Exactly, I would take a mostly harmless (as in little to no actual power) Monarchy for the subjects to love gossip, idolize or hate over as they wish, over a republic all powerful elected politician figurehead who receives these same collective human emotions. Emotions that actually interfere with any rational "who should I vote for" thought process, when there is one. Hollywood has made more than enough unquestioningly love-thy-Politican (aka President) movies, thank you very much.
what evidence do you have that the FBI, CIA, NSA, GCHQ et al are not run by simple crooks?
What, facilitating the sale hard drugs in America or selling military equipment on the black market to "axis of evil" type countries is not criminal enough? People forget the criminal history of some of these organizations rather quickly and seem to ignore the current ongoing continuation of the same. Guess that propaganda and a firm grip on the corporate mass media message reaching the majority just works. We have a serious amount of evidence that those organizations have committed egregious crimes, so the real question is: How do we know/guarantee that they are NO LONGER being run by criminals?
Oh it can be pretty successful if done right. The NSA will little doubt start doing Limited Hangouts of information.
A limited hangout, or partial hangout, is a public relations or propaganda technique that involves the release of previously hidden information in order to prevent a greater exposure of more important details.
When journalists get around later to releasing Snowdens whistleblower material as a "full hangout" truth, most mass media will then shout LALALA OLD NEWS nothing to see here as loud as they can to drown it out. You might even see it being marked as a dupe here on/.
" Mr Williams... visiting little known websites on the internet." How would they know that? Oh, wait...
In December 2010, police released further details, stating that Williams had visited a number of bondage websites.
The coroner rejected suicide,... She said his visits to bondage websites only occurred intermittently and were not of a frequency to indicate an active interest.
Good to see that always on, always recording spy network being put to good use...
I think it is obvious to all following the Snowden revelations that these spy agencies do not play by the law, anyones law - as can be seen with all the data sharing agreements to circumvent their respective nations laws. Any small group of individuals causing the spy agencies grief will have their life investigated inside out exactly like what happened to the engineers in this Belgacom case. Small step from there to "neutralize" or coerce the threat though many different means. The only way that these agencies will be reined in and subjected to national laws is if there is a massive public outrage forcing a lot of politicians to put a leash on the rabid attack dog (without getting bitten themselves for trying to do it). So far none of that looks to be happening or that it even will happen... police states here we come.
Lucky they now have secret blacklists at every major UK ISP to block these. Think of the children that would be harmed by reading these speeches!
FTFA:
In a remarkable step the party has also blocked access to the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine, a San-Francisco-based library which captures webpages for future generations, using a software robot that directs search engines not to access the pages.
You would have a point if the time from "Final Draft" to final law included time for consumers and community groups to review and contribute to the draft before it is passed into law. As we have seen from past abusive treaties like ACTA THIS DOES NOT HAPPEN in most of the countries that finally signed it. No it is all kept secret and undemocratic so as to keep consumers and community groups off the negotiating table and leave them no time to react once the final draft is released and it is quickly passed into law.
Also now that we know that "the wheeling and dealing" involves spying on the negotiators or anyone else in key positions that stands in the way of the worst case clauses of the agreement - basically blackmailing them into agreement wherever possible. This is another important reason why no self respecting democracy (are there any left) should allow such negotiations to be held for so long in secret, nor run by a small select few of power brokers operating in the dark.
Seriously, though, good on WikiLeaks. It can't hurt to rub people's noses in the facts -- can it?
It is a sad day that we must rely on an donation sponsored organization like Wikileaks to attempt to defend the rights and interests of consumers - our respective national institutions have obviously failed us. Wikileaks and brought some sunlight on the backroom dealing, bribing and power struggle negotiations over the TPP and defiantly hurts the corrupt politicians goverment functionaries and corporations behind it.
If this knowledge now translates into pushback and political action then maybe it will not have been in vain. Given mass media is not interested in informing the masses that their rights and interest are about to be stripped away by this deal then this it is a long shot. We the people get the governance we deserve in the end, I guess.
This new hot on the heels of GHCQ targeting engineers to gain access to the systems of the companies they work for.
Looks like Slashdot, LinkedIn and other sites engineers frequent just earned themselves a NoScript->Forbid status. That Slashdot does not even have a cert auth SSL, for what pathetically little it does to secure your communications, is a crime for a tech orientated site...
if you have a starving and overpopulated population **IN SOME AREAS** - as the link I gave shows we defiantly do - then just because other (richer) areas overproduce food that goes to waste does not change the fact that some areas are starving due to overpopulation. Fix the distribution/tech gap problem to solve this inequality then yes we would not have any starving/overpopulated areas anymore.
The problems of extreme poverty and population growth (may well) have been solved.
Climate change is still a massive problem (which we must therefore try to solve).
Excessive per-capita resource consumption in rich countries must now be reduced.
"We" already are starving and overpopulated**. This research project is sponsored by companies operating in a very rich country - has potential to alleviate starvation and in the third world, but it is unlikely that will happen in our lifetimes. The evidence so far strongly suggests that we now live in a "winner-take-all" world economy, where technological advances do not filter down and only serve to deepen the inequality both within a countries population and between countries. Your stand on the environment one way or the other has nothing to do with that...
Corporate America in general can't directly intercept and store your emails, chat logs and VOIP sessions. They have little data fiefdoms dominating partial areas on your online life related to their respective businesses, wheras the NSA has built massive data warehouses to record and store all your bases...
Take your business elsewhere whenever possible. Only thing that will make companies sit up and pay attention is when their bottom line starts to be affected. Computer professionals advise non-techy business types on how best to protect sensitive company information against the massive industrial espionage spy network. People may not care about their facebook page and personal email is being compromised, but they sure as hell care when their companies sensitive business information is put at risk...
Your Genocide denier claim for Chomsky, are so very false (like most of the propaganda you peddle). It is curious that you repeat such an extremist claim given what Chomsky really said is on public record:
"I see no antisemitic implications in denial of the existence of gas chambers, or even denial of the holocaust".[170]
I was asked whether the fact that a person denies the existence of gas chambers does not prove that he is an anti-Semite. I wrote back what every sane person knows: no, of course it does not. A person might believe that Hitler exterminated 6 million Jews in some other way without being an anti-Semite. Since the point is trivial and disputed by no one, I do not know why we are discussing it. In that context, I made a further point: even denial of the Holocaust would not prove that a person is an anti-Semite. I presume that that point too is not subject to contention. Thus if a person ignorant of modern history were told of the Holocaust and refused to believe that humans are capable of such monstrous acts, we would not conclude that he is an anti-Semite.[171]
Chomsky's true harmonious crime is to speak truth to power, such as in this interview - which is the real reason why your here peddling flimsy ad hominems... but please, continue. It is amusing to watch this Cold Fjord account operator struggle with the real world...
Does the CIA still raise that money by selling drugs into the US like it was caught doing previously, or do they just sell weapons on the black market to "Axis of evil" type countries. Such a credible and upstanding extra-govermentmtal organization, a shining beacon for protecting democracy... *sigh*.
Like a first date, AT&T fell in love with "counterterrorism investigations", such a clean and respectable sounding type. Turns out it is little more than organizing illegal kidnappings, torture, assassinations - outside the rule of law, anyones law, anywhere... and forget the constitution.
The problem is that only a smaller percentage of people actually click through or bother to read the forums - so slashdots frontpage is effectively used for peddling crude propaganda such as this example to the majority that use syndicated/google news summaries and/or do not read any "balancing" upmodded comments. The echo chamber effect of the same message coming in from many perceived "credible" news sources makes the statements true in the minds of many. It would be much less suspicious if the actual slashdot news item was not basically a direct quote/stated as a fact. Add to this the fact that/. editors have repeatedly posted propaganda as crude as this in short sustained bouts over a few days (like a marketing campaign) plus throw in the enormous interest companies like Stratfor have expressed in internal communications to increase their influence over the public discourse - and it is hard not to start raising questions about Slashdot editor integrity... reddit was marketing itself as a supposed bastion of independence - until recently.
Slashdot Mirror
Exactly, I would take a mostly harmless (as in little to no actual power) Monarchy for the subjects to love gossip, idolize or hate over as they wish, over a republic all powerful elected politician figurehead who receives these same collective human emotions. Emotions that actually interfere with any rational "who should I vote for" thought process, when there is one. Hollywood has made more than enough unquestioningly love-thy-Politican (aka President) movies, thank you very much.
what evidence do you have that the FBI, CIA, NSA, GCHQ et al are not run by simple crooks?
What, facilitating the sale hard drugs in America or selling military equipment on the black market to "axis of evil" type countries is not criminal enough? People forget the criminal history of some of these organizations rather quickly and seem to ignore the current ongoing continuation of the same. Guess that propaganda and a firm grip on the corporate mass media message reaching the majority just works. We have a serious amount of evidence that those organizations have committed egregious crimes, so the real question is: How do we know/guarantee that they are NO LONGER being run by criminals?
A limited hangout, or partial hangout, is a public relations or propaganda technique that involves the release of previously hidden information in order to prevent a greater exposure of more important details.
[sarcasm] By lucky coincidence [/sarcasm] the NSA are now allowed to go direct to the public with their message (see "'Anti-Propaganda' Ban Repealed... Direct Broadcasting at American Citizens"), not that private mass media was not on their side to begin with anyway.
When journalists get around later to releasing Snowdens whistleblower material as a "full hangout" truth, most mass media will then shout LALALA OLD NEWS nothing to see here as loud as they can to drown it out. You might even see it being marked as a dupe here on /.
Oh I do not know - looks like a routine baby step these days, see The US Using Prism To Engage In Commercial Espionage Against Germany And Others
In December 2010, police released further details, stating that Williams had visited a number of bondage websites.
The coroner rejected suicide,... She said his visits to bondage websites only occurred intermittently and were not of a frequency to indicate an active interest.
Good to see that always on, always recording spy network being put to good use...
I think it is obvious to all following the Snowden revelations that these spy agencies do not play by the law, anyones law - as can be seen with all the data sharing agreements to circumvent their respective nations laws. Any small group of individuals causing the spy agencies grief will have their life investigated inside out exactly like what happened to the engineers in this Belgacom case. Small step from there to "neutralize" or coerce the threat though many different means. The only way that these agencies will be reined in and subjected to national laws is if there is a massive public outrage forcing a lot of politicians to put a leash on the rabid attack dog (without getting bitten themselves for trying to do it). So far none of that looks to be happening or that it even will happen... police states here we come.
Lucky they now have secret blacklists at every major UK ISP to block these. Think of the children that would be harmed by reading these speeches!
FTFA:
In a remarkable step the party has also blocked access to the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine, a San-Francisco-based library which captures webpages for future generations, using a software robot that directs search engines not to access the pages.
You would have a point if the time from "Final Draft" to final law included time for consumers and community groups to review and contribute to the draft before it is passed into law. As we have seen from past abusive treaties like ACTA THIS DOES NOT HAPPEN in most of the countries that finally signed it. No it is all kept secret and undemocratic so as to keep consumers and community groups off the negotiating table and leave them no time to react once the final draft is released and it is quickly passed into law.
Also now that we know that "the wheeling and dealing" involves spying on the negotiators or anyone else in key positions that stands in the way of the worst case clauses of the agreement - basically blackmailing them into agreement wherever possible. This is another important reason why no self respecting democracy (are there any left) should allow such negotiations to be held for so long in secret, nor run by a small select few of power brokers operating in the dark.
Seriously, though, good on WikiLeaks. It can't hurt to rub people's noses in the facts -- can it?
It is a sad day that we must rely on an donation sponsored organization like Wikileaks to attempt to defend the rights and interests of consumers - our respective national institutions have obviously failed us. Wikileaks and brought some sunlight on the backroom dealing, bribing and power struggle negotiations over the TPP and defiantly hurts the corrupt politicians goverment functionaries and corporations behind it.
If this knowledge now translates into pushback and political action then maybe it will not have been in vain. Given mass media is not interested in informing the masses that their rights and interest are about to be stripped away by this deal then this it is a long shot. We the people get the governance we deserve in the end, I guess.
This new hot on the heels of GHCQ targeting engineers to gain access to the systems of the companies they work for.
Looks like Slashdot, LinkedIn and other sites engineers frequent just earned themselves a NoScript->Forbid status. That Slashdot does not even have a cert auth SSL, for what pathetically little it does to secure your communications, is a crime for a tech orientated site...
America has a very visible easily confirmed two tiered justice system.
if you have a starving and overpopulated population **IN SOME AREAS** - as the link I gave shows we defiantly do - then just because other (richer) areas overproduce food that goes to waste does not change the fact that some areas are starving due to overpopulation. Fix the distribution/tech gap problem to solve this inequality then yes we would not have any starving/overpopulated areas anymore.
Conclusions
The problems of extreme poverty and population growth (may well) have been solved.
Climate change is still a massive problem (which we must therefore try to solve).
Excessive per-capita resource consumption in rich countries must now be reduced.
"We" already are starving and overpopulated**. This research project is sponsored by companies operating in a very rich country - has potential to alleviate starvation and in the third world, but it is unlikely that will happen in our lifetimes. The evidence so far strongly suggests that we now live in a "winner-take-all" world economy, where technological advances do not filter down and only serve to deepen the inequality both within a countries population and between countries. Your stand on the environment one way or the other has nothing to do with that...
** in some areas
Corporate America in general can't directly intercept and store your emails, chat logs and VOIP sessions. They have little data fiefdoms dominating partial areas on your online life related to their respective businesses, wheras the NSA has built massive data warehouses to record and store all your bases...
Take your business elsewhere whenever possible. Only thing that will make companies sit up and pay attention is when their bottom line starts to be affected. Computer professionals advise non-techy business types on how best to protect sensitive company information against the massive industrial espionage spy network. People may not care about their facebook page and personal email is being compromised, but they sure as hell care when their companies sensitive business information is put at risk...
Well we have at least 25 centuries of Chicken Little/Henny Penny folklore warning us about the dangers of Faux News and the society destroying consequences of it. We obviously have a had time to collectively assimilate the danger however given that news organizations can now legally lie to you.
Despite the technological advances we as a species have been here before... and going by history - it is going to get ugly before it gets better.
Your Genocide denier claim for Chomsky, are so very false (like most of the propaganda you peddle). It is curious that you repeat such an extremist claim given what Chomsky really said is on public record:
"I see no antisemitic implications in denial of the existence of gas chambers, or even denial of the holocaust".[170]
I was asked whether the fact that a person denies the existence of gas chambers does not prove that he is an anti-Semite. I wrote back what every sane person knows: no, of course it does not. A person might believe that Hitler exterminated 6 million Jews in some other way without being an anti-Semite. Since the point is trivial and disputed by no one, I do not know why we are discussing it. In that context, I made a further point: even denial of the Holocaust would not prove that a person is an anti-Semite. I presume that that point too is not subject to contention. Thus if a person ignorant of modern history were told of the Holocaust and refused to believe that humans are capable of such monstrous acts, we would not conclude that he is an anti-Semite.[171]
Chomsky's true harmonious crime is to speak truth to power, such as in this interview - which is the real reason why your here peddling flimsy ad hominems... but please, continue. It is amusing to watch this Cold Fjord account operator struggle with the real world...
Why Shouldn't I Work for the NSA?
Does the CIA still raise that money by selling drugs into the US like it was caught doing previously, or do they just sell weapons on the black market to "Axis of evil" type countries. Such a credible and upstanding extra-govermentmtal organization, a shining beacon for protecting democracy... *sigh*.
Like a first date, AT&T fell in love with "counterterrorism investigations", such a clean and respectable sounding type. Turns out it is little more than organizing illegal kidnappings, torture, assassinations - outside the rule of law, anyones law, anywhere... and forget the constitution.
Antitrust violations are ignored, while they continue to be cooperative. Same goes for most big companies, play ball or be investigated...
mind as well have asked me to paint a picture which best conveys my ex-girlfriend's LiveJournal post from 2001.
it is not a Rorschach test, silly.
2001, you really do have to get over her and move on...
The problem is that only a smaller percentage of people actually click through or bother to read the forums - so slashdots frontpage is effectively used for peddling crude propaganda such as this example to the majority that use syndicated/google news summaries and/or do not read any "balancing" upmodded comments. The echo chamber effect of the same message coming in from many perceived "credible" news sources makes the statements true in the minds of many. It would be much less suspicious if the actual slashdot news item was not basically a direct quote/stated as a fact. Add to this the fact that /. editors have repeatedly posted propaganda as crude as this in short sustained bouts over a few days (like a marketing campaign) plus throw in the enormous interest companies like Stratfor have expressed in internal communications to increase their influence over the public discourse - and it is hard not to start raising questions about Slashdot editor integrity... reddit was marketing itself as a supposed bastion of independence - until recently.
Great intro video... 31,306USD Raised of $50,000 Goal...