‘Welcome To The United States Of Paranoia’ Michael Walsh nypost.com February 2, 2014
Between the NSA’s power and the IRS’s revenge, how can Americans not be worried about the opinions they express? Feel like Big Brother is watching you these days? You’re not alone. “This is not some far-out Orwellian scenario,” wrote the late William Safire of The New York Times in 2002, in the panicky aftermath of 9/11. “Here is what will happen to you: Every purchase you make with a credit card, every magazine subscription you buy and medical prescription you fill, every Web site you visit and e-mail you send or receive . . . will go into what the Defense Department describes as ‘a virtual, centralized grand database.’ ” Twelve years on, this is the world we live in, but worse. Through a combination of fear, cowardice, political opportunism and bureaucratic metastasis, the erstwhile land of the free has been transformed into a nation of closely watched subjects — a country of 300 million potential criminals, whose daily activities need constant monitoring. Once the most secret of organizations, the NSA has become even more famous than the CIA, the public face of Big Brother himself. At its headquarters on Savage Road in Fort Meade, Md., its omnivorous Black Widow supercomputer hoovers up data both foreign and domestic, while its new $2 billion data center near Bluffdale, Utah — the highly classified Intelligence Community Comprehensive National Cybersecurity Initiative Data Center — houses, well, just about everything. As James Bamford wrote in Wired magazine two years ago, as the center was being completed: “Flowing through its servers and routers and stored in near-bottomless databases will be all forms of communication, including the complete contents of private e-mails, cellphone calls, and Google searches, as well as all sorts of personal data trails — parking receipts, travel itineraries, bookstore purchases, and other digital ‘pocket litter.’ ”
Modal Trigger NSA headquarters in Fort Meade, Maryland.Photo: EPA The question is: To what end? The administration says: Trust us, we’re only after the bad guys. But considering President Obama’s track record, how is “trust us” a consoling argument? The IRS admitted targeting conservative groups before the 2012 election, subjecting them to extra scrutiny and delaying their nonprofit status. One group, Friends of Abe, says its application was held up for two years and they were asked to hand over a list of its members. Another, the National Organization for Marriage, alleged that the IRS leaked its 2008 tax return and donor lists. Meanwhile, a number of Obama’s critics have noticed how audits seem to follow their outspokenness — a coincidence, to be sure. But how about conservative filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza, who was charged with a felony for allegedly making illegal campaign contributions — something that warranted a much lesser charge for other defendants? Is his prosecution just a coincidence? Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz doesn’t think so. “The idea of charging him with a felony for this doesn’t sound like a proper exercise of prosecutorial discretion,” he said. “I can’t help but think that [D’Souza’s] politics have something to do with it . . . It smacks of selective prosecution.”
Modal Trigger NSA headquarters in Fort Meade, Maryland.Photo: EPA/Jim Loscalzo One could conclude that the administration can’t keep private information private — and is happy to seek retribution on those who disagree with it. The irony is, all this snooping may not really be necessary. These days, Americans can’t expose themselves enough: Their smartphones constantly broadcast their whereabouts to law enforcement, while millions cheerfully post intimate personal details and embarrassing photographs of themselves and their families on social media. The fact is, privacy has become a thing of the past, destroyed by the rise of information technology, the force of government, and the willing surrender of the citizenry.
But how many Americans’ hands are pausing over a keyboard these days, wondering if posting their opinion over Facebook isn’t putting themselves at risk? The NSA revelations and the IRS scandal have sent a chill through freedom of speech and expression in this country. “Trust us” cannot be the answer. As the old saying goes: Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you.
New Regime At NSA To Deal With Snowden Fallout Leaked Source February 2, 2014
Spencer Ackerman/Guardian/RT: The embattled National Security Agency is about to get new leaders to deal with the ongoing fallout from whistleblower Edward Snowden’s surveillance disclosures. Vice-admiral Michael Rogers, the commander of the US navy’s tenth fleet and its Fleet Cyber Command, will take over from NSA Director Keith Alexander, who reluctantly became a global figure in the wake of the Snowden revelations. Rogers is a longtime cryptologist in the Navy, whose informal turn it was to nominate a director for the NSA. Alexander is an Army general; and his predecessor, Michael Hayden, hailed from the Air Force. Rogers has a resume studded with experience in cryptography and electronic eavesdropping that are
central to the NSA’s charter. Tenth Fleet, inert since World War II, was reactivated as the Navy’s cybersecurity command and based at Fort Meade, the base of operations for the military’s infant Cyber Command – which Rogers will also head, pending Senate approval – and the NSA. Rogers also served for two years on the military’s Joint Staff as intelligence director, a prestigious Pentagon post. But his low-profile commissions have not provided him with a platform to articulate his views on the propriety and appropriate scope of the bulk surveillance of a large swath of world communications, the subject of Snowden’s disclosures that have been published in the Guardian, the Washington Post and other news outlets worldwide. Nor will the Senate have a chance to scrutinize him, at least formally. The NSA directorship is not a position confirmed by the Senate. Rogers’ appointment to head US Cyber Command, which is colocated with the NSA and largely reliant on its personnel and expertise to protect US military networks, will require Senate approval, making Rogers’ forthcoming Senate Armed Services Committee hearing a proxy venue to learn his views on surveillance. “Rogers has never had to make the public case that the country’s intelligence apparatus is not abusing its legal authorities,” wrote Shane Harris in a recent Foreign Policy profile. Whether or not Rogers will endorse any further reigning in of those NSA programs is a matter that will likely not be known until and if he is officially confirmed to take control. According to at least one interview with the Navy cryptologist, though, he’s likely to continue Gen. Alexander’s ethos of ensuring the US can collect and control seemingly all of the intelligence that’s transmitted around the globe. Speaking in late-2012 to CHIPS, the Department of the Navy’s Information Technology magazine, Rogers indicated that he favored not just increasing the offensive power of the American military’s cyber units, but also stressed the importance of the US maintaining its dominance over the world’s information. “The Navy’s cyber warriors are doing an incredible job every day defending the network and achieving information dominance,” he told CHIPS. “To preserve the Navy’s cyber warfighting advantage, we must continue to develop an elite workforce that is recruited, trained and educated to better understand the maritime environment, employ the latest technological advances and deliver cyber warfighting capability anywhere around the world,” he told CHIPS.
“In summary, the Navy’s success across the maritime domain is guaranteed by our ability to defend, project power and prevail in cyberspace with an exceptionally trained cyber force, continued vigilance, proven tactics and an unshakable warrior ethos,” he added. “If you are not excited by the opportunity that cyber represents to the Navy then you do not have a pulse,” he said in a separate interview last year to the Navy Times. Richard Ledgett, the head of the agency’s investigation into Snowden – who publicly floated the prospect of an amnesty for the former contractor – will become the NSA’s new deputy director and top civilian leader. The appointments, both long anticipated, were announced by the Pentagon on Thursday.
Woman Collapses In Court, Dies, Attorney Says She Was Stressed By Commando-Style Raid Ed Krayewski reason.com February 2, 2014
Stacey Feigel’s husband, Sheldon, is facing multiple felony counts related to an alleged scam involving filing fraudulently for adverse possession on abandoned homes. While arriving in court for a hearing, Stacey collapsed from a “cardiac event” (according to the coroner) and died. Attorney Mark Coleman suggested stress from the raid and arrest could have led to her death. Via the Fresno Bee: Stacey Feigel appeared fit and healthy and jogged regularly, he said. But she also has been stressed by her husband's arrest and the commando-style raid on her home when three of their children were present, Coleman said. Investigators, with guns drawn, entered their home while family members were sleeping or just waking up, Coleman said. "For Chrissakes, the family had never been in trouble before but police pointed guns at the kids' heads," he said.
The Sanger attorney was arrested on suspicion of perjury and falsifying documents in a statewide real estate scam. He has filed a claim against the state of California seeking $1 million in damages for the raid on his family's home. His claim alleges that armed officers violated his freedom of unreasonable search and seizure when they entered his home at 6:30 a.m. on Jan. 15. He was then held all day and denied his right to speak to a lawyer. The Feigels also are seeking damages for the assault and emotional distress inflicted on his three teenage children who were home at the time.
81-Year Old Woman Jailed Without Bond For Feeding Backyard Animals Deborah Bowden myfoxtampabay.com February 2, 2014
Neighbors say Mary Musselman has been feeding backyard animals as long as they can remember.
"She fed the squirrels, the birds, strays and that was in the community. She's just always been that kind of soul," says neighbor Patty Palmer. That is, until Wednesday, when the 81-year retired physical education teacher was hauled to jail for feeding bears one too many times. "I just think it's so heavy handed. Way overdone. I don't think that there was much thought given to her age, her physical, her mental condition," says John Payne, who is also a neighbor. But authorities say she had been warned before. Last November, Fish and Wildlife officers had to euthanize a bear she had been feeding. A judge gave her probation, and made it clear: do it again, and go to jail. "We sympathize with her and her husband. This is a situation that deteriorated through time and it's an unfortunate outcome," says Gary Morse, Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission spokesman. Apparently, Musselman didn't go without a fight. An arrest report says she struggled and kicked at officers, then threatened to shoot and kill the wildlife officer if she set foot on her property again. Wildlife officers say bears that are fed are more likely to get aggressive and more likely to be euthanized. "Once wildlife, any wildlife -- especially bears -- lose their fear of people, then there's a potential for destruction when they're trying to get into people's sheds at food, birds seed, dog food, etc. And there's a potential for danger to people," Morse said. A lot of people are upset not only that Musselman is in jail, but that a bear had to be euthanized. Fish and wildlife officers say that's exactly what they want to avoid. But once a bear becomes aggressive and unable to be relocated, they say they have no choice but to euthanize. 81-year Old Woman Jailed Without Bond for Feeding Backyard Animals VIDEO BELOW http://www.infowars.com/81-year-old-woman-jailed-without-bond
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