[jsmthrowaway]

As shocking as it might be, the NSA has other things to do which actually are crucial for national security. Reforming the agency will go much further than basically saying "you can't have cool servers or toilets that flush."

I know hating the NSA is en vogue but seriously. This is almost as bad as stonewalling and other hostilities toward other branches of government simply because the opposite party is in power (that goes both ways, before you think I'm attacking the right). The NSA committed grievous sin. I'm as upset about it as you. Even so, it baffles me that we would be having this conversation about water.

God, stuff like this just depresses me. And that you love it, too. That depresses me as well. It's a cheap "rah rah go Utah sticking it to the man" puppet show that is ultimately meaningless, but you and many like you just eat it up.

--

Edit: Between this stupid "you're submitting too fast" barrier that I've never seen until recently on a >year account, downvoting being blessed as okay to represent disagreement, graying comments as a result which silences disagreement and causes a dogpile effect, arbitrary shadowbans in 2014, and my critique of this political theater being interpreted as defense of the NSA or an advertisement that I need the condescension of having an intelligence agency explained to me (better: I'm not going to answer your question but anybody that passed US History knows the answer), HN has done a pretty good job of silencing opposing thought. I asked a question and it's barely legible. Even now, watching people Cmd+F my username and downvote every hit between refreshes. You sure showed me for not thinking like you!

Since I disagree with many things HN holds dear, and since the people and technology have made clear that's not welcome, after six years of contributing to Hacker News on various accounts, I'm done. I can't take the technology nor the people any more.

It amazes me how hostile HN is now, both socially and technically, and yet people remain. The crowning irony is that people here complain about becoming Reddit, yet on some of the very lesser-known subreddits I've had literally life-changing conversations. Here it's just bickering to see who is more right. Nothing of value comes of this thread, or the hundreds before it. Nothing. I want a refund of my time wasted here.

[optimusclimb]

Hating the NSA is far from "en vogue"...more like, trying to avoid 2014 becoming "1984" (as in the book) is en vogue.

You're hardly as "upset about it as you" if you can't see why any act that makes their NON-AMERICAN surveillance state harder to implement is a good idea.

But then, you used a throwaway account, so I think that speaks for itself.

[jsmthrowaway]

What in your eyes is an "American" intelligence agency? What does the phrase "American" mean to you in general? You capitalized it, so it's an important thrust of your point and, since it's almost always a meaningless hand wave instead of a useful adjective, I want to give you a chance to solidify your position before discarding it.

Also, "throwaway" is a poor regex for "should disregard opinion". Click my profile.

[optimusclimb]

See my reply to "thizbuzz" in this thread for a very basic understanding of why I think having an intelligence agency makes sense at a basic level.

As for your mentions of karma, and my commenting on "throwaway" being in your name - you're right, I don't click through and check the status of a user before replying to their comment on this forum, or any other - because I'd rather reply to what they wrote. Was I tricked by the "throwaway" in your username? Absolutely - your plan worked as you desired. If you think this makes me lazy, so be it. I'd say you intentionally mislead me, because putting "throwaway" in a profile is a common convention on internet forums, and I absolutely just accepted it as is.

What does "American" mean to me in general? I'd say the founding fathers of our country made clear their intentions in the Constitution, and Bill of Rights. To me, being American at present means agreeing with those intentions - which encompass a lot of ideals about personal freedoms, and rights to privacy.

I think the current attitude of many branches of our government toward our rights to privacy is "un-American" - especially with respect to the NSA. I'm not going to write a treatise here on exactly what that means, however I think it should be self evident to those who have a good grasp of American history. In fact, I'd be willing to bet that recent immigrants who have achieved citizenship and taken the requisite tests might have a better understanding of the concept of what "American" ideals supposedly are than many native born citizens.

[thizzbuzz]

I am not convinced that the NSA has any purpose. What do you think is necessary about the NSA?

[buttcoinslol]

Collecting and analyzing information for foreign intelligence and counter-intelligence. This seems like a fairly necessary organ of state for the country with the largest military in the world.

[ende]

But that's what the CIA does. Which one is redundant then?

[optimusclimb]

Possibly one of the most naive comments I've ever seen on here.

We keep a military at the most basic level - so that another country can't send a boat full of troops over here, or airplanes filled with troops - invade us - and take over. In other words, basic protection against normal acts of war. Imagine if you, thizzbuzz, suddenly awoke tomorrow and found out the dictator of some small European country died, and you were the heir apparent. What would you want to have to make sure that Russia didn't just come in the next day with tanks and declare your country was now theirs? Oh - that would be a military.

So great, you've made sure you have that. Now at the very least, if some other country violates your sovereignty, you can at least put up a fight, and it will be a visible spectacle to the rest of the world, which might come in and try and help you.

Next up - Inhabitants of your country speak one language. The rest of the world speaks other languages. If a newspaper in a neighboring country starts publishing articles calling for an invasion of your country, in a language most of your inhabitants don't speak...isn't that something you'd like to be aware of? Who do you expect to be responsible for keeping tabs on that? Are you just going to hope that one of your citizens keeps tabs on it for you and drops you an email (at [e-mail]) to let you know you might want to be on the lookout for an invasion? Or would your citizens prefer your government is a little proactive about this? (assuming you're a benevolent dictator that wants to keep his country.) Sounds to me like you want some sort of government agency that keeps tabs on such things - you know, for NATIONAL SECURITY.

What you DON'T want, if you have an American mindset, is for that agency to be spying on all of its native citizens. That doesn't mean you don't want such an agency to exist.

[vidarh]

> The rest of the world speaks other languages. If a newspaper in a neighboring country starts publishing articles calling for an invasion of your country, in a language most of your inhabitants don't speak...isn't that something you'd like to be aware of?

You do realise that you have a diplomatic corps with feet on the ground and people who speak the native languages in a substantial percentage of countries, right? And that e.g. CIA have analyst desks for handling exactly this type of thing?

What makes you think the NSA is needed for that? And even if they were, it'd be something like %0.001 of their resources that'd be needed for that.

The NSA's primary mission is sigint targeting non-public sources, as the CIA and DIA and other agencies are under substantial restrictions in terms of what sigint they are allowed to engage in without going through the NSA.

[twombly]

Part of the reason people would even want to send a boat full of troops is because of the way our military interacts with the rest of the world. It's an unfortunate situation to be in but that doesn't mean it needs to continue forever. If we would just scale back the size of our military presence it would definitely be safer for everyone.

[snowwrestler]

> Part of the reason people would even want to send a boat full of troops...

Yes but not the entire or only reason, so even if we had the best possible foreign policy, we would still need a national defense.

[optimusclimb]

While I agree with you that much of our foreign policy causes us problems, I see that as orthogonal to the need for such defense even if we were to change said policy(ies.)

[cmdkeen]

Safer for who? Probably not for Europe, certainly Eastern Europe who see what Putin is doing in Ukraine. Probably not for Japan and South Korea, both of whom rely on US military backing against undemocratic opponents who have designs on their territory.

US military strength underpins the current Western democratic system, which keeps the US wealthy through trade and commerce.

[tobltobs]

It would be safer for europe if the US wouldn't act like an idiot in the arabic world. Or at least if they would learn something from their zillions of mistakes. Islamic terrorism kills people everywhere, but mostly not in the US.

[vidarh]

Given what Putin is doing in Ukraine, and given how the US and Europe appeared to be totally unprepared, it doesn't seem like the NSA is really benefiting Europe enough for it to be a viable for the necessity of the NSA.

[optimusclimb]

Since HN is not transparent about downvoting, other than that only certain users have the ability - I'd love the feedback on the reasons for the down votes.

How a country could exist without an organization that pays attention to what the rest of the world is up to towards the goal of keeping itself "secure" is beyond me. What I wrote was a fictional circumstance which I thought explained to others how you'd arrive at this conclusion - i.e. answering the question that was asked.

[nkurz]

My downvote was because you led off with an unnecessary personal insult to a new user in response to a polite and legitimate question. He created an account a week and a half ago, has made a few high quality comments (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8614442), and I wouldn't want to see your rudeness drive him off, or worse, encourage him or others to respond in kind. The rest of your response was on-topic and well-argued, although like some of the others I think you might be unnecessarily equating the need for the NSA as a separate agency to the need for any form of foreign intelligence gathering.

[optimusclimb]

Thanks for the feedback. I wrote the first sentence because the question I was responding to was in my head akin to saying we should get rid of the police across the board because of what happened in Ferguson.

It might have been fine on other forums, but I see that I would have been better off letting the rest of my answer stand on its own merits (or not.) Will keep that in mind going forward.

[thizzbuzz]

Thanks! I've been on HN for 4 or 5 years though, I just make a new throw-away every few months. It will take a lot more than that to scare me off!

[vidarh]

You're changing the subject.

No other country has intelligence services with even a fraction of the reach of the NSA, so clearly countries can exist without an NSA class agency.

Whether a country could exist without an organization that pays attention to what the rest of the world is up to is another matter. It's a role served by diplomatic services, and where even the most low tech intelligence agency can provide substantial additional abilities without stepping all over civil liberties. I don't see anyone questioning the need for a diplomatic corps, foreign service, or even basic human intelligence agencies, or for that matter basic sigint.

But it's an entirely different issue than whether an agency like the NSA is needed - or warranted.

Arguably, while the NSA may thwart some threats, it is also part of maintaining the image of the US as the big bully of the world, and as a result it is part of creating the type of threats it is meant to protect you against. It's self-reinforcing.

[AnimalMuppet]

It's not that simple.

Arguably, NSA-type stuff (SIGINT) saved our behinds in World War II. Enigma let us read the German intentions, and Purple let us know what the Japanese were planning. The battle of Midway, for example, could have been completely different without SIGINT. So there's good historical precedence that we need something like the NSA.

On the other hand, we didn't figure out what the Japanese were up to by collecting metadata on domestic telephone calls. That is, some SIGINT activities are arguably essential, and some are... otherwise. The "otherwise" ones are both more intrusive to personal privacy, and less effective at national defense.

So one can be in favor of having the NSA, and against the NSA as it has become.

Side note: If there's ever another successful attack on the scale of 9/11, you're really going to see the US move toward a police state...

[baddox]

You seem to be confusing the NSA with any agency that does any intelligence gathering or any military action of any sort. Yes, "NSA" stands for "National Security Agency," but that doesn't mean that other agencies can't perform legitimate actions for national security.

[optimusclimb]

I see what you're saying. I think the three letter acronym doesn't matter so much (i.e. whether it's the NSA, CIA, or some other org) that carries out the mission - but I think given the sophistication of communications and technology these days - we'd be foolish not to have such an organization. To me the problem is that that particular org has shifted a lot of its resources and abilities to domestic surveillance - and what the article in question is discussing is just Utah symbolically objecting to it.

[vidarh]

It matters in the the NSA is the only agency authorised to carry out widespread signals intelligence, and the only one with the resources to do so at anything approaching that scale.

> is discussing is just Utah symbolically objecting to it.

It may just be symbolic, but sometimes symbols are important. If nothing else, if more and more parts of US society brands the NSA as un-American pariahs, it may make more insiders think twice about what they're doing (and about whistleblowing), may make it harder for Congress to keep supporting it, and may make their recruitment more difficult.

[slavik81]

The United States somehow managed to survive for 176 years without the NSA. The country could probably get along well enough without them, if it had to.

[optimusclimb]

It survived 158 years without an FCC but we still eventually needed that.

[baddox]

Isn't this a semantic argument? There's really not much of a difference between "getting rid of the NSA" and "reforming the NSA by kicking out anyone in any way involved in the spying scandals and drastically overhauling the rules and oversight." Either way, you're getting rid of anything recognizable as the current NSA, and it doesn't really matter what you call the new agency that performs the legitimate tasks that the NSA is supposed to perform.

[CHY872]

Well, not really. You'd absolutely destroy the NSA's experience and domain knowledge, setting back its operational capabilities by a matter of decades and basically put the Russians and the Chinese in the driving seat. It's not a small organisation - these things take a lot of time to set up properly.