[Previous entry: "Angel Shamaya selling his guns to pay legal fees"] [Main Index] [Next entry: "Common sense on opiate addiction"]

05/29/2006 Archived Entry: "What is the REAL reason for NSA spying?"

WARRANTLESS SPYING ISN'T FOR CATCHING TERRORISTS

We know that:
- NSA analysts know that warrantless spying weakens security;
- calling patterns can be used to connect anyone to terrorists; and
- it is probabilistically impossible to find terrorists via mass surveillance of an entire population.

The NSA isn't stupid, they can do the math. This program was never about catching terrorists. So what is it for? I don't claim to know, I literally can't imagine all the new forms of abuse that will be enabled by the largest database in history. Our government claims and uses the power to kidnap its citizens, imprison them indefinitely without charges or access to courts, torture them, and kill them, all without any oversight or pretense of due process. History teaches harsh lessons about what tyrants will do with those powers. A few things that we know already:

- Narus vacuum cleaners record anything and everything that travels the internet:e-mails, attachments, web pages, VOIP calls;
- the NSA intends to share the spy data with other government agencies;
- the NSA is tracking peaceful protestors;
- the FBI and local police are spying on political, environmental, anti-war and faith-based groups;
- the FBI is issuing 30,000 secret "National Security Letters" every year demanding information about people who are not connected to terrorism and who are not suspected of any wrongdoing; and
- Halliburton is being paid $385 million to construct mass detention centers.

The "debate" about security versus privacy is a sham, the real question is one of liberty versus control. This horrible weapon of freedom destruction is a massive extension of government control into the lives of literally every American. It will add terrible new meanings to the phrase "guilt by association."

The thugs will continue expanding their control until we stop them. It is that simple. The question is, do we stop them before or after the detention centers are filled to capacity?

Posted by Silver @ 07:28 AM CST
Link