
Obama’s Remarks on NSA Controversy - dshankar
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2013/06/07/transcript-what-obama-said-on-nsa-controversy/?mod=e2tw
======
jpdoctor
> _And the reason that’s not how it works is because we’ve got congressional
> oversight and judicial oversight. And if people can’t trust not only the
> executive branch but also don’t trust Congress and don’t trust federal
> judges to make sure that we’re abiding by the Constitution, due process and
> rule of law, then we’re going to have some problems here._

Oh thank god, all branches are providing oversight. So it's just as harmless
as all those other programs being overseen by all branches of government.

Like TSA.

~~~
boot
I love how he says several times "we aren't listening to your phone calls". As
if that suddenly makes everything better. Fuck me.

~~~
baddox
It gets worse. Moments later, he says:

"if anybody in government wanted to go further than just that top-line data
and wanted to, for example, listen to Jackie Calmes’s phone call, they’d have
to go back to a federal judge and — and — and indicate why, in fact, they were
doing further — further probing."

Great. So they can't listen to your phone call, unless they indicate why they
want to listen to your phone call. I'm sure everyone involved in this program
was cherry-picked to ensure that no one says "no" to any of these requests.
Oh, and I'm sure all the logs (who asked who for permission, what the reasons
were, which requests were granted or denied, etc.) are also conveniently
"classified," which you should remember is different than "secret."

~~~
rayiner
So now you're objecting to the very concept of a warrant?

~~~
betterunix
Did FISC warrants suddenly start requiring probable cause? Did the court
itself suddenly start scrutinizing requests (how would we even know)?

Don't conflate FISC warrants issued for criminal investigations. FISC is
barely even a speedbump when it comes to this sort of surveillance.

~~~
rayiner
The quote isn't talking about FISC warrants. Its talking about regular Article
III warrants.

What's deeply ironic about the outrage here is that FISC was created as an
extra layer to safeguard privacy. FISC warrants give law enforcement officials
permission to initiate an investigation, not to access information that would
otherwise require an Article III warrant.

------
tmzt
I'm trying to understand one thing: what is the difference between a telephone
number and a name?

This is Penn register information, that is what it's referred to as in public
laws.

In aggregate it can be used to draw connections between people, such as people
talking to those who are committed to doing us harm. That is what public
comments on these programs have said and that is true.

But clearly telephone numbers are identifying information, unless they are
hashing them prior to building their graphs, but if that is the case why not
say that?

His speech also conflates "federal courts", with "FISA court", which implies
review by the independent judicial branch.

~~~
natrius
He also glosses over the fact that cell tower location is included in this
data. Most of the information that they would overhear in the actual call
audio can be deduced from the data they're collecting. Which is kind of the
whole point of the program.

~~~
anigbrowl
So if I call you from outside 123 Main Street, Anytown on Tuesday at 6:37pm,
what are we talking about? Even if one of us is known criminal or terrorist,
the fact that conversation took place is merely suspicious rather than
probative.

~~~
AutoCorrect
keep drinking the kool-aid. seriously, every response up to this has been you
defending the ongoing actions of the government. are you a government
employee?

~~~
anigbrowl
Far from it; in fact, as a non-citizen I have _far_ fewer rights than you do,
assuming you're a US citizen. Now try addressing my argument instead of
attacking me personally, and try to distinguish between defending the actions
of the government and pointing out factual context, such as the fact that it
is not in fact illegal or unconstitional for the government to collect records
of phone calls, even though it perhaps _should be_.

As it happens, I'm from Europe, and one thing I do miss about the EU is that
citizens of that territory enjoy a explicit and robust constitutional right to
privacy that does not exist in the US, not to mention a unilateral right of
access to and control over their personal data in both governmental and
commercial spheres. I have called on many occasions for an amendment to the US
Constitution that would confer such rights on Americans instead of relying on
the vague and implicit 'discovery' of a privacy right that did not exist
before 1965 and which could be taken away as easily as it was given.

------
lukejduncan
Why is it that politicians think that "not listening to your phone calls" is
any different than tracking everything about your phone calls.

It reminds me of little kids fighting, getting in each others face and
shouting "I'm not touching you, I'm not touching you!"

~~~
MartinCron
_Why is it that politicians think that "not listening to your phone calls" is
any different than tracking everything about your phone calls_

Because there's a huge material difference, maybe?

~~~
lukejduncan
If I stretch my imagination I can see the argument, but I don't buy it (IMHO).

I think the spirit of why the privacy of the content of my conversation is
important equally applies to any information about that conversation. If my
conversation is privileged, why shouldn't my meta-data be? What's the
difference?

If AT&T provided a service that cataloged and tagged my conversation for
retrieval based on analysis of the content (and I opted into this) would that
meta-data also be available to the government?

~~~
MartinCron
If you're having trouble stretching your imagination, just go back to your
teenage years.

Mom: Who was that on the phone?

You: My (girl|boy)friend.

Mom: What exactly did you talk about?

~~~
lukejduncan
First, I hear your point.

But, I think there is a "huge material difference" between a parents right to
know who their kids are talking to and a governments right to know who I am
talking to.

To put it another way: is this a form of blocking the assembly of people? If I
meet in private with a group of people does the government have a right to
know all of the meta data about the conversation such as who was present, when
they arrived and left, etc? In this hypothetical, I'm assuming we are
convening on private property and not a public sidewalk. If we met in private
does the government have the right to compel the doorman to reveal these
details indiscriminately?

~~~
harryh
"If we met in private does the government have the right to compel the doorman
to reveal these details indiscriminately?"

Of course they do.

~~~
lukejduncan
The key to the question was "indiscriminately." Does the government have the
right to require to doorman to keep tabs on everyone without probable cause.

[edit typo]

------
droopybuns
_" Now, let — let me take the two issues separately. When it comes to
telephone calls, nobody is listening to your telephone calls. That’s not what
this program’s about. As was indicated, what the intelligence community is
doing is looking at phone numbers and durations of calls. They are not looking
at people’s names, and they’re not looking at content. But by sifting through
this so-called metadata, they may identify potential leads with respect to
folks who might engage in terrorism. If these folks — if the intelligence
community then actually wants to listen to a phone call, they’ve got to go
back to a federal judge, just like they would in a criminal investigation. So
I want to be very clear. Some of the hype that we’ve been hearing over the
last day or so — nobody’s listening to the content of people’s phone calls."_

So, this is about CDRs- Call Detail Records. They are the atomic unit of all
mobile telecommunications. There's no billing, no provisioning of data or
anything without them. These are the most fundamental log files of all your
mobile activity. They are in a sense, the primary key needed to enumerate all
of your transactions.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_detail_record](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_detail_record)

An excruciating level of detail on what a CDR can include can be found here:

[http://downloads.avaya.com/css/P8/documents/100096784](http://downloads.avaya.com/css/P8/documents/100096784)

Our president is using weasel words. Yes, obtaining CDRs isn't the same as
obtaining your texts or your voicemail, but once you have them, you have
everything you need for obtaining the content through subpoena. So, from here,
we jump to this:

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iog5IeEjR00](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iog5IeEjR00)

 _" We certainly have ways in national security investigations to find out
exactly what was said in that conversation. Its not necessarily something that
the FBI's going to want to present in court, but it may help lead the
investigation or the questioning of her."_

Our political leaders are not worth defending any more. The whole system is
corrupt. Everyone in office needs to be ejected, followed by the comprehensive
removal of non-political government leadership. This country has beached
itself.

~~~
rayiner
> Yes, obtaining CDRs isn't the same as obtaining your texts or your
> voicemail, but once you have them, you have everything you need for
> obtaining the content through subpoena.

Hint: it's always been possible to get nearly any piece of information with a
subpoena or a warrant. The 4th amendment protects against _unreasonable
searches_ not searches period. And a subpoena or a warrant is by definition a
reasonable search.

There is nothing weasel-y about this language.

~~~
benmmurphy
I believe a big issue he is raising is the ability to go back in time and
wiretap your phone before the subpoena has been issued.

~~~
rayiner
Collecting CDR's is not wiretapping.

~~~
droopybuns
Watch the youtube video referenced above. There is some kind of wiretapping
going on _all_ the time.

------
betterunix
Standard government nonsense -- "There is oversight, this is for your safety,
trust us, we respect your privacy, whoa look at the time I have to meet
someone important bye!"

------
natrius
Let's talk a little about trusting the government to abide by the
Constitution. The Constitution establishes the treaties we enter into as the
law of the land. The Geneva Conventions are treaties that make torture
illegal. The government has tortured people pretty recently.

We're pretty far beyond "trust, but verify" territory here.

~~~
anigbrowl
I question your minor premise, just for starters. I also think you're
committing a fallacy of composition, since the government is not a monolithic
entity.

~~~
Domenic_S
Oh, this retort again. "HN/Reddit/the Government isn't just one person with
one opinion you know!" And then someone replies yadda yadda scotsman yadda
yadda and then we all kill ourselves.

Make an argument!

------
jervisfm
Here is an interesting quote from his remarks that I think could actually be a
worthwhile argument that gives some indication that there is serious concern
to ensure that the systems are not abused.

 _> And by the way, with respect to my concerns about privacy issues, I will
leave this office at some point, sometime in the last — next 3 1/2 years, and
after that, I will be a private citizen. And I suspect that, you know, on — on
a list of people who might be targeted, you know, so that somebody could read
their emails or — or listen to their phone calls, I’d probably be pretty high
on that list. So it’s not as if I don’t have a personal interest in making
sure my privacy is protected._

~~~
A__MJ
I would interpret that as Obama casting himself in the position of an average
citizen to garner a feeling of connection and trust.

I'm taking a wild guess, but I doubt that presidents get bumped down to
"average dude" status by intelligence agencies after they leave office.

~~~
sliverstorm
_I doubt that presidents get bumped down to "average dude" status by
intelligence agencies after they leave office._

Isn't that exactly his point? After he leaves office, he will be very high on
"List of people to snoop"?

------
don_draper
How would you identify and disrupt terrorist cells in America that were
talking with known terrorists overseas?

I'm not trying to defend the government, but genuinely ask, 'How would you do
it?'

~~~
noonespecial
There comes a point where you just admit that you can't. Bad people do bad
things and sometimes you can't stop them.

Burning the whole village to save it, cure worse than the disease, cutting
noses to spite faces, and all that.

~~~
don_draper
In the age of nuclear weapons doing nothing is not acceptable.

~~~
beat
That doesn't mean doing ANYTHING becomes acceptable. There are lines that
shouldn't be crossed. We can debate what those lines should be, but you're
suggesting there are no lines.

------
coldtea
> _And the reason that’s not how it works is because we’ve got congressional
> oversight and judicial oversight. And if people can’t trust not only the
> executive branch but also don’t trust Congress and don’t trust federal
> judges to make sure that we’re abiding by the Constitution, due process and
> rule of law, then we’re going to have some problems here._

The people shouldn't have to "trust" anything and surely not blindly. As is
the case here. The people should KNOW about everything that is being done, and
judge for themselves.

If the people have to ..."trust" their government ("Don't worry, we know
what's best and we'll do it, we wont bother you with details, just trust us"),
then we already have a huge problem here.

The government should represent the will of the people, transparently, openly,
and under constant oversight of the citizenry -- not just of judges and
congress. Trust should only come into play in very small doses into this.

~~~
pkulak
It's not really my _will_ that every single intelligence gathering operation
be disclosed to the public. There's a lot of value in terrorists not knowing
exactly what communication mediums to avoid at any moment. I think it's a good
point that hundreds of directly elected people, representing the entire
country, have known about this since it's inception. You can't just put every
single government action to a vote, for several reasons.

~~~
coldtea
> _It 's not really my _will_ that every single intelligence gathering
> operation be disclosed to the public. There's a lot of value in terrorists
> not knowing exactly what communication mediums to avoid at any moment._

Really? As if skilled terrorists chat their plans over the phone like casual
people. They might get some young idiots, but nobody else. And those things
are black swan events.

Furthermore, if every single government action was "disclosed to the public",
there wouldn't even be more terrorists. People that get to be domestic
terrorists would have less reasons to mistrust that open government. And the
country wouldn't be made to invade, mess with other sovereign countries and
get their people to seek revenge -- at least not without consensus.

------
cm2012
That was remarkably well spoken and reasonable.

~~~
droopybuns
In the words of Jamie Kilstein:

"Honestly democrats, does Obama have to fuck your girlfriend for you to get
mad?"

------
cinquemb
don't trust the executive branch?: √

don't trust Congress?: √

don't trust what is called "due process and rule of law"?: √

I wonder what problems he thinks people will cause? Petitions are ignored.
Protests are relegated to "Free speech zones". People are taking on more debt
than ever to live the "American Dream". Sounds like they have everything in
control to me…

~~~
medde
we've got a problem... stop funding the NSA, TSA, etc...

------
dlitz
If voters in the US are just supposed to "trust" Congress and the executive,
why even bother having elections?

~~~
encoderer
Seriously?

To elect somebody you trust.

This is a republic.

~~~
dlitz
OK, so you've elected representatives that you trust. Now what?

A major purpose of having new elections every 4 years (as opposed to life
tenure) is to allow the people to periodically re-evaluate their trust
decisions. What do you propose as the basis for that trust? Blind faith?

What's being suggested here is that elected representatives ought to be
trusted by the public _without_ access to the information necessary to verify
that their trust has not been misplaced.

It's not like we're talking about specific information that was leaked. The
mere fact that there exists such a broad surveillance program---authorized by
Congress, the White House, and the FISC---was classified "top secret" and not
scheduled to be declassified until decades later. The legally-enforced lack of
accountability _to the people_ for such a massive program undermines the
legitimacy of a government that supposedly governs by the consent of the
people.

------
tommis
>Now, with respect to the Internet and emails, this does not apply to U.S.
citizens, and it does not apply to people living in the United States.

For EU and rest of the world: Every message (email/IM,anything..) trough
gmail, hotmail, AOL or facebook is stored by US Gov. and used as they see fit.

~~~
ihsw
Your comment may be tongue in cheek however the concept of universal
jurisdiction is a serious one that many have contemplated over the past
century or so.

Why do you assume the 4th Amendment applies for foreign people? Is it because
their data simply transits through the US (eg: to Facebook's servers)? Or is
it because you expect the US Government to use that data to impose its laws
and regulations selectively at its convenience (combating piracy)?

~~~
dragonwriter
> Why do you assume the 4th Amendment applies for foreign people?

Because its a limitation on the power of the _federal government_ that has no
restrictions as to nationality of targets written in to it.

------
kawera
_Now, with respect to the Internet and emails, this does not apply to U.S.
citizens, and it does not apply to people living in the United States._

As for those living outside the US...

~~~
twoodfin
I thought these programs were essentially constitutional when President Bush
was in office, and I think they're essentially constitutional now (perhaps
moreso with the added oversight of the FISA Amendments Act of 2008). But it's
funny how much more interested President Obama is in making the distinction
between purely domestic and foreign intercepts now that it's "his" program. I
hope the brouhaha of the last few days has taught him some humility if nothing
else.

------
InclinedPlane
We already have an established process with established safeguards designed to
strike an appropriate balance between public safety and personal liberty.

This isn't it.

This is so far from it as to make a mockery of the principles that lay at the
very foundations of our nation.

------
kjackson2012
So we're expected to trust someone that has been lying to us for 5 years?

------
Achshar
What the fuck is the "we are not reading emails of any US citizen" bullshit. I
am not a US citizen, so you are reading my emails? That is _even_ more fucked
up. For one second forget about US citizens and think about all the other
people in the world. I don't care what US government does to it's people, it's
your government after all. But what I do care is what it does to data of
others (including myself), because it has no right to any of that data. So
someone get the questions answered.

------
coley
"They are not looking at people’s names, and they’re not looking at content.
But by sifting through this so-called metadata, they may identify potential
leads with respect to folks who might engage in terrorism. If these folks — if
the intelligence community then actually wants to listen to a phone call,
they’ve got to go back to a federal judge, just like they would in a criminal
investigation."

So if you're not collecting names, whose name goes on the warrant once
suspicious is aroused?

~~~
medde
they are getting the data from different sources to not look too suspicious

------
benmmurphy
Not sure why Obama thinks he would be high on the list of people this program
would abuse. Why would the people running the program punish someone that
supported the program? The innocent people that have to fear from this program
are the people currently opposing the surveillance state. If you are in a
position of power either in private industry or the government and are not co-
operating with NSLs or other surveillance requests then you are high on the
list.

------
hu_me
It also mentions that the spying doesn't involve reading emails of US
residents? So that means people outside US jurisdiction are being targeted?

------
platypii
My problem with his remarks was that he was addressing the wrong issue. He was
defending the need to access this data without a warrant. He then repeatedly
stated that he welcomed the discussion.

But how can a national discussion take place about a secret program??

He never addressed this issue of why the program needs to be secret in the
first place.

------
qwerta
I do not get why people are not using PGP more. It takes 10 minutes to setup
your email client and put public certificate on web. It is just question of
time until government starts using this data for "other dangerous stuff" such
as tax evasion and not paying parking tickets.

~~~
sliverstorm
People have not yet accepted the fact that in a digital age, there will always
be _somebody_ snooping your information. They still believe with enough laws,
it can be stopped.

------
mindstab
Obama: "And I think it’s interesting that there are some folks on the left,
but also some folks on the right who are now worried about it who weren’t very
worried about it when it was a Republican president. I think that’s good that
we’re having this discussion."

------
scrabble
"...represent only small encroachments of people’s privacy."

This is pretty much how it starts. First the people accept small
encroachments, then they're asked to accept slightly larger encroachments.

Eventually there is no privacy left.

------
gcb0
<quote>Obama: number one, to keep the American people safe; and number two, to
uphold the Constitution.</quote>

isn't that wrong order or priorities exactly what the constitution should
protect us from?

------
notmarkus
It opens with "all of your duly elected officials have been aware of this
program for years and have consistently voted to maintain it."

Yes, that makes it so much better.

------
jlarocco
It's hard to believe anything the government says about this because a month
ago they would have denied anything was being done at all.

------
rglover
[http://youtu.be/cGKEkI8IV2o?t=7m43s](http://youtu.be/cGKEkI8IV2o?t=7m43s)

------
bguthrie
"Do you welcome the leak, sir? Do you welcome the leak if you welcome the
debate?"

------
boi_v2
The logical fallacies in his speech are remarkable.

------
suredo
what is the reason for this being classified? so that people don't stop using
Verizon?

------
suredo
with great powers comes great responsibilities.... and I thought he could
handle it...

------
medde
obama - bush = 0

------
monsterix
Thank you for posting this dshankar.

Is this an impromptu speech? Why is he mumbling so much?

~~~
cleverjake
It isn't a speech - its a reply to a question.

~~~
smackfu
Well, I would call it a prepared response to an inevitable question, at an
unrelated event that was already scheduled.

