FROM WASHINGTON TIMES - SEPT. 16 2009:
EXCLUSIVE: W.H. collects Web users' data without notice
The White House is collecting and storing comments and
videos placed on its social-networking sites such as Facebook,
Twitter and YouTube without notifying or asking the consent of the
site users, a failure that appears to run counter to President
Obama's promise of a transparent government and his pledge to
protect privacy on the Internet.
Marc Rotenberg, president of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said the White House signaled that it would insist on open dealings with Internet users and, in fact, should feel obliged to disclose that it is collecting such information.
"The White House has not been adequately transparent, particularly on how it makes use of new social media techniques, such as this example," he said.
Defenders of the White House actions said the Presidential Records Act requires that the administration gather the information and that it was justified in taking the additional step of asking a private contractor to "crawl and archive" all such material. Nicholas Shapiro, a White House spokesman, declined to say when the practice began or how much the new contract would cost.
Susan Cooper, a spokeswoman for National Archives and Records
Administration, said the presidential records law applies to
"social media" and to public comments "received by
the president or immediate staff."
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/sep/16/obama-wh-collects-web-users-data/
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Apparently, it wasn't enough to ask citizens to
report something "fishy." They decided to troll
themselves, that is, to take the *special step* of reaching out
from the White House to find dissenters. What the fools in
the house of white would do with that information is presumably
illegal, and *very* Nixonian.
It is very dusturbing that the WH would collect the passing
feelings of citizens, and identify dissenters, and that they would
get that information by any means possible!
Now, in the week or so since this latest intrusion was published by
the Times, we have had:
- three internal terror plots foiled;
- another round of fictitious health-care benefit law writing;
- massive cuts to senior citizen health plan - Medicare Advantage;
- a government run public option health care provision is jammed through the House (again);
- several tens of thousands of mortgages defaulted;
- thousands of small businesses collapsed;
- a ***shoot-out at the San Diego/Mexico border with border agents***, as three vans loaded with about 70 illegals tried to shoot their way through the San Ysidro border crossing;
- a month-long delay in a decision for added troops in Afghanistan (while our military members are being killed awaiting reinforcements);
- we gave up a missile shield system in exchange for an insult;
- Isreal has been trown under the Obama Express (again);
- Eastern Europe (especially Poland) has been thrown under the bus;
- the bogus threat of man-made global warming was declared the greatest threat to life on Earth by a lawyer/community organizer, with no perceptible understanding of any science;
- global economic and environmental terrorists demonstrating in Pittsburgh; and
- another nuclear enrichment facility has been revealed in Iran.
But surveillance and attacks increase against internal
dissenters exercising their Constitutional right to Free
Speech. When legitimate questions are raised, the Obamabot
answers invariably are "Racist!" "right-wing nut
job!" "unAmerican!!!". The Obama
machine continues to stoke faux "grass roots"
groups, selected unions, bamboozled ethnic groups, and useful
idiots to suppress and disrupt legitimate dissent, and to track
down and black-ball dissenters.
Why? Why waste energy to find individuals? Don't
they already use focus groups, polling, NBC, and MSNBC to collect
information about citizens?
Most other countries, including adversaries, see Obama as a weak,
vacillating, and ineffective leader - not a threat at all to his
external threats.
No wonder.
Obama and his machine still act like street-level operators, with
eloquent (telepromptered) speeches, haughty/uppity
attitudes, and nice suits. He, and they, are impotent in
any other context - and foreign leaders/bad actors know
it.
In closing, ole Mhu Cao knows that he is considered to be
an enemy of the State, in view of the White House admitted trolling
of social web sites. For the record, I took an Oath to protect and
defend the Constitution from all enemies foreign and
domestic. I would never raise a hand against another
American, except to stand up to what my Oath requires to defend the
Republic.
Whether you, the reader, chooses to curtail your public comments in
view of this outrage is a personal decision.
I hope you do not. I hope you stand with me in defying the
fringe that has weaseled its way into political strength and social
limelight. 2010 is a long way away, and 2012 is even
further. If we stand resolute, however, we will bring
even-handedness and pragmatism back into our Government.
