McGovern: Unconstitutionality of NSA Phone Call Collection is Indisputable

[BelgianMadCow]

You may be very well aware of the NSA scandal, but McGovern cuts through several layers of BS in no uncertain terms. Real news, phew it's so refreshing.

transcript will be up at The Real News Network.

[idwiyo]

1. k&r

[JDPriestly]

2. Excellent information!

The NSA is taking what is for them the easy route. It looks like they are doing a lot. They hired a lot of bodies and brains, and they are collecting a lot of information. But as McGovern points out, they aren't doing the old-fashioned sleuthing they need to do to identify terrorists and differentiate them from the curiosity-seekers on the internet. They did not catch the Boston Bombers. And that was an easy one.

Collecting the metadata on millions of Americans is a waste of money. They should target their investigations.

[BelgianMadCow]

3. Yes, even if one lets no other concern into play, from an economic perspective

the worldwide dragnet and its costs make very little sense as a counter to a terrorism threat.

Which brings the obvious question: either people make no cost/benefit analysis (which is rather weird in These Deficit Cutting Times) because terra terra, or the program serves other goals. I'd venture a guess, and say that the economic and political data swept up probably DO provide considerable monetary rewards. Just not for the citizens of the USA, as is evident. But they're paying for it. Hmmm.

There is an almost 100% correlation between people that care about the surveillance state (make that world) and those that strongly dislike the corporate state.

[Pholus]

4. Corporations gots to get paid!

And we need a way to print out the list of Quakers protesting our next war of choice.

Right?

[JDPriestly]

7. Agreed.

[90-percent]

5. NSA

The NSA is charged with looking for needles in haystacks. Their "total information awareness" has given them a haystack the size of Rhode Island!

Secondly, this meta data stored forever is a wonderful tool for a totalitarian government to practice some truly beautiful SELECTIVE PROSECUTION. If you practice your rigt to FREE SPEECH and somehow offend the POWERS THAT BE they can sift through years of your electronic life and perhaps stumble on something you did 6 years ago that you MAY NOT BE PROUD OF.

Mass criminalization - there's so many laws we're all breaking some law now and then. If they don't like you, they can put the hammer down and ruin your life in punishment for being critical of them.

The building of an American Totalitarian Fascist Police State has been happening since Sept 11, 2001. IF us peasants start to revolt, we will see our militarized police putting us all down like General Macarthur did to the Bonus Army in 1932.

-90% Jimmy

The Bonus Army was WW1 vets living in tents in DC trying to get monies the govt promised them for their service in WW1.

[Pholus]

6. Yup, the ACTUAL sales presentation about dragnet spying....

likely had a section in there about unraveling social unrest (read Occupy-like movements) in their early stages before they can become a problem.

Why waste time infiltrating when you can roll up the network through the metadata?

The most likely actual application will be things like the pre-emptive arrest of protestors to the 2008 RNC convention. Easy to do when you know who was talking to who, right?

[2banon]

8. and so few people are even aware of the pre-emptive arrests in 2008, including left journalists

this is what gets me down.. all those assholes who claim they've nothing to hide, all of this fine with them because terra terra, aren't even aware of historical events, even within our life times, prior to the technology that is at hand right now.. The PNAC milieu really understood this and how far "low information" reaches.

[2banon]

9. That last comment summarizes why the Prez isn't doing anything about this

He's afraid of the NSA, and that speaks volumes.

[RC]

10. Maybe it was the NSA that talked to Obama between the swearing in and him entering the Oval Office.

Something sure happened.

[2banon]

11. I agree with you, something seriously major happened between swearing in and entering office. eom