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Here's a link if you want to listen for yourself: http://www.citizencorps.gov/resources/webinars/zombieawareness.shtm

I didn't miss the joke -- I LOL'ed, I promise -- but speaking as a CERT instructor: you were told to get under your desks not to protect against a blast near enough to cause vaporization, but to protect against a possible collapse of a building damaged by an otherwise-non-lethal pressure wave. Yes of course if the bomb detonates right above you, you're toast, and if the bomb detonates far enough away that the pressure wave can't cause building damage then you're cowering under your desk for nothing. For the huge chunk of distance-from-ground-zero in between those two extremes, though, your chance of surviving a building collapse is much greater if you have a personal void to hide inside -- like the area under a desk. That's why your 'nuclear bomb drill' and your 'tornado drill' are so similar: you are increasing your odds of survival, being successfully located and extracted by search and rescue teams, in the event that part of your building collapses.

Community Emergency Response Team??

Well, TIPS caught my attention on a prior /. post
CONTENT="FBI Demands Logs From Radical Website"

  REL="author" HREF="//yro.slashdot.org/search.pl?op=stories&author=36799"

Which contained a link to
http://www.citizencorps.gov/about.shtm

And, FWIW, /. also had this thread awhile back:
National "Dragnet" Connecting at State, Local Level
on a 'national data x-change" tho i'd seen it elsewhere.
  http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/03/07/0138253
http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=08/03/07/0138253

So, datamining, sharing the information, encouraging wholesale spying on the angry
unwashed, not the stuff of conspiracy theory, but happening in real-time. And, i'd bet, that most of the people who know about it and dissent are bound by law (yea, right) or national security impositions to have them effectively gagged.

Listen, keep fighting the good fight! You've apparently passed thru the 'bubble of no return':)

I remember someone asking me at a demonstration in D.C. "how do you know when to get involved?"
My answer was when it becomes compelling enough that cannot be ignored. When one cannot stop themselves from getting their feet wet and jumping into the fray.

We're all 'little guys' here. And ppl who man hotlines may not be well informed.
Instead of thinking how the ACLU can assist you consider how you can assist them.

Now that you've gotten self-involved you've taken the 1st big step. Kudos

CERT is already an acronym. Pick a different one.

https://www.citizencorps.gov/cert/about.shtm
The Community Emergency Response Team concept was developed and implemented by the Los Angeles City Fire Department (LAFD) in 1985.

Wikipedia:
CERT as in CERT/CC, formerly an acronym for Computer Emergency Response Team Coordination Center but CERT is no longer an acronym[1] and is known as simply "CERT". The CERT Coordination Center was created by DARPA in November 1988 after the Morris worm struck.

No, you go find another (non)acronym.

• forced medical procedures
  Woman who killed baby will be sterilized watchers
• the tips program came from here
  citizencorps

it would be interesting to find a document from the cold war days and go point by point and fill it in.

tin hat aside, i am quite sure the u.s. has passed the tipping point for a fascist state. my opinion is based less on the fact that there is a "evil entity" but more out of the observation the base of the economy is shrinking for and you have more and more displaced people. people say with innovation there are new opportunities. i realize that computational theory is not a hot topic on ./ but i think otherwise forget moore's law look up "church's thesis", hint we are computational processes too. connect the dots and you will see why bill gates is the richest person in the world "he who controls the spice rules the world."

fast forward another 10 years; there are are prob. 100k coders/chip makers who create the digital stuff that runs most of the world ... people 100k in the argi-business feeding most of the world ... run through the top 10 industries you cover pretty much all what we need for civilization ... dunno what you are going to need the other 6 billion for, the mean green fighting machine or maybe just solvent green.

so me thinks : you have to keep people in check somehow; prisons : dept of corrections, tv : csi , dhs : terrorist in your cereal etc.. bravo we have a fascist state. the question now for me is how far will it go.

time to take my pills, lets see the blue on or the red one

guess i can afford both, i forgot i moved to canada 4 years ago ... after 2 years of protesting and people not getting it ... shortly after the coronation of king george ii and people still not getting it ... so long suckas. guess it pays to be a person of conscience or a rabble rouser in fascist speak or a terrorist in new fascist speak ... i forget.

smash the state : [black-n-red]

http://www.citizencorps.gov/ready/ What is this? "Citizen Corps is an easy way for communities across America to engage every individual in preparing the homeland for any type of emergency or threat." Now are these homeland spies?

I picture it like those glorious mass rallies the Nazis used to have. There he is lovingly pounding away at my second front while legions of goose-stepping Citizen Corps march past and salute our union.

Just as my Glorious Leader is about to empty his tiny holy-warrior into the security of my Homeland a wing of F22s will fly overhead, their afterburners growing into great balls of fire in synchronicity with the primal cries of pleasure from the Glorious Leader.

My God, what a man!

Who the hell comes up with these names?

As a director of Homeland SS I would like to take this opportunity to remind you that although no terrorist attacks took place in Christmas, our great nation is still under a terrorist threat.

So keep your eyes open and report your neighbours [citizencorps.gov] for any suspicious activity.

Be pure, be vigilant, behave!

PS. And if you want our children to be safe in the future as well, remember to vote for our commander-in-chief in 2004! Now you do want our children to be safe, don't you?

Tom Ridge
Director of Homeland SS

I would like to take this opportunity to remind you that although no terrorist attacks took place in Christmas, our great nation is still under a terrorist threat.

So keep your eyes open and report your neighbours for any suspicious activity.

Be pure, be vigilant, behave!

PS. And if you want our children to be safe in the future as well, remember to vote for our commander-in-chief in 2004! Now you do want our children to be safe, don't you?

Tom Ridge
Director of Homeland SS

the students were supposed to looking at some binary stars when they decided to look a the asteroid instead.

Kids who don't do what they're told and know how to use a telescope? Why, next they'll be using the telescope to plan the trajectory of ICBMs!

Their professors should report them under the TIPS program, especially in the event of a student holding a temporary visa, to ensure a quick, appeal-free exile.

If you want to learn something, read Orwell. Then if you haven't got the point, maybe move on to Huxley.

I'm not being rude, I mean it. They put the case better than I ever could.

If you're not a reader, find a friend who lived in the U.S.S.R.. Ask them about what it was like to have serial numbers on typewriters and copy machines, and a national informant system, or to have to show papers to go from one town to the next, or at any time for any reason. To walk down a quiet street at night with a girl, arm in arm, but not steal that kiss, because you are not really sure you're alone.

The psychological effects of these regimes are subtle and pervasive.

The thing you want to think about is that, often times, the government does things not quite for the reasons that it gives. And surveillance is one of those things that has a lot of purposes besides preventing terrorism.

Consider the fact that almost none of the security measures passed since 9/11 were related to published dificiencies in our previous security program's handling of the disaster. National IDs had nothing to do with Al Qaeda, and would not have prevented the attack - the attackers would have simply had their own. They were in the country legally.

The Soviets pulled out every stop. They did things the current pro-surveillance, pro-data-collection Americans would have nightmares about. I'll give you a hint. It didn't stop crime, let alone terrorism. But it did make a striking example that life in a totalitarian state is barely that.

Our history in this country is that of refugees from government. And we organized our society in perpetual conflict with its government as a result. If we trust government, why have a jury, since judges are better qualified? Why have courts? Don't you trust the police? Wouldn't they know best who'se guilty and who'se not? Why have elections? After all, as Lenin put it, some things are too important to put to a vote.

Instead we have checks and balances, and we have a sense that a life should not be lived in the shadow of government. That it should be in our lives as little as possible. That every time it intrudes, to collect a tax, to stamp a passport, to pull us over on the highway, it had better be giving us a hell of a bargain in return. Our country's resistance to ID's stems from a basic, visceral aspect of that conflict; I do not exist at the sufferance of my state. I do not need to be stamped and photographed to be legitimate. I am a free, "legal" person inherently - not because of my card. I am not, in other words, a number. But this sounds too much like rhetoric. The basic point is, let each agency who needs to know who I am ask each time it needs to. Let each give an ID if it must. Don't let government as a whole enumerate us; that's a bad bargain, because it doesn't need to. Only specific parts of it do. So let it do only as much as it needs.

Of course, it also stems from the basic necessities; a national ID system is expensive, and it has no clearly stated and important benefits that justify its expense. If you say that it helps provide "security," you'll have to say precisely how.

But I'd rather not preach at you. You should look at the works on the subject, read about the relevant history, and draw your own conclusions.

-David

I think it is called the Citizen Corps or something like that. The program is TIPS (Terrorist Information and Prevention System).

"Would you like to know more?"

www.citizencorps.gov/tips.html

For a "Bleak Future of the Wired Society Told Before the Internet Even Existed" dystopia, find a copy of E.M.Forster's short story The Machine Stops.

Orphans of the Sky by Robert Heinlein is an interesting "mystics vs. scientists and humans vs. mutants on an interstellar lifeboat from Earth" sort of tale.

And for a glimpse of an upcoming dystopia, or to do your part to help form it, just go to the Citizen Corps site.

Don't you know that national security is also your duty? If you're not a member of the Informant Corps, you've better join fast before your neighbour starts reporting on you instead.

New New Order is coming (George Bush Sr.'s New World order got delayed) and if you're not a part of it, you'll be nothing.

I applaud the spirit of this lawsuit, especially in light of such bright government ideas as this that are coming our way, but it misses one crucial point: the ID requirement is not attached to allowing people to travel, it's attached to allowing them into a position to get control of a powerful guided missile. From a security standpoint, the fact that the plane is actually going anywhere is incidental. The writers of the Constitution were opposed to people's movements being restricted, which to them pretty much meant stopping people on the road. I don't think they would have seen an airplane ride in exactly the same way, but we'll never know.

Planes are also are private property, and although the government appears in this case to be the prime mover, it wouldn't be unconstitutional for the airlines themselves, or say, a movie theater, to require photo ID for admission. It is an uncomfortable thought, but we live in the world we live in. I know, people who give up liberty for the sake of security deserve neither, but how often do you run red lights or drive in the wrong lane to feel like you are more free?

If you want to protect your freedom, fight things like corporate lobbyism, which has turned democracy into government-by-bribery. And have a safe trip!

You mean like the new TIPS system, bush is pushing? Where they estimate 5% of the public will spy and report "suspicious, and potentially terrorist-related activity."

So basically, anyone walking into your house can be a spy for the government, the Cable guy, Phone Repair, or Water/food services. My god, I hope Bush gets voted out of office before more damage is done to our Country. Welcome to homeland security my fellow USians.

Did anyone notice the security certificate for this site is buggered? Nice.

http://www.citizencorps.gov/tips.html

"The program will involve the millions of American workers who, in the daily course of their work, are in a unique position to see potentially unusual or suspicious activity in public places."
"Operation TIPS will be phased in across the country to enable the system to build its capacity to receive an increasing volume of tips."

I'm so glad I live in Canada. Until the tanks roll across the border.... :(

Exactally.

The only mistake that orwell seemed to make was the timeline, and accounting for biotech. (how long untill genetic profiling?)

between TIPS (aka "The Party".. are you a member?)
DRM and the olagopoly of companies now being allowed to own the media, we are well on our way to being told "the big lie"

DRM requires no copying of digital media without permission. And soon we will be required to have all digital broadcast media.

Perhaps he should have also been more afraid of the private sector than the coporate sector.

We're ending up with the MAX HEADROOM future instead of the 1984 one.

Throw in TIPS for good measure ...

The U.S. Justice Department has unleashed it's newest anti-terrorism initiative called TIPS. The programs webpage has the quote: "A national system for concerned workers to report suspicious activity." The ACLU today sent out a press release detailing the dangers of the TIPS program. Among which is turning private sector companies into a domestic spy service. Will your ISP report you for visiting the wrong sites? One citizen has already posted his obviously tongue in cheek support for the TIPS program.

The program operates by asking everyday citizens to join Citizen Corp's TIPS program and than report suspicious activities via a form on the webpage.

Despite your formidable encryption scheme, I'm on to you two terrorists. You have been reported.

A live performance of 1984, coming to a living room near you:

Associated Press (NYTimes link)

Operation TIPS

It's getting to the point where you can't voice an objection to things like this. I mean, if I did, some cop may likely decide that my dissent means I'm a prime target to eavesdrop on. The next law will allow them even broader and more vague situations where they're allowed "search & seizure".

Along with this, life in America is getting sillier every moment.