Big Brother is Watching You

[O Really]

http://www.examiner.com/article/cia-now ... of-america

"EX-CIA employee admits President Obama is a radical Islamic enemy of America"

[bannination]

http://www.examiner.com/article/cia-now ... of-america

"EX-CIA employee admits President Obama is a radical Islamic enemy of America"

[Mr.B]

Y'all might wanna go and reinforce the elastic band in your step-ins before reading this....:

Fake Cell Phone Towers

[O Really]

Doesn't seem to me it would be all that hard to find out whose antennas these are. Somebody owns the property they're on, right? There's got to be either leases, contracts, permits, something. Or there's always money. Not NSA, though. They don't need to put up fake cell antennae to snag your calls.

[Mr.B]

I saw on WLOS News tonight, in a follow-up to this story, that there's one in Asheville; location unknown at this time.

[O Really]

Not that Faux is reliable, but even they think Snowden's done damage... http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/09 ... picks=true

[bannination]

It's way silly to imagine that very tech-savvy ISIS doesn't know to avoid surveillance without Snowden. The issue is the NSA's spying on hundreds of millions of Americans and allies.

"Collect everything." - NSA chief.

"even" Faux (and the Moonie Times)? When did they become dovish or concerned with individual liberty and privacy?

Since Obama.
Because Obama.

[bannination]

It's way silly to imagine that very tech-savvy ISIS doesn't know to avoid surveillance without Snowden. The issue is the NSA's spying on hundreds of millions of Americans and allies.

"Collect everything." - NSA chief.

"even" Faux (and the Moonie Times)? When did they become dovish or concerned with individual liberty and privacy?

No kidding, before Snowden I still knew to stay off cell phones and land lines, avoid the internet without serious encrypting and rerouting all communications behind 7 proxies and sanitize any data posted. I'm not even a terrorist! I'm just concerned about privacy.... so you know they are even more concerned and informed.

If anything Snowden just confirmed what most of us already knew.

[O Really]

He lists in detail the "outright lies and nonsense" spewed in order to demonize himself and Snowden and divert from the NSA's crimes. Some of that smear job was even echoed by lefties in this thread. For example, there are the charges that Snowden willingly gave info. to China or Russia, as if that makes any sense for someone that went public and gave so much to western journalists. Why not spy for them surreptitiously? Then, there's the silly notion that China or Russia could and did break his security on the info. he had with him, despite the fact that he was a cybergeek for the best in the world, the NSA, and had already defeated the NSA using his encryption, etc. knowledge.
.

"Some of that smear job was even echoed by lefties in this thread." That would be me. Unbowed and unrepentant.

Why don't I read the book, one might ask? Maybe I would learn something? Why don't I buy into Kanye's lame explanation for having humiliated a couple of wheel-chaired fans who wouldn't stand up for him? Because despite enormous talent, his ego and sense of self-importance are even greater. Because just the fact he did it makes it right. Because nobody knows more about being a performer than Kanye.

So Snowden appointed himself as the one true hero who could kill Grendl. But of all the hundreds of people who might have an impact, he apparently couldn't find even one member of Congress, Agency person, administration official, or anybody who would agree with him that the NSA was amock and must be exposed. Except for a Guardian reporter. And then the reporter writes a book about how wonderful they are. Looks like Snowden is the stooge for political grandstanding by China and Russia, and for beefing up Greenwald's piggy bank and in the process turned himself into an international outcast.

[O Really]

Not just you . . . but are you admitting to spewing "outright lies and nonsense" in order to demonize and divert from the NSA's crimes?

...
He felt that we needed to know, and the reaction proves he was correct. Love or hate what they did, neither was dishonorable and your continued attempts at smears won't change that.

I haven't said anything that I know to be untrue, but since almost all my comments are matters of opinion rather than fact, there certainly could be some factual inaccuracies.

Reaction doesn't prove right. And I don't care if he's honorable or not - I don't even care if he's right that the NSA is the Devil or not. What he did was wrong, IMNVHO.

[O Really]

Well sure, but we disagree on of the relevance of the rest - Reaction, honor, right and the Devil.

Necessity and Duress

Necessity:
A defense that permits a person to act in a criminal manner when an emergency situation, not of the person's own creation compels the person to act in a criminal manner to avoid greater harm from occurring.

Public Necessity:
A necessity that involves the public's interest.

(no Duress, so not included)

Yeah, I know he'd probably lose on that defense in a US court - probably wouldn't even be allowed to present most or any of it - but I think the principles are still valid.

..but points for creativity!

[O Really]

I thought Van Buren's article was interesting until I got to this part... "After all, (Obama) is the Constitutional law professor who studied the document the same way a burglar learns about an alarm system. TO BREAK IT BETTER." Then I tossed him onto the pile of birthers, tin-hat conspiracy theorists, Obama/Muslim Brotherhood Believers and general claptrap. Too bad - I'm sure he knows better.

[O Really]

It's an accurate description of the result even if the mechanism is hyperbole. He also names Reagan and implies Shrub.

"Hyperbole"? Seriously? Saying Ray Rick is a human might be hyperbole. What he said was a bald-faced lie, that would be defamatory if Obama weren't a public figure.
Unless, of course, one considers any study of Constitutional Law to be a way to determine if ones objectives are Constitutional, and that looking for legal paths is the same as looking for illegal paths. A bit esoteric, there, donchathink?

[O Really]

.

His bio and other works sure don't look wingnutty.

No, they don't. That's why I was surprised to find that he must be one.

[O Really]

...Snowden's longtime partner Lindsay Mills joined him in Moscow in July...



Just like in the movies the hero got the girl.

Наслаждайтесь жизнью в России, предатель свинья

[indago]

Journalist James Risen fight for confidentiality of sources

James Risen

[indago]

Journalist Raphael Satter wrote for The Associated Press 13 October 2014:
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Over the telephone, in jail and online, a new digital bounty is being harvested: the human voice. Businesses and governments around the world increasingly are turning to voice biometrics, or voiceprints, to pay pensions, collect taxes, track criminals and replace passwords. ...In the U.S., law enforcement officials use the technology to monitor inmates and track offenders who have been paroled. Activists worry that the popularity of voiceprinting has a downside. "It's more mass surveillance," said Sadhbh McCarthy, an Irish privacy researcher. "The next thing you know, that will be given to border guards, and you'll need to speak into a microphone when you get back from vacation."
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article

[O Really]

. "The next thing you know, that will be given to border guards, and you'll need to speak into a microphone when you get back from vacation."
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Let's say they did. Is that a bad thing? Practically every ordinary means of ID can and is counterfeited and yet the shrieks of border porosity get louder. We've got finger and hand-print time clocks at employers, and I scan my finger to get into my health club. If voice recognition (or eyeballs, whatever) makes a better assurance that you really are who you claim to be, what's the problem - other than rampant conspiracyitis?

[O Really]

Though most Big Brother abuses are decades old and consistent, there's a pretty strong case to be made that Obama and Holder have been extremists in targeting journalists and whistleblowers.

Oh, I don't know. Unless you're going to blame Obama/Holder for Sacco-Vanzeti-ing some people, I don't know how "extreme" they've been. Back in the olden days, before the term "whistle-blower" became popular and incorrectly applied to anyone otherwise violating their security clearance, people who stole and unlawfully disseminated information that was supposed to be "protected" were just shot, hung, or put away. We're much more civilized now.

[O Really]

Well, I've seen figures making the case that it's now the worst in modern history but I'm too lazy to look it up. Whatever, are you okay with the degree to which Obama and Holder are targeting journalists and whistleblowers?

I don't think journalists and whistleblowers are necessarily in the same category. I don't think all who claim to be "whistleblowers" are blowing on something whistle-worthy. I think specific facts and circumstances of each case should determine the action, if any, to be taken. I do support an active effort to reduce leaking, and agree with Obama's statement... “As commander-in-chief, I believe we must keep information secret that protects our operations and our people in the field. To do so, we must enforce consequences for those who break the law and breach their commitment to protect classified information,”

Not everyone who leaks is necessarily breaking the law, but the concept of "loose lips sink ships" has been around for a long time - way before Obama/Holder.

In my little corner of the world, whistleblowing is protected, and retaliation is unlawful. Because of that, every employee who gets disciplined for a safety rule violation claims s/he was retaliated against for reporting or complaining about a hazard. An employer can re-assign an injured employee to some "light duty" in an attempt to accommodate his/her medical limitations, and find themselves defending a claim of retal for the assignment to a job that isn't theirs. "Whistleblowing" protection requires only that the person "has a good faith belief" in what s/he reports, and isn't required to be able to prove what they say. Makes it easy keep OSHA at the door, as is happening to one of my clients in FL now. Guy leaves mad, turns the company into every alphabet agency he can find in the book. And there's very little the company can do about it without facing the "whistleblowing/retaliation" issue. And the retal claim would probably win. McKayla is not impressed.