Does America need Oversight?
I have come to the conclusion that America has too many intelligence and other agencies that are operating in isolation from one another.
It seems to me, that there is a lack of oversight between said agencies. What would be required may be called a return to some unifying central command that would make all these (16) intelligence agencies operate in unison.
I call this 'Project Oversight'. A self-policing type of agency that would control, audit, and monitor the activities of subordinate agencies.
Just recently, Trump authorized Homeland Security to gain new powers beyond belief.
Does America need an oversight agency, why or why not?
It seems to me, that there is a lack of oversight between said agencies. What would be required may be called a return to some unifying central command that would make all these (16) intelligence agencies operate in unison.
I call this 'Project Oversight'. A self-policing type of agency that would control, audit, and monitor the activities of subordinate agencies.
Just recently, Trump authorized Homeland Security to gain new powers beyond belief.
Does America need an oversight agency, why or why not?
Comments (83)
https://reason.com/2020/01/30/house-moves-to-give-homeland-security-more-power-to-snoop/
The legislation—like its companion in the Senate—gives the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) more power to subpoena information from internet and telecommunications companies, including subscriber names, addresses, and telephone numbers.
...
Compelling private information when it involves risks to "critical infrastructure" might sound smart. But it's important to keep in mind that it doesn't take much for CISA to deem something critical infrastructure. The agency's 16 sectors of critical infrastructure extend to such places as casinos, hotels, motels, campgrounds, zoos, shopping malls, self-storage facilities, condominiums, banks, insurance companies, and motion picture studios.
...
Thompson has said the bill will likely be part of a bigger package of "DHS authorization legislation."
What the fuck?
Just connecting the dots here; but, CISA legitimizes the perpetual use of the Patriot Act in effect.
Mother of God.
The DoD needs to step in from a perpetual state of paranoia and insecurity that the above entails.
The Constitution's separation of powers was designed to have the jobs assigned to each of the three not be overturned by one of the others.
So I am all for the DOD doing some things but not to make sure we aren't handing our country to a traveling salesman.
That was the FBI's role, hasn't it, or what agency are you referring to?
The FBI, along with the Department of Defense (along with the other Federal agencies) are under the administrative control of the Executive Branch with the President being the Commander and Chief.
Congress is the agency to oversee what the Executive Branch is doing. If enough people from the Executive Branch corrupt that process, then you have a problem.
The Judicial Branch is supposed to be independent of the other two. If enough people from the Executive Branch corrupt that process, then you have a problem.
In theory, Congress is supposed to be the oversight committee for intelligence agencies. But, in practice, the dominant party may choose to look the other way, when secret operations are aimed at ends they approve, even when the means are illegal. So, ultimately, I guess we rely on whistle-blowers, as in the Iran-Contra affair. :cool:
At least, you can't do it well...
The speed,complexity, scope, and sensitivity of most of the goings-on at various intelligence agencies renders comprehensive oversight implausible at best. The compartmentalization that is required in this kind of work basically creates a situation where intelligence agencies cannot even coherently oversee themselves.
One of the main reasons that it has to be this way is that these agencies are locked in existential conflict with every other intelligence agency (they all constantly try to hack, spy, and harm one another, even allies, because they operate as state enforcers/thugs). Deep down they really are trying to benefit their countries, and therein lies their endless and problematic moral justification. The down-shot of this is that they need to operate in vast shrouds of secrecy, lest they be exposed as targets for other state actors.
If you're interested in the subject though, I recommend looking into cyber-security and cyber threat intelligence. There's a really scary but neat-o world that consists of public security firms vs threat actors, where information about known hacking groups is gathered, newly discovered exploits are discussed and addressed, etc, and it bleeds heavily into the world of state intelligence.
You would know better than any of us.
I'm sure you are familiar with the term deep state.
To some extent the executive branch does this atleast to a small measure.
But to watch over all the different CIA & CIA clones would require beaurocracy, and who is going to watch that central beaurocracy?
I know i spelled beaurocracy wrong.
Once, not all that long ago, they had this; they called it the "President".
Now there's just this slow, incomprehensible train wreck...
So very, very true...and sad!
Couple all that with the incredibly power money has over government and we have a mess long before Trump came a long with his circus.
I think the President can't sleep at night, thus, the need for an oversight agency, no?
Yeah, there's an issue here. The DoD has command over the military; and yet all the other alphabet agencies are under civilian jurisdiction. :chin:
Talk about a debacle for the US. The OPM (database of all government employees) got hacked by the Chinese in 2014.
You do an analysis of (un)encrypted credit and debit card transactions (which isn't hard to do), and all the secrets are out. Crazy...
In theory, that doesn't work. Because, the nature of intelligence gathering limits the analysis to a unifying understanding of the scope needed to understand all loose ends and knots. I don't believe this should be handled by a person who has 4 years to get to understand everything and then comment on it. Thus, the need for a central agency to handle the task, that has no time constraints.
The civilian control of the DoD is exerted through the Secretary of the Defense along with the coordinating influence of the NSA.
The Constitution was meant to instill confidence and security. Now, you have an agency that is monumental, power-mad, and continuously given more and more powers that thrives on insecurity, fear, and paranoia. I'm not sure how long the Constitution will maintain its ethos.
Watch closely what happens in the next 4 years of Trump's favorite agency.
The Eisenhower administration put the Military-Industrial Complex in place and I think we should all heed his warning.
The Military-Industrial Complex is what Hitler and Bush called the New World Order. It is what we defended our democracy against in two world wars. We are now what we defended our democracy because we adopted the German model of bureaucracy and the German model of education, and the general population is clueless and therefore defenseless, emotionally driven and reactionary.
Adopting the German model of bureaucracy was essential because our bureaucratic organization was extremely inefficient and could not manage federal programs such as social security. If we had just retained education of our liberty and democracy, we would not be in the mess we are in now. A man like Trump would be recognized as a tyrant, not the Great Father of our country that many Christians think he is, and we would have managed the pandemic with science, not a man who tells us God whispered in his ear that our social distancing could end by Easter, such a special day. :rage:
We would have the democratic mythology of our democracy, not the Christian mythology of our democracy. Destroying our national heroes was very much about shifting power and authority from citizens to centralized power and authority. The state is God and all must conform to the state. God's will and our will are the same because we are good Christians, right? :pray:
How about Neitche and Hegel? Superman and the State is God.
We must pay attention to education and culture. If people are turning to the Bible for truth and we stay on the same path Germany followed, what will the result be?
The military is also under civilian jurisdiction...and well it should be.
Unfortunately, at the moment, the control is held by Trump.
What about them? As I understand it, most Americans are closet Nietzsche'ians. Hegel only makes sense in America, for the dominant party, which is none, since Democrats and Republicans both are guided by self-interest for their constituents (dot dot dot), which are themselves.
Quoting Athena
Well, the issue as I understand it, is some kind of anti-intellectualism dominant in the US. It's a big issue that some astonishingly large percentage of Americans believe wholeheartedly in creationism, like thinking that rain causes frogs to be created or some such loony'ness.
The separation of the powers is far more evident in Westminster systems.
On dead branches
Crows remain perched
At autumn's end
-- Matsuo Basho
Other systems of democracy are more ad hoc. History smashed and remoulded them, giving the opportunity to tinker in the process.
But the Constitution produced a fossil.
Nah, ethics and morality are timeless. Just the kind of stuff that need to be included in it, the 'stitution.
Hm. Seeing the US constitution as an ethical document strikes me as profoundly misguided; an example of Mythologising; "The tale is finished; it cannot grow further".
As if perfection were achievable.
As a foundation it's pretty solid. Everyone is guided by defending it, despite rampant paranoia or insecurity. Humdrum for it's ethical import nowadays with the existence of Chinese viruses or shithole countries.
Beyond criticism?
That might be the problem, right there.
Don't think so. I suppose it's a greater danger hereabouts is to deviate from a document that has provided a high standard of living, and ensures that through its defense and upholding. The rest is politics, no?
What's the alternative?
:rofl:
Yeah, I'm surprised too man. At least I get my Cybertruck, when I can afford it:
Just kidding, I want a Tesla Model Y.
The federal government's power grew over time with a sequence of crises.
It's you who is creating myths.
Quoting Shawn
A high quality of living? All that working and running around buying stuff so you can live in fear of a medical emergency bankrupting you. Not for me.
’Tis all that’s left
Of ancient warriors’ dreams
-Matsuo Basho
So, you get a comprehensive health insurance. What else you going to do?
I'm not the biggest fan of the US; but, where else can I move to or would it make sense to move to Europe just for health insurance?
As I understand it, the two biggest differentiating things between Europe or Canada and the United States are essentially two things:
1. Healthcare
2. Education
If the US supplied both of those without strings attached, most of the nay-sayers wouldn't have much to criticize the US about anymore, perhaps apart from starting wars.
Like I said, I'm not the biggest fan of the US.
And, yes... we even have private prisons! A shitstain that will always remain on our national identity in a hundred years from now.
All those southern states wen't loony. (Never going there)
Quoting www.sentencingproject.org
We definitely need some oversight over this kind of shit.
Coincidentally, I had a debate with a student on this topic today. Unfortunately, I needed to argue for private prisons, which was difficult.
Who won?
Oh my fucking God!
The Chinese Communist Party
Will soon be
Your master
It's gotta make one proud to see that odd old American business sense at work.
Already.
I don't know; but, if I was a journalist it would sure be a firecracker.
America wen't nuts. But, wait, the Chinese virus insanity, the shithole countries downright racism will continue for 4 more years, and the DNC allowed it to happen because they think a demented man can handle the country better than a paranoid guy.
The patriotism is oozing out of me.
There is a fair amount of oversight within the constitution... the separation of powers... in addition to all of the different oversight committees within both houses of congress.
Unfortunately, there are too many bad actors in play, as well as too many that are quite simply not doing their job. They are untrustworthy, and nowadays they are not even hiding the fact that they are not performing the duties that they took a sworn oath to be personally responsible for performing.
The problem is that there is no real way to fire them or hold them accountable. In theory it(the framework of American government) works. Unfortunately, the success of any given methodology is only as successful as it's implementation, including how a representative democracy with democratic traditions ought to work while retaining the failsafes necessary to avoid too much concentration of power.
:worry:
This is the sort of thing your country has to look forward to.
Maybe. Australia has a history, which of course we will not claim, of belligerently invading other people's homes at the behest of a great and dear ally - we replaced the Empire with the USA in that roll.
But to become a guard dog for China we would have to overcome our inherent racism; the fear of the yellow peril.
“And do you think that unto such as you
A maggot-minded, starved, fanatic crew
God gave a secret, and denied it me?
Well, well—what matters it? Believe that, too!”
? Omar Khayyâm, Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám
:wink:
In addition...
Look at what Trump has done - every time he could get away with it - to each and every individual who did their job when it concerned being in a position to enact oversight on Trump.
He fired them for doing their job, for performing the duties that they took an oath to perform. He fired them for keeping their word, because it involved investigating him.
That's a big big problem when not enough congressional members perform their own sworn duties.
And the OP is simply talking about democracy, which, of course, the US barely has; or has in a degraded, utterly stilted form.
Aren't you already part Asian? We are (I am).
With no flowers
You are free
as a willow.
--Kaga no Chiyo
So, what changes need to be in the US so that both are better places?
We should stop doing this shit:
https://futurism.com/the-byte/trump-executive-order-moon-asteroid-mining
What reason do you have to believe that we are?
Uhh, Trump just made an executive order for Dick Force to plunder asteroids and the moon.
According to whom?
https://www.space.com/trump-moon-mining-space-resources-executive-order.html
https://www.foxnews.com/science/trump-signs-order-to-support-moon-mining-pulling-resources-from-asteroids
:chin:
That's the sort of priorities that a mind has when it's sole concern is profit.
That said, I agree with you. We ought not be doing shit like that.
Mind you, there's a lot of profit out there. I just pray to the spaghetti monster that we don't start claiming planets like Mars as our own.
Russia, China, and India will all have a grand mal seizure.
https://www.technologyreview.com/2007/08/23/223985/mining-the-moon/
At the 21st century’s start, few would have predicted that by 2007, a second race for the moon would be under way. Yet the signs are that this is now the case. Furthermore, in today’s moon race, unlike the one that took place between the United States and the U.S.S.R. in the 1960s, a full roster of 21st-century global powers, including China and India, are competing.
Even more surprising is that one reason for much of the interest appears to be plans to mine helium-3–purportedly an ideal fuel for fusion reactors but almost unavailable on Earth–from the moon’s surface. NASA’s Vision for Space Exploration has U.S. astronauts scheduled to be back on the moon in 2020 and permanently staffing a base there by 2024. While the U.S. space agency has neither announced nor denied any desire to mine helium-3, it has nevertheless placed advocates of mining He3 in influential positions. For its part, Russia claims that the aim of any lunar program of its own–for what it’s worth, the rocket corporation Energia recently started blustering, Soviet-style, that it will build a permanent moon base by 2015-2020–will be extracting He3.
The Chinese, too, apparently believe that helium-3 from the moon can enable fusion plants on Earth. This fall, the People’s Republic expects to orbit a satellite around the moon and then land an unmanned vehicle there in 2011.
Nor does India intend to be left out. (See “India’s Space Ambitions Soar.”) This past spring, its president, A.P.J. Kalam, and its prime minister, Manmohan Singh, made major speeches asserting that, besides constructing giant solar collectors in orbit and on the moon, the world’s largest democracy likewise intends to mine He3 from the lunar surface. India’s probe, Chandrayaan-1, will take off next year, and ISRO, the Indian Space Research Organization, is talking about sending Chandrayaan-2, a surface rover, in 2010 or 2011. Simultaneously, Japan and Germany are also making noises about launching their own moon missions at around that time, and talking up the possibility of mining He3 and bringing it back to fuel fusion-based nuclear reactors on Earth.
[...]
Laying claim to celestial bodies is announcing that they are your personal property. No one owns the moon.
Everyone owns the moon.
We should all have seizure, if by that we mean that we should all take that as a serious affront to humanity, because that is exactly what it is.
That's a part of everyone's world that is worth preservation.
There is no profit to be made by using the moon's resources unless the start up costs are covered. Anyone who expects some immediate return on investment will find themselves sorely disappointed.
I wonder what Frankfurt would call that?
Some of it is certainly bullshit.
NASA didn't want to do it with exorbitant launch costs, so guess who is going to be contracted to do launches. It starts with 'space' and ends with an X.
And, I think this is something Trump will be positively views as making America's hegemony last a long time.
China must be furious, as SpaceX can't share tech due to national security issues.
Most of it has been in the works for a while now. Newt Gingrich is having a party, last I heard. This is where Republicans deserve credit.
You presented an article chock full of false predictions about what's going to be happening later.
You use that article to ground your own current belief that those things are happening?
Surely, you understand my concerns here?
You friends with Newt?
Not really. It's been Republican dream of returning to the Moon for a very long time. Now that there's a legal framework devised you can bet the barn that the economics presented by stupendously lowered costs of SpaceX rockets to make it a reality.
Not really, but I actually miss neocons instead of these Trump apparatchiks populating the government.
The evidence you're presenting does not warrant the conclusion you're drawing. The start up cost of moon mining would be astronomical(pun intended). The cost of freight would be as well. For water and a gas not readily available on earth...
Yeah, I wouldn't worry about that too much.
Where would the demand for such water and gas come from if not by force?
Do you realize how much space launch costs have decreased? Google it, and tell me that doesn't make mining as infeasible as it once was.
DOES AMERICA NEED OVERSIGHT?
Shawn, right now, if America were a human...it would need institutionalization.
As a human, we would be considered bat-shit crazy!
I gave up in the end. All I had was 'taxpayers' and 'efficiency'. Not enough.
What is the source of ethics and morality? The US has always been more religious and less philosophical than Europe. Not that long ago illiteracy was common and the only thing many learned was from a preacher. That left people on the lower levels of moral thinking.
If we do not pay attention to what education has to do with moral thinking, we are going down the toilet. We had education for good moral judgment and those who had that education manifested a very different culture from the Wrestlemania culture we have today. Religion is the lowest level of moral thinking dependent on fear of punishment and rewards provided by a God or god-like figure (parents). In 1958 we replaced education for good moral judgment, with education for technology and left moral training to the church.
The 2012 Texas Republican Agenda was to keep education for higher-order thinking skills out of the schools, and that state strongly pushed for creationism being taught as a science equal to the theory of evolution. The Bible supports the notion that we can not be self-governing and must have authority above us and God gives us leaders and our prayers give this person the power of God. In this corner we have Jesus. In that corner we have Satan. And the crowd is worked into a frenzy.
These folks have no idea, our constitution is based on notions of human excellence and the power of knowledge. Please, do not stop with the words "ethics" and "morals". Those words are like flat balloons, without education and leaving moral training to the church is not a good idea.
:worry:
https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2020/apr/06/coronavirus-american-reaction-economy-covid-19