Man Who Wants Database Has His Personal Info Splashed On Web!

Why not post the whole article. It's easy and fun, too!

The head of the government's Total Information Awareness project, which aims to root out potential terrorists by aggregating credit-card, travel, medical, school and other records of everyone in the United States, has himself become a target of personal data profiling.

Online pranksters, taking their lead from a San Francisco journalist, are publishing John Poindexter's home phone number, photos of his house and other personal information to protest the TIA program.

Matt Smith, a columnist for SF Weekly, printed the material -- which he says is all publicly available -- in a recent column: "Optimistically, I dialed John and Linda Poindexter's number -- (301) 424-6613 -- at their home at 10 Barrington Fare in Rockville, Md., hoping the good admiral and excused criminal might be able to offer some insight," Smith wrote.

"Why, for example, is their $269,700 Rockville, Md., house covered with artificial siding, according to Maryland tax records? Shouldn't a Reagan conspirator be able to afford repainting every seven years? Is the Donald Douglas Poindexter listed in Maryland sex-offender records any relation to the good admiral? What do Tom Maxwell, at 8 Barrington Fare, and James Galvin, at 12 Barrington Fare, think of their spooky neighbor?"

Smith said he wrote the column to demonstrate the sense of violation he felt over his personal records being profiled by secretive government agencies.

"I needed to call Poindexter anyway, and it seemed like a worthy concept that if he's going to be compiling data that most certainly will leak around to other departments and get used, one way to get readers to think about it was to turn that around," Smith said.

What Smith didn't realize was that Poindexter's phone number and other information would end up on more than 100 Web pages a week later as others took up the cause.

Phone-phreaking hackers supplied details on the Verizon switch serving the admiral's home. The popular Cryptome privacy-issues website posted satellite photos of the house.

Poindexter could not be reached for comment for this story, and calls to his home phone now reach a recording: "The party you are calling is not available at this time."

Since the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency began awarding contracts for the Total Information Awareness project in August, the effort has been criticized by both civil rights advocates and data-mining experts.

The dispute over TIA seems to fall not along straight political party lines, but between advocates and opponents of the government's right to monitor its own citizens. Former President Clinton expressed support for the project in a recent public appearance, while conservative New York Times columnist William Safire recently wrote a pointed editorial criticizing the idea.

One Bush voter, speaking on condition of anonymity, said of the pranks on Poindexter: "If they're making him as uncomfortable as we are, good."

"What you are missing is that the SF Weekly isn't the government,and they don't have the powers the government has. Nobody from the SF Weekly is going to arrest you,indict you for any crimes,call you in for questioning,or seize your bank accounts. They also won't be working hand in hand with Bubba-2's new Office of Reich Security."

Equal protection requires that John Poindexter have as much right to information as the SF Weekly, John Zogby or Alec Baldwin. If you believe that private agencies can lawfully obtain personal information, then you will have no objection to John Poindexter hiring a private investigators to dig it up.

The basis of any privacy protection must be to keep information out of the public domain without a person's consent. You cannot simultaneously agree to have a newspaper splash details all over the papers and then prohibit John Poindexter from acting on it.

As I said, there are many sound reasons for objecting to the Total Information Awareness agency, but this is not one of them.

Equal protection requires that John Poindexter have as much right to information as the SF Weekly, John Zogby or Alec Baldwin.

Equal protection doesn't apply to Poindexter,as a agent of the government. As a private individual,it does.

If you believe that private agencies can lawfully obtain personal information, then you will have no objection to John Poindexter hiring a private investigators to dig it up.

Where did I ever say I agreed with that?

The basis of any privacy protection must be to keep information out of the public domain without a person's consent.

You don't go far enough. You are only half right. The other half is privacy guarantees a right to keep information out of the hands of the government,unless there is a warrant involved. A specific warrant given for a specific reason,and searching for a specific item or items.

You cannot simultaneously agree to have a newspaper splash details all over the papers and then prohibit John Poindexter from acting on it.

You can if he's acting in his role as government agent. Or at least you should be able to prohibit him in that role.

If you believe that private agencies can lawfully obtain personal information, then you will have no objection to John Poindexter hiring a private investigators to dig it up.
Where did I ever say I agreed with that?
You cannot simultaneously agree to have a newspaper splash details all over the papers and then prohibit John Poindexter from acting on it.

You can if he's acting in his role as government agent. Or at least you should be able to prohibit him in that role.

Presumably you thought that it was a good idea for the SF newspaper to splash Poindexter's details all over its pages. Then surely, it must be a legal act and the government is not prohibited from performing legal acts. Warrant? You don't need a warrant to perform anything a Jane Doe can do at any time. If it is legal for a private agency, like an SF newspaper to obtain information on an individual without his consent, without a compelling reason, why would it be illegal for someone else?

The Saudi government's attorneys are not agents for the US government, but are US citizens. Can they do what the IRA just did recently: obtain the home addresses and telephone numbers of warders in high security prisons and anti-terrorism policemen, without their consent? Can they do what this SF newspaper just did to Poindexter? Do private attorneys lose Equal Protection too? How about the Beltway sniper? He hasn't been convicted yet. He hasn't lost any rights and he's a US citizen. Can he have his lawyer get the home address of the judge? Maybe he can hire the SF newspaper to do that.

Government ought to be limited in its powers. But you can't grant the very powers which you wish to limit to everyone else. It would make a mockery of what you were trying to achieve in the first place.

Presumably you thought that it was a good idea for the SF newspaper to splash Poindexter's details all over its pages.

Deys too much presumin' goin' on around heah! I never said it was a good idea. I just said I was glad they did it. It might be good for him to see how it feels.

Then surely, it must be a legal act and the government is not prohibited from performing legal acts. Warrant? You don't need a warrant to perform anything a Jane Doe can do at any time. If it is legal for a private agency, like an SF newspaper to obtain information on an individual without his consent, without a compelling reason, why would it be illegal for someone else?

The government isn't a person,and it doesn't have rights. Only duties or obligations. Only people have rights.Rights like the right to privacy that Poindexter wants to take away from us.

The Saudi government's attorneys are not agents for the US government, but are US citizens. Can they do what the IRA just did recently: obtain the home addresses and telephone numbers of warders in high security prisons and anti-terrorism policemen, without their consent? Can they do what this SF newspaper just did to Poindexter? Do private attorneys lose Equal Protection too?

You are babbling.

How about the Beltway sniper? He hasn't been convicted yet. He hasn't lost any rights and he's a US citizen.

He HAS lost his rights for the time being,anyway. This happened when he was arrested. Yes,he is a citizen now,and will still be a citizen when they strap him to the gurney to put the needles in his arm.

Can he have his lawyer get the home address of the judge?

Sure he can. And if anything happens to the judge because the lawyer passed this address on to the person who harms the judge,he can also be arrested and tried for criminal conspiracy.

Maybe he can hire the SF newspaper to do that.

He can have one of his PI's do it.

Government ought to be limited in its powers. But you can't grant the very powers which you wish to limit to everyone else. It would make a mockery of what you were trying to achieve in the first place.

You have it backwards. It's government that I worry about the most. Nobody else has armed men with badges who can kill you and get a paid vacation and promotion.

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