The NSA very likely have secret information to blackmail President Obama and other important political figures. Daniel Ellsberg agrees with this sentiment (which he mentions in his recent reddit AMA), and Russell Tice confirmed this possibility when becoming an NSA whistleblower in 2006:
"On June 19, 2013, Tice claimed while being interviewed that the NSA had spied on Barack Obama while he was a senator, along with monitoring federal judges, ranking military officials, and other members of Congress, saying he himself had seen and held papers ordering such actions.[12][13] He went on to say, "This thing is incredible what NSA has done. They've basically turned themselves—in my opinion—into a rogue agency that has J. Edgar Hoover capabilities on a monstrous scale on steroids"."
Remember, this has already happened very recently in our nation's history, during J. Edgar Hoover's direction of the FBI:
"Hoover became a controversial figure, as evidence of his secretive actions became known. His critics have accused him of exceeding the jurisdiction of the FBI.[1] He used the FBI to harass political dissenters and activists, to amass secret files on political leaders,[2] and to collect evidence using illegal methods.[3] Hoover consequently amassed a great deal of power and was in a position to intimidate and threaten sitting Presidents.[4]"
This part of american history needs to be shouted from the mountain tops. "The Burglary" and COINTELPRO need to be mandatory teaching subjects in our schools. It's not a conspiracy theory to suspect NSA of controlling politics and activism through blackmail and coercion. This is exactly what has happened before with Hoover's FBI, and there's every reason to believe this is happening again with the NSA.
there's every reason to believe this is happening again with the NSA
No, there isn't -- there is no such evidence that our elected officials are being coerced by the NSA.
Let me say it again, if such proof is revealed then it would be absolutely terrifying for everybody involved and all over the news (be it MSM or social or whatever). As it stands now there are only claims, and there is a distinct lack of evidence and facts surrounding such claims.
Now, with regards to blackmailing our elected officials, I think we can put it simply as such: the fear of just the possibility that we might be blackmailed is enough to cause self-censorship. This is a historical truth and accepted as self-evident.
That said, our elected officials are no less victims than we are. They are spied on as much as -- if not more than -- us.
Please acknowledge this one thing, if you will acknowledge anything in my post: our elected officials are no less victims than we are.
Please acknowledge this one thing, if you will acknowledge anything in my post: our elected officials are no less victims than we are.
If I hire someone to walk around a room punching everyone in the face, my nose may be broken, but I'm not a victim in any real sense. These officials made their choice and it came back to bite them in the ass.
The OP knows there is no evidence, hence the use of the phrase "every reason to believe". It is believed to be true using reason, not evidence. Its a best deduction.
Your demand for evidence and facts is bogus, since there cant really be any. What we are talking about is what goes on in the mind of an individual. We cant prove that. But we do know that, for want of a better term, implied pressure to conform works. Its the same reason belief in a god works. God knows all and will punish us if we don't follow his rules. So, if we believe in the god/NSA, we do what is wanted because we don't want to be punished.
We know people act like this. We know it is possible that the NSA has information that might damage us, or ones we love. We know what the NSA wants. Therefor we have reason to believe someone who might want to control the NSA won't out of personal fear.
A reasonable deduction, based on what is known and history. No, sorry, no evidence. That one of the nice things about blackmail, there usually isn't because the victim obviously doesn't want to be outed.
Yes, of course the elected officials are victims in this, potentially. But as elected officials, with the power of democracy, they are, IMHO, duty bound to put that aside. Not doing so is selfish cowardice. Some one has to be as brave as Snowden, and I don't see that in our elected officials.
I find it amusing that you are being downvoted, because you are absolutely correct.
In light of what we do know about the NSA, it is completely reasonable to assume (and in fact believe) the worst when we speculate on what we don't know. If people ask, "what evidence do you have?" I just respond with, "I'm sorry, but have you actually been paying any attention to Snowden's revelations and have you done any critical thinking about what they actually mean?" That is enough to shut them up.
Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. And the NSA has as close to absolute power as one can reasonably reach today: in the Age of Information, they have access to almost all information. What makes them especially dangerous is that their deeds are powered by their misguided conscience. They strongly believe that what they are doing is the Right Thing because it protects America. People who have succumbed to such fundamentalist thinking will do anything with the power they have, including blackmailing politicians.
Just because someone or some organization is really really bad does not mean that all critical thinking ceases and every contrived scenario becomes true.
Right... just because an organization has been caught doing things in the past, and lying about them, doesn't mean they'll continue to do those things, and lie about them... especially now that those things have become too easy to do, and therefore probably too boring to bother with.
The NSA has likely already used its capabilities for blackmail, but it's impossible to confirm because they would never directly blackmail someone, as in "do this or else", because that would be easily traceable to them and cause a PR nightmare.
Instead, people who run afoul of their agenda will have damaging information leaked through seemingly unrelated channels, or be targeted by other law enforcement agencies after parallel construction tip-offs.
This instills more fear and creates stronger influence than the threat of direct blackmail. Rather than being faced with explicit demands, anyone in power with something to hide must continually assess whether anything they say or do could be construed as offensive to the intelligence community.
I'm not convinced that blackmail is even effective today. You're assuming that politicians have a sense of shame. Maybe they did in the 1950s, but it's clear they don't today.
Smoking marijuana, using cocaine a bit? Admitted in an autobiography, there are even pictures of the former.
There are the usual rumors he's homosexual, although his daughters would indicate he's at "worse" bisexual. After getting reelected, this would result in exactly what???
To paraphrase Edwin Edwards, he'd only be in danger if "caught in bed with either a dead girl or a live boy".
It's not just about shame, but political assassination and public ridicule. The right kind of narrative could destroy, not only Obama's personal prospects after his presidency, but everything else he worked on during his presidency, including healthcare reform. The political fallout of a large enough scandal could damage the perception of the entire political party, and the balance of power to shift. The political fallout from Clinton's scandals happened during his second term, affected leadership in the House of Representatives, and the outcome of the 2000 Presidential campaign.
"The right kind of narrative could destroy, not only Obama's personal prospects after his presidency, but everything else he worked on during his presidency"
Bullshit.
A guy who the MSM regularly photographs with a halo, or publishes such pictures as supplied by the White House (there's a bit of a tiff right now about all that). Who's described as "sort of a god" by Newsweek's Evan Thomas. Etc. etc. ad nauseam.
The scandals for which we have firm evidence, and actual bodies (dead boys, as it were, but a number of dead girls in Mexico too) are so numerous that we can be very sure the dominate culture that makes or ignores scandals will continue to do the latter.
As for future prospects, you really believe Obama could have done something that only the NSA knows that will keep him off the speech circuit, unlike Clinton??? He's set for life ... or perhaps only until the Federal government runs out of money, but that's a very different thing. The scandal of "trillion dollar deficits as far as the eye can see" is not in the least hidden.
Your Clinton example again fails to impress, plus moves the goalposts (considerably less damage; heck, Hillary! becoming Secretary of State did more damage to his opportunities and income than anything else, Obama's low cunning WRT to that was much remarked on at the time).
I'm not aware of any damage that did to what Clinton worked on during his presidency (although I could have forgotten), you're going to need to expand on "affected leadership in the House of Representatives" since as I remember the Republicans captured it in 1994, halfway through the 1st term (although, yes, scandals were a part of that, e.g. Waco), and I suppose the razor thin margin of 2000 means that any single thing like that could have flipped it to Gore. Joining a crime family does have its downsides....
Now a case can be made that all this will harm Hillary! ... but that's complicated by the palpable desire of a lot of Democrats to avoid having her on the ticket, e.g. she doesn't have a fraction of Bill's political skills.
But I think all this still falls substantially short of the impact you claim is possible, I still maintain he's in Edwin Edwards territory.
It's not about feeling shame. It's about political assassination and public ridicule.
Many important political figures have been involved with adulterated sex and illegal drugs. Mass surveillance can uncover these scandals and use them as leverage to coerce and blackmail. The FBI put MLK under mass surveillance, uncovered evidence of his sexual deviancy, and sent him threatening letters in an attempt to suppress his civil rights activism.
Your MLK example would be more convincing if it actually worked.
BTW, what is "adulterated sex"??? Adultery? Only seems to matter in the military, where it's still a crime and grounds for discharge, at least for officers. And for many Republican politicians, but certainly not all, Mark Sanford being only the latest infamous example I can recall.
It's one thing to blithely talk about the potential for blackmail; actual modern examples in today's "no shame" culture (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7070045) would be more useful. A failed attempt at blackmail or worse harms the case you're trying to make.
I could also add "look at the Abscam aftermath" if you think these potential targets are toothless.
And of course I know what adulterated means, I've just never seen that formulation with sex; Google comes up with 4,600 entries, perhaps I'm just behind the times. However I'd use "scandalous", which is in common use, and alliterates.
Comments
The NSA very likely have secret information to blackmail President Obama and other important political figures. Daniel Ellsberg agrees with this sentiment (which he mentions in his recent reddit AMA), and Russell Tice confirmed this possibility when becoming an NSA whistleblower in 2006:
"On June 19, 2013, Tice claimed while being interviewed that the NSA had spied on Barack Obama while he was a senator, along with monitoring federal judges, ranking military officials, and other members of Congress, saying he himself had seen and held papers ordering such actions.[12][13] He went on to say, "This thing is incredible what NSA has done. They've basically turned themselves—in my opinion—into a rogue agency that has J. Edgar Hoover capabilities on a monstrous scale on steroids"."
Remember, this has already happened very recently in our nation's history, during J. Edgar Hoover's direction of the FBI:
"Hoover became a controversial figure, as evidence of his secretive actions became known. His critics have accused him of exceeding the jurisdiction of the FBI.[1] He used the FBI to harass political dissenters and activists, to amass secret files on political leaders,[2] and to collect evidence using illegal methods.[3] Hoover consequently amassed a great deal of power and was in a position to intimidate and threaten sitting Presidents.[4]"
This part of american history needs to be shouted from the mountain tops. "The Burglary" and COINTELPRO need to be mandatory teaching subjects in our schools. It's not a conspiracy theory to suspect NSA of controlling politics and activism through blackmail and coercion. This is exactly what has happened before with Hoover's FBI, and there's every reason to believe this is happening again with the NSA.
No, there isn't -- there is no such evidence that our elected officials are being coerced by the NSA.
Let me say it again, if such proof is revealed then it would be absolutely terrifying for everybody involved and all over the news (be it MSM or social or whatever). As it stands now there are only claims, and there is a distinct lack of evidence and facts surrounding such claims.
Now, with regards to blackmailing our elected officials, I think we can put it simply as such: the fear of just the possibility that we might be blackmailed is enough to cause self-censorship. This is a historical truth and accepted as self-evident.
That said, our elected officials are no less victims than we are. They are spied on as much as -- if not more than -- us.
Please acknowledge this one thing, if you will acknowledge anything in my post: our elected officials are no less victims than we are.
If I hire someone to walk around a room punching everyone in the face, my nose may be broken, but I'm not a victim in any real sense. These officials made their choice and it came back to bite them in the ass.
ihsw meant the other elected officials.
The OP knows there is no evidence, hence the use of the phrase "every reason to believe". It is believed to be true using reason, not evidence. Its a best deduction.
Your demand for evidence and facts is bogus, since there cant really be any. What we are talking about is what goes on in the mind of an individual. We cant prove that. But we do know that, for want of a better term, implied pressure to conform works. Its the same reason belief in a god works. God knows all and will punish us if we don't follow his rules. So, if we believe in the god/NSA, we do what is wanted because we don't want to be punished.
We know people act like this. We know it is possible that the NSA has information that might damage us, or ones we love. We know what the NSA wants. Therefor we have reason to believe someone who might want to control the NSA won't out of personal fear.
A reasonable deduction, based on what is known and history. No, sorry, no evidence. That one of the nice things about blackmail, there usually isn't because the victim obviously doesn't want to be outed.
Yes, of course the elected officials are victims in this, potentially. But as elected officials, with the power of democracy, they are, IMHO, duty bound to put that aside. Not doing so is selfish cowardice. Some one has to be as brave as Snowden, and I don't see that in our elected officials.
I find it amusing that you are being downvoted, because you are absolutely correct.
In light of what we do know about the NSA, it is completely reasonable to assume (and in fact believe) the worst when we speculate on what we don't know. If people ask, "what evidence do you have?" I just respond with, "I'm sorry, but have you actually been paying any attention to Snowden's revelations and have you done any critical thinking about what they actually mean?" That is enough to shut them up.
Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. And the NSA has as close to absolute power as one can reasonably reach today: in the Age of Information, they have access to almost all information. What makes them especially dangerous is that their deeds are powered by their misguided conscience. They strongly believe that what they are doing is the Right Thing because it protects America. People who have succumbed to such fundamentalist thinking will do anything with the power they have, including blackmailing politicians.
Just because someone or some organization is really really bad does not mean that all critical thinking ceases and every contrived scenario becomes true.
Down that path lays dragons and madness.
Right... just because an organization has been caught doing things in the past, and lying about them, doesn't mean they'll continue to do those things, and lie about them... especially now that those things have become too easy to do, and therefore probably too boring to bother with.
So all critical thinking stops and we assume they do anything and everything any person ever may accuse them of.
How logical and reasonable. /s
The NSA has likely already used its capabilities for blackmail, but it's impossible to confirm because they would never directly blackmail someone, as in "do this or else", because that would be easily traceable to them and cause a PR nightmare.
Instead, people who run afoul of their agenda will have damaging information leaked through seemingly unrelated channels, or be targeted by other law enforcement agencies after parallel construction tip-offs.
This instills more fear and creates stronger influence than the threat of direct blackmail. Rather than being faced with explicit demands, anyone in power with something to hide must continually assess whether anything they say or do could be construed as offensive to the intelligence community.
I'm not convinced that blackmail is even effective today. You're assuming that politicians have a sense of shame. Maybe they did in the 1950s, but it's clear they don't today.
There's also the changing of what's shameful.
Smoking marijuana, using cocaine a bit? Admitted in an autobiography, there are even pictures of the former.
There are the usual rumors he's homosexual, although his daughters would indicate he's at "worse" bisexual. After getting reelected, this would result in exactly what???
To paraphrase Edwin Edwards, he'd only be in danger if "caught in bed with either a dead girl or a live boy".
It's not just about shame, but political assassination and public ridicule. The right kind of narrative could destroy, not only Obama's personal prospects after his presidency, but everything else he worked on during his presidency, including healthcare reform. The political fallout of a large enough scandal could damage the perception of the entire political party, and the balance of power to shift. The political fallout from Clinton's scandals happened during his second term, affected leadership in the House of Representatives, and the outcome of the 2000 Presidential campaign.
"The right kind of narrative could destroy, not only Obama's personal prospects after his presidency, but everything else he worked on during his presidency"
Bullshit.
A guy who the MSM regularly photographs with a halo, or publishes such pictures as supplied by the White House (there's a bit of a tiff right now about all that). Who's described as "sort of a god" by Newsweek's Evan Thomas. Etc. etc. ad nauseam.
The scandals for which we have firm evidence, and actual bodies (dead boys, as it were, but a number of dead girls in Mexico too) are so numerous that we can be very sure the dominate culture that makes or ignores scandals will continue to do the latter.
As for future prospects, you really believe Obama could have done something that only the NSA knows that will keep him off the speech circuit, unlike Clinton??? He's set for life ... or perhaps only until the Federal government runs out of money, but that's a very different thing. The scandal of "trillion dollar deficits as far as the eye can see" is not in the least hidden.
Your Clinton example again fails to impress, plus moves the goalposts (considerably less damage; heck, Hillary! becoming Secretary of State did more damage to his opportunities and income than anything else, Obama's low cunning WRT to that was much remarked on at the time).
I'm not aware of any damage that did to what Clinton worked on during his presidency (although I could have forgotten), you're going to need to expand on "affected leadership in the House of Representatives" since as I remember the Republicans captured it in 1994, halfway through the 1st term (although, yes, scandals were a part of that, e.g. Waco), and I suppose the razor thin margin of 2000 means that any single thing like that could have flipped it to Gore. Joining a crime family does have its downsides....
Now a case can be made that all this will harm Hillary! ... but that's complicated by the palpable desire of a lot of Democrats to avoid having her on the ticket, e.g. she doesn't have a fraction of Bill's political skills.
But I think all this still falls substantially short of the impact you claim is possible, I still maintain he's in Edwin Edwards territory.
It's not about feeling shame. It's about political assassination and public ridicule.
Many important political figures have been involved with adulterated sex and illegal drugs. Mass surveillance can uncover these scandals and use them as leverage to coerce and blackmail. The FBI put MLK under mass surveillance, uncovered evidence of his sexual deviancy, and sent him threatening letters in an attempt to suppress his civil rights activism.
Your MLK example would be more convincing if it actually worked.
BTW, what is "adulterated sex"??? Adultery? Only seems to matter in the military, where it's still a crime and grounds for discharge, at least for officers. And for many Republican politicians, but certainly not all, Mark Sanford being only the latest infamous example I can recall.
Try again.
That has nothing to do with my example. I don't believe you are really that naive.
adul·ter·at·ed: to corrupt, debase, or make impure by the addition of a foreign or inferior substance or element;
You could have easily looked this up. You are being purposefully obtuse and it's not fooling anyone. I'll call a spade a spade.
It's one thing to blithely talk about the potential for blackmail; actual modern examples in today's "no shame" culture (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7070045) would be more useful. A failed attempt at blackmail or worse harms the case you're trying to make.
I could also add "look at the Abscam aftermath" if you think these potential targets are toothless.
And of course I know what adulterated means, I've just never seen that formulation with sex; Google comes up with 4,600 entries, perhaps I'm just behind the times. However I'd use "scandalous", which is in common use, and alliterates.
Interesting. I knew a bit about Hoover, but not to that extent. Can you edit in your numbered sources?
The numbers are citations on the J Edgar Hoover's wikipedia page. The comment (you speak of) is copied verbatim. [1]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Edgar_Hoover