires massive amounts of data to be collected and ultimately freedoms curtailed for specific individuals who evince a pattern of behavior demonstrated to lead to crime. With organizations like the FBI, NSA, CIA, etc. all tasked with preventing another 9/11/2001, they understandably want the data to be able to proactively root out those individuals who might be likely to pull something like that off.
I'm not saying I agree with what guys like Brennan are asking for, but I am saying that they realize their responsibilities have changed and they are demanding the tools to do so. From their perspective, they probably don't understand how the people can say over and over "you'd better not ever let anything like that happen again but you can't infringe on any of my rights in order to make that happen". To a professional law enforcement officer, even a bureaucrat, that is a contradictory statement. Worsening matters is the ham handed way in which they've chosen to implement everything and how the American people have come to know how these things are being done.
You can't have the kind of safety people seem to expect today without a significant infringement of your rights.
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
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
In 1928 there was a court case called "Olmstead v. United States" in which the government tapped a telephone wire (relatively new technology at the time) and caught a Roy Olmstead and several others who were allegedly distributing Alcohol, which violated the National Prohibition Act.
One of the justices, Louis Brandeis, argued that the government's actions were not lawful because it violated the principle which the Fourth Amendment stood for; here is a quote of his dissent:
You can read more of it here (law.cornell.edu)
FTA: Rogers said, "I don't think we have fundamentally destroyed the public's trust. Some feel that way, but we are accountable to the citizens of the nation, and the nation is counting on us. The nation needs the insights we generate and our computer expertise."
No, you're not accountable to the citizens of the nation, Mr. Rogers. If you were, many of you would be in jail right now. Was James Clapper "held accountable" for the felony crime of lying to Congress?
Once you understand that you're not above the law, and once you truly become accountable to those you ostensibly "serve", then the cynicism will die down. Until then, you're continuing to reinforce that cynicism on your own by your actions, your attempts to hide them, and your willingness to lie about them. You have no one else to blame for it other than yourself.
Please stand clear of the doors, por favor mantenganse alejado de las puertas
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.
When I was in the 4th grade, I learned that "Russia" (meaning the USSR) was evil because they tracked where you went and who you talked to even if you weren't a criminal and because the police just did what they wanted when they wanted and the U.S. was great because none of that happened here.
In other words, the USSR was evil because it did what these assclowns want to do here. How can I possibly see them as anything but a domestic enemy that must be rooted out? They want to turn us into the USSR.