• SeanRenaud said on Mar 21, 2008....

  I'm not defending the lack of oversight here.  I'm asking.  Why isn't this information public record?

• bloc said on Mar 21, 2008....

  people's passport information?

• SeanRenaud said on Mar 21, 2008....

  What countries you've visited.  Yeah that seems like something that should be a public record sort of thing.  It's not like it's illegal to travel in the first place.

• TinSoldier said on Mar 21, 2008....

  Umm, I don't see how you are tying this into the general privacy/government snooping issue. This was some misbehaving workers.
  
  Yes, it could have been for political purposes and I'm sure the investigation will find that out, but..
  
  Okay, I just skimmed the article and I see the point. It's not the passport info collecting that is a big deal, but the fact that government collects data in other activities and that despite classification some of this data could make its way into the wrong hands.
  
  While I agree in general on the privacy issue, this specific instance and point seem to be pretty weak tea to me.
  

• bloc said on Mar 21, 2008....

  let's see if I can tie my thoughts together. There is no justification for warrantless spying. NONE. However, the people that defend illegal warrantless wiretapping always resort to the argument that it's only terrorists or suspected terrorists that are having their privacy violated. They also say that the second they see peoples privacy being violated for political reasons that they will care.
  
  My argument is that there is absolutely no reason to have warrantless wiretapping because it will always be violate and most importantly we gain nothing from the practice.
  
  We already know that warrantless wiretapping is occurring and now we know that peoples privacy is being violated for political reasons.
  

• TinSoldier said on Mar 21, 2008....

  I agree that warrantless wiretapping is wrong and unconstitutional.
  
  I see, after reading a bit more of Greenwald's piece, how that can be linked to irresponsible people.
  
  Kind of a weak link, IMO, since there are many other strong arguments against warrantless wiretapping though.
  
  Edit: But I just noticed that you said "warrantless spying". That's a little different. While our intelligence services need to have oversight, I still think that they should be allowed to perform their duties even if they are quasi-legal or even illegal in foreign countries.
  
  And maybe even sometimes in the US. But I think that FISA covers that.
  

• bloc said on Mar 21, 2008....

  Here's more on this. The state department looked into private files of Obama, Clinton, and McCain. The explanation that it's the fault of a few low level contractors reminds me of the false claim that torture was limited to a few bad apples at abu ghraib. The later we now know is patently false.
  
  

• TinSoldier said on Mar 21, 2008....

  No, we don't know that.
  
  But whatever, man. You go with your conspiracy theories. Just let me know when you have more than theories, 'kay?
  

• bloc said on Mar 21, 2008....

  i didn't mean to imply that foreign spying should be restricted the same as domestic spying.
  
  It's funny how the standards for a conspiracy theory vary so much with a single person. If this is a conspiracy theory then so are many of your assertions about the intention of vietnam during the time of our war their.
  

• TinSoldier said on Mar 21, 2008....

  So my pointing out that the Vietnam war was not some kind of conspiracy theory is itself a conspiracy theory?
  
  Interesting. I think I'd like to subscribe to your newsletter.
  
  Anyhow, I'm not denying that this could have been done for political purposes. I'm saying that it's entirely possible that it wasn't.
  
  And I take some exception to your Abu Ghraib comment as well, which is what really made me comment.
  

• ALIENated said on Mar 21, 2008....

  
  
  http://www.soulcast.com/post/show/120182/Stop-Looking-At-My-Name-And-Address#
  
  
  
  

• bloc said on Mar 21, 2008....

  first, what is the exception you took with abu ghraib. More importantly, which part of what I said is a conspiracy theory. Show me that and I'll show you a few things you've said about vietnam that fit the same pattern.
  
  You made a strong statement calling me a conspircay theorist and I'd like to see you back it up clearly. If at the end of it I am a conspiracy theorist then I'll bet money that you are too.
  

• TinSoldier said on Mar 21, 2008....

  My exception with Abu Ghraib is that it was just a few low-level soldiers committing hijinks.
  
  Or at least, the implication that their superiors ordered it. I won't deny that more officers should have been culpable for improper supervision, or that non-military interrogators may have lead the military folks to believe that that kind of behavior was okay.
  
  Reading again, I realize that it's the wording of your statement that set me off.
  

• bloc said on Mar 22, 2008....

  I'd love to take up this issue with you. Please let me know your opinion after considering my thoguhts. I've shown clearly that certain policies were ordered by the Bush admin. Here is a short list
  
  
  • stress positions
  • sensory deprivation
  • sexual humiliation
  • cold cell
  • long time standing
  • dogs
  
  The vast majority of images from abu ghraib fall well within the confines of these authorized techniques.
  
  
  
  How is it that these images are not within the listed techniques, or do you not believe that the listed techniques were officially authorized?

• TinSoldier said on Mar 22, 2008....

  I may or may not get back to this later. I'm just letting you know that I'm not ignoring your point.

• kelly said on Mar 23, 2008....

  C'mon, Tin.  The CIA murdered some of those guys at Abu Ghraib.  You can't tell me that it was just a few bad apples.  All that crap was known about all the way up the chain.

• SeanRenaud said on Mar 23, 2008....

  I doubt it.  You can keep a lot hidden, particularly if you don't want to know.

• bloc said on Mar 23, 2008....

  @sean
  here's the catch. The CIA tortured a guy to death at abu ghraib. Why hasn't the Bush admin prosecuted anyone for that if they had no idea and didn't authorize what was happening? 
  
  
  Also, I've shown that the techniques I listed were authorized by the Bush admin. I believe these images are clearly within the confines of those techniques are they not?

• SeanRenaud said on Mar 23, 2008....

  Oh what was going on was clearly illegal.  And I'm sure that a lot of people we're in on it, but you can hide a lot if you really want to.
   
  The Bush admin isn't going to prosecute anybody because they agree with what is being done

• ALIENated said on Mar 24, 2008....

  
  So, we started with some temps taking a peak at passport information and
  we are already back to torture? What a broken record. For balance, do you
  have any pictures of the 9/11 attacks or people getting their heads cut off
  on TV by those guys buddies? How about pictures of all the people Sodamn
  killed?
  
  

• TinSoldier said on Mar 24, 2008....

  C'mon, Tin.  The CIA murdered some of those guys at Abu Ghraib.  You can't tell me that it was just a few bad apples.  All that crap was known about all the way up the chain.
  
  @seanhere's the catch. The CIA tortured a guy to death at abu ghraib. Why hasn't the Bush admin prosecuted anyone for that if they had no idea and didn't authorize what was happening?
  
  
  
  
  Umm, I remember hearing about some prosecutions for that, but maybe I'm confusing them with ones in Afghanistan?
  
  Anyway, I thought that we were talking about soldiers, not CIA.
  
  
  Also, I've shown that the techniques I listed were authorized by the Bush admin. I believe these images are clearly within the confines of those techniques are they not?
  
  
  You have not clearly shown that. You've implied it. And even if those pictures represent the accepted policy of the US government, with which I disagree, these individual soldiers were acting on their own authority.
  
  My, how we have swerved off topic.
  

• bloc said on Mar 24, 2008....

  "And even if those pictures represent the accepted policy of the US government, with which I disagree"
  
  
  so you deny that the Bush admin authorized the techniques I listed? Btw, I've shown it in other posts. People constantly complain about me saying the same thing over and over again. I say it over and over and over because some people on here, not you, will deny things I've documented in the past.
  
  
  We swerved off topic because you took exception with my analogy. You said that you didn't believe that the images shown were the techniques authorized by the Bush admin

• bloc said on Mar 24, 2008....

  here is rumsfeld signature on a memo authorizing many of these techniques.

• TinSoldier said on Mar 24, 2008....

  bloc, I mean that I disagree with some of these techniques.

• bloc said on Mar 24, 2008....

  ah, my bad. Grammar can be so ambiguous sometimes :/

• kelly said on Apr 04, 2008....

  "Anyway, I thought that we were talking about soldiers, not CIA."
  
  
  The soldiers were the ones complying with CIA orders to move and tie up the victims.  They were accessories to the crime in the same way that driving a getaway vehicle at a bank robbery makes someone an accessory.

• TinSoldier said on Apr 04, 2008....

  Except that the soldiers weren't complying with the CIA orders. They were doing this on their own and that's why they were prosecuted.
  
  I mean, why weren't soldiers from other shifts caught and prosecuted?
  

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