First, from the snoops who have announced themselves and expect me to help them:
I got a call from an employee of the Department of Commerce this evening, who was calling regarding their intrusive survey that they generously provided a shotgun invitation to. She confirmed the phone number and address, and wanted to speak to the man or lady of the home. I advised her that she was speaking to the man of the home, but that I had NO intention of answering their survey. She asked me why that was.
I informed her that it was because their intrusive questions include ones that a prospective employer could not ask me, that some of them would be in violation of HIPPA laws if my doctor revealed the answers, and because some of them asked sensitive information that could be used to my detriment by identity thieves. She started to say something, and I cut her off, saying, “Don’t try to tell me about how the information is “confidential” and would never be misused. The revelations coming out of Washington D.C. over the last couple weeks are enough to dissuade me from ever believing that.
She said that she understood that some of the questions could be construed as personal, and that I could always decline to answer specific questions on that basis. I responded by telling her that it wasn’t just about the questions being intrusive, but that they had clearly exceeded the statutory grant of authority which they felt empowered them to ask the questions in the first place. Her response was that she understood, but it was Congress that gave them that authority so it could get the answers to those questions. I told her that I didn’t doubt that they wanted the answers; no doubt they could be used to buy a lot of votes with taxpayer money. She responded again that it was Congress who wrote the law. I responded by telling her she just didn’t get it. “I’m an attorney. I’ve read the law that your agency relies on as its authority to ask me these questions. The scope and the nature of these questions clearly exceed that. It isn’t even a question. You can’t blame that on Congress, they aren’t the ones sending the surveys and threatening me if I don’t play along.” She assured me that it was not her agency’s intention to make anyone feel threatened. I looked at the envelope with its bold-lined box on the front stating in bold all capital letters “YOUR RESPONSE IS REQUIRED BY LAW”, and mentally uttered thanks that she had cleared that up. I again repeated that the questions exceeded their authority.
She responded, “I can certainly see your point. But the fact is that Congress is who decided that they wanted the answers to these questions before the next decennial census, and that’s why they wrote the law.” For a second, I mulled over asking her how it is that Congress could decide that they could require a census more often than the decennial measure set forth in Article I, Section 2* of the Constitution without an AMENDMENT permitting them to do so, and then decided against it, since she clearly wasn’t equipped to have that discussion.
She then suggested that I do the online survey, and simply refuse to answer the questions I felt were too personal. I asked her who was going to pay me to do it. She laughed. I said “I’m serious. I bill out at $200.00 an hour, and I don’t appreciate my government thinking that it has the right to essentially directly stick me with an unfunded mandate requiring me to give it an hour of my time I’ll never get back for something no reasonable person who believes in limited government would have any intention of participating with in the first place.” She was almost at the point of pleading me to just fill out the survey, even if I only answered one question, and again invited me to do it online. I told her that I would think about it, but if I do, I’m filling out the paper survey, and sending a letter that they won’t like very much with it. She laughed and told me that they always welcome opinions. I advised her that I’ll fix that, and she just laughed again before saying good night and hanging up.
…which brings me to the snoops who don’t announce themselves, and apparently have the ability to read every word I type online…
I kicked myself after hanging up for not saying that the survey was redundant, given the revelations today about PRISM. I mean, why bother asking me when the NSA can (and probably does) monitor everything I do online. I know, they want me to believe that the information would never be misused or illegally shared with other parties, but let’s be honest:
What’s stopping them from misusing or abusing the data that they never should have had in the first place?
We all know the answer to that question.
Nothing.
Which is why the data will flow to whoever finds it politically useful. It isn’t like this Administration has any interest in actually going after real terrorists…the ones who actually kill people, and hate America, not the average Americans alarmed and enraged by the excesses, lawlessness, and tyrannies enjoyed by the Federal government, who it pretends are the terrorists. After all, its ok if a few flunkies are sacrificed to quench the rage of the taxpayers. It’s a very small price to pay for keeping the right people in power, and those who oppose them struggling to get a government boot off of their necks. It provides the illusion of accountability without ever putting any of our self-appointed betters in any real jeopardy of having to answer to us.
From the Slate story on PRISM:
The Washington Post disclosed Thursday that it had obtained classified PowerPoint slides detailing the program, codenamed PRISM, from a career intelligence officer who felt “horror” over its privacy-invading capabilities. “They quite literally can watch your ideas form as you type,” the source told the newspaper.
Participating in the PRISM program, according to a selection of the leaked slides, are Internet titans including Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, AOL, Skype, YouTube, and Apple. It was established in 2007 and is used by NSA analysts to spy on Internet communications as part of the agency’s foreign intelligence-gathering work. The analysts use PRISM by keying in search terms supposedly designed to “produce at least 51 percent confidence in a target’s ‘foreignness’.” However, the Post notes, training materials for the program instruct new analysts to submit “accidentally collected” U.S. content for a quarterly report, “but it’s nothing to worry about.”
According to the Post, the system enables NSA spies to monitor Google’s Gmail, voice and video chat, Google Drive (formerly Google Docs), photo libraries, and live surveillance of searches. If agents believe a target is engaged in “terrorism, espionage or nuclear proliferation,” they can use the spy system to exploit Facebook’s “extensive search and surveillance capabilities. And PRISM can monitor Skype, the Post notes, “when one end of the call is a conventional telephone and for any combination of ‘audio, video, chat, and file transfers’ when Skype users connect by computer alone.” In order to receive immunity from lawsuits, the participating companies are obliged to accept a directive from the attorney general and the director of national intelligence to “open their servers to the FBI’s Data Intercept Technology Unit, which handles liaison to U.S. companies from the NSA.”
Sure, sure. That sounds like something that would never, ever, ever be abused by the federal government. Especially under this Administration. Just ask James Rosen or his parents. Or the Tea Party groups whose First Amendment rights were treated by the IRS with all the care and concern one might give to a used kleenex.
Had Enough Yet?
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* Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons. The actual Enumeration shall be made within three Years after the first Meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent Term of ten Years, in such Manner as they shall by Law direct. The Number of Representatives shall not exceed one for every thirty Thousand, but each State shall have at Least one Representative; and until such enumeration shall be made, the State of New Hampshire shall be entitled to chuse three, Massachusetts eight, Rhode-Island and Providence Plantations one, Connecticut five, New-York six, New Jersey four, Pennsylvania eight, Delaware one, Maryland six, Virginia ten, North Carolina five, South Carolina five, and Georgia three.
[The underlined portion was modified by Section 2 of the 14th Amendment; the rest has never been altered by Amendment.]
Taxes, Stupidity, and Death 