The Presidents Technical Advisor

T.Hobbes writes "There's an interview with the president's advisor on technology, Floyd Kvamme, at news.com. Some of it is just general political pr, though he does touch on (and dodge, at times) touchy tech issues (privacy, copyright, censorware, carnivore, ..). " He doesn't seem to be as mentally broken as the man he advises. But (and I know you liberatarians will scream) his stance on to many issues is that "The Industry Will Sort it Out". Of course they will. And then we will all have to go start a new planet just to prevent the the glorious self regulated industry from implanting chips in our asses to know where we are, what we are doing, and with who.

Comments

politics

[Trepidity]

Taco, your extreme bias and general incomprehension of political issues is getting a bit annoying. It's ok to be completely ignorant about politics, but not when you constantly talk about them on a large site that purports to disseminate "news."

Oh, and while I'm not a big fan of Mr. Bush's and usually vote Democrat, I'm glad he won this election - I shudder to think of what it'd be like if Joseph "ban movies and music" Liebermann and Tipper "parental advisory label" Gore had any power.

hmm

[Phil-14]

I know it's your habit to knock Bush, but were things really that much better when it was a pretend liberal (Clinton) pushing things like Carnivore and the Clipper Chip? I'd rather have someone with a hands-off approach than an administration that was looking into giving the Clipper Chip Backdoors to China so they'd have incentive to use it too... all the governments ganging up on all the citizens?

Re:You'd prefer to be ruled by corporations?

[Jonathan]

>With companies, you can avoid doing business >with them.

It is the goal of all corporations to make themselves so ubiquitous so as to make avoiding them impossible. Take a look at Microsoft -- in their own words they want "Windows Everywhere".

>...whereas a corrupt government can *control* >the judicial system,

And corporations can't? Money controls everything ultimately, and many corps already have more money than some nations.

Gawd.

[Gray]

So, in your future, it's a big facist goverment which keeps corperations out of our asses? That's *so* much better..

Nothing like more laws to solve a problem..

Oddly, I'm a democrat, but this kind of thinking is so luddite.. Corperations are made of people who are remarkable like you and I, and run by people who actually grew up pretty much the same as you did.. Don't hate me for what you can't do..

Re:Gawd.

[LaminatorX]

YES!

"The main reason is that because corporations have "personhood" under the law, but no one has to pay the price of any wrong they do. Also, these "persons" can afford the best lawyers and the best politicians to get their way."

Corperations serve to shield the shareholders from the wrongs that are done on their behalf. If we got a group of people together and gassed a town in India, we would be extradited and jailed. When Union Carbide does it, the get a nice big tax write-off, err fine.

If our gas-gang were sued by the Indian government, we would all loose everything we have. The U/C shareholders would only have their stock devalued. The corperate veil is the ultimate tool of plutocratic supremacy. These pseudo-persons dilute the decision-making process so widely that the "normal" people involve can all feel like it's not their fault, or plausably deny knowlege or whatever. This is by design! This is how people who would not normally hurt anyone have turned blind eyes to every form of exploitation from slavery to unsafe SUV's.

Governments have this problem also, but there is at least some accountability. If we as citizens folow an imperialist dictator, we will suffer the inevitable wars and sorrows that would bring. As much of a sham as govt accountability is when barely half of us vote and 90% of those votes are for the entrenched interests/parties, corperations are far worse.

Noone ever voted for a chemical company, or signed a referendum on holding adjusted$ wages stagnant since the seventies while exexutive salaries go through the roof. Marketing infests our very minds. People describe themselves as "consumers" without a hint of irony or shame. If the government used the kind of marketing that businesses do, it'd be positively Orwellian.

STFU Taco

[AntiBasic]

He doesn't seem to be as mentally broken as the man he advises.

Ok Bush may be stupid, he flunked out of college once. But I never see you bash Al Gump who flunked out of college twice.

You're just another one of those conformist rebels who love to hate capitalism yet love the life it is providing you. You hate capitalists but love capital.

Rob, get a clue about libertarians!

[browser_war_pow]

That is exactly what we want. We want the "industry to sort it out!" As for your ignorant rant about planting chips in the hind quarters of the population, as a libertarian I just want to know one thing.... what corporation will legally be able to do that? Yeah that's right Rob, no corporation can legally do that, that is an initiation of force. We don't tolerate that, that is what the government is here to stop. Corporations cannot legally force you to do that. But oh wait, you're a Gore supporter that means that anything that corporations do that you don't like is a fundamental violation of your "rights." Don't criticize Bush for being ignorant about politics if you confuse liberals with libertarians. Liberals want active intervention, not us. The only exception to that is spam and only because it is theft of someone's resources.

And for those of you that think the government has all the makings of being the great champion of privacy remember that it started the war on drugs, and created wiretapping

I've got yer ass-chipping right here, pal.

[Vassily Overveight]

So the eeevil corporations want to chip our asses, huh? Well, here's a great example of our kind and benevolent government doing exactly that. Here's the relevant part:

But there's a darker side. Several government agencies are claiming that the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act lets them use this technology to track you legally, without a warrant or even probable cause, in what it deems "emergencies." Do you trust these clowns?

They're talking about a requirement that phone companies be able to geolocate wireless phones, not just to find you when your car has run off the road, but for 'tracking' purposes. Now who's doing the ass-chipping?

Rob

[Patrick McRotch]

"then we will all have to go start a new planet just to prevent the the glorious self regulated industry from implanting chips in our asses to know where we are, what we are doing, and with who."

Rob, why would they need to put a chip in your ass to know what you're doing? What exactly ARE you doing? Oh and the last sentence should read "with whom".