NSA admits listening to U.S. phone calls without warrants - Angry yet?

Originally posted by CB328
Why are people mad at Obama for something he didn't do??

The issue here is that the military industrial espionage complex thinks they are above the law, doing "the lord's work", and entitled to all the tax money they can spend.

Until the American people decide to regulate the military and intelligence instead of worshipping them nothing will change.

Have you just crawled out from under a rock or something?
Put those pom poms down, slowly step away from the delusion, slap yourself around the face a couple of times and then go and apologize to your parents for being so naive.

Obama has systematically expanded the powers of the surveillance state. He has also allowed the construction of the biggest secret data gathering, storage and collating complex on the planet in Utah, and he has lied on camera to the American people about the level of spying the NSA is doing.

It's times like this I wish there was an "ignore" button, allowing me to filter out the nonsense on ATS. It's one thing to have people giving really offensive opinions about something - I can put up with that and wouldn't feel the need to block them - but to have people actively denying reality in defense of their precious leader is a completely different level of ignorance.

Originally posted by EarthCitizen07

Originally posted by MsAphrodite
reply to post by EarthCitizen07

 

Hey everybody, look over there!! A squirrel...

next.

Whats your point? I must have missed it.

It's a funny line from the movie "UP".

~Namaste

reply to post by EarthCitizen07


It's difficult to help you understand when you lack the basic knowledge of how things are supposed to be in this nation....

Glenn Greenwald can help you out much better than I can dear millennials. This is an excerpt from his most recent post regarding this issue. Please read it and attempt to understand what you are condoning.

The way things are supposed to work is that we're supposed to know virtually everything about what they do: that's why they're called public servants. They're supposed to know virtually nothing about what we do: that's why we're called private individuals. This dynamic - the hallmark of a healthy and free society - has been radically reversed.

Now, they know everything about what we do, and are constantly building systems to know more. Meanwhile, we know less and less about what they do, as they build walls of secrecy behind which they function. That's the imbalance that needs to come to an end.

No democracy can be healthy and functional if the most consequential acts of those who wield political power are completely unknown to those to whom they are supposed to be accountable. There seems to be this mentality in Washington that as soon as they stamp TOP SECRET on something they've done we're all supposed to quiver and allow them to do whatever they want without transparency or accountability under its banner. These endless investigations and prosecutions and threats are designed to bolster that fear-driven dynamic. But it isn't working. It's doing the opposite.

Now stop being lazy and go read this entire post

and this one too

Originally posted by MsAphrodite
reply to post by CB328

 

How many times do I have to repeat myself.

The Executive Branch (that's Obama for those of you who lack basic knowledge of civics) has complete control when it comes to classified information and national security. The buck stops with the president.

well, except for the money thingy, and law passing thingy...but, what do i know, i don't have a basic knowledge of civics, i just come to ATS to sit at the feet of all the republican constitutional scholars...i'll now return back to my drooling and knuckle-dragging

reply to post by Arbitrageur

Blaming the president is appropriate since I think presidential executive orders were given to allow the NSA to ignore the constitution and do their spying. Of course the president isn't the only one to blame, but we can't really blame anyone else for their executive orders.

But if you blame Obama you also have to blame Bush, because warrantless spying goes back at least as far as pre-9/11 2001, with Bush.

The last president who appeared to be trying to follow the law and constitution was Clinton, who of course authorized spying with a warrant. I haven't seen anything yet showing Clinton authorized warrantless domestic spying.

Not disagreeing with you, BUT I have been doing some digging on "When was the Patriot Act written" seems to be a lot of scrubbed articles that no longer exist.

However, Clinton is not blameless either!!! That is if we can stop the team mentality and view the Ds and Rs as the same party who's only job is to create division, and here is why........

First thing is the Patriot Act was over 400 pages long, and it was signed and implemented 20 days AFTER 911. Therefore, I can pretty much say it was written before 911 happened.......... The question is when?

Then I found this transcript from Sept 20th 2001 from the CNN show Crossfire where who else but Senator Joe Biden says this...................

BIDEN: In full disclosure, I wrote that bill. I'm not being facetious.

PRESS: It's really a great bill. BIDEN: No. No. I'm not being facetious. I'm not being facetious when I say that. I got a call from the attorney general in 1995 after the bombing of the -- in Oklahoma City. I drafted a bill as chairman of the Judiciary Committee that expanded a lot of these authorities. But none of the expansion relates to anything that will in any way jeopardize your civil liberties. Let me give you one example.

Right now, there is a situation where if in fact you are going to get -- you have probable cause, you go to judge and say, "I have probable cause to believe a crime has been committed, we had want" -- a federal judge has to sign off on it. Right now, you say you can tap the phone in your home.

Well, we know if we can show that you go to the corner and make a phone call from a corner booth all the time, then we should be able to tap that phone and these phones, like my phone. They have a phone. They will use this phone and literally throw it in the Potomac and go to the next phone. So how do you deal with that reality?

The way you deal with that reality is -- and the worry is, if you are going to mother's house to use her phone and you are the one being tapped, you end up tapping your mother's phone and you find out your mother shoplifted, they hear that on the phone -- there is a way in which we wrote into the law that you cannot use anything you gather in that tap against anyone else on that phone, other than the person for who -- against whom you are seeking the tap.

Because -- look. There is no possibility any longer -- none of these terrorists, none of the organized crime units, none of the druglords, go to a single phone and use it anymore. So the ability to tap their -- intercept their calls and the ability to legitimately do that when you have probable cause to believe a crime has been committed, has to change as the technology is changed.

But keep in mind it requires a federal judge to determine that the standard -- that a crime has probably been committed is in play, and it goes against the individual who you are saying is the one who committed the crime. So this is not -- I mean, I usually agree with you on this program, I'm usually a Press guy, not a Tucker Carlson guy, you know, but I think you are wrong on this one, Bill.

Source

Who was President at that time????? Bill Clinton!!

They ALL lie!!!!

Ron Paul had mentioned that the Patriot Act had been written 20 years before 911 and had been sitting in a desk at the DOJ.......

Regardless, Obama is the POTUS now and he had two choices. Keep up the lie, or tell the American people the truth. He made his decision to serve his corporate masters. He needs arrested, along with all of the other so called elected officials whom have lied. After that, then we can go back and arrest the ones whom have retired to their lives of luxury. Think of the money saved from that!

Bottom line, just try to find when the Patriot Act was written and who wrote it! Damn near impossible.....

reply to post by jimmyx


If you were keeping up you would know how congress has been knee-capped on this issue.


Read this whole thing. Do you understand who Glenn Greenwald is???

reply to post by Rocker2013


You are the one that is confused and unfortunately providing nonsense. Project Echelon spans many decades and many presidents. The president rubber stamps stuff according to what his advisors tell him to do. The president is not the be all and end all that NAIVE PEOPLE think so.

And what has congress been doing??????????????? Do they play golf all day or do they attend bilderberger parties?

ECHELON is a name used in global media and in popular culture to describe a signals intelligence (SIGINT) collection and analysis network operated on behalf of the five signatory states to the UKUSA Security Agreement[1] (Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States, referred to by a number of abbreviations, including AUSCANNZUKUS[1] and Five Eyes).[2][3] It has also been described as the only software system which controls the download and dissemination of the intercept of commercial satellite trunk communications.[4]

ECHELON, according to information in the European Parliament document, "On the existence of a global system for the interception of private and commercial communications (ECHELON interception system)" was created to monitor the military and diplomatic communications of the Soviet Union and its Eastern Bloc allies during the Cold War in the early 1960s.[5]

The system has been reported in a number of public sources.[6] Its capabilities and political implications were investigated by a committee of the European Parliament during 2000 and 2001 with a report published in 2001,[5] and by author James Bamford in his books on the National Security Agency of the United States.[4] The European Parliament stated in its report that the term ECHELON is used in a number of contexts, but that the evidence presented indicates that it was the name for a signals intelligence collection system. The report concludes that, on the basis of information presented, ECHELON was capable of interception and content inspection of telephone calls, fax, e-mail and other data traffic globally through the interception of communication bearers including satellite transmission, public switched telephone networks (which once carried most Internet traffic) and microwave links.[5]

Bamford describes the system as the software controlling the collection and distribution of civilian telecommunications traffic conveyed using communication satellites, with the collection being undertaken by ground stations located in the footprint of the downlink leg.

en.wikipedia.org...

Originally posted by NorEaster
If all of this actually does end up reining in this crap, then that'd be good. If it's just an Obama impeachment run-up, then the GOP is going to lose its ass in a way that they can't even imagine at this point. And forever, at that. Like the Wig Party.

This NSA stuff started under Bush/Cheney, and has just gotten worse - or maybe it's just become more technologically able - as a result of not being stomped on by the Justice Department since it started building its infrastructure in the first decade of the new century. I keep in mind that this whole I-spy on American citizens industry was launched by Bush's Patriot Act, and that trillion$ in private sector profits are anticipated by that industry over many decades of govt contracts. I also keep in mind the sketchy circumstances that launched all of this (those 9/11 Attacks), and the fact that when weapons grade Anthrax (as in the 4 letters to Congress and the MSM in the fall of 2001 that were presented as a follow-on attack specifically related to the 9/11 Attacks) is manufactured, the batch would never be limited to only enough to salt four letters, but would be literal pounds of the stuff. And that no one's ever recovered all that bio-weaponry, and that no one's ever been investigated or prosecuted for the 2008 banking theft and subsequent collapse of our entire economy.

In other words, this is just a continuation of the very same crap that Bush/Cheney infected our nation with, and with ongoing impunity even well into the next administration, which smacks of a heavy hand still being present and affecting how our entire federal government operates from the top-down.

This is a conspiracy site. Start looking at the real conspiracy behind all the insanity that's never stopped running us all down since those planes hit the World Trade Center in 2001. That conspiracy hasn't gone away. Why would it. The folks in charge are still running things and making unprecedented profits off us as they do. These international corporate monsters are the new organized crime, but on a white Anglo guy scale that no one's ever achieved in the past.

edit on 6/16/2013 by NorEaster because: (no reason given)

how would you feel if you found out that all this was on the back of the 9/11 media
fakery extravaganza which featured no real plane crashes and very few if any real victims,
most being computer generated entities with no basis in reality?

doubly duped? tripply? more?

www.septemberclues.info
www.cluesforum.info

time to start taking this seriously, don't you think?

we were duped into giving it all away. and we didn't just give it; we threw it.

Project Echelon spans many decades and many presidents

Yeah, but it's all Obama's fault. He obviously should have run for president when he was born to stop this.

reply to post by CB328


He campaigned on stopping this. It was his primary issue.

Originally posted by MsAphrodite
reply to post by EarthCitizen07

 

It's difficult to help you understand when you lack the basic knowledge of how things are supposed to be in this nation....

Glenn Greenwald can help you out much better than I can dear millennials. This is an excerpt from his most recent post regarding this issue. Please read it and attempt to understand what you are condoning.

The way things are supposed to work is that we're supposed to know virtually everything about what they do: that's why they're called public servants. They're supposed to know virtually nothing about what we do: that's why we're called private individuals. This dynamic - the hallmark of a healthy and free society - has been radically reversed.

Now, they know everything about what we do, and are constantly building systems to know more. Meanwhile, we know less and less about what they do, as they build walls of secrecy behind which they function. That's the imbalance that needs to come to an end.

No democracy can be healthy and functional if the most consequential acts of those who wield political power are completely unknown to those to whom they are supposed to be accountable. There seems to be this mentality in Washington that as soon as they stamp TOP SECRET on something they've done we're all supposed to quiver and allow them to do whatever they want without transparency or accountability under its banner. These endless investigations and prosecutions and threats are designed to bolster that fear-driven dynamic. But it isn't working. It's doing the opposite.

Now stop being lazy and go read this entire post

and this one too

I am NOT supporting such behavior. I abhor, detest, loathe, condemn to the fullest degree. I was JUST SAYING the president does not have the PROPER CLEARANCE to oversee nsa or cia operations. There are higher clearances than top secret.

Bob Lazar had a majic clearance that was 40 levels above top secret and Q clearance(nuclear energy). Everything is compartmentalised to death on purpose to keep secrecy. Extreme secrecy is BAD, OBVIOUSLY!

Its not about russia, china, iraq, libya, syria. Its about royal families, bilderbergers, masons having INFILTRATED all the governments and then they USE the american government because of its awesome infrastructure and financial muscle on the world market.

I am pissed more than you are, ALWAYS HAVE BEEN. I have read stuff that maybe 50 years from now will become declassified. Its terrifying how out of the loop most are. A plane flying on auto-pilot will eventually crash when it runs out of jet fuel.

38 levels above top secret. Its a very interesting video. I have seen it a few times.

reply to post by elouina


the thing that astonishes me the most is that Americans still believe that they are doing this for our own good, For our "safety" when that's not the case at all

Originally posted by all2human
Angry yet?..Nope too distracted by the Syria thing

Not that this doesn't piss me off, but I know how you feel. I'm still too distracted by Benghazi. Besides, I assumed since the passing of The Patriot Act that this was happening. Amazing how this domestic spying thing has taken the pressure off of Obama and Clinton, isn't it?

You no longer hear about how Washington watched in real-time as Americans were killed, and did nothing. Or how the Secretary of State suddenly became too ill to answer questions, and then finally said "what does it matter?"

Benghazi and Syria have become dead issues overnight because of this. These guys are masters of deflection for sure.

"HEY, LOOK WHAT' THAT GUY'S DOING TO YOU OVER THERE!" **Sweeps the dirt under the rug**

The liberal trash that voted for this anti-American character and his crew will support him as long as they receive their 'freebies'. Welfare and other freebies were ment to assist citizens in a time of need...not support the population of Mexico and other third world countries...

The following is a quote, supposedly from General George S. Patton: "Politicians are the lowest form of life on earth. Liberal Democrats are the lowest form of politicians." Very applicable today...

Originally posted by MidnightTide
I am surprised that the NSA isn't looking at ATS, where as they look at sites like ebaumsworld.

Every month or so, isn't there a thread created accusing ATS of being the NSA?

The outrage is all well and good, and justified.. But will anyone actually DO anything but complain on an internet forum? Where are the revolutionaries? Is that even what 'domesticated' Americans even want? Soo many questions. Who has the asnswers?

Originally posted by Rhinoman77
The outrage is all well and good, and justified.. But will anyone actually DO anything but complain on an internet forum? Where are the revolutionaries? Is that even what 'domesticated' Americans even want? Soo many questions. Who has the asnswers?

Shh. The guys with all the answers are right next door.. and for revolutionaries,
they've got the best tools on the planet.
They just stop by over here before the pub for joke material.

reply to post by MsAphrodite


Dear MsAphrodite,

Do I seriously have to explain to you why what is being done in the name of national security is wrong, insidious and the most evil form of tyranny?

Yes, you have to explain why what they are doing is wrong. You read people's online comments, yet, claim that the government reading what you post is wrong. Do you understand that the government owns the internet? Do you understand the government created the internet, specifically DARPA created the internet. When you use GPS do you understand you are using the military satellites? If you don't want your location tracked, don't use GPS. If you don't want your correspondence read, don't use the internet.

You have no right to privacy when you use the internet. You may wish to believe that you do; but, the courts have made it clear and will continue to. If you want privacy, send a letter. You can be as upset as you want by this; but, it is the truth. I may not like it; but, I do understand it.

Originally posted by AQuestion
reply to post by MsAphrodite

 

Dear MsAphrodite,

Do I seriously have to explain to you why what is being done in the name of national security is wrong, insidious and the most evil form of tyranny?

Yes, you have to explain why what they are doing is wrong. You read people's online comments, yet, claim that the government reading what you post is wrong. Do you understand that the government owns the internet? Do you understand the government created the internet, specifically DARPA created the internet. When you use GPS do you understand you are using the military satellites? If you don't want your location tracked, don't use GPS. If you don't want your correspondence read, don't use the internet.

You have no right to privacy when you use the internet. You may wish to believe that you do; but, the courts have made it clear and will continue to. If you want privacy, send a letter. You can be as upset as you want by this; but, it is the truth. I may not like it; but, I do understand it.

A few things that are incorrect about your post.

First of all, the Internet is no longer exclusively owned by the government. The telecommunications companies own the backbones that the Internet operates on today. Servers that companies purchase are their private property, not the Government's, and they have disclaimers all over the place for both hackers, and any unauthorized entities that clearly state that ANY unauthorized access is strictly forbidden by the LAW and that includes the Government. They must have a warrant, period. The Government has ZERO right to that data since it is privately owned by a corporation, it would be the same as them walking in to your house without a warrant and taking something you own.

Second, you DO have a right to privacy with the Internet.

§ 1.04 “Search”

[A] Katz v. United States

In Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347 (1967), federal officers, acting without a warrant, attached an electronic listening device to the outside of a telephone booth where the defendant engaged in a number of telephone conversations. The controlling legal test at the time for determining whether police conduct violated the Fourth Amendment was known as the “trespass” doctrine. Under the trespass doctrine, the Fourth Amendment did not apply in the absence of a physical intrusion - a trespass - into a “constitutionally protected area,” such as a house.

Noting the advent of modern technology that allowed the government to electronically intercept conversations without physical intrusion into any enclosure, the Court abandoned the trespass doctrine and announced that the appropriate inquiry for Fourth Amendment challenges was whether the defendant had a “reasonable expectation of privacy.” Applying this new standard, the Court found that despite the fact that the telephone booth was made of glass and the defendant's physical actions were knowingly exposed to the public, what he sought to protect from the public were his conversations, as evidenced in part by shutting the door to the phone booth. Thus, the government's electronic surveillance of the defendant's conversations without a warrant violated the Fourth Amendment.

A reasonable expectation to privacy is key in interpreting their right to access your data. When you are in your home, and you send a private email to someone you know, it's no different than the phone booth example above, which was determined to be a violation of privacy. The phone lines were owned by the same companies that own them today, it's no different. You are expecting that nobody is reading your email except that person. When you pick up the phone to call someone, you are expecting privacy between you and the person you are talking to. The only time you would expect not to have that privacy is if someone had a warrant to listen to you. The guy who walked in to that phone booth expected that nobody was listening to him.

There should be no question on the legality of this anymore, it is a complete violation of our privacy and a crushing blow to the 4th Amendment if we allow it to stay the way it is today.

~Namaste