The Hypocrisy and Phoniness of the #McResistance on full display
The House passed a renewal of Section 702 of the 2008 FISA Amendments Act yesterday, the same section that Snowden blew the whistle on in 2013, but they made it even worse.
In 2013, Edward Snowden revealed that the National Security Agency was legally collecting millions of Americans’ phone calls and electronic communications—including emails, Facebook messages, and browsing histories—without a warrant. Congress has now decided not only to reauthorize these programs, but also to expand some of their most invasive techniques.
... In April, the NSA halted one kind of surveillance authorized under Section 702, referred to as so-called “about” collection. It stopped amassing conversations concerning foreign targets, but that weren’t from the targets themselves.
But the bill newly passed by Congress opens the door to reintroducing about collection in emergency situations only—though what constitutes an “emergency” isn’t specified, leaving room for broad interpretation.
Trump, after opposing this bill came out in favor of it.
So it seems an obvious move for Democrats that hate Trump and call him a "traitor" would oppose giving him enhanced domestic spying powers, right?
After all, aiding a known traitor is treason, right?
Leading the charge against reforms of the FBI’s domestic spying powers was Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee who, in countless TV appearances, has strongly insinuated, if not outright stated, that Trump is controlled by and loyal to Russian President Vladimir Putin.Indeed, just this weekend, in an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper, Schiff accused Trump of corruptly abusing the powers of the DOJ and FBI in order to vindictively punish Hilary Clinton and other political enemies. Referring to Trump’s various corrupt acts, Schiff pronounced: “We ought to be thinking in Congress, Democrats and Republicans alike, beyond these three years what damage may be done to the institutions of our democracy. ”
Yet just two days later, there was the very same Adam Schiff, on the House floor, dismissing the need for real safeguards on the ability of Trump’s FBI to spy on Americans. In demanding rejection of the warrant requirement safeguard, Schiff channeled Dick Cheney — and the Trump White House — in warning that any warrant requirements would constitute “a crippling requirement in national security and terrorism cases.”
Standing with Schiff in opposing these safeguards was his fellow California Democrat Eric Swalwell, who has devoted his entire congressional term almost exclusively to accusing Trump of being a puppet of the Kremlin, in the process becoming a media darling among the MSNBC set and online #Resistance movement. Yet after spending a full year warning that Trump’s real loyalty was to Moscow rather than America, Swalwell echoed Schiff in demanding that no warrant safeguards were needed on the spying power of Trump’s FBI.
How could one not see this and conclude that #Resistance is nothing other than SOP of Machiavellian politics?
Guess who was also with Schiff and Swalwell in defending Trump's warrantless domestic spying ability?
Joining the pro-surveillance coalition led by Trump, Paul Ryan, Devin Nunes, Schiff, and Swalwell was the House’s liberal icon and senior Democrat, Nancy Pelosi. The San Francisco Democrat also stood on the House floor and offered a vigorous defense of the Trump-endorsed bill that would extend to Trump’s FBI the power to spy on Americans without warrants, in the process denouncing the minimal warrant safeguards favored by many in her own party. Pelosi’s speech earned praise from GOP House Speaker Paul Ryan: “I want to thank [Pelosi] for coming up and speaking against the Amash amendment, and in favor of the underlying bipartisan [bill].
...While 125 Democratic House members were joined by 58 GOP members in voting for these reforms, 55 Democrats — led by Pelosi and Schiff — joined with the GOP majority to reject them, ensuring defeat of Amash’s amendment by a mere 26 votes.
“The House just passed a bill to give the Trump administration greater authority to spy on Americans, immigrants, journalists, dissidents, and everyone else.”
- ACLU
“The House just approved the disastrous NSA surveillance extension bill that will allow for continued, unconstitutional surveillance that hurts the American people and violates our Fourth Amendment rights.”
- Electronic Frontier Foundation
“This Section 702 bill would give AG Jeff Sessions unchecked power to use this information against Americans. This bill prevents his decisions from EVER being challenged in court.”
- Sen. Ron Wyden
When @justinamash & @VoteMeadows, chair of the freedom caucus, vote against surveillance, but scores of Democrats vote for it, then its fair to ask what does our party stand for? If we can’t be unified around the principle of civil liberties, then what is the soul of our party?
— Ro Khanna (@RoKhanna) January 11, 2018
Comments
Caitlin spotted it too
It's all bullshit
Just took a look at TOP.
Not a single word about this. Almost every diary is about "standing up to Trump", unlike Democrats in Congress.
Kabuki theater
never had it so good.
"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott
They are all in this together.
No matter what we think - the dems and rethugs are all one party. Nancy Pelosi's son was at the New Year's celebration in Mar-a-lago with the Trumps.
http://insider.foxnews.com/2018/01/08/pelosi-son-mar-lago-new-years-eve-...
See it and weep. We are all doomed unless we revolt.
"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11
It's like that movie
where Marky Mark Wahlberg plays a sniper and Ned Beatty is one of the adversaries.
When Wahlberg says something to the effect, "I'd never be one of them," Beatty points out, "there are no Repubs or Dems, there are only Haves and Have Nots. I've got a job for you if you want one, but there are only so many seats at the table."
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
Good analogy.
Sadly.
"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11
If the bill allows
for equality of surveillance, regardless of the observed person's Identity, surely that's another victory for the Democratic Party.
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
ROTFL
As long as we aren't showing privilege to white males, it's all good.
Has any Democrat considered running on a "Restore the Bill of Rights" platform?
Or is the virtually meaningless "defend the flag" all they know?
It's still problematic though,
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
But The FBI Loves Hillary!
I thought the Republicans were attacking the FBI because Obama/Hillary's undercover agents were out to get Trump. All of a sudden it's Trump's FBI?
Both sides are flipping the script so often that I lost track. Was Comey working under cover for Trump when he released the email report? Who was really behind the Steele Dossier? Were the pee tapes a secret plot by Karl Rove? Is Jeff Sessions an in the closet gay pot smoker? Is there a black slave love child hiding in Trump's family tree? Has Sheriff Arapaio released his birth certificate?
So many questions and so few investigations. We need and should demand more Special Prosecutors. Call in Ken Starr! Now! Before the provocateurs slip away!
"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn
Totally OT
ugly
Freedumb drive-by
Hey, they were just exercising their Second Amendment rights in another country!
Seriously though, it looks like Murder One to me.
Room 614A is in Pelosi's district
Not that it's connected or anything, just a coincidence. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Californias_12th_congressional_district
Just call it the Re-district why not. Sheesh. PU
It's 2 blocks away from where I'm sitting right now
In the belly of the beast. How's the weather?
"The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco" --Mark Twain (maybe)
heh
I've got one better
About two decades ago I had a contract job in that very building.
(tin foil hat starts glowing) ... and?
over
I'd tell you
but then I'd have to kill ya.
No joke The coldest night I've ever had
...was on a hot summer night in ?Texas? I think... somewhere deep south. It was sweltering hot outside. We were a bunch of passengers all of whom had missed our connections and were stuck in the airport. The airport air conditioning was getting really brutal until I finally saw another arriving flight crew and begged them for any blankets or whatnot they had on board. I'm not joking here. It was cold enough that many people couldn't speak well due to their teeth chattering.
A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard
You Are Being Watched
That's the weekly intro to the Person of Interest TV show about a super intelligent AI that watches every camera, reads every text and email and monitors every phone call or electronic communication. Every single person who posts, comments or lurks at c99p is already on the Dept. Of Homeland Security domestic threat list as either an American terrorist or Enemy of the State.
YOU ARE BEING WATCHED!
(Being diagnosed as paranoid does not necessarily mean there is not really someone out to get me)
"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn
There we go!
I knew the "shithole" faux outrage was engineered to cover up something they were trying to push through. "Look, over there! Trump did an outrageous thing!" Meanwhile, Democrats voted to give Trump greater spying power? Ehhhh...never heard of it.
Like clockwork, every damn time. Sigh.
Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.
OK, TinyHands... You're Gonna Tweet Something REALLY Stupid on
Wednesday and we're going to pass this turd on Thursday. We'll send out our usual bunch to whip the Drumpfenfear, and it'll coast right through.
“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu
It sure feels that way.
Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.
Bullshitters who will face no repercussions for their vote
Pelosi has been screwing us since 2006 and yet she's still in congress. People are holding their breaths for the FBI to take Trump down and remove him from office, yet when democrats had their chance to vote on impeaching him, Pelosi said "now isn't the time" just like she did in 2006 when she took impeachment off the table. And yet people are working hard to get her back in charge of the House. Why? Do they really think that the democrats will reverse everything that the republicans have done and that they will pass legislation that will help us? They have gotten their chance to do this many times, yet each time they fold like a pile of dawg shit during the spring thaw.
What so many people who approves of the spying don't understand is that if the NSA and their goons can take our information without a warrant, then they can also plant information on anyone's computer or phone. On top of that, Obama signed an NDAA that allows for us to be accused of doing anything regarding terrorism and the military can arrest us and hold us indefinitely without charges or access to a lawyer. Democrats just told Trump that that's still acceptable.
Jimmy's anger over this came out didn't it? Good for him and his show that doesn't let stuff like this lie dormant. He's a journalist in every sense of the word, the NYT and others are just PR pawns for the government.
Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.
I see the current privacy trends continuing
... until we do something about the plutocracy. I fully expect corporations and wealthy people to get more and more rights with progressively stricter penalties attached while us consumers and citizens get nothing. Why on earth would anything else happen with the plutocrats in charge?
A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard
The plutocracy is getting to comfortable
We need to find a way to shake them up.
Scientists are concerned that conspiracy theories may die out if they keep coming true at the current alarming rate.
@snoopydawg Or off.
Or off.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.