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Several of the programs Snowden revealed are authorized under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Amendments Act. The 2008 law was scheduled to sunset on December 31, but in a last-ditch effort Thursday, Congress extend its authority through January 19.
The Trump administration, meanwhile, believes that the authorization doesn't really expire until April, leaving lawmakers several months to either reform or strengthen the provision. Hanging in the balance is the legal framework the government largely relies on to conduct mass surveillance of foreigners, and Americans who communicate with them. Which makes it all the more concerning that the fight over Section 702's future has taken place largely in the dark.
Source : Congress Is Debating Warrantless Surveillance in the Dark
(Score: 5, Informative) by stormwyrm on Monday December 25 2017, @06:41AM (10 children)
The late Senator Frank Church [youtube.com] had understood full well all about this surveillance, as far back as 1975:
Emphasis added. But we actually getting any kind of real supervision in the use of this surveillance technology as Senator Church said is essential to prevent tyranny from becoming total in America? At the rate things are going, it seems we have already gone and crossed over that abyss from which there is no return.
Numquam ponenda est pluralitas sine necessitate.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 25 2017, @07:20AM
Even my so called 'liberal' parents, who were like the hippie equivalent of hipsters, have basically started saying 'if you don't have anything to hide...' or 'we're too old to worry about that'. At the same time they get offended when I suggest that maybe if they are no longer going to help make the system better they should be shoved in a vat with all the other old useless people and made into biodiesel, so they can fuel the next generation's carbon footprint, even though that is a very real and possible step from where we are now, if Germany's rise and fall from power are any indication. And keep in mind Germany had an incomplete surveillance state system, as did East Germany after them (although they and others were obviously quite effective in cementing social repression for the average person.)
And that doesn't get into conservative friends and family, who even if they didn't like Trump during the primaries are now talking as though he is the walking messiah, and still talking about how much worse things would be with Clinton and completely ignoring how much better or worse they could have been under other candidates. Quite a few of them were vehemently pro-Cruz for instance, because they essentially want America as a conservative evangelical christian state, even the ones who profess to be Libertarians choosing candidates more along party lines than along actual political beliefs.
America may be a ship that can be righted, but it will not be righted within my generation. And since I neither want to teach my children to skirt the laws, nor to bow down to an unjust authority, I intend to depart America soon, formally renounce my citizenship and do what is necesssary to build a nation my own children can be proud of. Because my parents, grandparents and ancestors immemorial have failed to do that in what remains of America.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 25 2017, @07:54AM (8 children)
You can have all sorts of trust and freedom and privacy and cooperation in a monocultural society. We've screwed the pooch on that one. We imported people who will always despise us. There goes the trust and freedom and privacy and cooperation. It was nice.
(Score: 2, Flamebait) by Runaway1956 on Monday December 25 2017, @09:40AM (7 children)
I would argue about the monocultural state. I mean, that's what the white supremacists are all about. Take a look at Canada. They may not have things "right", but they've got them more right than we have. The problem in both countries is that we've overdone that diversity bullshit, and we're actively inviting enemies of Western civilization into our countries. Ban the Muslims, and a lot of thigs will start getting right. No, things won't get right within your generation, but maybe in about three generations. As long as we keep inviting enemies here to live, things can only get worse.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by FatPhil on Monday December 25 2017, @12:34PM (2 children)
Happy arrival of the asexual budding of the angry space fairy day.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 25 2017, @10:59PM (1 child)
There is exactly one major religion that is unable to ever have peace with any other religion. This one religion has conquest as a core belief. There can be no peace in the world for as long as this one religion exists.
There is the idea that there would be peace if everybody converted... but we have seen time and time again that subgroups declare each other to be false believers, and then the killing starts. There can be no peace for as long as this religion is upon the Earth.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Tuesday December 26 2017, @09:15AM
Society, education, and technology should advance so that members of all religions look at us and say "fuck this shit, I don't like being backward", in contrast to the current "Fuck those idiots, I'm proud to be different". Change from within, not without.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 25 2017, @12:35PM (3 children)
The problem is that "enemies" tend to also be friends depending on your timeline. The UK as obvious example.
If you're talking within 3 generations, we need to be worried about the Germans in WW1 and about 1/2 the countries in the world the US has bombed since then.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 25 2017, @02:03PM (2 children)
For about 1400 years now, Islam has never been the friend of any Christian, or of any Christian nation. For that matter they have never been the friend of any other religion, or any nation whose government was not Islamic. Muslims have no friends, outside of Islam.
(Score: 4, Touché) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday December 25 2017, @03:55PM
Not so. The greedy fossil fuel types love them some Muslims, or at least certain tribal groups of them like the Saudis.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 26 2017, @03:32AM
Hey moron, there are millions upon millions of Muslims that don't go in for the death and conquest. The children of these more moderate Muslims are even more moderate, to the point where I'd prefer them over some of the Christians in the world.
Mooooooronnnnnnnn.