World Wide Web Creator Blasts NSA For Undermining Online Security

You have to hand it to the spooks at NSA for being mischievous liars, dissemblers, prevaricators, obfuscators.....however you want to put it. And it's amazing how their crap works hand in glove with other spooks, from other nations. Case in point, the recent (TIME) comments of French Head Spook Bernard Squarcini, who deplored the "level of naïvete" of those condemning the NSA spying on allies when "we all do it". This, even as NSA Troglodyte James Clapper admitted in a Sunday NY Times interview ('No Morsel Too Minuscule for All -Consuming NSA', Nov. 1) that despite dismissing objections from other nations to NSA spying as "brazen hypocrisy":

There's no question that "from a capabiity standpoint (of the scale of eavesdropping of the NSA), we probably dwarf everybody on the planet with perhaps the exception of China and Russia"

Really now? Of course, he was referring - as the article noted - to the 35,000 workers and the $10.8 b a year which sets it apart for such dedicated international spookery. All money, imho, that is totally wasted. Money that could better be allocated to replacing the $40b to be cut from the food stamps program over the next 10 years - thanks to the security fetishist Reepos and assorted Demo Neoliberal punks in their camp. Just 4 years worth of NSA "allies' phones spymongering" would pay for that sliced SNAP program! It would mean the difference between kids in the "richest nation on Earth" going to bed hungry or not.

Anyway, now the creator of the World wide web has come out against the way this hyper, no holds barred spy craft is undermining the whole security of the web. According to a UK Guardian report, Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the computer scientist who created the world wide web, has called for a "full and frank public debate" over internet surveillance by the National Security Agency and its British counterpart, GCHQ, warning that the system of checks and balances to oversee the agencies has failed. Make no mistake that as the inventor of the global system of inter-connectivity known as the web, with its now ubiquitous www and http, Berners-Lee is uniquely qualified to comment on the internet spying revealed by the former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

In an interview with the Guardian, he expressed particular outrage that GCHQ and the NSA had weakened online security by cracking much of the online encryption on which hundreds of millions of users rely to guard data privacy. He said the agencies' decision to break the encryption software was appalling and foolish, as it directly contradicted efforts of the US and UK governments to fight cybercrime and cyberwarfare, which they have identified as a national security priority. Berners-Lee also said it was a betrayal of the technology industry. Let's recall, by way of fixing ideas here, how the NSA last year helped the Israelis create the 'Stuxnet' then 'Flame' virus - which escaped their control and (after being created as worms to destroy Iranian centrifuges for nuclear processing) and now lurks as a weapon that can be turned back on us all. (To get my take on it, see my post: 'The Stupidity of Stuxnet' from March 5, last year.)

Make no mistake that as a brilliant guy, Berners-Lee sees the Guardian news organization and Snowden as having acted in the public interest. This is in contrast to several senior British Puppets......errrrr....politicians – including the prime minister, David Cameron – who have called for The Guardian to be investigated over reporting of the Snowden leaks. Similar to the Neoliberal poseurs and puppets like Chuck Schumer and Dianne Feinstein who loudly proclaimed Snowden a "traitor" and called for his prosecution, even as they turned a blind eye to the actual violations of the 4th amendment by using bogus Fisa courts to secure mass warrants as opposed to the individualized ones required by the 4th.

Berners -Lee went on to observe in his Guardian interview:

"Whistleblowers, and responsible media outlets that work with them, play an important role in society. We need powerful agencies to combat criminal activity online – but any powerful agency needs checks and balances and, based on recent revelations, it seems the current system of checks and balances has failed."

Sadly, the NSA has broken beyond all bounds of any useful or reasonable checks and balances. As the NY Times piece reported (op. cit., p. 11) the "exploits of the Tailored Access Operations, or T.A.O., is the prim name for the NSA division that breaks into computers around the world to steal the data inside, and sometimes leaves spy software behind." I mean, is it any wonder many citizens are flocking to the downloadable Tor browser (which is pre-configured to mask your IP address and therefore your location) with this shit going on and few legislators with the balls to impose some kind of control?

Today is to have been D-day when an unprecedented hearing in Westminster questions the conduct of Britain's spy agencies and the heads of the three secret services – MI5, MI6 and GCHQ – go before parliament's intelligence and security committee. The 90-minute session will give the nine-strong committee, led by Sir Malcolm Rifkind, a chance to question the agencies about the reach of the mass surveillance programmes that have provoked a global debate about privacy in the internet age.

Meanwhile, in the U.S., two parallel tracks for legislation - one bogus as a $3 bill, the other serious and real, are up for consideration. In the case of the former, the bill sponsored by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, would effectively legalize many of the NSA’s controversial spying tactics that have been exposed to the public recently. It would also expand the NSA’s powers, giving the agency new authority to tap cellphones, track cellphones, and would also impose 10-year sentences on any unauthorized person who accesses the NSA’s data. In other words, it's '4th amendment, fuck you' hubris raised to the googleplex power. Citizens need to barrage their reps to stop this perfidy. Whether Reepo or Demo, tell them no votes on their next election bid if they fuck this up.

The other bill, by Sen. Patrick Leahy and Jim Sensenbrenner (an original co-author of the Patriot Act), would actually reform the NSA. It would end the NSA’s bulk collection of data, require the government obtain court orders before it could use information collected on Americans, create transparency by allowing communications providers to disclose information about the orders they've received from the NSA, make FISA court orders since 2003 public, and create a public advocate for the FISA Court. Feinstein has vowed to kill Leahy’s legislation. We can't let that happen. Not on our watch, not when this may be the last, best chance to regulate the spooks gone wild.

Back to Berners-Lee. Speaking from his office at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts, he said that though he had anticipated many of the surveillance activities exposed by Snowden, including taps on the internet through the Prism program, he had not been prepared for the scale of the NSA/GCHQ operations, he "didn't realize it would be so big." At worst, such spying could damage the public's confidence in the intimate privacy of the internet as a free and safe place to interact, adding: "When you take away the safe space, you take away a lot of the power of human problem solving,".

Berners-Lee, who was honored in the opening ceremony of the London Olympics, reserved his harshest words for GCHQ and the NSA's undermining of the protection afforded by encryption, which he said would benefit organized criminal hacker gangs and hostile states. He said:

"In a totalitarian state where it reckoned it was the only strong state in the world, I can imagine that being a reasonable plan. But in this situation, internet security is hard. It's naïve to imagine that if you introduce a weakness into a system you will be the only one to use it."

He also criticised the cracking of encryption on ethical grounds:

"Any democratic country has to take the high road; it has to live by its principles. I'm very sympathetic to attempts to increase security against organised crime, but you have to distinguish yourself from the criminal."

Is the U.S. really a democratic nation any more, or has it reverted to a total, lawless gangster state? - As author Michael Parenti has warned, from the time of the JFK assassination. (When the security state finally grabbed the last leash of governance via complicity in Kennedy's assassination, facilitating it and its ensuing cover-up). This 50th anniversary year of the assassination is the perfect time to apply the ultimate litmus test to see whether we're a gangster state, or still a nominally democratic nation. If Feinstein's bill wins, you damned well know the answer.

And, btw, if you believe that's "over the top", consider the words of former senior NSA official Bill Binney, who in a CBS June 19 interview declared there were "simple principles that can be used to find bad guys without violating anyone's privacy". In the NY Times piece (ibid.), at the very end, Binney goes on the record again, stating bluntly, that without new leadership, new laws and top-to-bottom reform:

The agency will represent a threat of 'turnkey totalitarianism' - the capability to turn its awesome power - now directed mainly against other countries - on Americans.

To be forewarned, and all that....

See also: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/11/department-justice-privacy-internet-lavabit-encryption-keys

IMF Warns of "Debt Catastrophe" if Debt Ceiling Isn't Raised - As Obama Takes the 14th Off the Table

Depiction of Obama from two years ago when he basically allowed the country to be extorted by the Reepo Economic Terrorists. This time he needs to approve the debt ceiling limit increase under Executive order- under the 14th amendment - even if brings on a constitutional crisis. The nation's interest must trump political interests and elections next year!

Incredibly, it appears that - despite strong advice from former Clinton aides- Obama does not have any intention of using the 14th amendment to raise the debt ceiling limit unilaterally, if the Tea Bagger driven Reepos continue their shutdown foolishness into the debt ceiling deadline of October 17th.  This despite the fact that according to a Financial Times article yesterday, the IMF has warned of a "debt catastrophe" if the U.S. doesn't pay its bills.

Let's be clear of the impact if the debt ceiling isn't raised by the due date. First, we may have about two weeks 'grace period' but then on Nov. 1st the Treasury must make a $25 billion payment to Social Security. This cannot be made if the ceiling isn't raised and that means that Social Security payments likely will be seriously delayed or not go out at all. Next, the Treasury must make a bond interest payment (on Treasury securities) of $30 billion by November 15th.  This payment assures creditors that the U.S. claim that bonds are "protected by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government" is honored. If it is not, and it won't be if the money isn't available via debt ceiling being raised, the markets will freak out. That includes the bond markets and the stock market. Two years ago, the latter dropped 17% as a result of GOP terrorism. What will it be like this time? Who knows?

Meanwhile, The Treasury Department has stated in a report:  "A default would be unprecedented and has the potential to be catastrophic. The negative spillovers could reverberate around the world, and there might be a financial crisis and recession that could echo the events of 2008 or worse."

As I noted in a previous blog (last month) The Constitution (Amendment XIV, Section 4),  is clear on the U.S. debt responsibilities:

The validity of the Public Debt of the United States, authorized by law, includes debts incurred for payment of pensions ....and shall not be questioned.

It is clear to me that if the Republican Congress refuses to act to raise the debt ceiling (and thereby honor the validity of paying the Public Debt) then President Obama can certainly issue an Executive Order to override a putatively derelict Congress and invoke Article 4 of Amendment XIV to raise the debt ceiling himself. 

But according to a UK Guardian article, Obama has no intention of doing so, thereby taking his most potent 'weapon' off the table. According to the Guardian:

" 'Using the 14th would show the Republicans he means business,' one former aide to Bill Clinton told the Guardian last week.

But the White House ruled out the option on Thursday, ending days of Washington debate about whether this obscure legal authority might provide a way out for Obama – at least from one half of Republicans' fiscal pincer movement.

 'The administration does not believe the 14th amendment gives power to the president to ignore the debt ceiling,' said spokesman Jay Carney.

'The fact that there is significant controversy around the president's authority to act unilaterally means that it would not be a credible alternative to Congress raising the debt ceiling and would not be taken seriously by the market.' "


But this is nonsense, and Carney's blather doesn't even pass a basic laugh test. Is Carney serious?  First, the President would not be "ignoring the debt ceiling"  - but rather respecting it given that a dysfunctional element in congress has obstructed its being raised!  Second, Carney's excuse that, 'There is significant controversy around the president's authority to act unilaterally'  is codswallop given  this is a prez who regularly (and unilaterally) orders drone strikes on targets from Yemen to Pakistan to Afghanistan - without any "approval" from congress.

While his drone strikes putatively address American security compromised by terrorists, clearly invoking the 14th would address Americans' domestic financial security compromised by the GOP and the incipient threat to the economic stability of the nation. Certainly, if Yemen merits a drone strike owing to incipient terrorist threats, the Repuke congress merits the 14th landing on their asses, given the Constitution clearly states. debts incurred for payment of pensions ....and shall not be questioned

So is Obama not obliged to uphold the Constitution, and in WHATEVER manner is required? I believe he is, given that the refusal to honor the nation's debts is a basis for intervention by an adult - and making specious arguments to avoid taking that responsibility  (to probably avoid political repercussions in the mid-terms next year) does not cut it. Not one bit!

Those who encourage Obama to grow some cojones believe 100% - contrary to Carney's PR blatherskite - that the power to use the 14th does inhere in the Executive if congress forfeits its own responsibilities.  In that case, Obama is obliged as the last adult in gov't to step in and seize the power to use the 14th. So yes, the power to use it  DOES EXIST IF Obama takes it. If he projects authority, and goes on the air to make clear the reasons for this extreme action, he will be as legit as JFK when he faced down U.S. Steel in 1962 and stopped them from raising steel prices.  Many in the corporate world at that time believed he "didn't have the authority to interfere in the markets" - but he did. Because he had balls, and he knew the national interest trumped petty political concerns.

Make no mistake also that the markets, contrary to Carney's nonsense, would definitely take such a move seriously, given what the alternative is!   Does Carney,  or whatever advisor is feeding Obama this foolishness,  really believe the markets would rather see a credit meltdown, default and a drop as big as the one in 2008? Puh---leeze! Do Carney and his clique really believe the markets would rather see a credit downgrade and the country's image damaged irreparably?

Will Obama have the balls to act, or will he allow the Repuke anarchists and terrorists to get the better of him again? We have to wait and see! In the meantime let's hope there are no further smokescreens giving BS reasons not to act, and more intelligent justifications for doing so. To give the Reeps a shot over the bow and show them the WH isn't going to come to a gunfight with a sling shot this time around.

American Zombots Get Brain-Jacked by the Corporate Media to Be Against Snowden

"America has become amnesiac - a country in which forms of historical, political, and moral forgetting are not only willfully practiced but celebrated. The United States has degenerated into a social order that is awash in public stupidity and views critical thought as both a liability and a threat"- blogger writing on SmirkingChimp yesterday.


Even as Americans appear to be growing more fearful of their use of the internet on account of NSA scoop -up surveillance - to the point of closing down Facebook pages, limiting emails, and phone calls while using alternative search engines like Ixquick-  their brains (many of them) and common sense appear to have degenerated in the past month and come out more in favor of the NSA spookathon and less for Ed Snowden. At least according to a recent Washington Post- ABC News poll. According to the poll's finding:

"The American people, who once defended Edward Snowden’s leaks of sensitive intelligence information gathered by the U.S. government, are starting to turn against him."


If we take common sense for granted in this sampled population (and that is not a foregone conclusion by any means) then one would expect people who are reasonably educated to be aware that their privacy rights are bound up intimately with their 4th amendment rights - to be free of lawless search and seizure. As I noted in previous blogs to do with this issue, while the specific right to privacy isn’t specifically listed in the Constitution,  the Founders understood that as time went on new rights would emerge which they might not be able to think of (e.g. to health care), hence bundled these into the unenumerated rights under the 9th amendment..

 In terms of privacy, however, it is clear the language of the 4th amendment:

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

Presupposes privacy as a necessary condition, hence the Founders saw no need to elaborate it as a separate right. Hence, use of the descriptor “personal” applied to papers, effects etc. naturally means private! Even if one for some reason disputed the argument, he’d still be left with the fact of the unenumerated rights under the Ninth amendment.

Now, track to the  Washington Post-ABC News poll   poll. It shows that a majority of Americans — 53 percent — now say that Edward Snowden should be charged with a crime for his leaks. That’s up from 43 percent less than a month ago. Meanwhile, over that same time span, the percentage saying Snowden should not be charged has dropped from 48 percent to 36 percent. These are significant differences!

 This elicits the question of why the anti-Snowden numbers are up, and the pro-Snowden are down?

The realistic answer rests on media observations over the past 4 weeks, disclosing is there has been a uniform drumbeat to turn Americans once again into zombots, passive morons and sheeple, as was done to them in 2003, to drive up support for the Iraqi invasion. Recall that in October, 2002, barely 1 in 3 had approved interference in Iraq or invasion, but that had mutated to nearly 2 in 3 by March, thanks to the disgusting involvement of the corporate media (including the NY Times). Thus, in one of  the more vile episodes of propaganda in Amerikkan history, the supposed "fourth estate"  was converted into brazen cheerleaders for the war state. Much the same is true here.

The sad insight here is too many Americans are unable or unwilling to think for themselves but would rather be buffeted by the winds of pundit opinion on FOX, ABC, CBS and even MSNBC (where only Chris Hayes stands out as a true independent thinker on the Snowden issue). Hence, they lack common sense or even basic intelligence into the nature of the war -surveillance state they inhabit.

Moving on: it is perhaps not at all surprising that much of the movement has come from conservatives and moderates, who are now more likely to say Snowden should be charged with a crime. Among conservatives, 56 percent believe he should be charged, and 40 percent feel “strongly” about it. Why is this not surprising?

First, conservatives (look at their stances on climate change-global warming, female reproduction, abortion) have amply demonstrated they lack even basic insights into science, or how to evaluate issues using critical thought. Second, conservatives are as ill-informed about the economy, failing to recognize the current low aggregate demand environment as they champion spending cuts and more tax cuts - the very things that will make matter worse! (See, e.g. http://www.brane-space.blogspot.com/2013/07/austerity-economics-is-triggering.html  )  Hence, it's not surprising they'd be zombots and willing sheep-tools in succoring a massive surevillance state as well. After all, they've also historically been the most adamant pro-war spenders!

"Moderates" to me are merely half-informed middle of the roaders, and as Jim Hightower once observed: "The only things in the middle of the road are yellow lines and roadkill". He said it, I didn't. But I agree.

Moderates are also more likely to be satisfied Neoliberals, who don't want to rock the boat, make waves or anger the war state. We've also seen a parade of them emerging now on MSNBC, including Melissa Harris Perry, Rachel Maddow, Lawrence O'Donnell and Ed Schultz. What one once believed to be die hard liberals or 'progressives' have emerged as vanilla echo boards for the war-surveillance state. A shorter term? Propagandists-  not much better than Leni Reifenstahl for the Third Reich. (Google her!)

The most worrisome aspects of the poll which show the complete absence of any common sense - in terms of grasping the Constitution or the nature of personal rights - are that a full 74% actually believe the NSA dragnet surveillance is more directed at "some Americans" (they most likely think Muslims) and that 49% believe it's directed at 'my privacy rights'. I have news for these inveterate bozos: any such thing as massive, indiscriminate scoop up surveillance done by approval of secret, rubber stamping courts and without any specific (search) warrants being served, definitely violates YOUR rights too!

Most reprehensible of all, and showing me these zombot yahoo tools (I refuse to even call them Americans)  don't deserve liberty or security (see my July 4 blog), is the finding that 57% have no objection to the NSA mass surveillance, even if it violates their privacy rights, while only 39% believe their privacy rights ought to be respected. The disparity (which could grow even more in coming months)  shows that we've basically lost this nation to the spooks, and the pro-Police state fascists. The "Good Germans", if you will, the same lot that watched as the Nazis plundered what remained of the Weimar Republic and converted it to the most devastating spy state in history. At least until the Amerkkans recruited former Nazis to run their own spy state!

Well, only the 39% have it right. The 57% need to move to an even more totalitarian state, say like China. Moreso because most of them are likely capitalists and China is now the capitalist nation supreme.

Meanwhile, debate is due to begin this afternoon on an amendment tabled by congressman Justin Amash, a two-term libertarian Republican from Michigan, that would prevent the NSA from collecting bulk phone records on millions of Americans. We're informed that: "The White House, Congress and the National Security Agency were bracing for a pivotal and unpredictable vote.

This may be the one shot in a while to cut back on the surveillance excesses, but it isn't a given that there will be enough with the courage to vote against it. Especially as the lobbynig efforts by the WH and Spy state have been ferocious. This is the first court challenge since the Snowden revelations, and the ACLU believes it has a strong case because of the publication by The UK Guardian of a secret court order authorising the bulk collection of Verizon records, and because it is a Verizon customer.


Meanwhile, "the Obama administration, the intelligence community, and its legislative allies were battling what has become known as the Amash amendment, portraying it as recklessly ending a longstanding, secret surveillance activity they consider vital for national security".  But this is bollocks. As former NSA code breaker Bill Binney commented on Keith Alexander's NSA spying testimony 4 weeks, ago: "I don’t understand this being bamboozled into thinking that you have to do this to find bad guys. That’s false. There’s very simple principles you can use to find out who is the bad guy and who isn’t and you can do this without violating anybody’s privacy”.  

But, of course, with a run amuck Empire, the expedient usually trumps the slower, judicious and correct way.  Interestingly, this legislative fight is "the rare Washington battle that does not divide along partisan lines, but between civil liberties supporters in both parties and security hawks in both parties." 

Count me in on the liberties supporters, because hey - once they're lost, they ain't coming back. And you can "resurrect" all the Founders you can, but it is not going to happen.   No surprise the usual Neoliberal spokesmen of the war-profit state have insisted that if the Amash amendment is rejected, they will  "develop appropriate additional protections" for Americans' privacy over their phone records.    But it's unclear what those would be, and if you believe that codswallop you're a bigger moron than the one depicted looking at himself in the mirror at top.