But then again, it is not outside of the realm of possibility.

Especially now that we KNOW that emails, phones and cell phones are vulnerable.

Did NSA and DOJ tap Robert’s phone to get information they could use against him?

Maybe. Who knows?

But his change of heart regarding Obamacare was…..shocking and quick.

Many of us speculated what the government (and the Obama Administration and the DNC) had on him to make him change his mind so rapidly and completely.

Likely, we will never know.

But here is and interesting article regarding the methods that may have been used to gather information.

Points to remember:

NEVER, ever put anything incriminating in an email, or use email to send information you want to keep secret. Always assume that emails will be read. Treat them as if they were as private as a postcard.

NEVER, ever, say anything on a cell phone that you don’t want overheard.

NEVER, ever call or email someone you don’t want anyone else to know you have contacted.

Remember: Big Brother IS watching you.

3 people CAN keep a secret….if two of them are dead.

And somewhat early too.

All the folks at the IRS who were at the top of the management chain that somehow let all those Rouge Agents” at the IRS do all of that profiling of conservative groups filing for 501-(X) nonprofit status are, strangely, resigned, retired or scheduled to retire soon, or are on administrative leave….. 

Interesting, innit?

Seems to me that their retirement pensions should be forfeit. Breaking the p[ublic trust (if not laws) should take care of that.

Really, if we want this to never happen again, then people need to be kicked out of government service, have their pensions stripped if recently retired (or if at any time they were a part of this debacle) and/or (I especially like AND) serve jail time.

If the current civil service laws don’t allow for this sort of punishment, then they should, after careful deliberation, be re-written so as to allow it NEXT time there is a revelation of this magnitude….Especially with Obamacare just around the corner.

Depends on your point of view:

Our founding fathers, had things gone the other way, would have been tried and convicted as traitors, and we’d never have heard of them…they’d be, at best, a footnote in history.

So it is with Edward Snowden.
” For him, it is a matter of principle. “The government has granted itself power it is not entitled to.”

He outed a great conspiracy by the government against the citizens. Sadly, it wasn’t outed by our domestic news media, but rather by the Guardian, a UK based newspaper.

But either way, it took a LOT of guts to do what he did. He violated a whole slew of secrecy orders, revealing information that was dubbed “secret” or better. At the least, he could be charged under the “espionage act”, even though he has not given military secrets to an enemy….or has he, by giving it to the citizens?

Now the existence of these programs wasn’t really a secret to anyone who was paying attention over the past 10 or 15 years. Most of us in the conservative half of the population had heard at least some details about Carnivore and Echelon and other programs you never heard about (but existed in some form) designed to spy on the citizens of the United States, and we all had, if we were paying attention at all, heard about the great many abuses of the “Patriot Act” by government officials using it as an excuse for investigations into many citizens lives, used WAAAAY outside the scope of intent. Prizm? No real surprises, were there?

But really, Snowden didn’t do more than confirm what many of us already knew.

I have said for years that you should put nothing on the internet, in an email or say anything on ANY phone that you didn’t want overheard. Never take your cell phone anywhere you don’t want to be tracked. (if you do, then TAKE THE BATTERIES OUT OF THE DEVICE!).

Now we know that all of us who were looked at askance, were, at least in some form, correct.

The government IS watching. They don’t trust you, and they see everyone, every citizen, as a traitor and a suspect.Guilty until proven innocent. They take your data and wait to use it against you.

and, if you piss them of enough, they will.

But again, I ask you:
Traitor or Patriot?

Did Mr Snowden betray his government (and therefore, the Citizens of the US?) or did he out a surveillance program which is, if not unconstitutional and illegal, at least plain wrong and immoral?

Yes, he broke the law. But in doing a wrong, did he do a right? Other than getting the federal government to give his life a thorough examination and possibly face jail time, did his wistleblowing accomplish anything? Did he make you and I safer, or did he harm the security of the government’s ability to track and find and stop potential terrorists?

I say, It matters little if he DID harm the investigators ability to work in the shadows. If we can’t win by playing within the rules established by the Constitution, then we deserve to lose.

I don’t know Mr. Edward Snowden. And while many in this country may think he has done wrong, I think that he did right by outing these programs.

I’d like to buy him a drink, and shake his hand.

He’s facing a LOT of shit and it is going to land on him HARD. But what he did took guts and honor.

I wonder how long until we find out something nasty about him….his history of drinking to excess….or the fact that he is a wanted child molester, or he sevretly has a gay lifestyle or something equally shaming…..Those government folks can be vindictive, you know. 

I only hope his actions were not in vain, and that this reverses the mindset of our government and that this sort of thing stops. I fear, however, that it won’t.

(Or at least some of you did)….Because of this post

But I wasn’t.

They are watching you….one way or another.

You can hope, like me, that you are unimportant enough for them to pay much attention to, but the fact is that the DHS/DOJ/FBI IS watching you. Tracking your calls and your movements  They are, if not watching you, at least collecting the data so when the choose to pay attention to you, they have history on you..

Now, likely, you are like me. You are in (mostly) the same places at the (mostly) same times…You call (mostly) the same people…

(Mostly) the same people call you.

Same with your texts.

Likely same with your emails.

And you aren’t really doing anything that terribly exciting or interesting to the feds.

So you really don’t care. If you are like me, the fact that some faceless bureaucrat can track your movements and calls and emails (H/T Borepatch) doesn’t really bother you because you are not doing anything illegal.

But really, folks, how long until the fact that you are reading this blog makes you illegal? How long until voting against the party currently in power becomes illegal.

How long until some faceless bureaucrat running the local Obamacare
office checks up on you to see who you associate with, who you call, or
who you email and text with……Then decides you don’t need that
antibiotic, or that test or x-ray or MRI…or that appointment with the
foot specialist (in 6 months) because he/she disapproves of your circle
of friends and acquaintances.

How long until some faceless bureaucrat decides you are illegal simply because your opinion differs from that of your current ruler leader.

What happens then? What happens if they decide you are and enemy of the state?
Your phone makes you trackable and the calls you make will help make their case at the prosecution.

Wouldn’t it be nice to have a secondary method of communication that while trackable, isn’t tied to you? At least have that option?  You should also have at least one or two free, anonymous emails that you have set up, not from your home but rather from a free public internet site (Starbucks/McDonald’s etc) not too close to your home (in fact, as far away as possible) so you can, for a time, communicate without the .Gov being able to find it.

But then again, maybe those folks who said I am paranoid are right.
No need for any of this, we should trust in our government and its minions.
Such things could never happen here…

all of our cell phones…

Looking at who called who, from where (cell tower data) and for how long.

Everyone

They claim that they need this data as a part of the “War on Terror” (even though, according to Obama, that war is OVER)…

Yet, for some inexplicable reason, despite having warning from the Brits, the Russians, and apparently any agency which ever heard of them, they DHS, even with all that cell phone metadata, was unable to connect the dots….THat these people were not only likely terrorists, but that they had been calling other known terrorists in their homeland.

But they need all that cell phone data….Apparently to spend more time looking at possible domestic terrorists….homegrown ones. You know, those gun and bible clingin’ Tea Party types.

The ones they originally blamed the Boston Bombings on.

If it werent’s so sad and disgusting, it’d be funny.

They get to spend our money to spy on us to keep us safe.

(in an unconstitutional manner, IMO)

But they are looking in the wrong direction.

Sickening.

I didn’t want to mention it, but yesterday was actually one of those numerological nightmares.

6th day

6th month

and if you add up 2013 (2+0+1+3) that is six as well.

666

but I didn’t want to frighten you or anything, if you are into numerology or whatever….

and it wasn’t the fault of the guns, but rather his insanity…

Got it.

Ain’t it the truth though….

‘Cause according to THIS, all calls are being recorded.

Now, I am sure that this is a LOT of hard drive space, even for the government.

Wonder how long, really, they could keep it up? Storing all those calls…

In a little over a month, the trial of Gerorge Zimmerman begins: (ETA: I had misread it as July 10th, So you have less time… Thanks to 3 boxes for the correction)

While we have no idea how long the trial will take, and while we really don’t know what the verdict will be…. At this time the evidence that I have seen and heard in the media and the internet indicates that, if the courts leave politics out of things and is truly impartial, George Zimmerman will likely be found not guilty.

If that happens, then you can expect outrage by people who only see race and not the fact that Treyvon was a thug, who will be outraged that a black man was killed by a white man…and the white man went free…no matter what the facts of the case  might be.

That outrage may be fanned into action.

Since this case is, and always has been about race…in fact, were it not for racial politics no matter which races the participants might have been this,  case would never have been anything but a police report.

And really, this was all about race in order to fan the flames and generate an “Us vs Them” in order stir up black voters in the presidential election…

But you can expect that if George Zimmerman goes free after being found “not guilty” there will be riots . Likely, even if the verdict is “guilty” there will be riots, if on a smaller scale.

But if the courts look at the facts and find George Zimmerman “Not Guilty”, expect black racists who have already made up their minds to be….unhappy.

Remember the Rodney King riots? Watts?

Might be as bad as that.

Plan ahead. Be smart. Be intelligent. If you live in, or work in, or must pass through an area which might see unrest if the verdict is not palatable to the inhabitants, then prepare. Plan, think. Prepare.

Might be that nothing happens.

We will see soon.

But I doubt it.