Would the President's proposed NSA reforms make us less safe, if implemented?

[cthulu2016]

Background: Ezra Klein's description is:

Obama began the news conference by announcing a series of reforms meant to increase the transparency of, and the constraints on, the National Security Agency’s surveillance programs. They included reforms to Section 215 of the Patriot Act, which enables the collection of telephone metadata; changes to the powerful surveillance courts to ensure ”that the government’s position is challenged by an adversary”; declassification of key NSA documents; and the formation of “a high-level group of outside experts to review our entire intelligence and communications technologies.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/08/09/edward-snowden-patriot/

Follow up question: Does Obama proposing reforms suggest that there is a current problem in need of reform?


Bonus question: If there has been (hypothetically) a problem in need of reforms, what was preventing proposing/implementing these reforms some time ago?


Discuss.

I'll start.

#1 No.

#2 Yes, it suggests that, though given the mild nature of what was proposed it is hard to say with any certainty whether the President thinks it's a real problem or is acting politically to defuse discontent. (Which is not necessarily bad... defusing invalid discontent could be a legitimate act of sound governance.)

#3 (Bonus) Because secrecy made it possible to do nothing without political consequence, and the President either didn't really consider it a problem in need of reform, or else did think it a problem but needed a catalyst like the Snowden leaks to be politically empowered to act.

[cthulu2016]

1. I did it! An NSA post so reasonable it upsets no one.

[hootinholler]

2. Was the goal to upset someone or not to?

It's certainly reasonable.

[cthulu2016]

3. Just joking. I wrote it yesterday amid an NSA feeding frenzy and

was amused that it provoked nary a response.

But it is, in fact, not very provocative.

[markpkessinger]

4. I'm not sure that's the question we should be asking...

I think the entire framing of all of these issues, to wit, "[xyz] is fine so long as it keeps us safe[r]," continually distorts our public discourse and leads us down a rabbit hole every time. I think, as a country, we went off the rails in the aftermath of 9-11, when we allowed 'safety' (or the perception thereof) to be elevated as a consideration to the point that it trumps all other concerns (including civil liberties). I think the sooner we, as a country, grow up about this whole business of creating some sort of illusion of safety for ourselves, the better of we'll all be.

[TriplD]

5. Their job isn't to "keep us safe", per se, it's to "preserve, protect, and defend...

...the constitution".

If our leaders can't keep us safe without violating their oath of office then they need to do the right thing for their country and resign so that we can replace them with competent leaders who can do the job of keeping us safe without violating the oath of office.