Slashdot Mirror
Best Handset For Freedom?
Father Thomas Dowd writes "The images we are seeing of Iran are being captured on cell phones and the text is being twittered over SMS. Still, the government has some control over the networks, and we are all familiar with fears of wiretap technologies to spy on users. If the cell phone is the new tool of freedom, what would the best 'freedom handset' contain? I'm thinking of a device with an open OS, where each phone could be a router for encrypted messages passed through Bluetooth/WiFi/whatever, thereby totally bypassing physical infrastructures when necessary. Of course, some sort of plausible deniability encryption a la Truecrypt would also be good, in case the secret police catch you with your phone. What else might we need?"
I'm getting sick of hearing about it. The single main reason is that any (and I mean any) Americans who are involving themselves in it are complete, total hypocrites.
You allowed a monster to hold political office in your country for eight years. He was the single worst political leader that you have ever had, and one of the worst that any country in the world has ever had.
He stole at least the first election, if not both of them. He committed the greatest crime against you that anyone in your government ever has. (9/11) He is responsible for baseless war crimes against Iraq. He built gulags, advocated torture, sought ways around international laws that prohibit torture, and worked tirelessly, night and day, to move your country as close to outright fascism as he possibly could.
Through it all, you never opposed him in any meaningful way. Not once.
No impeachment. No censure. No investigation of him directly; only actions aimed at entirely dispensable underlings like Scooter Libby.
You never challenged either of his election victories. You were never even willing to remotely comprehend the idea that he might have been responsible for 9/11, instead sticking your fingers in your ears and singing whenever anyone suggested it, or calling such people either insane conspiracy theorists, or traitors and un-American.
When he insisted that war with Iraq was necessary, despite using a totally bogus rationale, the vast majority of you unquestioningly swallowed it whole.
With the presidency of George Walker Bush, (and even more, with the continued outrage that the man has not been taken into custody for his crimes) America has permanently forfeited any right that it may previously have had, to pass comment on the moral character of any foreign government, or whether or not said government is serving the cause of liberty.
You cannot credibly oppose monsters in government abroad, when you are entirely willing to allow and accept them domestically.
Spare me also the usual, semi-crying, "Why do you hate America?" response. The only thing such response serves to do, is illustrate the complete, unsparing lack of even the most basic intelligence in the person making it.