If you want to burry your neighbor -- submit an anonymous tip about them being a terrorist, child pornographer or a illegal music downloader. With a bit of luck, their life will be completely ruined.

I remember stories from Soviet Union how neighbors would make up stories about each other and denounce them as conducting anti-party propaganda, because say, they insulted them or moved the fence too close. It was the amazing ease and predictability with which this process worked.

People make comments about people from the US being "sent to Gitmo" for daring to stand up to authority here, but it's worth noting that nobody has been taken from inside the US and held in Guantanamo.

Having noted that, I think we find we don't even need to litigate Gitmo here. Which is a good thing, because I think you'll have a hard time finding a lot of people to disagree with you in interesting ways about it. Of course military and intelligence agencies shouldn't have taken innocent people from Afghanistan and stuck them in a brig without due process rights. Thankfully, that has little to do with what the FBI does in San Jose.

No, we avoid this problem by killing natural born US citizens outside the country before they can be put on trial. Far easier politically that way.

Why does it even matter WHERE a teenager is from if they are innocent? Why would you imprison and fly them out of their own country before you know if they are actually guilty of anything? Then treat them so badly over years that you can never release them again because they will become a terrorist against you for the way you treated them?

Everything has become so polarized it's almost impossible to have a discussion that crosses any sort of substantive divide.

Even the slightest hint of apostasy indicates the speaker to be an obviously evil individual who completely and utterly opposes every rational or moral concept and indeed fact that all our right-thinking intellectual cohorts believe.

Want to do something about giant banks fucking up our country? Sorry, you're a socialist loser who still lives in your mother's basement, your point is invalid, discussion over.

Concerned that the process of science is becoming corrupted in climatology due to group-think? Sorry, you're a global warming denialist (which is as bad as if not probably worse than a holocaust denier, sorry to say), your point is invalid, discussion over.

Etc.

Yeah, it's more than a little disheartening.

But when there are real things being done right now by your government in your name causing innocent people to suffer, I cannot fathom a middle-ground on that.

First, stop the process and THEN we can have a calm, intellectual discussion about if it's right or wrong. But not while someone is aggressively doing something against another without public approval.

It's easy to call for dispassion when one isn't directly affected by an issue, how would you react if was your neighbor, family or yourself?

^They don't admit this part for obvious reasons. And they also say waterboarding isn't torture...

I even left some hints: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russells_teapot

Furthermore, his point is logically sound: In a world where governments are permitted to keep secrets, they are effectively able to keep secret what they are keeping secret, by simple induction.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism#House_Committee_on_...

It's like comparing the Japanese American Interment Camps to Auschwitz.

Talk to the countless East Germans who were imprisoned b/c of a tip from one of the thousands of Stasi informants. See if their stories in any way compare to the people who were swept up in the red scare.

I am not suggesting the two are the same, but rather that thinking about the two at the same time and deciding in what ways they are the same and in what ways they are different is a useful exercise.

You can't argue from a position that says "surveillance" and "arrest" are the same thing. They are simply not the same thing. The police cannot arrest you at will. An arrest is a big deal.

Still, it's sad to think the most effective / damaging / and possibly profitable approach for a risk averse terrorist might be to pretend to be a overly helpful.

But that is exaggeration. The tip led to him being observed, not being ported off to Gitmo. So it's no where near being "exactly" like these innocent people being sent to Gitmo. If anything, your only hurting your case by sensationalizing it. Does it not stand on it's own?

That this was done with a GPS device as opposed to being tailed by people doesn't strike me as a big difference (if only that the GPS device is more accurate and less invasive).

  > That this was done with a GPS device as opposed to
  > being tailed by people doesn't strike me as a big
  > difference

What's the difference between having a cop watch a street corner vs installing a security camera? You can install a lot of security cameras for the same cost as hiring a police officer or FBI agent.

It's the same case here. They can track a lot more people via GPS devices when they don't have to pay for agents (agent salaries + car + gas) to tail someone.

I mean, at ~$400 a pop, how many GPS devices can you get for the cost of a single agent? And a list of GPS coordinates is something that can easily be processed automatically to look for patterns.

Surveillance is like that. It’s more than just being cheaper than having an officer follow a suspect around. It has become so cheap that agencies can now (or will very soon) be able to simply follow everyone, everywhere, without the slightest need for justification. Collect all the data, store it away, and if you later suspect them of a crime, you can open up the archives and look at everywhere they have been and everything they have said in their entire lifetime.

By following everyone, everywhere, law enforcement can effectively go back in time. Joe Blough is a drug dealer? Interesting. Whose car has been on his street in the past five years? Who called him and who did he call? Who is on his Facebook or in his Google+ circles?

Look at that, he plays Settlers of Catan with Thomas Rapido. Pull up Tom's data. Interesting, he’s married but his car has spent a lot of time at stripper clubs. Bet his wife doesn’t know that, call him in and threaten to tell her if Tom doesn’t cooperate with us.

> Bet his wife doesn’t know that, call him in and threaten to tell her if Tom doesn’t cooperate with us.

Because, let's be honest, the "scale" argument is pretty well worn (and one I've yet to see argued well).

So, I'm going to assume this is where it breaks down. How this information can be used against you, even if you didn't do anything illegal. At least, that's the point you are trying to make. The important part isn't that this can't be done now, but the scale at which it can be done.

With this in mind, the problem isn't on the data retrieval side, but on the data retention rules, as well as the rules regarding how that data can be used.

More importantly, tracking is now cheaper, more efficient then before, more accurate, and less invasive.

You're scenario is fairly pointless. I can easily come up with arguments that make it a no brainer (Joe Blough is a murderer and Tom is covering for him).

So the question is, why are you so concerned with the capture of data when the negative you present isn't on the capture side?

However, the issue with these devices as I understand it is that the government’s position is, “We don’t need a check and balance, because we’re collecting information that doesn’t invade privacy.”

And my position is, if the information can be used to harm a citizen, then collecting and storing it should be subject to the check and balance of judicial oversight.

Capturing data on the off-chance that it might turn up something or be useful some day can be used harmfully, and therefore I want oversight before it is collected.

  > So the question is, why are you so concerned with the
  > capture of data when the negative you present isn't
  > on the capture side?

Here's a negative with the capture side though: it is another small step in the transfer of power from the hands of the people into the hands of the government.

1) Build a large infrastructure that allows you to view the activities of anyone, anywhere, but not anytime. You have to be viewing it in real-time, there is no storage mechanism.

2) Now that people are comfortable with cameras and listening devices everywhere, add a provision allowing storage with a 1 month time limit.

3) Now that people are comfortable with a 1 month time limit, increase it to 2 months.

...

n) Now increase it to n months.

Limit as n approaches infinity.

Note that every time some major terrorist event happens the politicians will add larger bumps (than the normal grind) to the retention limit.

Because they are different. If the data is collected, but only kept for a period of time determined by some oversight committee, then where is the harm?

> it is another small step in the transfer of power from the hands of the people into the hands of the government.

So, you're arguing against even allowing warrants (which are handed out by the government)? Because if one branch can oversee warrants, they can also provide oversight on the other end as well.