Telecoms deserve immunity

Posted by Joel Sun, 22 Jun 2008 01:19:33 GMT

Recently, Sen Obama came under fire by the left for supporting a new FISA bill. Let me break down a few of the facts to start with.

  1. FISA stands for the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which was passed in 1978. This act defined the means by which government agencies can survey Americans. Relevant to the current situation, it requires that wiretapping (phone call surveillance) have a court warrant.
  2. The Fourth Amendment of the Constitution, part of our Bill of Rights, reads: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."
  3. The Bush administration authorized a program which they named the "Terrorist Surveillance Program". The details of the program are classified. They have stated that the program exclusively involves surveillance of calls, emails, and other online communications where one party is in America and the other is on foreign soil. They admit that in some cases, there has been surveillance of "purely domestic" calls; i.e., both participants were in America at the time. Officials say this was a mistake due to the logistical problems posed in determining the source of phone calls, and that the executive order still applies only to international communications.
  4. The White House says the President has the power to override FISA and the 4th Amendment due to the Constitutional title of "Commander in Chief". In that same press release, they also cite similar measures taken by past Presidents during wartime as legal precedent: "Signals intelligence has been a fundamental aspect of waging war since the Civil War, where we intercepted telegraphs, obviously, during the world wars, as we intercepted telegrams in and out of the United States. Signals intelligence is very important for the United States government to know what the enemy is doing, to know what the enemy is about to do." The White House also says that Congress and the Judicial branch have given them this authority.
  5. In order for the NSA to fulfill the order they required and requested cooperation from telecommunication companies ("telecoms"), such as AT&T.
  6. As a result, a number of legal cases have arisen against these companies.
  7. The new bill essentially has two parts: it reiterates the warrant requirement, and it grants retroactive immunity to all the telecoms that helped the NSA for privacy infringement.
  8. Obama has said he approves of the primary purpose of the new bill, but will try to strip telecom immunity from it when it reaches the Senate.

It is uncertain if Obama will support the bill if he fails at removing the immunity element, but he implies that he will. Given the "compromise" nature of the bill, he is unlikely to be successful in doing so, leaving some to suggest he is either naive or trying to give a token gesture to the bill's opponents.

Is warrantless wiretapping by the Bush administration illegal? The answer is actually, "yes and no". The law here is contradictory. It is illegal according to the 4th Amendment. It is illegal according to FISA. But, as the White House points out, their actions also have legal precedent, and Congress and the judges did in fact allow them to do this. The legality is therefore unclear.

The purpose of reintroducing the same FISA law is to make it more contemporary, as new law tends to take priority over old law when conflicts exist.

The telecoms should be granted immunity. They were merely helpless participants in all this. When an authority comes to you asking that you break a law, can that same authority then punish you for doing so? No. If a policeman were to order you to steal, and then took you to jail for it, that would be called entrapment.

These corporations were likely merely trying to do whatever they could to avoid malfeasance. They have been put in a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" situation.

As for the core of the idea, I think surveillance should be limited to warrants like the Constitution sets out. If you can't determine probable cause, you shouldn't be monitoring someone. The same rationale for monitoring people without warrants could be used to extend to monitoring everyone. Protecting the privacy of American citizens who are not suspected under due process is an essential right.

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Masaaki Yuasa and Kaiba

Posted by Joel Mon, 09 Jun 2008 09:09:00 GMT

So, I've actually watched a few anime series lately. Aside for the excellent Miyazaki films, and the mainstream Death Note, I haven't watched much anime since sophomore year of college, having become disenfranchised with the direction anime was going, and perhaps just growing out of it. However, I still have a fascination with the work of some of these imaginative Japanese artists.

The one that stands out for me is Masaaki Yuasa. I was first exposed to him by my friend Justin who gave me a copy of Mind Game. I felt like this movie was one of the most impactful movies I'd ever seen, despite its goofy title. It was at once hilarious, horrifying, and life-affirming. The climactic scene is so powerful it still stands as a significant metaphor in my mind for fighting against the inevitable.

I watched another movie of his, the purely surrealist and mostly dialogue-free Cat Soup. You can watch this one on Google video, if you're curious.

Somewhere along the line I realized he was making new TV shows. I watched Kemonozume, his most recent completed show. While the premise was excellent and there were some great moments, ultimately, this series had a tacked-on ending I didn't really like.

The newest show, Kaiba, is incredible. It asks a lot of questions about the nature of memories and the soul. It takes place in a sci-fi universe where memories can be traded or removed, and where you can have your memories transferred from body to body. All of it is woven around a love story with engaging characters. Figuring out the nature of the universe has been very entertaining for me, as Masaaki likes to challenge his audience. The best part is, unlike, say, Evangelion, it doesn't seem to be a bunch of thrown-together randomness which is ultimately impossible to solve, but is rather a very cohesive universe. If you're into arty, thinking stuff, you'd probably really like it.

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My political state

Posted by Joel Mon, 09 Jun 2008 08:41:28 GMT

So, life hasn't been bad the last few months. For the most part, I've been spending the time fairly routinely involved in work and entertaining myself via various vices. Easily the worst of them is time spent on Reddit reading the various articles posted there and commenting on them.

This election has been a catalyst for my first true venture into understanding my political stances, and as such I've been doing a lot of reading and discussion. I have no firm upbringing, as my parents disagreed on a lot of political issues. My friends as well, growing up, were pretty diverse in their political leanings. So this particular election, with all the important stuff going on in the world right now, has forced me to do what I can to understand our history and where we should probably be going.

I call myself a moderate today. In college I would have identified as a libertarian, and I still lean that way, but I've come to understand more of the utility of government and not react to it reflexively. I've also gained a lot more respect for interventionist foreign policy, particularly after listening to noted anti-theist Christopher Hitchens.

This has disturbed a lot of my friends who nowadays are all fairly standard leftists. In many ways I feel unable to have discussions with some of them -- at least a few of them entertain the idea that 9/11 was a Bush administration conspiracy, which makes further levels of discourse difficult.

I've been (very slowly) reading Alan Greenspan's weighty book in which he covers the history of the last century or so from a very informed economic perspective. It gives great insight into the various presidents, and their motivations and ideas, and proposes where he thinks the world is going. It also paints a much clearer picture of the oft-misunderstood Federal Reserve system and what the Chairman's role is in it. I would recommend it to anyone who has an insatiable penchant for trying to understand the big picture.

My dad increasingly tries to keep me grounded and focused on my own life. I've been trying that more lately, perhaps because I've seen my increased focus on the Other take a toll on my personal goals. I don't think it's entirely without merit, as I think being an informed citizen is a personal goal, but it's true that I need to put the more tangible aspects of my own life first, and stop spending so much time focusing on these intellectual pursuits.

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