Washington's Blog — Exclusive: High-Level NSA Whistleblower Says Blackmail Is a Huge – Unreported – Part of Mass Surveillance

Just when you thought it couldn't get any worse. Oh, and turns out it has been going on for a long time. J. Edgar Hoover was a master at it, and Harry Truman denounced it specifically. Yukky.

Exclusive: High-Level NSA Whistleblower Says Blackmail Is a Huge – Unreported – Part of Mass Surveillance
Washington's Blog

Dennis J Bernstein — Bush's Foiled NSA Blackmail Scheme

More than a decade ago, President George W. Bush enlisted the National Security Agency in a blackmail scheme to dig up dirt to coerce UN Security Council members to approve his aggressive war against Iraq. But the plot was foiled by a brave British intelligence officer, Katharine Gun, as Dennis J. Bernstein reports.

Truthout
Bush's Foiled NSA Blackmail Scheme
Dennis J Bernstein, Consortium News | Interview

Surprise. Intelligence is used for more than intelligence.

J. Edgar Hoover reputedly had a file on "everyone." Whether he did or not, remains uncertain, but "everyone" knew he had files and no one was sure whether he didn't have a file on them. Result. Intimidation.

Total information awareness is fascism and leads to totalitarianism, where everyone feels watched all the time. This is an unacceptable tradeoff for false security.

See also Are They Allowed to Do That? A Breakdown of Selected Government Surveillance Programs by Staff, Brennan Center for Justice | News Analysis

Whistleblowing 2.0: From the Pentagon Papers to Bradley Manning to PRISM by Patrick McCurdy, Waging Nonviolence | Op-Ed