Now for the clown award, given as always for meritorious stupidity. And my oh my have we got one this week.The big red nose goes to House Intelligence Committee chair Mike Rogers.
At a recent you'll pardon the expression "oversight" hearing about the NSA's spying, he had this exchange with American University law professor Stephen Vladeck.
Quoting Rogers: "I would argue," he said, "the fact that we haven't had any complaints come forward with any specificity arguing that their privacy has been violated, clearly indicates, in ten years, clearly indicates that something must be doing right. Somebody must be doing something exactly right."
Vladeck asked, quite reasonably, "But who would be complaining?"Here's where it gets good. Rogers' answer was, I emphasize quoting, "Somebody who's privacy was violated. You can't have your privacy violated if you don't know your privacy is violated."
Of course! And you can't be embezzling money if the bank doesn't know you're embezzling money and you can't have cancer if you don't know you have cancer and you can't be dead if you don't know you're dead, which makes for an interesting twist on that "life everlasting" business.
But one thing is surely true: You can be a clown without knowing you're a clown. Just like Mike Rogers.
Sources:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/10/31/1252139/-A-congressman-s-new-interpretation-of-the-Fourth-nbsp-Amendment
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20131029/18020225059/mike-rogers-you-cant-have-your-privacy-violated-if-you-dont-know-about-it.shtml
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