Proof the NSA did not spy on Michele Catalano after all: update from her blog.

[pnwmom]

I don't blame Ms. Catalano for being upset under the circumstances. Anyone would be shocked after a visit from the police. But I do blame the people who continue to spread the original NSA/Google story even though they now know it was false.

https://medium.com/something-like-falling/2e7d13e54724

CLARIFICATION AND UPDATE

We found out through the Suffolk Police Department that the searches involved also things my husband looked up at his old job. We were not made aware of this at the time of questioning and were led to believe it was solely from searches from within our house.

I did not lie or make it up. I wrote the piece with the information that was given. What was withheld from us obviously could not be a part of a story I wrote based on what happened yesterday.

The piece I wrote was the story as we knew it with the information we were told. None of it was fabricated. If you know me, you know I would never do that.

If it was misleading, just know that my intention was the truth. And that was what I knew as the truth until about ten minutes ago. That there were other circumstances involved was something we all were unaware of.

[think]

1. So his searches were circumspect but the backpack & pressure cooker

were OK?

Maybe the NSA could help us all and tell what words we aren't suppose to search...

[pnwmom]

3. His searches were "circumspect"? Where do you get this?

Last edited Fri Aug 2, 2013, 12:59 AM - Edit history (1)

It's clear that she was only guessing why the police arrived, and she didn't know the biggest piece of the puzzle.

[leftstreet]

7. But that still makes no sense

She AND her husband were BOTH searching for those terms at home AND on his work pc?

I doubt it. Sounds like she knew exactly why the ex-employer contacted LE. She even notes in her original blog post that it took them 'weeks' to show up. So she knew exactly when both she and her husband were both conveniently searching the same terms? Sounds like bs.

It's just as fun to guess that the husband was disgruntled and hoping to get the employer in trouble with LE

[frazzled]

4. The NSA had NOTHING to do with this. Got it?

Jeebus.

[think]

10. "the searches involved also things my husband looked up at his old job"

But apparently her husband looked up something at work and the police came.

Am I interpreting this much incorrectly?

(Edit: I did mention the NSA. Sorry)

[frazzled]

12. I give up.

You really need to change your user name. Or take a good hard look at it.

Some days I'm embarrassed to even post on this board, it's gotten so kooky. Indeed, days and weeks go by when I say to myself, "no, I'm not going to respond to that lunacy." And I don't. I regret I responded to anything in this thread. It's clear that no facts of the world can convince those already convinced of their own ideas. It's not worth trying to inject reality into the conversation.

[think]

14. I asked for a link and you are quick to judge me

for not knowing facts that aren't in this thread about a current event.

Please just let me know th link where it shows the husband was fired.

[Andy823]

36. I know what you mean! nt

[nadinbrzezinski]

18. From echelon, the dictionary (collection of key words)

Is long. In fact, the word dictionary will trigger it.

Here, for some fun reading.

http://www.ncoic.com/echelon.htm

It's just gotten far worst than the glory days of echelon, which would also triger it

[frazzled]

2. The lesson from this is ...

People are so anxious to convince themselves that the government is spying on them, that they will glom onto anything that might show how Big Brother is hovering over each and every one of us. Well, the government did not send the police to this guy's house: an employer did (I won't ask for what the guy got fired that they were scared enough to call out the cops to check him out).

I've got news for you: you have more to worry about from your employer, from stores, from the companies that spy on your Web activity every single day, and from criminals who may empty your bank account electronically at any moment. You let yourselves be tracked by your iPhone, you give out your personal information all over the Internet, you reveal intimate details of your lives even here on places like DU ... and then mewl about privacy.

But the evil government is always the problem. Ronald Reagan would be so proud of you for thinking that. If you could just get rid of the government and have ... oh, I don't know, corporate America be in charge of everything. Or, alternately, move to Russia. What a paradise.

[pnwmom]

5. None of this is news to me. Maybe you're talking to someone else.

[frazzled]

6. I'm talking about the topic, to the board

Why would you think I am somehow trying to talk you into something? I was making a freaking comment.

[think]

17. yipers..../nt

[pnwmom]

22. You said, "I've got news for you." And so for some dumb reason I thought

you were talking to me.

[morningfog]

8. The lesson could be that it is still fucked up.

You said it wasn't the government that sent police. But, the police are the government! It doesn't matter who sends them, they are the government.

The lesson here is that we live in an increasingly fascist state. The lines between corporations and the government get more blurred each day. One hand washing the other.

The remedy to these problems is the greatest fear of Reagan, it is actual functioning oversight and federal regulation.

Instead, the feds have acquiesced and embracing the overreaching corporations. The government has employed them as agents to do their bidding. Sometimes it is overt through a contract to spy on us, but other time it is through brute authority.

[frazzled]

9. His former employer called the police

He was fired and they called the police; so they came to investigate. I'm not sure what you don't get about this. Maybe you don't want to have police.

Try for one moment to get out of your paranoid mindset and view this story objectively. It's a story from a fiction writer who writes stories about John Kerry drugging it up on a boat in Vietnam. It's someone with an active imagination. It's someone who posted something on an Internet board that people wanted to believe so badly they were willing ... nay, still willing, to take it at face value. It was the equivalent of a viral cat video.

[think]

11. That's fine. Do you have a link? I haven't been glued to this case

sorry if I am not up to snuff on the current information....

[morningfog]

15. The update in the story, valid and worth noting,

has been latched onto like a nursing piglet to a teet to deny any wrong doing by any authority.

[think]

21. I am weak. I put around 60 people on ignore today

I don't care to feel like I did when I went tooth and nail with neocons over Obama's presidency in forums where I worked.

My experience on DU might be much more limited but I doubt it. The only thing that will change is my blood pressure and my personal joy.

I came here to get away from the right wing mind set. Not to rejoin the battle.....

At this point my personal happiness is worth ignoring those on the board that are supporting a status I don't feel reflects my values as an American and a human being.

To be fair I blew up at an individual last night here and I was the party in the wrong. They finally got my goat and I exploded or imploded.

I was ready to leave DU. After that I decided I wanted to stay but I did not want to engage with those who were more satisfied prosecuting whistle blowers than discussing what was revealed.

It's my fault for taking the low road and not including these people but at the same time I don't care. And I will continue to put people on ignore until the noise leaves my head.

It's not a recommended way to handle things but it has become my way to deal with the unpleasantness which is robbing my soul...
..... JMO

[pnwmom]

26. How can you decide there was any wrong doing here

when all we know is that the employer was concerned about some things that the ex-employee had been looking up at work and reported it to the police?

We don't know enough to draw any conclusions -- except that Ms. Catalano has retracted her original story accusing the NSA or Google of being involved.

[morningfog]

28. Did she completely retract?

Or did she day that there was the additional call from her husband's employer? That definitely provided more to the police, but from what I've read, it isn't clear that the search was still based solely on googles searches.

[pnwmom]

30. It is clear that the search was triggered by the employer

and whatever it was that the employee was searching at work.

It is also clear that this woman has more in common with Michele Malkin and 'Ann Coulter than with any DUer. She is not to be trusted.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023391018

[morningfog]

13. Six joint terrorism task force members searched a guys home

and asked him questions solely on an internet search term he used at work. You should not be okay with this.

I will do you the favor or ignoring your personal attacks.

[pnwmom]

24. "things my husband looked up at work" could mean something very extensive

or something very simple. There isn't enough information here to draw any conclusions except the employer was the one who reported the husband -- not Google or the NSA.

[morningfog]

27. And the police acted.

So far, I have not seen anything that showed the google search he used warranted a search and an interrogation.

[pnwmom]

31. And you expect the woman would tell us if her husband HAD done something

on his work computer that warranted a search and an interrogation? She'd have to be nuts to do so.

Even more nuts than we know she is:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023391018

[Cha]

29. Brilliant, frazzled.. Mahalo Russia seems so wonderful

to so many people now.. it's just amazing.

Who knew Pres Obama would be such a good travel agent for .. Russia!

[Life Long Dem]

35. +1 n/t

[HipChick]

16. I can see what folks are doing on a company firewall..

One time I reported a high ranking executive who was looking at child porn..

He was fired...

and I was let go for reporting him 3 months later...

Go Figure..

[morningfog]

19. He was fired with good reason.

It sounds like your termination was retaliatory.

But, child porn is itself a crime. Possession and visiting child porn sites is a crime. Entering a google search term is not a crime. And it should not be used as a grounds to send 6 cops to search your house and ask you questions.

[pnwmom]

23. That would depend entirely on what you were searching for.

People who search for child porn, to use the previous example, might draw the attention of employers and police. And there must be many other examples.

[morningfog]

25. We are dealing with a specific case here.

Do you know what his google search was? Do you know how many searches he did with the term or like terms? Do you know what sites he viewed?

[pnwmom]

32. No. And the police aren't going to be telling us either, unless they decide to charge him.

And the woman isn't telling us either -- and we know enough about her not to trust her word on this.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023391018

[Cha]

20. People spreading this false story have an agenda.

They can't push it on the facts so they grab anything and run with it.

So many damn lies and so little time.

[Scurrilous]

33. Yep.

Tell a lie and move on. All that matters is "Obama BAD!!1!"

[Cha]

34. "NSA=Obama=Bad!11 Everyone else is Blameless Putin Propaganda=Good!"

[Andy823]

37. Exactly

It's the same crowd over, and over and over again who simply can't, or won't bother with the "facts". Its truly amazing!