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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsSens. Widen & Udall on Wash Post NSA Report:"This confirmation is just the tip of a larger iceberg."
http://www.wyden.senate.gov/news/press-releases/wyden-udall-statement-on-reports-of-compliance-violations-made-under-nsa-collection-programsWyden, Udall Statement on Reports of Compliance Violations Made Under NSA Collection Programs
Friday, August 16, 2013
Washington, D.C. U.S. Senators Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Mark Udall (D-Colo.) issued the following statement regarding reports that the NSA has violated rules intended to protect Americans' privacy thousands of times each year. Wyden and Udall are both members of the Senate Intelligence Committee.
The executive branch has now confirmed that the 'rules, regulations and court-imposed standards for protecting the privacy of Americans' have been violated thousands of times each year. We have previously said that the violations of these laws and rules were more serious than had been acknowledged, and we believe Americans should know that this confirmation is just the tip of a larger iceberg.
While Senate rules prohibit us from confirming or denying some of the details in today's press reports, the American people have a right to know more details about of these violations. We hope that the executive branch will take steps to publicly provide more information as part of the honest, public debate of surveillance authorities that the Administration has said it is interested in having.
In particular, we believe the public deserves to know more about the violations of the secret court orders that have authorized the bulk collection of Americans' phone and email records under the USA PATRIOT Act. The public should also be told more about why the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court has said that the executive branch's implementation of section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act has circumvented the spirit of the law, particularly since the executive branch has declined to address this concern.
We appreciate the candor of the Chief Judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court regarding the Court's inability to independently verify statements made by the executive branch. We believe that the Court is not currently structured in a way that makes it an effective check on the power of the executive branch. This highlights the need for a robust and well-staffed public advocate who could participate in significant cases before the Court and evaluate and counter government assertions. Without such an advocate on the court, and without greater transparency regarding the Court's rulings, the checks and balances on executive branch authority enshrined in the Constitution cannot be adequately upheld.
kentuck
(110,950 posts)How much more serious? Obviously these two Senators know much more than anyone posting on this thread, I would assume.
HooptieWagon
(17,064 posts)What we know is bad enough. It seems what we don't know is far worse. Time for an open investigation...including indictments for anyone found to have violated constitutional rights or to have lied about the program.
Blue_Tires
(55,445 posts)Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)KoKo
(84,711 posts)And, that includes FISA Court Judge Reggie Walton's incredible revelation?
I shudder to think what the heck else is coming. Many of us have suspected Blackmail..Bribery...Wall Street Trading... Could that be next?
ProSense
(116,464 posts)I mean, why their statement so much different from Feinstein's?
WashingtonSenator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, released the following statement on reports that the NSA has not complied with privacy rules or overstepped its legal authority. While todays Washington Post stated that Feinstein did not receive a copy of the 2012 audit cited by the paper until The Post asked about it, Feinsteins full statement provided on Thursday to the paper made clear the committee receives the FISA compliance information in a more official format rather than as an internal NSA statistical report. A statement from Feinstein follows:
By law, the Intelligence Committee receives roughly a dozen reports every year on FISA activities, which include information about compliance issues. Some of these reports provide independent analysis by the offices of the inspectors general in the intelligence community. The committee does not receive the same number of official reports on other NSA surveillance activities directed abroad that are conducted pursuant to legal authorities outside of FISA (specifically Executive Order 12333), but I intend to add to the committees focus on those activities.
The committee has been notifiedand has held briefings and hearingsin cases where there have been significant FISA compliance issues. In all such cases, the incidents have been addressed by ending or adapting the activity.
The large majority of NSAs so-called compliance incidents are called roaming incidents, in which the NSA is collecting the phone or electronic communications of a non-American outside the United States, and that person then enters the United States. The NSA generally wont know that the person has traveled to the United States. As the laws and rules governing NSA surveillance require different procedures once someone enters the U.S.generally to require a specific FISA court orderNSA will cite this as a compliance incident, and either cease the surveillance or obtain the required FISA court order. The majority of these compliance incidents are, therefore, unintentional and do not involve any inappropriate surveillance of Americans.
As I have said previously, the committee has never identified an instance in which the NSA has intentionally abused its authority to conduct surveillance for inappropriate purposes.
I believe, however, that the committee can and should do more to independently verify that NSAs operations are appropriate, and its reports of compliance incidents are accurate. This should include more routine trips to NSA by committee staff and committee hearings at which all compliance issues can be fully discussed.
http://www.feinstein.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=9e2e8297-2968-40c9-8001-321e7a9a5079
Aerows
(39,961 posts)have made their fortune off of war and defense contracts. I'm not even going to sit here and pretend they are anything but profiteers. Nor should anyone else. Of course she sees no evil, hears no evil and speaks no evil.
You never do when you profit as handsomely in such a loathsome manner as she and her husband have. Hell, even hardcore Obama and NSA defenders don't like her. If you suddenly do, you either don't know a thing about her, or you don't give a shit about the morality of war for profit whatsoever.
stuffmatters
(2,574 posts)Many of which are WPA treasures, our national heritage as valuable and irreplaceable as the FSA negatives (Dorothea Lange, Walker Evans etc) in the Library of Congress.
I was also thinking how right wing convenient this dismantling of the post office network is...beyond the obvious boon to privatization and ALEC beneficiaries UPS and FedEx and whatever corporate power ultimately feasts upon the gazillions pension/health fund that Issah strangled the USPS to pay ahead 75 years...which is what's also forcing the fire sale of these buildings, to pay this unjust financial demand.
Shock Doctrine to get rid of one of the remaining Unions, fair employer of women and minorities at a middle class wage, largest employer of vets. Additionally just the existence of this national network of US Post Offices...a national network of accessible buildings for the community... are exactly what ALEC doesn't want for supporting community movements.
So Di-Fi and her husband are raking in millions selling off not just our heritage but also our community centers. Why should a senator and her husband openly profiteer from this pillage?
NuclearDem
(16,184 posts)I'm sure that statement's worth a brand new car.
Mojorabbit
(16,020 posts)midnight
(26,624 posts)indicated that many of us suspected blackmail....
MotherPetrie
(3,145 posts)sabrina 1
(62,325 posts)in charge of the people's business in this country anymore? Didn't they all swear to defend and protect the Constitution of the US??
kentuck
(110,950 posts)...it will roll over him like a tank at Tiananmen Square.
If it appears that he is lying or covering up, the right-wingers in Congress will not hesitate to start impeachment proceedings.
He needs to get on top of this story ASAP.
leftstreet
(36,078 posts)by Greg Henderson
August 07, 201312:44 AM
President Obama defended the US government's surveillance program, telling NBC's Jay Leno on Tuesday that: "There is no spying on Americans."
"We don't have a domestic spying program," Obama said on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. "What we do have is some mechanisms that can track a phone number or an email address that is connected to a terrorist attack. ... That information is useful."
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/08/06/209692380/obama-to-leno-there-is-no-spying-on-americans
How does he get on top of this?
LondonReign2
(5,213 posts)Though I wouldn't put it past them try to impeach AND still support NSA spying.
dhill926
(16,234 posts)Octafish
(55,745 posts)http://tsanewsblog.com/3005/news/sen-dianne-feinstein-lauds-heavy-patdowns/
Catherina
(35,568 posts)rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)called CT. Just goes to show, some CT are true.
neverforget
(9,433 posts)have to say about this. I haven't come across any....yet.
Sure is quiet.......
Maedhros
(10,007 posts)neverforget
(9,433 posts)Maedhros
(10,007 posts)They're all over there right now bathing in the irrelevancy.
DirkGently
(12,151 posts)Maedhros
(10,007 posts)It has all the people I need to put on "Ignore" in it. Quite the time saver.
neverforget
(9,433 posts)on Greenwald's and Snowden's character.
ohheckyeah
(9,314 posts)Last edited Fri Aug 16, 2013, 08:46 PM - Edit history (1)
or if I have them all on ignore.
neverforget
(9,433 posts)I want to hear the other side but sometimes, it's pretty tough.
ohheckyeah
(9,314 posts)but after reading the same arguments over and over and over again, I was going to snap. I didn't want to have to replace my monitor.
LondonReign2
(5,213 posts)The whole point of this forum is debate...but a person simply repeating the same thing again and again in the face of overwhelming facts isn't debating, they are simply trying to disrupt.
xchrom
(108,903 posts)99th_Monkey
(19,326 posts)KoKo
(84,711 posts)Sadly...this is the "FRIDAY DUMP" for those folks.
It's up to us to do it somehow.
Blue_Tires
(55,445 posts)99th_Monkey
(19,326 posts)This is in the Atlantic for Pete sake.
Lawbreaking at the NSA: Bring On a New Church Committee
The Washington Post has revealed an audit documenting thousands of abuses per year. An exhaustive investigation is long overdue -- and Ron Wyden should lead it.
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/08/lawbreaking-at-the-nsa-bring-on-a-new-church-committee/278750/
Blue_Tires
(55,445 posts)The nsa can be reorganized, reformed, or checked on its powers...Any proposal that isn't "complete elimination" is a waste of time....
Of course the system creates way too many jobs and makes too many powerful people wealthy, so for all the congressional grandstanding, deep down they know this truth as well...Naturally, this is the same congress that is trying nonstop to eliminate obamacare, social security, the postal service, etc. etc.
99th_Monkey
(19,326 posts)Call me naive, but I do on balance feel the Church Committee did clean up
the cesspool a bit, to make it somewhat accountable, for awhile ... until it
wasn't anymore. <-- which may be your point.
nadinbrzezinski
(154,021 posts)Autumn Colors
(2,379 posts)From way back ... how many years has this been going on? Five years? Seven years? And all have been told that if they don't play ball the way they want ("they" meaning NSA, secret government, whoever is REALLY controlling things) .... that these taped conversations will "somehow" get leaked to the press, the web, etc.
The "they" I refer to in the subject line is every congress critter, every supreme court justice, all cabinet members, and the President himself. There already was a leaker from a few years ago who just came forward again to validate what Snowden has been saying and this person said specifically that Barack Obama was an NSA snooping "target" back when he was a senator.
Tierra_y_Libertad
(50,414 posts)Logical
(22,457 posts)burnodo
(2,017 posts)nt
Autumn
(44,748 posts)I hope they both stay on this like a tick on a dog.
1awake
(1,494 posts)Hissyspit
(45,788 posts)Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)If they say it, I believe it has some validity.
TransitJohn
(6,932 posts)Warren Stupidity
(48,181 posts)I'm confused. These threads always have a comforting explanatory rebuttal.
Douglas Carpenter
(20,226 posts)stuffmatters
(2,574 posts)With Elizabeth Warren Sec of the Treasury.
It's time to address 21century dynamics and problems with 21st century candidates, not the same old Wall Street Fraud friendly, Defense and Security hawk, "public-private" bait and switch, pot and immigrant into prison obsessors from last century.
These two Senators are really stepping up here; it seems an enormous political and personal risk to go against Obama and the omnipotent MIC Security State.
cantbeserious
(13,039 posts)eom