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Congress May Consider Mandatory ISP Snooping
An anonymous reader writes to mention a News.com story covering a most disquieting trend in the House of Representatives. From the article: "Colorado Rep. Diana DeGette's proposal says that any Internet service that 'enables users to access content' must permanently retain records that would permit police to identify each user. The records could not be discarded until at least one year after the user's account was closed. It's not clear whether that requirement would be limited only to e-mail providers and Internet providers such as DSL (digital subscriber line) or cable modem services. An expansive reading of DeGette's measure would require every Web site to retain those records."
Um, a few mag tapes? All ISPs need to do is record the contact details and names of its subscribers, along with a record with time, date and duration of each DHCP lease. Websites will need to keep their usual access logs for longer.
This is all done already, they're just making it mandatory and specifying a minimum time for records to be kept...
...as long as we, the public, can get to see which web site you've visited, and get to see the emails you're sending and recieving.
What's that, Congressman? "Invasion of privacy" you say? Goodness, so it is.
it would likely stimulate additional R&D into even higher data storage and really huge backup technologies.
--- Asking inconvenient questions for over 30 years...
Considering how often this sort of thing is staring to come up, I think it's time to start a bounty fund. The next time some elected person starts up with this nonsense, the fund should be used to reward any ISP or IT operator/technicians who post a list of every site and e-mail address visited, mailed to, or received by the representative, his or her spouse, and his or her children.
After all, of they think it's such a great idea, and not at all an invasion of privacy, they won't mind, will they?
The one thing I would suggest is that people should go hit c-span and watch the briefings and testimony that lead to Degette to push this law. This solution to the problem won't work, and I think we as a technical community can come up with a better fix to the darker side of the internet, but the testimony is the most horrific thing I have seen on CSPAN this year (with the exception of the budget negotiations).
Think of the unintended consequences. If this passes, I think we can expect the free internet at coffeehouses, libraries, airports, etc. to end quite abruptly. Maybe we'll have to present a national ID card first...
l s)
I know your questions are rhethorical, but from this Conservative Libertarian's viewpoint:
1. Who runs the country? Lobbysts, and those who hire them. The will of the people is little more than a quaint notion. Just look at this Amnesty program for ILLEGAL aliens. 80% of America is against it from recent opinion polls, but the politicians don't care. Same goes for the Dubai ports deal. America's against it, but the politicians will make it work anyway.
2. What does Congress think it's doing? Whatever the hell it wants. It's not like that 10th Amendment to the Constitution applies any more. Seriously, have you ever (EVER?) heard any poliician say "We can't do that, that's a State Right?" or "We can't pass a law requiring XYZ, that violates the 10th Amendment?" Nobody else has either.
3. Do they have any idea how much it will cost? No. Like they care. It won't cost THEM anything. That's your problem, buddy. Now get back to work paying your taxes. (Speaking of taxes, Tax Amnesty Day is the 3rd of June for 2006, meaning that if the tax burden were evenly distributed, the average person would work from Jan 1 to June 3 just to pay their taxes for that year. Now consider that 49% pays no federal taxes. Don't believe me? Go to the IRS web site and look it up yourself. http://www.irs.ustreas.gov/pub/irs-soi/01in01ts.x
Anything else I can clear up for you?
(And moderators, just because you disagree, it doesn't mean it's "flamebait" or "troll". It could simply indicate that I'm an idiot.)
More encryption products need to be made available. They don't have to be completely full proof, just easily available. Built into products by default so it can get in the hands of the general public. Because huge surveillance is on its way. Its coming and it wont be stopped, it can only be prolonged.
Encryption is going to be the answer. Its like people getting random searches at the airport. More time and resources is required to open up each persons luggage. We shouldn't all be carrying our personal items in clear bags. Some people have freaky fetishes, some others have serious problems. But those people should not be judged by the things they own. They have the right to have a private life. And the same thing goes for our content, our personal messages/photos/audio/reading habits..... everything that travels over the air and miles of cable. It should be put in a new bag.....ENCRYPTION.
It's agonizingly ironic; that Congress forces us to pay for the removal of our privacy.
Look to one of the oldest books: The Bible. In that day, the government supposedly made Jesus carry his own cross up a hill before nailed him to it.
In essence, they made him fund the means toward his own execution.
Now in modern times, the government is making citizens fund the removal of their own privacy? I am not surprised.
Also interesting is to note that the former was considered a criminal and a terrorist (after all, he spoke of the collapse of government). The latter are just ordinary citizens such as ourselves...
Is there a difference?
Disclaimer: I am not Christian.
Well, you could delcare yourself a soverign by rescinding your birth certificate, federal citizenship (AKA US Citizenship), Social security, drivers lisence, and other lisences and government contracts, then declare yourself a citizen of your state as it was in 1868 before the federal government illegally decided it had the right to conquer it's own states and foreign nations and simply state, to it's face, that it is an illegal illegitimate government under it's own laws. At that point you can sue for ownership of your property back since they have the title to your house and car; you have only a certificate of title and since it's in your posession, it isn't theirs.
Infact, some people are doing that precise thing right now.
http://www.ncrepublic.org/
It's a good way to simply replace the federal government with a local, understandable, legal government. Soon that project will be popping up in other states. We ain't afraid of guns; we're afraid of losing life, liberty and property and if they want to come for us, they're more than welcome to try and fail.
Otherwise, congress won't pay down it's debt or do anything of the sort; they will keep on spending as they are told by their masters, wiether their master is the dollar, party heads, cults they are members of, mercantiles in the form of CEO's and business heads, or foreign nations. We know it's a bad government, the only reason we haven't overthron it or replaced it is because we still consider the current politicians and parties legitimate. Why? We see no alternatives, and there are no alternatives because those alternatives are met with iron fists and bars. Remember last year when kerry and bush were having their debate and Nader stormed the building and was arrested?
It's a pretty clear message. The republicrats don't want their stranglehold on the seats of power challenged, neither by ideas nor by contenders.
Afterall, the senior citizen pays his taxes to have roads paved and cops paid, not to pay for extra-legal wars against foreign countries that have no purpose or place in the world aside from making a whole lotta people dead and angry. That's the problem with single-chunk, manditory taxation. You pay income taxes but have no right to say what you want to pay, which is the major flaw in a federal/feudal system. Nowadays, Americans pay 48% of their income (organized by size from largest to smallest, income tax, social security tax, state income taxes, property taxes, fiat tax (devaulation of dollars caused by the fed banks printing more dollars), smaller taxes in the form of lisence stickers and plates, taxes on products, taxes on companies trickling down to us.) to the federal government.
Half of that money goes to service our debt, by the way. 1 Trillion a year of it.
Don't kid yourself; if we stay in this shitty form of "government" for much longer, they'll have us working gattica/brazil/1984/prisoner style. Don't believe me? Wait for the debters prisons.
Yup, the folks above are 100% correct. Introducing some form of proportional representation to replace the antiquated and inherently distorted "first past the post" system, as has been done in pretty much every other significant democratic nation (i.e. where democracy is not a total charade) except the US, UK, and Canada where I'm from, is the *only* way a new party can have a shred of a chance at real electoral success and maybe even form the government one day. Our major third party in Canada, the NDP, is trapped under a ceiling of about 20% of the vote and has been for years, because of the strategic voting the "first past the post" winner takes all electoral system imposes. I've always been a supporter of the NDP (New Democratic Party), a mildly left-of-centre party, roughly analogous to social democrats in Europe, or the progressive component of the US Democratic party. But at least half the time in federal elections I've had to hold my nose and vote for the Liberal party (centre-right, analogous to the conservative elements of the US Democrats) to ensure that the Conservative right-wing candidate doesn't take the riding. This dynamic keeps the NDP's share of the popular vote artificially low and is inevitable in our system. In fact, in Canada the presence of more than two parties in parliament obscures the fact federal elections are actually a set of regionally defined two-party contests, with a scattering of exceptions. The NDP wins much fewer seats relative to their overall share of the popular vote because their support is spread out and only in a few places do they get a majority in a riding. This and many other distortions of the popular vote relative to the parties' share of seats are all due to the "first past the post" electoral system.
Only if people are watching the light when it shines. Blink, and the spin will cause the light to wander off in another direction. A few may see it, but the vast majority are too entertained with the latest TV drama or current useless time waster to even care.
Perhaps what we need is a new reality television show. Some sort of investigative, edited for maximum effect, scandal digging show, a la Cheaters. Wouldn't that be great?
I mean, just look at those Survivor challenges! They're probably excrutiatingly boring when taped out on some beach or sand pit in the middle of nowhere, but get that footage back in the studio, cut out 90% of the people running on sand, slap on some tension building music and you've got yourself a hit!
Senator? It's a Recall. The Constituents have spoken.
Qualitas edurus commercium, nullus penitus net rimor, nullus deus beneficium
" ...instead of jumping back and forth between left wing /right wing opposits in each election (as we currently do)..."
As Gore Vidal has observed, the United States is governed by a single party with two right wings. Anything resembling socialism as practiced in Europe and elsewhere would probably be stamped out by violence ("godless communism", etc.) That's why the Democrats have been unable to make any progress against the current administration: you couldn't fit a cigarette paper between their beliefs. (And to preempt ad hominem attacks, I am a lifelong conservative).
To be fair, the same process is happening worldwide. Politicians are slow on the uptake, but not so slow that they did not eventually notice the vastly greater attractiveness (from their point of view) of business governance. So citizens in the Land of the Free are controlled for most of their waking lives by corporations run on Stalinist lines. (OK, if you step out of line you don't get a bullet in the back of the head; you just get fired; but you are ejected from that particular corporate universe just as thoroughly as a dead man is removed from the political universe. And there is no trace of democracy).
Politicans realised that it's a mug's game pushing ideologies, so they all transformed themselves into managers. It is much easier to get into power and stay there by giving the voters what they want. That's why all parties these days promise much the same - they all use the same opinion polls and focus groups to form their policies. Hence also the lack of interest in voting - why bother, when there is so little real choice?
I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.
And I bet you know nothing of Arrow's Theorem that lists a number of voting criteria and proves that it's impossible to meet them all.
:)
A bet you'd lose
I suggested and discussed the Condorcet method because it it is generally considered the best known method for running a multi-candidate election for an office such as presidet.
in a multi-seat election
You're absolutely right that I did not address the multi-seat legislature elections. I agree that those elections could use an overhaul as well, and that they do indeen involve different considerations. A proportional election system would be better... but an ensemble council would be even better tah a proportional system. (Ensemble council is mostly proportional, but also adds a stabilizing centrist minority elected through a Condorcet style proceedure.)
For anyone interested in learning more about how to best design an accurate democratic system, I higjly recommend the website Accurate Democracy. It covers all of this in great detail, and far more. It gives excellent examples and explanations of how and why different mechanisms of democracy fail, and how to fix them.
Even just reading the front page is incredibly informative and powerful. A must-read page.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.