Just another Executive Order that over-rides Congress and the Constitution
Bee's Note: When reading Google's report (see chart below) it certainly made me blink twice to see the difference between the only democracy in the Middle East - Israel - compared to the United States' requests for individual "user data". However, we should not be too surprised, since earlier this year the Dept. of Homeland Security also had a list of Conservative bloggers being monitored by their department, such as, Jihad Watch. Many of our readers are very familiar with Robert Spencer/Jihad Watch's blog - it details reports of Islamic terrorism around the world and apparently, our government is more interested in what we have to say about terrorism, than monitoring actual terrorists organizations and/or Islamic terrorism in the United States.
Speaking of terrorism, the one nation in the world who has had to fight Islamic terrorism long before 9/11 is Israel. How many wars against this tiny nation have been fought since 1948, all because the Muslim nations/people, using their Koran, have chosen to include in their Mission Statements, their ideology which includes the destruction of Israel, since they refuse to accept Israel's right to exist?
The Muslims rain down terror upon Israeli citizens, using suicide bombers, rockets, kidnappings, and murders at every opportunity and then cry "fowl" whenever Israel responds in-kind to defend its citizens from this constant terrorism. Therefore, Israel has studied terrorism, its ideology, propaganda, and mindset of terrorist organizations long before 9/11 and, with the use of high-tech capabilities, along with common sense, Israel leads the pact when it comes to monitoring their airports and terrorist cells within their own borders.
Since 9/11, or shortly after 9/11, the U.S. even had Israel train our government agencies on the art of seeking out terrorists within our borders. I can tell you, they never had to frisk little old ladies at airports! It is apparent that whatever they taught was either forgotten, or not comprehended. Right now, there are airports (Florida, to mention one) that are in the process of hiring their own security to do away with the man-handling of TSA employees. Another example of private corporations doing a better job than the government.
The bottom line is this: we now have in the White House, an administration that has sought to control every aspect of America's way of life (as Grumpy states in his article, below). How many freedoms have we had to fight for since Obama took office? The choice of healthcare taken from America's citizens; the fight for freedom of speech, which includes free speech on the Internet; deciding what we feed our children; etc.
Why should we be surprised about our government searching our personal choices through Google? Sounds more like an invasion of our privacy (once again), than searching out Islamic terrorists, doesn't it? This revelation from Google's report is just another thing to file in the long list of "control" and abuse of power, by an administration that refuses to protect the laws of this land, in exchange for making new laws that reach beyond the duties of an American President (and its administration). ...... Bee Sting
File this one under What the hell???
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. First Amendment to the US Constitution
I guess that doesn’t prevent them from censoring the Internet.
Google has released their biannual Transparency Report, take down requests and requests for information about individuals by the United States have sky rocketed.. The numbers aren’t even close to other nations.. As you know Google tracks your every move on line, they know what your emails say, what blogs you read, where you shop and what you buy.. They can provide government with more information about you in a a matter of seconds the the FBI could gather in a months worth of conventional investigation.
If the US Government was limiting itself to it’s traditional role under the Constitution and the only people they’d be likely to investigate would be terrorists members of organized crime it would be one thing. Probably Unconstitutional, but they’d have some kind of justification. But the US Government has started going well beyond that, as proven by things like the school lunch box police. There seems to be no aspect of your life that isn’t cause for suspicion.. If you are deeply religious, if you own guns, if you are a vet, even if you stockpile food or your kids are overweight they consider you a potential risk..
As the election gets closer it looks like government concern about the information Americans are looking at and sharing on the Internet is jumping to record levels. I happened to read Governments asking Google to remove more content by Michael Liedtke at Mercury News:
It’s alarming not only because free expression is at risk, but because some of these requests come from countries you might not suspect — Western democracies not typically associated with censorship,” Dorothy Chou, Google’s senior policy analyst, wrote in a Sunday blog post.That comment may have been aimed at the U.S., where police prosecutors, courts and other government agencies submitted 187 requests to remove content from July through December last year, more than doubling from 92 requests from January through June.Only Brazil’s government agencies submitted more content removal requests with a total of 194 during the final half of last year. But that figure was down from 224 requests in Brazil during the first half of the year.Brazil’s requests covered a more narrow range of content than the U.S. demands. The submissions from Brazil covered 554 different pieces of content while the U.S. requests sought to censor nearly 6,200 items.One U.S. request from a local law enforcement agency asked Google to remove 1,400 YouTube videos for alleged harassment. Without identifying the requesting agency or the targeted videos, Google said it rejected the demand.
Read all of Governments asking Google to remove more content
Even Even more startling was the news in The Transparency Report about the request for individual user data, directly from the report
The U.S. government filed 6,321 requests with Google for user data during the final six months of the year. That was far more than any other country, according to Google, and a 6 percent increase from the previous six months. Google complied with 93 percent of the U.S. requests for user data, encompassing more than 12,200 accounts.
Read the entire Transparency Report
From January through June 2011 the number of removal requests increased 70% over July to December of 2010. From July through December of last year it increased again by another 103%. Compounded that’s starting to get close to triple the number of removal requests in just one year..
Look at the chart
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. Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution
If the information the government wants might be buried in your personal email- then it looks like the 4th Amendment may simply be ignored.
Google doesn’t break down the results anymore that to say that they come from Government, which includes both Federal and State, so it’s hard to say exactly who is responsible for the increase…
That’s over 100 times the number of requests for individual account data then the Russians made– .. Russia has never been a supporter of free speech.. Neither has India but the United States made three times as many as India, their population is roughly three times that of the United States.
Given the volume of Internet users Internet the actual numbers of people being targeted is not. At least at the moment, an alarming percentage. The trend concerns me, we start doubling the percentage of people being looked at every six months you have to wonder why. For the last several months Congress has tried to pass proposal after proposal that would further both censor the Internet and allow government to legally look at your personal data. Since the US Government already out censoring and investigating more internet users than any other country, except maybe a few dictatorships Google can’t report on, why do they need more control?
Darrell Issa has proposed an Internet Users Bill of Rights
The Digital Bill of Rights
- 1. Freedom – digital citizens have a right to a free, uncensored internet.
- 2. Openness – digital citizens have a right to an open, unobstructed internet.
- 3. Equality – all digital citizens are created equal on the internet.
- 4. Participation – digital citizens have a right to peaceably participate where and how they choose on the internet.
- 5. Creativity – digital citizens have a right to create, grow and collaborate on the internet, and be held accountable for what they create.
- 6. Sharing – digital citizens have a right to freely share their ideas, lawful discoveries and opinions on the internet.
- 7. Accessibility – digital citizens have a right to access the internet equally, regardless of who they are or where they are.
- 8. Association – digital citizens have a right to freely associate on the internet.
- 9. Privacy – digital citizens have a right to privacy on the internet.
- 10. Property – digital citizens have a right to benefit from what they create, and be secure in their intellectual property on the internet
Thers is nothing in Issa’s proposals that free Americans don’t consider to be a natural right under the US Constitution.. In fact all it does is re-enforce rights we already assumed we had under the Constitution
It seems to me we need to encourage Congress to pass Issa’s Bill Of Rights before we let them even consider anything else… the existing tend is obvious and Congress wants to try and legitimize with laws covering the Internet.
Being first in some things is great, it gives you sense of pride, being first in government censorship and intrusion into your personal data makes you wonder where the hell our country is headed..
