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Surveillance Update
Several things occurred within the past few days on the privacy/surveillance frontier. First, the EU Parliament decision we mentioned yesterday is being widely reported as an assault on privacy (the European press barely mentions the spam angle we covered yesterday). As far as I can tell, this decision will loosen the EU's protections against surveillance, but does not implement any spying itself - national governments are free to NOT spy on their citizens, in the (perhaps unlikely) event that they don't want to do so. In the U.S., the FBI will be increasing their general surveillance - that is, they'll be doing more surveillance unrelated to any suspected crime, using commercial databases, etc. We can expect the Bureau to be used for more overtly political uses in the future - spying on the not-in-power political parties is no longer prohibited and will, therefore, occur. The NYT has an interesting analysis. Finally, the Washington Post reports that banks will be creating a massive financial database/blacklist of terrorists, wife-beaters, anti-globalization protesters, etc.
I say we all flee to Mars to escape persecution. It's not so bad; I hear they have water there now...
As a British Citizen, I'd like to say sorry for the part the UK played in this. I quote:
Despite opposition from civil liberties groups worldwide, the European parliament bowed to pressure from individual governments, led by Britain...
In my defence, I voted Lib-Dem in the last General Election, so the current bunch of clowns are nothing to do with me...
Syllable : It's an Operating System
As far as I can tell, this decision will loosen the EU's protections against surveillance, but does not implement any spying itself - national governments are free to NOT spy on their citizens, in the (perhaps unlikely) event that they don't want to do so.
A government is like a small child--give it an inch, and it will take a mile. A good case in point is Carnivore, here in the United States, which we already know intercepts non-suspects' e-mails despite FBI promises to the contrary.
Really, I'm surprised. Slashdot editors are usually the first ones I can count on to sound the alarm when this kind of blatant Big-Brotherism is passed into law. Maybe it doesn't matter to them because it's not happening in the U.S., yet?
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
This sounds like the RIP (Regulation of Investigatory Powers) Act we've been subjected to in the UK. We were informed that the Government had these rights, but no amount of correspondance with politicians would get us a concrete answer as to what exactly 'necessary' and 'appropriate' were defined as in the Government's eyes. It might be 'necessary' to violate our privacy to monitor all of our communications to safeguard National Security, for instance. And the less said about Echelon the better.
But really... wouldn't a free big-screen high-definition plasma television in exchange for allowing the goverment to plant a camera behind the screen be great?! I want my Phillips Telescreen!
Learn to Play Go
Officials said they believe that terrorists unknown to the FBI have taken advantage of such policies by meeting in mosques or Internet chat rooms where agents were unlikely to be watching. That was the case with most of the 19 Sept. 11 hijackers, officials said.
But the NY Times article only says they were meeting in mosques, and I've heard no other proof of Internet chat rooms being a contributer to 9/11.
So that justifies placing agents in chat rooms for the sole purpose of developing leads?
In addition, from NY Times:
Among other changes, the new guidelines let agents search Web sites and online chat rooms for evidence of terrorists' planning or other criminal activities.
It's that "other criminal activities" that has me worried. If someone is talking about drugs (regardless of whether or not they actually use them), does Uncle Sam track 'em down and start a file? And "terrorist activities"...seems that they could possibly keep pushing that one until anything that criticizes "Our Great Country" could lead to an investigation.
Seems to me the Thought Police can't be far behind.
We can expect the Bureau to be used for more overtly political uses in the future - spying on the not-in-power political parties is no longer prohibited and will, therefore, occur.
.... Richard Nixon and J. Edgar Hoover enjoy a final, hearty laugh.
Mod Karma -1: I sed bad wurds. If I cep my mouf shut, I wud be at riyses.
That gets a big, fat PFFT from me. I didn't know George Dubya logged onto Slashdot as tps12.
Come on, man. The government does *not* need to be compiling a database worth of material on me. I haven't done anything. I'm not a terrorist. So why am I being investigated? That's just not cool.
Learn to Play Go
Yup, looks like lib-dems are the way to go.
The uk seems to be taking on the worst ideas from all over the world at the moment.
no sig.
The question you should really be asking yourself is "Would I gladly give up a lot of privacy for a false impression of security?", because that's what is really happening.
Every bloody emperor has his hand up history's skirt [Peter Hammill/VdGG]
I've started carrying Orwell's 1984 around in my pocket with me now so that I can show people the parallels between it and what's going on in America today. I may have to buy more copies so I can start lending them out. This is absolutely ludicrous. Did Ashcroft ever consider that there were valid reasons for having those limitation on there in the first place??
The NRA's slogan "Vote Freedom First" seems kind of ludicrous when you consider that it was used in support of this administration. Mod me as flamebait if you must, but increased FBI powers and freedom are not in any way compatible.
On all fronts our freedom is being assaulted. Technological and now social. We don't even have a Congressman to write to and complain in this cse; where are the checks and balances on the FBI? Oh yes, in the hands of the man who just gave them broader powers. And, given their track record for reporting the information they receive to their superiors...
These are scary times.
maybe the russians won the cold war after all...
ah well, so be it, go for communism. I'd rather live with some communist quinquennial plan than with my Nortel stock...
However, that's not directly what I wanted to say. I'd instead like to point out the two main reasons we got to this point:
And you do it too. Every time you say, "I wish the federal government would just regulate <foo>" or "I can't believe those ball players/lawyers/neurosurgeons make so much money," you're demonstrating envy and righteousness. Realize that if you think someone you don't know owes you something just because of your circumstances or his, someone else thinks the same about you. Realize that if you have the power to take away another's liberties, he has the power to take away yours. The only way to combat this is to deny government the power to forcibly take away any of our liberties.
If you're not voting Libertarian, donating to the EFF, the ACLU or the Institute for Justice, and the NRA, your complaints about big government taking away all your freedoms one-by-one is pointless blather.
[ home ]
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Yeah, but where to move to?
Seriously, where in the world is there a country whose government isn't corrupt, where individual freedoms are abundant, personal privacy is respected, people aren't viewed as criminals until *after* they commit a crime, and where you can have a decent life with some modicum of prosperity?
Finally, the Washington Post reports that banks will be creating a massive financial database/blacklist of terrorists, wife-beaters, anti-globalization protesters, etc.
I searched the article and didn't even find the word wife or global. Where did this summary come from? Wife beaters? Why would you even make up a lie that a bank is profiling wife beaters? Is that suppose to add sensationalism to the article? Because I don't think many computer geeks are wife beaters...
Outdoor digital photography, mostly in New Engl
In a masterful spin, Bush said:
"The FBI needed to change," said the president. "It was an organization full of fine people who loved America but the organization didn't meet the times."
Excuse me, but I don't see how increasing their monitoring capabilities has anything to do with a reorganization of the FBI.
The organization is broken, so we'll fix it by giving it more powers. Argh.
I don't think I'm alone in saying that I will gladly give up a little privacy in exchange for a lot of security.
is too dangerous by far -- how much is a little privacy? Who would you like to determine how much privacy you are allowed to keep versus your security? Unfortunately, we have already seen, in the month of May alone, how many breaches of security within the FBI? Insider trading, Carnivore overstepping its bounds, and the current disaster investigation are only the tip of the iceberg....As far as
...the American intelligence community is well within its Constitutional rights to create these databases and monitor our transmissions
... what Constitutional rights? The rights you allude to are rights of the citizens, not the police/investigative forces created to enforce the law. As much as I crave the feeling of security, the loss of privacy and the rest of my Constitutional rights you offer up in the name of this security will always be too high of a price to pay....we are from the government - we are here to help...
Okay, who else read the Washington Post article about the "criminal database" and thought "oooh...fun place to insert records...of, say....John Ashcroft..."
Of course, I'm not advocating that...that would be illegal....
The full EFA briefing is found here, and I sure as heck don't like the idea of it.
Alas gallinaceas de urbe bovis volo
The problem with the intelligence communbity is lack of communication. They all report to the president but the president can't filter and remeber all the intelligence information that is passed his way. From what I understand the FBI handles all domestic crimes(i.e. kidnapping, bank robberies, inter-state crimes. ) The CIA gathers intelligence about foriegn powers. The NSA is electronic surveillance. And the NIS handles Illegal immigrants. These groups (some or all i don't remember) report the National Security Advisor to the President. What has been happening is that all the information the organizations gather get lost in the mix because of the large scale that they are. What needs to happen is that every report that the lowliest field agent files regardless of classification needs to be submitted to an independent but small group of experts with both clearence and access to all this information. Obviously this is alot of information so I believe they need to set up some sort of small and secure network to file and review all this info. Like I said I earlier I always believed this to be the job of the National Security advisor but I believe this has now been passed to the Office of Homeland Defense. What has been happening is shameful rather than try to improve communication between these agencies, the government tries to tighten up on our rights. Which happens to fall right in to step with what the MPAA, RIAA, and BSA want: A very monitored and restricted internet. Of course like most /. ers this is my antichrist. I only hope some one in this administration has enough balls and/or knowledge to see what is going on.
Semper Fidelis
It's all Politics
Spackler likes the FBI. Spackler is a good guy. Spackler thinks you are doing a great job. Spackler will be happy to give up all the rights his forefathers fought for so you can get off finding out if I masturbate or not. Spackler is your friend. Don't investigate Spackler.
2 days later: Sir, here is that report on that subversive Slashdot thing.
Everyone but Spackler is a commie.
Anyway, it seems that at some point, our subversive dialogues and challenging viewpoints may make us targets in the (near) future.
...we are from the government - we are here to help...
Time to wake up, boys n girls. The legacy philosophies we've suckled on for so long have finally been whipped out from under us like some magician's tablecloth. No more the unharrassed, laissez-faire, self-regulated, sensical approach. Sloppy, sloppy, sloppy for letting it go.
And yet all is not lost. This is the net, a place driven by evolution and change and progress. It evolved from one organisation's needs to an unpredictable beast that panders to the needs of anyone and everyone, a panacaea for a sick society dependent on simple variety. And now it's being tamed.
Look around. Netspace has grown stale and bloated. Development, the slave of investment and capital, galumphs towards stationary anguish, a victim of its own success, the energy required to organise its own grotesque matter turning it into a turgid lump feeding off the ideas and technologies that made it so successful all those years ago.
But all is not lost. Much as the limitations and restrictions imposed upon content distribution begat the rise of distributed systems, just as the advances of surveillance gave birth to fresh, simpler waves of viruses, so the need now is for infrastructures that take back what was previously reigned by an absence of crumbling politics. The technology means anything's possible, the forces driving us towards necessity are gathering and rumbling. Time to change the net again.
agent package spores president activate terminate Allah plastique stegonography
Is this yelling "fire" in a crowded theatre, or is it an illustration of how futile it is to try and filter out the overwhelming false positives generated by free speech?
While you're deciding, remember that intelligence agencies are spending your taxes to monitor you. Free speech might become a very expensive priviledge.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Worse, the proles seem to think it's a great idea: to them, Big Brother is nothing more than a TV concept. Watch any vox pops show on the subject and all you hear are variations of lines like "Those with nothing to hide have nothing to fear". It's the one thing Orwell missed: that the proles would be manipulated to actively welcome 1984.
Of course, this message will soon be placed in my thought-crime file....
-- And when Justice is gone, there is always... Force. --Laurie Anderson, "Oh Superman"
Leading financial services firms here have formed a private database company that will compile information about criminals, terrorists and other suspicious people, for use in screening new customers and weeding out those who may pose a risk.
Obviously, that's the catch-all phrase for anti-globalization wife beaters who make intricate gadgets from tropical bamboo and powered by cocnut cream pies.
Mod Karma -1: I sed bad wurds. If I cep my mouf shut, I wud be at riyses.
Clowns to the political left of us Jokers to the right Here we are Stuck in the middle with EU . Sorry......
...and he grinned, like a fox eating shit out of a wire brush.
Ahem. Just to introduce some complication here, there was just a news release about this where the (Libertarian) Cato Institute has "no serious problems":
(this is not false, it's honest-to-god what they said)
There's been quite a trend about this generally, with many hardcore, cap-L Libertarian pundits. saying similar things overall. It's been almost amusing to watch. No atheists in foxholes, and no paens to personal responsibility in the face of suicide terrorists (not all have had "foxhole conversions", but quite a few).
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Mary Culnan, a business professor and information technology specialist, said she believes the database will eventually mistakenly identify people who have similar names, or prompt financial services officials to incorrectly spurn some customers.
The current system mistakenly identifys people!
I'm in the process of getting a mortgage, so I got a copy of my credit report. I was so supprised to find out that about 40% of the accounts on the report are not my own. Most are my fathers, we have the same name, I'm a Jr. Anyway the information on there is so badly maintained it is scarry.
For example there is somthing on the report from '78, I was born in '77. Aparently I was buying diapers for my self with a VISA. In '89 there was a credit card opend with a limit of $11K, I was in 6th grade at the time, I bought lots of candy for my friends with that Mastercard!
All joking aside. The system is broken now, the new system will be just as broken. I'm guessing that it will be "more broken" because it will be in the name of finding the terrorists to protect the children, or some such crap! This war on terror is now way out of hand in the political arena, our poloticians are using it to accumulate power.
The day "Emergency Powers" are granted to the president of the USA is the day I head for the hills. I fear that day is soon approaching!
If at first you don't succeed, skydiving is not for you.
We can expect the Bureau to be used for more overtly political uses in the future - spying on the not-in-power political parties is no longer prohibited and will, therefore, occur. Finally, the Washington Post reports that banks will be creating a massive financial database/blacklist of terrorists, wife-beaters, anti-globalization protesters, etc. (emphasis mine)
I hope I don't have to point out the logical fallacies in the above argument - the above train of thought is so poorly constructed and hate-filled that it can't even begin to be taken seriously.
Michael, there's a reason you're not a journalist for anything more than Slashdot, and it isn't because you're too good, or there's a conservative conspiracy against your liberal views, etc. etc., it's because you are a horrible "journalist."
Michael writes stories like this every so often; he writes stories and headlines claiming far-out conspiracy angles as fact and generally spewing hatred and venom towards those he disagrees with.
It's unfortunate, because I agree with most [of the objective parts] of what Michael said, but he does it in such a silly, infantile manner that it's unbearable to read. Please, Michael, spare us the melodrama; this isn't the end of the world yet.
I have some unfortunate news for you, Michael: the "freedom" and "democracy" you no doubt feel you're trying to protect by [rightly] informing the citizenry does not approve of or recognize slander, hatred, or general whinyness as legitament forms of political discourse. You have done nothing, I repeat NOTHING to make your conspiracy angles and ranting seem credible. All you have done is stoop down to the level of those you're fighting against, and then gone lower.
In conclusion, I would like to resubmit my original suggestion to CmdrTaco and the Slashdot editorial board: fire Michael. He's detrimental to the credibility of this site, and his hatred and name-calling should not be given such a place of prominence. Please show him the door and strongly encourage him never to return.
Go ahead and mod me to oblivion, oh unthinking moderators: my karma can take a hit for the truth.
We can expect the Bureau to be used for more overtly political uses in the future - spying on the not-in-power political parties is no longer prohibited and will, therefore, occur. Finally, the Washington Post reports that banks will be creating a massive financial database/blacklist of terrorists, wife-beaters, anti-globalization protesters, etc. (emphasis mine)
I hope I don't have to point out the logical fallacies in the above argument - the above train of thought is so poorly constructed and hate-filled that it can't even begin to be taken seriously.
Michael, there's a reason you're not a journalist for anything more than Slashdot, and it isn't because you're too good, or there's a conservative conspiracy against your liberal views, etc. etc., it's because you are a horrible "journalist."
Michael writes stories like this every so often; he writes stories and headlines claiming far-out conspiracy angles as fact and generally spewing hatred and venom towards those he disagrees with.
It's unfortunate, because I agree with most [of the objective parts] of what Michael said, but he does it in such a silly, infantile manner that it's unbearable to read. Please, Michael, spare us the melodrama; this isn't the end of the world yet.
I have some unfortunate news for you, Michael: the "freedom" and "democracy" you no doubt feel you're trying to protect by [rightly] informing the citizenry does not approve of or recognize slander, hatred, or general whinyness as legitament forms of political discourse. You have done nothing, I repeat NOTHING to make your conspiracy angles and ranting seem credible. All you have done is stoop down to the level of those you're fighting against, and then gone lower.
In conclusion, I would like to resubmit my original suggestion to CmdrTaco and the Slashdot editorial board: fire Michael. He's detrimental to the credibility of this site, and his hatred and name-calling should not be given such a place of prominence. Please show him the door and strongly encourage him never to return.
Go ahead and mod me to oblivion, oh unthinking moderators: my karma can take a hit for the truth.
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
my copy of the infamous ANARCHISTS
COOKBOOK
The difference between Theory and Practice is greater in Practice than in Theory.
I tried for FIVE years to get them to unmerge our credit records, without success. And, thanks to the protections congress has given the credit bureaus (that is, it seems I can't sue them for defamation) I have no recourse other than bad credit since my credit report shows all my mother's bad debts.
Wonder how long it will be before they decide that I'm really the well-known russian terrorist Ivan Narkinsky.
"He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere. " -- John Calvin, commenting on Genesis 1
Please turn your webcam to the wall.
"It's the search for the perfect database on bad guys. What they might not realize is there is so much bad information out there." - IT Guy
"Before taking any action, they will dig deeper to be sure of a customer's identity and attempt to confirm any allegations and reports" - Bank Guy
Pardon my cynicism, but, YEAAAAH, RIIIIIGHT. I'm sure that when I attempt to open a new account with $5,000, and my name pops up as a terrorist, they're going to spend an extra $1000 of company resources to investigate further, just like they do now if my name tilts a TRW report. Never mind the fact that it means they will have spent more money acquiring my account than they hope to profit from it - as my brother (a banker) has explained to me, profits don't matter to banks, they just want to provide liquidity to markets and make their account holders happy. If they make some money along the way that's a happy side effect. It's not like profitability is their sole driving motivation. It's not as if it's a deep, almost spiritual, belief verified in each potential new employee above janitor.</sarcasm>
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
Post-September 11th American concerns about liberty and safety are very different from the pre-September 11th concerns. I see a lot of arguments here that do not take this into account. A lot people here are talking about liberty first, safety later. You are not talking to the converted, folks, you are talking to a mob scared about covering their respective asses. So to them, the vast majority of the American public, y'all sound a little hollow, hear?
I'm sure Slashdot would love to be an esoteric forum of quaint thoughts about the exciting rarefied air of liberty for its own sake. I'm sure Slashdot would love it even more if the words that are spoken here had more to do with the common man and woman. TO do that, some of you have to get your heads out of your Ivory Towers and talk about the real world rather than some grand libertarian utopia we should really be living in. I'm glad it sounds like cotton candy. So can you talk about your concerns in a way that the folks living in Paramus, New Jersey and Pasadena, California can relate to? They are SCARED.
A herd of buffalo, once it starts charging, has no intelligence, and will trample the fields that feed it just because somebody fired a few rounds by their flanks. Many decades hence, if we remove a lot of our own rights, there may be a lot of regret about our reaction to September 11th, but right now, we are in the thick of it. People are afraid.
So what am I saying? Y'all sound rather hollow, ok? Because you offer no protection from the kind of folks who committed September 11th. You invoke theories and possibilities of a police state, but the democratic tradition in this country is strong and deep, and the terrorists are REAL and in our midst, plotting our doom. You stand in the way of a herd of trampling buffalo, and you shout slogans that mean nothing to the mob before you, running over their own rights.
Folks, if you want to protect our freedoms, you have to find new arguments, and here is the kicker- you have to invoke those arguments that address the real problem: not our freedom, but our safety! I am with y'all, but I'm just saying: NO ONE IS LISTENING TO YOU. YOU SOUND TIRED AND SHRILL. I agree with you that our rights are in jeopardy, and they need to be saved, but you are doing nothing to appease the approaching mob who will trample our freedom in the name of our safety, get it? THEY DON'T CARE ABOUT THEIR FREEDOM THEY CARE ABOUT THEIR SAFETY. YOU MUST ADDRESS THIS.
"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
--Benjamin Franklin, 1759
Gee what a wonderful quote. Any volunteers to write this on a big banner and hold it up in front of a herd of charging buffalo? I didn't think so.
People are scared. They are covering their asses, they are not listening with their ears wide open and their minds in full-tilt. They are scared. You must invoke arguments that include their safety, because none of you do, and safety is what the herd of buffalo is worried most about right now.
Hear me now or regret it later when you are really out of touch with a reality we all dislike, when we REALLY get our rights bitten into. Fight the good fight but fight it with your feet on the ground and your eyes on the mud in front of you, not the glorious utopian fantasies of a world where liberty exists for liberty's sake with no concern at all for real world problems. The world needs the good fight for liberty, but ain't nobody gonna care about liberty if their DEAD.
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
It's like, you guys want your privacy, but you also want full disclosure of everyone else.
Get on with it. Polititians are like lawyers, it doesn't matter who wins, or who is in power, they will still be making a profit off your fears and complaints.
Have you guys ever noticed that polititians do the opposite of what they say? So why waste your time voting based on what you find out? Just vote for who you DON'T agree with, and get on with life. Besides, all the elections are rigged, or have some sort of cheating in them anyways.
I'm surprised you guys don't all have ulcers and hemherroids from constant worrying. The rest of the country just goes back to whatever they were doing the day before.
"I can't give you a brain, so I'll give you a diploma" - The Great Oz (blatently stolen sig)
All of these companies except Citigroup are under SEC and 30 state investigation for fraud and insider trading. Merrill Lynch just bought their way out of a crime. This is current news from the last two weeks.
Are these companies going to add their names to the database of criminials and suspicious activity?
At the time of its demise, the East German government held dossiers on about one-third of its citizenry. Yet in spite of this database, they failed to forsee the mass protest that culminated in the destruction of the Berlin Wall.
The uk seems to be taking on the worst ideas from all over the world at the moment.
Not all over the world, just from Seattle.
New Labour has an ongoing relationship with our friends.
Quote
The UK government's increasing reliance on Microsoft software has been demonstrated yet again with leaked documents regarding its new email encryption system.
...
And then during the election, Blair decided to launch his business manifesto at Microsoft's UK HQ in Reading. (He was usurped by MS using the event to publicise Windows XP.)
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
there is no 'free world'
it's a US Govt buzz word they use to crush whoever they like
WAKE UP
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
Monitoring a group, or assuming the group's guilt and limiting your investigation to them, either without a specific crime(preventive surveillance, like all the "terrorist" crap) or without supporting evidence, that's racial profiling. Like assuming that a black man in a nice car is a car thief. Or assuming that only middle-eastern men are terrorists, and limiting your investigation to them.
It sounds to me like you have some sort of chip on your shoulder about the ACLU - they aren't as reactionary as all that. They attempt to act as watchdogs when the government crosses the line, which it does rather more often than we'd like. Remember, they look out for YOUR rights too.
"Political Correctness" is a fine idea. It's take to a ridiculously silly degree by some moronic people, but there's nothing wrong with the idea that discriminating against people is bad. Racial profiling is inherently discriminatory - it's making a judgment based on race INSTEAD of actual evidence.
And yeah, I suspect you probably are racist.
#welcome to the ozamab1nl@den channel ..... ?
#abbadabba has joined the room
abbadabba : Wassup to all my arab homeys
#l33tEfBeeEye@gent has joined the room
abbadabba : Hey l33t!
l33tEfBeeEye@gent : Hello
abbadabba : don't you hate this government?
l33tEfBeeEye@gent : Maybe, why do YOU hate it?
abbadabba : because
l33tEfBeeEye@gent : because
abbadabba : because I do . Man, you acting weird
l33tEfBeeEye@gent : Me, Weird? Nah, Just doing my job. Well, not my job. Just surfing for Info. Well, not info. Just hanging out... yeah, that's it. Just hanging out. So, why do YOU hate this government again?
You're Jon Katz posting under another user id, aren't you? Come on, admit it!
---dragoness
"Racial Profiling" is LAW ENFORCMENT speak. It means "We target people who are of X race because we think they commit more crimes". And you know jack all about the ACLU, too. Point the first: You can say God Bless America whereever you want. Watch some news some time, you'll notice that our president is really fond of it. You can also say the pledge of allegience all you want. What you can't do is force someone else to do that, which is good, because I don't believe in your stupid fucking god and prefer that he not get brought up in conversations with me.
From: John Ashcroft
Subject: Time to make new friends
As many of you are aware, our righteous pursuit of organized crime in Boston has led to unwarranted criticism since our agents had to become one with the Mob in order to fully develop our intelligence sources within it. We will henceforth improve our public relations posture by returning to the policy of J. Edgar 'There-Is-No-Mob-in-America' Hoover, and refocus on developing intelligence sources within the Islamic Fundamentalist, Catholic Pedophile, and Hippie Treehugging communities.
Pursuant to the new policies, deep cover may require our good agents to occassionally take part in IF and CP activities in order to go after the true heads of those nefarious movements. However, special care must be taken not to go too far.
Get busy! And remember, the sacrifices freedom requires may seem at time distasteful, but to guard the largest number of the American citizenry, we must sometimes prove our trustworthiness to our intelligence sources by aiding in the sacrifice of lesser numbers, such as those jailed and killed to protect our Boston associates. It is a small price to pay.
Remember to wipe the Crisco from your foreheads before undertaking undercover activities. We must not gloat that we are the annointed ones.
___
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
I spent a year in Iraq looking for WMD and all I found was this lousy sig.
To put all this hysteria in perspective, about the same number of people as died in the WTC disaster die on U.S. roads each and every month and few seem to mind. If writers want to end a character immediately in a soap opera, they can just say they had a car accident and no one will question it. Yet, U.S. policies still promote cars over other alternatives (mass transit, working from home, mixed use zoning). Millions more middle aged lives are cut short each year from lack of exercise -- where are the walking trails and bicycle trails in every U.S. city and suburb (compared to say, the Netherlands)? So from this point of view, even if a million U.S. citizens are killed a year by terrorists, bicycle paths are still a better investment in American health and safety than more surveillance. So, my starting position is what people care about seems really strange when looked at from the big picture perspective. And fear, and building and economy and tax structure and new laws based directly on short-term fear, have direct negative effects on U.S. society, as U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt said, "So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself -- nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance."
The problem is that the ways to safety have all been outlined for the last forty years and ignored. They are essentially summed up in: people who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. So, as an action agenda for the most safety:
1. Stop throwing stones.
2. Make houses out of something else than glass.
3. Help others to live in non-glass houses and to stop throwing stones.
I'm not going to talk about stopping throwing stones as that is now considered unpatriotic (although I have done so for a long time in the past). But I can still talk about glass houses, I guess.
Consider this book "Brittle Power" written around 1980: http://www.rmi.org/sitepages/art7095.php Federal energy policy continues to promote the most centralized, unforgiving, and vulnerable sources and infrastructures, while ignoring or suppressing the more efficient, diverse, dispersed, localized, and renewable options that could in time make major supply failures impossible by design. At present, the Department of Energy, apparently unwittingly but quite effectively, is undercutting the antiterrorist mission of the Department of Defense.
The problem with the U.S. from a safety perspective is that because the way the economy is set up, the most money can be made by centralizing a service, like Microsoft centralizes the OS, or agribusiness centralizes monocultures, or the oil company centralizes with a few pipelines. All these are the most profitable concerns because they are centralized, and backed by social, legal, political, and financial systems that keep them that way and supress alternatives. And because they are centralized, they are vulnerable.
What are the safe choices?
Consider, for example, a suggestion I read years ago that taking one year of the money spent on maintain the Persian Gulf Deployment, and applying it to insulating U.S. homes, would eliminate U.S. dependence on foreign oil. The figures may have changed since (and may have been optimistic) but do you see the point? Passive solar architecture shouldn't just be an oddity -- it should be the law, if we are serious about building a safer society. Yet, it is more profitable to centralized companies for have the U.S. government subsidize oil costs (some economist say to $60 per barrel) than to consider a decentralized approach like home insulation. Same with resisting the non-brainer of fuel efficiency standards for automobiles.
Another safe choice -- local community supported agriculture, to reduce the length of food supply lines (typically 1500 miles). Other forms of alternative energy (especially wind power) could be developed. Well insulated refrigerators can be 10X more efficient than current ones (that is the major consumer of electricity in many american homes).
Basically, take much of the stuff environmentalists, consumer advocates, small farmers, civil rights leaders, and probably the green party have been saying for years, and do it. But you know what, it isn't "profitable". It's somehow "profitable" to tax Americans a trillion dollars a year to prop up the current system, but somehow talk about doing things that provide true safety, and while we're at it, also compassion, and justice, and humaneness, and fairness, and one will get mostly blank stares. Seems so much easier to just declare a war on terrorists and the problem seems almost solved -- it seems like the president is doing something, instead of providing leadership on home insulation (an effectively impossible thing for an oil man to ever do...)
My own tiny efforts along that line (mostly laughed at or ignored): http://www.kurtz-fernhout.com/oscomak That, and helping people learn how to grow more of their own food with a garden simulator. The problem is, when the current approaches keep being tried, and they keep not working, any alternative is going to seem laughable. We can spend $300 billion dollars on defense, but suggest spending $100 billion dollars a year on sustainable technology research and that seems laughable.
The ironic thing is, all the people who messed up the system already as far as promoting policies producing an unsafe U.S. are mainly the ones getting rewarded by the new spurt of government funding. And we get solutions like pump more arctic oil when it will take ten years to get it, it will be expensive, and any yahoo with a hunting rifle can shut down the Alaskan pipeline for days or weeks (as recently happened from one shot).
These people are working on a report for Congress that will hopefully show a better way: http://www.nepinitiative.org/ Bet they recommend insulating homes as the number one way to fight terrorism. A laughable idea, or is it?
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
Libertarian: They are great allies on many of our issues, but if you look deeper they have some real scarry positions. Like getting rid of the FDA, eliminiating licencing for doctors, and selling off all public land to finance all sorts of radical changes. Not only are they opposed to the Microsoft anti-trust case, they want to eliminate the anti-monopoly laws. [lp.org]
The libertarians equate business (or corporate) freedom with individual freedom, (some even claim that individual freedom is predicated on corporate freedom), so while they want to get rid of unjust drug laws that incarcerate thousands of living, breathing people they also want to get rid of drug regulations to unfetter the pharmaceutical companies from "oppresive" government regulation as well.
This is their fatal flaw: setting individual freedom equal to corporate freedom. The two are often in conflict with one another (e.g. an employer who wants to spy on their employees during off hours), and all but the very smallest of companies is significantly larger, richer, and more powerful than individuals, even indivuduals of means. That of course means that, in a society that sets a human being's rights equal to those of a corporations, the corporation is going to have the advantage in terms of resources, power, and influence, which means whenever said freedoms conflict it is the individual who will almost invariably lose their freedoms as a result.
This is an absolutely fatal flaw in Libertarian thinking, and the reason I am not a libertarian.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
The Individual Rights Foundation.
I'd offer to run for the House, although I am not old enough.
Here's the trick folks; if you want a congressman to write to, vote for a congressman that will...
Bullshit. As has been pointed out time and time again, you can increase security all you like, lock down men, women and children in their little homes with their little TVs just so they can't be harmed, and bring in all the laws you want. But at the end of the day if someone wants to inflict horrible damage upon you and your population, then they will.
Privacy and rights are not mindless. It's standing up for what makes the human race so great - individuality, and the ability to think and speak for oneself.
If you want answers, first you have to find the questions. Now, the question is not "how can we stop people killing us?" but rather "Why do they want to kill us?" Once we've asked that (which is currently a rarity, thanks to the loss of freedom of speech), then we can sort out the solutions. Don't claim that security through obscurity is going to help anything, because it's not.
From the article:
Indeed, the restrictions under which the F.B.I. has operated for three decades were self-imposed. Congressional pressure, lawsuits, scandals and a public outcry played a role in the bureau's vow to limit domestic surveillance to situations in which criminal conduct was suspected. But the restrictions were not enforceable in court and were grounded in what might be called constitutional values, rather than actual law.
WTF?! So again when some entity wants to do something good, maybe along the lines of the intent of what our forefathers wanted, a lawyer comes alongs and picks apart every letter just to f*ck us over. Great.
I hate it when that happens.
Jason
just watch things get back to being like hoover's fbi.... something like less than 200 files on the KKK, while who even knows how many on abbie hoffman.... the us government, especially when projected through the fbi has a huge history of having a bias towards 'leftist radicals.' in a country where 'freedom', 'democracy', and similar terms are catchphrases that it's known for gets this corporate owned and biased.... it should be obvious that something needs to change....
and reformism doesn't work, either.... look at what the trade unions of the 30's fought and won... look at what we have now.. things have turned back to the same sort of shit. the fbi got fucked over, but it's building itself back up. eventually a revolution's gotta happen...or things will end up like 1984 or brave new world....
I don't see how his logic is flawed. Essentially, surveillance is ultimately ineffective. If surveillance worked, then why do prisons have such a problem with contraband drugs or prisoner rapes (leading to more AIDS deaths)? Additionally surveillance is expensive, taking away money from real solutions for safety such as decentralization, education, charity, efficency, research, arts, and community. Also, surveillance creates an unpleasant social environment where those in power selectively enforce laws against their opponents.
I think you make good points about personal responsibility, and the issue of where to draw the line in excusing people's behavior based on circumstances, and how the growing material abundance removes some presures for negative social behaviors, and how a life of physical violence (or, for that matter, economic violence such as by those supporting slavery in the past) can consume a person and their community.
Still, widespread one-way surveillance is an idea that sounds good in theory but is ultimately counterproductive in practice. Who watches the watchers?
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
Don't worry folks, I run interferance for shit like this. So whenever I'm in the room you can rest assured that I will be the main focus for all government scrutiny with my constant comments on my the progress of my 'Incindiary Projectile Project' and my vacation plans to DC this summer. Not to mention my 'Bush is such a fucking asshole someone should really off him to make room for an intellignent administration' speech and my 'Y'know, I can see why people would want to fly planes into a bunch of buildings in the US, we're all assholes!' speech. So don't worry! Despite the fact that I don't actually have any bomb making equipment, and don't give a flying fuck about Bush, and think that the people who crashed those planes should all burn in hell for eternity, the government agents should hopefully be too busy creaming their jeans over the new 'Terrorist Axis of Evil' they've found in my apartment to bother the rest of you about whether you're smoking a joint or a cigarette. >:) I also make misleading comments on my phone, and in my e-mails. And I'm pretty sure this slashdot post will be archived and editted to take out all of the non-incriminating stuff so they can use it against me some day!
Cheers!
Kintanon
Check out JoshJitsu.info for Brazilian Ji
All criminals/badthinkers won't be on that database. Somehow I don't think that white collar scum like Kenny-Boy Lay and all the other Enron and Anderson thieves will ever be blacklisted. Steal ten dollars, and you go on the list. Steal ten million, and you'll be invited to join the board of directors.
Seriously now. This is without a doubt the worst news I've heard all year, and I've heard a lot. This database will be a tool of very powerful and opinionated people to destroy the financial lives of people that disagree with them. And let's not even think about how Nixonian politicians or well-connected cults will manipulate that database to brand people "terrorists".
That word, "terrorist", mark me here, is the shiboleth of the 21st century. It will be used by very motivated political interests to annihilate "enemies", i.e. anyone who opposes their policies. And opposition will be forever muted, because people will learn not to make waves, else be spied on by the world cops, and marked "verboten" for financial dealings by the financial world.
Paranoid, you say? [bang head on wall].
It's already happening. Democratic party members are already terrified of speaking out because they WILL be branded traitors and terrorist sympathizers. The WTO protesters are already being labelled premptively as violent criminals wherever they show up -- and you can bet that is because of the influence wielded by the those they oppose. Oh, and did you know that protestors against Bush are not allowed within miles of the Great Man? They are bussed to cordoned-off "First Amendment Zones" miles away, and penned there by local cops until the Leader is gone, free of protestor taint. Of course, pro-Bush people are allowed to swarm the Bush -- this is democracy???
And to forestall any more "paranoia" strikes -- the use of lists and secret monitoring against political adversaries was used extensively by Nixon -- and a lot of the same moral-free characters than ran his culture war in their youth are now happily and ruthlessly slamming around the Constitution in pursuit of money for their peers and political control for themselves. I've never seen a press corps so utterly whipped.
To be fair, I don't think many of the NRA types are very happy about this either. Bush is a sweet-talker. They got taken.
DNA just wants to be free...
~ imaginary scenario, AD 2048 ~
Congressman: "Huh? Wazziz ting with foldy bits and black squigglez? Smells funny. Oh no! Duz it got ant tracks?"
Staffer: "A book, sir, and no, sir, you know everything's been screened for biohazards. The foldy bits are pages, (no, Sir, not the kind you fuck after-hours, the other kind, the kind you write on!), and the squiggles are letters, that make words, like the ones they put in the Congressional Record when they write down your speeches."
Congressman: "OK, it's a book. Whaddya do with it? Wazzit for?"
Staffer: "The words contain ideas. It's a communications medium. You read it to extract the ideas."
Congressman: "Hmph. No time for that. I've gotta get to the floor for a vote. You read it and tell me the ideas when I get back."
Staffer: "Okay, sir."
Congressman: "Hey, did you ever get around to reading that 'book' thing? Any interesting ideas there?"
Staffer: "Yes sir! Lots of them! This Orwell guy was some kind of genius! He anticipated technologies 100 years ahead of his time. Call up Jack Valenti Jr. and Hilary Rosen II, and tell 'em their prayers are answered!"
Careful what you ask for, kids :)
The thing is, if you have no expectations of being left alone in public, your effective world will become your apartment.
With your voice and data communications monitored there, of course.
There will be nowhere left to live free. And our kids will never know what that means, and be happy with their imprisonment.
If you want to live a safe life, live in a prison? Waitaminute -- prisons are pretty bad, aren't they, if the wardens and guards don't like you?
but your arguments lead to inaction.
I wouldn't advocate inaction as opposed to increasing surveillance. I argued for promoting decentralization, education, charity, efficiency, research, arts, and community as all ways to confront and minimize terrorism. In another response I talk about the value of improving home insulation to combat terrorism (a form of decentralization of energy production). I talk about increasing fuel efficiency standards. Of promoting local family farms to minimize key supply lines. Charity to refugees can help prevent terrorists from coming into existence. Promoting stronger and friendlier and healthier communities at home and abroad make it more difficult for terrorists to operate.
Unfortunately extending surveillance and other operations of a war on terrorism will leave less money to support the initiatives I feel will be more effective in reducing risks from terrorism. Increased surveillance may also in the long term undermine some of these like promoting friendly community (because of the abuse of such powers which inevitably come). I'm all for appropriate vigilance, though perhaps the line between increased vigilance and Orwellian 1984-style surveillance is a thin one, and what we may also need in Congress is a more extensive discussion about what is appropriate, not a wholesale signing over of all individual privacy out of fear. I did write my Congressional representatives, but they don't seem to be listening judging on what legislation is being passed.
In a way, increased terrorism is like a symptom of a failure to foster more of those other basics like justice, fairness, compassion, and charity. I can also point to many other indicators -- higher suicide rates, more homelessness, increasing domestic violence, more child abuse, lower literacy levels, increased drug use, high per capita imprisonment, and so on which are also symptoms of a U.S. social malaise. I think to treat one symptom of this malaise (increasing fear of terrorism) without addressing the whole is not going to be effective long term. And the reality seems to be the governmental focus in terms of $$$ is on surveillance, not promoting healthy and resilient communities here and abroad. So, you will get what you say you want -- just remember the Oscar Wilde quip, "When the gods wish to punish us, they answer our prayers".
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
It's even worse than that. Since the agents don't announce their presence or intent, anyone who is unknown to a group could be an agent fishing for leads. Thus the chilling effect occurs even in the absence of an actual agent, and groups are encouraged to be more suspicious of outsiders.
Pretty effective way to push either conformity or paranoia, n'est pas?
Want to stop terrorists? Want to ensure public safety? Of course. So here's how to do it without trampling civil liberties.. AND it'll increase our quality of living.
1.) Take the steps necessary to cut off ALL dependance on mideast oil, but without finding new sources that may also prove vulnerable (ie. Alaska). That means subsidizing efficient technologies and development: quality public transit, fuel cell based autos, strict requirements on new home / building insulation, subsidies to people with older homes to re-insulate, higher standards for energy efficient appliances, alternative energy research, etc. None of these things infringe upon the rights of the individual--they only regulate inefficient industry in a way that is progressive. The only ones to lose out would be the executives of old energy companies that refuse to adapt to a new market. Some current energy companies "get it." Others do not. Innovate or Die.
If mideast countries lose their oil revenue, out go the terrorists. You can't organize and maintain an international terrorist network with no resources and without supporting foreign governments.
2.) Adopt a no-nonsense mideast policy. Terminate any regime that supports Islamic radicals and foster public support in those countries for democratic rule. This should be exceedingly easy after a few years without oil revenues once the fat cats have died off and any military infrastructure lies in ruins from lack of upkeep. And note I did not say carpet bombing. The Bush admin's push for tactical / precision weapons is good example that some intelligence still exists within.
3.) Strict immigration policy, at least for the time being. That means pretty much blacklisting all countries known to support Islamic radicalism.
As I recall, back in 1984, the FBI and CIA identified and tracked terrorists trying to detonate a truck full of explosives at the World Trade Center. The thwarted plot involved toppling one tower into it's twin.
The thing is, as in 2001, the agencies were on the ball, and the messages heeded. In 2001, tho, idiots were in charge.
The chief idiot was on a four week vacation when the warnings were given. Not that he would have heard about them. He insisted on a three-page-a-day synopsis of everything he needed to know. Not a great reader, apparently.
Let's not forget the Osamawatch, meticulously maintained by Clinton, was shut down as a Bad Clinton Idea. And Ashcroft didn't really care much about the terrorist problem up til then -- his staff told a senator(I believe) that he would hear her urgent plea about potential attacks... in six months. Smirk. Get out of our office, liberal.
The communications and intel were absolutely perfect. The failure was at the top level - the White House. The blaming of "communication" and "organization" is nonsense. Everything worked, except the analytical skills of the current boys in charge.
And I'm pretty sure this slashdot post will be archived and editted to take out all of the non-incriminating stuff so they can use it against me some day!
Somewhere in a dark basement, under an obscure FBI building, there's an investigating agent reading what you've just typed, and evaluating your comment using the latest FBI scale...
Moderation: +1 Funny, +1 Terrorist
Citizen #3618112's Karma Total: 27.
Recommend with-holding the arrest until he reaches the Karma Cap.
Tongue-tied and twisted, just an earth-bound misfit, I
Learning to fly, Pink Floyd.
Never plan for the future with optimism. Assume the worst, because it eventually will happen.
Yes, "we" survived McCarthyism -- because we weren't alive at the time! A lot of people didn't survive the insanity of the witchhunts. Lives were destroyed, and the press was whipped into silence because NO ONE wanted to be branded a traitor.
And the great Soviet threat that we thought was so omnipresent turned out to be a paper bear. But since to analyze the analysis of the great enemy would label the questioner as a commie, no one ever pointed out that the SU was a hapless giant.
An utter, directed lie that was premptively floated by Ashcroft before anyone had a chance to utter a word. "Damn those Democrats! I warn them not to take political advantage of this utter failure on our team's part!"
The thing is, not a single member of the Congress had said a word. It was a nasty strike designed to smear anyone daring to speak out against the president. Once someone actually spoke, they had to defend against "partisan" alegations.
The things is, it is a hoax. NO ONE accused Team Bush of knowing about the attacks beforehand. NO ONE, damn it. What was said was muted and responsible -- that the investigation into the attack, usually a normal procedure, had been blocked since 9/11 by Bush -- and it seems now obvious that they blocked the process because they had known parts of the puzzle, and had failed to act.
As for "Democrats" being in attack mode, horse#$%@. If Clinton had been president on 9/11, the hounds of Fox News and friends would have run impeachment charges and removed him by now. Imagine Clinton blocking the investigation into 9/11! Can you IMAGINE the frothing rage and revolution by the right-wing of the nation?
The Demos, to their credit, pledged allegiance to the President, with not a whimper of protest against the Partiot Act, apparently a right-wing wish-list compiled for years. At least three amendments of the Constitution are essentially repealed, the debt is skyrocketing, we're in Eternal War, evironmental issues are dead, the President and his records are now sealed off from historical review... and barely a peep from the only group big enough to oppose, because attacking the Bush is TREASON, Don't You Know There's A War On, You Traitor?
Lord God, IMAGINE if Clinton demanded silence and acquiesence from the right wing under these circumstances! Imagine the 24/7 coverage on CNN and MS-NBC and FOX concerning his criminal behavior.
But Bush, a man not even elected, but appointed by the Federalist Society, more or less, has had, until the 9/11 leaks, abject adjulation (read: not much hard questioning) from a press corp that spent 8 years on Clinton's zipper.
The Demos had their cojones cut off when Gore won, and any chance that they could be sewn back on expired on 9/11 when the nation went ultrapatriotic.
Ashcroft did not float the "Democrats should not dare to say we knew about 9/11 in advance" lie -- it was VP Cheney.