Penguins, Polls and Personal Privacy

OR

Please Don’t Call Me Here

“Penguins on the Equator” blogmaster AK alerted to a poll taken by ABC/Washington Post on Friday [May 12.06]. By virtue of it’s significance, the topic of Domestic Telecommunications Spying in the US probably deserves a blog all it’s own but I don’t have the time or patience to start one. So we took a poll and decided just to re-post from “Penguins” and pretend we invented it.

http://penguinsontheequator.blogspot.com/2006_05_01_penguinsontheequator_archive.html
Saturday, May 13, 2006

Could the latest NSA revelations help Bush?

I don't know if "surprised" is the right word, but I was definitely intrigued by the findings of an ABC/Washington Post poll released yesterday on the news that Bush has been creating a massive database of phone calls made by people in the US:

The new survey found that 63 percent of Americans said they found the NSA program to be an acceptable way to investigate terrorism, including 44 percent who strongly endorsed the effort. Another 35 percent said the program was unacceptable, which included 24 percent who strongly objected to it.

This poll was hastily done (overnight), and, as Mark Blumenthal points out, had a relatively small sample size (504 people) and correspondingly large margin of error (plus or minus 4.5%). Even so, the results are informative. So should Democrats just stop talking about it in the near future? Bush's numbers on terrorism have certainly gone down since January, when the last NSA surveillance scandal occurred, and the Democrats, since the Dubai Ports World dustup, have seen a significant rise in their numbers that has tended to place them on pretty much even footing with Bush and the GOP.

But terrorism still remains Bush's strongest area as far as polling, and as Blumenthal argues, "Bush can only stand to gain if the public's attention shifts from his handling of gas prices, the economy, immigration and Iraq to his administration's efforts to 'investigate terrorism.'" Much as it pains me to have to admit, I think I'm in agreement with that.

UPDATE: A Newsweek poll, asking a different question, gets different results:

Has the Bush administration gone too far in expanding the powers of the President to fight terrorism? Yes, say a majority of Americans, following this week’s revelation that the National Security Agency has been secretly collecting the phone records of U.S. citizens since the September 11 terrorist attacks. According to the latest NEWSWEEK poll, 53 percent of Americans think the NSA’s surveillance program “goes too far in invading people’s privacy,” while 41 percent see it as a necessary tool to combat terrorism.

UPDATE 2: "Sibling Rivalry: 'Wash Post' and 'Newsweek' Polls Clash on NSA":

They may be owned by the same company, but two polls commissioned by The Washington Post and Newsweek magazine on the important issue of public approval of the National Security Agency's gathering of phone records produced quite different results.
...
So what happened? Most likely views changed that much in one day after more negative media reports (including many from conservative commentators such as MSNBC's Joe Scarborough) surfaced. The Washington Post survey took place before many Americans had heard about, or thought about, the implications. The Newsweek Poll also reached twice as many Americans.

BBMS Comment

Sunday, May 14, 2006

A.K.;

I'm sure most of your readers have 'cottoned on' to the tendency of the WP, Newsweek and the American Mainstream Corporate Media generally to understate the importance of many of the issues attached to the Bush Administration. Many of us up here north of the 49th are completely baffled by what we see and hear.

Its not that we necessarily feel we are owed an explanation, [if we did, I’m sure most Americans would agree we are likely to be disappointed] but the truth of the matter is, we suffer for want of one. The poll results you cite are a case in point.

A poll conducted by CBS & NYT ‘long about last February asked a similar question. My recollection of the question is: ‘Would you, or would you not, be willing to let the government monitor your phone calls and emails as part of it's campaign against the threat of terrorism against the US?’ The results of that poll indicated that 70% of Americans were opposed to this practice.

Since then, support for, and confidence in, the Presidency has dropped 10 percentage points, AND, trust in the MSM in the US is even lower than trust in the government, according to a London Times Poll taken recently.

So, you see at least part of the reason for our bafflement. Trying to form a coherent picture of Life in America affords about the same kind of challenge you would face if someone took a handful of tiles from 3 or 4 different jigsaw puzzles, tossed them into one box with a picture of a fourth puzzle on the top, and tasked you to put it together. The project sure keeps a body busy; but the results are not satisfying.

The picture that has emerged thus far rather looks like a country with an executive presenting ALL the clinical diagnostic criteria of a "Dry Drunk", a Congress that behaves like an "Enabler", a Senate “Pushing” Lobbyists’ Dope, an Economy that is in the “Tank”, and a media that is in "Denial". The American People come out looking completely narcotized; which, under these circumstances is not surprising.

One take on these results could well be that those polled by WP/Newsweek are just too exasperated to care much any more what the government is doing to them; it almost looks like a ‘white flag’ gesture.

00Buck

AK said...

I agree that the poll results are somewhat confounding. It's important to remember, though, that the Washington Post poll was conducted very soon after the revelations (the same evening the USA Today story was published), and many people may not have had a chance to learn details about the program.

As to the CBS/NYT poll you cite, the only explanation I can think of is that Americans see a distinction between the NSA's data mining and what they would consider "monitor[ing]" their phone calls. Most Americans, I think, would have a very serious problem if the government were actually listening in on, or reading, their communications. At least as USA Today describes the program, that doesn't appear to be occurring (yet).

I also agree it's somewhat perplexing that there remains such a disconnect between Bush's public approval rating and the public's tolerance for counterterrorism measures implemented by his administration. Since 9/11, however, Americans have revealed themselves to be quite risk-averse -- willing to tolerate all sorts of practices that previously they would have vehemently resisted. Quite simply, they're willing to put up with counterterrorism policies that they believe will make them safer -- even if those policies come from a White House that has revealed itself to be unprecedentedly inept.

New poll on NSA domestic data mining

Posted By AK Mon. May 15

USA Today:

A majority of Americans disapprove of a massive Pentagon database containing the records of billions of phone calls made by ordinary citizens, according to a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll. About two-thirds are concerned that the program may signal other, not-yet-disclosed efforts to gather information on the general public.
...
By 51%-43%, those polled disapprove of the program, disclosed Thursday in USA TODAY.

BBMS Comment: Later that same day.

AK:

As you have aptly noted today [May 15]; the USA Today/Gallup poll indicates a shift in opinion (again, a sub-standard sample. It should be at least 1000 +) from Fridays ABC/Washington Post poll. But it still indicates the polled public is pretty much equally divided on the issue. The reason this troubles me can be cited with reference [back] to Friday’s poll.

My 'BS-o-meter' started making a racket as soon as I saw/heard the results. I’m sure your sources will confirm the widespread citing of these results over the weekend, and how this tended to dampen criticism of NSA’s monitoring program. I’ve seen this pattern repeated in the US MSM over and over since the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq. What those poll results ‘seemed’ to indicate is what will stick to the wall for a long time; and it takes a lot more time and effort to clean a spot than it does to make one.

What I haven’t heard are serious challenges to the legitimacy of publishing a poll based on only 500 contacts. That figure doesn’t meet the threshold for ensuring a random sampling with respect to US population demographics. Neither does the brief window of time in which the poll was taken. Taken together, these factors bring into question the purported margin of error of 4.5%.

If the poll had been taken by/published in a small, family-owned newspaper using the same methodology, and had the results been damning of the NSA program, I think the MSM would have treated it very differently, assuming they would have bothered to pick it up at all. It is doubtful it would have been deemed worthy to make the front pages, and, in my opinion, the essay would have been to undermine the credibility of the publication for attributing statistical significance to the results. Based on the WP’s track record of late, I’m pretty sure there would have been accusations of political bias and journalistic irresponsibility.

In short; I am confident the “story” would have been a case for shooting the messenger.

Data Mining versus Monitoring
Why this troubles and baffles me is the apparent disconnect between extant information about the current administration and the logical conclusions a reasonable person would make based on that information.

In the interest of brevity, a partial list of ordinates that inform my understanding include:

1. The dissembling/prevarication of intelligence information vis. Iraq in 2001
2. The dissembling/withholding of information vis. NSA and DoD [domestic] activities
3. The dissembling of Administrations role vis. Katrina
4. The Administration’s disregard for the UN
5. The Administration’s questionable respect for Human Rights vis. POW’s
6. PNAC Initial Report (1997), The Signatories and the Follow up(s)
7. THE PRESIDENT'S NATIONAL SECURITY STRATEGY; March 2006
8. The subjugation of the Elected Legislature to the disposition of the Administration (“The Decider”) viz. “SIGNING STATEMENTS”
9. Walker’s GOA TREASURY REPORT for 2005; STRATEGIC PLAN for 2006, PERFORMANCE and ACCOUNTABILITY HILIGHTS
10. John Snow’s Budget Forecasts for 2005 and 2006

Having followed your blog for a couple of months, I am confident you are hip to all these points of reference; I just want to economize on bandwidth by letting you know, so am I. I include #9 and #10 by way of underscoring the manner in which the Administration has dissembled/minimized the significance of these reports; … a practice that appears to be abetted wholesale by the US MSM, and is arguably insidious.

The elemental question that connects these 10 items is; what has this Administration done with information it has gathered? It can be convincingly argued that in each case, the Executive has collectively and severally abused their oaths of office to uphold the Constitution and to faithfully execute their duties and responsibilities.

Especially egregious from the POV of other Sovereign Nations [like Canada] is the conjunction of #6 and #7. Taken together, these articulate a manifesto that canonizes American hegemony as divine right and equates all matters that pertain to US Global influence and economic interests with legitimate National Security Interests. In other words, any interference with American perceived needs, wants or desires is a de facto threat to American National Security. This policy framework is tantamount to dismissing the sovereign rights of all other nations in determining foreign, domestic and economic policies, and it subjugates these rights to the approval of the United States under threat of unilateral pre-emption or interdiction by force.

Had congress been fully informed as to the frailty of the intelligence cited as justification for the Invasion of Iraq, had it been cognizant of the trillions of dollars that shall ultimately attach to the War, if it was aware of the damage to US credibility that was to ensue, it would not have acceded to the War, nor would it have failed to challenge Budget(s) carefully contrived to conceal the real costs through discretionary post hoc diversions.

Similarly, the cloaking of domestic intelligence gathering in National Security language has prejudiced Legislative oversight and effectively sequestered Congressional committees from peer, Judicial, and voter view. NSA, DoD, DHS, DEA, CIA and FBI now all have access to personal and heretofore private information on citizens of the US, which information is now being legally “classified” and therefore not subject to challenge or appeal; rendered inaccessible even through the Freedom of Information Act.

The abstraction of the Executive from Constitutional (Judicial) purview on the basis of Privilege deriving from National Security and rendering new legislation into palimpsests upon which to ‘forge’ Presidential “Signing Statements”, substantively alters the contract that has existed since 1876 between the American public and it’s elected representatives. Critics are caught in the logical loop of “begging the question” To assert that the executive might be violating the Constitution, ignoring Congress or just plain breaking a variety of civil and criminal laws and codes is moot if the executive can override/overwrite/interpret or void any law on the books as it pertains to them.

Obscuring domestic spying by presuming to scatter a variety of technical definitions in the way doesn’t change the nature of the beast. Terms such as “Monitoring”, “Data Mining”, “Call-Tracking”,"terrorist surveillance program",
etc. seem to indicate some nice distinctions only ‘cognoscenti’ with peculiar savvy sets could be expected to understand. What seems to be ignored is that no matter what the data bases contain, something is intended to be done with it, and someone is going to be in the position to evaluate and render an interpretation of the information and assign levels of risk, now and for years to come.

Anyone accidentally tripping a telephone “monitoring” algorithm in the course of high school or university study, or someone using the internet as a tool of satisfying intellectual curiosity will produce a ‘daemon alert’, or a red flag, or a blip of some sort. And a file will be automatically created. From then on, every accidental blip will accumulate in that file and personal names, addresses, SINs, DL #s, “Known Associates”, etc., will be attached to it.

By’n bye, that student, or even an old girlfriend (known associate) from his email address book long ago, might apply for a position requiring a basic security check or even a security clearance for university grant money, defense contract or government job. Since everything about the ‘intelligence’ is “Classified”, the applicant would have no way of redressing a rejection of a security clearance. All anyone would know was that at one point a file was started and maintained; indicating suspicion of something relating to “National Security”. The ease with which this protocol could be used to impair the careers of individuals politically unsympathetic to a Party or to government in general is patently Orwellian.

The swiftness with which this Administration was able to contractually compromise AT&T, Bell South and Verizon by entrapment into abdicating their responsibility to protect their customers under Section 222 of the Communications Act is a good indication of just how Orwellian this issue is. I use the word, “entrapment” advisedly. First; the government contracted to pay them for the information; then, leveraged the offer with threats they would be liable to reprisal by violating “National Security” if they demurred. FISA was not invited to opine upon the matter, presumably ‘trumped’ by the USA Patriot Act. FISA wasn't fast enough to be patriotic, evidently.

An assessment of the legitimacy of domestic intelligence gathering as a counter-terrorist tool must be predicated on the assumption that a threat to American vested interests has been identified and that people living within it’s borders are implicated. Reflecting upon this Administration’s performance; it’s reliability in gathering, interpreting and deploying intelligence, the poll results suggest the ‘civvies’ abide in a somewhat serendipitous state of mind as to what, and who is assumed to present the greatest threat.

The ABC/WP poll, by virtue of timing and content, seemed like an attempt to predispose America to feel there was nothing alarming about the announcement of the extent of domestic spying by muting the bell before ringing it.

Putin has been up to similar shenanigans and Cheney unabashedly called him on it last week. If another democracy, say France, had been perpetrating the same Constitutional infringements and misdemeanors as [this Admin has practiced in] the US, I am confident the American Press and The White House would be all over it like pink on a pig, and opinions would not reflect ambivalence.

What’s it going to take; d’ya think?

Roderick Whitney Stillwell
The Boundary Bay Morning Steamer

“Oh Say Can You See…”

“Oh Say Can You See…”
Or
“The US Wants to Give Canada BO”

The Boundary Bay Morning Steamer®
Boundary Bay, B.C. (bbmornsteamer@dccnet.com) Sunday April 30, 2006

Editor: Roderick Whitney Stillwell
Senior Staff Writer: 00Buck

You never know what will get you going; eh? Most of the people I admit to knowing only know of Bill O’reilly by hearsay. To those of us with basic cable (we don't get him... no pun intended) , he’s a bit like the invisible man of lore:

“The other day upon the stair,
I met a man who wasn’t there.
He wasn’t there again today.
Oh dear; I wish he’d go away.”

One web site I frequent, http://mediamatters.org/, enjoys making sport of this imperfectly formed quackfish. I credit them for their pains; the same way I give credit to vice cops who have to watch child-porn videos when following the trail left by the 'slithies' that produce them. I am also grateful for MM’s dogged coverage; otherwise I might squander my equanimity when I could be discovering things going on out there that I want to be offended at.

Hosts of the MM site describe their mission thusly:
“Media Matters for America is a Web-based, not-for-profit, 501(c)(3) progressive research and information center dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media.”

I infer from the way the US Media slings their lingo, that Americans employ a modified form of the word “conservative” from the one ‘brere’ Noah [Webster] bequeathed to them. Either that or they have surrendered the theatre of the “preposterous misinformation in the U.S. media” to a bigger army.

I really didn’t give a hoot about what BO was reported to have said about us [Canada], he doesn’t know enough about Canada or Canadians to have an opinion, and his apparent burden of information about his own country appears to be a poorly executed illusion created by being orally ‘sumpted’ by station interns; who can read. Such a waste of potential; if only he had applied himself as a youth, he could have been an accomplished punk, instead of just a mediocre one.

What was interesting were comments about the piece provided by other Media Matters 'aficionados'. Unfortunately, the thread had already been archived, and I blithely proceeded to bash out a comment of my own by way of improving upon one that I liked. What follows are the original lump of hurl offered up on BO’s radio vomitory last Thursday, the comment that got me started, and lastly my languishing repost.

Media Matters headed the thread:

“O'Reilly failed his own "civics test"; will he deport himself to Canada?”

“Summary: On the same edition of his radio show in which he misidentified the energy secretary, Bill O'Reilly proposed a "bill" to deport to Canada "high school kids in this country [who] couldn't pass a civics test," because they "don't know what the House of Representatives is; they don't know what the judicial branch is."
[.....]
“So, I have a bill that would throw all those kids out. All right? Let's do that. Let's get rid of all these dopey kids. OK? Y'all with me on that one? Can't pass the civics test, Seymour? Say hello to Canada.” J.M

pleindepoisson commented:

“People joke, but...

People say they're going to move to Canada, but usually it's humorous. “As soon as I finish college, I'm moving to Canada”. Well, that's not entirely true. I'm going to go live somewhere in the US for a year and hold a job, then move to Canada. It's easier to get in that way, if I have a year under my belt.”
Posted by - pleinedepoisson Thursday April 27, 2006 06:00:05 PM EST
http://mediamatters.org/items/200604270011?offset=20&show=1#comments

Bonjour pleinedepoisson;

True American Patriots ARE moving to Canada; more than many realize. Most do it quietly; keeping a low profile so's not to startle our bureaucrats and complicate the formalities. They aren’t doing it as protest; they’re doing it because they’re ashamed, afraid, and demoralized. Mention the likes of Bill O’reilly, Ann Coulter, Pat Buchanan or Tucker Carlson to them and they get this baleful look of despair; as if you’d inadvertently reminded them that their children have turned out to be crack whores and pimps: and have syphilis.

One exception to those flying in under NORAD radars is the great x? grandson of Francis Scott Key, Christopher Key [1]; Viet Nam vet and unabashed lover of the America that was. In a TV interview with Vicki Gabereau in March, he cited 3 reasons for his decision to immigrate:

Ø the level of intolerance,
Ø widespread pathological ignorance, and
Ø omnipresent violence

According to Chris, all of these have become accepted norms all across the US.

Mr. Key’s laments and observations came as no surprise. I live ON the 49th and schmooze with friends and acquaintances in Point Roberts, WA daily. Our (grand)kids play together on the beach in Summer and we routinely chat thru the "fence" while our pooches swap salutary ‘notes’;… all of us regarding the border with a kind of abstract bemusement like students on adjacent university campuses.

At least it was that way before Bush.

Now, instead of chats about the tides, the kids, and the cheapest side to get gas on today, our encounters usually invoke at least one sheepish ,’quasi-casual’, query about getting a job in BC and how that might help in settling here permanently. Although the rush is over, the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs (DIMA) web site in November 2005 cited 115,000 inquiries a day from the States. The last figure I saw cited 21,000 a day.

Six years ago, summer homes I see from my dining room over on the US side, sold for 1.3 times what my house was listing. Now, abodes in that same neighborhood might languish on the listings at a quarter to one third that of mine; some haven't even been occupied in 1-2 years. Although such discrepancies are not the rule, 2-3 years ago, they were unheard of.

There are other economic incentives for those contemplating “Movin’ On Up”. US financial papers are understandably mum on the subject, but; even though Canada is still way behind the US in terms of productivity, and even though our transportation, heating and material goods costs are considerably higher, the US dollar has dropped by 40% against the Canadian dollar in just 5 years. Media ebullience about US financial health is baffling; like the pet shop owner in the Monty Python skit, blithely assuring John Cleese that the parrot he fobbed off on him wasn’t really all that dead.

Invoking a different metaphore: the Bush Administration acts like a football team’s Front Office, bruiting the wondrous health and vitality of the squad, while the coroner is arguing with the team doctor about taking it’s liver temperature to estimate the time of death.

The American Corporate Media Ensemble (ACME) financial journalists seem mesmerized by the Front Office PR. Their hype would make anyone think they were having an ‘apple pie’ flashback; verily transporting readers into Norman Rockwell’s “Thanksgiving” on the front page of the Saturday Evening Post. Other sources [2], arguably more objective ones, show that the US has fallen to 37th in the world in terms of ability to deliver quality health care, one in five Americans is functionally illiterate and lacks basic math skills (four times the Canadian illiteracy rate), the standard of education provided by US public schools dropped to 18th among English speaking countries in 2004, and the Real National Debt is not the $8.3 trillion cited most often in the Press; its $46 trillion [3] (GAO Treasury Report, Dec. 2005).
The Trade Surplus forecast by Treasury Secretary John Snow in 2004 for 2005 turned into a Trade Deficit of $756 billion according to the same GAO report.

Every baby born in the United States today comes with an FOB bill of lading for $156,000, and the nation’s debt is mushrooming by $2 billion every 24 hours. The wee thing hardly needs a slap on the bum to start crying. Yet the front pages of the financial papers would have Americans wax rapt over a growing GDP and (artificially) low interest rates! ‘Hell’s Bells’; what 'company' couldn’t increase production if it was borrowing $2 billion a day to do it?

This isn’t a Norman Rockwell print; it’s a chalk outline.

If Christopher Key’s granddad was writing the “Star Spangled Banner” today, he might well leave off after the first line; “Oh say can you see…..” pour out the jar of Kentucky mash and reach for the “Canadian Club”.

A word of caution to anyone thinking of moving North; the lot we’ve got on Capitol Hill isn’t anything you’ll want to write back home about; either. If you could persuade Colin Powell to come along with you, there is a good chance we would waive the usual residency and citizenship folderol and proclaim him king. Its not that we lack excellent and worthy minds among our available representatives; its just that we could really use a competent leader.

roderick whitney stillwell

The Boundary Bay Morning Steamer

[1] http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0208-02.htm
http://thetyee.ca/Views/2004/12/30/MoveToCanada/
http://bc.indymedia.org/newswire/display/247/index.php

[2] http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/7/20486/49640

[3] “Including these items, the federal government’s fiscal exposures now total more
than $46 trillion, up from about $20 trillion in 2000. This translates into a burden of about
$156,000 per American or approximately $375,000 per full-time worker, up from
$72,000 and $165,000 respectively, in 2000. These amounts do not include future costs
resulting from Hurricane Katrina or the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Continuing on
this unsustainable path will gradually erode, if not suddenly damage, our economy, our standard of living, and ultimately our national security"
David M. Walker
Comptroller General
of the United States
http://www.gao.gov.