I don't see why this is a conspiracy kind of thing. We have a spy agency, that are hired to do SIGINT spying.
Where is this written down?
Facts matter. Especially in debates like this.
""" The Signals Intelligence mission collects, processes, and disseminates intelligence information from foreign signals for intelligence and counterintelligence purposes and to support military operations. """
Collecting All the Things is not in the mandate, but it's a very effective way to meet it. I'm not even sure how they'd go about collecting only mission-specific information without being able to peek at the metadata they collect on us all.
I don't like it, but I don't see an alternative way to do what they are mandated to do.
That's the keyword there.
> for intelligence and counterintelligence purposes and to support military operations
This is meaningless without oversight.
> That's the keyword there.
Ah, but they don't know if it's a foreigner until they look at it. So might as well collect it all and figure out which ones are the foreign ones later. After all, the data's not actually "collected" until an analyst looks at it. It's a sort of Heisenberg-data - only exists when you look at it. While it's sitting in the NSA data centre, it's entirely harmless!
More info: http://www.commondreams.org/views/2013/07/15/crux-nsa-story-...
Quoting the top review: "This is a documentary not about UFOs but rather intelligence operations perpetrated against Americans by their government in order to cover up top secret projects and engage in social control experiments using a particular American subculture."
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2015/05/why_the_curre...
Chris Soghoian 5/180 or 3% of FISA orders are about this bulk phone metadata program. the rest: "other programs".
Rebranding has been the tactic of choice ever since Blackwater decided that PR was expensive and it would be cheaper to simply rebrand themselves as "Xe" (now "Academi" - they ruined the "Xe" brand, too).
Blackwater was a private company. They did briefly rebrand as Xe. A ridiculous name that sounds even more scary than blackwater. Academi may as well be a new organization.i don't consider it a successor to blackwater, even if it is in a legal sense. a company purchased blackwater for their extensive training facilities (possibly the most best in the world at the time). The blackwater IP left a long time ago.
the true spiritual successor is Prince's UAE private contractor company. according to Wikipedia it is called Reflex Responses, but Wikipedia is generally shit with this kind of information. *
* Wikipedia has to cite sources, the only publicly available sources are mainstream media, written by clueless journalists who barley understand the subject matter. for example the Wikipedia article mentions Prince recruited from Executive Outcomes, 12 years after they ceased trading. He may have recruited from EO's alleged spiritual successor, but he definitely did not recruit from a company that no longer existed.
Rebranding has, of course, existed ever since ancient humans figured out that using an alias was useful. My point is that it is not that it is a new tactic; I'm suggesting that it has been a tactic of choice, preferred over others such as using propaganda to deny problematic accusations (traditionally popular in Russia), or claiming bad things are good for patriotic reasons.
So yes, there are no rules.
They may get away with illegal behavior for a time, but that doesn't mean it isn't illegal.
NSA does not view itself bound by the US constitution (or the whole executive branch as a whole) and view it as a nuisance that must be at best circumvented to do their perceived job. (To the NSA guy reading this comment - have a nice day, it is tedious)
Senators Wyden and Udall (both members of the Senate Select Intelligence Committee, and -therefore- privy to classified briefings and Q&A sessions delivered direct from intelligence agencies) frequently and loudly proclaimed:
0) We are prohibited from speaking specifically -to anyone- about what we have been told in our capacities as members of the Intelligence Committee.
1) If the rest of Congress and/or the American people were told what the Intelligence Committee was told, they would be horrified by the extent of the overreach and creative interpretation of law. [0]
2) The intelligence agencies habitually stonewalled any real inquiries by the Intelligence Committee into their activities. What the Committee got to do was listen to the agency's spiels, ask a few softball questions, and adjourn for the day.
[0] Clearly, not all members of the Committee felt this way. Mrs. Feinstein, in particular, seemed to be very pleased with the status quo. (Big surprise, right?)
Also... "prohibited"? By whom? By rules the committee itself made. That the committee can change. Federal agencies don't have the power to prevent Congress from doing a damn thing. Don't kid yourself - Congress is the problem here.
Agreed. I also note that the Intelligence Agencies aren't above lying to Congress (whether behind closed doors or in public hearings), to the DoJ, the Supreme Court, the President, or anyone else for that matter.
> Also... "prohibited"? By whom?
Uh, actually prohibited by long-standing Federal law? USC Title 18, Section 793, and Section 798 totally apply here. Congressmen are NOT immune from prosecution that stems from their disclosure of classified information that they receive firsthand.[0] What's more, the Speech or Debate clause only protects Congressmen from arrest and detention while performing their official duties. It doesn't shield Congressmen from prosecution stemming from illegal acts performed while acting as Congressmen.
So, no, Federal agencies can't prevent[1] Congressmen from revealing directly-disclosed-to-the-congressman classified information on the debate floor. But then, a Congressman can't protect himself from prosecution, fines, and jail time after the big reveal.
[0] Remember that the Pentagon Papers were sent to a Congressman by a newspaper. Generally speaking, disclosure of classified information that's in the public interest by a person who is not under an obligation to control access to said information is a protected activity, as is disclosure of classified info by the press.
[1] Though, they can directly discourage it by limiting cooperation with Committees and access to personnel. This would clearly be a roadblock, rather than a permanent obstruction, but it would probably serve as a permanent obstruction to dispassionate Congressmen.
Okay, and who makes the laws?
1) Both Congress and the Judiciary make law. Congress passes bills that become laws. The judicial system's rulings on cases form precedent which fills in the holes of (or totally perverts, depending on the case) law passed by Congress. The judicial system's part in this is part of why it's so critically important to get good rulings on edge cases.
2) You're implying that Congressmen should pass a law that places them above the law? That's an incredibly slippery slope.
3) To arg. ad. absurd.[0] your position: Congres should just pass a law that frees all Congressmen from any and all legal obligation while acting in their official capacity as Congressmen. This would obviously permit them to act in any way that they felt would best allow them to improve the health and well being of the Republic.
No. Judges do not make law. I see what you're trying to say, but making law is not their function. To the extent they engage in legislating from the bench they ought to be punished with censure and/or impeachment.
>You're implying that Congressmen should pass a law that places them above the law? That's an incredibly slippery slope.
That ship sailed long ago. Congress exempts itself from all sorts of laws. Insider trading is the one that pops into mind most prominently. And do you remember the House banking scandal? Most recently they've exempted themselves from the ACA.
The idea laws pass only when voted on by the full house and yet only a tiny subset have the data to make decisions is absurd. If that's the state of the law now they ought to change it.
>To arg. ad. absurd.[0] your position: Congress should just pass a law that frees all Congressmen from any and all legal obligation while acting in their official capacity as Congressmen.
They certainly need enough freedom to do their jobs. That's why the constitution includes the Speech and Debate clause.
We live in a system that considers both the text of a law and the Judicial precedent surrounding that law. The Judicial branch interprets law, and issues binding statements based on that interpretation multiple times per day every single day. For a recent example, search for "The state asked the court to employ a remedy in this situation" in [0] and read on until the end of the paragraph.
Notice that this remedy is something that courts are supposed to do whenever they can. Moreover, history is littered with creative interpretations of law. Wickard v. Filburn is one of the most well-known.
>The idea laws pass only when voted on by the full house and yet only a tiny subset have the data to make decisions is absurd.
Heh. You really need to spend a month or two and read all the level-headed accounts you can find of the role that staffers and lobbyists play in Congress.
I'm not sure, but I strongly suspect that when you learn how the sausage is made these days, you'll change some of your more objectionable opinions.
[0] http://popehat.com/2015/05/27/minnesota-court-rules-that-cri...
I know how laws are made, that's why I want to make sure information gets to the people who need it to make good decisions. They may ignore that information, but at least they'll have it.
Like it or not, we live with a Judicial system that considers both the text of a law and the court precedent relating to that law.
We've been living in this system since the founding of the Republic. We have always had the system that you say we shouldn't, and we will very likely continue to have it until the day that the Republic has vanished from the earth.
Honestly, you might be happier in one of those European countries that give their courts zero room for interpretation. :)
As far as illegality, what the Executive has taken to doing over the last 20 years or so is lawyer-shopping until they can get an opinion that justifies what they already decided they were going to do. Then they classify both the decision and the legal justification. No information = no debate. No debate = no oversight. Very nice and easy. Problem solved.
We need the NSA. But the structure of the legal system the operate in has been totally fucked up by the War on Terror. I don't even think most politicians understand the nature of the problem, much less are able to provide needed oversight.
There's no evidence of this. Many countries have nowhere near the intelligence capabilities of the 5 Eyes and yet seem to do just fine for themselves. In many ways, better than the USA.
I concur with venomsnake that "The difference between theory in practice is greater in practice than in theory."
And I think both you and veonomsnake are grossly underestimating the culpability of Congress in all of this.
To analogize: The US Army answers to the DoD. The DoD answers to the POTUS. This the Army and the DoD are military organizations, despite this fact.
You're mistaken.
That's assuming they can't simply stop collecting call metadata, but then keep collecting tower signalling metadata or something like that, thus allowing them to tell themselves that's not what Congress cared about ..... and then extract call metadata on demand from it.
It's obvious that the NSA cannot be controlled by anything at this point. The DoJ would need to jail Clapper to get their attention and that won't happen short of some ridiculous sex-related personal scandal.
[1] https://www.emptywheel.net/2015/05/23/mitch-mcconnell-and-ri...
[2] http://justsecurity.org/23149/rand-paul-wyden-surveillance-r...
They have ONE and ONLY one mandate "Collect all the things".
There is virtually no chance that the NSA will stop collecting this information until there is actual meaningful oversight.
If DNI James Clapper can directly lie to Congress publicly and face no consequences & the CIA is able to spy on the Senators & then whitewash it - there is zero credibility left in any intelligence agency following the rules. At this point we might as well say it - we have let loose the dogs and now are at their mercy.