Slashdot Mirror

Saddam kicked out the inspectors which were supposed to verify the lack of a nuclear program. Why on earth would he do that if he didn't have a nuclear program?

The answer is, because he wanted to convince Iran, his regional rival, that he had a nuclear program. Unfortunately, he did too good a job, and convinced the Bush administration too, and we got a very destructive war as a result.

WRT Libya (and all the more so Ukraine a couple decades earlier) you are correct that the US broke its promises and gave a massive incentive to proliferators in the future.

https://www.usnews.com/news/be...
http://www.kitsapsun.com/story...
http://www.investopedia.com/ar...

You can also see it in the cost of a 26' UHaul between Texas and California/NY
Los Angeles, CA to Dallas, TX: $2,558
Dallas TX to Los Angeles: $1,232

NY, NY to Dallas, TX: $2,772
Dallas TX to NY, NY: $653

More seriously, though, China has its own spy satellites and certainly has detailed aerial imagery of Taiwan probably in excess of the quality available to commercial imaging satellites. This information being known to the public isn't really going to change anything -- it's not like the average person is going to be able to do anything to a radar installation on a military base.

You don't say?
How about an above average militant?

There is quite a leap from protester (or militant) with access to low resolution imagery and state military with access to state-launched spy satellite high resolution imagery. For instance, the state military is unlikely to launch an attack unless the leadership of that country has decided instigate a de facto war. The "average person," on the other hand, has little other means for obtaining details concerning internal security fences, obscured lines of sight, illuminated and non-illuminated areas, etc. The sort of information that you'd need to plan an infiltration in advance.

There is quite a difference, but you either fail to appreciate it or do not care. Military personnel both appreciate the difference and care. Most people with a passing knowledge of military history apprecite the difference and care.

So... no.

This isn't the first time in recent years this has happened... in 2009, protestors broke into SWFPAC at Naval Base Kitsap... which is where the USN keeps both D5 missiles and their warheads.

I don't know why anyone would put any real data into a service like Facebook.

Because most people have no understanding about what the consequences might be. Apart from the first year or so online, I have used an alias especially to separate real life and online things. Basically because I know people will drag stuff out of context.

And most Slashdotters keep vaguely handwaving about 'consequences' without ever really actually enumerating any. It's become a fear word like 'terrorism' or 'think of the children'. If you need an alias to separate your words from yourself, I suspect the problem is you can your communications skills - not 'people'.[1]
 

I had an facebook account just to see what it was and got even to the point of having 100 people as 'friends'. Basically people I have no idea of what to say to in real life. So I had no idea why I had them as 'friends'. I guess the number of people on your list is like a pissing contest.

In other words, you added people you don't really know as friends - and this it's somehow Facebook's fault that you don't have any actual people you'd want to talk to.
 

Anyway: there was only one other person who did not use her own name and that was because she was stalked by her ex and she would want to use her own name. And yes a real name IS real data. And all the other information that people put out there is amazing.

And here you invoke the equivalent of 'think of the children' again.
 

Just ask one of these people to go to a complete stranger in a pub or on the street and tell them the information they just hared with the world and they will think you are crazy or they are natural attention whores.

Which is utterly irrelevant to Facebook, as unless you are crazy or a natural attention whore, the people in your friends list aren't complete strangers.

[1]What I've posted to my facebook in the last 24 hours:

- A link to a story about an amazing rescue performed the USN (they flew a helicopter under a bridge and into a narrow canyon to medivac an injured hiker).
- A wry comment on looking through the house for something only to find it right where it should have been in the first place. ("Don't you have when you're looking for something, and when you find it: a) it was right where it should have been and you swore it wasn't..., and b) you've walked past/looked right at it half a dozen times?")
- A link to a picture I took back in March, but just now got around to processing and putting up on Flickr. (And a pretty good picture if I do say so myself.)

I can see how there's going to be serious consequences for sharing that, and how people can take it out of context, etc... etc...

Or not.

... certainly does, and in those exact words.

I'm more than a bit irked at the media for taking the "structurally deficient" term, and plastering it all over the news without a very clear understanding of what it means.