[jnbiche]

Two things are bothering me immensely:

1. Each time something increasingly worse about the NSA surveillance gets revealed, or confirmed, Sens. Wyden and Udall release a statement saying something like: "This is only the tip of the iceberg: if Americans only knew how bad it was, they'd be very angry." They're on the Senate Intelligence Committee, and so are in a position to know at least more than their colleagues, and much more than their employers (the American people). This is extremely disconcerting. What we know and now see confirmed officially about the surveillance is pretty stunning. Exactly how bad is this? Is all of congress tapped? All the governors? Snowden hinted at this. What the fuck is going on in my country?

2. So, if it's so bad, why won't the honorable Sens. Udall and Wyden take a stand and reveal the wrongdoings on the Senate floor? As I understand the law, they cannot be charged for anything revealed on the Senate floor. And even if there were a way to charge them, I'd like to think it would be political suicide for any president to try.

These two gentleman swore an oath to the U.S. constitution. Why won't they uphold it? They are in a unique position to do so. The fact that they keep making these ominous statements is starting to seem more like a cover-your-ass strategy than an honest attempt to stop the illegal activities.

[ihsw]

> Is all of congress tapped? All the governors? Snowden hinted at this. What the fuck is going on in my country?

I'm going to assume the worst, which would be that the NSA is used as a tool of blackmail by nefarious parties whom the NSA relies on. Key House and Senate members put in a good word for the NSA and then they get some "free" information on their opponents, at which point they convince their opponents to "trade" wins with the opposing party's leadership.

Those in on the game get to continue their political career because the party leaderships are coordinating wins between each-other through bipartisan-orchestrated gerrymandering, and "suicide" elections where elected officials intentionally lose their elections in order to boost the profile of their friendly opponents.

Those whom are bucking the chain of command are ostracised and relegated to the fringes (eg: the Pauls).

[droopyEyelids]

You're adding an extra step, unnecessarily complicating your idea.

The blackmail information doesn't need to be passed to a third party. It can be brought directly to bear on problematic government officials by the NSA.

All they would need to do is make the senator understand that a record of all correspondence and browsing history exists.

Considering about 5% of the population has some pedophilic tendency, and estimates are around 10% of people have an incest fetish, 10% of people are estimated to be gay yet only Tammy Baldwin is out in the senate, lots of successful people do drugs, and everyone else has tons of relatives who may or may not have those problems, you can not underestimate the power wielded by someone with access to all our communications.

It's too great a power to comprehend. And someone wouldn't even have to be consciously doing ill to exploit it. I imagine that anyone in the position would believe they're protecting the USA from terrorism, and righteously punishing the deviants by leveraging their 'sins' while unconsciously building the infrastructure for future tyranny.

Furthermore, I've only listed the problems I think could be discovered through software. We aren't getting into conspiracy theory stuff like what would happen if you put a secret team of 10 analysts and 20 lawyers to work for a year looking to find laws broken by the members of the legislative branch. I mean, Hoover has been dead for a while, right?

[ihsw]

That's assuming the NSA is interested in playing politics. General Alexander may be well-versed in public speaking but I'd be hard-pressed to think managing political allegiances is of interest to him.

Also, the various federal executive agencies (Justice Department, State Department, et al) may very well be tapping into NSA data as much as possible for exactly what you're describing, especially since the recent DEA (Justice) and IRS (Treasury) revelations have shed some light on this.

The NSA's dam for controlling information dissemination has cracks in it, and I'm betting it'll be wedged wide open for the federal executive agencies to use at their convenience.

[amirmc]

"... but I'd be hard-pressed to think managing political allegiances is of interest to him."

Everyone operating at that kind of level has an interest in political allegiances (lowercase p). It's just part of the job. To not have such an interest means you'll simply be out-gamed and replaced by someone who does.

[gasull]

They are blackmailing and targeting anyone that is in the way to their goal of total surveillance.

This hasn't gotten enough attention:

US targets lie-detector coaches following Edward Snowden affair

http://www.scmp.com/news/world/article/1297622/us-targets-li...

[ihsw]

That's hilariously bad. Polygraph examinations are awful, they're little else than measurements of how people deal with stress and there's no difference between "passing" the examination and "beating" it.

Personally I think it's appalling that they're still regarded as "lie detectors."

[amirmc]

Choice quote:

"Nothing like this has been done before," John Schwartz, a US Customs and Border Protection official, said of the legal approach. "Most certainly our nation's security will be enhanced. There are a lot of bad people out there. This will help us remove some of those pests from society."

Regardless of how anyone may feel about 'lie-detector' tests, this is chilling.

[olefoo]

Wyden & Udall are constrained by their roles within the system; they have both been trying to encourage people to ask the right questions, but they are not going to break the laws they are sworn to uphold.

What we need is an independent congressional commission with the power to unilaterally declassify information that is not directly related to ongoing operations ( i.e. anything naming specific operatives or live intelligence about events now in the field would be exempt. But descriptions of scope, and summary reports of the outcomes of programs would be allowed. ) so that the American public can get an idea of what is being done in it's name.

This commission to include in it's scope psychological warfare operations and propaganda directed at American audiences. And a full investigation of any information sharing regarding American citizens with other agencies of the Executive branch.

We need this now. These stains on our nations honor can only be cleaned by sunlight.

[jnbiche]

Just to be clear, the only thing that Udall and Wyden are actually sworn to is this oath:

"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God."

[samstave]

I am just curious, what is the difference, in relation to that oath, between "swear" and "affirm" (under which circumstance would one be affirming and not swearing and vice-versa)?

[nkurz]

If permitted, one might 'affirm' if one's religious belief prohibits 'swearing oaths': "But above all things, my brethren, swear not, neither by heaven, neither by the earth, neither by any other oath: but let your yea be yea; and your nay, nay; lest ye fall into condemnation."

http://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/James-5-12/

I'm nonreligious, but agree with this position, as the alternative would imply that lying should be expected in all cases where no oath is sworn. Here's one small, specific, interesting piece of the history of offering an alternative: http://www.northcarolinahistory.org/commentary/161/entry

[mentat]

They swore other oaths when getting clearances to be sure.

[jnbiche]

It turns out you're half right. I knew congressmen didn't have to undergo security clearances. But it turns out that starting in the 104th congress (1997-1999), they are required to swear a secrecy oath.

I still think the oath to the constitution is far more important to the integrity of our country, but I was wrong that they swore no other oath.

[mentat]

Funny that I still got down voted for disagreeing. Ah, the new HN.

[LoganCale]

They'll be kicked out of the committees that allow them access to that classified data and will be unable to do anything further to try and fight these things.

[jnbiche]

So their precious committee appointment is more important than their oath? Really, if that's all that's holding them back, then I've lost any respect I have for them. As things stand, they've been able to do very little to "fight these things" even sitting on the committee.

What we need right now is to know the full extent of the damage. And they swore an oath to protect the constitution. Any fool can see what an existential threat this is to our constitution and country.

[LoganCale]

Their committee appointment is important to us, not just them. It's better to have a few allies on these committees, even if their hands are tied, than to have none at all. They've done more than most have been able to do, including calling out NSA lies.

[jnbiche]

I strongly disagree, but I respect that we're on the same side here, so I'll very carefully consider your logic. But in return, I'd ask you to carefully consider my argument, which is that we need to know the current damage right now far more than we need allies in the Senate IC in the future.

[DannyBee]

Unless americans are willing to do anything abuot it, which, so far, they haven't been, what more do you need to know right now?

As a country, we have already made clear that the majority are okay with roughly anything that is justified on the alter of terrorism.

Do you really think there is something they can reveal that will change this?

If so, what is it? IE What do you think is the galvanizing thing they could ever reveal that would make the tradeoff you suggest worth it.

[argumentum]

If what they can give us "right now" won't win us the war, we lose a valuable resource to win the war over the long term. Afaik, these are two of the few principled people with power in the legislature .. let's give them the benefit of the doubt.

[SimHacker]

Just assume the worst. That's as close as you can possibly get to knowing everything right now for sure.

I just hope that Snowden thought to take a copy of Clapper's (any anyone else responsible's) internet browsing history, or at least is creative enough to forge some terrible blackmail material and leak it, just to do to them what they're doing to us.

[discostrings]

Perhaps they believe that gaining the necessary amount of public attention and support requires these things to be revealed slowly and to consume many news cycles. I would argue that the pace things have been proceeding at has been perfect for those who generally don't pay attention to get a sense of how important an issue this is.

If this had all been released at once, it would have been much easier to sweep under the rug, and those who generally reflexively defend their political parties might not have had to really confront the issue. They could be proceeding this way secure a better chance of victory.

[dclusin]

This is why I think Snowden is such a sharp guy, because of the fact that he has been releasing documents slowly and methodically as opposed to a mega-dump wikileaks style disclosure. The basic problem is that a large share of the American public (such as my mom) get their information from exclusively one source. In my mother's case it's CNN, where there hasn't been very much coverage of this other than the odd report here and there. For instance looking at CNN right now the main headline is an article about this most recent school shooting, and the NSA revelations are a small print link jumbled in with lots of other unrelated articles.

[jacquesm]

I think you're confusing Snowden and Greenwald here.

The way I read it so far (please do correct me if I'm wrong) is that Greenwald received a very large dump of information from Snowden and that Greenwald is dictating the pace and selection of the releases.

[argumentum]

I don't think you even read the post you replied to ..

[jnbiche]

Of course I did. My stand is this: what the US needs now, possibly more than any time before in its history, is for the full extent of the surveillance and other activities by the NSA and other IC members to be revealed to the public. What happens next year in the Senate Intelligence Committee is much less important.

[argumentum]

How are you so sure they know as much (or the same info) as Snowden/Greenwald et al. will eventually release? If they don't, there is no value in getting kicked out of the committee, as they may get insights that we aren't going to get from whistleblowers.

How do you know they aren't playing Lincoln to your Thaddeus Stevens?

[jnbiche]

If you're referring to Lincoln vs. Thaddeus Stevens on slavery, then I'd respond that things may have turned much better, particularly for Americans of African descent, if Stevens had got his way.

I do appreciate the strategic thinking behind your suggestion that Snowden or Greenwald may eventually reveal what they are obliquely referring to. My personal opinion is that Greenwald led with his strongest story -- I don't think they have much more. But I have nothing to back that up. But clearly Wyden and Udall have a whole lot more.

In the end, I'm the type of person who believes that their oath to the constitution supercedes any strategic concerns.

[beedogs]

> What the fuck is going on in my country?

The short answer is that it isn't your country anymore.

[TruthElixirX]

It was never your country. You are just now filling the full oppression that minorities have been suffering since this country's inception.

In the 80's it wasn't the country for gays. In the 50's it wasn't the country for non-whites. In the 1900's it wasn't the country for women. Before the 1900's it was only old white land owners.

The ruling class has just expanded to not be exclusively old white men. And the oppressed class has expanded in the same way.

[Amadou]

You are just now filling the full oppression that minorities have been suffering since this country's inception.

We aren't even close to that. So far the NSA hasn't done anything like beat someone and leave them to die in the road.

I'm totally on board with the idea that pervasive surveillance smothers society if for no other reason than its presence causes self-censorship like the groklaw situation. But until it comes out that the NSA has been maiming and killing innocents we aren't on the level of what those minorities have had to suffer.

[joshfraser]

They've been supplying much of the intelligence data that we use to fly drones over Afghanistan, Iraq and Yemen killing hundreds of innocent people in the process.

[Amadou]

We've been killing innocents abroad long before the NSA got involved. The NSA's domestic surveillance does not change that aspect of american life.

[JackpotDen]

> www.reddit.com/r/Bad_Cop_No_Donut/

Hi Mr Agent, how awesome is it being a plant and getting paid to browse tech sites?

[TruthElixirX]

I did not confine the oppressors to just the NSA. I said the ruling class.

[pekk]

Better load up and kill somebody who works for the government to "take it back," right? This drivel makes me sick.

[beedogs]

Glad it does.

[chanux]

I'd like to think it would be political suicide for any president

I am not an American and have no idea how politics work in the US but Obama is basically a political Zombie by now. He can do whatever he wants now right?

[btilly]

Before getting access to classified information, they also swore an oath to not reveal it. Even if they can't be sued (which I do not know is true), they'd still be breaking their sworn word.

[Zoomla]

They don't want to go to jail, maybe.

[einhverfr]

That would be an interesting trial.

If only we'd have politicians with the courage to take on such a crusade.

[bengrunfeld]

I think right now making noise in any way is a respectable move. If they go to far, then NSA might retaliate against them, and no legal protection in the world would save them. If they keep going the way they are right now, it will keep this issue in the public eye, which is exactly where it needs to be. Yes, the system is totally fucked, but give them credit for having the balls to say something at all.