Althouse: "There is no spying on Americans."

August 8, 2013

"There is no spying on Americans."

"We don't have a domestic spying program."

25 comments:

Matt Sablan said...: It was probably just the least untruthful answer he could give at the time.; 8/8/13, 9:29 AM
John Borell said...: Pay no attention to that domestic spying program behind the curtain.; 8/8/13, 9:40 AM
Robert Cook said...: Yep, when I read he said that I thought, "Obama is lying straight to Jay Leno and to the American people."

I wonder what would have happened if someone in the audience had yelled out Liar!"; 8/8/13, 9:43 AM
traditionalguy said...: This must be from The Onion.

Of course the Obama style has been to tell a total lie about everything going on, and have the government media agree with whatever he says.

Snowden must be rolling on the floor laughing...that is the Snowden who according to the media talking heads is a Criminal and a Russian spy and a Traitor endangering the war on terror by exposing this Big Lie.; 8/8/13, 9:46 AM
MathMom said...: Really lame animation, and a really lame lie. Who believes anything this guy says? If he said the sky is blue, I would have to go outside and check.; 8/8/13, 9:47 AM
Tank said...: Con man gonna con.

What was the name of that Congressman who yelled out liar at one of Zero's speeches? He took a lot of heat. But HE was not lying.; 8/8/13, 9:56 AM
Hazy Dave said...: Depends on what you mean by "program". And "spying". Maybe even "domestic", and "Americans". But his lips were moving, so the standard assumption applies.; 8/8/13, 10:22 AM
victoria said...: Do you all not believe that this has been going on for years? Decades?
It's not just Obama who did this.

Vicki from Pasadena; 8/8/13, 10:34 AM
O2bnaz said...: That's right along with the check's in the mail and honey, Just do it swear I won't ...; 8/8/13, 10:42 AM
Matt Sablan said...: "It's not just Obama who did this."

-- It was impossible for any president, except Obama and maybe Bush, to engage in this level of intelligence gathering on the American public purely due to technological limitations. There's a fine line between reviewing public information and the level of spying alleged against the administration (and seen in the wiretaps on reporters.); 8/8/13, 11:11 AM
Chris Lopes said...: If he had said "I'm not doing all that much more than any other president", a case could be made that he's simply interpreting things in his own favor. That's not what he said though. His claim is that there is no domestic spying program at all. That is a clear falsehood.; 8/8/13, 11:37 AM
Sam L. said...: All who believe this are named Paullie (The Beard) Krugman and Tom (I Loves China) Friedman. MoDo, maybe.; 8/8/13, 11:54 AM
ErnieG said...: If this program we don't have comes up with actionable information, the IRS has a manual detailing how to sanitize the investigative trail to show for the record a plausible way the information could have been developed.

This is wrong on so many levels: due process, the right to face one's accuser, and prosecutorial misconduct, to name three.; 8/8/13, 12:06 PM
cubanbob said...: Well it's certainly obvious he graduated from the WJ Clinton School Of Parsing And Brazen Lying with honors. At least Nixon broke in to a sweat when he lied. Imagine that, there was a time a president had enough residual character that he couldn't lie without any sense of shame.; 8/8/13, 12:46 PM
Smilin' Jack said...: If the president does it, it isn't spying.; 8/8/13, 1:14 PM
Robert Cook said...: "It was impossible for any president, except Obama and maybe Bush, to engage in this level of intelligence gathering on the American public purely due to technological limitations. There's a fine line between reviewing public information and the level of spying alleged against the administration (and seen in the wiretaps on reporters.)"

Frank Church didn't feel so sanquine 40 years ago:

(From Wikipedia)

"Warning about the NSA

"Church was stunned by what the Church Committee learned about the immense operations and electronic monitoring capabilities of the National Security Agency (NSA), an agency whose existence was unknown to most Americans at the time. Church stated in 1975: 'That capability at any time could be turned around on the American people, and no American would have any privacy left, such is the capability to monitor everything: telephone conversations, telegrams, it doesn't matter. There would be no place to hide.'[34] He is widely quoted as also stating regarding the NSA: 'I don't want to see this country ever go across the bridge... I know the capacity that is there to make tyranny total in America, and we must see to it that this agency and all agencies that possess this technology operate within the law and under proper supervision, so that we never cross over that abyss. That is the abyss from which there is no return.'"[35]

We've passed the point of no return.; 8/8/13, 1:45 PM
Carl said...: Of course the President lies. All Presidents lie. All human beings lie, when it is sufficiently in their self-interest.

The solution is not to find the angel in the clothes of man that does not lie and make him Dictator for Life (and then clone him when we get the technology), but to frame our relationship with government so that it doesn't matter if he's lying or not.; 8/8/13, 2:20 PM
traditionalguy said...: Thinking about total tyranny running from DC, the last necessary move is the elimination of cash money.

The money laundering crimes come close to doing that. But a replacement currency with tracking chips inserted and all old stored cash money outlawed should finish us off.; 8/8/13, 2:35 PM
Matt Sablan said...: Cook: I understand that we -could- spy on ourselves easily. But, telephones and telegrams are a far cry from smartphones and black boxes on your car.; 8/8/13, 2:58 PM
Robert Cook said...: Trad Guy, talking about the elimination of cash money,here's a scheme on the back burner that should curl your hair, (and straighten your curlies)!

I first read of this scheme months ago on Counterpunch, who just reprinted this original article from Nation of Change.; 8/8/13, 3:08 PM
MarkD said...: His lips were moving.; 8/8/13, 3:44 PM
Robert Cook said...: Matthew,

The point is, the NSA has always had the capacity and the inclination to spy on us to the limit of extant technology at any time. The danger has always been there, and Frank Church saw the gravity of that danger 40 years ago. This is hardly unique to the current or immediately preceding administration.

Two significant changes have occurred over the intervening years: the means by which the NSA can spy on us have multiplied, as have their justifications; and, the idea that the government must abide by the law and by the constitution and curb its power has been openly cast aside as "pre-9/11" thinking. The overreaction to 9/11 has been such that the government glibly warns of vague threats and "increased chatter" to justify its most extreme and lawless behavior, confident it will face no challenge, and those in power have no fear of having to answer to the law, as even Nixon did.

We have allowed things to come to this pass, as we all too readily accepted the always-exaggerated danger posed by muslim terrorists, and have surrendered ourselves to hyperbolic imaginings.; 8/8/13, 3:44 PM
Danno said...: Since Obama is always the smartest guy in the room, and he (or more likely the Teleprompter) has a large vocabulary, we shall properly call it reconnaissance!; 8/8/13, 10:33 PM
Wince said...: So, does that mean Bill Ayers is Gepetto?; 8/9/13, 8:07 AM
Real American said...: YOU LIE!; 8/9/13, 9:23 AM