surveillance

It's really sad when you think about it. During the Bush years, Patrick Leahy was a man that stood on the side of privacy. Now that a Democrat is in the White House, he stands on the side of spying:

A Senate proposal touted as protecting Americans' e-mail privacy has been quietly rewritten, giving government agencies more surveillance power than they possess under current law.

CNET has learned that Patrick Leahy, the influential Democratic chairman of the Senate Judiciary committee, has dramatically reshaped his legislation in response to law enforcement concerns. A vote on his bill, which now authorizes warrantless access to Americans' e-mail, is scheduled for next week.

Leahy's rewritten bill would allow more than 22 agencies -- including the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Federal Communications Commission -- to access Americans' e-mail, Google Docs files, Facebook wall posts, and Twitter direct messages without a search warrant. It also would give the FBI and Homeland Security more authority, in some circumstances, to gain full access to Internet accounts without notifying either the owner or a judge.

Legislation like this is the very reason I argue for two parties willing to work together. It's the best form of checks and balances we have, just like a warrant is a form of checks and balances over law enforcement. Hopefully that will happen here. If not, then you need to really watch what you EMail and sit back as our Constitution dies a little more.

I'm starting a new post on this since the story is constantly growing. For background, check out my earlier post.

So the skepticism is really growing now with this latest story:

When Ms. Todd reported the incident, "nowhere did she say to the officer that [the assailant] made reference to the bumper sticker. I don't know how she came to the conclusion that he noticed the sticker," Cmdr. Ross said.

Updates after the fold

He said the description of the robber as a 6-foot 4-inch, 200-pound black man is similar to that of a man who robbed a Liberty Avenue bank in recent weeks.

Police were checking surveillance video of the Wednesday ATM incident.

Several employees at nearby businesses last night said they were unaware of the attack.

So the whole bumper sticker thing was thought of after the fact? MSNBC has reported that she took her lie-detector test today, but the results aren't known. I have also been reading that this is a very busy part of town with a lot of bars and restaurants, including right across from the ATM. This happened at 9:00 pm at night, so business should have been good, yet no one saw it happen.

There was also the postings on her Twitter making it sound like she had no idea where she was and was in a "bad part of town". Apparently she knew right where she was:

Ms. Todd then went to a friend's house in the 5100 block of Cypress Street, about a mile away, where she reported the incident to police about 45 minutes later. She declined medical treatment at that time.

So she was in an unknown part of town, yet went to a friends about a mile away? Really? Let's add some perspective here. Todd is from Texas, but in Pittsburgh volunteering for the McCain campaign, on behalf of the College Republicans. Apparently she hasn't been there that long, so where did she make a friend at? A safe guess would be McCain headquarters, and possibly another volunteer.

Now let's add to that the fact she waited 45 minutes to call the police. If this is fake then I wonder if she now has an accomplice in this fraud. I am sure the police are talking to her friend now.

Also the right has been trying to defend the upside B by saying that the man sat above her head as he carved it in, which would make the B face properly. That story is now debunked:

Ms. Todd told police during at least five hours of questioning last night that her attacker said to her, "You are going to be a Barack supporter." She told police the man then sat on her chest, pinning both her hands down with his knees and used what she believed was a dull knife with a roughly 5-inch blade to carve the B.

Five hours of questioning is a lot also. If her story was solid, the questioning wouldn't have taken no where near that long.

If this all does turn out to be a fake then she needs to be publicly humiliated for what she has tried to do. Perhaps a public apology beside Obama when he does his big national TV appearance next week?

(Updated below the fold)

This is too funny to pass up:

Latest Bush administration leak comes
from ... Bush

CAMBRIDGE, Md. The source of the latest leak from the Bush administration
is: President Bush himself.

Thanks to an error by a White House technician, the sound of what were
supposed to be private remarks to G-O-P House members was relayed to the
White House press corps.

Bush made a brief public speech to lawmakers at their retreat on
Maryland's Eastern Shore. He then shooed out reporters and photographers,
saying, "I support the free press, let's just get 'em out of the room."

Once they were gone, Bush -- not realizing he was still audible -- said,
"I expect this conversation we're about to have to stay in the room." He
added, "I know that's impossible in Washington."

Bush then spoke for roughly two minutes on the war on terror and his
warrantless eavesdropping program before the outside feed was switched off.
On the surveillance, he repeated earlier assertions he'd cleared the program
with top government lawyers.

Via kaji8.

I wonder if someone will be losing their job over this one.

Senator Feinstein has just asked Gonzalez to pinpoint what in FISA gives them
this authority. She said there are two provisions, one is the 15 days after a
declaration of war and the other is the 72 hour window, which was changed since
9/11 to allow that extra time. He reference section 109 which does not give this
authorization. Feinstein asked him to check it again and get back with her.

Senator Sessions has blamed the press for saying that the program has
conducted wide spread surveillance instead of being limited to international
calls. Gonzalez replied with "yes the program I am talking about today is
limited to international calls". So is there another program out there that
listens in on domestic calls? By the response Gonzalez gave it seems as though
there is.

Apparently Session's had someone checking blogs because he referenced back to
Washington and clarified that Washington authorized any means necessary to
obtain enemy communications. Of course he remained oblivious to the fact that
the Revolutionary war was a long time before we had the Bill of Rights or even a
constitution.

They are breaking one hour for lunch.

Just as a computer warning to all my readers, someone is sending out mass
emails across the net today in order to spread a nasty little virus/worm called
Sober.Y. The email are addressed as coming from numerous sources including:

• Yahoo
• AOL
• CIA
• FBI

They all contain different messages but all have the same attachment. If you
receive one of these emails do not open the attachment, which should be common
practice for any email user. The FBI has already issued a warning about this:

FBI Warns of E-Mail About Surveillance

Monday November 21, 2005 9:46 PM

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Federal Bureau of Investigation issued an alert
Monday about a scam involving unsolicited e-mails, purportedly sent by the
FBI, that tell computer users that their Internet surfing is being monitored
by the agency.

The users are told they have visited illegal Web sites and are instructed
to open an attachment to answer questions.

The FBI did not send these e-mails and does not send any other
unsolicited e-mails to the public, an agency statement said. As many harmful
computer viruses are located in e-mail attachments, the FBI said it strongly
encourages computer users not to open attachments from unknown recipients.

The FBI is investigating the scam. Recipients of these e-mails are asked
to report them by visiting the Internet Crime Complaint Center at
http://www.ic3.gov.

I have received at least 10 of these so far today, all originating from the
same place in New York. They have all come on my personal email account and not
the one I use for this site. If you get any of these then visit the link listed
in the article to inform the FBI so they can better track this person down.