SWS FISA NEG

Global Economy

1nc data pulloutForeign, not domestic, surveillance is what is driving data pull out – Chander and Le 15 (Director, California International Law Center, Professor of Law and Martin Luther King, Jr. Hall Research Scholar, University of California, Davis; Free Speech and Technology Fellow, California International Law Center; A.B., Yale College; J.D., University of California, Davis School of Law)Anupam Chander and Uyên P. Lê, DATA NATIONALISM, EMORY LAW JOURNAL, Vol. 64:677, http://law.emory.edu/elj/_documents/volumes/64/3/articles/chander-le.pdf)

First, the United States, like many countries, concentrates much of its surveillance efforts abroad. Indeed, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act is focused on gathering information overseas, limiting data gathering largely only when it implicates U.S. persons.174 The recent NSA surveillance disclosures have revealed extensive foreign operations.175 Indeed, constraints on domestic operations may well have spurred the NSA to expand operations abroa d . As the Washington Post reports, “Intercepting communications overseas has clear advantages for the NSA, with looser restrictions and less oversight.”176 Deterred by a 2011 ruling by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court barring certain broad domestic surveillance of Internet and telephone traffic ,177 the NSA may have increasingly turned its attention overseas. Second, the use of malware eliminates even the need to have operations on the ground in the countries in which surveillance occurs. The Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad reports that the NSA has infiltrated every corner of the world through a network of malicious malware.178 A German computer expert noted that “data was intercepted here [by the NSA] on a large scale.”179 The NRC Handelsblad suggests that the NSA has even scaled the Great Firewall of China,180 demonstrating that efforts to keep information inside a heavily secured and monitored ironclad firewall do not necessarily mean that it cannot be accessed by those on the other side of the earth. This is a commonplace phenomenon on the Internet, of course. The recent enormous security breach of millions of Target customers in the United States likely sent credit card data of Americans to servers in Russia, perhaps through the installation of malware on point-of-sale devices in stores.

1nc tech not keyThis advantage has no card on how a public advocate stops mass surveillance in programs like PRISM and BULLRUN, which is what the link chain talks about being key to reviving the tech industry.

Tech not key – companies don’t even fully make use of existing digital tech AND manufacturing is an alt causeTom and Fosler 14 (Josh Tom, Senior Analyst for The GailFosler Group , Gail D Fosler, president of The GailFosler Group, “How Important Is Digital Technology to Our Economic Future?: An Interview With Rob Atkinson”, Rob Atkinson is an economist and the president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, Gailfosler.com, http://www.gailfosler.com/important-digital-technology-economic-future-interview-rob-atkinson)Q: In 1987, Robert Solow famously wrote, “You can see the computer age everywhere except in the productivity numbers.” Today, it seems you can see the digital revolution everywhere but in the economic numbers. Where is this new age of prosperity that all the “techno-optimists” are talking about? Let’s begin with an important premise. Digital tech nology is an important dimension in our economy, but it is by no means the only driver of economic activity or opportunity. In contrast to the universal and almost magical properties that “ techno-optimists ” attribute to digital technology, we need to make a critical distinction between the promise of technology and the use of technology. People are blaming technology for not living up to its promises because of poor economic performance in recent years when it is really its use as manifest in the lack of basic investment in the economy that is limiting growth . Without increased capital investment in equipment and software, innovation and technology have no way to spread throughout the economy . Long-run growth is lower as a consequence. The slowdown in investment has little to do with technology. Rather it is due in part to an increasing short-termism on the part of U.S. businesses, leading them to invest less for the longer term . As a result, we are investing less in machines and equipment and structures than we did a decade ago. The slowdown also appears to be caused by a decline in manufacturing . Manufacturing is a very high-investment, high-productivity sector that pays good wages relative to some of the service industries. But manufacturing’s decline is due in large part to international competition, not to digital technology . Indeed, without digital manufacturing equipment and robotics U.S. manufacturing would have become even less internationally competitive. Advances in digital tech nology have created important new industries and new jobs . Unfortunately, the decline in manufacturing has offset these gains to a great extent.

Tech doesn’t impact economy-stock increasing nowCordero 14 [Carrie Cordero is the Director of National Security Studies and an Adjunct Professor of Law at Georgetown University Law Center], Lawfare, “exploring the effect of NSA disclosures on the US technology industry,” 4/12/14 http://www.lawfareblog.com/exploring-effect-nsa-disclosures-us-technology-industry

This past Monday, I had the honor of moderating a panel organized by students at the American University Washington College of Law’s National Security Law Brief, on Understanding the Global Implications of the NSA Disclosures on the U.S. Technology Industry. The panel (Elizabeth Banker (ZwillGen), David Fagan (Covington), Joseph Moreno (Cadwalader), Gerard Stegmaier (Wilson Sonsoni) and Lawrence Greenberg (Motley Fool)) was stacked with practitioners who are navigating, on a daily basis, issues related to data privacy, transparency, and cooperation with law enforcement/government requests, among other related issues. As we explored during the discussion, there are a number of recent media and other reports describing the “fallout” for U.S. industry as a result of the disclosures. So, at least two questions arise: first, are the reports to be believed, and second, if so, will there be a lasting impact, or is this only temporary?¶ The short answer is that it is too soon to judge. But, as we all read these reports, such as this one produced by NTT Communications and cited in a Guardian article late last month, it will be important to look at the source and potential motivations behind them before drawing firm conclusions about the state of U.S. industry.¶ Of interest, several of the panelists suggested that the reactions to the recent disclosures perhaps represent the tipping point of what was already a growing discomfort with, if not outright opposition to, changes to the law in the national security area since the USA Patriot Act of October 2001. Another panelist noted that despite the reports of dramatic effects, stock prices of certain affected U.S. technology companies have gone up in recent months (while some others have gone down). It is an important point: drawing conclusions about the long term effects on U.S. industry will take careful study, over a sustained period of time. In the meantime, I intend

to spend more time looking into this issue. It seems to me that, given that foreign intelligence surveillance activities conducted by the United States are subject to more laws, rules, procedures and oversight than any other nation , the rush – if there is one – to displace U.S. companies, may be misguided. There just may be a different story to tell.

2nc tech not keyTechnology’s benefit to the economy is overstated – the benefits are concentrated among a small portion of the populationBhajaria 15 (Nishant Bhajaria, senior product architect at Nike and a career coach, “Why isn't the tech boom helping the economy?”, 5/5/2015, LinkedIn, https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/why-isnt-tech-boom-helping-economy-nishant-bhajaria, DJE)As I wrote last week, the hi-tech sector in the U.S. is red hot in terms of job opportunities. Even as the rest of the economy barely registers a pulse for many, hi-tech is vibrant with capital and jobs. This made me wonder: why is the tech boom not boosting the overall economy? Just so we’re clear, no one can deny the innovation and disruption to daily life that technology makes possible. My argument is that it is possible to have a major impact on our daily life while generating wealth without growing the overall economy. To understand why the tech boom has a limited impact on economic growth, consider the following reasons. First, unlike traditional sectors like agriculture, infrastructure and healthcare, technology is inherently different in terms of the relationship between output and labor. In those sectors, you need a lot of workers consistently to convert plans into product. That is not the case with tech jobs, where one of the main appeals of technology is to use automation to do more with less labor and fewer iterations. For example, w hen Facebook acquired WhatsApp for $19 Billion, the latter employed just 55 employees. This purchase was great for WhatsApp employees, but did not create any profit or income for anyone outside of those 55 people . Similarly, when Yahoo bought Tumblr, about 40 employees made millions, and about 178 employees made about $300K . There are other examples similar to this one all over the world. As far as tech sector being a jobs engine is concerned, reputation is not the reality. As advertised, technology creates great wealth; that wealth, however is distributed among a small slice of society. There is a bright green line between those who make millions and the remaining minions. Put simply, the tech sector can create wealth without creating a lot of work. Second, 90% of startup tech ventures fail . In such instances, employees come away with marketable skills and contacts, but the benefit to the rest of the economy is negligible in the near term. For a business to create jobs outside of its immediate scope, the business needs to sustain itself to profitability. Third, the tech sector is more of an urban phenomenon compared to sectors that have historically boosted the U.S. economy. This is significant since technology and resultant automation are at least partly responsible for the decline of manufacturing jobs. That decline in manufacturing affected the whole country. Tech jobs are mainly concentrated on the coasts, along with venture capital funders (See Figures 1 and 2 below), tech-centric universities and a workforce with transferable skills. Urban America, therefore, had an easier transition from a manufacturing to a service-oriented economy while the rest of the country did not. Vast areas of the U.S. have been historically dependent on manufacturing with skills to match for ages. During my undergraduate years in rural Missouri, driving through the midwest often made for depressing viewing. Town after town featured abandoned homes and factories, all a symbol of what once was and will never be. These are shards of a shattered past that would never join together again, and the jobs they once provided have gone forever. The tech sector, with its vast footprint, has not stepped in to fill that void. To the degree that rural America does offer job opportunities, it is from traditional sectors like healthcare and automobiles. Smaller towns in Nebraska and Indiana, for example, are surviving due to hospitals that offer high-paying jobs. Beyond those jobs, the next best options for locals include small, low-skill factories, the dollar store or a Dairy Queen. Similarly, the benefits of a reviving auto industry are not confined to states like Michigan and Ohio. Ford is building plants and creating jobs in other rural states. Alcoa is a supplier of aluminium to auto companies, and spent $300m expanding an aluminium plant in rural Iowa. It will soon spend $275m expanding a factory in rural Tennessee. The tech sector is different from these older sectors when it comes to job creation. Its power is deep, but its reach very limited. The above three points make clear: the booming tech sector creates a few vastly successful startups that create a handful of millionaires and many more failed startups that create no tangible economic benefit. The remaining middle-class jobs created by the tech boom are concentrated in pockets of the country among the highly educated . All t his mitigates the economic impact. Fourth, even when tech companies venture outside of urban coastal locations, they provide limited benefits at best to their communities.

Over-emphasizing the importance of technology in an economy drains capital away from a diversified entrepreneurial portfolioKammer-Kerwick and Peterson 15 (Matthew Kammer-Kerwick, , James A. Peterson, , “Want to rebuild the economy? Stop obsessing over tech start-ups.”, 5/4/2015, The Washington Post,

http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/05/04/want-to-rebuild-the-economy-stop-obsessing-over-tech-start-ups/, DJE)Six years after the Great Recession ended, the nation’s economic recovery remains tenuous . The hiring rate has weakened ; the manufacturing sector continues its rapid decline ; and the labor force has shrunk to its lowest level since the 19 70s . Nobody has felt this sluggishness more than millennials , who are facing lower incomes and higher unemployment than their parents did at their age. That’s a big problem: Projected to be 75 percent of the global workforce by 2025, millennials are the key to a sustainable economic recovery. But the leaders orchestrating our economy’s turnaround keep overlooking them and failing to cultivate their full economic potential. Millennials have made clear how they want to help rebuild our economy. Survey after survey has shown that the nation’s youngest workers have a hungry entrepreneurial spirit, driven by the opportunity for independence and creativity. A recent study by Bentley University found that most young adults dream of starting their own businesses: “Millennials view career success differently than their parents do. Rather than striving for the CEO spot, 66 percent of millennials would like to start their own business.” We conducted a study that found that, in terms of setting professional entrepreneurial goals and having formed an idea about the type of company they want to start, millennials outpace older Americans by approximately 10 percentage points. But despite their dreams of becoming business owners , few millennials actually do : Just 3.6 percent of households headed by young adults own stakes in private companies , compared with 10.6 percent in 1989, according to a recent Wall Street Journal analysis . The future of our economy depends on finding a way to shrink that chasm between having an idea and having a business. Cultivating entrepreneurs is great for the economy because the new firms they create are a prominent source of job growth. Washington understands that. This summer, the Obama administration will hold the first White House Demo Day, billed as an effort to make entrepreneurship more accessible to people from diverse backgrounds and geographies. This broad, inclusive goal is positive. But the White House has made it clear that its focus is actually much narrower. When it comes to celebrating entrepreneurship, our society, led by Washington and Wall Street , has become fixated on the technology industry, funneling money and support primarily into tech start-ups. That myopic focus is misguided. In contrast, most aspiring entrepreneurs dream about starting Main Street companies – restaurants, barbershops, boutiques and other everyday retail and services . The timing is perfect to capture the economic promise of millennial entrepreneurship. The oldest members of the generation are reaching what has historically been the prime entrepreneurial age, at a time that coincides with improving economic conditions and renewed optimism. The climate for Main Street start-ups is looking brighter, with consumers spending more and interest rates having remained low. Of course, the entrepreneurial process is complicated and fraught with risk: Hopeful business owners must turn their visions into solid business plans, assess the market, determine how much capital they need and find backers before they can even launch. After that, it gets even harder. Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that approximately half of start-up companies fail to last more than five years. These are among the hurdles that have prevented many young people from becoming their own bosses. For this generation — already saddled with debt and struggling to get the private-sector experience that helps one launch a business — the risk can be especially intimidating. Although as a group, Main Street companies can be less risky than tech nology start-ups , they are often underfunded and poorly planned . In the absence of funding and planning, they are driven by passion, and that’s not sustainable. That’s why government and other institutions need to step up. For one, we need to demystify the start-up process for aspiring entrepreneurs. Colleges and universities are the best place to start encouraging Main Street entrepreneurs to plan and fund their companies in a way that reduces risk. Babson College is an excellent example of an existing program that could be expanded, requiring students to gain start-up experience on a small scale as part of their course work. The University of Houston is another great example of how education can include hands-on experience along with traditional classroom learning. The University of Texas at Austin, in addition to offering formal entrepreneurship-related courses, offers a variety of entrepreneurship programs for students, including Texas Venture Labs, Longhorn Startup, Longhorn Entrepreneur Agency and the Technology Entrepreneurship Society. These types of programs should be expanded to reach young people who seek to start businesses after their formal education is over, too. We also need to enhance connections between millennials and more experienced entrepreneurs as partners and mentors. Mentorship programs have been promoted at New Orleans Entrepreneur Week and South by Southwest, but we need more. These mentorships and targeted events help increase young people’s awareness of existing financing options and start-up support programs to launch their ideas. Too often, nascent entrepreneurs take easier – but riskier routes – to financing their ideas, like credit cards and relatives. Though those options are more expedient for the passion-driven entrepreneur, other funding routes, like SBA loans and bank loans, require the business-planning process that reduces the financial risk and stress that can cripple a start-up. Great business ideas shouldn’t stall simply because they don’t yet have the acumen to engage angel investors or venture capitalist partners. New programs and opportunities for entrepreneurs shouldn’t just benefit aspiring business owners in their 20s and 30s. Generation X and baby boomers also have substantial interest in entrepreneurship and can benefit from more experience. When members of different generations work together – whether in a mentorship or as business partners — synergies can develop between their unique strengths and perspectives: Millennials are more confident about setting goals, more optimistic about future economic conditions and are driven by a desire to make a difference in society. In contrast, Generation X and baby boomers are marginally more likely to value persistence in recovering from setbacks and focus on the concrete benefits of employment: job security, reliable health insurance and retirement savings. If we continue to undervalue the potential of young entrepreneurship, the consequences will trickle throughout our economy . Inaction promises a less robust and less diversified economic recovery, and one in which fewer

Americans pursue their entrepreneurial dreams. Such inaction is akin to inadequate planning for retirement. At this point in our tenuous recovery, now is exactly the best time to invest in a diversified and inclusive portfolio of entrepreneurs.

The benefit of technological growth is sidelined by a deficit in US Stem education Engler 12 (John Engler, journalist for US News, “STEM Education Is the Key to the U.S.'s Economic Future”, 6/15/2012, U.S. News and World Report, http://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2012/06/15/stem-education-is-the-key-to-the-uss-economic-future)A close look at American unemployment statistics reveals a contradiction: Even with unemployment at historically high levels, large numbers of jobs are going unfilled . Many of these jobs have one thing in common–the need for an educational background in science, technology, engineering, and math ematics. Increasingly, one of our richest sources of employment and economic growth will be jobs that require skills in these areas, collectively known as STEM . The question is: Will we be able to educate enough young Americans to fill them? Yes, the unemployment numbers have been full of bad news for the past few years. But there has been good news too. While the overall unemployment rate has slowly come down to May's still-high 8.2 percent, for those in STEM occupations the story is very different. According to a recently released study from Change the Equation, an organization that supports STEM education, there are 3.6 unemployed workers for every job in the United States. That compares with only one unemployed STEM worker for two unfilled STEM jobs throughout the country. Many jobs are going unfilled simply for lack of people with the right skill sets. Even with more than 13 million Americans unemployed, the manufacturing sector cannot find people with the skills to take nearly 600,000 unfilled jobs, according to a study last fall by the Manufacturing Institute and Deloitte. The hardest jobs to fill were skilled positions, including well-compensated blue collar jobs like machinists, operators, and technicians, as well as engineering technologists and sciences. As Raytheon Chairman and CEO William Swanson said at a Massachusetts' STEM Summit last fall, "Too many students and adults are training for jobs in which labor surpluses exist and demand is low, while high-demand jobs, particularly those in STEM fields, go unfilled." STEM-related skills are not just a source of jobs, they are a source of jobs that pay very well. A report last October from the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce found that 65 percent of those with Bachelors' degrees in STEM fields earn more than Master's degrees in non-STEM occupations. In fact, 47 percent of Bachelor's degrees in STEM occupations earn more than PhDs in non-STEM occupations. But despite the lucrative potential, many young people are reluctant to enter into fields that require a background in s cience, t echnology, e ngineering, or m athematics. In a recent study by the Lemselson-MIT Invention Index, which gauges innovation aptitude among young adults, 60 percent of young adults (ages 16 to 25) named at least one factor that prevented them from pursuing further education or work in the STEM fields. Thirty-four percent said they don't know much about the fields , a third said they were too challenging , and 28 percent said they were not well-prepared at school to seek further education in these areas. This is a problem—for young people and for our country. We need STEM-related talent to compete globally, and we will need even more in the future. It is not a matter of choice: For the United States to remain the global innovation leader, we must make the most of all of the potential STEM talent this country has to offer. Government can play a critical part. President Barack Obama's goal of 100,000 additional science, technology, engineering, and math teachers is laudable. The president's STEM campaign leverages mostly private-sector funding. Called Educate to Innovate, it has spawned Change the Equation, whose study was cited above. A nongovernmental organization, Change the Equation was set up by more than 100 CEOs, with the cooperation of state governments and educational organizations and foundations to align corporate efforts in STEM education.

The U.S. is not locked into a “winner-take-all” race for science and tech leadership. Increased innovation in China and India will increase production and consumption in the U.S. service sector.Bhidé ‘9Amar Bhidé, Thomas Schmidheiny Professor in The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy @ Tufts, was Glaubinger Professor of Business at Columbia University. “The Venturesome Economy: How Innovation Sustains Prosperity in a More Connected World”. Winter 2009. Journal of Applied Corporate Finance • Volume 21 Number 1. http://bhide.net/venturesome_press/JACF_Venturesome_Economy_1_bhide.pdf

My analysis of the multiplayer game and cross-border interactions suggests outcomes that differ sharply from the dire predictions of the techno-nationalists. According to my assessment, the United States is not locked into a “winner-take-all” race for scientific and technological leadership, and the growth of research capabilities in China and India—and thus their

share of cutting-edge research—does not reduce U.S. prosperity. Indeed my analysis suggests that advances abroad will improve living standards in the U. S. Moreover, the benefits I identify are different from the conventional economist’s account whereby prosperity abroad increases opportunities for U.S. exporters. Instead, I show that cutting-edge research developed abroad benefits domestic production and consumption in the service secto r . And contrary to the policy prescriptions of techno-nationalists, I suggest that the U.S. embrace the expansion of research capabilities abroad instead of devoting more resources to maintaining its lead in science and cutting-edge technology .20

Tech development is not zero-sum – it does not matter the origin of innovation – the U.S. will still capitalize on it.Bhidé ‘9Amar Bhidé, Thomas Schmidheiny Professor in The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy @ Tufts, was Glaubinger Professor of Business at Columbia University. “The Venturesome Economy: How Innovation Sustains Prosperity in a More Connected World”. Winter 2009. Journal of Applied Corporate Finance • Volume 21 Number 1. http://bhide.net/venturesome_press/JACF_Venturesome_Economy_1_bhide.pdf

Any catch-up, even if it takes place gradually and in the normal course of development, will to some degree reduce the U.S. “lead.” Furthermore, the global influence of techno-nationalism could accelerate this process. As alarmists in the U.S. continue to remind us, governments in “emerging” countries such as China and India—also in the thrall of techno-nationalist thinking—are making a determined effort to leap ahead in cutting-edge science and technology. But I am skeptical that these efforts are going to do any more good for China’s and India’s economy than similar efforts in Europe and Japan in the 1970s and 1980s.21 But putting aside the issue of whether investing in cutting-edge research represents a good use of Chinese and Indian resources, does whatever erosion of U.S. primacy in developing high-level know-how this might cause really threaten U.S. prosperity? Should the U.S. government respond in kind by putting even more money into research? Nobel laureate Paul Krugman has long decried what he refers to as the “dangerous obsession” with “national competitiveness.” As Krugman wrote in a 1994 article in Foreign Affairs, the widespread tendency to think that “the United States and Japan are competitors in the same sense that Coca-Cola competes with Pepsi” is “flatly, completely and demonstrably wrong.” Although “competitive problems could arise in principle, as a practical, empirical matter,” Krugman goes on to say, “the major nations of the world are not to any significant degree in economic competition with each other.”22 The techno-nationalist claim that U.S. prosperity requires that the country “maintain its scientific and technological lead” is particularly dubious: the argument fails to recognize that the development of scientific knowledge or cutting-edge technology is not a zero-sum competition. The results of scientific research are available at no charge to anyone anywhere in the world. Most arguments for the public funding of scientific research are in fact based on the unwillingness of private investors to undertake research that cannot yield a profit. Cutting-edge technology (as opposed to scientific research) has commercial value because it can be patented; but patent owners generally don’t charge higher fees to foreign licensors. The then tiny Japanese company Sony was one of the first licensors of Bell Labs’ transistor patent. Sony paid all of $50,000—and only after first obtaining special permission from the Japanese Ministry of Finance—for the license that started it on the road to becoming a household name in consumer electronics. Moreover, if patent holders choose not to grant licenses but to exploit their inventions on their own, this does not mean that the country of origin secures most of the benefit at the expense of other countries. Suppose IBM chooses to exploit

internally, instead of licensing, a breakthrough from its China Research Laboratory (employing 150 research staff in Beijing). This does not help China and hurt everyone else. Rather, as I discuss at length later, the benefits go to IBM’s stockholders, to employees who make or market the product that embodies the invention, and—above all—to customers, who secure the lion’s share of the benefit from most innovations. These stockholders, employees, and customers, who number in the tens of millions, are located all over the world. In a world where breakthrough ideas easily cross national borders, the origin of ideas is inconsequent ial . Contrary to Thomas Friedman’s assertion, it does not matter that Google’s search algorithm was invented in California . After all, a Briton invented the protocols of the World Wide Web—in a lab in Switzerland. A Swede and a Dane in Tallinn, Estonia, started Skype, the leading provider of peer-to-peer Internet telephony. How did the foreign origins of these innovations harm the U.S. economy?

1nc tech high nowTech high now-structural featuresCalamur 13 (Krishnadev Calamur editor at NPR in DC, NPR, “U.S. Competitiveness Up, Ranking Fifth, Survey Says”, 9/4/2013, http://www.npr.org/blogs/parallels/2013/09/04/218902510/u-s-competitiveness-up-ranking-fifth-survey-says)U.S. competitiveness among global economies suffered after the 2008 global economic crisis. Four years after the crisis, the U.S. slipped in the World Economic Forum's annual competitiveness ranking. This year it's back up a bit: The U.S. rose to fifth position overall from seventh last year, in the forum's latest survey, which was released Wednesday.¶ Here's what the survey says about the U.S., the world's largest economy:¶ U.S. competitiveness among global economies suffered after the 2008 global economic crisis. Four years after the crisis, the U.S. slipped in the World Economic Forum's annual competitiveness ranking. This year it's back up a bit: The U.S. rose to fifth position overall from seventh last year, in the forum's latest survey, which was released Wednesday. Here's what the survey says about the U.S., the world's largest economy: "Overall, many structural features continue to make the US economy extremely productive. US companies are highly sophisticated and innovative, supported by an excellent university system that collaborates admirably with the business sector in R&D. Combined with flexible labor markets and the scale opportunities afforded b y the sheer size of its domestic economy — the largest in the world by far — these qualities continue to make the United States very competitive.

2nc tech high nowTech industry growingThomas J. Casey, 1-22-2015, "2015 Technology Industry Trends," Pwc Network, http://www.strategyand.pwc.com/perspectives/2015-technology-trendsThe tech industry is always in flux. Frequent new products and category innovation define and redefine the sector’s constantly shifting landscape. But lately we’ve seen even greater volatility than usual, and it has begun to affect the makeup of hardware and software companies themselves. Increasingly, technology firms are reexamining the structure of their businesses and taking bold steps to squeeze out better financial performance. They are doing this because their profit margins and market share are under siege from disruptive, often well-funded startups and other aggressive competitors. The competition, in turn, has made customers more demanding. They are seeking greater performance, better features, and more platform independence and flexibility at the lowest price point possible . This volatility is manifested in a flurry of attempted and consummated mergers, acquisitions, and divestitures. In the early fall of 2014, for example, multiple major business publications reported that Hewlett-Packard was in talks to purchase storage equipment maker EMC, primarily to improve scale and cut costs. Both sides refused to comment on any possible deal, and none occurred. Then, in November, HP announced that it was splitting in two, separating its computer and printer hardware business (HP Inc.) from its enterprise hardware, software, and services units (Hewlett-Packard Enterprise). HP’s goal for the split is to allow both units, which will each generate more than US$50 billion in revenue and be Fortune 50 companies, to become more nimble and focused on their respective markets and competitors. With this breakup, the two companies will have to find ways to improve the performance of slow-growth businesses struggling to maintain decent profit margins.

1nc US econ not keyU.S. not key to the global economy.Caryl 10 [Christian, Senior Fellow at the Center for International Studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a contributing editor to Foreign Policy. His column, "Reality Check," appears weekly on ForeignPolicy.com, Crisis? What Crisis? APRIL 5, 2010, http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/04/05/crisis_what_crisis?page=full]

Many emerging economies entered the 2008-2009 crisis with healthy balance sheets. In most cases governments reacted quickly and flexibly, rolling out stimulus programs or even expanding poverty-reduction programs. Increasingly , the same countries that have embraced globalization and markets are starting to build social safety nets. And there's another factor: Trade is becoming more evenly distributed throughout the world. China is now a bigger market for Asian exporters than the United States. Some economists are talking about "emerging market decoupling." Jonathan Anderson , an emerging-markets economist at the Swiss bank UBS , showed in one recent report how car sales in emerging markets have actually been rising during this latest bout of turmoil -- powerful evidence that emerging economies no longer have to sneeze when America catches a cold . Aphitchaya Nguanbanchong, a consultant for the British-based aid organization Oxfam, has studied the crisis's effects on Southeast Asian economies. "The research so far shows that the result of the crisis isn't as bad as we were expecting," she says. Indonesia is a case in point: "People in this region and at the policy level learned a lot from the past crisis." Healthy domestic demand cushioned the shock when the crisis hit export-oriented industries; the government weighed in immediately with hefty stimulus measures. Nguanbanchong says that she has been surprised by the extent to which families throughout the region have kept spending money on education even as incomes have declined for some. And that, she says, reinforces a major lesson that emerging-market governments can take away from the crisis: "Governments should focus more on social policy, on health, education, and services. They shouldn't be intervening so much directly in the economy itself."

2nc US econ not keyDecoupling means US isn’t key to the global economy Bloomberg 10 [“Wall Street Sees World Economy Decoupling From U.S.”, October 4th, 2010, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-03/world-economy-decoupling-from-u-s-in-slowdown-returns-as-wall-street-view.html, Chetan]

The main reason for the divergence: “Direct transmission from a U.S. slowdown to other economies through exports is just not large enough to spread a U.S. demand problem globally,” Goldman Sachs economists Dominic Wilson and Stacy Carlson wrote in a Sept. 22 report entitled “If the U.S. sneezes...” Limited Exposure Take the so-called BRIC countries of Brazil, Russia, India and China. While exports account for almost 20 percent of their gross domestic product, sales to the U.S. compose less than 5 percent of GDP, according to their estimates. That means even if U.S. growth slowed 2 percent, the drag on these four countries would be about 0.1 percentage point, the economists reckon. Developed economies including the U.K., Germany and Japan also have limited exposure, they said. Economies outside the U.S. have room to grow that the U.S. doesn’t, partly because of its outsized slump in house prices, Wilson and Carlson said. The drop of almost 35 percent is more than twice as large as the worst declines in the rest of the Group of 10 industrial nations, they found. The risk to the decoupling wager is a repeat of 2008, when the U.S. property bubble burst and then morphed into a global credit and banking shock that ricocheted around the world. For now, Goldman Sachs’s index of U.S. financial conditions signals that bond and stock markets aren’t stressed by the U.S. outlook. Weaker Dollar The break with the U.S. will be reflected in a weaker dollar, with the Chinese yuan appreciating to 6.49 per dollar in a year from 6.685 on Oct. 1, according to Goldman Sachs forecasts. The bank is also betting that yields on U.S. 10-year debt will be lower by June than equivalent yields for Germany, the U.K., Canada, Australia and Norway. U.S. notes will rise to 2.8 percent from 2.52 percent, Germany’s will increase to 3 percent from 2.3 percent and Canada’s will grow to 3.8 percent from 2.76 percent on Oct. 1, Goldman Sachs projects. Goldman Sachs isn’t alone in making the case for decoupling. Harris at BofA Merrill Lynch said he didn’t buy the argument prior to the financial crisis. Now he believes global growth is strong enough to offer a “handkerchief” to the U.S. as it suffers a “growth recession” of weak expansion and rising unemployment, he said. Giving him confidence is his calculation that the U.S. share of global GDP has shrunk to about 24 percent from 31 percent in 2000. He also notes that, unlike the U.S., many countries avoided asset bubbles, kept their banking systems sound and improved their trade and budget positions. Economic Locomotives A book published last week by the World Bank backs him up. “The Day After Tomorrow” concludes that developing nations aren’t only decoupling, they also a re undergoing a “switchover” that will make them such locomotives for the world economy, they can help rescue advanced nations. Among the reasons for the revolution are greater trade between emerging markets, the rise of the middle class and higher commodity prices, the book said. Investors are signaling they agree. The U.S. has fallen behind Brazil, China and India as the preferred place to invest, according to a quarterly survey conducted last month of 1,408 investors, analysts and traders who subscribe to Bloomberg. Emerging markets also attracted more money from share offerings than industrialized nations last quarter for the first time in at least a decade, Bloomberg data show. Room to Ease Indonesia, India, China and Poland are the developing economies least vulnerable to a U.S. slowdown, according to a Sept. 14 study based on trade ties by HSBC Holdings Plc economists. China, Russia and Brazil also are among nations with more room than industrial countries to ease policies if a U.S. slowdown does weigh on their growth, according to a policy- flexibility index designed by the economists, who include

New York-based Pablo Goldberg. “Emerging economies kept their powder relatively dry, and are, for the most part, in a position where they could act countercyclically if needed,” the HSBC group said. Links to developing countries are helping insulate some companies against U.S. weakness. Swiss watch manufacturer Swatch Group AG and tire maker Nokian Renkaat of Finland are among the European businesses that should benefit from trade with nations such as Russia and China where consumer demand is growing, according to BlackRock Inc. portfolio manager Alister Hibbert. “There’s a lot of life in the global economy,” Hibbert, said at a Sept. 8 presentation to reporters in London.

1nc no econ warNo causal relationship between the economy and war.Ferguson 6 [Niall, MA, D.Phil., is Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University and William Ziegler Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School. He is also a Senior Research Fellow at Jesus College, Oxford University, and a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, Foreign Affairs, Sept/Oct, “The Next War of the World”]

Nor can economic crises explain the bloodshed . What may be the most familiar causal chain in modern historiography links the Great Depression to the rise of fascism and the outbreak of World War II. But that simple story leaves too much out. Nazi Germany started the war in Europe only after its economy had recovered . Not all the countries affected by the Great Depression were taken over by fascist regimes, nor did all such regimes start wars of aggression. In fact, no general relationship between economics and conflict is discernible for the century as a whole. Some wars came after periods of growth, others were the causes rather than the consequences of economic catastrophe, and some severe economic crises were not followed by wars .

No impact—statistics proveDrezner 12 – Daniel is a professor in the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts. (“The Irony of Global Economic Governance: The System Worked”, October 2012, http://www.globaleconomicgovernance.org/wp-content/uploads/IR-Colloquium-MT12-Week-5_The-Irony-of-Global-Economic-Governance.pdf)

The final outcome addresses a dog that hasn’t barked: the effect of the Great Recession on cross-border conflict and violence. During the initial stages of the crisis, multiple analysts asserted that the financial crisis would lead states to increase their use of force as a tool for staying in power.37 Whether through greater internal repression, diversionary wars, arms races, or a ratcheting up of great power conflict, there were genuine concerns that the global economic downturn would lead to an increase in conflict. Violence in the Middle East, border disputes in the South China Sea, and even the disruptions of the Occupy movement fuel impressions of surge in global public disorder. The aggregate data suggests otherwise , however. The Institute for Economics and Peace has constructed a “Global Peace Index” annually since 2007. A key conclusion they draw from the 2012 report is that “The average level of peacefulness in 2012 is approximately the same as it was in 20 07 .”38 Interstate violence in particular has declined since the start of the financial crisis – as have military expenditures in most sampled countries. Other studies confirm that the Great Recession has not triggered any increase in violent conflict; the secular decline in violence that started with the end of the Cold War has not been reversed.39 Rogers Brubaker concludes, “the crisis has not to date generated the surge in protectionist nationalism or ethnic exclusion that might have been expected.”40None of these data suggest that the global economy is operating swimmingly. Growth remains unbalanced and fragile, and has clearly slowed in 2012. Transnational capital flows remain depressed compared to pre-crisis levels, primarily due to a drying up of cross-border interbank lending in Europe. Currency volatility remains an ongoing concern. Compared to the aftermath of other postwar recessions, growth in output, investment, and employment in the developed world have all lagged behind. But the Great Recession is not like other postwar recessions in either scope or kind; expecting a standard “V”-shaped recovery was unreasonable. One financial analyst characterized the post-2008 global economy as in a state of “contained depression.”41

The key word is “contained,” however. Given the severity, reach and depth of the 2008 financial crisis, the proper comparison is with Great Depression . And by that standard, the outcome variables look impressive . As Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff concluded in This Time is Different: “that its macroeconomic outcome has been only the most severe global recession since World War II – and not even worse – must be regarded as fortunate.”42

2nc no econ warNo war from economic collapseBarnett ’09 (Thomas P.M. Barnett, Thomas P.M. Barnett is an American military geostrategist and Chief Analyst at Wikistrat, 24 Aug 2009, “ The New Rules: Security Remains Stable Amid Financial Crisis”, http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/4213/the-new-rules-security-remains-stable-amid-financial-crisis)

When the global financial crisis struck roughly a year ago, the blogosphere was ablaze with all sorts of scary predictions of, and commentary regarding, ensuing conflict and wars -- a rerun of the Great Depression leading to world war, as it were. Now, as global economic news brightens and recovery -- surprisingly led by China and emerging markets -- is the talk of the day, it's interesting to look back over the past year and realize how globalization's first truly worldwide recession has had virtually no impact whatsoever on the international security landscape. None of the more than three-dozen ongoing conflicts listed by GlobalSecurity.org can be clearly attributed to the global recession. Indeed, the last new entry (civil conflict between Hamas and Fatah in the Palestine) predates the economic crisis by a year, and three quarters of the chronic struggles began in the last century. Ditto for the 15 low-intensity conflicts listed by Wikipedia (where the latest entry is the Mexican "drug war" begun in 2006). Certainly, the Russia-Georgia conflict last August was specifically timed, but by most accounts the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics was the most important external trigger (followed by the U.S. presidential campaign) for that sudden spike in an almost two-decade long struggle between Georgia and its two breakaway regions. Looking over the various databases, then, we see a most familiar picture: the usual mix of civil conflicts, insurgencies, and liberation-themed terrorist movements. Besides the recent Russia-Georgia dust-up, the only two potential state-on-state wars (North v. South Korea, Israel v. Iran) are both tied to one side acquiring a nuclear weapon capacity -- a process wholly unrelated to global economic trends. And with the United States effectively tied down by its two ongoing major interventions (Iraq and Afghanistan-bleeding-into-Pakistan), our involvement elsewhere around the planet has been quite modest, both leading up to and following the onset of the economic crisis: e.g., the usual counter-drug efforts in Latin America, the usual military exercises with allies across Asia, mixing it up with pirates off Somalia's coast). Everywhere else we find serious instability we pretty much let it burn, occasionally pressing the Chinese -- unsuccessfully -- to do something. Our new Africa Command, for example, hasn't led us to anything beyond advising and training local forces. So, to sum up: *No significant uptick in mass violence or unrest (remember the smattering of urban riots last year in places like Greece, Moldova and Latvia?); *The usual frequency maintained in civil conflicts (in all the usual places); *Not a single state-on-state war directly caused (and no great-power-on-great-power crises even triggered); *No great improvement or disruption in great-power cooperation regarding the emergence of new nuclear powers (despite all that diplomacy); *A modest scaling back of international policing efforts by the system's acknowledged Leviathan power (inevitable given the strain); and *No serious efforts by any rising great power to challenge that Leviathan or supplant its role. (The worst things we can cite are Moscow's occasional deployments of strategic assets to the Western hemisphere and its weak efforts to outbid the United States on basing rights in Kyrgyzstan; but the best include China and India stepping up their aid and investments in Afghanistan and Iraq.) Sure, we've finally seen global defense spending surpass the previous world record set in the late 1980s, but even that's likely to wane given the stress on public budgets created by all this unprecedented "stimulus" spending. If anything, the friendly cooperation on such stimulus

packaging was the most notable great-power dynamic caused by the crisis. Can we say that the world has suffered a distinct shift to political radicalism as a result of the economic crisis? Indeed, no. The world's major economies remain governed by center-left or center-right political factions that remain decidedly friendly to both markets and trade. In the short run, there were attempts across the board to insulate economies from immediate damage (in effect, as much protectionism as allowed under current trade rules), but there was no great slide into "trade wars." Instead, the World Trade Organization is functioning as it was designed to function, and regional efforts toward free-trade agreements have not slowed. Can we say Islamic radicalism was inflamed by the economic crisis? If it was, that shift was clearly overwhelmed by the Islamic world's growing disenchantment with the brutality displayed by violent extremist groups such as al-Qaida. And looking forward, austere economic times are just as likely to breed connecting evangelicalism as disconnecting fundamentalism. At the end of the day, the economic crisis did not prove to be sufficiently frightening to provoke major economies into establishing global regulatory schemes, even as it has sparked a spirited -- and much needed, as I argued last week -- discussion of the continuing viability of the U.S. dollar as the world's primary reserve currency. Naturally, plenty of experts and pundits have attached great significance to this debate, seeing in it the beginning of "economic warfare" and the like between "fading" America and "rising" China. And yet, in a world of globally integrated production chains and interconnected financial markets, such "diverging interests" hardly constitute signposts for wars up ahead. Frankly, I don't welcome a world in which America's fiscal profligacy goes undisciplined, so bring it on -- please! Add it all up and it's fair to say that this global financial crisis has proven the great resilience of America's post-World War II international liberal trade order. Do I expect to read any analyses along those lines in the blogosphere any time soon? Absolutely not. I expect the fantastic fear-mongering to proceed apace. That's what the Internet is for.

Terrorism

1nc can’t stop mass surveillanceA privacy advocate doesn’t solve mass surveillanceNojeim 13, (Gregory Nojeim is a Senior Counsel at the Center for Democracy & Technology Constitution Center, 11/1/13 “FISA court advocate helpful, but no replacement for ending mass surveillance,” http://blog.constitutioncenter.org/2013/11/fisa-court-advocate-helpful-but-no-replacement-for-ending-mass-surveillance/)Whatever the truth, several factors erode trust in the FISA Court, the foremost being that it operates secretly and issues important decisions in a one-sided process in which only the government is represented. This inhibits the Court from giving adequate consideration to arguments against surveillance, and leaves the government free to make flawed or unsubstantiated assertions without fear of rebuttal.¶ One-sided FISA Court proceedings has led to the development of an unnatural collaborative relationship between clerks of the court and the Department of Justice lawyers who submit surveillance applications to the FISA Court.¶ In response to this problem, Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) introduced legislation, S.1467, to create an independent Special Advocate within the Executive Branch who would “vigorously [advocate] before the FISA Court or the FISA Court of Review … in support of legal interpretations that minimize the scope of surveillance and the extent of data collection and retention.”¶ The Special Advocate would review every application to the FISA Court, and could ask to participate in any FISA Court proceeding, although the FISA Court has the authority to deny such requests. The Special Advocate could also request that outside parties be granted the ability to file amicus curiae briefs with the Court, or participate in oral arguments. The Special Advocate could also appeal FISA Court decisions – including requests to participate and substantive decisions regarding surveillance applications – to the FISA Court of Review and the Supreme Court. Finally, the Special Advocate could petition for public disclosure of decisions and other relevant documents held by the FISA Court.¶ Picking up on this idea, Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) included a “Constitutional Advocate” in his FISA reform bill, the Intelligence Oversight and Surveillance Reform Act (S. 1551) and Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Representative James Sensenbrenner (R-WI) included a similar provision in their USA Freedom Act, which was introduced on October 29.¶ Several improvements could strengthen the “Special Advocate ” legislation. First, advocating protection of privacy and civil liberties should be added to the duties of the Office of the Special Advocate. While the current charge to advocate for minimizing the scope of data collection is helpful, sometimes consideration of broader civil liberties interests is appropriate. In addition, the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board should choose the Special Advocate, rather than selecting a slate of candidates from which the Chief Judge of the FISA Court would choose, as is suggested in the Blumenthal bill. Finally, the Special Advocate, not the FISA Court, should decide in which cases the Special advocate would have a voice. Otherwise, he or she could be barred from participating in most proceedings.¶ Inserting a Special Advocate in FISA Court proceedings – particularly one charged with making those proceedings more transparent – would go some distance toward restoring trust in intelligence surveillance. But, it is no substitute for clearer, more restrictive rules about the information that can be collected for intelligence purposes, particularly when that information pertains to Americans . In other words, having a Special Advocate is no panacea; it is far more important that Congress act to end the bulk collection of metadata about communications.

1nc key to stop terrorismSurveillance works and NSA domestic programs are keyZuckerman, Bucci and Carafano 13 (Jessica, Policy Analyst, Western Hemisphere, Heritage Foundation, Steven P., Director of the Center for Foreign and National Security Policy at the Heritage Foundation, and James Jay, PhD, Vice President for the Institute for National SEcurity and Foreign Policy, "60 Terrorist Plots Since 9/11: Continued Lessons in Domestic Counterterrorism")

Strengthening the Domestic Counterterrorism Enterprise¶ Three months after the attack at the Boston Marathon, the pendulum of awareness of the terrorist threat has already begun to swing back, just as it did after 9/11. Due to the resilience of the nation and its people, for most, life has returned to business as usual. The threat of terrorism against the United States , however, remains.¶ Expecting to stop each and every threat that reaches a country’s borders is unreasonable, particularly in a free society committed to individual liberty. Nevertheless, there are important steps that America’s leaders can take to strengthen the U.S. domestic counterterrorism enterprise and continue to make the U.S. a harder target. Congress and the Administration should:¶ Ensure a proactive approach to preventing terrorist attacks. Despite the persistent threat of terrorism, the Obama Administration continues to focus on reactive policies and prosecuting terrorists rather than on proactive efforts to enhance intelligence tools and thwart terrorist attempts. This strategy fails to recognize the pervasive nature of the threat posed by terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda and homegrown extremism. The Administration , and the nation as a whole, should continue to keep in place a robust, enduring, and proactive counterterrorism framework in order to identify and thwart terrorist threats long before the public is in danger.¶ Maintain essential counterterrorism tools. Support for important investigative tools such as the PATRIOT Act i s essential to maintaining the security of the U.S. and combating terrorist threats. Key provisions within the act, such as the roving surveillance authority and business records provision, have proved essential for thwarting terror plots, yet they require frequent reauthorization. In order to ensure that law enforcement and intelligence authorities have the essential counterterrorism tools they need, Congress should seek permanent authorization of the three sun setting provisions within the PATRIOT Act.[208] Furthermore, legitimate government surveillance programs are also a vital component of U.S. national security, and should be allowed to continue. Indeed, in testimony before the house, General Keith Alexander, the director of the National Security Agency (NSA), revealed that more than 50 incidents of potential terrorism at home and abroad were stopped by the set of NSA surveillance programs that have recently come under scrutiny. That said, the need for effective counterterrorism operations does not relieve the government of its obligation to follow the law and respect individual privacy and liberty. In the American system, the government must do both equally well.¶ Break down the silos of information. Washington should emphasize continued cooperation and information sharing among federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies to prevent terrorists from slipping through the cracks between the various jurisdictions. In particular, the FBI should make a more concerted effort to share information more broadly with state and local law enforcement. State and local law enforcement agencies are the front lines of the U.S. national security strategy. As a result, local authorities are able to recognize potential danger and identify patterns that the federal authorities may miss. They also take the lead in community outreach, which is crucial to identifying and stopping “lone wolf” actors and other homegrown extremists. Federal law enforcement, on the other hand, is not designed to fight against this kind of threat; it is built to battle cells, groups, and organizations, not individuals.¶ Streamline the domestic counterterrorism system. The domestic counterterrorism enterprise should base future improvements on the reality that governments at

all levels are fiscally in crisis. Rather than add additional components to the system, law enforcement officials should streamline the domestic counterterrorism enterprise by improving current capabilities, leveraging state and local law enforcement resources and authorities, and, in some cases, reducing components where the terrorist threat is not high and the financial support is too thin or could be allocated more effectively. For example, the Department of Homeland Security should dramatically reduce the number of fusion centers, many of which exist in low-risk areas or areas where similar capabilities exist. An easy way to reduce the number of fusion centers is to eliminate funding to those that are located outside the 31 urban areas designated as the highest risk.¶ Fully implement a strategy to counter violent extremism. Countering violent extremism is an important complementary effort to an effective counterterrorism strategy. In August 2011, the U.S. government released a strategic plan called “Empowering Local Partners to Prevent Violent Extremism in the United States.”[209] The plan focuses on outlining how federal agencies can assist local officials, groups, and private organizations in preventing violent extremism. It includes strengthening law enforcement cooperation and helping communities understand how to counter extremist propaganda (particularly online). Sadly, this plan is not a true strategy. It fails to assign responsibilities and does not direct action or resource investments. More direction and leadership must be applied to transform a laundry list of good ideas into an effective program to support communities in protecting and strengthening civil society.¶ Vigilance Is Not Optional¶ In a political environment of sequestration on the one hand and privacy concerns on the other, there are those on both sides of the aisle who argue that counterterrorism spending should be cut and U.S. intelligence agencies reigned in. As the above list indicates however, the long war on terrorism is far from over . Most disturbingly, an increasing number of Islamist-inspired terrorist attacks are originating within America’s borders. The rise of homegrown extremism is the next front in the fight against terrorism and should be taken seriously by the Administration.¶ While there has not been another successful attack on the homeland on the scale of 9/11, the bombings in Boston reminded the country that the threat of terrorism is real and that continued vigilance is critical to keeping America safe. Congress and the Administration must continue to upgrade and improve the counterterrorism capabilities of law enforcement and intelligence agencies as well exercise proper oversight of these capabilities. The American people are resilient, but the lesson of Boston is that the government can and should do more to prevent future terror attacks.

2nc key to stop terrorismNSA mass surveillance is critical –to combating terrorWittes 14 (Benjamin, Senior Fellow @ the Brookings Institute, April 8th 2014, "Is Al Qaeda Winning: Grading the Administration's Counter terrorism Policy, Brookings Institute)

As I said at the outset of this statement, the question of intelligence collection under Section 702 of the FAA may seem connected to the AUMF’s future in only the most distant fashion. In fact, the connection between intelligence collection authorities and the underlying regime authorizing the conflict itself is a critical one. Good intelligence is key to any armed conflict and good technical intelligence is a huge U.S. strength in the fight against Al Qaeda. Yet ironically, the more one attempts to narrow the conflict, the more important technical intelligence becomes. The fewer boots on the ground we have in Afghanistan, for example, the greater our reliance will become on technical collection. The more we rely on drone strikes, rather than large troop movements, in areas where we lack large human networks, the more we rely on technical intelligence. Particularly if one imagines staying on offense against a metastasizing Al Qaeda in the context of a withdrawal from Afghanistan and a narrowing—or a formal end—of the AUMF conflict, the burden on technical intelligence collection to keep us in the game will be huge even ignoring the many other foreign intelligence and national security interests Section 702 surveillance supports.¶ Section 702 is a complicated statute, and it is only one part of a far more complicated, larger statutory arrangement. But broadly speaking, it permits the NSA to acquire without an individualized warrant the communications of non-US persons reasonably believed to be overseas when those communications are transiting the United States or stored in the United States. Under these circumstances, the NSA can order production of such communications from telecommunications carriers and internet companies under broad programmatic orders issued by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), which reviews both targeting and minimization procedures under which the collection then takes place. Oversight is thick, both within the executive branch, and in reporting requirements to the congressional intelligence committees.¶ Make no mistake: Section 702 is a very big deal in America’s counterterrorism arsenal. It is far more important than the much debated bulk metadata program, which involves a few hundred queries a year. Section 702 collection, by contrast, is vast, a hugely significant component not only of contemporary counterterrorism but of foreign intelligence collection more generally. In 2012, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence wrote that “[T]he authorities provided [under section 702] have greatly increased the government’s ability to collect information and act quickly against important foreign intelligence targets. . . . [The] failure to reauthorize [section 702] would ‘result in a loss of significant intelligence and impede the ability of the Intelligence Community to respond quickly to new th reats and intelligence opportunities .’”[8] The President’s Review Group on Intelligence and Communications Technologies, after quoting this language, wrote that “Our own review is not inconsistent with this assessment. . . . [W]e are persuaded that section 702 does in fact play an important role in the nation’s effort to prevent terrorist attacks across the globe .”[9] The Washington Post has reported that 702 was in 2012 the single most prolific contributor to the President’s Daily Brief.[10]

1nc no cyber terrorNo impact to cyber terror –countries don’t reactLibicki, 13 – Senior Management Scientist at the RAND Corporation and a Visiting Professor at the U.S. Naval Academy (Martin, “Cyberwar Fears Pose Dangers of Unnecessary Escalation,” Rand Corporation, 7/15/13, http://www.rand.org/pubs/periodicals/rand-review/issues/2013/summer/cyberwar-fears-pose-dangers-of-unnecessary-escalation.html)//schnallFor all these reasons, cyberwar may not be seen as it actually is, and states may react out of fear rather than reflection. An action that one side perceives as innocuous may be seen as nefarious by the other. Fortunately, mistakes in cyberspace do not have the potential for catastrophe that mistakes in the nuclear arena do. Unfortunately, that fact may prevent leaders from exercising

their normal caution in crisis circumstances. Paradoxically, although the systemic features of cyber crises lend themselves to resolution (there is little pressure to respond quickly, and there are grounds for giving the other side some benefit of the doubt), the fretful perceptions of cyberoperations as they opaquely unfold may drive participants toward conflict. Cautionary Guidelines To manage crises and forestall their escalation in cyberspace, the following seven points may be usefully kept in mind. The first is to understand that the answer to the question — Is this cyberattack an act of war? — is a decision, not a

conclusion. Even if cyberwar can be used to disrupt life on a mass scale, it cannot be used to occupy another nation's capital. It cannot force regime change. No one has yet died from it . A cyberattack , in and of itself, does not demand an immediate response to safeguard national security . The victim of a cyberattack could declare that it was an act of war and then go forth and fight — or the victim could look at policies that reduce the pain without so much risk , such as by fixing or forgoing software or network connections whose vulnerabilities permitted the cyberattack in the first place. Second is to take the time to think things through. Unlike with nuclear war, a nation's cyberwar capabilities cannot be disarmed by a first strike. There is not the same need to get the jump on the other guy — or to match his offense with your offense when it is your defense that dictates how much damage you are likely to receive. Third is to understand what is at stake — which is to say,

what you hope to gain. With cyberattack, what you are trying to prevent is not the initial attack but the next attack , the effects of which might be larger than the initial attack but might also be smaller. (The latter is particularly true if the initial attack teaches the victims that, say, making industrial controls accessible to the Internet may not have been the smartest idea.) Fourth is not to take

possession of the crisis unnecessarily. That is, do not back yourself into a corner where you always have to respond, whether doing so is wise or not. It is common, these

days, to emphasize the cost and consequences of a cyberattack as a national calamity . Having created a demand among the public to do something, the government is then committed to doing something even when doing little or nothing is called for. Emphasizing the pain from a cyberattack

also fuels the temptation of others to induce such pain. Conversely, fostering the impression that a great country can bear the pain of cyberattacks, keep calm, and carry on reduces the temptation . Fifth is to craft a narrative that can take the crisis where you want it to go. Narratives are morality plays in which events take their designated place in the logical and moral scheme of things: "We are good, you are bad"; "we are strong and competent, unless we have stumbled temporarily because of your evil." Narratives also have to find a role for the attacker, and the development of such a role may, in

some cases, encourage the attacker's graceful and face-saving retreat from belligerence. After all, the odds that an attack in cyberspace arises from miscalculation, inadvertence, unintended consequences, or rogue actors are nontrivial. Perhaps more than any other form of combat, cyberwar is storytelling — appropriately for a form of conflict that means to alter information. Sixth is to figure out what norms of conduct in cyberspace, if any, work best. In March 2013, the United States and China agreed to carry out high-level talks

on cyber norms. Particularly useful norms are those that can be monitored before any war starts . These include norms that pledge nations to cooperate in investigating cybercrimes, that sever bonds between a state and its hackers or

commercially oriented cybercriminals, and that frown deeply on espionage on networks that support critical public services (such as electrical

power). Working toward useful norms may well help reduce the likelihood of a crisis , but it would be unrealistic to believe that they can eliminate the possibility.

No cyberterrorism- technological complexity and lack of publicityCovert 15(Edwin, 1/13/15, InfoSec Institute, “Cyber Terrorism: Complexities and Consequences,” Edwin is a cybersecurity professional and works for Booz Allen Hamilton, http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/cyber-terrorism-complexities-consequences/)While a terrorist using the Internet to bring down the critical infrastructures the United States relies on makes an outstanding Hollywood plot, there are flaws in the execution of this storyline as an actual terrorist strategy. Conway (2011) calls out three limitations on using cyber- related activities for terrorists: Technological complexity, image, and accident (Against Cyberterrorism, 2011, p. 27).∂ Each is important to consider. While critical infrastructures may make a tempting target and threat actor capabilities are certainly increasing (Nyugan, 2013), it is a complicated process to attack something of that magnitude . It is precisely the interconnectedness of these two disparate parts that make them a target, however.∂ Nyugan (2013) calls them cyber-physical systems (CPS): “A physical system monitored or controlled by computers. Such systems include, for example, electrical grids, antilock brake systems, or a network of nuclear centrifuges” (p. 1084).∂ In Verton’s (2003) imaginary narrative, the target of the Russian hackers, the SCADA system, is a CPS. However, Lewis (2002) argues the relationship between vulnerabilities in critical infrastructures (such as MAE-East) and computer network attacks is not a clear cut as first thought (p. 1). It is not simply a matter of having a computer

attached to a SCADA system and thus the system is can now be turned off and society goes in a free fall of panic and explosions and mass chaos.∂ The first idea Conway (2011) posits reduces to the notion that information technology is difficult in most cases. There are reasons it takes veritable armies of engineers and analysts to make these complex systems interact and function as intended. However, there are a limited number of terrorists with the necessary computer skills to conduct a successful attack (pp. 27-28).∂ Immediately the argument turns to hiring external assistance from actual computer hackers (as most journalists and Hollywood scriptwriters do). Conway (2011) dismisses that idea, correctly, as a significant compromise of operational security (p. 28).∂ The US Department of Defense as defines operational security, or OPSEC:∂ A process of identifying critical information and analyzing friendly actions attendant to military operations and other activities to: identify those actions that can be observed by adversary intelligence systems; determine indicators and vulnerabilities that adversary intelligence systems might obtain that could be interpreted or pieced together to derive critical information in time to be useful to adversaries, and determine which of these represent an unacceptable risk; then select and execute countermeasures that eliminate the risk to friendly actions and operations or reduce it to an acceptable level (US Department of Defense, 2012).∂ In the context of this paper, letting outside profit-motivated technicians into the planning and execution phase of a terrorist plot would be risky for conservative-minded individuals such a religious terrorists (Hoffman, 2006). As the number of people who are aware of a plot increases, the potential number of people who can leak operational details of the plot i ncreases exponentially. ∂ It is for this reason Verton’s (2003) scenario is most improbable.∂ The second concern Conway (2011) notes is one of audience. Recalling the definition of terrorist put forth by Hoffman (2006), terrorists need to generate publicity to achieve their goals: they need to create a climate of fear through violence or the threat of violence. Simply attacking something and having no one notice it is not a n operational success for a terrorist . Terrorists need to have their grievances known (Nacos, 2000, p. 176).∂ The terrorist act needs to be witnessed, such as the planes crashing into the World Trade Center or the hostage taking in Munich. in order to generate the necessary level of discourse to affect the goals the terrorist has in mind. Unfortunately, injecting code into a DNS server or shutting down Amazon.com does not generate the required intensity of chaos modern terrorists require (Conway, Against Cyberterrorism, 2011, p. 28).∂ This leads to Conway’s (2011) third point: the accident. The United States relies heavily on computer and information systems. However, if a system goes offline in today’s world, users are just as likely to suspect a system failure or accident as anything else is (p. 28).

Even if they attack, easy to stopCluley 14(Graham, 10/20/14, The State of Security, “GCHQ Spokesperson Says Cyber Terrorism Is ‘Not a Concern’,” former employee of Sophos, McAfee, Dr. Solomon’s, inducted into the InfoSecurity Europe Hall of Fame, http://www.tripwire.com/state-of-security/security-data-protection/gchq-spokesperson-says-cyber-terrorism-is-not-a-concern/, 7/17/15, SM)Yes, a terrorist could launch a denial-of-service attack, or write a piece of malware, or hack into a sensitive system, just as easily as the next (non-terrorist), but there is no reason to believe that an attack launched by a terrorist living in his secret HQ in the mountain caves of Afghanistan would be any harder to stop than the hundreds of thousands of other attacks launched each day.∂ That’s not to say that launching an Internet attack wouldn’t have attractive aspects for those behind a terror campaign. Put bluntly, it’s a heck lot easier (and less physically dangerous) to write a Trojan horse to infect a computer on the other side of the world, than to drive a lorry loaded up with Semtex outside a government building’s front door.∂ Furthermore, terrorists are often interested in making headlines, to focus the world’s attention on what they believe to be their plight. If innocent people die during a terrorist action that certainly does help you make the newspapers, but it’s very bad for public relations, and is going to make it a lot harder to convince others to sympathise with your campaign.∂ The good news about pretty much all Internet attacks, of course, is that they don’t involve the loss of life. Any damage done is unlikely to leave individuals maimed or bleeding, but can still bloody the nose of a government that should have been better protected or potentially disrupt economies.∂ But still, such terrorist-initiated Internet attacks should be no harder to protect against than the financially-motivated and hacktivist attacks that organisations defend themselves against every day . ∂ So, when a journalist asks me if I think cyber terrorism is a big concern, I tend to shrug and say “Not that much” and ask them to consider why Al Qaeda, for instance, never bothered to launch a serious Internet attack in the 13 years since September 11.∂ After all, if it is something for us all to fear – why wouldn’t they have done it already?∂ So, I was pleased to have my views supported last week – from a perhaps surprising source.∂ GCHQ, the UK intelligence agency which has become no stranger to controversy following the revelations of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, appears to agree that cyber terrorism is not a concern. Or at least that’s what they’re saying behind closed doors, according to SC Magazine.∂ Part of SC Magazine story on cyber terrorism∂ The report quoted an unnamed GCHQ spokesperson at a CSARN (City Security And Resilience Networks) forum held last week in London, debunking the threat posed by cyber terrorists:∂ “Quite frankly we don’t see cyber terrorism. It hasn’t occurred…but we have to guard against it. For those of you thinking about strategic threats, terrorism is not [a concern] at this point in time,” although he added that the agency was ‘very concerned’ on a possible attack at the time of the 2012 London Olympics.∂ ∂ He said that while it is clear that terrorism groups – such as ISIS and Al-Qaeda – are technically-adept, there’s been no sign of them venturing to cyber beyond promotional purposes .∂ ∂ “For some reason, there doesn’t seem intent to use destructive cyber capability. It’s clearly a theoretical threat. We’ve not seen – and we were very worried around London Olympics – but we’ve never seen it. We’ll continue to keep an eye on it.”∂ In a time when the potential threat posed by terrorism is often used as an excuse for covert surveillance by intelligence agencies, such as GCHQ, and the UK government raising the “threat level” to “Severe” at the end of August due to conflict in Iraq and Syria, one has to wonder if the spokesperson quoted was speaking entirely “on-message.”

2nc no cyberterrorNo cyberterrorism— too expsensiveChen 14(Thomas, June 2014, Strategic Studies Institute and US Army War College, “Cyberterrorism After Stuxnet,” professor of cybersecurity @ the School of Engineering and Mathematical Sciences at City University London, http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/PUB1211.pdf)WHY NOT A MAJOR CYBERATTACK∂ Having established motive, means, and opportunity∂ for terrorists, the natural question is why a major∂ cyberattack has not happened yet. It seems that al-Qaeda ∂ and other terrorist groups still prefer bombs and∂ physical attacks, even after Stuxnet.35 In the absence of∂ an attack, a case could be argued that cyberterrorism∂ is more of a hypothetical threat than a real one.36 However,∂ there is debate about whether an actual cyberattack∂ by terrorists has happened.37 No major attacks∂ have occurred, according to the public record, some∂ observers have speculated that attacks have happened∂ but have been kept confidential so as not to disclose∂ weaknesses in the national infrastructure. ∂ 21∂ In 2007, Denning postulated three indicators that∂ could precede a successful cyberterrorism attack:38∂ 1. Failed cyberattacks against critical infrastructures,∂ such as ICS. Unlike the case with the professionally∂ developed Stuxnet, Denning expected that∂ the first cyberterrorist attack would likely be unsuccessful,∂ considering that even terrorist kinetic attacks∂ frequently fail.∂ 2. Research and training labs, where terrorists∂ simulate their cyberattacks against targets, test attack∂ tools, and train people. Israel reportedly had centrifuges∂ at its Dimona complex to test Stuxnet on.∂ 3. Extensive discussions and planning relating∂ to attacks against critical infrastructures, not just∂ websites.∂ So far, none of these indicators has been observed,∂ which would imply that terrorists are not trying hard∂ to prepare for cyberattacks.∂ Conway has argued against the likelihood of cyberterrorism∂ in the near future.39 Her argument consists∂ of these reasons:∂ • Violent jihadis’ IT knowledge is not superior.∂ • Real-world attacks are difficult enough.∂ • Hiring hackers would compromise operational∂ security.∂ • For a true terrorist event, spectacular moving∂ images are crucial.∂ • Terrorists will not favor a cyberattack with the∂ potential to be hidden, portrayed as an accident,∂ or otherwise remaining unknown.∂ Perhaps the most straightforward explanation of∂ the lack of observed cyberattacks is the cost-benefit∂ argument put forth by Giacomello.40 He compared the ∂ 22∂ costs of traditional physical terrorist attacks with cyberattacks∂ of the “break things and kill people” type.∂ Specifically, Giacomello estimated the costs of three∂ cyberterrorism scenarios aimed at the power grid; a∂ hydroelectric dam; and an air traffic control system. If∂ the power grid was viewed as an unlikely target, fatalities∂ will be indirect or accidental. For a hydroelectric∂ dam, the cost is based on a historical incident of an∂ insider sabotaging the controls at the dam. Somewhat∂ arbitrarily, the estimate assumed two proficient hackers∂ with supporting personnel, totaling up to $1.3 million.∂ For an air traffic control system, a higher number∂ of skilled hackers are needed to compromise the∂ system, prevent the air controllers from detecting and∂ responding to the intrusion, and defeat built-in safety∂ mechanisms. Again, it is not explicitly stated, but a∂ year of work seems to be assumed, since the total is∂ based on a year’s salary. The resulting estimated cost∂ was up to $3 million.∂ For comparison, Giacomello pointed out that the∂ World Trade Center bomb cost only $400 to build,∂ yet, it injured 1,000 people and caused $550 million of∂ physical damages. The March 2004 attacks in Madrid,∂ exploding 10 simultaneous bombs on four commuter∂ trains using mining explosives and cellphones, cost∂ about $10,000 to carry out. The 9/11 Commission Report∂ stated that the 9/11 attacks cost between $400,000∂ and $500,000 to plan and execute.41∂ An examination of these comparative costs makes∂ it clear that bombs are a much cheaper approach than ∂ cyberattacks by orders of magnitude. Stuxnet, estimated∂ to have cost millions of dollars, does not change∂ the cost-benefit comparison. At the present time and∂ in the near future, cyberattacks of the “break things∂ and kill people” type require an enormous amount of ∂ 23∂ effort by highly skilled experts . In contrast, bombs can∂ be made cheaply and deployed without skilled effort.∂ In addition, physical attacks are appealing because of∂ the higher certainty of success.

1nc no nuclear terrorUniqueness is for cyber attack coming while the impact card is about a nuclear bomb blowing up in New York. Not real sure how they get to that impact

No risk of nuclear terrorism---too many obstaclesJohn J. Mearsheimer 14, R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago, “America Unhinged”, January 2, nationalinterest.org/article/america-unhinged-9639?page=show

Am I overlooking the obvious threat that strikes fear into the hearts of so many Americans, which is terrorism? Not at all. Sure, t he U nited States has a terrorism problem . But it is a minor threat . There is no question we fell victim to a

spectacular attack on September 11, but it did not cripple the United States in any meaningful way and another attack of that magnitude is highly unlikely in the foreseeable future. Indeed, there has not been a single instance over the past twelve years of a terrorist organization exploding a primitive bomb on American soil, much less striking a major blow. Terrorism—most of it arising from domestic groups—was a much bigger problem in the United States during the 1970s than it has been since the Twin Towers were toppled.¶ What about the possibility that a terrorist group might obtain a nuclear weapon ? Such an occurrence would be a game changer, but

the chances of that happening are virtually nil . No nuclear-armed state is going to supply terrorists with a nuclear weapon because it would have no control over how the recipients might use that

weapon. Political turmoil in a nuclear-armed state could in theory allow terrorists to grab a loose nuclear weapon, but the United States already has detailed plans to deal with that highly unlikely contingency.¶ Terrorists might also try to acquire fissile material and build their own bomb. But that scenario is extremely unlikely as well : there are significant obstacles to getting enough material and even bigger obstacles to building a bomb and then delivering it. More generally, virtually every country has a profound interest in making sure no terrorist group acquires a nuclear weapon, because they cannot be sure they will not be the target of a nuclear attack, either by the terrorists or another country the terrorists strike.

Nuclear terrorism , in short, is not a serious threat . And to the extent that we should worry about it, the main

remedy is to encourage and help other states to place nuclear materials in highly secure custody.

Terrorism doesn’t pose an existential riskFettweis, Professor of Political Science, ‘10Chris, Professor of Political Science @ Tulane,Threat and Anxiety in US Foreign Policy, Survival, 52:2

Even terrorists equipped with nuclear , biological or chemical weapons would be incapable of causing damage so cataclysmic that it would prove fatal to modern states. Though the prospect of terrorists obtaining and using such weapons is one of the most

consistently terrifying scenarios of the new era, it is also highly unlikely and not nearly as dangerous as sometimes portrayed . As the well-funded, well-staffed Aum Shinrikyo cult found out in the 1990s, workable forms of weapons of mass destruction are hard to purchase, harder still to synthesise without state help, and challenging to use effectively. The Japanese group managed to kill a dozen people on the Tokyo subway system at rush hour.

While tragic, the attack was hardly the stuff of apocalyptic nightmares. Super- weapons are simply not easy for even the most sophisticated non-state actors to use.31 If terror- ists were able to overcome the substantial obstacles and use the most destructive weapons in a densely populated area, the outcome would of course be terrible for those unfortunate enough to be nearby. But we should not operate under the illusion that doomsday would arrive. Modern industrialised countries can cope with disasters , both natural and man-made. As unpleasant as such events would be, they do not represent existential threats.

2nc nuclear terrorNo risk of nuclear terrorism---too many obstaclesJohn J. Mearsheimer 14, R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago, “America Unhinged”, January 2, nationalinterest.org/article/america-unhinged-9639?page=show

Am I overlooking the obvious threat that strikes fear into the hearts of so many Americans, which is terrorism? Not at all. Sure, t he U nited States has a terrorism problem . But it is a minor threat . There is no question we fell victim to a

spectacular attack on September 11, but it did not cripple the United States in any meaningful way and another attack of that magnitude is highly unlikely in the foreseeable future. Indeed, there has not been a single instance over the past twelve years of a terrorist organization exploding a primitive bomb on American soil, much less striking a major blow. Terrorism—most of it arising from domestic groups—was a much bigger problem in the United States during the 1970s than it has been since the Twin Towers were toppled.¶ What about the possibility that a terrorist group might obtain a nuclear weapon ? Such an occurrence would be a game changer, but

the chances of that happening are virtually nil . No nuclear-armed state is going to supply terrorists with a nuclear weapon because it would have no control over how the recipients might use that

weapon. Political turmoil in a nuclear-armed state could in theory allow terrorists to grab a loose nuclear weapon, but the United States already has detailed plans to deal with that highly unlikely contingency.¶ Terrorists might also try to acquire fissile material and build their own bomb. But that scenario is extremely unlikely as well : there are significant obstacles to getting enough material and even bigger obstacles to building a bomb and then delivering it. More generally, virtually every country has a profound interest in making sure no terrorist group acquires a nuclear weapon, because they cannot be sure they will not be the target of a nuclear attack, either by the terrorists or another country the terrorists strike.

Nuclear terrorism , in short, is not a serious threat . And to the extent that we should worry about it, the main

remedy is to encourage and help other states to place nuclear materials in highly secure custody.

1nc no retaliationNo retaliation or escalationMueller 5 (John, Professor of Political Science – Ohio State University, Reactions and Overreactions to Terrorism, http://polisci.osu.edu/faculty/jmueller/NB.PDF)

However, history clearly demonstrates that overreaction is not necessarily inevitable . Sometimes,   in fact, leaders have been able to restrain their instinct to overreact. Even more important, restrained   reaction--or even capitulation to terrorist acts-- has often proved to be entirely acceptable politically . That   is, there are many instances where leaders did nothing after a terrorist attack (or at least refrained from   overreacting) and did not suffer politically or otherwise . Similarly, after an unacceptable loss of American lives in Somalia in 1993, Bill Clinton responded by withdrawing the troops without noticeable negative impact on his 1996 re-election bid. Although Clinton responded with (apparently counterproductive) military retaliations after the two U.S. embassies were bombed in Africa in 1998 as discussed earlier, his administration did not have a notable response to terrorist attacks on American targets in Saudi Arabia (Khobar Towers) in 1996 or to the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole in 2000, and these non-responses never caused it political pain. George W. Bush's response to the anthrax attacks of 2001 did include, as noted above, a costly and wasteful stocking-up of anthrax vaccine and enormous extra spending by the U.S. Post Office. However, beyond that, it was the same as Clinton's had been to the terrorist attacks against the World Trade Center in 1993 and in Oklahoma City in 1995 and the same as the one applied in Spain when terrorist bombed trains there in 2004 or in Britain after attacks in 2005: the dedicated application of police work to try to apprehend the perpetrators. This approach was politically acceptable even though the culprit in the anthrax case (unlike the other ones) has yet to be found. The demands for retaliation may be somewhat more problematic in the case of suicide terrorists since the direct perpetrators of the terrorist act are already dead, thus sometimes impelling a vengeful need to seek out other targets. Nonetheless, the attacks in

Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Great Britain, and against the Cole were all suicidal, yet no direct retaliatory action was taken. Thus, despite short-term demands that some sort of action must be taken , experience suggests   politicians can often

successfully ride out this demand after the obligatory (and inexpensive) expressions of   outrage are prominently issued.

Solvency

1nc ineffectiveEven if advocate is constitutional-the question undermines effectiveness Doyle and Kumar 14 (MICHAEL DOYLE AND ANITA KUMAR 1/20/14 MCCLATCHY WASHINGTON BUREAU “No one is sure how public advocate at spy”¶ ://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/nation-world/national/national-security/article24761953.html)

Serious questions shadow President Barack Obama’s proposal to add a public advocate to the secret court that oversees surveillance programs. The public advocate, Obama says, would provide an “independent voice in significant cases” before the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. The details, though, remain sketchy even as some of the administration’s own lawyers wonder about the wisdom of it all.¶ The questions include: How will the advocates be appointed? What surveillance cases will merit their participation? How much power will they have? And, not least: Does the Constitution allow them?¶ Obama's proposal echoed ideas that legal scholars and others have raised in recent years.¶ “There are both practical and legal concerns with a special advocate,” Robert Litt, the general counsel of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, told the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, a government panel, in November.¶ Obama offered the public advocate proposal, along with others designed to address surveillance and spying controversies, on Friday. A number of the proposals, such as the one for a public advocate, left up to Congress or the Justice Department the job of filling in the blanks. Skeptics abound.¶ “The advocate proposal is simply a cosmetic attempt to make up an appearance, without substance, of an adversarial proceeding ,” said Carl Messineo, the legal director of the Partnership for Civil Justice, a liberal advocacy group.¶ The nonpartisan Congressional Research Service said in a report last October that the “novel” public advocate proposal raises “several difficult questions of constitutional law” that ultimately might undermine the advocate’s authority . The former chief of the surveillance court, Judge John D. Bates, cautioned lawmakers in a letter last week that a public advocate is “unnecessary and could prove counterproductive in the vast majority” of surveillance court matters.¶

2nc ineffectivePrivacy advocate doesn’t fix surveillance problems

Woodhouse 13 (Leighton Woodhouse 8/10/13 partner and co-founder of Dog Park Media, a creative agency that focuses on video production and graphic design, journalist and independent producer “NSA Surveillance Needs More than Window Dressing Reform” http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leighton-woodhouse/nsa-surveillance-needs-mo_b_3735707.html)Yesterday, President Obama repeated what has become a familiar routine: after two months of bad press on a controversial issue, he made a grand gesture of conceding that his critics may have a point, even while largely holding to his increasingly untenable position, and announced a series of "reforms" that amount, at the end of the day, to window dressing. It was an even less persuasive version of his performance than his pretense of holding Wall Street accountable for the crimes that led to the economic meltdown.¶ Obama's declared reforms of the massive and opaque government surveillance programs that have dramatically expanded on his watch are as follows:¶ Set up a toothless committee to make non-binding recommendations months in the future, once it's safe to ignore them.¶ Hire a privacy officer in the NSA whom few in the agency will take seriously, possibly including the privacy officer him/herself.¶ Appoint a privacy advocate to the FISA Court , and pretend that he/she is a reasonable stand-in for a truly adversarial court system.¶ None of these measures will come close to dealing with the serious Constitutional issues at stake in the continued existence of the government's surveillance regime. Short of scrapping the NSA and the FISA Court (FISC) altogether, nothing less than an about-face on the administration's position on the public's right to challenge the legal basis of the surveillance programs will even begin to bring government spying into line with the Constitution.

1nc circumventionReforms fail – the NSA will circumventGreenwald 14 (Glenn, lawyer, journalist and author – he founded the Intercept and has contributed to Salon and the Guardian, named by Foreign Policy as one of the Top 100 Global Thinkers of 2013, “CONGRESS IS IRRELEVANT ON MASS SURVEILLANCE. HERE’S WHAT MATTERS INSTEAD”, https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2014/11/19/irrelevance-u-s-congress-stopping-nsas-mass-surveillance/)All of that illustrates what is, to me, the most important point from all of this: the last place one should look to impose limits on the powers of the U.S. government is . . . the U.S. government . Governments don’t walk around trying to figure out how to limit their own power, and that’s particularly true of empires . The entire system in D.C. is designed at its core to prevent real reform . This Congress is not going to enact anything resembling fundamental limits on the NSA’s powers of mass surveillance. Even if it somehow did, this White House would never sign it. Even if all that miraculously happened , the fact that the U.S. intelligence community and National Security State operates with no limits and no oversight means they’d easily co-opt the entire reform process . That’s what happened after the eavesdropping scandals of the mid-1970s led to the establishment of congressional intelligence committees and a special FISA “oversight ” court —the committees were instantly captured by putting in charge supreme servants of the intelligence community like Senators Dianne Feinstein and Chambliss, and Congressmen Mike Rogers and “Dutch” Ruppersberger, while the court quickly became a rubber stamp with subservient judges who operate in total secrecy . Ever since the Snowden reporting began and public opinion (in both the U.S. and globally) began radically changing, the White House’s strategy has been obvious. It’s vintage Obama: Enact something that is called “reform ”—so that he can give a pretty speech telling the world that he heard and responded to their concerns—but that in actuality changes almost nothing , thus strengthening the very system he can pretend he “changed.” That’s the same tactic as Silicon Valley, which also supported this bill: Be able to point to something called “reform” so they can trick hundreds of millions of current and future users around the world into believing that their communications are now safe if they use Facebook, Google, Skype and the rest. In pretty much every interview I’ve done over the last year, I’ve been asked why there haven’t been significant changes from all the disclosures. I vehemently disagree with the premise of the question, which equates “U.S. legislative changes” with “meaningful changes.” But it has been clear from the start that U .S. legislation is not going to impose meaningful limitations on the NSA’s powers of mass surveillance, at least not fundamentally.

T-Curtail

1nc shellCurtail means reduce or limitMerriam-Webster 15 © 2015 Merriam-Webster, Incorporated http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/curtail

Curtail verb cur·tail \(ˌ)kər-ˈtāl\: to reduce or limit (something)Full Definition of CURTAILtransitive verb: to make less by or as if by cutting off or away some part <curtail the power of the executive branch> <curtail inflation>

Violation: voting aff doesn’t mandate a surveillance reductionAdvocate doesn’t have to stop surveillanceCarr 13 (James G. Carr a federal district judge for the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ohio. 7/22/13 “A Better Secret Court”http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/23/opinion/a-better-secret-court.html?_r=0)James Robertson, a retired federal judge who served with me on the FISA court, recently called for greater transparency of the court’s proceedings. He has proposed the naming of an advocate , with high-level security clearance, to argue against the government’s filings. He suggested that the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, which oversees surveillance activities, could also provide a check. I would go even further.¶ In an ordinary criminal case, the adversarial process assures legal representation of the defendant. Clearly, in top-secret cases involving potential surveillance targets, a lawyer cannot, in the conventional sense, represent the target.¶ Congress could, however, authorize the FISA judges to appoint, from time to time, independent lawyers with security clearances to serve “pro bono publico” — for the public’s good — to challenge the government when an application for a FISA order raises new legal issues.¶ During my six years on the court, there were several occasions when I and other judges faced issues none of us had encountered before. A staff of experienced lawyers assists the court, but their help was not always enough given the complexity of the issues.¶ The low FISA standard of probable cause — not spinelessness or excessive deference to the government — explains why the court has so often granted the Justice Department’s requests. But rapid advances in technology have outpaced the amendments to FISA, even the most recent ones, in 2008.¶ Having lawyers challenge novel legal assertions in these secret proceedings would result in better judicial outcomes. Even if the government got its way all or most of the time, the court would have more fully developed its reasons for letting it do so. Of equal importance, the appointed lawyer could appeal a decision in the government’s favor to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review — and then to the Supreme Court.

Reasons to prefer:

Limits- the aff could do a small legal change which explodes the topic

Ground- core negative ground for the topic are predicated off of the affirmative reducing surveillance not a small legal change

Topicality is a voting issue for education and fairness

At best makes the Fx T-the plan may not reduce surveillance

Independent voter for fairness and competitive equity- if we win that the plan doesn’t guarantee ruling against the government then voting aff doesn’t mandate topical action.

Interp CardsCurtail is to reduce or limitCambridge 15 (Definition of curtail from the Cambridge Academic Content Dictionary © Cambridge University Press) http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/american-english/curtail)

Curtail verb [T] us /kərˈteɪl/› to reduce or limit something, or to stop something before it is finished: He had to curtail his speech when time ran out.

Curtail means reduce or limit somethingMacmillan 15 Macmillan Dictionary 2015 http://www.macmillandictionary.com/us/dictionary/american/curtail

curtail - definition and synonyms Using the thesaurus verb [transitive] formal curtail pronunciation in American English /kɜrˈteɪl/Word FormsContribute to our Open Dictionary to reduce or limit something, especially something good a government attempt to curtail debate Synonyms and related words To limit or control something or someone:draw a line in the sand, limit, control... Explore Thesaurus Synonyms and related words To reduce something:salami-slice, top-slice, cut back... Explore Thesaurus

Politics

1nc linkFISA reforms are unpopular with republican and cost PCGross 6/5/15 (Grant Gross covers technology and telecom policy in the U.S. government for the IDG News Service 6/5/15 “Don't expect major changes to NSA surveillance from Congress” http://www.pcworld.com/article/2932337/dont-expect-major-changes-to-nsa-surveillance-from-congress.html)The USA Freedom Act also does nothing to limit the NSA’s surveillance of overseas Internet traffic, including the content of emails and IP voice calls. Significantly limiting that NSA program , called Prism in 2013 Snowden leaks, will be a difficult task in Congress, with many lawmakers unconcerned about the privacy rights of people who don’t vote in U.S. elections.¶ Still, the section of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that authorizes those NSA foreign surveillance programs sunsets in 2017, and that deadline will force Congress to look at FISA, although lawmakers may wait until the last minute, as they did with the expiring sections of the Patriot Act covered in the USA Freedom Act.¶ The House Judiciary Committee will continue its oversight of U.S. surveillance programs, and the committee will address FISA before its provisions expire, an aide to the committee said.¶ Republican leaders opposed to more changes¶ Supporters of new reforms will have to bypass congressional leadership, however. Senate Republican leaders attempted to derail even the USA Freedom Act and refused to allow amendments that would require further changes at the NSA.¶ In the House, Republican leaders threatened to kill the USA Freedom Act if the Judiciary Committee amended the bill to address other surveillance programs. Still, many House members, both Republicans and Democrats, have pushed for new surveillance limits, with lawmakers adding an amendment to end so-called backdoor government searches of domestic communications to a large appropriations bill this week.¶ Obama’s administration has threatened to veto the appropriations bill f or several unrelated reasons, but several House members have pledged to push hard to prohibit the FBI and CIA from searching the content of reportedly tens of thousands of U.S. communications swept up in an NSA surveillance program targeting overseas terrorism suspects.¶ Closing that surveillance backdoor is a top priority for civil liberties groups, said Neema Singh Guliani, a legislative counsel with the American Civil Liberties Union’s Washington, D.C., legislative office. “We’ve had this statute that masquerades as affecting only people abroad, but the reality is that it sweeps up large numbers of U.S. persons,” she said.¶ Other changes possible¶ Advocates and lawmakers will also push for a handful of other surveillance reforms in the coming months. The changes most likely to pass make limited changes to surveillance programs, however.¶ While not tied to NSA surveillance, lawmakers will press for changes to the 29-year-old Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA), a wiretap law that gives law enforcement agencies warrantless access to emails and other communications stored in the cloud for more than six months. A House version of ECPA reform counts more than half the body as co-sponsors.¶ Still, tech companies and civil liberties

groups have been pushing since 2010 to have those communications protected by warrants, but law enforcement agencies and some Republican lawmakers have successfully opposed the changes . ¶

Another bill that may gain traction in coming months is the Judicial Redress Act, a bill that would allow citizens of some countries to file lawsuits under the U.S. Privacy Act if government agencies misuse their records.¶ “The Privacy Act offers limited protections, even to Americans, but passage of this bill would be an important first step to addressing especially European concerns that US privacy reforms won’t help them,” said Berin Szoka, president of free market think tank TechFreedom.¶ Public pressure, along with potentially new leaks, will be the key to driving any more surveillance changes, advocates said.¶ “The public will for mass surveillance laws was made very clear recently, and that’s partly why we saw much of Congress flock to whatever could be called surveillance reform,” said Tiffiniy Cheng, a founder of digital rights group Fight for the Future. “No one is fooled by USA Freedom—it’s a weak piece of legislation that uses exceptions in legislative language to codify the NSA’s practice of surveilling most people.”¶ Congress has much work left to do, Cheng said by email. “After the recent showdown and public outcry, USA Freedom is at best, seen as a beginning of surveillance reform, not the end,” she said.

Block linkObama will fight to maintain NSA surveillance through FISAAckerman 6/9 (Spencer Ackerman: National security editor for Guardian, “Obama lawyers asked secret court to ignore public court's decision on spying”, The Guardian, 6/9/2015, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/09/obama-fisa-court-surveillance-phone-records)

The Obama administration has asked a secret surveillance court to ignore a federal court that found bulk surveillance illegal and to once again grant the N ational Security Agency the power to collect the phone records of millions of Americans for six months. ¶ The legal request, filed nearly four hours after Barack Obama

vowed to sign a new law banning precisely the bulk collection he asks the secret court to approve, also suggests that the administration may not necessarily comply with any potential court order demanding that the collection stop. ¶ US officials confirmed last week that they would ask the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance court – better known as the Fisa court, a panel that meets in secret as a step in the surveillance process and thus far has only ever had the government argue before it –

to turn the domestic bulk collection spigot back on.

McConnell will inevitably make any NSA collection reform bill a huge fight- PATRIOT Act provesKim 5/17 (Seung Min Kim: An assistant editor who covers Congress for POLITICO. Previously, she edited the Arena and served as a Web producer, “Time crunch pushes Senate to edge of surveillance cliff,” 5/17/15, http://www.politico.com/story/2015/05/senate-cliff-nsa-patriot-transportation-trade-recess-118040.html, Accessed: 7/16/15, RRR)The overwhelming 338-88 House vote last week ending the NSA’s bulk collection programs — though phone companies would still keep the data that could later be tapped in smaller amounts for terrorism investigations — puts considerable pressure on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who is demanding a straight reauthorization of the current bulk collection methods until 2020. ¶ “I think it is an important tool if we’re going to have the maximum opportunity to defend our people here at home, and I don’t think the House bill does that,” McConnell said of the NSA program Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.” “I think it basically leads us to the end of the program.”¶ But McConnell , Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R-N.C.) and other GOP proponents of retaining the NSA bulk collection program are running into resistance from Democrats and libertarian-leaning Republicans, as well as a bipartisan vow to filibuster even a short-term reauthorization of the PATRIOT Act powers.