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NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show

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Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show

#231

Post by bmelton »

diminoten wrote: post #228
bmelton wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> seems relatively small, and it seems to be mostly restricted to non-Americans or people that the American public don't really care about. For what it's worth - that's the very point of the poem, that it always starts with the undesirables, minorities, or peoples to whom the population wouldn't object to. The tacit implication there is that those people were all portrayed as evil first, allowing public acceptance of…

The poem is one massive slippery-slope fallacy, and it's also a poem, not reality. It's fiction. Just like 1984, Brave New World, or any other literary piece that gets bandied about these days. Absolutely zero anchor in reality. And "Jews" isn't the same as "terrorists". The US isn't going after people based on what they look like or who their parents are, they're going after people based on what they do and say. I k…

> And "Jews" isn't the same as "terrorists".

According to who, exactly? Who's to say that it isn't simply a placeholder for 'arab', or 'sheikh'?

It's worth noting that I don't think it actually is, and I don't know of any specific abuses of the powers enumerated by the aforementioned acts -- but the point isn't what they're doing is wrong (though it is), it's that we've allowed the government to grant itself the authority powerful enough that, if they wanted to start killing Jews, or Arabs, or Sheikhs, or whomever, they could. The NDAA and Patriot Act give them the authority to do so.

That is a very, very scary proposition to me. That we have abused such power in the past only lends further credence that we will again in the future, and while I don't mean to offend anyone's sensibilities in suggesting that our current administration is evil, there is literally nothing in place now to prevent us from electing a Hitleresque tyrant and him getting away with committing the slaughter of millions.

"Slippery slope fallacy" is an odd accusation as well, considering that somewhat accurately synopsizes many distinct periods in our world's history leading up to genocide, politicide and democide.

I'm sorry that you're so cavalier about the subject, but there's a very real argument that this is exactly the kind of authority the Constitution was designed to limit any single branch of the government from having with its separation of powers. If the executive branch has the power to detain or kill anyone it wishes with no Legislative or Judicial oversight, and the executive branch controls the US military, then there is literally no power that we can pretend it doesn't have.

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show

#232

Post by Ihmahr »

sebkomianos wrote: post #162

I shouldn’t be writing this. Every time I read something NSA/FBI/CIA/KGB/Interpol/MI5/Stasi related I get this instinctive feeling of angriness and sadness at the same time. We were given the “internet”, pretty much for free, and we believed it would be a fair deal? That there would be nothing in for them? When was the last time you were give something for free, can you even remember? They are breaking encryption? Re…

Actually, you can do something. You can run a tor node (from your home mostly for free). You can also set up a bridge in 10 minutes via https://cloud.torproject.org/ for just $3 per month.

You might not directly see the good that you do, but you would be doing a significant amount of good! That tor node will push a lot of freedom bytes, and that bridge will help circumvent Iranian, Syrian and Chinese censorship.

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show

#234

Post by nate_meurer »

CWuestefeld wrote: post #169
penrod wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What immoral acts do you consider US troops to currently be engaged in?

My opinion isn't the question here. I'm observing first that there are many people who profess that one or more of our multiple wars are immoral; and second, that they simultaneously profess that the soldiers fighting deserve our support rather than scorn for supporting the putatively unjust war. If you believe that the war is unjust, and you believe that it's the duty of a soldier (or any person) to refuse to perfor…

That's a pretty black-and-white world you're trying to impose on folks.

I've spoken with a lot of Iraq war veterans. Every one of them has qualms with how the war was conducted, and many have doubts about the reasons for invading. But the things they have in common are an underlying desire to to "protect" their country in some sense, and the willingness to die for that cause.

There's plenty of room there for both disagreement and respect.

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show

#235

Post by swalkergibson »

TheCondor wrote: post #222
swalkergibson wrote: post #29

I am now numb to these revelations, as I suspect are most of the technology community. The only thing that will make the rest of the general populace wake up is if someone on TV says they are vehemently opposed to it. Someone who has trotted out the, "I have nothing to hide, so I am not worried." I believe the only way this will happen is if Edward Snowden specifically targeted one of those people and created a file…

Take action! The DNC is doing their annual "survey fund raiser" respond to it if you have one. I'm certain the RNC is doing something too. Write letters to you representatives, call them. I know this will shock and sound sacrilege to many here, give your sitting representatives $100 and share your opinion. Make defunding NSA your number one issue. We can play the game and it's not that expensive to be heard. It won't…

Good thinking on the $100. I suppose it never really occurred to me to donate like that to get a conversation going. Power to the people!

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show

#236

Post by GVIrish »

diminoten wrote: post #229
downer91 wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a generation or two, those positions will be staffed by completely different people, as the "THEY" of today retire. When the "THEY" of tomorrow are handed the keys to this vast panopticon that they didn't have to build themselves, how will "THEY" behave. No one can be sure. Consider the men that inherited the ash heap of Europe after WWI. What did those men do? They started WWII.

If you think the world today is anything like post-WWI Europe, you're either immensely blind, or you don't know what post-WWI Europe looked like.

I don't think parent was equating current times with post-WWI era Europe in the least. He was simply saying that people who inherited a challenging/dangerous geo-political landscape went on to create an unimaginably worse geo-political landscape.

The current challenge is global terrorism, but the swing towards authoritarianism by Western governments may end up being FAR worse than the threat of terrorism.

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show

#237

Post by CWuestefeld »

dredmorbius wrote: post #188
CWuestefeld wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So why is that in polite company, even those that are opposed to our various wars are obliged to toe the line, "we support our troops"? Even in 21st century America, we continue to fool ourselves, thinking that somehow soldiers can be noble, heroes even, all the while being engaged something that is immoral.

It's a lie of diversion / distraction. Noam Chomsky: Anything that's totally vacuous and diverts, after all what does it mean to be in favor of .. suppose somebody asks, do you support the people in Iowa, can you say I support them or no I don't support them. It's not even a question it doesn't even mean anything. And that's the point of public relations slogans like support our troops is that they don't mean anythin…

Thanks, that's really interesting.

The nonsense message of American democracy is another one that's always bothered me, so it's enlightening to see how these are connected.

FWIW, despite all the propaganda and even our school history books, democracy never was a core value of America. There is virtually nothing democratic about the design of the federal government, and even those aspects that are democratic were nothing new at the time the Constitution was written. America was not a bold experiment in democracy. That was old hat: the Dutch were already doing it, and heck, the Greeks did it a couple thousand years earlier. What was a bold experiment, seemingly entirely forgotten in today's discourse on Capitol Hill, was a limited government that wielded only a small set of powers that were explicitly ceded to it by the people.

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show

#238

Post by diminoten »

bmelton wrote: post #231
diminoten wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The poem is one massive slippery-slope fallacy, and it's also a poem, not reality. It's fiction. Just like 1984, Brave New World, or any other literary piece that gets bandied about these days. Absolutely zero anchor in reality. And "Jews" isn't the same as "terrorists". The US isn't going after people based on what they look like or who their parents are, they're going after people based on what they do and say. I k…

> And "Jews" isn't the same as "terrorists". According to who, exactly? Who's to say that it isn't simply a placeholder for 'arab', or 'sheikh'? It's worth noting that I don't think it actually is, and I don't know of any specific abuses of the powers enumerated by the aforementioned acts -- but the point isn't what they're doing is wrong (though it is), it's that we've allowed the government to grant itself the auth…

You're basically scared because someone other than you has power. It's sad you can't see past that fear.

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show

#239

Post by acqq »

sebkomianos wrote: post #221
acqq wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The view presented before the last line is counterproductive on so many levels. There's a nice name for it: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/defeatism Acceptance of defeat without struggle. The problem with the writing style where only the last line brings the change in mood is that a lot of people don't read everything. The direct call to action is always a better approach. Don't make the text full with wrong arguments…

A better approach for what? Against defeat you mean? I only wanted to share some thoughts, I am not a leader of a social movement or anything.

If you stand to your "But I care. And I hope you start caring too" then writing the big wall of defeat acceptances ending with "but I care" will bring the opposite result to the one for which you claim that "you care." If you claim that you can't do anything you're certainly wrong. Your actions influence others too, otherwise your post wouldn't be on the top here.

Re: NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show

#240

Post by Houshalter »

Amadou wrote: post #224
Houshalter wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not entirely true. Like 4% of people are sociopaths with an inability to feel empathy for others or feel guilt for their actions. There really are evil people who know what they are doing is wrong and just don't care.

You are the second person to bring up sociopaths as if they don't match the definition of evil I wrote above. The thing is, they are the very personification of lacking empathy. They believe that their own welfare is more important than anyone else's. They don't see that as evil, they see it as the way of the world.

The point is they don't rationalize or justify what they do, they simply don't care. They know it's wrong (by societies/normal people's) standards, but it doesn't violate their own.

This is what I consider evil, and I think it's important to separate it from people who think what they are doing is ok. I.e. "Someone else would have done it anyways", a thief who steals from a bank because "they have insurance" or "they are rich assholes who don't deserve it", or a dictator who tries to do what he thinks is best for the country even though his policies are bad.

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