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NSA Chief Built Star Trek Like Command Center
Bruce66423 writes "As the NSA scandal moves from appalling to laughable, the latest report in the Guardian indicates that the current NSA chief spent US taxpayers' money to create a command center for his intelligence operations that was styled just like Star Trek. From the PBS News Hour report: 'When he was running the Army's Intelligence and Security Command, Alexander brought many of his future allies down to Fort Belvoir for a tour of his base of operations, a facility known as the Information Dominance Center. It had been designed by a Hollywood set designer to mimic the bridge of the starship Enterprise from Star Trek, complete with chrome panels, computer stations, a huge TV monitor on the forward wall, and doors that made a 'whoosh' sound when they slid open and closed. Lawmakers and other important officials took turns sitting in a leather 'captain's chair' in the center of the room and watched as Alexander, a lover of science-fiction movies, showed off his data tools on the big screen. "Everybody wanted to sit in the chair at least once to pretend he was Jean-Luc Picard," says a retired officer in charge of VIP visit '"
Awesome? It's creepy at best.
with other people's money
I got to the chocolate box before you, that's why the hard ones have teeth marks.
For a DIY hobby project maybe. Somehow, I don't find it very comforting that this is the mindset of people who are entrusted with everyone's private information (things like banking data, medical records, private correspondence, news interests, political leanings, whereabouts etc.). It kind of gives the impression that it's just a game to them.
And how much taxpayer money was burnt on this nutjobs sci-fi wet dream? Its like watching any one of those films depicting a dystopian future, those in power playing out their fantasies while those who actually fund their antics (either through taxes or illicit corporate profits) live in squalor. I suppose the latter part has yet to completely come to pass but at the rate things are going ($17 trillion in debt & federal spending increasing at $200 a second)its not going to take long.
We ALL wear red shirts.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Also, what about the name "Information Dominance Center"? Creepy and pathetic at the same time; it sounds like BDSM-style slash-fic based on TRON. Bring in the Logic Probe!
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
The money's bad but I don't find it the most disturbing part of this. The place doesn't look that much more expensive than any office the senior management of a large organization would work in.
It's the mindset that would want such an Information Dominance Center that is disturbing. It bespeaks a person willing to use his position to live out a fantasy. In this fantasy, the fate of the galaxy country rests in his singular hands. Far from being a functionary who answers to civilian authorities, he's the protagonist in some grand drama.
And as much as I love Star Trek, a Star Trek fantasy is the last one I'd see in such a man. Star Trek captains righteously flout all the rules. When superiors order them to stand down, when their fundamental laws (the Prime Directive) deny them the power, when the lives of entire worlds are at stake, they do what they think best, damn the torpedoes, warp 9, engage. A man with such delusions of grandeur ought not be put in charge of HUD, much less a secretive organization known for its willingness to spy on citizens.
Yes, there are terrorist threats to the US, and they are less of a threat than bathtubs.
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The bridge serves a real purpose for the NSA,
And what purpose is that other than to satisfy the delusions of grandeur of the people running the place and the people holding the purse strings?
even if it didn't, there's plenty of data centers that have fancy-looking NOCs that are only there to look fancy for the big wigs
That might be tolerable in a corporate environment, but not a government one. This is pure, unadulterated waste. "Selling" isn't part of the mission.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
Nothing. The curtains have merely been pulled back a little.
In other words, Terrorism is not actually a real threat, but it's designed to make you act irrationally out of fear, The answer is not act irrationally out of fear, but be careful about using your budget, but to not act irrationally out of fear. Also, to quit being dicks on the international stage and stop being involved in political coups.
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I'd be alright with it if they also treated the Bill of Rights like the Prime Directive.
An important change for education.
You're missing the point. Spending taxpayer dollars for a fancy NOC that is not even supposed to exist is just shitting on the citizens. His motto is "Collect it All". He ran an "all-out, barely-legal drive to build the ultimate spy machine" (quotes from the article)
The reflections off the metal would be impractical, based on the pictures. For a room whose "primary function is to enable 24-hour worldwide visualization, planning, and execution of coordinated information operations for the US Army and other federal agencies" it would be better off using a dark matte paint.
I think the article said it best:
And yes, I am concerned about all of those other wastes of dollars too. They just don't happen to stem from a clearly illegal surveillance program. That is what puts this in a completely different ballpark of outrage. The glass and openness and conference table make sense. The giant projector makes sense. But having a single chair positioned to look at the 22 foot projector is ridiculous. It seems that there are two seats on either side, but they are behind a completely unnecessary bulky chrome something or other. A simple wall structure on the front side, with table/desk on the back would have been far more functional. And less reflective. And depending on the purpose of those seats you could have room for more people, more equipment, or just more space.
I'm not sure what the crap on the ceiling is - functional or decorative - but from the images the lighting is spotty. I would have preferred either track lighting or something consistent, but this design seems to work against the light rather than with it. The opposite of what you want in a data visualization room. If you make the argument that a projector requires darker conditions, there are a completely new pile of objections to the design, with the metal and parts of the glass reflecting light right back at where the projector is supposed to be.
This is a terrible, purposeless design which just shows off how disconnected the people driving the train really are. Done right, this would have been an expensive but obvious solution to the problem of data visualization. The extra bling, and hollywood set design work, way outstepped any reason.
Yes, in the grand scheme of military/intelligence spending its a drop in the bucket. Problem is we have millions of them, and they're adding up fast. That command facility that was built in Afghanistan and never used/wanted, $34 Million. GAO audits have classified nearly half of purchases on government charge cards as improper. The SEC spent nearly $3.9 million rearranging desks at its DC HQ. Congress members have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxpayer money on cars, popcorn machines, cameras, TV's and other amenities. And the list goes on, and on, and on. I'm all for going after the big ticket waste as well, but you can die from a thousand small cuts just as easily as you can die from a meat cleaver to the head.
Let the NSA geek feel like he's Captain Picard. You know you would too if given the chance.
I can say with complete assurance that I wouldn't be spending other people's money on such an embarrassingly obvious teenage power fantasy. It belittles the man rather than imbuing him with authority.
"To any truly impartial person, it would be obvious that I am right."
Yes, al Qaida is doing everything they can to harm us. The sad thing is our government seems to be doing everything they can to help al Qaida (and the Muslim Brotherhood).
Y'all enjoying your loss of freedom and privacy in the name of safety? Thought so.
On the last real Enterprise (CVN-65) flight deck, ordnance personnel wore red jerseys, aircraft maintenance wore green, fuelers purple, and crash and safety white, etc. The idea is to allow the Air Boss to ID who's where and whom at an instant to run the deck. Also Forrestall class aircraft carrier Combat Direction Centers (Enterprise was designed on a modified Forrstall blueprint) were laid out in a more or less similar horseshoe shape with the Tactical Action Officer (TAO) chair elevated in the middle looking across from the status displays, which the series bridge layout reminded me of, kind of. I'm sure that's where Roddenberry got the idea of colored uniforms to designate branch (ops blue and engineering red). Anyway, art often imitates life, and visa versa. For a command center, the Forrestall/Enterprise layout was, in my experience, far superior to Nimitz class layout for maintaining situational awareness. Ergonomics count, as we learn, forget and relearn, over and over and over.
Its bullshit man, sure there's people who act as terrorists (see "The Mandarin, Ironman") for a (movie example, since literary examples are not quite relevant anymore).
There has been no significant threat to Americans thwarted by the CIA or NSA. The FBI was told to STAND DOWN before 911. And the prior bombing int he basement. Even though they had specific intel on both incidents.
The intel that gets shared on public mass media is propanda. There were no bunkers for Hussam in Iraq. There is no grand chemical weapons threat.
Could something happen like the incident in Tokyo with Sarin gas? Sure but its just as likely to be government funded than an actual terrorist organization. At this point.
The point is we cannot trust our government to "protect us". Take away our freedom, disabling our means of protecting ourselves. They don't want revolution. Because we are on the verge of something tianamin square level in the states. Despite how much people want to bury their heads in the sand.
2 million bikers in DC this month/last few weeks. Not even aired on public TV. Take a good look at your world. At the corporations, the services they provide. Who they cater to. And how your police operate.
Take a solid hard look. Don't take my word for it.
Ask why there are so many disenfranchised poor vagrant transient people in America today. Ask why welfare exists. Question everything. Look at it all.
Cold re "They have destabilized multiple countries" so has the CIA http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covert_United_States_foreign_regime_change_actions
Every country in the region has a database of useful 'freedom fighters' to ship around as needed. The only implications are its little regional wars as usual and the same teams keep showing up year after year after year.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Certainly, I couldn't agree more. But that's not what I was talking about.
Certainly, I couldn't agree more. But that's not what I was talking about.
Context here is important. We're not talking about the underling who refuses the unjust order. We're not talking about the outside contractor who goes whistle-blower on his former employer. We're not dealing with the valiant Starfleet captain refusing to accept the judgment of a corrupt admiral. We're talking about the guy giving the underling the unjust order; the employer whose patriotic employees must flee the country after speaking out for its sake; the admiral whose worst corruption is that he breaks the law while thinking himself the valiant captain. We can hope that the underling, the whistleblower, or the captain might stand up to such a man, but this is only a scarce hope. The normal means, indeed the preferred means, of preventing such things is to bind such a man with law and transparency. But an organization such as the NSA denies in word and deed that it should be subject to transparency; it is your Section 31. And we know because of the whistleblower how regularly it flouts the fundamental laws meant to bind it.
This is why I call this man's decision to model himself on Star Trek captains disturbing. It's the context. An NSA Chief will not fancy himself the corrupt admiral whose unjust orders Kirk, Picard, or Sisko refuse since they answer to the higher law of their conscience. He will sit in the captain's chair and, hearing Fourth Amendment like Prime Directive, will regard himself as the valiant rogue captain, out to save the Federation against its own lesser judgment. This is, after all, usually the case with corrupt admirals. Thus I agree with Lewis when he says:
In short, I do not say this because I think all laws ought always to be obeyed. Rather I say this because I think some laws ought to be obeyed. Especially by those in charge, whose lust for power, whose self-righteousness presumption, and above all whose assumption that they know what's best, the laws themselves were meant to contain.
The far greatest threat that al Qaida poses is that the government is using them as an excuse to trample civil liberties. Otherwise, those impotent, pissant losers aren't even worth worrying about.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz