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“Weapons”.

about 7 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview

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Most people probably don’t really care about the specific data, but they do care about the principle and precedent.

Anyway, just because something is in open view does not make it public domain and, as you rightly stated, there are specific restrictions on what law enforcement can do even when they can clearly see criminal activities.

I don’t by any means believe everything about me is private. A google search for my name brings back a lot of accurate (and inaccurate) information. That is out there for the world to see, but just because I have information out there doesn’t mean that all of my information is fair game. I don’t think it’s unreasonable for anyone to expect their phone conversations, email history, photo backups, etc. are only available to the companies who hold their accounts for such things and not used to build personality profiles on them by the government. Do you really think that is an unreasonable expectation?.

about 7 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview 1 recommend

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It should, though. It should apply to any data you give to a private entity. There is absolutely no reasonable expectation that anyone outside of that private company has access to that data without a warrant, especially with no disclosure.

If you write something down (let’s say an idea for a video game) and someone sees it with a telescope and takes a picture of it and releases it into the public domain for you, you are fine with that, right? Because you wrote it down and there was no longer any reasonable expectation that it was private.

about 9 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview 1 reply

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The metadata they are collecting now is more than numbers. If you read the decision in Smith v. Maryland, you will see that a big reason the Supreme Court ruled the way they did was that pen registers only recorded an “intent to connect”. In other words, there was no information about whether the connection was successful or how long the connection was maintained or anything else. The NSA has already admitted they collect more information than just numbers dialed which is precisely why they are not collecting the data without court orders.

about 9 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview

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1) Of course it is. What else would I find that disagrees with a Supreme Court decision??

2) I never said it was or was not unconstitutional, I said that I was fine with people who interpret the 4th amendment that way. It is, of course, an interpretation issue, which means it is entirely possible to disagree with the Supreme Court on that topic. The problem is that the legality issue is irrelevant here. The question is if it should be legal, not whether it currently is.

about 9 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview 1 reply

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Sorry, yeah, I meant “dead drops”. They stick packages containing things like numbers to contact each other at known spots and ditch the numbers later on.

about 13 hours ago on 'Over 50' terrorist plots were stopped by surveillance efforts, says NSA director 1 reply 1 recommend

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I used spoiler tags :(((((((((((((

Sorry! The show is dang good, though. Worth watching even if you know how it ends.

about 13 hours ago on 'Over 50' terrorist plots were stopped by surveillance efforts, says NSA director 1 reply

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You underestimate career crap eaters.

about 15 hours ago on Chipotle becomes first US fast food chain to label all genetically modified ingredients 5 recommends

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Good point. I"m anxious to see where they are going with next season, though. Is root the only one with admin access now?

about 16 hours ago on 'Over 50' terrorist plots were stopped by surveillance efforts, says NSA director 1 reply

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His argument has been that the courts have defined what the government is doing is legal. Just because the government can do something doesn’t mean it is right.

Of course they can’t just come do whatever to you on your property. But they can take it away from you if they want to. That would be fought tooth and nail in court because it isn’t right.

The point I was obviously making is that just because something is legal does not make it right. Focusing on legality is frivolous when everyone else is talking about whether it should be legal, not whether it is.

about 16 hours ago on 'Over 50' terrorist plots were stopped by surveillance efforts, says NSA director 1 recommend

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Plus this monitoring is easy to avoid by having burner phones and number drops, which is pretty common in certain organizations. The data would be entirely useless for those people since it would just see a bunch of unrelated people calling each other.

about 16 hours ago on 'Over 50' terrorist plots were stopped by surveillance efforts, says NSA director 1 reply 1 recommend

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A better question is, did $1.5trillion stop Boston? And, are we any more safe than we were as a result of post-9/11 fearmongering? I would say probably not.

about 16 hours ago on 'Over 50' terrorist plots were stopped by surveillance efforts, says NSA director 1 reply 4 recommends

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There may be some of those, but the privacy we are graciously given by the government isn’t expressly defined (at least, not in a way that an average person would understand). Just saying something or writing something down doesn’t put it in the public domain. If it did, there would be a lot of corporate espionage going on :p

about 16 hours ago on 'Over 50' terrorist plots were stopped by surveillance efforts, says NSA director 1 recommend

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The TSA has confiscated plenty of “weapons”. We really have no idea if any of these “weapons” were about to be used maliciously or were 1" bladed pocket knives. And TSA chokepoints, as I like to call them, are just another hotbed for a terrorist attack later on.

about 17 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview

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Based on the way the supreme court understood it, yes. But the what constitutes unconstitutionality is relatively subjective. And even if case law supposedly defines it well today, there is no guarantee that it will be the same tomorrow.

Also, I never specifically stated it was unconstitutional, but I do think it’s reasonable for people to claim that it is according to how they interpret the 4th amendment.

about 17 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview 3 recommends

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Part of the ruling on Smith v. Maryland stated that you had no expectation of privacy when you dialed numbers to reach someone else, and because the pen register only contained information on intent to connect and nothing else, there was no expectation of privacy.

The NSA has already admitted they are collecting more than simply number dialed. This is why they are even bothering to get court orders and warrants. So Smith v. Maryland is barely even relevant here, though it is quite often used as a stick to whack opposing viewpoints.

Also, the Consitution itself can often only be understood subjectively which is why there are differing opinions on the meaning of things like the 2nd Amendment. According to current law, this may be legal. But that doesn’t mean every person should just be okay with it or not say it is unconstitutional.

about 17 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview

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You probably should have read what I said directly after what you quoted before replying. Smith v. Maryland does not allow this kind of data collection.

And of course it is my opinion. What did you think we were posting here? Very few of use are full blown lawyers, and those that are are not here to restate law. This would be a pretty awful discussion if personal opinion was not allowed to be stated here.

Whether what the NSA is doing is legal or not is entirely irrelevant. What they are doing is wrong according to many of us and many Americans and, frankly, many citizens of the world. These are well reasoned responses. Your post implies that most people here are not thinking and instead spouting nonsense and that is not true.

about 18 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview 1 reply 4 recommends

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Sorry, Katz v. US overturned a previous decision defining what a “reasonable expectation of privacy” was. The article above pretty succinctly explains why this definition does not work. Just because the Supreme Court has decided something doesn’t mean that all disagreements must stop, the Supreme Court has a tendency to weigh public opinion heavily into their decisions and this time it stinks bad. There is nothing preventing the ACLU case against the NSA on this from reaching the Supreme Court who overturns or redefines the limitations of Smith v. Maryland, and I, personally, hope that happens.

Smith v. Maryland is far too overreaching in what it allows as an expectation of privacy. It’s basically saying if I tell you a secret and the government forces you to tell them that secret, they didn’t need a warrant to get it from you because it was basically public information. That is completely and utterly wrong.

(Actually, the decision doesn’t allow for that and I was being obtuse, but it also doesn’t allow for the kind of collection the NSA is currently doing because it contains more than ‘an intent to connect’ which is almost entirely why Smith v. Maryland was decided the way it was)

about 18 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview 4 replies 1 recommend

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Being technically correct is only something a lawyer cares about.

about 18 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview 2 replies 1 recommend

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So all of us make a decision that we go through a whole bunch of security
at airports

No. All of us did NOT decide that. It was decided for us and fat lot of good it has done for anyone.

about 18 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview 2 replies 3 recommends

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Let it be known that it is possible to disagree one some issues and agree on others! ;)

about 18 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview 5 recommends

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That’s great and all, but case law can be revisited and reversed on further examination. Smith v. Maryland reversed a previous decision that made such things illegal. Also, Smith v. Maryland doesn’t really allow what they are currently doing if you read the actual decision (sas discussed in the above article).

about 18 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview 2 replies 1 recommend

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What information? The fourth amendment clearly states what constitutes a valid warrant.

and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

You really think that a warrant covering hundreds of thousands to millions of people has probably cause or specifically states the place to be searched and what specifically will be seized?

about 18 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview 1 reply 6 recommends

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Here is an article that specifically covers the Smith v. Maryland angle from 2006.

http://reason.com/blog/2006/05/30/revisiting-smith-v-maryland

about 18 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview 1 recommend

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and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

about 18 hours ago on President Obama defends NSA program in 'Charlie Rose' interview 3 replies 4 recommends