I hope someone can answer this. I have read that thiswhole telecom issue is just arose to a technology change. That this surveillance has been going on for decades but before, because the infomation was transmited by microwave, no telecom permission was required. Now, due to the introduction of fiber optics, telecom cooperation is now required. So the question becomes has this activity of surveillance been going on long before the Bush administration?

Fittingly, Johnson was once a consultant for the CIA and he writes with authority about "blowback," a term first coined by a CIA employee after the overthrow of Mossadeq in Iran in 1953, engineered by the Central Intelligence Agency, the first of many such acts in the pursuit of American global hegemony.

One of Johnson's central points is that democracy and empire have never been compatible -- one or the other dies, they cannot co-exist in a society. The historical examples are numerous, ancient Rome comes to mind first.

The British relinquished their empire, for reasons that had more to do with the resistance of these country's populations rather than a conscious choice by the British, as Johnson argues, but the point remains -- the British empire crumbled and enabled the British to retain their democracy.

We have just under 800 permanent military bases in countries around the world and we spend more on "defense" than all the other countries of the world combined. The current government's foreign policy consists entirely of threatening or employing the use of force. (former Ambassador John Bolton on diplomacy, "I don't do carrots."), meaning he only knows about sticks. This nicely summarizes "foreign policy" of the new American empire.

Democracy and empire cannot co-exist. What Glenn describes today is the ongoing, relentless destruction of the former side of this equation: democracy. We now have one in name only. When Presidents can break the law at will, corporations write the laws and are immune from prosecution when they break them, the judicial process is thoroughly politicized, torture is lauded, imprisonment without charges is no big deal, police brutality is commonplace, capital punishment is routine, rampant gun violence decimates our cities and kills our children, young people commit senseless serial killings and hate crimes increase, all the while highly-rated media pundits warn of the dangers of unfettered free speech and use eliminationist rhetoric, it's apparent our society is not only sick, it's on life support.

I got into an exchange on this thread the other day with another commenter who says he/she plans to leave the country. I have two teenagers and I am filled with dread when I think about what kind of a country they will be living in when they grow up. Yet I want to stay and try to make a difference, because what happens in this country will affect the future of the planet.

From Chalmers Johnson's, Nemesis, page 21.

"'Some years ago, [Hannah Arendt] wrote, 'reporting the trial of Eichmann in Jerusalem, I spoke of the 'banality of evil' and meant with this no theory or doctrine but something quite factual, the phenomenon of evil deeds, committed on a gigantic scale, which could not be traced to any particularity of wickedness, pathology, or ideological conviction in the doer, whose only personal distinction was perhaps an extraordinary shallowness. However monstrous the deeds were, the doer was neither monstrous nor demonic, and the only specific characteristic one could detect in his past as well as in his behavior during the trial and the preceding police examination was something entirely negative: it was not stupidity but a curious, quite authentic inability to think.'"

I can't think of a better description of much of our political leadership and media establishment. If anything, for some, this description is overly generous.

The Bush Administration is pushing to put "civilian" (read "political") commissars over military lawyers, e.g., JAGs, in order to "coordinate" the administration with the military lawyers. In other words, no more JAGS who don't like violating Geneva, etc. JAGs who won't "coordinate" won't be promoted.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/

2007/12/15/control_sought_on_military_lawyers/?page=full

Is it possible to undo the harm these people are doing?

The British relinquished their empire, for reasons that had more to do with the resistance of these country's populations rather than a conscious choice by the British, as Johnson argues

No one did Empire as well as the British. They quit because it was bankrupting them. Period.

If you speak the truth aloud.

The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

I can't think of a better description of much of our political leadership and media establishment. If anything, for some, this description is overly generous.

All excellent observations. Tyrannical leaders of other countries get demonized into absurd caricatures, stick figure cartoon villains. So as long as people don't see those absurd images here, they tacitly assume that everything is fundamentally different, even when the behavior is the same.

So the question becomes has this activity of surveillance been going on long before the Bush administration?

Census information is supposed to be sacrosanct yet it was used during WWII to locate and incarcerate Americans of Japanese origin.

So I'm wondering if ordinary, grassroots conservatives, whom we hear are perfectly comfortable with warrantless wiretapping, are okay with the idea that the IRS can listen in to their phone calls and e-mails?-- El Cid

LOL. Actual taxpayers understand that the IRS can pretty much do anything they want without a warrant. One's financial records are considerably more intimate than a random phone call. The really funny part is the demand for Government to furnish healthcare to everyone, which requires REALLY intimate knowledge be circulated around hither and yon. And you're worried about an overheard word or two? AIDS lists anyone?

As far as I can tell you folks are going nuts over something that hasn't been shown to happen. Datamining and keyword search is not listening in to whole conversations or even whole sentences. As for datamining, as far as I can tell there, it's little different than doing a reverse lookup for a phone number on Google.

For all the fearmongering the right is accused of regarding terrorism, it's nothing compared to the left's fearmongering of telecoms. Get a grip people, this is not a lawless surveillance state. Not even close. You're just being stamped by people with an ordinary political agenda.

PS. Anyone got an answer for me on the "call in" side of actual legal eavesdropping?