General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Get One Thing Clear: NSA Domestic Spy Op Is FASCISM [View all]TheKentuckian
(25,026 posts)extraordinary claim.
History of abuse is of anything like such systems is very high, if not 100% even in the US.
The burden of proof is on the secret state not the concerned citizen, the secret state is the one with all the proof and all the benefit and especially the profits of the programs.
The rationale for the program also stretches the ability to suspend disbelief in the asserted context. The story supposedly is "we are looking for patterns, when we get a hit we then get an individualized warrant and dig in, if a crime is committed then we can go and rewind the associated content from the pattern matching data, and terrorism is stopped or can face justice". I don't know why anyone would think this high dollar and easily perverted (if it doesn't start that way) system can plausibly benefit commiserate with the obvious risks, costs, and potential for breaches and external misuse due to scope with thousands of contractors and for profit entities.
This doesn't make a lot of sense and is gambling with very long odds on our future as a free society.