In the TCB concept, all security mechanisms (including hardware) should be trusted and easily auditable. TCB != Trusted OS AND != TC.
Very nice. So tell me: how do I know that a box I'm using in some net cafe to connect to Sensitive Server is, in fact, a computer that fulfills these requirements and not one that just claims it does ? Remember in your answer that as a human being I'm incapable of calculating public-key cryptography in my head, and I'm not carrying any extra hardware (because if that is allowed, the problem becomes trivial - just have that piece of hardware crypt the data before I enter it into the untrusted terminal).
I'm trying to say that, as far as I'm concerned, any computer sitting before me is a black box, and I can't possibly verify if it's "Trusted" or not with any reasonable effort without carrying extra hardware with me. Therefore, trusted computing is completely useless here - I can't know for sure anything about what the computer does with the data.
In other words, when I'm sitting in a net cafe, and the computer I'm using sports a nice "DRM" logo, I have no way to verify if the computer actually implements DRM without having extra hardware, and if I have extra hardware, I can simply use it to crypt the message before entering it to the computer.
The truth is that corporations really have more influence than John Q. Public because they maintain a relationship with officials and John doesn't bother. But he could.
Except that Joe Senator knows that Disney will be alive and willing to contribute the next year too, while Joe Average might not. Therefore, Disney makes a better master to serve.
Besides, Disney is old, powerful and famous. Serving it allows Joe Senator to warm himself with that glow. Joe Public can offer no more money, and no glamour whatsoever, so why serve the commoners when you can serve a king ?
Why can't we have a TCB that is really Trusted? A secure operating system is all that takes to divert these attacks (granted it's easier said than done).
How do you know the operating system in a particular machine is actually the Trusted version, and not a hacked version that's masquerading as the trusted one ?
Seriously now. Are we going to inconvenience ourselves just because a few programs out there do Bad Things?
I'd imagine this would be most useful to run in my home server, so I could contact it from anywhere without having to trust the computer I'm using. And yeah, I'd rather inconvenience myself with this password entry method than with cleaning up the mess when someone hijacks the server.
The solution isn't to work around the baddies but to eliminate them altogether.
Funny you should mention "terrorists" in your subject and then say this. After all, the War on Terror has been completely unsuccesfull in eliminating them. I think that it's been adequately proven that you can't eliminate baddies, you just have to design systems that can withstand badness.
Well, at least you've ruined that one for me. Seriously dude, courtesy spoiler warning next time.
Yeah, but at least he didn't tell you that Mike was actually built by Darth Vader, who dies in a huge kung-fu fight with Queen Serenity at the end, but manages to kill her too and free the Moon from the tyranny of royalty.
Oops... Sorry for the spoilers, but maybe they'll help some kid write an essay for school or something !
Only a tiny percentage of "free software" has good support.
I'm not saying that free software has good (or even bad) free support; I'm saying that if you want, you can hire programmers to support for you. You can't do that with proprietary software; well, arguably at least part of the license fee goes to pay programmers, but you don't have any control over that.
I just added some modules to a PHPBB2 forum I put on some website, and it was interesting to track the evolution of some of those modules. At the beginning the authors almost daily answered questions and posted updates. A few months later the project had been pretty much abandoned.
And if your business happens to depend on this software, does anything stop you from hiring a 3rd party progammer to support it ? Does the apathy of developers prevent you from paying some other developer to maintain or support the software ? If the software is proprietary, then yes; if it i free open sourced software, then no. That's all I'm saying.
Once upon a time everyone who owned a car was an amateur mechanic. Today we have vehicles that don't need much more than regular oil changes and the odd fill-up. There is no reason to expect that software will not follow essentially the same curve, and it is quite likely that the bottom of that curve for software will be zero support.
Yes there is, at least four reasons:
Car engines are relatively simple machines with a few dozen moving parts. An average computer central processor alone has about 20 million transistors.
Car engines operate by laws of physics, which have remained unchanged for at least billions of years. Computer programs operate within an everchanging mess of operating system quirks, library incompatibilities and outright bugs, varying amounts of memory, varying timing of operations, etc.
Car engines are assumed to operate in a friendly environment where no one actively puts a minefield on the road, fills the gasoline tank with maple syrup, replaces oxygen in air intake with gaseous nitroglycerin, pours fine sand into the oil tank, and runs the engine in redline for hours at the time - and neglects any kind of maintenance. Computers operate in an environment where any and all input is an attack vector one script kiddie or another will be utilizing sooner or later. They also face the very real possibility that some other program (possibly a virus) deletes or scrambles their important data or library files.
A car is used for one thing, and one thing only: moving from point A to point B. A computer can be used (programmed) for unlimited amounts of different things, most of which are still uninvented.
Cars and computers aren't comparable in any way. They aren't even near the same order of magnitude as far as technical complexity goes, and computers are infinitely flexible and need to handle any task gracefully while no one excepts a car to turn into a submarine or airplane when needed and complains loudly when it doesn't. Oh, and when a car gets hit with another car it gets taken to a repairman and repaired, while when a computer gets hit with a virus the owner most likely continues using it and lets damage accumulate.
I don't know of much free software that is really competitive because truly free software doesn't have the support that it needs to compete with software that does have support.
On the contrary, free open sourced software has much better support than proprietary software. With proprietary software you, the end user, are at the mercy of the maker of the software; if he doesn't feel that solving your problem is worth his time, or if he has end-of-lifed that software or gone banckrupt, you're out of luck. With free open source software, you simply hire a programmer to fix the problem.
Of course hiring a programmer is more hassle than simply calling the software maker, but I'd imagine that firms whose sole business model is offering support for FOSS programs will eventually arise as FOSS gains more and more usage.
The entire Indian economy is run in a balanced Statist-Anarchist way. If you buy anything large (car, house, land, business) you pay a small portion of "white" money (that is heavily taxed) and a big portion of "black" money (that is under the table, and often comes in the form of bullion). That's awesome -- people realize what a burden the State is, and they work around it.
It will be especially awesome when the State loses so much income that it cannot support police force anymore. Then you'll learn what Anarchy actually means. Hint: it has something to do with drowning in your own blood after getting mugged - unless you're lucky and the local gang leader is smart enough to realize he can gain more by enforcing order and making himself a local dictator, in which case you'll learn what oppression really means too.
State is a big bad alpha wolf with its jaws on your throat demanding tribute, but it's also the only thing standing between you and the rest of the wolfpack. And I assure you, none of the modern-day states gets anywhere near the level of pure evil human beings exhibit without a gun being held to their heads. See Somalia or Iraq for examples of what happens when the State no longer has capacity to force people to behave.
Anarchy is the one state of society that's even worse than Fascism, since it represents the complete breakdown of even pretense at civility. Even North Korean government is better than none at all.
Since there are so many people willing to volunteer their time to create (they create for a profit -- that profit might just be the happiness of making something that works and is used), and there are so many people who want to use that software at no charge, open source/free software works here and in much of Europe. But if you go to countries where people don't like to work for free -- they want SOMETHING for their time and to make their lives better -- you won't see a social drive to giving away their labor.
You are making a simple error here: you are equating licensing the program under GPL or similar licenses as giving it away. This, in turn, implies that someone else gains it and you lose it. This is incorrect. What actually happens is that you both now have use of the program. The more users there are, the more likely at least some of them are going to contribute improvements and bugfixes of their own.
In effect, licensing something under GPL or a similar license means exchanging some potential earning potential from software sales for free developers. In some cases this trade can be a very good move; in others, it can be stupid. But claiming that it is always a financially unsound move shows lack of imagination on your part.
Take, for example, the Apache web server. Having a free, communally maintained web server software available doesn't give any particular web site an advantage, it simply lowers the operating costs of them all (since the sites don't need to pay a license fee for a commercial server, and the burden of program maintenance is shared).
So what then.....if my neighbor leaves his bright red sportscar with the door open and the keys in it, then all those photons of light that are bouncing off of it and onto my property and into my eyes are an invitation to get in it and take it for a drive?
No. Setting a loudspeaker next to it and making it endlessly broadcast "This car is free for all to use! Come right in!", however, is. Which is the situation with an unsecured Wi-Fi access point.
I'm starting to suspect you're trolling. Your analogies certainly seem absurd enough...
Why is there this line between physical purchased property and services bought?
There isn't. Which is why I think that getting invited to use a service should be treated the same as getting invited to use a car.
By connecting to someone else's network you are sending trespassing data on that network.
You cannot tresspass if you were invited in. An unsecured Wi-Fi access point is constantly sending out invitations. Why is this so difficult for you to understand ?
This kid knew that this was not his network. He connected anyways. I imagine that if the owner of the network had complaints then it was probably because the kid was using an incredible amount of bandwidth. Enough that the rightful owner couldn't use his own internet.
Apart from the fact that the guy owns neither Internet or Internet connection - the latter is a service, not physical property - I have to say that if you don't want unkown people connecting to your access point, then maybe you should tell that access point to not keep inviting them.
My computer asks me if I want to connect to an untrusted network (I have a mac) so maybe connection software needs to have this provision so that people don't accidentally use a network that is not theirs. The law doesn't give you a break for negligence.
Or perhaps we should consider people responsible for correctly configuring their own technological devices, instead of making everyone else assume they didn't. Specifically, if you configure your Wi-Fi access point to invite anyone within range to connect, you couldn't then turn around and sue them when they accept the invitation. Sure, it means you'd better actually read the manual for the things you buy, but, you know, the law doesn't give you a break for negligence.
But tell me, how many times do I have to ask someone "are you really sure" when they invite me over, to make sure I'm not being neglicent of the possibility that they don't really mean it after all ?
Have you ever tried? Personally, I'd like to do so just to see if it works.
Bumping a disk tumbler lock ? It doesn't have pins. The key doesn't have cut teeth, instead it has segments that rotate disks. Only when the disks have been rotated to the correct position relative to each other does the lock open.
Technically, functionally, you may be right. Morally and ethically might be a different question. The main question is..."if it is unsecured, is that a specific invitation to use it?"
Yes. An unsecured wireles access point is constantly sending out an invitation to every device nearby. It's broadcasting "Hey, I'm here, connect to me!" to every device nearby.
So yes, leaving a wireless access point unsecured means it's constantly and actively inviting everyone to connect to it. It's not just sitting there waiting for connections (like a HTTP server, for example), it's like a spammer sending e-mails with connection instructions to everyone nearby.
Personally I say no. You and others may have a different opinion.
This is not an opinion. This is how the Wi-Fi protocol works. Leaving an access point unsecured means it's constantly sending invitations to connect to every device nearby. Maybe that's not what the owner meant, but it's what his actions (or inaction) amount to anyway. And I, for one, am starting to get a bit tired on having to walk on eggshells because some morons can't be bothered to RTFM.
Bump keys can open doors easily and anybody can make them.
/blockquote>
Pin tumbler locks, that is. That's why we don't use them in Finland (we use disc tumbler locks instead). Polar bears would eat us in our bed if we didn't have secure locks;).
Good, I hope he follows through. The sooner the better, actually. So far, he hasn't even said what patents Linux is supposed to be violating. And as soon as he does, either his bluff will get called, or the offending code will be instantly replaced, leaving Microsoft with nobody to sue.
Patents aren't the same as copyright. If you're infringing on a patent, you can't just replace the code with a rewrite; you have to remove the very idea from your code. Since the US Patent Office is what it is, the patent in question could well be "a method of simulating multitasking by changing the program being run multiple times per second", "authenticating an user with a secret string token" or something similar.
In other words, it is well possible to kill Linux - or any other program - off with a suitable patent.
Also in practice, a Set provides nothing that a Map with only keys and null values provides other than reduced memory utilization. Since the CLR already reduces memory utilization vs. Java, this isn't really a Java win.
Actually, the default Set implementation in Java (HashSet) is a wrapper around a HashTable (which implements Map). Or at least the version shown Eclipse's "view definition" function was. Dunno if that's so in different JVMs...
Yes lets keep everyone remotely suspicious under surveillance, you never know when an un-person might commit a thougtcrime.
Quoting words from 1893 doesn't make a convincing argument. Especially since we aren't talking about thoughtcrimes, we are talking about mass murder.
Meanwhile your chance of actually dying driving to the store for milk is thousands of times higher than being blown up by a terrorist.
The nearest foodstore is about 100 meters from my home, without a single crossing, so I walk:).
In any case, your argument is invalid. My chances of getting run over by a drunk driver are pretty low too, so should we allow drunks to drive ?
But never mind reality, lets all cower in fear and give the government unlimited power to spy on people and arrest them for the contents of their hard drives, that sounds much more rational than paying attention to the real dangers dontch'a think?
Cowering in fear from the government doesn't make any more sense than cowering in fear from terrorists. If the police suspect a serious crime is being planned, then they have not only the right but the duty to put the suspected perperators under surveillance. Obviously such surveillance needs to have stronger reasons than just gut feelings, and it must have a time limit, but it is not in itself a sign of oppression.
As for giving the government unlimited power, that is a strawman of your own invention and has nothing to do with what I said. Viciously attacking strawmen is hardly a rational approach to reality, now is it ?
In any case, if it helps you think of this rationally, replace "terrorism" with "bank robbery" and Anarchist Cookbook with How To Pull Off Armed Robbery.
Some critics frequently refer to various performance issues to support arguments against broader adoption of Mono technology in open source projects, most notably within the GNOME community.
Just how slow does it have to be that even GNOME doesn't want it ? Three-legged turtle stuck on tar is like greased lightning compared to GNOME...
If there are 1,600 terrorists that's it head for the hills....but we all know thats not the case. What there really is, is alot of people "suspected" or witch hunted by the government for some reason.
Never did I expect to defend a government in a War Against $BUZZWORD, but... maybe, just maybe, they know that there's a terrorist network of, say, 10 people, and they know their amongst these 1,600 people but now which 10 they are, exactly speaking, so they keep all 1,600 under surveillance to find out ?
I know that it's not fun being under watched, but it's not fun being blown up either, and there are good reasons to suspect that there's going to be more terrorist attacks against Britain. Given that, it would be hard to justify not investigating people you suspect might be planning it. We are, after all, talking about surveillance and not arrest of those 1,600, on suspicion of them - or some of them - planning mass murder.
And, frankly, someone with a hard drive full of terrorism manuals does seem a bit suspicious to me. Maybe not enough to merit arrest, but certainly enough to merit an investigation.
I think if they wanted to really protect marriage, they should outlaw divorce.
If they really wanted to protect marriage, they should shorten the workdays to give people more time together. That's pretty much all the government can do; trying to outlaw divorce will simply result in people who are technically still married despite not having lived together for 10 years.
But seriously, a libertarian society is not an anarchy, he would have no more right to attempt to ruin my life under it than he would under our current society, I'm not sure how you figure otherwise. What about a libertarian society changes that? On the flip side, he has enough money that if he decided to ruin someone's life under ANY society, he would probably succeed.
A libertarian society has the minimum government influence, in order to maximize personal freedom; taken to the extreme, the government has no role beyond enforcing contracts and preventing outright violence. The problem with this is that nothing stops Bill Gates from paying the local water and power companies to not do business with you. Under current government such attempts would almost certainly be illegal (harassment).
The fatal flaw of libertarian philosophy is that coercion is defined as using force against someone. It is flawed because it ignores another coercive strategy: resource deprivation. If I control the only source of water in a desert, I hold power of life and death over all other residents, and can kill them without ever once using force against them (except when they try to take water by force, at which point libertarianism allows me to use it in defense).
People in the current technical society aren't self-sufficient, they depend on support infrastructure to stay alive. People with lots of money can buy that infrastructure and then coerce others by threatening to cut them out of it, at which point those other people either obey or starve to death.
In short, government stepping down and relinquishing power over some aspect of society will simply result in the next most powerful individual or organization taking over. Power doesn't disappear simply because someone gives it up; in a libertarian society, since the government refuses to wield power, someone else will. And since that someone else doesn't have any responsibility to citizens, he can rule as a ruthless tyrant.
Just look at any nation where the government collapses: if a new one doesn't rise quickly, local warlords take power over their area and then begin to fight amongst each other. Somalia is a good example of this.
Libertarianism is a very simple philosophy, simpler than even Marx's theories; like them, it assumes that as soon as $EVIL has been removed and everyone been converted to the correct worldview, everything will be wonderful. No such ideal has ever delivered what it promised, so why should libertarianism ?
Whatever that concept might have been (if it ever was) it was discarded when it came time to come up with the Constitution and Bill of Rights. There, no special status is given to political speech, as opposed to, say, talking about food or "Star Trek."
And the Constitution in turn was discarded when it came time to actually rule the country. Consequently, political speech is more protected than commercial speech and showing nipples in television carrie fines for the innocent.
Not surprising, really: after all, your Constitution is just a "goddamned piece of paper" to your supreme leader.
Slashdot Mirror
Very nice. So tell me: how do I know that a box I'm using in some net cafe to connect to Sensitive Server is, in fact, a computer that fulfills these requirements and not one that just claims it does ? Remember in your answer that as a human being I'm incapable of calculating public-key cryptography in my head, and I'm not carrying any extra hardware (because if that is allowed, the problem becomes trivial - just have that piece of hardware crypt the data before I enter it into the untrusted terminal).
I'm trying to say that, as far as I'm concerned, any computer sitting before me is a black box, and I can't possibly verify if it's "Trusted" or not with any reasonable effort without carrying extra hardware with me. Therefore, trusted computing is completely useless here - I can't know for sure anything about what the computer does with the data.
In other words, when I'm sitting in a net cafe, and the computer I'm using sports a nice "DRM" logo, I have no way to verify if the computer actually implements DRM without having extra hardware, and if I have extra hardware, I can simply use it to crypt the message before entering it to the computer.
It sits in my home, guarded by locks and dogs.
Except that Joe Senator knows that Disney will be alive and willing to contribute the next year too, while Joe Average might not. Therefore, Disney makes a better master to serve.
Besides, Disney is old, powerful and famous. Serving it allows Joe Senator to warm himself with that glow. Joe Public can offer no more money, and no glamour whatsoever, so why serve the commoners when you can serve a king ?
Sure you can. You just need to have a red herring to turn everyone's attention away while doing so. That, or you need to lie really well.
How do you know the operating system in a particular machine is actually the Trusted version, and not a hacked version that's masquerading as the trusted one ?
I'd imagine this would be most useful to run in my home server, so I could contact it from anywhere without having to trust the computer I'm using. And yeah, I'd rather inconvenience myself with this password entry method than with cleaning up the mess when someone hijacks the server.
Funny you should mention "terrorists" in your subject and then say this. After all, the War on Terror has been completely unsuccesfull in eliminating them. I think that it's been adequately proven that you can't eliminate baddies, you just have to design systems that can withstand badness.
Yeah, but at least he didn't tell you that Mike was actually built by Darth Vader, who dies in a huge kung-fu fight with Queen Serenity at the end, but manages to kill her too and free the Moon from the tyranny of royalty.
Oops... Sorry for the spoilers, but maybe they'll help some kid write an essay for school or something !
I'm not saying that free software has good (or even bad) free support; I'm saying that if you want, you can hire programmers to support for you. You can't do that with proprietary software; well, arguably at least part of the license fee goes to pay programmers, but you don't have any control over that.
And if your business happens to depend on this software, does anything stop you from hiring a 3rd party progammer to support it ? Does the apathy of developers prevent you from paying some other developer to maintain or support the software ? If the software is proprietary, then yes; if it i free open sourced software, then no. That's all I'm saying.
The function of the state is to protect its citizens. Protecting their property is just a nice aftertought.
Yes there is, at least four reasons:
Cars and computers aren't comparable in any way. They aren't even near the same order of magnitude as far as technical complexity goes, and computers are infinitely flexible and need to handle any task gracefully while no one excepts a car to turn into a submarine or airplane when needed and complains loudly when it doesn't. Oh, and when a car gets hit with another car it gets taken to a repairman and repaired, while when a computer gets hit with a virus the owner most likely continues using it and lets damage accumulate.
In short: don't hold your breath.
On the contrary, free open sourced software has much better support than proprietary software. With proprietary software you, the end user, are at the mercy of the maker of the software; if he doesn't feel that solving your problem is worth his time, or if he has end-of-lifed that software or gone banckrupt, you're out of luck. With free open source software, you simply hire a programmer to fix the problem.
Of course hiring a programmer is more hassle than simply calling the software maker, but I'd imagine that firms whose sole business model is offering support for FOSS programs will eventually arise as FOSS gains more and more usage.
It will be especially awesome when the State loses so much income that it cannot support police force anymore. Then you'll learn what Anarchy actually means. Hint: it has something to do with drowning in your own blood after getting mugged - unless you're lucky and the local gang leader is smart enough to realize he can gain more by enforcing order and making himself a local dictator, in which case you'll learn what oppression really means too.
State is a big bad alpha wolf with its jaws on your throat demanding tribute, but it's also the only thing standing between you and the rest of the wolfpack. And I assure you, none of the modern-day states gets anywhere near the level of pure evil human beings exhibit without a gun being held to their heads. See Somalia or Iraq for examples of what happens when the State no longer has capacity to force people to behave.
Anarchy is the one state of society that's even worse than Fascism, since it represents the complete breakdown of even pretense at civility. Even North Korean government is better than none at all.
You are making a simple error here: you are equating licensing the program under GPL or similar licenses as giving it away. This, in turn, implies that someone else gains it and you lose it. This is incorrect. What actually happens is that you both now have use of the program. The more users there are, the more likely at least some of them are going to contribute improvements and bugfixes of their own.
In effect, licensing something under GPL or a similar license means exchanging some potential earning potential from software sales for free developers. In some cases this trade can be a very good move; in others, it can be stupid. But claiming that it is always a financially unsound move shows lack of imagination on your part.
Take, for example, the Apache web server. Having a free, communally maintained web server software available doesn't give any particular web site an advantage, it simply lowers the operating costs of them all (since the sites don't need to pay a license fee for a commercial server, and the burden of program maintenance is shared).
Or take the Linux kernel.
No. Setting a loudspeaker next to it and making it endlessly broadcast "This car is free for all to use! Come right in!", however, is. Which is the situation with an unsecured Wi-Fi access point.
I'm starting to suspect you're trolling. Your analogies certainly seem absurd enough...
There isn't. Which is why I think that getting invited to use a service should be treated the same as getting invited to use a car.
You cannot tresspass if you were invited in. An unsecured Wi-Fi access point is constantly sending out invitations. Why is this so difficult for you to understand ?
Apart from the fact that the guy owns neither Internet or Internet connection - the latter is a service, not physical property - I have to say that if you don't want unkown people connecting to your access point, then maybe you should tell that access point to not keep inviting them.
Or perhaps we should consider people responsible for correctly configuring their own technological devices, instead of making everyone else assume they didn't. Specifically, if you configure your Wi-Fi access point to invite anyone within range to connect, you couldn't then turn around and sue them when they accept the invitation. Sure, it means you'd better actually read the manual for the things you buy, but, you know, the law doesn't give you a break for negligence.
But tell me, how many times do I have to ask someone "are you really sure" when they invite me over, to make sure I'm not being neglicent of the possibility that they don't really mean it after all ?
Bumping a disk tumbler lock ? It doesn't have pins. The key doesn't have cut teeth, instead it has segments that rotate disks. Only when the disks have been rotated to the correct position relative to each other does the lock open.
Just see this PDF for details :).
Yes. An unsecured wireles access point is constantly sending out an invitation to every device nearby. It's broadcasting "Hey, I'm here, connect to me!" to every device nearby.
So yes, leaving a wireless access point unsecured means it's constantly and actively inviting everyone to connect to it. It's not just sitting there waiting for connections (like a HTTP server, for example), it's like a spammer sending e-mails with connection instructions to everyone nearby.
This is not an opinion. This is how the Wi-Fi protocol works. Leaving an access point unsecured means it's constantly sending invitations to connect to every device nearby. Maybe that's not what the owner meant, but it's what his actions (or inaction) amount to anyway. And I, for one, am starting to get a bit tired on having to walk on eggshells because some morons can't be bothered to RTFM.
Patents aren't the same as copyright. If you're infringing on a patent, you can't just replace the code with a rewrite; you have to remove the very idea from your code. Since the US Patent Office is what it is, the patent in question could well be "a method of simulating multitasking by changing the program being run multiple times per second", "authenticating an user with a secret string token" or something similar.
In other words, it is well possible to kill Linux - or any other program - off with a suitable patent.
Actually, the default Set implementation in Java (HashSet) is a wrapper around a HashTable (which implements Map). Or at least the version shown Eclipse's "view definition" function was. Dunno if that's so in different JVMs...
Quoting words from 1893 doesn't make a convincing argument. Especially since we aren't talking about thoughtcrimes, we are talking about mass murder.
The nearest foodstore is about 100 meters from my home, without a single crossing, so I walk :).
In any case, your argument is invalid. My chances of getting run over by a drunk driver are pretty low too, so should we allow drunks to drive ?
Cowering in fear from the government doesn't make any more sense than cowering in fear from terrorists. If the police suspect a serious crime is being planned, then they have not only the right but the duty to put the suspected perperators under surveillance. Obviously such surveillance needs to have stronger reasons than just gut feelings, and it must have a time limit, but it is not in itself a sign of oppression.
As for giving the government unlimited power, that is a strawman of your own invention and has nothing to do with what I said. Viciously attacking strawmen is hardly a rational approach to reality, now is it ?
In any case, if it helps you think of this rationally, replace "terrorism" with "bank robbery" and Anarchist Cookbook with How To Pull Off Armed Robbery.
Just how slow does it have to be that even GNOME doesn't want it ? Three-legged turtle stuck on tar is like greased lightning compared to GNOME...
Never did I expect to defend a government in a War Against $BUZZWORD, but... maybe, just maybe, they know that there's a terrorist network of, say, 10 people, and they know their amongst these 1,600 people but now which 10 they are, exactly speaking, so they keep all 1,600 under surveillance to find out ?
I know that it's not fun being under watched, but it's not fun being blown up either, and there are good reasons to suspect that there's going to be more terrorist attacks against Britain. Given that, it would be hard to justify not investigating people you suspect might be planning it. We are, after all, talking about surveillance and not arrest of those 1,600, on suspicion of them - or some of them - planning mass murder.
And, frankly, someone with a hard drive full of terrorism manuals does seem a bit suspicious to me. Maybe not enough to merit arrest, but certainly enough to merit an investigation.
I certainly hope so. I'd hate to think that anyone was crazy enough to believe in Libertarian doctrine IRL.
If they really wanted to protect marriage, they should shorten the workdays to give people more time together. That's pretty much all the government can do; trying to outlaw divorce will simply result in people who are technically still married despite not having lived together for 10 years.
A libertarian society has the minimum government influence, in order to maximize personal freedom; taken to the extreme, the government has no role beyond enforcing contracts and preventing outright violence. The problem with this is that nothing stops Bill Gates from paying the local water and power companies to not do business with you. Under current government such attempts would almost certainly be illegal (harassment).
The fatal flaw of libertarian philosophy is that coercion is defined as using force against someone. It is flawed because it ignores another coercive strategy: resource deprivation. If I control the only source of water in a desert, I hold power of life and death over all other residents, and can kill them without ever once using force against them (except when they try to take water by force, at which point libertarianism allows me to use it in defense).
People in the current technical society aren't self-sufficient, they depend on support infrastructure to stay alive. People with lots of money can buy that infrastructure and then coerce others by threatening to cut them out of it, at which point those other people either obey or starve to death.
In short, government stepping down and relinquishing power over some aspect of society will simply result in the next most powerful individual or organization taking over. Power doesn't disappear simply because someone gives it up; in a libertarian society, since the government refuses to wield power, someone else will. And since that someone else doesn't have any responsibility to citizens, he can rule as a ruthless tyrant.
Just look at any nation where the government collapses: if a new one doesn't rise quickly, local warlords take power over their area and then begin to fight amongst each other. Somalia is a good example of this.
Libertarianism is a very simple philosophy, simpler than even Marx's theories; like them, it assumes that as soon as $EVIL has been removed and everyone been converted to the correct worldview, everything will be wonderful. No such ideal has ever delivered what it promised, so why should libertarianism ?
Yeah. Some of them are skinny gangsters or crazy Libertarians.
Burn, karma, burn !-).
And the Constitution in turn was discarded when it came time to actually rule the country. Consequently, political speech is more protected than commercial speech and showing nipples in television carrie fines for the innocent.
Not surprising, really: after all, your Constitution is just a "goddamned piece of paper" to your supreme leader.