I was wrong. The guy in question didn't end up dying. And you are wrong. There's not "always time", regardless of what your talking-points say. Unless you're saying the NY Post story is false.
Actually, this is indeed an "anything goes with no consequences, ever" policy. If there is no oversight, then no one looks and no one ever discovers wrongdoing. Therefore, there are no consequences. Ever.
So, when I said "independent, after-the-fact oversight and examination of the choices", that's a policy with no oversight? You want to elaborate on that?
WASHINGTON - U.S. intelligence officials got mired for nearly 10 hours seeking approval to use wiretaps against al Qaeda terrorists suspected of kidnapping Queens soldier Alex Jimenez in Iraq earlier this year, The Post has learned.
Read the rest of the NY Post story. Are you saying everyone involved was lying and your partisan talking-points are right instead?
That's such an ignorant argument. They could have just as easily used walkie-talkies available at almost any department store, or spent some money and got some military grade communications for the cost of a few hand grenades. Or cell phones. Or satellite phones. Or wi-fi. Or broadband internet. You going to scan every frequency? Monitor every mode of communication? And it's not like they were sending detailed plans back and forth on their Blackberrys, it was tactical comm.
Apparently it's an argument that's "ignorant" of a bunch of stuff that didn't happen. I agree. I claim ignorance of the non-facts about the things that didn't occur.
What did occur was that they used Blackberries. The ability and the willingness to intercept signals from those Blackberries might have come in handy. Also, the ability to look at all the calls to and from those Blackberries in the last few months might have helped. You could then listen to the phone calls on those phone numbers. And maybe find out which ones are still active in the hotels and triangulate the signals.
But they could have used WiFi, I guess, so there's no use even thinking about it (because of the "ignorance"). That's your point, right?
I'm not sure why you want to change the subject to something about bathrooms. But changing the subject doesn't seem to take terrorism seriously. Terrorism is serious.
This argument relies on pretending to know that warrants are always available for any situation where the conversation may be useful to save lives. Agents fighting terrorism will tell you they are not always available for those situations. People have died because no warrant was available in time.
Also, there's no need for an "anything goes with no consequences, ever" policy. No one has proposed such a policy. A policy requiring independent, after-the-fact oversight and examination of the choices of the agents involved would be adequate. Also, any evidence gathered would be excluded from court proceedings.
If agents were found to be malicious, they could face charges. If they were found to be careless, they could face discipline. If they made an honest mistake, they could be told to be more careful next time. If they took a good-faith chance and it didn't pay off, they could be encouraged. And if they ended up saving lives, they could be commended.
It seems like a reasonable policy that might work.
I'm not seeing where your analysis takes terrorism seriously.
And it's all predicated on the disputed point that the "domestic spying" (or Signals Intelligence) was "illegal" And so nothing else matters. We can't save lives. There are procedures to be followed instead.
I disagree that following procedures is more important than saving lives in a terrorist attack -- even if the law were clear and undisputed regarding the procedures.
But the problem is that we don't know who they are.
What if we do? Or what if we know enough to listen to a few different conversations to find out which one might be the right one? The "domestic spying" question (or scandal, if you prefer) wasn't about randomly listening in to every conversation in the world. It was about listening on some specific phones of suspected terrorists.
In other words, you can't say "we should never consider doing it except in situations where we're 100% certain it will prevent a specific future event". Because no one can perfectly predict the future.
"Eavesdropping" (or Signals Intelligence) is a tool. It's either in your toolbox or it's not. If you prohibit it, then you won't be able to use it when you need it. The authorities in Mumbai might have used it to prevent part of the massacre.
At the very least, it means there are two sides to the "eavesdropping" question. It's a question for thoughtful discussion, not the sloganeering and bumper-sticker Constitutional Law pronouncements everyone has heard a thousand times.
Eavesdropping on terrorists could save hundreds or thousands of lives. That's a benefit that has to be weighed against the costs. But most of the partisan discussions on this subject don't fairly acknowledge that benefit. Terrorism is real -- the terrorists have reminded us of that again.
The preventable damage caused by terrorism can be seen stacked in body bags on the news broadcasts (again). What was the damage caused by the eavesdropping? Are we all 100% sure the eavesdropping is so much worse that it could never even be considered, even with safeguards? I'm not.
Interesting timing for this now that we've learned that the gunmen in Mumbai used Blackberries to communicate. I'm sure no one violated their rights by eavesdropping on their communications.
Games don't tend to be genuinely scary. It's because there's no genuine danger.
Dead Space is an example of a game that completely succeeded in everything it was trying to do. The game mechanics were fun. Even in a year full of games with superb graphics and sound, those elements in Dead Space stood out. The story tied it all together well.
No one complains about what Dead Space was. You'll read complaints about what it wasn't. And sometimes you'll hear that someone just couldn't get into it.
Games are something you play for fun. If you're playing them to write self-aggrandizing articles about how you're above it all and ahead of all the rest of us, then Dead Space is a good choice because it's a great game. But it's not the best game at everything every game does well. And you can pat yourself on the back noticing that.
Personally, I might have enjoyed it more if it were a rescue story instead of an escape. But the story belongs to the authors, not to me.
We're trusting Internet security to people who don't know any better than to schedule meetings in Minneapolis in the winter. It's 17 degrees and very windy out right now.
You don't understand. The glacier is melting at 0.2 ducks per year! Prior to this experiment, the glacier was melting at zero ducks per year. It has increased 2 whole ducks per 10 year period! At this rate of increase, the entire population of ducks will be exhausted by 2142! Don't you care about the ducks?
The only upside is that, barring any additional interference, the glacier's melting will return to zero ducks per year once all the ducks are gone.
In the US, you can change government officials and policy.
Only in the majority.
Increasingly, minorities and individuals have absolutely no recourse. In a free country, a person in the minority would be free. But freedom is ending in the US. Majorities can take what they want, force people to do what they want, and prevent anyone from escaping their control.
But, but... What if this type of thing continues? Pretty soon anyone will be able to give someone else a ride in a car without asking the government's permission!
What's next? Letting people cut hair without a government license?
Wow, questioning the patriotism of people with a different view than yours, wonder where you learned that?
You don't need to learn it. When someone tells soldiers to shoot their commanders, it figured that patriotism is not really their main motivation. Also when they go to Iraq to act as human shields to support an enemy nation. Burning flags, praising Fidel Castro, blaming America for everything anyone ever did wrong in the world, wanting us to be more like Europe, threatening to move to Canada every election, how many incidents does it take to raise a question?
Why should there even be a question? America-haters are not patriotic.
Congrats on parroting a well-worn talking point though.
Since you claim the environmentalists want dead sailors and a weakened America, please cite your proof...
One indication that they want dead sailors is that they're taking an action that might result in dead sailors. That's why the court ruled against them. If they don't want dead sailors, why are they endangering the sailors? They'd rather sailors die than whales get "injured". That's the whole point of the story.
Seriously? And this sentence isn't emotional appeal with a lack of science how?
Both of these questions are emotional and lack science.
... generally accepted link...
There's a sciency notion for you. I hear there's a "generally accepted link" between toads and warts too. Give me a PhD in ecology!
How "generally" does a "link" have to be "accepted" before it's irrefutable proof of cause and effect? Very, very generally indeed, I suppose.
And as a side point, what would emotionally charged environmentalists have to gain by stopping sonar exercises around whales?
Dead sailors and a weakened America. I'm sure that's enough for it to be worth it to them.
They'd also like to set a precedent where they speak for the animals and they can therefore control an arbitrarily large part of everyone's daily lives by deciding what we can do and what we can't. Then we can all go to them for their blessing with any planned project or action. They'll give us a yea or nay based on their unique bond with the animals. It's potentially very lucrative.
And the government will pay attorney's fees, which is good if you're an attorney. Then the attorneys can donate to the non-profit that brought the lawsuit. Everyone gets paid. Thanks whales!
Slashdot Mirror
See above.
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1047557&cid=25955599
I was wrong. The guy in question didn't end up dying. And you are wrong. There's not "always time", regardless of what your talking-points say. Unless you're saying the NY Post story is false.
Actually, this is indeed an "anything goes with no consequences, ever" policy. If there is no oversight, then no one looks and no one ever discovers wrongdoing. Therefore, there are no consequences. Ever.
So, when I said "independent, after-the-fact oversight and examination of the choices", that's a policy with no oversight? You want to elaborate on that?
Here's the story. I guess they didn't die though. I remembered it wrong.
From the NY Post:
Read the rest of the NY Post story. Are you saying everyone involved was lying and your partisan talking-points are right instead?
Do you care which is true and which is false?
That's such an ignorant argument. They could have just as easily used walkie-talkies available at almost any department store, or spent some money and got some military grade communications for the cost of a few hand grenades. Or cell phones. Or satellite phones. Or wi-fi. Or broadband internet. You going to scan every frequency? Monitor every mode of communication? And it's not like they were sending detailed plans back and forth on their Blackberrys, it was tactical comm.
Apparently it's an argument that's "ignorant" of a bunch of stuff that didn't happen. I agree. I claim ignorance of the non-facts about the things that didn't occur.
What did occur was that they used Blackberries. The ability and the willingness to intercept signals from those Blackberries might have come in handy. Also, the ability to look at all the calls to and from those Blackberries in the last few months might have helped. You could then listen to the phone calls on those phone numbers. And maybe find out which ones are still active in the hotels and triangulate the signals.
But they could have used WiFi, I guess, so there's no use even thinking about it (because of the "ignorance"). That's your point, right?
What we don't have is a system that explicitly sets out to systematically oppress and render voiceless segments of the population...
That's what Slashdot's Moderation system is for.
I'm not sure why you want to change the subject to something about bathrooms. But changing the subject doesn't seem to take terrorism seriously. Terrorism is serious.
This argument relies on pretending to know that warrants are always available for any situation where the conversation may be useful to save lives. Agents fighting terrorism will tell you they are not always available for those situations. People have died because no warrant was available in time.
Also, there's no need for an "anything goes with no consequences, ever" policy. No one has proposed such a policy. A policy requiring independent, after-the-fact oversight and examination of the choices of the agents involved would be adequate. Also, any evidence gathered would be excluded from court proceedings.
If agents were found to be malicious, they could face charges. If they were found to be careless, they could face discipline. If they made an honest mistake, they could be told to be more careful next time. If they took a good-faith chance and it didn't pay off, they could be encouraged. And if they ended up saving lives, they could be commended.
It seems like a reasonable policy that might work.
I'm not seeing where your analysis takes terrorism seriously.
And it's all predicated on the disputed point that the "domestic spying" (or Signals Intelligence) was "illegal" And so nothing else matters. We can't save lives. There are procedures to be followed instead.
I disagree that following procedures is more important than saving lives in a terrorist attack -- even if the law were clear and undisputed regarding the procedures.
But the problem is that we don't know who they are.
What if we do? Or what if we know enough to listen to a few different conversations to find out which one might be the right one? The "domestic spying" question (or scandal, if you prefer) wasn't about randomly listening in to every conversation in the world. It was about listening on some specific phones of suspected terrorists.
In other words, you can't say "we should never consider doing it except in situations where we're 100% certain it will prevent a specific future event". Because no one can perfectly predict the future.
"Eavesdropping" (or Signals Intelligence) is a tool. It's either in your toolbox or it's not. If you prohibit it, then you won't be able to use it when you need it. The authorities in Mumbai might have used it to prevent part of the massacre.
At the very least, it means there are two sides to the "eavesdropping" question. It's a question for thoughtful discussion, not the sloganeering and bumper-sticker Constitutional Law pronouncements everyone has heard a thousand times.
Eavesdropping on terrorists could save hundreds or thousands of lives. That's a benefit that has to be weighed against the costs. But most of the partisan discussions on this subject don't fairly acknowledge that benefit. Terrorism is real -- the terrorists have reminded us of that again.
The preventable damage caused by terrorism can be seen stacked in body bags on the news broadcasts (again). What was the damage caused by the eavesdropping? Are we all 100% sure the eavesdropping is so much worse that it could never even be considered, even with safeguards? I'm not.
Interesting timing for this now that we've learned that the gunmen in Mumbai used Blackberries to communicate. I'm sure no one violated their rights by eavesdropping on their communications.
In fact, it heavily rips off Event Horizon.
So what?
(I swear people just say stuff like this because they've impressed themselves that they noticed two similar things.)
And then there was the stupid way you were conveniently separated from your fellow crewmen again and again.
Again, so what? What's your point? You should never be separated from the others in the crew? All stories are bad unless everyone stays together?
What should they have done instead? Who did a better job of a similar thing? What did they do?
Games don't tend to be genuinely scary. It's because there's no genuine danger.
Dead Space is an example of a game that completely succeeded in everything it was trying to do. The game mechanics were fun. Even in a year full of games with superb graphics and sound, those elements in Dead Space stood out. The story tied it all together well.
No one complains about what Dead Space was. You'll read complaints about what it wasn't. And sometimes you'll hear that someone just couldn't get into it.
Games are something you play for fun. If you're playing them to write self-aggrandizing articles about how you're above it all and ahead of all the rest of us, then Dead Space is a good choice because it's a great game. But it's not the best game at everything every game does well. And you can pat yourself on the back noticing that.
Personally, I might have enjoyed it more if it were a rescue story instead of an escape. But the story belongs to the authors, not to me.
If it's any consolation, it'll probably be posted several more times before next Thursday.
The post I was replying to said:
No though, we're supposed to care that some egomaniac Republican operative's feelings might have been hurt.
Joe was not an operative. The OP was lying about Joe being an operative.
The campaign is over. You guys can stop lying for a few weeks. You can stop smearing Joe for asking a question.
Joe was just a guy in Ohio. Obama came to his house to campaign. He wasn't an "operative".
Do you guys even care that you're lying? Your guy won. There's no need to continue to smear and lie about Joe the Plumber.
We're trusting Internet security to people who don't know any better than to schedule meetings in Minneapolis in the winter. It's 17 degrees and very windy out right now.
You don't understand. The glacier is melting at 0.2 ducks per year! Prior to this experiment, the glacier was melting at zero ducks per year. It has increased 2 whole ducks per 10 year period! At this rate of increase, the entire population of ducks will be exhausted by 2142! Don't you care about the ducks?
The only upside is that, barring any additional interference, the glacier's melting will return to zero ducks per year once all the ducks are gone.
It doesn't work. Guns don't prevent any oppression until the oppression becomes so bad you'd sacrifice (or at least gravely risk) your life to end it.
The oppressors know this, so they make sure to try to oppress just a little short of this threshold.
In the US, you can change government officials and policy.
Only in the majority.
Increasingly, minorities and individuals have absolutely no recourse. In a free country, a person in the minority would be free. But freedom is ending in the US. Majorities can take what they want, force people to do what they want, and prevent anyone from escaping their control.
But, but ... What if this type of thing continues? Pretty soon anyone will be able to give someone else a ride in a car without asking the government's permission!
What's next? Letting people cut hair without a government license?
Wow, questioning the patriotism of people with a different view than yours, wonder where you learned that?
You don't need to learn it. When someone tells soldiers to shoot their commanders, it figured that patriotism is not really their main motivation. Also when they go to Iraq to act as human shields to support an enemy nation. Burning flags, praising Fidel Castro, blaming America for everything anyone ever did wrong in the world, wanting us to be more like Europe, threatening to move to Canada every election, how many incidents does it take to raise a question?
Why should there even be a question? America-haters are not patriotic.
Congrats on parroting a well-worn talking point though.
Since you claim the environmentalists want dead sailors and a weakened America, please cite your proof...
One indication that they want dead sailors is that they're taking an action that might result in dead sailors. That's why the court ruled against them. If they don't want dead sailors, why are they endangering the sailors? They'd rather sailors die than whales get "injured". That's the whole point of the story.
Seriously? And this sentence isn't emotional appeal with a lack of science how?
Both of these questions are emotional and lack science.
... generally accepted link...
There's a sciency notion for you. I hear there's a "generally accepted link" between toads and warts too. Give me a PhD in ecology!
How "generally" does a "link" have to be "accepted" before it's irrefutable proof of cause and effect? Very, very generally indeed, I suppose.
And as a side point, what would emotionally charged environmentalists have to gain by stopping sonar exercises around whales?
Dead sailors and a weakened America. I'm sure that's enough for it to be worth it to them.
They'd also like to set a precedent where they speak for the animals and they can therefore control an arbitrarily large part of everyone's daily lives by deciding what we can do and what we can't. Then we can all go to them for their blessing with any planned project or action. They'll give us a yea or nay based on their unique bond with the animals. It's potentially very lucrative.
And the government will pay attorney's fees, which is good if you're an attorney. Then the attorneys can donate to the non-profit that brought the lawsuit. Everyone gets paid. Thanks whales!
The lesson to be learned here is "pirate often".
It's interesting how people who like to pirate and who like free stuff tend to find ways to learn that lesson over and over.
"X, Y, and Z things happened in the past. Therefore, gimme free entertainment."
That's just it. The renters and the used game buyers aren't their customers.