When telephones were first introduced, they weren't secure in any way. They were party lines... and an operator physically connected and monitored your conversations. Even in the Revolutionary war, we intercepted messages. Don't tell me the framers of the Constitution envisioned pay phones or people buying untraceable cell phones with the expectation of privacy.

The assault on our personal freedoms is NOT the result of the Bush presidency. It is the result of the sort of terrorism that allows 20 people with box-cutters or a guy with "fake" sneakers to cause billions of dollars of damage, thousands of lost lives and trillions in economic impact.

I'm not saying you have to agree with the particular steps that have been taken, but to argue that we have the right to whatever freedoms we want when those "freedoms" were and are being used against us is just not reasonable.

These freedoms we now say we're losing didn't exist AT ALL 20+ years ago. There were virtually no restrictions and it cost us dearly. We may have swung too far back, but we're STILL ahead of where we were initially, and I'm sure those freedoms will generally find a happy compromise between freedom and safety.

Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:So it's okay for the government to have too much power because they are incompetent?
That gives me a warm and comfortable feeling.
As for the " consent of the governed" argument, I know first hand that there's a lot going on already that the governed probably wouldn't consent if they knew about it. I just don't want to give statutory legitimacy.
As for libertarians supporting secret courts, you weren't referring to me, were you?

not you specifically, but libertarians in general that do, that don't recognize the FISA court itself is what is 'unconstitutional' and argue on the side of FISA now against Executive Power. Many of them have drifted away from the Constitution over time here Originally, the POTUS was intended to have these powers as part of its inherhent authority, during war time. thats ideally speaking with some qualifications, this view isn't politically possible these days anyway which is part of our problem. I also found it amusing, when I read Lew Rockwell praising the Liberal Supremes for the Boumdiene decision granting rights to non-americans living outside our country, effectively giving them more rights than the Nazi's received or any foreign enemy in our history.


I don't doubt mistakes here and there with intelligence gathering, my point is practically speaking, there is very little chance that the Orwellian vision of "Big Brother" is listening to your phone conversation. Call outside the country and say key words like "Jihad" and it may...or "Brooklyn Bridge" over and over in Arabic as a real world example and it may get tagged, and latter heard.

I was also pointing out that "Community Rights" and "Individual Rights" have always had to balance out, probably the hardest thing our brilliant politicians have to figure out. The Patriot Act and Terrorist Surveillance programs aren't effecting our lives in any, negative way on a day to day basis. If anything its positive because they've thwarted attacks and plots to attack, which would if materialized infringed on American's Economic Liberties and Civil Liberties.


as usual, our Political and Media elite have failed us in engaging this subject

Hambone10 Wrote:When telephones were first introduced, they weren't secure in any way. They were party lines... and an operator physically connected and monitored your conversations. Even in the Revolutionary war, we intercepted messages. Don't tell me the framers of the Constitution envisioned pay phones or people buying untraceable cell phones with the expectation of privacy.

The assault on our personal freedoms is NOT the result of the Bush presidency. It is the result of the sort of terrorism that allows 20 people with box-cutters or a guy with "fake" sneakers to cause billions of dollars of damage, thousands of lost lives and trillions in economic impact.

I'm not saying you have to agree with the particular steps that have been taken, but to argue that we have the right to whatever freedoms we want when those "freedoms" were and are being used against us is just not reasonable.

These freedoms we now say we're losing didn't exist AT ALL 20+ years ago. There were virtually no restrictions and it cost us dearly. We may have swung too far back, but we're STILL ahead of where we were initially, and I'm sure those freedoms will generally find a happy compromise between freedom and safety.

yep, the Closed Circuit is a relatively new invention and in the days of the open circuit you shared a line with the neighborhood and operator and whoever else picked it up. No Orwellian Big Brother materialized from this, they have bigger issues on their plate to worry with anyway.


Interestingly, George Washington is known as one of the greatest Intelligence gather's in history. He caught many British spies and traitors, by seizing their Mail, reading it then having it delivered as normal, undetected. It's called competently waging a war, its doubtful we would've won had these things not occurred.

the fundamental question are things like: "Are we in war time?"
"Who is the enemy, and are they living among us?", etc. For conservatives anyway, 9/11 answered those questions along with subsequent developments. One problem, is with the modern era we are basically at war for long periods of time. Trying to figure out how not to alarm the public too much is tricky.

My only hope is that one of these facists that cast a vote for this dung...gets caught up in its web. Anyone that thinks that this will not be expanded beyond its intended scope...obviously has not been observing the natural order of governmental expansionism.

Coming to a phone near YOU.

Fo,

They did get Spitzer. That was kind of poetic justice for his past "holier than thou" attitude.

If only they could have implicated Chucky too, it would have been perfect.