NSA's Trailblazer...

[Joe]

President Bush secretly authorized the NSA to eavesdrop on Americans and others inside the United States without obtaining a warrant through a secret court system designed to allow foreign surveillance.

I don't get it, if the president is doing this than shouldn't he be prosecuted, isn't what he is doing illegal?

As far as I understand, it is, but he's doing it to save you from terrorism.  It's because of him breaking the law that you haven't been attacked by a terrorist.  And this rock keeps lions away .

If I understand correctly, the patriot act allows that.

[iago]

He did not pass an amendment.  That requires 33 of the 50 states.

He said (poorly) "bypass", not "pass". 

[GameSnake]

I see MyndFyre's point, Clinton did lie to us all and for that he was bad, but that isn't really a big deal when you compare in comparision to the injustice Bush maybe doing to us by "secretly" and without "warrants" eavesdrop on americans. Now seriously MyndFyre, I know your partisan-Bush and that's fine, but wouldn't you admit you feel just a little uncomfortable with all the privacy issues being invaded here? I do not find Bush to be all that bad of a president. I feel though however, that if our privacy is comprimised for liberty (and vice-versa), we deserve niether (to paraphrase Ben Franklin), and that does make Bush a bad president and something should be done about it for the sake of our rights, which have been slipping away ever so pacely since 2000.

[deadly7]

I see MyndFyre's point, Clinton did lie to us all and for that he was bad, but that isn't really a big deal when you compare in comparision to the injustice Bush maybe doing to us by "secretly" and without "warrants" eavesdrop on americans. Now seriously MyndFyre, I know your partisan-Bush and that's fine, but wouldn't you admit you feel just a little uncomfortable with all the privacy issues being invaded here? I do not find Bush to be all that bad of a president. I feel though however, that if our privacy is comprimised for liberty (and vice-versa), we deserve niether (to paraphrase Ben Franklin), and that does make Bush a bad president and something should be done about it for the sake of our rights, which have been slipping away ever so pacely since 2000.

To semi-quote Stealth:
"If they feel like tapping my phone lines, I'm not worried.  I shouldn't be because I'm not doing anything wrong."

[MyndFyre]

I see MyndFyre's point, Clinton did lie to us all and for that he was bad, but that isn't really a big deal when you compare in comparision to the injustice Bush maybe doing to us by "secretly" and without "warrants" eavesdrop on americans. Now seriously MyndFyre, I know your partisan-Bush and that's fine, but wouldn't you admit you feel just a little uncomfortable with all the privacy issues being invaded here?

No.  I do not see that my privacy is being invaded.  I'm not talking to an al Qaeda terrorist, nor am I even placing out-of-country calls (except that one time I called Ron).  And even then we didn't discuss plans to blow anything up.

As I said, Bush has not given me a reason to doubt his honesty, and so if he is going to tell me as the President that he is only authorizing this to monitor people making calls to terrorists, I'm going to believe him.  I've seen lots of accusations of lying, but I've never seen any that sufficiently discount all alternative rival hypotheses.  My favorite lie accusation is when people tell us Bush lied about the Iraq war and WMDs: I can think of at least two ARHs -- that the weapons were removed in the great length of time we gave them, or that the intelligence was faulty.

I do not find Bush to be all that bad of a president. I feel though however, that if our privacy is comprimised for liberty (and vice-versa), we deserve niether (to paraphrase Ben Franklin), and that does make Bush a bad president and something should be done about it for the sake of our rights, which have been slipping away ever so pacely since 2000.

This statement seems a little....  unclear.  But what can you not do now that you did legally before Bush was President?  I never have had a habit of calling terrorists and conspiring to blow shit up.  I don't know about you, but that just seems....  well, stupid, for one, and wrong, for another.

Bush pulled us out of a recession that he inherited from the former president with flying colors. 

There are lots of things that I don't agree with Bush on, particularly education and immigration.  But I think that people are missing the facts of the matter because of misinformation from biased media combined with the typical citizen's lack of education.

[iago]

To semi-quote Stealth:
"If they feel like tapping my phone lines, I'm not worried.  I shouldn't be because I'm not doing anything wrong."

I wouldn't worry about doing anything wrong, I'd worry that my basic rights are being violated.  If they can take away some rights, what's next?  Will they be able to slowly erode your personal freedoms until suddenly there aren't any left?

That's my biggest concern.  If Bush really wasn't violating basic freedoms, then there's no problem.  As somebody here kindly pointed out, I'm no expert on American law.  I'm not sure how you discovered that

[MyndFyre]

I wouldn't worry about doing anything wrong, I'd worry that my basic rights are being violated.  If they can take away some rights, what's next?  Will they be able to slowly erode your personal freedoms until suddenly there aren't any left?

That's my biggest concern.  If Bush really wasn't violating basic freedoms, then there's no problem.  As somebody here kindly pointed out, I'm no expert on American law.  I'm not sure how you discovered that

To be perfectly honest, at the uproar that came out of the discovery of the monitoring (that, as I said, does not make me feel as if my personal freedoms are being eroded) of int'l phone calls to suspected terrorists, I am fairly confident that further and deeper intrusions will also be made public.  So no, my acceptance of this program is not simply complacency.  I want my personal freedoms as well.  I just don't think that it's affecting me in this instance.

[iago]

I wouldn't worry about doing anything wrong, I'd worry that my basic rights are being violated.  If they can take away some rights, what's next?  Will they be able to slowly erode your personal freedoms until suddenly there aren't any left?

That's my biggest concern.  If Bush really wasn't violating basic freedoms, then there's no problem.  As somebody here kindly pointed out, I'm no expert on American law.  I'm not sure how you discovered that

To be perfectly honest, at the uproar that came out of the discovery of the monitoring (that, as I said, does not make me feel as if my personal freedoms are being eroded) of int'l phone calls to suspected terrorists, I am fairly confident that further and deeper intrusions will also be made public.  So no, my acceptance of this program is not simply complacency.  I want my personal freedoms as well.  I just don't think that it's affecting me in this instance.

Although it's not affecting you in this instance, it IS affecting other American citizens.  What happens if the next group they target as a threat is whatever ethnicity you're from?  If they cross the line with a group of American citizens, I'd think it would be a warning to all other American citizens that they could be targetted next. 

[MyndFyre]

Although it's not affecting you in this instance, it IS affecting other American citizens.  What happens if the next group they target as a threat is whatever ethnicity you're from?  If they cross the line with a group of American citizens, I'd think it would be a warning to all other American citizens that they could be targetted next. 

I don't have any relatives who are terrorists, either, and if I did, I would already be sending the authorities to their doors.

[igimo1]

So what if they eavesdrop on you? If they find out that you haven't done anything wrong, they'll move on. You have nothing to hide unless you're in cohorts with terrorists, or plan on doing something illegal. Even if they specifically targeted Asian Americans because of a possibility we're in contact with terrorists, it wouldn't matter. Because why? Because I know that I'm innocent. The government is there to protect you and your rights, remember that.

[GameSnake]

Ok seriously, if you really feel 100% comfortable with what a politician says and believe that is what he really does, than you are really not up to par with this discussion!

[iago]

So what if they eavesdrop on you? If they find out that you haven't done anything wrong, they'll move on. You have nothing to hide unless you're in cohorts with terrorists, or plan on doing something illegal. Even if they specifically targeted Asian Americans because of a possibility we're in contact with terrorists, it wouldn't matter. Because why? Because I know that I'm innocent. The government is there to protect you and your rights, remember that.

Can't the government use this to suppress freedom of speech, and eventually freedom of thought?  What happens if you give a speech about how everybody should rise up and overthrow the Government of the USA (which is a perfectly valid scenario; in fact, it's how your government was FORMED) -- would you still not need your privacy from the government? 

[igimo1]

How can they use it to suppress freedom of speech? You have to understand that the NSA does not have teams of staffers sorting through your emails; it's done electronically, in most cases.

[MyndFyre]

So what if they eavesdrop on you? If they find out that you haven't done anything wrong, they'll move on. You have nothing to hide unless you're in cohorts with terrorists, or plan on doing something illegal. Even if they specifically targeted Asian Americans because of a possibility we're in contact with terrorists, it wouldn't matter. Because why? Because I know that I'm innocent. The government is there to protect you and your rights, remember that.

Can't the government use this to suppress freedom of speech, and eventually freedom of thought?  What happens if you give a speech about how everybody should rise up and overthrow the Government of the USA (which is a perfectly valid scenario; in fact, it's how your government was FORMED) -- would you still not need your privacy from the government? 

It was determined to be illegal to secede from the US in the 1865 following the Civil War -- which was the real reason it was fought.

Ok seriously, if you really feel 100% comfortable with what a politician says and believe that is what he really does, than you are really not up to par with this discussion!

This is precisely the kind of attitude that makes me not want to have a discussion about anything with you.  It is my opinion.  It is educated.  Fine if you don't agree.  Fuck off if you're going to say that I'm incompetent because my opinion is different.

[GameSnake]

This is precisely the kind of attitude that makes me not want to have a discussion about anything with you.  It is my opinion.  It is educated.  Fine if you don't agree.  Fuck off if you're going to say that I'm incompetent because my opinion is different.

Well okay if it's fair to say that, than it's by far more fair to say you cannot trust political leaders to thier word, you couldn't with Clinton, Nixon and many others, and you know that for goodness sake it is an educated pre-disposistion.