Month: December 2013

The Year of Edward Snowden

I am increasingly in awe of what Edward Snowden, at great personal risk, has done for our country. One of the three original journalists to whom he gave documents, Barton Gellman, has written the following article for the Washington Post. Edward Snowden after months of NSA revelations says his missions accomplished/2013/12/24  Every American who cares about the future of our country should read it. I have blogged a number of times this year about Snowden if you would like to read more.

Some people confuse the technical and legal ability to collect personal information about targeted individuals under well-developed controls, with the data mining searches for needles in haystacks Snowden exposed. Here are just two of his statements from the article:

“I don’t care whether you’re the pope or Osama bin Laden. As long as there’s an individualized, articulable, probable cause for targeting these people as legitimate foreign intelligence, that’s fine. I don’t think it’s imposing a ridiculous burden by asking for probable cause. Because, you have to understand, when you have access to the tools the NSA does, probable cause falls out of trees.”

“I believe the cost of frank public debate about the powers of our government is less than the danger posed by allowing these powers to continue growing in secret,”

Snowden likened the NSA’s powers to those used by British authorities in Colonial America, when “general warrants” allowed for anyone to be searched. The FISA court, Snowden said, “is authorizing general warrants for the entire country’s metadata.”

More on the balance between the public and private sectors

Private sector rights.

I strongly support the right of the Boy Scouts of America’ to define who it will accept as members (i.e. its right to exclude gays). I don’t have to agree with how people use their freedom to believe passionately in their right to be free including who they join with in clubs. I was happy to see that organization relax its rules and open its doors to gay boys. But that door was not opened very wide and the BSA still has a way to go. I was thus very happy to see Lockheed-Martin end its donations to the Boy Scouts until remaining discriminations are ended.

Richard “Guglielmetti, 66, who led Troop 76 in Simsbury, Conn., for a dozen years until 2005, said leaders and members of his troop ignored the national organization’s prohibition on gays as scouts or leaders because they felt it was wrong.” (US Today, January 28, 2013)  It would have been counterproductive and morally wrong in my view for the government to have forced this result or to push it further.

As another example, Duck Dynasty star Phil Robertson (I never heard of him) said some perfectly ignorant and offensive things about gays. We should all defend his right to say what he wants to. We should also defend the right of A&E to suspend his show, though I am not particularly happy about mixing up commerce and politics or moral issues. Fortunately, A&E is a cable show. Cable programs are not subject to the government regulations covering over-the-air shows and are free to pretty much do what they want. This helps explain why cable shows are often much more interesting.

A process of public discussion and education best sorts out touchy issues such as these. The government is not needed or wanted here.

Domestic spying

Whistle blower Edward Snowden received further confirmation of the legitimacy of his belief that the government has over reached in its domestic personal data collection (see my several earlier blogs on this subject). In ruling that NSA’s massive metadata collection for all domestic phone calls (numbers called, date/time, and duration) was unconstitutional, Federal Judge Richard J. Leon stated that the government had failed to “cite a single instance in which analysis of the NSA’s bulk metadata collection actually stopped an imminent attack.” (Washington Post, December 20, 2013).

Equally damning was the just released report of a panel appointed by President Obama to investigate charges of NSA abuse, which included among its members former deputy CIA director Michael J. Morrell. The review panel said the program “was not essential to preventing attacks and could readily have been obtained in a timely manner using conventional [court] orders.”

Snowden has performed an enormous public service at great personal risk. Thank you Mr. Snowden

Maybe our ship is starting to right itself.

More on cell phones in planes

My blog Friday was meant to contrast two attitudes toward the desired role of government—regulating our behavior for our own good (Big Brother), or regulating our behavior when necessary for the protection of third parties.  But the more I thought about the cell phones in airplanes issue, the more convoluted it seemed.

There is no evidence, despite lots of testing, of any danger from cell phones, iPads, PCs, etc. for the operations of airplanes. See the article by a WSJ staff reporter: http://www.cs.ccsu.edu/~pelletie/local/news/telecom/Cell_phones_on_planes.html. The Big Brother argument that it protects those of us preferring quite from the conversations of other passengers is also bogus. Not only are people free to carry on conversations with other (willing) passengers, but we have been able to talk to people on the ground from phones in our arm rests for well over two decades. So what is going on? Without denying that many well-meaning, public-spirited people go into government service, the answer seems to lie in the usual place. Government regulations very often come to protect the interests of the incumbent members of the industry being regulation. Most monopoly power of private companies is bestowed by government. Please save me from Big Brother.

Cell Phones on Planes: A Defining Issue

The Federal Communications Commission is moving towards allowing the use of cell phones on airplanes. Many of us have known for a long time that their use poses no safety issues (yes the government does sometimes—how shall I say it in a way that will not attract NSA attention—misrepresent things). The FCC’s ruling rests on whether it would be good or nice for us to be able to use them. Whether we want our government to establish rules on what is nice public behavior is one of those issues that help define and reflect differing attitudes toward the desirable (not to mention, because it seems largely irrelevant these days, constitutional) role of government.

As I write this note, it seems that the FCC is moving towards a compromise ruling that would allow the use of phones and other electronic devises (Mac, iPad, etc – yes I am an Apple fan) for internet access to email, text messages, and web surfing but not talking. This strikes me as odd in that it has been possible to do that for some years now. I have used the service (for a fee) to send and receive email on Delta and other planes with the equipment: http://www.gogoair.com/gogo/splash.do. Oh well.

I cringe when people base their views on whether government should control certain behaviors (pot smoking, public profanity, talking lauding in public etc) on whether such behavior is good or bad for the person doing it. For me the test (along with the constitution) is whether my behavior endangers other people. Thus the issue of whether secondary smoke is harmful and if so should be banned in the workplace, for example, is a legitimate public policy concern. The outcome should rest on the facts; is it harmful to third parties or not.

I would not like for people to talk on their cell phones on planes, but am appalled by the idea that the government would not allow airlines to set their own policies in this regard. I don’t like talking on planes in any form. I have not talked to anyone on a plane other than the flight crew for many years. No government ruling caused this or is desired. Somehow I have been able to successfully and without words communicate to anyone next to me that I do not want to talk. My loss, I am sure, but it is fortunately still my choice.

I am reminded of a flight home from a wonderful European vacation with my son, Brandon, years ago. The man and woman behind us were chattering away and their conversation became more and more homophobic. My son finally turned around and said, “Would you please shut up.”  Those lobbying the FCC to forbid phone calls on planes should probably include fines for offensive speech on planes or in other public places (the First Amendment be damned). Those, like me, who prefer a more limited, less intrusive government, prefer to rely on common courtesy as it evolves through private interactions. Perhaps because I am the oldest of my siblings I never liked the idea of a Big Brother.