Try Not to Sing Along
2 months ago
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Because thinking deep is just too frickin' hard.
Just tryin' my best.
Diversions
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Pack Your Bags, We're Moving!4 years ago
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Changing My Tune10 years ago
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Belsby Road and Whatnot2 years ago
From The Beginning
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2013
(386)
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June
(38)
- Cooling Off
- Nash Metropolitan
- PopCycle
- FBC Prom Ride Video
- The Demise Of DOMA
- The Irony, It Rains Upon Texas
- Bike Happenings
- Unbelievable
- Road Find
- FBC Prom Ride
- Missing The Sweet Spot
- Making The Most Of It
- Great Day For A Bike Commute
- William Shatner "Sings" Again
- Bike Happenings
- Rail Biking
- So You Are One If You Doodee?
- So Today I Did This Thing Called Rail Biking
- Guantanamo For Everyone
- Lucky Students
- It's Street Music Week Again
- One Degree Closer To Kevin Bacon?
- Bike Happenings
- How Can We Protect What We Do Not Have
- Someone Is Having A Bad Facebook Week
- Can I Count On Your Support Today?
- Surveillance State
- Lots Of Road Finds Today
- Interesting
- A Bastion Of Freedom And Democracy?
- The Surveillance State Lives
- It's More Than An Image Problem
- Ouch!
- A Masquerade
- Retail Bureaucracy
- So I Get This Letter In The Mail...
- Bike Happenings
- Is This Thing On?
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June
(38)
22 comments:
Oh...William Shatner. You're so...William Shatner.
To boldly go beserk with drones
To coldly get up in our phones
To creepily read all our mail
To freakin throw us all in jail
No fresh air on this planet
We had freedom now they ban it
Fuck you Borg! Fuck you Spock!
Hope and change? Suck Klingon cock!
Meters
Expensive parking meters
Spying parking meters that watch your every move
Happy
The city demands that we feel happy
"Give up your privacy, or we'll kill a tree!"
Meeeeters!
Wo-oh-oh meeters
Trying to forget how
It once felt to be free...
http://m.spokesman.com/stories/2013/jun/20/council-members-refer-to-trial-parking-meters-as/
Stuckart on you
Got a feeling down deep in your gut that you just can't lose
That he never looks away
Big Brother ain't a friend
But the mayor will trade away our faces and data until the end
The corporations stare at us all day
Their mighty glad we pay
Once upon a time
You drove so fine
You parked for a dime in your prime
Didn't you?
ACLU called
Said democracy's stalled
It's become an eyeball
And you thought they were all just
Kiddin' you?
You used to laugh about
All the libertarians hanging out
Now you don't talk so loud
Can't escape into the crowd
You suddenly realize that you ain't free
How does it feel? How does it feel.
To secretly stand with Rand?
To silently curse your own man?
To be without a political home?
Like a rolling drone!
I don't know if the shields can last much longer. :-)
Edward Snowden is Luke Skywalker. He may have just blown up the NSA Death Star.
Once again the rebel alliance of Snowden and Guardian/Greenwald explode the Empire's lies.
This morning the media battle was between two contrasting interpretations of the citizen and foreigner NSA documents. The Empire Bomber New York Times declared the documents showed real constraints on domestic spying. Obiwan Greenwald argued they showed analysts were in fact empowered to decide who to bug, just as Snowden had claimed.
But then Snowden zoomed into the fray, guided by the force of his latest documents. Turns out the citizen vs foreigner debate is irrelevant, a ruse. Guided by the NSA, the Brits spy on the entire US population and then pipe the data back to the NSA without constraint, endrunning the Fourth Amendment. Presumably the NSA returns the favor to the UK spooks. The revelation of this mutual spying is like a depth charge exploding every statement the Obama administration has made in the last two weeks.
In pique, the Times leads with Snowden's indictment, burying the Guardian charges in deep paragraphs. The Guardian headlines its Death Star rattling exclusive.
The best quote is from Death Star Commander Alexander. Remember this is the creep who lied that "We’re the only ones not spying on the American people" only a month ago.
In the latest document he treasonously pleads with the British to capture more American material, saying
“Why can’t we collect all the signals all the time? Sounds like a good summer project for Menwith.”
An American official who would explain the remark only on condition of anonymity said: “General Alexander’s comment was a quip taken out of context — nothing more.”
Quite. Commander Alexander of course meant to say "a good summer project for MenSith."
Cue Darth Clapper.
"Edward, I am your father."
Menwith? Another lie.
Alexander meant menwithout.
Men like himself.
I love when officials leak anonymously to protest anonymous leaking.
"my particular thing is high tech and you know, what’s going on is the other thing, which is the...terrestrial dragnet. Well my specialty is outer space. I deal with satellites, and everything that goes in and out of space. I did my spying via space. So that’s how I found out about this."
Russell Tice (DIA/NSA)
Okay. They went after–and I know this because I had my hands literally on the paperwork for these sort of things–they went after high-ranking military officers; they went after members of Congress, both Senate and the House, especially on the intelligence committees and on the armed services committees and some of the–and judicial. But they went after other ones, too. They went after lawyers and law firms. All kinds of–heaps of lawyers and law firms. They went after judges. One of the judges is now sitting on the Supreme Court that I had his wiretap information in my hand. Two are former FISA court judges. They went after State Department officials. They went after people in the executive service that were part of the White House–their own people. They went after antiwar groups. They went after U.S. international–U.S. companies that that do international business, you know, business around the world. They went after U.S. banking firms and financial firms that do international business. They went after NGOs that–like the Red Cross, people like that that go overseas and do humanitarian work. They went after a few antiwar civil rights groups. So, you know, don’t tell me that there’s no abuse, because I’ve had this stuff in my hand and looked at it. And in some cases, I literally was involved in the technology that was going after this stuff.
The US government charging Edward Snowden with espionage is a risable act of hypocrisy and breathtaking chutzpah.
How exactly do Obama, Holder and President Clapper plan to keep proceedings of such a trial secret?
The coverage varies so bizarrely.
If the New York Times were covering the battle of Gettysburg in the same way as the NSA battles, they'd have a blurb in the tech section and maybe a profile of Lee in sports. The Times editorial board is more interested in zombies and Tom Friedman's moustache than the total destruction of the Bill of Rights.
Even the Spokesman does a better job plodding through the main events and document releases.
The Post is doing pretty well, but the Guardian is cleaning up.
Another great quote from the AP:
However, a senior administration official issued a pointed warning that if Hong Kong doesn't act soon, "it will complicate our bilateral relations and raise questions about Hong Kong's commitment to the rule of law." The official was not authorized to discuss the matter by name and insisted on anonymity.
Will Obama charge this leaker with espionage? I love that Obama is standing on the "rule of law."
Christ.
Well, you gotta agree that the Times is in hot pursuit of Skywalker-Phoenix-Pimpernel today, after Hong Kong politely laughed off the US lecture on legality.
We welcome a discussion on legality, said Hong Kong. How bout we start by discussing the legal rights of Hong Kong's citizens in hospitals and universities to be free from surveillance? We can go from there.
Meanwhile in DC, Senator Graham just spit out a stent in his rage. CARACASHAVANAAAARGGH.
The foreign media increasingly sees the US government as a junta, with a puppet president, congress, and judiciary. Real power lies with the military spy agencies. The US media adds to the impression by dutifully ignoring topics like the systematic torture at Gitmo this week, which Europeans covered.
To those outside the US, Snowden is like a fragile spark of freedom racing across the forboding sky.
Young Americans see it just a little differently, telling Pelosi that, quite frankly? You suck. Meaning, you all suck: President, Congress, Judiciary, media. No one is doing their job and standing up to the junta. No politician or judge is true to their oath to the Constitution, which includes the Bill of Rights.
To drop Graham on his apopolectic head: what a sad day that the route to freedom for a US dissident is China-Russia-Cuba-Venezuela. What has happened to us under Bush and Obama?
How did the USA become the NSA?
I haven't thought of that song in years.
Godspeed, Mr. Snowden, on your dangerous journey.
Let's hope you don't become one of the disappeared.
All eyes on el Presidente Clapper and Generalissimo Alexander.
The Times Lede blog is quoting Chinese officials that they felt the purpose of the espionage charges (and the insulting legality lecture) were calculated not for extradition to the US, but to make Snowden flee. The US put HK/China in a position in which it could not extradite Snowden, nor keep him.
If true, it may be that Clapper wants Snowden in the open so the CIA or Booz can murder or rendition and torture him.
And, presumably, to teach us all a lesson on the junta's power.
Meanwhile, the junta has assigned Lackey Obama to give a speech on global warming. Make it distracting.
I thought Venezuela would be an option from the start, and maybe Iceland was just a distraction.
Ecuador seems a dicier step, second or third choice. Maybe it's just a step. If he makes it there, people will forget his brief hotel stays in Moscow and Havana.
On the negative side, the NSA junta knows where he is.
On the positive side, so do we.
He's probably most exposed at this moment on a Russian transit visa. But also prolly chillaxin and watching kitten vids on Reddit.
The HK takeaway:
The Hong Kong government was dismayed that the United States chose to include espionage in its charges against Mr. Snowden, because that created clear complications under the bilateral agreement between Hong Kong and the United States for the surrender of fugitives. The agreement specifically excludes the surrender of fugitives from political cases.
“If they really want him back, they wouldn’t have put that in — they would have just put that he stole something,” said the person knowledgeable about the government’s handling of the case.
Either the NSA didn't want them or Holder was playing to the elites back home and bungled the charges, tonedeaf to the spied upon Chinese. He could have added espionage after they got Snowden.
It may be the NSA doesn't want a trial, even apart from their plans to "just disappear" Snowden.
Why doesn't Snowden seek asylum at an embassy?
Here's another anonymous leaker who Lap Poodle Obama will no doubt NOT investigate:
"The U.S. official would only discuss the [cancelation of Snowden's] passport on the condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to discuss the matter."
Hard to parse the signifance. HK let him go and Russia took him in (and issued a visa) though he didn't have a valid passport. A pssport is the least of Cuba's concerns. Aeroflot won't care.
If he does get to Cuba he could just stay and keep his democratic bonafides by blogging with dissidents there. Cuba is maybe better actually than Ecuador? Better than mainland China or Russia (or the US for him) at least. Be a Hemmingway.
Another take on the extradition demand--maybe the US politicos don't want to Snowden back, knowing Clapper would murder him or (more likely) demand indefinte detention. So, they delay, perhaps secretly hoping for an Assange type house arrest.
Our spy agencies seem angling for a full on, public coup d'etat.
Although the cynicism of Obama ignoring global warming until this moment are pretty transparent, the bigger problem are his quickly assembled untenable solutions. We have to have rewards/value for common citizens, not just costs. Obama doesn't have the political power to dictate energy use, nor do our rulers at the spy agencies seem to care about this issue.
I agree that Snowden has become an existential Constitutional issue. He embodies a democratic dilemma for the US. If the US gets him, then what? Gitmo? Indefinite detention? Illegal secret trial? Military tribunal? Torture? Murder? Any path other than a full public trial is a surrender of democratic principles.
But, I'm not sure that NO members of Congress will resist the NSA/CIA etc. The immediate tool at hand for any remaining proConstitution members of Congress is charging Clapper and Alexander with perjury, and PUBLIC congressional hearing before its too late.
I guess we'll see. Unfortunate silence from some likely Congrssional heroes so far.
The bigger problem is probably that antiBill of Rights activist John Roberts is part of the cabal, and he has an unchecked stranglehold on the FISC as well a bloc on a Court compromised by NSA intimidation. It's hard to imagine a return to the rule of law without impeachment proceedings against the chief justice.
Stick a fork in Holder, he's done.
Obama is now the lamest of lame ducks.
The permanent powers in the federal agencies will run the country.
The Clapper Cabal is gaining power even as it loses legitimacy.
I will predict a drone strike on Snowden if he leaves Russia.
He may consider surrending to the US now.
Holder is toast but plenty of blame for Kerry.
The real culprit is Obama's bubble. He gets his intel from spies who have every reason to distort his worldview.
As Snowden wisely hints--espionage on our friends' legal, non aggressive activities carries risks for them, and therefore for us.
The NSA has shat in our international bed, now Obama can't understand why no one wants to sleep with us.
The world watches and says meow.
Yes.
The spy agencies would have us think they are passive observers, but observation changes the observed. The gaze is never neutral, never free from judgment. The gaze changes discourse and pushes it toward dishonesty and indirection and sycophancy.
The structure of US spying reflects the unexamined assumptions of a very few, unrepresentative, unelected individuals who are shaping our view of the world to match their own.
I agree with General Alexander that Snowden's reveal has caused irreversible change, but not that that change is damaging. Damaging to Alexander's cloistered self-image, perhaps.
Without any sense of irony, the US looks for inspiration from the USSR:
Mr. Schindler, the former N.S.A. counterintelligence officer, said that while a person’s political views are not considered in terms of security clearances, the reviews may need to be expanded to include Twitter posts and other online comments that could yield clues to a job candidate’s thinking.
He said the N.S.A. could also do what Soviet officials did after one of their cipher clerks defected in 1945.
“Their response wasn’t to crack down on code clerks, but to make them happier,” Mr. Schindler said. “They boosted their pay and gave them more reasonable hours, and they got no-knock privileges with the boss to keep them happy.”
You really can't make this shit up.
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