Snowdon is a dummy

@Walter Hinteler,

Quote:

NSA-personal in the US-embassy all have diplomatic status ...

All US diplomats are spies, Walter, and frequently they are also terrorists and war criminals. How might they differ from NSA spies?

0 Replies

@hawkeye10,

Quote:

there is no way that a slightly properly run NSA allows Snowden to take even a tiny fraction of what he did.

IMO it's more structural than that: The decision of going for mass surveilance is what ruined the whole project. It led to a project if massive size, which collapsed under its own weight. If you want to spy on the entire human race, you will need a lot of staff, in the tens of thousands, and the more staff you have, the higher the chances that there will be a Snowden among them.

If they had gone for a smaller operation, evedropping on Merkel but not on all Germans for instance, they would not have needed to hire so many people and they could have checked them better.

2 Replies

Quote:

In neither the French nor the German case did he offer any elaboration of what, in his view, the National Security Agency was actually doing in France or Germany.

But okay. We don't get it, and don't understand that it's all done for our own security.
Lawmaker Offers Strong Defense of U.S. Surveillance Efforts in Europe

1 Reply

@Olivier5,

it does not matter if NSA has 100,000, 500,000 or 50,000 employes, there will always be some who will want to steal or otherwise act illegally. the organization must have systems in place to make doing this difficult and to catch those who do it. " But but but but....he is a bad guy, a rogue, it is all his fault!" does not cut it for me. poor management is the second most important take-away here, that our government is a criminal organization is #1.

1 Reply

@Walter Hinteler,

that is how we Americans roll, "SAFETY!" bleaches all bad acts.

0 Replies

@Olivier5,

Excuse me for showing my stupidity but weren't we looking for terriosts who are trying to blow people up? Does Merkle fit this bill?

3 Replies

@RABEL222,

RABEL222 wrote:

Excuse me for showing my stupidity but weren't we looking for terriosts who are trying to blow people up? Does Merkle fit this bill?

Obviously. And she's been on that list since .... 2002.

2 Replies

@Walter Hinteler,

Yes Walter. But that was when the two idiots Bush and Cheney were in office. I was hoping the intelligence "smarts" level would have gone up at least 100%.

1 Reply

@RABEL222,

Quote:

The paper [Bild am Sonntag] quoted US intelligence sources as saying that in 2010 the NSA’s director, Keith Alexander, had personally briefed Mr Obama about the phone tapping operation which targeted Ms Merkel.

“Obama did not halt the operation, but rather let it continue,” the newspaper quoted a senior NSA source as saying. Ms Merkel’s number was said to have been on a NSA surveillance list into 2013.

Source

0 Replies

@spendius,

spendius wrote:

Quote:
I was not in a serious conversation with you. Whatever made you think that I was.

That you took the time to engage in a conversation which involved you answering a question of mine. Which shows that you not answering other questions of mine on the lame excuse that I show you no respect is actually due to your refusing to answer them because you prefer ducking them. It can't be because I don't respect you because you just answered a simple question of mine despite knowing I don't respect you. As I only respect certain members of the female sex you ought to be pleased that I don't respect you. That'll be the day when I respect another bloke.

I think all your posts are deadly serious because they all involve you prettying up your self-image which is a very serious business for you. Claiming to be playing golf for example. Even when I could sometimes go round in par it never entered my head that I was playing golf.

It was a social mobility exercise mainly. Once blokes like you started becoming members blokes like me started jumping ship. I still have a couple of business connections which I made in those long gone days when the golf club was exclusive. At least I learned how to get on in life and having done so the next thing was to practice it. In a small pond I mean. The big pond is for mad men.

I'm inclined to think that the intelligence community is beset with the same basic, human, character and looking in at it from outside is very much like a kid with his nose pressed up against the toffee shop window.

Now this kind of idle, silly, playground chatter is more like it, Spendius.

Do you pick your nose in public...or do you do it mostly when nobody else is watching?

0 Replies

@BillRM,

BillRM wrote:

Quote:
I really don't understand your laughing here.
Wiretapping is a crime in Germany and we do have laws about it.
It was done from and on German soil.

I was laughing as it turn Frank express opinion here that Snowdon should be try by a US court on it back.

I was laughing as it turn Frank express opinion here that Snowdon should be try by a US court on it back.

I would love to know what you were attempting to say with those words. Did you put them in that order on purpose...or was it something that happened by chance?

And what did you mean to say?

2 Replies

@Frank Apisa,

Quote:

"I would love to know what you were attempting to say with those words. "

So would I. Billrm certainly knows how to butcher the English language.

2 Replies

@Walter Hinteler,

Walter Hinteler wrote:

RABEL222 wrote:

Excuse me for showing my stupidity but weren't we looking for terriosts who are trying to blow people up? Does Merkle fit this bill?

Obviously. And she's been on that list since .... 2002.

And it's about Germany in general - she is the head of the government. From today's "Meet the press":

Quote:

REP. PETER KING: As far as Germany, that's where the Hamburg plot began which led to 9/11. They've had dealings with Iran and Iraq, North Korea, the French and the Germans, and other European countries. And we're not doing this for the fun of it. This is to gather valuable intelligence which helps not just us but also helps the Europeans in--
[...]
... And we're not doing this to hurt Germany, but the fact is, there can be information that's being transmitted that can be useful to us, and then ultimately useful to Germany.

0 Replies

@hawkeye10,

Quote:

it does not matter if NSA has 100,000, 500,000 or 50,000 employes, there will always be some who will want to steal or otherwise act illegally. the organization must have systems in place to make doing this difficult and to catch those who do it. " But but but but....he is a bad guy, a rogue, it is all his fault!" does not cut it for me. poor management is the second most important take-away here, that our government is a criminal organization is #1.

I agree the NSA's in fault because it hired poorly vetted people, but it's easier to check on 1000 people than it is to check on 26,000 people. The very idea to go for a massive spying operation was ALREADY poor management, or bad foresight.

1 Reply

@Moment-in-Time,

I think I know what Bill meant. It isn't that difficult.

1 Reply

@RABEL222,

The point is, the NSA has been used to collect commercial and diplomatic secrets or priviledged info from allies and foes alike, far beyond the war against terror.

All I am saying is, if you have to spy on your allies, do it nimbly. Don't hire 26,000 staff to do it. And therefore, focus your search as much as possible.

Of course I agree it was risky and bad manners to evedrop on Merkel, Sarko and co, and the US should have known better. But it's the mass spying that allowed, triggered and empowered Snowden. The idea of spying on the entire world truly invited disaster.

0 Replies

@spendius,

It is a possibility that the traditional intelligence community might have an interest in scuppering the mass surveillance programs. Such programs, with practice and investment, might render it redundant and replace the secret agents with a bunch of computer nerds sitting in bunkers in Utah. If PRISM catches terrorists then bigger and better PRISMS catches them all.

Just as DNA evidence tends to replace detectives and drones to replace the military.

I'm not claiming that Snowden is part of a turf war between agencies but guessing that he isn't with no evidence is not something Apisa approves of. He is constantly asserting that "To acknowledge what you do not know, is a display of strength. To pretend you know what you truly don't, is a display of weakness."

Efficiency of operations always costs jobs as the Luddites said. Spy thriller movies will go the way of invisible ink and Mata Haris.

1 Reply

@Frank Apisa,

You don't ever want to know what anyone is actually saying, Frank, because that might require you, the grandiloquent editorial writer, to actually have to address something in a meaningful fashion.

That also applies to MiT, who is at least as cowardly as you.

2 Replies

@JTT,

Quote:

That also applies to MiT, who is at least as cowardly as you.

My fellow poster, JTT, I can assure you I'm not a coward; just because I don't feel the need to respond to every meaningless post does not support such. Now, if you don't get off my case I'm going to come through the internet and ring your bloody neck! Now, do *"Ya'll"* understand that?

1 Reply

@Walter Hinteler,

Quote:

A trial will be rather impossible: according to Spiegel, NSA-personal in the US-embassy all have diplomatic status ...

Bet that the technicians that did the dirty work might not be cover.

1 Reply

Snowdon is a dummy

Related Topics

Quick Links

My Account

able2know