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USA Freedom Act fails as senators reject bill to scrap NSA bulk collection

64 points by jdp23 11y ago

drawkbox 11y ago
As of now the Patriot Act expires on June 1st then. As he put it, there are those who want a “straight extension, those who like USA Freedom and those who like nothing”. Those want a straight extension of the Patriot Act are in a distinct minority and supporters of the USA Freedom Act still cannot muster the necessary super majority to advance the bill. The result means those who are more than happy to simply let Section 215 expire on May 31 are in the driver’s seat. Count me in on the group that wants to see it expire. It is also just terrible to see the words 'patriot', 'USA', 'Freedom' in this mess.
- jdp23 11y ago
  The Senate's meeting again on the 31st. Rand Paul plans to offer some amendments; Burr may well have one as well. So it may be a revised USA Freedom Act; or it may be a sunset.
orthecreedence 11y ago
This is a good sign. And to be clear, USA Freedom is just another reauthorization of NSA spying. There were motions to extend the Patriot Act by just a few days (even one more day), all objected to by Rand Paul/Ron Wyden. So the next vote is Sunday the 31st. Hopefully the windbags (who truly believe the US is under constant attack and the only way to save us from these horrible terrorists is to passively treat every citizen as a terrorist) will lose this battle. The US did just fine before the Patriot Act. It will do just fine, once again, without it.
jdp23 11y ago
There's a video of the whole session at http://www.c-span.org/video/?326202-3/us-senate-votes-nsa-surveillance http://www.c-span.org/video/?326202-3/us-senate-votes-nsa-su... It gets really dramatic at around 1:04, after McConnell's 2-month reauth was blocked as well (46-52). Shorter-term reauths needed unanimous consent. McConnell proposed a 1-week extension and Rand Paul objected, requesting to have a guarantee to have 2 amendments voted on. McConnell proposed a four-day, three-day, two-day, and one-day extensions; Rand Paul objects to all. Then after a few minutes McConnell came back to say "well, we have one more chance to act responsibly, see you on the 31st." EDIT: Buzzfeed has the confrontation on video at http://www.buzzfeed.com/katherinemiller/in-a-box-with-a-fox http://www.buzzfeed.com/katherinemiller/in-a-box-with-a-fox
- iaw 11y ago
  Thank you for that. I'm quite pleased to watch our democracy finally playing this out properly.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
danenania 11y ago
My guess is that losing the "patriot" act would actually improve the capabilities of US counterterrorism because they'll be forced to get their shit together and do some real intelligence work rather than wasting huge amounts of time and resources on this panopticon fantasy that they clearly have no idea how to utilize effectively. Constraints provide focus.
swalsh 11y ago
Watch as Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski gets up, and defends the program... then take a look at her top contributors. http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/summary.php?cid=n00001945 http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/summary.php?cid=n0000...
- csandreasen 11y ago
  I'm sorry, which one of those contributors has a vested interest in extension of Section 215?
  - rmxt 11y ago
    Both Harris [1] and Mantech [2] offer products that include "intel analysis". Section 215 seems like a great avenue to perpetually harvest data and keep these products a necessity. Yes, [1] looks like any other analytics dashboard, but what else would you expect for NLP and voice recognition on a massive scale? [1] http://govcomm.harris.com/solutions/InformationManagement/DataAnalytics.aspx#innovations http://govcomm.harris.com/solutions/InformationManagement/Da... [2] http://www.mantech.com/solutions/Intelligence%20and%20Counter-Intelligence/Pages/default.aspx http://www.mantech.com/solutions/Intelligence%20and%20Counte...
azcoder 11y ago
I hope all of you are as excited about a Rand Paul 2016 nomination as I am. Spread the word! Need your support.
sillygoose 11y ago
The Land of The Free needs a "Freedom Act" to add some freedom? Even if it's passed, do you think NSA will stop snooping on everyone? If not, what's the point of enacting the legislation? Are politicians just retarded, or do they think the law serves a purpose even without an effect on what NSA is doing? Wha t might that purpose be? Could it be related to perception management?
- pluma 11y ago
  The names of US senate bills sometimes seem straight out of 1984. Freedom Act. Patriot Act. It's amazing they can keep a straight face while saying those names.
  - sillygoose 11y ago
    True. But it's even more amazing how the masses just keep swallowing that shit. Of course, it's understandable too, considering people have been trained to be obedient cattle.

64 points by jdp23 11y ago

As of now the Patriot Act expires on June 1st then. As he put it, there are those who want a “straight extension, those who like USA Freedom and those who like nothing”. Those want a straight extension of the Patriot Act are in a distinct minority and supporters of the USA Freedom Act still cannot muster the necessary super majority to advance the bill. The result means those who are more than happy to simply let Section 215 expire on May 31 are in the driver’s seat. Count me in on the group that wants to see it expire. It is also just terrible to see the words 'patriot', 'USA', 'Freedom' in this mess.

jdp23 11y ago
The Senate's meeting again on the 31st. Rand Paul plans to offer some amendments; Burr may well have one as well. So it may be a revised USA Freedom Act; or it may be a sunset.

orthecreedence 11y ago

This is a good sign. And to be clear, USA Freedom is just another reauthorization of NSA spying. There were motions to extend the Patriot Act by just a few days (even one more day), all objected to by Rand Paul/Ron Wyden. So the next vote is Sunday the 31st. Hopefully the windbags (who truly believe the US is under constant attack and the only way to save us from these horrible terrorists is to passively treat every citizen as a terrorist) will lose this battle. The US did just fine before the Patriot Act. It will do just fine, once again, without it.

jdp23 11y ago

There's a video of the whole session at http://www.c-span.org/video/?326202-3/us-senate-votes-nsa-surveillance http://www.c-span.org/video/?326202-3/us-senate-votes-nsa-su... It gets really dramatic at around 1:04, after McConnell's 2-month reauth was blocked as well (46-52). Shorter-term reauths needed unanimous consent. McConnell proposed a 1-week extension and Rand Paul objected, requesting to have a guarantee to have 2 amendments voted on. McConnell proposed a four-day, three-day, two-day, and one-day extensions; Rand Paul objects to all. Then after a few minutes McConnell came back to say "well, we have one more chance to act responsibly, see you on the 31st." EDIT: Buzzfeed has the confrontation on video at http://www.buzzfeed.com/katherinemiller/in-a-box-with-a-fox http://www.buzzfeed.com/katherinemiller/in-a-box-with-a-fox

iaw 11y ago
Thank you for that. I'm quite pleased to watch our democracy finally playing this out properly.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

danenania 11y ago

My guess is that losing the "patriot" act would actually improve the capabilities of US counterterrorism because they'll be forced to get their shit together and do some real intelligence work rather than wasting huge amounts of time and resources on this panopticon fantasy that they clearly have no idea how to utilize effectively. Constraints provide focus.

swalsh 11y ago

Watch as Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski gets up, and defends the program... then take a look at her top contributors. http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/summary.php?cid=n00001945 http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/summary.php?cid=n0000...

csandreasen 11y ago
I'm sorry, which one of those contributors has a vested interest in extension of Section 215?
- rmxt 11y ago
  Both Harris [1] and Mantech [2] offer products that include "intel analysis". Section 215 seems like a great avenue to perpetually harvest data and keep these products a necessity. Yes, [1] looks like any other analytics dashboard, but what else would you expect for NLP and voice recognition on a massive scale? [1] http://govcomm.harris.com/solutions/InformationManagement/DataAnalytics.aspx#innovations http://govcomm.harris.com/solutions/InformationManagement/Da... [2] http://www.mantech.com/solutions/Intelligence%20and%20Counter-Intelligence/Pages/default.aspx http://www.mantech.com/solutions/Intelligence%20and%20Counte...

azcoder 11y ago

I hope all of you are as excited about a Rand Paul 2016 nomination as I am. Spread the word! Need your support.

sillygoose 11y ago

The Land of The Free needs a "Freedom Act" to add some freedom? Even if it's passed, do you think NSA will stop snooping on everyone? If not, what's the point of enacting the legislation? Are politicians just retarded, or do they think the law serves a purpose even without an effect on what NSA is doing? Wha t might that purpose be? Could it be related to perception management?

pluma 11y ago
The names of US senate bills sometimes seem straight out of 1984. Freedom Act. Patriot Act. It's amazing they can keep a straight face while saying those names.
- sillygoose 11y ago
  True. But it's even more amazing how the masses just keep swallowing that shit. Of course, it's understandable too, considering people have been trained to be obedient cattle.