[scrumption]

Thanks for that reputable source -- but I'm still missing your implication. Do you mean to say that the NSA is primarily concerned with foreign intelligence rather than combating domestic terrorism? Then why so much domestic spying, the entire point of this conversation thread?

Furthermore, are you trying to tell me you think they've done a good job in their counterintelligence work? Honestly, given what we have observed in the Middle East for decades and what happened in 2016?

[BookmarkSaver]

>Then why so much domestic spying, the entire point of this conversation thread?

Oh yeah, that makes sense. Let's only worry about what other nations are doing, until their agents and activities enter our country. Then we might as well stop bothering. Makes sense.

<Furthermore, are you trying to tell me you think they've done a good job in their counterintelligence work? Honestly, given what we have observed in the Middle East for decades and what happened in 2016?

What are you referring to? Do you have a security clearance? Do you think that other nations aren't constantly attacking our electronic infrastructure and security? What in the world makes you think that you would be aware of any success whatsoever of intelligence gathering in the Middle East? What makes you think that the situation couldn't have gotten much worse that it did?

[olfactory]

> What in the world makes you think that you would be aware of any success whatsoever of intelligence gathering in the Middle East? What makes you think that the situation couldn't have gotten much worse that it did?

To the extent that the expanded sigint is used for actual defense, it's trivial to expect more data to have helped (at least marginally) with the national defense aims of the agency. This is not controversial and somewhat trivial to point out.

The issue is that the NSA's behavior violated the 4th amendment rights of millions of people. You suggest that the ends justify the means. I respect that opinion and may even agree with it, but that doesn't matter.

What matters is that the law was broken in the creation of the domestic surveillance program and nobody is currently serving time in prison for breaking it.

The bill of rights exists because of very hard earned lessons about the appropriate relationship between the people and the government. We let a handful of officials ignore the 4th amendment and steal billions of dollars in taxpayer dollars to build the infrastructure to do so.

This is not just a major violation of rights but a major financial crime. The program should be cancelled, the officials responsible jailed, and the equipment auctioned off so that the proceeds can be returned to taxpayers.

Many of our rights as citizens give criminals and innocent people various protections against law enforcement. This is not a design flaw.

[lern_too_spel]

> Then why so much domestic spying, the entire point of this conversation thread?

The estimates in this thread are that they received .3% or less of all call metadata in the US, which is probably a generous overestimate since the article says the full call records are "billions ... per day." Of that, they query less. I don't know how this can be considered "so much" domestic surveillance.