This Won’t End Well
by lizard
Is anyone really surprised the NSA is collecting phone records of millions of Verizon customers?
The National Security Agency is currently collecting the telephone records of millions of US customers of Verizon, one of America’s largest telecoms providers, under a top secret court order issued in April.
The order, a copy of which has been obtained by the Guardian, requires Verizon on an “ongoing, daily basis” to give the NSA information on all telephone calls in its systems, both within the US and between the US and other countries.
The document shows for the first time that under the Obama administration the communication records of millions of US citizens are being collected indiscriminately and in bulk – regardless of whether they are suspected of any wrongdoing.
For those who voted for the lesser of two evils, this is the result of your political calculation.
Will this latest revelation challenge Americans’ seemingly endless capacity for inaction in the face of the continued diminishment of our rights? Doubtful.
Our trajectory, paved with inaction, continues toward fascism.
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4&20 blackbirds 
June 6, 2013 at 9:47 am
Scary shit, liz but hardly unexpected. Interview with Greenwald on WNYC here.
June 6, 2013 at 11:31 am
Ralph is barnstorming about American fascism now:
“It’s not too extreme to call our system of government now ‘American fascism.’ It’s the control of government by big business, which Franklin Delano Roosevelt defined in 1938 as fascism. And they control the government and turn the government to their favor—subsidies, handouts, giveaways, deferred prosecutions, non-prosecutions—and against the American people.”
And if the fascists are collecting Verizon’s records, you can be sure they’re doing the same with AT&T, Sprint, and all the rest.
But yawn, American Fascism is predicated on its media and congress turning there eye elsewhere, and the people staying complacent. If this doesn’t get civil libertarians turning out in droves to organize politically, game over.
June 6, 2013 at 11:48 am
Not only are they collecting phone numbers, but they’re collecting location data. Which means they can pinpoint the two parties exact location based on cellphone triangulation.
It’s enough to make one become a luddite. Or an expat. Maybe both.
June 6, 2013 at 12:31 pm
Ted Kaczynski, prophet.
June 6, 2013 at 2:54 pm
I guess we all have a Obamaphone now.
June 6, 2013 at 5:40 pm
And today we find out about PRISM.
“The National Security Agency and the FBI are tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading U.S. Internet companies, extracting audio, video, photographs, e-mails, documents and connection logs that enable analysts to track a person’s movements and contacts over time.
The highly classified program, code-named PRISM, has not been disclosed publicly before. Its establishment in 2007 and six years of exponential growth took place beneath the surface of a roiling debate over the boundaries of surveillance and privacy. Even late last year, when critics of the foreign intelligence statute argued for changes, the only members of Congress who knew about PRISM were bound by oaths of office to hold their tongues.”
June 6, 2013 at 7:23 pm
If you’ll recall, Dear Lizard, my reason for voting for Romney was that the media would pick on him. We’ll see if the media fries the president in any comparable way that they did G.W. Bush. The lesson then, if one is worried about the concentration of power is to (apologies to W.F. Buckley) vote for the most distrusted politician that can be elected.
But perhaps Mr. Obama will finally do what he set out to do – unite Americans. If he succeeds I’m sure he’ll hate it.
From my perspective we’re only marginally more fucked under Obama than under Bush.
June 7, 2013 at 6:41 pm
my reason to vote Romney was to accelerate collapse and stoke opposition.
the media would have picked on him, but not in any substantive way. the political consensus that keeps us fucked doesn’t get much ink.
June 6, 2013 at 9:26 pm
Guantanamo, drones, data mining. At least the terrorists aren’t winning.
June 6, 2013 at 9:29 pm
Just 3 months ago. Lips moving, liars lying.
June 7, 2013 at 12:22 pm
Twin Spin.
June 7, 2013 at 8:52 am
The Patriot Act (Oct., 2001). Maybe Americans will finally begin to comprehend its purpose and consequences. Congress granted a 4-year extension in May, 2011. Anyone in Congress today feigning “surprise” is lying through their teeth.
June 7, 2013 at 10:53 pm
“Guantanamo, drones, data mining. At least the terrorists aren’t winning.”
Yes they are. Every freedom of our own that we compromise is a win for them.
June 7, 2013 at 11:32 pm
You think we should get out of Guantanamo, quit our covert drone attacks, and get out of the data mining business? Wow, three things we agree on. Imagine that…
June 8, 2013 at 1:40 pm
That was sarcasm.