The USA Freedom Act: What's to Come and What You Need to Know
eff.org
eff.org
EFF -- if you're listening -- it would be great to stake a very clear position on this bill at the very top of your statement.
Something like "We urge you to support the USA Freedom Act."
Since neither the name of the bill itself, nor anything on the page, makes it clear that the "Freedom Act" is an act against the digital surveillance of US citizens, someone who had never heard of the Act, or someone skimming the page, would not gain a meaningful conclusion.
I was unsure at first whether to support or decry the bill, and heck, the name even sounds like "Patriot Act." The title of the page itself does no help: it paints an ominous message in a severe tone.
Marketing: it's important. Be clear.
"The signals we give—yes, or no, or maybe— should be clear; the darkness around us is deep."
William Stafford -- http://williamstafford.org/spoems/pages/ritual.html
This was a revelation to me, so I would have to agree. I'm ignorant of the subject and my initial reaction to a thing called the USA Freedom Act was "great, how are my rights about to be curtailed now?"
--News at 11
Clear as mud.
"The USA Freedom Act, the leading contender for NSA reform, is set for a vote this week. The bill has some problems, but is a major step forward for surveillance reform. That's why we're asking you to call your Senator and urge them to support the USA Freedom Act."
How much more clear do you want it?
Obviously ideally people will read past the biggest font on the page, but that doesn't always happen.
I revisited the page and realized my eye was immediately drawn to the huge propaganda eagle, after which I jumped to the middle of the article and started skimming. Once again I missed the initial sentence. Had to intentionally look for it.
Since I have enough information to determine that I don't want the Freedom Act to pass, why would I click through to the article?
So you didn't read the article, which was the original complaint of the root comment. If you can't take 30 seconds to read about legislation that could significantly impact the power of the security state to spy on the American public, you're not doing your duty as a citizen.
So why would I read it?
If you take a systemic stance on improving the problem, then you have a chance at improving the rate at which people do their duty as citizens.
Your choice.
Secret courts? Advocate. Now secret courts are more OK because apparently we reviewed them and decided they are fine with an advocate. This just cements the status quo into our system.
Are you sure about that? Because once such law get effective, replacing it will read like an admission of failure to everybody that helped it pass.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/08/understanding-new-usa-...
The bill isn't perfect, but it'll mean that the government collects less information on innocent people, there'll be greater transparency, and an advocate for citizen privacy in the FISA court. Beyond that, it's the most likely vehicle for NSA reform. We're unlikely to see anything stronger if this doesn't pass. And it seems like a better bet than trying to push for Section 215 to sunset next year.
~Filing~
"In Klayman I, the plaintiffs, subscribers of Verizon Wireless, brought suit against the NSA, the Department of Justice, Verizon Communications, President Barack Obama, Eric Holder, the United States Attorney General, and General Keith B. Alexander, the Director of the National Security Agency.[5] The plaintiffs alleged that the government is conducting a "secret and illegal government scheme to intercept vast quantities of domestic telephonic communications" and that the program violates First, Fourth and Fifth Amendment and exceeds statutory authority granted by Section 215.[5] In Klayman II, the plaintiffs sued the same government defendants and in addition, Facebook, Yahoo!, Google, Microsoft, YouTube, AOL, PalTalk, Skype, Sprint, AT&T, Apple again alleging the bulk metadata collection violates the First, Fourth and Fifth Amendment and constitutes divulgence of communication records in violation of Section 2702 of Stored Communications Act.[4]"
~Current Status~
"On January 3, 2014 the government filed notice of appeal. On February 21, 2014 government filed a motion for extension of time to file dispositive motions in wake of the President's changes to Section 215 metadata program on January 17, 2014.[17][18] The parties argued the case before a three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals on November 4, 2014.[19]"
(In the last month, Klayman has filed suit accusing Obama of intentionally allowing Ebola-infected ISIS suicide troops into the US to kill Christians, Jews, and whites; the complaint ended with a demand that Obama be deported since he isn't a citizen. He is not the kind of standard-bearer any cause wants.)
Is there a TLDR of the changes around? Post-water-down version ideally.
"Some moron amended bill f7eed03, now it's bill f5ba821. Do you know how much I had to tweak the language in order to generate a hash that looks like 'freedom'?"
For anyone interested, here is the bill in question: https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-bill/3361
HR3361.4 HR3361.5 HR3361.6
etc
Easier for everyone to understand, not just geeks...
HR3361.20141106142502
almost as bad as hash, but immediately parseable and understood if a version was before or after something else.
https://github.com/BenKallos/legislation
It's a unique approach to governing that I wish more would follow.
Is it just me, or the last one is a pretty big deal? Since before, "number of NSLs" could include a single letter asking for all the data on all users or really large sets of accounts. Of course, there is still always the typical loophole of "oh, it wasn't an NSL, it was data collected under a different program...", but otherwise this bill does seem to address a lot of the issues with NSA collection happening at completely secret rates, based on secret law interpreted by secret courts. Am I being too optimistic about it?
I'm so sick of how partisan the EFF has become.
Why would we expect or want anything else?
You're free to act or not upon the EFF's urging - but at least they're honest about their goals.
What's honest about that?
FWIW, I've read some other articles about this bill, and my opinion of it has improved slightly since reading the EFF brief here.
If you're interested, I recommend you check out the EFF's press releases about CISPA, and then compare it to what's on Wikipedia. They just make a number of legal leaps that aren't founded in any kind of law, amounting to a fearmongering argument no more valid than screaming, "BUT FREEDOM!!!!" too loudly for anyone else to object.
I guess you are expecting the EFF to be neutral with regard to NSA snooping and data collection, versus NSA not doing any of those things. That's not a reasonable ask, though.