"Directorate of Terrorist Identities (DTI)" sounds like something right out of a dystopian novel.
Like "Ministry of Truth"?
Minitrue prevents crimethink.
Obama's Secret Terrorist-Tracking System, by the Numbers
31–38 of 38 posts
Re: Obama's Secret Terrorist-Tracking System, by the Numbers
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
"How long until central databases are collecting datapoints on our whereabouts at all times, not only from mobile devices, but just the image of our faces?" this is a fine question - the DHS has proposed a project with the City of Oakland to prototype just such a thing, described as a combination of NSA surveillance and stop & frisk, which they call the Domain Awareness Center. Originally targeted at the port post 9/…
You're a few months out of date. Plans for this have been scaled back to the portage areas: http://www.eastbayexpress.com/SevenDays/archives/2014/03/05/... While I share your dislike of the program, it's important to look at the overall scope rather just the government one. After all, you could build a pretty good automatic photo identification system on top of Facebook.
>After all, you could build a pretty good automatic photo identification system on top of Facebook.
There's very little utility in identifying people in pictures that were uploaded intentionally by people who knew who the people in the pictures were before they uploaded them.
Re: Obama's Secret Terrorist-Tracking System, by the Numbers
#33They called the system Hydra? Really? Seams like some agents read too much Marvell comics
Or Greek mythology, rather.
Re: Obama's Secret Terrorist-Tracking System, by the Numbers
#34They called the system Hydra? Really? Seams like some agents read too much Marvell comics
At least they're showing us their true faces.
Re: Obama's Secret Terrorist-Tracking System, by the Numbers
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
Slightly off topic, but I am curious and don't understand, why do you care what the founders did or did not envision? You live in a democracy, where you elect people to govern the country in a way that suits the majority of the population. The way I see it, these issues aren't about what someone 250(?) years ago wanted, but what the people who are alive today want . If their views outweigh those of the electorate tod…
Because democracy without an underlying system of values is indistinguishable from a tyranny by the majority (in other words, it cannot be two foxes and a hen voting on what's for dinner). That underlying system of values, as I understand, is the constitution. A law can be unconstitutional even if the entirety of congress votes in favor. While specific needs of American society have changed, I don't believe the value…
Is it not similarly "tyrannical" to be bound by the views of people who lived a few hundred years ago. I believe that the constitution specifically forbade the vote to certain segments of society by race/gender? Which is one example where values have changed significantly.
Not to mention, there have been amendments to the constitution as I understand it - or are those only additions rather than contradictions/supercededants?
Re: Obama's Secret Terrorist-Tracking System, by the Numbers
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're a few months out of date. Plans for this have been scaled back to the portage areas: http://www.eastbayexpress.com/SevenDays/archives/2014/03/05/... While I share your dislike of the program, it's important to look at the overall scope rather just the government one. After all, you could build a pretty good automatic photo identification system on top of Facebook.
>After all, you could build a pretty good automatic photo identification system on top of Facebook. There's very little utility in identifying people in pictures that were uploaded intentionally by people who knew who the people in the pictures were before they uploaded them.
It's easy to connect with vast numbers of people that you don't actually know, and then you can upload your own photos to see who is in them.
Re: Obama's Secret Terrorist-Tracking System, by the Numbers
#37The article indicates many states are beginning to supply federal agencies with biometric data including driver's license photographs. It also states a local police force (the NYPD) was a customer of a facial recognition system. How long until central databases are collecting datapoints on our whereabouts at all times, not only from mobile devices, but just the image of our faces? I don't think the founders [US-centr…
Take a look at this article's analysis on whether or not the 'Founding Fathers' would have been for or against the type of surveillance we are now seeing.
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2014/01/29/if_george_w...
Re: Obama's Secret Terrorist-Tracking System, by the Numbers
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because democracy without an underlying system of values is indistinguishable from a tyranny by the majority (in other words, it cannot be two foxes and a hen voting on what's for dinner). That underlying system of values, as I understand, is the constitution. A law can be unconstitutional even if the entirety of congress votes in favor. While specific needs of American society have changed, I don't believe the value…
Is it not similarly "tyrannical" to be bound by the views of people who lived a few hundred years ago. I believe that the constitution specifically forbade the vote to certain segments of society by race/gender? Which is one example where values have changed significantly. Not to mention, there have been amendments to the constitution as I understand it - or are those only additions rather than contradictions/superce…
American here, what Dalek_Cannes said was correct, but to add to that, we have a system to change the underlying views. These are called Amendments, and that is how we changed the underlying view to allow everyone to vote. The difference between an Amendment and ordinary laws is that Amendments are really, really, really big deals that have the authority to redefine those value systems instead of working within the definition as ordinary laws can.
There are only 27, the first 10 of which was kind of a "Constitution out of beta" thing that all happened at once, so you can kind of consider there to be 17 changes to the underlying values. That way when one occurs it's a BIG DEAL and can't sneak past the people as easily as say, the Patriot act or the NDAA, both of which are pretty easy to make a case against that they go against the core values but were voted on quickly at times no one was looking.
Also we have a separation of powers where Congress creates laws, the President acts as a leader and can also prevent Congress from creating laws in some cases, and the Supreme Court can challenge legality of laws. The idea is that the Supreme Court challenges laws against Constitution + Amendments, so they can strike down a law as being unconstitutional, but the Supreme Court does not have the power to strike down an Amendment as it by definition is the constitution.
If Congress creates bad laws, it is the Supreme Court's responsibility to point it out. However they are only legally allowed to do that when a case is put before them. Imagine being legally restrained from refactoring unless a customer files a bug report. Part of the reason the US is having some trouble with laws as I understand it is Congress + some organizations are working to prevent laws from going to the Supreme Court on technicalities. Such as person X tries to take law Y to the court with evidence Z, but evidence Z is "classified" so they are legally not supposed to know the evidence and cannot legally present it in court.
A similar problem our country is facing is that the lack of refactorization is catching up to us so our legal system has become an insane mess that only highly trained specialists (lawyers) can even attempt to navigate. Then people learn how to abuse the system and can try to attack people on all the un-refactored points of the law. This is how patent trolls work, the addition of the law (patent) is a relatively easy process and the removal of bad laws (bad patents) can only be done by challenging it in court. This causes thousands of bad patents to exist because no one can challenge them until it is used against someone.