Jun 02 2006
NSA Phone Records From Search Warrants
Folks, the news broke by USA Today last month regarding NSA phone records (my original post on the matter is here) is not what the liberal media was spun by their cowardly, leaking sources (or are possibly co-spinning themselves). Please direct your attention to this statement by the US Attorney General today:
In the interview, Gonzales also said the Justice Department will continue to fight a lawsuit challenging the National Security Agency’s surveillance program. He also said he’d defend another N-S-A program that allegedly requests phone records of American domestic telephone calls from phone companies.
He says the U-S government’s not engaging in domestic surveillance without a court order.
Emphasis mine. The USA Today story mentioned 10 of millions of records on people’s phone numbers. that is out of 300 million people and probably that many phone numbers, if not more. 30 million records is 10% of the total number of phone records in existence in this country.
That 10% number is magically around the number of people in serious trouble with the law at any given time. Very close to the number of people in jail. Combine the statement with the reporting and it is clear that all we could be looking at are records associated with legal warrants and subpoenas. Duh!
It seems USA Today has just unearthed our judicial system. Sadly, this moment of revelation came with a price as they also tipped off our enemies on possibly how to evade detection (again). What price are we paying for journalistic ignorance?
Actually, it seems the media and their cowardly leaking sources may be paying the price. More Gonzales:
Regarding federal subpoenas and investigations of the news media, Gonzales denies the Justice Department is avenging unfriendly news coverage. He says the subpoenas are issued only if they’re deemed “helpful in prosecuting somebody that has done something illegal.”
He added that “if somebody has information that is evidence that could be helpful in a criminal prosecution, you should come forward whether you’re a member of the media or not.”
So, there have been subpoena’s to journalists with regard to the leak investigations. And clearly this is not about the well known Plame subpoenas from last year. The game is afoot.
It seems Pandora’s Box is wide open. Done by the MSM, itself. Because they wanted to “get” Bush; and impeach him out of the White House.
How come no one notices that everytime they swipe their “supermarket shoppers card” the personal information is registered and Data Mined?
You can probably earn a Ph.D in marketing where you’re an expert at designing traffic flows. So businesses capture money. While you’re free to spend it.
And if anyone thinks Carol is exaggerating the supermarket data mining process, take a look at the computer-generated coupons provided by the checkout clerk when you’ve used the store’s card.
The coupons will be for items you often do purchase, but did not include in the instant groceries. And, they’ll be either for your usual brand, or for the store’s generic brand.
“That 10% number is magically around the number of people in serious trouble with the law at any given time. Very close to the number of people in jail. Combine the statement with the reporting and it is clear that all we could be looking at are records associated with legal warrants and subpoenas. Duh!”
Should 10% of our country be in serious trouble with the law at any given time? What about personal marijuana offenders, racial discrimination cases, our nation’s poor forced to steal because of a faltering economy? Sometimes I don’t understand people’s confusion of the terms “immoral” and “illegal” — they mean drastically different things. I believe that if we have to wiretap child molesters, let’s do it. Maybe it will help some sleep at night. But if someone wants to smoke pot in their own home, I refuse to pay my government to jail, feed, and on top of that, monitor their every move.
Let’s get our heads out of the fed’s crotch and start thinking for ourselves.
Bub2000,
All the allusions to sex is not going to make me paranoid. Give up now while you are behind. 10% of any modern society is on trouble. That is human nature. Deal with it instead of fantasizing about a nirvanna. 10% is actually really, really good. That means 90% are law abiding, peaceful people.
AJStrata,
90% of our country may be law abiding, but are they good people? First, look to our police and military officials. Rather than protecting the people, often times oversights allow these so-called “law abiders” to beat and maim innocent people, arrest the innocent, and exercise blatant abuse of power. Next, look to our judicial system, which puts a select few in the position to determine the rest of the populous’s fates at the stand. Need evidence? What about the German man who was detained by the U.S. government for five months and whose trial was dismissed because it could undermine “state secrets?” Put yourself in the man’s shoes. Does anyone deserve such treatment? What happened to a fair trial with a jury of peers? The “War on Terror” is turning the United States into the Salem Witch Trials.
I’m not saying that there is a perfect way to make society function. What I am saying, however, is that our current path is one that resembles that of Hitler’s or Mussolini’s. Totalitarianism doesn’t crop up overnight; rather, it is a slow process that relies on the brainwashing of a populous into thinking they are unsafe or unfree. It is when they believe it that they will find themselves the most insecure and the most persecuted.
And if you want to play the semantics game — your use of the word ‘nirvana’ is incorrect here — I think you are thinking of ‘utopia.’ Nirvana is more a spiritual state of being than societal idealism.
The real threat in this country is not those pushing their beliefs; rather, it is the blind believers.
Where did you lose my point I am not impressed with your paranoia Bub2000???