Featured Obama Admin Grabs Millions of Verizon Phone Records

Got it in one!

 

Let me see if I understand this correctly: Don't like the Patriot Act because it can be used for purposes that we don't understand; BUT, you're okay with monitoring phone calls and records, which is an extension of the Patriot Act and is advertised exactly like the Patriot Act was (deterrence against terrorism), and which most likely will be used for purposes that none of us fully understand....

It's not okay to have our mail carriers monitor us, but it is okay to have our cell phone providers help the government monitor us....

Agh. Where's the Excedrin? My head hurts....

BTW: If you want to keep the terrorists from using cell phones, then discontinue the ability of cell phone carriers to sell "pay as you go" phones that can be paid for with cash or anonymous gift cards, be easily discarded, and are extremely hard for the government to track. You don't need to download hundreds of millions of Americans' phone records if you've made it where the only way you can use a cell phone is to actually put your name on an account. While not 100% full-proof (nothing is), it would go a long way towards negating the use of cell phones for illegal activities.

AND, this worry about more 9/11 attacks? I'm more worried about being rear-ended by a teen-ager with a suspended license and no insurance ... wait, that happened last Saturday....

 

I'm still trying to figure out how the roles got reversed here.

When Bush was in the WH the republicans were defending all this snooping and warrantless wiretapping stuff while the democrats were going ballistic over it.

But now with Obama in the WH it's just the opposite. The democrats are defending it while the republicans are going ballistic over it.

It's like someone flipped a switch and there was an instant role reversal.

All I can say is to the Republicans, I told ya this is what would happen if you let Bush have all that expanded power.

And to the democrats, what happened to all your concerns about government snooping and warrantless wiretaps?

The whole left vs right paradigm makes no sense to me at all there is no consistency on either side. I just don't get the whole "if my guy does it it's good but if your guy does it it's bad" thing.

What's up with that anyway?

 

You answered your own question. It's a matter of who do you trust (or have more trust in) with these powers? Obama or Bush?

Personally, I don't see much of a difference, but if I had to choose one of those guys it would be Bush. The slope of the greased rails to destruction would not be as steep under Bush, so the ride would take longer, but that's about it.

 

It's not a matter of trust at all. It's a matter of holding them all to the same standard. That standard is the constitution and bill of rights. We started down the slippery slope when we started "trusting" those who claimed that if we just gave them a little more money power and control they could fix things and keep us safe.

 

Tyranny is tyranny Rev. The constitution and the bill of rights are the standards it's measured by not trust in men or political parties. Bush violated that standard plenty. Bush primed the pump and Obama is working the handle.

Wouldn't you agree there has been a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object that evinces a design to reduce us under absolute Despotism ?

Whoa! Just now reading that I realized our founding fathers were "conspiracy theorists". What a trip!

 

I objected from the beginning. Measures like the Patriot Act have been used in the U.S. in the past during wartime. Lincoln did it during the Civil War and Roosevelt did it during WW2. Thousands of American citizens were put in "intyernment" camps during WW2 simply because they were from Japanese families. But there really was no war like these going on when the Patriot Act was passed despite Bush's declaration of an everlasting war against terrorism. Of course we want to stop terrorists from doing harm to U.S. citizens and property. But I never believed that the situation demanded a suspension of our freedom.

Benjamin Franklin said:

"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."

The Patriot Act goes way beyond counting the number of calls a person has made to specific destinations. It lets the government break into a private home without a search warrant, trash the place, and warn the owner to keep quiet about what happened. I personally know someone this happened to. Then there are the laws which allow racial profiling to identify persons to be stopped and demand that they produce "their papers." This isn't America. It's more like Nazi Germany.

 

There's a war going on all right but it ain't a war against terrorism. It's a war against the constitution and national sovereignty.

 

So you believe that this is an everlasting war as Bush proclaimed and that therefore taking away our constitutional rights is justified?

 

Who cares what the polls show? What does the evidence show??

It shows the "war on terror" is an ongoing hoax! You don't fight a war by arming the enemy and leaving the borders unsecured.

Unless you're either insane or lying through your teeth about the reason you're using military force.

 

I hate to make a habit of disagreeing with you a lot, but I have to say, the war on terror is no hoax. The "hoax" is the Great Pretender's claiming that it's over.

Hooray! We have agreement. You're absolutely right.

While the Great Pretender is the best at this since Tricky Dick (lying through his teeth, that is) I don't think it's about using military force overseas. I think he probably wants to use it domestically to silence his opposition and set up a socialist (dare I say "communist"?) state. Sounds far-fetched, I know, but given who his real mentor (and perhaps his dad) was, I'd say it gets less far-fetched. Fortunately, with all the scandals, he seems to have derailed his own train.

 

Of course we're going to disagree. You look at politics from a left vs right perspective while I look at it from a right vs wrong perspective. We're on different levels of awareness is all.

To me wrong is wrong. I don't try to defend the wrong being done by saying the other side is wronger. Evidently that argument makes sense to you but it makes absolutely no sense to me at all.