Hypocrisy or Double Standards - PART 3

The Betrayal of the American People by the Democrats

In a vote denounced by civil liberties advocates, the US House of Representatives has voted 256 to 164 in favor of re-authorizing Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

The reauthorization of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act allows the government to continue conducting warrantless searches of communications of foreigners abroad, even when they are talking to American citizens.

Mr. Krumholz is particularly concerned with the process known as unmasking, wherein government officials can find out the identities of Americans participating in foreign communications picked up by intelligence agencies (the U.S. person’s end of the conversation is supposed to be redacted, or “masked,” when executive branch or intelligence officials examine the intelligence. When an official needs to see the American’s side of the conversation, it can be “unmasked.” The problem is that this unmasking doesn’t require a warrant). There aren’t (or weren’t) clear rules put in place about when an unmasking is appropriate. Despite their best intentions to prevent terrorism and crime, he argues, intelligence agencies are not immune from a central tenet of human nature: “Unaccountable power corrupts and would be abused by even the best of us.”

The problem, fundamentally, is that Congress has given our intelligence agencies too much power, and refuses to check these agencies even when they flagrantly abuse the vast powers they have been granted. A case in point is the FISA Section 702 reauthorization vote.

The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, allows the U.S. government to spy on foreign powers, and agents of foreign powers in America, without violating Americans’ Fourth Amendment rights. If an American were acting as an agent of a foreign power, the government had to go to a secret court—the FISA court—to obtain a warrant before spying on that American. The current provision within FISA meant to allow snooping on foreigners, Section 702, was passed in 2008. This amendment grants the US intelligence agencies powerful tools to conduct surveillance. The power 702 grants intelligence agencies expires, something written into the law to protect against abuse and allow Congress to have some oversight. Over 50 Democrats backed by the GOP, not only reauthorized 702 without any meaningful reforms, but they also expanded intelligence bureaucracies’ legal powers.

Democrats have been very vocal & critical about Donald Trump abusing the Justice Department to go after his political enemies —most notably his former opponent Hillary Clinton and the Clinton Foundation, which the Department of Justice is reportedly currently investigating based on allegation made during the 2016 presidential campaign. So you’d think they would oppose handing Donald Trump any more power with which he could potentially use against all sorts of Americans who attract negative attention from his administration.

Yet, with the help of some Democrats, the House of Representatives voted — and the Senate will do so sometime in the next week — to extend a controversial NSA surveillance power that potentially affects millions of Americans’ privacy rights.

Currently, the NSA has over 100,000 foreign nationals under this type of surveillance now, but it also has the communications of the potentially millions of Americans they've talked to, texted with and emailed over the course of the surveillance. The FBI has access to this vast database of information and regularly searches it like Google without a warrant, for crimes that have nothing whatsoever to do with terrorism.

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Full story here​

https://anon.to/F39kwC

But I betcha, most people will still buy from these stores.

This was reported in 1999.

SOURCES: 1. Krumholz, W., & Krumholz, W. (2018). Why We Shouldn't Expand Intel Agencies’ Power To Spy On Americans. The Federalist. Retrieved 13 January 2018, from http://thefederalist.com/2018/01/11/congress-shouldnt-expand-intelligence-agencies-power-spy-americans/

2. Right and Left React to the Extension of Warrantless Surveillance | News - Zedid. (2018). News.zedid.com. Retrieved 13 January 2018, from https://news.zedid.com/world/us/right-and-left-react-to-the-extension-of-warrantless-surveillance/ 3. Opinion | Dems should know better than to give Trump more spying power. (2018). NBC News. Retrieved 13 January 2018, from https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/democrats-just-handed-trump-more-domestic-surveillance-powers-they-should-ncna836836