Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Former NSA Employees Praise Edward Snowden, Corroborate Key Claims

theatlantic.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 73 posts

Re: Former NSA Employees Praise Edward Snowden, Corroborate Key Claims

#61

Post by sneak »

mehmehshoe wrote: post #46
gruseom wrote: post #2

The interview he's talking about [1] was posted here [2] and it really is extraordinary. I highly recommend watching all the videos—unfortunately, they carved it into pieces and you have to scroll down the page to get at them. But it's worth it. The transcript doesn't convey how dramatic the discussion was, or capture William Binney's muttered asides ("including content! including content!") or show the meaningful ex…

Binney's comment on the serial number of the Verizon order was great. I never caught the number when studying the doc. By his logic there were as many as 79 other orders to other companies this year. It is the second video down on your link and about 4 min in.

Indeed. I think that by congressional logic, that makes him a traitor though, for aiding the enemy by letting them know ALL the phones are tapped.

Re: Former NSA Employees Praise Edward Snowden, Corroborate Key Claims

#62

Post by rdl »

rdl wrote: post #53
gruseom wrote: post #2

The interview he's talking about [1] was posted here [2] and it really is extraordinary. I highly recommend watching all the videos—unfortunately, they carved it into pieces and you have to scroll down the page to get at them. But it's worth it. The transcript doesn't convey how dramatic the discussion was, or capture William Binney's muttered asides ("including content! including content!") or show the meaningful ex…

IMO Binney (and possibly all 3) deserve the next Nobel Peace Prize.

Actually, today I learned Thomas Drake essentially got screwed out of his federal pension from his whistleblowing, and currently works in an Apple retail store in the DC suburbs. He has 4 sons who are approaching college age. Both Binney and Wiebe are retired (and presumably got their full pensions).

So, the ideal thing would be some kind of prize or other financial reward (or higher paying job) for Drake, or scholarships for his children.

Re: Former NSA Employees Praise Edward Snowden, Corroborate Key Claims

#63

Post by krichman »

wavefunction wrote: post #50
sologoub wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While the recent IRS disclosures of targeting Tea Party activists is deplorable, I'm still optimistic that it's the exception and not the rule in the US. Criminals gaining this access is definitely plausible. Foreign governments using it for oppression/retaliation is also very plausible.

What do you call government officials that don't respect the rule of law?

Congress.

Re: Former NSA Employees Praise Edward Snowden, Corroborate Key Claims

#64

Post by flyinRyan »

wavefunction wrote: post #47
jacoblyles wrote: post #45

It's time for a "Tea Party" of the left to take down pro-surveillance Democrats in the primaries.

Maybe all right-thinking (as in clear headed, not right vs left politics) Americans should dispense with the corporate duopoly presented to us by both the GOP and the Democrats.

You're 100% right, but you can't win on 3rd party in the US and even if you did your options are people like Ron Paul (good with many policies but dangerous on others).

The best is to do exactly what the GP said: invade a popular existing party. Though, my choice would be the republicans because I anticipate backlash against the dems in the next election cycle.

Re: Former NSA Employees Praise Edward Snowden, Corroborate Key Claims

#65

Post by vidarh »

rdl wrote: post #62
rdl wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO Binney (and possibly all 3) deserve the next Nobel Peace Prize.

Actually, today I learned Thomas Drake essentially got screwed out of his federal pension from his whistleblowing, and currently works in an Apple retail store in the DC suburbs. He has 4 sons who are approaching college age. Both Binney and Wiebe are retired (and presumably got their full pensions). So, the ideal thing would be some kind of prize or other financial reward (or higher paying job) for Drake, or scholar…

The Nobel Peace Price includes 8 million SEK (ca. $1.2 million).

Re: Former NSA Employees Praise Edward Snowden, Corroborate Key Claims

#66

Post by user24 »

flyinRyan wrote: post #64
wavefunction wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe all right-thinking (as in clear headed, not right vs left politics) Americans should dispense with the corporate duopoly presented to us by both the GOP and the Democrats.

You're 100% right, but you can't win on 3rd party in the US and even if you did your options are people like Ron Paul (good with many policies but dangerous on others). The best is to do exactly what the GP said: invade a popular existing party. Though, my choice would be the republicans because I anticipate backlash against the dems in the next election cycle.

> you can't win on 3rd party in the US

We used to think that in the UK too.

Re: Former NSA Employees Praise Edward Snowden, Corroborate Key Claims

#67

Post by abalashov »

logn wrote: post #54
Natsu wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's what makes me surprised that both political parties are on board with this. It has the potential to make the Watergate burglaries look positively small time. What, exactly, stops one political party from using this system against the other one? They're all up in arms about the IRS thing, but either party could very easily adapt a system like this into the most powerful opposition research tool ever known. Even…

"So every other country with half-decent spies can just tap the whole country's communications and blackmail any and everyone in power with whatever they find using the systems we set up on our own." I'd imagine the spy world has already realized this, and we're already at a level of mutually assured blackmail. :)

I was about to say the same thing, but you said it much better.

In fact, I think this state of affairs by and large predates the digital age, which is why there are so many "gentleman's agreements" and semi-informal reciprocal codes of honour among intelligence organisations. They have their roots in the Cold War.

For instance, Russia's FSB recently received some opprobrium for revealing the identity of a CIA operative in Russia. It's not because the FSB doesn't know who they are; the FSB knows who they are, and the CIA knows that the FSB knows who they are, and they both know far more about each other's intelligence operations than we realise. It's just not the custom to come out and publicise this information.

Re: Former NSA Employees Praise Edward Snowden, Corroborate Key Claims

#68

Post by freyr »

ianterrell wrote: post #16
freyr wrote: post #15

It's been purported here that the media is coloring its reporting to paint Snowden in a bad light. But when the bias favors Snowden, everyone looks the other way. For instance, they conveniently left out any mention of this quote by Binney: "But now he is starting to talk about things like the government hacking into China and all this kind of thing. He is going a little bit too far. I don't think he had access to th…

They didn't leave it out entirely. From the last paragraph: > one thinks he may have crossed a line by talking about surveillance on China

Ah, I completely missed that, thanks.

Re: Former NSA Employees Praise Edward Snowden, Corroborate Key Claims

#69

Post by king_jester »

talmand wrote: post #27
xradionut wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The major problem with the IRS is that is handicapped by law and politics from doing it's job. There's an insane amount of capital sitting in offshore accounts that probably should have been taxed. Loopholes for the big players are crazy.

If the law prevents the capital from being taxed, such as loopholes, then those laws are not handicapping the IRS in any way as the practice is perfectly legal. The IRS has no standing to do anything pertaining to that capital in the first place. If the capital should have been taxed and hasn't, then that implies law-breaking that's a bit beyond what involves just the IRS. But you are correct about the politics, as i…

Tax loopholes are usually used in the context of money that was intended to be taxed but cannot be due to technical reasons, such as language of the law or inability for the IRS to execute enforcement of the tax.

Re: Former NSA Employees Praise Edward Snowden, Corroborate Key Claims

#70

Post by talmand »

king_jester wrote: post #69
talmand wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the law prevents the capital from being taxed, such as loopholes, then those laws are not handicapping the IRS in any way as the practice is perfectly legal. The IRS has no standing to do anything pertaining to that capital in the first place. If the capital should have been taxed and hasn't, then that implies law-breaking that's a bit beyond what involves just the IRS. But you are correct about the politics, as i…

Tax loopholes are usually used in the context of money that was intended to be taxed but cannot be due to technical reasons, such as language of the law or inability for the IRS to execute enforcement of the tax.

If the loophole exists because of the law then the practice is perfectly legal and therefore that money was not intended to be taxed in the first place. In that case there's nothing to prevent the IRS from doing something because there's no reason for them to do anything at all.

If the IRS is unable to execute enforcement of the law concerning taxation then that's not a loophole, it's likely a criminal act. That would imply that something could possibly change in the future that would no longer prevent the IRS from collecting the tax, with penalties.

I see these two as completely separate things.

People need to get out of this mindset that the big companies are using loopholes in the tax code to cheat the government out of tax revenue. If the loophole exists due to the law then there is no cheating, just bad law. Public companies are practically obligated to reduce their tax liabilities as much as possible and if the government gives them the abilities to do so, then why is that the company is considered the evil entity in the matter? They are simply doing exactly what the government and the law has told them they are obligated to do.

Post reply on HN