

2 Senators Accuse Justice Dept. of Twisting Patriot Act - luigi
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/27/us/27patriot.html

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trotsky
_“I want to deliver a warning this afternoon: When the American people find
out how their government has secretly interpreted the Patriot Act, they will
be stunned and they will be angry,” Mr. Wyden said._

 _Another member of the Intelligence Committee, Senator Mark Udall, Democrat
of Colorado, backed Mr. Wyden’s account, saying, “Americans would be alarmed
if they knew how this law is being carried out.”_

That's two _senators_ who are on the select committee, so they really know the
nuts and bolts of whats going on, basically shouting from the roof tops. And
they're even the same party as the executive branch that's using it. And they
aren't even allowed to tell us what the problem is.

Something seriously bad is going on.

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Roboprog
New & Improved! USA PATRIOT Act, now with 30% more Bill of Rights violations!

This damn thing just needs to die (expire), already.

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davidw
Please, no politics.

> Off-Topic: Most stories about politics

<http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html>

You can go to reddit to talk about that stuff if you want.

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wnight
Politics is reps vs dems, liberals vs conservatives, and so on. Partisan
nonsense.

This is a warning and discussion about the misuse of government power.

Yes, it is totally off-topic, like patents are, in that they're arbitrary
legal nonsense. But, they're enforced nonsense and thus relevant.

~~~
davidw
> Yes, it is totally off-topic, like patents are, in that they're arbitrary
> legal nonsense. But, they're enforced nonsense and thus relevant.

So... by that definition, pretty much anything is fair game.

You're playing "7 degrees of hacker news".

How do "nonsense" laws being enforced make them "hacker news". Does it just
apply to nonsense laws? I think a drinking age of 21 in the US is nonsense,
and it's enforced - does that expand the purview of this site to articles
about that, too?

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wnight
It's hacker news because it's about high-tech spying. And it's discussion-
worthy because it's a secret, a huge tech project, and fundamentally flawed in
multiple ways. I thought that went without saying.

What I'm talking about is how an otherwise relevant story is still relevant
even if it is also a political or otherwise off-topic. A story about a cool
new location tracking tech is hacker news even if the specific example is
tracking hockey pucks or real-time overlaying of ads in stadiums or whatever.

Almost anything is relevant if it has a complex or interesting impact on our
lives. Some political wind-bagging, no. A new law, especially a far-reaching
one contrary to existing law or policy, very much so. That you think the
drinking age is nonsense does seem like a worthy topic, whether you support
party X, does not. Tie that to tech or traditionally hacker-related topics
such as privacy or freedom to tinker and it seems relevant to this site, even
if tainted with a dash of politics.

