I'm wondering if it has ever occurred to any of my dashing bright liberal friends of formidable intelligence to make a career choice in law enforcement? or perhaps they'd rather enter the field of political analysis and weapons specialist? Might they dabble in classified cybersecurity trouble-shooting by chance?
I think it was David Sedaris from This American Life who said it best:
"I'm a liberal; They know I'm unarmed."
This is the era of what marketeers have gleefully dubbed
"the referral economy." It's all in who you know, and in how well you can wipe clean the bad-reputation inducing farts and burps and incompetencies of your professional and private life. It's all in who you know, and in what you
redact.
I'm more concerned about the people I don't know. Have we all gotten used to the uber-surveillance yet? It's starting to feel like an old, worn-out coat. So mundane now that I almost forget to wonder if anyone cares.
Who's watching the watchers watching you? Is the Senate Intelligence Oversight Committee keeping tabs on your local sheriff's deputy assistant? Is the NSA? or is it the secret local militia? If there's some kind of chain of command or "Internal Affairs" or whathaveyou, who's watching over them? Maybe your uptight hyper-religious secretly impotent local school superintendent is keeping tabs on... everybody? Or could it be your boyfriend? Or maybe it's the Illuminati. Who knows?
And who cares, for all the salt that Senate Oversight Committee has in its coffee. We came, we saw, they redacted. Thank goodness the Senate Intelligence Oversight Committee has some oversight of its own, or it might get something done.
It's all pretty passé anyway. The NSA started working on Thin Thread and Trail Blazer what, back in the 90s? What we know about surveillance even given Snowden is child's play compared to how far-advanced surveilllance applications really are. Heck, the local cops have higher-tech surveilllance equipment now than the CIA did during the cold war, by far. And they're using it -- partly because they can, and partly to demonstrate a "national security" preparedness so money and resources keep rolling in.
I know, I know. "Preparedness" for disaster and chaos, riots, terrorism, any other "social contagions," and hard core, hard core attack is critical for our national security. Nothing has gone overboard here. There has been no (show of hands) disproportionate response or pre-emptive pre-crime over-statement of authority and power, anywhere, at any time in recent memory.
At least, that's true for many sleepy middle America Main Street towns where nothing much happens and everyone already knows who the weirdos are anyway. Weirdos like loners, Quakers, peace activists, environmentalists, anyone who is not a WASP, hippies, vegetarians, whistleblowers, journalists, organic farmers, feminists, anyone with an "attitude," and professional clowns. No one trusts a professional clown. And I don't want to sound homophobic or macho or anything, but there are some awfully bodacious looking women out there in middle America. Whoot!
Hey, wait a minute... do you think the watchers watching you might be sharing information with other voyeurs in their secret club? Do they have their own "classified" version of America's Funniest Home Videos? and is it X-rated? I suppose it's irresponsible to even suggest such a thing, since I could never hope to prove it.
Who watches the watchers watching you? Should we all just buy our own surveillance equipment and start watching out? Like that character in the movie Casino, you know, Nicky Santoro, what was that line? "Peekaboo, you f*cks you..."
"I got the latest anti-buggin' equipment from the same places that sell to the fuckin' CIA. I had all the special police frequency radios, FBI descramblers, cameras that see in the dark, and because of that, the miserable sons-of-bitches that they are, they never once caught me doin' anything I couldn't handle."
But even
Casino is an old movie, made back in the 90s. I wonder what surveillance capabilities Nicky Santoro would have today? If he were real, that is.
Real or not, maybe we should all just go out and buy the equipment and start watching out for ourselves. Who else would we entrust with the highest-tech tools of espionage?
I know this sounds like so much snark. I know John Stewart is out there saying "You can have great regard for law enforcement and still want them to be held to high standards." That's true. But who? Who enforces standards on law enforcement? Who's watching over whom? And is it all already redacted?
Can you blame me for asking? When the Supreme Court tells us we don't have standing in court to sue our surveilllors because only our surveilllors have proof of their surveilllance activities, how tough can it be to edge out some local making a big deal about rights?
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? Nobody learns Latin anymore.