Domestic Spying Redefined
Definition Changing for People's Privacy
Sunday November 11, 2007 6:01 PM
By PAMELA HESS
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - As Congress debates new rules for government eavesdropping, a top intelligence official says it is time that people in the United States changed their definition of privacy.
Privacy no longer can mean anonymity, says Donald Kerr, the principal deputy director of national intelligence. Instead, it should mean that government and businesses properly safeguard people's private communications and financial information.
Kerr's comments come as Congress is taking a second look at the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
Lawmakers hastily changed the 1978 law last summer to allow the government to eavesdrop inside the United States without court permission, so long as one end of the conversation was reasonably believed to be located outside the U.S.
The original law required a court order for any surveillance conducted on U.S. soil, to protect Americans' privacy. The White House argued that the law was obstructing intelligence gathering because, as technology has changed, a growing amount of foreign communications passes through U.S.-based channels.
This Constitution-hating bureaucrat just executed a classic propaganda maneuver that combines redefinition of the basic tenents of our nation with diminished expectations of the government. First, he threw out the concept of unreasonable search and seizure by saying the government can spy on Americans as much as it wants. Then he said that the best American citizens can hope for is that the government won't release the illegally obtained information it collects on private citizens to the public.
Well, I am still of the opinion that what I expect from the government is that it abides by the civil protections stated in the Constitution of the United States, and if it cannot do so, then it needs to be corrected. We can start by firing Donald Kerr and all of his superiors and subordinates who agree with his bleak outlook on civil liberties in America in the 21st century. Then we can fail to re-elect any lawmakers who try to reduce the civil liberty protections of the original FISA. If we do not make it hard for the government to spy on average Americans, we are surrendering out civil rights.
And consider this. Under the blighted Bush administration, "reducing government" is synonymous with outsourcing government functions to private contractors. Private contractors are not in the business of providing for the common defense, promoting the general welfare or securing the blessings of American citizens or their posterity; private contractors are in business to make money--the greatest profit with the least effort. If you don't believe that private contractors would find a way to turn a profit using intelligence collected, then you have no concept of what capitalism is all about. I can even tell you the justification: They had to spend the time and effort and money to collect private information on everyone, and that effort has to show a profit because that's what business is all about. If the private contractors who win the bid for domestic spying are going to do a thorough job, which means spying on everyone thoroughly, then they need to recoup the costs of that spying, which would no doubt be expensive. Catching terrorists might earn a bonus from the government, that doesn't pay for spying on Joe Average Citizen. So the private contractor must pay for that spying by being able to sell what it has learned about Mr Joe Average Citizen to whomever will pay for it.
That's what outsourcing the legitimate functions of government will get you.