Rokita Readings 8-2-13 - The Spying on Americans Never Ended

Statement

Rokita Readings
A clickable offering of books and articles that I've read recently and highly recommend, as we strive together to "Keep the Republic."

Featured in this week's Rokita Readings is a column by Elizabeth Goitein, "The Spying on Americans Never Ended." (PDF is below)

Goitein's column is easily the best piece I have yet read on why the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) and FISC (FISA Court) and the National Security Agency (NSA) surveillance actions are unconstitutional and bad policy.

In her column, Goitein effectively strings the whole argument together - in pieces, some of these things seem trivial and perhaps even necessary - however, when one steps back and compares the actions of the FISC and NSA with our bedrock founding documents, every American should be alarmed. The Members of Congress that are "in-the-know" and the intelligence community's "nothing to see here" strategy falls far short of a justified reason for the blanket surveillance of innocent Americans.

I believe that any American who is under surveillance without probable cause has a right to know the legal justification as to why, as well as the fact they are being, in effect, investigated by their own government. That is why I introduced the Ending Secret Law Act several weeks ago. The Ending Secret Law Act will require the declassification of FISC decisions pertaining to the surveillance of Americans and help restore faith that our intelligence community is acting in our best interest and not collecting data on innocent Americans in bulk.

-A hat tip to a great friend and advisor who pointed this article out.

Downloads
http://rokita.house.gov/sites/rokita.house.gov/files/8-2-13%20Elizabeth%20Goitein_%20The%20Spying%20on%20Americans%20Never%20Ended%20-%20WSJ.pdf

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