Americans' Privacy Strategies Post-Snowden
"It has been nearly two years since the first disclosures of government surveillance programs by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden and Americans are still coming to terms with how they feel about the programs and how to live in light of them. The documents leaked by Snowden revealed an array of activities in dozens of intelligence programs that collected data from large American technology companies, as well as the bulk collection of phone “metadata” from telecommunications companies that officials say are important to protecting national security. The metadata includes information about who phone users call, when they call, and for how long. The documents further detail the collection of Web traffic around the globe, and efforts to break the security of mobile phones and Web infrastructure.

A new survey by the Pew Research Center asked American adults what they think of the programs, the way they are run and monitored, and whether they have altered their communication habits and online activities since learning about the details of the surveillance. The notable findings in this survey fall into two broad categories: 1) the ways people have personally responded in light of their awareness of the government surveillance programs and 2) their views about the way the programs are run and the people who should be targeted by government surveillance."

Social Media and the "Spiral of Silence"
A major insight into human behavior from pre-internet era studies of communication is the tendency of people not to speak up about policy issues in public—or among their family, friends, and work colleagues—when they believe their own point of view is not widely shared. This tendency is called the 'spiral of silence.'¹
 
Some social media creators and supporters have hoped that social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter might produce different enough discussion venues that those with minority views might feel freer to express their opinions, thus broadening public discourse and adding new perspectives to everyday discussion of political issues."

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Glenn Greenwald to Publish Names of Americans NSA Spied On

Those who have grown apathetic about the National Security Agency violating privacy rights, may soon find their interest renewed, as the political is about to get very personal. According to The Sunday Times of London, Glenn Greenwald will publish the names of Americans targeted by the NSA.
“One of the big questions when it comes to domestic spying is, ‘Who have been the NSA’s specific targets?’” he told the Times. “Are they political critics and dissidents and activists? Are they genuinely people we’d regard as terrorists? What are the metrics and calculations that go into choosing those targets and what is done with the surveillance that is conducted? Those are the kinds of questions that I want to still answer.”

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‘Why Have You Gone to Russia Three Times in Two Months?’—Heathrow Customs Agent Interrogates Snowden Lawyer

A lawyer who represents National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden and has spoken on his behalf numerous times was detained while going through customs at Heathrow airport in London.

Jesselyn Radack told Firedoglake she was directed to a specific Heathrow Border Force agent. He “didn’t seem interested” in her passport. She was then subjected to “very hostile questioning.”

As Radack recalled, she was asked why she was here. “To see friends,” she answered. “Who will you be seeing?” She answered, “A group called Sam Adams Associates.”

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"Snowden Was Justified." Get the Facts and You’ll Likely Agree.

A New York audience devoted nearly two hours yesterday evening to a riveting Intelligence Squared debate about Edward Snowden and the surveillance regime that his disclosures revealed.

The motion up for debate was "Snowden Was Justified." Arguing for the motion were Daniel Ellsberg, of Pentagon Papers fame, and Ben Wizner, Edward Snowden's legal advisor and the director of the ACLU's Speech, Privacy & Technology Project. They debated Andrew C. McCarthy, a former federal prosecutor, and Ambassador R. James Woolsey, a former CIA director. A pre-debate vote revealed the audience's feelings on the whistleblower to be evenly split, with 29 percent for the motion, 29 percent against, and 42 percent undecided.

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AG Eric Holder Against Clemency For Snowden, For It For Marc Rich

US Attorney General Eric Holder has an interesting standard for clemency. Last week Holder said he was open to having a discussion on giving the whistleblower Edward Snowden a reduced sentence but that full clemency was “going too far.” And to some degree it would be inconsistent given the Obama Administration’s wild and outrageous attack on whistleblowers and journalists for Holder to say anything different.

But while Holder has become notorious for going soft on Wall Street as Attorney General, as Deputy Attorney General in the Clinton Administration he was part of one of the most controversial pardons in American history. A pardon so odious many thought it would disqualify Holder from becoming AG in the first place.

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American Privacy Is Vanishing as the Government and Corporations Raid Our Online Lives

 Was 2013 the year online privacy died? Or was it the year that people paying attention realized that their online lives—and all their data and communications—was low-hanging fruit that was being picked and parsed by big government and big business.
  
Edward Snowden’s theft of what’s now said to be 1.7 million files showed the world that America’s spymasters were grabbing everything that passed between smart phones, Wi-Fi signals, laptops, and those devices’ contents: account log-ins, passwords, etc. As 2014 began, The Washington Post reported that the National Security Agency was building “a computer that could break nearly every kind of encryption used to protect banking, medical, business and government records around the world.”

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NSA Statement - No denial they are spying on Congress

Whenever you're ready, dear Congressional members. We're all waiting for you to show some balls here. Just wondering how much more it's going to take:

The National Security Agency on Saturday released a statement in answer to questions from a senator about whether it “has spied, or is … currently spying, on members of Congress or other American elected officials”, in which it did not deny collecting communications from legislators of the US Congress to whom it says it is accountable.

Yes, Congress, they're spying on you too:

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10 Disruptors: People Who Really Shook Up the System in 2013

Americans live in a country lorded over by corporate and banking power. Our big business culture is accompanied by a pervasive and extraordinarily expensive military dominating the globe, ensuring our economic hegemony and protecting our interests. Meanwhile, there is a steady push to privatize as much of the public sector for private profit as achievable, especially in the education sphere.

 

In addition, the intelligentsia, the hipsters and the most progressive people embrace the corrupt company that is Apple; we are seduced by the beautiful functionality and design of its products, ignoring the fact that Apple is a corporation that is not friendly to America. Despite its rank at the top of the most profitable corporations, Apple gives almost no money to charity—a legacy of Steve Jobs—and as  Business Insider describes: Apple avoids $17 million in taxes everyday "through a ballsy... tax avoidance scheme." 

 

As consumers we often shop and eat at huge companies like Walmart, Dardens and McDonald's—companies that don't pay their employees living wages, or remotely what they could, given the  historic profits they're earning. 

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