A breaking story from The Guardian reports that the National Security Agency issued a court order requiring Verizon to disclose, daily, the phone records of millions of Americans. The order was approved by the secret FISA court (which is not surprising, as it approves almost every governement request), and phone call information will be collected until July.
The justification is found once again in the Patriot Act. I say “once again” because, as most of us can recall, this same situation occurred during the Bush administration. We don’t yet know the extent to which it compares, however; all we know is that it’s happening again under Obama. Does this warrant outrage? Or will Americans be too blasé or defeated to protest?
Don’t most people assume the government can access their telephone and mail records whenever they want? So no biggie. And from what I remember the main reason so called progressives complained last time was because Bush was going around FISA. Obama dotted his i’s, crossed the t’s etc. So everything is peachy keen.
The people with actual values and minds will be outraged. The people who follow our increasingly autocratic President as the source of right and wrong will call everyone who objects a racist or whatever it is they usually do.
I can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic or not. It’s a surveillance and privacy issue, obviously. There’s also the issue of a why a foreign surveillance act is being used to justify domestic surveillance.
In related news, I guess the Associated Press doesn’t use Verizon, because the DoJ had to subpoena those phone records independently. You know, in that big scandal that happened a couple weeks ago.
I’m sure that a) it’s a mistake, and b) the President only found out about it this morning. Just like the IRS thing, the AP thing, and Fast and Furious.
Face it, he has a rogue administration that is trying to sabotage him.
And BTW, why the hell is the Guardian the one to find this out? Where is our own media? Licking boots?
Helping the NSA spy on people? All the juicy stories are for government eyes only.
Hey guys, what do you think the giant NSA data center in Utah is for, if not to store the calls, texts, tweets, or straight dope posts of every last American?
What the hell else is the NSA even for? Doesn’t “NSA” stand for “Nasty people who Spy on Americans”? Who needs enemies when we’ve got groups like that “protecting” us?
Obama is an autocratic dick, who will happily steamroll people’s rights whenever it suits him, or…
He has his head in the sand, and doesn’t know or care what his subordinates do, until one of them bites him on the ass.
I’m wondering if it might not be Option 2. Especially given the I’m-sure-it’s-all-just-coincidental sudden departure of his National Security Advisor yesterday.
The same people who, when warrantless wiretaps were authorized by Bush, dismissed concerns with the logic “if you’re not doing anything wrong, you have nothing to worry about”, will be the loudest critics snapping at Obama’s heels. The Patriot Act was a hastily approved knee-jerk, foisted on us by Dick Cheney in order to expand the powers of the President’s office. Reap, sow, etc.
I do. It makes me sad to do so, but it’s the only reasonable assumption. I further assume that what happened here has been going on for years, and that this is just one case we were informed about because the measures in place to keep us ignorant failed.
I don’t know whether the information will be misused. But the notion of keeping our personal communication (and to a large extent, our whereabouts at all times) private from the government has already been lost forever. Some of us just haven’t quite understood and accepted it yet.
It was approved by the courts that were set up for requests like this. Whether people are OK with this kind of enormous data collection and secret approvals is another question. But let’s not get bogged down with boring legal and Constitutional questions and privacy issues; let’s snark on Obama. That’ll be much more productive.
We’re well into year 5 of the Obama regime. “I just HAD to renew, expand, and defend all of this stuff that Dick Cheney foisted on me even though I detest it so” stopped working a long time ago.
Just FYI, courtesy of the Department of Justice via the ACLU, here’s a handy chart detailing what information your major cell service providers retain and for how long.