Let’s call a spade a spade. We now have a “Secret Police.”
The Blotter — This just gets better and better. What amazes me is how the public and the Bush-apologists just have no complaints. I guess nobody is seeing the potential for all sorts of blackmailing schemes here. Exactly why the big media hasn’t gone ballistic over this is amazing to me.
The FBI acknowledged late Monday that it is increasingly seeking reporters’ phone records in leak investigations.
“It used to be very hard and complicated to do this, but it no longer is in the Bush administration,” said a senior federal official.
The acknowledgement followed our blotter item that ABC News reporters had been warned by a federal source that the government knew who we were calling.
The official said our blotter item was wrong to suggest that ABC News phone calls were being “tracked.”
“Think of it more as backtracking,” said a senior federal official.
“Every screened call in the name of stopping terrorists is a casualty on our side.” Comment by James —
That’s the way I see it, but I imagine some Bush/Republican Party apologist will speak up and make me feel unpatriotic about it.
To be fair, though, I don’t use mass transit…don’t frequent major cities…and rarely fly. Those that do may have a different take on the matter.
If there are leaks of classified information, then the leaks are inside the security forces. So, if the security forces have not done so already, why not polygraph every security employee that has access to the information, monitor the phone calls of the security employees that have access to the information and clamp down on how many security people that can have access to the information. Since the investigation team is backtracking lends me to believe it is easier to violate a citizen’s privacy than it is to investigate one of their own employees.
As for the NSA, the President is justifying his actions by claiming that there is some big bad evil out there so he must illegally tap everyone’s phone. That is like a murder claiming mental disoders for his actions. There are laws governing spying and the President should follow those laws. Do you really want a President to disregard the law and the Constitution? There is no justification for the President to break the law and he took an oath to protect the Constitution.
After 9/11 the FBI leased office space and installed top secret servers and telecom equipment in Verizon central offices in New York. Don’t know why. But the source where I got this from is extremely reliable.
#13, #17… So this is what it’s come down to, eh? If the President has an intrusive surveillance program that he says will keep us safer (as long as it’s not abused by him, his staff, or others), then nobody has the right to complain about our loss of privacy unless we propose an alternative?
Well, aren’t you a couple of little security whores! You’ll sell your soul for a little more security, won’t you? Fine with me, but all I ask is, don’t sell my soul along with it. The majority tends to rule, but the minority is still supposed to have rights.
what is privacy for anyway?
my real concern is their hueristics for determining who’s a criminal. I don’t care if they check my phone records, but when they mistakenly take people away, that’s a concern
Republicans an extremely frightened bunch (I include all conservatives as republicans by the way. Most conservatives who say how sick they are of the GOP and will vote democrat are just liars).
“An inelegance agency, who is trying to find who leaked classified information that could help terrorists avoid being tracked and or captured, is trying to stop the leaks by looking at the end point and “backtracking” to the source so the can stop it.
Sounds good to me. ”
Kind of like the argument that it’s better to have “terrorists” fighting our military in Iraq than having them come here. Join the military, be used as a target. Interesting slogan idea.
Of course, maybe they’re on to something. It took just one major terrorist attack for the U.S. to give up on everything it believed in for the 200+ years prior. God help us all when they strike again.
–WKW
How can NSA logging my phone records affect me? I do not call terrorist. I just call my friends and family. But may be one of my friends or fmaily do call terrorist. May be friends of my friends and family call terrorist. May be the NSA is playing 5 Degrees of seperation with the phone records. What would happen to me if one of my friends calls a friend that calls a terrorist? Can the Homeland Security take custody of me just because someone I know knows a terrorist? Just remember, if you are taken into custody for terror reasons, there is a good just you will not be able to get a lawyer.
NSA is using the phone records to build a social network of all Americans. Put that data with the data Homeland Security can gather from the credit card companies you do business with, the banks you use, what groceries you buy and any other data that might provide your habits. Do you really want the Government to have this much information about you?
If we allow illegal wire taps now, how about warrantless house searches later? If those house searches protect us from terrorist that is a good thing, right? What about vidoe cameras in peoples homes? Must be protected from terrorist, right?
I rather have my liberties, freedoms and privacy than trying to be safe from something that has less probabilty than a lightning strike.
david, do you have any equally reliable sources about the missile strike into the Pentagon or the demolition of the WTC?
#29. Self-Intelligence, AB CD, Self-Intelligence.
You’ve got it all wrong John! True our government is spying on us but it’s for our own good. They just want to make sure no nasty terrorists hurt us and make sure we are all doing the right thing. Our government loves us and would never do anything to hurt us. And after all our Great Decider has repeatedly said that he is guarding our privacy!
You know Gary……It’s pretty easy calling someone a *security whore* when your also benifitting from that security.
I really don’t feel like my life is being impinged on when goverment collects info on me that just about anyone can collect. If you buy anything, in any store, your being tracked, even if you pay cash, wear your tin foil hat and have a beard.
Does goverment need this info? Probably not, but to be honest, I don’t really know……do you? Are you privey to information that the rest of aren’t? Please, show me how my liberties have been taken away from me by this program, I’m such an ignorant bastard that you might want to use universal sign language and small words.
Why is asking you to come up with other ways to keeps tabs on those who would use terror such a terrible thing? Is it because your one of those who bitch and moan at everything, but have no real ideas of your own? Just saying something is wrong isn’t answering the question of how you would protect the citizens of this or any other country.
Of course there are limits to what we should allow goverment to do, and I respect your’s or anyone elses rights to protest what they don’t agree with, but it would be nice if you could respect my right to not join your protest until I see a reason to.
I can’t believe how ignorant most of these comments are. People just seem to want to believe the worst about anyone who works in our Federal Government. Don’t let the facts get in your way. The phone records in question are not recordings of your phone calls and nobody has the legal right to do that except by court order or unless the calls involve known out of country calls to suspected terrorists. The telephone records involved are phone numbers called/received only. If they help Homeland Security to locate associates of terror suspects then that is fine by me and by most adult American (according to polls, not petty rumours). To say we now have a secret police force (showing a picture of the 1930′s – 1952 era Soviet Berria) is pure stupid. There are many good folks out there trying their best to protect the US and I appreciate them.
Douglas — ignorant? The basic federal law governing telecommunications has been on the books for 72 years. It served as foundation for the refusal of a couple of firms to cooperate with the government’s fishing expedition. It has served as the basis for several successful class action suits against the so-called Justic Dept. over the years. It has never been amended to allow what you don’t give a damn about.
There are sound reasons for that. All having to do with the Bill of Rights. Something else you evidently don’t give a damn about.
The fact that polls show Americns don’t “approve” of the Bill of Rights is nothing new. Neither did the Weimar Republic.
Douglas, did you not read the article? Let me quote it for you.
“It used to be very hard and complicated to do this, but it no longer is in the Bush administration,” said a senior federal official.
Now… the problem here is, the requirements for collecting phone records/etc are going away. They can almost make up any reason to tap anyones phone and have it be legit thanks to the Bush administration. They don’t even need a judge to agree anymore. They just decide they need something and they have the right to get it.
“The NSLs are a version of an administrative subpoena and are not signed by a judge. Under the law, a phone company receiving a NSL for phone records must provide them and may not divulge to the customer that the records have been given to the government.”
#32, OK Joshua, since you’re insisting that anyone who criticizes a surveillance program as too intrusive on our privacy must submit an alternative, here goes…
Tighten up port security, and leave my phone traffic alone.
Get back to me after the shipping ports are truly secure.
P.S. I didn’t mean to be harsh, calling you a security whore.
Let’s make it security “escort”… wink, wink, nudge, nudge
# 36…Gary….I’ll accept that…escorts make much better money(or so I’m told)