Wow! Perhaps that will be one of the things that is addressed by the time third party apps are allowed, considering that they're not now? Could this perhaps be part of the reason (among many others) that third party apps aren't currently allowed?
I mean, I know it would be unheard of for an issue to be addressed or fixed on an OS that is clearly undergoing active major change and development (as is evidenced by internals and framework changes between 1.0.2 and 1.1.1) in four months...
Could the things that Jobs says Apple is working on to make the iPhone platform secure possibly include things like this, or does Jobs need to explicitly say they're addressing this exact problem in order for you to believe Apple might actually be working on the security of one of the most important and visible products in their history?
I love all the people who are now going to say that Apple is only doing an SDK because the brave, innovative hackers who just want us all to be able to free our hardware have forced their hand.
Kind of like the only reason they have a battery replacement program for iPods was because of the Neistat Brothers' video, right?
Except that it would be wrong, on both counts.
For a device like the iPhone, Apple probably had SOME kind of SDK/third party development planned all along. But the iPhone's OS is still a wildly moving target, and it's not appropriate to have an SDK before things have calmed down with the OS APIs, frameworks, etc.
But if you want to believe that a statistically insignificant (yes, really - most people don't care, much less even know, about this) group of hobbyists and hackers have "forced" Apple to scramble to release an SDK, go right ahead.
Considering that the iPhone's OS is a moving target, and the majority of the frameworks and private APIs have changed from 1.0.2 to 1.1.1 (which is why many third party apps broke between 1.0.2 and 1.1.1), I don't think it's unreasonable to wait until things on that front have stabilized before you start providing developers with an SDK.
I knew that most of the negative responses to this would be along the lines of saying that Apple was "forced" into doing an SDK because of the third party hacking community, when in reality third party development was very likely in the cards all along.:-/
Yes, it does. It says it "removes the horsepower." It doesn't matter if the engine is still running - if it can't deliver power, then it has been effectively killed. The entire purpose of an engine is to deliver power.
No. As ordinary people, mechanics, whomever you chose, what "killing the engine" means. Every one of them will tell you the engine is shut off. They won't say that it's in a idle state with no throttle with power brakes and steering still functional. When someone says "remotely shuts down vehicles", the clear implication is that the vehicle is being turned off. It is not.
I also didn't deny it's stopping the car, anywhere
Yes you did, it's in the title of your post.
No. I said 'It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"'. I didn't say it didn't stop the car. That's the very purpose of this system. It does NOT "shut down" the vehicle, and I define exactly what I mean by "shut down" in the very first sentence, which is a continuation of the subject, in my post.
In other words, it remotely shuts down the vehicle. No matter how "complex" or "gradual" or "controlled" it is - it is remotely shutting down the car. So why did you say in your title that it doesn't remotely shut down the car?
No. I said exactly this:
'It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"...the implication being that it just slams on the brakes or kills the engine or both.'
If you said to someone that a vehicle is remotely "shut down", with no other information, nearly all people would immediately assume that meant the engine and all systems were simply turned off. The clear follow-on to that, and a major objection, would be that such an action would be massively unsafe. That's what the submitter is implying all throughout her blog post, saying things like "would you be your life" on this, etc.
It does NOT remotely "shut down" the car in the context of what I clearly described in the furst sentence of my post. You can sit here all day and say that if you can't apply power to the wheels to drive, the vehicle is effectively "shut down". Yeah, I get it...but you don't: I wasn't implying that this doesn't stop the car, and NEVER said that. Obviously you can see from my initial and subsequent posts that I understand exactly what is going on. But you just don't agree with my stance, so instead you're try to say I'm contradicting myself, when I in fact intended to say exactly what I said for exactly the reasons I said it.
A controlled way? So, does it know if the car needs power based on circumstances that others have mentioned (on ice or snow, in the middle of a turn) and keep the power on, or does it still shut the power down anyway?
Which is why "if officers see the car in motion and judge it can be stopped safely, they can tell OnStar operators".
That's the whole point.
Does a spike strip know when to not pop the tires? Does a vehicle performing the PIT maneuver know to spin in a beautiful, exact 180 degree half-circle and come to a graceful rest? The idea is that this is SAFER than those technologies, and safer than a high speed chase.
Now if you believe it will be used in contravention of the ways they're explicitly and specifically saying it will be used, that's another story entirely. But that should also mean we should have heard a lot of other examples of OnStar abuse, since it's been around for a while, except we haven't.
But how do you know it won't be abused? It's not like the police have a wonderful track record of honesty, integrity and concern for public safety.
Actually, police, to most people and for the most part, do have exactly that track record. That's, you know, their job.
You just apparently choose to take examples of corruption and abuse, and assume that is the norm, when it is the exception.
It's not impossible for this to be hacked, either. So, what guarantee do you have that it will always be used properly and carefully?
None, because there is no
Re:Once again daveschroeder slings the propaganda
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Stalling Cars Via OnStar
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Yes, spun; my fully-disclosed identity and educational background must completely invalidate any points I have made, as well as my own opinions!
However, a completely anonymous slashdot poster using an ad hominem attack is definitely "+5, Interesting".
I don't quite understand how making shoulder belts and air bags, both of which are proven to be life-saving devices (on the whole) mandatory is related to the police operating in a "safe and sane" matter. The humor is that police not operating in a "safe an sane" manner is most often brought up in the context of high speed chases...
I also note the many places in this post where I say the government never, ever lies.
I suppose that your implied assertion that all elements of government must always be distrusted and always be assumed to be lying (or have ulterior motives, usually evil) is the correct point of view, though?
And wow, yeah, I sure talk about "terrists" a lot, using the imaginary threat to incite fear in the sheeple! Oh, wait...I'm just a person who knows there is often more than one side to a story or more than one solution to a problem, unlike yourself.
If you want to dispute what I'm saying, why don't you take the actual issues, instead of personally attacking me, or bringing up what is blindingly obvious on my personal web site or CV every time I post something you disagree with to slashdot?
Re:It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"
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Stalling Cars Via OnStar
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Y'know, I never did see any of those studies about the proven effects of the third brake light. Could you point one or two out to me? And... at the time they were mandated, they were a novelty. Are they still as effective as they were initially?
- The lamps were most effective in the early years. In 1987, CHMSL reduced rear impact crashes by 8.5 percent (confidence bounds 6.1 to 10.9 percent).
- Effectiveness declined in 1988 and 1989, but then leveled off. During 1989-95, CHMSL reduced rear impact crashes by 4.3 percent (confidence bounds 2.9 to 5.8 percent). This is the long-term effectiveness of the lamps.
- The effectiveness of CHMSL in light trucks is about the same as in passenger cars.
- At the long-term effectiveness level of 4.3 percent, when all cars and light trucks on the road have CHMSL, the lamps will prevent 92,000-137,000 police-reported crashes, 58,000-70,000 nonfatal injuries, and $655,000,000 (in 1994 dollars) in property damage per year.
- The annual consumer cost of CHMSL in cars and light trucks sold in the United States is close to $206,000,000 (in 1994 dollars).
- Even though the effectiveness of CHMSL has declined from its initial levels, the lamps are and will continue to be highly cost-effective safety devices.
OnStar is still wholly operated by GM, and it's the OnStar privacy policies that are at issue in any event, and OnStar is under GM's umbrella.
As to airbags, I spoke to that already in this post...airbags have saved far more lives than they have taken in narrow circumstances. Some people have argued that shoulder belts have also cost lives. Except for the fact they've saved many more. Third brake lights were also mandated and were sharply criticized in many auto rags for being ugly as sin, and many saw it as an example of government interference. Except they, too, provably save lives and property.
If a remote kill capability that is only used in the case of a stolen vehicle or court order becomes mandated, it will no doubt save lives and property as well. Your problem is that you think that just because it exists, it will automatically be abused, or just because air bags, shoulder belts, and center high mounted stop lamps have been mandated, this will also be. Well, as far as the former, that's a very cynical view, and for the latter, remote kill capability authorized by police is a far cry from shoulder belts and third brake lights.
Not a contradiction at all. If power steering and power brakes are still working, that means the engine is still running. Also, it does NOT kill the engine. That is a factual statement, and you can confirm it yourself by contacting GM public relations and requesting comment if you wish.
I also didn't deny it's stopping the car, anywhere. What I said was it doesn't "remotely shut down the vehicle, the implication being that it just slams on the brakes or kills the engine or both." It stops the car in a very controlled manner, and it's fairly complex how it functions. It is de-throttling the vehicle; the equivalent of taking the foot off the gas, putting the engine in an idle/coast state, but still running, and nothing more, leaving full power steering and power brake control.
Nowhere did I deny that it "stops the car"; of course it effectively "stops the car", but in a controlled way, and not by simply shutting off the engine or slamming on the brakes, as some people seem to think. Also, it is only to be used when police have the vehicle in sight and are in direct communication with OnStar; that's its purpose. So before people say "what if it's on a hill" or "what if it's not in a safe place to stop, even by releasing the throttle", it's only done when it is within visual contact of police, and a hell of a lot safer than a high speed chase, a spike strip, or the PIT maneuver.
Re:It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"
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Stalling Cars Via OnStar
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Yes, I remember (barely) the shoulder belt, the air bag, and the center high mounted stop lamp, better known as the third brake light.
I also remember the arguments about shoulder belts and air bags killing people, and about how the CHMSL destroyed the aesthetics of the rear of a vehicle. Except that it was easily proven that the benefits of shoulder belts, air bags, and third brake lights outweighed any drawbacks.
What if a controlled remote kill of a vehicle under police supervision that has been reported stolen or is the subject of a court order has the same results? Returning stolen properly safely, preventing high speed police chases and death?
Same thing with Tasers. Tasers are statistically harmless, and a hell of a lot less harmless than a number of other ways of subduing a suspect, including lethal means. Whether Tasers are overused is a different question altogether, but being tased is a much better alternative than being forcibly subdued by any number of other means. Tasers are designed to be a safer and non-lethal ("non-lethal" in weapons terms doesn't mean "never, ever lethal or having any contributing effect on a possible lethal scenario whatsoever" - and please, don't link me to your favorite article or sob story about how oh-so-dangerous Tasers are: given their use, they are far, far less dangerous than the means they replaced).
And same with the PATRIOT Act. It was pretty much universally agreed that a lot of older laws needed updating. Given the size and scope of PATRIOT, only very, very small portions of it were controversial. Nearly all of the rest of it was benign or viewed as sensible by most people. Some provisions have been called into Constitutional question. But you don't throw the baby out with the bathwater, as we do when we imply that all of the PATRIOT Act rises to this level of controversy, when in reality it is very small portions of it, on the whole.
I don't fundamentally disagree with the government using the power it has, using anything it is given, and, inasmuch as it can be anthropomorphized, always "wanting more". But is this because of the evil or corruption or totalitarianism that is sometimes implied by such assertions, or because many in government simply use all the tools at their disposal? Governments and police agencies can do a lot more with vehicles, telephones, cameras, computers, databases, networks, Tasers, spike strips, and all manner of things than they can without. Technology is always enabling and is often a force multiplier.
Government mandates, and government in general, are not all sinister, nor are they all roses. But we should look at them on balance.
...the implication being that it just slams on the brakes or kills the engine or both.
From TFA:
OnStar would call police and tell them a stolen car's whereabouts.
Then, if officers see the car in motion and judge it can be stopped safely, they can tell OnStar operators, who will send the car a signal via cell phone to slow it to a halt.
"This technology will basically remove the control of the horsepower from the thief," Huber said. "Everything else in the vehicle works. The steering works. The brakes work."
GM is still exploring the possibility of having the car give a recorded verbal warning before it stops moving. A voice would tell the driver through the radio speakers that police will stop the car, Huber said, and the car's emergency flashers would go on.
"If the thief does nothing else it will coast to a stop. But they can drive off to the side of the road," Huber said.
And from TFR (where "R" stands for "rant"):
The claim is that owners will have to give permission first for this capability to be enabled. Bull. I don't care what OnStar's privacy policy says, if the technical capability for this function is present, OnStar will have no practical choice but to comply when faced with a law enforcement demand or court order, whether or not owner "permission" was ever granted.
It is completely technically feasible for this system to need to be enabled in order for it to work. For example, with BMW Assist, BMW's OnStat-like service, equipment is physically disabled in the car if the user does not subscribe to a service.
This argument appears predicated on the belief that even if a customer doesn't voluntarily and willingly "opt in", that it can still somehow be used by police or hackers. I'm sorry, but that's simply not how it works.
Further, OnStar can currently be used to unlock vehicles. Why isn't that an "irresistible target for hackers"?
It's impossible to hack OnStar? Would you bet your life on that?
Um, no, because I wouldn't have to, nor would anyone else who opts in to the service?
And how long will it be before such systems are mandated, one might wonder?
Ah, my old friend, the slippery slope. Long time, no see!
This is no different than Lojack, which can also, in theory, be "activated" when a user chooses to have the service, in the same way this could be.
And if you don't believe GM's clearly stated privacy policies, which state, in short, that "OnStar will release information about a vehicle only for marketing research, to protect the rights, property, of safety of any person, in exigent circumstances, to prevent misuse of their service, when legally required to do so or when subject to a valid court order, or in various other circumstances", then you probably shouldn't buy a GM vehicle.
Good thing buying GM vehicles isn't mandatory, and GM isn't a government agency, huh?
(And of course -- and I didn't look at this at first -- because there is editorializing about how the "MSM" doesn't mention privacy implications, I'm not surprised to see it's posted by kdawson.)
I guess the automated systems will have to take this legal reality into account, then, won't they?
(I think the original poster is assuming that just because someone is in the "back seat" or in an "infant seat", somehow they won't be counted. From TFA: "All blood is red, and all living humans have water in them, and we're reliant on those attributes." It would seem obvious that "living humans" would also include children, regardless of what position they're in or whether they happen to be behind or in a seat that will be essentially invisible to such detectors.)
It's great that HOV lane laws have apparently included children for simplicity. But even this Q&A makes it clear that children were only included for that reason, and that still wasn't the original idea or purpose of HOV/HOT lanes. Even so, the parent poster won't have to get affidavits from toddlers or in-vehicle video cameras monitoring their child's presence: if this system doesn't work to accurately detect multiple-occupancy vehicles within the law, it won't be serving its purpose.
Believe it or not, technology can and has taken the place of mundane human activity in all manner of disciplines, including law enforcement tasks.
I'm saying, then, that the idea and spirit of HOV lanes is for carpool, multiple passenger commuter, busses, passenger vans, and similar applications, and not someone who happens to be toting a child in an infant seat.
I hope this clears things up.
And to be serious, I don't know what the specific law is in Virginia, Maryland, or Washington, DC, for HOV/HOT lanes. But the idea, purpose, and principle is what I said above, not for someone to be able to get somewhere faster or more conveniently because they have a child with them.
Yes, yes, I know, they don't really specify......but hopefully you realize the idea and spirit of HOV lanes is for carpool, multiple passenger commuter, busses, passenger vans, and similar applications, and not someone who happens to be toting a child in an infant seat.:-/
Not only that, but the submission is wrong. That Tom Yager Infoworld piece that is linked was Yager's reaction to the fact that Apple hadn't yet open sourced the Intel kernel, and ran it under the sensationalist headline "Apple closes down OS X".
Except for the fact that at WWDC, they announced that the Intel kernel would continue to be open alongside PowerPC, as it always had.
Anyone is welcome to see for themselves. At the same time, Apple also launched Mac OS Forge, Apple's clearinghouse for its open source projects. Granted, Darwin as an OS is essentially dead, and has been for some time. But Darwin as the core of Mac OS X is alive, and many key components, including the kernel, are open source on both Intel and PowerPC.
And, no, Apple did not do this in "response" to Yager's article or anything similar. Yager just wasn't patient enough to find out what was actually going to happen, and assumed that since he hadn't seen any new Intel kernel source releases before WWDC that Mac OS X must now be "closed" - but he was wrong.
Does Apple do some of its open source stuff for PR or because it's to its advantage? Of course. One would hope that would be obvious. If you don't think Apple is giving back enough to the community, that's another valid, albeit subjective, opinion. I'd advise people to look at some of the Mac OS Forge projects, however.
So, the submission is wrong in both spirit (irritating Microsoft) and in fact (OS X now being "closed"; or any more closed than it has ever been).
For the sake of clarity, Jobs is saying they're going to try to stop *unlocked*, not "hacked", iPhones. "Hacked" in this context is generally construed as the process via which people install third party applications or ringtones, and is different from unlocking. Apple is not expected to stop "hacking", and has already stated as much.
When Jobs said he wants to fight unlockers, this also doesn't have to mean end customers who unlock their phones - it means stopping tools, processes, and vulnerabilities in the Phone that enable unlocking. It doesn't mean Apple is going to go after end users who have unlocked their phones.
Even given Jobs' statement, it does NOT mean Apple is going to try to disable already-unlocked iPhones. In fact, Apple would probably like to avoid this, because breaking peoples' otherwise-working phones would cause a negative PR firestorm. What they DO want to stop is any process or procedure that allows any new phones to be unlocked from that point forward, which they will be doing as such methods are discovered. Apple will not intentionally be disabling iPhones that are unlocked, but is warning that it MAY happen for reasons beyond their control.
Again, if you choose to believe that this situation combined with Jobs' statement means Apple is going to be intentionally disabling already-unlocked phones, that's your prerogative, of course. The reality is that Apple is simply going to do whatever it can to stop the cottage unlocking industry, which includes patching vulnerabilities in the phone that currently are used for unlocking...not intentionally damaging or disabling already-unlocked phones.
And that doesn't mean Apple will intentionally damage phones that have been unlocked out of spite.
It means exactly what it says: that Apple will fight unlocking hacks.
Which means they'll be doing things like patching the buffer overflow currently used to unlock, which means that current unlocking mechanisms won't work in the future.
Schiller's statement is 100% accurate and not in conflict with, or "trumped", by what Jobs said. What Schiller said is the voice of Apple, and was probably vetted with Jobs himself, to be frank.
So to reiterate, you are wrong. Apple WILL NOT be intentionally or purposely damaging or disabling unlocked phones. I was already aware of Jobs' statement, and that doesn't change any of this. If you choose to believe it means that Apple will be intentionally bricking unlocked phones, or that since Jobs is "higher" than Schiller (...), you choose to interpret his statement as meaning Apple will be intentionally bricking phones and Schiller's statement is invalid, be my guest.
I know your post was sarcastic, but any mac users dealing with the agonizing slowness of their photo upload applet should be cheering for joy if what you're saying is true.
Flash on Mac isn't all that hot either. Adobe's more or less been shitting all over the platform ever since Apple started directly competing with them. A single Youtube video can easily suck up 80% of the CPU cycles on a modern Core Duo machine.
You do know about the official Mac OS X-native FaceBook Exporter for iPhoto, don't you? It's that kind of integrated app that makes the user experience with Facebook nice, not things like Silverlight.
No, it means, "among the unlocking mechanisms for then iPhone, the one which is the most popular". This does not imply that iPhone unlocking is mainstream, and is not referring to SIM unlocking in general. It is referring to the most common unlock for iPhone, and "mainstream" was far from a suitable choice of words.
Apple is doing this with iPhone OS updates; that is, checking to see if it is in an expected state, and if it's not, requiring the iPhone to go through a "restore".
However, for the radio firmware, Apple is alleging that some unlock mechanisms may have irreparably damaged the hardware of the phone. If that is correct - if the iPhone hardware has been permanently damaged - then I don't think Apple is to blame. If, however, it is all software-only and reversible, then I agree with you completely, and expect Apple to try to follow exactly that path.
Apple has discovered that many of the unauthorized iPhone unlocking programs available on the Internet cause irreparable damage to the iPhone's software, which will likely result in the modified iPhone becoming permanently inoperable when a future Apple-supplied iPhone software update is installed. [...] Apple strongly discourages users from installing unauthorized unlocking programs on their iPhones. Users who make unauthorized modifications to the software on their iPhone violate their iPhone software license agreement and void their warranty. The permanent inability to use an iPhone due to installing unlocking software is not covered under the iPhone's warranty.
''This has nothing to do with proactively disabling a phone that is unlocked or hacked,'' Phil Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of worldwide product marketing, said in an interview. ''It's unfortunate that some of these programs have caused damage to the iPhone software, but Apple cannot be responsible for... those consequences.''
The current unlock mechanism uses a buffer overflow in the current version of the iPhone's OS to unlock. Will that be fixed, thereby "stopping" unlockers? Yes.
This doesn't mean they're going to intentionally damage phones that have ALREADY BEEN unlocked.
It's about the radio firmware being altered in an unknown way, or even damaged. (Note: this is DIFFERENT from jailbreaking, OS hacking, and installing third party apps.)
Why should that be covered under warranty?
[...] is Apple designing future software updates to do damage to iPhone when said SIM Unlock code is present?
NO!
Absolutely not.
Apple has already explicitly stated that they are not going to intentionally or proactively do anything to unlocked phones. Even a small amount of logic would reveal that when the baseband radio firmware is in an unknown state (this is different from the OS on the phone, and doing the "hacking" to install third party applications, and so on), future updates, either to the firmware or the OS or both, may break things. Even a software update that expects the radio to accept commands or interact with the OS in a particular way could end up breaking things.
Oh, I know a lot of you really want to believe Apple is actually going to intentionally damage phones that are unlocked. Sorry to disappoint, but that is simply not the case.
If there is any legal issue that erupts over this, Apple will very easily be able to prove that there is no way for it to predict the state of the hardware when it does updates when it has been altered, perhaps irreparably depending on the method, in an unknown fashion by the user.
Further, I think it's funny that some seem to carp about how Apple will be "fixing" the mechanism via which phones are currently unlocked, as if it's evil. Of course they will! It's a general buffer overflow that happens to be used in the unlock process. Should Apple not fix an exploitable buffer overflow in the OS just so people can continue to unlock phones? The arguments on this topic are laughable.
Moreover, while end-user unlocking of handsets is legal in the US under the current DMCA exemption, the vendor is under NO OBLIGATION to support the phones in such a state with future software/firmware updates. I can hear all the "But what about the UK?" people chiming in now. Apple will do whatever is required by law in any jurisdiction. If a certain jurisdiction REQUIRES unlocked phones, Apple may skip that market entirely (for now). Even in the UK it isn't as clear as some people like to think it is, because the phone technically isn't subsidized, meaning that it may not have to be unlocked after the subsidy is repaid - because there is no subsidy. And a large part of Apple's iPhone strategy with carriers is tight integration for things like the activation process: things that simply aren't supported with anyone but the partner carrier.
Remember: it's "legal" to do a lot of things which also might end up voiding the warranty of a particular product. Something being "legal" doesn't imply all of these things people seem to think it does. A lot of odd arguments appeared in the last story about this, saying that since the DMCA exemption allows handset unlocking, somehow, Apple must actively enable it. Wrong.
Customers have a choice:
- Don't ever apply a software update after unlocking (unless applying said update to a phone unlocked using your exact mechanism has been confirmed to work by others), and your phone will stay unlocked
- Don't buy an iPhone
Don't act like Apple is somehow bound to support all unlocked phones via any mechanism, some which may damage the phone, in any and all future software updates, especially when it can't possibly predict all iterations. You don't have to buy an iPhone.
And if you want to argue about simlocking in general, it's a very common practice the world over, and your beef isn't with Apple. If Apple just sold all iPhones unlocked, like some people think they should, there would be nowhere near the tight integration with any and all carriers, the pleasant do-it-yourself activation process that is part of what makes the iPhone genius, not to mention the economic arguments, where
Of course the cosponsor of the bill said that. What do you expect? He also said that the the Insurrection Act changes in the 2007 Defense Authorization Bill enabled the president to easily declare martial law, when in reality the changes were made in large part because of the outcry related to Hurricane Katrina, and actually had stronger guidelines for domestic use of the military than the previous provisions of the act had for the prior two centuries.
This is a political move, and if it was as clear cut as you claim it is, this act to "restore" a fundamental principle of our country should have passed unanimously. Except that it didn't, because it is nothing more than a political move. To believe otherwise believes that the Constitution applies equally to every human on the planet, whether they are a US citizen or permanent resident or not. That notion is ridiculous to me and many others, for some of the reasons I briefly alluded to in my post.
Just like the updates to the Insurrection Act of 1807 didn't enable martial law under nearly any circumstances or revoke Posse Comitatus, the Military Commissions Act of 2006 didn't revoke Habeas Corpus. To believe otherwise about either is politically charged fantasy.
Note that the linked article is an opinion piece from The Nation, self described as "the flagship of the left", so when it says things about Habeas Corpus such as, "which the Republican Congress revoked", it's not a fact, it's just what the type of article it is explicitly states: an opinion. Further, we don't have a Republican Congress anymore, so I'm not sure how that is even meaningful. I guess I'm supposed to assume that even a Democratic Congress doesn't want to "restore Habeas Corpus"? (And naturally, surprise, this is posted by kdawson.)
The fact of the matter is that Habeas Corpus was not suspended in any way, shape, or form. The Military Commissions Act does not apply to US citizens, permanent residents, or persons with a valid legal status within the United States. Only US citizens have a right to Habeas Corpus (Gonzales' ridiculous statements on the issue aside). MCA only applies to "aliens [that is, not US citizens] with no [US] immigration status who are captured and held outside the territorial jurisdiction of the United States"; that is, MCA does not apply to US citizens. Therefore, Habeas Corpus was not suspended, and to argue that it was is puzzling to me.
The argument that Habeas Corpus needs to apply to literally everyone because otherwise there is no way to "prove" that you are a US citizen to which MCA doesn't apply is something of a curious one. MCA already does not apply to US citizens apprehended on US soil. You do not need a court to affirm what is already known. If you believe the authorities will ignore the fact that someone is a US citizen and detain them anyway, then there are larger fundamental issues than whether or not someone can challenge detention; indeed, if the government really wanted to secretly detain someone without cause or ability to challenge, US citizen or not, they simply wouldn't give them any recourse at all, Habeas Corpus or no, now would they?
On this general issue, there is certainly some merit to the argument that things like terrorism should be treated as a civil or criminal matter and not a military and national security issue. However, I do not subscribe to that viewpoint. Our freedoms and rights are things that US citizens and immigrants enjoy. Else, there is no function or purpose for immigration or even borders.
Some tend to confuse US citizens and residents with everyone else on the planet, and pretend that the Constitution actually applies to everyone on Earth (which it doesn't), or that it should (which it shouldn't - perhaps in an idealized world, someday, everyone can expect and enjoy such a baseline of freedoms and rights).
And to those who will come out of the woodwork saying, "What about Jose Padilla?"
That was before MCA, which is what people say "suspended Habeas Corpus". That is, Jose Padilla did have Habeas Corpus rights and yet was still detained. That's part of reason MCA came into existence: to clarify this situation. Such detention of a US citizen apprehended on US soil, regardless of designation, has subsequently been clearly determined to be legally inappropriate, and, as such, does not fall under MCA.
On top of all of this, to those that think that administration officials are going to lie and ignore any and all laws anyway, then what difference does any wording of any law really make?
Disclaimer: portions of this post were culled or paraphrased from a couple of previous posts of mine here on the topic, but is precisely on point, so there is no need to retype.
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Wow! Perhaps that will be one of the things that is addressed by the time third party apps are allowed, considering that they're not now? Could this perhaps be part of the reason (among many others) that third party apps aren't currently allowed?
I mean, I know it would be unheard of for an issue to be addressed or fixed on an OS that is clearly undergoing active major change and development (as is evidenced by internals and framework changes between 1.0.2 and 1.1.1) in four months...
Could the things that Jobs says Apple is working on to make the iPhone platform secure possibly include things like this, or does Jobs need to explicitly say they're addressing this exact problem in order for you to believe Apple might actually be working on the security of one of the most important and visible products in their history?
Wrong.
I love all the people who are now going to say that Apple is only doing an SDK because the brave, innovative hackers who just want us all to be able to free our hardware have forced their hand.
Kind of like the only reason they have a battery replacement program for iPods was because of the Neistat Brothers' video, right?
Except that it would be wrong, on both counts.
For a device like the iPhone, Apple probably had SOME kind of SDK/third party development planned all along. But the iPhone's OS is still a wildly moving target, and it's not appropriate to have an SDK before things have calmed down with the OS APIs, frameworks, etc.
But if you want to believe that a statistically insignificant (yes, really - most people don't care, much less even know, about this) group of hobbyists and hackers have "forced" Apple to scramble to release an SDK, go right ahead.
Considering that the iPhone's OS is a moving target, and the majority of the frameworks and private APIs have changed from 1.0.2 to 1.1.1 (which is why many third party apps broke between 1.0.2 and 1.1.1), I don't think it's unreasonable to wait until things on that front have stabilized before you start providing developers with an SDK.
:-/
I knew that most of the negative responses to this would be along the lines of saying that Apple was "forced" into doing an SDK because of the third party hacking community, when in reality third party development was very likely in the cards all along.
Yes, it does. It says it "removes the horsepower." It doesn't matter if the engine is still running - if it can't deliver power, then it has been effectively killed. The entire purpose of an engine is to deliver power.
No. As ordinary people, mechanics, whomever you chose, what "killing the engine" means. Every one of them will tell you the engine is shut off. They won't say that it's in a idle state with no throttle with power brakes and steering still functional. When someone says "remotely shuts down vehicles", the clear implication is that the vehicle is being turned off. It is not.
I also didn't deny it's stopping the car, anywhere
Yes you did, it's in the title of your post.
No. I said 'It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"'. I didn't say it didn't stop the car. That's the very purpose of this system. It does NOT "shut down" the vehicle, and I define exactly what I mean by "shut down" in the very first sentence, which is a continuation of the subject, in my post.
In other words, it remotely shuts down the vehicle. No matter how "complex" or "gradual" or "controlled" it is - it is remotely shutting down the car. So why did you say in your title that it doesn't remotely shut down the car?
No. I said exactly this:
'It doesn't "remotely shut down vehicles"...the implication being that it just slams on the brakes or kills the engine or both.'
If you said to someone that a vehicle is remotely "shut down", with no other information, nearly all people would immediately assume that meant the engine and all systems were simply turned off. The clear follow-on to that, and a major objection, would be that such an action would be massively unsafe. That's what the submitter is implying all throughout her blog post, saying things like "would you be your life" on this, etc.
It does NOT remotely "shut down" the car in the context of what I clearly described in the furst sentence of my post. You can sit here all day and say that if you can't apply power to the wheels to drive, the vehicle is effectively "shut down". Yeah, I get it...but you don't: I wasn't implying that this doesn't stop the car, and NEVER said that. Obviously you can see from my initial and subsequent posts that I understand exactly what is going on. But you just don't agree with my stance, so instead you're try to say I'm contradicting myself, when I in fact intended to say exactly what I said for exactly the reasons I said it.
A controlled way? So, does it know if the car needs power based on circumstances that others have mentioned (on ice or snow, in the middle of a turn) and keep the power on, or does it still shut the power down anyway?
Which is why "if officers see the car in motion and judge it can be stopped safely, they can tell OnStar operators".
That's the whole point.
Does a spike strip know when to not pop the tires? Does a vehicle performing the PIT maneuver know to spin in a beautiful, exact 180 degree half-circle and come to a graceful rest? The idea is that this is SAFER than those technologies, and safer than a high speed chase.
Now if you believe it will be used in contravention of the ways they're explicitly and specifically saying it will be used, that's another story entirely. But that should also mean we should have heard a lot of other examples of OnStar abuse, since it's been around for a while, except we haven't.
But how do you know it won't be abused? It's not like the police have a wonderful track record of honesty, integrity and concern for public safety.
Actually, police, to most people and for the most part, do have exactly that track record. That's, you know, their job.
You just apparently choose to take examples of corruption and abuse, and assume that is the norm, when it is the exception.
It's not impossible for this to be hacked, either. So, what guarantee do you have that it will always be used properly and carefully?
None, because there is no
Yes, spun; my fully-disclosed identity and educational background must completely invalidate any points I have made, as well as my own opinions!
However, a completely anonymous slashdot poster using an ad hominem attack is definitely "+5, Interesting".
I don't quite understand how making shoulder belts and air bags, both of which are proven to be life-saving devices (on the whole) mandatory is related to the police operating in a "safe and sane" matter. The humor is that police not operating in a "safe an sane" manner is most often brought up in the context of high speed chases...
I also note the many places in this post where I say the government never, ever lies.
I suppose that your implied assertion that all elements of government must always be distrusted and always be assumed to be lying (or have ulterior motives, usually evil) is the correct point of view, though?
And wow, yeah, I sure talk about "terrists" a lot, using the imaginary threat to incite fear in the sheeple! Oh, wait...I'm just a person who knows there is often more than one side to a story or more than one solution to a problem, unlike yourself.
If you want to dispute what I'm saying, why don't you take the actual issues, instead of personally attacking me, or bringing up what is blindingly obvious on my personal web site or CV every time I post something you disagree with to slashdot?
Here ya go...
- The lamps were most effective in the early years. In 1987, CHMSL reduced rear impact crashes by 8.5 percent (confidence bounds 6.1 to 10.9 percent).
- Effectiveness declined in 1988 and 1989, but then leveled off. During 1989-95, CHMSL reduced rear impact crashes by 4.3 percent (confidence bounds 2.9 to 5.8 percent). This is the long-term effectiveness of the lamps.
- The effectiveness of CHMSL in light trucks is about the same as in passenger cars.
- At the long-term effectiveness level of 4.3 percent, when all cars and light trucks on the road have CHMSL, the lamps will prevent 92,000-137,000 police-reported crashes, 58,000-70,000 nonfatal injuries, and $655,000,000 (in 1994 dollars) in property damage per year.
- The annual consumer cost of CHMSL in cars and light trucks sold in the United States is close to $206,000,000 (in 1994 dollars).
- Even though the effectiveness of CHMSL has declined from its initial levels, the lamps are and will continue to be highly cost-effective safety devices.
OnStar is still wholly operated by GM, and it's the OnStar privacy policies that are at issue in any event, and OnStar is under GM's umbrella.
As to airbags, I spoke to that already in this post...airbags have saved far more lives than they have taken in narrow circumstances. Some people have argued that shoulder belts have also cost lives. Except for the fact they've saved many more. Third brake lights were also mandated and were sharply criticized in many auto rags for being ugly as sin, and many saw it as an example of government interference. Except they, too, provably save lives and property.
If a remote kill capability that is only used in the case of a stolen vehicle or court order becomes mandated, it will no doubt save lives and property as well. Your problem is that you think that just because it exists, it will automatically be abused, or just because air bags, shoulder belts, and center high mounted stop lamps have been mandated, this will also be. Well, as far as the former, that's a very cynical view, and for the latter, remote kill capability authorized by police is a far cry from shoulder belts and third brake lights.
Not a contradiction at all. If power steering and power brakes are still working, that means the engine is still running. Also, it does NOT kill the engine. That is a factual statement, and you can confirm it yourself by contacting GM public relations and requesting comment if you wish.
I also didn't deny it's stopping the car, anywhere. What I said was it doesn't "remotely shut down the vehicle, the implication being that it just slams on the brakes or kills the engine or both." It stops the car in a very controlled manner, and it's fairly complex how it functions. It is de-throttling the vehicle; the equivalent of taking the foot off the gas, putting the engine in an idle/coast state, but still running, and nothing more, leaving full power steering and power brake control.
Nowhere did I deny that it "stops the car"; of course it effectively "stops the car", but in a controlled way, and not by simply shutting off the engine or slamming on the brakes, as some people seem to think. Also, it is only to be used when police have the vehicle in sight and are in direct communication with OnStar; that's its purpose. So before people say "what if it's on a hill" or "what if it's not in a safe place to stop, even by releasing the throttle", it's only done when it is within visual contact of police, and a hell of a lot safer than a high speed chase, a spike strip, or the PIT maneuver.
Yes, I remember (barely) the shoulder belt, the air bag, and the center high mounted stop lamp, better known as the third brake light.
I also remember the arguments about shoulder belts and air bags killing people, and about how the CHMSL destroyed the aesthetics of the rear of a vehicle. Except that it was easily proven that the benefits of shoulder belts, air bags, and third brake lights outweighed any drawbacks.
What if a controlled remote kill of a vehicle under police supervision that has been reported stolen or is the subject of a court order has the same results? Returning stolen properly safely, preventing high speed police chases and death?
Same thing with Tasers. Tasers are statistically harmless, and a hell of a lot less harmless than a number of other ways of subduing a suspect, including lethal means. Whether Tasers are overused is a different question altogether, but being tased is a much better alternative than being forcibly subdued by any number of other means. Tasers are designed to be a safer and non-lethal ("non-lethal" in weapons terms doesn't mean "never, ever lethal or having any contributing effect on a possible lethal scenario whatsoever" - and please, don't link me to your favorite article or sob story about how oh-so-dangerous Tasers are: given their use, they are far, far less dangerous than the means they replaced).
And same with the PATRIOT Act. It was pretty much universally agreed that a lot of older laws needed updating. Given the size and scope of PATRIOT, only very, very small portions of it were controversial. Nearly all of the rest of it was benign or viewed as sensible by most people. Some provisions have been called into Constitutional question. But you don't throw the baby out with the bathwater, as we do when we imply that all of the PATRIOT Act rises to this level of controversy, when in reality it is very small portions of it, on the whole.
I don't fundamentally disagree with the government using the power it has, using anything it is given, and, inasmuch as it can be anthropomorphized, always "wanting more". But is this because of the evil or corruption or totalitarianism that is sometimes implied by such assertions, or because many in government simply use all the tools at their disposal? Governments and police agencies can do a lot more with vehicles, telephones, cameras, computers, databases, networks, Tasers, spike strips, and all manner of things than they can without. Technology is always enabling and is often a force multiplier.
Government mandates, and government in general, are not all sinister, nor are they all roses. But we should look at them on balance.
...the implication being that it just slams on the brakes or kills the engine or both.
From TFA:
OnStar would call police and tell them a stolen car's whereabouts.
Then, if officers see the car in motion and judge it can be stopped safely, they can tell OnStar operators, who will send the car a signal via cell phone to slow it to a halt.
"This technology will basically remove the control of the horsepower from the thief," Huber said. "Everything else in the vehicle works. The steering works. The brakes work."
GM is still exploring the possibility of having the car give a recorded verbal warning before it stops moving. A voice would tell the driver through the radio speakers that police will stop the car, Huber said, and the car's emergency flashers would go on.
"If the thief does nothing else it will coast to a stop. But they can drive off to the side of the road," Huber said.
And from TFR (where "R" stands for "rant"):
The claim is that owners will have to give permission first for this capability to be enabled. Bull. I don't care what OnStar's privacy policy says, if the technical capability for this function is present, OnStar will have no practical choice but to comply when faced with a law enforcement demand or court order, whether or not owner "permission" was ever granted.
It is completely technically feasible for this system to need to be enabled in order for it to work. For example, with BMW Assist, BMW's OnStat-like service, equipment is physically disabled in the car if the user does not subscribe to a service.
This argument appears predicated on the belief that even if a customer doesn't voluntarily and willingly "opt in", that it can still somehow be used by police or hackers. I'm sorry, but that's simply not how it works.
Further, OnStar can currently be used to unlock vehicles. Why isn't that an "irresistible target for hackers"?
It's impossible to hack OnStar? Would you bet your life on that?
Um, no, because I wouldn't have to, nor would anyone else who opts in to the service?
And how long will it be before such systems are mandated, one might wonder?
Ah, my old friend, the slippery slope. Long time, no see!
This is no different than Lojack, which can also, in theory, be "activated" when a user chooses to have the service, in the same way this could be.
And if you don't believe GM's clearly stated privacy policies, which state, in short, that "OnStar will release information about a vehicle only for marketing research, to protect the rights, property, of safety of any person, in exigent circumstances, to prevent misuse of their service, when legally required to do so or when subject to a valid court order, or in various other circumstances", then you probably shouldn't buy a GM vehicle.
Good thing buying GM vehicles isn't mandatory, and GM isn't a government agency, huh?
(And of course -- and I didn't look at this at first -- because there is editorializing about how the "MSM" doesn't mention privacy implications, I'm not surprised to see it's posted by kdawson.)
I guess the automated systems will have to take this legal reality into account, then, won't they?
(I think the original poster is assuming that just because someone is in the "back seat" or in an "infant seat", somehow they won't be counted. From TFA: "All blood is red, and all living humans have water in them, and we're reliant on those attributes." It would seem obvious that "living humans" would also include children, regardless of what position they're in or whether they happen to be behind or in a seat that will be essentially invisible to such detectors.)
It's great that HOV lane laws have apparently included children for simplicity. But even this Q&A makes it clear that children were only included for that reason, and that still wasn't the original idea or purpose of HOV/HOT lanes. Even so, the parent poster won't have to get affidavits from toddlers or in-vehicle video cameras monitoring their child's presence: if this system doesn't work to accurately detect multiple-occupancy vehicles within the law, it won't be serving its purpose.
Believe it or not, technology can and has taken the place of mundane human activity in all manner of disciplines, including law enforcement tasks.
I'm saying, then, that the idea and spirit of HOV lanes is for carpool, multiple passenger commuter, busses, passenger vans, and similar applications, and not someone who happens to be toting a child in an infant seat.
I hope this clears things up.
And to be serious, I don't know what the specific law is in Virginia, Maryland, or Washington, DC, for HOV/HOT lanes. But the idea, purpose, and principle is what I said above, not for someone to be able to get somewhere faster or more conveniently because they have a child with them.
Yes, yes, I know, they don't really specify... ...but hopefully you realize the idea and spirit of HOV lanes is for carpool, multiple passenger commuter, busses, passenger vans, and similar applications, and not someone who happens to be toting a child in an infant seat. :-/
(How did the parent get modded "Insightful"?)
A local municipal government agency, using technology to solve a problem, as part of its charge to the public?
O, the humanity!
Not only that, but the submission is wrong. That Tom Yager Infoworld piece that is linked was Yager's reaction to the fact that Apple hadn't yet open sourced the Intel kernel, and ran it under the sensationalist headline "Apple closes down OS X".
Except for the fact that at WWDC, they announced that the Intel kernel would continue to be open alongside PowerPC, as it always had.
Anyone is welcome to see for themselves. At the same time, Apple also launched Mac OS Forge, Apple's clearinghouse for its open source projects. Granted, Darwin as an OS is essentially dead, and has been for some time. But Darwin as the core of Mac OS X is alive, and many key components, including the kernel, are open source on both Intel and PowerPC.
And, no, Apple did not do this in "response" to Yager's article or anything similar. Yager just wasn't patient enough to find out what was actually going to happen, and assumed that since he hadn't seen any new Intel kernel source releases before WWDC that Mac OS X must now be "closed" - but he was wrong.
Does Apple do some of its open source stuff for PR or because it's to its advantage? Of course. One would hope that would be obvious. If you don't think Apple is giving back enough to the community, that's another valid, albeit subjective, opinion. I'd advise people to look at some of the Mac OS Forge projects, however.
So, the submission is wrong in both spirit (irritating Microsoft) and in fact (OS X now being "closed"; or any more closed than it has ever been).
For the sake of clarity, Jobs is saying they're going to try to stop *unlocked*, not "hacked", iPhones. "Hacked" in this context is generally construed as the process via which people install third party applications or ringtones, and is different from unlocking. Apple is not expected to stop "hacking", and has already stated as much.
When Jobs said he wants to fight unlockers, this also doesn't have to mean end customers who unlock their phones - it means stopping tools, processes, and vulnerabilities in the Phone that enable unlocking. It doesn't mean Apple is going to go after end users who have unlocked their phones.
Even given Jobs' statement, it does NOT mean Apple is going to try to disable already-unlocked iPhones. In fact, Apple would probably like to avoid this, because breaking peoples' otherwise-working phones would cause a negative PR firestorm. What they DO want to stop is any process or procedure that allows any new phones to be unlocked from that point forward, which they will be doing as such methods are discovered. Apple will not intentionally be disabling iPhones that are unlocked, but is warning that it MAY happen for reasons beyond their control.
Again, if you choose to believe that this situation combined with Jobs' statement means Apple is going to be intentionally disabling already-unlocked phones, that's your prerogative, of course. The reality is that Apple is simply going to do whatever it can to stop the cottage unlocking industry, which includes patching vulnerabilities in the phone that currently are used for unlocking...not intentionally damaging or disabling already-unlocked phones.
Yes, spun, it's a very scary place indeed! ;-)
It's like I'm working for the special branch of the government that spreads propaganda about Apple!
Or could it be that I just posted my personal thoughts about this story? Nah, that'd be too obvious! It must be something sinister!
Yes.
And that doesn't mean Apple will intentionally damage phones that have been unlocked out of spite.
It means exactly what it says: that Apple will fight unlocking hacks.
Which means they'll be doing things like patching the buffer overflow currently used to unlock, which means that current unlocking mechanisms won't work in the future.
Schiller's statement is 100% accurate and not in conflict with, or "trumped", by what Jobs said. What Schiller said is the voice of Apple, and was probably vetted with Jobs himself, to be frank.
So to reiterate, you are wrong. Apple WILL NOT be intentionally or purposely damaging or disabling unlocked phones. I was already aware of Jobs' statement, and that doesn't change any of this. If you choose to believe it means that Apple will be intentionally bricking unlocked phones, or that since Jobs is "higher" than Schiller (...), you choose to interpret his statement as meaning Apple will be intentionally bricking phones and Schiller's statement is invalid, be my guest.
I know your post was sarcastic, but any mac users dealing with the agonizing slowness of their photo upload applet should be cheering for joy if what you're saying is true.
Flash on Mac isn't all that hot either. Adobe's more or less been shitting all over the platform ever since Apple started directly competing with them. A single Youtube video can easily suck up 80% of the CPU cycles on a modern Core Duo machine.
You do know about the official Mac OS X-native FaceBook Exporter for iPhoto, don't you? It's that kind of integrated app that makes the user experience with Facebook nice, not things like Silverlight.
No, it means, "among the unlocking mechanisms for then iPhone, the one which is the most popular". This does not imply that iPhone unlocking is mainstream, and is not referring to SIM unlocking in general. It is referring to the most common unlock for iPhone, and "mainstream" was far from a suitable choice of words.
Apple is doing this with iPhone OS updates; that is, checking to see if it is in an expected state, and if it's not, requiring the iPhone to go through a "restore".
However, for the radio firmware, Apple is alleging that some unlock mechanisms may have irreparably damaged the hardware of the phone. If that is correct - if the iPhone hardware has been permanently damaged - then I don't think Apple is to blame. If, however, it is all software-only and reversible, then I agree with you completely, and expect Apple to try to follow exactly that path.
No. Apple said:
and:
It's not about unlocking phones.
It's about the radio firmware being altered in an unknown way, or even damaged. (Note: this is DIFFERENT from jailbreaking, OS hacking, and installing third party apps.)
Why should that be covered under warranty?
[...] is Apple designing future software updates to do damage to iPhone when said SIM Unlock code is present?
NO!
Absolutely not.
Apple has already explicitly stated that they are not going to intentionally or proactively do anything to unlocked phones. Even a small amount of logic would reveal that when the baseband radio firmware is in an unknown state (this is different from the OS on the phone, and doing the "hacking" to install third party applications, and so on), future updates, either to the firmware or the OS or both, may break things. Even a software update that expects the radio to accept commands or interact with the OS in a particular way could end up breaking things.
Oh, I know a lot of you really want to believe Apple is actually going to intentionally damage phones that are unlocked. Sorry to disappoint, but that is simply not the case.
If there is any legal issue that erupts over this, Apple will very easily be able to prove that there is no way for it to predict the state of the hardware when it does updates when it has been altered, perhaps irreparably depending on the method, in an unknown fashion by the user.
Further, I think it's funny that some seem to carp about how Apple will be "fixing" the mechanism via which phones are currently unlocked, as if it's evil. Of course they will! It's a general buffer overflow that happens to be used in the unlock process. Should Apple not fix an exploitable buffer overflow in the OS just so people can continue to unlock phones? The arguments on this topic are laughable.
Moreover, while end-user unlocking of handsets is legal in the US under the current DMCA exemption, the vendor is under NO OBLIGATION to support the phones in such a state with future software/firmware updates. I can hear all the "But what about the UK?" people chiming in now. Apple will do whatever is required by law in any jurisdiction. If a certain jurisdiction REQUIRES unlocked phones, Apple may skip that market entirely (for now). Even in the UK it isn't as clear as some people like to think it is, because the phone technically isn't subsidized, meaning that it may not have to be unlocked after the subsidy is repaid - because there is no subsidy. And a large part of Apple's iPhone strategy with carriers is tight integration for things like the activation process: things that simply aren't supported with anyone but the partner carrier.
Remember: it's "legal" to do a lot of things which also might end up voiding the warranty of a particular product. Something being "legal" doesn't imply all of these things people seem to think it does. A lot of odd arguments appeared in the last story about this, saying that since the DMCA exemption allows handset unlocking, somehow, Apple must actively enable it. Wrong.
Customers have a choice:
- Don't ever apply a software update after unlocking (unless applying said update to a phone unlocked using your exact mechanism has been confirmed to work by others), and your phone will stay unlocked
- Don't buy an iPhone
Don't act like Apple is somehow bound to support all unlocked phones via any mechanism, some which may damage the phone, in any and all future software updates, especially when it can't possibly predict all iterations. You don't have to buy an iPhone.
And if you want to argue about simlocking in general, it's a very common practice the world over, and your beef isn't with Apple. If Apple just sold all iPhones unlocked, like some people think they should, there would be nowhere near the tight integration with any and all carriers, the pleasant do-it-yourself activation process that is part of what makes the iPhone genius, not to mention the economic arguments, where
Of course the cosponsor of the bill said that. What do you expect? He also said that the the Insurrection Act changes in the 2007 Defense Authorization Bill enabled the president to easily declare martial law, when in reality the changes were made in large part because of the outcry related to Hurricane Katrina, and actually had stronger guidelines for domestic use of the military than the previous provisions of the act had for the prior two centuries.
This is a political move, and if it was as clear cut as you claim it is, this act to "restore" a fundamental principle of our country should have passed unanimously. Except that it didn't, because it is nothing more than a political move. To believe otherwise believes that the Constitution applies equally to every human on the planet, whether they are a US citizen or permanent resident or not. That notion is ridiculous to me and many others, for some of the reasons I briefly alluded to in my post.
Just like the updates to the Insurrection Act of 1807 didn't enable martial law under nearly any circumstances or revoke Posse Comitatus, the Military Commissions Act of 2006 didn't revoke Habeas Corpus. To believe otherwise about either is politically charged fantasy.
Note that the linked article is an opinion piece from The Nation, self described as "the flagship of the left", so when it says things about Habeas Corpus such as, "which the Republican Congress revoked", it's not a fact, it's just what the type of article it is explicitly states: an opinion. Further, we don't have a Republican Congress anymore, so I'm not sure how that is even meaningful. I guess I'm supposed to assume that even a Democratic Congress doesn't want to "restore Habeas Corpus"? (And naturally, surprise, this is posted by kdawson.)
The fact of the matter is that Habeas Corpus was not suspended in any way, shape, or form. The Military Commissions Act does not apply to US citizens, permanent residents, or persons with a valid legal status within the United States. Only US citizens have a right to Habeas Corpus (Gonzales' ridiculous statements on the issue aside). MCA only applies to "aliens [that is, not US citizens] with no [US] immigration status who are captured and held outside the territorial jurisdiction of the United States"; that is, MCA does not apply to US citizens. Therefore, Habeas Corpus was not suspended, and to argue that it was is puzzling to me.
The argument that Habeas Corpus needs to apply to literally everyone because otherwise there is no way to "prove" that you are a US citizen to which MCA doesn't apply is something of a curious one. MCA already does not apply to US citizens apprehended on US soil. You do not need a court to affirm what is already known. If you believe the authorities will ignore the fact that someone is a US citizen and detain them anyway, then there are larger fundamental issues than whether or not someone can challenge detention; indeed, if the government really wanted to secretly detain someone without cause or ability to challenge, US citizen or not, they simply wouldn't give them any recourse at all, Habeas Corpus or no, now would they?
On this general issue, there is certainly some merit to the argument that things like terrorism should be treated as a civil or criminal matter and not a military and national security issue. However, I do not subscribe to that viewpoint. Our freedoms and rights are things that US citizens and immigrants enjoy. Else, there is no function or purpose for immigration or even borders.
Some tend to confuse US citizens and residents with everyone else on the planet, and pretend that the Constitution actually applies to everyone on Earth (which it doesn't), or that it should (which it shouldn't - perhaps in an idealized world, someday, everyone can expect and enjoy such a baseline of freedoms and rights).
And to those who will come out of the woodwork saying, "What about Jose Padilla?"
That was before MCA, which is what people say "suspended Habeas Corpus". That is, Jose Padilla did have Habeas Corpus rights and yet was still detained. That's part of reason MCA came into existence: to clarify this situation. Such detention of a US citizen apprehended on US soil, regardless of designation, has subsequently been clearly determined to be legally inappropriate, and, as such, does not fall under MCA.
On top of all of this, to those that think that administration officials are going to lie and ignore any and all laws anyway, then what difference does any wording of any law really make?
Disclaimer: portions of this post were culled or paraphrased from a couple of previous posts of mine here on the topic, but is precisely on point, so there is no need to retype.