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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
Mayor Bloomberg to donors: Cut off Dem senators who opposed gun bill
Democratic senator calls Keystone pipeline 'the Kim Kardashian of energy'
GOP Rep. Franks says rate of pregnancies from rape is 'very low'
House Appropriations panel approves $512 billion Pentagon spending bill
I'm pretty sure it's in their standard blurb about What Not To Say. The problem is that their people can't keep their tongues in their heads any more than they apparently can keep their dicks in their pants.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"We know perfectly well that the money being spent on 'stopping terrorism' is ridiculously disproportionate.
We know perfectly well that legal manipulation and secret surveillance are tools used by authoritarians for their benefit at the expense of the public; the 20th century gave us more than enough examples of that. What other conclusion are we supposed to come to?
Interestingly, according to this page,
the death rate from terrorism on american soil has actually been higher from 2008 to 2013 than it was from 2003 to 2007. Clearly all this new surveillance has been working really darn well.
edited 12th Jun '13 3:23:00 PM by Meklar
Join my forum game!Senator Merkley (D-OR) waves Verizon phone, demands NSA chief share grounds for seizing data
edited 12th Jun '13 7:43:13 PM by DeviantBraeburn
Everything is Possible. But some things are more Probable than others. JEBAGEDDON 2016Not a fan of Chris Matthews. He's the sort of person that's put on TV because he yells a lot, and if he can yell over other people in a conversation, then he 'wins' by default.
I'm not the biggest fan of Ted Cruz, but likening him to the past like that is a huge stretch.
Glove and Boots is good for Blog!The other three, however, I think will eventually be seen as, if not heroes, then at least forerunners of a culture with a more mature set of views, standards and policies on information and human freedom. Bradley Manning and Anonymous may have done it partly for the attention, but their rejection of authoritarian trends still stands. All three already have many supporters, and are only demonized by those who either fear the idea of an open society, or are too stupid to know any better.
As has been mentioned before, what's disturbing is the asymmetry of the whole thing. The american government is telling its people that it doesn't trust them enough to not snoop through everything they do and say across wires, yet demands that they trust it not to abuse that power, and to somehow sustain 'democracy' without, you know, telling them what issues the people they're voting for are actually going to be making decisions on.
Hmm...are you all talking about PRISM or about its effects on American politics? Because we have a thread for surveillance in general.
On other news, the immigration reform bill's going better than expected, apparently. It got cloture with 82-15 votes.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard FeynmanMassachusetts Democrats Greet Obama… With Protests
NSA Director: ‘Dozens’ Of Terrorist Plots Thwarted By Snooping Programs
GOP lawmakers demand classified meeting with leaders on NSA
shut the fuck up, Rand Paul. You signed off on the fucking thing, or perhaps conveniently didn't read any of the memos about it?
Very big Daydream Believer. "That's not knowledge, that's a crapshoot!" -Al Murray "Welcome to QI" -Stephen FryI'm waiting for Graham and Feinstein to introduce a "Microchip In Every Baby" Bill to the Senate.
panel votes to keep assault cases in military chain of command
The abolitionists helped bring slaves to safety when that was illegal. The unionists organized and went on strike when those were illegal. The gays and us bis had hot gay sex when that was illegal. The anti-Vietnam protesters burned draft cards. Many important events in many movements, from Stonewall for the LGBT rights movement to the Kent State Shootings for the anti-Vietnam movement, involved breaking the law. Do those actions marr the movements? No. Most of them are seen as acts of heroism or triumph. Civil disobedience has been successfully used by almost every major progressive movement I can think of with great success.
edited 13th Jun '13 6:51:02 AM by NativeJovian
Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.The problem is, there isn't enough material for "mass" civil disobedience in the NSA. I don't think intelligence/surveillance agencies try to recruit people based on moral standards, rather than propensity for obedience.
"And as long as a sack of shit is not a good thing to be, chivalry will never die."...Do you need to be reminded of what civil disobedience is? Cause that's exactly what it is. Also, you brought up groups, such as Anonymous, who most certainly aren't lone individuals.
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That's true, but I don't think civil disobedience is the right way to deal with things like Prism anyway.
There's a huge difference between a mass movement collectively breaking the law (thus forcing change by overwhelming the justice system, making it impossible to enforce the law being broken through sheer numbers) and a single person or small group doing something illegal to make a point. When I said "mass civil disobedience", I was trying to specify the former rather than the latter.
As far as Anonymous goes, yes it's a fairly large group, but the vast majority of the actual illegal activity (ie, hacks and such) were performed by a tiny handful of people, most of whom have already been arrested and prosecuted at this point.
Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.How would you even "civilly disobey" PRISM, anyway? Not use the Internet? The concept is meaningless. What these leakers are doing is intentionally bringing a secret issue into the public arena. Whether they do this out of moral outrage, self-aggrandizement, personal gain, anger, boredom, or whatever is irrelevant in the long run.
Whether Snowden's actions were right or wrong will be determined eventually. I can appreciate both sides' arguments but I don't have a strong personal opinion in the matter.
What I do have an opinion on is people getting outraged over "government intrusion". Or rather, that they suddenly are getting all hyper about it now, considering that this program was authorized by PATRIOT, which enjoyed wide bipartisan support both at its creation and at its reauthorization.
Our duly elected representatives have told us that the government can access our records without a warrant, and to my knowledge the Supreme Court has agreed. So at this point our only recourse is to vote out the schmucks who did that and put in people who won't surrender our freedoms in the name of security, if that's what you care about.
edited 13th Jun '13 12:19:46 PM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"![]()
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Then how should it have been addressed? The program was secret. Had it not been for whistle blowing, it would have remained secret. Had it remained secret, no one would have been able to utilize appropriate avenues to address it.
This is a a democracy. Our representatives cannot claim to be enacting the public's will if the public's will on a matter is never expressed and it cannot be expressed if the public is unaware.
I disagree. Mass movements are often a coagulation of smaller groups. The smaller groups take preliminary action that garners enough attention and outrage to provide the manpower to mobilize larger groups. Just because a protest starts small, or even solitary doesn't mean it will stay that way. Depending on what's being protested, the fear of more widespread dissent might invoke concessions.
I think you're underestimating the potential for a ripple to become a wave. Mohamed Bouazizi's self-immolation, that is to say one man setting himself on fire, is often used as the starting date for the entire Arab Spring.
edited 13th Jun '13 12:31:54 PM by IConfuseMe
edited 13th Jun '13 12:49:54 PM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

When did PRISM start?
Because I'm trying to evaluate the devil's-advocate side of this statement: