What else is new? Open Thread
Posted: June 6, 2013 Filed under: Barack Obama, cyber security, Department of Homeland Security, FBI, metadata, NSA, National Security Agency, PRISM, SDB Evening News Reads, U.S. Politics | Tags: AOL, Apple, D-Day, Esther Williams, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, NSA, PalTalk, RFK, Skype, Yahoo, YouTube 35 Comments
Good Evening
While the first tropical storm is making its way over Florida, and TCM is having an evening of creature features…here are a few news items to discuss tonight.
Yesterday’s big break via The Guardian and Glen Greenwald had a bit of company this evening. The Washington Post is reporting more companies are involved in the NSA Data “collection.”
The National Security Agency and the FBI are tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading U.S. Internet companies, extracting audio and video chats, photographs, e-mails, documents, and connection logs that enable analysts to track one target or trace a whole network of associates, according to a top-secret document obtained by The Washington Post.
The program, code-named PRISM, has not been made public until now. It may be the first of its kind. The NSA prides itself on stealing secrets and breaking codes, and it is accustomed to corporate partnerships that help it divert data traffic or sidestep barriers. But there has never been a Google or Facebook before, and it is unlikely that there are richer troves of valuable intelligence than the ones in Silicon Valley.
Equally unusual is the way the NSA extracts what it wants, according to the document: “Collection directly from the servers of these U.S. Service Providers: Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, PalTalk, AOL, Skype, YouTube, Apple.”
PRISM was launched from the ashes of President George W. Bush’s secret program of warrantless domestic surveillance in 2007, after news media disclosures, lawsuits and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court forced the president to look for new authority.
Congress obliged with the Protect America Act in 2007 and the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, which immunized private companies that cooperated voluntarily with U.S. intelligence collection. PRISM recruited its first partner, Microsoft, and began six years of rapidly growing collection beneath the surface of a roiling national debate on surveillance and privacy. Late last year, when critics in Congress sought changes in the FISA Amendments Act, the only lawmakers who knew about PRISM were bound by oaths of office to hold their tongues.
You can read more at the link…
Here are a few more links on the matter.
The government needs to explain about the NSA’s phone data program – The Washington Post
Dianne Feinstein Says NSA Phone Records Surveillance Has Thwarted Terrorism, ‘But That’s Classified’
Obama administration defends massive phone record collection | Reuters
It is disgusting, and in my opinion, with the way these terrorist sting operations are handled, that “border” on entrapment or set up and organized by the feds themselves…these secret courts and top-secret decisions scare the crap out of me.
In other news, that did not get much notice today…
Today is the 69th Anniversary of D-Day: Before and After D-Day: Color Photos From England and France, 1944 | LIFE.com
It’s no mystery why images of unremitting violence spring to mind when one hears the deceptively simple term, “D-Day.” We’ve all seen — in photos, movies, old news reels, and usually in grim black-and-white — what happened on the beaches of Normandy (codenamed Omaha, Utah, Juno, Gold and Sword) as the Allies unleashed their historic assault against German defenses on June 6, 1944.
But in color photos taken before and after the invasion, LIFE magazine’s Frank Scherschel captured countless other, lesser-known scenes from the run-up to the onslaught and the heady weeks after: American troops training in small English towns; the French countryside, implausibly lush after the spectral landscape of the beachheads; the reception GIs enjoyed en route to the capital; the jubilant liberation of Paris itself.
[MORE: See all of LIFE.com’s World War II galleries.]
As presented here, in masterfully restored color, Scherschel’s pictures — most of which were never published in LIFE — feel at-once profoundly familiar and somehow utterly, vividly new.
June 6 is the 45th anniversary of the death of Robert Francis Kennedy. Shot the day before as he claimed victory in the 1968 Democratic primary in California, he remains a lasting influence on the politics of this day.
Clearly a progressive and a liberal by any measure, Robert Kennedy’s message transcends political boundaries. Expressed in the vocabulary of humanity, Kennedy’s intellectual perspectives can be found in the policy proposals of Reagan as well as Obama. It was Robert Kennedy’s concept, for example, that Reagan borrowed to advocate targeted regulatory relief and specialized tax incentives to economically depressed areas. Kennedy called it “operation bootstrap”; Reagan called it enterprise zones, both liked it for the same reason: it confessed faith and confidence in a person’s ability to stand on his own if given a fair chance.
And…one of Hollywood’s legends passed away, Esther Williams, Who Swam to Movie Fame, Dies at 91 – NYTimes.com
Esther Williams, a teenage swimming champion who became an enormous Hollywood star in a decade of watery MGM extravaganzas, died on Thursday in Beverly Hills, Calif. She was 91.
[…]
From “Bathing Beauty” in 1944 to “Jupiter’s Darling” in 1955, Ms. Williams swam in Technicolor pools, lakes, lagoons and oceans, cresting onto the list of Top 10 box-office stars in 1949 and 1950.
“Esther Williams had one contribution to make to movies — her magnificent athletic body,” the film critic Pauline Kael wrote. “And for over 10 years MGM made the most of it, keeping her in clinging, wet bathing suits and hoping the audience would shiver.”
For some vintage images: Esther Williams in Pictures – Slide Show – NYTimes.com
Ms. Williams in 1950 on location for the film “Pagan Love Song.”
Credit: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, via Associated Press
Isn’t she beautiful…
So of course you know this is an open thread, but I leave you with this little clip….of Gods and Monsters.
Sima
peej
Carissa
bostonboomer
dakinikat
ecocatwoman
fiscalliberal
grayslady
Minkoff Minx
mablue2
peggysue22
quixote
skydancingguestblogger
Mona (aka Wonk the Vote)
Well, another name to add to the list of Watergate and Iran-Contra… PRISM.
The Volokh Conspiracy » Feinstein & Chambliss Confirm That NSA Call Records Program Has Been Operating Under FISA Orders for 7 Years
And…more companies on the list
NSA Monitors Most Phones, Collects Credit Data — Daily Intelligencer
This isn’t new information. Remember when the NSA was installing equipment in AT&T offices in San Francisco years ago? Has everyone developed amnesia because it’s a more exciting “scoop” now?
Does anybody remember at the Democratic convention, 2008……………….ATT had a hell of a set up outside, and was giving away free Backpacks with goodies, in support of Obama?
What’s new from my point of view is that the corporate media is covering it heavily and people who haven’t paid attention are going to have to face reality.
I don’t remember that Ralph? I knew this sort of thing was going on, but I guess it makes a difference when you see the thing in writing on court orders.
That’s what I wondered. Although if we are winding down the “War on(of) Terror” its a good time to readdress it. Or are we now in a perpetual war?
Geez, I still hate that missing “ism”.
The NSA and AT&T were covered large to start but petered out when the public kind of went “meh” about it.
Even PRISM has been ongoing since early 2007.
I second your take on this – I was thinking the same thing myself when I saw this story. What’s the big deal? We’ve known about this for years & years. The AT&T thing was big, at least for me, since I worked for them (Southern Bell actually) for 14 years. We are a probed & surveilled nation. Short of going off-grid, there’s no escaping it.
I was just reading about that in the WaPo. Looks like all hell has broken loose in the secret data collection world. What next?
Obama’s second terms is a shambles!
Yup, I am sitting here watch Godzilla destroy Tokyo, with Raymond Burr saying…”Nothing can save Tokyo now.”
And I am thinking, yup, that is about what you can say about Obama…
Hardly a shambles. Everyone who is anyone in DC already knew about it and voted for it, I’m sure. Maybe a shambles to the ACLU,
I just mean that he’s being hit by one thing after another. He isn’t in control of what’s happening at all.
Presidents are never in control of what’s happening, See Bill Clinton for example.
I guess you’re right. It just doesn’t seem that there has been any focus on important issues in Washington in a very long time. You’ll probably say that’s not new either. Maybe it’s just me feeling frustrated.
Allow me to join you in frustration. I almost like it coming out now cause everyone is in the middle of it. Let them defend it together.
Last week or so a poll was done showing that 60% of people they polled didn’t know who the attorney General was……………….that ought to tell us something.
There really is no such thing as privacy in a digital world…..nada.
You all will see this cartoon tomorrow, but dammit, I have to put it here now.
Yep, seamless sameness – great cartoon JJ – thks
I have been thinking of Obama as Bush III since way back before June of 2008.
Fisa brings it all back, it’s like a flashbulb in my face.
Found your comment, JJ. 😉
Yup. Since before June of 2008. By the time I heard this little darling interview, in Jan 2008, my antennae were up for sure:
But you supported his reelection anyway, as did pretty much everyone here.
No, I didn’t. I voted for Jill Stein.
It was pretty split between Stein voters and reluctant Obama votes …I was more anti-republican
Daily Howler: John Dickerson doesn’t know how to read!
Love Bob Somerby,
That was great. I can’t stand John Dickerson. He’s another Luke Russert. He has a job because of his famous mom.
Me 2
Sources: NSA sucks in data from 50 companies – The Week
Clearly a progressive and a liberal by any measure
It amazes me how many Leftists have forgotten how RFK got his start (as Assistant Counsel to the redbaiting McCarthy Committee). Or, for that matter, that he was one of the architects of Operation Mongoose (the CIA’s post-Bay of Pigs scheme to assassinate Fidel Castro).
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/rfk/filmmore/pt.html
Or, for that matter, that he personally authorized the FBI bugging and surveillance of Martin Luther King. (http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2002/07/the-fbi-and-martin-luther-king/302537/).
I haven’t forgotten, but he had a major life change. His murder in 1968, my senior year, changed my life more than the death of my father in 1965. I believe the murder of his brother may have had the same effect on him & his belief system.
I wasn’t aware until a few years ago of Bobby’s bravery (at least in my eyes) when he kept a campaign stop in Indianapolis on the evening following MLK’s assassination. The police escort refused to go into the neighborhood with him – they feared there would be a riot. Bobby went anyway. Here’s a link to the story: http://www.folnewsmyrna.org/2013/03/12/the-assassination-of-martin-luther-king-jr-and-the-words-of-robert-kennedy/
This is just one paragraph from the story:
I will forever admire RFK and mourn this country’s loss. Comparing either Reagan or Obama to RFK, for me at least, is blasphemous. I couldn’t bear to read the article. I still can’t listen to the Battle Hymn of the Republic without crying – and I can still see the funeral train traveling across country. If only…………..
I believe the murder of his brother may have had the same effect on him & his belief system.
I would never deny the transformative effect of personal tragedy – I just don’t believe it happened in this case. I think RFK was genuinely grieved by the loss of his brother, just as both he and JFK were by the loss of Joe, Jr. during the war. I think the tears he shed when he spoke of his brother’s death after the King assassination were real, authentic tears of grief and shared sadness. I just don’t believe it affected him as a politician. Politically speaking, I think Bobby was an opportunist, motivated largely by personal ambition and (in his later years) by his intense (mutual) personal dislike for LBJ. He jumped on the antiwar movement in the late 60’s, just as he had jumped on the Red Scare in the early 50’s – because he saw it as a powerful force he could harness for personal advancement.
One of the classic requirements for authentic μετάνοια is an acknowledgement of the wrongs one has done. As a devout Catholic, Kennedy was as aware of this as anyone. Yet I never heard RFK apologize for the lives the McCarthy investigations destroyed, for the assassination of Diem, or for the surveillance of MLK. Hell, he didn’t even have the guts to declare his candidacy until Gene McCarthy proved it was safe for him to do so in 1968.
We’re of an age, ecocatwoman, but Bobby wasn’t a hero to me in ’68 and he isn’t now. I’ll agree with you that his assassination, like that of his brother and Dr. King, was a national tragedy, but I just don’t think of him as an icon of liberalism or progressivism.
JJ, I watched most of the old movies you love so much now when I was a child. At that time the few stations (maybe 2 or 3) ran afternoon and weekend movie shows. I fell in love with Errol Flynn, Clark Gable, Alan Ladd & Gene Kelly. I loved Esther Williams and would never miss one of her films. Did you know that one of her films was made at Cypress Gardens in Florida (Easy to Love)? Of course, Cypress Gardens is now Legoland. As a child my parents would take me on road trips to the attractions around Florida & we visited Cypress Gardens frequently, enjoying the water ski show. The tour always included the areas where the filming took place & it was so exciting to me. Ms. Williams was so amazingly beautiful both in & out of the water. Loved her films. RIP.