A smile spread across [Wolfgang Schmidt's] face.

“You know, for us, this would have been a dream come true,” he said, recalling the days when he was a lieutenant colonel in the defunct communist country’s secret police, the Stasi.

choad wrote:

A smile spread across [Wolfgang Schmidt's] face.

“You know, for us, this would have been a dream come true,” he said, recalling the days when he was a lieutenant colonel in the defunct communist country’s secret police, the Stasi.

Access to the Brandenburg Gate, the backdrop for his speech, was severely limited, as was access to Berlin’s entire downtown.

Sounds like a great plot line for a Doctor Who episode...

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and finally the Disinformation Campaign begins.

Calling out the media for uncritically repeating the "Russian spy" slur.

"It’s not the smears that mystify me," Snowden told me. "It’s that outlets report statements that the speakers themselves admit are sheer speculation." Snowden went on to poke fun at the range of allegations that have been made against him in the media without intelligence officials providing some kind of factual basis: "'We don’t know if he had help from aliens.' 'You know, I have serious questions about whether he really exists.'"

Snowden went on, "It’s just amazing that these massive media institutions don’t have any sort of editorial position on this. I mean, these are pretty serious allegations, you know?" He continued, "The media has a major role to play in American society, and they’re really abdicating their responsibility to hold power to account."

We've seen this movie before.

No wonder Obama wanted to get his proposal out before an independent panel had its chance to report: NSA's phone data collection is illegal, unconstitutional, and ineffective.

However, the Board concludes that Section 215 does not provide an adequate legal basis to support this program. Because the program is not statutorily authorized, it must be ended.

Section 215 is designed to enable the FBI to acquire records that a business has in its possession, as part of an FBI investigation, when those records are relevant to the investigation. Yet the operation of the NSA’s bulk telephone records program bears almost no resemblance to that description.

Based on the information provided to the Board, including classified briefings and documentation, we have not identified a single instance involving a threat to the United States in which the program made a concrete difference in the outcome of a counterterrorism investigation. Moreover, we are aware of no instance in which the program directly contributed to the discovery of a previously unknown terrorist plot or the disruption of a terrorist attack.

Last edited by square (2014-01-24 01:03:41)

choad wrote:

Meet your spy blimp overlords.

HA HA HA HA HA I can't wait to see these things bobbing around above DC!

NSA Wants Your Kids

choad wrote:

NSA Wants Your Kids

https://cruelery.com/sidepic/pedobot.png

~ click ~

Jeepers!

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Seems things were as fucked up 40 years ago as they are now.

http://pando.com/2014/02/04/the-first-c … one-cares/

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Last edited by choad (2014-02-07 03:22:03)

sigmoid freud wrote:

Seems things were as fucked up 40 years ago as they are now.

http://pando.com/2014/02/04/the-first-c … one-cares/

I caught Otis Pike's obit in the NYT, Pike's hometown paper, and was dumbstruck to find the Times scrubbed his record clean of the NSA. Not one note.

sigmoid freud wrote:

Seems things were as fucked up 40 years ago as they are now.
https://cruelery.com/sidepic/otis.pike.1978.png
http://pando.com/2014/02/04/the-first-c … one-cares/

Hmmm, One of the most disturbing observations here is how we have internalized into the culture the belief that exposure transforms wrongdoing. When really exposure may not matter as much as we think. Now that the politicians and authorities are so adept at deflecting any real transformation. Scary to contemplate how easy it is to be be fickle and accept the fate we are being sold.

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choad wrote:

Johnny_Rotten wrote:

Hmmm, One of the most disturbing observations here is how we have internalized into the culture the belief that exposure transforms wrongdoing. When really exposure may not matter as much as we think. Now that the politicians and authorities are so adept at deflecting any real transformation. Scary to contemplate how easy it is to be be fickle and accept the fate we are being sold.

To think otherwise is a thoughtcrime. "WAR IS PEACE," "FREEDOM IS SLAVERY," "IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH."

Due process never happened.

I had a black friend ask me what I thought about a Federal ban on using the word, "nigger".  I said, "Eh, we'll just start calling you Double-Plus-Un-Whites."

Johnny_Rotten wrote:

When really exposure may not matter as much as we think.

Exposure is a necessary condition for reform, but not a sufficient one.

Last edited by choad (2014-02-11 09:40:01)

Emmeran wrote:

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2014/02/no-fly-coverup/]State secrets privilege

Better than any of their emails...that made me renew my ACLU membership.

phreddy wrote:

Emmeran wrote:

State secrets privilege

Eric Holder wrote:

disclosure that an individual is not a subject of an FBI counterterrorism investigation could likewise reasonably be expected to cause significant harm to national security

Do you still feel Congress was out of bounds for finding Holder in contempt for basically doing the same thing in the "Fast and Furious" scandal?

Hard to say as I hold Congress in complete contempt anyway.  One neat coincidence here is that both of these situations began in the Bush administration sooo do you still feel that the Bush conservatives were upstanding citizens working for the good of the country?

square wrote:

NSA collections are no big deal; it's just metadata, right?

"They jump to conclusions and there is no going back to correct mistakes." Because there is an ever-increasing demand for more targets to be added to the kill list, he says, the mentality is "just keep feeding the beast."

They're deluded kid cunts, playing cowboys and indians, and like the Honey Badger, they don't give a fuck.

Last edited by choad (2014-02-12 06:53:56)

Fled wrote:

Just to keep it interesting,
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/ … ml?hpid=z7

This is the most cheerful thing I've heard all week!

NSA Targeting Domestic Nogoodniks

Sure it's for the  illegal immigrants

edit: Drink your coffee, Em! Fixed the stray space hosing the link.

Last edited by choad (2014-02-19 07:03:00)

thefriendsofeddiedoyle wrote:

It's reassuring to know that our national security apparatus is geared up to crack down on forty year old rekindled romances which carry the hint of a possibility of immigration fraud.

I haven't seen this story in any other news outlets.  An overwhelming state apparatus used for selective law enforcement, how comforting.

Next up on the nightly news, a "review" of a movie produced by our parent company, plus an expose on how many geese are infesting a golf course! Stay tuned...

square wrote:

If you perverts could just keep your pants on, we wouldn't end up with all this undesirable nudity in our archives of your webcam chats!

GCHQ does not have the technical means to make sure no images of UK or US citizens are collected and stored by the system, and there are no restrictions under UK law to prevent Americans' images being accessed by British analysts without an individual warrant

And that's how you get around those pesky warrant requirements, you spy on my citizens and I'll spy on yours.