OpenGov - Open Government Brainstorm

I've never heard of the FISA protections. Do you have more details?

All the authoritative sources either only describe FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) after its latest amendment (or destruction, according to many civil libertarians) in Feb 2008, (like the doj.gov site) or they require following a lot of links to learn what it was originally and how it changed the 3 times it was amended.

The only succinct, self-contained explanation I could find is a blog post with a clearly stated point of view. The opinions in the post are well-distinguished from the facts and the facts as posted are an accurate condensation of those in all the lengthy articles + links. It is a good place to start. Here's the URL: http://liam-and-janet.blogspot.com/2008/07/what-is-fisa-anyway.html

If you want more detailed information, follow the links and external-sourced footnotes in the "Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act" article in Wikipedia. They are extremely lengthy and complete.

I'm definitely in favor of freedom, but this sounds like a very controversial way to get it. Can't we just repeal the Patriot Act? Would that be enough?

Reopening FISA would be a smaller change than overturning the entire Patriot Act, so actually easier and less controversial. The decimation of FISA, and the chilling effect of lack of court oversight of gov't surveillance, also has direct relevance to the topic of gov't transparency, which is why I posted the above proposal on this site.

The problems caused by the Patriot Act are a knotty, but very important, issue to be discussed elsewhere.

Oh, and I forgot to add, there was overwhelming public support for retaining the safety provisions of the FISA and the culpability of the telecommunications cos. before the June and July 2008 votes in Congress. 100's of thousands of people signed the many online petitions opposing the changes. See www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/07/09/fisa_vote/

I voted yes on it. You seem to know your stuff and would support a better option if it was available.

63. Vote NO on Senate Resolution 773: Cybersecurity Act of 2009 – This law will moderate the current free speech internet by allowing unprecedented government access to servers, all in the name of national security. This must not happen. The internet is the last bastion of free thought. Our other media outlets, television, radio, and newsprint, are all compromised by controlling interests who moderate or script daily news. Internet is the last public free resource of information, untainted by those corrupting forces of government sponsorship. As this bill is currently written it would devastate freedom of speech all under the guise of protection from so called cyber attacks. This Act must not be passed as read on April 1, 2009.

• April 1, 2009, version, Section 14, part (b) FUNCTIONS – The Secretary of Commerce – (1) shall have access to all relevant data concerning such networks without regard to any provision of law, regulation, rule, or policy restricting such access.

• If congress wanted to reinforce cyber security all they need to do is reinforce their gate keeper code, meaning accessibility to their mainframes. This bill is an over achiever bill that has far too many powers for its purpose.

• Presently, all purchases over the internet are done sales tax free, this must continue. Any legislation by the state or federal government to place fees or sales taxes upon internet sales must be resisted and discouraged, under the pain of recall or impeachment, if necessary.

Thanks, KD. Writing my Senators today.