Discussing NSA surveillance kills Americans? Hogwash
Having a free society requires being able to report on and publicly discuss what our government is doing with our tax dollars. This principle is even more important when there are allegations of wrongdoing.
Which is why it's odd to see National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell say that Americans will die because of the discussion of National Security Agency spying in public and in the U.S. Congress.
This is, unfortunately, no exaggeration. Check out this excerpt from an interview that McConnell, a former NSA director, recently gave to the El Paso Times:
Q. So you're saying that the reporting and the debate in Congress means that some Americans are going to die?
A. That's what I mean. Because we have made it so public. We used to do these things very differently, but for whatever reason, you know, it's a democratic process and sunshine's a good thing. We need to have the debate. The reason that the FISA law was passed in 1978 was an arrangement was worked out between the Congress and the administration, we did not want to allow this community to conduct surveillance, electronic surveillance, of Americans for foreign intelligence unless you had a warrant, so that was required. So there was no warrant required for a foreign target in a foreign land. And so we are trying to get back to what was the intention of '78. Now because of the claim, counterclaim, mistrust, suspicion, the only way you could make any progress was to have this debate in an open way.
This is a bizarre statement. For it to be true, it requires that the NSA's adversaries (terrorists, I assume) be ignorant of the fact that eavesdropping occurs.
That's unlikely. The Puzzle Palace book describing the inner workings of the NSA was published in 1983. The late 1990s were consumed with online speculation about the Echelon surveillance system. CNN reported in 1997 that Osama bin Laden was worried about electronic surveillance, and the Los Angeles Times wrote a year later that the Feds intercepted calls placed by bin Laden on his Inmarsat satellite phone.
It would take a singular terrorist to be both (a) blissfully unaware of all these reports and (b) yet somehow cunning and savvy and well-funded enough to be a serious threat.
Even if such a singular terrorist existed, there are still reasons for Congress and the public to discuss NSA surveillance. The most important is that it may have been, as a Michigan federal judge has ruled, unconstitutional. Related to that point is that the officials who authorized it may have violated criminal law.
McConnell's argument is especially slippery because it relies on information that only he (presumably) knows and because it can be applied so broadly. Why wouldn't prosecuting Scooter Libby have caused the executive branch to lose focus on the "War on Terror" and therefore killed Americans? Why wouldn't criticizing President Bush embolden terrorists and therefore kill Americans?
Besides, it's a little odd that the Bush administration is so worried about Americans dying because of intelligence disclosure. It might be more seemly if top officials were more worried about Americans dying (3,723 so far) because of bad or politically manipulated secret intelligence instead.
Declan McCullagh, CNET News' chief political correspondent, chronicles the intersection of politics and technology. He has covered politics, technology, and Washington, D.C., for more than a decade, which has turned him into an iconoclast and a skeptic of anyone who says, "We oughta have a new federal law against this." E-mail Declan. 
Now, to my point. (See, you should have a POINT!)
We are at war. When you are at war you can NOT make public everything you do, ESPECIALLY when it involves intelligence. For example, wouldn't it be GREAT if Al Qaeda actually believed our govt was listening in, not only on calls between US and foreign Quaeda, but on ALL DOMESTIC CALLS? Wouldn't that make it harder for them to communicate, even if we actually were NOT? And wouldn't it be great if Al Qaeda believed that there were armed air marshals on every US airliner, even if there were not? Are you getting any of this? Do you still think this jerk is 100% on target? Man, people like you are pathetic. Why don't you just go turn yourself in to the Taliban and let them lop off your head?
To suggest that we should NOT listen in on Al Qaeda communications because they know we are listening is like saying we should not have monitored Japanese naval communications in WW2 because they were incrypted.
The next time you want to write about grown-up business, please ull your head out of your @ss first.
My only point is that federal law and the U.S. Constitution must be followed when we do it.
The atomic bomb development and war plans should always be discussed in public to give our enemies a fair chance. McCullagh, your inability to logically evolve a position is once again showing.
Most rational people, whose interest in self-preservation surpasses their desire to knee their political opposition in the groin, will agree that it is essential that some form of monitoring of potential threats to national security take place on American soil. We can discuss, argue, and disagree over some of the finer details of when and where this should take place, who has to sign off in advance, and what happens if some agency or individual goes too far.
But, again, Declan McCullagh's overheated rhetoric misleads: if you read the McConnell comments in context, it is quite clear that he is arguing that "outing" classified methods alerts potential enemies to our tactics, so that they will simply switch how they conduct business, likely to something that is harder for national security agents to exploit. And that, rather than simply discussing policy, is what results in deaths.
Some CNET readers were confused by the author's recent claim to be "nonpartisan," even as they brushed away the spattering of saliva from his previous column. So to clarify, he has graciously consented to sing the well-known chorus, mantra of the hard left, "Bush lied, people died." Quite the song-and-dance man.
But what the Bush administration is upset about seems to be even the disclosure that certain surveillance projects exist, even if that disclosure includes no details.
I think we can all agree that Al Qaida already knows without being told that we are trying to intercept their communications, regardless of the form they take. These aren't stupid people. They know we want to listen to their phone calls, intercept their emails, etc. None of this is a secret.
The real secrets here are the operational methods, what frequencies we listen in on, the nature of the equipment we use, etc. And I have not seen a single person, Republican or Democrat, liberal or libertarian, argue for the disclosure of that information. I am as hard-core a liberal critic of President Bush as you're ever likely to meet, and my opinion is that the particulars of how we collect intelligence, our operational methods, the technologies used, are simply not things that the public needs to know. Nobody is disputing that certain things need to be kept secret, lest the usefulness of those methods is nullified. And nobody I know, regardless of political orientation, wants to see that happen.
Furthermore, nobody I know of is arguing that we should not be collecting intelligence on terrorists or their activities. In fact, I am strongly in favor of doing so. Again, I'm as hardcore a liberal as you'll find, and I am strongly in favor of spying on anyone who intends to do harm to my country. There is no real dispute here, although dishonest Bush supporters have worked very hard to try and create the perception of a dispute by falsely claiming that Democrats "don't want to listen in when Osama calls."
Where there is a point of dispute is how much power this President - or any president - should be given when it becomes clear that the activity of surveilling terrorists suspects is overlapping with intercepting the communications of innocent Americans who are guilty of nothing. The President and his supporters seem to believe that the law is a trifle to be brushed aside when the President believes it to be a hindrance to his intelligence-collecting activities. But this country was founded upon the rule of law, and any actions by the chief executive must be confined to lawfully permitted activity. The law trumps everything. Because if any president is allowed to act outside the law, then the Constitutional system of checks and balances that have served us well for over 200 years has been broken.
This President, for four straight years, had a Congress which was willing and eager to give him everything he asked for in order to secure the country and go after terrorists and terrorist suspects. And yet, we now know that the President has explicitly stated, through the use of so-called "signing statements," that he intends to defy legislative mandates in some cases. We know that his Administration has unlawful programs to torture terrorism suspects. We know that under his Administration, suspects who have been convicted of nothing has been flown to foreign countries to be tortured. We know that he was openly defying the FISA law for four years before being forced to disclose that publicly in 2005. He has unlawfully seized the right to detain American citizens indefinitely without trial or access to an attorney merely by declaring them to be "enemy combatants," a power that even all-powerful British monarchs have not had since the mid-13th Century.
It's very simple. Nobody wants to stop the U.S. Government from collecting intelligence. We just want them to follow the law. And when Director McConnell suggests that even talking about these programs is going to get Americans killed, then what I hear is yet another attempt by the Administration to use fear as a means to stifle public debate about these programs. It's debate we must have, since the President has proven himself to be so untrustworthy. He asks for the public's trust when he says that these programs are completely within the law, but given how often he has lied about so many matters great and small, what incentive do I have to trust him? If he announced today that they sky is blue, I'd go outside and check for myself. Why should I trust him about something like this?
Judge Taylor's ruling was overturned by the 6th US Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati. If you were intellectually honest, you would check your facts. Do not use these specious arguments to advance your progaganda. It only makes you look dishonest.
Specifically, they created a Catch-22, demanding that the plaintiffs, who quite potentially/likely WERE surveilled illegally, could not PROVE that they were surveilled, and to have PROVED that they were illegally tapped would've required access to classified materials, which they did not have access to.
The up-coming decision in San Fancisco doesn't seem to have those deficiencies..
What was that about honesty and fact-checking??
As for technology, News.com has written about the Patriot Act, wiretapping, NSA eavesdropping, etc. for years. Internet wiretapping is about technology, no?
I like how we now monitor big money transactions of citizens too. I think the government should know where all of their money is, after all they need to protect us from our money. But really Declan, think how many kittens we could save! I am so scared. Maybe my neighbor is a terrorist you know? You never know. They're everywhere watching... watching from their caves on mount doom. It's my hope that by watching more TV and by never talking to my fellow neighbors but rather by constantly stating how much I hate my fellow Americans that I too can become a sociopath like das leader. I'm am sooo scared, please mommy and daddy government save me from my neighbors *waaah* *waaaah* I think their out to get me, so you'll save me won't you government?
Oh and leave our boarders open, because, I mean, as everyone knows boarders aren't important for keeping out terrorists at all. I think we continue with the American Union and NAFTA to further tear down our borders because letting anyone in should help to keep us be even more safe. After all, a country doesn't need borders and it makes much more since to concentrate on tracking every Americans' move while taking away their rights.
I mean after all, just like the founding father's said "love thy government forever, thou hast no rights, be afraid, be very afriad, only the State can help you now" ah good 'ol Alexander Hamilton...
your country, and in the USA our country is supposed to by
synonymous with Freedom.
Think about that. And then just suppose for 10 seconds that
revealing warrantless spying in the USA actually does cause
Americans to die. Well, they died for freedom then. They would
be the Intense Patriots picking up the flag of our forefathers, to
die for freedom.
Freedom is not Big Brother. Freedom is the USA out of the
hands of neocon fearmongers. So fu¢k it, let the world know
about the spying and $hit - We will Live Free or Die.
And besides I don't have a license or permit for practicing Liberty(TM). Do you happen to know what bureau or department I have to stand in line at in order to get one?
GW's Air Guard 'attendance', and Cheney's deferments make that pretty clear to me...
It's quite stunning for the rest of the world to witness how fragile the much-vaunted American democracy really is. Apparently, all it takes is for fewer than two dozen religious fanatics to crash a handful of aeroplanes to shake its peoples' confidence in it to the core. A large portion of the US population is now questioning or even abandoning many long-cherished founding principles of the nation.
Many of the vitriolic replies to this article and similar ones dealing with this subject suggest that there is considerable support for the suspension of the right of privacy. These people are unconcerned that in the 4th Amendment, searches and seizures (of US citizens) without warrants are expressly verboten. It seems they believe that a broad dragnet trawling all communication channels could possibly pick up terrorist chatter or deter potential terrorist communications. They argue that US citizens who have done no wrong should have nothing to worry about. Those who oppose such measures are therefore terrorist-appeasers or may most likely have something to hide.
It doesn't matter that the current debate on this topic is on the extent and legality of the broad surveillance programme and that hardly anyone has demanded its actual innards be revealed. To some, the mere discussion of it endangers national security. As the author of the article has said, no terrorist worth his or her salt would be ignorant of the fact that the US monitors a large amount of foreign and domestic (previously with warrants) communications. It's no secret that close US allies are well aware that even they are being constantly spied upon by Uncle Sam.
In this age of fear and uncertainty, large masses are clamouring for their leaders to lead them to safety. With unspecified terror warnings coming thick and fast, no doubt the people will look for leadership that appears strong and decisive. There is certain no lack of candidates for this role.
So, how does one show true leadership in the US these days?
Suspend principles when deemed necessary, that's how! After all, what good are principles when people are dead? Remember that flexibility is key to effective leadership.
The nation's leader should strike out at anyone or any country that that refuses to come to heel. That will surely encourage the previously-reluctant to fall in line, and also give those with ill intents second thoughts. Remind the world who is boss!
Any US citizen who questions the actions of the country's leaders in times of crisis only serves to weaken the nation as a whole. Such traitors should be publicly shamed and even prosecuted for treason. Drastic times call for drastic measures. This is the only way to keep Americans safe.
Benjamin Franklin famously said that: "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." Surely, this 18-century thinking should be considered long past its usefulness by now.
How about this gem by by former chief of the Luftwaffe, Hermann Goering? "[T]he people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country." Shouldn't this also be dismissed since it was uttered by a long-deceased Nazi?
In the meantime, America's enemies are happy to sit back and watch the country and its people self-destruct. Mission accomplished!
disseminated via the White House and that somehow the
President or someone in his cabinet can "manipulate,"
"generate," or otherwise change intelligence within the current
National Intelligence Community, that person should be given
absolutely no credibility. All NIEs from 1998 up to 2003 all
stated the same thing and came from within the NIC and not the
White House.
You simply have no concept how the Sigint world works and thus
you honestly believe in your hatred that you are right and the
professionals working at NSA are wrong.
I trust these people more than all you liberals combined because
I was one for over 20 years. People have died and will continue
to die as long as we have people like you who have no concept
of intelligence gathering, methods and sources.
disseminated via the White House and that somehow the
President or someone in his cabinet can "manipulate,"
"generate," or otherwise change intelligence within the current
National Intelligence Community, that person should be given
absolutely no credibility. All NIEs from 1998 up to 2003 all
stated the same thing and came from within the NIC and not the
White House.
You simply have no concept how the Sigint world works and thus
you honestly believe in your hatred that you are right and the
professionals working at NSA are wrong.
I trust these people more than all you liberals combined because
I was a siginter for over 20 years. People have died and will
continue to die as long as we have people like you who have no
concept of intelligence gathering, methods and sources.
So many people have come here, exclamation points and fearmongering slogans at the ready, to blast Declan for pointing out the obvious: that this statement from Director McConnell is nothing more than an attempt to use fear to stifle debate about the Administrations policies and the very important point about whether or not the Administration follows the law in its methods. It's almost enough to convince me of the effectiveness of terrorism as a political strategy to see so many people so terrified of "the terrorists" that they are willing to accept any claim, however dubious, from an Administration that has proven time and again that it is willing to lie in order to carry out its aims, regardless of how many laws they have to break to get what they want.
Here's a sampling of the incoherent, bedwetting nonsense I'm talking about:
"The atomic bomb development and war plans should always be discussed in public to give our enemies a fair chance. McCullagh, your inability to logically evolve a position is once again showing."
Except that nobody is asking for the exposure of our atomic bomb development or war plans. This is meaningless, histrionic nonsense.
"Why don't you just go turn yourself in to the Taliban and let them lop off your head?"
Sadly, this is standard boilerplate that I have seen over and over again from Bush supporters. If you issue any criticism of Bush, if you suggest even slightly that he might be overreaching the powers granted to him by the Constitution, then obviously you're with the terrorists and you want the Taliban to chop the heads off of Americans.
"Another One Led Around by a ANose Ring"
Because it's obvious to everyone that if you oppose Bush, you're nothing more than a nose-ring wearing, hippie liberal, and probably a pacifist as well.
"You simply have no concept how the Sigint world works and thus you honestly believe in your hatred that you are right and the professionals working at NSA are wrong.
I trust these people more than all you liberals combined because I was one for over 20 years. People have died and will continue to die as long as we have people like you who have no concept
of intelligence gathering, methods and sources."
I would expect that someone who worked in SigInt for over 20 years might have something more substantive to say about the matter than the tried-and-true dismissive of "well, you just hate Bush."
Color me unimpressed.
The problem is that though these terrorists are aware that the United States has a lot of capabilities they aren't quite sure what exactly they can and can't do and the extent to which they can and can't do it. Obviously bin Laden thought his sat phone was ok to use but by exposing to the public that it isn't you've taken away one more tool that the good guys had to track the bad guys.
The Bush administration (who I voted for...) has gone too far, and even with the horribly low approval rating he has, nobody has the balls to stand up against him. Can't be perceived as being soft on terror. There are things worth dying for.
'1984' sports applicable themes for any generation. Mostly because there will always be persons among those who seek power, who also seek undue and excess authority. Sadly, mnore often than not, or our constitutional republic would not even be close to the mess that it's in.
Unfortunately, Gandhi rarely runs for office. Nor would his more balanced kind typically want to. Seizing power over others is counter-intuitive to real freedom.
Nothing is for USA anymore.
The CNET editor who has kept this leftist propagandist on the payroll for so long should be fired with him.
- NSA is afraid of the truth.
- by likes2comment August 24, 2007 9:27 AM PDT
- What the NSA is afraid of is Americans NOT being afraid due to open discussions on security. Ever notice after a month or two when things are "normal" and the public/press is focusing on the Bush admininstration, suddenly there is a new "terror alert", the sky is falling, type of news from the White House / Bush League to distract Americans from the goverment activities.
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