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Florida Activates System For Citizens To Call Each Other Terrorists
An anonymous reader writes "Sheriffs in 13 Northeast Florida counties announced an online system Thursday for residents to report suspicious activity they think may be terrorism-related. The site provides examples of red flags to watch for, such as people with an unusual interest in building plans or who are purchasing materials useful in bomb making. Important places to watch include hobby stores and dive shops."
Can't they just call 9-1-1???
Karma: Bad
Ben Kingsley looks like a very convincing one in Florida if Iron Man 3 is anything to go by. Bit of a different role to Ghandi :)
With enough reporting, they might catch a single person who once thought about some act of terror. But wait, isn't that different from a terrorist attack?
Oh well, let Florida sort it out, they're good at that.
Because the best way to find a needle in a haystack is to dump increasing amounts of hay on top.
What can possibly go wrong?
Drop out of school. Anybody who wants to learn any math and language at all is obviously suspicious. The buttons on the Mcdonalds cash register don't have any numbers or words on them. Curiosity kills more than cats.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
I have here in my hand a list of all the people I suspect of terrorism. It includes many of my business competitors and personal acquaintances I find annoying or otherwise repulsive. For example, you'll see on page 5 I've included Ms. Johnson from down the street who lets her dog shit in my yard and never cleans up after it. I've noticed her making furtive glances at my front window while the dog is dumping and I'm pretty sure she's making notes of when I'm not home so she can steal the propane tank from my Grillmaster and use it in her reign of terror.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stasi
Read it, think, reflect.
HTTP/1.1 400
I am just looking at my hate list and deciding who deserves more more than just a minor SWATting....
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
As a relatively reclusive person with an electronics "lab" in my garage with the door always open I can see it now.. Police barge in and force me to the ground. "what is this device? it's used for making bombs isn't it!" "no sir.. that is called an oscilloscope." Hell, that might be enough to ship me off to gitmo, but I'm white so probably not.
all of Florida's landscaping business now under suspicion of being terrorists. Multiple instance of fertilizer being purchased have been witnessed..
. . . .What a breakthrough! NOW, you don't need to hack VOIP to SWAT somebody, the most you need to do is spoof your IP address. . . .assuming the system is smart enough to log and geo-locate IPs in the first place. . .
...right down the drain.
I genuinely don't know what to say to Americans now. It's not like they can just pack up and move to the next country over. But I sure as hell wouldn't be staying another week if I was there... what a sad ending to a country with great promise.
[SHOW SOME LENIENCY TOWARDS
...Otherwise, I'd be spending all my time talking to the cops. I'd probably set off every single alarm that's on their "suspicious activity" list. I'm active in hobby rocketry, and sometimes transport my engines in surplus bazooka shell cases. Plus, the girlfriend is a dive instructor.
Hey, anyone remember the 50's and 60's? One the AWFUL things were were told about the Soviet system was the constant suspicion - people encouraged to turn in their neighbors, children encouraged to turn in their parents... (SIGH)
If they're young, or wearing a hoodie, or darker skinned than you, or listening to that rock music... they must be up to no good.
This will not end well.
chemical (water processing etc) engineers are interested in one of the country's largest man made chemical(water) processing structure.
shocking!
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
You mean the sheriffs? The politicians? The newspaper editors? Who exactly do you want us to report all of?
Maybe it should be a poll:
Who should we focus on when making reports about terrorism in Florida:
* The local police department.
* A state or federal police-related department.
* The local judiciary
* State or federal judiciary
* State politicians
* Federal politicians
* Newspaper editors
* Cowboy Neal
Wow, if you replace the word 'terrorism' with 'witchcraft' - it sort of reads like a document from Salem, MA circa 1692.
My neighbors are mutants. And Commies. And they talk of these security levels that I know can't exist...
Double plus good! Vote "Fascist" for a seventh glorius decade of secure stability!
Looks like a report submition can be sent from outside the US. This will be abused massively.
United we stand, divided we fall. Now we can all not trust one another.
This is just what we need. All of the Gladys Kravitzs' of the world unite to create suspicion and problems with your neighbors. A system that lets you anonymously turn in those you hate. Shit, the KGB would love this.
It reminds me of "Cheech and Chong's Next Movie:" In an effort to get the cops to come to the hotel for the protagonists activities, i.e., breaking into a room, Paul Rubens in his Pee Wee Herman motif tells the police: "Look I think they're Iranian!" Next thing you know SWAT and dozens of squad cars show up.
So, grab some popcorn and lets watch to see what happens next when some poor guy is shot or arrested for welding in his garage.
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
This is a good example of why I prefer to live where the local top police official is elected, not appointed.
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.
Perhaps we could call the terrorist hotline and report a black car with tinted windows. I just saw the driver looking around suspiciously as he sat in the car and just before he closed the door, I noticed he was carrying a pistol out in the open and had what seemed to be a sawed off shotgun in the front seat. He spoke using a lot of codes, as if they were second nature to him. I strongly suspect this individual to be involved in a rather large, well organized group who seems to want to harass and harm people. I think he's either a terrorist or a government agent in an unmarked car.... it is so hard to tell the difference these days.
Only the police and military should have hobbies.
Didn't Germany have a similar program to this, where a citizen could report suspicious behavior on their fellow citizens?
7 Caught Trespassing At Quabbin Reservoir; Patrols Stepped Up Across State
BELCHERTOWN (CBS) – Shortly after midnight Tuesday, seven people were caught trespassing at the Quabbin Reservoir.
State Police say the five men and two women are from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Singapore, and “cited their education and career interests” for being in the area. The men told police they were chemical engineers and recent college graduates.
The Quabbin, in Belchertown, is one of the country’s largest man-made public water supplies. Boston’s drinking water comes from the Quabbin and the Wachusett Reservoirs.
Looks like the Massachusetts State Police were able to spot this one on their own.
Though my suspicion is that these gentlement just got directions to a B&B in Enfield, and didn't realize it was at the bottom of the reservoir now.
This definitely reminds me of the V science fiction series from the 80s. Society looks down on science and scientists, and society puts full faith and trust in the authorities. People are ready to snitch on their neighbors over the slightest bit of suspicion.
The only difference from the series and real life, the enemy isn't an external force; it's us tearing ourselves apart in fear. Meanwhile, the power hungry simply use that fear to gain more power and wealth while everyone else is distracted and takes little notice.
Should I report Mike Holmes alone, or do I need to name each member of his crew
I'm a chemical engineer, and I too visited several water and wastewater treatment facilities while in college. The whole class went at the same time on these "field trips." But, from TFA:
All of the "field trips" we took were during the day, and never "shortly after midnight." And, the trips were made while we were still in school, not after we graduated. The actions of these people seem very suspicious to me.
When you recognize love in another and realize how precious it is, everything else seems so insignificant.
State Police say there were no warrants or advisories on any of the individuals and "there was no evidence that the seven were committing any crime beyond the trespassing."
How does that justify a tip line for people to report suspected terrorist activity?
Even if those people were trying to poison the water, that reservoir holds 412 billion gallons of water. You would have to dump tanker truck loads of poison it before you'd have any chance of making anyone sick.
There's simply no way that seven people trespassing can carry enough of anything to have any real effect, yet that's exactly the sort of thing that would get reported to the tip line (along with crazy people reporting their neighbors and all the people reporting Florida Man).
Considering this is Florida... Instead of Big Brother, this can be called Paranoid Granny.
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
I immediately (certainly didn't RTFA) thought of the retirees already staking out the pressure cookers at Wal-Mart.
Now they'll have a # to call, this should save the 911 operators a lot of grief.
They feared that it could be used to suppress protest or support unpopular rule.
So when I pull the plans for my home and the neighbors, then purchase stump remover and fertilizer I can expect a visit from the cops? If I have a pool I am double screwed?
Bomb materials are quite often things that have very many innocent uses. Last time I was at homedepot I saw no bomb aisle. I did see a pool section and a garden section that would give you just about everything you needed.
This is exactly the methods used in Soviet Russia and other countries with similar political system.
For years various such countries lived under communism, and they finally got rid of it 25 years ago. For years USA was hailed as the "country of freedom", and it recently adopts communist-like methods.
In California if you want to purchase medicaments, they check your ID and input your date of birth to the cash register, because law prohibits sale of medicaments (known to Americans as "drugs") to minors.
You also need to provide your ID and date of birth if you purchase a knife sharpener (made in China, of course). Sales of knives to minors is prohibited, and knife sharpeners are put under the same "knife" type of merchandise.
Heck, you cannot even buy something as simple as contact lenses without a prescription! Apparently it is too dangerous for people to buy without doctor approval. Must be true, so many people in Europe die because they bought wrong lenses, right?
Combine this all with extensive spying on their own citizens, security theatre (most visibly by TSA) and now encouraging citizens to spy on the others... Stalin would have been proud!
What next? USA remake of Pavlik Morozov?
Wait, they already have people sue their parents... some will surely chose to denounce instead.
(note: this is slightly on pessimist side to compensate for the optimists out there who will surely reply "nah, it's not an issue, we don't have a problem")
Here's your lesson, kids: caring about the thing you got your degree in should stop the minute you graduate, because any learning not done between 9 and 5 and in a school building by a tenured professor will get you arrested.
wtf is wrong with you?
This is exactly why it's a bad idea.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Looks like they haven't learnt from the Korean debacle.
Korean govt started this thing for traffic offenses (South Korea).
There was a monetary benefit too attached. Soon there were people, who deliberately slowed down while crossing on green, so their hiding snapper friend would click pictures of motorists caught unawares. Soon this developed to a stage that motorists beat up a few people., and it also resulted in streetfights. Needless to say, it was abandoned.
Now of course, there is no monetary benefit here, but you will have a small percentage who would be misguided into thinking that its their patriotic duty. There will also be a small percentage of malicious people who want to get even with their "weird" neighbor. Then there would be some douchebags who will think its a nice prank to have a swat team in their neighborhood.
So its going to be a party now
My Aurora : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o91ZsGwJYyg
FB : https://www.facebook.com/TanveersPhotography
Once they're reported, you're allowed to shoot them, right?
Second, âoeThe majority of citizens want to do whatâ(TM)s right,â? "Wanting to do what's right" is usually the exact opposite of "Doing what's right."
And third, this sounds like an excellent way of getting back at those annoying neighbos. There are so many suspicious activities that they're bound to engage in a least one or two of them. Nothing like seeing them "evicted" by a SWAT team someday.
Have you seen what how the idiots in Florida behave? Terrorists don't need to file false reports of suspicious activity. The people living there will file a ton of real reports of suspicious activity which will almost all turn out to crazy people with no intentions of committing terrorism.
"The site provides examples of red flags to watch for, such as people with an unusual interest in building plans or who are purchasing materials useful in bomb making."
So, you report your neighbour for purchasing chemicals X and Y from the gardening store because they can be used to make IEDs, and are yourself flagged because you know that chemicals X and Y can be used to make IEDs.
Dear America,
Please add me to your No Fly lists so I never, even accidentally, come anywhere near your Orwellian country again.
Finally had enough. Come see us over at https://soylentnews.org/
I'm sure the terrorists(tm) will never ever read those PDFs and even if they do, will not at all use the information found therein to obfuscate their activities.
Way to build more fear and distrust of your neighbours.
how do you know she's a witch?
she turned me into a NEWT!
a newt?
well, I got better...
I hope they have lots of staff, because between the "OMG I heard somebody speaking terrorist on the bus today" anti-Muslim freakouts and the "OMG the UN is coming for OUR GOLFS! AGENDA 21!!!one!!!!" full-on whackjob calls they're gonna have a lot to deal with...
I can't believe I just read this, but I guess I'm not surprised.
My favorite thing so far about their site is that one of the "Places to watch" is "Peroxide-Based Explosives."
Sounds like a fun place to spend a weekend.
Porquoi?
I love the first one:
People drawing or measuring important buildings.
I really just want to go grab a sketch pad and a measuring tape and head downtown...
I browse on +1 so AC's need not respond, I won't see it.
Really something which could have been taken out of propaganda material from WW2.
Achtung ! Achtung ! Dies wird eine Ansage für ihre Schutzt ! Bitte melden sie jede merkwürdiges AktivitÃt ab, die zu eine terroristische Akt führen konnte ! Insbesonders melden sie jede braune Leute ab, weil die sowieso Suspekt sind.
We will see if they will get a better result than the Nazi during WW2 (They got so many denunciation that they had to close the postbox , or shoot everybody in the cities in some country).
A newspaper report of statements by the police about the actions of these people seem very suspicious to me.
FTFY ;)
Quabbin, though... I dunno, sounds suspiciously Muslim to me.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
...In other news today, Florida became the first official supporter of Amadicia, and both White Cloacks and dark friends rejoice in this public approval of what many are calling the "Dragons Fang" law.
How does that justify a tip line for people to report suspected terrorist activity?
It doesn't. Don't the cops have a non-immediate-emergency number for this kind thing? 912? I made it a point to memorise the local police force's main phone number, which has come in handy a couple of times.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Are we headed down the road of emulating the DDR (the German Democratic Republic)?
"... counting part-time informers, the Stasi had one informer per 6.5 people. By comparison, the Gestapo employed one secret policeman per 2,000 people." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stasi)
Circle the wagons and fire inward. Entropy increases without bounds.
If the ultimate goal is to observe something then it is best done during daylight when you can see better.
Trespassing, at midnight, to satisfy educational curiosity?
The only time I have been that hungry for knowledge was when i lived next door to some hot sorority girls who kept the window shades open while changing.
Time to report whoever came up with this idea as the terrorist.
It's doing a perfectly good job destroying itself from the inside.
Budding chemists, engineers, pilots and generally skilled people are being caught up in the dragnet and being rounded up as potential terrorists in this persistent culture of fear. Especially if they're brown.
So, an "education session" after midnight, in the dark, when you can't see very far, at a geophysical structure known for being enormous is size - where you would have to see far to see much of anything, after trespassing to do it, is part of their "continuing education?"
You don't go to broom closets to watch ball games, do you?
Nothing about the totality of the incident raises even just a sliver of curiosity?
wtf is wrong with you?
I could ask the same of you, and that moderator.
I'll tell you what . . .if there are many people in your society that think like you do, especially people responsible for public safety, there will be some real leaning that is likely to happen eventually. I just doubt you will enjoy the lesson.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
I wonder how long it will be before they start paying people to spy on their neighbours?
in soviet florida you come from cuba to the same system of reporting.
I love when police gather huge amounts of data resulting in tonnes of false positives. So now every farmer (fertilizer) with a pressure cooker (most) who like Scuba (some) will be getting a visit. If that same farmer donates to a tea-party then the police will think they now have probable cause for a warrant. I really hope that judges will say, "Other than having a computer tell you to raid his house what actual police work have you done?"
Reason 587 to enshrine privacy rights and limit data gathering right in the constitution.
Why the fuck did we spend the resources and lives to fight those wars to prevent the spread of this 'communist' behavior for again? I mean, was it a war over patents and we had to wait 20 years to implement it here?
Anyone planning armed resistance to our criminal government is an idiot. (Peaceful resistance looks pretty fucking foolish, as well.)
Anyone who thinks that taking away my guns improves security is an idiot. (If I can't be trusted with WMDs, then wtf am I doing AT LARGE?)
I can't seem to get through to anyone that the Second Amendment's purpose was to keep us from maintaining a tyrannical military, to be used for crimes against the People. Publius had to do a lot of hard selling to convince everyone that we could trust a national army. I think we got conned.
They feared that it could be used to suppress protest or support unpopular rule.
80 or 90% of Florida's border is water, and they have 30,000 lakes encompassing 3 million acres of land. So clearly, nobody would ever just dive there recreationally. And hobby shops? Well, everyone knows lots of old people live in Florida, and certainly old people don't have any hobbies. Model Trains? Crochet? Those are just covers for terrorist activity. Quick, take away granny's knitting needles before she knits an Afghan!
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
Exactly, these kids probably just have an alergy to sun, that's why they went at midnight. Nothing suspicious, no sir.
It had to be Florida? Elderly people suspicious of their neighbors? Yeah, that never happens. Let's give them all an outlet for it! A family from Kosovo moved into my grandma's neighborhood a few years back and she was convinced they were drug-dealing terrorists. It turns out they were just assholes but it's easy for old people to get confused about that.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
"By my hand, a $BAD_EVENT can happen to anyone, any time. There is no defense unless you crawl into your shell and stop living life. You might sometimes think you are safe but no matter who you are, I might inflict $BAD_EVENT upon you. The random $BAD_EVENTs will continue until you, my pool of victims, collectively persuade your government to alter its policies in accordance with my wishes."
We all agree that the above really is the very essence of terrorism, right?
export BAD_EVENT=reporting innocent people to the terrorist suspect database
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Florida System for Normalizing Information on Terrorists, Criminals and Hazards.
Now if only I could come up with a good short name for that...
I don't have a sig.
State Police say there were no warrants or advisories on any of the individuals and "there was no evidence that the seven were committing any crime beyond the trespassing."
How does that justify a tip line for people to report suspected terrorist activity?
Reconnaissance of vulnerable targets.
Even if those people were trying to poison the water, that reservoir holds 412 billion gallons of water. You would have to dump tanker truck loads of poison it before you'd have any chance of making anyone sick.
You only have sufficiently dense poison of sufficient toxicity at the water intake. You don't have to have a uniform distribution of poison or biological substance through the entire reservoir. In the same way, poison only needs to get to your heart or brain, not your little toe.
There's simply no way that seven people trespassing can carry enough of anything to have any real effect, yet that's exactly the sort of thing that would get reported to the tip line (along with crazy people reporting their neighbors and all the people reporting Florida Man).
Since you can't piece it together, I'll lay it out: 7 people conduct reconnaissance, note where the water intakes are, and identify routes to the place. At some future time, either they or others return driving trucks of toxic substance and dump it at the water intake, achieving lethal density of toxins.
But I forget myself, we should only be picking up bodies, not preventing them from being poisoned.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
You can start with your senators, representatives, and all their lobbyists.
wtf is wrong with you?
He's been conditioned into a state of fear, just like so many of our fellow citizens. Now everyone is watching what they say and do and jumping at their own shadows. You know, like in any free country...
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
I was afraid that I was going to have to spend a lot of money to get back at my SOB neighbor by building a big, ugly fence. Now I can do it with an anonymous post .
Have gnu, will travel.
Quabbin, though... I dunno, sounds suspiciously Muslim to me.
Al-Qabin? I hear they've been collecting supplies for weapons of mass achusetts.
And be done with it.
Sad.
They should have known better than to use Apple Maps.
Good thing there are no legitimate divers, hobbyists or home builders in Florida. It would be a shame if this brilliant plan accidentally snagged one or two thousand false leads and innocent citizens.
Terrorists, the new communists
blindly antisocialist = antisocial
Dude, did you not see what happened to the shark in the first Jaws movie?
Circle the wagons and fire inward. Entropy increases without bounds.
About six months ago, or more, I was in a hobby shop in western New York - not necessarily a hot-bed of anything, really; Amish dudes and farming? - and the guy behind the counter tried to impress me with his position as "investigator of potential terrorist activity" based on a sheet he'd been given by the authorities regarding suspicious purchases that could be masked as mere hobby activity. I chuckled - yeah, right, this is gonna happen around here? And you're gonna catch a would-be international terrorist, Gomer? - and groaned inwardly, at the same time, for what we've become.
what can I buy at a dive shop to make a bomb? I know home depot has lots of stuff for bombs, but dive shops?
my thought is the gasses you might get, and the tanks that contain them could be used.... much like sections of pipes, propane tanks, and many other things like that you can pick up just about anywhere...and yes... anyone that needs a propane tank or pipe or possibly anything else you might buy at home depot or the grocery store is defiantly a terrorist.
So, there's a school of thought that says that a system like this could only lead to trouble since people will abuse it. Even if it's totally effective, do they really have the staff to follow up on every tip?
Be Safe: Be Suspicious
Terrorism has become an unfortunate fact of life not only in New York but the country at large, a direct assault on our communities and our way of life that leaves citizens struggling to find answers to difficult questions, not the least of which is "What can I do to prevent such atrocities? How can I help?"
Quite simply, terrorism is successful because terrorists are able to pass unnoticed and unremarked upon - but they fail to count on the best intelligence network ever devised: the American people. How can you tell who might be a terrorist? Look for the following characteristics:
* A stranger or foreigner.
* Argumentative, especially about politics or philosophy.
* Probing questions about your work, particularly high-tech.
* Spends a greater than average amount of time on the Net.
* Interests in chemistry, electronics, or computers.
* Large numbers of mail-order deliveries.
* Taking photographs of major landmarks.
And those are just a few. If you're suspicious, then turn them in to your local law enforcement for a thorough background check. Better safe than sorry. You and your neighbors will sleep more securely knowing that you're watching each other's back.
He is applying his brain and professional experience and training to make an assessment. You aren't doing the first, and probably aren't qualified to do the second. It is really astonishing that you can't figure out that there just might be something suspicious there.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
Isn't there already a perfectly good forum for outing suspicious people in Florida?
Of course this means that they're TERRORISTS out to kill people, and not just stupid people tresspassing.
The important thing here is that you adapt to the state of perpetual fear that you're supposed to live in.
The reservoir used to be a cool place to go drink beer back in the day.
Some mornings it's hardly worth chewing through the restraints to get out of bed.
If you read TFA you would know that this is not an anonymous system, and that people making reports must provide their contact information and, if requested, be interviewed by police.
I take it then that it didn't, and probably never would, occur to you that they might simply be conducting reconnaissance to see if an attack is feasible? You do know that Al Qaida agents have been caught more than once doing that?
So, you don't want to live in a state of perpetual fear? May I assume then that you don't bother to check both ways before crossing the street since that would be "giving in to fear" of being hit by a car? And perhaps drinking water from the toilet wouldn't bother you because you refuse to "live in fear" of disease? And insurance? Doesn't that just show you are living in fear of an accident? Apparently in your world, people don't do things that are prudent, they only act out of fear. Pity that.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
By promoting said "Rep-a-trrrst service".
What's the point of a program no one knows about, right?
It's a mere 150k grant for 13 counties, so it's not about simply spending taxpayer's money. At least not at this stage.
Their care may be genuine. As in genuinely delusional.
Those making reports must provide their name and contact information. ...
For iWATCH, people are less likely to be targeted by rumors or malicious accusations. Also, it gives investigators the opportunity to further interview the person reporting the activity.
"It's always a concern that someone may be setting up a neighbor," Rutherford said.
Godforbid, someone should get the idea of misrepresenting one's identity to get one's neighbor (or two) in trouble with the authorities.
I mean, it's not like one could just say his or her name is Neighbor A and report on Neighbor B - and then watch snickering while police pays a visit to both neighbors.
At the very least, one of the neighbors will start being paranoid about the other.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
Don't include bankers on that list, they are outside scope
The good thing about sheriffs is that they are elected. The citizens should demand that their county sheriff opt-out of this snitch system or face the consequences at the next election.
Attempting to influence national elections is hopeless. At the county level, some determined activists could make a real difference. Come on Floridians. How about giving us a few small victories for civil liberties?
I only buy porn, and that's not on the suspicious list.
Oh, and I start my sentence in the subject line, but that's not on the terrorist list either.
https://app.box.com/WitthoftResume Code: https://github.com/cellocgw
Red Scares, plural.
1919 - 1921
1947 - 1957
Red scare
That's just the USA. No doubt other countries have similar histories.
-kgj
" really become the eyes and ears of law enforcement ... in their homes"
Their HOMES ? Kids ratting out their parents for doing home improvement projects involving pipe, electrical wire or fertilizer?
Facts are stubborn things.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
[on Jaws: The Revenge (1987)] I have never seen it, but by all accounts it is terrible. However, I have seen the house that it built, and it is terrific.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
While back in the reality only thing you can safely assume is that there is more hay.
Only way to be sure that there IS a needle prior to searching trough ALL the hay (at least twice) is if you're the one who's put it there.
And if you're certain that THERE is there and not over there or here.
And even if you find one - how can you tell if it's the only one?
How can you tell that you haven't missed many needles while finding that one?
How can you even tell it's a needle? Maybe it's a nail? Or a piece of wire?
False positives are a bitch too... Just like confirmation bias.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
http://www.innocenceproject.org/understand/Eyewitness-Misidentification.php
Eyewitness misidentification is the single greatest cause of wrongful convictions nationwide, playing a role in nearly 75% of convictions overturned through DNA testing.
While eyewitness testimony can be persuasive evidence before a judge or jury, 30 years of strong social science research has proven that eyewitness identification is often unreliable. Research shows that the human mind is not like a tape recorder; we neither record events exactly as we see them, nor recall them like a tape that has been rewound. Instead, witness memory is like any other evidence at a crime scene; it must be preserved carefully and retrieved methodically, or it can be contaminated.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
Holy shit, that's hilarious. In addition, this is the first really good use for Twitter I have ever seen in my life.
Your 'reconnaissance of vulnerable targets' is why i cant take pics of bridges anymore without feeling the chilling effect on my neck. You REALLY should study the meaning of Liberty.
Good-bye
I take it then that it didn't, and probably never would, occur to you that they might simply be conducting reconnaissance to see if an attack is feasible? You do know that Al Qaida agents have been caught more than once doing that?
I think everyone in this thread has gone out on a tangent from what this story was all about.
I don't know if these guys are potential terrorists on a recon mission, or if they're a bunch of guys who were hanging out one night and randomly decided they should check the facility out because of professional curiosity. I don't really care. They were trespassing, which is an already illegal activity, which gives the police all the authority they need to arrest them and question them on what they were doing there. Seems perfectly reasonable to me.
What this article is about is having people call the police's "tip" hotline when they decide they see others do "suspicious" things that are perfectly legal. I have a problem with that.
If I inform on my neighbors, I won't be suspected of being a terrorist. If my neighbor informs on me, I might be considered a terrorist based solely on that accusation. My neighbor might be thinking the same thing. Whoever informs first has the best chance of not being branded a terrorist. Think it can't happen? Read the Gulag Archipelago
I'm afraid you've misaddressed that complaint. You should be sending it to this lot. If they have their way, it won't just be a "chilling effect" you feel on your neck. On the other hand, they like to give people a "hot time" when they can. If it makes you feel any better, I think the restrictions on that sort of thing aren't as rigid as they were in WW 2.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
You think the system might work for non citizens as well ?
To a great extent the Second Amendment's purpose was to protect commerce and property. Notice that it never distinguishes between different kinds of weapons, only says "arms". Not long guns, not handguns, not even cannons. This was because commercial shipping was commonly armed (some of them better than some of the naval ships), convoys of valuable goods traveled with armed guards, and the 'town hall cannon' wasn't just decorative. Communities mounted cannon at the mouth of their harbors for fear of pirates and Spaniards. Local militias formed to protect against roving bands of brigands. Frontier communities built palisades where they could retreat if Indians or Frenchmen attacked. It was a different world.
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin
The Slashdot tradition: Facts are flamebait if they don't agree with your politics.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
Or some engineers, fresh out of college, got bored and wanted to go on an adventure and went exploring.
Everything we do is a learning experience. You don't have to sequester yourself in an office with a pile of books to figure out something new.
We all need to take a deep breath and relax and realize that not everybody out looking at things or throwing around what-ifs is up to no good. They could be bored and curious, and the cost of expansive freedom and the right to be curious and explore to satisfy that curiosity means that, yeah, the occasional nutter intent on harm succeeds.
I'm okay with that.
And we are (or I am, at least; can't speak for the other guy) applying my memories of what it was like to be young with the freedom to get in relatively minor kinds of trouble without people assuming I was a terrorist.
You've got to have more faith in people than that. The world is complicated enough as it is without assuming that everybody in it is out to do damage to you.
Because we must always assume the worst, and therefore we should overreact and assume a state of perpetual paranoia?
Really? Got anything to back that up?
Ah yes, because driving oneself into a state of paranoia such that we must live in constant suspicion of our neighbors is equivalent to making no cars are traveling down the street.
You're completely fucking off base.
History... Rinse cycle repeat.
pretty harmless (apart from the part where they could probably easily be misled by someone who knows the program and what people will be watching for) since the rat can't be anonymous about it. I was kinda worried they would provide a list of ingredients used in making explosives but i'm happy to see that's supposed to be common knowledge to all people behind the floridan wall. Double-edged sword
Free speech was meant to be free for all... how can anyone grow up in a nanny state ?