Biden signs bill criticized as “major expansion of warrantless surveillance”
Biden signs bill criticized as “major expansion of warrantless surveillance”
Goddamn. What in the fuck is this timeline even. Now we need a THIRD secured device to secure comms between a remote server to stop MITM shit for fucks sake. Time to go deeper I guess.
What do you mean? The miracle of encryption means any two servers can establish secure communication, and MITM is not possible. The hard part is knowing that the server you're connecting to is the right one.
Surveillance is bad, but in other parts of the world people die in wars and get killed with families for their ethnicity and\or religion, with punishing the perpetrators not even being attempted.
I'd say these tendencies in the (power-wise) center of the world are the reason for more violence on the rim, though.
So in my opinion this is generally one and the same battle.
It's very funny that the workable compromise between "this is important for national security" and "this infringes on basic liberty" is "maybe we just do it for 2 years and see how we feel after that."
It's always permanent. The short time period is just for the sake of getting it voted in.
That's how I got my first girlfriend.
Everyone hates Rand Paul but he voted no on this, as did others on the left and the right. Fuck fascism and fuck left authoritarianism.
Neoliberals are conservatives. Always have been. By all international standards, the Democrat party is a conservative party and the Republicans are a more conservative party. We don't currently have a viable left/progressive party.
The entirety of the left-of-center in the US is a handfull of progressives, at most.
By international standards Biden is hard-right, Trump is far-right.
This shit is full-on rightwing authoritarianism.
there are no left authoritarians in office.
liberals are not leftists. haven't been since 1848.
What leftist vote for this? And don’t give me that shit about Dems being left.
Yeah, of my two reps (Utah), the one I dislike more voted no on this (Sen. Mike Lee), and the one I kinda like (Sen. Mitt Romney) voted yes. I'm not sure how to feel about this.
And yet I still hate Rand Paul.
Hitler loved dogs.
Lmao when Democrats do a bad thing it's left authoritarianism lol
Can't wait for people to tell me how this is actually a great thing and we need to cheer for this...
"But Biden had to sign the Bush era anti-terrorism surveillance state bill! Think of how many of those spies can now be gay or women! REAL Progress is baby steps to where your constitutional rights are violated by minorities and women!!
It's genuinely amazing how we can't push for any bills for raising the federal minimum wage, protecting abortion, protecting queer healthcare, but we can ban wearing hoodies on the senate floor, [passing spying bills on par with China, and then bundling a TikTok ban with aid to Ukraine and Israel.
Sure is great living in a democracy. Where there's only one "valid" option, and he still sucks shit.
Here are some " " to put around democracy.
You're welcome.
Sucks shit because he's the only valid option.
yeah, see, you have to vote for Joe biden or you might get fascism. can't have that uncertainty of a third party fluke candidate winning.
Well...Trump didn't sign it...It must be good right?
You think the government would ever get rid of powers like these? Of course not!
Joe Biden, while loading a very large gun: "It would be terrible if Donald Trump ever got his hands on this."
Donald Trump, having loaded that same gun 4 years ago: "We have to retake the White House from this far-left communist maniac, because he's going to use that very large gun against White People!"
What a fucking racket.
People think about Red vs. Blue, but the world is ruled by Purple.
Spying on the American people is a bipartisan issue.
If you want to change that, you'll need more than votes.
There's an exception to the rule that prohibits spying on religious groups.
Who wants to start an anti-surveillance religion?
I don't think that'll save you.
https://peoplesworld.org/article/hearings-lawsuit-slam-bush-spying-defense/
NBC News obtained a secret 400-page Pentagon document that listed the Truth Project as a “credible threat” to national security. The Pentagon sent an agent to spy on the group’s first meeting at the Quaker Meeting House in Lake Worth in 2004, one of almost four dozen similar meetings nationwide infiltrated on Bush-Cheney orders.
The report revealed that the Defense Department spy operation kept tabs on 1,500 “suspicious incidents” such as distribution of antiwar leaflets at high schools, peace vigils and town hall meetings.
Eight people are active in the Truth Project, Hersh said, including Quakers, a 79-year-old grandmother and Hersh himself, partially disabled by a nerve disease that often confines him to a wheelchair.
Hersh added with a chuckle, “Yes, I guess we are a ‘credible threat.’ The truth is always a threat to those who are lying. We are always a threat to illegitimate and unjust powers.”
SLAMMIN back in ‘06!
Something like the Tuareg idea of Islam, where you are obligated to kill anyone who eavesdropped on you?
Oh yeah
So it seems that there are indeed issues where "both sides" agree.
From the outsider perspective those aren't sides but teams going to the same goal with slightly different tactics.
The worst legislation that gets passed is typically the bill every Congressman agrees on. If you didn't have to fight through six committees and an extended filibuster, you can assume it must have been a Christmas Tree of kickbacks and crimes.
Dang it, one of my senators voted for this nonsense.
the land of the safe ☺️
And the free of the brave 🫡
You don't have to take your shoes off at the airport anymore if you're willing to tell the government a bunch of stuff about you though!
Imagine if there were actual, tangible concessions for this. I bet if the administration moved to disestablish TSA citing how effective surveillance is, we'd have a lot of very confused celebration and "mission accomplished" banners
Non-sensationalized summary from the article:
Although Section 702 authorizes electronic surveillance of non-US people overseas, the official summary of the reauthorization bill notes that "information about US persons may incidentally be acquired by this type of surveillance and subsequently searched or 'queried' under certain circumstances.”
The reauthorization bill imposes some new limits on data collection. For example, FBI personnel must obtain prior approval from an FBI supervisor or attorney before making queries about US people. But this provision has an exception allowing such queries without prior approval if "the query could assist in mitigating or eliminating a threat to life or serious bodily harm."
There are also some new limits on queries involving elected US officials, political candidates, political organizations, media organizations, journalists, and religious groups. There is a prohibition on "the involvement of political appointees in the approval process for such politically sensitive query requests," and a requirement that the FBI director "establish consequences for noncompliant querying of US person terms, including zero tolerance for willful misconduct.”
Zero tolerance you say?
the FBI had a 96% compliance rate for FISA queries, a 14% improvement from OIA’s first baseline audit
Can't wait for those 4% of queries to be prosecuted. I hope we can get better though. I only want 2% of what the FBI requests to be illegal.
"this is why it's good" meme
ExcludeNodes {US}
APAB. Fucking bullshit!
Well at least my rep was trying to fight against that shit.
Heartbreaking: The Worst Person You Know Just Made A Great Point
So, he wants the government to dig dirt on US residents, but only if they're immigrants or temporary workers.
Yeah, the Constitution protects anyone on American soil, not just citizens.
Well he would have to be against warrantless searches if his father is the Zodiac killer