Abolish the Department of Homeland Security • Hacker News Board

Re: Abolish the Department of Homeland Security

#31

Post by sehugg » Sat, Jan 14, 2012, 4:07 PM UTC

DHS is the poster child for mission creep. The White House suggested last year that they could help track down "circumvention devices" such as game console mod chips. From the Office of White House's "Copyright Czar":

“[It] is illegal to import or traffic in devices that can be used to circumvent technological measures that control access to copyrighted works,” they wrote. “When DHS discovers the importation of a potential circumvention device, current law does not authorize DHS to share a sample with a rightholder to aid CBP in determining whether it is, in fact, a circumvention device. Allowing DHS to provide a sample would aid enforcement efforts.”

Re: Abolish the Department of Homeland Security

#32

Post by lukeschlather » Sat, Jan 14, 2012, 4:24 PM UTC

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #22

I was reading along, nodding my head, then I got to this: Hard to argue with most of that, although abolishing the TSA isn't a good idea. Airport security should be rolled back to pre-9/11 levels, but someone is going to have to be in charge of it. Putting the airlines in charge of it doesn't make sense; their incentives are going to be passenger service rather than security. What? How many passengers can you service…

Airports aren't subject to higher scrutiny than buses for the sake of the airports' customers. 9/11 would have been unremarkable if people had stolen buses and driven them into the same buildings. Airports are subject to higher scrutiny because their planes can potentially become missiles with a high-power payload. In a totally free market, most of the airlines could probably absorb the loss of a plane every year, but that plane would be flown into someone who has no connection to the airport.

Although, airlines would probably still cause less damage to people in the US than cars.

Re: Abolish the Department of Homeland Security

#33

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Jan 14, 2012, 4:40 PM UTC

sehugg wrote: post #31

DHS is the poster child for mission creep. The White House suggested last year that they could help track down "circumvention devices" such as game console mod chips. From the Office of White House's "Copyright Czar": “[It] is illegal to import or traffic in devices that can be used to circumvent technological measures that control access to copyrighted works,” they wrote. “When DHS discovers the importation of a po…

[deleted]

Re: Abolish the Department of Homeland Security

#34

Post by bdunbar » Sat, Jan 14, 2012, 4:58 PM UTC

wisty wrote: post #24

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #22

I was reading along, nodding my head, then I got to this: Hard to argue with most of that, although abolishing the TSA isn't a good idea. Airport security should be rolled back to pre-9/11 levels, but someone is going to have to be in charge of it. Putting the airlines in charge of it doesn't make sense; their incentives are going to be passenger service rather than security. What? How many passengers can you service…

I don't think a free market solution would work - airports will cut costs until there's a disaster. But airports could do it the way they handle general aviation safety. You don't have a TSA minder next to the pilot, giving instructions on how to lower the landing gear - there's a system in place which seems to work pretty well. You could argue that no solution (an honor system?) is better than the TSA. Or that it wo…

I don't think a free market solution would work - airports will cut costs until there's a disaster.

Except this is how airport security was ran before 9/11.

9/11 didn't happen because costs were cut. 9/11 happened because the attackers worked the problem, discovered gaps, exploited them.

Gaps that the government, who set the standards and rules for security, had no idea were there.

Recall that in August, 2011 'everyone' knew that hijackers would jack the plane, hold hostages, make demands.

The idea that anyone use airliners as improvised cruise missiles was so far into looney-tunes land that Tom Clancy used it as a plot device to catapult Jack Ryan into the presidency.

Re: Abolish the Department of Homeland Security

#35

Post by bdunbar » Sat, Jan 14, 2012, 5:04 PM UTC

carbocation wrote: post #6

DHS is too inconsistent to be credible. The only flight I've ever missed (I was running late to a wedding), I missed because I had a tube of toothpaste in my carry-on. It was found to be small enough to be acceptable, but not until it had gone through a second round of X-ray. On another occasion, I was equally late to a connection flight (this time, not my fault), and I got through security despite having a bottle of…

It was inconsistent before, too.

Anecdote. In 1998 I went through Gate 1 to catch a flight. Realized I left something in my car. Out to get the thing, back through Gate 2, which was closer to my gate.

Where an alert-looking agent pulled me aside, took out a candle I'd had in my bag [1] and wiped it down with what I assumed was a sniffer for explosives.

This amused me because his sleepy-looking peer at Gate 1 had waved me through with no problems twenty minutes earlier.

I don't think you can get consistency of effort/organization/process across a large organization of civilians. The only group I've been a part of that managed to come close is the US Marines.

And most people will not be willing to subject themselves to 9 weeks of brainwashing in basic training, then the rigid hierarchy of command, for the sake of a job screening passengers.

[1] Gift for sister-in-law

Re: Abolish the Department of Homeland Security

#36

Post by slowpoke » Sat, Jan 14, 2012, 5:06 PM UTC

Peaker wrote: post #29

waffle_ss wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there a list somewhere of all of these corrupt politicians / traitors? If not, I'm going to start a wiki. Who knows, maybe it will be useful if the winds of change ever blow through this country.

That would be a great website -- though perhaps somewhat dangerous to run.

You could ask the Wikileaks folks and community around them for help. I'm sure they wouldn't be adverse to such a project.

Re: Abolish the Department of Homeland Security

#37

Post by steveplace » Sat, Jan 14, 2012, 5:07 PM UTC

lukeschlather wrote: post #32

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #22

I was reading along, nodding my head, then I got to this: Hard to argue with most of that, although abolishing the TSA isn't a good idea. Airport security should be rolled back to pre-9/11 levels, but someone is going to have to be in charge of it. Putting the airlines in charge of it doesn't make sense; their incentives are going to be passenger service rather than security. What? How many passengers can you service…

Airports aren't subject to higher scrutiny than buses for the sake of the airports' customers. 9/11 would have been unremarkable if people had stolen buses and driven them into the same buildings. Airports are subject to higher scrutiny because their planes can potentially become missiles with a high-power payload. In a totally free market, most of the airlines could probably absorb the loss of a plane every year, bu…

Schneier states the case that the solution to this risk has already been completed:

For years I've said that exactly two things have made us safer since 9/11: reinforcing the cockpit door and convincing passengers that they need to fight back.

http://www.schneier.com/essay-303.html

Neither of those solutions required increased security measures.

Re: Abolish the Department of Homeland Security

#38

Post by SoftwareMaven » Sat, Jan 14, 2012, 5:12 PM UTC

bdunbar wrote: post #34

wisty wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think a free market solution would work - airports will cut costs until there's a disaster. But airports could do it the way they handle general aviation safety. You don't have a TSA minder next to the pilot, giving instructions on how to lower the landing gear - there's a system in place which seems to work pretty well. You could argue that no solution (an honor system?) is better than the TSA. Or that it wo…

I don't think a free market solution would work - airports will cut costs until there's a disaster. Except this is how airport security was ran before 9/11. 9/11 didn't happen because costs were cut. 9/11 happened because the attackers worked the problem, discovered gaps, exploited them. Gaps that the government, who set the standards and rules for security, had no idea were there. Recall that in August, 2011 'everyo…

"""The idea that anyone use airliners as improvised cruise missiles was so far into looney-tunes land that Tom Clancy used it as a plot device to catapult Jack Ryan into the presidency."""

And that, IMO, sums up what is wrong with how we handle airport security. We continually focus on fixing what happened last time instead of looking at what could happen. Of course, once you do that, you realize there are too many variables to account for and that it is an intractable problem that needs to be approached differently.

Re: Abolish the Department of Homeland Security

#39

Post by SoftwareMaven » Sat, Jan 14, 2012, 5:17 PM UTC

waffle_ss wrote: post #27

dguaraglia wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look up the term "security theater". That's exactly what they are doing. Well, that and buying extremely expensive machinery from a company partially owned by the very man, Michael Chertoff, who co-wrote the PATRIOT act and jump-started this whole stupid thing. Talk about revolving-door politics and corruption. That bothers me more than any pat-downs.

Is there a list somewhere of all of these corrupt politicians / traitors? If not, I'm going to start a wiki. Who knows, maybe it will be useful if the winds of change ever blow through this country.

Is it too cynical to say "look at the congessional roster"? I think it would be hard to identify who are truly corrupt and who are doing what they think is right but get caught up in the machine. I would love an objective way of identifying that.

What we really need is real campaign finance reform. Politicians need to get money for office from real, individual people, not lobbyists and corporations. Want different outcomes? Change the incentives.

Re: Abolish the Department of Homeland Security

#40

Post by rnemo » Sat, Jan 14, 2012, 6:09 PM UTC

waffle_ss wrote: post #27

dguaraglia wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look up the term "security theater". That's exactly what they are doing. Well, that and buying extremely expensive machinery from a company partially owned by the very man, Michael Chertoff, who co-wrote the PATRIOT act and jump-started this whole stupid thing. Talk about revolving-door politics and corruption. That bothers me more than any pat-downs.

Is there a list somewhere of all of these corrupt politicians / traitors? If not, I'm going to start a wiki. Who knows, maybe it will be useful if the winds of change ever blow through this country.

Wikileaks appears to be the best option out there at the moment. But while it's a good resource to mine for data, it is pretty useless to the average person who may want some easily discovered facts.

If you're really serious about that wiki though, and would like some help, shoot me an email, you can find it in my profile.