When you don't HAVE the data, it is nonsense to make conclusions as if you have the data, which is exactly what you and others are doing. Terrible reasoning indeed.
shows that the FBI/NSA/big brother already can't process all of the data
Once again -- no data (you have absolutely no idea what data they have or don't have), but you can declare that the problem is processing data.
There is a trend here.
Well, that's not really true:
The FBI has confirmed that Russia alerted the agency in 2011 that Tsarnaev had ties to 'radical Islam' groups in his homeland. Homeland Security sources have also revealed the agency received tips in 2012 about his ties to extremists connected to a Boston mosque. (...) Tamerlan was said to have been named as one of the radicals that came to attention of an informant working with an agency attached to the Boston-area Joint Terrorism Task Force
When you don't have the data and the data is kept completely hidden from you, the only reasonable course of thought is to assume that the data does not exist or is completely and totally flawed. When the NSA or gov't asserts that its data collection is protecting you, they must provide the evidence so that such a statement could be examined. If they do not provide such data, you can't assume anything about its existence or even its existence in the first place.
Ugh.. what terrible reasoning. The absence of data is not somehow possible data.
>pointing out the failure in the Boston bombing is a poor counterpoint given that to many it would suggest that increased surveillance is necessary, not less.
It's actually a rather good counter point. It shows that the FBI/NSA/big brother already can't process all of the data it has in a meaningful amount of time. How does adding more data to sift through help? Unless there's some benevolent, magical AI that can pick terrorist patterns out of a colossal sea of data, I fail to see how more data is the solution.