Weekend Economists Salute Our (Founding) Fathers June 14-16, 2013

[Demeter]

15. Privacy and the Founding Fathers

The Bill of Rights was so important to the first Americans that they wouldn't accept the Constitution as written without it. The current explosive situation of government spying would have them up in arms--literally. A compendium of thought on this issue of the day/week/month/year/century/eternity:

Tell Me What Is Being Done In My Name By Charles P. Pierce

OK, let us persist in the notion that I am an American citizen. Let us persist in the notion that I am the citizen of a self-governing political commonwealth. Let us persist in the notion that I have a say -- and important and equal say -- in the operation of my government here and out in the world. Let us persist in the notion that, in America, the people rule. If we persist in these notions -- and, if we don't, what's the fking point, really? -- then there is only one question that I humbly ask of my government this week.

Please, if it's not too damn much trouble, can you tell me what's being done in my name?

That has been the essential plea of the citizen of a democratic political commonwealth for going on 70 years now, since the war powers and their attendant influence detached themselves from -- or were abandoned entirely by -- the constitutional authority in which they were supposed to reside. That was the plea that was answered, officially, by the incredibly brave Frank Church and his committee, and by the House Committee on Assassinations (the case of the murder of a president in broad daylight is still open, by the way). That was the plea that has been answered, unofficially, by Ron Ridenhour about My Lai, and by Sy Hersh about a lot of the things the Church committee opened up, and by those guys in Lebanon with the mimeograph machine concerning Iran-Contra, and by Bob Parry and so many others during the era of Reagan triumphalism, and by people like the invaluable Charlie Savage and Jane Mayer and others when the country lost its mind after 9/11, and, yes, by Jeremy Scahill and whoever he talks to, and, yes, by Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden, too....

http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/A_Simple_Question

Greenwald Says ‘There’s A Lot More Coming,’ Argues NSA Revelations Don’t Harm Security

The Guardian's Glenn Greenwald on Monday defended the 29-year-old who served as the source of one of the biggest intelligence leaks in history, arguing that the revelations of the National Security Agency's sweeping surveillance programs only harmed "those in power who want to conceal their actions and their wrongdoing" while also foreshadowing future bombshells.

During an appearance on MSNBC'S "Morning Joe," Greenwald said his bombshell reports — based on information provided by whistleblower Edward Snowden, a former technical assistant for the CIA and current employee of the defence contractor Booz Allen Hamilton — were of "great public interest."

"The reality is that U.S. government officials for many decades now — and certainly over the last ten years — have been abusing their secrecy power to shield from the American public, not programs that are designed to keep America safe and not to prevent disclosures that would help the terrorists, but to conceal their own actions from the people to whom they're supposed to be democratically accountable," Greenwald said. "What we disclosed was of great public interest, of great importance in a democracy that the U.S. government is building this massive spying apparatus aimed at its own population, and it harms nobody. Anyone who wants to say that any of these stories or disclosures have harmed national security, I defy anybody to say anything that we've published that does that in any way. The only people who have been harmed are those in power who want to conceal their actions and their wrongdoing from the people to whom they're supposed to be accountable."

Greenwald also appeared to suggest that more disclosures are imminent...

http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entry/suggesting-theres-lot-more-coming-greenwald-says-nsa?ref=fpa

Someone call Nixon’s plumbers. We need them again. Fabius Maximus

Marcus Ranum looks to our past — the government’s history of surveillance — to see the future which the government’s vast surveillance machinery makes possible, and perhaps will help bring into being.
We prepare the way for a Leader

We prepare the way for a Leader

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The NSA Doppleganger and Enemies

The Nation currently has an excellent piece on some of the history of surveillance in the US. Combine it with reading Tim Weiner’s latest book Enemies, and you have a picture of a government that has always illegally surveilled its citizens (also see Subversives: The FBI’s War on Student Radicals, and Reagan’s Rise to Power).

Occasionally, as today, we are brought to confront that fact, and it’s always instructive because you can tell from the backlash how badly it stung those who enjoy secret power and status. The rule of law is something that you criticize other countries for not following. This amounts to moving from “US Exceptionalism” to exceptionalism for the US power elites.

In the long-term it’s poor strategy because it amounts to building the weapons that will eventually be used against one faction when there’s a disagreement among elites. It’s laying the framework for an eventual takeover of the republic by centralized power. The more you centralize and aggregate power, the worse it is when your Stalin or Bonaparte comes along. As soon as one faction of the power elites realizes they can use the power of the police state to silence internal dissent among the elites, rather than simply controlling the lumpenproletariat, the republican experiment will be conclusively ended....

http://fabiusmaximus.com/2013/06/13/fascism-51325/

Lindsey Graham: ‘If I thought censoring the mail was necessary, I would suggest it’

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/lindsey-graham-thought-censoring-mail-necessary-suggest-182932835.html

Deputy CIA Director Morell to retire to ‘spend more time with family’

Deputy CIA Director Michael Morell, in a surprise announcement on Wednesday, confirmed that after 33 years of service, including two stints as acting director, he will retire to "spend more time with family."

To head off speculation regarding that familiar Washington excuse for exiting office, Morell added, "Whenever someone involved in the rough-and-tumble of Washington decides to move on, there is speculation in various quarters about the 'real reason.' But when I say that it is time for my family, nothing could be more real than that."

"As much as I would selfishly like to keep Michael right where he is for as long as possible, he has decided to retire to spend more time with his family and to pursue other professional opportunities," CIA Director John Brennan said in his own statement...

YEAH, RIGHT! THIS DISCLAIMER IMMEDIATELY FOLLOWED BY WHAT WAS REALLY GOING ON.

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/deputy-cia-director-michael-morell-retire-replaced-white-200541735.html

This Isn’t How to Stop Hacking By JOE NOCERA

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/15/opinion/nocera-this-isnt-how-to-stop-hackers.html?_r=0

... The news about Edward Snowden had just broken, and it was much on our minds. To us, at least, it seemed to scream for a Chinese response. Snowden, a 29-year-old employee of Booz Allen Hamilton, had leaked information about a huge program conducted by the National Security Agency to obtain a record of every phone call made in the United States. He also leaked news of another program, Prism, that gathered information from Facebook, Apple and other tech companies about the cyberactivity of customers. The revelations were astonishing.

Now Snowden was hiding out somewhere in Hong Kong, popping up just long enough to grant the occasional interview. What would China do if, say, Snowden asked for asylum? And what did China have to say about all this spying by the U.S. government?

Not much, at least not at first. In one early meeting, the official answering our questions knew so little about l’affaire Snowden that he asked us to walk him through it. “It sounds like Hong Kong has quite a problem,” he grinned...

... After he had been in Hong Kong a few days, Snowden gave another interview in which he said that the United States had routinely hacked into Chinese computers. In addition to suddenly improving his chances of gaining asylum, Snowden had given the Chinese the ammunition they had been looking for. All over the country, a magic switch went on. Thousands of writers and editors who hadn’t dared touch the Snowden story on Tuesday couldn’t get enough of it on Wednesday.

“The U.S. Has Attacked Chinese Networks for 15 Years,” said a headline in The Yangtze Daily. “Snowden Leaks Information About Prism to Reveal the Hypocrisy of the U.S. Government,” added The Wuhan Evening News.

China Daily quoted a Chinese expert on American affairs saying, “For months, Washington has been accusing China of cyberespionage, but it turns out the biggest threat to the pursuit of individual freedom and privacy in the U.S. is the unbridled power of the government.”

I don’t know whether Prism and the other programs truly stop terrorists. I have my doubts. What I do know is that if you are going to lecture the world about right and wrong — and if you’re trying to stop bad behavior — perhaps you shouldn’t be engaging in a version of that behavior yourself....

MORE TO FOLLOW, OF THAT I HAVE NO DOUBT!