This and That...

[Warph]

NSA slides explain the PRISM data-collection program

Published: June 6, 2013
Through a top-secret program authorized by federal judges working under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), the U.S. intelligence community can gain access to the servers of nine Internet companies for a wide range of digital data. Documents describing the previously undisclosed program, obtained by The Washington Post, show the breadth of U.S. electronic surveillance capabilities in the wake of a widely publicized controversy over warrantless wiretapping of U.S. domestic telephone communications in 2005. These slides, annotated by The Washington Post, represent a selection from the overall document, and certain portions are redacted.

Read related article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/us-intelligence-mining-data-from-nine-us-internet-companies-in-broad-secret-program/2013/06/06/3a0c0da8-cebf-11e2-8845-d970ccb04497_story.html



Introducing the program
A slide briefing analysts at the National Security Agency about the program touts its effectiveness and features the logos of the companies involved.


The seal of
Special Source Operations,
the NSA term for alliances
with trusted U.S. companies.




Monitoring a target's communication:
This diagram shows how the bulk of the world's electronic communications move through companies based in the United States.



Providers and Data: The PRISM program collects a wide range of data from the nine companies, although the details vary by provider.




Participating providers This slide shows when each company joined the program, with Microsoft being the first, on Sept. 11, 2007, and Apple the most recent, in October 2012:

[Warph]

Top Law Clown Eric Holder:
"When The Time Comes For Me To Step Aside For My Successor, I Will Do So"

(That time has long since come and gone, MoonBat!)

[Warph]

WHITE HOUSE VISITOR LOGS:
When did Stephanie Cutter (Obuma Campaign) and Doug Shulman (IRS) Meet?

In what must have been some sort of mistake on her part, Obuma 2012 campaign adviser Stephanie Cutter recently revealed she attended meetings at the White House with the IRS commissioner, Doug Shulman.

A clue as to whether the targeting by the IRS of Tea Party and other conservative groups was discussed at the 157 meetings that former IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman had at the White House may be found in remarks by Stephanie Cutter, deputy manager for Obuma's 2012 re-election campaign, in a recent appearance on Jake Tapper's show "The Lead" on CNN.

As reported by the 'Daily Caller', Cutter attempted to dismiss charges they were political meetings but admitted she had attended meetings with Shulman at the White House.  "I was in them with him," Cutter said. "So there was nothing nefarious going on."

Well, if they were not political meetings, why was she there at all?  Was she there to offer her health care or tax code expertise? ... Cutter became Obuma's deputy campaign manager in September 2011.  Shulman, a Democratic donor, was IRS commissioner from March 24, 2008, to November 9, 2012.  Cutter was an Obuma attack dog during the 2012 campaign.

So I took a look at the White House Visitor Access Records (most transparent administration evah!) to get a sense for when Shulman and Cutter might have been in meetings together.

Here are the 2011 records:

And here are the 2012 Records:

Finding only one date... June 5, 2012... where their paths appeared to cross at the White House.  Notice that many of the expected details during this period (who they were visiting, number in the party, etc.) are missing.

Given the track record of this administration, one must wonder whether even the vaunted White House Visitor Access logs are accurate and complete.... probably not.

[Warph]

Senator Kirk to Holder:
Have You Been Spying on Congress?

Attorney General Eric Holder brushed off a question at today's Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, and Science and Related Agencies hearing on whether phones of the legislative branch were being monitored by the executive branch with help of the judicial branch.

"I want to take you to the Verizon scandal, and which I understand takes us to possibly monitoring up to 120 million calls. You know when government bureaucrats are sloppy, they're usually very sloppy," said Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.). "I want to just ask, could you assure to us that no phones inside the Capitol were monitored of members of Congress that would give a future executive branch, if they started pulling this kind of thing up, that would give them unique leverage over the legislature?"

"With all due respect, Senator I don't think this is an appropriate setting for me to discuss that issue. I'd be more than glad to come back in a — in an appropriate setting to discuss the issues that — that you have raised," Holder responded.

"I would interrupt you and say the correct answer would be to say no, we stayed within our lane and I'm assuring you we did not spy on members of Congress," Kirk interjected.

Chairwoman Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) jumped in, saying that when she read the story in the New York Times this morning "it was like, oh God, not one more thing."

("it was like, oh God, not one more thing." - Mikulski (D- Md)  LOL!  Please, pardon my SchadenFreude.  LOL!  Well, Mme Mikulski, there IS the Impeachment option. It would make all this go away.  Maybe you Demo-rats could talk tothat POS Obuma about resigning?  That, too, would make it all go away for you.  Congress could actually flex its muscles, for once)


"And not one more thing where we're trying to protect America, and then it looks like we're spying on America. I think the full Senate needs to get a brief on this. And I think we need the attorney general. I think we need the National Security Agency, and other appropriate people. This is in no way to minimize, actually, Senator Kirk your very excellent question," Mikulski added.

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) said "the sooner the better" he hoped Mikulski, as chairwoman and a member of the Intelligence Committee, "would create the appropriate forum, that is a classified hearing to get into this where the attorney general could be open with us."

"I think that what Senator Kirk is raising, is a very important question," Shelby said.

Mikulski vowed to send notes to Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) because the question cuts across committees, including Judiciary and Armed Services.

Kirk, also an attorney, said he wanted to ensure "that when you're jumping out of your executive branch lane, you want to make sure you're not gaining new intel and leverage over separated powers under our Constitution."

"I would hope that we would get absolute assurance that not a single Supreme Court justice was at all involved in this whole Verizon thing," he added.

"Senator Kirk, please do not take my response as something — as anything but being respectful of the concerns that you have raised. There has been no intention to do anything of that nature, that is to spy on members of Congress, to spy on members of the Supreme Court," Holder said.

"Without getting into anything specific, I will say this, that with regard to — members of Congress have been fully briefed as these issues, matters, have been underway. I'm not really comfortable in saying an awful lot more about that. But the concerns that you have raised..." he continued before Mikulski interjected that "fully briefed" usually means a group of eight congressional leaders.

Kirk said he raised the questions because "someone, whoever was running this program, knows they really screwed up."

"I would just ask that you kind of seize the records and not allow the destruction of evidence that they have accidentally monitored other branches of the government," he said.

"As I said, I'd be more than glad to discuss this in an appropriate setting," Holder responded.

[Warph]

Hot Air

I was in the restroom at Cracker Barrel Restaurant yesterday and someone had put this sticker on the hand drier unit.

However, I have heard a national radio show host say that if you wanted to listen to an Obuma speech, you could hear one by hitting the flush handle on a toilet at Disney World!   You gotta hand it to those dang Disney guys!  They are really creative!

[Ross]

West Point center cites dangers of 'far right' in  U.S.

   

By Rowan  Scarborough

The Washington  Times

Thursday, January 17, 2013


A West Point think tank has issued a paper warning America about "far right" groups such as the "anti-federalist" movement, which supports "civil activism,  individual freedoms and self-government."

The report issued this week by the Combating  Terrorism Center at the U.S. Military  Academy at West Point, N.Y., is titled "Challengers from the Sidelines:  Understanding America's Violent Far-Right."

The center — part of the  institution where men and women are molded into Army officers — posted the  report Tuesday. It lumps limited government activists with three movements it  identifies as "a racist/white supremacy movement, an anti-federalist movement  and a fundamentalist movement."

The West Point center typically focuses reports on al  Qaeda and other Islamic extremists attempting to gain power in Asia, the  Middle East and Africa through violence.

But its latest study turns inward and paints a broad brush of people it  considers "far right."

It says anti-federalists "espouse strong convictions regarding the federal  government, believing it to be corrupt and tyrannical, with a natural  tendency to intrude on individuals' civil and constitutional rights. Finally,  they support civil activism, individual freedoms, and self government.  Extremists in the anti-federalist movement direct most their violence against  the federal government and its proxies in law  enforcement."

The report also draws a link between the mainstream conservative movement and  the violent "far right," and describes liberals as "future oriented" and  conservatives as living in the past. (emphasis added)

"While liberal worldviews are future- or progressive -oriented, conservative  perspectives are more past-oriented, and in general, are interested in  preserving the status quo." the report says. "The far right represents a more  extreme version of conservatism, as its political vision is usually justified by  the aspiration to restore or preserve values and practices that are part of the  idealized historical heritage of the nation or ethnic community."

The report adds: "While far-right groups' ideology is designed to exclude  minorities and foreigners, the liberal-democratic system is designed to  emphasize civil rights, minority rights and the balance of power."

The report says there were 350 "attacks initiated by far-right  groups/individuals" in 2011.

Details about what makes an attack a "far right" action are not clear in the  report, which was written by Arie Perliger, who directs the center's  terrorism studies and teaches social sciences at West Point.

A Republican congressional staffer who served in the military told The  Washington Times: "If [the Defense Department] is looking for places to cut  spending, this junk study is ground zero.

"Shouldn't the Combating  Terrorism Center be combating radical Islam around the globe instead of  perpetuating the left's myth that right-wingers are terrorists?" the staffer  said. "The $64,000 dollar question is when will the Combating  Terrorism Center publish their study on real left-wing terrorists like the  Animal Liberation Front, Earth Liberation Front, and the Weather  Underground?"

http://nolathe.net/category/gun-control/

[Warph]

Gallup Poll: 50% Of Americans Think Team Obama Knew IRS Was Targeting Conservatives

(According to MSNBC's resident MoonBat Clown Martin Bashir:  It's because of racism)

[Warph]

Feds Asking For Four Year Sentence For Jesse Jackson, Jr.

(He's lucky it's only for four years, and need I say Chicago politics, again?)

Via Politico:
Federal prosecutors are seeking a four-year prison sentence for former Illinois Democratic Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr., who has plead guilty to illegally diverting hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign funds to personal use.

Under the Justice Department recommendations, Jackson would have to forfeit the $750,000 he stole from his campaign, and pay back another $750,000 to his reelection committee. Prosecutors are asking that someone not related to Jackson be appointed to run the campaign, which would then be "wound down."

In a break for Jackson and his wife — former Chicago Alderman Sandi Jackson, who also plead guilty in the case — prosecutors have requested that their prison sentences be staggered so that both aren't in prison at the same time. Sandi Jackson faces up to 18 months in federal prison as part of the couple's illegal scheme. The couple have two young children.

[Warph]

Obama DOJ Fights Release Of Secret Court Opinion Finding
Domestic Surveillance Is Unconstitutional

(So they knew it was illegal and did it anyway? 
Sounds like something the Obama administration does all of the time

)

Via Mother Jones Rag:
In the midst of revelations that the government has conducted extensive top-secret surveillance operations to collect domestic phone records and internet communications, the Justice Department was due to file a court motion Friday in its effort to keep secret an 86-page court opinion that determined that the government had violated the spirit of federal surveillance laws and engaged in unconstitutional spying.

This important case—all the more relevant in the wake of this week's disclosures—was triggered after Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), a member of the Senate intelligence committee, started crying foul in 2011 about US government snooping. As a member of the intelligence committee, he had learned about domestic surveillance activity affecting American citizens that he believed was improper. He and Sen. Mark Udall (D-Colo.), another intelligence committee member, raised only vague warnings about this data collection, because they could not reveal the details of the classified program that concerned them. But in July 2012, Wyden was able to get the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to declassify two statements that he wanted to issue publicly. They were:

*** On at least one occasion the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court held that some collection carried out pursuant to the Section 702 minimization procedures used by the government was unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment.

*** I believe that the government's implementation of Section 702 of FISA [the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] has sometimes circumvented the spirit of the law, and on at least one occasion the FISA Court has reached this same conclusion.

For those who follow the secret and often complex world of high-tech government spying, this was an aha moment. The FISA court Wyden referred to oversees the surveillance programs run by the government, authorizing requests for various surveillance activities related to national security, and it does this behind a thick cloak of secrecy. Wyden's statements led to an obvious conclusion: He had seen a secret FISA court opinion that ruled that one surveillance program was unconstitutional and violated the spirit of the law. But, yet again, Wyden could not publicly identify this program.

[Warph]

 

Dem Elijah Cummings:
President Should Go Back And Read His Own Speeches on Privacy

Via Breitbart:
As the scope of the government's spying on private citizens becomes clear, left-wing politicians are openly criticizing Obama and his Administration. Long critical of Bush-era anti-terror policies, many had expected Obama to end these practices, rather than expand him. MD Democrat Rep. Elijah Cummings said, "I think the president needs to go back and read his own speeches."

"I'm very concerned that this is basically a continuation of the policies of the Bush administration and the abuses of the Patriot Act. I'd like to see better out of this administration," OR Rep. Peter DeFazio told Politico.

The Obama Administration isn't just continuing policies begun under Bush, in many cases they are expanding them. He has greatly expanded the drone program and uses is regularly to assassinate suspected terrorists. The massive database of phone records also includes on-line data and internet activity. Combined with the seizure of reporters' phone and email records, the new revelations show an Administration obsessed with monitoring individuals' behavior.

This presents an existential challenge for Obama. In Bush's case, at least the controversial policies were undertaken by a President who believe the nation was in a state of war against terrorism. Obama has often rejected the idea that we're at war and has noted repeatedly that terrorists are "on the run." So, why maintain or expand Bush's policies?

Obama has maintained his standing in the polls largely because his base has supported him strongly. The government's expansive spying on citizens, however, threatens to alienate his base. If even a small percentage of them abandon him over this, his approval rating will fall quickly. Speeches won't fix that.