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NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show (2013)

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Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show (2013)

#141

Post by tastythrowaway »

nan0 wrote: post #137
heartsucker wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(warning: anecdote) I knew a guy who joined the US Marines and talked about how he wanted to "shoot towel heads." I don't believe that the US armed forces are purely virtuous at the top, bottom, or in between levels. There likely is a non-zero number of service men/women who get some sort of sick joy out of murdering non-Americans.

So your saying that the whole United States Armed Forces is non virtuous, based on one guy you knew? This is a huge claim.

That's literally not what he said at all - he said "a non-zero number", meaning (i'm assuming here) an amount that exists but is difficult to quantify, yet not so low as to be completely ignored.

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show (2013)

#142

Post by etiam »

jklinger410 wrote: post #117
datamoshr wrote: post #8

The thing that bothers me most about this as a European is; I have zero say in this, in the US you can strike out against surveillance, you can write to senators, protest against terrible legislation. Actually have a voice, however faint it is. Whereas I don't get a say but the exact same treatment from your country. The Five Eyes have made me paranoid and the only escape seems to be downgrading your phone to a brick…

>Whereas I don't get a say but the exact same treatment from your country. The NSA works with the 5 eyes to gather data on you. If you want to stop the NSA from spying on you, vote in your democratic country to remove yourselves from our intelligence agreements. It doesn't necessarily mean the NSA won't spy on you, but it does mean it will be technically illegal for them to do so, so they probably won't do it unless…

I don't see that it would make said spying illegal under US law, and those are the only laws I expect NSA to fear enough to even bother subverting.

Not that I disagree with the suggestion to put pressure on the partners though.

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show (2013)

#143

Post by [deleted] »

nan0 wrote: post #137
heartsucker wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(warning: anecdote) I knew a guy who joined the US Marines and talked about how he wanted to "shoot towel heads." I don't believe that the US armed forces are purely virtuous at the top, bottom, or in between levels. There likely is a non-zero number of service men/women who get some sort of sick joy out of murdering non-Americans.

So your saying that the whole United States Armed Forces is non virtuous, based on one guy you knew? This is a huge claim.

[deleted]

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show (2013)

#144

Post by nan0 »

tastythrowaway wrote: post #141
nan0 wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So your saying that the whole United States Armed Forces is non virtuous, based on one guy you knew? This is a huge claim.

That's literally not what he said at all - he said "a non-zero number", meaning (i'm assuming here) an amount that exists but is difficult to quantify, yet not so low as to be completely ignored.

"I don't believe that the US armed forces are purely virtuous at the top, bottom, or in between levels.". I think the non-zero number could be upwards in the positive millions, according to this claim.

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show (2013)

#145

Post by chocolatebunny »

meric wrote: post #4
ffggvv wrote: post #3

This shows clearly that Putin is a dictator, that China is communist and that the USA spys the entire world to protect its citizens freedom. /s

The "communist country" has a capitalist economy. The "free country" has total electronic surveillance. The "federation" is run like an empire in a dictator-like fashion. And north korea, the "democratic republic", is the most oppressive regime in the world. What a world we live in.

doublespeak has always been a thing.

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show (2013)

#146

Post by jgroszko »

grandalf wrote: post #97
lettergram wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's part of the reason I spend every political conversation discussing the merits of a multiparty (not biparty) system. Pretty sure I've convinced at least a handful of people to vote Gary Johnson as a protest vote. Though personally I'm all about that #Snowden2016

I don't think a responsible person can possibly vote for a major party candidate. Doing so just results in the same powerful interests remaining entrenched. There's always the "oh no what if so and so gets elected" but it always turns out that any major party candidate does pretty much the same stuff once elected. Obama continued and extended the Bush Doctrine on foreign affairs, for example.

All first past the post systems like we have in the US will trend towards a two-party system. It sucks because voting third party just takes votes away from the major party candidate that most closely represents your views. To maximize your influence you have to hold your nose and vote for the major party candidate that most closely represents your views...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7tWHJfhiyo

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show (2013)

#147

Post by Semiapies »

MichaelGG wrote: post #24
datamoshr wrote: post #8

The thing that bothers me most about this as a European is; I have zero say in this, in the US you can strike out against surveillance, you can write to senators, protest against terrible legislation. Actually have a voice, however faint it is. Whereas I don't get a say but the exact same treatment from your country. The Five Eyes have made me paranoid and the only escape seems to be downgrading your phone to a brick…

Is there any reason to believe that no European countries do this kind of thing? Relative to national budgets, this kind of stuff can't cost that much. Dunno where the EU is on their EU-level army right now, but it'd stand to reason that a EU-security org would do exactly this kind of stuff. The UK certainly has no qualms about it. Even the US's allies will try stunts as bad as false flag bombings[1]. So it's not lik…

Quite the opposite - GCHQ in the UK is just one agency that, from available evidence, is very probably doing the same things against its own people and those of the rest of Europe.

The American outage at the NSA is entirely correct. The European histrionics are mostly yank-bashing with a side of whistling in the dark.

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show (2013)

#148

Post by grandalf »

jgroszko wrote: post #146
grandalf wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think a responsible person can possibly vote for a major party candidate. Doing so just results in the same powerful interests remaining entrenched. There's always the "oh no what if so and so gets elected" but it always turns out that any major party candidate does pretty much the same stuff once elected. Obama continued and extended the Bush Doctrine on foreign affairs, for example.

All first past the post systems like we have in the US will trend towards a two-party system. It sucks because voting third party just takes votes away from the major party candidate that most closely represents your views. To maximize your influence you have to hold your nose and vote for the major party candidate that most closely represents your views... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7tWHJfhiyo

Perhaps that is true in terms of maximizing your influence in the next election.

But to maximize your influence over a longer time period, you should vote for the third party candidate that most closely matches your views.

Then, when the major party candidate you would have resorted to loses, the post mortem reveals votes lost to the candidate you voted for, and in the subsequent election the major party adapts its platform to win some of those lost votes.

If politicians expected voters to vote on principle and to hold them accountable, we'd have an entirely different sort of politicians.

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show (2013)

#149

Post by heartsucker »

nan0 wrote: post #144
tastythrowaway wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's literally not what he said at all - he said "a non-zero number", meaning (i'm assuming here) an amount that exists but is difficult to quantify, yet not so low as to be completely ignored.

"I don't believe that the US armed forces are purely virtuous at the top, bottom, or in between levels.". I think the non-zero number could be upwards in the positive millions, according to this claim.

My tone above is clearly one of doubt, thus saying "just like there are some residents of middle eastern nations that want to kill American civilians, there are some Americans who want to kill middle eastern civilians."

> I don't believe that [they] are purely virtuous

The only claim I'm making is that there are members of the US military at all levels that don't have God-Like Perfect Morality.

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show (2013)

#150

Post by [deleted] »

toomanythings2 wrote: post #92
peterkelly wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The KGB ceased to exist in 1991 with the break-up of the Soviet Union, a full three years before HTTPS was invented. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KGB https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTPS

Has nothing to do with my point. Quit pretending the Russians don't have a spy agency.

[deleted]
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