The Secrecy Industry is Dead

[kentuck]

There was a time when spies and moles and espionage were effective means of attaining information. For over a half century, the US built up the greatest spy network in the history of the world. Our spies competed with the Russian KGB and other great spy networks.

But the world changed. Our intelligence gatherers did not adapt to the new realities. With greater ability, with technology, to gather more and more information, our intelligence agencies grew bigger and bigger. With flash drives and the Internet, the information became less and less secure. Our intelligence chiefs did not adapt to this reality.

The CIA and the NSA are obsolete. They need to be re-evaluated and re-structured. They are presently wasting tens of billions of dollars on ideas from the 1950's. The times have changed but they did not.

Secrets are becoming impossible to keep with the new technology. I think it is naive to think that Edward Snowden is the only person with secret information on a flashdrive and is the only person in this vast network of spies that is giving information to our "supposed" enemies. The real "spies" are anonymous. They don't give the information to journalists.

[sibelian]

1. They're collecting vast amounts of data that they can't actually control.

One guy's buggered off with shitloads of it, or so they're telling us. "Security" !!!

Did they not see this coming?

[graham4anything]

2. Are you saying there are no bad guys in the world? Look at WW2.

How many tens of millions died, and the USA was NOT involved at that time.

The bad guys did quite nicely without the USA involved.

Remember, we are not the evil of the world.

Real bad people exist out there. And, they are spying on us.

We however, are just culling information, no matter how many times one memes the word spying, it is NOT being done,
and there is ZERO proof of it.

It is just a bunch of hyperbole.

and you said you are for O'Malley. Tell me, will O'Malley dismantle the entire CIA/NSA/and defense department?
Please show me where he said he would do that. I googled and cannot find that he would.

BTW, George McGovern was a war hero, and McGovern also would not have dismantled the entire operations.Nor did he think
all wars were bad.
Is there anyone who thought WW2 was bad?
And Afghanastan was voted on by Ron Paul and just about everyone else as a go.

[kentuck]

3. I never said I was for "O'Malley.

I said I liked O'Malley as a possible candidate. I like several people as possible candidates.

Where in the deep recesses of your warped mind do you come up with this bullshit??

[graham4anything]

4. where did OMalley, Warren and Grayson say dismantle the NSA/CIA/etc. Just wondering

Elizabeth Warren's issue is the banking issue.
but I haven't seen her or anyone say to get rid of the NSA, HS, FBI, CIA

will Rand Paul get rid of all of that? I shudder to think what would happen if all these agencies are closed.

Sheesh, these are AMERICANS who work in these agencies, could be my neighbors. Good people.

It is really maligning them.

Same as saying all policemen and policewomen are bad.

No, maybe ONE or 1% are, but 99% are just doing their job.

When I was a kid, yes, it was fashionable to bash all these. But then I realized, these people are the same as all of us.
Just people working 9 to 5 or different hours, trying to make a living on a small salary.

Do you know how much unemployment would go up if we suddenly got rid of the entire whole thing?

And not to mention, all the collateral closures of say, a deli or diner or restaurant that relies on those workers coming in.
Garages that make their living on cars coming to the area
Gas stations, anything

What will be there the day after?
No one ever asks those questions

and as this is an international free to post anything (long as it is civil) so, tell me, what rights has anyone lost?

I don't see it.

I buy charmin. Everyone knows it, and guess what, no one cares.

WHy don't the Dallas Cowboys give the New Orleans Saints their playbook.
It's like baseball players.
It's like Tony LaRussa wanting to but Mark Mcgwire in for one at bat so he can delay for 20 years a hall of fame vote.

and why wasn't it important for the dude in question to do this in 2006? Why did he wait 7 years?

[kentuck]

7. Who said they did??

Where did you get that info?

[graham4anything]

8. That is what I am asking. Your op is asking for something NO ONE will do.

Who is going to re-do the NSA?

Will Peter King, republican IN New York, will he do it? Will Bernie Sanders?
Will Darryl Isaa or Alan Grayson?

left/right/center/whatever no one will do that.

not to mention

What will happen the day after another Munich Olympics event happens?

How in the world is anyone suppose to prevent anything if there is no one who knows.

What do you mean no one talks on phones?

and did Ben Franklin and the other founding fathers never spy on anyone?

and yes, SCOTUS decided this in Smith vs. Maryland 1979.
It doesn't have to say specific 2013 words to make it true

after all, the 2nd never specifically said the names of technology today did it?

If we can reinterpret Smith vs. Maryland, then by all means, let's reinterpret the 2nd and ban all guns/bullets from the hands of all citizens who are not law enforcement.


see.

everything is tied together.

at the end of the day, isn't wellness the central issue?

[kentuck]

9. You misinterpret my post.

I'm saying that times have changed since Ben Franklin and the Munich Olympics. Our intelligence organizations have not adapted to the changes. In fact, they may have made us less safe? Nothing is possible unless you think it is possible.

[graham4anything]

10. It is like flu shots-every year can bring a new version,but the old ones still out there.

So, IMHO, you don't dismantle, you need even more.


actually it is similar to vaccinations

Just because there is a new flu, doesn't mean one isn't vigilant on the older ones, and it is like Wakefield getting people to not get shots, and eradicated diseases are back.

They don't go away, just new ones are added.

and the two older rulings including Smith vs. Maryland should and do cover all this.

[kentuck]

11. Huh?

[graham4anything]

12. add new methods, but keep the old. Last thing to do is to get rid of anything. Modernize,& keep old

Just like you said
There are new methods, we need even more ways to keep up
But, not by getting rid of past methods

Like smallpox, it comes back if we keep our guard down

[marions ghost]

5. Times have changed...

I agree with your statements:

Intelligence gatherers (and a lot of Americans) have not adapted to new realities.
CIA and NSA are obsolete.
The real spies are anonymous.

[HereSince1628]

6. Just to put your comment in perspective...

40 years ago, I sat through seminars about the transition to electronic intelligence as the master of the future electronic strategic battlefield.

Way back then we also scoffed at the idea of secrecy. We looked at the lifespan of a signal's security as the time it took to unravel and make sense out of its place in communication traffic. Nothing was secret, but some things were more or less difficult to exploit.

Over the ensuing decades, the balance of the resources certainly has shifted from spies to geeks. This didn't, and never will, replace the use of spies and the potential value of a well placed mole. But it certainly shifted the size of the pieces of an ever growing more gigantic budgetary pie.

[Junkdrawer]

13. When everything is secret, nothing is secret.....

Drowning in deception