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DHS To Kill Domestic Satellite Spying Program
mcgrew writes "The Bush administration had plans in place to use spy satellites to spy on American citizens. This morning the AP reports that new DHS head Janet Napolitano has axed those plans. 'The program was announced in 2007 and was to have the Homeland Security Department use overhead and mapping imagery from existing satellites for homeland security and law enforcement purposes. The program, called the National Applications Office, has been delayed because of privacy and civil liberty concerns. The program was included in the Obama administration's 2010 budget request, according to Rep. Jane Harman, a California Democrat and House homeland security committee member who was briefed on the department's classified intelligence budget.'"
DHS.
Hope is the currency of fools
Intel assets should not be used to spy on our own country. They have too much money to spend on this sort of thing. Imagine the DOD budget being spent to enforce laws. Traffic tickets being issued because a satellite saw you going too fast, or jaywalking. Obviously I'm going for histrionics here, but it's a slippery slope once you take away the absolute prohibition.
Just my $0.55 (US inflation, 1774-2008, for $0.02)
Do you have any idea how much red-tape laws create? It doesn't matter if people "can" still use these satellites to spy, what matters is that doing so will force people to walk through miles of red-tape. Right now, if the police knock on my door, I can tell them to **** off and there is jack crap they can do about it. If they really want in, they get to jump through hoops to do so. This is a huge deterrent for corruption. It's the same reason we lock our door -- just because someone "can" smash the window to unlock the door doesn't mean it doesn't "deter" people from doing it.
"Sorrow is better than laughter, for by sadness of face the heart is made glad." [Ecclesiastes 7:3]
In lots of jurisdictions, a cop could just smash through your door and chalk it up to a mistake, with few consequences.
Sure, they wouldn't be able to prosecute you, but that wouldn't make the events a whole lot more convenient to you.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Food for thought:
The best way to maximise the power of these would be to use them day to day. The more comfortable and accurate we can make it on the common stuff, the better the technology will be when we need it for something more serious.
On that note, where can I get a tinfoil hat to cover my house?
From the article:
"Napolitano recently reached her decision after the program was discussed with law enforcement officials, and she was told it was not an urgent issue, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk about it."*
Later on:
"Bratton, in his role as head of the Major City Chiefs Association, wrote on June 21 that the program, as envisioned by the Bush administration, is not an urgent need for local law enforcement."*
*(Emphasis mine)
Anonymity. Yes, we've heard of it.
-dZ.
Carol vs. Ghost
The interesting thing here -- and this comment is partly motivated by your sig -- is that this killing of the domestic satellite spying program is not a liberal action but a conservative one. If you need an example of where real conservatives and today's Republicans differ, here it is. Republicans such as Peter King will say this is "a step back in the war on terror" but a real conservative would say the U.S. government never had any business spying on its citizens in the first place.
Not private is not the same as government recorded and analyzed.
"I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
Imagine I have a 7 foot (or higher) privacy fence around my back yard. I have an expectation of privacy. Or I happen to own 150 acres in the middle of nowhere. I have less, but still some, expectation of privacy there as well.
In my own arrest a few years ago, for innocent behavior that looked suspicious from afar, I was never once interviewed by a law enforcement officer or prosecutor and given a chance to tell my story, right up to the morning of the trial.
Would that have helped? We are often reminded not to talk to the police. In their current incarnation, the police don't seem to be in the business of maintaining peace and order, but rather in the business of arresting people.
In the current system, pleading with an officer wouldn't do much good. Their role is only to bring in suspects. It is for the courts to decide on the validity of the accusations. Maybe that's not how it ought to be... but that's the way it currently is. As such, talking to the police would not have done you much good.
A classic example of this sort of thing is taking photographs in public locations. The law allows for it, but law enforcement has been known to be to lacking in an understanding of that. As a photographer I would rather have the option of explaining to a policeman my rights (and perhaps showing an excerpt of the law) than to be hauled off to court for something that would eventually be thrown out. That latter wastes my time, the courts time and a whole lot of public money.
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
The title would be less exciting if it read "Bush and Obama has never used satellites to spy on Americans".
Bush didn't use spy satellites our of privacy and civil liberty concerns. Got it.
Now that we are straight on this particular issue, let the Bush bashing begin.
And if you aren't smuggling heroin up your ass, you won't mind an anal probe every single day from the DEA, right?
"But this one goes to 11!"
The program was included in the Obama administration's 2010 budget request
It seems the opening paragraph should have said, "The Obama administration had plans in place to use spy satellites to spy on American citizens." On the other hand, why let the facts get in the way of a good line?
I'm a Programmer. That's one level above Software Engineer and one level below Engineer.
If you need an example of where real conservatives and today's Republicans differ
Nice word game, and example of the No True Scotsman fallacy.
All nice job at partisan baiting. Attribute all positives to the side you identify with, and all negatives to your mythical "liberal" enemies.
I'm getting really sick of these silly dogmatic partisan statements. 100% of conservatives, liberals, libertarians, socialists, and whatever stupid ideology people identify with are wrong. Some small amount of their greater ideology might not be wrong, but the larger corpus of ideals is always wrong. Anyone who identifies themselves within a pure ideology, probably completely divorced from reality, or at least very uninformed. Ideology blinds us to what politics is about, and should be about, PEOPLE, and more so, people in the real world, not some ideologically pure fantasy land.
A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. -edward abbey