What If Richard Nixon Had Had Your E-Mail Password?

[MrScorpio]

47. I wish you the best of luck, Congressman Grayson

I truly do.

However, you and I both know how this thing got started and why it's going on the way that it is. It's the same process that's going on with Defense appropriations and just about any other corporation that the government contracts with.

Wouldn't it be possible to shrink the growth of this National Security State by reducing the amount of outsourcing that the government does with private contractors? Now, of course, it's necessary to limit what the NSA does, who it can surveil, what information it can gather, what it can do with that information, so forth and so on. But isn't this just half of picture?

How are you going to push back of the compartmentalization of private contract resources that serve as guarantees of support by other members of Congress that have these facilities located in their districts?

Also, we know that the NSA is focusing on the US side because this country serves as the largest hub for global telecommunications. They do this mostly as a stop gap against other countries who may try to do the same thing against the US and the rest of the world. What efforts are you sponsoring to prevent some kind of global telecom cold war from happening if the US creates a vacuum by reducing its own activities?

Is it possible to rescind the authority of as many copycat agencies within the government, that conduct telecom surveilling, without violating the laws that restrict these agencies from conducting ops outside of their realm of responsibility? How many Intelligence Agencies does the government really need?

Yes, we have all been sold a bill of goods, in the form of the so-called "terrorist threat," to justify the expansion of the National Security state... We all know that it's utter bullshit. It's like using a sledgehammer to kill a fly. What's really going on is that these agencies really have no idea what they're doing and why they're doing it, right?

Shouldn't the Congress seek to limit what those responsibilities are and then appropriate at a much reduced rate in order to accommodate that limitation? Something like that will kill the building boom of contractors within the Beltway to a more manageable degree.

The problem really is a matter of over-capacity in the telecom surveillance arena.

I suggest that what must be done first is the repeal of the PATRIOT Act and that the Congress conduct a systematic effort to reduce the size, outsourcing and scope of our telecom surveillance capacity. Yes, I'm very concerned about the invasions of privacy that these agencies are responsible for. However, I know that if they're not curbed and their size limited, it's not going to be very easy to control them.