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You're conflating the CIA with the public which makes no sense.

lazide 3y ago
How so? I’m saying that the public tolerates this situation (and the CIA et al use the classification system this way) because the public prefers feeling a certain way about what their government is doing, over knowing what their government is doing. Nominally, if the public cared more about what was actually happening: 1) Church commission type investigations would be a monthly occurrence (at the scale the gov’t current works at), not a one time fluke (historically) 2) Classified information and secret programs would require third party independent oversight (actual oversight. Not FISA like rubber stamping, which BTW came out of the Church commission investigations). 3) classified information would have very short timeframes before mandatory publication (at most a decade) 4) people would actually go to jail for abuses. None of which happens.
- avgcorrection 3y ago
  > I’m saying that the public tolerates this situation (and the CIA et al use the classification system this way) because the public prefers feeling a certain way about what their government is doing, over knowing what their government is doing. Based on what evidence? Think about what you are saying. 1. The clandestine arms of the US government has hidden things from the public 2. But this was because the public wanted it Explain how (2) came about. The US was much more open about things like the Vietnam War because there was virtually no public opposition at the start of it. Then a culture of opposition eventually emerged. When Reagan took office his administration interferred in Latin America. But then they found out that they couldn't just do that in the open like in the past because there was too much public opposition. So the operations had to be more clandestine. Public interest in US government operations abroad directly lead to a more clandestine approach—the exact opposite effect that you are claiming. > Nominally, if the public cared more about what was actually happening: And these things would come about how? Again, you're missing a step and somehow think that the public can will these concrete legislations into effect. How? The US government has been around for centuries while what could be called universal democracy only came about in the 1960's (arguably). And what democracy? A stronger one than pre-WWII, but still an elite-ruled democracy.
  - lazide 3y ago
    My position is de-facto true - if it weren’t, after the Snowden leaks (among others), the next round of representatives/President would have as their top issue disbanding the NSA/CIA no? As freedom from an abusive gov’t surveillance apparatus would have to be a major concern! Or at least there would have been a serious investigation with large scale imprisonment of gov’t employees on the top of the list of issues? Instead, you’d be hard pressed to find anyone outside of a small minority of mostly computer geeks that cared at all. Because most folks didn’t want to look or know. After all, the evidence in those leaks is damning. And they were very widely distributed. And they shows large scale illegal spying on the US population, abuse of power (spying on ex’s being one well documented behavior), lying to Congress and the American public, etc. Instead, Snowden has been actively hunted down as a traitor (with pronouncements of him as a public enemy being common), a token investigation was done which resulted in no actual changes or actions except for the Director of the NSA being brought up to (verifiably) lie to Congress and the Public, and some hand waving pronouncements that they totally stopped doing what they denied doing in the first place. And then they made sure to be more clandestine. Which Congress and the public never tried to stop them from doing! The US public wants to be ‘safe’ and know their government is ‘protecting them’, and ‘the bad guys are getting punished’. If you don’t believe me, look up the polls for those in favor of torture after 9/11. I certainly overheard it a lot! Gitmo became a common term. That doesn’t mean they wanted to see or know about the reality of it though. If they did (despite their efforts to ignore it), it would be outrage not indifference from the general population, and it wouldn’t be a small handful of activists going after the agencies, but enterprising politicians of all stripes taking advantage of the new ‘mandate’ to clean things up. MKULTRA and ARTICHOKE before it existed because ‘The Russians are figuring this out so we need to figure it out first’. A natural response, and if they panned out, all the sins would have been forgotten. The US would be a world power from more than just Nukes! They have to be clandestine about the sins, and the failures though or it gets folks worked up and then they get actual problems (Church commission, funding cuts, etc.). Which as long as they hide it (and they are allowed many tools to do so) no problems. I certainly haven’t seen any public discourse or overheard any conversations about getting rid of the ability to classify things. Have you? It’s the ‘he’s not cheating if I don’t know about it’ response.

How so? I’m saying that the public tolerates this situation (and the CIA et al use the classification system this way) because the public prefers feeling a certain way about what their government is doing, over knowing what their government is doing. Nominally, if the public cared more about what was actually happening: 1) Church commission type investigations would be a monthly occurrence (at the scale the gov’t current works at), not a one time fluke (historically) 2) Classified information and secret programs would require third party independent oversight (actual oversight. Not FISA like rubber stamping, which BTW came out of the Church commission investigations). 3) classified information would have very short timeframes before mandatory publication (at most a decade) 4) people would actually go to jail for abuses. None of which happens.

avgcorrection 3y ago
> I’m saying that the public tolerates this situation (and the CIA et al use the classification system this way) because the public prefers feeling a certain way about what their government is doing, over knowing what their government is doing. Based on what evidence? Think about what you are saying. 1. The clandestine arms of the US government has hidden things from the public 2. But this was because the public wanted it Explain how (2) came about. The US was much more open about things like the Vietnam War because there was virtually no public opposition at the start of it. Then a culture of opposition eventually emerged. When Reagan took office his administration interferred in Latin America. But then they found out that they couldn't just do that in the open like in the past because there was too much public opposition. So the operations had to be more clandestine. Public interest in US government operations abroad directly lead to a more clandestine approach—the exact opposite effect that you are claiming. > Nominally, if the public cared more about what was actually happening: And these things would come about how? Again, you're missing a step and somehow think that the public can will these concrete legislations into effect. How? The US government has been around for centuries while what could be called universal democracy only came about in the 1960's (arguably). And what democracy? A stronger one than pre-WWII, but still an elite-ruled democracy.
- lazide 3y ago
  My position is de-facto true - if it weren’t, after the Snowden leaks (among others), the next round of representatives/President would have as their top issue disbanding the NSA/CIA no? As freedom from an abusive gov’t surveillance apparatus would have to be a major concern! Or at least there would have been a serious investigation with large scale imprisonment of gov’t employees on the top of the list of issues? Instead, you’d be hard pressed to find anyone outside of a small minority of mostly computer geeks that cared at all. Because most folks didn’t want to look or know. After all, the evidence in those leaks is damning. And they were very widely distributed. And they shows large scale illegal spying on the US population, abuse of power (spying on ex’s being one well documented behavior), lying to Congress and the American public, etc. Instead, Snowden has been actively hunted down as a traitor (with pronouncements of him as a public enemy being common), a token investigation was done which resulted in no actual changes or actions except for the Director of the NSA being brought up to (verifiably) lie to Congress and the Public, and some hand waving pronouncements that they totally stopped doing what they denied doing in the first place. And then they made sure to be more clandestine. Which Congress and the public never tried to stop them from doing! The US public wants to be ‘safe’ and know their government is ‘protecting them’, and ‘the bad guys are getting punished’. If you don’t believe me, look up the polls for those in favor of torture after 9/11. I certainly overheard it a lot! Gitmo became a common term. That doesn’t mean they wanted to see or know about the reality of it though. If they did (despite their efforts to ignore it), it would be outrage not indifference from the general population, and it wouldn’t be a small handful of activists going after the agencies, but enterprising politicians of all stripes taking advantage of the new ‘mandate’ to clean things up. MKULTRA and ARTICHOKE before it existed because ‘The Russians are figuring this out so we need to figure it out first’. A natural response, and if they panned out, all the sins would have been forgotten. The US would be a world power from more than just Nukes! They have to be clandestine about the sins, and the failures though or it gets folks worked up and then they get actual problems (Church commission, funding cuts, etc.). Which as long as they hide it (and they are allowed many tools to do so) no problems. I certainly haven’t seen any public discourse or overheard any conversations about getting rid of the ability to classify things. Have you? It’s the ‘he’s not cheating if I don’t know about it’ response.