
Mitch McConnell Moves to Expand Bill Barr’s Surveillance Powers - macawfish
https://www.thedailybeast.com/mitch-mcconnell-moves-to-expand-bill-barrs-surveillance-powers
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zaroth
If I might offer a more neutral and IMO significantly more informative source
on Senate FISA amendments;

[https://www.lawfareblog.com/senate-proposes-five-
amendments-...](https://www.lawfareblog.com/senate-proposes-five-amendments-
fisa-reform)

It’s quite extensive and talks about each of five amendments including the
various side-by-sides that McConnell has put forward.

Here’s the part just about web browsing content vs metadata;

> _Courts have struggled with the line between what constitutes the “content”
> of communications and what does not. For example, most courts have ruled
> that a first-level web domain, like www.amazon.com, is considered to be
> dialing-routing-addressing-signaling, not “content,” and as such could be
> collected without a warrant. But a domain name that results from a search of
> “anarchist cookbook”—a 1971 book that contains instructions for
> manufacturing explosives—would be considered “content.” The Wyden-Daines
> amendment is designed to clarify that all Americans’ internet website
> browsing and internet search history information would be off-limits without
> a warrant._

> _McConnell has authored a side-by-side to this amendment that would seem, on
> its face, to similarly limit an application under Section 215 to exclude an
> order authorizing or requiring the production of internet website browsing
> information or internet search history information. But the side-by-side
> would limit such an application only “to the extent such information
> constitutes contents of a communication, as defined in section 2510 of title
> 18, United States Code.” This qualification is key to understanding the
> McConnell alternative amendment: Rather than requiring a warrant for
> collection of Americans’ internet website browsing and internet search
> history information, it essentially restates and reifies the existing,
> somewhat confusing, state of affairs. In essence, the McConnell amendment
> maintains the current status quo regarding treatment of internet website
> browsing and internet search history information._

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someguydave
Lawfare is hardly neutral - they have been cheerleading the expansion of
surveillance powers for the intelligence bureaucracy for years.

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zaroth
I doubt you could find any site that could be described as absolutely neutral,
but if you read both articles, TFA is nakedly political while Lawfare seems
decided _less_ so, wouldn’t you agree?

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someguydave
No, I view them both as nakedly political.

