Frankly, I'm quite horrified by the UK Metropolitan Police Anti-Terrorism Campaign.



Click on the image to go to my original.

The headline reads Obama's Friends Appear Poised to Hold Clout in Washington. As soon as I saw that phrasing on Google News, I knew it was a right-wing rag trying to plant in people's minds the suggestion that there's something unsavoury about this. Yup. It's Fox News. The phrasing is a dead give away. Just read their opening:

Barack Obama owes a lot of favors.

His successful bid to be America's 44th president was aided by unprecedented fundraising, and he gained the early support of mutinous Democrats who rebelled against the better known and more experienced candidates in the primaries.

That's one hell of a subtle yet juicy opener. You could have a lot of fun dissecting those sentences, the heavily negative words and the tone, but I'd be preaching to the choir here.

Never mind that this is what every single president does. And you know what? It's not even wrong. If they're you're friends, it's because you trust them. You surely aren't going to appoint your enemies to important positions (appointing someone you disagree with, of course, is an entirely different kettle of fish and something that I doubt most Fox News affianados would understand).

And people still defend Fox News? The problem is that when Fox News comes out swinging like this, you could easily read this as newsworthy and "fair and balanced" because it really does read like news, but their continued, subtle digging of Obama (and much of their less subtle tactics) suggest that as far as they're concerned, it's business as usual.

Tom Harris, a Scottish MP, doesn't recognize the Orwellian tendencies of the UK. I was so furious at his "oh, wake up" blog entry that I posted the following as a comment. It's awaiting moderation. I'll be very impressed if it's published (particularly since I was so harsh).

---

Just as 1984 can be thought of as a warning and not a blueprint, so too should it be thought of as an illustration and not a documentary. Just because the exact manifestation of the Orwellian tendencies in the UK aren't what we see in Orwell's book does not mean that these things aren't happening.

Everyone knows about the CCTV, not many people know that you're now teaching the cameras to listen to us as well. (http://is.gd/6k88) Or how about the fact that Jack Straw wants to let anonymous people testify against you? (http://is.gd/6k8P) Your police want the DNA of children who might be pose dangers in the future. (http://is.gd/2cW) You're talking about tracking all of our calls and email (http://is.gd/1Pfo).

So you photograph us, keep our DNA, are listening in on our conversations and all in the name of "terrorism". Frankly, many people are more afraid of the government than terrorists.

And just getting back to the CCTV problem, not only do the police admit it doesn't work (http://is.gd/1b1a), but the Home Office admits it, too (http://is.gd/6k9O). So how can you stand there and tell me with a straight face that you support the blatant rape of our civil liberties? You should be ashamed of yourself, but then, I think you've just made it clear that you don't give a damn about us.

(I could have listed plenty of other links besides the ones above, but I felt that was a good start)

From the Army Times Website: US Army troops to be deployed in US. Duties may include crowd control and dealing with civil unrest. That's a violation of US law, but nobody cares any more. I've finally added a 'fascism' tag. I could argue against it before, but my arguments felt hollow. Not any more :(

The more I look around the world and wonder "where should I live?", the more I despair. Seems the French are giving the UK and the US a run for the money in creating a surveillance state (hey, at least 'surveillance' is a French word, so they've the right, yes?) From the article:

[The police database] Edvige ... was created by decree in July to store data on anyone aged 13 or above who is "likely to breach public order".

What sort of data? How about how you hang out with, your sexual orientation, your political opinions? Would you be comfortable with some some anonymous database basically storing rumors about you for government officials to peruse?

As you may have learned to expect by now, it's British journalism doing the hard work for Americans, but a prominent Bush lobbyist has been caught on tape offering to sell access to the Bush administration. He's talking about face-to-face meetings with Dick Check, Condoleeza Rice and other high-ranking officials in exchange for money. There's the possibility of the US administration making "favorable" statements which are beneficial to the the payee.

You know the odds are stacked against anyone having the courage to do anything.

In other news,the mainstream media is finally beginning to use the word "war crimes" in connection with torture.  Again, I've grown so cynical that I know nothing will come of this.  I believe most major Democratic figures are tantamount to traitors and if they follow this up, their own culpability will be established.

If you really want to get a fascinating look at illegal CIA activities (mostly pre-1970), you need look no further than their infamous Family Jewels (24 meg pdf) memo. This document, compiled in 1973, is a huge account of multiple assassination attempts against world leaders, illegal domestic spying, mob ties, illegal break-ins and so on. It's almost 700 pages of illegal activity, most of which CIA employees have never been held accountable for.

You can read through this summary of the "Family Jewels", but I highly recommend you read the Jewels for yourself.

Justice Secretary Jack Straw wants to allow anonymous witnesses to testify against you in a court of law. I'm sure this would never be abused.

I'm trying to figure out if this is worse than plans to have CCTV cameras listen in on your conversations.

Does it really matter which is worse? Cameras watching and listening to us everywhere. Secret witnesses in court that you can't challenge. DNA of innocent people and children being stored in databases.

It's not really 1984. It's more "Brave New World." Help!

I can't friggin' believe it. Every time I turn around, the UK government is working harder and harder to strip its citizens and residents of every last bastion of privacy. They've admitted CCTV doesn't work and yet keep pushing for more (see many of my previous posts on this topic). They have a draconian national DNA database and the DNA spokesman for the Association of Chief Police Officers recently discussed identifying "problem children" who should have their DNA recorded. Now they're talking about a database with "details of every phone call and e-mail sent in the UK".

I don't have anything to hide, but I think I'm not bringing my laptop into the US. I don't think people have the right to go snooping through my personal effects just because they want to.

I've said before (many times) that CCTV doesn't work, but now the British police are saying it, too. We know it doesn't work. It does little to solve crime other than to coddle the feelings of those who don't know better. Of course, the government won't listen. If they were to admit that they've wasted billions of pounds for nothing, people would ... well ... what? They'd grumble and turn back to their pints.

Japan used to require all foreigners entering their country to be fingerprinted. They abandoned this policy due to privacy concerns and, as far as I'm concerned, this is a Good Thing. More and more countries, rather than honestly asking themselves, "what can we do to to make the world a better place?", have simply given up, assumed things are bad, and just assume that violating our privacy is a necessary evil in their fight against reason terrorism.

Giving into terror hysteria, Japan again requires foreigners to be fingerprinted.

Of course, if you're disturbed by the idea of the mounting assaults on our privacy, this probably bothers you. Offhand, short of hiring a plastic surgeon, I am only familiar with one way of changing your fingerprints. You get someone to press their fingerprints into modeling clay. Then you spray the prints with jeweler's oil, apply Nu Skin (they have a clear artificial skin product), and when it sets, carefully peel off the prints. Then you superglue them to your fingertips and carefully pierce the prints with a needle to let your natural oils cover the prints. More Nu Skin will need to be applied to blend the fingerprint edges into your own skin.

Of course, the other person is probably not going to want to be implicated in whatever you do, so it helps if they're unconscious when you borrow their prints. This is probably not a viable route.

Enter "mock". This is the online handle of a rather curious gentleman I've met at a couple of conferences. He's a security researcher and is passionate about privacy. He decided that the trick would be to remove his fingerprints. He researched various methods and actually tried them. Then he posted a blog entry about how to remove your fingerprints. He even has a PDF of slides of his attempts. And yes, he even pressed his fingers into a frying pan with hot, smoking oil (it didn't work but it hurt like hell).

He claims he successfully made it through Japanese customs and he actually had to wait in a line of people who didn't have fingerprints. Curiously, he mentioned they were mostly old Chinese women. I'm wondering how that came about.

The downside of this, as mock points out, is that you probably want to have a plausible reason why you don't have fingerprints. That last bit has me stumped.

While I often complain about how heavily the UK government spies on its own people, I also talk about emotions overriding reason and the fact that CCTV just plain doesn't work. Many British agree to trade their freedom for safety and wind up with less of both, but they pay more for the privilege.

What really pisses me off about this is that we know CCTV isn't very useful. Who's telling us this? The same people who are telling us we need CCTV, the UK government! The linked article from a couple of years ago reported on a study where the government admitted CCTV doesn't work. So the Lib-Dems recently applied under the British Freedom of Information Act to get a lot of crime and CCTV data and guess what? Seems CCTV cameras still don't reduce crime. From the article, it appears that Scotland Yard knows this but rather than admit that the government is wrong, they're trying to figure out how to make it right.

Unfortunately, it's not a battle we can win. All we need is one or two high profile cases solved with the help of CCTV and the public will beg the government to continue spying on them. Never mind that, in aggregate, this spying doesn't solve crime. Nobody in government pushing CCTV gives a damn about whether it works. They just don't want to lose face and admit they were wrong.

Meanwhile, wear a hat with a brim and keep your face down.

I realize not everyone will agree with me on this one, but here's more justification that liberty threatening software must be open source. People are winding up with felony convictions because poorly designed software is providing evidence against them in court.

This is a follow up to my earlier OnLamp blog entry on this topic.

It's easy to underestimate the importance of images. Take, for example, this 2003 image of George Bush on the USS Lincoln (from www.kwhitaker.com). He's clearly the leader. He's clearly the man in charge. He clearly has a suspiciously large crotch, perfectly designed for photo opportunities, but abysmally situated for a flight harness. Guys, do you really want tight straps yanking against your testicals like that? I didn't think so. (no comment about the crotch of the guy in the right of the photo)

The fact is, appearance is an extremely powerful psychological tool. I remember back when I sold cars and we were reminded repeatedly that some customers simply can't be sold to because we look like an ex-husband or a hated neighbor. Appearance is important. Appearance can prejudice you in so many ways. News sources repeatedly pick images that make a story more powerful, but those images can be misleading. It can be very difficult to choose a "fair" image, particularly when one is biased.

So let's consider Conservapedia. They state that they are without the liberal and anti-Christian bias of other online sources like Wikipedia. Now I believe it's quite possible to be a devout conservative Christian and yet still believe it's only honest to try and present a fair viewpoint of the opinions of others. Is this true of Conservapedia? Let's take a look at their images.

Note that unless otherwise stated, all images are from Conservapedia as of May 3, 2007. I have not altered them aside from attempting to resize them to match a corresponding "liberal" image (the image of the "conservative" individual is usually much larger for some reason ...)

What's interesting is that I didn't have to search around for "good" images for this. I just looked for famous liberals and was horrified by what I saw. I haven't seen a bad image of a conservative icon yet.

( Conservapedia images )

I slept almost the entire night. I'm finally getting over this!

In other news: pdx42, you may be paranoid, but it turns out that they really were watching you. (Not that we had any doubt that the US is struggling to become more of a police state).

And you remember Cuyahogo county, right? That's the most populous county in Ohio and it's the one which pretty much gave Bush the last election. As it turns out, two election workers have just received felony convictions for tampering with the vote recount. Apparently they spent three days hand-picking ballots to ensure that Bush still won the county. However, in a stunning display of typically awful journalism, we find the following sentence:

Special prosecutor Kevin Baxter did not claim the workers' actions affected the outcome of the election — Kerry gained 17 votes and Bush lost six in the county's recount.

Um, excuse me? Are those with the hand-picked ballots or not? I would assume they're not the hand-picked ones, but there's no way to know from the story.

So I've been doing a bit of reading about CCTV and crime rates. As it turns out, they're extremely expensive to implement, but since most Brits are willing to trade their freedoms for safety, it's a price they're willing to pay.

The problem is, study after study shows that CCTV often has little to no effect on crime rates and more effective measures, such as better lighting on dark streets, are much more cost effective. So Brits have happily been trading their freedoms for, um, not much.

Pwned!

At this point, some folks might claim that conviction rates could increase, but even the British Home Office isn't saying much about this though they crow about some areas which have lower crime rates after CCTV was installed (which raises the ol' "correlation/causation" question). I haven't found much decent information on this, but I suspect that there are so many crimes and so many CCTV cameras (around 4.3 million with more being added all the time) that trying to wade through all of that data means that it's mostly high profile crimes which get proper attention via CCTV -- and that's assuming you knew where the crime took place.

On the other hand, CCTV has led to the convictions of CCTV operators for spying on women in their flats and it turns out that this is not uncommon.

And in the "I'd laugh if I wasn't so horrified" department (well, I'm laughing anyway), Scotland is considering adding CCTV cameras to monitor their speed cameras.

Side note: are any of my British friends offended by my talking like this? I realize that me moving over here and ripping on your country could be rubbing some of you the wrong way, but I can't seem to help speaking out about civil liberties.

I realize that my previous inflammatory comments could do with some explaining. When I some people of being emotion-driven rather than rational, I realize that without the context of what I mean, that can sound pretty damned bad.

I linked to a coverage of survey results suggesting that 7 in 10 Brits would be happy to trade freedom for safety. They'll accept mandatory ID, police tapping people's phones for mere suspicion and letting their email and bank details be freely available to the government. Basically, the government sees that you're overdrawn by £32.47 and they have a powerful tool against terrorism.

Or not.

The problem.

Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!

The solution.

Let the government watch you every second of every day because the government, fortunately, has the resources to do this. And they would never, ever abuse this privilege. Tony Blair will take care of that once the cash for peerage scandal dies down.

Anyone see a problem with that?

Here's a little analogy of the problem. Let's say that I'm programming a system which takes financial data and sends it through three computers before finally spitting out company reports.

                    +-------+   +-------+   +-------+
                    |       |   |       |   |       |
(Financial data) -->|   A   |-->|   B   |-->|   C   |--> (Company Reports)
                    |       |   |       |   |       |
                    +-------+   +-------+   +-------+

With me so far? Now what I'm about to explain happens every day, all over the planet. It's a major reasons why the software you buy is so buggy and full of security holes and crashes if you breathe on it funny.

Pam the programmer is picked by her big boss, Betty. She tells him "the reports coming out of 'C' are borked. Fix it now or get fired. Have a nice day."

So Pam looks and sees that sure enough, the reports are indeed borked. Maybe a column of numbers doesn't add up. Maybe the formatting is off. Whatever it is, she changes the code on 'C' and everyone's happy.

Except there's a problem. The bad code wasn't in 'C'. The bad code was in 'A'. Or maybe we were getting bad financial data. Pam, by putzing around with the end result, didn't solve anything. She put a band-aid on it and what's worse, she may even have thought she did the right thing. However, the bug is still there and waiting to manifest in other ways.

Would you trust a building contractor who tells you to just prop up your ceiling and doesn't notice the foundation of your home is crumbling? Would you trust a doctor who just throws drugs at you and doesn't bother to find out anything about your history? Would you want to turn the country into a police state without asking why we're seeing the problems we're seeing and trying to solve them? Apparently, 7 out of 10 people in Britain are quite happy with that.

I actually tried to go to work today. I made it halfway through before a coworker drove me home.

In other news (with sincere apologies to my British friends), 7 out of 10 people in Britain are spineless cowards. From the article:

The survey found seven in every 10 people think compulsory identity cards for all adults would be "a price worth paying" to reduce the threat of terrorism. Eight in 10 say the authorities should be able to tap the phones of people suspected of involvement in terrorism, open their mail and impose electronic tagging or home curfews.

What's worse, I suspect we have similar numbers in the US, but it horrifies me. The problem is summed up perfectly in a Bruce Schneier (a well-regarded security expert) article about CCTV cameras catching a murderer:

I can write essay after essay about the inefficacy of security cameras. I can talk about trade-offs, and the better ways to spend the money. I can cite statistics and experts and whatever I want. But -- used correctly -- stories like this one will do more to move public opinion than anything I can do.

Does it occur to any of them that rather than taking away their freedoms and allowing the government to spy on them 24/7 that maybe a wee bit of root cause analysis might be in order here? Few people seem to be interested in truly understanding the problems we face or determining what would truly bring the greatest good to society. It's all emotion, emotion, emotion.

Guess the answer before reading on.

Poll #876913 Orwell Lives!
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 60

What's the most surveilled country in the world?

( How to control your population )