This video may not seem remarkable at first…. Boston, U.S.A. from UrtheCast on Vimeo. It’s Boston… and you can see Fenway Park and cars moving on Storrow Drive as well as I-40. Here’s the astonishing, but creepy, thing about this: it was taken from space. From a satellite. You can see the Prudential Center and the Hancock Building appear to … Read More
Why I Still Can’t Get 100% Behind Snowden
Whistleblowing is good. Whistleblowing is important. It is important that we know what the government is doing regarding our communications and the impact on our privacy rights. I am happy for the debate, and I thank Edward Snowden for it. But then there is this: Britain has pulled out agents from live operations in “hostile countries” after Russia and China … Read More
I Don’t Worry About Spying
I know. I should care. Governmental abuse and all that. But I don’t. This past week has been filled with stories about the sunset clauses of The Patriot Act, and overwhelming surveillance methods regarding our phone usage. And I can’t quite give a damn. I like what Edward Snowden did, for the most part. I think he should be granted … Read More
Second Circuit Rules Against Mass Collection Of Phone Records
I haven’t written much about Ed Snowden and the huge, perhaps unconstitutional, mass surveillance of Americans, but this is too noteworthy to ignore: A federal appeals court ruled Thursday that the National Security Agency’s controversial collection of Americans’ phone records, first revealed by Edward Snowden, is not legal under the Patriot Act. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals held in … Read More
Then And Now
53 years ago today, an outgoing President Eisenhower said: “In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.” He went on: “We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or … Read More
Legal Rationale for Surveillance
I haven't been writing much about the telephony surveillance "scandal" because unlike many liberals I know, I'm not that upset by it. I do not consider the mass collection of metadata to be an invasion of my privacy. Collection is not the same thing as searching or prying, to my mind. Anyway, the Obama Administration released a white paper which … Read More
Here’s Why The NSA Surveillance Now Is Better Than The Way It Was Under Bush
Chart On Surveillance Oversight Prepared By Nancy Pelosi For Democratic house Members by tpmdocs
Snowden Is A Dick
I have been following with interest the various leaks from Edward Snowden, although I have not been writing about them much. I write this post to officially say that the so-called whistleblower really is a self-aggrandizing a-hole, and not the 4th Amendment crusador that he envisions himself to be. I join with others who ask — if he was so … Read More
US Majority Backs NSA Surveillance
A new Washington Post-Pew Research Center poll found that 56% of Americans consider the NSA's accessing of telephone call records of millions of Americans through secret court orders "acceptable." A 62% majority believe it's more important for the government to investigate terrorist threats, even if those investigations intrude on personal privacy. Support drops when it comes to government monitoring of emails, but even here, the … Read More
On The NSA Leaks And The Fact That Your Phone Records Are Being Seized And Everything You Do On The Internet Is Being Swept Up And All That
Busy-ness and business kept me from blogging about last week's bombshell news: the leaks to Glenn Greenwald and the Washington Post that (a) phone records of Americans are seized en masse by the NSA and (b) everyone's Internet activity is likewise seized. My immediate thought is: This is news? Rachel Maddow devoted almost all of her show on Thrusday to … Read More
Unintelligent Intelligence
Everyone should read the Washington Post's recent effort in investigative reporting, Top Secret America. As a piece of journalism, it represents what actual journalism should be — not what passes for journalism in today's he-said-she-said creaming-heads world. That said, the subject of the piece is distressing. Since George W. Bush, we've had this reckless, ridiculous, uncoordinated expansion of intelligence agencies, all sucking … Read More
Bill Clinton’s Email Accessed By NSA During Bush Administration
Man, it was bad: The difficulty of distinguishing between e-mail messages involving foreigners from those involving Americans was “one of the main things that drove” the Bush administration to push for a more flexible law in 2008, said Kenneth L. Wainstein, the homeland security adviser under President George W. Bush. That measure, which also resolved the long controversy over N.S.A.’s … Read More
Revelations From Bush Era: American Journalists Spied Upon
One day into his administration, and Obama is already making leaps and bounds in removing the secrecy that so characterized the Bush Administration. In the sweep of a pen, Obama has made the process of governing more open and transparent. But the damage has been done. MSNBC's Keith Olbermann interviewed Russell Tice, a former National Security Agency analyst last night. Tice … Read More
My Thoughts On The FISA Bill
Greenwald summarizes: The Democratic-led Congress this afternoon voted to put an end to the NSA spying scandal, as the Senate approved a bill — approved last week by the House — to immunize lawbreaking telecoms, terminate all pending lawsuits against them, and vest whole new warrantless eavesdropping powers in the President. The vote in favor of the new FISA bill … Read More
Bush’s Wiretapping: Now 0-For-3 With The Courts
Greenwald: A Bush-41-appointed Federal District Judge yesterday became the third judge — out of three who have ruled on the issue — to reject the Bush administration’s claim that Article II entitles the President to override or ignore the provisions of FISA. Yesterday’s decision by Judge Vaughn Walker of the Northern District of California also guts the central claims for … Read More