The latest lefty flap is over the sudden realization that the government is WATCHING us.
C’mon…
This is not news. folks.
SusanD commented on SusanHu’s diary regarding this ( “I Spy” Rants and Demands):
My answer to her continues below.
SusanD…
You and all the others who are so outraged and surprised by this simply have not been looking. This sort of surveillance has been mainstream spook business as usual for 40 years or more. How can you have missed it? Computerization has made this a simple act. The main reason it has gotten bigger is simply because it has gotten progressively easier to do and the resultant information has gotten both easier to store and easier to retrieve as our computer capabilities have increased
The F.B.I., the C.I.A., the N.S.A., the I.R.S…..ALL the little alphabet soups have data on all of us.
This practice has taken a LITTLE step out of the shadows because there are forces within the PermaGov that feel that it is necessary to take down this administration at the present time, and this is a convenient way to do so. The whole neo-con thing has taken a step or two over the line, and they are getting pinned for it.
But what line IS that, exactly, and who draws it?
Once we this internal PermaGov war is resolved…hopefully by the left wing of the right wing instead of its current right wing which is now in power (Take your victories where you can get them, if you know what’s good for you.)…all the little cyberfunctionaries will be back at work. Hard at work, gathering data.
On YOU.
Bet on it.
And if you think that the “Freedom of Information” Act is going to help you, I’ve got a number of bridges to sell you, because you cannot access information from agencies (or their subdepartments) that YOU DO NOT KNOW EXIST.
Every time you acquiesce to this…every time you fill out a salary form with your “Social Security” (THAT’S a knee-slapper, ain’t it? Who says the government has no sense of humor?) number on it, every time you register to vote or buy a weapon or get ANY kind of license or even drive your goddamned car through an automatic toll machine or make a bank transaction or get on a plane or…hell, if you have publicly stated your opposition to what is going on here, every time you step outside of your house on a clear day or log onto the internet with your computer to look up some toys for your children or denounce George Butch or see if it’s going to rain…YOU ARE BEING DATA LOGGED.
It’s a brave new world, and there is not a GODDAMNED thing that you can do to stop it.
And I will guarantee that once this little brouhaha is over…once they lame duck or get rid of or otherwise neutralize ButchCo somewhat…it will be business as usual all over again.
Orwell didn’t have a CLUE as to how serious things were going to get, because he could not imagine the power of computers.
It’s deep, Susan.
And it is EVERYWHERE.
Bet on it.
if there is any hope at all…hope of privacy, hope of not being forcibly Borg-ed into some giant hive of lockstepping, clomping peons…it is that the people who do these sorts of things are so unimaginative, so line level dull, so stupid and so incompetent that they will fuck the whole thing up and it will eventually get so that trying to retrieve data on ANY of us it will be like trying to get inventory help in a mediocre chain superstore like Home Depot.
Q-“Excuse me…do your stock plumber’s tape?”
A-“Duuuuhhhh…maybe it’s in aisle 3. Or 4… Plumber’s tape? Issat what plumbers use?”
Or
Q-“Excuse me…I need some information on Arthur Gilroy.”
A_”Duhhh…how d’ya spel dat? Aurthpr Giulwoy? I can’t seem to FIND it…”
Let us pray.
That mediocrity once again collapses like the overstuffed, weak colon full of too much shit it so often resembles.
Let us pray.
Because if it doesn’t…we are in TROUBLE.
Later…
AG
