We done it once before, what makes you think it can't happen again.

[boston bean]

We were afraid of the commies. They were named a national security threat.

It manifested itself into what we know as McCarthysim.

A foreign threat turned in on itself that rounded up and accused innocent Americans of being subversive.

They used the law, made laws, used congress, government agencies and the presidency to do this.

Does anyone think this is any different, and if so why? With the information they collect on innocent Americans, what makes anyone think it couldn't happen again. Or at the very least begin to recognize we are strolling down the same road.

[Cooley Hurd]

1. Happy to be the First Rec!

[JaneyVee]

2. They couldn't even keep track of the Tsarnaev brothers who were on a watch list.

[boston bean]

3. that makes me feel all better. LOL. nt

[JaneyVee]

5. I know right. LOL.

[boston bean]

7. Imagine what they could have done had they

had access to people's lives like they do now.

Sure they could get print outs from the phone company, send an FBI agent to some meeting... Bug people... but what we can do today would have made their goals a whole lot easier to achieve!

[Fuddnik]

8. Incompetence mixed with power and delusions of grandeur.

We had a revolution before, too.

[kenny blankenship]

31. But they were the "good kind" of terrorist

The good kind: the ones that attack our global rivals and enemies, either with or without our organizational and material support. So you can understand the blind eye treatment. This is not the first time that kind of mix-up has happened. cough Able Danger cough. But it was almost certainly done, like everything our government does, with the best of intentions: when we coddle terrorists it's for very good reasons that benefit all Americans, aside from the dead ones.

[Puzzledtraveller]

4. k&r

[xchrom]

6. du rec.

[treestar]

9. Wouldn't be the same

Actual regular American people were in danger of being considered commies. Now it is "foreign" Muslims.

The attempts to outlaw "Sharia Law" are the most ridiculous aspects of it.

There was paranoia that Russians, being white and able to blend in, faked being American and spied on us that way, or tried to undermine us by convincing us of the rightness of communism.

It was a much deeper paranoia.

Terrorist attacks are different from the fear that the communists would take over from within. They remain outside. It would be more like if Muslims tried to convert more of us. Still, it's a religion, not an economic system. If Muslims started trying to convert us, the right would go nuts.

[boston bean]

12. If the threats remain outside, why are innocent Americans info being mined and stored?

The point is that a reason is given for all of this. Mainly, FEAR. National Security. Laws created, enforced, information being collected, which was used at some point against innocent Americans.

[treestar]

15. How could they limit it to "guilty Americans" without searching it all?

And there are non-Americans in America. These poor victim innocent Americans wanted all this after 911 and they went along with plenty more - the wars, for one.

This is nothing like the communist paranoia. It would not get to that level until the Muslims really try to recruit and start succeeding in recruiting Americans to their religion. It is finding out which Muslims are calling known AQ operatives. You can talk to plenty of Americans willing to have profiling on Muslims. It's like the TSA carrying out its duties after the 911 fear and suddenly being wrong for it, mostly because they treat us all the same.

These "innocent Americans" are like the proverbial old white lady getting "mugged" by TSA agents before boarding a plane. It's just those dirty Muslims who should be searched in these people's opinion.

If people want rid of these laws, they can elect people to repeal them. These are duly passed laws. Playing the innocent victim card is dishonest.

[boston bean]

18. I get it. You are ok with innocent people being caught up

in gov't investigations and having their lives ruined. And can't possibly see the paralells between to what is happening today.

You trust the government. History should tell you otherwise... but don't let me stop you from your willingness to go along with this. As it is your right. Lots of Americans saw no problem with McCarthyism either. They were FEARED into going along with it.

[treestar]

19. that is not what my post said, and you know it nt

[L0oniX]

23. Let have all 330,000,000 of us body cavity searched. Jobs jobs jobs.

[treestar]

37. So just search those who look like Muslims?

And just data mine those accounts that look like they belong to Muslims/Arabs. Hard when it's all just numbers.

White Americans are always "innocent."

[premium]

35. How could they limit it to "guilty Americans" without searching it all?

That's like saying cops should pull over all drivers because if they didn't, they wouldn't catch all the drunk drivers.

[treestar]

38. It's like saying the cops, at a DUI checkpoint, only check black people.

Or that the TSA only search suspicious looking Muslim people.

And it does not even involve crime - what they find can't be used in prosecutions.

[Buzz Clik]

10. "commies" never did any harm to the US within our borders

That's the difference. Does that provide justification?

[boston bean]

11. The fear used by officials to justify these actions are what it has in common mostly. nt

[Buzz Clik]

13. Agreed.

[boston bean]

16. And we know from history what can happen

when information is collected by the gov't on innocent americans. McCarthyism shows the capability and the cause for concern.

[zeemike]

17. And fear works the same

whether it is ideology or religion...it is also what keeps a heard of sheep together and moving in the same direction.
Get out of the pack and the dogs come after you.

The difference is that in those days we had members of congress both R and D that put a stop to it...now even our Ds agree and will say nothing....a far more serious situation IMHO.

[siligut]

24. Yes, a common enemy unites people and serves the few

The PTB want to keep it that way and our increased access to reality and information through the Internet is hurting them. So now, the Internet is going to be used against us.

[sibelian]

14. Absolutely.

Spot on and many thanks for pointing this out.

[ProSense]

20. Yes

"Does anyone think this is any different, and if so why? With the information they collect on innocent Americans, what makes anyone think it couldn't happen again. Or at the very least begin to recognize we are strolling down the same road."

...it could happen again. The government has been collecting information for decades. The question has always been whether or not those activities violates the Constitution, even when they are in compliance with existing laws.

Smith v. Maryland, 442 U.S. 735 (1979) - No warrant required for call metadata
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022966764

Meet the Carnivore system
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022972777

This is as good a time as any to have the debate. It's probably one of the best times.

Bush committed the ultimate illegal act, illegal wiretapping of many Americans (http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022973979)

The law passed in response did not legalize warrantless wiretapping. The implementation of the law, its scope, is where the controversy lies. The administration's released some details about the program (http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022972852).

The Obama administration actually got a warrant. His administation went through the FISA court. He complied with the law, and even critics of the program will acknowledge the actions were legal (http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022959738).

Obama administraton releases details on Senate briefings
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022974680

ACLU: DOJ Tells Court It's Reconsidering Secrecy Surrounding Patriot Act's Spying Powers
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022973455

Are the laws Constitutional? That's the debate that's going to happen, again. As some of the reports have pointed out, the implemetation of these laws often become problematic.

Should the FISA amendments be repealed? Will that solve the problem? Remember the FISA law existed before the Patriot Act.

[boston bean]

21. Is the gov't gathering/collecting info on innocent Americans?

Yes or no.

[ProSense]

32. The answer

"Is the gov't gathering/collecting info on innocent Americans? Yes or no."

...is no. That is not an Obama policy.

There is no Obama policy of spying on everyone and no domestic spying
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022971026

[boston bean]

33. I asked you if the gov't was gathering or collecting info

on Americans. Not spying on Americans.

Apparently, you are not up to date with the news.

[ProSense]

34. And

"I asked you if the gov't was gathering or collecting info

on Americans. Not spying on Americans.

Apparently, you are not up to date with the news."

...answered your question. The facts:

Ret. Adm. Dennis Blair, who served as President Obama’s DNI in 2009 and 2010, told NBC News that, in one instance in 2009, analysts entered a phone number into agency computers and “put one digit wrong,” and mined a large volume of information about Americans with no connection to terror. The matter was reported to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, whose judges required that all the data be destroyed, he said.

<...>

The Justice Department publicly confirmed to the New York Times in April 2009 that Holder had taken “comprehensive steps” to correct a problem in NSA collection after it “detected issues that raised concerns.” But department officials declined to discuss details about what was described at the time as the “over-collection” of information.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022971026

[L0oniX]

22. I don't want their protection. I'll take my chances and enjoy my freedom and rights.

Freedom was never risk free.

[1-Old-Man]

25. McCarthysim was just a small part of the greater "Cold War" which was terrifyingly expensive

and equally contrived. We built a war machine so grotesquely out of proportion to our defense needs that it has engulfed us.

[libodem]

30. Speaking of the war machiene

We had to wait for a train way out in the country yesterday. The flat cars had one grey tank after another. Must have seen 500 army tanks sailing down the tracks.

I just thought the Military industrial complex is alive and well. And then I wondered where they were going to be deployed.

I sorta wanted to take a picture because it was so iron curtain bleak. But I was afraid of a possible violation of unwritten security provisions.

[graham4anything]

26. Isn't it ironic that the anti-government posts put FEAR into every post, which they claim is wrong?

the irony is triple drippingly irony personified x1000

FEAR the government (and elect Rand to be Jebs vp to insure the government need not be feared.

[libodem]

27. Yes we did

And we didn't really see clearly what we were doing was wrong until we could do a look back. Hind sight is 20/20.

We need your spirit of optimism that we are better than this and we will be restored to a country of civil rights and rules of law.

[obxhead]

28. It's ok though, Obama is in control.

That's what I read over and over on DU anyway.

I stand with you BB. This is WRONG regardless of who is in power.

[kenny blankenship]

29. I wonder what this guy would think of the Feds bugging and tracking everyone

I mean, besides: "Welcome to my world."

[suffragette]

39. "Welcome to my world."

True, that.
And good point wondering what he would think of all this.

[90-percent]

36. It can't happen here

The 1966 Mothers of Invention Freak Out album version

-90% Jimmy

[suffragette]

40. K&R

[reusrename]

41. Actually this is new. Completely new.

We have never faced this particular challenge before, nor anything like it. If we are going to have a real discussion about this, we need to know what we are talking about, specifically.

Just like Mutually Assured Destruction was never an issue before nuclear weapons were invented, protocols for monitoring social networks were never necessary before we had the ability to identify and track these social networks.

If you need background, google keywords: thesis insurgent and social networks.

For a while we (the US govt.) have been using a new branch of science against the public. This new branch of science is being used to thwart the will of the people. Science is being used against the public to inhibit normal folks from organizing any normal resistance at all.

What happened to the occupy movement? What happened to the uprising in Iran? What happened to the anti-war movement that preceded the invasion of Iraq? How the hell was Romney selected as a candidate?

The public is being manipulated in ways that it is totally unaware of. Sure, we have had propaganda before, that's old school. But the best that the fascist could come up with in the past, as far as social engineering goes, was the rather crude block leader system deployed in prewar Germany. Not a very effective approach to social control, and of course it failed.

Nothing that has happened in at least the last decade or so represents the will of the people.

(There is, of course, a single exception in that I do believe that the world really did want Obama to be our president, rightly or wrongly.)

To get the gist of what I'm talking about, I would guess that our own American Revolution could have been thwarted by eliminating, intimidating, detaining or discrediting a very few number of people. This is not a complicated strategy.

Thomas Paine as an individual, even though his treasonous pamphlet "Common Sense" was instrumental in the insurrection, might not necessarily be one of those people who would have had to have been removed. Just remove a few folks he associated with him and his work could not have been published or distributed. Back then, just like now, people listened to their friends. We weigh what we hear based on where we hear it.

Social networks are the key to how people naturally interact. Controlling these interactions (by first mapping them in a coherent way) is a method of controlling people.