Massie on NSA spying, days after the Snowden disclosures

Jun 12, 2013 · 18:21 surveillance fourth-amendment

On Cincinnati radio, Massie says the NSA is collecting Americans' records and that Congress was not told the truth about it.

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8:06 at 55 KRC the talk station and a very happy Wednesday to you Brian Thomas inviting you out lunch we're going to be at uh caban on the
River today listener lunch out about kicking off summer and I know from the area code Mr Thomas Massie Congressman Thomas Matthew he will not be in town you're in Washington DC right now and
for good reason welcome back to the program Congressman it's a pleasure to have you on thanks for having me Brian um wow and where to begin I I guess let me just start with this I know you had
an NSA briefing yesterday probably had more information than you could actually reveal because of course you have it was a private closed meeting but I I'm looking at a stack here and on one side
I have uh bipartisanship Diane Feinstein along with uh Speaker of the House John Boehner calling uh this guy a call him a
traiter the guy that basically I would argue confirmed everything that we sort of s thought in the back of our minds that we were being spied on in essence
uh Mr Snowden and on the other side a couple of people who I have tremendous amount of respect for uh Judge Andrew do palatano and Rand Paul senator Paul both saying he's more of a hero than a
traitor I'm going to put you on the spot Congress Massie but where do you come out on this well I've already uh come out on this and first let me say we
don't know everything about Mr Snowden there's a lot of stuff still yet to come out true but um I can say this if it
weren't for him we wouldn't be having this discussion exactly and there are a lot of people who are in enaged upset about the the revelations but at the
same time how can you be enraged about the revelations and then be mad at Mr Snowden uh you they want to shoot the messenger and I don't think we should
shoot the messenger well and and the argument that is being made is it was this NSA compilation and and and keeping
this is they are retaining the so-called metadata who we called when we called how long the conversation last where we were when we called information that is absolutely frighteningly frighteningly
revealing heck even Joe Biden said back in 2006 that quote I don't have to listen to your phone calls to know what you're doing I know every single phone
call you made I'm able to determine every single person you talk to I can get the pattern about your life and that is very very intrusive that's Joe Biden he's one of their guys yeah so well let
me let me say something else so far everything that he's revealed has turned out to be true yes uh so nobody has denied it yet but as as recently as two
or three months ago the director of of National Intelligence Mr Clapper came to Congress and lied to us lied to us he was specifically asked by Senator weiden
are you collecting data on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans and he said no no I the video is there for all
to see and he looks nervous and he's scratching his head and someone said you I it was a daily show that that lampooned him for his just absolute
apparent lying saying you know anybody that has a tell like that you know you should be playing a poker game with him gez it's awful but so here's the question the big question here the big
issue is do you think it's okay do you think it's ever okay for your government to lie to you no is that okay because if you accept that premise we've gone over
the cliff if the American public accepts that it's okay for the government to lie to the American public then we're in big trouble and this guy came to Congress
and lied to Congress well I guess he had another option didn't he Congressman Massie he could have defended himself in a prepared statement and then taken the
fifth he could have well no he was yeah I guess he could have but um just to be a little bit cute there but wow um he
could have said that's that's classified information and I can't talk about it exactly in fact I I specifically you know I can't tell you
what the answer was but in our classified briefing yesterday I asked the um you know dep Deputy attorney general and and all the folks who were
there I just I asked them if that was okay and I'd love to share their answer but I can't well I think I know what the answer is it is okay in the minds of some people and this comes down to the
fundamental question the people who are arguing uh that Snow's a traitor the people arguing this is a big breach of National Security are arguing that this was lawful and under the patriarch and
subsid sub like the the fisa that that established these courts that we don't know anything about we're not allowed to know anything about all this cloaked in secrecy that there's these Protections
in there but it but that it was lawful Congressman Massie I look at the Constitution and contrast the the Fourth Amendment and also the first amendment
and some other of these scandals and I say how could anything like this be lawful when we have a constitution well it shouldn't be lawful but back to those
uh congressmen and Senators that you mentioned U or didn't mention and let's not specifically mention them by name but there are certain congressmen who
believe it is in your best interest to lie to to you that and and to keep secrets from you specifically about how
they are surveilling you and I fundamentally disagree with those people the other thing you need to I would like to explain to the American public is the
president went on TV and said every member of Congress knew about this program that is untrue that's a lie and that was a subject of our discussion
yesterday in the classified briefing not everybody knew about it there were about 20 members of Congress who are privileged to this information uh be by
virtue of the Committees that they serve on well as you just Illustrated Congressman the the the guy that's heading up the whole organization even if you were aware of it you're being fed
lies yeah and so the question is how how does the how does the truth come out and there are a lot of people that want a Monday Morning Quarterback well Snowden
should have done this he should have done that and and we still we don't know all the information about Mr Snowden but there are people who ask well why didn't
he come to a member of Congress I'll tell you what there's I I'm fully convinced that there are members of Congress if he had gone to them with this information he'd be in the Clink
right now he'd be in jail they his story would have not been released wow if he had gone to the wrong members of Congress and then um The Whistleblower
protection that everybody talks about you know their whistleblower statutes they specifically exclude this type of information it says he's there is no as
far as I understand I've been discussing this with other congressmen for the type of disclosure he made there is no U
legal Pathway to do that legitimately um through a congressman like there is with other whistleblower statutes and that's as best as I know so
the question is if he what do you expect him to do and are do you appreciate the information that he gave you or would you rather be lied to about what your
government is doing to surveil you well I think about it I would rather know this and with good reason it's it's it's the information it's like labeling on a product product
labeling what's in it what nutritional value does it have what vitamins is there going anything bad in it if I know that I can make an informed decision about whether or not I want to put it in my body and the same thing goes with
this if we are told upfront that if you use the internet email Communications and and I appreciate how impossible in modern technology would or in in a
modern day and age it would be to turn our backs on this we'd have to become luddites but at least we would know and have the option in this particular case
we had no knowledge in ahead of time and we we're just voluntarily without our unbeknownst to us giving every little detail of Our Lives to an unseen unknown
giant computer datab base for future use I'm sorry that just doesn't sit well I don't know how it sits well with anybody no it shouldn't if it does you're in
trouble because if the government can lie to you you first of all they shouldn't be able to spy on American citizens who are not not suspected of anything that's the Fourth Amendment and
you've already touched on that we we fought a revolution over this although I will say on the on the house floor the other day I heard one of my other
members jokingly say oh you didn't know about the Fourth Amendment they just put that in there for the to get the Liberals to vote for the other
stuff nice Congress Messi of course we're going to have to contrast this bulk across the board what I'll call
spying characterizes spying done by the NSA without regard to political affiliation let's contrast that with targeting and that ultimately becomes
the biggest problem with bulk information and keeping it because at some point something nefarious could happen or be used with that information apparently that's been going on over the
IRS don't go away we'll continue with the Commonwealth of kuy's fighting forth Congressman Thomas Massie right after these brief words for my friends at fashion pro fashion pro 818 at 55 krcd
talk station Brian Thomas with Commonwealth kuy Congressman Thomas Massy joining me back on the 55 KC Morning Show Regular uh contributor uh
of of comments and offerings Congressman mass is a pleasure to have you on the program as always we talked a little bit about the NSA briefing yesterday of course the specific details the actual answers to questions you cannot reveal
because it is confidential H and it was done uh in a secure setting but of course you and I share the same impression about the NSA and it's targeting of Americans we do have a
constitution the Fourth Amendment still exists and it it is concerning to most people like me Congressman Massie because of the potential for abuse now
if you listen to John Boehner oddly enough he relied on the statements of the president to S to tell the American people that we shouldn't be worried
about this I think he could have been a little more Artful or tactful about that relying on a man that he had previously uh called in essence a liar uh doesn't
seem to be like good salesmanship Thomas or mrass but yeah know you can call me Thomas I wouldn't I wouldn't rely on this Administration either look do you
trust them with the IRS information here's here's something else that I tell some of my friends who by the way I've got Congressman coming up to me saying you know I was almost there
with you on sispa I wanted to vote with you uh but now I'm with you this is it this is it I'm this pushed me over the edge and what I tell them is you know
what if if you accept if you accept the premise that the government can lie to you for your own good then never expect
to get an answer about Benghazi never expect to get an answer because that's what that's what I think they're doing right now on Benghazi I think they've
got information that they're trying to hold back because um for our own good so they're going to lie to us about it and that's it well I mean let's look at it
this way it could conceivably be a criminal gun running operation that have been going on there right I mean there's any number of things that that there's there's has to be a reason for a cover
up right can you can let your imag Run free now that we know the government thinks it's okay to lie to exactly so here's so I you know I mentioned sispa
that was a cyber intelligence sharing and protection act that was specifically about this issue people were saying oh well we just want to know who uh we just
want your internet information we don't want to know what was in your email and it's the same thing except phone records is is what we're talking about here
today and I think sis but I think that legislation came to us because these Private Industry you know internet providers were getting nervous they're
like gee my goodness we're trampling all over their rights we better get some kind of protection from the government before we keep doing this and that's what sispa was it was to absolve all
those corporations of any liability for infringing on our fourth amendment rights or breaking contracts well they're not allowed to talk about it anyway I mean look at the aftermath when when Snowden comes out with this prism
information in the NSA spying and it shows that all of them we we have access we the government in essence have backdoor access and call it back door front door call it side door whatever
it's a matter of semantics their response was we don't give anybody backd door access but if you step back from that and think about like Clinton and it
all depends on what the word is is right there's one argument there but the other one is aren't they prevented by law from even mentioning this or discussing this
anyway so a lie is okay in the mind of the government when we hear it from Facebook telling us that they're not sharing information by way of the back door well we need there needs to be
disclosure on this we need to have a national discussion they certainly need to disclose it to Congress we we're not even aware of this although you can extrapolate you can look at some of
these bills like the Patriot Act we were sounding the alarm back when when it was Bush's Patriot Act and I sounded the alarm here on cispa when we voted on that what's coming up this week the ndaa
all right and the the thing to be worried about in the ndaa is two years ago they they allowed for indefinite atten detention
I wish it was in attention indefinite Detention of Americans and U without a trial you know
without being convicted in the National Defense authorization act we're still trying to get that fixed that's coming the ndaa is coming up for a vote this
week think about that I mean you we're we're still trying to get that fixed the idea of unlimited attention of American citizen and you're trying to get it
fixed I mean it passed so when we when we find out listen to this so should we be surprised when we find out in a
couple years that there's a camp with a bunch of Americans in it who've never had a trial they got whisked away in the middle of the night and nobody knew they were there they just went missing and
the president whoever that may be at the time comes out and says well Congress authorized this it was the law it was totally lawful exactly Congressman
Massie I'd love that and and and and again you people oh roll the eyes uh come on Congressman you're just you know no let's go back to the IRS I'm going to
be on steuart Varney and Company today on Fox Business they want to talk about this today so they invited me on the program again but the IRS specifically targeting groups based upon ideology
this sounds to me like uh fascist nazi Germany to me yeah and and the thing on the IRS I hope people don't miss the big picture it doesn't matter who's in power
that that organization is going to be abused it's right for abuse there's 70,000 pages is a tax code we need to capitalize on the moment on the outrage
with the IRS and say simplify the tax code just go with a flat tax flat tax we don't need the agents we won't need accountants we won't need to bother with
the hassles everyone will pay their tax or easily be found out it's piece of cake it doesn't offer favoritism it doesn't offer political cronyism no carve outs no exceptions no exclusions
hey it's the end of corruption yep so there well there's no way you guys are going to vote for it in the well well when you get here you
understand why things are broken how they got broken and um the P the people that wrote those laws they're raising
their money their campaign money from the people that get the exemptions in the tax code and it's going to be hard to unwind that it is I don't want to
give that up because their positions here in Congress are predicated on how much money they can raise you know and they wouldn't be if you got rid of all that Capital that cronyism and you got
rid of the tax code and you had a flat tax then their positions you know what they'd be based on they'd be based on their actions yeah it's amazing wonderful Congressman massia real quick
here because your comments about the IRS and maybe going to a flat tax Lead Me To The Logical question the IRS is getting ready to have access to all of our Healthcare isn't that a wonderful thing
um does this not serve as an opportune time particularly given rate shock that's going on throughout this country with Obamacare Ohio is going to see an 88% increase next year because of
Obamacare if that's so if that bad or California's getting the same thing people aren't going to be able to afford insurance people are going to have their hours cut back at work people are going
to get fired or have it dropped it's cheaper to pay the penalty than buy insurance there's no incentive to buy insurance anymore the prea is gone all of this spells absolute chaos and
collapse but back to the IRS isn't this a golden opportunity with all of this Obamacare mess finally registering with voters to maybe try to stick a fork in
that if for no other reason the IRS is responsible absolutely look it's going to be irreversible damage to this country the Obamacare is and it's
supposed to be implemented by the IRS as you point out they're going to have 15,000 more agents to implement an aspect of it I think we should hold tight on the next debt limit deal the
president's going to come to Congress and ask for another credit card and we should say no we're not going to give you another credit card to implement
Obamacare let's let's stop let's Hold the Line right there and isn't it amazing you have the power of the purse you could do this for any of the organization you could you could strangle the IRS financially couldn't
you we could we could achieve a lot of things by holding the purse strings a little bit tighter here in Congress the problem is our folks here are I don't
want to implicate anybody we all know who they are right they don't want to take a stand and they're afraid to get a black eye in the media well look the
president right now his approval ratings are at an all-time low I don't think we should worry about doing the right we should do the right thing and not worry about it okay that should be the spring
board every day and maybe that they're in lines the problem we as Americans are not electing people that have a spine they do not have charact we are electing
people without character we are letting people uh we are electing people who get easily manipulated and swayed by the dangling Cara of lobbyist dollars yep
and but I'll tell you what daylight is a wonderful antiseptic and we're we're seeing so much daylight these days I I hope we double the daylight up here
I'm I'm with you keep it up Thomas or I keep W to call you Thomas Congressman Massie you always a welcome guest on my program radio personality Thomas
appreciate your fresh and cander and uh I'll look forward to talking you again real soon thank you Congressman Massie 82755 KRC the talk station quick word for Emory Federal Credit Union

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