Minneapolis Police Catalog License Plates and Location Data

tripleevenfall writes "The Minneapolis Star-Tribune reports that Minneapolis police used automated scanning technology to log location data for over 800,000 license plates in June alone, with 4.9 million scans having taken place this year. The data includes the date, time, and location where the plate was seen. Worse, it appears this data is compiled and stored for up to a year and is disclosed to anyone who asks for it."

Comments

Lawsuit

[dmitrygr]

in 3...2...1...

Re:Lawsuit

[Scutter]

And nothing will come of it. The police will continue to do things exactly as they are now, and we'll continue to lose more of our privacy and civil rights every day. Oh, perhaps they'll throw us a bone by making it harder (although not impossible) to obtain their stored data, but the data will still be there. They won't give up that "valuable tool in the War Against Crime" and the courts will side with them, as they always have when this sort of thing comes up.

Start voting for politicians who will protect your rights and stop voting for just whichever idiot happens to be a member of your party.

Re:Lawsuit

[dmitrygr]

> Start voting for politicians who will protect your rights

I'd love to. Show me one

Re:Lawsuit

[Scutter]

> Start voting for politicians who will protect your rights

I'd love to. Show me one

You'll never see one as long as people keep voting for the status quo. When politicians start understanding that we're sick of this crap and that we won't put up with their poor leadership, then they'll start to change and we'll start getting better candidates. That will never happen, though.

Re:Lawsuit

[MightyYar]

Most people don't care about privacy as much as they care about wedge issues. Sad but true.

Re:Lawsuit

[tom17]

You mean LCD.

Re:Lawsuit

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, perhaps they'll throw us a bone by making it harder (although not impossible) to obtain their stored data

We need to go the other way. If the police gather public data, then it needs to be made totally public, searchable by anyone. That way, (a) everyone's aware of exactly what data is being collected, and (b) everyone is equally subject to surveillance, whether they're police, politicians, etc.

Re:Lawsuit

[Dr Damage I]

IMO, judges see themselves as being protectors of the innocent and punishers of the wicked. This is why the gun rights crowd got hammered in United States v. Miller; gangsters trying to get away with their crimes by appealing to the supreme court aren't exactly sympathetic defendants. By contrast, the Heller and McDonald decisions involved defendants carefully chosen as upstanding and law abiding citizens cruelly oppressed by government overstepping its bounds. Or to put it another way, Jack Miller was seen by the judges as an evildoer in need of their punishment whereas Dick Anthony Heller and Otis McDonald were seen by the judges as upstanding citizens in need of their protection.

In most cases and in the absence of binding precedent, IMO, judges all the way up to supreme court level will attempt to craft their decision in such a way as to produce an outcome that punishes the wicked and/or protects the innocent.

Which means the trick to getting a favorable outcome is carefully selecting who challenges the law. Let a slimebag criminal challenge the law first and we're all gonna get screwed in the rush to punish the wicked. Find someone cruelly oppressed by government drunk on its own power, on the other hand, and we've got a much better chance of a favorable outcome.

Re:Lawsuit

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't want the authorities knowing how, when or where I choose to use my wedges, thank you very much.

Re:Lawsuit

[Anonymous Coward]

Senator Russ Feingold. I'm at least as cynical as most, but Senator Feingold from Wisconsin was the real deal. An honest political broker. Sadly, the anti-Obama wave of 2010 replaced him with a standard issue douche bag politician. A total travesty, no matter your party persuasion.

If you don't remember Feingold for any of the amazing things he did in the Senate--not all I agree with, but all were solidly justified--then remember him for this: he was the only senator to vote against the PATRIOT Act in 2001.

*sigh*

Re:Lawsuit

[fustakrakich]

I'd love to. Show me one

Is that how it works? Everything has to be spoon fed? How about all of you go out and conscript somebody for office. Give him a secretary, and tell him, like it or not, he's stuck there for a four year term. It's the only way you're going to get an honest one, because you all should know by now that anybody who wants the job should probably be locked up in a padded cell... in a straightjacket.

Re:Lawsuit

[Darkness404]

Except for the fact that the masses aren't sick of this crap though. And they system makes it impossible for any third-party candidate to win.

Ask the average Joe why they are voting for Romney/Obama chances are it is because Obama is worse than Romney or vice versa. No one really -likes- Obama, no one really -likes- Romney. About the only politicians that people actually like are the "long shot" candidates like Ron Paul, Gary Johnson and Jill Stein. Naturally, they have no shot in winning because A) The US election system is based on having a medium sized state government and a tiny federal government, a far cry from the large state governments and colossal federal government we have today B) The American people simply don't care about any real changes they just care about ZOMG ROMNEY DOESN'T SUPPORT GAY MARRAGE! MUST VOTE OBAMA!!!! And ZOMG OBAMA SUPPORTS ABORTION MUST VOTE ROMNEY!!! Rather than any intelligent debate on the real issues.

Re:Lawsuit

[Anonymous Coward]

For what? Driving isn't a right. If you want privacy, walk.

Re:Lawsuit

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure, as long as your not a woman or a minority.

Re:Lawsuit

[Desler]

No, because that just furthers the incorrect idea that we only have the rights explicitly enumerated in the Bill of Rights. This is not the case.

Re:Lawsuit

[fustakrakich]

So, you're saying that if all the people that really liked, say, Jill Stein for instance, actually voted for her, she wouldn't be allowed to occupy the office? I wish people would put that to the test, because otherwise their complaints are full of shit. How is that the "system's" fault? The system is fine. The problem is operator error. PEBKAC

Re:Lawsuit

[Darkness404]

The system is based on an ideal America which was shattered following the civil war. The idea is that most laws affecting you and me would be passed in local and state elections where there is more impact and more ability for the common man to influence change, along with more ability to vote with your feet. The federal government would be in charge of doing "big picture things" such as tariff rates, wars and foreign affairs. Their impact on the individual would be normally very low. There was competition built in, the states would choose the senate and the masses the house, meaning that laws that threatened state sovereignty would more than likely be blocked by the senate. When it came to the laws people wanted, it could easily be decided by a state by state basis where one industry or product dominated their economy. Also, political parties were minor.

Today we don't have that, senators are directly elected by the masses, the federal government affects people a lot more than the state government does, no state has a single industry anymore, sure, there are a lot of farms in Kansas but there are also huge technology firms (Garmin and Sprint for example).

There are several improvements that the US could do, such as proportional representation by party (like what much of Europe does) to let everyone's voice be heard, especially since a lot of ideas aren't geographically based. And while I'm not sure what the political benefits would be, I would like to see something like Prime Minister's questions done with the US.

Re:Lawsuit

[Dr Damage I]

Good luck when the SWAT team bursts through your door, shoots your dog and holds you in handcuffs in the back of a police cruiser in full view of your neighbors for six hours or more while the cops tear your home, car and possessions to shreds. When they don't find anything it will be body cavity search time; you wont _believe_ the size of the hands on the nurse assigned to perform the search.

At the end of which, having found nothing incriminating, they'll let you go back to your home saying "hey, no harm, no foul, right?" sniggering all the while.

Re:Lawsuit

[Dr Damage I]

Fair enough. I did say that the chances with a sympathetic defendant are "much better" rather than say or imply that it is a slam dunk. I suppose I was less careful on the "punishing the wicked" side of things.

Re:Lawsuit

[Dr Damage I]

Theoretically true. In practice... not so much.

Re:Lawsuit

[White Flame]

For starters, exclude everybody with a Rep or Dem next to their name.

Re:Lawsuit

[fustakrakich]

This "ideal America". It actually existed? Despite the Indian wars, slavery, The Aliens and Sedition act, whiskey (and various others) rebellion, etc.? Might be a good idea to reread your history there. It wasn't exactly peaches and cream between the states and the feds then either. All things considered, I feel better off in the here and now. Either way, the "system" cannot prevent us from electing who we wish into office, not until somebody puts a gun to our heads and tells us who to vote for.

Re:Lawsuit

[cluedweasel]

Dare I suggest Ron Wyden as a start? Not perfect, but at least he appears to be aware of privacy issues. http://www.justice-integrity.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=648:senator-wyden-fights-lonely-battle-to-protect-your-privacy&catid=44:myblog

Re:Lawsuit

[binarylarry]

I hear Mitt Romney is running on the primae noctae platform.

Re:Lawsuit

[SacredNaCl]

After 9/11 the federal government offered up a TON of money to police departments for the war on terror, and to get them new equipment. Like everything else the federal government does, and generally any payer does - the money came with strings. The strings involved were that the places that took the money would lose a large chunk of local control (and in the event of an emergency -- ALL -- of their local control).

These cameras are a part of that that package, and the package which followed. They are all over any area near an airport (reasonable enough), but they are also along tons of our highways, and in many suburban jurisdictions; with a similar lack of privacy policy in place.

Its impossible for me to drive from my folks place in St Louis County to my home in St Charles County without seeing at least a dozen of these type of cameras. This issue isn't isolated to MN.

I have NO idea where the cameras feed to, who watches them, and what else they do with them. It does, however, creep me out.

Re:Lawsuit

[Smauler]

And nothing will come of it. The police will continue to do things exactly as they are now, and we'll continue to lose more of our privacy and civil rights every day.

Privacy is not the issue, really here, IMO. If you're driving down the road in a government sanctioned car, you've already told them where you live and what you're doing. The problem is fake numberplates - anyone with the same car can just copy your numberplates. Then all the governmental issues get tracked backed to you. The speeding tickets, etc.

Re:Lawsuit

[Anonymous Coward]

Ideal isn't necessarily perfect.

Either way, the "system" cannot prevent us from electing who we wish into office, not until somebody puts a gun to our heads and tells us who to vote for.

Well that is the rub isn't it? A large majority of the population would have to come together around a third party to get them elected, all the while tens of millions of dollars representing billions of dollars in entrenched interests would be fighting to tear that community effort apart.

4chan has a better shot at choosing a third party president than you do.

Re:Lawsuit

[TheLink]

From the summary:

Worse, it appears this data is compiled and stored for up to a year and is disclosed to anyone who asks for it."

If the above is true then anyone including you can build up the database.

Re:Lawsuit

[Attila Dimedici]

Most of the time all they probably need is a similar car (and maybe not even that, if the plate does not come back with anything flagged, what are the chances that the cop bothers to check what type of car it is supposed to be on), unless the driver is already behaving suspiciously. "There was a robbery at 12th and Main. Pull all of the license plates that were logged near there around that time."

Re:Lawsuit

[anagama]

About the only politicians that people actually like are the "long shot" candidates like Ron Paul, Gary Johnson and Jill Stein. Naturally, they have no shot in winning...

It is people constantly worried about winning or losing to the other evil that is the main problem. A third party candidate doesn't have to win to cause a victory for America. All a third party candidate has to do is show the status quo Demoplicans or Republocrats that it is the 1/3 of voters (independents) who decide elections and that they aren't speaking to those voters anymore.

The only way to get there is to make your voice heard by NOT voting for Mr. Brain Cancer (D) or Mr. Ebola (R). If it becomes clear to Mr. Cancer and Democrats that he lost an election because independent liberal minded voters went with Stein instead of him, then the party is going to do something (hopefully beyond mere rhetoric) to try to appeal to those voters. If they don't they'll never be in power again, and that's a mighty incentive.

Here's the key though: you have to be willing to take a short term loss for the long term win.

So for someone like me who is very worried about civil liberties, the worst vote I could make is to vote for Obama because all he has done is make what was radical under GWB, the new normal. If I vote for him, I give Democrats the green light to be even worse. The only way to drive Democrats back to pretending to care about civil rights, is to make it clear that liberal voters abandoned Obama. However, if I use my protest vote for Romney, it will be heard by the Democrats as a suggestion to be even more neo-con than they are currently acting. That option is as bad as voting for Obama. And of course, not voting would just lump me in with the apathetic so it would gain me nothing.

That leaves me with one rational vote: Jill Stein. She is strong on civil liberties and on the ballot. It's actually a very plain choice for anyone who thought GWB's policies were evil and doesn't think those same polices become magical and sparkly fine merely because Obama practices them. All those policies liberals hate will just get worse under Obama, but if he loses, there will, at least hopefully, be some pushback.

A conservative could come up with a similar analysis to vote Buddy Roemer or whoever (fwiw, I've heard him speak and I like him too, I just want my vote to be a clear anti-war, anti-police state vote).

Re:Lawsuit

[MrSteveSD]

How about all of you go out and conscript somebody for office.

That system is known as Demarchy.

Re:Lawsuit

[dcollins117]

No one really -likes- Obama, no one really -likes- Romney.

Huh? I like Obama. That's why I voted for him.

Re:Lawsuit

[betterprimate]

> Start voting for politicians who will protect your rights

I'd love to. Show me one

---------
1. Enjoy your job
2. Make lots of money
3. Work within the law

Choose any two.

Sorry, they all picked options 1 and 2.

Re:Lawsuit

[Gordonjcp]

This is why CCTV is a Good Thing. I kept getting various traffic tickets for my black BMW X5 in London, from ANPR cameras - driving in bus lanes, illegal parking (okay, that one is down to boots on ground), speed cameras and all sorts.

Eventually the police came round, and one of the first things they noticed was that CGA 78X is not in fact a black BMW X5 and is not in London - that plate is on a white Citroen CX in Glasgow. "Aha" they say, "a false number plate!" So by matching up an ANPR activation with a bit of CCTV footage they can easily tell that the car they've seen is not mine but someone else's, and *far* more interesting. I don't know what ever came of it, but I stopped hearing about the black BMW X5 pretty soon after that.

Since things like insurance companies have access to the DVLA database - stick in registration number, get make, model, colour, engine size and a bunch of other useful stuff - you'd think that whoever deals with the tickets would do the same. It's particularly interesting that the tickets I received actually had the make and model down as the BMW - someone must actually be looking at the images, or something.

Re:Lawsuit

[drkim]

I hear Mitt Romney is running on the primae noctae platform.

More like the "primae noctae magicis brevi Braccae."

Re:Lawsuit

[davester666]

That is exactly the kind of attitude that makes politicians want to pass laws forcing you to divulge exactly how, when and where you choose to use your wedges.

Re:Lawsuit

[drkim]

Agreed. Thank you for saying that.

I don't see why having a camera shooting pictures of your state owned plate as you drive down the public street is any different than a cop standing there writing down the plate number in a book, or taking a picture of it.

Actually I do see a difference... the cheap camera being there means the cop is free to answer important calls and saves the taxpayers money.

The truth works for people and not against them.

If I may embellish on this as well:
The cameras work for the innocent and against the criminals.

Re:Lawsuit

[Dr Damage I]

Yes. Because they will never ever ever be used for nefarious purposes to the detriment of the innocent. I trust you, mr policeman! You wear the maaaaagic badge that makes everything alright.

Re:Lawsuit

[drkim]

Yeah, I don't recall the exact amendment that makes driving a right, but I think it's in the same paragraph that gives every citizen the right to fly a jet, gives every citizen the right to date a supermodel, and the right to do brain surgery.

Seriously, it's not a right because it is not enumerated as such in the constitution or any amendment.
Really.
Please look it up.
http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/
http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/billofrights/

The reason it's not a right is because there are qualifications you much have, above and beyond being a citizen, to be a driver.

Great definition here: "A constitutional right is a legal right granted by a sovereignty's constitution to its citizens and possibly others within its jurisdiction."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitutional_right

Re:Lawsuit

[shuz]

Shush, we voted into office Jesse Ventura!

Re:Lawsuit

[penix1]

IF they actually have "no shot" at winning, the reason is because idiots like you keep saying so. Ron Paul is an excellent example of this effect.

You just proved his point. Ron Paul has exactly zero chance of winning an election outside of one of the established parties which is why he is running as a republican.

Re:Lawsuit

[Firethorn]

I'd argue that there are plenty of voters who actually like their candidates, but the 'no one really' comment is merely an exaggeration - Obama, Bush, and Clinton weren't elected because 51% of the population thought he was the best candidate. Realistically, a statistically insignificant number of people is going to believe that their candidate is the 'most optimal choice', but a lot of people are voting for somebody they agree with barely half the time because they perceive the other guy as being even worse.

So when somebody goes to the polls and pulls the lever for Romney when they'd really prefer Ron Paul, they're voting for the 'least worst' candidate they think has a chance.

As a 'moderate libertarian', I'm the type where in preference polls I tend to hit about 40% for both candidates... Huh, this is new, in the 'selectsmart' test I scored 52% for Obama, 39% for Romney. I'll note that in previous tests I normally agreed with Ron Paul(48%) the most. Eh, I had been leaning Obama recently anyways, in the sense that I've seen nothing that suggests Romney would 'do better'.

2nd Opinion: 75% Ron Paul, 60% Obama, 51% Romney.

Given those results, I'd say that a candidate I could vote for without 'holding my nose' would have to at least be in the 70-80% range, average. I say this because Ron Paul is still hold the nose at 62%. Obama(57) clearly leads Romney(45), but not overwhelmingly.

Re:Lawsuit

[Uberbah]

The system is based on an ideal America which was shattered following the civil war.

Trent Lott, is that you?

Re:Lawsuit

[Uberbah]

No. People care about their own privacy plenty. It's that they are fed misdirection (don't you want law enforcement to catch pedos?) and a lack of other options (both parties for the Patriot Act, NDAA, etc).

Re:Lawsuit

[Firethorn]

The 'gun rights crowd' got 'hammered' in US v. Miller because the government got to argue up at the supreme court unopposed. Traditionally speaking, not showing up to court is an automatic loss, regardless of the merits of the case. However, Miller had died by then with him having won at the appellate level, and his lawyer didn't feel like showing up to argue at the supreme court. The 'gun rights crowd' hadn't really even formed back then, so nobody else was watching to ensure somebody showed up.

Despite this, gun ownership was STILL decided to be an individual right, and the regulation of 'short barrel shotguns' was allowed only because nobody showed them as useful to a militia. Now, this being the same year as WWII started, most gun rights types feel that making that argument would have been very simple - short barrel shotguns nicknamed 'trench guns' being a semi-common issue in the military of the time.

Re:Lawsuit

[roman_mir]

How about 2?

Ron Paul.

Garry Johnson.

Re:Lawsuit

[kheldan]

Most people are idiots who have been cowed into the belief that "privacy" is not valuable, or worse, that it's something that only criminals want to protect. I'll be the one pointing and laughing at them all when and if they discover what it is they've thrown away.

Re:Lawsuit

[Stirling Newberry]

There's something called the 14th Amendment which established a new relationship between citizen and states and citizen and Federal Government. One of the reasons that libertarians are going nowhere is because it doesn't take too long to hear the "Lincoln was a war criminal" meme, and along with several other phrases which were very popular among say, Dixiecrats, in 1972. States do not have monetary policy and their economies are not large enough to stabilize at our current level of trade. Left to their own devices states such as Florida and Rhode Island would do to their economies what Ireland and Spain did: throw open the doors to financial speculation, and then fall when it collapses, or what Italy and California have already done: create large untaxed economies and still insist on having horizontal transfers of wealth.

There is a reason for the victory of muscular federalism between 1855 and 1945, not just in the United States, but globally. That reason is that markets, not borders, define a state interest. This is a reality that many people in the present – while most visibly on the far left and far right, just as pervasively in the suburbanite middle – do not want to grasp. If the national economy fails, then all of the small carve outs that people grab for their locality are unsustainable and unaffordable.

Re:Lawsuit

[MightyYar]

I think it is actually because we are genetically predisposed not to value privacy. It's very unlikely that we had much in the way of secrets during our hunter-gathering years when the bulk of our evolution likely occurred. It's possible that we're even programmed NOT to keep secrets.

Re:Lawsuit

[MightyYar]

Perhaps, but I think that no matter what a candidate thinks about privacy, people value other issues more: gay rights, abortion, immigration, offshore oil drilling, etc... despite these issues having very little to do with most people's living standards or the well-being of the country. Privacy just hasn't hit "wedge issue" status yet, and probably won't since God doesn't seem to inspire preachers about it and it can't be used as a tool to redirect populist anger.

Re:Lawsuit

[fustakrakich]

A definite improvement. Now, to work it into the mainstream...

Re:Lawsuit

[fustakrakich]

...markets, not borders, define a state interest.

That is the quote of the day.... Word

Re:Lawsuit

[fustakrakich]

The spoiler effect is bullshit. Bush won because enough people voted for him, not because some voted for Nader. So you can shitcan that idea.

Re:Lawsuit

[tolkienfan]

If we don't vote for a lizard, the wring lizard might get in.

Re:Lawsuit

[pepty]

So is there a problem with jurisdictions where it is simultaneously illegal to record and log the position and behavior of officers/their vehicles but it is legal for officers to record and log the positions and behavior private citizens/their vehicles?

Re:Lawsuit

[ubrgeek]

Not sure you picked the right examples: I'd say gay rights and abortion more than just touch on privacy issues. For example, look at Associate Justice Blackmun's disenting comments in Bowers v. Hardwick.

I think the problem is that most people don't see the link between things like that case and the government's downslide away from respecting our privacy. There should (in a magical world filled with puppy tears and unicorn farts) be a direct correlation where every time a government entity loses a case that deals with some aspect of privacy it acts as a wakeup call reminding them the issue is actually Privacy - with a capital P - with respect to Our Right To It Everywhere, vice privacy - with a lowercase p - with our right to it as it relates to that one particular instance.

Re:Lawsuit

[canadian_right]

The USA constitution doesn't give Americans any rights. The USA constitution says you already have all those rights, plus any we didn't think to write down, and reminds the government to NOT abridge any of these rights that you already have simply because you are a human being.

Driving is not a right because the law says it is so dangerous that you need to be licensed to do it.

Re:Lawsuit

[drkim]

Later gvmt took that right away from you. The states can possibly do this -

Correct, the state can regulate who, and who cannot, drive a vehicle on a public street. That is to try to keep people from killing each other with their cars. They can test you, monitor your driving record, etc. So it's not a right of every citizen, it's a privilege granted by the state.

In the same way not everyone has a 'right' to be a brain surgeon, not everyone has a 'right' to fly a passenger jet.

Common law allows us to do that which is not prohibited, but the feds or states can regulate things (like driving) for the good of the public.

Re:Lawsuit

[drkim]

Thank you... you said it far more eloquently than I.

Re:Lawsuit

[AK Marc]

The system gives free handouts to the two parties. The system penalizes any party other than the two parties. It's very easy for a two-party candidate to get on the ballot. The last time a 3rd party candidate was on all available ballots was when, 1980 (and even then, as a 3rd party, he was still a member of one of the two parties).

I agree in principle that there's nothing that prevents people from getting a popular non-major candidate elected. But in practice, there are significant barriers.

Re:Lawsuit

[AK Marc]

Ross Perot is a better example. Ron Paul is an actual member of a major party, and has run as such.

Re:Lawsuit

[MightyYar]

I get where you are coming from... but people just don't think that deeply about wedge issues. They are "black and white" issues that are easy for a politician to spout off about. Blackmun might be a very thoughtful, considerate man. But the average person does not consider the deeper implications... they just don't want babies to be slaughtered (or the government restricting what women do with their bodies). They don't want gays to be married (or want gays to be married). That's pretty much where it stops. If you are lucky, they might have a particular bible quote they can point to or a particular Supreme Court case... but mostly it's just the same drivel you hear time and time again from talk radio.

Re:Lawsuit

[fustakrakich]

They already do. Romney on one, and Obama on the other (though Romney's is a sham). Guaranteed win. In a way it's the reverse. Today's republicans are really just the old dixiecrats that bailed when Johnson signed the civil rights act.

Re:Lawsuit

[ai4px]

I keep digging to find out when we went wrong. So far, I'm back to the War of 1812. The American Ideal didn't last long. Reconstruction was particularly horrendous.... very much akin to the mob making you a deal you couldn't refuse.

Re:Lawsuit

[ai4px]

Absolutely. The dems and repubs are doing a grand job of making us afraid of the other guy. What the USA needs, but will never get, is a preferential vote system like Australia has.

Re:Lawsuit

[ai4px]

The part I like about Miller vs US case is what the Supreme Court didn't say.... you see, if Miller had shown that a short barrelled had a use in a militia it would have been unconstitutional to tax it. Funny, I read this as saying that any fully auto weapon that has ever been used in war by anyone should not be taxed / restricted. In contrast, the small 10/22 rifle I shoot at home could be taxed / restricted because it has no use in a militia.

Re:Lawsuit

[Firethorn]

That's basically the argument that has carefully NOT been brought before the supreme court. By the Miller decision, one can argue that a military pattern M-4, much less it's semi-automatic variants, are MORE deserving of constitutional protection than weapons not militarily useful - such as your 10/22, black powder guns, hunting rifles, and such. As such, the NFA in most of it's entirety would be unconstitutional, much less the closing of the automatic weapon registry.

They recently asked Scalia about the issue, specifically about hand held missiles. He danced around a bit, but it seems that he, by default, seperates 'arms' and 'ordinance' as 'arms' being something the single soldier can carry and use, are at least semi-commonly issued to such.

My personal line - is it equivalent to what our soldiers are individually issued for use? If so, then it has to be legal for 'the people'. Whether it's a single shot musket or a futuristic laser gun. I'll even go so far as to say that an 'arm' is typically not single use, which would rule out most RPGs, grenades, and such.

Currently, that would be the M-16/4 line of weapons, short barreled shotguns(issued to breach teams a lot), 9mm semi-automatic handguns, etc... The 'milita' isn't expected to be able to show up with 100% conforming weapons, and they can provide a good test-bed of alternative arms, so I'll include PDWs(personal defense weapons like the FN-90), which give potential combatants more firepower in an easier to control platform than handguns, but still maintain a fairly small profile compared to an assault rifle. Along with that, I'll allow alternatives. The Beretta 9mm is the US Service pistol, but the Brits use a Browning or Sig in the same role while the Germans use an H&K USP. US Special forces often use .45ACP, and .40S&W is about the most common police cartridge(where they use pistols more than the military). The FBI wanted to use 10mm, but found it too powerful for some agents. So I'd provide protection for any 'high power semi-automatic handgun', with 'high power' being anything 'roughly' between 9mm Parabellum and 10mm Auto in power range(.45 is fat and slow, about the same as .40S&W, less powerful than 10mm). Rifles would be an even wider range - anything between .223 and .50 BMG, automatic to bolt.

Re:Lawsuit

[JBaustian]

The politics around the civil war changed things(true). It became clear that states were no longer part of the union by their own choice (regardless of the reason they wanted to leave.

The Constitution was ratified by conventions in each state, not by the state legislatures. Thus it was argued that the people and not the states had created the union. Those states which tried to secede lost the argument.

Re:Lawsuit

[JBaustian]

Feingold was as much a collectivist as any other Democrat. Which is to say that he was just as active in limiting individual liberties as any of the others. His vote against the Patriot Act could be seen as an effort to protect Islamic extremists from the consequences of their actions.

Re:Lawsuit

[JBaustian]

Unfortunately (for the usefulness of your idea) there are a number of states in which it is illegal to have any kind of cover over the license plate. I learned about this after I bought clear plastic covers to protect the extra-cost "nature" plates. (The extra money goes to the Dept of Natural Resources.)

Re:Lawsuit

[kheldan]

If that turns out to truly be the case then I'm happy I'm a throwback in that regard.

Re:Lawsuit

[Errol backfiring]

Isn't there a Pirate Party in the USA?

Re:Lawsuit

[Keith111]

The best way to counter this would be to get a group of people to do the same thing to the police. Create a database of when and where you saw any police vehicle and their license plate numbers. Eventually they will get freaked out enough that there will be a law against collecting this sort of data.

Disclosed to anyone who asks for it?

[Anonymous Coward]

So I could request and get this data? Sounds like it could be fun to play with.

Log the Minneapolis Police

[ZipK]

Someone should log the Minneapolis police; somehow I think they'd object.

Re:Log the Minneapolis Police

[y86]

They tend to object to being video taped.

Example
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROwtAk6Q_Rk

Re:Log the Minneapolis Police

[girlintraining]

Someone should log the Minneapolis police; somehow I think they'd object.

Actually, in Minnesota, you can be charged with a felony for giving people any warning of an upcoming speed trap. You can also be charged with one for providing information about the police' whereabouts. The first thing authority does whenever it violates your privacy is exempt itself from similar treatment. This is how you periodically hear about an off-duty police officer in plain clothes getting into a fight with someone -- even if they were the aggressor, and even if they fail to identify themselves as a police officer, the other person still goes to jail for many years for striking an officer. Or that case of how a man accidentally bumped into the President in a crowd, while waiting to shake his hand, and was then carried away by the Secret Service and held without a trial for several months because he "made a physical threat against the President."

Government agents can abuse whomever they want, whenever they want, for as long as they want. And you will take it, Citizen, or things will get even worse for you... as well as your family and friends.

Re:Log the Minneapolis Police

[bmo]

Actually, in Minnesota, you can be charged with a felony for giving people any warning of an upcoming speed trap

Citation needed or GTFO.

Every time someone decides to fight stuff like that, especially "the flashing of headlights is a felony" bullshit, it gets struck down as unconstitutional.

http://articles.nydailynews.com/2012-05-23/news/31829713_1_ryan-kintner-speed-trap-free-speech

Legislatures can keep passing these laws, and they can keep getting struck down. If you get hit by one of these laws, fight it.

--
BMO

Re:Log the Minneapolis Police

[girlintraining]

Okay. Heeeere's your sign:

"Flashing lights are prohibited, except on an authorized emergency vehicle, school bus, bicycle as provided in section 169.222, subdivision 6, road maintenance equipment, tow truck or towing vehicle, service vehicle, farm tractor, self-propelled farm equipment, rural mail carrier vehicle, funeral home vehicle, or on any vehicle as a means of indicating a right or left turn, or the presence of a vehicular traffic hazard requiring unusual care in approaching, overtaking, or passing. "

Next up, flashing your high beams. If you flash your beams to warn other drivers, you very likely will be doing that when they are less than 1,000 feet away. Hello ticket!

You may be right that coming straight out and saying warning motorists of an upcoming speed trap is protected speech today, in Certain jurisdictions, but there has been no nationwide precident, and it's quite clear that the laws have been rewritten so officers can continue to punish you for warning other motorists, they simply now classify it as either an equipment malfunction (if you say you didn't flash your lights), or a moving violation (if you say you did). Oh, point of note: The fines for each cost the same. Choose well, young grasshopper.

Re:Log the Minneapolis Police

[Dr Damage I]

If only there were a law that enabled us to refuse to answer a government officials questions

Re:Log the Minneapolis Police

[tripleevenfall]

You can't log the cops' license plates, they all just say "POLICE"

Re:Log the Minneapolis Police

[canadian_right]

Our police post most of their big speed traps, etc... on their web site so the local news can spread the word. Our police are trying to make the roads safer, not collect fines. Part of this might be because all the fines go into the province's general revenue, not to the police or city.

Re:Log the Minneapolis Police

[randyleepublic]

Soon mobile apps will alert one and all. No flashing lights needed.

Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[vandelais]

for comparing records against stolen vehicle, missing persons, wanted criminals, and revoked license reports.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[Anonymous Coward]

None of those uses require retention. None.

If a license plate connected to suspected criminal activity is located, the officer can be notified right then, right there and take appropriate action.

If a plate is of interest then law enforcement needs to act. If it is mundane then there is no reason to store it.

The flipside to the "nothing to hide" cliche is that if a law-abiding person has nothing to hide, then the authorities have no business intruding.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[knapkin]

Granted you did point out a legitimate bias as the lean is that all capture of license plates is bad (something I'm admittedly on the fence about).

For me the real problem is the logging and storing. For each of the legitimate use cases you outlined, there should be no need to store license plates for anyone to whom those use cases do not apply.

For instance, let's just look at the stolen vehicle use case. As soon as the license plate number is processed (i.e. the image processing software has done it's job and associated an actual number to the image), a query is made against stolen vehicles. If the license plate is not for a stolen vehicle, the image and logs are deleted. You may argue that 12-24 hours of activity are needed, so I could see a data log that is that long being legitimate since it might take a day or so to notice that your car is missing.

A similar process could be applied to each use case you outlined. I would be interested in use cases you can identify that make a year's worth of logs sound legit.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[Darkness404]

Right, and we also should do ID checks every 3 blocks, after all, it would allow to search for:

Missing persons, wanted criminals, "illegal" immigrants, kidnapping victims, terrorists, etc.

Just because there are possible legitimate uses for the police to deploy such technologies doesn't mean the benefits outweigh the clear privacy violations. Do you also really believe that all the PATRIOT act does is protect us from terrorists?

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[girlintraining]

...for comparing records against stolen vehicle, missing persons, wanted criminals, and revoked license reports.

Every technology has both legitimate and illegitimate uses. The law should anticipate illegitimate use and prescribe penalties, rather than wait until the town square is full of angry citizens with pitchforks and torches, and then call them 'subversives' and 'terrorists' and have them water cannoned and shock grendade'd into a bloody pulp while yelling "Terrorists!" Responsible law makers take the social contract of "protect and serve" seriously... which is exactly why there are no responsible law makers anymore. Who the hell wants to protect and serve when you can abuse the hell out of the general population in exchange for kick backs and living in a mansion?

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[zerro]

In some places, like Texas, probable cause isnt really needed if they want to search your persons. There are many loopholes in the law that leave the decision to "arrest" a suspect of seemingly trivial, non-violent offenses (such as jaywalking, or running a stop sign) up to the officer. Purportedly for safety, the officer may search your persons/property and of course hope you didn't have something incriminating on you. (Tip: don't hold on to your friend's "electronic cigarette" for him)

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[girlintraining]

Right, and we also should do ID checks every 3 blocks, after all, it would allow to search for...

Actually, that's totally legal, as long as they stop everyone passing the checkpoint.

Just because there are possible legitimate uses for the police to deploy such technologies doesn't mean the benefits outweigh the clear privacy violations.

Er, you're going to deny the benefits of the technology because of a logistical/administrative issue? The privacy violations are only because this data is available publicly, something required by federal law. That's one of the reasons why our crime rate is so high to begin with: Once you're convicted, that conviction becomes public record and can be used forevermore in employment decisions. Which for all intents and purposes makes you unemployable, especially when the economy is bad. Which leaves you only one option for income: More crime.

Do you also really believe that all the PATRIOT act does is protect us from terrorists?

Yes, but only the really stupid ones.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[nurb432]

"...he who gives up liberty..." bla bla bla.. Go look it up.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[Darkness404]

Do I wish to deny the use of technology to amoral thugs who routinely abuse their power? Absolutely! Giving more power to the police has never worked out well, not for the US, not for any other country. Given their abysmal track record for protecting civil liberties why would I want to give them another tool to oppress people? Given their lax attitude towards real crime (ever report something stolen to the police?) and their attitude towards victimless "crimes" (they'll knock down doors and come in with riot gear to attack a suspected "drug dealer") why would I want to assist them? In most other countries the people act as a deterrent to police power. In the US you see this: http://thesocietypages.org/socimages/files/2011/11/original.jpeg in the rest of the world if a cop does that, you see this: http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/07/05/world/sub-ukraine/sub-ukraine-articleLarge.jpg (both SFW images).

And to top it all off, their only checks end up being... other cops. No accountability to the people at all.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[fm6]

Every civil liberties violation has a legitimate use. Think how much easier it would be for cops to solve crimes if they didn't have to bother with search warrants.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[drkim]

And perhaps it should be illegal for a government to use technologies that automatically record all license plates. It's an order of magnitude different from someone simply sitting around and recording them by hand.

Why is it 'worse' because it is 'more?'

Would that also apply to free speech? "Well, one radical blogger on the internet is OK, but 10 radical bloggers on the internet should be illegal because it's an order of magnitude more."

It seems to me like these cameras would help exonerate 10 times the innocent, and catch 10 times the criminals. I don't see that as worse.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[Uberbah]

Why is it 'worse' because it is 'more?'

He didn't say "more". He said there's a difference in an "order of magnitude", which is obviously the case.

Unless you think that an officer writing down numbers by hand, or a police scanner that stores numbers only long enough to check to see if they are stolen, is remotely equivalent to a permanent, cross-referenced government database.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[AK Marc]

My favorite is "arrest". Any time the police are talking to you and you reasonable expect they would hold you by force if you were to leave, you are being held by force at that point, thus arrested. So, if you are pulled over for a traffic ticket, you are under arrest. But if you reasonable expect that you will be let go at the end of the conversation, then you are not under arrest.

It's Schroedinger's arrest. You are arrested in that they can search your person for weapons (anywhere in your car within arms reach of where you were in the car is on your person, even if you are handcuffed and sitting in the back of a police cruiser at the time), but not arrested in the manner where you are read your rights or can exercise them without being arrested for resisting arrest.

Any question you are asked (other than your name and address) answer "no" unless that's a lie, in which case indicate you won't answer without your lawyer present.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[AK Marc]

"...he who gives up liberty..."

Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.

Oh, even in your abbreviated version, you screwed it up. Hard to believe you know what it means when you quote only the part you remember and mangle that horribly.

Booth was a patriot

And Abraham was a vampire hunter.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[nurb432]

It wasn't meant to be accurate word for word, but instead to represent the essence of it.

I think you also need to look up the definition of patriot. Lincoln was many things ( *none* good ) and he was not a vampire hunter. But nice try to diminish what Booth tried to do.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[Culture20]

The privacy violations are only because this data is available publicly

I thought the privacy violations are due to government's (any govt) tendency to become corrupt. A secret tracking database in the hands of a corrupt govt official is no less dangerous than a public govt database in the hands of a corrupt govt official, except that the data is also available to random crazies and lawyers in the public example. But that doesn't make the private DB benign.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[AK Marc]

Booth was a coward who would murder for his ideals, but not fight for them. He hated Lincoln almost solely for Lincoln's anti-slavery position, and only gave lip service to anything else as justifications for his pro-slavery stance against Lincoln. He was against a strong government solely because the government effectivelly nationalized the private property of slaves, and not for any other reason. He wasn't a patriot, he was an anarchist, the opposite of patriot. That, and insane, but libertarianism (modern anarchism) requires insanity. Oh, and I am a libertarian, but I've never met another libertarian who could state his opinions without directly contradicting himself at least 10 times. But then, I'm not a real libertarian because I believe that things like the Bill of Rights were a good thing.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[nurb432]

Booth was a man who was willing to make the ultimate sacrifice for his country. Patriot.

He was no better or worse than someone like Washington, only that the south had lost so he was not herald as a hero.

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[AK Marc]

So all the IRA bombers, PLO bombers and every other suicidal terrorist should be lauded as a "patriot"?

Re:Nice bias, burying legitimate usage instances

[nurb432]

Technically, yes.

How to fix this

[mbone]

Step 1 : Request data on every member of the City Council (or whatever the local government equivalent is).
Step 2 : Find out who's "daily routine" includes frequent trips to a local strip club, and who is spending the night at locations not their home.
Step 3 : Publish anonymously in wikileaks.
Step 4 : Watch this policy change amazingly fast.

Re:How to fix this

[Anonymous Coward]

All that will change then is that only the police and politicians will have access to the info.

Re:How to fix this

[Professr3]

The only change would be that City Council records are excised automatically from the database, and requesting any such information about City Council members will become a felony.

Re:How to fix this

[girlintraining]

Step 5: Forget that FOIA requests have your name on it.
Step 6: Go to jail for a long time for... *shakes magic 8 ball* terroristic threats.

Minneapolis city counsel members were amongst the first to draft anti-occupy legislation to evict people from the public squares, in secret and without notice. They then posted signage saying that the area would be closed for 'maintenance'. A few hours later... they rolled in with the big police vans and arrested everyone in sight. Before that they ran water pressure sprayers from dawn to dust in the area the protesters congregated, under the title "routine cleaning". For two weeks.

Do you really think they're gonna blink if someone publishes that information? You can't negotiate with terrorists.

Re:How to fix this

[Ichijo]

Step 1 : Request data on every member of the City Council (or whatever the local government equivalent is).

Impossible. If you had read the synopsis, you would know that the data only includes "the date, time, and location where the plate was seen." It doesn't include names.

Re:How to fix this

[Ichijo]

look up who owns the plates

How do you do that without a court order?

Re:How to fix this

[Ichijo]

Just wait in the parking lot after the city council meeting. I'm pretty sure it would be easy to connect names to plates.

What if it's a secured garage, or the vehicles are shared, or the city council members carpool, or walk, or ride bicycles, or take mass transit?

Re:How to fix this

[ToddInSF]

Uhh, you watch them get in the car ?

Geeze, its SO hard to get someone's home address and look at their plates.

Re:How to fix this

[Dr Damage I]

What, city council members use the transportation methods that they prescribe for ignorant peons?

Cold. Day. In. Hell.

Re:How to fix this

[dcollins117]

The only change would be that City Council records are excised automatically from the database, and requesting any such information about City Council members will become a felony.

Step 5: Run for City Council.

DON'T LIKE IT ?? TAKE A BUSS !! TAKE A CAB !!

[Anonymous Coward]

Or just don't go out and commit crimes you low-life scoundrels !! This is for your protection, which is our job !! You think we want to do this just because we can ?? We don't it because it is our duty !! And so we can pay Intergraph 58 million dollars. Besides, we got the money for all those cameras from Homeland. Use it or lose it !! We are The Government !!

Slashdot hypocrisy

[Anonymous Coward]

So, when people get stopped by the police for taking pictures in public, everyone rages against the police. When the police take pictures in public, everyone rages against the police.

YOU CAN'T HAVE IT BOTH WAYS. Either it's okay to take these pictures and do what you like with them, or it's not. Stop looking at everything the police do as bad and evil and inherently abusive, and treat all instances of an issue the same.

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[SydShamino]

Sure you can. The police are public officers working a job for which they are empowered with the ability to detain and arrest. The public are exercising their rights to move freely and with relative anonymity through their own state.

These are drastically different scenarios and it's perfectly reasonable to allow constant surveillance of one (where the people have been entrusted with abusable rights) and not the other.

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[qbel]

We have a right to anonymity?

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[BlueStrat]

So, when people get stopped by the police for taking pictures in public, everyone rages against the police. When the police take pictures in public, everyone rages against the police.

YOU CAN'T HAVE IT BOTH WAYS. Either it's okay to take these pictures and do what you like with them, or it's not. Stop looking at everything the police do as bad and evil and inherently abusive, and treat all instances of an issue the same.

ORLY?

Just try setting up surveillance of a police station and log/publish license plate data on comings and goings.

Helpful Tip: Make sure you've made prior arrangements for legal counsel and for posting bail.

Strat

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[SydShamino]

Yup, you have a right to move about without being constantly monitored. It only rarely comes up. A few years back a judge ordered someone to stop recording the license plates of every car that came into a polling station to vote. The same injunction is made on occasion again people trying to record the plates of every car visiting a given adult video store. Unfortunately the right isn't codified into law, but it's based on judicial precedent. Of course you don't have the right to total anonymity as the government or a private detective can choose to follow you specifically - even with a tracker on your car if they have a warrant.

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[SydShamino]

While you were replying to me in general agreement, note that I don't actually believe much in inalienable rights. The problem is that they are entirely impractical. You might claim that a person has the right to free speech, sure, but do they have the right to live? Probably - what's the point of speech if you're dead.

But to live, I continue, you need breathable air. So is the right to breathable air inalienable? What air is yours then, exactly? Just the air in your lungs? How useful is that since that's spent air. Do you have a right to the air you are about to breath in? What if it's above someone else's property? What if that person chooses to pump mercury vapor into this air? Do you have a right to stop him from doing that? Is that more you stopping him from exercising his rights than him stopping you from exercising yours?

The end result of this logic exercise is usually that, in order to have any inalienable rights at all, we have to have strong and strict laws protecting the commons and environment. We may even need food stamps and health care.

I'd much prefer a strict, strong list of defined limitations in our rights, that include things like protections for commons and care for the sick, and then let anything else by free by default. Then some people can argue which of those free things are more or less free than the others while the rest of us stop being bothered by them.

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[Jedi Alec]

YOU CAN'T HAVE IT BOTH WAYS.

Actually, we can. There are plenty of things private citizens are allowed to do that we do not want the government to do.

And as history has shown us time and time again, any and all government activity should be viewed with suspicion, for if we look away for even a split second we get screwed sideways. A politician, contrary to a suspect, is guilty of being a lying untrustworthy sack of shit until proven otherwise.

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[drkim]

We have a right to anonymity?

Not in public.

There is no expectation of privacy for your license plate, which is the property of the state and is designed specifically to identify a vehicle.

Remember, the camera doesn't shoot the driver, just the plate. (and there is also no law prohibiting taking pictures of you in public, anyway...)

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[qbel]

Who said I thought the Bill of Rights grants rights? I was pointing out a flaw in what I see as the mindset driving the OPs statement, and now the responses to my post. I think you, and many of the responses here to this article, are just assuming we have these things that don't exist until questioned. I believe the same thing as the person in the post above about the Wright brothers and their right to fly without a permit.. before a permit for flying was even thought up We don't know if we have a right to something until that right is questioned in court, and then deemed necessary to be controlled by law. If it is determined that it is a right, then that court case and its result is the only thing standing as future testament to it being a right (though it can be challenged.. where as a law has more weight, and is more difficult to challenge). I think it's foolish to assume everything not explicitly stated/limited is a right.. the truth is: it MAY be a right, but won't truly be until it has stood up to the scrutiny of the courts and/or lobbyists.

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[Penurious Penguin]

Could it not be reasonably argued that while there is no reasonable expectation of privacy while driving and despite state-ownership of the plate, it would otherwise require at least the efforts of a very persistent stalker to acquire half the data collected by this technology?

To compound the line of logic above, it is also exceedingly questionable that such powerful, perpetual surveillance should be pointed at the public while the public are still -- despite Federal rulings -- being intimidated, arrested, detained, and prosecuted for filming police in public places.

I know it is vaguely related, but what are your thoughts that the Castle doctrine can apply to automobiles, which are apparently public places?

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[drkim]

Well, taking pictures in public is legal, both for the public and the police. I think we agree on that.

The law does not recognize an expectation of privacy on a public street. Collecting this data for a lawful purpose seems to be legal, however, stalking itself is illegal. So, much like having a screwdriver in your pocket, it's not so much the collecting of data, but the intended use of the data that matters. (The screwdriver in the pocket of a mechanic, in the daytime, in his shop, is a tool. In the pocket of someone loitering around behind a jewelry store at 3am, it's a burglary tool. 466 PC here in CA.)

As to photographers "being intimidated, arrested, detained, and prosecuted for filming police" I believe police are now being instructed in the legality of this. However, a lot of these people (that I see on YouTube) are not being arrested for photography, they are being arrested for:
1. Interfering with the police.
2. Failing to obey a lawful police order (like, "Hey, get out of the street. Get out of the street. Get out of the street. Get out of the street. Get out of the street. OK, you're busted.")

I don't know how the Castle doctrine would apply to your car; but I never said your car is a public place. I was saying that if your car is on a public street, that it, and you, are in a public place. However, your car would be a legal 'extension' of you, which means if someone started beating on it, it could be considered a battery against you.

(And please, no "car battery" jokes...)

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[AK Marc]

Of course you don't have the right to total anonymity as the government or a private detective can choose to follow you specifically - even with a tracker on your car if they have a warrant.

That's not the right to anonymity, that's the right to secrecy. Anonymity and privacy are mostly unrelated. Anonymity is security through obscurity. Using a pseudonym isn't "secure", but, so long as someone can't subpoena your publisher for your details, it's usually sufficient. Violating anonymity requires using non-identifying information to identify someone. With sufficient non identifying information, identity can be confirmed.

But a tracker on your car isn't something they do if they don't know who owns the car. They generally do that so they can more easily violate privacy.

Secrecy is neither privacy, nor anonymity. Secrecy is hiding something from someone/anyone. Anonymity is a tool for secrecy, but not the only one. Secrecy is more a why, and anonymity and privacy are hows. Take prostitution. Say someone is going to one of the many conventions in Vegas and decides to partake of the legal prostitution while there but doesn't want work/wife to know. They would likely take out cash (explain it away as cab fare, as acceptance of credit cards in taxis is not universal, or is it, I haven't taken one in a while), and exchange payment in cash without names, so it would be anonymous. They would also likely meet with "discretion" (privately, and as non obvious as possible).

But yes, nothing will stop a determined professional from following you. For the divorce, they could subpoena the bank ATM records for the withdrawal and check bank statements for any cabs paid with cards to verify the laundering of funds to free them for cash payment, or stop the private eye following him from getting photos of her going to his room, and anything he can see through the window, along with interviewing her after for her statement, though it would likely be short.

But following someone is unrealted to anonymity. To be followed, you must first not be anonymous. You are known to the follower. So any anonymity could not apply. But privacy may still apply, depending on the situation.

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[Penurious Penguin]

A thoughtful reply, but there are one or two errors in it, one of which I can correct with both experience and certainty, and the other which I'm not sure of.

First, both "1." and "2." are rarely factors beyond abusing technicalities. From the reports, videos and actual instances I've dealt with, the police are not "interfered" with and the camera-person if lawfully instructed has complied. But if that camera-person is on their own property or elsewhere (not a street) -- as has been the majority of cases -- then a command from an officer to leave the area is unlawful, or at the very least an abuse of power. "Interference" is a very big term and must be used responsibly. Even the less-intelligent officers are creative enough to stretch this word far beyond reasonable context -- and frequently they do. I will admit that I've seen such examples as you've mentioned; however, they are rare. I would even say that such cases are more rare than the illegal confiscation and destruction of the camera and/or its contents. An officer is payed to police both public and private areas. With this duty comes risk. They simply cannot evacuate the area of every minor crime scene and they shouldn't be able to! In many of the cases I've observed, it was the equivalent of redirecting interstate traffic so that a single traffic-citation could be issued without "interference".

Now for that second thing I wasn't quite sure about, but find sort of interesting; are many houses not also in public places -- with some literally on, or at least (with their rooftops) overhanging? And is the street "public" or private? We seem to have to pay rent to use them. Perhaps it is a simple matter of what immediate surface happens to be below the individual at the time and location of the question, i.e., either the public owns the spectrum of space aka the asphalt or concrete road (to a vaguely defined depth and height) -- or the state owns it likewise. But that's probably silly because on a road, a car is a "legal 'extension' of" the self and is not just beneath, but all around. *I am beginning to suspect all legal planning comes with obligatory aneurysms, or at least a prerequisite of nihilism and bucket of amphetamines*

Aside from that, and as you mentioned, the data is a critical aspect of the surveillance. What makes you sure that the data is not being applied to other things beyond their stated mission? It requires a mere reference to "terrorism" or "extremism" these days for government to avoid an FOIA or conceal their affairs. Maybe we should all read the fine print on the implementation of this technology; sometimes it can be very fine, and I doubt a few FOIA and FOIL requests would hurt.

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[drkim]

...if that camera-person is on their own property or elsewhere (not a street) -- as has been the majority of cases -- then a command from an officer to leave the area is unlawful

It may very well be unlawful, but that is not the place for the debate.
In the field, citizens have a duty to comply with commands from police. The legality of those commands can be challenged later in court, and torts filed for damages. The thought being that a citizen may not know the reasons for these commands (maybe someone called and said there was a bomb in your house, maybe there is a suspect in the area...)

On the photography: Again, this is a fairly new ruling. Many departments have already done training on this, some have not, I believe the tide is turning. Why don't you post links to some egregious examples?

On the public/private house: you are confusing a "public place" with "public view." If I am walking down the street, I am in a public place(...and in public view.) If I am standing in my picture window in the front of my house facing the street I am on private property, in public view. This is why if the cops walking down the street look though that same picture window in the front of my house facing the street, and see me bagging drugs, that could give them probable cause.
I'm not sure why you said you "pay rent" to use the street? Do you mean taxes? All citizens pay taxes to provide for things enjoyed by all citizens.

...the data is a critical aspect of the surveillance. What makes you sure that the data is not being applied to other things beyond their stated mission?

I'm not sure.

Like many things in real life, I have to place a certain degree of trust in my doctor, dentist, car mechanic, and police department.

There are many checks in place over the actions of the police and government. (Believe it or not.) And, although that does not prevent every bad behavior, that is why pretty much everything eventually comes to light; from Watergate, to water boarding, to a "wide stance" in a mensroom.

It's NOT a perfect system. It's just the best we have been able to devise.

Myself, personally, I like the idea that everybody has a camera. The citizens have them, the police have them, the stores have them, the ATMs have them.

To me (a non-criminal) that means that I can video the police if they misbehave, they can find my stolen car quicker, the store can see that I'm not shoplifting, and the bank can see it wasn't me hacking money out of my account.

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[Penurious Penguin]

"links"
Aside from more than a few having been taken down from youtube by youtube, here's what i have for now. You'll very likely resent all sources involved, and while I dig up references to instances of police abusing photographers specifically, I will supply stuff I've gone over in the past, especially considering the latter part of your last reply: ~
http://eccentricintelligenceagency.info/archives/7389 ~
http://eccentricintelligenceagency.info/archives/5243 ~
http://info.themicroeffect.com/2011/06/23/rochester-police-arrest-woman-videotaping-a-traffic-stop-from-her-own-property/ ~
http://www.libertariannews.org/2011/06/28/terrorist-breaks-serfs-nose-and-kicks-his-chest-in-for-video-taping-him/ ~
http://www.libertariannews.org/2011/08/19/pastor-tells-a-pig-to-shove-it-after-pig-accuses-pastor-of-potentially-having-a-wmd/

Since the mainstream media misses so many of these events and fails terribly at interrelating them to examine the larger issue, you'll have to deal with the sources who are willing to. If you really are interested, I will find more recent and more specific examples. The above should be quite a headful.
Suffice it to say though, that I am very wary of giving excessive advantages to these "authorities".

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[drkim]

Well, I looked at your first two examples. (I'll look at the rest later)

1. The VO guy makes a lot of assumptions, and ignores a huge fact. He doesn't show what led up to this guys arrest. You can't really see what happens when they try to pull the guy out of the car. And in the audio, when the suspect spit on the officer, the dialogue was telling, "Why did you spit on me?" "I'm sorry..."

Now, it sounds to me like the guy DID spit on the officer. i.e. If some cop suddenly said to me, "Why did you spit on me?" my response would be "What are you talking about?" not, "I'm sorry..."

2. You never see what happens between the police and the two people just before they are arrested. We do see them, very gently, being led away. This seems to be fairly common in this type of video, you don't know if they hit the officers, grabbed at their gun, or did nothing; so they really don't "prove" anything, one way or the other.

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[Penurious Penguin]

Not that it should make much of a difference, but I'm beginning to suspect you are involved in law-enforcement in some way? I will tell you very directly that there are officers I would gladly assist any time. I am not anti police -- am anti corruption. But what you saw in that first video, aside from being narrated by a former officer, was 100% police brutality. I urge you to re-evaluate it. But there are far more than dozens of other examples to examine - far more!.

Finally, while I offer you respect even if in fact you are affiliated with law-enforcement, I also hope you will spare me of future dialogue; I am a chronically tired person and just don't want to waste my time talking to an iron fist, no matter how intelligent it is. Your evaluation of that first video is very suspicious to me and I honestly cannot imagine how anyone but an apologist could gather what you have. If not so, my sincere "thanks" for looking, but maybe have another glance.

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[drkim]

Well, in the first video, I will honestly say I didn't "see" anything.

By that I mean, I didn't see whether or not the guy was resisting, I didn't see whether or not the cops beat on him, I didn't see whether or not the guy spit on the cops.

The VO guy sure put as much anti-cop spin on it as he could (and then some) saying, in essence, because he didn't actually 'hear' the guy spit on the cop - it never happened. So, I dismiss everything the VO says and draws.

So on this video, I gotta pass. It's obvious the cop's blood was up, but that doesn't mean he beat the guy.

The guys car was smashed up in a ditch. Is it possible he was injured in the crash? Is it possible he was in a bar fight before the crash?

There are just too many things I didn't see, so it's possible there was police abuse, it's possible there was none; but I gotta pass on judgement.

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[Penurious Penguin]

I admire your reluctance to judge - though we definitely disagree on the video. People get convicted on less evidence many times per day. If you'll permit, whether you reply or not, I will leave this thread with the following facts:

The US imprisons more people per capita than any other developed nation.
We trade inmates on the stock market in the US. Crime is an industry.
An enormous portion of inmates are incarcerated for victimless crimes.

The first fact can be verified by many sources, including wikipedia. The second as well (I made the wiki stub on Correctional Services Corporation). The third should be apparent to any rational mind. Thousands and thousands of upstanding people are more than sick of police-state abuse. To be fair and unprovocative I'll leave it that. Thanks for making me think.

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[drkim]

OK Number 3:

She wasn't arrested for videotaping. She was arrested for not following the instructions of the officer.

One of them (couldn't tell) kept telling her he didn't want her standing behind him while he was doing his job with the other person.
He kept telling her to go in her house. She kept arguing. He gave her several chances.
She kept arguing. Finally she got arrested.

This goes back to my previous post:

...that is not the place for the debate.
In the field, citizens have a duty to comply with commands from police. The legality of those commands can be challenged later in court, and torts filed for damages.

I'd guess he didn't want anyone standing behind him, who could be a threat to him.
Maybe he didn't want her standing behind him in case someone in the car opened fire on him.

The sad part is that she could have just said, "Yes sir." gone in the house, and videotaped through the window.

Re:Slashdot hypocrisy

[SydShamino]

I don't propose a small list of rights. I propose a small list of limitations, I.e. the opposite. Those limitations need to include some things not limited now, though, like better protections for the common air, water, and soil.

Mod parent interesting

[Mr 44]

This is apparently the logic that actual police use.

Re:Mod parent interesting

[codepunk]

No it is exactly the logic that all govt organizations use.

New Revenue Stream: Blackmail

[stoicfaux]

Is the database of married couples in Minneapolis also public...?

Can we cover our plates while the car is parked?

[Snotnose]

Might be a money making opportunity for someone to make plate-sized magnetically attached doohickeys we could slap on our license plate as we exit the car. Make even more money by selling advertising on the things. Just don't forget to remove it when you get back in your car.

Doesn't solve the problem of getting caught heading down the highway, but does solve the problem of parking in a strip club parking lot.

As the death screams......

[Grayhand]

of ten thousand cheating husbands echoed through Minneapolis.

I think this is a good thing.

[fustakrakich]

I can call up and find out where I was on last night's bender

Re:This is what police do

[Darkness404]

Says someone who has most likely never actually looked outside of the US or Europe. There are plenty of places that are quite safe despite having very little or no police presence. You look at the biggest causes of violence in the world and the answer is simple: the state. Look at the drug cartels, do you really think that drug cartels would exist if the drugs they were selling were legal? Of course not. Nearly all organized crime exists because of the state prohibiting the sale of goods where there is an inelastic demand.

It is perfectly possible to have harmony and peace without having a police state.

Is this legal for citizens to do?

[DeadboltX]

Can I put a camera on my front yard that records license plates, and then feed that into a computer system that creates similar logs?.

Can I put a camera on the roof of my business to do this?

Can Starbucks or McDonalds put a camera on top of every store location and track vehicles nationwide?

Re:Is this legal for citizens to do?

[pentalive]

There is the story of the major supermarket chain that sent someone over to the competitors to record license plates. Then used the information to send out extra coupon flyers.

Re:Is this legal for citizens to do?

[Penurious Penguin]

Not sure if I am understanding you correctly. Are you implying that you're clever enough to configure your home computer to interpret numbers from a .png, .jpg, etc.? If so, you are a bright fellow; the police-force pays high dollar for this technology. Otherwise, the answer to your first question is a hopefully-obvious "NO!". If I'm the fool here, please do explain what program is available to me that will extract numbers from images.

Re:Is this legal for citizens to do?

[drkim]

Can I put a camera on my front yard that records license plates...

Sure. You can take pictures of anything in public view.

The only hitch is that you can't turn those numbers into names. All you'll have is a bunch of letters and numbers. But you'll know that 123ABC passed your house at 10:00pm.

Re:Is this legal for citizens to do?

[drkim]

It's called OCR "Optical character recognition" and started back in 1914.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_character_recognition

Re:Is this legal for citizens to do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, it's legal (for now). And there are companies (Vigilant Video, for example) that aggregate the license plate+location data and resell it for things like auto repossession.

Re:Is this legal for citizens to do?

[Penurious Penguin]

Thanks for the wiki link, but can you direct me to any particular software that would read license tags passing by my home? Preferably something that would work on Linux. And how long are you implying that cameras have had the capability of reading license plates (in motion and many numbers of them) for? Surely not since "1914", or 1941, or even 1984. I am still convinced that this is on an effective level, a recent and expensive technology. Again, all corrections welcome.

Re:Is this legal for citizens to do?

[Penurious Penguin]

Thanks for that much. The comments are a bit useless; but their comprehension likely doesn't exceed their acronyms.

Re:Is this legal for citizens to do?

[drkim]

You may want to try the new search service called "Google" (funny name, huh?)

Type in "license plate reading software" and you'll get about 1,970,000 results.

Here's one now! :
www.platerecognition.info/1103.htm

Re:Is this legal for citizens to do?

[Penurious Penguin]

First, I admit my naivety on this subject and truly did not think it was so widely available on the consumer level. I was aware of its widespread use in the UK, and even in my own town by authorities. It seemed to me at first, that a home camera and desktop-computer would have a difficult time sorting through thousands or even hundreds of plate-images per day and indexing them accordingly. I stand corrected and mildly embarrassed. Please pardon the ignorance. However, the fact that it's existed for decades should not be exaggerated. The same could have been said about the SR-71, which had existed for quite some time before it was known about by even the technically inclined.

As for the cutesy "Google" comment, why not just bypass /. and use the all "new" google instead, aye? Or try suggesting it during your next discussion where any questions are asked. And just in case the only two things you have knowledge of are OCR and google; "results" imply very little. For example: "Platypus cup reading software" produces 12,900,000 results. But I guess I have no choice but to absorb your insults; I did make a ridiculous reply to what I now realize was your perfectly reasonable comment. And yes, it is a funny name for a government proxy.

Re:Is this legal for citizens to do?

[drkim]

OCR isn't the issue; that was assumed. The provlem is that you have no way of turning plate "123ABC" into "Joe Blow's car".

please do explain what program is available to me that will extract numbers from images.

Actually, he was asking about OCR.
You are right, however, that "...turning plate "123ABC" into "Joe Blow's car" is a problem.

More specifically, it's trivial for computers, but difficult legally.

At least it's open

[dirk]

While I think it's a shit policy and would prefer that they don't do it, I do have to say I do like the fact that it is open to anyone. To me, if law enforcement is gathering this type of information, it should be available to anyone. That way, we can keep track of the police and politicians as well as they keep track of us. The same things goes for public "safety" cameras. While I would prefer to not have any, if they are going to do them, they should be open to anyone to be able to watch.

Re:At least it's open

[Penurious Penguin]

Yes and no. Regarding public availability, the problem I see is the potential to build a sort of historical locational dossier on people, which though no secret, perhaps should not be compiled and and placed by software into a dense, organized file containing otherwise virtually impossible-to-acquire data for convenient perusal of, well, anyone. Until we actually go at least a few decades without a holocaust or war, I vote for privacy. The present invasions of privacy taking place are dubious even for a utopia. We have neuro-marketing in nearly every major retail venue, a very curious NSA, unrestricted law-enforcement surveillance (almost), TSA, civilian psychopaths, and much more.

As for other problems, I could easily go into a rant. But hopefully someone else will take care of that.

Re:This is what police do

[Darkness404]

Exactly.

Although, I have to say this is more true for the Americas and Europe than the rest of the world. A good chunk of the police in what the west are fond of calling the "third world" actually have morals and want to help people.

Probably much more pervasive than you expect

[Penurious Penguin]

For example, they do it here in SRQ. What I'm curious about is how this stuff works on helicopters. As for what was once called "VeriPlate" but is now attempting to slip into obscurity, please see this PDF for an overview.

Much better plan

[SuperKendall]

1) Put up your own license scanner for the same roads the official ones are on.

2) Gather data for a year.

3) Download the official list, and see who they deleted...

NOW you have something juicy.

Re:Much better plan

[AragornSonOfArathorn]

1) Put up your own license scanner for the same roads the official ones are on.

2) Gather data for a year.

3) Download the official list, and see who they deleted...

NOW you have something juicy.

4) Publish route to Batcave

Why act surprised?

[nurb432]

You are out in public running around. They have access to both public and private data ( license plate matching ) and tech is now pretty cheap to do this and once setup it for the most part is self-mining.

Is it right? No. Is it legal? Yes. Get used to it? Yes.

Re:Why act surprised?

[cheekyjohnson]

Get used to it? Yes.

Yeah! Why bother trying to fix anything? Just get used to it.

Re:Why act surprised?

[nurb432]

Good luck with that. The government has been encroaching on our rights since it was formed. It wasn't 'fixable' then, you expect it to be now?

Get used to it and adapt.

Re:Why act surprised?

[cheekyjohnson]

The government has been encroaching on our rights since it was formed. It wasn't 'fixable' then, you expect it to be now?

I expect it to be fixable when people do something (even if that's highly unlikely).

Of course, that'll be "never" if all we do is adapt.

Relevant Seattle Police Case

[Frosty Piss]

The Seattle Police recently lost a lawsuit concerning access to Dash Cam video and related information about retention...

See here: http://www.informationliberation.com/?id=40238

Re:If you don't want to be tracked...

[cheekyjohnson]

If you don't want to be tracked, then just move out of the US. You have that option. That's how free countries operate.

Re:If you don't want to be tracked...

[Ichijo]

You're being tracked right now, while reading this. Now, care to tell me what wanton destruction justifies such tracking?

You misunderstand. My point is, it's justified to track something that has a high risk of causing death and destruction.

Re:This is what police do

[BenEnglishAtHome]

There are plenty of places that are quite safe despite having very little or no police presence.

Where?

Seriously. I'm retired and deeply troubled by the notion that I no longer respect but merely fear the police in my country. I might be willing to relocate. Give me a short list and I'll do some research.

Land of the People Who think They're Free

[fullback]

"If you don't stop stalking and harassing me, I'm calling the police!"

"We are the police."

Re:This is what police do

[BenEnglishAtHome]

Feeding the troll, but, hey, what can I do? Like any good troll, he's building on a kernel of truth that should be addressed.

I've done this research in the past and found nothing that suits me. The GP seemed to have some particular places in mind and, if so, then the GP seemed to need a bit of encouragement to reveal them.

As for standing up and fighting - there are ways and there are ways. One of the best ways to fight injustice is to leave its sphere of influence until it burns itself out. That's proactive, hard work, and pretty much the opposite of lazy. If my country is an experiment that's failing (and I believe it is), then building a better life in a better place (assuming I can find such a thing; I haven't succeeded yet) is pretty much the most efficient way to fight injustice that exists. Effective resistance against evil is illegal, anyway, so I'm willing to trade away immediate local effectiveness for long-term achievement. If such logic disgusts you, feel free to continue bitching on internet forums. I prefer to actually do something.

Re:DON'T LIKE IT ?? TAKE A BUSS !! TAKE A CAB !!

[smchris]

Of course, most of the buses have had cams for years.

And since they're phasing out the old passes and pushing the convenient web account enabled smart passes that you can charge with your credit card from home, you better pay cash if you don't want your bus route tagged.

Re:This is what police do

[Darkness404]

A lot of the island nations in the Caribbean are generally (mostly) laid back and have less of a police presence, I've heard people having good luck with Argentina and oddly enough Mexico, haven't been outside of the tourist-y areas there enough to tell you exactly how they are. If you can, I'd talk to people who have moved/lived in those countries if possible because it tells you a good deal more than the official crime statistics (for example, was the person killed in a random drive by killing or cheated with a guy's wife? Were they killed in the "bad part" of town or not? Etc.). If you want to explore the option further, you might want to try reading some of this blog: http://www.dollarvigilante.com/blog/ , while I certainly don't agree with all of it, its interesting to read nonetheless. There are a few benefits to relocating to a more free country, and while I haven't taken the plunge quite yet its certainly eye opening to see what many are missing.

Medical care is cheap and top notch, hospital rooms feel more like a room at a luxury hotel than a prison. Your dollar goes further, a very nice meal that might cost $75+ in the states costs perhaps $20. Property taxes are cheap to non-existent and labor is quite cheap.

But you've got to do your research to find something that fits what you want. But the nice thing about the internet is, finding people who live in X foreign country is a lot easier than it was 20 or 30 years ago.

Re:This is what police do

[Darkness404]

Sure, its a problem with bad laws. Now, do you expect me to have respect for someone who knows there are bad laws out there and yet tries to uphold them? This isn't a 1950s TV show, anyone who joins any sort of police force knows exactly what corrupt laws are in place and undoubtedly knows the corruption rampant in "law enforcement" and yet they still choose that as their career path. Why would I have respect for someone who does that? Why would I have respect for an organization who as a whole ignores real crime (try reporting something stolen the police, they nod, write stuff down and promise to "call if something turns up") and goes after non-crime (such as drug use, the same officers who were so apathetic to help fight real crime suddenly can get encouraged to break down a door to stop someone from committing a victimless "crime") instead.

I have absolutely no respect for any amoral thug who happens to be wearing gang colors and a gang sign, no matter if those colors may be blue and the gang sign is a brass shield.

Re:This is what police do

[BenEnglishAtHome]

Thanks. Based on my research, Argentina is at the top of my list and it's interesting that you'd mention that country. I have a visit planned for 2014.

There is precedent

[Beryllium Sphere(tm)]

It works for jury duty.

Re:This is what police do

[Darkness404]

So what do you propose to do Mr. AC? What's really funny is we look at the people who escaped tyranny abroad to come to the US with nothing but a dream and the shirt on their back to have more opportunities as heroes, but yet a few generations later when the tyranny is domestic suddenly its cowardly?

Tell me, how are you going to fight injustice? Lets just start with one piece of injustice, the US PATRIOT act, tell me, how do you, as a single person, expect to get that to be repealed? Its not like everyone loves the act or that it is so obscure no one knows what it is. So tell me, how are you going to get that repealed? What candidate is running on a platform of repealing the PATRIOT act? Certainly none of the major ones. Sure, you can vote for Ron Paul and Gary Johnson or another third party candidate, but how will that turn out better than 2008 did?

If you want to fight injustice (without violence) the only way is to leave, deprive the government of your income, your talents. It isn't cowardly, its heroic. Its not running away from hard times, its running towards a better future.

Re:This is what police do

[Darkness404]

Yep, you might also want to check out Chile too. Both are very modern and generally well prepared for disasters, economic, natural or man-made. Economic collapses are nothing new in Argentina and so the people largely have a culture based around that and so they are better prepared if/when another one hits.

Let's crowd source it

[witherstaff]

I could see an interesting crowd sourcing project though of a name to a plate. If the camera hardware was cheap enough for an outdoor system and easy to use software to spit out a plate I wouldn't be surprised if people around the country would use it. Any neighborhood watch would love it. I'm not a hardware guy but an external camera and easy software that would work is probably still too pricey to make this doable. Perhaps a hardware guru could chime in.

I live on a state highway, a rural area but it still gets a lot of out of staters on weekends. I don't see how I could get in trouble if I directed a camera on my property at all license plates driving by and recorded the info, even if I published it as a live feed. Of course police have it easier since they can do a plate search to find out who the individual is. Also private cars don't have the nice plate scanners on their car and cell electronics probably wouldn't work.

I have a vague recollection of some license plate website in the dotcom era where you could leave messages to a license plate. Seems like a natural fit for FB app.

Re:This is what police do

[drkim]

Very few countries have "...little or no police presence..."

Somalia has a fairly minimal police force but, "Pervasive and violent crime is an extension of the general state of insecurity in Somalia. Serious, brutal, and often fatal crimes are very common. Kidnapping and robbery are a particular problem in Mogadishu and other areas of the south." (USDOS)

Why don't you move there, and then report back to us on the, "...harmony and peace..."

They aren't out to get you

[shuz]

Unless they should be. I live a few blocks from a police station in Minneapolis. So I am sure they have seen me driving around before. Though I am pretty sure they are not out to get me. A few years ago during a bad snowstorm a police officer knocked on my door. My elderly neighbor, bless his heart, called the police to say that he had not noticed my car move in several days. I take the bus to work so this is fairly normal. The nice officer apparently checked out my garage, walked around the house to ensure that it was "safe" and then knocked on my door. When I came to the door he politely asked if I was ok. After explaining that I take the bus to work and that I was perfectly fine he left, no more questions. Now if I had a drug lab setup in my garage, there might have been a problem, but I don't. Heck he didn't even mistake my beer brewing stand for a drug lab, which I guess in a sense it is a legal one. A quick thank you shout out to Jimmy Carter, best president ever. My point is that the police are not out to get you and though I may not agree with programs like automatic scanning and tracking databases, I believe that police serve much more of a positive service than an invasive one.

There is no "at least" here.

[Uberbah]

This system is police state BS, straight up. This is the same faux-balance that we see with the 'Super Congress' - a few dollars in defense cuts to match cuts to health care. But in the first case, a defense contractor might have to make do with a Mercedes instead of a Bentley. But in the latter, people will die from lack of health care.

Re:There is no "at least" here.

[khallow]

But in the latter, people will die from lack of health care.

We will all die from lack of health care. You need to show substantial benefit from that health care spending, not merely claim that people will die. Else, I merely point out that people will die from the allocation of wealth to health care (people who give more to taxes have less to spend on their own well being). Also, more demand for health care means higher health care costs (that supply and demand thing).

I'd love for this so-called "faux-balance" to exist in Congress. It'd address the US deficit which I personally see as a far greater problem than public health care.

Re:There is no "at least" here.

[Uberbah]

We will all die from lack of health care

Don't be willfully obtuse. The United States is alone in the industrialized world in rationing health care based on the ability to pay. Case in point: a 24 year old man who died from a freaking toothache because he didn't have money to pay for a dentist until it was too late.

You need to show substantial benefit from that health care spending

This was proved decades ago by the rest of the industrialized word with socialized medicine. Not only does it provide better care, it does so for less money. Which is why wingnuts resort to hand waving crap like "we all die from lack of health care" rather than citing stats showing the US having superior stats for less cost.

Else, I merely point out that people will die from the allocation of wealth to health care (people who give more to taxes have less to spend on their own well being). Also, more demand for health care means higher health care costs (that supply and demand thing).

Tautologies with zero basis in reality. If you could, you'd be showing how the US has a lower infant mortality rate than Japan while spending less money on maternal and pediatric care. If you could, you'd be showing how the US has a lower rate of fatal heart disease than France while spending less money on prevention and care.

You don't because you can't. Like the jury in To Kill A Mockingbird, you know perfectly well what the facts are. You just choose to ignore them because sticking to your storyline is more important.

AC dumbfuckery

[Uberbah]

On what planet is a private citizen making recordings on his personal equipment and, at worst, uploading a video to Youtube remotely equal to a permanent government database tracking millions of people?

Seriously, did you think about this for two nanoseconds? 40 years from now, what's going to have more of an impact on society: that an old Youtube video showing a cop bullying a skateboarder might still be on online, or President Jenna Bush (or President Sasha Obama) being able to pull up records of your every movement for most of your life?

Smart phones

[shuz]

Google, Apple, and possibly to a lesser extent Microsoft already have better patterned info about your whereabouts and that information is largely private but still available to government agencies at their request. The license plate scans would be pretty useful for crime fighting. Police for many years have been allowed to at random run a plate to check for any problems. This program just automates that. My only hope is that a tiny Perl script pulls everything nicely together on the backend. :-)

Re:Smart phones

[gl4ss]

forget google, apple and MS about having your whereabouts.

the operator you subscribe your cellular service has logs about which cells you were connected to. these logs have been used in serious crime investigations for the past 20 years already as clues and proof - the government can get that if they want. and to google, ms and apple you could send fake info - rather harder to do that to the cell network(well, leave your phone home. if you have a second phone never ever mix the sims in the phones or even keep them regularly open at same location).

Re:This is what police do

[gl4ss]

huh, somalia has an extremely large militia to civilians ratio... which is occupying itself with for example kidnappings. they are the de-facto government in charge there and largely that's the problem..

Re-read the Request...

[damn_registrars]

Start voting for politicians who will protect your rights

I'd love to. Show me one

How about 2?

Ron Paul.

Garry Johnson.

You must have misread the request. He was asking for politicians who will protect rights, not politicians who will openly and happily sell rights to large corporations.

Re:This is what police do

[drkim]

Yes, Somalia is one of the few places on earth that doesn't have a well structured police force.

But, I'm still waiting for "Darkness404" to tell us about all the magical fairy-lands that are, "...quite safe despite having very little or no police presence..."

Perhaps he never heard about the Montreal police strike:

"As a young teenager in proudly peaceable Canada during the romantic 1960s, I was a true believer in Bakunin's anarchism. I laughed off my parents' argument that if the government ever laid down its arms all hell would break loose. Our competing predictions were put to the test at 8:00 A.M. on October 17, 1969, when the Montreal police went on strike. By 11:20 A.M. the first bank was robbed. By noon most downtown stores had closed because of looting. Within a few more hours, taxi drivers burned down the garage of a limousine service that competed with them for airport customers, a rooftop sniper killed a provincial police officer, rioters broke into several hotels and restaurants, and a doctor slew a burglar in his suburban home. By the end of the day, six banks had been robbed, a hundred shops had been looted, twelve fires had been set, forty carloads of storefront glass had been broken, and three million dollars in property damage had been inflicted, before city authorities had to call in the army and, of course, the Mounties to restore order."

Re:This is what police do

[AK Marc]

I'm not telling. I moved out of the US 3 years ago, and I'm not planning on going back. I'd renounce my citizenship to lower my tax burden to the US, but then I'd possibly have trouble doing things like going back to the US for my mother's funeral (not that she's dying any day now, but my father died last year, and she's in her 70s). The police here are much more like the British police from 40 years ago. No guns, and very polite, even to drunken brawlers spitting on them.

But there are few Americans here, as Americans talk about leaving, but so few ever do (unless assigned overseas for work, in which case a surprisingly large number stay abroad, except for military, they always go home.

Re:This is what police do

[Culture20]

Frankly, the police could have prevented none of that from happening had they not been on strike. That was a temporary power vacuum. What was stopping all those crimes was the fear of getting punished, and police were seen as the sole arbiters of punishment, much to the chagrin of the burglar the doctor killed (an MD? What happened to the Hippocratic Oath?).

Re:This is what police do

[drkim]

Frankly, the police could have prevented none of that from happening had they not been on strike.

I think that's kind of the author's point-- q.e.d.: that the city went nuts BECAUSE they knew the police were on strike..