Yet Another Attack On The Fourth Amendment

Here we go again. The Cyber Security Information Sharing Act of 2014, courtesy, once again, of Dianne Feinstein, would allow sharing of personal information between major internet sites and the United States government. You can get in touch with your representative here to request that your Fourth Amendment rights be protected and this bill be scrapped. On the bright side, Apple's new mobile operating system, i0S8, was engineered only to unlock for the owner of the device, even if Apple or the retailer is presented with a search warrant. Of course, this would not even be an issue if the United States Government would just let J. Edgar Hoovers tactics remain in another era.

The Day We Fight Back

Mass Surveillance. What a concept; it conjures up an Orwellian image of government control extending everywhere, reaching into all affairs, personal and otherwise. The argument can and has been made that there really are no actual secrets and there never were, but what about warrantless grabs of information government agencies against an innocent, but targeted citizen? The Fourth Amendment to the Constitution prevents warrantless searches and seizures of our property in person, but where does it fit in electronic communiques?

Right now, there are two important pieces of proposed legislation that need attention from our representatives. First is the FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) Improvements Act, written by Dianne Feinstein. Her idea of updating and reform would simply legalize all the illegal data mining already done by NSA. It would also allow legitimate spying tactics on actual espionage suspects overseas, the original purpose of FISA, to be utilized here, in America. Because of the obvious conflicts with the Fourth Amendment, this is not a good idea. On February 11, we are asking everyone to call or write their representatives to state opposition to Feinstein's FISA Improvements Act.

The second proposed piece of important legislation is the USA Freedom Act. This act would amend section 215 of the Patriot Act, which is used to mine and store phone records of Americans. Limits would be placed on the data that is collected, the amount of data that can be stored, and the length of time it can be saved. The bill would also amend the FISA Amendments Act, (FAA, 2008) which allows warrantless wiretapping of American citizens. Our representatives need to know that we support this.

To anyone who still thinks that the NSA and that government agencies actually have the best interests of American citizens at heart, think about the fact that despite so much metadata and other information that there is barely room to store it, America still has unsolved missing persons cases.

BooHooHoo! We Don't Have Time To Spy Anymore!

It seems the NSA is a bit anal retentive these days because they do not have as much time to devote to unrestrained spying, thanks to Edward Snowden and the information he released to the general public. The NSA would much rather operate in secret, allegedly gathering as much intelligence as possible about foreign targets and "protecting" the United States. That's a very nice thought, but Snowden's leaks did not actually deal very much with surveillance of foreign nationals operating in a hostile fashion; the leaks dealt with metadata collected and stored about the everyday lives and activities of average American citizens. That said, it seems plausible that those who spy for the NSA may actually be prevaricating when they express concerns that foreign targets upon whom they spy will now be forewarned and change their communication styles and mediums in an ongoing effort to frustrate information harvests.

How often has the NSA successfully averted unfortunate goings-on in the dominions and lives of everyday citizens? A look at any news network will show that if the NSA truly has any intentions of making the world a safer place for Americans and others, they've been slacking lately. What, exactly then, have they been doing with all of the data they collect? The ability to intercept Facebook and Twitter communications could stop a lot of everyday criminal activity. While the NSA can argue that those everyday criminal activities are petty crimes, and not worthy of their attention, the direction of prosecutors nationwide has been to criminalize, over-criminalize, and charge each and every defendant or police detainee with a felony whenever possible. It seems, kinda, sorta, like informing local sheriff departments about premeditated felony crime should be a priority of sorts, or at least a side interest, if the intelligence to intercept is available, which it clearly is. How many missing persons cases are still open?  How many times has the NSA offered it's help in locating missing children? Probably never. Your children are not important, everyday Americans. Now that the middle classes are not important, your children do not matter, and your tax dollars that support law enforcement do not pay anyone to protect you or your children. Don't expect anyone's intelligence gathering activities to help you in any way.

In the "Post Edward Snowden Era", the NSA is very, very unhappy about it's perceived obligation to control damage, rather than to come clean and amend it's practices. There is much ado about all of the time agents must spend tracking down that which has been revealed, and any defensive postures that must be taken. Finding out who knows what, and who is changing gears in order to compensate for lack of privacy, is much more important than treating the general population with respect. In fact, the NSA is not concerned, in the slightest way, about any murders or any missing persons cases whih could have been prevented, but for some useful information, denied, rather than shared with lower level law enforcement; and the NSA is not concerned in the slightest about the lack of respect it has shown for American citizens.
 

Turnabout's Fair Play?

It seems that instead of making progress, since the Civil Rights Movement, America has been losing it's grip on it's understanding of the Constitution. Not only do we deliberately fail to teach children about the Constitution in school, (no joke, Kansas; the principal of the school in Frankfort, Kansas told yours truly that he purposefully did NOT teach, or allow the teachers to teach, any student about first or fourth amendment rights) we pay law enforcement to bully innocent citizens, we allow unnecessary surveillance, and now our judicial community uses the lag between the average person's understanding of the digital world and the analog world as an excuse to make examples of information "leakers", such as Edward Snowden and Bradley Manning, accusing them of treason, and attempting to punish them with sanctions that are not even imposed on serial killers. Did we threaten Nixon and et els with decades in prison, or cancel his passport? Revealing information that is contractually held in confidence is breach of contract, but generally not high treason, yet John McCain is fuming because Russia has granted a year's asylum to Edward Snowden. Has McCain forgotten how many Russians either defected, or attempted to defect, to the United States? Not that they did not have reasons for this, but McCain seems to almost deliberately overlook Snowden's perspective, Putin's possible perspective, and Russia's perspective.

If all of the increased surveillance had put a dent in human trafficking, or had actually stopped a terrorist or a school shooting, it might seem like a worthy sacrifice of Americans' rights, but instead; violence has only increased with the amplified spying. Rather than jump to punish the young people who spilled the information about NSA and Prism into collective awareness, have Americans stopped to ponder exactly with whom NSA and Prism intended to share the collected data?