Do you believe the FBI and NSA when they say more than 50 plots were foiled by NSA surveillance?

[Cali_Democrat]

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	Yes
	10 (20%)
	No
	41 (80%)
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[Cali_Democrat]

1. Here's more information regarding these claims:

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57589831/fbi-surveillance-info-helped-reveal-subway-stock-exchange-bombings/

[leveymg]

5. That one was also previously detected by other means. Proves Zip.

[Hissyspit]

31. .

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023036869

Homegrown jihadist extremists have mounted 42 plots to conduct attacks within the United States since 2001. Of those plots, nine involved an actual terrorist act that was not prevented by any type of government action, such as the failed attempt by Faisal Shahzad to blow up a car bomb in Times Square on May 1, 2010. Of the remaining 33 plots, the public record shows that at least 29 were uncovered by traditional law enforcement methods, such as the use of informants, reliance on community tips about suspicious activity and other standard policing practices.

[Cali_Democrat]

32. Interesting. Thanks for the link. n/t

[unblock]

2. just think how many plots they could foil with surprise home inspections!

wut? yer not p'tecting the terrists are ya?

[Savannahmann]

8. Ah yes

The Boston Bomber technique. Door to door, pointing machine guns at the people, with armored cars/tanks on the street covering the brave police who are shouting out now or we'll kill you all. Or words that carry that implicit message.

Those who object, well the don't understand the dangers is all. Seriously, what happened to my country? I'm sure I left it around here somewhere.

[FSogol]

11. Ridiculous Alex Jones-like exaggeration of Boston. Very pathetic.

[Savannahmann]

62. Ah I see.

You believe the police were going door to door. http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news/national_world&id=9129480
And while there asking politely if there were any bombing suspects in the house. I see, you choose to pretend that is the way things work. Yet, as we saw in California when the police were searching for Dorner, and in Boston, they swarm the streets with heavily armed police and then while pointing machine guns at people ask politely if they may please search the premises.

OK, choose to believe that as well as the NSA is not reading your mail, or monitoring your phone calls. Yet, for some reason, the stories keep supporting my point of view, instead of yours.

But wait, I thought the story about heavily armed police and armored vehicles which are tanks in everything but the tracks, were an alex jones nonsense right?

BTW Here's the information on the Armored Vehicles that the Homeland Security were using.

Now, how did Alex Jones talk the Homeland Security into getting those damned things. He's far more effective than I'd given him credit for. I'd thought he was a nut who talked to fifty people on the internet, but hey, if you say so....

[FSogol]

64. Comparing the actions of the LAPD against the actions of the Boston Police after the bombing

is beyond ridiculous. Did you miss the video of happy Bostonians thanking the police? Or do you consider that propaganda too? You do your cause a lot of harm with spurious allegations, exaggeration, and fear-mongering.




For the record, Alex Jones made the same bullshit comments about the Boston Police that you made. Pretty embarrassing, imo.

[Savannahmann]

66. I have seen the video, and I've seen similar and heard of similar through history.

Does that mean only the ones who are in the area are worthy to judge?

Consider your answer carefully. Because this argument has been held in history, and authoritarians are always liked, until they are on the dustbin of history.

Hitler was popular, I have several videos at the house of him and there is one especially disturbing documentary where people admit to liking life under the Nazi's. They had nothing to fear, so they were unafraid.

Mussolini was also popular. To this day, the Italians complain that the trains haven't run on time since he was deposed. He was popular, and they had nothing to fear from him, so why worry?

There is an embarrassment here. I agree. It is that the arguments being made are historically and factually wrong. Military equipped police is an embarrassment to everyone. My father saw it coming back in the early 1980s. When additional funding was set aside for more SWAT teams. They were so successful after all. Now, every cop has full assault gear, the kind that our actual military dreamed of having in the early stages of the Iraq war. The kind of equipment that was a national disgrace for months while they struggled to armor the Hummers, and get every soldier in battle a vest.

Yes, there is an embarrassment, and I feel it. I feel embarrassed that any Democrat would applaud the authoritarian police state. I feel embarrassed that the party of Civil Rights back in the 1960's, and 1970's. The party that objected to the Military Industrial Complex of the 1980's, and fought to cut the military funding of the 1990's, would today cheer the Police having the same authority we once protested against with the School Of the Americas. That any democrat would applaud such things is embarrassing to me, when I stood in the heat and protested the School of the Americas where foreigners were taught at Fort Benning to drag people out of their homes at gunpoint. Use overwhelming force to intimidate and overwhelm your opponents. Then tell lies to get public support.

A long time ago, I worked as a security guard. We were taught, by State Sponsored Schools, to lie if we had to beat someone up. We were told to tell the crowd that the guy we just beat was a child molester. That way they would report favorably on our actions, because everyone hates a child molester. I never did, but I expect many others did lie about that.

So while I am embarrassed, I am so because of your actions. Because I am also a Democrat, and it's embarrassing to admit that I am when so many of our party members have become cheerleaders of the authoritarian police state.

[FSogol]

67. Kudos on Godwin. We either agree with you or we're Nazis?

Rampant hyperbole. Pathetic.

[Savannahmann]

68. No, I answered your question.

Had I seen the cheering crowds in Boston? As if that settled the matter. I've seen cheering crowds through history. I've read about cheering crowds through history. That doesn't mean it's right, or a good thing. That was all I was saying and proving.

My answer was as topical as your question. The cheering crowds in Boston don't make the actions of the police right any more than the cheering crowds in Italy made Mussolini a great leader.

[MannyGoldstein]

77. It's possible that I'm a government plant...

But I claim to be one of the locals that you're talking about, and it wasn't at all what you're thinking.

Out local cops are cool.

[Savannahmann]

79. If you prefer that sort of policing, then you are entitled to your opinion

However I am seriously disturbed when I see police in more armor than our troops had at the beginning of the Iraq war, with state of the art machine guns, and armored cars, moving from house to house. Among other interests I have is a healthy respect for history, and that scene has never gone to a good place once in history. Perhaps we will be the first. Perhaps we will be the first in history to have a paramilitary trained police force that didn't end up authoritarian. Perhaps that slippery slope that history says is nearly a given, isn't.

The problem is this however. We keep giving more authority, more widely universal powers to the Government, state, city, and Federal. powers we can't get back, ever. Powers like the paramilitary police you are so cool with. You are cool with them now, but what would it take for you to be less cool with them?

http://www.wsbtv.com/news/news/police-shooting-of-elderly-woman-tragic-unfortunat/nD9wC/

For me, we give the police too much leeway, too much understanding, and not enough scrutiny. We used to shout question authority from the rooftops. Now, we shout sit down and shut up to anyone who does question authority.

You go for what feels right for you. For me, I am going to keep sounding the alarm, because where we're headed has never once ended well in history. Not once. The Government was intended to be By, For, and Of the people. Yet the People are given less and less say in what the Government is doing. When someone does question, they are denounced immediately, and the only thing discussed is the one raising the questions, not the questions they are raising.

Find a nation in history, just one, where paramilitary police ended up being a good thing. Most of those nations ended up with new constitutions, written in pencil.

[MannyGoldstein]

80. There was a guy on the loose, probably nearby, who'd

Been throwing nasty bombs at cops and had executed a cop.

When I woke up and found out what had happened, it seemed like a pretty reasonable response to me.

[Savannahmann]

90. A pretty reasonable response?

So the police prepared for this reasonable response, by making sure that everyone on the force had military battle fatigues, military grade automatic weapons, military grade ballistic armor, and then there are the tanks. That seems reasonable to you? Again we aren't talking about a handful of guys who are strolling about with this emergency gear in their trunks. We're talking enough cops to swamp Boston and Watertown armed and equipped like a special forces team assaulting an enemy compound. Nothing about that raises little red flags anywhere in your world view?

There was a time not too long ago that the popular fiction had it that a cop faced a less than 10% probability that he/she would ever discharge their weapon in the line of duty. Now, there is a less than 10% chance they don't have a machine gun. Why do they need machine guns? Why do they need fully automatic machine guns to enforce the law and carry on the image that they are protecting the population? How many bad guys have fully automatic machine guns that make the police feel they need the advantage of all that crap?

Reasonable response? It is reasonable in your mind that people come to your door, and point guns at you, and tell you that you must evacuate your house with your hands visible while they go inside searching for a bad guy who is probably not there?

True story, a police officer ran into my yard and asked if I'd seen a guy run past. I said no, and walked into the house alerted the wife that the cops lost another one. Then I sat down on my porch with my door locked. Two more asked if I'd seen anything, I answered the same way, and continued to sit there. Nobody was going into my house to search for anything, they had a right to ask me, but not enter my house without either a warrant, or probable cause, and they had neither.

Again your answer brings us back to the same argument. Because the residents, or citizens, thought that it was OK, does that make it right? Your argument seems to be yes. But was that argument enough to save Mussolini? The Italian people loved him, and Fascism started in Italy. The trains all ran on time, and the Government took care of the people, providing services for the people. The Residents and citizens loved it, so who were we to argue that it was wrong?

The people of Jonestown loved Jim Jones. The Branch Dividians thought that David Koresh was the reincarnation of the Lord. The majority of people in Alabama thought it was just fine and dandy to have the African-American's segregated. Shall I continue? I can for some time now where the majority within a smaller set thought that something was fine, and history shows it was not.

We come from two points of view. One that the ends justifies the means. The other is that the rules apply always, and without those rules, the Constitution does not contain civil rights that are set within stone, but is written if not in pencil, something with a lot of white out. History shows that paramilitary police is always the tool of the authoritarian state. Perhaps I am wrong, and this will be a first. But from what I've seen so far, we are well on the path. Perhaps it won't happen under President Obama, and it might not happen under whomever comes next, but it will happen eventually.

The time to stop it with minimal bloodshed is not when the boot stomps, but long before. We are a representative republic, and that means that we choose people to represent, and answer to us. To be represented, we must be informed, and we must understand that the rules matter always. If we don't, if we aren't informed, or we don't object when the Government takes a little more of our civil rights, eventually we end up as subjects.

[MannyGoldstein]

95. Well, now I can see why you're so concerned.

It was a big deal, but not quite at the level that you're thinking.

No tanks, zero. As far as I can tell, just a few armored Humvees, which make sense in case the guy was holed up somewhere shooting or throwing more bombs.

Most cops had armor on, which seems prudent. A few had combat fatigues, but certainly not most.

The "swamped" area was just a few square blocks. We live about a mile away, in a reasonably-well-traveled area, and didn't hear or see a cop all day. Boston was certainly not swamped - in fact there were no extra cops around that 'm aware of - but some Boston cops went to Watertown to help out.

As to machine guns - I'm quite certain that local cops around here don't carry machine guns or automatic weapons. Maybe some staties carry automatic weapons, but I can't fathom that they carry machine guns as a matter of course. We're not gun nuts here, and neither are our cops. It just wouldn't be tolerated.

My own city, Newton, borders Watertown and Boston. Most years, Newton makes the list of the top-10 safest cities in America. Watertown is similarly safe (but smaller and not a city), as are most parts of Boston. I'm not sure of the cause and the effect, but for some reason, the local cops are just incredibly reasonable. Even shooting an errant bear rains hell down upon the cops, can you imagine if they shot a person unless it was incredibly necessary?

The night when the younger bomber brother was captured, I was at an event with about 50 people from around the country. One of the participants looked up from his cell phone and announced "They found the guy, they say they'll be executing him in 5 minutes."

Someone in group: "Executing him?"

Original reader: "Well, they sad they'll be storming his boat in 5 minutes, and I'm sure that they'll figure out *some* reason to kill him for resisting arrest - after all, he killed a cop or two last night"

Me: "I know that's what they do in some other parts of the country, but that's not what happens here. They'll do what they can do get him alive."

And they did.

[Demo_Chris]

92. Exceptional post. nt

[Demo_Chris]

91. We can see good and happy citizens thanking the police right here. nt

[longship]

53. Oopsie! Goin' off the deep end here, aren't we?

[FSogol]

65. +1 True dat. n/t

[allin99]

3. yes and no...

did they do it by collecting milions of people's data, or did they do it by using the program a little more selectively. I'm guessing the latter, so f--k them and their b.s.

[leveymg]

4. So far, every single incident has proven to be plots already known to US intel.

or purely foreign communications intercepts that don't involve trampling the 4th Amendment.

Batting .000 for an $80 billion domestic spying program. That's a new record.

[Octafish]

15. Think of it as a Jobs Program.

Jobbing the US Taxpayer by putting information -- time, money and power -- directly into those who deserve it, the Affluent who paid for this government.

[leveymg]

34. Notice that those who post and repost pro-surveillance propaganda have nothing to say?

And that AP omits to mention that in all these cases, the plotters were already known or the subjects were abroad?

The lying is shameless.

[MrSlayer]

6. No. I don't believe any real plots were foiled.

Maybe some Mickey Mouse bullshit like in Miami or Fort Mifflin but nothing real or serious.

[AgingAmerican]

18. Right, like the two supposed terrorists...

...that were going to dice up the Brooklyn Bridge with cutting torches and sell it for scrap.

[MrSlayer]

26. Yep.

No one needs a significant attack. 9/11 did everything the owners wanted. Anything real will be small potatoes crap like Boston.

[closeupready]

49. Exactly. After they helped create these supposed plots,

by pre-finding terrorists and pre-foiling pre-plots in advance, I suppose you'd have a count of 50.

[HappyMe]

7. Maybe so.

[msongs]

9. oh look, weapons of mass destruction! nt

[kentuck]

10. I doubt it.

And I doubt that we will hear specific examples. The Congress will be asked to take them at face value.

[Bluenorthwest]

12. I don't believe either agency made the claim you say they did.

In the stories I have read and heard, even the big four they are touting are said to have been foiled 'in part' by these programs. Of course, they were also foiled 'in part' due to agents having automobiles instead of horses....

[Cali_Democrat]

27. Here:

According to Sean Joyce, the Deputy Director of the FBI, and General Keith Alexander, Director of the National Security Agency, more than 50 attack plots were discovered and derailed thanks to the NSA data


http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57589831/fbi-surveillance-info-helped-reveal-subway-stock-exchange-bombings/

[ucrdem]

13. It's not hard to imagine that between those two mammoth agencies,

covering domestic and foreign relations -- the world, basically -- 50 plots of one kind or another were not intercepted and blocked with the assistance of some kind of electronic surveillance.

[Hissyspit]

30. There you go imagining things again.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023036869

[Octafish]

14. FBI alone probably instigated more than 50 plots.

They've a history.

http://educate-yourself.org/cn/fbiplots02may12.shtml

[premium]

17. Well, ya know,

gotta pad them numbers to justify the WOT and their budgets.

It's gotten to the point where I don't believe a fucking word coming out of our intelligence services.

[HooptieWagon]

54. Yep. The FBI instigates plots that the NSA takes credit for stopping.

Helps justify the budgets, and prevents going after real criminals and terrorist...like Wall St bankers.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

59. Rec

[treestar]

74. that may foil the people who would do the plots

They weren't innocent angels. If the plots happened, you'd blame the FBI. If they get the people so minded to agree to a plot, who cares if the FBI agent is a fake plotter? Thank God. Then the person can be stopped.

Frankly this view is agenda driven. We can't know until the documents are de-classified.

[Whisp]

16. well just rip it down, drown the NSA and any government agency

like Norquist wants.

then we will see what they say when power grids are compromised, nuclear facilities under threat by cyber warfare and a host of other uglies I'm sure a lot here haven't even thought about -

as long as there is anarchy and chaos and a 'clean' slate to start from, then it's all good. Then 'a real democrat' (usually translated to libertarian by how these people talk) can rise up from the ashes and start the world anew.

there are more than a few people here that salivate at the thought of destruction.

[ucrdem]

19. And just think how low our taxes would be!

Makes ya want stand with Rand, doesn't it?

[premium]

23. No, don't tear them down,

reign them in, revamp or eliminate the Patriot Act, (there's an oxymoron term), get rid of the secret courts and secret warrants, strict, and I mean invasively strict oversight of the intelligence services.

[Demit]

29. That's a pretty Manichean view you have.

Seems to me that there are less drastic solutions available to us now. Like regulation, accountability, and strict oversight. You know, democratic stuff. What you do in a healthy democracy.

[Aerows]

20. I'd like to see the 5 people that believe this bullshit

Oh look, I can. Here are the most gullible people on the planet.

[Nimajneb Nilknarf]

21. The claim is unverifiable, not subject to scrutiny by the general public.

Therefore I remain highly skeptical of it.

[Cali_Democrat]

24. Apparently they are going to present the evidence in a closed-door meeting with Congress

But you are correct, the general public will not be able to see this information.

[Nimajneb Nilknarf]

25. It is my understanding that members of Congress won't be able to discuss the information with anyone

Including their staff, and other members of Congress. They have to keep their mouths closed and listen.

[leveymg]

36. If ever there was ever anything that should be leaked by Congress, that briefing is it.

The American public should know that this hasn't been a complete waste of $80 billion. If NSA has a case, now's the time to make it publicly so that the claims can be verified. If they can't make a case for domestic universal spying and profiling, the programs need to be cut back and the law changed to the pre-PATRIOT Act status quo ante.

[Hydra]

57. No details, no sale

At least for me.

[tarheelsunc]

22. I believe them, but that's irrelevant to the debate on the program. eom

[Logical]

28. If you define "threat" as someone saying the hate the USA then yes! N-t

[dipsydoodle]

33. See sign

[leveymg]

37. That's the CIA Bush Center for Intelligence sign on the Memorial Pky past Spout Run, isn't it?

[dipsydoodle]

43. Dunno

just a pic I came across which seemed appropriate.

[leveymg]

50. Sure looks like it>

[hobbit709]

35. I believe that like I believe Sarah Palin is a genius.

[Buns_of_Fire]

38. That's nothing. I thwarted two plots all by myself yesterday, before lunch even.

One was to break off the tip of south Florida so it would drift up the Gulf Stream and collide with England, and the other one would've caused the entire state of Rhode Island to completely sink. I can't tell you any details, since that would violate National Security, but it's obvious my methods worked.

Don't believe me? Well, they're both still there, aren't they? I rest my case. I also await America's thanks and fawning admiration, along with my check for $1.8 billion for services rendered. Mostly the check.

I also had a hand in ensuring that the sun didn't explode yesterday, but I'll give the world that as a freebie. Just because that's the kind of guy I am.

Whoever said "you can't prove a negative" never worked for the federal government.

[premium]

42. LOL.

Best post of the day. I just read it to my wife and she is laughing her head off.
Thanks for the laugh.

[Buns_of_Fire]

46. Thank YOU. And since I've got a $1.8 billion check coming, no charge either.

[intaglio]

39. Nope, it depends on what you mean

by foiled, plots, surveillance and possibly even 50

[HooptieWagon]

56. +1000!!

"...depends possibly even what they mean by 50..."

good one!

[LeftInTX]

40. I voted "yes", but there was no option for "I'm not sure"

The info is classified and made public via talking points.
I think it is probably true.

However what the specific threats were. How they were resolved. etc etc
NSA surveillance can encompass lots of things.

I'll be interested to hear Sen Udall's and Wyden's opinion.

[Rex]

41. After all the lies from that past Administration?

I have no good reason to believe anything the govt or big biz has to say.

[Fire Walk With Me]

44. The FBI creates "terrorists" by intoxicating and setting up regular people. n/t

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

45. About as much as I believe the snoopers value privacy and the 4th Amendment.

Or, when they say they're "protecting" us by spying on us.

[sarisataka]

47. I vote yes but

still do not approve of the surveillance. I would bet that many plots were also foiled by a random passing person when a terrorist was looking for a potential target.
The ratio of plots to actual plans (not even actions) is immense.

[closeupready]

48. No.

[yourout]

51. Yes....if was a plot of Marijuana. Terrorist plot.....no.

[JoePhilly]

52. No. And as a result, I think we should cut taxes ...

... and starve the government beast until it is small enough to drown in a bath tub.

Only then will we be free of the out of control government oppression.

[graham4anything]

55. How many people do not drive 90 because the sign says 55?

One cannot statistically answer a poll like the one above, because it is impossible to know how many people
(and the whole world already knew this, so there is nothing new released the last few weeks)

OBL knew enough to have one of the most sophisticated systems to avoid detection for 8 years and there were few and far between.

As there is no way to prove a finite number, the question should be

How many times HAS a successful terrorist event happened since 9-11?
and count the official international terrorist groups events that happened.

Why not ask how many people were not run over on Queens Blvd. in Queens NYC since they put up the barricades making it harder to cross in the middle of the streets were there have been scores of deaths prior to that.

How many people did NOT die now that they no longer drink 48 ounce sodas?

How can one answer a question where there is no way to have a finite number?

It's not like a baseball relief pitcher coming in and saving a game by not allowing runs to score.


BTW, if only ONE second 9-11 was foiled, that is good enough for me. The Empire State Building is still standing.

[Marr]

58. I don't trust in their definition of "terrorist plot".

We've seen otherwise harmless homeless people entrapped into a headline-friendly 'counter-terrorist' bust, we've seen Occupy protestors dealt with by Homeland Security...

I just don't believe the 1%'s definition of "terrorist" is the same as that of the average American.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

60. They probably stopped as many plots as the TSA employees did with free feel-ups at the airports.

[idwiyo]

61. Sure they did! And I am a Klingon Princess! Honest!

[Boomerproud]

63. It's their job to lie.

n/t

[PennsylvaniaMatt]

69. I voted yes

Call me idealistic, but as someone who wants to enter into law and politics, I don't have the cynical view about the government that most people have, on both the left and the right, and I think that in a post-9/11 world, there are many plots that have been disrupted, and the public doesn't even know the full extent of it.

[Logical]

71. You are gullible IMO. n-t

[kentuck]

75. OMG!

You had 666 posts!

[PennsylvaniaMatt]

83. Creepy!

Thanks for alerting me so this post will make it 667!

[former9thward]

70. Did they count foiling plots by medical marijuana clinics?

[NaturalHigh]

72. I can't exactly go with Yes or No...

More of a "Not Really," I guess.

[treestar]

73. Maybe

I do think at least that is the intent.

[baldguy]

76. That number is probably low.

Legislative oversight prevents the NSA from revealing sources & methods.

[Historic NY]

78. I agree you won't know because they won't tell.......

exactly. I do believe its probably a low number given the world wide workings of the agencies.

[Egalitarian Thug]

81. I so hope to encounter you IRL someday. You would make my year.

Possibly the easiest mark I've ever encountered, and that's saying a lot.

[Logical]

85. +1000! n-t

[baldguy]

87. .

[Logical]

84. LOL! Define terror attack! n-t

[avaistheone1]

82. No way! If the FBI and NSA had foiled any of these so called "50 plots" they themselves would have

it on the cover of every major newspaper in the country. They would be on every news show in America while patting themselves on the back. I don't believe them at all.

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

86. Nope

Never, no way, no how.

[krispos42]

88. No

I believe that 50 plots were foiled that, at some point, involved the NSA spying on people at some point, generally after indications of the plots surfaced through other means. Just like at some point there was human intelligence-gathering, analysis of financial and travel records (hopefully with a warrant of some kind), interviews with people, and good old-fashioned footwork following leads.


I don't believe that the NSA was just recording every phone call (or whatever they were recording) and, through some sort of sophisticated algorithm, discovered 50 previously-unsuspected plots with enough detail to have the feds swoop in and arrest people.

[railsback]

89. If you all believed the FBI and NSA

the Snowden wet dream would crash hard without a happy ending. Then you'd all have a sad.

[Recursion]

93. With a broad enough definition of "plot" and "disrupted", yes

Probably less than a dozen active plots that were imminent, though.

[Harmony Blue]

94. Nope

That says it all IMO.

[libodem]

96. Especially since

Most of the publicized plots were entrapment by agents who supplied all the 'promised' explosives. It's ridiculous.

[sibelian]

97. They are not mining the data to get the terrorists.

They are mining the data to GET THE DATA.