government transparency

[yjacket]

Really?

Officials: NSA surveillance programs helped foil terror plots in 20 countries | Fox News

A lot of good it did for Boston!!

Of course, the government will spin this in any way to help them. Understanding government is extremely simple. Those who aspire to positions in government want power. Everyone acts and does things for what they perceive is in their own best interest. There are bureaucratic individuals and policy makers who have made their careers out of this program. To admit that this program is wrong would destroy those individuals who have a vested interest in the program. Those who have a vested interest are the ones administering the program. When those above them ask if the program is necessary, the only answer they will come back with is of course and here is why. If they said no it isn't necessary they would be killing themselves (i.e. then why have we been paying you to do x for the last x # of years!!).

So in order to provide relevance (i.e. keep their job and money) they will claim it saved lives. Who would go into an interview or a job promotion saying, well I really screwed up here, here and here and my job really isn't necessary so you should fire me. Their employers are the public so in order to keep their job they will spin things in the best light possible.

More to the point . . . if I put a policeman on every street corner it would not stop murder. Murder rates would probably drop, but it would not stop murder. The justification is that we need policemen on every street corner to stop murder. But everything has a cost benefit to it. Murder will not stop but it may be reduced, so have much time/money/effort is put into reducing the murder rate. To put a cop on every street corner requires additional taxes, additional manpower, additional funds. Then the question becomes is it really worth it?

According to this mentality no cost is too great to reduce the murder rate. No cost is too great to reduce terrorists, it must be reduced at all costs. The line goes that even if 1 terrorist act is prevented then the program is justified. If 20 plots are "helped" (and we won't even go into what helped means, i.e. was PRISM the sole method of prevention or would those plots have been stopped regardless through good detective work??) over 7 seven years out of how many intrusions and false alarms?

Unfortunately, those who have this myopic viewpoint are looking beyond the mark. Yes xx # of plots may have been stopped (we'll never know how much this program actually contributed to stopping them) but that is what is seen, what about the unseen. This program costs x # of billions of dollars and manpower. How many engineers worked on this program (100? 1000?). How much did it cost (100 million, 1 billion??) If this program didn't exist what would those resource been spent on. Instead of developing a computer program to suck up all the data, maybe some of those engineers would have spent time developing algorithms to map the human genome and map cancer, maybe that money would have been spent on medical cures or research? We simply do not know where that manpower and money would have been spent. So sure we see that 20 plots were supposedly foiled that supposedly saved lives; but what about the lives that could have or would have been saved or improved had those resources been deployed elsewhere.

So 1) it cannot and could not stop terror.

2) It is against the Constitution of this country.

3) While the emotional ties that it claims to have prevented some accounts feels nice and fluffy, what about all the other great things that could have been done with those resources had they been put to other uses.

Edited June 17, 2013 by yjacket

[carlimac]

A lot of good it did for Boston!!

Of course, the government will spin this in any way to help them. Understanding government is extremely simple. Those who aspire to positions in government want power. Everyone acts and does things for what they perceive is in their own best interest. There are bureaucratic individuals and policy makers who have made their careers out of this program. To admit that this program is wrong would destroy those individuals who have a vested interest in the program. Those who have a vested interest are the ones administering the program. When those above them ask if the program is necessary, the only answer they will come back with is of course and here is why. If they said no it isn't necessary they would be killing themselves (i.e. then why have we been paying you to do x for the last x # of years!!).

So in order to provide relevance (i.e. keep their job and money) they will claim it saved lives. Who would go into an interview or a job promotion saying, well I really screwed up here, here and here and my job really isn't necessary so you should fire me. Their employers are the public so in order to keep their job they will spin things in the best light possible.

More to the point . . . if I put a policeman on every street corner it would not stop murder. Murder rates would probably drop, but it would not stop murder. The justification is that we need policemen on every street corner to stop murder. But everything has a cost benefit to it. Murder will not stop but it may be reduced, so have much time/money/effort is put into reducing the murder rate. To put a cop on every street corner requires additional taxes, additional manpower, additional funds. Then the question becomes is it really worth it?

According to this mentality no cost is too great to reduce the murder rate. No cost is too great to reduce terrorists, it must be reduced at all costs. The line goes that even if 1 terrorist act is prevented then the program is justified. If 20 plots are "helped" (and we won't even go into what helped means, i.e. was PRISM the sole method of prevention or would those plots have been stopped regardless through good detective work??) over 7 seven years out of how many intrusions and false alarms?

Unfortunately, those who have this myopic viewpoint are looking beyond the mark. Yes xx # of plots may have been stopped (we'll never know how much this program actually contributed to stopping them) but that is what is seen, what about the unseen. This program costs x # of billions of dollars and manpower. How many engineers worked on this program (100? 1000?). How much did it cost (100 million, 1 billion??) If this program didn't exist what would those resource been spent on. Instead of developing a computer program to suck up all the data, maybe some of those engineers would have spent time developing algorithms to map the human genome and map cancer, maybe that money would have been spent on medical cures or research? We simply do not know where that manpower and money would have been spent. So sure we see that 20 plots were supposedly foiled that supposedly saved lives; but what about the lives that could have or would have been saved or improved had those resources been deployed elsewhere.

So 1) it cannot and could not stop terror.

2) It is against the Constitution of this country.

3) While the emotional ties that it claims to have prevented some accounts feels nice and fluffy, what about all the other great things that could have been done with those resources had they been put to other uses.

I think you're overreacting a bit here. The human genome has already been mapped for one thing. And if we're all going to die anyway and terrorism can't be eliminated, why are you worrying that resources are being spent on this venture rather than cancer research ( which by the way is about saturated with researchers already.) You're talking in circles.

My point is that yes we can write to our congressmen and women, we can vote our conscience, we can sign petitions and even march in a parade and hold up signs if we feel so inclined, but in the meantime, life goes on and I'd rather live it that fret about stuff I can't do more than that about. I don't trust the govt implicitly- never will. But until election time rolls around again, there are some things that we just have to live with. So I'm going to do my best to live happily rather than focusing to heavily on how unfair the system is. That's a recipe for despair.

[MorningStar]

So now we're supposed to take the NSA's word for it that they prevented terror attacks with their PRISM program? Yeah, they're so trustworthy.

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[Gretchen]

I made the mistake of checking the news this morning. I saw an article that had more holes that swiss cheese. The first part was saying that because the NSA's been watching us, they've thwarted about 50 terrorist attacks. Okay great, how'd they do it? Not explained, instead, they go on to talk about (I kid you not) international relations, (jumbled, of course) and

Fifty years ago next week, President Kennedy addressed a crowd of 450,000 in that then-divided city to repudiate communism and famously declare "Ich bin ein Berliner," German for "I am a Berliner." Since then, presidents from Ronald Reagan to Bill Clinton have used Berlin speeches to articulate broad themes about freedom and international alliances.

Ummm... not proper German grammer. "Ich bin Berliner" is the gramatically correct way to say it. Surely a freaking President would want to not sound like an idiot in front of people.

Where was I going with all this origionally? Oh yeah, the "thwarted attacks"...

[Traveler]

I made the mistake of checking the news this morning. I saw an article that had more holes that swiss cheese. The first part was saying that because the NSA's been watching us, they've thwarted about 50 terrorist attacks. Okay great, how'd they do it? Not explained, instead, they go on to talk about (I kid you not) international relations, (jumbled, of course) and

Ummm... not proper German grammer. "Ich bin Berliner" is the gramatically correct way to say it. Surely a freaking President would want to not sound like an idiot in front of people.

Where was I going with all this origionally? Oh yeah, the "thwarted attacks"...

If we know about the source of attacks - we would also know about the social-political entities that are festering them and the individuals of power - including the governments that are assisting such efforts. If we really want or intend to end such attacks we must eliminate the nurseries where they are born and trained. If this system was minimally effective we would know by now how and who radicalized the Boston bombers. If we do not know by now - it does not work.

The Traveler