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Meet Big Brother

Zam-Zam

Zam-Zam

Senator
WASHINGTON (AP) - The U.S. intelligence community will now be able to store information about Americans with no ties to terrorism for up to five years under new Obama administration guidelines.

Until now, the National Counterterrorism Center had to immediately destroy information about Americans that was already stored in other government databases when there were no clear ties to terrorism.

Giving the NCTC expanded record-retention authority had been called for by members of Congress who said the intelligence community did not connect strands of intelligence held by multiple agencies leading up to the failed bombing attempt on a Detroit-bound airliner on Christmas 2009.

"Following the failed terrorist attack in December 2009, representatives of the counterterrorism community concluded it is vital for NCTC to be provided with a variety of datasets from various agencies that contain terrorism information," Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said in a statement late Thursday. "The ability to search against these datasets for up to five years on a continuing basis as these updated guidelines permit will enable NCTC to accomplish its mission more practically and effectively."

The new rules replace guidelines issued in 2008 and have privacy advocates concerned about the potential for data-mining information on innocent Americans.

"It is a vast expansion of the government's surveillance authority," Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said of the five-year retention period.

The government put in strong safeguards at the NCTC for the data that would be collected on U.S. citizens for intelligence purposes, Rotenberg said. These new guidelines undercut the Federal Privacy Act, he said.


Complete text: http://apnews.myway.com/article/20120323/D9TLT6VG0.html
 
StanH said:
Ah yes, from the president who ran against the Patriot Act.

Nice.
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Many of those who railed against the Patriot Act will utter not a peep of protest over this. For many, it's not what's done that is important, it's who does it. The deafening silence from the left over this is confirmation.
 
ITALIA said:
Isn't it conservatives who say if you have nothing to hide why worry?
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I can't speak for all conservatives anymore than you can speak for all liberals. Can you provide a direct quote with a source?

And more importantly, are you fine with this move by the White House?
 
It's sickening. But I expect nothing better from the Obama administration, at this point. Ever since he reversed himself on FISA, way back in 2008, it's been all downhill on the civil liberties front. In some ways, he's clearly worse than Bush, who was the most autocratic president we'd had to that point.
 
Arkady said:
It's sickening. But I expect nothing better from the Obama administration, at this point. Ever since he reversed himself on FISA, way back in 2008, it's been all downhill on the civil liberties front. In some ways, he's clearly worse than Bush, who was the most autocratic president we'd had to that point.
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I have to give you credit, you stand up for what you believe in regardless of party. I won't hold my breath waiting for others to join you, but I'll be quite happy to be wrong about that if that does indeed occur.
 
By the way, would you have posted this same thing if it were the Bush administration? I hear a lot of accusations of hypocrisy by right-wingers against lefties about this stuff, and those accusations are fair, since a lot of lefties will defend Obama for the exact kind of thing they would have attacked Bush over. But I think the hypocrisy is actually far worse among conservatives. You will hear MANY liberals attacking Obama in harsh terms of this kind of stuff, where there was a deafening silence from the right over Bush's conduct.... even on topics where they'd criticized Clinton and Bush was clearly vastly worse.

Just as an example, think back to the rhetoric of the late 90s conservatives, which came to a head during the 2000 campaign, attacking Clinton for "nation building" and "mission fatigue." Such rhetoric is so jarring, in retrospect, when one realizes that Bush was about to plunge us into two simultaneous wars, each vastly bigger than all of Clinton's engagements combined, in which we'd stay mired for a decade, at least, through some of the most ambitious nation-building projects of modern times, all with enthusiastic support from most conservatives.
 
Arkady said:
By the way, would you have posted this same thing if it were the Bush administration? I hear a lot of accusations of hypocrisy by right-wingers against lefties about this stuff, and those accusations are fair, since a lot of lefties will defend Obama for the exact kind of thing they would have attacked Bush over. But I think the hypocrisy is actually far worse among conservatives. You will hear MANY liberals attacking Obama in harsh terms of this kind of stuff, where there was a deafening silence from the right over Bush's conduct.... even on topics where they'd criticized Clinton and Bush was clearly vastly worse.

Just as an example, think back to the rhetoric of the late 90s conservatives, which came to a head during the 2000 campaign, attacking Clinton for "nation building" and "mission fatigue." Such rhetoric is so jarring, in retrospect, when one realizes that Bush was about to plunge us into two simultaneous wars, each vastly bigger than all of Clinton's engagements combined, in which we'd stay mired for a decade, at least, through some of the most ambitious nation-building projects of modern times, all with enthusiastic support from most conservatives.
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I honestly don't know the answer. I'm sure if it had been the Bush administration, about one thousand or so posters would have likely beaten me to the punch. Since it was Obama, they remained silent. Silence is acquiescence.

I have no problem with the intelligence community looking hard at those with suspected ties to terrorist organizations. In fact, I expect them to do that in order to keep my family and myself safe. This move by the Obama administration goes beyond that. This is reminiscent of the Nixon White House Enemies list of the 70's. Nixon, of course, was tumbled from power, due in large part of a press corps that would not let his dealings go unnoticed. Much of the press now amounts to humble obedient servants of the President, and thus stuff like this happens without a great deal of fanfare. For most of you, if you didn't read it here, you likely didn't read it at all. Why is that?
 
Zam-Zam said:
Much of the press now amounts to humble obedient servants of the President, and thus stuff like this happens without a great deal of fanfare. For most of you, if you didn't read it here, you likely didn't read it at all. Why is that?
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I don't think that's it. I think it has to do with whether there's a bipartisan consensus or not. When one party's establishment thinks one thing and the other party's establishment thinks the other, they feed the press attack lines and the press covers it with typical he-said, she-said stenography-style "journalism." In the Bush era, the torching of our Constitution on these kinds of issues was still an issue of partisan contention, with major Democrats and their establishment talking heads up in arms about it, so the press covered it. They'd have covered it more or less equally much if the positions of the two parties had been reversed. But as soon as Obama reversed himself, taking the Democratic establishment with him, the controversy virtually vanished from the establishment press's perspective. These days, the leaders of both major parties think the president can wipe his ass with the Constitution so long as he claims he's doing it to fight the terrorists, and so these stories are treated as not newsworthy. I find it deeply horrifying, but it's not a sign the press is in the corner of one party or the other. It's a sign that the press is aligned with the conventional wisdom of the "establishment."

In a similar sense, you'll see a LOT of coverage about what our tax rates should be, because the two party establishments fight about that. But you will see almost no coverage about returning to a gold standard, because both party establishments think that would be idiotic. I happen to agree with them, on that one, but the point is that without the left/right establishment divide, the establishment press views it as a non-issue.
 
I must admit I'm a bit confused. Why would the U.S. intelligence community even collect information on individuals with no ties to terrorism or who otherwise aren't engaged in activities that threaten our security?
 
bdtex said:
I must admit I'm a bit confused. Why would the U.S. intelligence community even collect information on individuals with no ties to terrorism or who otherwise aren't engaged in activities that threaten our security?
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As far as the state police are concerned, this is like East Germany, where they are collecting scent samples on certain people, just in case they need to be tracked down with dogs.

They are gathering up information on lots of folks. And the criteria are always expanding.

I've had at least two face book infiltrators. One of whom identified themselves, the other is uncertain.

Take it from me darling. Nobody believed me, that the federales came to town this summer, and they set up camp. This fact was revealed only with Friday's edition of the local paper.

They nailed a half dozen gang bangers along with the local PD.

You wouldn't believe the weird I've observed so don't even get me started.


The local cops didn't say a word about their presence, not to me, not to close friends and associates.

Nada.

They looked at me like I was crazy when I said they were here this summer. I sensed them.


The older woman, white silver shoulder length hair, could have been your grandma. I think she drove a four door Chrysler.

Saw her at a gas station removing an ear piece. She was wearing big sun glasses so you couldn't get a good look at her face.

Second time I think I saw this person at a grocery store, only no glasses so it's uncertain if I'm just bat guano insane.


I sensed I was being checked out by this person, a perfect stranger.

I gave her a stern look, she avoided my eyes.


Blues eyes so unforgettable they will haunt you.
 
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