
President Obama Should Shut Down the NSA’s Mass Spying Before It’s Too Late - rizzzo
http://time.com/4565149/obama-trump-nsa-surveillance/
======
wwalser
I don't understand all of the fighting in this thread. I don't understand why
people are acting like every liberal was on board with these policies until
the election. It's simply not accurate.

Two groups of people who completely agree that mass surveillance is a bad
thing will go at each other's throats about _when_ the other speaks up about
it needing to be dismantled. You're on the same fucking side and chances are,
if you actually believe that mass surveillance is bad, you've both been at
least mildly against it the whole time.

The expansion of surveillance powers under Obama was probably _the most_
consistently cited dissatisfaction amongst HN contributors one, four, and six
years ago. Threads critical of these policies were consistently on the home
page during the Obama presidency. Security and privacy conscious individuals
on the left and right agreed. The top thread at the moment mocks liberals:
"Well, sure, unconstitutional power grabs are tolerable when someone I like is
in power…" but that straw man simply isn't in line with reality, not on this
forum at least.

More broadly, yes, masses of people have given up their privacy. Go talk to
them, stop bitching at people who agree with you.

~~~
jnbiche
> I don't understand why people are acting like every liberal was on board
> with these policies until the election.

As a libertarian, I agree. Many liberals have opposed these policies. I think
even Glenn Greenwald may have or may still identify as a liberal.

However, _every_ person I know who self-identifies as a "Democrat" and not a
"liberal", has supported "all" of Obama's policies (including mass
surveillance), and has condemned Snowden in the strongest terms. There are a
few of those on HN, but I agree that by far most HNers oppose mass
surveillance (unless there's a large "hidden" segment as is apparently the
case with Trump supporters, who have come out en masse on HN in the past few
days).

~~~
dllthomas
I know a lot of people who identify as a "Democrat", few who can't find things
to nitpick about any given candidate (including Obama). I'm surprised our
experiences are as different as you describe. Probably presentation is
different when discussing with people they view as allies versus those they
view as opposition?

~~~
jnbiche
You're probably right, had I probed enough I probably could have found policy
they disagreed with. But on surveillance/national security stuff, the self-
identified Democrats I know have stood staunchly behind Obama, and view
Snowden as a traitor. It's kind of odd how much like most Republicans they
sound when talking about these issues (not counting pro-liberty Republicans
like Rand Paul, who view these issues like a libertarian would).

~~~
dogma1138
Being against surveillance and considering Snowden a traitor are not mutually
exclusive; one can be pro-privacy and liberty and still think of him as a
traitor for seeking refuge in Russia and for having a deadman switch for
example.

~~~
JBlue42
I'm not disagreeing but I think it can also be hard to trace it back and be
absolutely 100% on this.

If Snowden hadn't committed the activities he did and revealed more
information about the scope and breadth of the surveillance state, would that
be good or bad? Did those activities help affirm your stance on surveillance?
If so, can we truly consider them traitorous (outside of a legal standpoint)?

Now, you folks are probably far better at logic puzzles than but as someone
that fits the bill of pro-privacy and liberty and still questioning how to
classify him, I'm open to other ways of arguing for or against.

------
liber8
It amazes me that journalists publish things like this with a straight face,
then don't understand why nobody trusts the media.

"Well, sure, unconstitutional power grabs are tolerable when someone I like is
in power, but this new guy is bad!" Yes, that's how it always works. That's
explicitly the reason our government was designed the way it was. Why do
educated people forget this every time "their guy" gets into power?

~~~
matt4077
This isn't a journalist. It's an opinion piece written by an activist.

Please show where this activist writes in support of the NSA programs in the
past.

Even if there were such a thing as homogenous left: I believe the number of
people from the left defending these programs has been pretty short for as
long as I can remember.

~~~
liber8
Please show where I said anything about "support of the NSA programs in the
past."

Please show where I said anything about the "left".

This is a problem that both democrats and republicans suffer from. Remember
when the PATRIOT Act was proposed and enacted? Most democrats thought it was
an unbelievably unconstitutional overreach that would be the end of the world,
and republicans mostly saw it as a necessary tool that didn't even really have
any constitutional concerns worth mentioning. Magically these perspectives
flipped when Obama got into power. This happens every single time.

*I would also note that journalists' "tolerance" for the NSA programs over the last 8 years is essentially tacit support. Nearly all of the network media's coverage of the NSA issues over the last few years has been centered on whether the effectiveness of the programs justify their existence. There has been virtually no network condemnation of these programs based on their illegality and unconstitutionality, whereas that was a major focus from 2001 to 2007.

~~~
linkregister
You and I must have been living in alternate realities. The furor over the
Snowden leaks was extreme. The calls for President Obama to shut down the NSA
were primarily from the far left. The article count of NSA-critical articles
from NYT and the Washington Post vastly outnumbered those from conservative
news organizations, such as Fox News and the Drudge Report (admittedly an
aggregator).

If you perform an internet search for "Pardon Snowden", the vast majority of
these articles arise from publications traditionally associated with
Democratic Party support.

I remember some milquetoast grumbling about the USA-PATRIOT Act from various
publications on both the right and the left, but the quantity of outrage was
far greater after the Snowden leaks.

In case you need any convincing:
[https://www.google.com/search?espv=2&q=unconstitutional+nsa](https://www.google.com/search?espv=2&q=unconstitutional+nsa)

In the top 10 results, you'll see various "MSM" news sources. The sole
defender of the NSA programs comes from The National Review, a (high-quality)
conservative newspaper.

I'm not trying to use "gotcha!" commenting, but I think it is grossly
misstates the position of most left-wing folks to push this flip-flop theory.

I will readily admit that flip-flopping happens all the time about other
matters but I have not witnessed it at all with this one.

On the matter of NSA surveillance being abused by President-elect Trump, I
consider it extremely unlikely. I consider the left's fear to be based off of
a failure by the government to communicate the programs effectively to the
press.

~~~
liber8
I just read the the first 5 results of your google link. There isn't any
outrage in any of them. They are actually fairly unbiased news reports about
court rulings on the illegality of various NSA programs, not opinion pieces
criticizing the programs. The post that we're discussing is an opinion piece,
and my comments were about opinion pieces. There is no dispute that there has
been an incredible amount of news coverage of state surveillance since the
Assange, Manning, and Snowden leaks.

Frankly, given how news is now consumed, it's very possible we're living in
alternate realities. The PATRIOT outrage I was referring to was circa 2002.
Where I lived, the media reported vociferous outrage from democrats and
nonchalance from republicans. Since "Obama" has wielded--and greatly expanded
--the state's surveillance powers, I have not heard anywhere near the same
objection from democrats. (Note that I say "Obama" because I have no idea
whether and to what extent he has actually overseen the NSA's actions; its
entirely possible much of these programs have been hidden from the executive
branch for decades, which is frankly much more worrisome).

The few polls i just looked at seem to back up this flip-flop:

[1] [http://articles.latimes.com/2013/jun/12/news/la-pn-
republica...](http://articles.latimes.com/2013/jun/12/news/la-pn-republicans-
democrats-nsa-poll-20130612) ["With President Obama in the White House,
Democrats stand in support of the NSA’s methods, 49% to 40% in the Gallup
survey. Republicans were opposed 63% to 32%. When President George W. Bush was
in office, Republicans were supportive of government surveillance efforts and
Democrats opposed."]

[2]
[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/06/12/poll-...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/06/12/poll-
republicans-hate-nsa-spying-democrats-are-ambivalent/) ["Interestingly, the
most intense opposition to the programs comes from the political right.
Republicans disapprove of the program by almost a 2 to 1 margin. Independents
disapprove, 56 to 34 percent. But 49 percent of Democrats approve of the
program, compared with 40 percent who disapprove."]

I don't share your believe that Trump won't seek to use surveillance for his
own purposes. Not because I think he's a horrible person, but simply because
people use the tools at their disposal, especially in times of stress or
emergency. Of course, the president of the U.S. deals with nothing but stress
and emergencies.

Finally, I don't think anyone's fear is based off a failure to communicate the
programs effectively. If the programs were wildly successful, those successes
would be publicized by now. The NSA needs some good publicity. By the way,
negative publicity the NSA can't avoid is largely its own fault. It's current
slogan is "Your Data: If You Have Nothing to Hide, You Have Nothing to Fear"
[https://nsa.gov1.info/data/](https://nsa.gov1.info/data/) I'm not sure you
could come up with a more Orwellian slogan if you tried.

~~~
linkregister
That .info site is a parody site.

------
pfarnsworth
Why would he, when he authorized it? Not only did he strengthen Bush's anti-
constitutional policies, he enacted new ones, like the NDAA which spits in the
face of the constitution.

~~~
opt4altruism
Because he has a new perspective on what unbridled data collection can render,
not only with the hindsight of the Snowden debacle, but also because I am
around 100% sure he didn't posit Mr. Trump as the future Head of State.

Maybe we should remember the words written in the founding document that
precluded our noble country's separation from the English State:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men/women (language added by
me) are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain
unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of
Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among
Men/Women (same semantic addition), deriving their just powers from the
consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes
destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to
abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such
principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most
likely to effect their Safety and Happiness

If one's right to privacy is being infringed upon, we are bound by this
document to remind the powers that be that they are beyond their right to
govern.

I think the initial thought is incredibly prescient, as Trump seems far more
laissez-faire when it comes to moral governance than President Obama is and
has been. Let's not put the cart before the horse, but let's also make sure
the toys are all child proof before we hand them down, n'est-ce pas?

~~~
bsg75
Hubris: Now that his term is over, mass surveillance is suddenly bad?

~~~
opt4altruism
Suddenly? Where do you draw word that from?

I referenced the fourth amendment, which seems not-so-sudden to my naive
(read: full of hubris) self.

Methinks thou dost protest too much.

~~~
bsg75
> Suddenly? Where do you draw word that from?

He as two months of an 8 year term remaining.

The program was in place before the current administration, and if there was a
problem to solve from their perspective, it should have been solved long ago.

~~~
opt4altruism
I mean to say why do you assign that adjective to my comment?

It isn't like I've been commenting every day on your blog or something and
today decided to voice my opinion on the wiretapping, stingrays, etc.

~~~
bsg75
Not to you or your comment, but to the President that if he shuts down NSA
programs in the final hour, then it would be arrogant indeed to have let them
run for 8 years.

------
eveningcoffee
When it was possibly used against the people they did not like then it was
acceptable. Now when it may become after them has it suddenly become a
problem. How pathetic.

I also can not say that many have not warned against this scenario. Something,
something about not standing up.

~~~
diyorgasms
It was never acceptable to many of us. But the threat of unbridled autocracy
was less present under Obama than it will be under Trump, for the reasons
stated in the article. It is possible to oppose these programs with some but
not utmost urgency, and then be catapulted into utmost urgency by an event
such as a minority of the voters electing a fascist.

~~~
generic_user
> But the threat of unbridled autocracy was less present under Obama than it
> will be under Trump.

The creation of the laws is the creation of the autocratic power. The
temperment of who ever is in power at a particular point is irrelivent. By
creating the law you automatically open the door to use those laws.

~~~
diyorgasms
Agreed, and I opposed the Bush expansion of executive powers and the Obama
expansion of executive powers. Perhaps not everyone has been ideologically
consistent throughout this process but there are those of us who have.

And as you have pointed out, the major difference is temperament. Obama has
not exhibited a temperament that has led me to believe he would use these
powers to round up run-of-the-mill opposition. Trump's opposition to protests
and potential unwillingness to concede an electoral loss leads me to believe
he would mobilize the executive apparatus into dictatorship, unlike Obama or
Bush before him.

~~~
generic_user
Good, there are not many who have evaded the grips of the partisan blob.

Each side takes credit for the same national security policy wrapped in
different language and each side pushes the policy a little father. The
perfection of the total surveillance state with unlimited Presidential power
is truly the bipartisan crown jewel that the Washington consensus wants.

Its a dramatic picture but maybe people need to be scared out of there apathy
at this point.

------
LyndsySimon
Trump isn't even in office yet, and already he's done more to advance the
libertarian agenda than 40-ish years of libertarians have managed.

Democrats are coming out in support of the Second Amendment, the right of
secession, and limited government. They're now apparently opposed to the
surveillance state and the expanding powers of the Executive.

~~~
pfarnsworth
Surveillance is not a Democrat belief. Most Democrats/all progressives are
against surveillance. The problem is that Obama went against liberal ideals
and enforced and extended Bush's policies, which is why Obama was generally
hated by progressives.

------
dontelmewhatodo
Fascism was all over the country a long time before recent events. I'm not a
Trump supporter but assuming that this problem is something that should be of
people's concern only now is just childish.

~~~
idlewords
I've seen this comment in various guises over the last few days, and I
struggle to understand what it's intended to accomplish.

If you think the problem is old news, that doesn't make it any less urgent to
fix. It's like seeing firefighters arrive and tell them not to bother, because
the house started burning hours ago.

~~~
mzw_mzw
Obama supporters were all for mass surveillance when it was their guy doing
it. So it's more like the firefighters showed up hours ago and you told them
not to put out the fire because it was only burning someone else's room.

~~~
dllthomas
> Obama supporters were all for mass surveillance when it was their guy doing
> it.

Not many of the Obama supporters I know.

Of course they were more willing to forgive it! That's going to be the case.
Partly because humans don't like admitting they were wrong. Partly because
it's legitimate to trade off issues against each other. Partly because we're
introducing selection bias - if it's enough to turn you off Obama entirely,
you're not an "Obama supporter".

But there's miles between overly generous forgiveness and support. It was
commonly named as an area where they were disappointed in Obama.

~~~
mzw_mzw
And yet that disappointment didn't translate into voting for other candidates
-- and I'm not talking about voting for Romney or Trump, there were plenty of
other options the whole time -- so in the end it is of no value.

~~~
r00fus
There are exactly 2 choices that are possible for any first-past-the-post
voting system.

Change that (which I support) and we can talk 3rd parties.

I supported Sanders 2016 primary and his 2012 primary threat to Obama, after
having voted for Obama in 2008. Once the options became Obama (and now
Clinton), I voted for those simply because the alternative means more coal,
less regulations, and more religious right.

~~~
mzw_mzw
That is to say, you voted for the surveillance state. There were other
candidates running, you know.

~~~
dllthomas
No, that is to say they were not presented with the option to cast a
meaningful vote for or against the surveillance state (in a general election)
and so chose to use their vote to speak about other things.

~~~
mzw_mzw
The only reason third-party isn't a meaningful vote is because of people who
tell themselves that it isn't a meaningful vote.

~~~
dllthomas
No, the reason a third-party isn't a meaningful vote is because we have a
voting system that means any vote for any but the two most-likely-to-win
candidates has a basically zero chance of affecting the outcome. The reason
_these particular_ parties' candidates are the two most likely to win is,
certainly, because everyone understands them to be the two most likely to
win... but we don't fix that by simply pretending it's not the case.

------
SiVal
You know, libertarians have been saying for a long time that it's best to keep
government as local as possible, so you could choose how you wanted to live,
and live that way to the greatest extent possible, without having to worry
about what happened in other states or in the federal election. You decide how
you want to live and others can decide how they want to live.

Liberals responded with a policy of moving as much power to Washington as
possible, explicitly to enforce a policy of, No, we will decide how _everyone_
lives, and enforce it federally to minimize others' ability to escape our
reach.

Libertarians have been saying that judges should do their best to interpret
the meaning of the legislators, so that whatever laws we had would be those
written by legislators elected by the people. Liberals said, No, we want
judges to interpret laws to mean what they ought to have said if they people
had done as we wanted, so that the laws will be what the political elite want
them to be, regardless of what the know-nothing rabble choose for themselves.
So now, we have the precedent established and argued for for years from the
left that the law is what the court wants it to be, not what the people said.
Nice work.

All along, those promoting local government rather than central, unescapable
authority have been derided as fascists by liberals. Now the chickens come
home to roost. Do you think now that maximizing and centralizing and moving
out of reach as much power as possible was a good idea? No? Want to change it?
Why didn't you in all the years you were in power and advocated the opposite,
because now you've turned that power over to another group. It didn't have to
be this way, but you wouldn't stop. Probably still won't and will instead just
fight to regain control.

~~~
csallen
This is vague and hyperbolic.

For starters, there is no united group known as "liberals" whom either of us
can speak on behalf of, but I will indulge you and also speak in
generalizations.

Liberals do not arbitrarily support "moving as much power to Washington as
possible". Rather, they believe strongly that human rights should be dispensed
equally to everyone in the country. If abortion is a right, then being born in
Texas shouldn't deprive a woman of that right any more than being born in the
south in the 19th century should've deprived blacks of their freedom. Similar
arguments can be made for gay marriage, miscegenation laws, female suffrage,
the availability of healthcare for the poor, quality education, etc.

There's nothing whatsoever baked into the liberal ideology that supports
things like domestic spying and warrantless wiretaps. Rather, the better
explanation is any branch of government (in this case the executive branch) is
incentivized to increase its own power, and people tend to be biased in favor
of their party's presidents. But I've met countless pro-Snowden liberals, and
I think you've really mischaracterized the essence of what makes liberals
liberal.

~~~
rayiner
You're skirting around his point. American liberals don't just believe in
human rights for everyone in the country--they have embraced using a strong
centralized government and its court system as the way of enforcing those
rights. But the side-effect of that is taking away autonomy and independence
from the states, which leaves states less capable of opposing centralized
surveillance.

Liberals may not want surveillance, but they helped create the power structure
that enables surveillance as a byproduct of pursing end goals they do want. I
think the benefits of that approach far outweigh the drawbacks, but it's
important to acknowledge the drawbacks. If you give the central government
more power so it can achieve X, you have to be aware of the possibility that
it will use its power to also do Y.

~~~
jamroom
Both parties have been complicit in creating the power structure that enables
surveillance - it's certainly is not something new. It has been growing ever
since WWII and supported by both parties. Neither party wants to be seen as
anti-military, and a lot of the technology used for domestic spying originated
in the military (or as off shoots of the military). Saying that liberals
created that power structure is disingenuous.

~~~
csallen
Exactly. It's totally inaccurate to blame our domestic spying apparatus on
liberal initiatives to protect human rights. It's the inevitable result of
fearful citizens on both sides of the aisle _ceding_ their rights in response
to war, terrorism, and foreign enemies.

------
gmuslera
This was one of the reasons why Hillary lost. It WASN'T ok that Obama got,
expanded and strengthened it. Still today come to light uses and misuses of it
under current administration. And Hillary would had kept that trend for sure.
It is one of the things that should change, and for sure she wouldn't do that.

Yes, Trump could make things even worse, or not. Is not the same people that
actually set things as it was in the last years, unless the people behind both
sides on this is the same, of course.

In any case, shutting down/disabling/destroying all dangerous things that US
may have in stock or running now (nuclear, cyber, biological, foreign
interventionism/destabilization and so on) that the narrative on Trump could
misuse could finally give some meaning to Obama's Nobel prize.

------
rando444
This has always been one of my biggest fears as well.

IMHO this was the one thing that allowed the Nazis to create the kind of power
structure they had. They spied on themselves to no end, bugging their own
officers, hitler youth teaching children to spy and report on their parents..
everyone was afraid to speak out or step out of line no matter how bad it got.

It would be terrible to see these systems used as a method of control.

~~~
matt4077
The Nazis were allowed to gain as much power as they did because they had a
charismatic leader exploiting partisanship and economic insecurity with a
unifying message blaming all ills on minorities.

~~~
xorxornop
Oh look, here we are again. Humans are so pathetically easy to manipulate.

------
noonespecial
It's the same reason you don't keep a loaded gun in your night-stand when
you've got a 5 year old. Immense power to defend your home is a good thing...
but that's probably not what's going to happen.

We're having a close call. We just caught the child peeking into the drawer
and got a quick education on why certain powers should be kept safely locked
up by the constitution. Even if it makes them a bit harder to use when we
"really need them".

------
njharman
I extremely doubtful that an "on the way out" president would be able/allowed
to do that. Hell he can't even get a SCOTUS nomination appointed, a
constitutional power.

He could (and must) pardon Snowden.

~~~
coredog64
As I understand it, he's got a phone and a pen and that's pretty much all he
needs.

~~~
njharman
Tell it to the Supreme Court Justice he has nominated.

------
greggy
Now you remember? Good to see liberals finally acknowledging the frankenstein
monsters they have created.

~~~
akerro
They would not complain about it if Clinton was elected.

~~~
revscat
Do you see the world so narrowly? Which "they" is it you speak of? The voices
that have protested these programs are many and loud. The separate existence
of partisans does not change that.

~~~
mzw_mzw
And those voices would then vote to elect and re-elect Clinton, and advocate
for her every chance they get, as most of them did this year.

~~~
revscat
Again I ask: who are you talking about? Just because someone supports a
candidate does not mean that they support all of what that candidate believes.
Frequently, they even oppose those stances, and actively work to change them.
Not everyone is a partisan.

~~~
mzw_mzw
If you're going to support the candidate no matter what, why should the
candidate care what your opinions are? They have your vote already. Candidates
will only care about your opinion on surveillance if you're willing to deny
them your vote over the issue.

~~~
revscat
I suspect that it is this (somewhat cynical) line of thinking that cost
Hillary the election. Successful politics is about coalition building.
Maintaining and expanding those coalitions means following through on those
promises.

~~~
hga
Or she didn't realize that what had worked for Obama, who's often cross that
he even had to deal with the Congress, even when it was Democratic, and very
famously went for a narrow but very deep Get Out The Vote (GOTV) strategy,
wouldn't necessarily work for her.

------
return0
The panic over trump is starting to get comical. Aren't you americans proud of
your guns to protect you from power abuses? Dont you have probably the worlds
best democracy that many would be jealous of?

~~~
hga
Ah ha ha, the people panicking pretty much by definition haven't taken
advantage of the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (RKBA), in fact loathe the very
concept and have been campaigning for decades to take them away from the
people who do have guns, which I'm sure massively overlapped with those who
voted for Trump.

Many even live in cities or states where it's impossible to own guns (NYC
unless well connected, D.C.), or hard/decided by whim (e.g. Massachusetts), or
where the types of arms that can be legally bought and owned are severely
limited in a way that makes them less useful for this sort of thing (e.g.
California, much of the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic).

Me, when Obama was elected, I finally broke down and bought an Evil Black
Rifle and ammo for it, but that was more a FU to someone I'd correctly pegged
as a "gun grabber" than anything I was planning on making "serious social use"
of (well, I'd bought those earlier). And I have a lot of company, for years,
most every month, sales of guns through licenced dealers are greater than the
same month in the previous year.

~~~
vacri
I'm not sure what you're talking about - there's been plenty of carving away
at the bill of rights, and it's started well, well before Obama took office.
And what have those passionate gun-owners done? Absolutely nothing but protect
the second amendment. Where were the gun-toting constitutional defenders when
the 'free speech zones' went up, for example?

The idea of a popular uprising against government overreach is a fiction. You
even have the police shooting citizens dead in the street to the fury of their
community, and the gun owners do...? Well, the ones you're describing, the
Trump-loving RKBAing lot, decide not to fight against the government, but
instead find excuses for the police's actions. The gulf between their 'talk'
and their 'walk' is better described as a chasm.

~~~
hga
Evidently this is a strange idea, but using lethal force as a first resort is
not a part of America's gun culture.

And therefore whatever we're doing about those other issues is effectively
anonymized, aside from things like supporting the NRA's fight against McCain-
Feingold's censorship of core political speech.

As for "police shooting citizens dead in the street to the fury of their
community", if the dead earned it, and we're much more able to analyze deadly
force encounters than those who've never shot a gun, we only care when that
"community" decides to rape and pillage innocents in return. And some of us
are known to take action in such situations:
[http://bearingarms.com/bob-o/2014/11/25/armed-business-
owner...](http://bearingarms.com/bob-o/2014/11/25/armed-business-owners-
thwart-mobs-ferguson-riots/)

The _vast_ majority of BLM protests are of this nature (in fact, while I think
I'm forgetting 1 or 2 cases, this is true of all the ones I can think of),
whereas true victims like Eric Garner ... well, yeah, you're right, all we've
done about his murder at the hands of NYC's finest is talk about it, quite a
bit. And buy more guns and ammo, and practice with them....

~~~
vacri
Nice. You don't care about the people being shot dead by the police, but you
do care about when they get so angry they start to spread the shit around a
bit. As long as they meekly take police abuse, you're just dandy with it.

You know how you all fantasize about rising up against an oppressive
government? Well, those BLM riots are going to be what that looks like. You
guys rabbit on about keeping an oppressive government in check, but do nothing
to help your neighbours. And if you're not going to do anything for your
neighbours, what hope in hell do you have when you finally rise up solo to
defend your own stuff by yourself?

And seriously, the ' _vast_ majority' (your emphasis) of BLM protests are
_not_ town-destroying rampages. You've painted a very bizarre and self-serving
view of the world around you. Do you guys ever step back and wonder why
there's no other first-world country where shop owners aren't expected to keep
firearms to keep their stuff safe?

~~~
hga
_You don 't care about the people being shot dead by the police_

Yes, I don't care about them _one tiny bit_ if their actions warranted a reply
of lethal force.

As the Alt Right puts it, "We Don't Care."

But getting back to your points, that's because we don't score _these_ events
as police abuse. We score others, like Eric Garner's murder, as such. If you
desire any proof, I can point you at some of the popular RKBA blogs I read
that cover these, plus of course see Radley Balko.

 _You know how you all fantasize about rising up against an oppressive
government? [...]_

 _You don 't understand us in the least_, not surprising from someone who
expects us to use lethal force as a first resort to non-immediate stuff, so
that and the rest of your paragraph are simply not to the point.

As for "vast majority", sorry for my lack of clarity, I'm referring to the
people who they choose to protest about, not the intensity of any particular
protest. The people who, as I said above, as we see it legitimately earned a
lethal force response.

 _Do you guys ever step back and wonder why there 's no other first-world
country where shop owners aren't expected to keep firearms to keep their stuff
safe?_

Oh, we "wonder" about this, and have our own set of answers, but they aren't
germane to this discussion.

------
idlewords
NSA surveillance, while terrible, is also kind of a red herring.

The bigger risk to people is the enormous pile of data at large Internet
companies and ISPs which any government would find useful in implementing a
policy of mass deportation or "extreme vetting".

NSA has legal and institutional barriers on domestic surveillance. These are
damaged, but still exist. What private industry collects is completely
unregulated and far broader in scope.

~~~
revscat
Those institutional barriers are less effective in the face of those who do
not respect them, and/or feel that disregarding them serves greater
ideological goals. Couple this with both of the other branches of government
being in the hands of political allies, and the normal system of checks and
balances is no longer present.

It is a fearful recipe. The calculus pre-Trump wherein corporations were
considered threats as you described has changed: now the government is far,
far more dangerous.

~~~
dredmorbius
The threats compound.

Gov't plus commercial is worse than either individually.

------
bitmapbrother
He should also pardon Ed Snowden before it's too late. Be sure to add that to
the list of things that will never happen.

~~~
ojbyrne
I guess you didn't actually read the article, because it says that too.

------
jonstokes
Like Calexit, this proposal is so unrealistic as to be unserious and not worth
discussing.

What is needed now are technologies of resistance. We need the private sector
companies who essentially built this monster to give us the tools to render it
nugatory. Not only is that the only way forward, but they owe us that.

------
dogma1138
In all honesty i see very little evidence that mass surveillance would
naturally increase under Trump more than it has prior to him, or more than it
would under Clinton or any other candidate.

Also anything that Obama does now can easily be reverted; there is little time
nor there is sufficient political capital to pass this as a law, and any
executive order can be overturned completely by the next administration.

Obama can't dismantle the NSA, he can't cut their budget, he can't do anything
of meaning at this point there is too much momentum behind these programs to
stop them if the next administration would indeed want to keep them or expand
them.

In his last 2.5 months he can't really do anything but pack.

------
drawkbox
9/11 allowed all this, next time let's not be little scared kids that hand
away our freedom so easily for security. They are hard to get back, probably
even need revolutions to get that back.

A decade and a half and we still can't shake this overreaction. "They hate us
for our freedoms", so our representatives went ahead and took away our
freedoms.

Both parties are responsible and we need to start being American over The
Party of your chosen type. If you like a one party system and vote in line
with it every time go to China, you'd fit right in.

Snowden is a hero as is every other statesman that is left that puts country
over party. It is time to start helping this country not your party.

------
aikah
Unbelievable hypocrites. It was fine during Obama but somehow he needs to shut
it down because they all despise Trump ? no it was shameful back then and it
should have never existed.

~~~
grzm
NSA surveillance predates the Obama administration. Limiting it now is a good
thing, isn't it? Regardless of when it started or who was responsible?

------
return0
When the good guys do it it's fine.

------
gorbachev
Why would he do that? It's been abundantly clear he's been in favor of it all
along.

------
fakeslimshady
It's probably impossible to shut down, but put in place authorization
processes that will discourage abuse

------
spoiledtechie
Before its too late? Its been too late for years!!!

~~~
idlewords
Now it's too later!!!

~~~
hawkice
There is something to be said about how this went past "urgent" into
"emergency response / recovery" sometime before the Snowden leaks (prompting
the Snowden leaks). Odd that there is an attitude surrounding this akin to
(not just telling firefighters not to bother as you said elsewhere in thread)
but, "The house is already on fire, clearly that means we shouldn't care about
putting it out. If it was a real priority to not have a building on fire why
is it clearly on fire? Also let's build some very flammable houses next door."

People's lives have already been ruined by the inability of the government to
secure the sensitive data it collects (see: OPM breach). That's pretty much
the end-of-the-line in terms of damage assessment. Let's just try to do it
better.

------
daodedickinson
You try opposing people that have all the blackmail material and power they
need to ruin you or anyone you could ever love. Look what happened to Hillary
with an incomplete email dump. They have every email anyone in this thread has
ever sent, at least in the last decade. Anyone who's been elected in this
country. Even encrypted ones which they may know how to read or may soon. So
don't threaten them unless you're ready to be ruined or you somehow have a
tremendous army.

------
leroy_masochist
HN really does have a soft spot for scathing denunciations of the SIGINT
Enterprise written by people who have absolutely no clue what the Enterprise
does, how it does it, why it does it, and the results consistently delivered.

It's very interesting to me. I get that this is an EFF-friendly crowd, and
attitudes here skew hard toward the maximalist end of civil liberties. But the
fact that articles like this continually get upvotes is a bit embarrassing to
our community, isn't it?

~~~
reneherse
I suppose the logical fallacy you're employing is a variation of the argument
from authority, isn't it?

Why don't you present an actual argument in support of "SIGINT Enterprise"
instead?

~~~
leroy_masochist
Sorry, so criticizing the article puts the onus on me to write you my version
of what the article should be?

~~~
logicallee
I second your parent comment's request for you to write that here. (please
take the 4 point karma hit, as it will be downvoted.)

This place is as good as any. If you're really worried about the backlash
(from HN) you (or 'someone') could reply under a throwaway, detailing those
thoughts and arguments.

>Why don't you present an actual argument in support of "SIGINT Enterprise"
instead?

~~~
leroy_masochist
I guess the short version would be that it provides the overwhelming majority
of the actionable intelligence that drives both national strategy and tactical
decision-making. Also that virtually all "domestic collection" is collection
on foreign adversaries whose comms include at least some American selectors,
which is a very, very different proposition from using national-level SIGINT
platforms to engage domestic targets.

I can't provide tangible examples to people who aren't read-in, and thus my
argument ultimately rests on a very annoying appeal to authority, i.e., "If
you were privy to what I know, you'd agree with me." I get how problematic
that argument is, but in this case I think it actually is true. I wish there
were a way that I could get around this quandary, but there really isn't.

Sorry -- I know that the above is probably not convincing to >90% of the HN
community. But it's my honest opinion.

~~~
logicallee
How can I get myself blacklisted from intelligence work so that I can be my
normal weird self without being read into anything, ever? Also while retaining
the right and ability to be extremely critical on forums like this one, while
using _all_ of the actually-public information (i.e. what has been published
by the New York Times.)

I'm artistic and write and do lots of stuff under all sorts of pseudonyms, I
travel, I want to directly engage the Chinese government on better IP laws, I
want to directly do all sorts of stuff that would be way too suspicious or off
limits if I had anything to do with intelligence - all without meeting your
qualification for what are "comms with at least some Americans" or whatever. I
just want to stay on the free side. I'm an American and foreign dual citizen.

I get the argument for why people who work with intelligence need to be held
to a different standard and arguably have fewer freedoms than people outside
of it. I just want to stay on the other, civilian or outsider side of that
line. How do I do that (other than not agreeing to that work)?

This is an issue that is coming up for me and I am seriously thinking of
paying some psychologist to say that I have some kind of specific tourrette's
syndrome where if I'm recruited for any kind of conspiracy/intelligence
"community"/whatever is on the other side of that curtain, I spasm out, and
then just going ahead and pretending to do that if it ever happens.

Please give me specific actionable steps I can take. I don't want to change my
attitude or habits. By the way, when intelligence agencies (don't know which
ones, may not even be US) read my writing or what I'm doing, they have
actually physically gotten the wrong idea. Which is fine, I don't care - they
didn't bother me. It's their job to stay invisible and out of civilians' hair.

but I am not going to change my attitude or behavior. I'm an American as well
and I think I certainly have the freedom not to participate in any institution
I didn't sign up for explicitly. America isn't a police state. I don't have to
watch what I say, certainly privately or anonymously, in case some bureaucrat
gets the wrong idea.

I don't want to live in an Orwellian nightmare. I wanted to show you another
commenter who raise a similar concern, but couldn't find it. He talked about
how stifling and restrictive it was to work on some generic (not even secret)
government contract, where they couldn't even do basic things like travel
without announcing it exactly etc etc.

Anyway in this comment I am asking specifically how I can disqualify myself.
What would keep someone from being read into anything, ever, or joining the
intelligence "community". (Obviously this is just speculation, I'm just
interested in your idea.)

~~~
leroy_masochist
I think you're safe, friend -- you don't get read into anything without making
the proactive decision to join the intelligence community. Not really
something that happens inadvertently.

~~~
logicallee
haha, all right. Hey if I get killed for going to some dictatorship on my own
and not belonging to the intelligence community but somebody thinks I am, I'll
have that on my tombstone, and it'll be your fault, ya jerk. :)

