Birds aren't real! But birds are not government spy drones either. They're aerial-based Pez dispensers. At least in China.

But what about theses conspiracy theories (as an example)
http://theantimedia.org/10-conspiracy-theories-that-turned-out-to-be-true/

Seems to me it was not long ago people were called 'conspiracy theorist', when they talked of government spying on its own people. Funny thing is it is actually WAY worse then 'conspiracy theorist' ever imagined. just sayin

painting someone as a 'conspiracy theorist' is just like how they are painting 'feminist' these days. Lumping everyone together is lame and is used to intimidate and shout people down. Many shut up for fear of being labeled by a hijacked name.

Really could have done without the cheesy quasi trench-coat dude. They're just feeding the stereotype that people who are concerned about government spying are a bunch of paranoid schizophrenics.

@VoodooV
your argument is flawed on sooo many levels.

1.you imply that our government is still "for the people by the people".while i admire the idealism i just dont see it manifested in reality.

2.you state you can vote out surveillance.
this "may" be possible but only due to the diligence of people like manning and snowden who brought these facts to light,and look at how doggedly our government is going after them?

would it be a stretch to assume that maybe,just maybe,the pursuit of manning and snowden had little to do with legality and EVERYTHING to do with sending a message to other potential conscientious government employees and respectable journalists that you dont fuck with the US government.

3.you state that anybody who has an issue with government spying on its own citizens but not with corporations who participate in similar activities is a hypocrite.

no they are not.
a corporation wont show up at your front door in full riot gear and drag you by the feet to club gitmo.

they just use your information to manipulate and control the way you feel and think about certain subjects in order to better control your responses.

and i find both reprehensible on a moral level but...again.the corporation does not have power over my freedom.the government does.

corporate america has purchased our government.
so while pretty and flowery rhetoric may sound delightful,when we actual LOOK how our government enacts policy it is almost ALWAYS,without exception,against what the public actually wants but everything corporate america wants.

the mechanisms that used to combat this are long gone,crushed into non-existence by the powerful elite who own this country.

my country has turned into a flock of infantile weeping pansies.
but it was not by accident but rather design.
they fear for their job.
they fear for their home.
they fear brown people in foreign countries.
hell..half the time they fear their own neighbor.
easy picking for those who wish to exploit that fear.

as someone on this thread stated "it has become a culture of fear".

we..the american people..have become the enemy.

http://www.aclu.org/reform-patriot-act

http://jonathanturley.org/2012/01/15/10-reasons-the-u-s-is-no-longer-the-land-of-the-free/

http://www.npr.org/news/specials/patriotact/patriotactprovisions.html

and for the person who mentioned that congress holds the most power in our legislature:
http://www.bu.edu/law/central/jd/organizations/journals/bulr/documents/MARSHALL.pdf

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/politics/2013/06/congress-government-spying-votes-charts/65969/

http://www.civilfreedoms.org/?p=7260

i could literally do this all day.
please understand my friend i am NOT buying into any media hysteria.
i just do not trust power and the past two administrations have proven they do not deserve it.

another point i would like to make is my suspicion is not the mere fact of a metadata dragnet perpetrated by the NSA.
hell..if you have a facebook you know your info is being jacked.
no..thats not where my skepticism lies.
for while i am not wholly comfortable with a government organization scooping up massive amounts of data,what bothers me far worse is our government expressly barring (verizon in this case) from letting their customers know the very existence of the program.

i also cannot nor will i ever accept the tacit and,in my opinion,bullshit reasoning that this is all about counter-terrorism.

there is far too broad a brush that can be painted with abuse.
and it is the abuse of power that i am concerned with.

see:
patriot act 1
patriot act 2
victory act 1
victory act 2
military commissions act of 2006
NDAA of 2012

which brought us the great hits of the past decade:
torture
warrantless wiretaps
illegal wars
assasinations
persecution of whistleblowers
persecution of journalists

im sorry man but we are in fundamental disagreement on this.
you see this as a necessary tool for law enforcement and counter-terrorism
and i see a horrific landscape of possible abuses by a government i feel no longer represents the citizenry but is,in fact,an arm of wall street and multi-national corporations.

and the possibilities of abuse are massive.

Meet your new government spy!

Until then, give Dash a switchblade and have him hunt real roaches.

These were students! They're not going to have freaking guns! It looks like they did what they could but yeah, those Combine troopers are something to fear.

All around this nation we see stories EVERY day in the news of the police acting more like gestapo then protecting the free. I hope you folks realize that our own version of the STASI are constantly monitoring popular sites like the sift and casually jotting down who is who and what they think.

Analyzing how likely each of us might be a potential "terrorist threat." You guys know that is still going on, right?

That Obama actually kept the government spying program going instead of shutting it down like he promised?

You guys realize that is still happening, right?

I was referring to the last bit of your comment, which seemed to me made only to want to agitate the Ron Paulites. If the only reason for your comment is to make people angry, that makes you a troll. I'm sure bf has used similar rhetoric, but that doesn't make it any less trolling.

"This is less, not more! They should have put that limit on government power from the beginning: "no running!" Why, it would've meant nobody could catch runaway slaves, and we would've never had to have the civil war.

I mean sure, there would've been more crime, but it's a small price to pay for liberty...

Why isn't this libertarian? You seem to be saying that the fascist police departments should have the power to raise taxes just so they can chase people. That makes you violent, evil statists!"

My non-troll-related answer was as much directed at dft, which characterized this as a clearly libertarian mayor, because it apparently was a libertarian act she did - I disagree with that.

I agree with most of what you say below though, apart from calling me a troll. I don't call you a troll for your views, just for that comment. But yeah, sorry if you felt slighted by it.

>> ^NetRunner:
>> ^gwiz665:
Netrunner, don't troll. It's not nice and it doesn't suit you.

Very cute.
You gave quite the response to my "trolling." Apparently I was making a point, and turning people's own demagogic rhetoric against them, not "trolling".
You even ultimately agreed with my point -- boiling down all arguments about government policy into an ideological tug of war about the "size" of government is asinine, and that "less government" can be just as monumentally bad as "more government".
Details matter. That's always been my position. I'm not for "big government", I'm for good government. I don't want government spying on me and torturing people. I do want government to try to clean up the mess that is the American health care system. I don't care about government run vs. private so much as I care about making it work for people in general.
I've been called lots of names for that position, even by people who should know better. I don't let it phase me, but I will gladly toss it back in the faces of the people who do it whenever I have the opportunity.
This was a good one. Troll.

>> ^gwiz665:
Netrunner, don't troll. It's not nice and it doesn't suit you.

Very cute.

You gave quite the response to my "trolling." Apparently I was making a point, and turning people's own demagogic rhetoric against them, not "trolling".

You even ultimately agreed with my point -- boiling down all arguments about government policy into an ideological tug of war about the "size" of government is asinine, and that "less government" can be just as monumentally bad as "more government".

Details matter. That's always been my position. I'm not for "big government", I'm for good government. I don't want government spying on me and torturing people. I do want government to try to clean up the mess that is the American health care system. I don't care about government run vs. private so much as I care about making it work for people in general.

I've been called lots of names for that position, even by people who should know better. I don't let it phase me, but I will gladly toss it back in the faces of the people who do it whenever I have the opportunity.

This was a good one. Troll.

^You know I am government spy, right? I am watching you...

Google is still facilitating the imposition of censorship.

Its the same argument the telecoms could make if they ever get sued for warrantless tapping of Americans by the US government.

"Its not our fault! We were just helping the government spy on Americans without warrants!"

Except Qwest, which got hammered afterwards.

Furthermore, it was Google itself that tauted the Do No Evil line.