Data mining has been big business for the last 15 years. The Government collecting phone call data is just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. They've been doing it (eavesdropping) since The Patriot, oops, I mean Communist Act was enacted shortly after 9/11. Only now that a Court Order (*) ordering Verizon to hand over customer data has surfaced during the last couple days is it making front page headlines around the Internet.
Even the congressman that drafted the bill said yesterday, that this was not the intent , Congressman James Sensenbrenner said that the business section he wrote said there had to be specific targets.
Data mining was never and should never be the order of the day. Additionally, the NSA is supposed to be about foreign electronic intelligence gathering, NOT domestic in the first place.
That's the problem about the entire thing. It's hard for anyone to trust Government, especially these days, when it comes to activity such as this. The Patriot Act gave Government way too much power, and the authority to basically ignore the Constitutional rights of the people. This warrant, no doubt, was obtained by citing the Patriot Act, which does allow Government to obtain secret warrants, such as the one issued for phone records. The only good thing about this warrant is the Judge used some common sense and restricted the information to only phone calls and put an expiration date on it of July 19, 2013.
The only way to judge the purpose is by accepting the order at face value.
Here is a link to the Guardian's webpage, which is the news source that reported about this warrant, and posted the court order in pdf format:
Trust me Howard, I am completely against Government intrusion in our private lives, but there may be times when it becomes necessary for the greater good.
Is this one of those times? I reserve judgement for now.
Raymond, when the justice department sought a warrant to seize James Rosen's telephone and email records from a judge, the first two judges refused to sign it, a third judge did and only after a bogus statement by the justice department that James Rosen was a co conspirator and a flight risk.
The federal government has a long history of judge mining in order to get warrants signed when other judges won't. Judges are not always provided truly accurate information before signing warrants and often the information provided is massaged.
The entire premise for this data mining expedition was that phone companies periodically purge records, and that the Government would simply store this info and seek another warrant post any incident to track the case according to Senator Feinstein.
Well, tax records with regard to donor list are supposed to be kept with the confidentiality. Yet, somehow the donor list of many opposed to our current administration were released in 2011 & 2012,
This goes way beyond the scope of what the Patriot Act called for and pretty much substantiates many peoples opposition to the patriot act, I can see absolutely no justification for this.
It is about a government way too large on the federal level, and much too intrusive
Truly, ignorance is bliss! These particular 'warrants' have evidently been popular for the last 7 years. Kinda like they get a new one for when the old one is about to expire. It grants blanket coverage, and the powers that be then take their time and disseminate all relevant data, and store the rest for later use, if needed. You think those giant server-farms that DHS and NSA (etc) run are to keep an inventory of their pencils and stuff?
No... America has been under a constant and quiet attack from within. All of the major media outlets are owned and operated by a small group of people who do NOT have the best interests of American sovereignty in mind. Those folks are also the same people who have been authoring the public school texts and tests for close to 50 years.
I believe it was Nikita Kruschev (sp) who said that the communists would take over America within a few decades, and that it would be done from within, and without a shot fired... He was evidently quite correct:
We have a pResidential administration that only concerns itself with the rule of law when it furthers their agenda. The rest of the time, the Constitution is an obstacle to their agenda, and the "law" is a tool with which to silence their critics.
They count on a massive showing of low-information voters, and have the vast majority of Americans living in ignorance of the REAL agenda. (That's easy to do when you control over 90% of all news-sources.) America is about done, and it will be a VERY short while before y'all are a part of the U.S.S.A... (If you don't see the truth in this, you are simply another part of the problem.)
"U.S., British intelligence mining data from nine U.S. Internet companies in broad secret program"
"The National Security Agency and the FBI are tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading U.S. Internet companies, extracting audio and video chats, photographs, e-mails, documents, and connection logs that enable analysts to track foreign targets, according to a top-secret document obtained by The Washington Post."
John- The vast majority of American's have a name for guys like you who think logically and don't listen to a news channel for your opinions..Conspiracy theorist. Just believe what you're told and nobody will think you're crazy.
It's no surprise that schools haven't focused on critical-thinking skills for a long time now.
We 'Conspiracy Theorists" have more facts available than anything Darwin came up with, and we also have a name for that majority you speak of: "Sheeple" (Properly spelled 'Sheople', but that would confuse too many of them!)
:-)
Almost everything "right wingers" said this administration would be like and were marginalized as wackos for has proven true. At some point it's time to wake up and smell the coffee that the rest of us smelled 5 years ago...only it didn't smell like coffee then and it still doesn't. I posted on here not too long ago that when Obama promised unprecedented levels of transparency, he meant ours, not his.
"Dear Government: I am taxed way too much and no longer want to pay taxes, but if I must can you please send my tax return in a much quicker fashion - it takes to freaking long! P.S. the way you spend tax dollars is pitiful. Stop sending my money to foreign countries." I figured this was the easiest way to get your attention. -- This message sent through Verizon Wireless
If they are truly collecting
If they are truly collecting it for the purpose of gathering intelligence on terrorist cells operating within the U.S., I would say yes.
However, if that's a ruse to gather the information, then no they should not.
Data mining has been big
Data mining has been big business for the last 15 years. The Government collecting phone call data is just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. They've been doing it (eavesdropping) since The Patriot, oops, I mean Communist Act was enacted shortly after 9/11. Only now that a Court Order (*) ordering Verizon to hand over customer data has surfaced during the last couple days is it making front page headlines around the Internet.
(*) http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/interactive/2013/jun/06/verizon-telepho…
Unless you've been purposefully living off the grid Corporations and Government know far more about you than you do.
Raymond, but how are we
Raymond, but how are we supposed to know and judge the purpose? Just trust what the government is telling us?
Even the congressman that
Even the congressman that drafted the bill said yesterday, that this was not the intent , Congressman James Sensenbrenner said that the business section he wrote said there had to be specific targets.
Data mining was never and should never be the order of the day. Additionally, the NSA is supposed to be about foreign electronic intelligence gathering, NOT domestic in the first place.
Howard, That's the problem
Howard,
That's the problem about the entire thing. It's hard for anyone to trust Government, especially these days, when it comes to activity such as this. The Patriot Act gave Government way too much power, and the authority to basically ignore the Constitutional rights of the people. This warrant, no doubt, was obtained by citing the Patriot Act, which does allow Government to obtain secret warrants, such as the one issued for phone records. The only good thing about this warrant is the Judge used some common sense and restricted the information to only phone calls and put an expiration date on it of July 19, 2013.
The only way to judge the purpose is by accepting the order at face value.
Here is a link to the Guardian's webpage, which is the news source that reported about this warrant, and posted the court order in pdf format:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/interactive/2013/jun/06/verizon-telepho…
Trust me Howard, I am completely against Government intrusion in our private lives, but there may be times when it becomes necessary for the greater good.
Is this one of those times? I reserve judgement for now.
Raymond, when the justice
Raymond, when the justice department sought a warrant to seize James Rosen's telephone and email records from a judge, the first two judges refused to sign it, a third judge did and only after a bogus statement by the justice department that James Rosen was a co conspirator and a flight risk.
The federal government has a long history of judge mining in order to get warrants signed when other judges won't. Judges are not always provided truly accurate information before signing warrants and often the information provided is massaged.
The entire premise for this data mining expedition was that phone companies periodically purge records, and that the Government would simply store this info and seek another warrant post any incident to track the case according to Senator Feinstein.
Well, tax records with regard to donor list are supposed to be kept with the confidentiality. Yet, somehow the donor list of many opposed to our current administration were released in 2011 & 2012,
This goes way beyond the scope of what the Patriot Act called for and pretty much substantiates many peoples opposition to the patriot act, I can see absolutely no justification for this.
It is about a government way too large on the federal level, and much too intrusive
Truly, ignorance is bliss!
Truly, ignorance is bliss! These particular 'warrants' have evidently been popular for the last 7 years. Kinda like they get a new one for when the old one is about to expire. It grants blanket coverage, and the powers that be then take their time and disseminate all relevant data, and store the rest for later use, if needed. You think those giant server-farms that DHS and NSA (etc) run are to keep an inventory of their pencils and stuff?
No... America has been under a constant and quiet attack from within. All of the major media outlets are owned and operated by a small group of people who do NOT have the best interests of American sovereignty in mind. Those folks are also the same people who have been authoring the public school texts and tests for close to 50 years.
I believe it was Nikita Kruschev (sp) who said that the communists would take over America within a few decades, and that it would be done from within, and without a shot fired... He was evidently quite correct:
We have a pResidential administration that only concerns itself with the rule of law when it furthers their agenda. The rest of the time, the Constitution is an obstacle to their agenda, and the "law" is a tool with which to silence their critics.
They count on a massive showing of low-information voters, and have the vast majority of Americans living in ignorance of the REAL agenda. (That's easy to do when you control over 90% of all news-sources.) America is about done, and it will be a VERY short while before y'all are a part of the U.S.S.A... (If you don't see the truth in this, you are simply another part of the problem.)
Pssst.... Big Brother is
Pssst....
Big Brother is watching you!
"U.S., British intelligence mining data from nine U.S. Internet companies in broad secret program"
"The National Security Agency and the FBI are tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading U.S. Internet companies, extracting audio and video chats, photographs, e-mails, documents, and connection logs that enable analysts to track foreign targets, according to a top-secret document obtained by The Washington Post."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/us-intelligence-mining-dat…
John- The vast majority of
John- The vast majority of American's have a name for guys like you who think logically and don't listen to a news channel for your opinions..Conspiracy theorist. Just believe what you're told and nobody will think you're crazy.
It's no surprise that schools
It's no surprise that schools haven't focused on critical-thinking skills for a long time now.
We 'Conspiracy Theorists" have more facts available than anything Darwin came up with, and we also have a name for that majority you speak of: "Sheeple" (Properly spelled 'Sheople', but that would confuse too many of them!)
:-)
Almost everything "right
Almost everything "right wingers" said this administration would be like and were marginalized as wackos for has proven true. At some point it's time to wake up and smell the coffee that the rest of us smelled 5 years ago...only it didn't smell like coffee then and it still doesn't. I posted on here not too long ago that when Obama promised unprecedented levels of transparency, he meant ours, not his.
"Dear Government: I am taxed
"Dear Government: I am taxed way too much and no longer want to pay taxes, but if I must can you please send my tax return in a much quicker fashion - it takes to freaking long! P.S. the way you spend tax dollars is pitiful. Stop sending my money to foreign countries." I figured this was the easiest way to get your attention. -- This message sent through Verizon Wireless
You should ask this question:
You should ask this question: Should the US collect data on Citizens who the US suspects might be terrorist?