Slashdot Mirror
As of October, FBI To Allow Warrantless Investigations
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "Attorney General Michael Mukasey has agreed to allow Congressional hearings, but not to delay, the implementation of new FBI regulations that would allow them to spy on American citizens who are not suspected of any crime. As an editorial in the New York Times points out, this is a power that has a history of abuse. In times past, it was used to wiretap Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. and to spy on other civil rights and anti-war protesters."
As Dekortage points out, "Several senators have formally complained that citizens could be investigated 'without any basis for suspicion,' which the Justice Department denies."
We should start encrypting all our data, no matter how "unsuspicious" or "ordinary" it may be. Everything from conversations between family and friends to financial records (though you should be already encrypting the latter anyway.)
How is this any different from how they're operating now? What does it matter that they're no longer going to breaking a law they never paid any attention to in the first place? Karl Rove tells Congress to take their subpoena, shine it up real nice, turn it sideways and shove it right up their collective asses. Consequences? So far, none. Will there ever be? Doubtful. Will it be any different for the FBI? Doubtful.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
Fascist America, in 10 easy steps
My history teacher pointed those out in 1997 and he wasn't thinking of the USA back then. I thought: come on, it can't be that easy! However, seeing what happens in the USA, I humbly have to retract that opinion.
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
I think if you told Thomas Jefferson that the United States would be up to this sort of thing, someone would have gotten a musket ball to the chest.
I think his reaction would have been more along the lines of "Goodness, what is that peculiar blue box you stepped out of?"
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
That's becuase everyone I talk to thinks "I don't do anything illegal, why should I care."
Which, as anyone here will tell you, is a terrible argument.
No one will do a single thing about it as long as they can watch their TV shows.
He said, posting on slashdot.
But seriously, what do you want to happen? Would you like everyone to rise up in an armed revolt? The last time something like that happened, we were left with the bloodiest war in US history, and that was before the advent of a lot of the modern weapons of war. Write to their congressmen? I wrote to Harry Reid while I lived in Nevada, and what I got back was a form letter that looked like it could have been written by a white house aide!
Get involved in your local party politics; grassroots efforts are the only peaceful way to pull this off, and changing from within the system seems to be the best method. Or get involved and try to grow a third party to where they can take a seat in congress.
People need to stand up and defend their rights, but unless it derails their daily lives, nothing will change. ....I hate being so negative...But you know it's true. :-/
Just so you all know, posting indignant posts on slashdot doesn't count as defending your rights. Preaching to the converted != protest.
Attorney General Michael Mukasey has agreed to allow Congressional hearings
That's big of him. He'll "allow" Congress to hold hearings? Who wears the pants in this family, anyways?
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
they're endangering the public
I think you've just hit upon what government doesn't ever want you to realize:
It is government itself that is the biggest threat to you, your family, and your freedom.
this is a power that has a history of abuse (from the summary)
Correction: The power itself is the abuse. How can a special "right" to bypass justice itself NOT be abuse? The concept of guilty before proven innocent -- in whatever slimy manifestation it appears -- is an attack on human rights before the discussion even started.
From the last link about senators complaining:
Among their fears: Americans could be targeted in part based on their race, ethnicity or religion
and
Citing remarks earlier by Mukasey about the new rules, the spokesman said an investigation would not be opened based solely on a person's race, ethnicity or religion.
That isn't the problem. I'm glad that they are attempting to slow it down and stop it, but why does it have to boil down to racism for them to stop it? Why can't they just say "this is completely against what the founders of our country intended"...?
History is not made by individuals. History is made by trends. Specific individuals who are surfing at the leading edge of a trend may get the spotlight, and hence the credit, but really it was the trend that made the change, not the person.
The net effect of current trends is a lot of corruption in our government, plainly visible to the public, with a large collective yawn in response.
Sitting around shouting that people need to stand up and do something will not, in and of itself, create a trend of people standing up and doing something.
For that we will need something bigger. And more painful.
All of these new police powers never seem to come with more accountability or independent oversight.
Raise your hands, everyone who is surprised by this...
yeah, that's what I thought.
We need the old USSR back. As odd as this seems, there was actually a sense of competition going on back then -- competition for goodness. I remember mocking the USSR for having secret courts, secret laws, secret prisons. Now WE have those things. I think that at least in part it's because we no longer have competition to compare and contrast our government's behavior to, so people are less apt to associate this kind of totalitarian behavior with The Evil Empire. As a result, we become The Evil Empire.
I'm not cheering for Russia as it stomps around in Georgia, mind you, but an odd side-effect of it might be that we start acting like the USA, rather than Trashcanistan.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
Seriously, there is no good way for an armed revolt to be pulled off right now. It took over 100 years for the Civil War to be recovered from, and those guys thought 100 / minute was pretty sweet. We've got van mounted miniguns that can shoot thousands of bullets per minute and are completely mobile. Terrorist actions could win the fight in theory, but in reality it's much harder to fight as a terrorist because the collateral damage turns the population against you. I just don't see any way an armed revolt could work given the realities of today's military.
He's an American. He'd ask about the DeLorean ;)
Attention deficit disorder is a complicated issue, spanning several major... HEY LET'S GO RIDE BIKES!
no, they'll investigate specific people on an agenda.
That agenda might be making trouble for those who oppose policy, those who protest, those who question government statistics on economy, etc.
Yes, and just in time for the election, too. Big surprise.
How are sites slashdotted when nobody reads TFAs?
The terrorists have won.
Don't count on the ammo box too, guns are useless against an army with tanks, snipers and airplanes.
Tell that to the Chinese. At the Tiananmen Square protests the 38th Army, responsible for security in Beijing, and other local units refused to fire on demonstrators. So the People's Army had to send in the 27th Army, based outside of Beijing. Chinese officials were afraid the army would split into warring factions because of this. It would be even worse in the US military. I don't know about you but I served in the US Army and just as happened in Viet Nam when soldiers fragged officers and others when they gave bad orders, plenty of people in the US military would do the same if they were ordered to fire on people in the US.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Guns and homemade bombs worked pretty good against an army with tanks, snipers and airplanes in Algeria, Viet Nam, Afghanistan (twice), and in Iraq. So yeah, let's imagine a scenario where the Feds try to impose some sort of dictatorship... you'd have an army of 500,000 active duty soldiers trying to suppress an technologically sophisticated and armed citizenry with 80 million rifles and god knows what sort of homemade contraptions. Good luck. Government by the consent of the governed is a statement of fact, not an ideal.
This is my sig.