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Bill to Restrict N.S.A. Data Collection Blocked in Vote by Senate Republicans

233 points by danielnaab 12y ago

JumpCrisscross 12y ago
> With the bill’s defeat, the Senate faces a hard deadline for new legislation since the legal basis for the phone records program, a provision of the Patriot Act, expires in June. After that, when the 90-day orders to phone companies requiring them to turn over their customers’ records expire, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court would be unable to issue a new round of orders. Given the "rifts between the [GOP's] interventionist and more libertarian-leaning wings," what are the probable endgames? Specifically, what are the odds of–and promoting factors for–an obstructionist minority flipping over the table in June?
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- Hario 12y ago
  D's lost 8, R's gained 8 in the latest election. Assuming no new R's vote right, that gets us to a vote of 50 / 50, with Biden getting the deciding vote. However, in the modern filibustering Senate, 41 Senators can kill any bill. So in theory, if everyone who voted for the bill hangs tight, they could destroy any new legislation, including PATRIOT ACT reauthorization. However, I'd be quite surprised if neither of these things happen: 1. McConnell decides the filibuster no longer works for him, so he kills it. 2. Obama puts remarkable pressure on fellow D's and they buckle. But theoretically, we have all the votes we need. And if 1 new R senator joins the anti-NSA caucus (and all the D Senators hang tight, and all the D senators are good on the issue), they wouldn't even be a minority -- they'd have 51 votes. Hope that makes sense.
  - protomyth 12y ago
    I'm away from my lists, but some of the new R Senators will vote anti-NSA with Paul / Cruz. I would imagine the Patriot Act reauthorization might be problematic.
    - _delirium 12y ago
      This article characterizes the new R senators as belonging more to the establishment wing of the party, in part because the party was fairly successful in getting its preferred candidates through the primaries, avoiding some of the surprises that characterized 2010/2012: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/16/us/new-senators-tilt-gop-back-toward-insiders.html http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/16/us/new-senators-tilt-gop-b... Some do have more track record in that regard than others though, so it might be that they won't all side with the national-security conservatives.
      - protomyth 12y ago
        4 were swept into the House in the wave that brought the R majority and their voting record isn't exactly all happy happy with the establishment. Joni Ernst is not establishment. I am not sure about the other 2. There were a lot a jockeying and some losses from the outsiders, but remember that Cantor got beat in the primary.
bobsil1 12y ago
dm;we (doesn't matter; will encrypt) Entire consumer stack will go encrypted.
- meepmorp 12y ago
  MITM
- slang800 12y ago
  Encryption doesn't quite solve everything here - the NSA can still demand the encryption keys, or demand direct modifications to the service like logging being installed. To solve this from a purely technical standpoint we'd need to design services where the service provider is a completely untrusted party - never allowed to see or manipulate user data on the backend, and all processing that requires decrypted user data would need to be moved to the client. We would also need a way to verify client code to ensure that malicious changes haven't been introduced. And finally, we would need a way to anonymize all requests to the backend. An architecture like this is pretty hard to implement, so it would be nice if we could just get the NSA to stop.
  - fru2013 12y ago
    This is true, but even if the NSA were not a problem we should move to that architecture anyway.
  - bobsil1 12y ago
    It stops mass spying, targeted is fine if legit. The NSA will not stop because DC wants to spy on governors, lawyers, judges, companies, etc. NSA has been illegally spying domestically since its inception, which was itself an undemocratic exec order. Only Supreme Court will restrain, and doesn't protect against Chinese and Russian hackers. So encryption throughout consumer tech stack and net protocols is the only answer.
Hario 12y ago
Nice of the article to clearly lay out the partisan divisions here. None of that "blame both sides" bs. The vote: All D's voted right except Bill Nelson of Florida. All R's voted wrong except Cruz, Lee, Heller, Paul, and Murkowski. Where "right" means "for the overhaul bill" and "wrong" means the opposite. You'll also notice that this bill got way over 50 votes, but still failed due to the modern filibuster.
- techrat 12y ago
  The next two years are going to be full of "wrong" votes.
  - deciplex 12y ago
    Two? You're awfully optimistic.
  - protomyth 12y ago
    Probably, but some of the new R's in the Senate would follow Paul / Cruz on this vote.
    - deciplex 12y ago
      The new R's are going to do what they're told, just like Paul and Cruz did what they were told in this vote, as well: as stars of the Republican party, they were allowed to vote for cloture and deflect attacks on them in a year when the race for President heats up. And, they were allowed to do this because the leadership knew they already had the votes to block the bill.
      - themartorana 12y ago
        The party of keep-the-government-out-of-my-healthcare would very much like to keep it in absolutely everything else you do. These are not your Goldwater Republicans.
        12y ago
graeme 12y ago
Does anyone have a history of the "60 votes needed" to pass a bill in the Senate? I could have sworn that within my lifetime, the press talked about "50 votes needed" to pass a bill. Then at some point in the Bush years, threat of filibuster was regularly invoked, making 60 votes the requirement in practice. Now no one even mentions a filibuster. As a non-American, it's rather strange.
- mikeyouse 12y ago
  The threat of filibuster is implicit in the "60 votes needed" language. At 60 votes, the majority side can invoke 'cloture' which moves the bill to an actual vote, after which you only need 50 votes to pass. Prior to 60 votes, the minority side can pretty much endlessly delay the actual vote on the bill through filibusters and other parliamentary tactics. A good history of how we got to where we are: http://www.brookings.edu/research/testimony/2010/04/22-filibuster-binder http://www.brookings.edu/research/testimony/2010/04/22-filib... And the more encyclopedic answer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloture#United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloture#United_States
- Hario 12y ago
  This might be what you're looking for: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/post/the-history-of-the-filibuster-in-one-graph/2012/05/15/gIQAVHf0RU_blog.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/post/the-histor... Very briefly: In the mid years of Bush, the D Senate filibustered more than usual in regards to nominations of non-Supreme Court judges. In 2006, when Democrats took the Senate, the Republicans started filibustering up a storm. But no one in the press noticed because Bush would have veto'd anyway, so the balance of power didn't shift. As soon as Obama was elected, the Republican Senate had an internal meeting where they agreed to filibuster everything all the time -- legislation, judges, executive appointments, everything. Even legislation they supported, just to throw a wrench into the plans. It was a momentous change. The press failed to point it out or make an issue out of it. And here we are.
  - graeme 12y ago
    Thanks, that's the summary I was looking for. I remember that shift happened, and thinking "that's odd". Then I checked out of politics for a few years, and noticed the current language, which doesn't even reference filibusters. I am now curious to see if things will shift back once there's a Republican president. The Republicans seem far better at press management than the Democrats.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
- tptacek 12y ago
  Both Cruz and Lee are assumed to be in contention for 2016. Neither can reasonably expect the nomination, but both could, with a decent showing in the early primaries, end up with the VP nod. They are very unlikely to buck the party at such a sensitive time (the optics of doing so right before McConnell takes over as majority leader are bad).
  - fivedogit 12y ago
    But they did buck the party. This was a mostly dem-supported bill. http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=113&session=2&vote=00282 http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_c... Note: I deleted my original post because I mistakenly said Paul had voted for the bill. Paul voted with the establishment republicans (McConnell, etc) against (i.e. to keep the NSA as-is) Edit: Also, Cruz bucks the Republican leadership all the time. That's his thing and they hate him for it. He was the main force behind the government shutdown.
    - acdha 12y ago
      I think the key part here is that they're strongly associated with the Tea Party enough that they're not worried about a challenge from the right in the next election cycle. I doubt we'll see very many others feel comfortable straying out of the fold unless it's something which is really important to voters back home.
    - lvh 12y ago
      Paul explained why: http://www.paul.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=1244 http://www.paul.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=1244 TL;DR: Paul voted against this act because voting for it means renewing the PATRIOT Act for another couple of years.
    - deleted 12y ago
      [deleted]
ninguem2 12y ago
Wasn't the program created by executive order? Can't it be dismantled the same way?
- pmorici 12y ago
  If you are talking about the Bush executive order congress went and passed laws legitimizing it after it was leaked in the press.
  - dllthomas 12y ago
    It may well still be able to be dismantled by executive order. Just 1) the next President could put it together again, and 2) Obama doesn't have much interest in dismantling it in the first place.
    - bediger4000 12y ago
      In 2008 he campaigned against dragnet (or at least warrantless) surveillance. Obama's wikipedia entry says he taught constitutional law for twelve years or so. Why is Obama not interested in dismantling dragnet surveillance? He also worked as a civil rights lawyer. Obama has the education and experience to know that surveillance has lots of bad effects, and that some secret special reading of a law doesn't make it legal or ethical or constitutional. Why didn't Obama dismantle the universal-as-possible surveillance?
      - 001sky 12y ago
        This is a really fair question. I think it is simply he doesn't want to look weak. The political problem with him fixing the EOs is he has to sign them. This is just a publicity stunt to blame someone else for not doing something he lacks the courage to do himself. Its truly mind-bending. A good leader would dix the stuff he can fix by himself and then work with other people to fix what needs to be fixed by consensus. POTUS is not that guy, tho.
      - djloche 12y ago
enlightenedfool 12y ago
I think they just reflect what the people want. In other words, a majority of American population does not want overhaul of NSA program. Right or wrong we will see in the future.
- krapp 12y ago
  Yes and no. The parties have successfully rigged the system such that they only need to cater to lobbyists, and the extremist wings of their respective parties, to maintain power. It really wouldn't matter what the majority of Americans believed, notwithstanding that a majority of Americans probably would view the NSA programs as, at worst, a necessary evil. You also have to take into account the politics approaching the upcoming presidential election.
  - bavcyc 12y ago
    Matt Taibbi is a good writer to read in regards to how Washington really works. I can't remember which of his books had the best example, but the system is broke.
- waterlesscloud 12y ago
  Some sort of NSA data collection reform has been supported in polls pretty consistently around 60-70%. Americans want something done.
suprgeek 12y ago
So that's it - the net legislative effect of all the "bombshell" disclosures that Ed Snowden made has been what - Nothing, NADA, Zilch. Proving once again that going thru "Official" Channels was never an option. That in the toxic hyper-partisan environment of Washington the Powerful will find a way to kill any meaningful reform of even the worst abuses. The solution to this has to be first and foremost Technological.
- pXMzR2A 12y ago
  A little bit familiarity with the US ways of congress tells me that this comment is most probably right about this and that the voters need to be categorized qualitatively ("Why did you vote against?) rather than quantitatively ("Did you vote against?): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8627770 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8627770
- vitno 12y ago
  saying that it is "Technological" is merely dodging what you are actually doing is a technology based form of rebellion. It is the statement that the government is not correct, and that the people can organize and do better. I very much agree, but keep that in mind.
- andrewfong 12y ago
  First, a single political defeat is not the end-all-be-all here. Politics may move slowly, but it does move (e.g. the political status of a black lesbian is undoubtedly better today than it was 50 years ago). Second, technology and political are not an either/or proposition (or even a primary/secondary proposition). IMHO, it's something like: Privacy = Technology * Politics. Simply stressing one will give you (relative) diminishing returns if you don't push the other as well. Good encryption can make it difficult for the NSA to conduct widespread online surveillance, but given (a) the difficulty of getting crypto right, (b) the sheer number of organizations with the ability to (intentionally or unintentionally) compromise security for a large number of users, and (c) the relatively low impact privacy and security have on purchasing decisions for many (if not most) people, it's something like the size of the NSA's budget (a political question) that will ultimately determine whether mass surveillance is prohibitively expensive or merely inconvenient.
001sky 12y ago
"Bill to Restrict Data Collection Blocked in Vote " -- actual title
- mikeyouse 12y ago
  The title on the article changed after it was submitted here. From NYTimes twitter: https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/534873348686495745 https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/534873348686495745
  - 001sky 12y ago
    This is a common tactic for NY times articles.
DanielBMarkham 12y ago
I have no pity for the Republicans and every one that voted against it needs to be reminded of it every day from now until election. I'm also not such a noob at politics that I think this is the entire story. Democrats knew this wouldn't pass. This was their last couple of months of control. So it's a poke in the eye to Republicans on the way out. The really interesting counter-factual here is what would have happened if a large block of Republicans switched up. My bet is that you'd see quite a few defections in the Democratic camp. If I'm a politician, I can either support something, oppose something, look like I'm supporting something when I really don't, or look like I'm opposing something when I really support it. The key issue isn't my stance, it's how I can position myself against the other politicians. I'd love to see movement on this. Not for a second did I think this vote was anything but political posturing. But still -- any vote is a good one. Just wish it would have actually meant something instead of more fodder for all the partisans to throw dung at each other. It also looks like the beginning of "See! If we were just back in power, this time we'd really fix all those problems we approved of and encouraged the last time we were there!" I wonder if this will have any traction among the base, which was the entire point. Sadly, I think it will.
dobbsbob 12y ago
At least your media even talks about this, I'm in a 5 Eyes Alliance country and none of them have written anything except excuses why we should be under 24/7 surveillance. Our senate can't even block bills.
paulhauggis 12y ago
The democrats want the government to control everything. Do you think we will have less data collection when we have universal health care? How about making the Internet a "utility"? You don't think when this happen there won't be a direct pipe to our data?? I can't believe anything I read on the Internet anymore. I would be interested to see why they voted against it. I'm shocked that a group that claims they are open and accepting, yet when the word republican is used, the tactics and tone change to that of the people you are against (personal attacks, slander, bigotry, and bias). It's because most of it is bullshit. There is only acceptance when someone aligns with your personal beliefs. I can see how evil dictators can come into power. The average person can so easily be swayed by emotion.
WBrentWilliams 12y ago
If what the purest form of this bill was trying to do is important to you and you're from the US, keep working for it. I suggest the following: 1) Show up at the primaries. 2) Reform your local laws to allow you to vote in the primaries for both parties. 3) Don't shut up. Keep talking. 4) Keep in mind, at all times, that the fight isn't over once the NSA is squelched. AT&T et. al. still get to keep this information forever. 5) Think about parallels. Encryption isn't good enough, as the same kind of meta-data is generated when you visit an encrypted site. It's not any one activity it's the pattern of all activity that's important and no one is making anyone give up that data, either.
- bobsil1 12y ago
  Net architecture needs to go Tor-style.
adventured 12y ago
Anybody know who attached the Patriot Act renewal to this bill? Which politician/s specifically.
- mikeyouse 12y ago
  Only 3 provisions of the roughly 100 from the Patriot Act would be renewed with this bill[1], but that amendment was added on by one of the original authors of the Patriot Act, Jim Sensenbrenner (R)Wisconsin.[2] [1] - https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/11/usa-freedom-act-week-whats-come-and-what-you-need-know https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/11/usa-freedom-act-week-w... [2] - http://sensenbrenner.house.gov/biography/ http://sensenbrenner.house.gov/biography/
- desdiv 12y ago
  It was a "manager's amendment" from the House Judiciary Committee, meaning that it was a majority consensus of whole committee. Here are the 23 Republican members on the committee: Bob Goodlatte, Virginia, Chairman Jim Sensenbrenner, Wisconsin Howard Coble, North Carolina Lamar S. Smith, Texas Steve Chabot, Ohio Spencer Bachus of Alabama Darrell Issa, California Randy Forbes, Virginia Steve King, Iowa Trent Franks, Arizona Louie Gohmert, Texas Jim Jordan, Ohio Ted Poe, Texas Jason Chaffetz, Utah Tom Marino, Pennsylvania Trey Gowdy, South Carolina Mark Amodei, Nevada Raúl Labrador, Idaho Blake Farenthold, Texas George Holding, North Carolina Doug Collins, Georgia Ron DeSantis, Florida Jason T. Smith, Missouri
devindotcom 12y ago
Not to sound more cynical than the situation warrants, but in this case I'm not particularly surprised or disappointed. Congress is clueless and more concerned with partisan politics and re-election fundraising. We should be (and many are) working to secure ourselves so that Congress and the legal system must work to catch up to the possibilities of citizens to protect themselves on their own terms: good end-to-end encryption, true anonymity when it's needed, and as much open and auditable code as we can get. They're not going to give security and privacy to us — they wouldn't even if they could. So we make it ourselves, slowly, surely, and publicly, and maybe in a few years they'll be the ones that are outraged.
- xnull2guest 12y ago
  You will, however, be bound by current 'lawful intercept and storage' laws. If you provide a remote computing service (email, hosting, cloud storage, fitness tracking, etc) you will be bound by 18 U.S.C. § 2703(f) [1]. If you provide telecommunications you will be bound by CALEA [2]. You will be bound by the Stored Communications Act and by the Patriot Act, and you will be bound to provide access to the core of your service and/or your private keys if you are given an NSL. Essentially - you can not provide secure communication as a service. If you try to provide it as a product it's more blurry. With precedents like Blackberry, RSA and Skype you need to make sure you're operationally able to deal with extreme levels of leverage and influence. [1] http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2703 http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2703 [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications_Assistance_for_Law_Enforcement_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications_Assistance_for_...
  - joering2 12y ago
    Will this also apply if your server is outside US. Example: you're using an US company (Rackspace) that is hosting your website in HongKong. Is there anywhere a list of "nay" voters.. I want to put few phonecalls in place tomorrow, express my disgust.
    - quesera 12y ago
devindotcom 12y ago
Not to sound more cynical than the situation warrants, but in this case I'm not particularly surprised or disappointed. Congress is clueless and more concerned with partisan politics and re-election fundraising. We should be (and many are) working to secure ourselves so that Congress and the legal system must work to catch up to the possibilities of citizens to protect themselves on their own terms: good end-to-end encryption, true anonymity when it's needed, and as much open and auditable code as we can get. They're not going to give security and privacy to us — they wouldn't even if they could. So we make it ourselves, slowly, surely, and publicly, and maybe in a few years they'll be the ones that are outraged. (pasted from the other thread where I wrote this before I saw this one)
benguild 12y ago
I feel like the biggest problem we have is that whatever can be done will be done by other nations, so the USA has to break rules too. :(
- Havvy 12y ago
  Being spied on by your own country is worse than being spied on by other countries. Your own country doesn't have another country between you and it to protect you. Also, other countries will look at the USA and say 'we can do it because they do it', and that just leads to more problems. Eventually you have to say no to spying. It's morally and ethically unacceptable, and we should not tolerate anybody doing it.
  - Istof 12y ago
    When a country wants to spy on it's own citizen, they apparently think that it's acceptable to ask for that data from another country as opposed to being illegal when getting the data directly. USA <-> Germany being an example
tylerlh 12y ago
It's worth noting that the USA Freedom Act would have extended the Patriot Act until the end of 2017.
discardorama 12y ago
It's ironic that the same people who detest "big government" are for big government spying on them.
lettergram 12y ago
"“This is the worst possible time to be tying our hands behind our backs,” Mr. McConnell said before the vote, expressing the concerns of those who argued that the program was a vital tool in the fight against terrorism." When would be a good time? Seriously, I hate these arguments, because there is no reasoning with them. Sure, these various programs may have helped stop terrorism, or at least have the potential to. However, so would killing anyone (citizen or not) who has any potential threat. I would argue the later is even more effective, and uses the same chain of reasoning. Why then, can we not move past that and try to stand a bit more on law (being the constitution in this case), if not reason. Clearly, these programs are disliked by a large number (if not the majority) of the constituents these senators represent. Then, why are they not voting on their behalf? That seems like a far better question.
- deciplex 12y ago
  Notice that the article only inferred that McConnell was referring to terrorism specifically. Perhaps they anticipate domestic unrest (due to, among other things, egregious NSA spying, ironically), and don't want to tie their hands behind their backs in the fight against that. In which case, a good time to do it, is whenever they decide to stop the spying and the impoverishment to destitution of literally everyone save for the rounding error of a demographic that constitutes the ruling and elite classes, et cetera. So, never.
logn 12y ago
"Earlier this evening, Sen. Rand Paul voted against further consideration of the USA Freedom Act as it currently extends key provisions of the Patriot Act until 2017. Sen. Paul led the charge against the Patriot Act extension" http://www.paul.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=1244 http://www.paul.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=1244
arh68 12y ago
If there's any nugget of gold in there, it's that Dianne Feinstein voted with Ted Cruz in a Yea. I would have expected a different outcome. Apart from that it's hard to frame positively. Is this something Americans should be proud of? Should the Germans have been proud in the '30s?
lazyant 12y ago
I can very much understand people for the 2nd amendment and people for government surveillance but for the love of me I cannot understand people for both things, they seem direct contradictions of what your idea of government involvement in citizen's life should be.

233 points by danielnaab 12y ago

> With the bill’s defeat, the Senate faces a hard deadline for new legislation since the legal basis for the phone records program, a provision of the Patriot Act, expires in June. After that, when the 90-day orders to phone companies requiring them to turn over their customers’ records expire, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court would be unable to issue a new round of orders. Given the "rifts between the [GOP's] interventionist and more libertarian-leaning wings," what are the probable endgames? Specifically, what are the odds of–and promoting factors for–an obstructionist minority flipping over the table in June?

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
Hario 12y ago
D's lost 8, R's gained 8 in the latest election. Assuming no new R's vote right, that gets us to a vote of 50 / 50, with Biden getting the deciding vote. However, in the modern filibustering Senate, 41 Senators can kill any bill. So in theory, if everyone who voted for the bill hangs tight, they could destroy any new legislation, including PATRIOT ACT reauthorization. However, I'd be quite surprised if neither of these things happen: 1. McConnell decides the filibuster no longer works for him, so he kills it. 2. Obama puts remarkable pressure on fellow D's and they buckle. But theoretically, we have all the votes we need. And if 1 new R senator joins the anti-NSA caucus (and all the D Senators hang tight, and all the D senators are good on the issue), they wouldn't even be a minority -- they'd have 51 votes. Hope that makes sense.
- protomyth 12y ago
  I'm away from my lists, but some of the new R Senators will vote anti-NSA with Paul / Cruz. I would imagine the Patriot Act reauthorization might be problematic.
  - _delirium 12y ago
    This article characterizes the new R senators as belonging more to the establishment wing of the party, in part because the party was fairly successful in getting its preferred candidates through the primaries, avoiding some of the surprises that characterized 2010/2012: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/16/us/new-senators-tilt-gop-back-toward-insiders.html http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/16/us/new-senators-tilt-gop-b... Some do have more track record in that regard than others though, so it might be that they won't all side with the national-security conservatives.
    - protomyth 12y ago
      4 were swept into the House in the wave that brought the R majority and their voting record isn't exactly all happy happy with the establishment. Joni Ernst is not establishment. I am not sure about the other 2. There were a lot a jockeying and some losses from the outsiders, but remember that Cantor got beat in the primary.

bobsil1 12y ago

dm;we (doesn't matter; will encrypt) Entire consumer stack will go encrypted.

meepmorp 12y ago
MITM
slang800 12y ago
Encryption doesn't quite solve everything here - the NSA can still demand the encryption keys, or demand direct modifications to the service like logging being installed. To solve this from a purely technical standpoint we'd need to design services where the service provider is a completely untrusted party - never allowed to see or manipulate user data on the backend, and all processing that requires decrypted user data would need to be moved to the client. We would also need a way to verify client code to ensure that malicious changes haven't been introduced. And finally, we would need a way to anonymize all requests to the backend. An architecture like this is pretty hard to implement, so it would be nice if we could just get the NSA to stop.
- fru2013 12y ago
  This is true, but even if the NSA were not a problem we should move to that architecture anyway.
- bobsil1 12y ago
  It stops mass spying, targeted is fine if legit. The NSA will not stop because DC wants to spy on governors, lawyers, judges, companies, etc. NSA has been illegally spying domestically since its inception, which was itself an undemocratic exec order. Only Supreme Court will restrain, and doesn't protect against Chinese and Russian hackers. So encryption throughout consumer tech stack and net protocols is the only answer.

Hario 12y ago

Nice of the article to clearly lay out the partisan divisions here. None of that "blame both sides" bs. The vote: All D's voted right except Bill Nelson of Florida. All R's voted wrong except Cruz, Lee, Heller, Paul, and Murkowski. Where "right" means "for the overhaul bill" and "wrong" means the opposite. You'll also notice that this bill got way over 50 votes, but still failed due to the modern filibuster.

techrat 12y ago
The next two years are going to be full of "wrong" votes.
- deciplex 12y ago
  Two? You're awfully optimistic.
- protomyth 12y ago
  Probably, but some of the new R's in the Senate would follow Paul / Cruz on this vote.
  - deciplex 12y ago
    The new R's are going to do what they're told, just like Paul and Cruz did what they were told in this vote, as well: as stars of the Republican party, they were allowed to vote for cloture and deflect attacks on them in a year when the race for President heats up. And, they were allowed to do this because the leadership knew they already had the votes to block the bill.
    - themartorana 12y ago
      The party of keep-the-government-out-of-my-healthcare would very much like to keep it in absolutely everything else you do. These are not your Goldwater Republicans.
      - 12y ago

graeme 12y ago

Does anyone have a history of the "60 votes needed" to pass a bill in the Senate? I could have sworn that within my lifetime, the press talked about "50 votes needed" to pass a bill. Then at some point in the Bush years, threat of filibuster was regularly invoked, making 60 votes the requirement in practice. Now no one even mentions a filibuster. As a non-American, it's rather strange.

mikeyouse 12y ago
The threat of filibuster is implicit in the "60 votes needed" language. At 60 votes, the majority side can invoke 'cloture' which moves the bill to an actual vote, after which you only need 50 votes to pass. Prior to 60 votes, the minority side can pretty much endlessly delay the actual vote on the bill through filibusters and other parliamentary tactics. A good history of how we got to where we are: http://www.brookings.edu/research/testimony/2010/04/22-filibuster-binder http://www.brookings.edu/research/testimony/2010/04/22-filib... And the more encyclopedic answer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloture#United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloture#United_States
Hario 12y ago
This might be what you're looking for: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/post/the-history-of-the-filibuster-in-one-graph/2012/05/15/gIQAVHf0RU_blog.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/post/the-histor... Very briefly: In the mid years of Bush, the D Senate filibustered more than usual in regards to nominations of non-Supreme Court judges. In 2006, when Democrats took the Senate, the Republicans started filibustering up a storm. But no one in the press noticed because Bush would have veto'd anyway, so the balance of power didn't shift. As soon as Obama was elected, the Republican Senate had an internal meeting where they agreed to filibuster everything all the time -- legislation, judges, executive appointments, everything. Even legislation they supported, just to throw a wrench into the plans. It was a momentous change. The press failed to point it out or make an issue out of it. And here we are.
- graeme 12y ago
  Thanks, that's the summary I was looking for. I remember that shift happened, and thinking "that's odd". Then I checked out of politics for a few years, and noticed the current language, which doesn't even reference filibusters. I am now curious to see if things will shift back once there's a Republican president. The Republicans seem far better at press management than the Democrats.

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tptacek 12y ago
Both Cruz and Lee are assumed to be in contention for 2016. Neither can reasonably expect the nomination, but both could, with a decent showing in the early primaries, end up with the VP nod. They are very unlikely to buck the party at such a sensitive time (the optics of doing so right before McConnell takes over as majority leader are bad).
- fivedogit 12y ago
  But they did buck the party. This was a mostly dem-supported bill. http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=113&session=2&vote=00282 http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_c... Note: I deleted my original post because I mistakenly said Paul had voted for the bill. Paul voted with the establishment republicans (McConnell, etc) against (i.e. to keep the NSA as-is) Edit: Also, Cruz bucks the Republican leadership all the time. That's his thing and they hate him for it. He was the main force behind the government shutdown.
  - acdha 12y ago
    I think the key part here is that they're strongly associated with the Tea Party enough that they're not worried about a challenge from the right in the next election cycle. I doubt we'll see very many others feel comfortable straying out of the fold unless it's something which is really important to voters back home.
  - lvh 12y ago
    Paul explained why: http://www.paul.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=1244 http://www.paul.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=1244 TL;DR: Paul voted against this act because voting for it means renewing the PATRIOT Act for another couple of years.
  - deleted 12y ago
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ninguem2 12y ago

Wasn't the program created by executive order? Can't it be dismantled the same way?

pmorici 12y ago
If you are talking about the Bush executive order congress went and passed laws legitimizing it after it was leaked in the press.
- dllthomas 12y ago
  It may well still be able to be dismantled by executive order. Just 1) the next President could put it together again, and 2) Obama doesn't have much interest in dismantling it in the first place.
  - bediger4000 12y ago
    In 2008 he campaigned against dragnet (or at least warrantless) surveillance. Obama's wikipedia entry says he taught constitutional law for twelve years or so. Why is Obama not interested in dismantling dragnet surveillance? He also worked as a civil rights lawyer. Obama has the education and experience to know that surveillance has lots of bad effects, and that some secret special reading of a law doesn't make it legal or ethical or constitutional. Why didn't Obama dismantle the universal-as-possible surveillance?
    - 001sky 12y ago
      This is a really fair question. I think it is simply he doesn't want to look weak. The political problem with him fixing the EOs is he has to sign them. This is just a publicity stunt to blame someone else for not doing something he lacks the courage to do himself. Its truly mind-bending. A good leader would dix the stuff he can fix by himself and then work with other people to fix what needs to be fixed by consensus. POTUS is not that guy, tho.
    - djloche 12y ago

enlightenedfool 12y ago

I think they just reflect what the people want. In other words, a majority of American population does not want overhaul of NSA program. Right or wrong we will see in the future.

krapp 12y ago
Yes and no. The parties have successfully rigged the system such that they only need to cater to lobbyists, and the extremist wings of their respective parties, to maintain power. It really wouldn't matter what the majority of Americans believed, notwithstanding that a majority of Americans probably would view the NSA programs as, at worst, a necessary evil. You also have to take into account the politics approaching the upcoming presidential election.
- bavcyc 12y ago
  Matt Taibbi is a good writer to read in regards to how Washington really works. I can't remember which of his books had the best example, but the system is broke.
waterlesscloud 12y ago
Some sort of NSA data collection reform has been supported in polls pretty consistently around 60-70%. Americans want something done.

suprgeek 12y ago

So that's it - the net legislative effect of all the "bombshell" disclosures that Ed Snowden made has been what - Nothing, NADA, Zilch. Proving once again that going thru "Official" Channels was never an option. That in the toxic hyper-partisan environment of Washington the Powerful will find a way to kill any meaningful reform of even the worst abuses. The solution to this has to be first and foremost Technological.

pXMzR2A 12y ago
A little bit familiarity with the US ways of congress tells me that this comment is most probably right about this and that the voters need to be categorized qualitatively ("Why did you vote against?) rather than quantitatively ("Did you vote against?): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8627770 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8627770
vitno 12y ago
saying that it is "Technological" is merely dodging what you are actually doing is a technology based form of rebellion. It is the statement that the government is not correct, and that the people can organize and do better. I very much agree, but keep that in mind.
andrewfong 12y ago
First, a single political defeat is not the end-all-be-all here. Politics may move slowly, but it does move (e.g. the political status of a black lesbian is undoubtedly better today than it was 50 years ago). Second, technology and political are not an either/or proposition (or even a primary/secondary proposition). IMHO, it's something like: Privacy = Technology * Politics. Simply stressing one will give you (relative) diminishing returns if you don't push the other as well. Good encryption can make it difficult for the NSA to conduct widespread online surveillance, but given (a) the difficulty of getting crypto right, (b) the sheer number of organizations with the ability to (intentionally or unintentionally) compromise security for a large number of users, and (c) the relatively low impact privacy and security have on purchasing decisions for many (if not most) people, it's something like the size of the NSA's budget (a political question) that will ultimately determine whether mass surveillance is prohibitively expensive or merely inconvenient.

001sky 12y ago

"Bill to Restrict Data Collection Blocked in Vote " -- actual title

mikeyouse 12y ago
The title on the article changed after it was submitted here. From NYTimes twitter: https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/534873348686495745 https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/534873348686495745
- 001sky 12y ago
  This is a common tactic for NY times articles.

DanielBMarkham 12y ago

I have no pity for the Republicans and every one that voted against it needs to be reminded of it every day from now until election. I'm also not such a noob at politics that I think this is the entire story. Democrats knew this wouldn't pass. This was their last couple of months of control. So it's a poke in the eye to Republicans on the way out. The really interesting counter-factual here is what would have happened if a large block of Republicans switched up. My bet is that you'd see quite a few defections in the Democratic camp. If I'm a politician, I can either support something, oppose something, look like I'm supporting something when I really don't, or look like I'm opposing something when I really support it. The key issue isn't my stance, it's how I can position myself against the other politicians. I'd love to see movement on this. Not for a second did I think this vote was anything but political posturing. But still -- any vote is a good one. Just wish it would have actually meant something instead of more fodder for all the partisans to throw dung at each other. It also looks like the beginning of "See! If we were just back in power, this time we'd really fix all those problems we approved of and encouraged the last time we were there!" I wonder if this will have any traction among the base, which was the entire point. Sadly, I think it will.

dobbsbob 12y ago

At least your media even talks about this, I'm in a 5 Eyes Alliance country and none of them have written anything except excuses why we should be under 24/7 surveillance. Our senate can't even block bills.

paulhauggis 12y ago

The democrats want the government to control everything. Do you think we will have less data collection when we have universal health care? How about making the Internet a "utility"? You don't think when this happen there won't be a direct pipe to our data?? I can't believe anything I read on the Internet anymore. I would be interested to see why they voted against it. I'm shocked that a group that claims they are open and accepting, yet when the word republican is used, the tactics and tone change to that of the people you are against (personal attacks, slander, bigotry, and bias). It's because most of it is bullshit. There is only acceptance when someone aligns with your personal beliefs. I can see how evil dictators can come into power. The average person can so easily be swayed by emotion.

WBrentWilliams 12y ago

If what the purest form of this bill was trying to do is important to you and you're from the US, keep working for it. I suggest the following: 1) Show up at the primaries. 2) Reform your local laws to allow you to vote in the primaries for both parties. 3) Don't shut up. Keep talking. 4) Keep in mind, at all times, that the fight isn't over once the NSA is squelched. AT&T et. al. still get to keep this information forever. 5) Think about parallels. Encryption isn't good enough, as the same kind of meta-data is generated when you visit an encrypted site. It's not any one activity it's the pattern of all activity that's important and no one is making anyone give up that data, either.

bobsil1 12y ago
Net architecture needs to go Tor-style.

adventured 12y ago

Anybody know who attached the Patriot Act renewal to this bill? Which politician/s specifically.

mikeyouse 12y ago
Only 3 provisions of the roughly 100 from the Patriot Act would be renewed with this bill[1], but that amendment was added on by one of the original authors of the Patriot Act, Jim Sensenbrenner (R)Wisconsin.[2] [1] - https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/11/usa-freedom-act-week-whats-come-and-what-you-need-know https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/11/usa-freedom-act-week-w... [2] - http://sensenbrenner.house.gov/biography/ http://sensenbrenner.house.gov/biography/
desdiv 12y ago
It was a "manager's amendment" from the House Judiciary Committee, meaning that it was a majority consensus of whole committee. Here are the 23 Republican members on the committee: Bob Goodlatte, Virginia, Chairman Jim Sensenbrenner, Wisconsin Howard Coble, North Carolina Lamar S. Smith, Texas Steve Chabot, Ohio Spencer Bachus of Alabama Darrell Issa, California Randy Forbes, Virginia Steve King, Iowa Trent Franks, Arizona Louie Gohmert, Texas Jim Jordan, Ohio Ted Poe, Texas Jason Chaffetz, Utah Tom Marino, Pennsylvania Trey Gowdy, South Carolina Mark Amodei, Nevada Raúl Labrador, Idaho Blake Farenthold, Texas George Holding, North Carolina Doug Collins, Georgia Ron DeSantis, Florida Jason T. Smith, Missouri

devindotcom 12y ago

Not to sound more cynical than the situation warrants, but in this case I'm not particularly surprised or disappointed. Congress is clueless and more concerned with partisan politics and re-election fundraising. We should be (and many are) working to secure ourselves so that Congress and the legal system must work to catch up to the possibilities of citizens to protect themselves on their own terms: good end-to-end encryption, true anonymity when it's needed, and as much open and auditable code as we can get. They're not going to give security and privacy to us — they wouldn't even if they could. So we make it ourselves, slowly, surely, and publicly, and maybe in a few years they'll be the ones that are outraged.

xnull2guest 12y ago
You will, however, be bound by current 'lawful intercept and storage' laws. If you provide a remote computing service (email, hosting, cloud storage, fitness tracking, etc) you will be bound by 18 U.S.C. § 2703(f) [1]. If you provide telecommunications you will be bound by CALEA [2]. You will be bound by the Stored Communications Act and by the Patriot Act, and you will be bound to provide access to the core of your service and/or your private keys if you are given an NSL. Essentially - you can not provide secure communication as a service. If you try to provide it as a product it's more blurry. With precedents like Blackberry, RSA and Skype you need to make sure you're operationally able to deal with extreme levels of leverage and influence. [1] http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2703 http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2703 [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications_Assistance_for_Law_Enforcement_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications_Assistance_for_...
- joering2 12y ago
  Will this also apply if your server is outside US. Example: you're using an US company (Rackspace) that is hosting your website in HongKong. Is there anywhere a list of "nay" voters.. I want to put few phonecalls in place tomorrow, express my disgust.
  - quesera 12y ago

devindotcom 12y ago

benguild 12y ago

I feel like the biggest problem we have is that whatever can be done will be done by other nations, so the USA has to break rules too. :(

Havvy 12y ago
Being spied on by your own country is worse than being spied on by other countries. Your own country doesn't have another country between you and it to protect you. Also, other countries will look at the USA and say 'we can do it because they do it', and that just leads to more problems. Eventually you have to say no to spying. It's morally and ethically unacceptable, and we should not tolerate anybody doing it.
- Istof 12y ago
  When a country wants to spy on it's own citizen, they apparently think that it's acceptable to ask for that data from another country as opposed to being illegal when getting the data directly. USA <-> Germany being an example

tylerlh 12y ago

It's worth noting that the USA Freedom Act would have extended the Patriot Act until the end of 2017.

discardorama 12y ago

It's ironic that the same people who detest "big government" are for big government spying on them.

lettergram 12y ago

"“This is the worst possible time to be tying our hands behind our backs,” Mr. McConnell said before the vote, expressing the concerns of those who argued that the program was a vital tool in the fight against terrorism." When would be a good time? Seriously, I hate these arguments, because there is no reasoning with them. Sure, these various programs may have helped stop terrorism, or at least have the potential to. However, so would killing anyone (citizen or not) who has any potential threat. I would argue the later is even more effective, and uses the same chain of reasoning. Why then, can we not move past that and try to stand a bit more on law (being the constitution in this case), if not reason. Clearly, these programs are disliked by a large number (if not the majority) of the constituents these senators represent. Then, why are they not voting on their behalf? That seems like a far better question.

deciplex 12y ago
Notice that the article only inferred that McConnell was referring to terrorism specifically. Perhaps they anticipate domestic unrest (due to, among other things, egregious NSA spying, ironically), and don't want to tie their hands behind their backs in the fight against that. In which case, a good time to do it, is whenever they decide to stop the spying and the impoverishment to destitution of literally everyone save for the rounding error of a demographic that constitutes the ruling and elite classes, et cetera. So, never.

logn 12y ago

"Earlier this evening, Sen. Rand Paul voted against further consideration of the USA Freedom Act as it currently extends key provisions of the Patriot Act until 2017. Sen. Paul led the charge against the Patriot Act extension" http://www.paul.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=1244 http://www.paul.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=1244

arh68 12y ago

If there's any nugget of gold in there, it's that Dianne Feinstein voted with Ted Cruz in a Yea. I would have expected a different outcome. Apart from that it's hard to frame positively. Is this something Americans should be proud of? Should the Germans have been proud in the '30s?

lazyant 12y ago

I can very much understand people for the 2nd amendment and people for government surveillance but for the love of me I cannot understand people for both things, they seem direct contradictions of what your idea of government involvement in citizen's life should be.