[raganwald]

All these goof-ups by the FBI don't paint a pretty picture about the agency

Do you mean the agency founded by J. Edgar Hoover?

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/J._Edgar_Hoov...

Its founding principle was that there are baddies out there who need a special force of investigators who have powers far exceeding the regular police and who collect dossiers on suspicious citizens rather than simply waiting for crimes to occur and then investigating.

In a certain sense, they aren't being incompetent, they're doing exactly what they were designed to do. The problem isn't the execution, it's the mandate.

Here's another tidbit:

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/COINTELPRO

[davidk0101]

I have no problem with the mandate. It's the clear lack of competence in intelligence gathering that bothers me. Who honestly considers anything said on reddit to be of any significant value to state security matters? They might as well throw a dart on some board and make decisions that way if they are so desperate as to use postings from reddit.

[mynameishere]

Seriously. Ever write a check for 10,000 dollars or more? Then the FBI has a file on you. It's just the way it is.