Greenwald 'imminent' NSA release (Jun 23 2014) Vote predictions!

[tvbcof]

Supposedly Greenwald has an imminent release of documents detailing the high priority targets of NSA surveillance.

I suppose that most people are like me and think that the NSA is out to get me mostly and less important people later.

If one feels inclined to vote, do it soon...or don't brag about being right after the fact.

[bitsmichel]

All of the above, you almost can't escape their enormous database. All of the phone messages, all of social networks, all of email, all of google searches.. it's hard to comprehend just how enormous it is.

They have created a simple search engine, to query the database called XKeyScore. Any person working there can simply type who they are looking for. It can be anyone, simply depends on who is searching. Searches are not only done by the NSA - but also by corporate employees of various companies.

[tvbcof]

Bump.

Still a chance to get a fair vote in...much to my consternation.  I've been hammering on the re-load button over at theintercept.  So much for 'very very imminent'.

[taipo]

My Other vote = All of the Above

[Chef Ramsay]

My vote would be for US Supreme Court Justices. On one hand they twisted the tax language to make it (Obamacare) normal and not a mandatory purchase of something since it's merely a tax plus all the pro-state decisions up until recently when they ordered that police must have a warrant to check someone's smart phone like it's a home record. Every decision prior in recent times indicated a leniency towards broader governmental police powers then all of a sudden they slap this one down. Something fishy going on up on the high court.

[Ron~Popeil]

My vote would be for US Supreme Court Justices. On one hand they twisted the tax language to make it (Obamacare) normal and not a mandatory purchase of something since it's merely a tax plus all the pro-state decisions up until recently when they ordered that police must have a warrant to check someone's smart phone like it's a home record. Every decision prior in recent times indicated a leniency towards broader governmental police powers then all of a sudden they slap this one down. Something fishy going on up on the high court.

The way the chief justice worded that decision certainly seems to support that theory. The current administration has shown it isn't exactly hostile to the idea of using agencies for political purposes.

[tvbcof]

My vote would be for US Supreme Court Justices. On one hand they twisted the tax language to make it (Obamacare) normal and not a mandatory purchase of something since it's merely a tax plus all the pro-state decisions up until recently when they ordered that police must have a warrant to check someone's smart phone like it's a home record. Every decision prior in recent times indicated a leniency towards broader governmental police powers then all of a sudden they slap this one down. Something fishy going on up on the high court.

That is an interesting observation.

Greenwald had the Snowden material for a long time and claims that it is the most important thing yet (at least to him) and that he is only releasing actual names of targets after discussing things with them.  If they do not wish their names released for whatever reason, he says he won't do it.  So, he's been making the rounds chatting with people and informing them of their status as special targets.

This makes me think back to a brief period of time when Feinstein stopped being a class-A totalitarian and seemed to suddenly have some concern for victims of surveillance.  I wonder if she had a little chat with Greenwald about that time.  Since her very unusual break from being the biggest supporter and proponent of the surveillance state apparatus she's gone back to her normal wicked ways, albeit perhaps without the same zeal.  It's hard to teach an old dog new tricks I suppose.

I found the SCOTUS decision about cell phones interesting.  One hypothesis that hit me is that they know they are going to have to rule on the NSA stuff at some point.  They loath the thought and have been punting on it as long as possible.  I am sure they are going to do what in effect will be to throw the 4th in the dumpster, at least when the central govt is commissioning the abuse.  There is no way the central govt is going to give up mass surveillance though they may pretend to make some movements in that direction for a bit.  Maybe with the cell phone ruling the SCOTUS is just trying to build up a little good will for when they have to swallow the nasty medicine (and their own pride and dignity a-la the Bush v. Gore decision.)

[tvbcof]

Could the story actually be so important that it was successfully quashed even though all the others to date have not?

  http://dailycaller.com/2014/07/02/greenwald-delays-biggest-snowden-story-yet-over-government-claims/

I hypothesized that that might end up being the case (which is why it showed up as an option for the vote.)  Greenwald was smart to break the story down to an individual level.  The government would have to argue that individuals who happen to be high-value NSA targets are threats on a case-by-case basis as well in order to make the theory that by releasing their target status Greenwald is endangering public welfare stick.  And has become a co-conspirator in their 'crimes' from a legal perspective.

Hopefully what will happen here is that Greenwald will take a little break and deal with whatever the last minute roadblock thrown down happened to be, then release the story as initially planned.  I've no doubt that the details they've been working on for this story will be released in some manner or another.  If nothing else, Greenwald-n-co have been visiting the targets to interview them and these people would be hard pressed not to be talking to their friends about it.  It would probably most effective if Greenwald could release the story more-or-less as he initially planned though, and I hoped it would be a years long trickle of water torture for the scum who've abused the nations intelligence apparatus for political and commercial purposes.

[tvbcof]

Finally the story is out.  Result:  A-Rabs (or to use the intelligence community's label, "Mohammed Raghead".  No shit!  Read the story.)

Or is the story really out?  I'd be surprised if this is not simply the first installment.  Give the simps at Fox News some time to justify the targeting to their Islamophobic audience, then land the next punch.  It'll be interesting to see who, if anyone, falls into this trap after a year of Greenwald doing the same moves.

Several other interesting things in no particular order:

The story released within the last few days about '9 out of 10' people being spied on being accidental was supposed to be very negative about the NSA, but I'm not so sure.  In many people's minds I think it will serve to cloud and confuse the issue about specially targeted people.

For some reason it seemed like we were pretty close to seeing the 'poison pill' over the time that this story was delayed.  Cryptome made some serious noise about doing the deed.  Did Greenwald almost end up a captive of the state (or dead?)

This (hopefully) first installment hints several times to pressure from the neoconservative corner resulting in their political adversaries being targeted for enhanced surveillance.  As a long-time observer, it strikes me that the neocons press strongly and almost always achieve control over internal security here in the good ol' U.S.A. though that role is denied them at the highest levels of our external security apparatus (state dept, military, etc.)  Not that they are not used heavily from time to time within these apparatus (esp in the Cheney admin for instance), but they never are handed the reigns.  Anyway, I'll look forward to see if that string gets tugged on some more.

That "John Guandolo" fellow is one whacked out motherfucker!  If he is representative of even a small fraction of the people working within the state security apparatus, heaven help us!

[cryptasm]

Thanks for the link ^^^



Shows the mindset of our intelligence communities, scary knowing they're the kind of creeps monitoring our personal information.