STRB LETTER TO EDITOR “HIS LEADERSHIP FAILS YOUNGER SUPPORTERS” 6/20/13:

Hmmm…. any surprise that Andrew Hasek, Chr. of MN College Republicans wrote a Letter to Editor citing the four scandals that created HIS dis-enchantment with Obama?  Just the fact he positioned he was disappointed and disillusioned is a pretty far stretch for a leader of College Republicans.  I would guess he NEVER was a fan…..but perhaps he indeed was a youth for Obama that became disillusioned and jumped over to the Republican Youth Movement and is now the Chair of the MN college organization. I am not taking the time to do that fact-check and perhaps that makes me as irresponsible as he is.

But despite that I do have a few facts to share on the scandals he is using as his “EVIDENCE”:

IRS scandal was initiated by a CONSERVATIVE REPUBLICAN IRS employee who testified in Congress he on June 6 or 8 that he was just trying to do his job more efficiently and it was not an Obama direction:  So Andrew, is that REPUBLICAN lying to protect the President or is the scandal DEAD?  Word from the Congressional review is that it is dead.

Benghazi Terrorist  Attacks…so far we know two things – the lack of more security was caused by REPUBLICANS denying funding to increase it and a talking points scandal involving both REPUBLICAN and Democratic staff in the Executive Branch…Add to that a factor of human error which exists in any situation and fast-moving crisis.  Word for now is that concerned Republicans have not given up and are digging -sure that they will find what Hillary did wrong…some day.    

My thoughts on that one?  The Benghazi scandal had some motivation in the desire to discredit not only Obama but also Hillary as a potential candidate for President in 2016.  It did not catch on; now we have rumblings of additional “Hillary” issues with personal actions of her secret service protection.  And I expect since that is not headline news today, it will peter out as well-only to be replaced by some new found scandal in hopes of ensuring that Republican hopes for taking over in 2016 will not be stymied by her.  Frankly, I don’t know why she even would want to put her family through more of this.  And were I a Republican, I would think twice.  You all spent 8 years trying to diminish the Clintons and all you accomplished was a growing spiral of disarray in your OWN party.

Justice Department Collection of Journalist Phone Records – who knows for sure on this one, it flared up…the Press are certainly engaged and looking for more but so far, all we have is silence…..so,  you could be right in your criticism but the silence seems to signal the scandal balloon may have burst. However, the anti-Obama press created by it has done its damage and certainly could be influencing youth opinion.

Government Surveillance– Oh, you mean the program initiated by the REPUBLICAN PRESIDENT BUSH  with actual wiretapping that was stopped by concerned Democrats and REPUBLICANS ; was changed with bi-partisan support and became the Patriot Act voted into law by Congress and continues to be reviewed and renewed by Congress on a regular basis?   That law and those executive actions overseen by a conservative court?   The phone number data base that can only be associated with a name after showing just cause and receiving a court order to do so?  And just cause is that it is a number that is in frequent contact with na identified terrorist suspect?  Pretty far-reaching, I would say.  If you have been caught in that dragnet, then I guess you need to take responsibility. You should not be working with the terrorists.

Or do you mean Prism?  Definitely to find the guilty party, look in the mirror.  If you are concerned about your own privacy, remember that you signed a contract with every single social media platform you participate in that gives the provider PERMISSION to share data with the US Government.  So this does not seem to have teeth – although it certainly does suggest we need more dialog.

All that aside, I am not dismissing the need for the continuing discussion of security vs. privacy.  My previous blog posted yesterday reinforces my concern and my continuing quest to clarify what IS ok and what IS NOT ok.  And as a concerned citizen, I will continue to fact-check, learn as much as I can, dig for answers on things that do not make sense and ponder over the future of not only the US but the world in view of the NEW DIGITAL  AGE and how it is shaping our future.  I only ask that others do the same, as only then do shared differences of opinion create an honest dialog from which we all can learn, reach consensus and move forward.

(And Yes, the highlighting of Republican throughout was done on purpose to show both parties/all citizens have a hand in what one group is calling the OBAMA SCANDALS)

THE RELATIONSHIP OF PRIVACY AND SECURITY

The debate rages on seemingly without any end in sight. Of course, it is particularly emotionally charged because we are not talking about just any kind of privacy; we are talking about how much the Government is entitled to know about us.

Unfortunately the current debate is fueled by an already raging distrust of this particular government – fed by irresponsible Congressional members who put “winning” over governing and irresponsible Press who put “ratings” over truth. How having a young African American President who thinks differently than the old “ruling class” of Traditionalists and Boomers helped to ignite this never-ending debate is up for review and discussion-as is whether or not he is doing a good or bad job in view of fact that one of our two political parties- is in a downward spiral internally. 

So it should be no surprise, then, that something we have debated for almost 250 years has surfaced…one more time.

We each have a point of view; we each are sharing our opinions and fears; we each are guilty of being distracted by the talking and shouting because we each are doing very little listening.

And surely, I am not asking you to trust and listen to me.

However, I am going to share an experience unfolding as time permits when I curl up- book in hand-in my comfy old wingback to read a new book I just stumbled upon. This is the book entitled THE NEW DIGITAL AGE – Reshaping the Future of People, Nations, and Business by Eric Schmidt and Jared Cohen.

The authors are not ordinary people like most of us; Eric Schmidt took Google from a small start up to one of the world’s most influential companies and Jared Cohen was a former advisor to secretaries of state Condoleezza Rice and Hillary Clinton, and is now the director of Google Ideas.  The sell copy on the book jacket convinced me their experience in technology and foreign affairs made them qualified to talk about how the technology world of the near future will look.

So I bought the book, went home, settled in, and started reading.  The Introduction was so jarring, I was not sure I could go further.  Chapter One was mind-boggling and Chapter Two scared me to death – and I am only on page 57! 

One thing I have already realized, however, is that today’s discussions regarding Snowden and the leaks; the IRS scandal; the AP scandal; the Benghazi Scandal, whatever the newly emerging Hillary and Obama scandals are being thought up are all simply irrelevant.  We continue to hear as scandals shrink to incidents, or accidents that we need to stop, discuss and set new guidelines about the things we are concerned about in terms of the security vs. privacy issues.

That would be wasting time, folks.  Not because we should NOT do it, but because we would be  talking about them, and addressing them with 20^th century- pre-internet and the digital world-capabilities, dangers and outdated benchmarks of what is good and what is not.  So surely, we will end up with some 20^th century irrelevant solution to reality.…it’s a bit like having Congressional discussions before WWII on how to care for all the troops’ horses when the war starts.  We need to understand where we are, and where we are going, before we invest time and effort in trying to use old thinking to establish rules to control that new world.

The Introduction to this book should be enough to shock us into letting go of our ways of thinking and opening our minds to what is before us.  A few comments taken from the Introduction:

The Internet…has transformed into an omnipresent and endlessly multifaceted outlet….a source for tremendous good and potentially dreadful evil.

This new capacity for free expression and free movement of information has generated the rich virtual landscape we know today…(but) consider too what the lack of top-down control allows: the online scams, the bullying campaigns, the hate-group websites and the terrorist chat rooms. This is the Internet, the world’s largest ungoverned space.

We’ll be more efficient more productive and more creative….a computer in 2025 will be sixty-four times faster than it is in 2013. Popular science fiction concepts…(will) turn into science facts. Fully integrated augmented reality…promises a visual overlay of digital information onto our physical environment. Communication technologies represent opportunities for cultural breakthroughs as well as technical ones.  How we interact with others and how we view ourselves will continue to be influenced and driven by the online world around us.

The vast majority of us will increasingly find ourselves living, working, and being governed in two worlds at once.  Sometimes these worlds (virtual and physical) will constrain each other; sometimes they will clash; sometimes they will intensify, accelerate and exacerbate phenomena in the other world so that a difference in degree will become a difference in kind.

The most significant impact of spread of communication technologies will be the way they help reallocate the concentration of power away from states and institutions and transfer it to individuals.

So, will this transfer of power to individuals ultimately result in a safer world, or a more dangerous one?  We can only wait and see…the future will be shaped by how states, citizens, companies, and institutions handle their new responsibilities.

For citizens…In many ways, their virtual identities will come to supersede all others, as the trails they leave remain engraved online into perpetuity.

There is a canyon dividing people who understand technology and people charged with addressing the world’s toughest geopolitical issues, and no one has built a bridge.  Yet the potential for collaboration between the tech industry, the public sector and civil economy is enormous.

Who will be more powerful in the future, the citizen or the state?  Will technology make terrorism easier or harder to carry out? What is the relationship between privacy and security, and how much will we have to give up to be part of the new digital age?  How will war, diplomacy and revolution change when everyone is connected and how can we tip the balance in a beneficial way?

To understand the future of politics, business, diplomacy and other important sectors, one must understand how technology is driving major changes in those areas.

This is a book about the importance of a guiding human hand in the new digital age.  For all the possibilities that communication technologies represent, their use for good or ill depends solely on people…..What happens in the future is up to us.

And with that, the book’s Introduction came to an end.  So far, so good…I was tracking with the vision and just a little uneasy with what I read.    Chapter One was devoted to Our Future Selves in this world of connectivity and most was pretty positive to me:  Increased Efficiency; More Innovation, More Opportunity, a Better Quality of Life…but I was beginning to have a hard time keeping the virtual and physical world separated in my mind – and not having or losing control is not an easy state for me!  Especially as I turned the page to Chapter Two  on the Future of Identity, Citizenship and Reporting  and immediately learned that to pull back – even from Facebook, Twitter, Skype, Google+, etc. to try to maintain some anonymity  may mean I become irrelevant.

As I mentioned above, Chapter Two is scary….but  I will push through the remaining chapters –  Future of States; Future of Revolution, Future of Terrorism, Future of Conflict, Combat and Intervention, the Future of Reconstruction  and finally a Conclusion  – just so I can get to and understand the “happy ending” that I hopefully can embrace.

After all, the whole point is, we have debated the same issues for 250 years with no resolution; maybe in this new digital world we are already in, we can find a better way to approach and reconcile that age-old of debate about the Relationship of Privacy and Security.

 

 

 

HARDBALL and Chris Matthews

It’s accepted practice to play “hardball” in many instances and over the years I have enjoyed watching an occasional HARDBALL program on MSNBC….tolerating Chris Matthews because his guests were thoughtful and knowledgeable on a wide range of topics.

And today?  I still tune in when I have time…but more and more, my tolerance for Matthews himself is eroding.  For me , he is the perfect caricature of the 20th Century Boomer Angry Old Bird…and despite obviously being a liberal, he belongs in the same category I place many other aging men still engaged in the political and press activities in our world today.

He knows bests, he screams loudest, he is impolite and interrupts his guests by shouting over them-often when they are making a rational point I want to hear.  He positions himself as THE EXPERT in most everything – for some reason because he was an aid to Tip O’Neal. 

I am not sure if my tolerance for his antics is what has changed or if indeed, he is becoming unhinged.  Most days I watch him screaming, not completing sentences, spitting, talking so  fast he cannot even complete a coherent sentence – and as for loud, that is one show I watch with remote in hand, constantly monitoring volume  as his voice raises to dangerous level decibals!

As time passed, I began to view him as the “comic relief” that perhaps is needed in discussing issues that are controversial and have far-reaching consequences…and so, although it was not my style, I tolerated him for what I learned about issues from his guests which gave me a direction to pursue if I wanted to learn more – as I had names of people that DID have the facts that I could research, and thus learn more and reach coherent decisions.

Recently most times I catch the act, I feel like he is auditioning for a role in the entertainment channel known as Fox News….but I do give him credit with at least sharing guests and names that I can use to dig up my own FACTS that he – perhaps unwittingly – no longer allow to come forth much on his program.

So, with that as the background, I pose a question:

On June 6 the IRS manager responsible for actions leading to the “IRS SCANDAL” testified in Congress.  By June 8, I had seen tape of that testimony and wrote my first blog questioning whether this was the Obama Admin spying on innocent citizens, or a lucky break  that happened innocently in the IRS that had exposed some pretty suspicious practices.  On June 12, I again blogged about this topic, as I had seen much more about this in my hometown newspaper. I wrote more on June 17….meanwhile, nary a word about it from Chris Matthews.

Finally, yesterday, he presented the whole thing as EUREKA – LOOK WHAT I AM UNVEILING…there is no IRS Scandal.

So that’s my question.  Why did it take a supposedly cutting-edge up-to-the-minute, somewhat left-focused cable news program anchored by Chris Matthews until TUESDAY 17 to “rule” that perhaps there was no IRS scandal” ?

 

MESSAGE TO MIKE LEE, R-Utah re IMMIGRATION

Your charge that (the Immigration Reform Bill) “grants broad new power to the same executive branch that today is mired in scandal for incompetence and abuse of power” needs a little editing at the very least so let’s look at the current status of all those scandals and mismanagement:

BENGHAZI INCIDENT ITSELF: 

So far, the only emerging suggestion for improvement is better security.  No one doubts that it was asked for prior to the night of violence, but let’s talk about who bears responsibility for denying the Administration’s request for funding to do that? I think it was the REPUBLICANS.  Maybe you should examine why that was.

BENGHAZI TALKING POINTS:

So we can’t find a concrete issue there  that is wholly owned by the Administration, so let’s switch to a five minute update on Meet the Press from a person sitting in for the Obama Administration reading talking points not prepared by her.  First you all chose to try to crucify her- knowing full well she was not involved; and now  enough evidence has been forthcoming to show that both Republican and Democratic members of the Obama Administration were involved in making decisions to capture a point in time in the talking points that was no longer accurate by the Sunday viewing of Meet the Press.  Once the facts were on the table in written proof, the noise on this faded….except for “Benghazi is a scandaland we are not through with this yet” When might you think it will be over?  It’s been weeks since you all have raged on this topic….you must still be looking for WHAT the scandal is that has upset you so.

THE IRS SCANDAL

I admit, it made my stomach drop when I first heard this.  Just as you all planned, the IRS is easy to be fearful of and therefore suspicious of,  I guess.  But once we learned the hyped “scandal” originated not with Obama, but with a conservative Republican employee just trying to do his job who sent the first file (that coincidently just happened to be a Tea Party organization) to IRS legal in Washington for further clarification on whether their actions were explicitly within the law. 

Unfortunately, legal counsel for all IRS resides in Washington so what a bonus to the scandal mongers.  This poor guy just trying to do his job the best he could had just created the perfect opportunity for the rest of you to cry scandal; why, the direction came from “Washington”!  Did you check the facts or did you all manipulate this on purpose to play on the average US citizen’s mistrust of all of you in Washington?

And now we even know what Washington told him…NOT to search for more of these, but if you do see more, let us know.

Back in Cincinnati, this poor little guy just trying to do his job the best he could amidst the flood of requests for non-profit status and with the absence of adequate number of  IRS employees to assist, made himself a list of buzz words to help him recognize cases that IRS legal wanted flagged for further review.  I call that conscientious; you call it a scandal.

I think the scandal occurred long before and  when the clerk ran a search expecting to quickly identify and process the few more that may be waiting in the stacks surrounding him, it surfaced.  His search uncovered a deluge – totally by accident- of political activists trying to skirt the law and requesting non- profit status . Too bad, so sad; they were all Republican-based.

Now whose fault was that again?  I simply cannot, try as I may, make the connection to Barack Obama.

THE “INVASIVE SPYING on CITIZENS by NSA” SCANDAL

We’ve looked at this backwards and forwards; in and out and upside down in the last days since this came to the surface. Oh yes, you mean the one the Bush Administration put in place after they were stopped from  actually eves-dropping  and wiretapping  at will without a court order?

Yes indeed, the one that Obama opposed at the time; still opposed when he ran for President in 2008, and slowly learned through 2009, that it was not as simple as he thought to get rid of ?   The one his staff (including those that were Republican carry-overs) convinced him he had to leave in place?  Oh yes, the one he said as this scandal broke he would WELCOME further debate on to find a better way? 

Ah yes, the one that has Congressional Oversight (and was just renewed by Congress)as well as Judicial Control?

That posturing does not even deserve my time. Look in the mirror for the guilty.

MISCELLANEOUS

And then we have the Press Scandal issue. Because it is the press, it seems there has been an unwillingness to share facts, or maybe the facts aren’t there- I don’t know, so for argument’s sake, let’s leave that one on the table until we know something concrete. 

That will give you more time to keep searching.  You thought Benghazi would be the strategy to pen in Hillary, but that did not work; now we have new issues…..not unique to Hillary… of bad moral behavior of her secret service guys.  They made the news, but aren’t exactly NEW news, so I am not sure that did the trick to turn the tide. 

Really guys, it needs to be something more subtle…Hillary survived 8 years of you the first time around; she has survived 4 years of you this time around…you are not going to be the influencing difference in whether she runs or not.  I know, if she runs, you lose.  But have you ever thought shouting scandal from the rooftops over the ants on the dinner table may be enough in itself to ensure you are not qualified as a party to take up residence in the White House?

BACK TO IMMIGRATION REFORM

All that aside, Immigration reform is needed for the country, for the immigrants and certainly for the Republican Party.  What about your lack of support in the last election do you not understand?.  Oh yes, got it.  That was before you started the scandal campaign that is working so well.

I’m thinking you all would be better served spending time looking in the mirror, identifying weaknesses, and misconnects with the American people. So far, looking for the Elmer Gantry in your midst that can “save” your party with soap box rhetoric is not working. 

And there is no doubt you all are not Shakespeare, so continuing to make “Much Ado About Nothing” is not the answer to moving the country forward.

 

SYRIA and “TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE”

This is getting old.  As this brouhaha unfolds, we’ve already learned that Obama had staff working on the “what if” contingency of arming Syrian rebels…BEFORE the much-quoted Red Line Speech.

Yes, as I recall, I read that within the Administration they had been charged with researching who to arm AND what should be included as elements…before reports surfaced about the use of chemical weapons.

From my perspective, the “red line” comment was a calculated one – it not only bought some time to ensure we were not headed for a repeat of “Iraq has nuclear weapons” myth of the Republican initiated debacle in the Bush Administration but it also may have bought some time to ensure allies positions and prepare for a rollout prior to the G-8 face-to-face meetings with Putin  – do ya think?

But then, I admit, I did not agree with the Neocon Iraqi plan when I heard it and I think it has been proven I was on the correct side of that argument – but maybe that was just “luck”?

Nevertheless, I do not buy in to the apparent theory that everyone including the poor folks begging for quarters on the street corners have better ideas, better intell, and better solutions that the experienced mixed-party staff in the White House can come up who review and discuss all known details and what-ifs, then share perspectives, listen and learn from one another and then reach a consensus plan of action that balances risks and rewards.  Will that always result in an error-proof plan? 

Those clamoring for differing actions based on only your own limited knowledge and opinion  should pause for a minute.   Ask yourself if all the plans you have implemented in your lifetime have been not only trouble-free but also highly successful, with no negative consequences.  Many of the public questioners have been consistently wrong.

That’s why it is so puzzling to me that even the Press who are neither administrative, legislative nor judicial members of our governing system feel they know more and better than those engaged in that governmental process.

Don’t get me wrong.  I certainly believe in freedom of the press to report on “facts” as they see them and I accept those “facts” are often reported too soon or too late and are also colored by personal beliefs.  But please, the Press is not the ultimate authority sitting in judgment of the other three branches of government…except to report and then play the role that all citizens share.

CLOSING OUT THE WEEKEND

One Minnesotan’s stance on Immigration:

A  letter to the Editor this week took the position that we should not allow additional immigration to our state, nor legalize those that are here illegally because Minnesota is getting too crowded…you know, it takes too much time to get “up to the lake” because of traffic caused by too many people.  The advice she gave to stop this was that found in a Native American belief – “Think seven generations ahead- about 140 years – and decide what type of world the children of that era will inherit.”

Really?   That may be good advice, and I am not sure if the writer is Native American or not, but if not, I expect the writer’s Goldberg family ancestors would not be here –as  most of the white migration to Minnesota started in in the 1870s. Were I a Native American then and could visualize what kind of life  Native American children would have in 2013, I am not so sure I would have let the Swedes, Norwegians,  or Germans set one foot in my territory!

Fifty Years of the Guthrie:

I attended my first Guthrie performance in 1964 when Tyrone Guthrie as the artistic director.   I missed a few years – my last two years at the U, my two years in Chicago, and some time right after I returned, but as I looked at the article “The Seven Stages of the Guthrie”, I experienced all but two – the Campbell and the Epstein eras….

Hero or What….

I am so trying to keep an open mind on the issue of privacy vs. security/Snowden the Hero or the Betrayer but the more I listen to the Press, the more I feel I am being pushed into an anti-Obama world; and of course, as the rebel, that makes me more inclined to side with him.

Just today, on Meet the Press,  David Gregory stated that Obama was critical of the Patriot Act when he first ran for President but he has not yet acknowledged that despite his “new position” now.  WRONG.  I heard the Press Conference myself the day the NSA news broke.  I specifically heard Obama reference his original opinion, the things he learned once in office that made him go along with a change in emphasis, and the fact that he welcomed the debate. 

I also heard Andrea Mitchell using both Benghazi and IRS situation as examples of Obama mismanagement.  As far as I know at this point, the worst part of Benghazi was the disagreement and various changes made to the talking points Susan Rice used on “Meet the Press”.  Security issues themselves were a result of Republicans in Congress turning down the Obama Administration request for additional funds  to increase security.  To that I say, has the press ever tracked the compilation of “talking points” on any other issue in any other Administration?  My guess would be they are always massaged and most likely will show differing opinions of various Presidential staff’s beliefs.  

But her comment this morning re the IRS included the word “certainly” to describe it as a scandal.  That is several days after the conservative Republican originator has been interviewed in the Congressional Hearing and his description of what happened confirmed this was what we used to call at Carlson , “Shit Happens” when things went awry instead of as planned.   It was not a planned act; it was not a malicious act; it was a worker asking the IRS legal department for clarification on whether the file he was reviewing was an issue, and as we know today, that tax attorney simply asked to be advised if he found others. The reviewer then innocently enough, to help him do his job, developed a list of key words to use to search and was surprised and overwhelmed when there were hundreds of matches!  That was not a conscious act of targeting “tea party” folks; it was a lucky break that uncovered just how many people asking for non-profit status were actually involved in political activities-thus making their request for non-profit status illegal.

Syria-the new example of Obama’s ineptness.

Last week we learned a bit more on the Syria issue as well.  In fact, Obama and his administration began discussions of what steps they would take in terms of providing weapons some time BEFORE he issued the statement about the red line being chemical weapons.  He may have regretted the red line statement as soon as the Press started the spin of “how long does it take to prove chemical weapons were used,”  but nevertheless, he stood firm until all involved reached consensus based on evidence, that indeed a line had been crossed.  Had the Neo-cons followed a similar process in verifying nuclear weapons in Iraq, think of the lives and dollars we would have saved!   

Now, again I am not suggesting there were not mistakes made, but I am saying that little by little these “scandals” are being found to have little staying power….except in the Press…and thereby the public.  I can’t help but wonder if the Press is not simply acting like naughty little kids – with one of their own accused of misdeeds, the parent has become the enemy.

Snowden the Betrayer

As for Snowden – hero or villain- I think the Washington Post article detailing his life prior to becoming center of attention after the leak says a lot.  He betrayed us all in his delusional picture of himself and his quest for fame.  The real issue about Snowden in my mind is not what access he had as a contractor, but how in the world did he get the access he did without some kind of background check.  I may be wrong, but my theory is that he was not given the clearance that would allow him to do all the things he boasted he could do; on the contrary, as a talented hacker, he found his own way in to systems where he should not have been.  So when NSA officials deny he had the access they are not wrong in that he probably was not GIVEN that access, but stole it.  But time will tell.

The Iranian Election

In view of all of our own troubles, I would so like to believe that the election this week in Iran is sign of good things to come….but let’s not forget; the people may have spoken – but what about Khamenei and the Revolutionary Guard?

And finally, the Louisiana Explosion

I am trying to remind myself that the Louisiana explosion  could have happened anywhere, but I admit, there is this nagging thought that will not go away…:why is it all those anti-federal government states have one disaster after another….and in the aftermath generally look for government disaster relief? “

I am beginning to think we should look at the age-old argument of Individual States Rights in a new way.  Of course there is an impact due to natural disasters, but how many of these tragedies could be avoided or at least lessoned if Individual and States Rights were at least in balance with safety and security.

For instance, the plan to rebuild More OK in exactly the same place that has been hit twice by tornados without insisting there are basements, storm cellars or SOMETHING, makes sense why?

After all, we know that Southern states receive more US government aid than they totally pay in in US taxes.  That means, if I had their view, I should be shouting – that’s “My” money being spent because they seem to do little to change – or recover – unless it comes from a federal fund.  I am not saying that but I am suggesting that whatever the issue, perhaps it is time we ask WHY does this happen over and over and what can be done to avoid similar situations in the future!

 

 

PRETTY GOOD HUMOR

While the STRIB and News Channels are  still full of opinions and rants on the NSA programs, the Tip Sheet in the Travel Section of the STRIB today FEATURES an article on TRACKING APPS – with a prediction that users of these locater services in North America and Europe alone will reach 70 million by 2016.  And along with that prediction, the STRIB shared a list of top ten that does the best job.

Nothing wrong with that…I’m just sayin’…it is okay apparently for commercial and social media organizations to track what we do, like and don’t like every minute of our lives; it’s okay for us to track friends, family, and others, and it is even okay if  the government  tracks “immigrants” wanting to become citizens, but….

It’s a scandal that NSA has a list of phone numbers, NOT identified by name used to identify connections to numbers of suspected terrorists.  If a connection is clearly identified, the government then must get a court order/search warrant to match a name with a number.

And as you ponder on that, I am going to sort through all my notes and scribbles as I try to put them in context  to clear the deck for what I am learning about the “the New Digital Age” I just posted about on Facebook!