
Here’s what real reform of the NSA looks like - Libertatea
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2013/08/02/heres-what-real-reform-of-the-nsa-looks-like
======
deveac
The recent House vote to remove funding for the metadata collection program
was much narrower in scope, and failed to pass.

The good news is that it failed to pass by a slim margin. This will probably
fail to pass as well. My hope is that it will fail by a slim margin as well,
and my dream is that opponents of overreach (both in the house and activists)
will take this as an opportunity that they narrowly missed on the last vote
and seize it.

At any rate, I hope anybody complaining about these programs on here has
already contacted their representatives by phone and is continuing to do so as
these bills are introduced and debated. Please.

~~~
Tarrosion
It is my understanding that contacting via non-form letter is the best way to
reach your representative. This comes from a chat with a friend who worked as
an assistant in a congressional office; she said form letters were discarded,
phone calls were usually from a few select cranks who called every day about
the same esoteric issue, and custom letters were read and their contents
summarized for the congressperson.

~~~
w_t_payne
A (legible!) hand-written letter would probably fare even better ... as it
shows that you care enough about the issue to take the time to write it by
hand.

~~~
1337biz
Is there already some API for outsourcing this whole hand-writing letter
thing?

~~~
lallysingh
A printer, cursive font, and a shitty renderer?

~~~
redthrowaway
This actually reminds me of the letters Peter Popoff sends out. Check out the
fake handwriting on it:

[http://www.jeffbelanger.com/blog/wp-
content/uploads/2007/05/...](http://www.jeffbelanger.com/blog/wp-
content/uploads/2007/05/popoffletter4.gif)

One of my room mates discovered this trove of comedy gold and has been signing
up all his friends to receive them. They're actually pretty convincing,
although they lack the indentation marks one would expect to see from a real
pen.

~~~
1337biz
Impressive! I wonder why direct mailers aren't making more use of stuff like
that. This should increase the response quota significantly.

------
ColinCochrane
This is a great quote:

 _The idea of the Fourth Amendment is not to get in the way of law enforcement
and intelligence, but rather to see that they do a good job by having to prove
at each step of the way that they know what they’re doing, that they’re not
off running down hunches and going off on wild goose chases and witch hunts._

~~~
a3n
Actually I think the idea of the 4th _is_ to get in the way of law enforcement
and the government, insofar as that obstacle is necessary to protect the
rights of the average non-suspect citizen.

Not sure there's any such thing as a non-suspect citizen these days.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Actually I think the idea of the 4th is to get in the way of law enforcement
> and the government, insofar as that obstacle is necessary to protect the
> rights of the average non-suspect citizen.

I'd say its more to get in the way of government insofar as that obstacle is
necessary to protect the rights of the average _suspect_ citizen, as well.

~~~
a3n
Yes, you are correct.

------
Charos
This would be a big step in the right direction. However, heavy-hitting
legislation like this that prioritizes civil rights at the expense of
government power rarely passes the Senate. We could try and push it through
with a SOPA-like activism blitz (which I think we should, honestly), but it
would take some serious effort to overcome legislative protectionism.

~~~
wil421
I agree, if industry leaders jumped on the band wagon like they did for SOPA
we may have a chance.

Some of the big tech companies are already willing to fight back we just need
to gain momentum for the cause. Some legislators are with us but I doubt the
senate will be on our side.

------
mtgx
Too bad people are flagging these stories more than ever now. It seems that
worrying about the surveillance state they're now in is too "boring" to them.

~~~
voodoo123
This isn't an appropriate forum for politics. There are plenty of other venues
online for civic debate.

~~~
tehwalrus
I'd humbly submit that

1) there are lots of non-Americans who are interested in what y'all are doing
with our data

2) Hacker News is a forum for "what hackers find interesting," not whatever
you think it is. Some politics, particularly digital rights and privacy, are
very much part of our interests and responsibility (as non-governmental
experts[1]).

3) Everything is political[2].

[1] "experts" \- not me, this community at large.

[2]
[http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Thomas_Mann](http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Thomas_Mann)

~~~
fusiongyro
Point one justifies a few articles, not a daily deluge.

Point two is true, but pissing off a significant part of your constituency is
not healthy for the community.

Point three is a cute way to try to subvert the fact that the guidelines
explicitly state "Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports,
unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon." Not every
commentator's opinion about a month-old leak is evidence of some interesting
new phenomenon. You may not like this or agree with it, but the HN Guidelines
are effectively the constitution of HN. It should supersede your own desire to
bring up politics whenever possible.

I agree firmly voodoo123. You have an entire internet full of places to whine
about American politics. HN is apparently deciding right now that politics is
always on-topic, in opposition to the guidelines. Fine, so be it, but we will
continue to whine about it until the guidelines are changed, because we like
the guidelines better.

~~~
angersock
Pay closer attention, sir--this isn't American politics writ large, but a
small section of issues that has deep and far-reaching consequences for our
customers, our businesses, and (without meaning to sound too grandiose)
nothing less than the future of privacy and exploratory computing.

This is exactly the sort of useful stuff I'd like to see here.

~~~
fusiongyro
Sure. And I don't object to a few articles with a lot of meat. But what I
don't need is every pundit's reaction, to see every breaking story about which
company cooperated and which did not, followed by a story summarizing the
tally, followed by two reactions to the summary from two more pundits,
followed by a guy who has a bone to pick with one of them, followed by a new
revelation about a fifteenth company, ...

The guidelines clearly make an exception for new, interesting stories that
have wide-reaching consequences. I agree and am glad that I found out here
about the major abuses, the amendment and the more recent bill. That's four
stories of real value. What the guidelines do not make an exception for is the
kind of fine-toothed-combing and navel-lint-cataloguing that is going on
surrounding these issues. Stories with titles like "People don't care about
these stories anymore" are great examples of what isn't a new and interesting
phenomenon.

I definitely grant that some of this is desired. I think you and others should
grant that some of it is not desired.

------
mpyne
I would be interested in the details of what law enforcement/surveillance
methods are actually useful for counterterrorism and which ones simply make
things more convenient but aren't really needed. It sounds to me like one side
says they're all desperately needed and the other side says that they're all
useless. Somehow I don't think the answer is either one of those.

But this bill looks like a great first step, and Rep. Holt makes a lot of
great points about the role of oversight, the need for overseen agencies to
buy into oversight, and the need for IC whistleblower protections that don't
force well-intentioned staff to have to dump things to the media to avoid
being treated like Thomas Drake.

------
JonSkeptic
>the Surveillance State Repeal Act....It would repeal the 2001 Patriot Act,
which the NSA has cited as the legal basis for its phone records surveillance
program. It would also repeal the 2008 FISA Amendments Act, the legal
foundation for the government’s PRISM program. And it would extend
whistleblower protections to cover employees of intelligence agencies.

Good luck passing that. It would be nice, but I won't get my hopes up.

~~~
thechut
This is the kind of apathy and negativity that means nothing will ever get
fixed. America depends on people like you feeling this way to do whatever it
pleases while presenting a "democratic" process.

You seem to comment a lot about the NSA / Snowden situation. If you actually
care about fixing it, then perhaps you should call your senator and try to
make this a reality as opposed to writing it off and not getting your "hopes
up"

~~~
JonSkeptic
America depends on people having a realistic perspective? I think you're a bit
out of touch...

If they want to pass these measures separately, they might have a chance, but
passing all of them at once is a farce, at best, as it has no chance of
passing. Of course, you can continue to root for the ineffective showboating
legislation that is already DOA, or you could put your hopes and cash into
more effective measures. Word is the EFF is fairly popular.

~~~
gtaylor
Stop whining. Call and write your representative, be a part of the solution.

We know it's bad, we know the going will be tough. We need to get off our
collective asses and put the pressure on to fix it instead of ranting and
perpetuating self-fulfilling prophecies.

~~~
msandford
Part of his complaint, though he didn't state it, is that it's just too damn
hard to get the elected officials to ACTUALLY REPRESENT the people who they
SUPPOSEDLY REPRESENT. And I think that's a fair criticism of our government,
the officials answer more to their corporate sponsors (who largely don't mind
tending towards actively support) this kind of thing, rather than to the
people.

Furthermore I shouldn't have to weigh in with my Congresspersons on whether I
think something is Constitutional or not. Their job, literally, is to make law
in accordance with the Constitution. Here's the oath they take:

"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the
Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic;
that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this
obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and
that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I
am about to enter: So help me God."

Many elected officials have broken their oaths by passing the Patriot Act or
the FISA Act as those authorize blanket warrants; something that the
Constitution implicitly prohibits by virtue of the Fourth Amendment.

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and
effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated,
and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or
affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the
persons or things to be seized.[1]"

That's the text and you don't get to judge the current laws based on the
original text plus all the intervening laws too; the Constitution is the
supreme law of the land and if any law contradicts it, guess which one is
considered invalid?

So given that the Congress collectively doesn't seem to answer to the people,
and collectively doesn't uphold its oath, I would argue that his whining is
incredibly justified.

It's not productive in that it doesn't change a congressperson's mind about
anything, nor does it get any of those criminals fired or impeached or un-
elected. But it's not invalid.

EDIT: Congressmen -> Congressperson

~~~
gtaylor
> Part of his complaint, though he didn't state it, is that it's just too damn
> hard to get the elected officials to ACTUALLY REPRESENT the people who they
> SUPPOSEDLY REPRESENT. And I think that's a fair criticism of our government,
> the officials answer more to their corporate sponsors (who largely don't
> mind tending towards actively support) this kind of thing, rather than to
> the people.

As politically apathetic as the American population is now, we _are_ a part of
the problem. Our reps certainly have their problems, but let's not pretend
like we're not at fault either. Our apathy allowed things to get like they
did. That doesn't make us all terrible people, it just means we need to do
more as citizens to keep our crooked politicians honest.

In the same time it takes to write some of these whiney posts, a letter could
have been written or a call made. We can sit and debate whether the letter or
the call did anything, or we could all just sack up and do it and potentially
benefit from it.

~~~
msandford
Does a woman who wears revealing clothing deserve to get raped?

You're blaming the victim.

Yes we are responsible for not voting these criminals out of office, but that
doesn't make what they do any less reprehensible. At least acknowledge that
they're in the wrong. I also think it's terrible that it's our job to keep
them honest. It's their job to keep themselves honest! That's why they were
elected! If we can't trust them to be honest (and it seems clear to me that we
can't) perhaps we ought to explore different ways of governing.

------
lettergram
Here's the letter I wrote my Senator and House representative. I have not
received a response and I sent it a couple weeks ago. I saw some posts about
contacting your representative and just wanted to share what I said.

"Supposedly, one of the major founding principles of the United States of
America was that every man was created equal. Everyone know's the quote,

"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety
deserve neither liberty nor safety" \- Benjamin Franklin.

Less known is a statement made my Thomas Jefferson:

"My reading of history convinces me that most bad governments result from too
much government" at the time Jefferson's library was likely the largest in the
U.S. was was the beginning of the library of congress (donated after his
death).

I could go on, every single founding member of the United States felt the
same, but I think you see my point. Our government, the United States
government, was based on the idea that each person's liberty was the single
most important right of each citizen. That includes your liberty and my
liberty and every other persons liberty. That implies that I have no right to
impede on a government officials liberty AND a government official does not
have the right to impede mine, unless I interfere with another citizens
liberty.

That, liberty and my inability to interfere with others and your inability to
interfere with mine is the basis of our constitution and its amendments. Each
and every amendment in the Bill of Rights is aimed at that goal. Yet, for some
reason, I have to discuss these rights because apparently someone misread or
did not read them at all.

My fourth amendment rights:

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and
effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated,
and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or
affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the
persons or things to be seized."

have been violated. It is important for my government to protect these rights,
if not simply to protect themselves. The law governing this land demands that
those who deprive me of liberty be punished. Do you wish to be punished? I
know I do not. I do not wish to be punished, therefore I do not impede on your
liberty, I do not take any of your items, nor do I make you insecure in your
persons, house, papers or effects. You trust me not to harm you... At least I
thought you did?

Now, I come to learn that my government has impeded on my liberty by stalking
me. Have I been charged with a crime? If so, what crime? Have I been suspected
or has someone affirmed that I did something wrong? I no longer have the right
not to be monitored by my cell phone company or my cable provider, but I
signed an agreement to give up my privacy to them. In the case of the
government, I agreed to the law of the land, the constitution. The government
is not allowed access to my documents or personal effects without a warrant,
requiring affirmation that I did something illegal or potentially to take away
someones liberty. Since this is not the case I demand, yes demand, that you as
a representative of the people of Illinois vote against anything allows others
to break the law of the land (or search me illegally). Specifically, I demand
that you do all in your power to stop all domestic spying operations.

Your oath is: "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend
the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and
domestic"

I expect you to uphold your oath and protect my rights, your rights, your sons
rights, your grandsons rights, and the rights of all United States citizens.
If you do not, you are nothing more than an enemy of state yourself. It was
you who volunteered to protect me, if you fail to a foreign threat I can
understand that. However, I will not understand if you knowingly harm me by
reducing my rights as a citizen."

