Novice Tournament Finals: NSA Spying is Beneficial to the US.

Thank you. Rebuttals My opponent begins by committing a straw man argument. He claims that "As we all know, the NSA's objective with its data mining program is to collect as much metadata as possible." This is simply false. As I attempted to establish in my opening constructive, the NSA's objective is not just to spy on innocent Americans and listen in on their conversations. Rather, the NSA's objective is to collect data that correlates with direct national security threats [1]. The NSA operates under a very strict set of legal and regulatory guidelines to ensure that this remains the case. Journalist Hendrick Hertzberg, referenced in my Round 2, elaborates on this. He contends that "this 'metadata' is digitally stored. But none of its individual components are ever seen by human eyes except in the comparatively tiny number of instances in which a computer algorithm flags one for further examination, in which case a warrant is required for further action." He goes on to say that "The primary (and legitimate) goal of the programs, which is kept in check by the FISA courts, is to find and identify unknown, unsuspected terrorists, either after or, preferably, in advance of an actual attack." [1]. Thus, my opponent's claim that the NSA's "massive data collection" is harming the effectiveness of counter-terror operations is baseless and erroneous. Next, my opponent provides two instances in which the NSA's data collection actually failed, and terrorists successfully attacked US soil. One such quote from my opponent is "If the NSA was actually able to effectively pan through all the data they were collecting, shouldn't the Tsarnaev brothers have shown up on their radar?" I have already established that the NSA doesn't just mass collect all of the data from everybody's phone and internet, nor do they even have access to this data in most circumstances. Instead, the NSA investigates data that they raise red flags on for potentially being a national security threat. So, to suggest that somehow "too much" data is actually hurting NSA's investigations is an unfounded claim. Also, my opponent's presents the notion that "the NSA should be focused on more quality data" as opposed to more data. Well, I ask that my opponent elaborate on what he means by "quality data." It is a false dichotomy to suggest that we can have either a little bit of important data, or a lot of irrelevant data. The current NSA data mining program receives a significant amount of data, but still has a myriad of resources available for analysis [2]. And yes, I agree with my opponent that providing a few anecdotal instances in which the NSA failed does not disqualify the program as a whole. Just as my opponent presented two successful terrorist attacks, I provided a whopping 50 that were directly prevented by intelligence organizations such as the NSA. My opponent also offers up a study which claims that only 4 of 225 terrorist attacks since 9/11 trace back to the NSA. However, my opponent grossly mischaracterizes this study. First of all, contrary to what my opponent says, there have actually been over 580 prosecuted terror cases since 9/11, plus over 200 more in which charges have been dropped - yet this study only looked at 225 of them [3]. Secondly, my opponent neglects to mention that another 27.5% of the terrorism cases mentioned in the study were actually attributed to "unclear methods.," or multiple methods. Thus, while 4 of the 225 prosecutions were directly due to NSA spying, another 62 of them likely had intelligence organizations playing a role [4]. However, even if the number of terrorist attacks that has been prevented by the NSA is miniscule, (its not), we still must examine what we're getting here. Even if we can prevent ONE terrorist attack from happening, then the NSA has accomplished its goal. If we can stop ONE commercial airliner from being hijacked by jihadists, and killing hundreds of people, then we have won. Because the fact of the matter is, we're dealing with real human lives. Not just statistics, or numbers in a study, but fathers, mothers, grandparents, and children. Even if the NSA has only prevented 4 terrorist attacks - and make no mistake, it has prevented many more than that - then this program is worth it. WIth regards to the "slippery slope" argument, I fail to see any convincing facts or historical evidence that validates this claim. Sure, my opponent brings up North Korea as an example of totalitarianism, but how exactly is this relevant? When my opponent argues that “Next they'll be censoring certain parts of the web, and actually listening in on the content of phone calls, all in the interest of 'national security,” where exactly is this assumption coming from? Once again, the NSA operates under strict legal guidelines to ensure that everything happening is within the scope of the Constitution. Quite blatantly, the objective of the NSA is not to eviscerate peoples’ rights just for the sake of doing so. I would also argue that the NSA’s policies are not really a slippery slope because, as of right now, “no citizen’s freedom of speech, expression, or association has been abridged by them in any identifiable way,” as we heard from the Washington Post [5]. The moment that the NSA actually starts spying on people without a warrant, or the moment the NSA actually infringes upon somebody’s rights, is the moment that we can begin to scrutinize it more thoroughly. Unfortunately, my opponent asserts that some event must inevitably follow from another without any argument for the inevitability of the event in question. When the Constitution or human rights are actually violated in any identifiable way, then we can begin to have a conversation about setting a bad precedent. Conclusion The NSA’s surveillance methods are a vital tool in preventing terrorist attacks both on American soil and around the globe. These programs have played a role in a significant number of terrorist convictions since 9/11, saving thousands American lives and helping to restore justice. Furthermore, there exist ample legal protections, ensuring that the extent of spying is minimal and that the Constitution is protected. Thank you, and I urge a Pro vote. Sources [1]http://www.newyorker.com... [2]http://www.dni.gov... [3]http://www.lawandsecurity.org... [4]http://patriotpost.us... [5]http://www.washingtonpost.com...