A Crash Course in the NSA Programs and the Fourth Amendment

[Narkos]

A divide is now presenting itself in the disparate responses to right-wing nutjob Ed Snowden playing the Left with respect to NSA's perfectly legal, court and Congress supervised, communication data gathering program. The people who are up in arms about politics don't seem to understand technology, and the technology nerds obviously have little idea about government, laws or rights. So the two sides - the politically clueless tech nerds and the technically clueless political screamers have come together to launch this "Restore the Fourth" campaign, a play on both the Fourth Amendment and the Fourth of July.
http://www.thepeoplesview.net/2013/07/restore-fourth-first-understand-fourth.html

[cantbeserious]

1. The New York Times And The Young Turks Wold Disagree About Legalities

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1017129956

https://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/28/opinion/the-criminal-nsa.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&

Op-Ed Contributors
The Criminal N.S.A.
By JENNIFER STISA GRANICK and CHRISTOPHER JON SPRIGMAN
Published: June 27, 2013

Snip ...

The Fourth Amendment obliges the government to demonstrate probable cause before conducting invasive surveillance. There is simply no precedent under the Constitution for the government’s seizing such vast amounts of revealing data on innocent Americans’ communications.

The government has made a mockery of that protection by relying on select Supreme Court cases, decided before the era of the public Internet and cellphones, to argue that citizens have no expectation of privacy in either phone metadata or in e-mails or other private electronic messages that it stores with third parties.

This hairsplitting is inimical to privacy and contrary to what at least five justices ruled just last year in a case called United States v. Jones. One of the most conservative justices on the Court, Samuel A. Alito Jr., wrote that where even public information about individuals is monitored over the long term, at some point, government crosses a line and must comply with the protections of the Fourth Amendment. That principle is, if anything, even more true for Americans’ sensitive nonpublic information like phone metadata and social networking activity.

We may never know all the details of the mass surveillance programs, but we know this: The administration has justified them through abuse of language, intentional evasion of statutory protections, secret, unreviewable investigative procedures and constitutional arguments that make a mockery of the government’s professed concern with protecting Americans’ privacy. It’s time to call the N.S.A.’s mass surveillance programs what they are: criminal.

[Narkos]

4. The NYTimes reference is misleading

that's not from the editorial board, it's from two individuals with an opinion.

[cantbeserious]

7. Opinion Or Not - Their Arguments Resonate With Me

eom

[bemildred]

2. Don't worry, we are going to change the law too.

We are going to outlaw this sort of shit permanently. Total surveillance and lying are not how we are going to do our business in the future, it is a stupid, expensive, and ineffective way to do business. That is our information they are stealing and hiding to use against us, and we don't like it, and we are not going to learn to like it.

That is why they keep it secret, they know people don't like being watched without their permission, especially by a government that is fucking paranoid about being watched itself and sees them as the enemy.

[Narkos]

3. Did you read the article? Just curious...

[bemildred]

5. Yes, I did, I read a lot, and it was interesting, the argument they make.

That is why I addressed it.

[bemildred]

6. If it helps, I don't worship Snowden, or his politics all that much.

I'm pretty pro-government, on principle, you can't have large advanced societies without effective governance, and I recognize that means government must be well-informed too.

[cantbeserious]

8. How Can Government Be Effective With De-facto Campaign Bribery By The Oligarchs Via Citizens United

eom

[bemildred]

9. Seems unlikely, doesn't it? nt

[Narkos]

10. Facepalm

[creon]

11. Good article

I thought that it was well written and logical.

If people have a problem with the Patriot Act, they should talk to Congress; send your thoughts to your Representative and Senators about this law.

It is Congress which will revise or repeal it.