Greenwald writes: "The actual story that matters is not hard to see: the NSA is attempting to collect, monitor and store all forms of human communication."
'The NSA director, Gen. Keith B. Alexander, wanted more than mere snippets. He wanted everything,' writes the Washington Post. (photo: Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
The Crux of the NSA Story: 'Collect it All'
15 July 13
The actual story that matters is not hard to see: the NSA is attempting to collect, monitor and store all forms of human communication.
he Washington Post this morning has a long profile of Gen. Keith Alexander, director the NSA, and it highlights the crux - the heart and soul - of the NSA stories, the reason Edward Snowden sacrificed his liberty to come forward, and the obvious focal point for any responsible or half-way serious journalists covering this story. It helpfully includes that crux right in the headline, in a single phrase:
What does "collect it all" mean? Exactly what it says; the Post explains how Alexander took a "collect it all" surveillance approach originally directed at Iraqis in the middle of a war, and thereafter transferred it so that it is now directed at the US domestic population as well as the global one:
"At the time, more than 100 teams of US analysts were scouring Iraq for snippets of electronic data that might lead to the bomb-makers and their hidden factories. But the NSA director, Gen. Keith B. Alexander, wanted more than mere snippets. He wanted everything: Every Iraqi text message, phone call and e-mail that could be vacuumed up by the agency's powerful computers.
"'Rather than look for a single needle in the haystack, his approach was, 'Let's collect the whole haystack,' said one former senior US intelligence official who tracked the plan's implementation. 'Collect it all, tag it, store it. .?.?. And whatever it is you want, you go searching for it...
"It also encapsulated Alexander's controversial approach to safeguarding Americans from what he sees as a host of imminent threats, from terrorism to devastating cyberattacks.
"In his eight years at the helm of the country's electronic surveillance agency, Alexander, 61, has quietly presided over a revolution in the government's ability to scoop up information in the name of national security. And, as he did in Iraq, Alexander has pushed hard for everything he can get: tools, resources and the legal authority to collect and store vast quantities of raw information on American and foreign communications."
Aside from how obviously menacing and even creepy it is to have a state collect all forms of human communication - to have the explicit policy that literally no electronic communication can ever be free of US collection and monitoring - there's no legal authority for the NSA to do this. Therefore:
[E]ven his defenders say Alexander's aggressiveness has sometimes taken him to the outer edge of his legal authority."
"The outer edge of his legal authority": that's official-Washington-speak for "breaking the law", at least when it comes to talking about powerful DC officials (in Washington, only the powerless are said to have broken the law, which is why so many media figures so freely call Edward Snowden a criminal for having told his fellow citizens about all this, but would never dare use the same language for James Clapper for having lied to Congress about all of this, which is a felony). That the NSA's "collect it all" approach to surveillance has no legal authority is clear:
"One Democrat who confronted Alexander at a congressional hearing last month accused the NSA of crossing a line by collecting the cellphone records of millions of Americans.
'What authorization gave you the grounds for acquiring my cellphone data?' demanded Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), waving his mobile phone at the four-star general."
I know this is not as exciting to some media figures as Snowden's asylum drama or his speculated personality traits. But that the NSA is collecting all forms of electronic communications between Americans as well as people around the world - and, as I've said many times, thereby attempting by definition to destroy any remnants of privacy both in the US and globally - is as serious of a story as it gets, particularly given that it's all being done in secret. Here's another former NSA whistleblower, from the Post article, explaining why that is:
"'He is absolutely obsessed and completely driven to take it all, whenever possible," said Thomas Drake, a former NSA official and whistleblower. The continuation of Alexander's policies, Drake said, would result in the 'complete evisceration of our civil liberties.'"
Numerous NSA documents we've already published demonstrate that the NSA's goal is to collect, monitor and store every telephone and internet communication that takes place inside the US and on the earth. It already collects billions of calls and emails every single day. Still another former NSA whistleblower, the mathematician William Binney, has said that the NSA has "assembled on the order of 20 trillion transactions about US citizens with other US citizens" and that "estimate only was involving phone calls and emails."
The NSA is constantly seeking to expand its capabilities without limits. They're currently storing so much, and preparing to store so much more, that they have to build a massive, sprawling new facility in Utah just to hold all the communications from inside the US and around the world that they are collecting - communications they then have the physical ability to invade any time they want ("Collect it all, tag it, store it... ...And whatever it is you want, you go searching for it").
That is the definition of a ubiquitous surveillance state - and it's been built in the dark, without the knowledge of the American people or people around the world, even though it's aimed at them. How anyone could think this should have all remained concealed - that it would have been better had it just been left to fester and grow in the dark - is truly mystifying.
Perhaps the coining of a punchy phrase by the Washington Post to describe all of this - "collect it all" - will help those DC media figures who keep lamenting their own refusal to cover the substance of the NSA stories begin to figure out why they should cover the substance and how they can. The rest of the world is having no trouble focusing on the substance of these revelations - rather than the trivial dramas surrounding the person who enabled us to know of all this - and discussing why those revelations are so disturbing. Perhaps US media figures can now follow that example.
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All religious groups should gain converts and support by their example, not by religious law.
If they can do it, US citizens can come back together as fellow Americans. I know some Evangelicals who are true to the values of Jesus Christ - they help the poor, feed the homeless, care for the drug addicted or alcoholic.
They do not let political positions influence their connections with people. They also show compassion for both Israelis and Palestinians instead of wanting Jerusalem for themselves - and when they get it, will give Jews 48 hours to convert or else. Unfortunately some have become the spokespeople for politicians funded by corporate interests and issue-focused political organizations like ALE and, AIPAC.
Mark Twain
And who with Eden disds't devise the Snake;
For all the Sin wherewith the Face of man
Is blacken'd,
Man's forgiveness give -and take!"
A wise Persian.
"they are unprepared to accept a duality between their spiritual inner lives and their membership in a worldly society among people with their own private minds & hearts."
They are not concerned with their own spiritual inner lives. They think religion is something other than that - a means for subjugating their women first, and the "others", second.
This syndrome is not limited to Christian fundamentalists . It is the same with ALL fundamentalist sects of the world Religions.
I think you have stated a key concept the US tried to establish with the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
A liberal society, pillared by laws, is accepting that the fundamentalist has a right to exist, participate in society, believe and practice their religion to the extent it does not infringe on the rights of other members of that society. A fundamentalist should respect the rights a liberal society would bestow on them and abide by the laws that guarantee the rights of everyone. A more perfect union is the path we should be on, not the winner take all, as you describe. Unfortunately, the US has slaughtered many fundamentalists and just plain old "other" religious members in it's history, too.
What evangelicals believe:
that the world was made in seven days and is not older than 5,000 years.
That science that questions "faith" is satanic.
That Jesus had a role in the writing of the Constitution, especially the second amendment.
That Jesus wil come at the end of times (any day now) with a sword and not peace, that he will rapture a chosen few from the whole species, the rest will be left behind.
That the United States is chosen by God to rule the world.
That the founding of the state of Israel is a sign of the coming end times
That Jesus was muscular and not meek
That the rapture happens on the first (or is it third?) day of the tribulation (big theological question for Fundies)
That homosexuals should be killed (see advances made by white evangelicals in their "missions" to African countries).
That all other kinds of Christians are heretics and apostates and will go to hell.
That non-Christians go to hell.
That women should serve their husbands.
Feel free to add your own points...
When pushed for an argument, he always backs up into the "Your Latte is getting cold" cliche or some such banality -and he once, in a giant but typically reactionary leap of presumptuousnes s, told me I "--obviously knew nothing about spirituality".
My wife's older brother is one of these "Born-again" Evangelicals who at one time told his own ailing, lovely, classy and spiritual mother that she'd go to Hell just because she kept her own beliefs to herself and didn't go to HIS church. We cut off all contact with he and his humorless, God-bothering alleged friends some years ago; he altered their dad's will to pretty much cut my wife out; -so VERY Christian, innit?! And he's a devotee of Rush Limpballs, so go figure.
On the other hand and to be fair, the leader of our local cat rescue organization, which I also volunteer to and support as best I can, is a deeply sincere Christian believer who actually walks the talk but you'd never know it as it's very personal to her; and there are many happy kitties with good homes or being fostered by virtue of this good, loving woman.
I'm going to make an effort to dialog with you. We have a lot to discuss since I have been a Pentecostal Pastor for 51 years and have stood firm in support of Israel and Jerusalem as Israel's capital.
You make some good points that I would like to discuss since I'm fine w/ the term "marriage" for same sex unions.
what I don't understand is your personal inconsistency. You sing the praises of the Democratic party. This is the party that illegally removed the words "God" and "Jerusalem" from is 2012 Presidential Platform in a verbal vote that was clearly NOT a majority.
Your thoughts pls.
That's 'cause himself is probably speaking' in tongues as Pentecostalists tend to do. If you've never witnessed this, it's quite trip -and Pentecostalists aren't the only denomination that do it. I was at a Catholic "Charismatic" service with my late ex-wife (one time only) and many of these seemingly rational Middle Class White people started yattering in all kinds of sounds which didn't equate to any language I've ever heard and must have come from a Galaxy far, far away -and they saw Angels hovering over us all too.
Now I've had some strange, Shaman-guided hallucinogenic experiences in different Andean "Oriente" and North African locations but these people had been drinking only coffee before this sudden onset of the "Spirit".
All this experience should make me open to almost any spiritual occurrence but I was a bit apprehensive rather than moved by these gibbering antics.
Explains a lot; the Tea-Thugs have their own language too, which is all to easy to comprehend -"Fuck everybody who isn't white, rich and Protestant Christian!"
As for that verbal vote being "clearly NOT a majority," surely if that were so the majority would have stepped up to complain? If you were watching on TV, you may simply have gotten a false impression.
This site along with 10's of thousands more dispute your assertions. There was talk about the removal but Prez. Obama vetoed that idea & yes any conversation about God & Jerusalem were open for any & all discussion.
If you are going to write, perform a tad more research unless you enjoy being seen as totally fact wrong in a public forum.
2) If you support Israeli, do you support Israeli's using Palestinian for target practice? Jesus would not countenance that, but the Old Testament god would - do you ignore Jesus's teaching of love thy neighbor, turn the other cheek, etc.? Are you a Jesus-following Christian, or a picker-and-choo ser? OT when it supports you, picking four words that supposedly prohibit homosexuality out of hundreds of other proscriptions you ignore? Sure they have "bombs' - mostly rocks and duds.
Why should not the imprisoned (ghettoized) Palestinians have a way to protest sufficiently to get the Israelis and the world's attention?
The only thing is that they are NOT aware of who they're being victimized by. They can start by looking at their own evangelical leaders
"Voting against their own interests" is just as toxic to the left as the "47%" is to the right. It has same the toxic effect in alienating people.
Calling people stupid and dumb isn't going to get them to change their minds. I get the point that the piece is trying to make, but I don't think it's effective.
I agree with you. But I'm at a loss to see how the piece could have been written in order to have been more effective. Can you offer a couple hints?
Republicans have become completely dependent on their culture war to maintain power because they still have nothing to offer middle class, working people. It's just a continuation of their racist Southern Strategy, reaching all 50 states. They have managed to convince these same culture warriors that the very rich need to benefit more than the rest of us and that government is evil and anti-American. I'm not sure how much longer they can sustain this myth with no facts to support it.
I think the only thing keeping them in power today after all that's happened over the last decade is the failure of the Democratic Party. They can't define themselves and shy away from the progressive agenda, in fear of these culture warriors. Bought off by the same corporate powers as the Republicans. The conservative movement has won and reshaped our country. Both parties are pushing the same agenda in too many ways. What a mess and what a shame, we had so much potential.