Resolved: The United States federal government should substantially curtail its domestic surveillance.

In debate- -Definitions determine the direction of debate. -Words are powerful and create meaning of what we discuss. -What does curtail mean? -Surveillance? -Substantial?

Definitions- -USFG: MUST be the federal government Can’t be state police, state government, or private companies Can’t make AT&T do something. -Substantially: to a great or significant extent -Curtail: reduce in extent or quantity; impose a restriction on -Domestic: existing or occurring inside a particular country; not foreign or international Surveillance: constant observation of a place or process

In Policy Debate- Two teams- (2 people per team) Affirmative Negative

Affirmative Team- Affirms (supports the resolution) Advocates CHANGE through your plan. Aff must overcome Presumption Presumption- the initial beliefs of the judge or audience about the resolution and the arguments. Meaning- Change MUST be Justified. If you are not doing anything illegal why do you care?

Aff’s Goal- Prove that the plan has substantial benefits Mitigates/solves the harms Mitigate- to make small or less severe Prove that the plan produces positive benefits over negative impacts. Ex- Gov can still collect digital records, but a warrant protects unnecessary intrusion on people.

Ex. Stop using Muslim informants

Or- No general Federal Drone surveillance

Negative Team Upholds the Status Quo Status Quo- the current system/way of doing things. SQ=How things are now.

Aff will produce THIS Neg claims they are this

Negative Goals- Prove Aff plan not needed Prove Aff plan non-topical Outside the resolution Ex- their plan does not involve federal informants only state Prove Aff plan is being done now Prove Plan fails to bring positive or any change Prove plan will cause something far worse to occur. This is called a disadvantage Prove any 1- and you win!

Not ‘Merica federal government

Prior Watergate Scandal- -1972 5 burglars belonging to the “plumbers” break into the Democrat national headquarters located in the Watergate building prior to the presidential election. -Plumbers: Its task was to stop the leaking of classified information, such as the Pentagon Papers, to the news media. Its members branched into illegal activities while working for the Committee to Re-elect the President. Conducted surveillance. -President Nixon knows about the break in and covers it up. (that is a crime) -Nixon conducted illegal surveillance on members of his “enemies list” It’s like you area cop and phone tap your neighbors.

Church Committee- 1978 Committee found FBI collected intimate information on political leaders, organizations to gain power. Think blackmail. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) erected a wall of separation between domestic and foreign intelligence collection Congress essentially said no domestic surveillance w/o specific search warrant.

History- What changed????? Acts of Terror destroys US illusion of safety April 19, 1995- Oklahoma City Federal Building bombing 168 victims including (19 kids, 14 preschool aged) Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols convicted -Angered over government raid at Waco Texas that killed anti-government militia members -Felt gov was encroaching on personal rights.

Conviction- McVeigh caught in part by a surveillance camera on the Regency Towers capturing his pickup 3 days before and the Ryder rental truck driving by. Places McVeigh on the scene. Showed the power of surveillance and putting together pieces of info

9/11

Safety over Civil Liberties! -Civil Liberties: are personal guarantees and freedoms that the government cannot abridge, either by law or by judicial interpretation without due process. Ex. Privacy, speech, trial Civil Rights: A broad range of privileges and rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and subsequent amendments and laws that guarantee fundamental freedoms to all individuals. Government action ensuring civil liberties. What is more important safety- or civil liberties?

Why 9/11? 9/11 Commission formed to find out why intelligence community fail to “connect the dots” -Intelligence failed due to FISA’s “wall of separation” between foreign and domestic intelligence -Needed tools to monitor possible terror suspects- _America people wanted to be protect and stop another 9/11 Enter NSA!

Congress Response: USA PATRIOT ACT -Purpose is to make it easier to monitor terrorist activities of persons living in the US by amending FISA -Seems legit.

Some specifics -Section 215 allowed for business records to be inspected by intelligence agencies as long as it is to protect against terrorism -Bulk metadata collection where gov seizes txt messages, emails, phone calls, finical transactions. 1.7 billion electronic communications per day (WP 2012) Metadata- is data that describes other data. "an underlying definition or description.“ Ex- txt message- #, time, and location NO WARRANT NEEDED- AT&T turns over all info- you agreed to in in your user contract. 3 party! You let AT&T have it.

Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court Can issue secret search warrants to the NSA. Has only denied less than 100 warrants. NSA expands the warrants without care. NSA has NO oversight- lies to Congressional committees charged w/oversight.

Specifics- Section 505= uses National Security Letter that gives intelligence agency power to demand customer records. -What did you buy off of Amazon? Think about it: gov has access to all your info on FB, Snapchat, twitter, amazon purchases, music listened to, websites visited. Gov. creates digital profiles of each of us. Companies do it already- I get running material suggestion.

How did we learn about NSA Spying? Edward Snowden- former NSA contractor who whistle blew on what NSA was doing. Leaked documents about PRISM. Whistle Blower- a person who exposes any kind of information or activity that is deemed illegal, dishonest, or not correct within an organization that is either private or public Policy only thing to stop this type of spying.

Something that was exposed In 2013, a top-secret order issued by the court was leaked to the media by Edward Snowden. It required a subsidiary of Verizon to provide a daily, ongoing feed of all call detail records – including those for domestic calls – to the NSA. So the NSA has my call record and can see who I talked to….

Snowden also showed- 90% of those placed under surveillance in the U.S. are ordinary Americans, and are not the intended targets.  The Washington Post in July 2014 NSA tracks the locations of hundreds of millions of cellphones per day, allowing them to map people's movements and relationships in detail. Access to all communications made via Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Yahoo, YouTube, AOL, Skype, Apple and Paltalk,  NSA collects hundreds of millions of contact lists from personal email and instant messaging accounts each year.  NSA weaken much of the encryption used on the Internet (by collaborating with, coercing or otherwise infiltrating numerous technology companies) to put in back doors,

NOT WIKILEAKS Bradley Manning (Now Chelsea) leaked top secret US military documents and diplomatic cables onto Wikileaks a website showing atrocities committed by the US military. Currently in maximum security prison

John Oliver’s take

What is the concern?

Major Question Is it possible to prevent another major terrorist attack while preserving civil liberties? Terrorism vs Safety Safety vs Privacy and Autonomy Tyranny vs Freedom Security vs Racism (ethnic profiling) Gov Power vs. Citizen Rights Cost vs other needs $75 billion on intelligence but we don’t know It’s a “Black” program a highly classified military/defense project,