Europeans are upset after learning that, in addition to capturing the email and phone records of Americans, the NSA has been doing the same to them in a global assault on privacy. This includes leaders of allied nations. The United States is now viewed as an international rogue nation with no respect for the law or privacy or even loyalty. Now into this explosive environment has jumped Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.), chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. Rogers responded directly to the French and said that this is all a “good thing” and the French should really be “applauding and popping champagne corks” for keeping them all under surveillance and destroying any notion of privacy.
Senator Marco Rubio (R., FL.) offered his own reaction to the story with a dismissive comment that “everybody spies on everybody.” Privacy it appears is worth little more than a shrug today. That is now the range of concern for the death of privacy among our leaders from a dismissive shrug to an open celebration.
Rogers truly personifies the new mentality of the surveillance state created under President Obama. While George Bush sought to expand surveillance, it was Obama who succeeded in getting Democrats and other politicians to embrace the new security state and a transparent society model. What is most striking is how members, particularly those supposed to be exercising oversight of these agencies, have become virtual spokespersons for the security state.
Rogers is a former FBI agent and is married to a former government contractor with the United States Department of State for intelligence-based and physical security services.
When asked how we should to respond to the French who are a bit peeved about having millions of calls intercepted, Rogers did not even suggest a hint of concern for privacy (which is so last century in the minds of politicians):
“I would argue by the way, if the French citizens knew exactly what that was about, they would be applauding and popping champagne corks. It’s a good thing. it keeps the French safe. It keeps the U.S. safe. It keeps our European allies safe. This whole notion that we’re going to go after each other on what is really legitimate protection of nation-state interest, I think is disingenuous.”
Presumably, the “really legitimate protection of nation-state interest” supporting American surveillance of the world is the same “really legitimate protection of nation-state interest” that supports our claim to be able to use drone attacks without the permission of countries, even allied countries, if we consider the target to be legitimate. It is unclear who is telling Rogers that objections to capturing communications of allied leaders and nations are clearly “disingenuous.” That “disingenuous” concern for Rogers concerns the monitoring of 70 million French telephone calls and Rogers simply cannot understand why the French are not thanking us. That is why those Spaniards intercepted among the 60 million calls by the NSA should be equally overjoyed. Indeed, he has attacked the media (as have Democratic leaders over prior surveillance stories) for upsetting people. He has denounced the stories as “dangerous” — not dangerous like a surveillance state, mind you, but dangerous because the government is your friend.
If Rogers appears in denial if not openly delusional, it is part of the new reality that has been created by the Obama Administration that borders on Orwellian doublespeak. Privacy is now a threat; the media is now a danger; and government monitoring is now reassuring . . . and of course the French should go back to the old grateful, Champaign-drinking, American-led silent partners that we used to love.
So, to France, Michael Rogers wishes to say, “De rien!”
Source: Politico
What James Knauer said.
Bernie Sanders:
https://twitter.com/SenSanders/status/393835202411110400/photo/1
(“Recklessness” describes it well.)
““We ought to come up with a way of stopping it.”
How about: Require warrants. Repeal the Patriot act. Repeal the authorization of military forces. Jail those found to breach privacy without a warrant. Undo any whiff of this poisonous unitary executive B.S. Seat grand juries to probe matters of war crimes.
But the good General cannot come up with a way of stopping it? Also: fire loudmouth clueless fascist generals.
The Congress can fire the general by the way. I certainly hope at the very least he will not even be promoted again.
Even when our Government gives a response to leaders questioning on if they were spied on, you have to not only listen to what they say, but what they don’t say….
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, she wasn’t placated by a phone conversation she had Wednesday with President Barack Obama, or his personal assurances that the U.S. is not listening in on her calls now.
Who would be? Not listening NOW?!?!
And it’s NOT…JUST for “National Security”…
CUT & PASTE
An investigation by the Reuters news agency has uncovered regular use of information from the National Security Agency (NSA) by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) to bust drug users and dealers.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/richard-shrubb/nsa-involved-in-drugs-bus_b_3719810.html
If there is a law out there that they can use against ANYONE, it will be used against EVERYONE!!
General Alexander, the military NSA Spymaster In Chief, has a solution to the problem:
(ACLU vs. Clapper, Alexander, Hagel, Holder, and Mueller – 6). Of course, that’s the ticket, shut down the press and we will all be the better for it.
That argument should go well in your November 1 oral argument before a federal judge.
I will really get worried if they try and pass a British style Official Secrets act. So far we still have some protections for the press here, even if the government tries to ignore the Constitution on items like this.
What is the difference between spying now and then?
The “conspiracy theory” doublespeak the govenment puts out is wearing so thin that everyone can see through it.
Also the propaganda that “everyone does it” is also so thin everyone can see through it.
Except for a few operatives who try to pull the curtain back over the military NSA wizard of odds.
Sometimes what one thinks should be kept to ones self.
BarkinDog, It is more than a bit absurd for the Dutch to be outraged at the violation of human rights, since they have the worst record in Europe for what they did in WWII and after. It is funny that the international court is based there to try war criminals since the Dutch gave ALL of their war crooks a pass after WWII. The Dutch had the greatest number of volunteers who joined the criminal organization called the SS. They also collaborated and had the least number of people prosecuted for that.
Then after WWII, they put their citizens who were in the SS to good use when they fought to re-enslave Indonesia. Using the standard Nazi techniques they tried their best to replicate a FInal Solution there. It is too bad that the UN did not demand that the Dutch execute their native war crooks before they got the ICC.
randy, Apparently we were not tapping the Brit PM. I guess we really do have a “special relationship.”
I thought Obama was going to make the world love us? Meet the new boss, worse than the old boss. OMG, am I a racist???
The US,Britain, and France have a reciprocal agreement that they all agreed not to spy on each other by using agents in their respective countries. ALL nations are spying on each other and this has been going on since the beginning of governments. I do not know what the agreements are for electronic spying, so the French and Britain may have some cause for complaint on that score. It is more than a little disingenuous for such complaints since Russia,China, and others are doing the same thing as the US.
Once again, if you use electronic means of communication over the airwaves which are FREE and OPEN to all, you cannot have any complaint about the fact that others are listening to what you are shouting out. You have no more right to privacy if you are on the street corner and using a bull horn and speaking. In fact from what I know of the law, you have NO legal right of privacy if there is a third party in the room and part of the conversation. What is banned is to physically tamper with or violate the lines of communication that are the private property of others. It is the difference between a police stakeout, and the police breaking and entering a place without a warrant. The cops do not need a warrant to observe. They DO need a warrant to enter and search. Big difference.
This is not about the US spying or eavesdropping on others. It is about getting caught. Israel spies on the US. The US spies on Israel. The French spy on everyone and get spied upon. In the early seventies in almost any major European city there were cameras everywhere. This is now just becoming common place in the US. The big issue here is the arrogance of the US. They are the big dog and don’t really care what others think. The rest of the countries now spying on everyone else are just more discreet about it, that is all.
Reblogged this on Brittius.com.
Why does Rogers bother to call them French. They are Frogs.
Yeah, it is only about “data”.
Months ago I told you folks about this contempt for America as I hear and heard about it in Den Haag (The Hague to Y’all), Netherlands.
I fear that Germany will see this explosion of distrust of the USA among many people of the world and its own people as an opportunity to take radical economic action. If German leaders ever make the calculation that the US dollar capital markets no longer look sustainable they may make a play to extricate Germany from the Euro and Dollar. An economic alliance with China/India/ & Russia with a new commodity based currency could be a economic collapse of the US. I believe they would have to have some kind of leverage or high level assurance the US would not start a nuclear war before taking such a drastic step.
The neo-cons love facism. What I don’t understand is the party of Kennedy drinking the Koolaid. When Kennedy and Eisenhower talked about a secret Cabal. Believe them.
It is a little silly to think that the military NSA has not been spying on the world for decades:
(A Tale of Coup Cities – 4, quoting 60 Minutes Transcript, Season 32, Episode 24). The catch-22 is when you decide to believe that Obama did not know about the spying on Merkel, or did know.
Either way it is shocking.
It isn’t just the French.
About 30 nations have expressed their concerns in an official document, and several have called in the U.S. diplomats.
The damage ought not be poo pooed or exacerbated by T-Party based reactionaries.
The military NSA has done grave damage to our reputation and diplomatic capability.
Which will cost billions of dollars to repair, if it can be repaired.
The story today is “did President Obama lie” when he told the German leader he knew nothing about it.