gonzo rodeo said:
The Circuit just heard arguments last week. It could be a while before we know.
Oh?
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/28/u...-federal-judge-rules.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
U.S. can keep court orders, phone cos secret in NSA spy case | Reuters
It seems it's not nearly as cut-and-dried as you purport. It's almost like- wait for it- it's simply your opinion that it should be illegal, so you call it illegal, when that's not really your determination to make. Like I've been saying.
Oh, you say? Yeah... neither of those cases you linked are appeals. It's also not just my opinion that it is illegal, now that certain truths have been exposed to sunlight.
I linked a District case decided December 16, 2013 (
Klayman v. Obama). Your New York Times link above (
ACLU v. Clapper) is a parallel District case decided two weeks later over almost the very same thing (slight differences in how it was being argued). Your Reuters link (
EFF v. DOJ) was a District case covering the secret orders issued to the phone companies (which, as it turns out, did force the government to explain some shadier aspects of the PATRIOT Act and how it is involved). The appeal for Klayman v. Obama hit the Circuit on the 4th, so we'll see in a little while what two Reagan appointees and a W appointee say in appeal. Then either way, it's a year or three before the USSC either hears it or officially declines.
In all of the cases against the NSA and the federal government in the last 15 years, ALL of them have revolved around the government claiming "state's secrets" privilege while simultaneously seeking dismissal on the grounds that the contesting parties cannot prove they were the targets of surveillance, let alone illegal surveillance. That's a neat trick, isn't it? "We don't have to tell you anything we've done wrong, and you can't prove we did anything wrong (because we don't have to tell you what we actually did)". The fact that such a construct was built into the PATRIOT Act (and even to some extent in 1978 with FISA) should give you pause. It's basically a blank check entitling the US Government to ignore anyone's First and Fourth Amendment rights, totally in secret, without oversight or chance for redress, for reasons
they don't even have to share.
You do not have to be a constitutional scholar to know
that is not constitutional. What should pique your curiosity further is the fact that real dents in these abrogations of constitutional protections have only been made possible by whistleblowers. Snowden, for example, leaked the secret order for Verizon to divulge it's data, which gave private citizens the proof that they had been the subjects of an illegal search/seizure. Take a look at these:
Before Snowden: The Whistleblowers Who Tried To Lift The Veil : NPR
William Binney (U.S. intelligence official) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Thomas Andrews Drake - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Mark Klein - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Trailblazer Project - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jewel v. NSA - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Hepting v. AT&T - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
https://www.eff.org/cases/shubert-v-bush
https://www.eff.org/cases/first-unitarian-church-los-angeles-v-nsa
No, it's kinda harmful to intelligence collection. But, ya know, people can sit on the sidelines and criticize it, because it's not their job. It's not their ass if there's attack, or someone gets kidnapped, or whatever. They can just sit there and Monday morning quarterback- it's not their responsibility and the likelihood it will affect any one person is really, really low. It's extremely easy to be critical of something when your nuts aren't on the line, isn't it?
If it's harmful to intelligence collection against US citizens without specific cause or warrant...
good. That list above makes a very excellent case for people actively fighting a very existent Big Brother. This stuff used to be the domain of tin-foil hat wearing truthers that made blog posts while hiding from black helicopters. As it turns out... it's all true! The government isn't even denying it, but rather hiding behind secret edicts and privilege. The NSA not only has the ability to tap into any form of electronic communication in existence,
but they do it on a regular basis as well. The extent to which it was capable, not even the most creative conspiracy theorist could have probably pieced together. So far, the only real defense for this kind of power
even existing in the first place is that there couldn't possibly be enough manpower to spy on little old Joe Blow from Anytown, USA, so don't worry about it America! Relax! Go back to work! Watch your local sports teams on network television and forget all about this! You should have nothing to worry about if you're doing nothing wrong.
Why 'I Have Nothing to Hide' Is the Wrong Way to Think About Surveillance | WIRED
I've already declared that I disagreed with the further extent of Snowden's leaks on our active foreign collection missions, but I also get why he did it. To quote Sam Kineson, "I don't condone it, but I understand it." Some of it even deserves to be exposed. Take, for example, the
alleged counter-collection and trade scheme between the Five Eyes countries - where we spy on their citizens and they spy on ours and we trade the info - if this is true, then that means it's all part of an intentional, unconstitutional collection against US citizens and as such
deserves to be exposed. It is not the fault of the exposers for all of the damage that could potentially fall out from exposing such a program -
it's the fault of the unconstitutional program! All the stuff about China, that was way over the line in my opinion... but, again, it also demonstrated things that are being carried out against US citizens without specific cause or warrant. And it was also a direct threat to the administration (that was threatening Snowden at the time, if you'll recall) to back off or else even more damaging things would come out. The administration didn't listen. It happened. Snowden is playing a very dangerous game, and in a way that I don't particularly enjoy, but he is playing it well.
Don't get me wrong, these tools exist, and we're not the only ones that have them. I get the fact that there is a full scale cyber war being waged 25 hours a day, 367 days a year. I want us to have the capability to protect national assets and cause harm to foreign assets if necessary. But there are higher laws in play that protect US citizens from the US government, no matter how high minded and citizen-focused their goals might be.