U.S. Government spying on entire U.S., to nobody's surprise

[dddaver]

"Absolute power corrupts, absolutely." O-Bush-ma bald faced lied to cover his ass and bad choices he already made, instead of admitting mistakes were made and that he would try to fix it. He's just compounding his problems now.

Damn, he needs another Bin Laden to kill here. He said he would close Gitmo? What happened there? As long as it's not on American soil makes it right? Typical lawyer bullshit. The American ideals are not supposed to right here just within our borders douches.

The terrorist are letting them assholes beat themselves now. Okay Anonymous. You're on. Go get 'em. I'm pissed.

Nothing really new here except the shit really hit the fan now that the public is being made aware. Bend over and assume the position, but wipe your asshole first please, cause here it comes douches.

Don't drone me bro!

 

[LEDfoot]

I sometimes drive by a big, shiny HSA building.

Security is not the word that comes to mind.

 

[SpasticGramps]

LMAO. Great speech by O. "Modest Encroachments" The whole thing is such a comedy clown show.

Data collection is a hallmark of totalitarian governments. In post WWII Germany they discovered the regime only really had "files" on 10% of the private population (i can't remember the source, but I thought it credible at the time). At the time that would have been about 7 million people. I don't doubt that many of the 6 million that perished even had the courtesy of a "file". Due to propaganda and militarist inspired fear the population thought the government was closely watching all of them. Everyone had a "file" and such fear changes collective behavior on a large scale.

Nowadays governments have the digital storage capacity to actually manage a database like that. Who knows what the sick fuckers are doing with it all now, but chances are little more than wasting resources to maintain the crappy failing totalitarian infrastructure.

But if you are listening Big Brother I ask only one thing.

Don't Drone Me, Bro!

No seriously, big bro....

 

[HempKat]

If this type of invasion of privacy, and the ignoring the citizens constitutional rights isn't grounds for an impeachment I don't know what is.... This is almost Watergate, but right in front of our faces (so no lies about having no idea) and no theft (no need to break in to steal the documents) they are just offered freely.

Well unfortunately impeachment would have to come from congress and congress has reviewed and approved the programs you deem impeachable offenses. You can't impeach a President for doing something you've reviewed and said was okay. We really need to learn to stop with this approach of blame it all on the President, blame it all on one party or another, blame it all on one political ideology or another. All of government is corrupt, there are no innocents that if we put them all in power everything will be okay. Either they are directly involved actively abusing their office for financial gain or they are complicit by silence perhaps honoring some sort of "code" among politicians such as "honor among thieves".

Trying to pin it all on one person or one group is just taking the easy way out and that's the problem. The nation as a whole has a tendency to show their outrage, maybe make a gesture by voting someone out of office and then they want to turn their backs and trust everything will be okay now and it never will because it's that moment we turn our backs that the politicians exploit. There is no easy fix but our government can be fixed if the people develop a resolve strong enough to stay on top of their representatives and not let them get away with the political brinkmanship bullshit we've been getting the past few decades now. We'll nee to make it a near daily part of our lives and we'll need to make a more concerted effort to stay on top of the issues and we'll likely need to do it for a long, long, time before we can ever relax our guard again.

 

[bombadil.360]

I think we may take this way more to heart than the average Joe... due to our relationship with Cannabis.

the average Joe does not really give a crap who knows who he has called or if he looked at porn a couple of weeks ago.

there's a line of reasoning (not always justifiable however), amongst people that says that if you have nothing to hide, then you have nothing to fear. hence they think it is ok to gather metadata on everyone.

personally, I think it is an inefficient way to try to gather intel on terrorist organizations, and has the potential to be abused and to affect innocent people, specially if said metadata falls in the wrong kind of hands.

I don't think this whole metadata mining thing is as bad as cannabis prohibition however; this thing pales in comparison with prohibition in terms of freedom and rights infringements.

 

[HempKat]

On many web sites I see the usual government shills plus other deluded souls now saying "OK this is bad but, let's just vote them out!" Ha! And how do you propose to vote out the ENTIRE GOVERNMENT? Especially when the vote is totally rigged? Wake up America....your chains have already been forged. Their clanking can be heard on the plains of Boston.

Not true, it may seem that way but if we continually stay on top of things we can force change. It's going to be a long tough fight though. Control of the Federal government represents access to approximately 2.5 trillion dollars a year of other people's money to play with. The powers that be will not give that up easily.

 

[dddaver]

I wonder who they think they're fooling with their stupid lawyer speak terms. They must think they will be able to hide behind them still.

"NO direct access" is very commonly used by the big media conglomerates, I guess thinking they can shed blame there. It means nothing. It just means they don't show the NSA exactly where the data is but they want (the listed offenders, at least) but do record and furnish the data. And they do allow all records to "any gov't agency" furnished upon request. So what are they saying? Just no direct lines? Well no shit. Why would the NSA even need "direct access" if they are just given everything recorded.

I love that "moderate encroachment" term O-Bush-ma thinks is going to protect him. So in other words we're screwing everybody, but not as hard as we could? Yeah right.

What bullshit, avoiding the truth using lawyer speak terms like that. They are just not going to work anymore but only act to point out where the problems are. Thank-you really. Point it out please to the hackers. But also to the terrorist too, you idiots.

What we really need is to erase it all. Some real talented hackers probably can fuck them up good but to erase the data they probably need physical access to Mead, and that could be a problem. I guess we need James Bond here.

I have long looked at these creeps as like the old 1920's movies The Keystone Cops, running around banging into each other, meanwhile the real criminals do what they want. Joke, but it's real.

Don't drone me bro. Thanks spaz-man. I love it.

 

[HempKat]

You know another thing that's funny about all this outrage about the government watching what we're doing is we put up with it daily from all sorts of other sources. Hell the credit bureaus make big bucks off of all our information and even charge us for access to it rather then pay us royalties like they should since it is "our information" they're profiting off of. Employers routinely do background checks on people and people routinely get passed over for jobs because they have a low credit score. Now the trend is turning to encouraging people to run background checks on friends and potential lovers. There are ads on tv and the internet promoting such use

 

[GeorgeWBush]

I just want ya'all ta know me and my daddy had nothing to do with this haven't you seen harold and kumar escape from guantanamo bay ?

 

[Skinny Leaf]

Millions of citizens standing on the steps of congress with pitchforks and torches will take care of this shit.

 

[Rob547]

You know another thing that's funny about all this outrage about the government watching what we're doing is we put up with it daily from all sorts of other sources. Hell the credit bureaus make big bucks off of all our information and even charge us for access to it rather then pay us royalties like they should since it is "our information" they're profiting off of. Employers routinely do background checks on people and people routinely get passed over for jobs because they have a low credit score. Now the trend is turning to encouraging people to run background checks on friends and potential lovers. There are ads on tv and the internet promoting such use

Good point, never thought of it that way, just another govt agency keeping track of everything you do....
A damn good way to save their own skin is to distract people from the truth and divide the masses as much as possible. "Dont worry about what the gov is doing, your neighbor/friend/relative are the real enemy!"

I don't know, sometimes I wonder what it will REALLY take to piss enough of the American population off to where we do something (effective) about it...
Recently read that about 1/3 of Americans don't believe the official story of 9/11 but I'm sure there are plenty of those threads around.

Also, Ixquick is a great search engine for those 'sensitive' searches

 

[OrganicBuds]

This is the kind of stuff that makes you feel terrible if you voted for Obama.......

 

[Hydrosun]

You know another thing that's funny about all this outrage about the government watching what we're doing is we put up with it daily from all sorts of other sources. Hell the credit bureaus make big bucks off of all our information and even charge us for access to it rather then pay us royalties like they should since it is "our information" they're profiting off of. Employers routinely do background checks on people and people routinely get passed over for jobs because they have a low credit score. Now the trend is turning to encouraging people to run background checks on friends and potential lovers. There are ads on tv and the internet promoting such use

Informed consent and full disclosure. Funny thing is irrespective of you or others voluntary data sharing with store rewards cards and casino player tracking cards; I have NOT consented to the government spying on me. AND the government has an affirmative duty to NOT violate my rights.

I do not consent to their slavery or slave master tactics.

 

[CosmicGiggle]

.....from the Palantir website pantir.com:

Our Work
What We Believe
Palantir is a mission-focused company. Our leadership team and founders, composed of California technologists and our allies in D.C. and beyond, are dedicated to working for the common good and doing what's right—in addition to being deeply passionate about building great software and a successful company.

..... uh huh, uh huh

From protecting privacy and civil liberties to promoting open software to pursuing philanthropic engagements to a host of other initiatives, we put our values to work in the service of making the world a better place, every day.

..... uh huh, uh huh.

PRIVACY AND CIVIL LIBERTIESMore Palantir Technologies is a mission-driven company, and a core component of that mission is protecting our fundamental rights to privacy and civil liberties. Since its inception, Palantir has invested its intellectual and financial capital in engineering technology that can be used to solve the world’s hardest problems while simultaneously protecting individual liberty. Robust privacy and civil liberties protections are essential to building public confidence in the management of data, and thus are an essential part of any information system that uses Palantir software.
A core engineering commitmentSome argue that society must “balance” freedom and safety, and that in order to better protect ourselves from those who would do us harm, we have to give up some of our liberties. We believe that this is a false choice in many areas. Particularly in the world of data analysis, liberty does not have to be sacrificed to enhance security. Palantir is constantly looking for ways to protect privacy and individual liberty through its technology while enabling the powerful analysis necessary to generate the actionable intelligence that our law enforcement and intelligence agencies need to fulfill their missions.

We believe that privacy and civil liberties-protective capabilities should be “baked in” to technology from the start rather than grafted onto it later as an afterthought. By seamlessly integrating these features into our software, we reduce user friction that might otherwise create incentives to try to work around these protections. With the right engineering, the technologies that protect against data misuse and abuse can be the same technologies that enable powerful data analysis.
Engaging with the policy communityWe also believe that privacy and civil liberties-protective technical capabilities must be combined with a rigorous set of policies to maximize their effectiveness. Audit logs are only effective when they are reviewed, and access controls only protect information when they are used to limit data availability to those with particular needs and authorities. We work with our customers to advise them on how to use our technology to support effective privacy and civil liberties policies, and we educate advocates and policymakers as to our capabilities so that they can craft more informed law and policy.

Technological advances often raise novel privacy and civil liberties issues. Where the law is silent or undeveloped, Palantir consults with privacy and civil liberties advocates and some of the top legal experts in the world to figure out how to build our technology with safeguards that can be used as part of a responsible information handling regime. We obligate ourselves to do what is right, not just what is legal.

To that end, In October 2012, we created the Palantir Council of Advisors on Privacy and Civil Liberties (PCAP), a group of privacy and civil liberties experts and advocates who will us in understanding and addressing the complex privacy and civil liberties issues surrounding our work in various fields. The PCAP helps us think about future developments in technology, how law and policy might change to account for that technology, and what steps Palantir might be able to take to help address these "over the horizon" challenges. Their insight is invaluable as we try to fulfill our duty as a good corporate citizen and design and build technology that can help to protect our fundamental rights.

But our obligations go beyond just our product and our customers. Palantir supports a number of privacy and civil liberties advocacy organizations around the world. We also are eager to lend our voice and technical expertise to academic and policy discussions that will shape the future of the fundamental freedoms that we hold dear.

We are proud of the work we are doing to ensure that data analysis is not just effective, but also reflects the values that are most important to us.

LEARN MORE, blah, blah, blah....

Feel better?????

 

[dddaver]

You know another thing that's funny about all this outrage about the government watching what we're doing is we put up with it daily from all sorts of other sources. Hell the credit bureaus make big bucks off of all our information and even charge us for access to it rather then pay us royalties like they should since it is "our information" they're profiting off of. Employers routinely do background checks on people and people routinely get passed over for jobs because they have a low credit score. Now the trend is turning to encouraging people to run background checks on friends and potential lovers. There are ads on tv and the internet promoting such use

I suppose that's true, but wrong is wrong, no matter when or where. At least the public is becoming cognizant of that shit finally.

 

[gaiusmarius]

please stay away from politics so this discussion can go on. the program originates with the donkeys after all, even if the elephants are running it and expanding it now. i for 1 am glad that this information has finally trickled out to the main stream.

 

[headband 707]

You and I, all of us ARE actual terrorists. These systems are set up to monitor the 99.9% NOT the .1% that might fuck a kid (or join the CIA and attack civilians).

Your so right "I am a terrorist and I kill with music" lol.. (Albororsia)

 

[headband 707]

Whenever a Gov says "I can KILL anyone of my citizens without holding any type of trail then you know your a part of one of if not the most corrupt Gov in the WORLD!!! Oh yeah BTW wiretapping is NOT LEGAL!!!headband 707

 

[greenmatter]

if you are shocked by this whole fiasco then have had to be growing poppy instead of herb.

IMHO they have been working to make things like they are since they got caught doing underhanded shit the last time (read tricky dick's administration)

there is not one single president that has made it harder for the government to fuck you over .........EVER,EVER,EVER

blame the current douche nozzle if that is what makes you feel better, but the fact is they have been using the fact that we are perfectly willing to point our fingers at one guy while the rest of them actively fuck us over for a long time.

how hard is it to get your mind around the fact that every president in recent memory has been very adept at smiling at us while we get our faces pissed in? it is in the job description

the only time congress and senate can agree on a fucking thing is when it has to do with a pay raise or enabling someone who is payed by us to screw us a little harder!

or am i wrong?

 

[Budweiser13]

Folks wake up this is not some new breaking news. I work in the Telecommunications industry for 15+ years now and the government has always had access to the systems. I have worked for some of the largest Telecomm companies in the US and they have had access since communications was started...Oh and I think are government are nothing like nazi's that is a pretty poor comparison go live in Syria if you are not happy here in the good Ol USA...