Just curious. These posts deflecting seem a bit odd.

Anyway, it's difficult to tell the two apart at times...

But the main distinction is: the government operates exclusively by threat of force.

A corporation data-mining is looking to improve its chances of having you patronize their business. If you decide you don't want to regardless of their solicitations then that settles the matter.

However, a government that indiscriminately sifts the lives of its citizens may decide it wishes to act on those that it finds displeasing. This can lead to regulatory harassment, undue legal proceedings (and the government can spend more on lawyers than you can) or even outright arrest.

And if the corporations ever did sink their fangs deep enough into the government they might then use those governmental powers that corporations normally lack to compel patronage even after you have decided to decline their goods and services. Who knows how far that could go? They might even use such powers to enforce something like insurance mandates!

Implying that they haven't already...

how long you took for a lunch break, when you used the loo

everything was RFID tracked

I got written for taking a 90min lunch break..

they tracked if you access external sites..I found out they kept track of anything I sent via email..I was asked to furnish my Gmail id information and password...I quit after 6 weeks..

What's interesting to me is that we've known of massive data collections by the government for some time so Greenwald's 'scoop' is not much of one except for those who want to see the world in its bleakest terms.

Since FISA warrants require review by Congress, I'm sure both parties have been aware of this for some time. Which is why the GOP isn't jumping all over it.

Although I expect Rand Paul to do that momentarily.

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[font color="blue"][center]Stop looking for heroes. BE one.[/center][/font]
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We've known, or should've known, it for a while now, and we've come to get on with our lives anyway. Sure it's not right, but it doesn't affect us personally on a daily basis.

If we get outraged at every thing we'll lose our focus. Save the outrage for serious problems like the environment or poison in the air and water. Sure google sux, but it doesn't hurt us.

Yes it is old news and I am with you, it sucks but it's life, and has been for a long time. My phone calls are pretty boring, so I hope they like being bored.

Apparently this citizen had to call three stores at his wife's request to find a step stool and padded potty seat for their child. His Internet activity also verifies he read reviews of a half dozen toilet seats.

But only if you raise to the level of being a noncompliant public figure. Oh what the heck, he'll throw you a free preview:

Citizen Nightwatcher may appear to be a force for good in society in his run for public office, but did you know he has a secret fascination with defecation? It's true, his network logs show an almost obsessive fascination with learning as much as possible about the process and implements of defecation. He has solicited multiple people over the telephone asking for their assistance in his defecation processes and there have been allegations that a child may have been involved somehow. There is something thoroughly unwholesome and scandalous here about this deviant you certainly should not trust him until he submits to a complete public congressional investigation.

Duh!

Molly Ivins would like to talk to you about how information like this might be misused where the stakes are a bit higher than getting spammed with more ads....

http://onlineathens.com/stories/111904/opi_20041119016.shtml

other than to distract and dilute?

n.t.

or maybe I did by voting for Obama? in any case, rationalization epic fail on your part.

That's your argument? That the Government listening to all our phone calls and knowing our every move is just fine and dandy because the Corporations do it to a lesser and non threat of force way?

Try another one. Perhaps you can get something that doesn't sound so bad next time.

Its Verizons fault. Its the corporations on our computers and smartphones fault.

Some of the comments are so insane they defy anything even resembling reason.

We have to pay some company to protect ourselves from corporations on our phones, computers and smartphones and I don't hear the outrage.
I am reading the views of those who were outraged from day one at the idea of a war on an amorphous concept like terror. Until that ends forget privacy from the government.
Meanwhile what are we doing about the invasion of our privacy by corporations.

I hear outrage about all this stuff you O" pologists say "what about what about" continuously.

We are complicit. Before buying these electronic devices, that make our daily lives so much easier, we could have demanded contracts that say our call info is ours & not to be sold, bartered or given away. We could have written & called our reps in Congress, when the patriot crap was passed, & demanded they not give up our rights for some fake security scam. I know many on this site did do that, but did America as a whole? Did you hear the news media reporting that the phone/fax lines of members of Congress were jammed due to the number of outraged citizens calling/faxing? I'm not always the most aware of current events, but I do not recall that. Shit, most of the population doesn't even vote. Why would they call?

Saying we are complicit doesn't excuse their actions, but it doesn't change that, we are complicit.