Harry “The Weasel” Reid is shocked, shocked!, to learn of Gov’t Surveillance

Gosh-a-mighty: Harry The Weasel is suddenly all miffed about the Federal Government’s penchant for snooping.

Huh; I wonder why?

(via ABC News) – “…In letters to the heads of the CIA and Justice Department, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said the CIA’s decision to search the Senate intelligence committee’s network and computers without approval was “absolutely indefensible” and carried serious implications for the separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches.

Democrat Senator Feinstein on Gov’t Surveillance: Rules for Me, but Not for Thee

It must be wonderful to live in a world where the rules don’t apply to you, …because you make all the rules.

And it must come as quite a shock when suddenly your rights are being usurped, right along with those of the hoi polloi:

(via Washington Post) – “…Senate Intelligence Committee chair Dianne Feinstein (D, Calif.) made waves Tuesday when she publicly accused the Central Intelligence Agency of spying on Senate computers in an alleged attempt to thwart her committee’s investigation into Bush era interrogation and detention practices. The senator even suggested that the agency had violated the Constitution and federal law.

But while Feinstein is up in arms about the intelligence agency’s search of her staff’s computer system and network, she has been an avid defender of National Security Agency surveillance programs. “It’s called protecting America,” she said shortly after the news broke that the NSA was collecting domestic phone records in bulk...”

Thanks to the #NSA, you’re now an “Enemy of the State” (or you soon could be…)

One of my top twenty movies of all time is Enemy of the State, a 1998 film starring Gene Hackman and Will Smith. If you haven’t seen it, Smith plays a normal guy (married, good job, etc.) who unwittingly gets mixed up in an NSA-ordered murder of a politician. The rest is about what happens to Smith’s life when the NSA decides it needs to rip that life to shreds.

This man, almost overnight, loses his job, his wife, access to his bank account, and is hotly pursued by law enforcement. Through satellites, cameras, and tons of cool tech, he’s tracked everywhere: nowhere seems to be safe. The film’s title is accurate: he literally is made into an Enemy of the State. If it weren’t for Gene Hackman’s character, Smith would have been jailed, or dead, or both.

Back in 1998 this was still relatively fantastical, taken seriously only by the professionally paranoid. We couldn’t have that sort of thing happen in the cradle of freedom and liberty.

Welcome to “Enemy of the State”, circa 2013: