Citizenfour

[merrylander]

Originally Posted by Boreas

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utah_Data_Center

So are the computers going to listen to each and every conversation.

[Ike Bana]

Originally Posted by Dondilion

I tend to believe that NSA is way ahead of us. However, when it is weighed, is it a good thing?..does it come out on the plus side?

We live in one of the most open society and there are very bad guys out there ever striving to do us harm.

How the f are we going to find them?

Reasonable question. But it seems to me that to begin with, we'll have better odds of finding them if we stop wasting tax dollars on F-22's, F-35's, 11 active carrier groups, and new NFL stadiums...amongst other stuff.

How do the Israelis do it? I suspect the bad guys want to do them harm even more than they want to do us harm. Is the Israeli government listening to everybody's phone calls and reading everybody's emails? Somehow I don't think so, but I suppose I could be wrong. I know one thing they're not doing is wasting time at the airport detaining old Jews with keys in their pockets. It's profiling of course, but typically, they know what the bad guys look like and what their names sound like...and those are the guys the Israelis are keeping their eyes on. If it's between an Al-Khatib and a Shapiro that's a good start.

[Dondilion]

Originally Posted by Ike Bana

Reasonable question. But it seems to me that to begin with, we'll have better odds of finding them if we stop wasting tax dollars on F-22's, F-35's, 11 active carrier groups, and new NFL stadiums...amongst other stuff.

How do the Israelis do it? I suspect the bad guys want to do them harm even more than they want to do us harm. Is the Israeli government listening to everybody's phone calls and reading everybody's emails? Somehow I don't think so, but I suppose I could be wrong. I know one thing they're not doing is wasting time at the airport detaining old Jews with keys in their pockets. It's profiling of course, but typically, they know what the bad guys look like and what their names sound like...and those are the guys the Israelis are keeping their eyes on. If it's between an Al-Khatib and a Shapiro that's a good start.

Bad comparison.

Society not as open as ours.
Also a smaller one.
Employs a large Arab spy network in an occupied zone.
Has created physical separation.

[Boreas]

Originally Posted by Ike Bana

If it's between an Al-Khatib and a Shapiro that's a good start.

What do you do about the Kahanes and the Amirs?

[Ike Bana]

Originally Posted by Boreas

What do you do about the Kahanes and the Amirs?

Kahane and Amir are already done with.

Of course neither Kahane or Amir ever flew a jetliner into a skyscraper crammed with innocent people. On the other hand, El Sayyid Nosair who got away with the murder of Kahane. He was later convicted for his involvement in the 1993 WTC bombing. So personally, I'm more afraid of the Nosair's than I am of the Kahane's. Amir is crazy. Most people who murder other people are crazy in one way or another...so you deal with them as if they're crazy.


Nosair is an interesting guy, isn't he. So much like so many of his fanatical associates...where he's from is a sewer so he comes to a western country for the employment, money, and ecoli free water supply. Then he decides that our culture is morally corrupt and that we should become just like the septic tank he came from that he hated. Then when he realizes nobody's interested he decides to set off a few explosive devices to kill people who are actually enjoying their lives. That's how it goes with these guys.

[merrylander]

Originally Posted by Ike Bana

Reasonable question. But it seems to me that to begin with, we'll have better odds of finding them if we stop wasting tax dollars on F-22's, F-35's, 11 active carrier groups, and new NFL stadiums...amongst other stuff.

How do the Israelis do it? I suspect the bad guys want to do them harm even more than they want to do us harm. Is the Israeli government listening to everybody's phone calls and reading everybody's emails? Somehow I don't think so, but I suppose I could be wrong. I know one thing they're not doing is wasting time at the airport detaining old Jews with keys in their pockets. It's profiling of course, but typically, they know what the bad guys look like and what their names sound like...and those are the guys the Israelis are keeping their eyes on. If it's between an Al-Khatib and a Shapiro that's a good start.

They have a very neat system, when I flew to Tel Aviv for that lecture date first a polite young lady asked me the usual questions. Then another young lady asked me the same questions. Then I saw them comparing notes. The first one came back and asked me why I was only going to be there the two days and not visiting. I looked her straight in the eye and said "Miss I have only recently married and in effect the honeymoon is not over. Also my wife is concerned about my flying to Israel." She smiled and said she understood.

When I flew back on El Al as we landed at JFK a small Ford station wagon with whited out windows met the plane and ran alongside it all the way to the ramp. Never saw that with any other airline. BTW their King David class is very nice.

[icenine]

Originally Posted by Boreas

Schwartzenegger?

Benedict Arnold and Vidkun Quisling were very different people from Snowden. Though you clearly do not, it's possible to admire Snowden for revealing government crimes against the people and Constitution. On the other hand, Quisling was the head of a puppet Nazi-controlled government in Norway. Similarly, Arnold went over to the British side during the Revolution, principally because of his pique at not receiving promotions he felt he had earned.

What Quisling and Arnold have in common is that both essentially switched sides during a time of war. You can't say anything even remotely like that of Snowden.

John

If Snowden went into that job with the intention of leaking classified information, undergoing background checks as he did so, he is guilty of a major crime of espionage.

Take Manning. My problem with him was he was sent to Iraq, had a desk job, instead of keeping his mouth shut and doing his duty while his comrades were out dying in convoys, decided to leak classified information to wikileaks. That is my issue with him. At least in his case he faced the music and his paying for his crime.

Look at the company Snowden is keeping now John. Besides he was an idiot.
You think he is happy being forced to live in Russia for the rest of his life?

How do you know that some American agents overseas were not revealed to our enemies by these actions?

[Boreas]

Originally Posted by icenine

If Snowden went into that job with the intention of leaking classified information, undergoing background checks as he did so, he is guilty of a major crime of espionage.

Take Manning. My problem with him was he was sent to Iraq, had a desk job, instead of keeping his mouth shut and doing his duty while his comrades were out dying in convoys, decided to leak classified information to wikileaks. That is my issue with him. At least in his case he faced the music and his paying for his crime.

Look at the company Snowden is keeping now John. Besides he was an idiot.
You think he is happy being forced to live in Russia for the rest of his life?

How do you know that some American agents overseas were not revealed to our enemies by these actions?

So, your problem is mostly about how Snowden and Manning did what they did rather than simply what they did. Would you be happier if Snowden's revelations had never been made and the government was still making a mockery of the Constitution?

And I don't know whether anything that Snowden disclosed revealed the identities of agents overseas. Neither do you.

John

[icenine]

Mockery of the Constitution? I think we are as free as we ever were. Perhaps the only difference is that in the information age everyone knows what we are doing.

Obviously the Second Amendment is still sacred.

[Ike Bana]

Originally Posted by icenine

Mockery of the Constitution? I think we are as free as we ever were. Perhaps the only difference is that in the information age everyone knows what we are doing.

Obviously the Second Amendment is still sacred.

Well said.