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Who's Flying Those Drones? FAA Won't Say
netbuzz writes "The Electronic Frontier Foundation nine months ago filed a Freedom of Information Act request to prompt the FAA to release the names of government agencies and private entities that have received permission to fly unmanned aircraft over our heads. Nine months later, the FAA has neither released the information nor explained why it hasn't. On Tuesday the EFF filed suit (PDF) to force the agency to do so. Says EFF staff attorney Jennifer Lynch: 'Drones give the government and other unmanned aircraft operators a powerful new surveillance tool to gather extensive and intrusive data on Americans' movements and activities. As the government begins to make policy decisions about the use of these aircraft, the public needs to know more about how and why these drones are being used to surveil United States citizens.'"
Not me.. I don't want to be groped and scaned by the tsa or worse by any of those tla alphabet groups for not doing anything.
Citizen moving along, not looking at anything at all. Don't hellfire missile me bro.
With all the economic problems going on, and no end in sight, and the approval rating of the entire government in the shitter, it's pretty obvious. This government knows that the populist uprisings are going to eventually come to our shores, this is why they're bringing the troops home, this is why there have been so many laws restricting the rights of American citizens as of late...
There's going to be an American Spring, maybe not this year, but soon. Things cannot continue as they are...
And here I thought they were bringing the troops home at the demands of the American people.
Occasionally living proof of the Ballmer peak.
Needs a tinfoil had moderation option.
You must think the demands of the American people counts for something.
I don't see any reason why such licenses couldn't be sold to the general public. The plane has to meet FAA UAV standards which they'll have to make up as they go along... and some sort of background check and licensing procedure for the pilots will be important. But why shouldn't everyone get in on this thing? UAV crop dusters. UAV traffic helicopters. UAV medical helicopters. Any situation where we might use human pilots... consider if we need them. Maybe we can get skybuses. Big helicopters that take people across traffic congested cities to depots, train stations, or airports.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
If we finally get rid of George Bush and elect a Progressive (someone like Obama, who has campaigned on maintaining transparency in government), I think we'll do away with this.
But as long as we keep Bush and Republicans in office, we'll always have these types of issues.
It's gonna get really bad when those troops are demob'd, can't find jobs and join OWS.
Or gangs.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
There's going to be an American Spring, maybe not this year, but soon.
Problem is, what we get after is not likely to be any better.
The original founders of the country were pretty effing brilliant in ways that few are any more. They set up a system that worked for a pretty long time to guard against the kinds of abuses we're seeing now, with a recommendation that we throw it all out and start over every once in a while after it becomes too bloated and power-hungry, as it has. I haven't see much out of either OWS or the TP that comes anywhere *near* the sophistication of political thought that those guys had in the 1700's. These days, it'd be all about "gimme!" and not about trying to create a free state.
Get some trial lawyer lobbying group to ask for this info and it will happen a lot sooner.
Once a drone crashes people will want someone to sue, and without a pilot there is no one to go after. Enter an attorney from Dewey, Faulkum, and Howe looking for his 33%, and you'll have more briefs flying around than in the showers at Penn State.
Drones being flown all over the country, by unidentified pilots, Microsoft giving their Flight Simulator game away for free. I coincidence? I think NOT.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
I agree with you 100%. I mean, just the other day my neighbor was sentenced to 25 years of hard labor for Googling "free Tibet".
Hello, former sensor guy here.
No, they are very rarely detectable from the ground. Look at how efficient the exhaust system on a prius is at reducing acoustic signatures. Now put that on a plane that's blue-gray and 16000 feet over you and smaller than a cessna (in fuselage size).
Barely ever spotted unless deliberately flying low.
The issue here is that WHO these are operated by appears to be a government secret. The Government should not have a secret about which government agencies are operating in the US.
Most effective drone technology is still in government hands. (Yes there are some private drones available for anyone with the money to spare, but these are expensive and unlikely to be deployed on anything that is secret, and would more likely be used for forest management, crop evaluation, mapping, etc.)
That leaves two principal areas of sponsorship. Law Enforcement (DEA, ICE, etc), or Military. Military training over military training areas seems perfectly permitted. Military assistance watching the boarders or off shore seems well within the military mandate.
But military operating inland, over cities to spy on citizens is on pretty shaky grounds, and when doing so is a government secret the ground are not only shake they are slippery. You get tangled up with the Possee Comitatus act when you start using Air Force drones for non-defense purposes or to aid Law enforcement without a formal orders to do so, that must originate with the United States Constitution or Act of Congress.
So if the drones are flown by CIA, or Air Force there is a problem.
If the government comes out and says they are flown by DEA, fine.
But refusing to say seems pretty short sighted for an administration that promised open government.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
How's the crime rate in London? Has it fallen significantly since they implemented this?
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
I mean, just the other day my neighbor was sentenced to 25 years of hard labor for Googling "free Tibet".
Mod parent up. Comparing the USA to China does a disservice to people who live in true police states. Could the USA do much better? Absolutely - But Suggesting the USA is as bad as China means one has no clue as to how bad things really are elsewhere in the world.
What the heck are you smoking (and the mods who modded you up, for that matter)? American Spring... American Spring my ass. We are very far from modern requirements for revolution:
1/ support from powerful entity abroad
2/ economical desperation (far far far from what we have now)
3/ a socially coherent massive enough organization of individuals ready to sacrifice dramatic part of their lives (including live itself).
The approval rating of the government could be 0.0%, yet the same 0.0% will go to street.
OWS failed miserably.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
One of the things that one of my teachers said to me in primary school was: "never compare yourself to the worst, or you'll always sink to their level. Always compare yourself to the best." That's good advice here. If you just keep patting yourself on the back for how great you think you are, you'll never get better, and you'll be less competitive.
"I have never let my schooling interfere with my education." - Mark Twain
Lets see :
.......
you are not in tibet yet. but the RATE things are going, are in that direction.
so far, people like you have been sitting pretty saying stuff like 'this is not china' and so on, and believing that such things may not happen in america.
and, meanwhile, while all of you were just sitting like that, the RATE things were going has not changed. increasingly, more repressive laws and bills have been put out. habeas corpus was basically gone out of the window back around 2001. but it had a condition of 'enemy combatant'. you people rationalized it, just kept sitting on your butt. and now, after 9 years, habeas corpus is gone out of the window for ALL american citizens. without any kind of reprieve.
there have been many attempts to censor internet and new media before too. the rate things were going in that direction. you just sit on your butt while these attempts were made. believing that these would not happen there. first attack on net neutrality circa 2005 was attempted, dmca passed, acta went into preparation aaand fast forward to today - there is sopa.
see the point ?
as long as there isnt any change at the RATE things are going and the DIRECTION they are going, it is only a matter of time before things just happen.
in short, if you just sit tight on your butt saying 'doh at least i am not in china', you will someday discover that, you ARE in china.
i cant believe that kind of stupidity which afflicts the modern society : there are a group of people who are saying that they WANT to limit your rights for their own profit, they are DOING things to limit your rights for their own profit, they continually succeed in incrementally removing your rights, so it is just a matter of time until your most basic rights are gone. it is on the horizon. these people are openly saying that they want to remove them, and they are not only telling that, but they are doing what they are saying.
it is the stupidity of looking at now, and seeing things as they are, and thinking that they will keep stay same forever, despite there are those who are incrementally changing it.
Read radical news here
I wish I had mod points for you. The moment you aren't concerned about it will the moment your caught up in a dragnet for viewing wikileaks, or go somewhere you're not supposed to IRL.
Whatever happened to spying at this level on ordinary citizens, simply being you know, WRONG?
---Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A START
One wants cradle-to-grave socialism where the government runs and administers every facet of your life. And the other wants to let their buddies running large corporations lobby for no-bid contracts to decide who gets to run and administer every facet of your life.
I never can tell with such people whether they deliberately lie, or simply don't listen. OWS wants even opportunity. Bush Jr. is explicitly against affirmative action. Nobody should ever get anything based on who their daddy was. Well, unless it's Bush Jr. getting into Yale with a poor record, in which case "legacy" (affirmative action for lazy white people) is perfectly acceptable. OWS recognizes the hypocrisy and such that the 1% uses to their advantage against the 99%. Nobody in the 99% should be eligible for "legacy" but everyone in the 1% should. As if the 1% needed even more handouts, or the 99% needed more hurdles. Yes, I'm explicitly stating that a qualified poor black person was rejected from Yale to let in a rich white person based on who his daddy was. When that's turned around, there's outrage, but when it's the poor black man being kept down, the 1% is fine with that.
"Free market" doesn't mean "anything goes," "free market" means that all the actors make consensual decisions based on their own self interests. Fraud can still be illegal. Use of force, coercion, and harm to others would still be illegal.
You are using economic terms incorrectly. A "free market" is a market with low barriers to entry and well informed consumers. The producers do not want a free market. They commit "fraud" (deliberately misleading consumers) whenever possible. The US does not have and would never have a free market. Such a beast requires tight government oversight, and those who say they want a "free market" do not want it, and those who are for governmental controls against corporate abuse wouldn't use that power to enforce a "free market." I'd love a free market. It puts the power in the hands of the informed consumers. But we don't have informed consumers, and may never have them.
Libertarians don't want to reduce the size of the government. They want to push their social agenda through, which may result in a smaller government than we have now, but they have no goal of "smallest government possible". If they did, they would support education more, as it's shown that $10 in education saves $12 in prison costs later. Instead, they have the "fuck education, we'll pay to put them in jail, but not pay to get them literate and productive" which indicates a goal of something other than trying to reduce the size of government as much as practical.
Learn to love Alaska
You want to know something absolutely bone-chilling?
You know that China that sentences people to labor for thought crimes? That big bad China? Huge population?
The US imprisons more people than they do. That's more people, period. Also more per capita, a shit-ton more per capita, but the really scary number is plain old More. There are over a Billion Chinese! It doesn't seem possible, but it is true.
Man, you really need that seminar!