Comments (74)

parrot wrote on November 7, 2007 6:17 PM:

And the question is...why were they domestically spying? Was it so they could get blackmail leverage on politicians in the United States? Was it so they could identify groups of people who would oppose suspension of the U.S. Constitution? Or was it so they could determine which companies could be intimidated and money extorted from them? It's a very interesting question and deserves to be explored in depth...and legal penalties applied to those who have abuse the law and our country by asserting that exercising raw power is more important than ruling wisely and with respect for the ruled.

iVoted4Nader wrote on November 7, 2007 6:30 PM:

Kerry/Edwards Election; you poor bastards, they were watchin' yer every move.

FMArouet wrote on November 7, 2007 6:34 PM:

Parrot asks the key question.

Here are a few questions which may help lead us to the answer:

What private, political, or corporate contractors were given access to the vacuumed communications and databases in order to conduct data-mining and link analysis? Was Booz Allen Hamilton, DNI Mike McConnell's former employer, one of them?

What goals did these contractors pursue, and what were the results of their efforts?

Did the Bush Administration harbor electronic "plumbers" to scrutinize political opponents? Did the Republican Party have special access to any such vacuumed data?

Bill W wrote on November 7, 2007 6:35 PM:

Wiretap Whistle-Blower's Account

... One of the documents listed the equipment installed in the secret room, and this list included a Narus STA 6400, which is a "Semantic Traffic Analyzer". ...
wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2006/04/70621

take a look at what Forbes had to say about Narus in 1999:

Forbes: Narus knows what you are doing on the network
forbes.com/1999/08/11/feat.html

mo2 wrote on November 7, 2007 6:36 PM:

Did the FBI have the goods on the airplane hijacking terrorists of 9-11 to prevent the attacks, and then did they fail to get a FISA warrant because they knew their goods were illegally obtained?

How responsible is the OVP's dabbling in NSA and FBI work for allowing 9-11 to occur?

noshrub wrote on November 7, 2007 6:59 PM:

Homosexual terrorists in San Francisco are one of this country's biggest threats.

Kahoneez wrote on November 7, 2007 7:00 PM:

My non collage butt tells me it's to get info on EVERYBODY and EVERY group that they can use against ANYBODY , by a certain few and one being Cheney & other intelligence services . This is a part of a massive data information collection agenda to use whatever they have any way they want and the complicit media isn't saying a WORD.
Contact CNN that professes to " keeping them honest " and let them know we ain't going to take their complicity and cover up , that's leading to the erosion of our civil liberties .
This crap ain't going to stand , if we get off our collective butts and DO SOMETHING about it .

Remove Speaker wrote on November 7, 2007 7:00 PM:

Klein's allegations need a full airing in an impeachment investigations. Based on these revelations, there is no reason not to impeach; nor any reason not to have a fully, open investigation of these 4th Amendment violations and FISA violations. Hit the link -- "Remove Speaker" above -- to learn about an effort underway to lawfully remove one impediments to an impeachment investigation of Klein's allegations: Removing Pelosi as Speaker.

Bill W wrote on November 7, 2007 7:02 PM:

Klein was on NPR's All things Considered today

AT&T Wiretap Whistleblower Fights Senate Deal
npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=16088947

Anonymous wrote on November 7, 2007 7:09 PM:

Why would they spy on Democrats? They didn't control anything.

They were spying on their own party and on journalists.

Bill W wrote on November 7, 2007 7:27 PM:

Anonymous wrote:
"Why would they spy on Democrats? They didn't control anything.
They were spying on their own party and on journalists."

Maybe they were spying on journalists and Democrats.

Did Bush wiretap CNN's Christiane Amanpour?
americablog.com/2006/01/did-bush-wiretap-cnns-christiane.html

CNN covers Amanpour spy story
americablog.com/2006/01/cnn-covers-amanpour-spy-story.html

Amanpour's husband, Jamie Rubin, was a former Clinton State Department official who was also a foreign policy advisor to John Kerry during his 2004 campaign.

Pangloss wrote on November 7, 2007 7:32 PM:

NSA goons hoovering up terabytes of email, webbrowsing and telephone communication data in California for the GOP, huh? Who knows what kind of compromising info they scooped up on all kinds of politicians and set aside for later use, to leverage pols into positions that favor the Bush junta? Where does DiFi live, again? Did they have one of these hoovering operations in NYC too?

This is the best of all possible worlds, isn't it?

Bill W wrote on November 7, 2007 7:40 PM:

Pangloss wrote:
"Did they have one of these hoovering operations in NYC too?"

Wiretap Whistle-Blower's Account
"... I learned that other such "splitter" cabinets were being installed in other cities, including Seattle, San Jose, Los Angeles and San Diego. ..."
wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2006/04/70621

"Salon exclusive: Two former AT&T employees say the telecom giant has maintained a secret, highly secure room in St. Louis since 2002. Intelligence experts say it bears the earmarks of a National Security Agency operation."
salon.com/news/feature/2006/06/21/att_nsa/index_np.html

And presumably everywhere else too.

mkolb wrote on November 7, 2007 7:43 PM:

Sometimes it is so hard not to be a conspiracy theorist!

Chris C wrote on November 7, 2007 7:52 PM:

I am as outraged as anyone about what in God's name the feds were doing tapping into private information. Rather than speculate about who or what the target(s)were, the focus needs to remain on fighting telecom immunity, because without blocking that measure, all we'll have is massive conspiracy theory and no fact. Contact your representatives, your local media outlets--anywhere where someone will sit up and notice. If this gross violation of multiple laws stands, then every privacy law enacted anywhere in this country is worthless. Is that enough reason to act?

Anonymous wrote on November 7, 2007 8:02 PM:

The retroactive immunity isn’t for the telecoms…

It’s for Bush and Cheney!

DickTater wrote on November 7, 2007 8:11 PM:

Remember folks, this isn't just real-time snooping. They KEPT the data. For use later. You get caught up in a sweep, they go back and troll thru the data to see what else they can get you with. Here is something else to think about....a lot of your internet traffic and browsing and hosting and email stuff crosses borders. Just checking your email (depending on where it is hosted) is technically INTERNAATIIONAL traffic...so they can behave like youare an international actor when you never left home or really contacted a foreigner.

I also agree that they snooped on everyone...regardless of party. They need dirt and this admin has twisted more arms than Stalin, on both sides of the aisle.

grossvogel wrote on November 7, 2007 8:18 PM:

Somebody should attach an ammendment that requires a full bipartisan investigation seeking to find out who ordered the splitters installed (and under whose authority), where and whether this data is stored, and who has access. Let the telcos go for now, and go after the people who leaned on them to get this stuff installed. All the way to the top.

Bob wrote on November 7, 2007 8:42 PM:

If Congress had any balls, they'd instead pass a law getting rid of the state secrets privilege. If lying White House political operatives can be trusted with intelligence information, then so can federal judges. A secret is 100 times safer in a secret court than with a neocon political hack leaker who gives CIA Agents names over to America's enemies for political gain.

Let me Guess wrote on November 7, 2007 8:43 PM:

grossvogel: "investigation seeking to find out who ordered..."

Not cheney?

john mccutchen wrote on November 7, 2007 8:54 PM:

Relative paucity of national media in SF

True. The SF Comical is well..just that

But where do you think Sen Feinstein of the Senate Select Committee on Intel comes from..to our great sorrow

Aredubya wrote on November 7, 2007 9:00 PM:

"Its very location in San Francisco suggests that the program was "massively domestic" in its focus, he said. "If they really meant what they say about only wanting international stuff, you wouldn't want it in San Francisco or Atlanta. You'd want to be closer to the border where the lines come in from the ocean so you pick up international calls. You only do it in San Francisco if you want domestic stuff. The location of this stuff contradicts their story.""

I do have to take issue with this aspect of Mr. Klein's story, depending on exactly what was (allegedly) being tapped. The Bay Area is home to some of the largest exchanges of Internet traffic, including PAIX (the Palo Alto Internet eXchange). From my days working in the ISP field, I recall that China Telecom passed a huge amount of its U.S. traffic via links (paid links to ISPs, and public exchanges at PAIX) in San Francisco and LA. As such, it would make perfect sense to tap those lines for spying on traffic to and from international systems.

That all said, the entire concept makes me sick to my stomach. With physically mirrored splitters as described (and sufficient storage), it would be trivial to track traffic of interest. It would also be massively illegal. The telcos had to have known this, and they put their capabilities behind this anyhow. They, and the government representatives who pushed them into it, must be held accountable.

That said,

just joe wrote on November 7, 2007 9:22 PM:

Whoa..."government representatives who pushed them into it.."??? The telecoms did this for lucrative contracts, they were bribed into it the same way they are now bribing congress to not hold them accountable for breaking the law. They came to do it licking their lips at the money they stood to gain...and did gain as a result of breaking the law. Senator Jay Rockefeller's donation account has grow huge over the last year as he and Cheney plotted how to get amnesty for the telecoms. The telecoms are paying them off.
Why don't they just go ahead and grant immunity to all corporations everywhere for any lawbreaking they might have done or are doing as long as they can claim it was for the good of the country. Fuck the rule of law, congress is deciding the rule of law now based on how much they get paid.

Ron England wrote on November 7, 2007 9:59 PM:

Why not pass laws that give the technician the legal immunity if they expose the shit the government and the corporations have done?

As to which corporations were given the data to analyze it has been public for years that it was the same GOP corporations involved with the voter suspression and voter pruge used in Florida and Ohio.

The same corporations that does the GOP direct mailing lists. They are the ones with the expertise and are the GOP source of data generation against Americans for tuning their messages to extract money of each specific group the GOP can identify.

libra wrote on November 7, 2007 10:18 PM:

When marshal law clamped on Poland (Dec 13, 1981), the hundreds (maybe thousands) of people who were swept off into detention camps were not swept off the streets; the secret police had all the names and addresses and charges *ready* and they came to people's homes (in once case I knew personally, they even called grandma to come and get her 10yr old grandson, because both parents were arrested).

When Musharraf nailed hundreds of lawyers, most of them were not nailed in street protests, either; they were taken from their homes; the lists were ready and waiting for the right moment.

And y'all are still wondering why Bush malAdministration might want all that secretly-acquired info and what they need it for???

There's nothing new under the sun... Go watch "Other People's Lives" (Germany,'06). Go watch "Black Book" (Netherlands, '06). Whenever a government gathers info about its citizens, unbeknownst to them, it's never, ever for a benevolent reason...

Kent Mueller wrote on November 7, 2007 10:42 PM:

There are a lot of factors running together here.
Not the least of which is that if the NSA can do it they will. They love their toys. They do it for the same reason household pets lick themselves, because they can.

For the most part all of this was about data-mining. We are after all a nation of 300 million potential terrorists, it is in every sense, us they fear, not readers of TPM merely, but every single American who doesn't work in the intelligence bureaucracy or it's many sub-contractors, and probably them too. Somebody wants to know how everyone knows everyone else.

The FBI, for all its faults, has apparently stopped mining info beyond the first or second level of contact, but not the NSA or who knows what other agencies. So if the brother of your friend's friend, or mere acquiantance, is a suspected terrorist, so are you.

It certainly helps them that at least a third of Americans think there is a terrorist, if not under their bed, then working at their convenience store or gas station. After all, they look different.

None of this was JUST for the Bush Administration's political benefit, but individuals could be targeted for political reasons and the personnel doing the actual work wouldn't necessarily have any idea, thanks to compartmentalization and the need to know. Unless the name was politically prominent, even then, they're just doing their jobs, trying to keep the boss happy and going home at the end of the day. They're used to not asking questions.

Thanks to Mark Klein and others like him, we may yet return to sanity. I'm not holding out great hope. Even if the telecoms don't get immunity, you know this will be a quickly forgotten lesson for them and the Gov. and end up with a class settlement that enriches lawyers on both sides and results in a one-time penalty of like 32 cents off a month's phone bill and maybe something similar off the federal tax on same.

It was nice country. It showed a lot of promise. Damned shame it feared itself.

john nihau wrote on November 7, 2007 11:10 PM:

stay tuned, watch the democrats roll over and play dead for dick cheney again.
ten dollars says the telcos get immunity.
with that ten dollars i will buy two gallons of gas next year.

the country is lost. democrats will not save it. it is too late.

PPark wrote on November 7, 2007 11:48 PM:

Hmmm. Short memories. The administration's desire to collection this kind of information has already been expressed. Does AIO (Awareness Information Office), John Poindexter, and TIA (Total Information Awareness) ring any bells?

workaday joe wrote on November 7, 2007 11:49 PM:

Klein said: "[You] wouldn't want it in San Francisco or Atlanta. You'd want to be closer to the border where the lines come in from the ocean so you pick up international calls."

uhh, how do you get closer to the ocean than San Francisco? He may want to clarify this statement before going much further.

Anonymous wrote on November 7, 2007 11:51 PM:

When will Congress get an NSA-like-method to monitor the President?

Roberta wrote on November 8, 2007 12:00 AM:

I followed the Forbes link Bill W put in at 6:35 PM, and here's how the abilities of some of the hardware/software on Folsom Street are described:

"For example, if someone in San Francisco makes a video conference call to New York and London, the probe captures the exact length of the call and then sends a log file, also known as a call data record (CDR) back to the database, which is housed on Narus' servers. The CDR is then used for billing purposes.

"Want to know what Narus software can do? It can find out how much time you spent on the network, how many E-mails you sent, how long you played online video games, how many files you uploaded or downloaded and what web sites you accessed."
From "Narus knows what you are doing on the network" by Om Malik, Forbes.com 08.11.99.

Does this sound bad enough? It's an outrage.

Well, with apologies to all those folks who engaged in the debate about "Anonymous" last summer and claimed that IP addresses could not be tracked through emails as Anonymous asserted, does what Anonymous posited really sound so outrageous now? I quote from May 16, 2007:

"However, there is a separate line of evidence that is public: Common IP numbers are linked PUBLICLY to the other websites that were used to transfer information, meet in cyberspace, and use instant messaging systems. ...

"Again, the issue isn't just e-mail, but to find the URLs in cyberspace where personnel were meeting; and identify the open source information showing which URL and websites -- outside White House control -- these DOJ and EOP IP numbers are linked, connected, and exchanging information. These IP numbers can give you an idea of their expertise, types of communications being used, and comments on the non-official communications methods including instant messaging that are linked not only to DOJ and the White House, but also the NSA in re FISA and prisoner abuse issues."

Maybe where Anonymous works is not in the government or a law office; maybe he works at one of those telecom nodes. If you can get detailed information about all the Websites someone's visited and the number of emails you've sent and received, the information about who received them from and sent them to you seems not to be so far-fetched. Maybe he knows (is?) Mr. Klein.

melior wrote on November 8, 2007 12:01 AM:

These crimes are ongoing. Why the persistent convention of referring to them in the past tense? I have never read that the massive database that was built from this entire message stream has been destroyed. It may still be being fed at right now, by these posts.

To this day we have only the historically counterfeit assurances of Bushco that no one in the administration ever uses it except to snoop on Teh Terrorists.

Who knows how many terminals and login names are still able to access the data today? It's not even a stretch to speculate that one of them may be sitting on a desk in America's most famous undisclosed location.

Will the neocons get whiplash when they begin to imagine one on First Husband Bill Clinton's desk?

mountain biker wrote on November 8, 2007 12:57 AM:

I just sent the following message to my conservative senators and representative:

I am conflicted concerning retroactive immunity for the telecommunications companies. On one hand, I want to know how far the Bush administration illegally tapped into the communications of private citizens. On the other hand, when Hillary is President, her administration needs to know everything you say, public and private? Don’t you agree that turn-about is fair play? Wake up!

chabuka wrote on November 8, 2007 2:05 AM:

I have suspected for some time..that some of this survellience has been the cause of "authorization not given" use of telephone and credit card charges..you get a bogus charge on your phone bill, your cell-phone or your credit card..just try and track it down!...although some of the providers will actually "stop" the charges once you have discovered a bogus charge, and complain, (for something you never signed up for in the first place) some one collects that one or two month charge before you find it (on your bill) and stop it....must be thousands of unsuspecting people paying out at least a one month charge, before you can cancel. Its happened to me at least three to four times ayear

Me_again wrote on November 8, 2007 4:46 AM:

Well here it is, the proof that Bush violate the US Constitution, with intent to do so.

The Senate Judiciary Committee will vote on the surveillance bill tomorrow.

And don't you know that the Dem Party knows this without Mr. Klein ever having said a word. The Dems know this, and DID know it for sometime. Bush was doing all of this BEFORE 9/11 and now the Dems know this too.

And we also know that just enough Dems will support retroactive immunity for the telecommunications ANYWAY, knowing how illegal this whole wiretapping business was been and still IS to this day.

Just exactly the same way the Sens. Charles Schumer and Dianne Feinstein help Bush keep right waterboard people, keep it secret and acceptable.

AND you can bet that once again TMP won't have a problem with this act by the Democrats, not anymore of a problem than Josh and his partisan news group had when Sen. Feinstein and Schumer sign right on to Bush's waterboard methods to anyone Bush considers an enemy combatant, be that person nothing more than a Mideast journalist.

Sen. Feinstein and Schumer should never had been allowed to retroactive give immunity to Bush's waterboarding tatics BUT THEY DID, and TMP didn't care either, didn't say a single defensive word about it.

Bush is doing criminal acts and we witnessed Republicans help Bush do them. BUT NOW we are seeing Dems helping the Bush adminstration keep right on doing illegal acts. Nader was right, there is NO difference between Republicans and Democrats.

Jalmari wrote on November 8, 2007 5:45 AM:

The Internet originated with government; one should assume the military has always had the means to intercept everything.

The qualification of only listening to "international" traffic is meaningless. With no oversight or accountability, even in hindsight, there's nothing to stop AT&T from reading Sprint's email. There's nothing to stop them from routing a target's email traffic through Tijuana or planting an overseas tracking cookie on the target's web page, rendering it "fair game" for interception.

If AT&T's defense is going to be that they obeyed orders from the government, fine. Let them make that assertion and prove it.

ed wrote on November 8, 2007 7:17 AM:

Off with their heads! No, really! Take all these turds out back and shoot them as a warning to any any future smart-ass stunts.

AC wrote on November 8, 2007 7:26 AM:

Prosecutors give immunity to suspects who will then give information in return. Obviously, this isn't what is going on -- immunity here would represent the termination of an investigative process, not the begining.

Funny how immunity and impunity sound so much alike...

nezua wrote on November 8, 2007 8:13 AM:

Rotten, top to bottom.

Praedor Atrebates wrote on November 8, 2007 8:38 AM:

It was absolutely domestic-focused AND it was an attempt at TIA even though Congress ostensibly killed TIA. Bush and Cheney being Bush and Cheney simply decided to ignore the Congressional ruling and decided to start up TSA anyway.

Of course, TIA could be, and likely WAS, tweaked to look for "suspicious" political activity too (ie, any activity NOT GOP/Bush/Cheney-supported) in addition to whatever else they decide is "suspicious".

Praedor Atrebates wrote on November 8, 2007 8:40 AM:

Oh...and there needs to be more than just no immunity granted. The lawsuits MUST go forward, the criminals MUST be punished, both in and outside government, and last but NOT least, any and all illegally gathered information/data must be completely and absolutely purged with no record retained. The government must NOT be allowed to mine the illegal and unconstitutionally-gathered information for any reason whatsoever.

jon reremey wrote on November 8, 2007 8:49 AM:

For those of you who think the telecoms did this for lucrative contracts, you are truly wrong. the telecos were given an ultimatum by the gov't. do this by a certain date or its a 100k per day fine until it is done. that's strongarming and doesn't sound legal to me. all legalities aside. IF YOUR NOT DOING ANYTHING WRONG THEN WHO CARES IF THE GOVT KNOWS WHAT YOUR DOING. Get over it people. Our freedoms in this country were gone long long ago. If you want to live where you can do whatever you want whenever you want, then move out of the US.

Slim wrote on November 8, 2007 8:53 AM:

You might think that something like this would get, oh I don't know, at least a headline on the main page of ABC, CBS, or MSNBC news... but there's nothing. You might think maybe an op-ed or an obvious article would grace the front pages of the NY Times or the Washington Post web pages - but no.

What the hell is wrong with this country? Doesn't anyone care? Will anyone stand up us?

I'm so sad today.

Praedor Atrebates wrote on November 8, 2007 9:10 AM:

Slim is sad today? SAD!? Hell's bells, I'm friggin' FURIOUS. I am OUTRAGED. I am ENRAGED.

This crap is almost enough for me to vote for a bomb-thrower like Ron Paul (even though much of what he SAYS he stands for he does NOT stand for based on his de facto voting record...). This crap does almost make be think that in order to save THIS village (liberty, the Constitution, non-corrupt government), we have to burn it down.

Liberaltarian wrote on November 8, 2007 9:30 AM:

Hey hey, ho ho, Bush and Cheney HAVE GOT TO GO!!

Patrick wrote on November 8, 2007 9:32 AM:

jon,

I'm not prepared to get over it.

Secondly, your statement "IF YOUR NOT DOING ANYTHING WRONG THEN WHO CARES IF THE GOVT KNOWS WHAT YOUR DOING.", is a statement of ignorance and weakness.

History demonstrates that this type of power will be abused by those who have it.

Slim wrote on November 8, 2007 9:47 AM:

yes, sad. i wish i could be furious, but i am so disappointed in our democratic reps - and we are stuck with them. the leadership is an unmitigated failure.

they were seriously going to run this through and if dodd hadn't stopped it, it would be done and over. this is so obviously criminal, so blantantly unconstitutional, so morally corrupt that anyone even considering immunity must be one of two things... either woefully ignorant of the laws and constitution they were elected to uphold and enforce, or deeply, cynically corrupted. period. there's really no other way to look at this.

so we are stuck with representation who are either almost unimaginablely incompetent, or are part of the same pernicious evil that is the bush administration. either way, as a country, we are f**ked.

Praedor Atrebates wrote on November 8, 2007 9:53 AM:

anyone even considering immunity must be one of two things... either woefully ignorant of the laws and constitution they were elected to uphold and enforce, or deeply, cynically corrupted. period.

I propose a new test for anyone and everyone seeking elected office. They must pass a test on the Constitution. If they fail, then they are automatically disqualified from being a candidate that cycle and will continue to be so disqualified until they actually PASS the test.

This would serve to mark off the "ignorant of the laws and the Constitution" and leave only "deeply, cynically corrupted" as the only answer for any subsequent failures. Thus, we could move immediately to prosecution and forced removal from office.

Weeha wrote on November 8, 2007 10:07 AM:

WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- The Senate Judiciary Committee won't decide whether to offer telephone companies immunity for their alleged participation in a warrantless government wiretapping program until next week, a spokeswoman for the panel said.

A planned mark-up of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act will now be split into two parts, the spokeswoman said.

Thursday's session will deal with Title I of the legislation, which involves the bulk of details of how the wiretapping program will actually work, including the role of the courts.

The more contentious issue, concerning whether phone companies such as AT&T Inc. (T) and Verizon Communications Inc. (VZ) should be granted immunity for their alleged participation in the warrantless wiretapping of Americans in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks in 2001, will now be considered at a second mark-up next week.

There may still be debate about the issue at Thursday's hearing, which has dominated the discussion over the controversial legislation, but there will be no vote on whether to include an immunity provision in the bill.

The Senate Intelligence Committee already included immunity in a version of the legislation it approved.

AT&T, Verizon and Qwest Communications International Inc. (Q) have always refused to comment on whether they participated in the program, but it has been reported that Qwest refused to do so.

-By Corey Boles, Dow Jones Newswires; 202-862-6637; corey.boles@dowjones.com

TheraP wrote on November 8, 2007 10:07 AM:

Praedor Atrebates:

A test of comprehension is not enough. An intelligent sociopath could do very well - meanwhile plotting to subvert that very document.

My test, click my name, is that all who present themselves for federal service should swear to uphold the Constitution, prior to being elected or appointed, that they should not only demonstrate their allegiance to the Constitution, as primary (coming before any personal gain or loss). But that they should explain their understanding of that.

In addition to this, one can look at the record of a person's truthfulness and adherence to ideals they have verbalized in the past.

Thanks for bringing up this issue. To me it is the most important issue we face. If we get this wrong, everything goes wrong!

Chasfy wrote on November 8, 2007 10:12 AM:

I wonder if the end of net neutrality had anything to do with the big telecommunications companies giving everything that you write and say to this administration as a bribe. Along with a few million dollars to Congress, to be quiet about it.

Anonymous wrote on November 8, 2007 10:26 AM:

If I wanted to hide a bunch of servers and keep the data on them protected, here is the first place I would look...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/28/AR2006072801617.html

danger wrote on November 8, 2007 11:13 AM:

I can't help but wonder if I sound like a full blown conspiracy theorist nutjob talking about this stuff, but apparently thats the case.

One has to figure that this massive data surveillance program has been used for the systematic blackmail of this entire country and likely this earth of ours, but does it really stop there? Somehow I don't think that's the case either. Who knows what other programs those NSA goons have in their pockets - data mining along with subtle propaganda programs, completely manipulating our lives as we know it. Some programs might be used to cover up other crimes.

At best, I think it's prudent to say that this administration, along with this surveillance program, is one massive criminal conspiracy. Not granting immunity is a good first step to restoring this country's future and it's integrity.

unclesmrgol wrote on November 8, 2007 11:31 AM:

danger -- you are on our list. Look out your window -- see the black helicopter hovering just above the horizon? Look 90 degrees -- see another? It's got your name on it, danger...

Personally, mark klein is the criminal. I would expect the NSA to "hoover" all foreign data connections transiting our domestic lines (which has been happening for several decades), looking for particular kinds of traffic from particular sources destined to particular targets. In true "loose lips sink ships" style, klein has put us all in danger (literally). Some of klein's windmills may cause all of us to bleed.

steev wrote on November 8, 2007 12:43 PM:

unclesmrgol: you can't protect the american ideals of freedom and democracy by destroying them.

your attitude is cowardly and unpatriotic.

danger wrote on November 8, 2007 1:09 PM:

don't worry unclesmrgol, i have my bases covered more than you could possibly know.

The 'loose lips sink ships' analogy doesn't work here, sorry.

Steev wrote on November 8, 2007 1:51 PM:

And if Cheney has nothing to hide, why so much secrecy? Why deny access to the energy policy committee papers all this time?

It boggles my mind how some people defend the most secretive administration in the history of American politics while simultaneously demanding the people who elected them sacrifice or downgrade their expectations of privacy.

IF YOUR NOT DOING ANYTHING WRONG THEN WHO CARES IF THE GOVT KNOWS WHAT YOUR DOING.

Make a couple of changes, and you get something that starts to make a little sense:

IF THE ADMINISTRATION'S NOT DOING ANYTHING WRONG THEN WHO CARES IF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE KNOW WHAT THEY ARE DOING?

Oh right. Disclosing any of the underlying reasoning that informed their energy policies, interrogation policies, surveillance policies, or virtually any other of their policies would violate the executive branch's reasonable expectations of privacy. Just like it would damage our relationship with an important ally in the War on Terror(TM) if we penalized Musharraf for harboring members of Al-Qaeda.

Alex wrote on November 8, 2007 2:35 PM:

I may be a little behind the curve on this topic, but I believe an important question is, who wrote and is sponsoring this immunity act?

v. popvli wrote on November 8, 2007 3:04 PM:

kudos to steev. well put.

Adam wrote on November 8, 2007 3:52 PM:

"IF YOUR NOT DOING ANYTHING WRONG THEN WHO CARES IF THE GOVT KNOWS WHAT YOUR DOING."

Screw you. This is the kind of ignorant attitude that allows this BS to continue. Why don't you tell us why it's okay for the administration to continue to operate in such secrecy, if they don't have anything to hide?

Anonymous wrote on November 8, 2007 4:19 PM:

It may be useful to couch the FISA and Torture/abuse issues under this theme: The President, without Judicial review and exercising non-delegated judicial powers, independently determined he could violate standards.

Prisoners of War

The memos state, "The President has made carefully reasoned and proper group determinations" and "The President's decisions this case is consistent with that view"; yet, the President, according to the Supreme Court, made the wrong decision: The Prisoners were subject to Geneva/POW status. [See March 22, 2002 Memo; Taft Memo For Hnyes]

FISA Violations

Similarly, as with the Geneva issues, the President -- outside Judicial review, as required by FISA -- "determined" the Judicial review of the activity/warrants would not occur.

Argument

Retroactive immunity for telecoms isn't just about immunity in re FISA, but about doing the same with POWs in re Geneva.

The issue isn't what the President narrowly did with either FISA or POWs, but whether the Congress will assent to Presidential immunity from judicial review.

Anonymous wrote on November 8, 2007 5:59 PM:

I'm sorry - tell me again why nixon was impeached?

Just me wrote on November 8, 2007 7:47 PM:

Shortly after 9/11 my friend's father who is Egyptian and name is Mohammed just out of mere coincidence happen to stay at the same hotel in which someone that was involved with the terrorists happen to be staying there that night. My friend's father was there for business and was just there one night and we live in Knoxville, TN.... Well the feds came into his house and arrested him for no reason whatsoever. How did they come across this information that he had just happened to be in the same hotel as a terrorists 6 months or longer prior to coming after him. Skulls and Bones are all behind everything and anyone involved in that group should never come to power in USA again. We are doomed to fall if we don't save ourselves.... Our $dollar is falling because of Bush....and our country is falling.... Start the Revolution!!

Anonymous wrote on November 8, 2007 10:28 PM:

They were probably spying on anyone or anything they could use to their advantage.

TheraP wrote on November 9, 2007 11:21 AM:

For the record, please note the similarities between a post by Anon back in August - and the testimony of Mark Klein. Sure lends credibility to some of Anon's claims.

Indeed the info provided by Mr. Klein makes one wonder if he and Anon have crossed paths.

Here's a bit of Anon's August post:

"What if the goal of Homeland Security State is to set up farms of terabyte upon terabyte collection servers to siphon up and store literally all electronic communications (voice and text), from whatever source or from whatever unidentified individual in the hope of later using data mining techniques to scour the collected data for individuals and messages of special interest? Might all electronic transactions, including all credit card and debit card transations, also be part of such a massive database?

If such massive data collection and data mining are the real goals, the constitutional questions suddenly become startlingly clear. If data mining techniques ever come close to matching the mere capacity to vacuum up raw electronic data passing through the electronic pipelines and through the routers and switches, it would become a trivial matter to filter out a complete picture of any individual American, for whatever reason."

Click my name for Anon's muckraker post and cafe commentary.

J.S. Lucas wrote on November 9, 2007 12:20 PM:

We must also keep in mind that there is ample evidence that this was being planned and put into effect BEFORE 9/11.
Therefore any validity it might have during an "emergency" goes out the window!

HistoryOnRepeat wrote on November 10, 2007 7:30 AM:

The next Bush and Cheney are waiting in the wings to make certain personal fortunes remain limitless by law. As always always always.

We will rid our species of the idea of having wealthpower giants, or we will succumb to the result of having the next and the next and the next, ad infinitum.

Oh, sorry. I know no one is interested in the big picture and the only way to create a future for humans.

carry on.

note to Noah: Scuttle the Ark.

Quiet wrote on November 10, 2007 11:15 AM:

Before 1968 Mr. Nixon already had an enemies list. Now there is a no-fly list. In 1968 Mr. Nixon's Admin., using Army Security Agency troops, techniques and technologies, monitored voice traffic at the Democratic convention in Chicago. Now there is Narus. In 1968 the most conservative "political" organization in the country had better technologies and communications than the ASA and likely the FBI or CIA. We are again seeing the tip of the same iceberg. Is this a new world order or just the Fourth Reich?

Adam James wrote on November 10, 2007 8:44 PM:

"IF YOUR NOT DOING ANYTHING WRONG THEN WHO CARES IF THE GOVT KNOWS WHAT YOUR DOING."

Famous last words. How do you KNOW youre not doing anything wrong. Government policy can change on a dime so that things that were once considered okay BECOME wrong.

I'm sure the folks living in Hitler-era Germany and Stalin'era Russia used the same lines to allow themselves to sleep better at night knowing that they themselves were to blame. That kind of reason not only enslaves you, but "allows" you the "priviledge"of paying for your own chains.

DallasNE wrote on November 12, 2007 1:51 PM:

Sen. Spector came up with a new, devious twist. He would add language that exempts the Telecom companies but does not exempt the federal government.

What Sen. Spector fails to point out is that other laws alrady exempt the federal government. That exemption is the very reason that it is the Telecom companies that are getting sued in the first place.

Somebody needs to call Sen. Spector on this little trick of his. In reality, Sen. Spector is once again caving to the Bush administration. No more and no less. That Sen. Spector has no honor should come as no surprise to anybody.

M. Onger wrote on November 15, 2007 8:24 AM:

Telecom Immunity - AKA the Nuremberg Provision?

Immunity is for illegal acts. If the telecoms acted illegaly then someone gave an illegal order. Following it is no defense. Giving it is a punishable crime. Or have we forgotten?

Destiny is made in small steps. Hope Congress takes this one wisely - for all our sake!

Bill GIllmore wrote on December 3, 2007 10:26 AM:

I have to punch some holes in your balloons people.

First off, in a packetized network any connection had multiple routes to follow. Those packets can also arrive in any order, especially in video and other applications where time is not essential, and this includes voice calls. At the very best what the feds got was a collection of data packet ids regarding some calls that traversed the switch. Even if they collected all the packet info for a complete call, they would have to have reassembled the packets in the correct pattern and then broken any and all encryption methods in place at the time. Only then could they decode what the traffic contained.

At very best this packet sniffer was only collecting the packet routing info, not the actual data. For example, the post office puts a source and destination barcode on every letter, but they do not record the contents of that letter. Think about it, in order to record every bit of data on a multi-megabtye packet switch would require a recorder that can record terrabytes of data PER HOOR, and that is not even doing an all day record. Where are you going store all that data?

Second major flaw in this argument is that the switch will only record some of the packets destined for any particular user. Usually there are two or more switches in parallel to keep a redundancy in place. In some case this is not true, but by and large at busy sites, redundancy is the norm. Even if the switch records every bit of every conversation or connection, that only is true for the conversations that terminate on that switch. A conversation from China would most likely have redundant paths through LA and Seattle, for example. It would be necessary to combine those packets with all the other packets through all the other possible routing nodes to recover the conversation.

Now you have multiple problems, first record and store all the packets from every possible route node, then reassemble the data packets into the correct order, and then crack any encryption in place and then analyze the completed call or connections. Ans somebody is going to do that for hundreds of thousands of voice and data calls, placed every day, day in and day out? You would have to harness the entire computing power of every PC in America to do that.

Consider that possibility against every naysayer article you have ever read regarding governmental computing efforts. They have been near universal fiascoes. Even the FBI is on record saying they have a tough time with wiretaps on DS1 calls, let alone multi-terrabyte traffic pipes. Once again the biggest argument against a conspiracy id the effort entailed in completing the conspiracy.

I would suggest that the lot of you go to any book store and read up on Cisco technology and try your theories out on real life facts. Collectively, and including Mark Klein, you are ignorant of the very basic facts of the arguments.

Denny wrote on December 17, 2007 5:22 PM:

Regardless of what the motivations of bush and the telecoms were, they all knew plainly that they were conspiring to violate the privacy rights of millions of Americans.

FISA, as it stood then, clearly defines the Civil penalties and who those penalties apply to - including bush himself. given the degree of clear-cut violations, the Civilpenalties alone would basically DESERVEDLY bankrupt all the telecoms involved, and give clear-cut reasons to Impeach and convict bush himself (and cheney as well).

The mere act of bush to dare attempt to seek retroactive immunity is in itself an admission of guilt, and is simply a last ditch attempt by bush to undermine the laws and the Constitution itself!

And, think, if the GOP had swept the last Congressional elections, they would whole-heartedly pass such subversive legislation - and in so doing, be derelic in their own SWORN duty and obligation to uphold the rule of law, and thus become criminally complicit themselves. The GOP today is a sham -- and are really only a cover for what they really are -- Fascists, PNAC elitist-pigs of the lowest form!

Mary Pat Schallert wrote on December 26, 2007 1:25 AM:

Topic:
Massively domestic secret surveillance
Comment:
There should be no legal immunity to telecommunication companies that violate private citizens' rights. Individual cases can stand on their own merit.