Posted on 02/15/2014 3:01:29 AM PST by Kaslin
I’m a national security hawk. But, I’m also a free-market, anti-crony capitalist. I’m a Catholic, I’m a dad and I’m a businessman.
And an American.
For all these reasons, I stand with Rand in his lawsuit against Barack Obama and his co-defendants: the Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, NSA Director Gen. Keith Alexander and FBI Director James Comey.
“Paul’s suit, filed in conjunction with conservative group FreedomWorks,” says the New York Daily News, “alleges that the NSA’s bulk collection program, under which the agency has collected the telephone metadata of many Americans, violates the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution, which protects against unreasonable searches.”
It’s also just the tip of the iceberg.
As a matter of law there is no legal way for us to secure our own electronic communications sufficient to prevent the government from spying on us.
The law limits the length of computer encryption, so that even without a key, the government can use a “black box”—a high speed computer deployed by intelligence agencies for pattern recognition, that can break encryption with the ability to alter the content of data as well – to sit outside servers and capture every single piece of electronic data generated on the internet, with very little latency.
That means, as a practical matter-- as opposed to a matter of law-- that the government can spy on us without us even knowing.
In the old days, this would be akin to a group of people from the government breaking into a private office at will and rifling through papers, say, at the Watergate headquarters of the Democrat National Committee.
We’ll call these people, for the sake of example, the Plumbers.
Let’s say that the Plumbers had a law in the 1970s that said that no office in the country could have a lock, no building a watchman, sufficient to make sure that home and businesses are secure from break-in.
But don’t worry, the Plumbers reassure us, trust us: Anything we break into will only “inadvertently” violate your right to unreasonable search and seizure.
It won’t be used against you.
It is this very eventuality that our Founders, previous political philosophers, great statesmen in our history sought to protect us from by the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution. It is the eventuality that Senator Rand Paul and contemporary political activists seek to protect us from right now
“Never before since Jamestown and Plymouth Rock,” said Franklin Roosevelt, “has our American civilization been in such danger as now.”
Yet today the enemy is not just a collection of thugs from across the ocean, although they include those thugs as well.
Today, the enemy is here, amongst us.
“I’m not against the NSA, I’m not against spying, I’m not against looking at phone records,” Paul told Politico. “I just want you to go to a judge, have an individual’s name and [get] a warrant. That’s what the Fourth Amendment says.”
Paul’s right. The enemy is not the people in the intelligence community or the work they do.
I go to church with them, meet them at civic meetings and have coffee with them.
And so do you.
They are moral people.
Not so the government. I have regularly observed that institutions, like government, are neither moral nor immoral. They are amoral, doing whatever necessary for survival. When combined with the increasing immorality of the people who lead us in the government—and I’m not just talking about the Democrats; people who are expected to make moral judgment and flunk the test-- the danger is real and urgent.
“For just as the magnanimous man tends to great things out of greatness of soul,” says Thomas Aquinas, “so the pusillanimous man shrinks from great things out of littleness of soul.” Or as William Manchester summed it up: “Thomas Aquinas once raised the issue of choosing between a proud man and a pusillanimous one. Take the proud one every time, he advised, because you will be sure that he will at least do something.”
Senator Rand Paul, tossed into a sea of pusillanimity, is doing something to defend us against that proud man in the White House who is doing anything he wants.
From Jamestown to Plymouth Rock, pride like Paul’s ought to be encouraged.
In regard to this matter I say, “Fine Mr. Senator. But what about the Obamacare atrocity and rampant unconstitutional Executive Orders, etc? I’m reminded of Christ’s reprimand of the Pharisees in Matthew 23:23b “...you ought to have done the one and not left the other(s) undone.”
Forget Rand Paul. Already seeing indications he’s not the right guy for the WH. I’d rather see Cruz in there...: )
We need to concentrate on the midterm election, not on the 2016 election
Besides the article has nothing to do with the 2016 election
Agreed. Didn’t mean to step on your toes if I did. We all want the same thing. We want our America back...: )
I agree that Paul appears to be pro-amnesty. However, that is separate from the lawsuit against the NSA spying and the violation of the 4th amendment. Rand Paul is correct. The government should get a court order naming the person to be searched and the thing to be seized. That’s our Constitutional right and a government which collects every communication is violating that principle.
COLLECTION should require the court order....not analysis of already collected data. Politicians are playing games with words when they say the government is not “listening” to everyday Americans. They want that to sound like they’re not collecting your data. They are. Since you’re a small fish, they simply aren’t analyzing it. Come to their attention, however, and they do.
Do NOT ever trust government. ALWAYS keep them starved for power.
If Orwell were ressurected he’d be astonished at how close he got yet how far he missed the mark on how farreaching their capabilities would be
Bump!
And the Primaries before the Midterm election may be almost as important as the election.
Paul is libertarian minded, Cruz is constitutional minded... they’re not that far apart in their world view and conservative values. But from where I sit, Paul has a good grasp of individual freedom and those things that mitigate against our personal liberty, and fearlessly goes after those things which invade. However, imho, Cruz seems to understand the deeper principals of the constitution and, like Paul, fearlessly defends it against the invading “progressive sociopoliticmedia” complex! Both however stand head and shoulders above the crop of posers on the left and the right!
In the wars our nation has fought, we remember the great pivotal battles won and those lost. This effort is one of those pivotal battles.
May he and his efforts be successful for all of our sakes and for our children who will inherit the result.
The Beast is rising and we need a dragon slayer or the Beast will surely kill US in our sleep.
I think the problem is that a true free market economy cannot exist with the kind of activist hawkish foreign policy we've had since the end of the Cold War. The first modern welfare state was Otto von Bismarck's Germany.
Correct. On Paul’s Presidential aspirations, he’s not likely to get that far, but you could do a lot worse than him as Obama is proving. Congress is the critical factor. They write the laws, run the committees and fund the government.
Obama’s hands are tied right now and if we take Congress, then his reign is over.
Spot on comment. The trouble is that people think we cannot keep commerce flowing without meddling in the internal affairs of every country.
Rand is pro-life, and that’s my basic issue, and I consider the second amendment to include self-defense, absolutely necessary for any reasonable pro-life position. If someone truly passes that obstacle, then they’re on my radar. Killing babies, the infirm, or the elderly is rotting us from the inside out.
I believe amnesty will be terrible for the country, but in itself it will not rot our soul.
We’re in complete agreement there. My concern with immigration is the undermining of our culture. If you’re familiar with the history of Western Civilization you know how fragile it is. That’s why government schools don’t teach it any more.
Some cultures aren’t healthy. They lead to tyranny or social dead ends. We currently have de facto amnesty. Cities and states ignore federal law and the character of our very special and precious republic and become sanctuaries for illegal immigration.
As currently constituted the proposed amnesty rewards Mexican illegals just because they share a border with us. I don’t see a simple way out. Legal immigration has to be improved and changed. That it is so hard to become an American or secure the border is telling.
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