Thursday, May 22, 2014
The House passes NSA bill
The original intention was for the bill to place some real restrictions on NSA spying upon Americans. Then it reached the House where the running dogs of the NSA made all meaningful changes meaningless.
The bill would now require the NSA and FBI to limit its collection to two links from a terror suspect and be based on a "specific selection term."A few adjustments and it is business as usual through loopholes as wide as the Mississippi. It would be a serious threat to the security of the nation if the NSA and others were required to uphold the Constitution.
However, the definition in the original bill would have limited that selection term to a "person, entity, or account," which gave civil liberties organizations hope that the bill would prove effective in ending all bulk collection under one provision of the law.
But the bill voted on Thursday broadened the definition, leaving it open-ended and potentially allowing for very broad selection of records, such as all call records to or from a certain country. The change followed closed door negotiations with intelligence officials.
Meanwhile, it’s unclear how the bill would limit other programs that may conducted by the CIA under other authorities. The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this year that the CIA is "building a vast database of international money transfers that includes millions of Americans’ financial and personal data" under a provision of the law.
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