Unbridled Exuberant Arrogance

[Turtle]

First off, NSA is not the criminal, SOME people at NSA are. Just as the vast majority are not. The same as every truck driver is not a criminal because some drive drunk.

Everyone who has come out as a whistleblower has used the same term or other terms that mean the same thing - systemic, pervasive, ubiquitous. By definition, and by any intelligent sense you choose to use, there is no way that a small handful of people in the NSA are the only ones behind this and the other tens of thousands don't have a clue as to what is going on. Most, in fact, do know what is being collected. It's just that the compartments prevent individuals from seeing the big picture of the totality of the collections. So, while there may be only a minority who know all the details of the totalities, most in the NSA, including low-level analysts we now know, are fully aware of what is going on, and that it's wrong.

SO, say I worked in "A" group. Which I did for most of my career. I have no idea but I will make it up. Prism is housed in "Q" group. There may be several thousand in "Q" group but only 30 have clearance for Prism. Is everyone in "Q" guilty of excesses? Are those in "A" responsible for the problems with a project that they have NO idea even exists?

Everyone in "Q" would be guilty if they knew what was going on, yes. They wouldn't necessarily need all the proper clearances to know what was going on. Not having clearance for PRISM doesn't necessarily mean you don't know that it exists and what it does, all not having clearance gets you is no access to the data. Are those in "A" responsible if they don't know it even exists? Of course not. But if they find out about it and the abuses, and they keep their mouth shut, yeah, they are.

Second, why is the Congress NOT competent to insure proper oversight? If even some are able to get away with it then they are NOT doing their job.

Because the oversight extends only as far as the NSA says it does. Congressional visits to NSA facilities are met with whatever the NSA allows Congress to see, which we now know isn't any of the details. NSA administrators have lied under oath in Congressional oversight committees, which we now know to have been routine about any of the details that the NSA doesn't want to tell Congress.

Former head of the CIA? Panetta? Is that the dud you are speaking of?

George Herbert Walker Bush. The NSA has admitted to the abuses (but in their mind not abuses at all) since before Senior's administration. As a former Director of Central Intelligence, it's hard for me to believe he was completely unaware of what the NSA did for a living.

I not not excusing those who did wrong, as I have repeatedly stated. I am also not willing to dismiss the root cause, which is a total lack of oversight. If it is even a lack of oversight, or was it planned?

The NSA bamboozled Congress into thinking it had oversight. We've got Intelligence Committee members, the ones who thought they had oversight of the NSA, being "startled" at these new revelations.