Senators Push To Preserve NSA Phone Surveillance

cold fjord writes "The New York times reports that the Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), and Vice Chairman, Senator Saxby Chambliss (R-GA), are moving a bill forward that would 'change but preserve' the controversial NSA phone log program. Senator Feinstein believes the program is legal, but wants to improve public confidence. The bill would reduce the time the logs could be kept, require public reports on how often it is used, and require FISA court review of the numbers searched. The bill would require Senate confirmation of the NSA director. It would also give the NSA a one week grace period in applying for permission from a court to continue surveillance of someone that travels from overseas to the United States. The situation created by someone traveling from overseas to the United States has been the source of the largest number of incidents in the US in which NSA's surveillance rules were not properly complied with. The rival bill offered by Senators Wyden (D-OR) and Udall (D-CO) which imposes tougher restrictions is considered less likely to pass."

Re:"Legal" does not equal "ethical" or "right"

[dido]

"Naturally the common people don't want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country." -- Hermann Göring.

Re:As a world traveler

[AHuxley]

Re: Also who trusts FISA again?
That was the debate the NSA and GCHQ always warned about historically and tried to stay out of books, politics, the press, courts for as long as they could in the ~1950-80's.
Once any target population knows they are under active, long term domestic surveillance programs their telco/isp use changes.
The classified programs and the brands are out now in public. How people interact and consume via the brands will be interesting to see.
Trials with the domestic metadata 'lock box' could also prove legally interesting as skilled defence teams ask to see more and present more to open courts.

Re:Fire them.

[joe user jr]

It would be no great surprise if voting on this bill went along the same lines as the congressional vote on reining in "the NSA’s phone-spying dragnet. It turns out that those 217 'no' voters received twice as much campaign financing from the defense and intelligence industry as the 205 'yes' voters. [wired.com]"

In particular,

Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), the chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, is married to Richard C. Blum, who was substantially invested in URS Corp, which owns EG&G, a leading government technical provider that has been awarded hundreds of millions of dollars in security-related contracts. Feinstein never abstained from voting when it affected her husband’s wallet and Blum made $100 million when he sold his shares, as investigative reporter Peter Byrne exposed in his 2007 series the “Feinstein Files [peterbyrne.info].”

( http://www.indypendent.org/2013/07/16/nsa-follows-you-we-follow-money [indypendent.org] )

See also:

• NSA Defenders Protecting Their Own Wallets [moneynews.com],
• Feinstein: 700k From NSA Affiliates Since 2007 PRISM Launch [drudge.com]
• Big campaign donations from contractors doing secret work for NSA [digitaljournal.com],
• .. etc.

Good luck firing them, though.

Re:As a world traveler

[Dunbal]

I got my perspective adjusted for me a few years ago when getting off an international flight in Miami. Three large policemen in body armor with assault rifles and with one of the most vicious looking black dog I have ever seen, standing at a "choke point" in the tunnels that lead from the plane to immigration. They stood in such a way that you had to pass near the dog, either on the right or the left.. And I thought to myself - this is the "new" America. Well I haven't been back. I plan on actively avoiding it if I can. They can dick around with other people.

Re:As a world traveler

[drinkypoo]

A police state isn't made by border guards, which is what those police were, but by how the state deals with its citizens on a day to day basis.

Yes, and the average citizen commits a felony every day, and the police use selective enforcement to control the populace in a way that benefits the oligarchs, because this is a police state.

Re:As a world traveler

[GameboyRMH]

A police state isn't made by border guards, which is what those police were, but by how the state deals with its citizens on a day to day basis.

Spying on them like a Stasi wet dream, searching them on a whim, either making them protest in "free speech zones" or having the media look away while the cops rush in to clear them, militarized police forces doing SWAT raids for nonviolent offenses or clearing houses door to door if there's a TERR'IST on the loose, temporarily detaining cryptographers and foreign politicians who stand up to the state or are friends with whistleblowers...

Totally not a police state. Goddamn now that I write that I'm second-guessing my 2015 vacation plans even more...

Re:Fire them.

[TheCarp]

> They're not representing the people and therefore undemocratic. Fire them.

Do you remember a few years back when Isreal invaded Lebanon? Shortly after that their own military put out a SCATHING report which absolutely skewered many people in the government, including elected officials.

There was an interview about this on NPR with a war scholar at west point who was asked why you never see reports like this within the US or from the US military. His answer was simple: We have no mechanism by which to remove the incompetent, if they screw up there is no point in saying anything because you are stuck with them until their term runs out anyway

LOL

[kilfarsnar]

Senator Feinstein believes the program is legal, but wants to improve public confidence.

That made me chuckle. Sorry Senator, once you've been caught hiding things people are going to think you are still hiding things even if you're not. That's how the loss of trust works. You see, we don't trust you or the NSA anymore. As a wise man once said, fool me once shame on you, fool me can't get fooled again. So there will be no improvement of confidence amongst thinking people. The NSA spies on us and lied about it. It will take a long time of explicit good behavior for us to trust you or NSA again. And we all know that's not going to happen.