How concerned are you about being spied on?

[struggle4progress]

8 votes, 2 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	I'm already using carrier pigeons instead of USPS, and I'm planning to drop my internet and phone service
	0 (0%)
	Stopped takin pictures of my gorgeous nekkidness on the office copier cuz the NSA might could be watchin
	0 (0%)
	I wrote a letter to the editor and called my Senator about it
	0 (0%)
	All my recent Facebook posts encourage people to vote for a third party
	0 (0%)
	My Sweet Snookums and I now carry out all our intimate communications using one-time pads
	2 (25%)
	Folk who try to hack my home computer all catch a lovely virus that overwrites their OS with countless goatse gifs :)
	1 (13%)
	Meh. Just encode all your emails with a simple unbreakable substitution cipher
	0 (0%)
	I've been contacting various embassies to see what asylum packages they offer
	0 (0%)
	My phone has been buzzing and clicking since 1968. Shizz, the very first year of my FBI file runs 5000 pages
	4 (50%)
	It's too late. Democracy in the US ended with the Roswell crash coverup
	1 (13%)
	2 DU members did not wish to select any of the options provided.
Show usernames Disclaimer: This is an Internet poll

[struggle4progress]

2. I assume that means you haven't bothered contacting congress with your concerns, and

that you don't actually know any of the many many people who got long FBI files in their honor back in the 1960s

[HiPointDem]

3. i assume you failed logic

[HiPointDem]

4. an yeah, it's a petty little poll, no point to it except to mock.

[cali]

5. clearly. critical thinking, it's just not a required skill.

[struggle4progress]

8. Actually, I've taught logic. What sort do you prefer?

Are you a Brouwerian intuitionist? Would you start with Curry's combinatorial formulation? Do you favor the lambda calculus?

[cali]

18. lol. I have no idea what you're talking about with your show-offy stuff but

I do know that to assume that I didn't contact my representatives based on my first comment in this thread, is a failure of logic. Obviously.

just sad.

[struggle4progress]

21. Well, let's try a different tack into the wind. Here is a cluster of questions:

Do most people have any reason to worry about NSA activities? If not, there's a political difficulty in trying to generate political opposition, even if there are grounds for real concern. Should we worry about political targeting of ordinary political dissidents? If so, how do we communicate that concern to the public? What specific changes to the program are likely to strike a balance between the political problem -- which is the perception that such a program protects the public from dangerous extremists -- and the essential civil liberties principle, that people should be free from surveillance, absent probable cause?

[cali]

27. I'm glad to address those. Most people should worry about about it because they do have

reason to worry about it. Start with secrecy so profound that even the number of people employed by the NSA and its budget are classified information. Such secrecy should concern everyone. Beyond that, one should be concerned for the detrimental effect on free speech. Don't you think there are people afraid that what they say may put them on a watch list somewhere, and who because of that, are "watching what they say"? Yes, we should worry about the targeting of ordinary political dissidents. For pete's sake, where have you been? OWS, for example. Specific changes to the program could include the cessation of collecting all meta-data, for one. Stronger oversight, a FISA court that is really a court and whose appointees aren't all selected by the SCOTUS CJ.

[BenzoDia]

26. doh

[cali]

6. didn't say any such thing. I commented on what I thought of your cute little piece

of nastiness. I don't take part in such bullshit.

[HardTimes99]

48. Ditto - because the right to privacy and trust in government are

worthy only of mockery.

Jeesh!

Thanks for fighting the good fight for all of us civil libertarians.

[madokie]

7. If anyone is spying on me they're going backwards

and are bored to death.
In all actuality I'm not the least bit concerned due to the fact there are people out there who would do us harm as the world trade centers is proof of. I trust my President and understand the difficulties in stopping these kinds of acts before they happen.
With the dick and w I didn't trust them to do the right thing as I've always felt that 9-11 was a MIHOP incident.
With O I feel I can trust him and his people.
Read my mail, listen to my calls all you want, hell you might even learn something IMO

[struggle4progress]

9. The real concern, I think, is not that most people have anything to fear, but that people

-- who actually and successfully challenge the status quo in some way -- will be targeted for their views and activities and that the dossiers will be used improperly to intimidate or blackmail them

[Aerows]

15. Not just them

Don't you think there are plenty of people with a lot to lose and who are powerful enough that someone would want to blackmail them? That's what scares me about this the most.

[struggle4progress]

17. That's the J Edgar Hoover model for an intelligence empire: collect dirt on people

who might challenge your kingdom. I have no idea whether the responsibility here is diffuse enough to prevent that or diffuse enough to allow it

[Aerows]

71. Which is why it needs oversight

because no one seems to know the answer to that, and that's the problem.

[treestar]

39. I honestly doubt it

Because they can do so in the open.

There's no point in doing anything to them as they are known.

I bet it is used against criminals and terrorists and those near them, other countries' spies, and in a few cases of misuse, some low level politician. Though sex scandals come out by themselves, too. It was not the NSA that caught those in the cases of Weiner, etc.

[Go Vols]

54. May be it's used

against people who support terrorism too.Gotta keep those private prisons full.

[Demit]

10. You tried too hard to be funny. Humor fail.

Suggestion: Try fewer choices with your next effort. It won't look so labored over.

[Aerows]

11. I love how

so many people on this board totally miss the point. You know, I'm not all that concerned about people spying on me. I'm not a big enough cog in the wheel for anyone to really care. What concerns the shit out of me is the people who are big enough, because they can be blackmailed.

I'm also not thrilled with the fact that I could accidentally end up being labeled some kind of criminal if they get their facts messed up (that has happened to people before).

[cali]

20. +1. Add to that the dampening of speech.

[snappyturtle]

37. Absolutely. I'm confused & concerned why folks can't see this danger. nt

[Quantess]

69. +1 I think most of us get that.

Some people want to dismiss it. Invalidate it.

[KharmaTrain]

12. History Tidbit...

...just saw a special on Charles Lindbergh and it was revealed that FDR not only had his taxes audited, he also had his phone tapped in the early days of World War II due to Lindbergh's association with the American firsters. How much ya wanna bet Alexander Graham Bell's first call was also tapped...

[struggle4progress]

16. ... While in Germany, Charles and Anne attended the Summer Olympic games as the special guests

of Field Marshal Hermann Goering, the head of the German military air force, the Luftwaffe. Lindbergh toured German factories, took the controls of state-of-the-art bombers, and noted the multiplying airfields. He visited Germany twice during the next two years. With each visit, he became more impressed with the German military and the German people. He was soon convinced that no other power in Europe could stand up to Germany in the event of war. "The organized vitality of Germany was what most impressed me: the unceasing activity of the people, and the convinced dictatorial direction to create the new factories, airfields, and research laboratories...," Lindbergh recalled in "Autobiography of Values." His wife drew similar conclusions. "...I have never in my life been so conscious of such a directed force. It is thrilling when seen manifested in the energy, pride, and morale of the people--especially the young people," she wrote in "The Flower and the Nettle." By 1938, the Lindberghs were making plans to move to Berlin.

In October 1938, Lindbergh was presented by Goering, on behalf of the Fuehrer, the Service Cross of the German Eagle for his contributions to aviation. News of Nazi persecution of Jews had been filtering out of Germany for some time, and many people were repulsed by the sight of an American hero wearing a Nazi decoration. Lindbergh, by all appearances, considered the medal to be just another commendation. No different than all the others. Many considered this attitude to be naive, at best. Others saw it as an outright acceptance of Nazi policies. Less than a month after the presenting of the medal, the Nazis orchestrated a brutal assault on Jews that came to be known as Kristallnacht, the night of broken glass. Nazis and their sympathizers smashed the windows of Jewish businesses, burned homes and synagogues, and left scores dead. Between 20,000 and 30,000 Jews were arrested and sent to concentration camps. The Lindberghs decided to cancel their plans to move to Germany.

Having returned to America in April 1939, Lindbergh turned his attention toward keeping his country out of a war in Europe. At the time, most Americans shared his isolationist views. Germany invaded Poland five months later, drawing Britain and France into the war. Two weeks later, Lindbergh delivered his first nationwide radio address in which he urged America to remain neutral. In the speech he criticized President Roosevelt, who believed the Nazis must be stopped in their conquest of Europe. Lindbergh saw Nazi victory as certain and thought America's attention should be placed elsewhere. "These wars in Europe are not wars in which our civilization is defending itself against some Asiatic intruder... This is not a question of banding together to defend the white race against foreign invasion." Building on his belief that "racial strength is vital," Lindbergh published an article in Reader's Digest stating, "That our civilization depends on a Western wall of race and arms which can hold back... the infiltration of inferior blood" ...

With his hero status already greatly tarnished by his philosophical and political beliefs, Lindbergh delivered a speech in Des Moines that fully knocked him off his pedestal. Announcing that it was time to "name names," Lindbergh decided to identify what he saw as the pressure groups pushing the U.S. into war against Germany. "The three most important groups who have been pressing this country toward war are the British, the Jewish and the Roosevelt Administration." Of the Jews, he went on to say, "Instead of agitating for war, Jews in this country should be opposing it in every way, for they will be the first to feel its consequences. Their greatest danger to this country lies in their large ownership and influence in our motion pictures, our press, our radio and our government" ...

Fallen Hero: Charles Lindbergh in the 1940s

[mountain grammy]

29. As my dear departed Jewish mother used to say:

"Fuck Lindbergh, he's a Nazi!"

[treestar]

55. Wow, sort of was used against a political dissident but then

in those days, that would not have been seen as mere political dissent. The equivalent now would have to be some well known person expressing sympathy with terrorists - there doesn't seem to be anyone to fit that profile. Can anyone think of anyone? Probably professors of Arabic studies somewhere who might have said something that seemed to sympathize with Al Qaeda or the like.

There were those professors denied entry due to their past expressions, but there does not seem to be any well known cases of that, and those would be foreigners. And they were publicly known to have said what they said.

[HipChick]

13. All they will find is..

I did more P90X workouts than I should this week..

[Bluenorthwest]

24. In your philosophy, faith or political outlook, is it always just about you and not about others?

So it's all emoticons and snark if it is not about YOU? Impressive stuff.

[HipChick]

25. They have been collecting for sometime...so apparently America has been asleep since 2006

or just Faux Outrage...

[Ian David]

14. They're collecting so much data on so many people...

... that our new privacy is the anonymity of the crowd.

The odds of them actually paying any attention to you, amongst all the drops from the fire hose they're trying to drink from, are very, very small.

[Bluenorthwest]

19. So Bitter OP and Snarky respondants, can we assume you are all fine with all 'spying' on

everyone, including your children, by anyone. So it is cool with you folks if any government or contractor or friend of a contractor follows your child's activities starting at age 6 or so and continuing on through age 17 if they remain attractive? That's cool with the 'we love Security Shows and Punch and Judy Policy' crowd? All spying on any one by anyone is super cool no matter?
Sick and devoid of humanity.

[struggle4progress]

23. It's not clear to me exactly how pedophile government bureaucrats are going to target

our innocent youth for oogling, based on metadata, though it is clear that the internet, including spaces such as Facebook, might put children at risk. Perhaps you could explain your thinking here

[Bluenorthwest]

28. Did you read your Poll? It does not mention 'metadata' it asks about 'spying' and proceeds to

list many options that have nothing to do with metadata. Your poll has two options 1 All spying is good and 2 'You are an idiot for not liking spying'.
If you were on about metadata collection, you should have said that. You said spying and your options involve many implied sources of data gathering.
My thinking is that your poll is not about metadata and it is unfair to claim now that is what it is about.

A larger point to notice is that those of you who support spying on anyone, anywhere, in anyway always speak of how it might effect yourself, never about others, never about your own damn kids, never about international cultural or charity groups. It is about YOU. 'They can read my mail, it'll bore 'em to death, ha ha ha (insert 20 emoticons here)'
The world ends at the end of the centrist's nose and is described by contradictions and emoticons.

[Bluenorthwest]

30. I await your response. You claim it is cool to spy on anyone, anytime, in anyway.

Why do you think it is ok to let creepy poorly vetted Corp employees spy on others including children?
And why are you now pretending your poll is about 'metadata' when it clearly says 'spying' and the poll lists several modalities including mail, visual, phone and computer?

[dipsydoodle]

22. They might think I'm a hermit.

I leave the smartphone at home when I go out and just take a smaller ordinary one which only my daughter has the number of anyway. If they listen to calls on that then they're probably still trying to figure the signifance of "put the kettle on".

***ts.

[Bonhomme Richard]

31. I am more concerned about people that thinks it OK. n/t

[cali]

33. Yes, that is a real and oft ignored concern. Me too.

[Bonhomme Richard]

40. If the policy lacked defenders would we even be......

having this discussion?
It's kind of funny to me that I never thought of Obama as the issue but rather an unchecked rogue security/power/control issue. Yes, there are people here that relish attacking Obama but they are a minority which I can ignore. It seems that the same ones that are making the issue about Snowden are the same ones making the issue about Obama.
The sad part is that now I have to look more critically of the writings of those long time posters that are willing to defend this policy. In the past where I might have given the benefit of the doubt I can no longer do so and will have to parse all their words.
Not that what I think is important to anyone else anyway. Reality.

[winter is coming]

53. +1. n/t

[Bonhomme Richard]

58. Maybe the only appropriate response to some of the post...

I see around here is...."Jon Snow, you know nothing."

[winter is coming]

59. But Jon wasn't willfully ignorant. n/t

[Zorra]

32. Very concerned. I'm also very concerned about the enormous number of obvious paid propagandists,

who are working furiously day and night to undermine the integrity of the internet as a means of effective communication for constructive progressive social, political, and economic change.

[struggle4progress]

35. Well, that sounds like an issue you should take up with the Ruler of the Internet

but you might want to start a little lower in the foodchain: maybe you should raise your concern first in Ask the Administrators

If you find you have difficulty phrasing your question there, my suggestion might be: "Skinner, why do you allow on your website so many people who are so obviously paid to disagree with me?"

[treestar]

57. The integrity of the internet for progressive change

is really threatened by the numerous right wing web sites.

[The Straight Story]

34. About as much as our government is concerned about someone spying on them

Apparently it is a big deal when it happens to them.

[marions ghost]

36. stupid poll --UnRecccccccc--yeccch puke

The title of the thread suckered me in--because it's a good question.

And then the poll is junk, obvious, boring, unfunny.

Have you not got it that many many people take this seriously, even if you don't, s4p?

I respect you. Have some respect for those who disagree with you on this.

This is pukable.

[snappyturtle]

41. +1

Those unconcerned about the gov't's data collection seem to be missing the point. It's not what the gov't is collecting it's the fact that they're doing it at all....and why? The IRS, Social Security, drivers' license agencies, the military, etc. have tons of info all ready. Why do they need even more? They know where to find us and can get a warrant. This pre-emptive collection of data is like pre-emptive war....doesn't work out well in the end.

But, those of us who are concerned are pelted regularly with the non-concerned's mockery. Not a way to win minds in my book.

[marions ghost]

66. +++

--It's not only that they're unconcerned, they don't allow for anybody else to be concerned. Hence the over-the-top mockery, such as this "poll."

In disrespecting anyone who has a different POV, they actually become what we fear--a body that wishes to silence us on this topic. They align with the exploitative mentality that would suck up our data and give us NO controls over it. Alarming, coming from Dems. Do they not see the negative implications after Booshcheney? Do they not see that this is leaving us very vulnerable to rightwing manipulation (the NSA & etc being full of RW thinking)? Should all our data be held in secret rightwing repositories?

[snappyturtle]

68. Here's a link I'm going to post everywhere I can. A 1 hr. 22 min interview (podcast)

of Russell Tice by Peter Collins (host) and Sibel Edwards on the NSA spying...whoa...lots more about the content and meta collection and how it's used +++++lots:

Tice also talks about Snowden, of course

http://www.peterbcollins.com/2013/06/19/boiling-frogs-blockbuster-nsa-whistleblower-russell-tice-reveals-that-obama-many-top-officials-were-targets-of-nsa-surveillance/

[marions ghost]

70. thank you

I'm going to read it now

[treestar]

38. Hilarious

Yeah, most of us know it's not us anyway. Neither is it any political activities. Probably mostly other spies.

[Faux pas]

42. I might have cared in my younger days, but now

I could give a shit. What can they do? Kill me? If so, I'll be outta here. Arrest me? Free room and board for my tarnished 'golden' years? Fine.

I'm more concerned about bigotry, the sick, the poor and women's rights.

[HardTimes99]

50. You might want to re-read Orwell's 1984 (or, to be truly terrified, watch

the movie version where they loose the rats on Winston) for examples of what 'they' can do.

My wife and I have been having this discussion. When I say the NSA scandal is the most important because without privacy we're nothing, she responds that destruction of the climate and ecosystem is the most important because without a life-supporting planet, privacy (or the lack thereof) is a moot point.

I'm pretty certain my wife would agree with you and disagree with me about how important this governmental spying on its citizens is.

[Faux pas]

61. I like the way your wife's mind works

! I can imagine what they can do to me, in the end, that will be their problem.

No matter how much spying they do, they can't get us all. That is, unless, they bring in troops from other countries. The way things are going now I could even imagine that happening, sometime way after we're gone.

Peace to you my fellow American

[HiPointDem]

60. if it's all about you, why should you care about 'bigotry, the poor, & women's rights'?

[Faux pas]

63. Huh?

The question was 'how concerned are YOU (me personally as in myself) about being spied on?' Not how concerned are you about everyone being spied on. Apples/oranges.

[Major Nikon]

43. Information is a powerful thing

[Apophis]

44. Ooooh, let's make a joke out of government spying.

Grow up.

[Major Nikon]

45. OK

[TBF]

46. The OP may be joking but I'm ready to move to Venezuela.

[whatchamacallit]

47. History will remember you all as tools

Our kids and grand kids... can thank you for their dystopian futures.

[Major Nikon]

67. I tried to make it as a tool...

[olddots]

49. I am concerned not for me but for everyone else on the planet

this bullshit is about technology verses humanity getting out of balance ,who wants to be the last human on a planet of robots ?
This is a joke ---- a very bad joke .

[Just Saying]

51. I didn't pick any of the choices.

I think The Patriot Act has been a threat to our privacy since it was passed in '01. I think we need to get Congress to get rid of the invasions into our private lives and honor the Constitution but seeing how that body has operated over the past decade, I'm not hopeful.

Spying is a concern, but it's not my only concern nor is it my top concern in everyday life. I think Americans are more concerned right now about finding jobs and putting food on the table.

[alc]

52. don't care about ME being spied on. do care about congressmen, fisa judges, etc

If they are spying on EVERYONE, that includes a lot of people who's daily action (and inaction) affects me. I don't care what is known about me, but I do think many of those people do have something to hide. I also know that it's impossible to hide/protect a database. Soon as "the wrong person" has access, Rove will have access (and we won't find out through a leak to the press). And the NSA does have access, and their "processes" don't convince me that they will always treat the data legally and won't use it to expand their authority (i.e. reduce oversight and increase the scope of warrants).

[Quantess]

56. I don't like any of your sarcastic, facetious, snarky options.

I don't appreciate the tone of your poll. None of the Above.

[flamingdem]

62. I wrote for my files

To my disappointment nada. What am I chopped liver? They did ask me to list the groups I'd worked with to help them find any data. Heh. Neat trick that some probably fall for!

[HiPointDem]

64. you won't get your 'metadata' with an foia, i don't think. convenient, that. it's how to spy

without 'files'.

[animato]

65. k and r

[kenny blankenship]

72. Not half as concerned as I am about so-called "liberals" clicking their heels

and giving the fascist salute to each new development of the 21st century police state as soon as we learn about it. In the end, it's not IBM punch card machines, or Soviet-supplied hidden microphones, nor 250,000 CPU supercomputers chugging through zettabyte sized databases deciding who's a good citizen and who's disloyal that makes a police state tick, it's the rot in the hearts and the fear in the minds of a people who've lost their way.