Posted on 12/03/2001 10:00:13 PM PST by Mercuria
Even in the worst of times, there's always something to be grateful for, a silver lining in the darkest cloud. For my part, I'm grateful the attacks and the events after it didn't happen while Bill Clinton was in office. Clinton was fundamentally in love with power. As he did after the bombing in Oklahoma City, and school shootings, he would have taken advantage of the deaths of other Americans for his own political advancement. In an example of extreme hypocrisy, his backers would call his grubby exploitation honoring the dead, and would accuse anyone who disagrees of having no concern for the loss of life. I've never understood the attitude that the way to memorialize the dead is by giving up freedom, the thing that makes us Americans. All I can say is, I'm glad Republicans don't have that attitude.
Picture what Clinton might have done, through crass political manipulation of the crisis. It would have been an excuse for a federal power grab. I'd imagine that he would get laws passed making it legal for his jack-booted thugs to search homes without even telling the person whose property is searched. He's the kind of dangerous politician to have done that, and more. He might have gone further, letting federal law enforcement track what content a person accesses over the internet, and, in his boundless desire to have unlimited authority over ordinary people, he might have required a lower standard of proof than probable cause. Maybe the only requirement would be that it's relevant to an investigation. I'm glad Bush is in office instead.
In 1998, the Clinton administration released plans to implement a set of regulations called "Know Your Customer", which would have required banks to determine the sources of customers' funds, track their transactions, and report anything considered unusual. The reports would be investigated by something called FinCEN, which would keep the records around for the feds to snoop through, regardless of whether there was any evidence of a crime. The whole idea was abandoned after a public outcry. Bill Clinton thus showed himself to be an enemy of financial privacy, and given what we know about his unscrupulousness he wouldn't have hesitated to exploit the situation to resume his attack. Maybe he would have revived Know Your Customer, or maybe he would have attacked privacy some other way. Maybe he would have made all retailers follow the rules banks already follow under the misnamed Bank Secrecy Act.
On that subject, that Democrats give their bills gimmicky, misleading names has always annoyed me. It's as if they know that political truth in advertising would undo them. If the Bank Secrecy Act had been called the Spy Bank Accounts Act, nobody would have voted for it. Clinton probably would've bundled all of it together in a single bill with a gimmick name like the "Patriot Act". I'm glad the honorable man in the White House now would never do something like that.
Beyond Clinton himself, there was his authoritarian Attorney General, Janet Reno. The Butcher of Waco would have plunged headlong into whatever tyranny she thought she could get away with. That was her nature, seeing no reason not to have a police state and every reason to have one, and thus subjugating ordinary people to official thuggery every time she could. By now she might have hundreds of people held incommunicado in jail, without charges, and in secret. The worst fears of the black helicopter crowd would be coming true. That woman, I tell you, had no respect whatsoever for our basic legal traditions. She might even have gotten the FBI to spy on political and religious organizations, creating the opportunity for purely political investigations like J. Edgar Hoover used to have.
But maybe I've taken it too far. Even if she wanted to, the public would never stand for that. War or not, there would be enough public complaint to stop that. And even if the public is too complacent, at least we now have good men in office, who would never take advantage of that kind of complacency.
That's incorrect. When a sniffer displays the plain text of a data packet, the human operator can read and/or store the literal text inside that message.
So?
as well as the principle that all machines on the internet backbone need to have public access to read the IP address in the header or every data packet for routing - and must read all other information in each packet to permit the recording, data mirroring, and re-transmission of packets.
And phone lines "listen" to conversations.
Other reasons to allow full public access to all backbone hardware would certainly include diagnostic and error correction activities.
Which isn't the same as investigations.
In short, the Internet doesn't work if routers can't read, decode, and properly route packets
No one denies that, it just isn't relivant.
Just as a techie can place software on one of her backbone boxes to track data packet destinations and routing, so too can a government machine read data packets, even if the software on that machine is called Carnivore.
No, that's not the same.
You just said that it isn't all plain text.
You are mistaken.
Game, set, and match. Well done Southack.
Why Are We Sacrificing Our Freedom For The Sake of Immigration
The discussion was over by the post cited. The winner of a debate is not he who can be obtuse the longest. He walked you into a corner and finished you off.
Oh? Funny, I can still post, and it looks like you can too.
Just because you say so, doesn't mean you win.
**g**
Don't get me wrong...I enjoy my privacy....and having one of my offices in Connecticut, the Corporate Electronic Wiring and Monitoring laws can be considered invasive by some...In fact, I have the nasty little habit of identifying the login ID of the individual monitoring my email in my history cache and then, sending a less than pretty message to him with a random graphic of at least 20 Megs. or more...I haven't seen him in a while...wonder why...
...and the MASSIVE LAUGH!!!
Perhaps you didn't understand the post. It was somewhat technical, I admit.
I am still waiting for the original poster to define what should be done in lieu of the Patriot Act. It is easy to say something is bad and potentially threatening but it isn't necessarily helpful. The heavy lifting is in designing a plan that is effective but without threat. Let's here what he would do differently?
I'd say placing restrictions on foreign visitors and upgrading the security at our borders before instilling acts that could be (and IMO probably WILL be) used against American citizens would be a handy start. That's my opinion, though, mind you.
I would like to understand clearly what you are saying. Is your contention that concurrent with the swearing in ceremony the Bush Adminstration someone drafted these exact line items currently known as the Patriot Act?
First of all...a correction, I made an error. There was a report submitted by the Hart-Rudman Commission in January 2001 that was the basis of the Office of Homeland Defense. (Might just be me, but I have a hard time separating the "Patriot" Act from the creation of the Office of Homeland Security.)
Also, here is a link I found re: JoeEveryman's mention of James Steinberg's preliminary idea for a form of "Patriot" Act. (I'll search for some more info, if this isn't enough...so much to sift through...I suggest you order out for pizza, this all takes a while to read.)
The logical continuation and connectivity from the paragraph above is with this legislation already drafted, the Feds intentionally allowed the attack to happen so that they could enact the Patriot Act. Is that what you are saying? The other way this can be read is that the Patriot Act is part of a planned strategy to usurp our rights, waiting in the wings for an opportune time to roll it out. Maybe that's what you are saying. A clarification would be appreciated.
The "opportune time" scenario is what I meant.
I agree partially with the first part. But that's the stating the obvious, you can get that from TV. The less obvious part, because you have to be there to see it, is many people do appreciate and benefit from our assistance. It may not be evident on the national level, yet, but as individuals many lives are better for the US's efforts. Over time the investments we make in educating citizens of foreign nations will payoff.
The assistance I'm addressing is, for example, our assistance to the Afghanis in getting the Russians out of their way some time ago.
I fear that the Northern Alliance, should we make any foreign policy move - or any move at all - that offends them are going to be as forgetful in the future of our assistance in getting them set up as the current crop of people we are now battling against had become after we helped them.
Yes, border security and immigration policy need systemic overhauls. I am with you there. I can't refute that items in the Patriot Act could at some point be used in a negative way. It is possible because that it true of almost any law. I do believe however that we have enough checks and balances in the system that abuses will be minimal, if they occur at all. I also believe that should things go so far that there is a trial, it would be adjudicated in favor of innocents. Repeated abuses would lead to a vociferous effort from all sides of the political spectrum for repeal of the law.
First of all...a correction, I made an error. There was a report submitted by the Hart-Rudman Commission in January 2001 that was the basis of the Office of Homeland Defense. (Might just be me, but I have a hard time separating the "Patriot" Act from the creation of the Office of Homeland Security.)
Also, here is a link I found re: JoeEveryman's mention of James Steinberg's preliminary idea for a form of "Patriot" Act. (I'll search for some more info, if this isn't enough...so much to sift through...I suggest you order out for pizza, this all takes a while to read.)
Thanks for the clarification and the link. I will check it out. A pizza sounds good. :-)
The "opportune time" scenario is what I meant.
Gotcha, makes sense. I think the difference in our opinions is that I wouldn't necessarily attribute bad motives to having a document prepared. I expect our leaders to plan for contingencies and to be ready to implement them 'real-time' if and when they are needed.
The assistance I'm addressing is, for example, our assistance to the Afghanis in getting the Russians out of their way some time ago.
I fear that the Northern Alliance, should we make any foreign policy move - or any move at all - that offends them are going to be as forgetful in the future of our assistance in getting them set up as the current crop of people we are now battling against had become after we helped them.
Thanks for clarifying that, I'm clear on what you meant now. I can understand differences of opinions on the example cited. Fair concern about the NA. This one is going to be dicey for a while and require a comprehensive strategy on our part to assure what you described doesn't happen.
LBT
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