This movie was a mess.

I'd like to see greater legal protection for pets under the law. It seems that these cops can kill pets with complete impunity. It would be nice if there were some consequences to make them think twice.

@dag - What I like best about your comment is that you present constructive criticism, while the rest of the media, government and public are preparing the tar and feathers.

I'm frustrated by the way we focus on personality and ignore the systemic nature of these kinds of issues. Once we tar and feather Obama, the next president will find herself/himself in need of effective national security measures and will likely go along with whatever the NSA thinks is best. Hillary is Stalin! Rand Paul is Hitler! Rinse and repeat. This is part of the reason why nothing ever seems to get done.

As an aside, I've certainly been on the offensive side of these crusades with Bush, McCain, Hillary and Romney, so this newish perspective is something of an epiphany. Not to say I didn't voice legitimate gripes, but I took cheap shots aplenty.

In short, I'm probably feeling what the rest of the world has long known, that Americans are immature, aggressive and completely unproductive in the way we manage their civic affairs, and it's not going to stop till we wise up.

(So just give up)


Anyway.....

@choggie

We are great at throwing tomatoes from the mezzanine, but what would we do if we found ourselves on stage when the lights come up. Who knows? Who cares? Let's throw more tomatoes! ....and I say this as one who has thrown many a tomato at Bush, Hillary, McCain and Mitt Romney.

If the way we do national security is a problem, then it's systemic, because the NSA pretty much done nothing else but collect intelligence 24-7 for the last 60 years.. They've used the system as it was intended to be used, yes, but they've also abused the system.

I'm sure there will be much caterwauling in 2016 about invasion of privacy, but once the dust settles, the crown will still weigh heavy with the burden of national security, and President Hillary, or Ryan, or Rubio, or Paul will find themselves backsliding into old way out of sheer necessity.

Same as it ever was.

If there is a problem with the way we do national security, we aren't going to fix it by calling people cunts and dramatically intoning high school level literary allusions. If we are going to fix it, it will require thought, discussion and hard choices.

Let the rest of them throw tomatoes while you and I fix this fucking system. What do you say, old sport?

President Choggie, how would you restructure the NSA in such a way that it can remain effective at it's job whilst minimizing potential for abuse?

I would argue with Glenn, but I doubt he'd return my emails. Also, I'm far more interested in what you have to say.

Do you think the NSA should monitor North Korean internet activity?

Is your argument that no information should be gathered on people that pose legitimate harm US citizens?

Do you think that the required warrant necessary for the US to look at your info is not a good enough safeguard?

Do you think the NSA should track people that pose a threat to the US or it's citizens?

Do you think Australia should track people that pose a threat to the country or its citizens?

When these suddenly controversial wiretap/monitoring measures were put into place a decade ago, the controversy was based around the fact that they didn't requie a warrant. The Obama admin has added oversight to the process by requiring a warrant.

I hate to go against my fellow lefties on this one, but this is a bogus scandal.

I think that cat is already out of the bag.

Would you be surprised to learn that Australia is monitoring internet activity in other countries? I bet you $10 they do.

It would piss me off to learn that the NSA was reading our hot daily sexts, but does that potential for abuse mean they shouldn't be able to check out what Kim Jong Un is doing in NK, or check up on unstable regions with nuclear capabilities?

What do you think?

(continued conversation from http://videosift.com/video/Democracy-Now-A-Massive-Surveillance-State-Exposed. Feel free to join in.)

@enoch - Specifically, what new power has the government gained here? (this is not a rhetorical question)

I'm with you on torture, warrantless wiretaps, illegal wars, assassinations (in general, thought I think Al Alakwi was justified considering the body count he had racked up), persecution of whistleblowers, persecution of journalists

The current NSA scandal encompasses none of these things. If they want to record your phone calls, they need a warrant. They didn't under Bush - but they do now - and PRISM can't go after your internet data at all.

Even if they did want to grab everyones' information, can you see how difficult it would be to pull off? How many phone calls are made in a day? (millions?) How many warrants would it take to get access to all those calls? How many man hours would it take to record and listen to all those calls? Even if the NSA were full of villainous mustache twirlers, doesn't that seem like a futile task? 99.9999% of the information would be useless.

I believe that the NSA genuinely works to stop terror attacks. I know there has been much bullshit done in the name of the "war on terror", but I believe there is a genuine need for an Agency that deals with National Security. I would imagine most countries have some kind of similar body.

I don't have a problem with information gained through search warrants. My major complaint is that this stuff is not better explained to the public. I know that there is plenty of specific information that needs to be kept secret in order to not blow the cover of agents who are wiretapping suspects, but I think the broad strokes should be put out there. Here's what we are doing. Here's why. Here are the problems we've had. Here are the successes we've had. How are we doing? How can we improve this?

I also think there would be far less need to monitor if drugs were legalized and the war on terror ended.

Anyway, I think this kind of surveillance is going to become status quo, will not be overly problematic and will be completely uncontroversial in a few decades. As far as abuse goes, you don't need any of these high tech contraptions to listen to people's phone calls and track internet usage. These things can be done fairly easily with comparatively primitive tech that can be bought legally at spy stores.

http://www.spy.th.com/audiocat.html

@criticalthud I don't disagree with what you say. My point is that judge approved wiretaps and internet surveillance should be a legal part of the law enforcement/National Security arsenal. How to do it best is beyond me. I think warrants and constitutional protections are decent checks and balances, but I know they are not infallible. As I mentioned to enoch, if someone wants to listen to your calls, be that person a high ranking government agent or your grumpy neighbor, it can be done easily with low tech. Killing these guidelines would do nothing to protect you from a rogue agent or personal vendetta.

If all this leads to a real discussion on the war on terror or the war on drugs, I'd be thrilled. My prediction is that it will just be used as a politicians electoral bludgeoning device until everyone gets sick of hearing about it and it slides off the radar screen.

also, should we continue this convo in a more current thread? http://videosift.com/video/Latest-NSA-whistleblower-Edward-Snowden-w-Glenn-Greenwald

@enoch - Specifically, what new power has the government gained here?

I'm with you on torture, warrantless wiretaps, illegal wars, assassinations (in general, thought I think Al Alakwi was justified considering the body count he had racked up), persecution of whistleblowers, persecution of journalists

The current NSA scandal encompasses none of these things. If they want to record your phone calls, they need a warrant. They didn't under Bush - but they do now - and PRISM can't go after your internet data at all.

Even if they did want to grab everyones' information, can you see how difficult it would be to pull off? How many phone calls are made in a day? (millions?) How many warrants would it take to get access to all those calls? How many man hours would it take to record and listen to all those calls? Even if the NSA were full of villainous mustache twirlers, doesn't that seem like a futile task? 99.9999% of the information would be useless.

I believe that the NSA genuinely works to stop terror attacks. I know there has been much bullshit done in the name of the "war on terror", but I believe there is a genuine need for an Agency that deals with National Security. I would imagine most countries have some kind of similar body.

I don't have a problem with information gained with search warrants. My major complaint is that this stuff is not better explained to the public. I know that there is plenty of specific information that needs to be kept secret in order to not blow the cover of agents who are wiretapping suspects, but I think the broad strokes should be put out there. Here's what we are doing. Here's why. Here are the problems we've had. Here are the successes we've had. How are we doing? How can we improve this?

I also think there would be far less need to monitor if drugs were legalized and the war on terror ended.

Anyway, I think this kind of surveillance is going to become status quo and will be completely uncontroversial in a few decades. As far as abuse goes, you don't need any of these high tech contraptions to listen to peoples phone calls and track internet usage. These things can be done fairly easily with comparatively primitive tech that can be bought legally at spy stores.

@criticalthud I don't disagree with what you say. My point is that judge approved wiretaps and internet surveillance should be a legal part of law enforcement/National Security arsenal. How to do it best is beyond me. I think warrants and constitutional protections are decent checks and balances, but I know they are not infallible. As I mentioned to enoch, if someone wants to listen to your calls, be that person a high ranking government agent or your grumpy neighbor, it can be done easily with low tech. Killing these guidelines would do nothing to protect you from a rogue agent or personal vendetta.

If all this leads to a real discussion on the war on terror or on the war on drugs, I'd be thrilled. My prediction is that it will just be used as a politicians electoral weapon until everyone gets sick of hearing about it and it slides off the radar screen.

In a nutshell, my main gripe with this is the large disconnect between the media hysteria and the actual specifics of the case.

OMG, PRISM IS LOOKING AT MY WEB INFO!

Nope, PRISM was designed to collect foreign data. It legally can't be used on Americans. http://thehill.com/blogs/hillicon-valley/technology/304349-administration-declassifies-prism-information

OMG, THEY ARE RECORDING ALL MY PHONE CALLS!

No they aren't, the only data they can collect is phone number, call time and length.. If they want to record you, they'll need a warrant. http://news.yahoo.com/nsa-collection-verizon-call-records-draws-instant-backlash-135550018.html

(I picked the first sources I could find. If they aren't sufficient, let me know and I'll find better, though I've not heard anyone say that either of these points are untrue.)

Another thing that makes me suspicious is that this leak seems to have been coordinated with the republican scandal offensive of a couple weeks back. This feels like a campaign strategy.

I'm not hearing any specific arguments about NSA protocol from either of you in this discussion. I'm getting the impression that you see the NSA as a group of assholes, unconcerned with National Security that instead focusses on harassing citizens. - which means we are having two different arguments "what are reasonable measures to be used to investigate attacks on American soil?" vs. "The NSA is evil".

These arguments exist in different universes. Can you think of a way to reconcile them?

@enoch - Specifically, what new power has the government gained here?

@Yogi

Where is the lie?

What is unreasonable about this?

@enoch

What specifically do you object to in Simon's article?

What specifically do you object to in this NSA controversy?

I know you are angry, but you're arguments have been a little on the vague side.

Change my mind. No need to hold back, brother. There is no quicker way to my heart than drag-out bareknuckled debate.