4 ms·

I wasn't surprised (the CIA ran the drone program), but apparently it is a common myth that the NSA is larger. More importantly though.. what purpose does leak

I wasn't surprised (the CIA ran the drone program), but apparently it is a common myth that the NSA is larger. More importantly though.. what purpose does leaking this serve? It shows nothing illegal, or even questionable. It has nothing to do with the documents leaked previously. I just don't understand why he thought this needed to be leaked.

MikeCapone 13y ago
> More importantly though.. what purpose does leaking this serve? It shows nothing illegal, or even questionable. It has nothing to do with the documents leaked previously. I just don't understand why he thought this needed to be leaked. Maybe it's about taxpayers knowing where their dollars are going? First you show that your government is spying on you, and then you show how much of your own money that costs..?
- rgbrenner 13y ago
  If it were $100b+ or some other outrageous number, then perhaps... but the CIA is $14.7b.. It's a drop in the bucket in the budget. It's even less than NASA, and you can see how much the general public cares about that.
  - jrs235 13y ago
    "No single raindrop believes it is responsible for the flood". Similarly what singled out line item in the budget isn't just a "drop in the bucket" when compared to the entirety of the government budget? Just because some program or item doesn't "cost" much compared to everything combined doesn't mean we shouldn't scrutinize spending money on it.
    - eru 13y ago
      The armed forces, or interest payments would be pretty substantial all by themselves. (And so would social security, probably, but I don't know enough about the USA to make that comment.)
      - jrs235 13y ago
        The armed services as a whole is large... continue breaking it down into finer line items and soon... it's just a bunch of "drops in the bucket". ADD: interest payments is probably large too and more difficult to break into smaller lines... so let's quickly scrutinize that item... "Yeah, we probably should continue to make those payments unless we want everyone to lose trust in the U.S. backed dollar."
        eru 13y ago
        Yes. So if you want to scrutinize the budget, you should prioritize by cost / value instead of by cost alone.
  - MikeCapone 13y ago
    Well, it is less expensive to build data-centers and tap fiber-optic lines than to send rockets to orbit and probes to Mars... (especially the way NASA does it compared to, say, SpaceX.. but that's another discussion) But in any case, I think it's fine to get these numbers public because it's still taxpayer money. I think it would've been worse of Snowden NOT to release numbers just because they aren't as shocking as they could've been. Transparency should be about showing you what's there, not about cherry-picking things to form a narrative that distorts what is there.
    - rgbrenner 13y ago
      "A whistleblower is a person who exposes misconduct, alleged dishonest or illegal activity occurring in an organization." [0] I support Snowden, but this document is none of those things. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower
      - socillion 13y ago
        None of what he has released qualifies him as a whistleblower, because it is classified information (which has strictly regulated ways to handle impropriety) and the activities are not illegal (ignoring tenuous Constitution arguments).
        ajays 13y ago
        I am sorry, but even if you absolutely ignore everything else, Clapper's lying to Congress was illegal. He has also exposed the fact that NSA has violated the constitution many times. What is "classified" anyways? Some guy sitting somewhere decides that it is "classified". So why can't some other guy decide that it is in the public interest to not classify it?
        speeder 13y ago
        So, a court already declared it illegal, and one of the things he leaked was information about illegal things NSA admitted it has done... How it is not illegal?
  - cdash 13y ago
    Well who uses all the spy satellites because its the air force that pays for them.
  - abecedarius 13y ago
    The ~$50B black budget is well over 1% of federal spending ($3.8T says http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_United_States_federal_budget http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_United_States_federal_budg... ). Considerably more than a drop.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- kaonashi 13y ago
  Taxpayer dollars get returned to the issuer. It's like asking where all your movie tickets are going.
alan_cx 13y ago
Because there is no reason for it to be secret?
- JonFish85 13y ago
  Bull-pucky. Seeing budgets can give foreign governments a very good idea of how many people work there, what sorts of equipment is being bought, etc.
  - revelation 13y ago
    These are allocations on the size of multi-billion dollars, it can not give anybody an idea "what sorts of equipment is being bought". And the information that the NSA employs tens of thousands of employees is likewise useless. No, this should obviously not be classified.
    - JonFish85 13y ago
      Planes that cost in the billions? Equipment for the government is never cheap, mostly because they can't get economies of scale pricing. And not to mention that year-to-year changes can give you excellent information too. For example: say last year they spent $10b, and this year they spent $20b -- holy crap they clearly expanded something or bought some crazy expensive gear. It's an intelligence agency. Most of what they do should be classified.
      - mhurron 13y ago
        > Most of what they do should be classified. Which leads to the current abuses.
      - greendata 13y ago
        Here's a thought. We don't need them and they do much more harm than good. They didn't protect us against 9/11, mislead us into Iraq, took 10 years to capture Osama Bin Laden, didn't foresee the collapse of the Soviet Union, and now are mucking about with Syrian "rebels" (and indirectly supporting Al-Qaeda) fomenting the start of WWIII. If they just didn't exist we would all be safer and we'd get to keep more money. By falsely leading us into war in Iraq for absolutely nothing, they effectively cost the US over $10^12. The cost of the CIA and other agencies is much higher than their yearly cost. They can't even manage their sys admins, why should we trusting them so much?
andrewcooke 13y ago
i would guess this decision depends on many details - it's going to involve weighing costs v benefits of making available for public inspection. the risks don't seem huge for a budget doc (compared to something with more operational details) while there are already possible gains - this report suggests that the CIA has misled the public, for example http://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/world/dna-test-verified-bin-ladens-id/story-e6frfkui-1226707426715 http://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/world/dna-test-verified...

MikeCapone 13y ago

> More importantly though.. what purpose does leaking this serve? It shows nothing illegal, or even questionable. It has nothing to do with the documents leaked previously. I just don't understand why he thought this needed to be leaked. Maybe it's about taxpayers knowing where their dollars are going? First you show that your government is spying on you, and then you show how much of your own money that costs..?

rgbrenner 13y ago
If it were $100b+ or some other outrageous number, then perhaps... but the CIA is $14.7b.. It's a drop in the bucket in the budget. It's even less than NASA, and you can see how much the general public cares about that.
- jrs235 13y ago
  "No single raindrop believes it is responsible for the flood". Similarly what singled out line item in the budget isn't just a "drop in the bucket" when compared to the entirety of the government budget? Just because some program or item doesn't "cost" much compared to everything combined doesn't mean we shouldn't scrutinize spending money on it.
  - eru 13y ago
    The armed forces, or interest payments would be pretty substantial all by themselves. (And so would social security, probably, but I don't know enough about the USA to make that comment.)
    - jrs235 13y ago
      The armed services as a whole is large... continue breaking it down into finer line items and soon... it's just a bunch of "drops in the bucket". ADD: interest payments is probably large too and more difficult to break into smaller lines... so let's quickly scrutinize that item... "Yeah, we probably should continue to make those payments unless we want everyone to lose trust in the U.S. backed dollar."
      - eru 13y ago
        Yes. So if you want to scrutinize the budget, you should prioritize by cost / value instead of by cost alone.
- MikeCapone 13y ago
  Well, it is less expensive to build data-centers and tap fiber-optic lines than to send rockets to orbit and probes to Mars... (especially the way NASA does it compared to, say, SpaceX.. but that's another discussion) But in any case, I think it's fine to get these numbers public because it's still taxpayer money. I think it would've been worse of Snowden NOT to release numbers just because they aren't as shocking as they could've been. Transparency should be about showing you what's there, not about cherry-picking things to form a narrative that distorts what is there.
  - rgbrenner 13y ago
    "A whistleblower is a person who exposes misconduct, alleged dishonest or illegal activity occurring in an organization." [0] I support Snowden, but this document is none of those things. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower
    - socillion 13y ago
      None of what he has released qualifies him as a whistleblower, because it is classified information (which has strictly regulated ways to handle impropriety) and the activities are not illegal (ignoring tenuous Constitution arguments).
      - ajays 13y ago
        I am sorry, but even if you absolutely ignore everything else, Clapper's lying to Congress was illegal. He has also exposed the fact that NSA has violated the constitution many times. What is "classified" anyways? Some guy sitting somewhere decides that it is "classified". So why can't some other guy decide that it is in the public interest to not classify it?
      - speeder 13y ago
        So, a court already declared it illegal, and one of the things he leaked was information about illegal things NSA admitted it has done... How it is not illegal?
- cdash 13y ago
  Well who uses all the spy satellites because its the air force that pays for them.
- abecedarius 13y ago
  The ~$50B black budget is well over 1% of federal spending ($3.8T says http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_United_States_federal_budget http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_United_States_federal_budg... ). Considerably more than a drop.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
kaonashi 13y ago
Taxpayer dollars get returned to the issuer. It's like asking where all your movie tickets are going.

alan_cx 13y ago

Because there is no reason for it to be secret?

JonFish85 13y ago
Bull-pucky. Seeing budgets can give foreign governments a very good idea of how many people work there, what sorts of equipment is being bought, etc.
- revelation 13y ago
  These are allocations on the size of multi-billion dollars, it can not give anybody an idea "what sorts of equipment is being bought". And the information that the NSA employs tens of thousands of employees is likewise useless. No, this should obviously not be classified.
  - JonFish85 13y ago
    Planes that cost in the billions? Equipment for the government is never cheap, mostly because they can't get economies of scale pricing. And not to mention that year-to-year changes can give you excellent information too. For example: say last year they spent $10b, and this year they spent $20b -- holy crap they clearly expanded something or bought some crazy expensive gear. It's an intelligence agency. Most of what they do should be classified.
    - mhurron 13y ago
      > Most of what they do should be classified. Which leads to the current abuses.
    - greendata 13y ago
      Here's a thought. We don't need them and they do much more harm than good. They didn't protect us against 9/11, mislead us into Iraq, took 10 years to capture Osama Bin Laden, didn't foresee the collapse of the Soviet Union, and now are mucking about with Syrian "rebels" (and indirectly supporting Al-Qaeda) fomenting the start of WWIII. If they just didn't exist we would all be safer and we'd get to keep more money. By falsely leading us into war in Iraq for absolutely nothing, they effectively cost the US over $10^12. The cost of the CIA and other agencies is much higher than their yearly cost. They can't even manage their sys admins, why should we trusting them so much?

andrewcooke 13y ago

i would guess this decision depends on many details - it's going to involve weighing costs v benefits of making available for public inspection. the risks don't seem huge for a budget doc (compared to something with more operational details) while there are already possible gains - this report suggests that the CIA has misled the public, for example http://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/world/dna-test-verified-bin-ladens-id/story-e6frfkui-1226707426715 http://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/world/dna-test-verified...