Slashdot Mirror
Big Brother Gets a Brain
Gregus writes "The Village Voice delves into the DARPA's latest plan to track people and vehicle movement in cities, ostensibly for urban warfare, though this would be really handy watching 'suspicious' people in any city. "The goal, according to a recent Pentagon presentation to defense contractors, is to 'track everything that moves.' " The actual DARPA RFP and briefings. I just feel more safe all the time."
The USGovt can't even manage the information they receive now. There are reams of information they had about the 9/11 plans that just didn't get invetigated, interrogations that are untranslated years after they happened, untold bytes that are simply stored and unexamined, we should abandon the notion that the government wants these capabilities to protect anyone.
The government wants this information because of a desire for power. Will this be used to scan for threats to the general public or to curtail and monitor the activites of those who threaten governmental power, like dissenting political activists? Look at the history of the abuse of the FBI by almost every executive administration for those answers.
This won't stop until the people pull the plug.
The best way to do is to be.
Jesus Tapdancing Christ. Don't you feel that there are people way too close to the levers of power who would be happy if every citizen reported to their local Patriotic Office every day to prove that they were not a terrorist (powder residue tests, full cavity search, lie-detectopr test)?
I'm praying for a rip in the fabric of spacetime that lets the Founding Fathers through. They would be bitch slapping these bastards so hard....
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
While you may not be in college or high school, its views like yours that let democracy fall. So Bin Laden trained a few hundred terrorists (because of our egotistical superiority over the middle east, but thats a whole 'nother topic)... does that give the United States any right to "suspect everybody"??? ABSOLUTELY NOT!!!
The reason that people live in this great country is because people have the freedom to do what they feel is necessary to protect their rights. If someone wants to "steal gas trucks and ram them into office buildings," certainly the government should take steps to stop them from doing so, but not at the expense of giving up our personal freedoms such as the right to privacy.
Sure, its a scary world, and the possibilities are definitely endless for terrorists who want to blow shit up. But being so gripped by fear to give up your freedom to live your life is the most idiotic way to live I've ever heard. There are millions of people around the world living under that kinda of facist/militaristic rule, and I'd be willing to bet that any one of them would LOVE to trade places with you, with the ability to use the internet to look up information they never knew existed before, to drive around in a car wherever they want, and if they desire, to rise up against an evil government and overthrow them!