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.

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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

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It's all bullshit

Anti-Trumpism has never been about opposing Trump. It’s about killing off what remains of the true left in America by bullying them into falling in line with the establishment and accusing them of supporting an evil Nazi traitor if they don’t. It’s about manufacturing support for new cold war escalations with Russia. It’s about manufacturing support for internet censorship to quash anti-establishment ideas. It’s about rescuing the career of every MSM pundit who’s been proven wrong about everything since 2015. It’s about distracting from the DNC scandal which proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that democracy does not exist in America in any meaningful way. It’s about pacing rank-and-file Democrats into alignment with Bush era neoconservatives. Opposing Trump has nothing to do with it.

No, when it comes to actual policies that actually matter, Trump and those who McResist him are playing for the same exact team. Same expansion of the US war machine, same expansion of unaccountable Orwellian surveillance networks, same increasing government opacity and persecution of whistleblowers, same increasingly militarized police state, same soul-crushing Walmart economy, same subversion of anything resembling democracy, same oligarchy, same agenda. Same play, different masks.

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.

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Steven D's picture

never had it so good.

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

Raggedy Ann's picture

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.

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"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

Wink's picture

where Marky Mark Wahlberg plays a sniper and Ned Beatty is one of the adversaries. @Raggedy Ann
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."

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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.

Raggedy Ann's picture

@Wink
Sadly.

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"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

for equality of surveillance, regardless of the observed person's Identity, surely that's another victory for the Democratic Party.

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Orwell: Where's the omelette?

@jim p
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?

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dervish's picture

@jim p what if I identify as someone unobservable?

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"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."

Meteor Man's picture

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!

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"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

ugly

U.S. commanders have launched an investigation into video footage that appears to show an American service member firing into the cab of a civilian truck as the two vehicles pass on a road in Afghanistan, an action that could have violated the military’s rules of engagement and may hamper the alliance with the Afghan government.

The shooting briefly appears during a gritty montage of combat footage allegedly recorded by U.S. troops battling the Islamic State’s Afghan affiliate. An anonymous user recently uploaded the video to YouTube under the title “Happy Few Ordnance Symphony,” then quickly removed it.

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travelerxxx's picture

@gjohnsit

Hey, they were just exercising their Second Amendment rights in another country!

Seriously though, it looks like Murder One to me.

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Not that it's connected or anything, just a coincidence. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A

Room 641A is located in the SBC Communications building at 611 Folsom Street, San Francisco, three floors of which were occupied by AT&T before SBC purchased AT&T. The room was referred to in internal AT&T documents as the SG3 [Study Group 3] Secure Room. It is fed by fiber optic lines from beam splitters installed in fiber optic trunks carrying Internet backbone traffic and, as analyzed by J. Scott Marcus, a former CTO for GTE and a former adviser to the FCC, has access to all Internet traffic that passes through the building, and therefore "the capability to enable surveillance and analysis of internet content on a massive scale, including both overseas and purely domestic traffic."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Californias_12th_congressional_district

Just call it the Re-district why not. Sheesh. PU

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@eyo

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@gjohnsit it is gorgeous up here in Cloverdale, a real stunner. 72 on the deck.
"The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco" --Mark Twain (maybe)
heh

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@eyo
About two decades ago I had a contract job in that very building.

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@gjohnsit hook us up bro, don't leave us hangin'. A contract job doing what?
over

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@eyo
but then I'd have to kill ya. Wink

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SnappleBC's picture

@eyo

...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.

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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

Meteor Man's picture

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)

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"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

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.

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Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.

k9disc's picture

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.
@Dr. John Carpenter

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“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu

@k9disc It might not be as literal as that but it sure seems to me if someone wanted to deflect attention from a crap vote, this would be the way to do it.

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Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.

snoopydawg's picture

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.

IMG_1408_1.JPG

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.

IMG_1596.JPG

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

SnappleBC's picture

... 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?

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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

snoopydawg's picture

@SnappleBC

We need to find a way to shake them up.

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

@snoopydawg

Or off.

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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.