Me too. America has become a totalitarian state. The right of privacy, for example, is almost totally dead. But in a lot of the Third World, it's not like that. The only problem is that you have to be rich before you move. But if you can afford to retire, you definitely should.
Any suggestions?
Pretty much all of Latin America is good. It's a different world down there--no government surveillance and no oppressive laws since central governments are weak.
In particular, I suggest you look into Roatan Island, off the northern coast of Honduras. There's a thriving American ex-patriate community there, land is pretty cheap, the area is beautiful, peaceful, and the standard of living is high.
I suggest travelling to Roatan and other places in the Caribbean. To avoid government surveillance, go to Florida (or any other state on the Gulf Coast) and rent a small yacht.
Agreed. History has demonstrated that no government can be trusted with knowledge of the private details of its citizens. Think back to the MacCarthyist and COINTELPRO eras in this country. Or even to World War II, when the US government used Census data to find out who was Japanese.
A lot of people are forgetting why it was in the first place that government's powers were curtailed. An out-of-control government is far more dangerous than terrorists.
How all this is supposed to protect against another plane hijacking is
a mystery to me. In fact, this CAPPS II plan will really be
counterproductive.
If there are a few guys in a terrorist cell, all they have to do is go
out on dry runs, meaning that they take an innocent flight, with no
weapons, no box-cutters, etc.
The ones who get the extra interview--since they have a high "threat
score"--are obviously the ones who will NOT go on the terrorist
mission. But the ones who are rated green will know that they can
more easily go on their hijacking mission without arousing suspicion
at the gate.
The only things we've done so far to make our planes safer are:
1) Reinforce the cockpit doors.
2) Arm a few of the pilots.
3) Put Air Marshalls on a few more flights.
4) Have the passengers fight back.
Number 4 has in fact been the most effective. Passengers fighting
back saved either the White House or Congress (no one knows for sure what the target was) from the plane that ended up crashing in PA.
Passengers fighting back also foiled Richard Reed (the shoebomber).
CAPPS II in no way is going to increase security, and is in fact going
to make planes less safe because it will give sleeper terrorists a
method to find out whether they are on watch lists or not. Whoever is in our Homeland Security Department devising these idiotic
plans should be fired.
Would you rather have the military and government using open source software or Microsoft?
I'd rather see them use buggy Microsoft software, of course. In the case of IRS, that means they'll forget I owe taxes. If military used M$ software, that means some bombs might miss the Iraqi cities and instead land harmlessly in the desert, thus saving civilian lives.
Thanks so much for your input. And as I'm sure you know, being as erudite as you are, the word "lexicographer" is not Germanic in origin but instead part of that "Greco-Latin vocabulary."
The lexicographer (that means "dictionary writer" for those not versed in the Greco-Latin roots of the English language) gave it a narrow definition in order to be 100% safe in court. To 'look for information related to a new or potential girl/boy friend' is how "google" was first used as a verb in print.
You can't sue a dictionary merely for reporting how a word is used. Google would have to instead have to send its reptiles after all the individuals on the Internet who use their precious fucking trademark as a verb.
An inciteful view from one of the lexicographers
on
Verbing Weirds Google
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2003 21:19:26 -0800 Reply-To: American Dialect Society Sender: American Dialect Society Mailing List From: Ben Ostrowsky Subject: Re: Google trademark concerns Comments: To: ADS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU In-Reply-To: Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
I'd guess that you can report accurately that many people use 'google' as a generic term, especially if you can cite some utterances.
And you could send them a pamphlet of your own about the difference between prescriptive and descriptive definition-writing -- a sort of Lexicographer's Apology (like the Actor's Apology, "this is fiction, don't blame us if it looks painfully familiar to you") to explain that you're not urging people to use 'google' but merely recording the fact that some do, and what they mean by it.
Good Lord, the OED had better watch out -- it's got 'xerox' and 'Kleenex', at the very least, and might get sued by companies after their trademarks have become common words.
This argument sounds familiar: "I'm not responsible for the fact that this exists; I'm just recording that fact." Isn't that how Google's counsel would likely respond to charges that their site enables pedophiles to find depictions of illegal sex, like so?
http://www.google.com/search?q=young+girl+erotic a
If they have no duty to remove this from their site, what duty do you have to remove a harmless bit of lexicography?
Geez, you're a nice guy. Do you torture animals in your spare time?
The guy's just a lexicographer, not a big tough Marine like you apparently are. Average people tend to get really nervous when they get a letter from a lawyer for a big corporation. So lay off the guy!
Keep in mind that downloading copyrighted music or software is a felony. So I hope you've never been one of the ~4 million people who are on Kazaa at any given moment. I hope you never got into the Napster craze a couple years ago, because the statute of limitations on that felonious behavious hasn't yet run out.
There's a big difference between breaking & entering in the real world vs. with a computer. In the real world, it takes a lot more effort. With a computer, you can literally become a felon in 2 minutes simply by clicking your mouse and pressing a few buttons on your keyboard. Therefore, breaking & entering with computers--assuming nothing is stolen and no profit is made--should carry a much lighter punishment than in the real world.
Nice guys finish last.
White-collar crime pays when you're still a minor.
If you think she likes you she probably does.
Don't let you parents send you to the all male school.
Invest all your college money in the NASDAQ stock with ticker symbol MSFT.
It would be very easy for the FBI to obtain court orders to find out what books the Buffalo Six purchased.
The problem with the PATRIOT Act is that it allows the government without a court order to find out what books you're reading.
I have lots of books I don't want the government to know about. For instance, I bought a book a couple years ago called Hide Your Assets and Disappear. So based on that, if I ever get arrested I'd get screwed at my bail hearing, since that book makes me a "flight risk.":roll eyes:
Most government agents may not be smart enough to do a basic google search. Sort of like how antiwar activists in the early 1970s would get knocks on the door by FBI agents to confirm where they live, when all the Famous But Incompetent folks would have had to do was look in the phonebook.
One would imagine that Amazon could set up a system in which they scramble/encrypt the records so that there's no way for someone searching Amazon's logs to match usernames with names & addresses. Anonymizer.com does that very thing.
But you're right that the real problem is the PATRIOT Act which allows govt without a court order to find out what books you buy.
NPR had a story on it. The person who made the public servic ad in November 2001 was unaware that the PATRIOT Act gave the government the power to do the very thing that the advertisement portrayed. The ad was quietly pulled from the air, and with most of the population still waving flags from their cars, people barely noticed.
If the government tries to go after Bear Pond Books for "obstruction of justice" or something, rest assured that lawyer groups like the ACLU will use their full power to defend Bear Pond. So I wouldn't worry about it.
In the Google story from a couple days ago, when I brought up the fact that Google *admits* that it keeps its logs FOREVER, and I suggested that those permanent logs might be a problem, I was mercilessly attacked as being a paranoid tinfoil hatter.
So yes, you're right, Google can do whatever it wants and still be cool.
Bear Pond Books is a small bookseller in Vermont. They don't even have a toll-free number, for pete's sake. They're hardly a big corporation as you imply. I certainly trust Bear Pond Books a lot more than the John Ashcroft's Justice Department.
Not all ISPs keep logs forever. I personally use the ISP service of Anonymizer, which stores logs for only 2 days.
As I've already stated, I'm really not concerned with my own privacy being violated, since my IP addy always changes. But there is a significant percentage of Internet users who have static IP addresses, and I'm concerned about their privacy. If an investigator gets access to Google's records, he can find out every search done from any specific IP addy.
I know you're not concerned about the lack of anonymity in Google searches, but a strong case can be made that true intellectual freedom is impossible without privacy.
Thanks for your input Mr. Ashcroft, but you didn't refute my assertion, which was that Google keeping logs forever means that an investigator can access all the searches done from your IP address.
There are plenty of legitimate reasons to be concerned by this. If you've ever done a Google search for "how to grow pot", I'm sure you wouldn't want a DEA employee to know about it. (Half of federal prisoners are non-violent drug users.)
Not that I myself am a drug user (and I presume you're not), but I'm sure there's *something* you do that's illegal. Do you report all your eBay profits as income to the IRS, for instance?
Google keeps its logs forever, rather than deleting them after a few days like privacy-oriented sites do. That means that if an investigator knows your IP address, he can then find out all the searches that your IP address has done. Doesn't that bother anyone? I know I wouldn't want the government to know everything that I've done searches for. (I use offshore proxies, so it doesn't bother me, but most people don't know about proxying.)
Slashdot Mirror
Me too. America has become a totalitarian state. The right of privacy, for example, is almost totally dead. But in a lot of the Third World, it's not like that. The only problem is that you have to be rich before you move. But if you can afford to retire, you definitely should.
Any suggestions?
Pretty much all of Latin America is good. It's a different world down there--no government surveillance and no oppressive laws since central governments are weak.
In particular, I suggest you look into Roatan Island, off the northern coast of Honduras. There's a thriving American ex-patriate community there, land is pretty cheap, the area is beautiful, peaceful, and the standard of living is high.
I suggest travelling to Roatan and other places in the Caribbean. To avoid government surveillance, go to Florida (or any other state on the Gulf Coast) and rent a small yacht.
You and RadagastTheMagician have excellent points. I wish had any sort of mod score so I could bump you guys up.
A lot of people are forgetting why it was in the first place that government's powers were curtailed. An out-of-control government is far more dangerous than terrorists.
If there are a few guys in a terrorist cell, all they have to do is go out on dry runs, meaning that they take an innocent flight, with no weapons, no box-cutters, etc.
The ones who get the extra interview--since they have a high "threat score"--are obviously the ones who will NOT go on the terrorist mission. But the ones who are rated green will know that they can more easily go on their hijacking mission without arousing suspicion at the gate.
The only things we've done so far to make our planes safer are:
1) Reinforce the cockpit doors.
2) Arm a few of the pilots.
3) Put Air Marshalls on a few more flights.
4) Have the passengers fight back.
Number 4 has in fact been the most effective. Passengers fighting back saved either the White House or Congress (no one knows for sure what the target was) from the plane that ended up crashing in PA. Passengers fighting back also foiled Richard Reed (the shoebomber).
CAPPS II in no way is going to increase security, and is in fact going to make planes less safe because it will give sleeper terrorists a method to find out whether they are on watch lists or not. Whoever is in our Homeland Security Department devising these idiotic plans should be fired.
I'd rather see them use buggy Microsoft software, of course. In the case of IRS, that means they'll forget I owe taxes. If military used M$ software, that means some bombs might miss the Iraqi cities and instead land harmlessly in the desert, thus saving civilian lives.
Thanks so much for your input. And as I'm sure you know, being as erudite as you are, the word "lexicographer" is not Germanic in origin but instead part of that "Greco-Latin vocabulary."
The lexicographer (that means "dictionary writer" for those not versed in the Greco-Latin roots of the English language) gave it a narrow definition in order to be 100% safe in court. To 'look for information related to a new or potential girl/boy friend' is how "google" was first used as a verb in print.
You can't sue a dictionary merely for reporting how a word is used. Google would have to instead have to send its reptiles after all the individuals on the Internet who use their precious fucking trademark as a verb.
Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2003 21:19:26 -0800
c a
Reply-To: American Dialect Society
Sender: American Dialect Society Mailing List
From: Ben Ostrowsky
Subject: Re: Google trademark concerns
Comments: To: ADS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
In-Reply-To:
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
I'd guess that you can report accurately that many people use 'google' as a generic term, especially if you can cite some utterances.
And you could send them a pamphlet of your own about the difference between prescriptive and descriptive definition-writing -- a sort of Lexicographer's Apology (like the Actor's Apology, "this is fiction, don't blame us if it looks painfully familiar to you") to explain that you're not urging people to use 'google' but merely recording the fact that some do, and what they mean by it.
Good Lord, the OED had better watch out -- it's got 'xerox' and 'Kleenex', at the very least, and might get sued by companies after their trademarks have become common words.
This argument sounds familiar: "I'm not responsible for the fact that this exists; I'm just recording that fact." Isn't that how Google's counsel would likely respond to charges that their site enables pedophiles to find depictions of illegal sex, like so?
http://www.google.com/search?q=young+girl+eroti
If they have no duty to remove this from their site, what duty do you have to remove a harmless bit of lexicography?
The guy's just a lexicographer, not a big tough Marine like you apparently are. Average people tend to get really nervous when they get a letter from a lawyer for a big corporation. So lay off the guy!
Keep in mind that downloading copyrighted music or software is a felony. So I hope you've never been one of the ~4 million people who are on Kazaa at any given moment. I hope you never got into the Napster craze a couple years ago, because the statute of limitations on that felonious behavious hasn't yet run out.
There's a big difference between breaking & entering in the real world vs. with a computer. In the real world, it takes a lot more effort. With a computer, you can literally become a felon in 2 minutes simply by clicking your mouse and pressing a few buttons on your keyboard. Therefore, breaking & entering with computers--assuming nothing is stolen and no profit is made--should carry a much lighter punishment than in the real world.
You're brutal! I hope you're perfect and never make any mistakes in your life.
Nice guys finish last.
White-collar crime pays when you're still a minor.
If you think she likes you she probably does.
Don't let you parents send you to the all male school.
Invest all your college money in the NASDAQ stock with ticker symbol MSFT.
The problem with the PATRIOT Act is that it allows the government without a court order to find out what books you're reading.
I have lots of books I don't want the government to know about. For instance, I bought a book a couple years ago called Hide Your Assets and Disappear. So based on that, if I ever get arrested I'd get screwed at my bail hearing, since that book makes me a "flight risk." :roll eyes:
Most government agents may not be smart enough to do a basic google search. Sort of like how antiwar activists in the early 1970s would get knocks on the door by FBI agents to confirm where they live, when all the Famous But Incompetent folks would have had to do was look in the phonebook.
But you're right that the real problem is the PATRIOT Act which allows govt without a court order to find out what books you buy.
NPR had a story on it. The person who made the public servic ad in November 2001 was unaware that the PATRIOT Act gave the government the power to do the very thing that the advertisement portrayed. The ad was quietly pulled from the air, and with most of the population still waving flags from their cars, people barely noticed.
If the government tries to go after Bear Pond Books for "obstruction of justice" or something, rest assured that lawyer groups like the ACLU will use their full power to defend Bear Pond. So I wouldn't worry about it.
So yes, you're right, Google can do whatever it wants and still be cool.
Bear Pond Books is a small bookseller in Vermont. They don't even have a toll-free number, for pete's sake. They're hardly a big corporation as you imply. I certainly trust Bear Pond Books a lot more than the John Ashcroft's Justice Department.
As I've already stated, I'm really not concerned with my own privacy being violated, since my IP addy always changes. But there is a significant percentage of Internet users who have static IP addresses, and I'm concerned about their privacy. If an investigator gets access to Google's records, he can find out every search done from any specific IP addy.
I know you're not concerned about the lack of anonymity in Google searches, but a strong case can be made that true intellectual freedom is impossible without privacy.
So you think the DEA wouldn't want to know who's reading about pot? Then check this out, my anonymous friend.
There are plenty of legitimate reasons to be concerned by this. If you've ever done a Google search for "how to grow pot", I'm sure you wouldn't want a DEA employee to know about it. (Half of federal prisoners are non-violent drug users.)
Not that I myself am a drug user (and I presume you're not), but I'm sure there's *something* you do that's illegal. Do you report all your eBay profits as income to the IRS, for instance?
Google keeps its logs forever, rather than deleting them after a few days like privacy-oriented sites do. That means that if an investigator knows your IP address, he can then find out all the searches that your IP address has done. Doesn't that bother anyone? I know I wouldn't want the government to know everything that I've done searches for. (I use offshore proxies, so it doesn't bother me, but most people don't know about proxying.)