[jivatmanx]

Keith Alexander believes that terrorists live amongst us, trying to implement Sharia and create a Caliphate. To fight this, he needs to "Collect it all".

It's just as important to understand his motivation as it is to understand ours, and assess the reasonableness of each in comparison to the other, comparing our current situation to others in history that were similar, and the result they had.

[diminoten]

Firstly, does he seriously believe that, or are you just demonizing him because it'll get you agreement? If he said something to that effect, that's concerning, but if he hasn't, can we stick to things which have actually happened?

And secondly, is not the motivation to stop terrorists in the US from harming US citizens a noble goal, in theory? Now granted, we shouldn't have to sacrifice our privacy to get that done, but it's not like Keith Alexander is trying to harm the US. He wants to help, and depending on who you ask, may be misguided, on the money, or completely wrong in how he plans to help.

It'd be more useful to correct than to abolish, because abolishment of the NSA and it's surveillance programs is never, ever going to happen, nor should it. ZERO surveillance (this might be arguable, I suppose) results in US citizens dead on US soil. Unacceptable.

[apalmer]

Very few movers and shakers in the history of the world are intrinsically 'evil' in their own judgement. Whether Alexander is purposefully trying to harm the US or not is immaterial.

Agree with you on the charicterization going on here, its one thing to feel his motivations are a given way, another to imply he has public made statements indicating this to be fact.

[diminoten]

I don't much care what Alexander judges himself to be, I'm talking about his actions and motivations for those actions. He's not trying to destroy the US, he's trying to keep it safe. He is possibly misguided or flat out wrong about how to do that, but it's not as if he's actively working to harm US citizens, as many people here would claim.

[Sauer_Kraut]

Why do you keep stating such things as "he's trying to keep it safe" or "NSA is trying to help the citizens of the US."

Do you have information on this or do you keep on stating your opinion as fact?

[diminoten]

Do I really need to show you the NSA's charter?

http://w2.eff.org/Privacy/Key_escrow/Clipper/nsa.charter

I'm not interested in getting into an emotional mud-slinging contest with you.

[jcromartie]

He believes that Islamist terrorists are trying to institute Sharia law and establish a Caliphate in the Middle East, and that terrorists live among us, and he's absolutely correct.

You are wrong to suggest that he believes that there is an imminent threat to American government itself from Islamists living in the USA. Some people do believe this, but he is not one of them, based on his own words.

[saraid216]

Alexander actually sounds like J. Edgar Hoover in that regard, which is pretty disturbing.

[knowaveragejoe]

Source?

[rhizome]

Black Hat Conference, a week and a half ago:

"Terrorists driven by a desire to 'create a caliphate' of sharia law in the middle east continued to plot attacks. 'Terrorists live among us,' he said"

GP conflates these statements to imply that those among us want to create Sharia or whatever among us, but Alexander did say the words.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/31/nsa-keith-alexa...

[jivatmanx]

Thanks Rhizome.

I'd like to add,

The Gulf States are already under Sharia, and have been since their founding almost a century ago. The Taliban copied Saudi Arabia, even using the exact same names for bureaucracies. [2] Relations with them were excellent before 9/11.

[2]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Committee_for_the_Promotion_of_....

But, as Iraq showed, there's no need to understand elementary facts about their culture before you invade and engage in a massive social engineering project, or engage in an global, eternal, "war on terror".

[rhizome]

there's no need to understand elementary facts about their culture before you invade

I can guarantee you that the people who directed the Iraq Wars knew full well the elementary facts about their culture before invading and engaging in a (partially) global war on terror. They know that you can't win a war against a technique, and they know that going to war in these areas attracts terrorists who want to fight against you. The only question was where the game board was going to be placed, and that question was answered over 20 years ago.

It was only in the portrayal to the taxpayer and the invaded that these were left as unknowns.

[knowaveragejoe]

Was that statement paired with a declaration of needing to "collect it all"? It seems more like we're stretching to fit a nefarious plot on top of what started as a largely benign effort and has since expanded into a system that has been abused in the past and could be abused to great effect in the future.

[rhizome]

Well, no, since the government has taken pains to say that they don't "collect it all." For instance, spam email. What they have done is say they need to collect what they think they need to collect. As the leaks have illustrated, this can indeed be expanded to "it all" if they want it.