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Scientific Research Encountering More Restrictions
vab writes "MSNBC is running an article
that details how the MIT AI Lab, the birth place of the free software movement, walked away from a $404K study because the government wanted to restrict participation by foreign students. The article talks about further restrictions the US Government is trying to impose in the name of homeland security and how other research institutions are reacting."
I'm glad MIT did the right thing and walked away from this study. It is although somewhat difficult to tell whether they did this out of a principled stand or if they did it simply because they have so many foreign students that they wouldn't be able to pull it off unless they used them. That quite possibly could be the case.
There's no reason to believe that some college student from Hong Kong is a terrorist. Sure there are some terrorists out there, but I doubt they're sweating their midterms at some university. To deny foreigners the ability to work on some stuff isn't just slightly racist, it's outrageously stupid since there are some unbelievably bright people who come to the US from other places for school.
In the financial services industry, most people have to be bonded - that is the FBI gets your fingerprints and they do some sort of rudimentary background check on you. Would that placate the "homeland security" wolves? At any rate, it would be more information on foreign students than they have on most Americans.
Sometimes I think that homeland security is the process of a bunch of people staring at a collander and trying to decide which hole to patch first. Sure it's possible to keep the total morons from pullling off something big (or burning you in the same way they did before) but how many people out there really think that with anything less than a fascist state, it's possible to secure the country against someone whose well funded, clever, and out to get the US?
-- Truth goes out the door when rumor comes innuendo. -- Groucho Marx
I was a grad student at Texas Tech until a few months ago and one of my prof.s had funding from US DOD to study dispersion of chem./bio. warfare agents. The project was multi-year and for 90% of the project, no foreign national was allowed to work on it. That was finally overturned, however, mainly because there weren't enough Americans to work on it.
The project was new just before Sept. 11th and I'm not sure I can blame them for their restrictions at the time. I think they finally figured out that, at least in this case, it didn't matter who worked on the project. It wasn't going to propogate information about how to make delivery agents more effective, just how they interact with urban, rural, etc. environments.
That and Lubbock isn't a hotbed for terrorists if you know what I mean. Cow-tippers, yes. Foreign spies, no.
I for one congratulate MIT!!! It was a bold move to stand up to something as blatantly wrong as what the government was trying to do. Security must not be gained at the sacrifice of our morals. What does that say about us as a society, our nation who claims to lead all others in progressive thought. We welcomed these people to our land when no other country would take them. France gave us a statue embodying the princple. Now we want to send them away because we think all people of a race would also wish us harm. Extremists come from all races, and someday a white female American will do something terribly destructive which will result in the loss of thousands of lives. What will happen then? The government steps in and calms us down and tells us that we can't trust each other and will therefore take away every personal freedom we have in the name of making us secure? I'll spend a cold day in hell before I allow that to happen to me. So yeah, GO MIT!!!!
-Never believe in the end of something great, send it to sub-committee for further study!!! - ME
Yes, I've definitely got to get me one of them Real Genius grants.
MIT is something like eight per cent foreign.
Tim
Omnia vestra castrorum habetur nobis.
MSNBC says: "But the National Security Agency refused to budge from a requirement that any foreigners working on a planned project at MIT's Artificial Intelligence Laboratory be screened by the government in advance, forcing the school to turn down the money in September, Powell said." You say: "MSNBC is running an article that details how the MIT AI Lab, the birth place of the free software movement, walked away from a $404K study because the government wanted to restrict participation by foreign students." Sounds like they are just checking for ties to terrorists. Where does it say that foreign students are restricted from participating?
But the National Security Agency refused to budge from a requirement that any foreigners working on a planned project at MIT's Artificial Intelligence Laboratory be screened by the government in advance
They didn't want to restrict anybody from working on anything - they just wanted to run backround checks on non-citizens working on the projects. Is that really such a big deal??
slow down there cowboy... when i grew up, i learned that people kill people. then somewhere along the way, that's been converted into guns kill people. and now you want us to believe that information kills people?
i have got to get into a new line of work!
The bottom line is that if you take someone's money - the government's, a corporation's, a foundation's, etc - you are implicitly or explicitly agreeing to the strings attached. Seldom is there a "free lunch". If there is money being offered, there is usually a reason why. I'm not entitled to have free money come raining down on me. Why should a wealthy institution like MIT? They know the game.
If I offer the FSF a $20,000 grant to develop a "Foo" software package for me, provided they design it how I want, the FSF is certainly free to turn that money down and do their own thing (or do without a Foo package). But that doesn't make me an evil man for asking the FSF to write a program that meets my needs if I give them a donation to do so. Similarly for the government.
A saying, from whom I can't remember: "We're all immigrants, or from families there of, we just got here at different times."
Without foreigners, the US would not exist, and without more foreigners, it can not grow, change, or have any right to call itself the land of the free.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-530647,0 0.html
After months of demanding an inquiry into the affair, Ed Crawley, the chairman of MIT's aeronautics and astronautics department, has reversed previous refusals and recommended an investigation.
The issue in question goes to the heart of missile defence technology, an article of faith among many Republicans and a key plank in Mr Bush's 2000 presidential manifesto.
Dr Postol and fellow critics say the ability of an interceptor missile to distinguish between an incoming warhead and the decoys likely to accompany it is deeply suspect. Any such doubts would cripple the credibility of the system.
Again, all as a matter of national security, and which did not make a splash stateside. The story at the link is much more detailed.
So what is the government going to do about this outbreak of integrity in the halls of learning?
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
>Imagine China/Pakistan/North Korea having satellite technology 20 yrs ago. It would have been a very different world.
Yes, imagine it. Satellites would finally be cheap enough today that one of the many freedom groups in China could afford to put one up in the air and the PRC would finally get its eyes opened up. Wouldn't it be nice!
If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think - BoC
You know why America still holds its place as a technological leader? Not becoz of just american researchers but a significant foreign nationals working in America, who wouldn't have that same oppurtunity in other countries. AFAIK, America's support for intelligence and research skills over nationality has let it remain supreme.
I think we should close our borders to people who only want to go to school here, and then leave the country when they finish their education!Wrong again, most of the students who come here don't make plans to leave. They settle here. In my past 3.5 yrs in college I have seen 90% of foreign nationals do something or other to stay even overstay their visa time.
Foriegn students are a big security risk! Their loyalties are always in question.
Agreed, but solution is not to close borders. And again you cannot let people walk freely in and out just for the sake of technology or research. Its neither a one line solution nor can be found in a week. May be this is the risk we have to take for the sake of free economy otherwise we have to turn like those chinese closing down thousands of internet kiosks and putting restrictions on our citizens! Not good!
2003: You must use Americans for this important work.
1941:You must use blonde haired, blue eyed Germans for this important work.
Trolling is a art,
Comment removed based on user account deletion
You have it backwards: the brain drain doesn't work like that -- smart people from poor countries study for advanced degrees in thhe US, then stay there to make 100 times the income they could back home, or have research opportunities impossible there.
Those that do have their education paid for may often be obligated to return home to benefit their countries -- as a form of foreign aid (teach a man to fish, etc). But many find ways to dodge that to stay in the land of milk and honey.
President Bush signed a law last summer prohibiting students from countries considered sponsors of terrorism from working with germs and toxins most likely to be used for bioterrorism.
I'm a computational biologist, but not an expert on biological weapons, by any means. Let me say at the outset: the government has no business regulating scientific inquiry. I'm sure other people will argue this point eloquently and what they may say about AI research applies to biology as well.
It's a good idea to keep something in mind - the history of the entire field of computer science is heavily intertwined with the rise of the modern intelligence apparatus here in the US. Likewise, nuclear technology. The same is NOT true of my field (biology.)
However, while you can use your m4d sk1llz to annoy uncle Sam, they're not really dangerous. The danger is in NCB (non-conventional) weapons:
1) Nuclear weapons technology is already restricted up the wazoo.
2) Chemcial weapons technology requires a great deal of industrial infrastructure. The cat is out of the bag. All sorts of foreigners know chemistry. The oil industry is incredibly secretive anyway. Government intrusion into chemical engineering is unlikely.
3) Biological weapons are extremely difficult to make. HOWEVER, my colleagues and I are doing our best to make molecular biology as easy as possible. There's a shortage of technicians; we train people without discriminating against Pakistanis. Advances in the field make molecular biology easier, quicker, cheaper and increase your yield.
The point is that molecular biology technology, used only once in a successful terrorist context (the Anthrax, mailed by a former Marine who had no trouble getting clearance; you know he's guilty), is POTENTIALLY the most dangerous of all. The only reason I don't need security clearance to do molecular biology is because Uncle Sam failed to get in at the ground floor - molecular biology has always been very much an international effort. Of course, US military labs remain the exception.
So, we (biologists) need to be ready and determined to resist the intrusion of security concerns into our laboratories; the pressure to do so will be fierce.
The good and new comes from no quarter where it is looked for, and is always something different from what is expected.
So you can go on living that fairy tail...I'll just rememeber who to contact when I decide to sell my swamp land in Florida.
They are our guests, and they shouldn't expect that we give them the keys and the kitchen sink.
No, it's more like "they're your guests, and you won't let them help you do the dishes because you're afraid they might steal the silverware, despite having no evidence at all to suggest they would". Yes, I'm stretching the metaphor but I feel it had to be said. "Foreign" does not equal "future terrorist" any more (or any less) than "U.S. citizen" does. We've forgotten McVeigh and Nichols *so* quickly. And the anthrax mailer remains mysteriously at large...
Freedom: "I won't!"
Heh...
Actually, sums that small, and that is small, are in discretionary funds that many Government departments can access for "miscellaneous" projects.
I don't recall the exact number, but I think it's in the neighborhood of half a million or so that triggers the entire government accounting process. These days, it's probably higher.
I like you, Stuart. You're not like everyone else, here, at Slashdot.
In the company of only their peers and an eavesdropping busboy, the group was candid and unguarded. Almost everyone had a story of a student who had been hindered by the stricter immegration rules. One expressed doubt that MIT could "be MIT" under these circumstances. Jerry Sussman--co-author of "the only good book on computer programming" (quote from a Slashdot favorite I won't name) and all-around brilliant and creative guy--said he's "been depressed for the last year". Man, that made me want to cry.
This convinced me that the problem is real, that it is hampering the advancement of learning--and that it could even lead to the unseating of the US as the center of the learned world.
The evaluation of an action as 'practical' . . . depends on what it is that one wishes to practice.
...pay attention to who's saying the government is wrong: Sheila Widnall. From 1993-1997, she was secretary of the Air Force, arguably the most technologically advanced of the four branches of the US military. For those not up on US government, the Secretary of the Air Force is the civilian head of the US Air Force. All the generals answered to her; she answered only to the Secretary of Defense, who answers to POTUS. She would have had authority and responsiblity for all the research funded by the Air Force, so she's seen both sides of this (though I don't know to what extent she micromanaged it).
She makes a VERY good point that what the government should do is to determine what's classified research and what's not. It's reasonable to restrict the participation of foreign nationals in classified research, but the concern with this grant was that it was for unclassified research.
For you cynics, note that this grant wasn't for that much money (only half a million) and was probably chosen to send a message because they didn't much want to do it anyway and it wasn't enough money to worry about.
There is no saying it was racist.
Nationalist, sure, but that isn't the same thing.
If the 'strings' had said "No French" or "No Germans", then this conversation wouldn't be happening.
In this case, the NSA wanted to pre-screen any foreign nationals working on the project.
I'm sorry, but I don't see the racism there. They didn't say that they (the foreign nationals) automatically couldn't work on the project, they just wanted to check out whichever ones did.
Profiling? Maybe. But it happens regularly in government and business. The last two companies I worked for had a much more rigorous screening process for foreign nationals. In their defense, they'd gotten burned at least once.
But then so has the US Government. I don't blame them for being careful.
I like you, Stuart. You're not like everyone else, here, at Slashdot.
The problem is that if all research funds require no foreign citizens at all, then there are consequences that will backfire very badly, such as:
1. It will decimate the number of graduate students.
Note that there is a significant portion of foreign graduate students, most of which are hanging about the funds for their TAs or RAs. Cutting their funds simply send them fleeing.
2. This will in turn bring many research projects ground to halt.
Since there are a lot less graduate students, researches will ultimately understaffed, and thus will bring it to halt. Of course this will recover as the animo from US students to continue to graduate studies grows.
3. This makes other countries advance in their research.
See #1. Lots of other countries like Germany, Australia, UK, and so on still use foreign grad students to do research. Not to mention if China will follow the same path.
--
Error 500: Internal sig error
What makes you think that more funding will improve the situation? The reason the percentage of foreign grad students pursuing PhDs is so high is because (this is the case in the uk and I assume also the us) the income from a PhD is so low. When faced with the choice of doing a PhD and earning $12k per year for 3-4 years or taking that job offer with company xyz for $30k per year rising to $60k after 4 years, it's easy to see why uk born graduates take the job.
More funding will simply increase the amount of new PhDs available, not increase the salaries of the people doing the PhDs.
Also, many of the PhD graduates I have known have the opinion that one's employability after completing the PhD is the same (and sometimes less) than before the PhD, unless the objective is to stay in academia.
If the gov't wants security checks, and in some cases that's reasonable (remember all the military work MIT has done, most famously during WWII), that should get them on EVERYONE. Stop this xenophobic insult now.
Aside from the philosophical problem with accused foreign citizens mindlessly, need we remind the NSA of all the wonderful homegrown dangers we have managed to grow in the U.S., from Timothy McVeigh (& Nichols) to the Unabomber to the Columbine shooters to John Walker Lindh to this DC sniper bastard Muhammed, and that's just the last ten years. And and those are just the killers; don't forget double agents Aldrich Ames (CIA) and Robert Philip Hanssen (FBI). Even if you are sympathetic to some of these, consider the rest.
My argument is that if you're going to be paranoid, do be equal opportunity about it out of respect for logic and fair play. Look in your own backyard.
Yeah. Like, imagine if someone had gone to Afghanistan 20 years ago and taught a bunch of insane fanatics to build bombs.
Or someone had sold poison gas-making technology to mad Iraqi dictators.
But that would NEVER happen, would it?
I mean, it's only a matter of time before our version of Hitler's 'SS' show up here...with 'HS' (Homeland Security) on their lapels. Think it can't happen? I'll bet that the citizens of Germany in the 1930's thought that too. We have unchecked paranoia in this country..and that's very dangerous, especially when the Government is using it to control its citizens.
Personally, I think your views are shortsighted and, sorry to be so frank, wrong.
It's true that 9-11 was a terrible thing to happen. It's also true that the US has done more damage to itself in the name of "Protecting the Homeland" than any terrorist could ever do. We have restricted the very freedoms that make this country great. We have violated the rights of people because they MIGHT be someone who knows someone who's dangerous. We have detained citizens without trial or charges and forbiden them to speak with anyone, even an attorney, even a government appointed attorney. We strip search grandmothers, and detain people that have funny last names. We listen to the quisling, reporting people that don't leave tips in greasy spoons.
"Those that would trade liberity for security deserve [and will get] neither." - B. Franklin.
As for your assertion that no one thought flight school students could be terrorists, you have your facts wrong. Remember the conflab at the FBI? That's what that's about. Someone DID think there might be terrorists being trained at flight schools.
To protect ourselves from terrorist requires a scalpel, not the howtizer that's being used. The true cancer of a free society are those that would render freedom impossible. The true terrorists are they that wage war on the rights of the people. The real terror is the loosing of the dogs of a police state.
Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
When the Soviet Union tried to keep its research secret, the research moved overseas. Restrictions on foreign nationals, visa restrictions, and secrecy are the best way for the US to ensure that research moves to Europe, Japan, and China. With secrecy, researchers won't generate the publications that advertise that a country and a lab is first rate. With visa restrictions, educated foreigners will increasingly look for jobs overseas, where they are more welcome than ever, or just stay at home and try to make things work there. Hiring restrictions on foreign nationals for "secret" projects further reduce available jobs and further drive them away.
--I'm more concerned over home grown terrorist like robert mcnamara, henry kissinger,both the clintons, george the elder, king george the present, rumsfield, cheney, the hierarchies in the democratic national committe and the republican national committee, the membership of the council on foreign relations, the members of the tri-lateral commission, and various criminal gangs and cartels inside the various combined workgroups of the military/industrial complex who profit from war and drug smuggling in the private sector, especially banking, and the spook, law and justice "communities".
..list to reflect more serious potential threats and dangers, to go down to slightly less serious,to less serious and so on. History has shown just over and over again that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. And the history of the 20th century shows that citizens of various countries around this ole whirrled have a much higher odds-on probability of being exploited/murdered/enslaved by their own governments and "connected ones" then by "outsiders". For every person killed by a "foreign invader" in the 20th century, there's 5 to 10 killed by their own nation's power structure once they became absolute tyrants.
Hegelian dialectic is alive and working daily to bring a fascist reality to the US. It don't matter what label or name these gents go by, a dictatorship "system" that lies chronically, steals everything that ain't nailed down, and uses their positions for personal and secret profit are way more of a danger than anything else.
Now this viewpoint doesn't negate the possibility and probability of various other foreigners being up to "no good". I take that as a gimme as well. It's reality, there ARE foreign bad guys here and also domestic low level independent nutjobs. We got a population of around 270 million or so, law of averages comes into play. I just think it's better to have th..
IMO, having watched politics and "current events/news/history" as a major interest since the late 50's/early 60's, I'd say that the US has well more than it's "fair share" of power mad dictators or dictator wannabe's,from the very highest levels to local levels, very public to very private, governmental and business, and it's official pronouncements have been full of lies and misdirections.
Just since I've been a teenager I've watched *someones* get away with whacking a president-JFK, to starting a decades long war-for-profit based on a total lie -nam war with the gulf of tonkin fairy tale, to shafting it's own vets -agent orange was a "myth" and "all in their heads", and gulf war syndrome was "in their heads", to experimenting on their own people by aerial and ground spreading of chemical, bioliogical and radiological agents-something they denied for years and finally admitted. And so forth and on and on, way too many examples to list. Heck just the federal reserve perpetual debt note scam is big enough to prove how much people get lied to and brainweashed into believing the lies.
The gestalt is-the old cliche is true, for a basic rule of thumb, when a politician's lips are moving..well, take it with several large handfuls of salt. Right now, IMO again, we are being lead down the dictatorship path with lies much more deep and sinister than minor accounting lies at enron, and those were large enough. That's chump change to what's really going on now with this "war on terrorism".
Anyone's MMV obviously, just fool me once, shame on you, fool me 4873 times, shame on me. Learn from history or repeat it, binary choice.
The enemies of freedom, themselves being quite naive, are always quick to accuse others of naivete.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
you belong to Caesar. It's a concept simple enough that it was expressed by a simple bookshelf builder who grew up out in the sticks two thousand years ago.
Once upon a time the great private universities were the bastions of independant thinking, but a funny thing happened on the way to the Forum. They started takeing Caesar's money. A little aid here, a little aid there, and then the big money, government contracts.
This has created on odd state of affairs where a private institution has a public face presenting public knowledge, and at the same time a public face creating very, very, VERY private knowledge.
Or worse, presenting as public knowledge that which it is payed to present as public by Ceasar. Do you really need it spelled out that some of that "knowledge" lacks a bit around the edges in the "truth" department?
When a government contracts for science the government OWNS that science. I mean this quite literally.
If you wish to do science, or engage in ANY free thought for that matter, the solution is obvious and simple. Don't take Caesar's coin.
The poet laureate, by accepting the the coin and protection of the Lord is compelled by his very state to write only that which is pleasing and/or flattering to the Lord. If you don't think this happens in science you are naive. The poet who rejects the Lords money may say anything he wishes, although his life may otherwise be somewhat harsher.
Which way to go is a choice. Choose wisely, if not well.
KFG
That's what I keep telling the IRS.
Devon
The short version is that with WW2 the US swapped places with the UK. The US provoked Japan into attacking it, as 80% of Americans didn't want to enter the war, because it saw that Japan was quickly building its own empire. Industrialization had been going strong in the US for a century, and the capitalists needed markets in which to sell products. The US came out of the war with a built-up industrial base, and an excuse to build military bases throughout the globe. Europe was decimated, leaving America the world's only superpower.
Since that time, we've worked to expand our economic sphere, as empires are wont to do, throughout Asia and South America. Through the CIA, the US has sponsored and/or outright led several military coups: Chile, Indonesia, Guatemala, Panama, and many more. The latest -- failed! -- attempt was Venezuela this past April.
Why would the US do this? Do Americans hate other people? Of course not. That assumes that Americans make choices which affect the US's foreign policy. I certainly wasn't asked about whether or not I wanted to overthrow the overwhelmingly democratically-elected president of Venezuela. But Venezuela controls a lot of oil, and capital needs oil (resources). So capital made that choice for me. Can you think of another country that controls a lot of oil? Hint: it starts with "I" and ends in "raq."
The fairy tale that terrorists hate all of our freedoms is so amazingly idiotic, I'm shocked that anyone buys into it. Yes, that's a sad statement on our citizens. Do you really think bin Laden is sitting in a cave somewhere thinking, "Stupid Americans! Why can't I have my MTV?! I'm so jealous." No, he's pissed because the US has military bases in what he believes to be the holy land of all Muslim people (over a billion world-wide). Whether or not we stop supporting Israel (his other beef), I think we at the very least should pull out of Saudi Arabia just to appease one sixth of the world's population. That's just common sense if not common courtesy.
It's easy to get cynical or give up when you look upon the world stage and see what the US does to other countries and peoples (1.5 million dead in Iraq due to economic sanctions). I just hope that by talking with others we can wake up enough people to take back control of the country. How? I wish I knew, but I'm convinced it's not going to happen through the ballot box.
You can go read any number of political essays and books yourself, but I think you'd be hard pressed to argue that our touted two-party system is not really a one-party system: the capital party. No, I'm not socialist or communist, though those systems haven't really been tried in the real world. I've been reading more about anarchy* and know that, once we stop hating each other for silly reasons, it's the way to go. The only question is can we get there?
Me? I'm actually hopeful.
* If you think Anarchy means mob rule or no order, you don't understand anarchy. Neither did I. Start skimming the FAQ, but the basic tenant is that you are a sovereign individual and should not be giving up your power to anyone.
P.S. For a good history of the US, I highly recommend A People's History of the United States: 1492 to Preset by Howard Zinn. I'm only up to the Civil War (and the other Civil War), but it's very good so far.
Freedom to fear. Freedom from thought. Freedom to kill.
I guess the War on Terror really is about freedom!
"I'll take the money"..." There is no saying it was racist."...what a couple of ignorant, blind, apathetic as*holes.
This is McCarthyism all over again, folks. The Bush adminstration needs to be taken out of office NOW. Land of the free??? Land of the federated, pre-fascist states. The government told MIT that the only way that MIT could get a $404k research grant was to let the NSA do a complete background investigation on all "non-Americans and foreign nationals" only, in the name of "Homeland Security". MIT said to piss off and forfeited the grant.
YEAH MIT!!!
Could you imagine how f*cked we would have been in WWII if the Department of Homeland Security wouldn't let Einstein work on research in our country because he was German (and a supporter of Communism)?
"Homeland Security" = xenophobia and racism. Period.
Mistakes of our past are meant to be lessons in which we learn from to not make again, they are not meant to be repeated. One of my favorite quotes in the world..."They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety -- Benjamin Franklin." That is exactly that the Bush administration is.
The January Wired magazine has an article about stem cell research and cloning in China. The combination of the US government restricting foreign students from participating in certain research and also restricting certain kinds of biological research has caused a brain drain of Chinese researchers from the US to China.
During the 1980's and 1990's, many Chinese researchers would study in the US, and many would stay in the US after graduating. Now some of those researchers that have been living and working in the US have been moving back to China. New students are staying in China to study since they are developing their own labs backed by the Chinese government.
As the US keeps adding restrictions, they (Congress, etc.) actually encourage foreign countries to develop their own research capabilities that the US cannot control, except by threats like in the case of Korea and Iraq. It will make those countries less dependent and more isolated from the US which will give the US less bargaining power in future diplomatic relations.
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So you're saying you're apathetic about apathy?
:)
Millions of us do vote, and almost exactly half of those who voted did not choose this President, nor were they apathetic about their choice.
Voting is technically irrational, that is, the benefits do not outweigh the trouble of doing it. But as the last election demonstrated, sometimes it's a good thing to be irrational. (OK, Florida sort of showed that your vote does AND doesn't count, but do show up.
BTW, an easy way to get involved is to simply donate some money to one of the many orgainzations that worry about watching gov't 24/7, or merely doing good things where gov't does not. They won't think you're apathetic.
And even arguing here is political involvement...
Um, dude? You do know that Soviet archives do show that McCarthy was correct in his assertions about Communists trying to control content in Hollywood? (You do also know that Richard Nixon proved Alger Hiss to be a Communist working for the Soviet Union? Soviet archives showed him to be correct also.)
That was not my point.
Just thought I would point these things out to your biggoted white liberal ass. Oh, sorry, did I make a wrong assumption there?
Yes, you did.
Perhaps you are just one of the decadant Americans which must be converted to Islam or killed. Whoops, that would just be another biggoted statement on my part.
Yes, it was.
You can also be pretty damn sure the FBI did investigate Einstein before bringing him into any research. Just as they did for all the people on the Manhatten Project.
That was not my point.
You do know that to get a security clearance, you need to get a background check, right?
Yes, I used to have one.
Or are you just professionally ignorant?
I am professional, yes, ignorant, no. I am simply not blinded by our current nationalism and so-called patriotism because of 09/11/2001. What needs to happen is to judge each person's actions individually, not just because they are from outside the US. The solution lies in fixing the cause of terrorism, nothing else. I could full well support the fall of Israel myself, and I am a full (born in the US) citizen and an educated, self-thinking man (read: educated atheist). What makes me any less dangerous than someone who is here on an education grant studying at MIT and follows Islam? Nothing. I can kill you just as much as them. Therefore the logic being followed by our government is wrong. You solve problems by solving the source of the problem. Why do people hate the US? And then solve that problem. That problem does not have a race, a face, or a nationality. People both inside and outside the US hate the US. Why? That is what is important. Not racial, national, or religious discrimination in a futile attempt to solve a much larger problem.