In Defense of the NSA

[BenSkywalker]

What do you have to hide?

I put clothes on every day. I'm not terribly modest, but I'd rather not have everything visible to everyone at all times. I'm assuming you must be nudist to say something like that, clearly you want everyone to see everything you do.

Since you actually have nothing to hide, why are you so scared?

I'd be 'scared' that some bumbling half wit not even capable of making it through basic trainer would be capable of accessing and exposing them for the grotesquely inept organization that they are, kind of like just what happened. You seem to be operating under the assumption that these people are competent. They have proven they are not. Outsourcing data mining to private contractors? This is like why don't we trust the dunk guy at the bar with the buttons to the nuclear weapons. They have *PROVEN* to be inept. Am I a fool who thinks the CIA operates any differently? Absolutely not, yet we don't hear shit about what they do. You are OK trusting all of your information to a bunch of half wits who leak their activity all over the internet. I am not. This is not a fear issue, it is a reasonable level of intelligence issue.

Aren't you the same person who whines about corporations writing laws to benefit themselves?

Yes, I am a rather ardent supporter of the Constitution. Corporations having laws written that are in direct violation of the 10th amendment(the most common violation) are disturbing and should be ceased immediately and then rolled back to a place that supports the bill of rights.

Aren't you the same person who installs parental control software to watch what your kids do on the internet?

Never. Not once. For my younger children I install software that limits their access- this is removed by the time they enter their pre teen years. My children range in age from 4 to 21- never have I nor will I violate their privacy like that. For that matter, the type of people that do are exhibiting a control impulse that is most commonly found in child abusers/rapists/spouse abusers.

It enables drugs that are illegal for a good reason

You need a babysitter, I don't. I get it.

It enables child porn lovers.

Actually, net neutrality does that to an even greater extent.

That person is thinking about how electronic privacy has enabled one of the worst kinds of criminals on earth to engage in their toxic activities more easily than ever before.

On a technological basis it would be trivial to shut them down. It is currently illegal to do so. It happens widely now, with the NSA going bonkers spying on everyone and everything, it is also entirely outside of the scope of what they can use it for.

Much like the FBI's extralegal war against the KKK in the 60s and 70s drove it into near oblivion.

Or the war they waged on the mafia and organized crime in general. They did such a good job, street violence exploded and the day to day threat to normal people is *significantly* higher now than what it was prior.

People who implicitly call for trading freedom to child porn lovers, drug dealers, and more, in exchange for their own security from "teh gubmint" deserve neither freedom nor security, and are bound to lose both. And if I were President of the USA, privacy advocates would lose both and die. Not to mention privacy software would be not only illegal, but blocked at the DNS level. If you were using Tor, you couldn't even access the internet in my USA.

That is net neutrality. End net neutrality and shut the NSA down on the same day and we will be *FAR* closer to fixing those problems than we are with the NSA as it is, or hell, even with an exponential growth factor thrown in. Tor is easy as fuck to shut down, it isn't legal to do so.