'Fake' Reform: Little to Celebrate as USA Freedom Act Passes House

[JEB]

With Patriot Act re-authorization looming, end of domestic phone collection program not enough to assuage civil liberty and privacy advocates
by
Jon Queally, staff writer

http://www.commondreams.org/news/2015/05/14/fake-reform-little-celebrate-usa-freedom-act-passes-house

Though the overwhelming and bipartisan passage of the USA Freedom Act in the House of Representatives on Wednesday portends the end of the NSA's mass collection of Americans' private telephone records, civil liberties groups found little else to celebrate as the ultimate passage of the bill, which now heads to the Senate, would re-authorize a number of worrisome programs by extending the life of the controversial Patriot Act.

<snip>

"This is a fake privacy bill. Corrupt members of Congress and their funders in the defense industry are attempting to package up their surveillance-powers wishlist and misleadingly brand it as ‘USA Freedom.’ This is disappointing and offensive, and we will continue to work to kill this bill and any other attempt to legitimize unconstitutional surveillance systems."
—Tiffiniy Cheng, Fight for the Future

<snip>

With the bill now heading to the Senate, critics of the House version are still holding out hope that improvements can be made in the upper chamber. As Mark Jaycox, legislative analyst for EFF, wrote in the immediate wake of Wednesday's vote:

We believe the House missed an opportunity to strengthen the bill in light of the recent Second Circuit decision. We’re urging the Senate to take steps to strengthen the bill. The bill is now sent over to the Senate, where all eyes will be watching. The Senate is expected to take up the USA Freedom Act anytime in the next two weeks, and is likely to vote on it by May 22. The Senate is uniquely positioned to improve the civil liberties protections in the USA Freedom Act by adding additional transparency and oversight provisions, adding stronger limitations on the collection of data on innocent people, and throwing out some of the recently-added provisions to the bill that were included at the behest of the intelligence community.

He added, "2015 can and should be the year for powerful surveillance reform, and we’re urging the Senate to rise to this opportunity."
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Sounds to me like the buy-partisan swill is worse than nothing. Short read with much info. Important stuff.
http://www.commondreams.org/news/2015/05/14/fake-reform-little-celebrate-usa-freedom-act-passes-house

[Octafish]

1. Nothing today says ''Reform'' like ''Fake Reform.''

The thing was supposed to be "sundowned." As if.

“Congress has an opportunity to reform mass surveillance by letting the Patriot Act expire, and that’s what they should do," said Tiffiniy Cheng, co-founder of Fight for the Future, which has spearheaded a coalition opposed to mass surveillance, the re-authorization of the Patriot Act, and specifically Section 215. Wednesday's vote to reauthorize the Patriot Act, said Cheng, would actually "expand the scope of surveillance" by the NSA and others. The USA Freedom Act, she said, "is the opposite of reform. It makes absolutely no sense."

Elaborating on the implications of the bill, she continued:

There is literally no reason for the NSA to be surveilling everyone and their mom in order to go after their targets. Why they aren’t satisfied with the US Constitutional limits on search and seizure and getting a warrant to do so is very suspicious. That’s just rogue and illegal behavior and part of selling a culture of fear. We’re demanding to see them build a case to surveil my mom and millions of Internet users around the world before they get one more peek at our private lives.“

Congress is trying to sell the USA Freedom Act to the American people as reform, but what the bill actually does is extend and expand the government’s power to monitor our communications under the PATRIOT Act. Far from reform, the bill will allow the government to invade even more of our private moments than ever by updating their surveillance powers for the devices and communications platforms we use most often these days.”

This is a fake privacy bill. Corrupt members of Congress and their funders in the defense industry are attempting to package up their surveillance-powers wishlist and misleadingly brand it as ‘USA Freedom.’ This is disappointing and offensive, and we will continue to work to kill this bill and any other attempt to legitimize unconstitutional surveillance systems.”

SOURCE: http://www.commondreams.org/news/2015/05/14/fake-reform-little-celebrate-usa-freedom-act-passes-house

It is swill. Thank you for the heads-up on a most important development in Police State USA, JEB!

[JEB]

2. Thanks for noticing and the reply.

Not a lot of interest, though I find it distressing. First for not letting the thing just sink below the horizon and then the rubber stamping by so many Dems. I expect not much good from the Republicans, but when Democrats play along on a bad bill...ugh. They better be getting something important in return, like rejecting fast track. Ha.

[Octafish]

3. Remember Dorothy Parker.

While enjoying drinks and a word game at the Algonquin, Ms. Parker was challenged to use "horticulture" in a sentence. She replied: "You can lead a whore to culture, but you can't make her think."

In some Zen Zombie way, that also sums up our current political reality: Laws and the words that make them mean one thing to some people and something else to other people.

IMFO, the entire domestic spy operation is intended to gather information to keep the Secret Team in power, vacuuming information for business and blackmail; as well as to identify which citizens know what and whom -- especially any with economic authority or a political following.

[JEB]

6. Its been years since I thought about Dorothy Parker. Thanks.

[Autumn]

4. "urging the Senate to rise" I deleted what I wrote and

I'll just leave it at that.

[bemildred]

5. They won't stop collecting our phone records either, despite this. nt