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Presidential Candidates and Online Privacy
noiseordinance writes "I'd like to know everyone's opinion about which presidential candidate seems most likely to preserve Internet privacy." We haven't officially started election coverage on Slashdot yet, but I figured it wouldn't be a bad idea to start tossing out questions like this as we get closer to the primaries. Try to stay on the subject of on-line privacy- we can run more stories on other topics in the future.
I'm not an American, but because the US is so influential in the world these elections are also important and interesting to me. This will have an indirect result on my life as well.
On the subject of online privacy, anything the US government decides on this matter will certainly affect me. Many sites (like Slashdot) that I visit are created and hosted in the US.
If the US decides to invade my privacy when visiting these sites, I will stay away from them. I have already decided to no longer visit the US, as long as it means having my fingerprints taken and such. I am not a criminal and I don't wish to be treated as one! I hope the US citizens (or at least enough of them) realize they are alienating themselves from the rest of the world. And that isn't in the best interest for any of us!
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I find him to be refreshingly contrary for a politician. He was just talking up open data formats, despite the fact that Microsoft is building a 500 million dollar data ceneter in his state.
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
You've got it exactly backwards, and unfortunately many folks have a hard time understanding Constitutional logic.
First, you have *ALL* rights. ALL means ALL. Whether they are enumerated/defined or not, you have them. The Constitution was written specifically in this manner, so not to suggest that the People got their rights from the Government or laws, but rather the other way around.
The impact of such logical construction of the Constitution means that rights that were undefinable or even unfathomable back then were *automatically* protected from infringement by the Government.
Amendment 10 further extended this logic, by actually explicitly stating all rights are reserved by the People and the States, rather than just implying it.
(I Am A Student of Political Science)
Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul are the two on either side of the aisle that seem most likely to preserve Internet Privacy. That said, they are probably also the two running that have the least likelihood of even placing in a primary. Besides not looking presidential, they both have very unique (among their fellow candidates at least) agendas. Paul would like to shut down just about every government agency and put an end to all positive liberties. Kucinich is for more (suprisingly enough) contemporarily liberal reforms, taking us in not quite the opposite direction, but pushing for more positive liberties. Both are interested in individual rights and are (for now) in it for something other than promoting the interests of contributors.
Your brain is not a computer.
Except that he doesn't believe that Federal individual protections apply to states. I don't expect much help from him against anybody *but* the federal government.
"It is our blasphemy which has made us great, and will sustain us, and which the gods secretly admire in us." - Zelazny
Actually, having just read both your references and a bit more, I think his rationale is quite valid. Maybe not perfect, but certainly justifiable.
First, the economic intervention proposed *would* set a dangerous precedent of using pension money for political ends. Regardless of the current ends, the precedent and power *will be* misused. The action should not be taken without careful consideration, which was the main thing Dr. Paul argued in both places: don't be hasty.
In the case of the declaration of genocide and intervention, his argument was primarily that the bill was being rushed through with minimal thought, debate, and time for revision. This is not really arguable if you look at the timetable. He is not saying (there) that he will utterly oppose it, but that he is predisposed to oppose it and that it requires *very* careful consideration. Given the debacle we already have ourselves in, I cannot argue that point either and I doubt you can.
He points out the condition of the military and its existing commitments. Can we meet those commitments by themselves? How can we do more on top of it? Again, hard to argue. Are we going to invade Pakistan, Venezuela, Burma, etc., etc.?
As for the "confusion" over the issues in Darfur, I see no such confusion in his statements. Those issues would become very confused by any intervention on our part, economic or military. The fact that the situation is complex makes it very hard to intervene surgically and not inflame issues. International peace keepers in Africa are seeing that now as they take fire from multiple sides because they are seen as interfering, because they are simply in the wrong place, or even because they are being raided by rebels for equipment and arms. Relief supplies rarely get to the right people, and sanctions often backfire because combatants will simply keep or take what they need from those we try to protect. We are very quick to consider action these days but very reluctant to actually think it through and really decide what is best and, of the things that need correcting in the world (and they are many) which ones we should really commit to. That, most often, is Dr. Paul's argument, and, again, it is hard to refute out of hand. The fact that he is primarily non-interventionist is a good foil to the trigger-happy attitude which prevails. That is why we have balance of powers (nominally).
Birth is the beginning of personhood. This seems very simple to me. Yes, I viewed all the ultrasounds of my unborn daughter and felt her kick. But if I had been told that by carrying her to term my wife would die, I would not have hesitated to have put the decision completely into my wife's hands. My daughter is now 19 years old and may someday be faced with the same decision. She is now sitting 20 feet away from me studying for a biology exam in the pre-med program in which she is enrolled. There is no question that she is now a person. If I pull out the ultrasound we have of her and compare it to a recent photo, I have no trouble determining that one is a picture of a person and one is the picture of an fetus, not yet a person.
I want her to be able to make decisions about her reproductive activity based on her own morality and reason, not the dictates of a legislature or religious dogma. You see, I trust women. My mother, my wife, my daughter, my neighbor are all capable of deciding what is best for their own bodies and whether or not to bear a fetus to term.
Motherhood is also very important. The act of having a child is the miraculous beginning to a person's life. That's why we count a person's age from the moment they are born, not when they were conceived. And, as I said, the fetus entirely belongs to the mother and to no one else. Ultimately, the question of "when does a person's life begin?" is answered, for me, by "whenever the mother says it does".
I am a little uncomfortable by the way the anti-choice activists seem to devalue both motherhood and the miracle of birth, and made even more uncomfortable when they start throwing words like "murder" around.
You are welcome on my lawn.