Senator Dianne Feinstein: NSA Metadata Program Here To Stay 510
cold fjord writes "The Hill reports, 'Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) predicted Sunday that lawmakers who favored shutting down the bulk collection of telephone metadata would not be successful in their efforts as Congress weighs potential reforms to the nation's controversial intelligence programs. "I don't believe so," Feinstein said during an appearance on NBC's Meet the Press (video). "The president has very clearly said that he wants to keep the capability So I think we would agree with him. I know a dominant majority of the — everybody, virtually, except two or three, on the Senate Intelligence Committee would agree with that." ... "A lot of the privacy people, perhaps, don't understand that we still occupy the role of the Great Satan. New bombs are being devised. New terrorists are emerging, new groups, actually, a new level of viciousness," Feinstein said. "We need to be prepared. I think we need to do it in a way that respects people's privacy rights."'"
Re:Of course it is here to stay (Score:5, Informative)
If the GOP had it's way LOTS of social programs would be gone entirely..or haven't you been listening to what they actually say?
Re:Of course it is here to stay (Score:5, Informative)
Banking regulations, Works Progress Administration (WPA), Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA), National Recovery Administration (NRA)... to name a few
This is a post 9/11 world, didn't anyone get the memo?
Re: The unseen enemy (Score:1, Informative)
Because she's a democrat? Still we should write in another name for the primary every election. Anyone know Lofgren's take on this & net neutrality?
Re:Of course it is here to stay (Score:4, Informative)
Reagan repealed mental health aid for the mentally ill. He also repealed housing assistance for the same groups. Suddnely faced with the choice between paying their rent and buing their meds, they came off their meds, lost their jobs due to the behaviors caused by being off their meds, then lost their house to no income (and no support). There's a *huge* jump in the homeless population in the US starting in the early 80s as a direct result.
He also repealed some SS benefits. As the son of a deceased sailor, I had been entitled to SS benefits until I turned 21 (if I went to college), but they were pulled back to 18.
There have been legions of cuts over the years to everything from the FDA to the ACoE. Happens all the time.
Re:Let's just stick our heads in the sand (Score:2, Informative)
9/11 happened because they needed the entire Nation to embrace the Patriotic Act and all of their neofascist arsenal. They let it happen, and immediately got a bunch of rednecks screaming "USA! USA! USA!" at the top of their lungs in front of the White House. Face it guys, you are becoming the fourth Reich. You just traded Hebrew for Muslim in the tale of the Unholy People Hitler used to get the Germans in line behind him.
Re: The unseen enemy (Score:4, Informative)
Lofgren is against it. She voted to support Justin Amash's attempt to defund these programs.
Re:Of course it is here to stay (Score:3, Informative)
Regan repealed mental health aid for the mentally ill. He also repealed housing assistance for the same groups. Suddnely faced with the choice between paying their rent and buing their meds, they came off their meds, lost their jobs due to the behaviors caused by being off their meds, then lost their house to no income (and no support). There's a *huge* jump in the homeless population in the US starting in the early 80s as a direct result.
He also repealed some SS benefits. As the son of a deceased sailor, I had been entitled to SS benefits until I turned 21 (if I went to college), but they were pulled back to 18.
There have been legions of cuts over the years to everything from the FDA to the ACoE. Happens all the time.
Re:So what's the NSA got on her? (Score:5, Informative)
What do they have on her?
A husband that makes a fortune through her legislation and owns companies which profit from defense contracts?
They don't need anything on her.
Re:Relevant Quote (Score:5, Informative)
I take it you haven't watched the shows then? Because I seem to recall the Eugenics Wars [memory-alpha.org], which led to the outlawing of genetic manipulation; the Bell Riots [memory-alpha.org], which led to the US government beginning to address the serious social problems facing the country; and World War III [memory-alpha.org] and the post-atomic horror [memory-alpha.org], followed shortly thereafter by first contact [memory-alpha.org], which acted as a catalyst for the unification of humanity [memory-alpha.org] which took about another 100 years to achieve after first contact.
There was nothing magical about it. From the mid-1900s (i.e. when the franchise first hit the airwaves) to when the United Federation of Planets is formed, you have nearly 200 years of history riddled with serious conflicts that led to societal changes after societal change. And even after things are allegedly "magically solved", you have internal conflicts going on, such as the Maquis Insurrection [memory-alpha.org]. Nothing was solved quickly or easily. Enterprise is all about this sort of stuff, in fact, since it pre-dates the formation of the Federation and deals with how fragile the United Earth government is and how the Vulcans mistrust the humans, since the humans were still pulling themselves out of the aftermath of the third world war.
And before you keep suggesting that there wasn't much in the way of explanation, those links tie back to information that was presented in each and every one of the series (I specifically recall the Eugenics Wars being mentioned in TOS, TNG, DS9, and ENT; Bell Riots were in DS9; WW3 was in the very first and last episodes of TNG; post-atomic horror was mentioned in TNG and VOY; United Earth was all over the place in ENT; and I'm still making my way through TAS, but I know some of those are brought up in episodes I haven't seen yet), so no matter which one(s) you watched, you should have gotten some idea of the history of their fictional universe [memory-alpha.org].
Re:Keeps getting elected (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Of course it is here to stay (Score:2, Informative)
I've listened to Rand Paul and Ron Paul talk about removing whole social programs (i.e. education, welfare) and social medicine entirely.. or are they not in the GOP when it's not convenient. I've listened to Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan and others talk about repealing Obamacare and they haven't said what they want to replace it with. I've listened to presidential candidates talk the same sort of talk. From what I can tell, the GOP seems to have a clear future in mind for the American public, but they're only clear about what they don't want in it. I'm an Independent, but I'm forced away from the GOP because of these sorts of issues. I'm really not a fan of the other side either, but they're the lesser of two evils here.
Overwhelmingly Democrat in California (Score:5, Informative)
With those two exceptions California is actually largely Republican.
Right. That's why California has 38 Democrats versus 15 Republicans in the House of Representatives, 2 Democrat senators, over 60% of the voters vote Democrat [wikipedia.org] in presidential elections and the Republicans haven't won a majority of the popular vote in presidential elections since 1988. (that's 25 years for those of you counting at home) The Democrats hold enormous majorities in the State House and State Senate and registered Democrats outnumber registered Republicans by over 2.5 million voters.
But you go ahead and keep believing that California is "largely Republican" if it helps you sleep at night.
Easy Solution (Score:4, Informative)
Nobody ever seems to remember that the NSA falls under the Executive Branch. Congress doesn't have to do squat. There's this one guy who has the authority to tell the NSA "Don't do that," and they're required to stop.
Clue: He lives in a really big house with a boring paint job.
Re:The unseen enemy (Score:5, Informative)
This is a deliberate attempt to kill this discussion thread, not actually advertising. This loser has just picked up a piece of spam that some moron actually posted here a couple of years ago and is filling the thread with it because he knows that most people won't scroll past it.
Because... (Score:5, Informative)
Elections are rigged....that should be obvious after the California GMO labeling vote where the results were polled as 70% in favor of, and then amazingly and unexpectedly the actual vote tally was reversed with 70% voting against the labeling.
That was when I knew that Californians DO NOT VOTE.
Why?
Because you have a reversal of the poll, on a indifference based issue. What does that mean? Most people either care about having GMO products labeled or they do not give a damn. Almost no percentage of the population except for a few die hard folks on the right that still 3 DDT are actually concerned about preventing GMO labeling.
So you had grass roots vs the weeds of indifference. With zero affect on the weeds. Those who don't care about GMO labelling, have not horse in the race. Adding it doesn't affect them. They don't care. That was an IMPOSSIBLE vote, blamed on a spending and advertising fee but clearly a result of the electronic voting fabrication system.