depends on who's in charge

Got some cites for this stuff, dys? I'm always interested in such stuff. Thanks!

jespah sorry i did not include but here it is
http://www.cato.org/dailys/12-07-02.html

Funky stuff there!

Didn't know M. Friedman was still around.

Dyslexia, we know that the truth lies in the fact that the republicans did everything they could to 'neuter' Bill Clinton in moe ways than one.

One would think that all common sense has fled the Congress of this land. They sit idly by while bu$h, ashcroft & gang disassemble the Constitution & the Bill of Rights. It is disgusting.

Dys,

What a difference 911 made, huh.

For what its worth, the amount of signal intelligence available almost impossibly large. Unless an intelligence analyst has some idea of what to look for, the flood of data is so large as to be meaningless. There are techniques and means by which a signal can be identified as of possible interest. Those signals are flagged, and given a fast perusal by trained people to see if the signal may provide clues to a planned attack on the United States, its allies, or interests. There aren't resources, or any interest really, in exchanges that don't meet the security criteria. I doubt that even if a signal was looked at that had credible evidence of any civil crime, it would trigger any action on the governments part. Big Brother may be "watching", but he isn't interested in our little secrets.

i totally agree Asherman, my only concern is from past experiences with misuse of information which various govt officials have Definitely done. There simple MUST be built into this kind of privacy invasion some oversight that i do not see at present. Hit lists, enemies lists, etc, absolutely need to be prevented.

dys,

The potential for abuse is certainly of concern. The old Hoover agency and Nixon certainly make us leery of how easily the government can use it's considerable power against individuals they don't happen to like.

Under the present circumstances, however, I don't see much choice but to use whatever tools we can to protect ourselves. We have been the target of deadly attacks for many years, and chose to ignor the threat. Our government chose to reduce human intelligence sources (spies, and traitors) because they offended the ethical standards of polite society. We came to believe that all the intelligence we need could be gleaned from technological marvels. A pipe dream.

Building up a picture of what is going on in the enemy camp from the avalanche of electronic signals produced in our world every second of every day, is like writing a message on grains of sand. Each grain carries only a word, or two of the whole message. The message takes up a handful of sand. In the middle of the night that handful of sand is secretly taken to a Hawaiian beach and dropped from waist height. Our intelligence people to recover that message have to guess which beach on earth the message was deposited, and then identify which grains of sand carry the message, and then put together all the grains in the relevant message. Once that's accomplished, we can wonder how important the message is.

Clinton tried to get the same laws inacted to fight terrorism after the first try at bringing down the two towers.

However, poking into private E mail would have to be strictly in control of the courts.

Oh the poor innocent Americans
Be free to loose your liberty.
security after 11th eptember) is more vital than decency .
Wage war and waterboard all.
export your brand of democracy.

If you've got nothing to hide you've got no problem.

What do you have to hide Dys.

This thread is more to arrest the attention of the participants of A2k