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Comment by ferdo | Hacker News Reader

The NSA stated, in 1975, that it's not bound or beholden the US Constitution or law. I don't expect that their opinion has changed much. I can't recall any lawless institution that all of the sudden became lawful of its own accord:

> "NSA does not have a statutory charter; its operational responsibilities are set forth exclusively in executive directives first issued in the 1950s. One of the questions which the Senate asked the Committee to consider was the "need for specific legislative authority to govern the operations of...the National Security Agency."

> According to NSA's General Counsel, no existing statutes control, limit, or define the signals intelligence activities of NSA. Further, the General Counsel asserts that the Fourth Amendment does not apply to NSA's interception of Americans' international communications for foreign intelligence purposes."

> http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/church/reports/book3/pdf/C...

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>The NSA stated, in 1975, that it's not bound or beholden the US Constitution or law.

They knew that was a lie when they said it. They had tried in the past to get Congress to amend the Communications Act of 1934.

Ignoring whatever laws have been passed since then, not to mention the control of the purse the Congress has, your excerpts don't make your case. E.g. by saying "the Fourth Amendment does not apply to NSA's interception of Americans' international communications for foreign intelligence purposes" the NSA was implicitly also stating that Americans' communications that didn't meet those criteria were protected by the Fourth.

> Ignoring whatever laws have been passed since then

I trust the NSA to do just that.

> the control of the purse the Congress has

They increased the NSA's budget by $4 billion last year.

You're more than welcome to trust an agency with little to no oversight. I'll keep my faith in human nature. It's served me well all these years.

Well the NSA's activities have strong bipartisan support (at least as long as as the public doesn't have a great idea about what it does). No member of the intelligence committees has changed their position as a result of these recent disclosures. Both republicans and democrats have rushed to defend the NSA.

The problem isn't a rogue agency that doesn't have oversight. The problem is the law that allows the NSA to do just that. Take section 215 of the patriot act for example(it allows the government to obtain business records aka the verizon phone provision ); it is written in a way that makes it laughably easy to use for almost any use at all. The FBI doesn't even have to go to the FISA court but can choose any magistrate judge they want. The only restriction is "that such investigation of a United States person is not conducted solely upon the basis of activities protected by the first amendment to the Constitution." Wonderful......

> Both republicans and democrats have rushed to defend the NSA.

In terms of realpolitik, that only makes sense. Politicians will defend anyone that they think might have the dirt on them. Intelligence apparatuses in all ages exist to control the political class.

Hoover's reign at the FBI is a history of political control via intel.

Senator Select Committee on Intelligence members Mark Udall and Ron Wyden may not have changed their opinions, but these leaks have changed what they can say about it, and that's not exactly complementary, e.g. try this search: https://www.google.com/search?q=senator+wyden+nsa

You're reading far too much into what I said, which was pointing out, at least based on the excerpts you quoted, that you hadn't made the case they were "not bound or beholden the US Constitution or law" back then.

Which you aren't as of yet denying, since you're only replying to asides on details you didn't address that are either relevant today (enabling legislation that's been passed since then) or relevant for all this period (power of the purse, and of course what the Congress did last year is hardly relevant to what they'll do this year after all these revelations, or in 2015 after the next round of elections, etc.).

I'm not sure what you're trying to communicate but I'd gently suggest that you worry less about what I think and more about the lawless agency that appears to have untoward power over our lives.

I'm not talking about what you think but what you've said in this discussion, or rather haven't said, that "you hadn't made the case" the NSA is lawless.

Which I think is a very important point: if they are subject to the rule of law, we have a variety of legal means to deal with them, some of which I've outlined.

If they are truly lawless, our options shrink down to the unpalatable choices of avoiding getting stomped on (which neither of us chose, given our participation in this discussion) or by definition extra-legal action. I'm not going to suggest that's what you're saying, but if you truly do believe they're lawless, do you have any ideas for action vs. "worry" and other forms of inaction?

> "you hadn't made the case" the NSA is lawless.

I don't need to. Their actions define them. They're not acting lawfully so therefore they must be lawless.

I have my own methods for keeping a low profile on the net. I wish I felt comfortable sharing them in a public forum, but I don't.

Please email me. My contact is in my profile

> I have my own methods for keeping a low profile on the net.

The Five Rules of surviving today's total surveillance information personal property cleptocracy:

1) Don't think.

2) If you think, don't speak.

3) If you think, and speak, don't write.

4) If you think, speak, and write, don't sign.

5) If you think, speak, write and sign, be prepared to escape to Hong Kong.

>>E.g. by saying "the Fourth Amendment does not apply to NSA's interception of Americans' international communications for foreign intelligence purposes" the NSA was implicitly also stating that Americans' communications that didn't meet those criteria were protected by the Fourth.

I might be missing something but just because X applies to Y doesn't mean X doesn't apply to Z.

Sure they can say whatever they want and get away with it. If someone could get standing to ask the supreme court to rule on this I bet they would be required to follow the constitution. The trick is getting standing to file a suit.

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