Achilles has explained repeatedly why they "change sides". I've always postulated the same rationale...it's not hard to figure out the "why" as to how quickly they change course once they get to the Beltway.
Ya, they're all blackmailed. That's why the "good ones" are always vilified by media and establishment hacks. Get a Johnny truth-teller in there, and fuck, the whole criminal operation gets exposed and thousands of higher ups go to jail... "One party rule" is exactly right. Except it's the "party" behind the NSA....
George W. Bush Defends PRISM: 'I Put That Program In Place To Protect The Country' By Luke Johnson Posted: 07/01/2013 9:49 am EDT | Updated: 07/01/2013 3:50 pm EDT "Former President George W. Bush defended PRISM, the Internet spying program that began under his administration but remained secret until The Washington Post and The Guardian revealed its existence last month. "I put that program in place to protect the country. One of the certainties was that civil liberties were guaranteed," Bush told CNN in an interview airing Monday. "I think there needs to be a balance, and as the president explained, there is a proper balance." "PRISM began under Bush in 2007 and has continued under the Obama administration. The program allows the National Security Administration to collect internet and email data from the nation's biggest technology companies. "Bush spoke with CNN from Zambia, where he and his wife, Laura, are renovating a health clinic. The comments were his first since news about PRISM was made public, and his reflexive, nonspecific defense of the program will likely add to critics' case that it was approved with little oversight or debate. "Bush also said that Edward Snowden, who leaked the existence of the program to the newspapers and is currently believed to be in the transit zone of the Moscow airport, had harmed national security. "When asked if he is a traitor, Bush said, "I know he damaged the country." http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/01/george-bush-prism_n_3528249.html?utm_hp_ref=mostpopular
If he puts people at risk, then judge him for it. Until then, to my knowledge all he's done is reveal unconstitutional behavior by a government that believes it doesn't have to answer to it's citizens.
And Bush was an asshat as well. Is that your point? I thought Obama was going to undue all this stuff. Hope and change. Transparency. Remember? At least that was why I was duped into voting for his lying ass the first time. But he's just Obama H. Bush.
+1 Tortoise. Those here stating that the gov't activities are "illegal" - How so? Because you feel it to be? Do you know the difference between English Common Law juris i.e. "Constitutional" grounds and Equity Law i.e. "public debt-backed cashflows?" People avail themselves to the public credit systems, you are on the hook via debt to a gov't that will do with/to you what it damn well pleases.
Of course, those in power will say" the end justify the means." The Boston bombers were able to get away unnoticed. Didn't work in that instance. On closer inspection, this is just a program for control and blackmail under the guise of national security. Too bad you are unable to see this, like the remainder of lemmings in US.
I do. And given the Supreme Court's record on such cases, I would be inclined to go with my opinion over those "experts" who have, time and time again, proven themselves to vote with political motives.
Very poetic, bud - you're painting my comment with the brush that it's pro-NSA, pro-statist, which it's not. Something is legal, or illegal. All of this activity was legal. I make no commentary on the ethics or politics of it.