Congress Passes Bill Allowing Warrantless Forfeiture of Private Communications 379
Prune writes Congress has quietly passed an Intelligence Authorization Bill that includes warrantless forfeiture of private communications to local law enforcement. Representative Justin Amash unsuccessfully attempted a late bid to oppose the bill, which passed 325-100. According to Amash, the bill "grants the executive branch virtually unlimited access to the communications of every American."
According to the article, a provision in the bill allows “the acquisition, retention, and dissemination” of Americans’ communications without a court order or subpoena. That type of collection is currently allowed under an executive order that dates back to former President Reagan, but the new stamp of approval from Congress was troubling, Amash said. Limits on the government’s ability to retain information in the provision did not satisfy the Michigan Republican."
PRIVATE encryption of everything just became... (Score:5, Insightful)
... mandatory. Seriously, what is the NSA going to do when the consequences of their arrogance propagate fully through our information culture? Eventually, everything of consequence is going to be held on private servers using private encryption keys that no one has access to but the users. The actual servers that push the information around are going to be shuffling around black boxes.
Re: PRIVATE encryption of everything just became.. (Score:4, Funny)
But cloud is great, right? They told me cloud is great!
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No one with a clue believes that anymore.
Re: PRIVATE encryption of everything just became.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Unfortunately, I suspect that anyone who is not a geek or privacy advocate still believes it.
Re: PRIVATE encryption of everything just became.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyone who is a geek and/or privacy advocate never believed it.
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The NSA: "Made in China"... Full communist cultural adoption... Next: Human sterilization lotteries...
Re: PRIVATE encryption of everything just became.. (Score:5, Informative)
Good thing geeks are responsible for building the entire information backbone.
Look, decoding things client side isn't expensive. It isn't a big deal. All you have to do is retrain a copy of the decryption engine and key client side. Which means if you're running a large company network that hosts all company files on data centers in the "cloud" then all the IT guy has to do is maintain ONE tiny server client side that serves those two things to the clients. Which they download as part of their login script... etc etc etc.
It isn't hard. And when that is in place... assuming the NSA has total control over the data center that is the cloud... what exactly do they have? Jack and shit.
Re: PRIVATE encryption of everything just became.. (Score:4, Informative)
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Which means you're assuming they're going to passively hack every computer in the US and keep it a secret from all the people fiendishly looking for it. Good luck with that plan. The discrepancy between what the computer should be doing and what it is doing will be noticed. When it contacts IP addresses that it shouldn't, it will be noticed... etc. There is no way they'd get away with that for any extended period of time. Which means it would be all over the media and the only people that would allow the ha
Re: PRIVATE encryption of everything just became.. (Score:4, Informative)
You missed everything I said about keeping the keys and decryption engine private... didn't you? Read that again and then comment please... you'll sound less stupid.
Where are you going to keep your files?? (Score:5, Insightful)
You missed everything I said about keeping the keys and decryption engine private
With NSA and all the spooks being given the blank check in snooping into every nook and cranny everywhere where do you think you gonna keep your files private ?
How long you think your files can be safely kept private?
The problem with the American government - no, not just the POTUS, not just the NSA, not just the Congress, not just the Court System, it's everything - is that it is turning into a totally uncontrollable monster, and it is getting uglier by the day
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Not if you're standing under it and it rains down in torrents.
Re: PRIVATE encryption of everything just became.. (Score:5, Interesting)
But cloud is great, right? They told me cloud is great!
Yes, cloud is great as a convenience for you.
It is also great as a convenience for NSA and other agencies. The text of the bill allows that anything that was encrypted can be kept indefinitely. If your web site says HTTPS then it is fair game for permanent governmental storage.
Also, they can retain it forever for a number of reasons:
From the bill now on its way to the President's desk: "(3)(B) A covered communication shall not be retained in excess of 5 years unless ... (ii) the communication is reasonably believed to constitute evidence of a crime ... (iii) the communication is enciphered or reasonably believed to have a secret meaning; (iv) all parties to the communication are reasonably believed to be non-United States persons;"
#2 should be troubling. Does your communication (which is not limited to just email, but also includes web pages and any other data) have any evidence of a crime? Evidence that you downloaded a movie or software from a warez site, or looked at porn as a minor, or violated any of the policy-made-crimes that even the federal government has declared they are not countable? [wsj.com] With an estimate of over 300,000 'regulations-turned-crime', plus laws that incorporate foreign laws (the Lacey Act's criminalization of anything done "in violation of State or foreign law"), pretty much anything you do probably violates some law somewhere in the world. Better preserve it just in case somebody eventually wants to prosecute you for that crime someday.
#3 refers back to a vague definition of "enciphered" that does not just mean encryption. The "secret meaning" could be as simple as data inside a protocol, Who is to say that the seemingly random bytes "d6 0d 9a 5f 26 71 dd a7 04 31..." used as part of a data stream are really not an encrypted message? Better record it just in case.
And of course #4, the law has a careful wording about communications between "non-United States persons". Considering the "internet of things", all those devices talking to other devices are not communications between United States persons. It was your camera (a non-United States person) communicating with a data warehouse (a non-United States person), so better exempt that from the 5-year retention policy as well.
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My read of #3:
"Hi Mom, I baked a couple of really good pans of cornbread with the cornmeal you sent me" just might be code for "Hi Muhammad, received the PCX and both bombs are now ready". You can never be sure, right?
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Don't forget it is the NSA who approves what type of encryption are legal for citizens to own. In the case of AES relies solely that combining 256 random bits with 256 non random bits, sufficiently, is too difficult to decipher except for the most powerful computer systems.
Re:PRIVATE encryption of everything just became... (Score:5, Informative)
They can't practically stop people from using any kind of encryption. Once the encryption procredure is handled entirely client side, how would you even know if the data was encrypted to spec unless you tried to decrypt it? And that's an awkward thing to admit to people that are assuming your service doesn't even try to do that.
Really, the whole NSA mission against general data has a big expiration date hanging on it. The cloud concept is obviously dead in the water in the long term unless the encryption keys and engine is kept client side. And are the terrorists of the future really going to be sending their terrorist plots over email and conventional cell phone calls? I can think of hundreds of ways to send information of an extremely criminal and national security relevant nature... completely anonymously... forever.
The only reason they're getting anything now is because our enemies are computer illiterate. That is like relying on your enemy being literally illiterate... forever. It isn't going to happen.
The whole thing is a giant waste of time and money. IF they had half a clue, they'd do their best to convince everyone that they're not actually going to wire tap everyone secretly. I know they say that all the time but they're not very convincing at it are they? Exactly. To be convincing, they need to be subtle. Which means the giant data centers and big laws flowing through congress are the opposite of what they should be doing IF they had a clue.
But they quite clearly don't have a clue so they're just going to spend billions of tax payer dollars to accomplish jack shit. As usual.
Re:PRIVATE encryption of everything just became... (Score:4, Informative)
Not disagreeing with you, but want to clear up what it means to make cloud storage, or any type of server storage, secure and inaccesible from court orders:
In the case of dropbox, data is stored encrypted, but the server software holds the encryption keys so it can serve the data to clients unencrypted. This means subpeanas and other legal/law enforcement actions can access the data by going to the server operators, who likely will not challenge the order.
If you instead encrypt the data client side before you send it to the server, then everyone who accesses the data must also have the key.
What if you want to revoke access for one person? You have to download the data client side, decrypt/re-encrypt with a new key, reupload, provide key to remaining sharers. So this technique only really works for data that you do not share, i.e. just your personal stuff, and is essentially what people do now when they encrypt data before uploading it to dropbox.
Asymmetric techniques don't really apply here unless you're only sharing with one party. You combined your private key and their public key to encrypt the data, then only they can decrypt it. This does not work when dealing with 3 or more parties, unless some are going to share the same key for one side of the asymmetric encryption, in which case you're back to the same problem we had with sharing a symmetric key.
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You're assuming it is either/or.
You have per client access rules and passively encrypt everything. What is more, the encryption keys can be held on office thin clients that transparently download the decryption engine and keys from an onsite server which likewise can serve both to remote users as part of their login script.
Non-technical people won't even know it is happening. Technical people will of course. If you want to keep things just a bit more secure, you can have remote clients RDP into a Terminal s
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"What is more, the encryption keys can be held on office thin clients that transparently download the decryption engine and keys from an onsite server which likewise can serve both to remote users as part of their login script."
This would be a great architecture for a business when talking only about accessing data that is shared among employees.
However, if they want to share certain files with another business to remotely access the encrypted data, then you have to also share the encryption key to support
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Not really, if you want to give another company access to your data, are you intending to give them total access to ALL your data or specific access to specific files?
If only specific files, then simply decrypt those and host them separately with either a key you are willing to share or no key at all.
This is not rocket science.
As to individuals sharing with other individuals... same thing. Decrypt, host separately... done.
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Someone could probably make a business of exactly the architecture you describe, providing a small onsite appliance that does this orchestration. So you use their cloud storage solution, and they provide an architecture that guarantees only your onsite appliance has the keys capable of decrypting the data.
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If you want to sell people an appliance they don't need.... sure. You could host something like this on pretty much anything. Grab a raspberry pi for whatever they're selling for now... or one of their more powerful competitors that are about the same price... and that is all you need. Or simply host the files on a file server that is already resident on your network. Pretty much any office network is going to have a file server of some description. Any of them can handle this operation. The work of bringin
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Why not use the protocol that PGP uses? The data is encrypted with one symmetric key that is unique to each packet or archive. Then copies of that symmetric key are encrypted with each party's public key. So, the sender sends to nine others, there are ten public keys attached that can decrypt the data's volume key, assuming the sender wants to retain the ability to read the contents.
The hard part is making sure the keys belong to the right people. However, this isn't that difficult. That is what keysig
Re:PRIVATE encryption of everything just became... (Score:5, Insightful)
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So you too have reading comprehension issues? Listen, idiots... I have no problem with people disagreeing with me. Disagree all day and I'll be just fine with it. But fail to read my post and then respond to your illiterate interpretation of my posts and I'm going to call you on your illiteracy.
Take you for example. You are apparently under the impression that I "flew off the handle" because someone disagreed with me. Which is clearly idiotic since it is quite clear that I flew off the handle because the mo
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>In the case of AES relies solely that combining 256 random bits with 256 non random bits
In the case of AES relies solely that combining 128, 192 or 256 random bits with 128 non random bits
There, fixed that for you.
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Thanks TechyImmigrant! Lost track of the block size for a moment. Over the last three years, I've been developing a block cypher. I was surprised to see that AES sole security is XORing the key with mono-substitution translations of the plain text. The 128 bit version can be broken on my laptop...
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>The 128 bit version can be broken on my laptop...
That's rather exciting. How does the attack work?
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It doesn't. As far as I can tell from his vague description of XOR'ing "random bits" with "nonrandom bits", he's talking about a very specific mode of using AES, which is OFB or CTR. In both cases it is clearly documented that reusing the key stream would destroy security. As long as you follow the specification for these modes it is secure.
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You forgot N number of hashings. For added delight, pass it over again with another key. Or do it several times, so long as you remember your sequence. Forgot it? Oh dear.
Re:PRIVATE encryption of everything just became... (Score:5, Informative)
There is no illegal encryption — not in the US. You can use anything you can get your hands on.
Now, getting your hands on something, the NSA can't break, may be difficult — because they have sabotaged efforts to develop strong crypto [techdirt.com]. But not because it is illegal.
That said, the existing freely available software — including OpenSSL — can be used properly to defeat would-be spooks. We know [washingtonmonthly.com] this — and the observation is confirmed by occasional stories on how the government leans on companies to reveal the private keys [cnet.com]. If they could break the encryption itself, they wouldn't be demanding keys...
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No, that's what happened. And when you don't have that random plane, you let your friends and allies die.
Or give up the only weapon you have that is working, when your ships and planes and soldiers are losing. That's how you lose a war.
I'm just glad I wasn't one of those 20 people. Dang. Because they did a good job, I don't have to know what that feels like.
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Incorrect. The NSA/NIST produce official, standardized versions of crypto libraries (which is a good thing because there are a lot of people who are clueless about the math principles behind crypto, and would use something braindead like ECB, or if hashing passwords, not bother with a salt.)
In the early 1990s, there was the Clipper chip that would have Skipjack loaded onto it on a secure site. This was something cryptographers were worried about because once that chip became common, the other shoe would d
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Don't worry, the encryption problem will be handled by the Terrorist Encryption Prevention Act. Since we all* know that only terrorists use encryption, obviously banning it or allowing law enforcement backdoors is the sensible thing to do.
* Where "we all know" should be read as "Congress members know".
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Never going to happen. The banks at the very least wouldn't allow it.
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Except for they won't because the whole financial system would instantly collapse.
come on... think a few moves ahead.
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Today on CNN, the commentators after the Brennan press conference said that the CIA was correct in saying that no non-bad-guys were killed by drone strikes. That's because the CIA redefined bad-guys to be any human of fighting age (13-60). So, that means that Grandma and your kid brother are free to use encryption, because they definitely aren't terrorists. They get to keep their shoes on at the airport, so there you go!
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Children below 13 were killed by drone strikes, too.
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Obligatory http://xkcd.com/538/ [xkcd.com]
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Sure, but they're not going to beat me with a wrench without a warrant.
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Sure, but they're not going to beat me with a wrench without a warrant.
They'll do that and much more. Haven you been living in a cave (like a terrorist)?
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Seriously, what is the NSA going to do when the consequences of their arrogance propagate fully through our information culture?
One thing they'll do is get their oligarch friends to deny services to people who use encryption to keep the government from knowing their identities, like they've been doing with banks and TOR [slashdot.org], by implying that people who use privacy protecting encryption are criminals.
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Go look back at the bill, start at page 22.
Observe that unencrypted communications can be retained for five years. But any encrypted communications can be kept indefinitely.
Also note that the law doesn't say anything about who enciphered it nor about if they are able to decipher it. If it was encrypted at any point along the journey it qualifies for unlimited retention.
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Not at all. I can think of several types of encryption that are not decipherable in any reasonable amount of time or with any reasonable amount of computing power. Even accounting for moore's law there are some very strong encryption methods that render the data so hard to decrypt that it is worthless to anyone without the key.
I even know of at least one that is literally impossible to decrypt. Like... you would need to be literally god and able to bend reality around your finger to break it.
Look, you don't
Over to you, SCOTUS (Score:5, Insightful)
If you do not declare this unconstitutional, immediately and unambiguously, then you have failed The People.
Your credibility is already hanging by a hair.
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The same SCOTUS that just said your employer can order you to do 25 minutes of security checks without compensation? The copyright extension SCOTUS? The fascism rubber-stampers in black robes? Good-luck.
Re:Over to you, SCOTUS (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Over to you, SCOTUS (Score:4, Insightful)
While I disagree with the 25-minute screenings, I'm not paid for walking through security, taking the elevator and logging into my workstation either.
SCOTUS merely maintained what was already in the Portal to Portal act: that things relevant to the job itself (e.g. butchers sharpening their knives) got paid, and that security searches were analog to time spent driving to work or taking the a long flight of stairs to your office.
Integrity Staffing Solutions, Inc. are, unquestionably, a bunch of shit-bags who should move the time-clocks to the other side of the sometimes up-to 25 minute screening machines, but it's not exactly like SCOTUS is out to screw people on this one. Someone in risk management there realized that they'd still be more profitable with the tiny bit of bad press and some legal fees than to pay overtime.
Eat a bag of dicks Integrity Staffing Solutions, Inc. -- but I don't blame SCOTUS.
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Oh. I will blame SCOTUS.
This isn't something that's an inherent part of getting to work. This is an extra burden specifically put in place by the employer. It is a REQUIREMENT demanded of employees. It doesn't matter if it is "relevant" to the job or not.
If your employer says you have to stand on one leg for 25 minutes before and after a shift, that's time that they owe you in compensation. They are stealing your time and the gatekeepers are allowing it.
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Then blame the SCOTUS of 1974, who already decided this case.
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He doesn't have to for it to become law anyways, 325-100 is a veto-proof margin.
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But he controls NSA. He tells them what to do and what not to do. Hell, a President (Truman) created NSA without any say-so from Congress. That's why they call him the Chief Executive. Congress could arguably ban the NSA completely, but in the absence of something it will never do, its participation in setting up the NSA was never required, and its participation in the NSA's continuing existence is not required now.
As for the Supreme Court, how many legions of law enforcement and, in the ultimate rubber-mee
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He wouldn't have voteoed it regardless of the margin. He's basically Dubya II.
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It is a Republican, who is raising awareness [infowars.com] of this issue today — you didn't see it on New York Times' front page, did you?
Re:Over to you, SCOTUS (Score:5, Informative)
Vote was reasonably even across party lines.
https://www.govtrack.us/congre... [govtrack.us]
71% of (D) voted for it.
80% or (R) voted for it.
9 congresscritters didn't vote, split 5(D), 4(R).
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Plenty of contemporaries said that the Patriot Act would to lead all the things it has. That you're ignorant of them does not mean they didn't exist. The ACLU was all over trying to fight against it due to all its onerous provisions. Michael Moore, love him or hate him, was all over it at the time in his film Fahrenheit 9/11. But at the time many of these criticisms were shot down as being overreactions.
That's not how it works (Score:5, Informative)
The court can't just jump up and say "We don't like that, it goes out." They have to follow procedure which means a challenge has to appear in front of them. That challenge can also only be brought by someone with standing, meaning that this law had a negative impact on you somehow.
That's one of the reasons the government loves the secret gathering so much, makes it harder for it to get challenged. If you can't show this harmed you, then you can't fight it in court.
So someone has to be impacted by this, challenge it, and it has to be appealed up to the SC. Then and only then do they rule on it.
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Still looking for a political solution? Look for the silver lining... if everyone KNOWS that the government is mining your communications for whatever ends they see fit, then that's all the more reason to apply technical solutions to the problem. We've been trying forever to get people to start encrypting their emails and stuff, this might be the thing that finally gets everyone to accept real technological measures for achieving encryption and anonymization on the internet.
I, for one, am kinda glad that
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Actually, the SCOTUS isn't the final arbiter, the people are. The DoI clearly sets forth a framework where tyrannical government can be overthrown.
I define Tyranny as any government serving its own interest (the interest of the Government itself) over that of the people. Yes, we have an elected tyranny, not because of the elected officials (which we change) , but because the bureaucracy that powers the real "government" isn't elected.
This is the police state that serves itself.
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The Declaration of Independence is an apologia in the true and noble sense of the word, but it does not convey any legal framework. The Constitution does that. So yes, the people are the source of power and the recourse when the government has gone rogue, but note well that they then act extra-Constitutionally and absent any legal foundation - just as the agents of the Revolution did. And they are subject to perfectly legal prosecution for treason - just as the agents of the Revolution were. It takes a hell
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Well, wrong. They don't follow the prescribed laws because doing so doesn't serve their goals. The not following the prescribed laws are a result of serving their own interests over the people. One can follow prescribed set of laws and still not serve the people (and thus be tyranny).
AND I didn't say "will of the people" I said self (government's own) interest over the people.
Lastly, we are in a place of illusion of a representative republic. Illusion, because the reality is, the Bureaucracy rules the peopl
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To quote TFA:
"Hidden in the law is âoea troubling new provision that for the first time statutorily authorizes spying on U.S. citizens without legal process,â Amash told other lawmakers. That provision allows âoethe acquisition, retention, and disseminationâ of Americansâ(TM) communications without a court order or subpoena."
I really hope someone can tell me that isn't as bad or as pervasive as that sounds. I wasn't surprised the USA Freedom Act didn't pass, but I didn't think we we
Ok Justin (Score:5, Insightful)
I have actually met this guy in person, I have nothing against him, but holy shit. Before he actually cared and I would have backed him up 100% opposing this without question. But he seems to have gone for the republican kool aid and somehow wants to blame this on.... the executive branch.
Look man, the executive branch doesn't make laws and the law enforcement agencies that report to it already had this power. This is congress who isn't part of the executive branch passing the law. Don't go in there a decent guy and come out a soulless husk spewing what you hear on Fox News. Don't try to shift blame on that 'Obama' fictional character everyone seems to want to. You're better than that.
Re:Ok Justin (Score:4, Informative)
and the law enforcement agencies that report to it already had this power.
The summary is wrong. The unlimited, open-ended collection powers enacted by EO12333 only apply to government employees and employees of contractors subject to background investigation for national security reasons.
Re: Ok Justin (Score:2)
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Obligatory:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
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That's certainly the mainstream media's "narrative", but:
"I just took an action to change the law," said President Obama to amnesty hecklers, describing his recent executive ruling on amnesty non-enforcement as a change to the law in his own words, constitutional scholar that he is.
Congressman Amash’s letter sent to Colleague (Score:5, Informative)
Dear Colleague:
The intelligence reauthorization bill, which the House will vote on today, contains a troubling new provision that for the first time statutorily authorizes spying on U.S. citizens without legal process.
Last night, the Senate passed an amended version of the intelligence reauthorization bill with a new Sec. 309—one the House never has considered. Sec. 309 authorizes “the acquisition, retention, and dissemination” of nonpublic communications, including those to and from U.S. persons. The section contemplates that those private communications of Americans, obtained without a court order, may be transferred to domestic law enforcement for criminal investigations.
To be clear, Sec. 309 provides the first statutory authority for the acquisition, retention, and dissemination of U.S. persons’ private communications obtained without legal process such as a court order or a subpoena. The administration currently may conduct such surveillance under a claim of executive authority, such as E.O. 12333. However, Congress never has approved of using executive authority in that way to capture and use Americans’ private telephone records, electronic communications, or cloud data.
Supporters of Sec. 309 claim that the provision actually reins in the executive branch’s power to retain Americans’ private communications. It is true that Sec. 309 includes exceedingly weak limits on the executive’s retention of Americans’ communications. With many exceptions, the provision requires the executive to dispose of Americans’ communications within five years of acquiring them—although, as HPSCI admits, the executive branch already follows procedures along these lines.
In exchange for the data retention requirements that the executive already follows, Sec. 309 provides a novel statutory basis for the executive branch’s capture and use of Americans’ private communications. The Senate inserted the provision into the intelligence reauthorization bill late last night. That is no way for Congress to address the sensitive, private information of our constituents—especially when we are asked to expand our government’s surveillance powers.
I urge you to join me in voting “no” on H.R. 4681, the intelligence reauthorization bill, when it comes before the House today. /s/
Justin Amash
Member of Congress
Re:Congressman Amash’s letter sent to Collea (Score:5, Interesting)
Thank you for posting the bill number, since neither slashdot nor the hill thought we should be able to look it up and see who voted for this bullshit [govtrack.us].
It appears in the Senate it was passed by voice vote [govtrack.us] by a bunch of cowards that did not want their name attached to the bill.
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My Tea Party representative voted against the bill, although I cannot be sure why. In the past he has supported civil forfeiture. I made a point of writing him a thank you note to balance my previous rap on the knuckles. My thank you noted my assumption that his vote was in support of Amash.
OTOH, my state's only Democrat voted yea.
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I hope that most of the congress voted in favor of this out of ignorance. It appears to have passed through both the house and senate under the guise of a routine reauthorization of existing process.
My hope is that the statutory authorization of warrantless wiretapping was surreptitiously added in the hope that no one would notice. Much like the banking giveaway, the massive increase in individual campaign donations, and the de-legalization of marijuana in DC have been added to the big spending bill. I s
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Ban the fucking voice vote, goddammit. It's only a rule of the Senate that allows it. The term does not occur in the Constitution.
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At least there's no pretense here... (Score:5, Insightful)
Sid Meier is a time traveler (Score:5, Insightful)
I get to break this out again:
As the Americans learned so painfully in Earth's final century, free flow of information is the only safeguard against tyranny. The once-chained people whose leaders at last lose their grip on information flow will soon burst with freedom and vitality, but the free nation gradually constricting its grip on public discourse has begun its rapid slide into despotism. Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master.
Commissioner Pravin Lal, "U.N. Declaration of Rights"
Accompanies the Secret Project "The Planetary Datalinks"
Re:Brian Reynolds is a time traveler (Score:2)
Unfortunately for us, it's not just denying access to information, but mandating access to our own information. What has yet to be tested is what legally happens when you generate a random file and send it to someone. If asked, how can you prove it's not an encrypted file? There is no key that can be used to unlock it!
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In the UK that could get you an infinite prison sentence.
You can be locked up for 2 years for not revealing an encrption key.
Then another 2 years if you don't reveal it after that.
Ad infinitum.
Everyone who blamed Bush for everything... (Score:5, Insightful)
Obama is just as bad... that doesn't excuse Bush from his errors, and he had many...
But frankly, if Obama doesn't Veto this, then he is the same scum of the Earth and frankly both sides need to be tossed out on their bums...
Voting third party may not bring in "better", but it will at least do SOMETHING different than the Repubs and Dems who are different sides of the same coin...
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Unfortunately the vast majority people do not think (or vote) rationally when it comes to politics. The same people that hated Bush and ridiculed him will continue to love Obama and rationalize a reason to support policies they previously despised. People who loved Bush will rationalize ways to hate Obama for the exact same policies that they loved under Bush. I have given in to the fact this will not change. Allegiance to political party is similar to sports teams i.e. Caroline fans hate Duke no matter wha
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But frankly, if Obama doesn't Veto this, then he is the same scum of the Earth and frankly both sides need to be tossed out on their bums...
It doesn't matter, he can't veto it. 325-100 is a veto-proof passage.
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It doesn't matter, he can't veto it. 325-100 is a veto-proof passage.
My understanding is that he can. Congress could then override the veto with a 2/3 majority of both the House and the Senate, but at least the President would be on record that he refused to approve the bill.
Citizen Private Interconnected Mesh Networks (Score:2)
That's the solution create an interconnected web of wlan and lan routes - also long ranges - freenet has some nice routing algorithms, and tons of encryption, now it just must be ported away from java.
It won't be that fast, but I think fast enough.
Cutting through the alarmist deceptive stuff. (Score:4, Insightful)
In other words, the only issue he has with this bill is that it acknowledges an Executive Order is in place. It doesn't even particularly bless it. Nothing is changing other than a slightly-less tacet approval of an order that has been around for decades. It's not a terribly long bill, check it out yourself [congress.gov]
When everything you say or do (Score:3)
When everything you say or do is recorded by the authorities, do you really want to be part of that world?
Resistance is futile (Score:2)
Executive orders aren't "bigger on the inside." (Score:2)
Neither the constitution, nor the laws bound by it, nor the orders bound by the law are "bigger on the inside"... They're not TARDISes. They may not exceed their legal limits.
Laws must not exceed the authority routed to them by the constitution. Orders must not exceed the authority routed to them by law. That's how the system is designed.
Wow (Score:2)
Congress just declared war on America,,,,
Glad to see this pushed through (Score:5, Informative)
So they can't settle on a decent healthcare system for us, but when it comes to spying on us... push it right through!
Who voted "YEA" to this crap? (Score:4, Informative)
https://www.govtrack.us/congre... [govtrack.us]
If your congressman voted YEA and you don't agree, write to him/her.
They are representing you.
Offensively arrogant (Score:3)
We really do have to throw them all out...
Holy fuck.... (Score:3)
What part of
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, 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.
does Congress not understand?
I wish I had a deeper, more meaningful response... (Score:4, Insightful)
But fuck these assholes. Fuck all of them; every one of them who voted for this shit. Fuck them regardless of their party or their stances on other issues, or their charity work, or their stupid kids, or their veteran status. Fuck 'em. Burn in Hell you pieces of shit.
Re: (Score:2)
Still there prioritizing free will and not making people automatons despite what many of them do with it.
I do find this a strange argument from a practical perspective, though. An existing God with afterlife consequences is the one and only thing that could make these people accountable. You certainly won't be changing anything.
Re: (Score:2)
U+1F4A9
Re: (Score:2)
Fox News watchers - are they at least bitching about this? I mean if there is anything to pick on Democrats for it is THIS. No, they are going to bitch about Festivus poles or some such nonsense, aren't they. For profit propaganda is what we have for a media in this country.
There's a lot of bitching right now on the blogging dextrosphere about the shit the lame duck congress is pulling, especially about departing Republicans being dicks (the Dems at least are gaming the system in a predictable and understandable way, but the GOP has no excuse here, as you point out).
Re: (Score:2)
It's gonna be abused.
The Republicans are absolutely certain they're going to win it in 2016 so it will be them who get to abuse it.
Big Government is only bad when Republicans aren't in control.
Re: (Score:2)
Most lead such "dull" lives, they foolishly assume this will have no effect on them.
Too bad the government once again makes the nutjob "militias" and similar groups look like oracles...