That's when it began. Macintosh craze launched 1/24/84. January 1, 1983 is considered the official birthday of the Internet. Prior to this, the various computer networks did not have a standard way to communicate with each other.
Yes! And the commercial mirrors the 2 minute hate scene from the movie version of 1984 that also came out that year. I teach the book to seniors every year because I firmly believe it’s the most important piece of literature they’ll ever read.
I was in London during the filming (not knowing about it). Why? I'd got a leave from my company for ten weeks in Europe. Main reason: To be in L. on the day Winston begins his diary. I even found Victory Square, a postage stamp clearing surrounded by modest homes. It was bright and cold at 1pm, with a squat grey council estate nearby. Too bad the moment had to be ruined by the sound of frolicking children in the playground ..
I was an enumerator for the 1980 Census. At that time, the job involved tracking folks down who didn't respond to the mail-in questionnaires. There were 2 questionnaires. Most folks got a simple 10 question questionnaire. A random sample got the more detailed questionnaire that asks demographic questions. Many folks failed to respond because it simply wasn't a priority and forgot to complete & return it by the deadline. A few balked at having to spend too much time on the long questionnaire. However, many were extremely hostile about government gathering information on them, like there was something personal about the whole thing other than attempting to keep track of the population for use in voter districting, as required by The Constitution. Their responses ranged from screaming at me at the door, sic-ing dogs, and one even chased me with a baseball bat. (There was even rumor of lynchings in parts of the country you might expect that kind of thing happening.)
A frequent response was that "the government knows everything about me anyway, so why should I bother?" to which I replied: "If that's so, why must they even ask your name?" (The Census works by polling addresses kept in the USPS MAF - Master Address File - and sends canvassers around finding locations, like under bridges and by freeway ramps, etc., where anyone could possibly live - without regard to knowing any names associated with said locations.) Fact is, I found the privacy concern - in other contexts legitimate - hysterical. Most of the questions asked - and still are, based on those asked in 2020 - are the kinds of things you talk about when you first introduce yourself to someone socially, and share as you get to know each other on meeting, while others are things many frequently brag about in bible school or beer-joint! (A lot of desperados are only found and busted because they've shot their mouths off at beer-joints!) I've not even mentioned - with regard to the Census - what you freely give to banking institutions, or even commercial businesses, to buy a house or car, initiate some other kind of loan, or to simply apply for a goddam credit card! How 'bout employment applications? That's because no such questions are asked - except maybe about your >approximate< - not ready for IRS evaluation - annual income within a range of income ranges - 10-20k, 20-30k, 30-40k . . . etc.
Yet these days, we have folks who "sell the farm" to social media for consumption by perfect strangers - as they shriek on social media about "Big Brother!" They no longer need to bother with bible-school or beer-joint! Sad but true, but that even applies to >this< forum, where strange eyes from all over the planet can see what we all reveal about ourselves. And I'm >certain< I've cautioned folks about it here, from time to time. And I haven't even yet gotten to the "surveillance state" concerns Dr Reich expresses in his daily discussion forum essay, today!
On that issue, I'll only say that in the late '80s, I was frequently made out to be some kind of goddam conspiracy nut, when I observed about the rise of "neighborhood watches," the early proliferation of surveillance electronics, and questioned the direction it was all headed. (Keep in mind, at the time I lived in one of the most heavily surveilled areas in the whole goddamn country. It was an area where you'd find many of your next door neighbors - and even postal patrons - were employed by any of the 3-letter agencies in the DC Metro "alphabet soup!")
That's as we were all being issued the scanners you see letter-carriers carrying around these days, when the technology was first being rolled-out - and were >required< to be kept on our persons at all times, when out on the street. Along with keeping track of certain, bar-coded pieces of mail, they're also used on labels stuck inside people's mailboxes, to be scanned when the carrier arrives, for keeping track of the time the carrier arrives at that location on the route. I'll hazard they're now upgraded with GPS to track carrier movements throughout the day. (As per Bill Maher: "I don't know it for a fact; I just >know< it's true!) I even composed a filthy joke about it at the time, that received the kind of hysterical laughter signaling you've just hit >really< too close to home. It's a one-liner: "I went to take a leak this morning when I got up, and found a bar code had appeared on my dick!"
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ASIDE: I see where ol' Tweety's using every druggie or hood's explanation when busted for contraband: "The cops planted it!" (Sometimes it >may< be true in a street bust.) When will his dupes catch on that he does that >every time< he's caught being an asshole ‽ By ol' Tweety's standard, Al Capone could've been the damn president!
Good for you! Then you'll appreciate the gravity of what I'll say to you. The federal government has been criticized for not even being able to build a web site - National Healthcare, remember? As a general principle, the stronger the security a system has, the harder the system is to implement and use.
Having said that, the reasons are three-fold:
1) The security protocols they must implement are nearly beyond comprehension by mortal man. It's not simply a question of building a high volume website. Once the public voluntarily provides their information for such a program, the requesting agency is >bound by law< under Title 5, and title 24 at very least, and others depending on the nature of the request and agency(s) involved, to insure the >absolute confidentiality< of that information, which in this case, would only exist in the kind of secure SCIF's the top secret documents in the news, of late, was supposed to be stored in.
2) Those government information systems are under continual attack from hostile actors, both domestically and abroad. When they're attacked by extraordinary technology sponsored by the full resources of hostile governments around the world, those federal systems must be "hardened" with equivalently extraordinary technology to prevent the kind of breeches that make news from time to time. The cyber-war isn't new. It's a continuing state, from the first time a high-school kid successfully hacked a defense system.
3) Only the DOD is likely to have access to both the cutting-edge hardware & software to maintain defense systems. Other agencies don't have that kind of funding clout, and their IT departments must look after hardware that is likely near obsolete, and software they must design in-house for a specific purpose. Although immanently competent, few of the non-DOD agencies have the sheer genius required of defense systems working in their IT departments. Of course, they have no access to that defense technology 1) because of compartmentalization required to maintain the checks & balances, and 2) because the DOD cyber-warfare technology is top-friggin'-secret!
On the other hand, private sector organizations have the financial resources to build almost any kind of information systems they can afford to implement. Although they're continually bombarded with attacks, they're typically not designed to handle an attack from a hostile foreign power. Sony learned that lesson the hard way in 2014, when N Korea hacked their systems over Seth Rogan's "The Interview" in 2014: https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-30512032
Now >I< can figure that much out on my own, and I lay no claim to being anybody's expert authority on it. I'm sure any expert could add much more - books, in fact - along with showing me things I overlooked or only partially understood in my comment. I doubt, though, they'll find anything I just said is flat-out wrong.
With that in mind, the private sector can claim to be more competent in implementing web sites, for example. However, to think your info is absolutely secure on private sites is - at best - misguided. What happens to the information you provide voluntarily and freely to those private sector systems if their security systems miss a cyber attack they don't detect, and can sneak around in their systems un-noticed. That's not today's discussion topic, but is sure-as-hell joined to it at the hip.
Thank you, DZK, for your very informed postings! !! And I gotta ask, what anti-virus and anti-malware software do you use? Are some of these products on the market just scams themselves?
McAffee seems to have served me well. I have no illusions that it's unbeatable, but they seem to stay abreast of current known malicious software. However, I stay away from websites it flags as risky, and under no circumstance do I visit gambling or porn sites - I don't even mess with online gaming. On our level, we can do a lot to prevent such attacks by avoiding such types of sites as are known risky. Also, make sure you know exactly who is sending any email that might have a tempting web link. and >don't click that link< if you don't know >exactly< who's sending it. Making sure all your software applications are up to date will serve you well, too, along with keeping your hardware drivers up to date. Most of the time you'll find such update are security fixes. Look at your Windows update manifest, if you use windows, to see how many of those updates are security patches. There's only so much casual users can do to protect themselves from a malicious attack, other than keeping a low profile. Casually surfing the internet can give you greater opportunity to visit more potentially risky sites. However in the final analysis, there's no magic bullet available to ordinary users that can prevent an attack in all situations.
DZK .... thanks for sharing your experience and humor. Government census always seemed like a minimal intrusion on my privacy in exchange for a worthy govt. benefit. I like to think I am honest and am probably naive thinking I have nothing to hide. If you are a criminal or hiding something I understand a census is to be feared. Ol' Tweety is afraid to come clean on anything, especially tax payment and secure documents, so his automatic response is to "deny wrongdoing" which is the first response of a liar. Trump has been sued 4000 times (I saw the fact on PBS TV yesterday evening). Ten years ago I recognized Facebook as a great family photo sharing experience disguised as a misinformation free for all for uninformed wannabe experts. When foreign countries such as Russia, China, Iran, North Korea and Cuba begin using (our) electronic surveillance the evil intent of spying becomes deadly serious. Google and Siri ( I use both) have access to enormous amounts of information that build algorithms that may be used for good or bad purposes. You have reminded me that there is much to fear from private enterprise ownership of my personal information.
A final though: >any< of us can be held hostage to >anything< we value. Ultimately, the only thing that can prevent >any< of us from being blackmailed is for us to value absolutely >nothing< - and there >may< even be an exception to that!
Always believe >yourself<. Other information is always assessed under advisement. Corollary: no matter how firmly you believe yourself, always be open to the possibility your wrong. That's scientific method in a nutshell - although, perhaps, not quite as strict. To me, you seem to be on the right track.
Try refreshing your page. Most of the time, you'll find the heart turns red after doing so without clicking it again. There should be a refresh button on your browser. Otherwise, you might find that if you right-click anywhere on the page, a pop-up will display next to your pointer arrow having a "reload" or "refresh" option.
I was just suggesting the remedy I always find effective, to someone asking about it. Nobody's complaining about it - certainly not me. I've >certainly< not complained about it to Dr Reich. Besides, that's a Substack issue, anyway. This is a Substack site.
I almost became one. The training was thorough and well-paid, but the crew leader was was a stone jerk, who barked that there was no more work. The real story here was how the Census people skulked into town, set up a closet office, and then left the same way. No, thanks--I'll vote by mail ..
During the Decennial Census? Of what interest would it be to the public that a satellite office is being set up on a shoestring to minimize the expenditure of taxpayer dollars. Would you have your tax dollars spent making a big deal of it - a big downtown office complete with Census plastered all over big, energy wasting neon signs? Besides, isn't that the news reporters job to find out about and report? Maybe your local news didn't consider it worth reporting, because nobody gave a damn about it otherwise?
As far as your supervisor is concerned, I appreciate your being miffed if they were out of order. You should have filed an EEOC complaint. The Department of Agriculture has a whole bureau that handles nothing but such complaints. (The Agriculture Department is a "checks and balance" agency, whose opposite number is the Department of Commerce, the governing agency for the Census Bureau. Get caught anywhere in the DOC pulling some bullshit, and the DOA will burn you to the ground!) However, the Census owns no monopoly on dick supervisors. Besides, dick supervisors get paid a lot more in the private sector for terrorizing minimum wage workers having no job security.
Check this out: I take surveys to supplement my tiny income.So the companies send the reward money to Paypal.For 4 yrs.I requested a check and got one(I refused to give my personal info online.) Then a few yrs. ago they took a page out of their (redemption website)and I couldn't get a check without giving my bank # or card #.PS.They are holding 50.00 of mine hostage.There's more to the story,but you get the picture.Why is a major corp.so insistent on having your personal info.?
I suspect whatever company you work for found it's less expensive to pay you electronically with direct-deposit than spending money on checks and postage or working with PayPal. In order to do that, they need your info to set up a direct-deposit account with your bank in order to pay you electronically. Also, I've had direct-deposit before and have always had to provide bank info to set up getting paid. Of course, that info was always submitted on a paper form and not at a website online. You might check with the company and see if they'll send you a paper form to submit your info - if you find that more comfortable. Like it or not, that's probably the "new normal." That's my best guess.
Only the elected politicians, who tell all those agencies what kinds of policies to implement give a single, stringy $hi7 about public image . The grunts in the agencies only concern themselves with implementation, following the guidelines set before them by the elected, or politically appointed officials, and the appointed officials are doing the bidding of the elected officials who appointed them. Agencies like the Census are only concerned with public image to the extent they're not violating state or federal law.
There's more to fear from commercial, private sector organizations & contracting agents than from the government. (You >are< aware that the political parties themselves are just such private sector organizations - allegedly non-profit, though they may be - aren't you?) >Laws< exist against abuse for government agencies that the private sector aren't obliged to follow, and will only do so in response to massive lawsuits - which can be brought against the government, as well. ol' Tweety is getting busted under the same federal law as >anybody< working in the government would've been strung up by the balls long ago for violating. I find it interesting how many self-proclaimed experts there are on government procedure who've >never< worked in the government. ol' Tweety's just another same old tired arsed example of what those self-proclaimed experts "believe" about the government - or it's law enforcement officers & agencies, if you happen to be one of the "blue lives matter" types. ol' Tweety's publicly stated that he believes "if I think it, it is so." Just saw and heard him stating it on the noon, mainstream, broadcast news.
Well, after all, he is an "Extremely Stable Genius," isn't he? What's not to trust about what trump says? (An attempt at humor there...)
I'm completely at loss to understand how anyone believes anything ESG says. And people eat it up. Give me more! How do folks on "our' side get folks on trump's side to challenge what he says? Seems to me that is the, or certainly a, problem of our time. Tell a big lie often enough... Fox News and the right wing media spin out fear/hate/victim sh*t that their audience desperately wants to believe, and do come to believe.
FOX and that ilk have taken to the word "grooming" and "groomers" of late, with respect to pedophiles - QAnon. FOX and its clones' stock in trade is grooming the audience they capture. Grooming isn't the sole purview of pedophiles. Incipient pedophiles use grooming practices on childlike, impressionable adult minds.
I signed up for Facebook years ago (not long after it's inception) but decided to 'cancel' my membership (& found out they'd only make it - dormant). I've never been back. I also have never - partaken - of any of the other forms of (so called) - Social Networking - especially after seeing how 'ol Tweety' (thank you all for that - moniker) used and miss-used that platform. I also only have a cellular flip phone & mainly for emergencies - & refuse to obtain a SmartPhone et al = I refuse to be the - next poster child for - OCD. (example = watching my brother's grand daughter walking across his farmyard -
directly toward a very big oak tree - while texting on her phone & my brother had to
yell at her to look up - just short of slamming into said tree..... smack .....
Same here. I refer to Facebook as fake book. I finally gave up my landline phone last year and now use an apple phone, but limit as much private and personal information as possible.
After you listen to former NSA Chief Technical Director William Binney speak you realize that one of the primary purposes of US government data surveillance inside the United States is not to protect against terrorist attacks as much as it is for political blackmail.
William Binney emphasizes this point when he tells the story about during his career, once in a while a government employee would come in to the office and hand a piece of paper with a phone number, date and time on it to one of his NSA operator co-workers and ask them to pull the audio file on that cell phone call and the NSA operator would do it for them.
Binney is very worried our gov't is going to destroy your right to privacy expectations in America.
Therefore President Biden and the Democrats absolutely must expand the U.S. Supreme Court and the lower courts with a Democratic Party majority because this whacked out Republican majority on the Supreme Court is hell bent on destroying your right to privacy expectations for corporate America.
And they will not stop there - next month they are going to rule on a case that would literally destroy the U.S. Supremacy Clause of the Constitution which says federal law supercedes state law and U.S. Constitutional rights supercede state law.
This Republican majority on the Supreme Court is the most dangerous body ever known in the U.S. government to date. They hate the federal government so much they want to shrink the federal government down enough so they can drown it in a bathtub, so to speak, and are hell bent on destroying 50 years worth of landmark U.S. Supreme Court cases; including your right to privacy and abrogating your First Amendment rights as well, not to mention the individual liberties protected by decades of landmark U.S. Supreme Court cases.
But the biggest danger is next month when this GOP Supreme Court majority rules on a case that could effectively turn the clock back to the Civil War during a time when Confederate states ruled their own destiny and they were the fighting enemy of the United States government.
These Confederate morons and their mindset are alive and well and kicking and destroying democracy, U.S. Const. rights and the federal gov't today.
We live in a 60/40 America where 60% are dare I say "normal people" and the 40% are rightwing conservative nutjobs such as MAGA and Trump.
Then there are the 60% of Republicans who believe America should be a Christian Nation and want the Supreme Court to convert America into a theocracy owned and operated by corporations.
Ron, It keeps me wondering why Republicans are so bent on losing their freedom to people who care nothing for them. They have somehow decided to let other people think and prepare their emotions for them. They want everyone else surveilled but not themselves, because of course, they are doing everything just right. You are right that we need to totally reconfigure the SC and the federal courts ASAP. Those 6 nut cases on the right really do want to bring about their idea of corporate theocracy and since they have life-time appointments, they are sure they will be in charge. OK, even people who reach Supreme Court level can be duped.
A VERY STRONG reason to implement TERM LIMTS that force these justices OFF the bench, say every 8 years. Also, the legislature MUST create a Code of Ethics for members of the Supreme Court, with ANY instances of misbehavior delivers "automatic" removal. In other words, no Trump tactics of suing endlessly meanwhile continuing to cause turmoil and havoc. I cannot believe, yet I can, that the Supreme Court, the highest arbiter in the land, does NOT have a Code of Ethics. Also, where are the repercussions when justices do NOT recuse themselves for "Conflict of Interest", for example, Thomas voting 'no" on investigations into what caused the rioting on January 6th while knowing full well that his wife was involved in the attempted coup? Where is the JUSTICE??
Ditto from me too, Jim. Ginny Thomas has agreed to testify just ahead of a subponea and I desperately (!) hope it will lead to Clarence Thomas' impeachment.
Put the attached in your browser and watch this. This is part of Amy Coney-Barrett's confirmation hearing, PRIOR to her being seated on the Supreme Court, where DARK MONEY and judicial activism is shared. This is exactly what needs to be cleaned out as it corrupts our justice system.
Just because they both do it, does NOT make it right. Instead of swimming with the cockroaches, isn't it beyond the time we take out a huge can of RAID and get rid of them? I do NOT understand why you want to play the "red vs. blue" game when this is about Patriotism vs. self-serving greedy behavior and what people will do for money in this corrupted system.
Inserting a word like “raping,” which was NOT charged or suggested, is irresponsible, and puts the rest of what you say on a bad footing.
Saying “They all do it” is just more of the same.
Yes, of course, everyone has their opinions and preferences. They don’t advocate publicly and with vigor, as Ginny does, nor do the spouses of all the other members of SCOTUS bring their Justices along to activist events.
Do you see liberals arguing for this to happen and being stonewalled in Congress and the Senate? Or not. Please speak in substance, as well as concept, to back up what you say conceptually.
In answer to Jo — I’d like to know to what you refer, Jo.
Not that I question that it’s there, but would like to know … to what you refer. And how do you see them having failed to live up to their statements? Thanks.
During their confirmation hearings Kavanaugh AND Barrett said that abortion WAS settled law that would not be messed with. And we all know how they voted. They flat out lied when asked what they would do when the issue came up. Barrett refused to answer questions. And is likely the most UNQUALIFIED having been a judge for only two years. But like most of Trumps appointments many were unqualified due to lack of experience or just FELONS.
I believe we must challenge the interpretation of "Lifetime appointments" based on what is actually written in the U.S. Constitution. Those words are NEVER mentioned. As in the Bible, men with personal agendas/motives have interpreted this to be true to PROTECT THEIR INTERESTS. The question would be once this is challenged and appealed to the justices on the Supreme Court, would they recuse themselves?? Who would be the final arbiter?
The words 'freedom' and 'liberty' are so cozy that even the OED defines one in terms of the other! Liberty is freedom under law; we do not have the free right to run stoplights. We should be relieved, therefore, that it and not the F word is stamped on our coinage ..
Let the deciding vote go to the other side every other year because these courts are obviously not blind folded any longer. They all have agenda. I just happen to think the the people on the left do more for people who have no power as opposed to the right who work for the wealthy. And don’t get me wrong I completely understand the damage some left leaning presidents did with up holding the neoliberal cause.
Elections have consequences, such as 45 years of non-stop Democratic Party rule -- from circa 1950 until 1995 Democrats ruled both the House and the Senate.
How did you think our nation's infrastructure was built? The Republican Party? Hahhahhaa. At any rate Democrat control is here and now and will increase during the midterms.
....if you haven't noticed Trump and MAGA hijacked the Republican Party for years to come; that means Democrats will keep control of both the House and the Senate for years to come, thanks to weak, politically homeless old school Republicans and the Orange Indictee, the first U.S. President to run for office while under indictment....it's going down very soon.
The other concerning issue is how many billions are being dumped into republican campaigns right now, with 1.6 billion in one tax free donation going into religious ideology to push for theocratic rule. It’s scary.
Not to mention that the economy was so much better for the years before Reagan instituted neoliberal policy that has essentially destroyed the middle class and only opened the doors for greed to take over. I sure hope you are right about democrats. This mid term is the most consequential in recent history.
Jo Rocks!!! Yeah!!! If Republicans were a brand, they would have been pulled off the shelf a long time ago. Racism, fascism, misogyny, corporate class warfare against We The People...what's not to love about Republicans?
Binney was long retired when the Chinese military stole all of my personal data through my security clearance. I was not alone. millions of other Americans' data was taken. NSA was asleep at the switch. Got all my medical records, financial, FBI checks, fingerprints DNA, etc. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_Personnel_Management_data_breach
If the Chinese have all that stuff, consider what our government has on me. Computer chip in my ID. I travelled for the government, all my hearings were recorded and transcribed, I typed most of my own stuff, including interim orders and final decisions and internal memos and employee evaluations, etc. I operated through email with my staff and with many of the participants in my cases. I did phone hearings sometimes on motions and eve, after agreement of the parties on the merits. All involved were probably subject to that data breech.
At one point Chinese companies were offering my book "free" over the internet. Could never find someone to sue.
I am not jealous of my privacy. I've given this a lot of thought. I really have nothing to hide. At onetime I worked for SSA which had the Privacy Act. HIPPA and all that. I have come to the conclusion that if someone seeks governmental benefits, they effectively should have waived privacy. If a neighbor legitimately knows that say, a claimant is lying about things like tax compliance, earning capacity, etc. the neighbor should be encouraged to come forward.
On the other hand if someone is profiting from data, the source should be compensated. I figure that Microsoft and Google, etc. owe me. Maybe I'll send them a bill for stealing my data without notice and compensation. Maybe I'll ask for attorneys' fees, costs and punitive damages.
I'm sorry to hear such bad news Daniel. I appreciate your candor and your angst towards the guilty parties. What are you doing in Baghdad, as if it were my business, sir.
YOU GOTTA SEE THIS: CLUB LOS ALAMOS - THIS IS WHAT A "BI-PARTISAN" CONGRESS GETS YOU: Congress allowed this to happen for years and years. Unbelievable. Ongoing Chinese criminal enterprise inside the U.S.
To whom are you referring as "thin-skinned", I hope neither Daniel Solomon, nor Robert Reich. Both these gentlemen are very straight up characters, they tell the truth as they see it and back up their statements with real evidence, as do most of the people on Substack.
There's plenty of conservatives on substat and I have no respect for conservatives at all because I do not consider conservatism a legitimate political ideology I consider it a sociopathy that should be treated preferably in an inpatient setting depending upon the deranged conservative. I consider conservatism a form of mental illness which can be summed up like this: I'm doing great and to hell with you buddy... And summed up like this: I don't have your kind of problems so don't expect me to help... That's the earmarks of conservatism, not to mention the racism the misogyny the cristofascism.
A good portion of the people on sub stack suck because they are conservatives or of a conservative nature. All the polls show that a majority of Americans support progressive goals and progressive policies there's no such thing as majority support for moderate policies or conservative policies
We handled, among others, nuclear whistleblower cases. UC Berkley owns most of the facility at Los Alamos. They have sovereign immunity (state of California) so we don't know what's happening there. I'm not paranoid but same is probably true re industrial spying in virtually every sector. A risk with globalization.
WRONG!!! He paid 17.9 million dollars in taxes on his donation. And Global Warming/Climate Change is only "liberal" cause if you're living on another planet or are a complete idiot.
Also the simple fact that the intelligence state we entered after 9/11 hasn’t prevented a single real terrorist threat should tell you that they had alterer motives for collecting our personal data.
did you read the post? are you aware that the real terrorist threat is the White Supremacist movement? and while all this surveillance data is helping to root them out it hasn't done much to prevent their attacks? do you feel safer taking your shoes and jacket off going through a terminal?
I’m thinking we know that terrorism threats from these groups remain. Whether this “surveillance state” has or has not actually prevented a real threat — well, we do not know what it has actually prevented or not prevented, because we’re not necessarily being told where real threats exist and where they may be foiled.
I believe judges have too much power. One person should not be able to have so much control or power. Such as the trump appointed puppet judge cannon he got to hold up the investigation of him. And I totally disagree with supreme court judges having lifetime terms. Just as teachers or no one should have tenure or guaranteed lifetime jobs.
Actually our Constitution does NOT say that. And, if Alito is NOT a hypocrite as the words "Lifetime appointment" are nowhere to be found in the document (incidentally the word "lobbyist" is not found there either), he should accept that fact and say so. But, of course, he wont. As in the Bible, men with agendas selectively tell you what words mean for their own purposes. If somebody lies and it is repeated enough times, people believe it is the truth. This is how "alternative facts" are created. The wording in the Constitution regarding the Supreme Court justices lenght of service:
Article III, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution reads that judges shall remain in their position so long as they follow "good behaviour." This has long indicated that judges, including Supreme Court justices, have lifetime tenure.
If you were to ask me, and millions of Americans, several judges are NOT following "good behavior" (Clarence Thomas is the most glaring example), quite a subjective word. Congress has been asleep at the wheel for centuries by NOT creating a Code of Ethics for Supreme Court justices as in lower courts. These people are NOT God and their recent decisions show the influence of nefarious characters in their decision making (Leonard Leo). Second, to curb the corrupting influence of Dark Money and bad actors who influence this body, TERM LIMITS of about 8 years are necessary. Once they reach this point they can rotate back down to lower courts. Also, Judges should have a mandatory retirement age that is the same as the Full Social Security Retirement age.
Put this in your browser and see what has been happening to the highest court in the land:
I agreed with you, Steven Bishop, all the way up to tenure. Tenure takes the teaching profession out of ‘fire at will,” and puts it into “fire for cause.” Teachers with tenure can be gotten rid of, if they are deficient or harmful. If school departments tend not to fire bad teachers, that is their failure, not the failure of the tenure system per se. But having experienced and qualified teachers in classrooms matters. In some places, you will see that teachers are regularly “let go” just BEFORE they qualify for tenure, because experienced teachers get paid more than brand new teachers, and some school boards are controlling “budgets” by keeping low-paid — but less experienced — teachers on board. [Yes, being less experienced does not mean you’re not a great teacher — but even great new teachers are fired before they get tenure, replaced by cheaper teachers. Just think how great an already great teacher might be with added experience under their belt!]
Tenure came in so teachers would have some security and not be at the whim of political waves in a town. Think about companies that have contracts that prevent firing without cause. If you don’t want tenure, then you DO want strong contracts that don’t allow firing at will. That means respecting the negotiation process with unions.
Big difference between judges and justices. however both are subject to 28 U.S. Code § 455 - Disqualification of justice, judge, or magistrate judge. Any justice, judge, or magistrate judge of the United States shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned.
I am far more concerned about surveillance capitalism impact on individual autonomy and privacy t h a n the government, but that is a concern as well. I agree with everything else you've said about the dangers we face with the Supreme morons and the pressing need to pack the court. as for theocracy and corporations, I don't see that corporations generally care one way or the other. they will go with whatever winds are blowing that are likely 2 optimize their profits shorter-term, be the winds democratic or authoritarian.it is the combination surveillance with AI that is a big threat.
years ago when in a passenger van coming from the airport to st. Pete the driver got lost because the application he was using to direct him failed. he had no idea how streets were laid out and it took the passengers on the van to explain to him where Street 109 would be in relation to 106. sort of like how to light a fire without using a lighter. I like getting driving directions from my phone. but one can see a slippery slope where I and others depend upon our quote technology to give us the quote right answers to the point where our capacity 4 thinking and decision making atrophies. that's not to mention that certain options might no longer exist. I recommend the book by Zuboff- surveillance capitalism.
I agree. Surveillance capaitalism affects every single individual in America. No doubt.
I posted my comment to illustrate how elite individuals and gov't officials use NSA data to politically blackmail other elite individuals, Senators, Congresspersons, etc.
I believe the seminal primary issue is neutering the whacked out Republican majority on the U.S. Supreme Court, who are not finished, but just getting started on crushing and disposing of our right-to-privacy rights and expectations; and how Biden and Democrats must expand the Supreme Court and lower courts with a Democratic Party majority - or else this GOP Supreme Court majority will continue to destroy landmark U.S. Supreme Court cases Americans have relied upon to protect their U.S. Const. rights, privileges and immunities for decades, until nothing is left.
Next month this dangerous rightwingnut majority is going to issue a ruling which could literally eviscerate the U.S. Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Const. which mandates that federal law and the free exercise of an individual's U.S. Const. rights supercede states rights and state constitutions.
That would be the ultimate constitutional crisis ever because such a rulling would spell the end of democracy, the end of the federal government as we have known it and the return of the Days of the Confederacy where a Confederate state held absolute dominion over the individuals actual freedoms and rights.
The Republican Party is barreling towards their long-term goal to neuter the power of the federal government over the states and empower the states over the individual.
It is the intersection of political reality and real world impacts.
I don't believe NSA data is being used to Blackmail Elite individuals as you state.it will take more than Binny to convince me of that. but I'm open to the evidence.this would be a monumental dysfunction and threat 2 democracy if true.
If you think that was an ad hominem attack, you probably shouldn't venture outside in the open air.....my God....talk about thin-skinned. You must have thought we were on the Love Boat, and I was Gopher and you're Captain Stubing.
Ron, I write mainly because I agree we should expand both the High Court and the lower courts and thought it might be useful if I injected some examples of how I would present the case.
To start, whereas in 1869 the number of justices was set at nine—one justice assigned to one of the nine federal circuit courts and whereas today there are thirteen circuit courts, I would contend that Senate Dems should either modify or set aside the filibuster and join the House majority (presuming we hold the House) to add four justices to the High Court.
I noted Jim Remedes, who’s part of this thread, suggested enlisting term limits. While conceptually I support, say, 18-year term limits, wherein justices presumably could rotate out to the appellate courts, because enlisting term limits would require amending the Constitution, which would require ratification by three-fourths of the state legislatures, I would set that recommendation aside.
Regarding you rightly suggesting expansion of the lower courts, I would underscore that it’s past time for the country to expand said courts. We merely need consider that the last time the federal circuit and district courts were meaningfully expanded was in 1990 and that the country’s population since then has increased by one-third.
Ultimately, I view a big part of our job as pressing our voters to prioritize judicial expansion as a crucial electoral issue.
Pat, I write, first, to note I viewed a poll earlier today that showed that establishing term limits for Supreme Court Justices is growing increasingly popular among all segments of the population. Additionally, I expect, that because our Founders conferred life service upon all federal judges, the term limit agreed upon for High Court justices probably would be 18 years, give or take. I view this as a positive development 1) because it would provide a more regulated and greater degree of turnover and 2) because vacancies could be staggered so that they occurred every 2 years.
As a final point, I would note, contrary to my original comment, that because justices rotated out could continue to work as fully compensated federal judges in senior status, term limits could be enacted through statute that would not necessarily require amending the Constitution.
I believe the seminal, primary issue is neutering the whacked out Republican majority on the U.S. Supreme Court, who are not finished but just getting started on crushing and disposing of our right-to-privacy rights and expectations and a laundry list of U.S. Const. rights we have been accustomed to our entire lives.
President Biden and Democrats must expand the Supreme Court and lower courts with a Democratic Party majority - or else this GOP Supreme Court majority will continue to destroy landmark U.S. Supreme Court cases Americans have relied upon to protect their U.S. Const. rights, privileges and immunities for decades, until nothing is left.
Next month this dangerous rightwingnut majority is going to issue a ruling which could literally eviscerate the U.S. Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Const. which mandates that federal law and the free exercise of an individual's U.S. Const. rights supercede states rights and state constitutions.
That would be the ultimate constitutional crisis ever because such a ruling would spell the end of democracy, the end of the federal government as we have known it and the return of the Days of the Confederacy where a Confederate state held absolute dominion over an individual's freedoms and rights.
The Republican Party is barreling towards their long-term goal to neuter the power of the federal government over the states, and empower the states over the individual.
By this potential GOP Supreme Court ruling, red states could theoretically reinstitute slavery and the federal government wouldn't be able to defeat them in the Republican-dominated courts.
That is why Biden and Democrats must expand the Supreme Court and lower courts with a Democratic Party majority. Problem is, I do not believe Biden will move to expand the Court or the filibuster; and consequently, we are in deep doo-doo as long as this insane, tone-deaf, racist, misogynist GOP Court remains seated as the majority on the Court.
It is the intersection of political reality and real world impacts.
Ron, I presume the Supreme Court dispute to which you are referring is Moore vs. Harper, a case entailing the fringe Independent State Legislature Theory that the justices have agreed to hear next term.
As I understand, this fringe ISL legal theory, that has advanced to the Supreme Court, argues, that because the Constitution says that state legislatures redistrict and set the time, place, and manner of elections, that it means only the legislature has the power to determine how Congressional elections are conducted (thus also impacting how Presidential electors are chosen) without any checks and balances from state constitutions or state courts, or perhaps even from a Governor’s veto.
Whereas I understand, technically, that ISL does not assert that the legislatures are above the U.S. Constitution’s guarantees of equal protection and due process, still, I worry about a High Court that would ignore 50 years of settled precedent in Roe, and would overturn a fundamental right relied upon by tens of millions every year. Clearly, a court willing to do that with a protection, over and over again reaffirmed, would do it to another fundamental protection.
As for legislatures being subject to regulations of Congress, while state legislatures are not exempt from federal regulations, as we saw last January with the Freedom to Vote: John R. Lewis Act, enforcing federal regulations requires either reaching the Senate’s 60-vote threshold or modifying the Senate’s filibuster rule to allow for debate and an up or down majority vote.
Hence, as you intimated, if Democrats don’t retain control of the House and pick up at least two Senate seats, the future I imagine we all see unfolding is one of utter chaos, the breakdown of the rule of law, and the loss of trust both in government and also in mainstream institutions of American life.
As a final point, I would be remiss were I not to note, along with defending democracy at the federal level, that mobilizing at the state and local levels is equally important. Here I am particularly indebted to The States Project that has worked tirelessly to out-organize Republicans, who ruthlessly are organizing to fill state and local positions with their own people—people who don’t believe in free and fair elections.
Hi Steve....I don't think this means exactly what you may think this means.
When I say "political blackmail" I'm not referring to you and I and the unwashed masses; I'm referring to what Binney was referring to, which are elite individuals and high-ranking officials accessing NSA data and using that data to blackmail very powerful wealthy individuals and U.S. government agency officials, Senators, Congresspersons, party leaders and members, etc.
“…they want to shrink the federal government down enough so they can drown it in a bathtub”
Given the control “small government“ Republicans want to have over our lives it is more accurate to say: They want to shrink the government down just enough so they can fit it into your bedroom.
This screams of returning to the Articles of Confederation that were a FAILURE— giving rise to our Constitution that bonded the states much more closely into an actual nation, with a federal government that overruled the states in many, many issues, especially those that involved the rights of citizens and cross-border regulation — rather than staying a loose bunch of associated ‘states.’
The drawbacks to remaining small, loosely-connected-through-language-and-customs ‘city states’ were, I thought, recognized around the world, as regions formalized their associations and declared themselves fully-realized nations — it happened all over Europe, at least …
Now, these guys wanna go back to being “Balkanized”?
You've hit on the >very thing< that has >never< made sense to me about all the missing Secret Service text messages. They should have all been on an NSA secure server in a SCIF somewhere in the backwoods of nowhere, and easily retrieved!
EXCUUUUSE ME! The government’s money is not the government’s money. It is the people’s money. So, what you say is just self-flagellation … or something. But don’t make no sense.
I don’t understand your comment. Federal judges and legislators get their salaries from the federal government. If they disapprove of their employer so much why are they working for it?
If you are talking to me, I still hold that working for the people is not inconsistent with objecting to some policies of government. The government is not a “them”: it is an “us.” You work for “us,” not “it.”
If you take issue with some policies and practices and don’t do anything about that. — don’t speak up or resist — I can see criticizing that as valid.
Of course it’s acceptable to object to policies of the federal government and work for it. What makes no sense is to work for an employer you want to do away with. Republicans want to get rid of the federal government except for defense. Why be a judge or a legislator for a body you believe has no right to exist except for conducting war?
I see that point, for sure, and I hope they are not doing it to help bring it down.
I guess all these issues are not circumscribed and isolated, so being a part of the machine you decry may have its value in change from within. But trying to bring it down? Well, that sounds like Steve Bannon, who hoped to help DJT “blow it all up.”
We live in scary times [I say this having lived through the Kennedy assassination and Watergate …]
This is so scary and dangerous. The idea of even doctors being surveilled to ensure that they are working fast enough is horrifying and will lead to serious misdiagnoses, along with all the health damage that will be done to people who are too scared to go to the toilet or take a moment to catch their breath, for fear that it will cost them money. I can't think of anything more horrific than being told which bar to go to in a strange town and finding that the bartender has my favourite drink ready - that is just freakily weird!
But if this surveillance is appropriate, then why don't we see it applied to all the managers and bosses. Why are people like Zuckerberg and Bezos not being subjected to such surveillance so that we can see what they get up to to justify their obscene wealth.
I actually worked in a wire mill where an older woman was afraid to leave her machine to go to the bathroom. She ended up with GI. problems that led to the end of her employment. This was before the internet. Oppression can happen without high technology.
Teachers face the same hostility in many places. Drs ability for sensible reasoned decisions are “managed” by systems that take no account for the time required for understanding and investment in an individual patient.
Elizabeth, you are right to mention teachers and doctors. There is a move, though to treat those professions as though they can be monitored like a machine. I am sure everyone can recall a doctor's visit that was unsatisfactory because the doctor didn't have time to really understand the problem the patient brought. It has happened to me often and I would realize after I left that I needed to have said more. Teachers are now being blamed for children's academic losses during COVID as if we had not faced the most horrific medical situation in a century. They call it "the lost year" not realizing that students learned a lot during the COVID experience and that new knowledge needs to be tapped into. Even though high school seniors didn't get the full "senior experience," they did get a unique opportunity to see education differently which might let them be more empathetic in the future of others who are experiencing problems. Teachers are given a curriculum that often does not allow for "teachable moments" where a lot of learning happens. We as a society can do better and need to make that better, happen.
This is so true Elizabeth. I was an obstetrician specialising in the care of high risk women and those who had suffered perinatal bereavement (in the UK NHS). I was fortunate enough that, for most of my career, the payment system meant the organisation was paid for every visit and so I was 'allowed' to offer care that was truly personalised to each woman, seeing many of them twice a week from very early in pregnancy until they were delivered and giving them as much time as they needed. Then I broke my wrist very badly just as the payment system changed to severely limit the amount of care that could be offered. Now appointment systems are totally managed by so called time and motion experts who know absolutely nothing about medicine and so there is no way that I could work as I had done for so many years. "Fortunately', I was forced tot take early retirement so I don't have to cope with the insanity that now prevails - but my heart breaks for the women who are now shovelled through the system as if they were 'product' on an assembly line and the staff who know that the care they are providing is way below the level that it should be. But of course nobody in the government we have had for the last 12 years has their medical treatment in the NHS so they don't give a s**t!
Insurance companies started that years ago when they developed protocols for disease management and started to dictate what treatments doctors can prescribe. Many doctors have lost the art of listening any longer, and unfortunately it’s probably the way they are being taught nowadays.
Laurie, I am so sorry to learn of your coworker's fate. Oh yes, oppression is older than modern tech, but now, it has the force of collusion by internet. I have been lucky to work jobs that respected my personal needs. Teaching was hard to get time to use the bathroom, but I often covered for teachers who had to go and I would go between classes. People in factories often don't get that kind of break and it is wrong whether low or high tech. That's why we need many more good unions.
There were reports of cashiers wearing Depends because their employers would not give them breaks to go to the restroom. That problem has been “solved” by requiring the customers to be their own cashier and checking themselves out as they are surveilled.
I can believe that they have massive surveillance for their 'possessions' so that nobody can get even a tiny little bit of what they believe is rightfully theirs, but I'm not sure who would actually be surveilling what they do to gain those possessions. Surveillance of that sort is just for us little people who are there to get their possessions for them.
yikes. a friend of mine, now passed due to cancer secondary to Crohn's Disease, understood that her disease was a direct epigenetic issue because of her grandfather's experience in WW1, when he forced himself to avoid eliminating because he had to take over leadership of the rest of his unit. He was the first to develop what is now known as Crohn's, and everyone down the line develops it. my friend's son has it as well. chances are HIS children will also develop it.
the rich are the ones who surveil, the poor and working class are those surveilled, it's slavery pure and simple and no longer restricted along racial/ethnic lines...
Seonaid, OMG you have this right! I would hate walking into anywhere, especially if I don't know the people, and they have my meal pre-prepared since they think they have surveilled me so well. I think it would be hilarious to see what Bezos and Zuckerberg et al are doing all day. I suspect playing video games with a few phone calls to sycophants to get stuff done for them. Those privileged white boys never had to grow up, so whatever looks new and hurtful to others would catch their attention and they'd gleefully want to employ it on others, not themselves, of course.
Hi Ruth - I suspect if I could see what they do all day I would not find it hilarious but would be even more infuriated than I am already about the lives that these people lead, the houses and possessions that they have and the ruination of our world that they are creating solely for their own benefit and enjoyment. Now being able to surveill them with the ability to give them an electric shock (mild) and remove some of their millions every time they do something that all of us here would consider unacceptable, THAT I would find hilarious!
Surveillance is one of those things that is & will be part of our lives whether we like it or not. So, rather than wasting energy fighting it, we need to learn all we can about it and make sure we have a seat at the table when decisions are being made. I’m certain we’re going to have legislation that addresses it, much like legislation re wiretapping phones. Yes, surveillance is more extensive than wiretaps & more complicated as well, so we need to break it down. I’m thinking it should be defined by its purpose first--for example, is the purpose of it to surveil employees or the public? Once the purpose of it is known, the next step would be to brainstorm about how any particular aspect of it could be used in a corrupt and/or illegal and/or unfair manner. Once that’s nailed down, crafting legislation should be pretty easy...unless you have a plethora of republicans hell-bent on making problems where there are none so they can use it as an issue to campaign on.
Susan, yeah, there is always a downside, those pesky Republicans who have no clue but don't want anyone else to have a clue either, that is, until they get surveilled and find they actually hate it.
One reason is greed: people compromise our shared values by shifting the burden of responsibility away from themselves and onto some vague, nebulous thing which is always outside of arm's reach (e.g. "the property insurance company", "the company", etc.); is a small discount on premiums really worth such a compromise? (Only a *real* idiot would say so!)
PS: Surveillance - failed mentalities aside - is not inevitable; the EFF helps activists pass surveillance bans across the country!
Asimov wrote about this. In one story, the authorities gave free robots to do cleaning, babysitting, house chores but then they captured all personal data and the authorities could control the family.
And is it different from the Military Industrial Complex?
Political resistance to the intentions and decisions of the executive branch sound so much scarier and intimidating if someone gives it a label as undefined as "deep state."
From my research, the controllers of the power; a global conglomerate, if you will, are the money houses, as they’ve been since very early on. History records it’s beginnings before the fall of the Roman Empire. It’s a relatively small group who have managed to buy and control politicians and government agencies for years. They control the media and tech now as well. They hide in plain sight with ideas “for the good of mankind”, but power and profit is their only agenda. It’s not difficult to find if you’ve the stomach for it. Humans are the most despicable species with regard to how they use and mistreat their own.
Mark, I,too find the concept of "deep state" unreliable. I think it has been a tool used to get more people to be scared enough to put into place all kinds of harsh laws that do not protect anyone from anything but give more power to those who want those restrictive laws. I need evidence of the "deep state."
Mary, ain't it the truth. Trump and Kump can't stand being surveilled the way they want everyone else to be watched and monitored. They really didn't like cameras noting that the FBI did not destroy Mar a Lago or steal anything that didn't already belong to the US people when they went to collect the stolen documents. Trump lied about it anyway, just what one would expect from a serial liar.
Mary, trump would deploy this tech on everyone. He’d love to have dirt on his “friends”. Perhaps dirt is the only thing that makes them “friends”. He’s such a grifter, it may be how he gets some of his “donations”.
Probably most if those “top secret” docs that Trump squirreled away at Mar-a-Lago is probably sensitive info about all the people that have blackmail potential for him to use.
Mark Gray, you are so right because Trump has no clue, so will parrot whatever his handlers at the time want done. And, those guys who will have given up their souls to Trump will be willing to do anything to scuttle our democracy, including installing massive surveillance tech. Those who vote for Trump will be easily pacified by Fox Not Really News et al so won't even protest that every time they leave their seat at work, they will be docked pay. They will be brain-dead to it and just go along because their demigod Donnie is in charge, or they think he is.
What do they need all this data for? I already see ads pop up repetitiously when I order something online. It’s creepy. I almost never buy anything twice and tend to shop predominantly brick and mortar rather than internet. They must be selectively discriminating in who to collect data on because Trump should already be in jail based on his tweet addiction.
I agree with you 100% that this is disturbing, and that the U.S. is not as different as we would like to believe we are. Facebook sent me a questionnaire yesterday, and I shared how disturbed I am about how they use and share data, yet how they allow blatant lies and calls for violence to be shared on their platform. I like connecting with faraway friends and family, but I wish we had an alternative to FB and others that track and sell our info. Great article!
After you listen to former NSA Technical Director William Binney speak, you realize that one of the primary purposes of US government data surveillance inside the United States is not to protect against terrorist attacks as much as it is for political blackmail.
William Binney emphasizes this point when he tells the story about during his career, once in awhile a government employee would come in to the office and hand a piece of paper with a phone number, date and time on it to one of his NSA operator co-workers and ask them to pull the audio file on that cell phone call and the NSA operator would do it for them. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M66saPW2Gq8
I often wonder what Edward Snowden is doing in Russia. He certainly had a lot of knowledge of 'cybersecurity.' In his book, 'Permanent Record', he suggests removing the camera from your cell phone if you want to avoid being spied on. I have lately had the experience of my phone and computer screen flashing almost unperceptively ; like a picture is being taken. Creepy. Am I just paranoid? I really doubt it.
Excellent insights regarding a silently advancing and ubiquitous problem that we seem to either be ignoring or accepting, at our peril.
But as with so many opinion pieces by Mr. Reich, and to be fair, many other progressive observers of our fraught situation, their is no culminating specific call to action for the readers who may be alarmed by the situation illuminated by the writer. So what do we do about this advancing security and surveillance state? Clearly, we need a broad social conversation, which more articles and books, like Ms. Zuboff's, should help stimulate. But the people, mostly intellectually lazy and somehow willing to accept the state of affairs as they exist unless it impacts their perception of their identities or their wallets, need much more stimulation to act than such articles and books provide, rare as these written alarms are.
Well, I feel certain that elected representatives such as Elizabeth Warren and Pramila Jayapal and Katie Porter either are or would be very interested in doing something legislative about the issue of surveillance. They would study it seriously and attempt, if they could persuade enough other legislators and cabinet officials, to codify recommendations that meet Constitutional standards and tilt the scales toward workers and the public without infringing upon the legal rights of corporations (expansive as they unfortunately have become within American case law). How does such an effort gain momentum? BY ELECTING MORE DEMOCRATS TO CONGRESS! THE REPUBLICAN PARTY, WITH ITS DONOR BASE SIGNIFICANTLY POPULATED BY WEALTHY PEOPLE AT THE TOPS OF CORPORATIONS AND ITS CURRENT STATE OF FIDELITY TO OLIGARCHY AND POWER, WILL DO NOTHING ABOUT SURVEILLANCE BECAUSE TO DISCUSS IT DOES NOT BENEFIT THEM EITHER POLITICALLY OR FINANCIALLY.
Yes, I will end with my oft-repeated directive: Vote for Democrats at all levels and in all branches of government in 2022, 2024, 2026 and 2028 at a minimum. The surveillance issue, like many others of importance such as climate change, inequality, voting rights, the right of people to control their own bodies and much else, will not be beneficially addressed unless Democrats control the levers of political power in this country for the foreseeable future.
MR. REICH: I KNOW IT GOES AGAINST YOUR CREDENTIALS AS AN IMPARTIAL OBSERVER, BUT NOW IS THE TIME FOR YOU AND ROBERT KUTTNER AND JOSEPH STIGLITZ AND YOUR OTHER PROGRESSIVE FRIENDS OF INFLUENCE TO BECOME PARTISAN. FOR THE SAKE OF THE COUNTRY. SPEAK OUT NOW, WITH LESS THAN 50 DAYS BEFORE THE 2022 MIDTERMS, TO ADVOCATE FOR THE REPUDIATION OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY AND THE ELECTION OF AS MANY DEMOCRATS AS POSSIBLE. There will be Democrats elected that will be less helpful than others, akin to Joe Manchin. But those types of Democrats are a concern for a later time. PLEASE, VOICE THE NEED NOW.
Yes, you are right, and No, they are really not that different. Where and how to counter this? Our institutions seem well-programed to promote the interests of Bezos and Musk, etc.
In his masterpiece 1984 George Orwell predicted a similar dystopia. His only mistake was choosing that year for his title.
That's when it began. Macintosh craze launched 1/24/84. January 1, 1983 is considered the official birthday of the Internet. Prior to this, the various computer networks did not have a standard way to communicate with each other.
Thank you Bridget. That’s uncanny. Good for Mr. Orwell.
The Apple Super Bowl commercial came out in 1984!
True, but that's why they made the commercial that year.
Yes! And the commercial mirrors the 2 minute hate scene from the movie version of 1984 that also came out that year. I teach the book to seniors every year because I firmly believe it’s the most important piece of literature they’ll ever read.
I was in London during the filming (not knowing about it). Why? I'd got a leave from my company for ten weeks in Europe. Main reason: To be in L. on the day Winston begins his diary. I even found Victory Square, a postage stamp clearing surrounded by modest homes. It was bright and cold at 1pm, with a squat grey council estate nearby. Too bad the moment had to be ruined by the sound of frolicking children in the playground ..
I was an enumerator for the 1980 Census. At that time, the job involved tracking folks down who didn't respond to the mail-in questionnaires. There were 2 questionnaires. Most folks got a simple 10 question questionnaire. A random sample got the more detailed questionnaire that asks demographic questions. Many folks failed to respond because it simply wasn't a priority and forgot to complete & return it by the deadline. A few balked at having to spend too much time on the long questionnaire. However, many were extremely hostile about government gathering information on them, like there was something personal about the whole thing other than attempting to keep track of the population for use in voter districting, as required by The Constitution. Their responses ranged from screaming at me at the door, sic-ing dogs, and one even chased me with a baseball bat. (There was even rumor of lynchings in parts of the country you might expect that kind of thing happening.)
A frequent response was that "the government knows everything about me anyway, so why should I bother?" to which I replied: "If that's so, why must they even ask your name?" (The Census works by polling addresses kept in the USPS MAF - Master Address File - and sends canvassers around finding locations, like under bridges and by freeway ramps, etc., where anyone could possibly live - without regard to knowing any names associated with said locations.) Fact is, I found the privacy concern - in other contexts legitimate - hysterical. Most of the questions asked - and still are, based on those asked in 2020 - are the kinds of things you talk about when you first introduce yourself to someone socially, and share as you get to know each other on meeting, while others are things many frequently brag about in bible school or beer-joint! (A lot of desperados are only found and busted because they've shot their mouths off at beer-joints!) I've not even mentioned - with regard to the Census - what you freely give to banking institutions, or even commercial businesses, to buy a house or car, initiate some other kind of loan, or to simply apply for a goddam credit card! How 'bout employment applications? That's because no such questions are asked - except maybe about your >approximate< - not ready for IRS evaluation - annual income within a range of income ranges - 10-20k, 20-30k, 30-40k . . . etc.
Yet these days, we have folks who "sell the farm" to social media for consumption by perfect strangers - as they shriek on social media about "Big Brother!" They no longer need to bother with bible-school or beer-joint! Sad but true, but that even applies to >this< forum, where strange eyes from all over the planet can see what we all reveal about ourselves. And I'm >certain< I've cautioned folks about it here, from time to time. And I haven't even yet gotten to the "surveillance state" concerns Dr Reich expresses in his daily discussion forum essay, today!
On that issue, I'll only say that in the late '80s, I was frequently made out to be some kind of goddam conspiracy nut, when I observed about the rise of "neighborhood watches," the early proliferation of surveillance electronics, and questioned the direction it was all headed. (Keep in mind, at the time I lived in one of the most heavily surveilled areas in the whole goddamn country. It was an area where you'd find many of your next door neighbors - and even postal patrons - were employed by any of the 3-letter agencies in the DC Metro "alphabet soup!")
That's as we were all being issued the scanners you see letter-carriers carrying around these days, when the technology was first being rolled-out - and were >required< to be kept on our persons at all times, when out on the street. Along with keeping track of certain, bar-coded pieces of mail, they're also used on labels stuck inside people's mailboxes, to be scanned when the carrier arrives, for keeping track of the time the carrier arrives at that location on the route. I'll hazard they're now upgraded with GPS to track carrier movements throughout the day. (As per Bill Maher: "I don't know it for a fact; I just >know< it's true!) I even composed a filthy joke about it at the time, that received the kind of hysterical laughter signaling you've just hit >really< too close to home. It's a one-liner: "I went to take a leak this morning when I got up, and found a bar code had appeared on my dick!"
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ASIDE: I see where ol' Tweety's using every druggie or hood's explanation when busted for contraband: "The cops planted it!" (Sometimes it >may< be true in a street bust.) When will his dupes catch on that he does that >every time< he's caught being an asshole ‽ By ol' Tweety's standard, Al Capone could've been the damn president!
This was fascinating, thanks for writing this.
Very interesting! I see exactly what you're saying.
Good for you! Then you'll appreciate the gravity of what I'll say to you. The federal government has been criticized for not even being able to build a web site - National Healthcare, remember? As a general principle, the stronger the security a system has, the harder the system is to implement and use.
Having said that, the reasons are three-fold:
1) The security protocols they must implement are nearly beyond comprehension by mortal man. It's not simply a question of building a high volume website. Once the public voluntarily provides their information for such a program, the requesting agency is >bound by law< under Title 5, and title 24 at very least, and others depending on the nature of the request and agency(s) involved, to insure the >absolute confidentiality< of that information, which in this case, would only exist in the kind of secure SCIF's the top secret documents in the news, of late, was supposed to be stored in.
2) Those government information systems are under continual attack from hostile actors, both domestically and abroad. When they're attacked by extraordinary technology sponsored by the full resources of hostile governments around the world, those federal systems must be "hardened" with equivalently extraordinary technology to prevent the kind of breeches that make news from time to time. The cyber-war isn't new. It's a continuing state, from the first time a high-school kid successfully hacked a defense system.
3) Only the DOD is likely to have access to both the cutting-edge hardware & software to maintain defense systems. Other agencies don't have that kind of funding clout, and their IT departments must look after hardware that is likely near obsolete, and software they must design in-house for a specific purpose. Although immanently competent, few of the non-DOD agencies have the sheer genius required of defense systems working in their IT departments. Of course, they have no access to that defense technology 1) because of compartmentalization required to maintain the checks & balances, and 2) because the DOD cyber-warfare technology is top-friggin'-secret!
On the other hand, private sector organizations have the financial resources to build almost any kind of information systems they can afford to implement. Although they're continually bombarded with attacks, they're typically not designed to handle an attack from a hostile foreign power. Sony learned that lesson the hard way in 2014, when N Korea hacked their systems over Seth Rogan's "The Interview" in 2014: https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-30512032
Now >I< can figure that much out on my own, and I lay no claim to being anybody's expert authority on it. I'm sure any expert could add much more - books, in fact - along with showing me things I overlooked or only partially understood in my comment. I doubt, though, they'll find anything I just said is flat-out wrong.
With that in mind, the private sector can claim to be more competent in implementing web sites, for example. However, to think your info is absolutely secure on private sites is - at best - misguided. What happens to the information you provide voluntarily and freely to those private sector systems if their security systems miss a cyber attack they don't detect, and can sneak around in their systems un-noticed. That's not today's discussion topic, but is sure-as-hell joined to it at the hip.
Thank you, DZK, for your very informed postings! !! And I gotta ask, what anti-virus and anti-malware software do you use? Are some of these products on the market just scams themselves?
McAffee seems to have served me well. I have no illusions that it's unbeatable, but they seem to stay abreast of current known malicious software. However, I stay away from websites it flags as risky, and under no circumstance do I visit gambling or porn sites - I don't even mess with online gaming. On our level, we can do a lot to prevent such attacks by avoiding such types of sites as are known risky. Also, make sure you know exactly who is sending any email that might have a tempting web link. and >don't click that link< if you don't know >exactly< who's sending it. Making sure all your software applications are up to date will serve you well, too, along with keeping your hardware drivers up to date. Most of the time you'll find such update are security fixes. Look at your Windows update manifest, if you use windows, to see how many of those updates are security patches. There's only so much casual users can do to protect themselves from a malicious attack, other than keeping a low profile. Casually surfing the internet can give you greater opportunity to visit more potentially risky sites. However in the final analysis, there's no magic bullet available to ordinary users that can prevent an attack in all situations.
Thank you, DZK.
Good for you! I'll take your observation for exactly what it's worth.
DZK .... thanks for sharing your experience and humor. Government census always seemed like a minimal intrusion on my privacy in exchange for a worthy govt. benefit. I like to think I am honest and am probably naive thinking I have nothing to hide. If you are a criminal or hiding something I understand a census is to be feared. Ol' Tweety is afraid to come clean on anything, especially tax payment and secure documents, so his automatic response is to "deny wrongdoing" which is the first response of a liar. Trump has been sued 4000 times (I saw the fact on PBS TV yesterday evening). Ten years ago I recognized Facebook as a great family photo sharing experience disguised as a misinformation free for all for uninformed wannabe experts. When foreign countries such as Russia, China, Iran, North Korea and Cuba begin using (our) electronic surveillance the evil intent of spying becomes deadly serious. Google and Siri ( I use both) have access to enormous amounts of information that build algorithms that may be used for good or bad purposes. You have reminded me that there is much to fear from private enterprise ownership of my personal information.
A final though: >any< of us can be held hostage to >anything< we value. Ultimately, the only thing that can prevent >any< of us from being blackmailed is for us to value absolutely >nothing< - and there >may< even be an exception to that!
Always believe >yourself<. Other information is always assessed under advisement. Corollary: no matter how firmly you believe yourself, always be open to the possibility your wrong. That's scientific method in a nutshell - although, perhaps, not quite as strict. To me, you seem to be on the right track.
Thanks for the wisdom and great advice
Heart.
Paula B this site is glitchy! I have trouble "liking" editing, logging in etc.
Try refreshing your page. Most of the time, you'll find the heart turns red after doing so without clicking it again. There should be a refresh button on your browser. Otherwise, you might find that if you right-click anywhere on the page, a pop-up will display next to your pointer arrow having a "reload" or "refresh" option.
I was just suggesting the remedy I always find effective, to someone asking about it. Nobody's complaining about it - certainly not me. I've >certainly< not complained about it to Dr Reich. Besides, that's a Substack issue, anyway. This is a Substack site.
Yes. They should fix it.
I almost became one. The training was thorough and well-paid, but the crew leader was was a stone jerk, who barked that there was no more work. The real story here was how the Census people skulked into town, set up a closet office, and then left the same way. No, thanks--I'll vote by mail ..
During the Decennial Census? Of what interest would it be to the public that a satellite office is being set up on a shoestring to minimize the expenditure of taxpayer dollars. Would you have your tax dollars spent making a big deal of it - a big downtown office complete with Census plastered all over big, energy wasting neon signs? Besides, isn't that the news reporters job to find out about and report? Maybe your local news didn't consider it worth reporting, because nobody gave a damn about it otherwise?
As far as your supervisor is concerned, I appreciate your being miffed if they were out of order. You should have filed an EEOC complaint. The Department of Agriculture has a whole bureau that handles nothing but such complaints. (The Agriculture Department is a "checks and balance" agency, whose opposite number is the Department of Commerce, the governing agency for the Census Bureau. Get caught anywhere in the DOC pulling some bullshit, and the DOA will burn you to the ground!) However, the Census owns no monopoly on dick supervisors. Besides, dick supervisors get paid a lot more in the private sector for terrorizing minimum wage workers having no job security.
Check this out: I take surveys to supplement my tiny income.So the companies send the reward money to Paypal.For 4 yrs.I requested a check and got one(I refused to give my personal info online.) Then a few yrs. ago they took a page out of their (redemption website)and I couldn't get a check without giving my bank # or card #.PS.They are holding 50.00 of mine hostage.There's more to the story,but you get the picture.Why is a major corp.so insistent on having your personal info.?
I suspect whatever company you work for found it's less expensive to pay you electronically with direct-deposit than spending money on checks and postage or working with PayPal. In order to do that, they need your info to set up a direct-deposit account with your bank in order to pay you electronically. Also, I've had direct-deposit before and have always had to provide bank info to set up getting paid. Of course, that info was always submitted on a paper form and not at a website online. You might check with the company and see if they'll send you a paper form to submit your info - if you find that more comfortable. Like it or not, that's probably the "new normal." That's my best guess.
Thanks for the response good buddy,but they charge me a 1.50 to process the check.
To me, more of an image thing, like something out of a bent movie where the office is just a front ..
Only the elected politicians, who tell all those agencies what kinds of policies to implement give a single, stringy $hi7 about public image . The grunts in the agencies only concern themselves with implementation, following the guidelines set before them by the elected, or politically appointed officials, and the appointed officials are doing the bidding of the elected officials who appointed them. Agencies like the Census are only concerned with public image to the extent they're not violating state or federal law.
There's more to fear from commercial, private sector organizations & contracting agents than from the government. (You >are< aware that the political parties themselves are just such private sector organizations - allegedly non-profit, though they may be - aren't you?) >Laws< exist against abuse for government agencies that the private sector aren't obliged to follow, and will only do so in response to massive lawsuits - which can be brought against the government, as well. ol' Tweety is getting busted under the same federal law as >anybody< working in the government would've been strung up by the balls long ago for violating. I find it interesting how many self-proclaimed experts there are on government procedure who've >never< worked in the government. ol' Tweety's just another same old tired arsed example of what those self-proclaimed experts "believe" about the government - or it's law enforcement officers & agencies, if you happen to be one of the "blue lives matter" types. ol' Tweety's publicly stated that he believes "if I think it, it is so." Just saw and heard him stating it on the noon, mainstream, broadcast news.
Well, after all, he is an "Extremely Stable Genius," isn't he? What's not to trust about what trump says? (An attempt at humor there...)
I'm completely at loss to understand how anyone believes anything ESG says. And people eat it up. Give me more! How do folks on "our' side get folks on trump's side to challenge what he says? Seems to me that is the, or certainly a, problem of our time. Tell a big lie often enough... Fox News and the right wing media spin out fear/hate/victim sh*t that their audience desperately wants to believe, and do come to believe.
FOX and that ilk have taken to the word "grooming" and "groomers" of late, with respect to pedophiles - QAnon. FOX and its clones' stock in trade is grooming the audience they capture. Grooming isn't the sole purview of pedophiles. Incipient pedophiles use grooming practices on childlike, impressionable adult minds.
I signed up for Facebook years ago (not long after it's inception) but decided to 'cancel' my membership (& found out they'd only make it - dormant). I've never been back. I also have never - partaken - of any of the other forms of (so called) - Social Networking - especially after seeing how 'ol Tweety' (thank you all for that - moniker) used and miss-used that platform. I also only have a cellular flip phone & mainly for emergencies - & refuse to obtain a SmartPhone et al = I refuse to be the - next poster child for - OCD. (example = watching my brother's grand daughter walking across his farmyard -
directly toward a very big oak tree - while texting on her phone & my brother had to
yell at her to look up - just short of slamming into said tree..... smack .....
Same here. I refer to Facebook as fake book. I finally gave up my landline phone last year and now use an apple phone, but limit as much private and personal information as possible.
He wrote the book in 1948. He just flipped the last two digits.
Must have seemed like a far distant future at that time.
After you listen to former NSA Chief Technical Director William Binney speak you realize that one of the primary purposes of US government data surveillance inside the United States is not to protect against terrorist attacks as much as it is for political blackmail.
William Binney emphasizes this point when he tells the story about during his career, once in a while a government employee would come in to the office and hand a piece of paper with a phone number, date and time on it to one of his NSA operator co-workers and ask them to pull the audio file on that cell phone call and the NSA operator would do it for them.
Binney is very worried our gov't is going to destroy your right to privacy expectations in America.
Therefore President Biden and the Democrats absolutely must expand the U.S. Supreme Court and the lower courts with a Democratic Party majority because this whacked out Republican majority on the Supreme Court is hell bent on destroying your right to privacy expectations for corporate America.
And they will not stop there - next month they are going to rule on a case that would literally destroy the U.S. Supremacy Clause of the Constitution which says federal law supercedes state law and U.S. Constitutional rights supercede state law.
This Republican majority on the Supreme Court is the most dangerous body ever known in the U.S. government to date. They hate the federal government so much they want to shrink the federal government down enough so they can drown it in a bathtub, so to speak, and are hell bent on destroying 50 years worth of landmark U.S. Supreme Court cases; including your right to privacy and abrogating your First Amendment rights as well, not to mention the individual liberties protected by decades of landmark U.S. Supreme Court cases.
But the biggest danger is next month when this GOP Supreme Court majority rules on a case that could effectively turn the clock back to the Civil War during a time when Confederate states ruled their own destiny and they were the fighting enemy of the United States government.
These Confederate morons and their mindset are alive and well and kicking and destroying democracy, U.S. Const. rights and the federal gov't today.
We live in a 60/40 America where 60% are dare I say "normal people" and the 40% are rightwing conservative nutjobs such as MAGA and Trump.
Then there are the 60% of Republicans who believe America should be a Christian Nation and want the Supreme Court to convert America into a theocracy owned and operated by corporations.
It's called Cristofascism. WILLIAM BINNEY: first >>> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1JDqNKMaus
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M66saPW2Gq8
Ron, It keeps me wondering why Republicans are so bent on losing their freedom to people who care nothing for them. They have somehow decided to let other people think and prepare their emotions for them. They want everyone else surveilled but not themselves, because of course, they are doing everything just right. You are right that we need to totally reconfigure the SC and the federal courts ASAP. Those 6 nut cases on the right really do want to bring about their idea of corporate theocracy and since they have life-time appointments, they are sure they will be in charge. OK, even people who reach Supreme Court level can be duped.
The fact that several flat out lied and refused to answer questions speaks volumes. They’ve had an agenda for a long time.
Perjury is a wonderful way to start off a prestigious ,patriotic career.Something many law students could look up to.
A VERY STRONG reason to implement TERM LIMTS that force these justices OFF the bench, say every 8 years. Also, the legislature MUST create a Code of Ethics for members of the Supreme Court, with ANY instances of misbehavior delivers "automatic" removal. In other words, no Trump tactics of suing endlessly meanwhile continuing to cause turmoil and havoc. I cannot believe, yet I can, that the Supreme Court, the highest arbiter in the land, does NOT have a Code of Ethics. Also, where are the repercussions when justices do NOT recuse themselves for "Conflict of Interest", for example, Thomas voting 'no" on investigations into what caused the rioting on January 6th while knowing full well that his wife was involved in the attempted coup? Where is the JUSTICE??
Ditto from me too, Jim. Ginny Thomas has agreed to testify just ahead of a subponea and I desperately (!) hope it will lead to Clarence Thomas' impeachment.
Great post. My sentiments exactly
Put the attached in your browser and watch this. This is part of Amy Coney-Barrett's confirmation hearing, PRIOR to her being seated on the Supreme Court, where DARK MONEY and judicial activism is shared. This is exactly what needs to be cleaned out as it corrupts our justice system.
https://youtu.be/a5-Snk_thAs
Just because they both do it, does NOT make it right. Instead of swimming with the cockroaches, isn't it beyond the time we take out a huge can of RAID and get rid of them? I do NOT understand why you want to play the "red vs. blue" game when this is about Patriotism vs. self-serving greedy behavior and what people will do for money in this corrupted system.
Inserting a word like “raping,” which was NOT charged or suggested, is irresponsible, and puts the rest of what you say on a bad footing.
Saying “They all do it” is just more of the same.
Yes, of course, everyone has their opinions and preferences. They don’t advocate publicly and with vigor, as Ginny does, nor do the spouses of all the other members of SCOTUS bring their Justices along to activist events.
Just saying.
I don’t see liberals overturning laws to remove rights that they said were fixed in law.
Do you see liberals arguing for this to happen and being stonewalled in Congress and the Senate? Or not. Please speak in substance, as well as concept, to back up what you say conceptually.
Thanks.
Like what? Please provide substance to statements. Thanks.
In answer to Jo — I’d like to know to what you refer, Jo.
Not that I question that it’s there, but would like to know … to what you refer. And how do you see them having failed to live up to their statements? Thanks.
During their confirmation hearings Kavanaugh AND Barrett said that abortion WAS settled law that would not be messed with. And we all know how they voted. They flat out lied when asked what they would do when the issue came up. Barrett refused to answer questions. And is likely the most UNQUALIFIED having been a judge for only two years. But like most of Trumps appointments many were unqualified due to lack of experience or just FELONS.
I believe we must challenge the interpretation of "Lifetime appointments" based on what is actually written in the U.S. Constitution. Those words are NEVER mentioned. As in the Bible, men with personal agendas/motives have interpreted this to be true to PROTECT THEIR INTERESTS. The question would be once this is challenged and appealed to the justices on the Supreme Court, would they recuse themselves?? Who would be the final arbiter?
Freedom means responsibility for one's actions? emotionally easier to place the burden in God's hands Que Sera Sera
The words 'freedom' and 'liberty' are so cozy that even the OED defines one in terms of the other! Liberty is freedom under law; we do not have the free right to run stoplights. We should be relieved, therefore, that it and not the F word is stamped on our coinage ..
Except for the lovely liberal women,the rest have infected brains.Imagine one of the justices having a traitor wife,how does that work?
Let the deciding vote go to the other side every other year because these courts are obviously not blind folded any longer. They all have agenda. I just happen to think the the people on the left do more for people who have no power as opposed to the right who work for the wealthy. And don’t get me wrong I completely understand the damage some left leaning presidents did with up holding the neoliberal cause.
Elections have consequences, such as 45 years of non-stop Democratic Party rule -- from circa 1950 until 1995 Democrats ruled both the House and the Senate.
How did you think our nation's infrastructure was built? The Republican Party? Hahhahhaa. At any rate Democrat control is here and now and will increase during the midterms.
....if you haven't noticed Trump and MAGA hijacked the Republican Party for years to come; that means Democrats will keep control of both the House and the Senate for years to come, thanks to weak, politically homeless old school Republicans and the Orange Indictee, the first U.S. President to run for office while under indictment....it's going down very soon.
The other concerning issue is how many billions are being dumped into republican campaigns right now, with 1.6 billion in one tax free donation going into religious ideology to push for theocratic rule. It’s scary.
Not to mention that the economy was so much better for the years before Reagan instituted neoliberal policy that has essentially destroyed the middle class and only opened the doors for greed to take over. I sure hope you are right about democrats. This mid term is the most consequential in recent history.
Jo Rocks!!! Yeah!!! If Republicans were a brand, they would have been pulled off the shelf a long time ago. Racism, fascism, misogyny, corporate class warfare against We The People...what's not to love about Republicans?
Binney was long retired when the Chinese military stole all of my personal data through my security clearance. I was not alone. millions of other Americans' data was taken. NSA was asleep at the switch. Got all my medical records, financial, FBI checks, fingerprints DNA, etc. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_Personnel_Management_data_breach
If the Chinese have all that stuff, consider what our government has on me. Computer chip in my ID. I travelled for the government, all my hearings were recorded and transcribed, I typed most of my own stuff, including interim orders and final decisions and internal memos and employee evaluations, etc. I operated through email with my staff and with many of the participants in my cases. I did phone hearings sometimes on motions and eve, after agreement of the parties on the merits. All involved were probably subject to that data breech.
At one point Chinese companies were offering my book "free" over the internet. Could never find someone to sue.
I am not jealous of my privacy. I've given this a lot of thought. I really have nothing to hide. At onetime I worked for SSA which had the Privacy Act. HIPPA and all that. I have come to the conclusion that if someone seeks governmental benefits, they effectively should have waived privacy. If a neighbor legitimately knows that say, a claimant is lying about things like tax compliance, earning capacity, etc. the neighbor should be encouraged to come forward.
On the other hand if someone is profiting from data, the source should be compensated. I figure that Microsoft and Google, etc. owe me. Maybe I'll send them a bill for stealing my data without notice and compensation. Maybe I'll ask for attorneys' fees, costs and punitive damages.
I was the wife of a US gov employee when that data breech happened. We're family members' data stolen too?
Probably.
I'm sorry to hear such bad news Daniel. I appreciate your candor and your angst towards the guilty parties. What are you doing in Baghdad, as if it were my business, sir.
YOU GOTTA SEE THIS: CLUB LOS ALAMOS - THIS IS WHAT A "BI-PARTISAN" CONGRESS GETS YOU: Congress allowed this to happen for years and years. Unbelievable. Ongoing Chinese criminal enterprise inside the U.S.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbwX_XwfWBU
Baghdad by the Sea is in Florida
Thx Fay...he's very thin-skinned...I hope he doesn't venture outside.
To whom are you referring as "thin-skinned", I hope neither Daniel Solomon, nor Robert Reich. Both these gentlemen are very straight up characters, they tell the truth as they see it and back up their statements with real evidence, as do most of the people on Substack.
There's plenty of conservatives on substat and I have no respect for conservatives at all because I do not consider conservatism a legitimate political ideology I consider it a sociopathy that should be treated preferably in an inpatient setting depending upon the deranged conservative. I consider conservatism a form of mental illness which can be summed up like this: I'm doing great and to hell with you buddy... And summed up like this: I don't have your kind of problems so don't expect me to help... That's the earmarks of conservatism, not to mention the racism the misogyny the cristofascism.
No not them.
A good portion of the people on sub stack suck because they are conservatives or of a conservative nature. All the polls show that a majority of Americans support progressive goals and progressive policies there's no such thing as majority support for moderate policies or conservative policies
Knew this was going on.
We handled, among others, nuclear whistleblower cases. UC Berkley owns most of the facility at Los Alamos. They have sovereign immunity (state of California) so we don't know what's happening there. I'm not paranoid but same is probably true re industrial spying in virtually every sector. A risk with globalization.
Ron Harold, an additional 1.6 billion bucks certainly helps their cause.
WRONG!!! He paid 17.9 million dollars in taxes on his donation. And Global Warming/Climate Change is only "liberal" cause if you're living on another planet or are a complete idiot.
Also the simple fact that the intelligence state we entered after 9/11 hasn’t prevented a single real terrorist threat should tell you that they had alterer motives for collecting our personal data.
You have no basis for that conclusion.
did you read the post? are you aware that the real terrorist threat is the White Supremacist movement? and while all this surveillance data is helping to root them out it hasn't done much to prevent their attacks? do you feel safer taking your shoes and jacket off going through a terminal?
As the protagonist in one of my novels says. "You no no wha' you no no."
Top law enforcement officials say the biggest domestic terror threat comes from white supremacists.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/12/us/politics/domestic-terror-white-supremacists.html
No doubt. 733 hate groups.
https://www.splcenter.org/hate-map
Yes, the reason they can say that with a considerable amount of certainty, is because of surveillance and data research isn't it.
Top law enforcement officials say the biggest domestic terror threat comes from white supremacists.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/12/us/politics/domestic-terror-white-supremacists.html
All those school shootings and shootings at grocery stores and concerts are not terrorism in your eyes?
I’m thinking we know that terrorism threats from these groups remain. Whether this “surveillance state” has or has not actually prevented a real threat — well, we do not know what it has actually prevented or not prevented, because we’re not necessarily being told where real threats exist and where they may be foiled.
We no no what we no no.
I agree, and the very least he could do is learn to spell (ulterior)
Women’s right to privacy have already been invaded. I’m waiting for when our right to vote is demolished, too.
That won't happen,'cos we won't let it.Remember,"hell hath no fury!"
I believe judges have too much power. One person should not be able to have so much control or power. Such as the trump appointed puppet judge cannon he got to hold up the investigation of him. And I totally disagree with supreme court judges having lifetime terms. Just as teachers or no one should have tenure or guaranteed lifetime jobs.
Actually our Constitution does NOT say that. And, if Alito is NOT a hypocrite as the words "Lifetime appointment" are nowhere to be found in the document (incidentally the word "lobbyist" is not found there either), he should accept that fact and say so. But, of course, he wont. As in the Bible, men with agendas selectively tell you what words mean for their own purposes. If somebody lies and it is repeated enough times, people believe it is the truth. This is how "alternative facts" are created. The wording in the Constitution regarding the Supreme Court justices lenght of service:
Article III, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution reads that judges shall remain in their position so long as they follow "good behaviour." This has long indicated that judges, including Supreme Court justices, have lifetime tenure.
If you were to ask me, and millions of Americans, several judges are NOT following "good behavior" (Clarence Thomas is the most glaring example), quite a subjective word. Congress has been asleep at the wheel for centuries by NOT creating a Code of Ethics for Supreme Court justices as in lower courts. These people are NOT God and their recent decisions show the influence of nefarious characters in their decision making (Leonard Leo). Second, to curb the corrupting influence of Dark Money and bad actors who influence this body, TERM LIMITS of about 8 years are necessary. Once they reach this point they can rotate back down to lower courts. Also, Judges should have a mandatory retirement age that is the same as the Full Social Security Retirement age.
Put this in your browser and see what has been happening to the highest court in the land:
https://youtu.be/a5-Snk_thAs
I agreed with you, Steven Bishop, all the way up to tenure. Tenure takes the teaching profession out of ‘fire at will,” and puts it into “fire for cause.” Teachers with tenure can be gotten rid of, if they are deficient or harmful. If school departments tend not to fire bad teachers, that is their failure, not the failure of the tenure system per se. But having experienced and qualified teachers in classrooms matters. In some places, you will see that teachers are regularly “let go” just BEFORE they qualify for tenure, because experienced teachers get paid more than brand new teachers, and some school boards are controlling “budgets” by keeping low-paid — but less experienced — teachers on board. [Yes, being less experienced does not mean you’re not a great teacher — but even great new teachers are fired before they get tenure, replaced by cheaper teachers. Just think how great an already great teacher might be with added experience under their belt!]
Tenure came in so teachers would have some security and not be at the whim of political waves in a town. Think about companies that have contracts that prevent firing without cause. If you don’t want tenure, then you DO want strong contracts that don’t allow firing at will. That means respecting the negotiation process with unions.
What’s your preference?
Not as much as you think.
https://www.uscourts.gov/judges-judgeships/code-conduct-united-states-judges
Big difference between judges and justices. however both are subject to 28 U.S. Code § 455 - Disqualification of justice, judge, or magistrate judge. Any justice, judge, or magistrate judge of the United States shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned.
I am far more concerned about surveillance capitalism impact on individual autonomy and privacy t h a n the government, but that is a concern as well. I agree with everything else you've said about the dangers we face with the Supreme morons and the pressing need to pack the court. as for theocracy and corporations, I don't see that corporations generally care one way or the other. they will go with whatever winds are blowing that are likely 2 optimize their profits shorter-term, be the winds democratic or authoritarian.it is the combination surveillance with AI that is a big threat.
years ago when in a passenger van coming from the airport to st. Pete the driver got lost because the application he was using to direct him failed. he had no idea how streets were laid out and it took the passengers on the van to explain to him where Street 109 would be in relation to 106. sort of like how to light a fire without using a lighter. I like getting driving directions from my phone. but one can see a slippery slope where I and others depend upon our quote technology to give us the quote right answers to the point where our capacity 4 thinking and decision making atrophies. that's not to mention that certain options might no longer exist. I recommend the book by Zuboff- surveillance capitalism.
I agree. Surveillance capaitalism affects every single individual in America. No doubt.
I posted my comment to illustrate how elite individuals and gov't officials use NSA data to politically blackmail other elite individuals, Senators, Congresspersons, etc.
I believe the seminal primary issue is neutering the whacked out Republican majority on the U.S. Supreme Court, who are not finished, but just getting started on crushing and disposing of our right-to-privacy rights and expectations; and how Biden and Democrats must expand the Supreme Court and lower courts with a Democratic Party majority - or else this GOP Supreme Court majority will continue to destroy landmark U.S. Supreme Court cases Americans have relied upon to protect their U.S. Const. rights, privileges and immunities for decades, until nothing is left.
Next month this dangerous rightwingnut majority is going to issue a ruling which could literally eviscerate the U.S. Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Const. which mandates that federal law and the free exercise of an individual's U.S. Const. rights supercede states rights and state constitutions.
That would be the ultimate constitutional crisis ever because such a rulling would spell the end of democracy, the end of the federal government as we have known it and the return of the Days of the Confederacy where a Confederate state held absolute dominion over the individuals actual freedoms and rights.
The Republican Party is barreling towards their long-term goal to neuter the power of the federal government over the states and empower the states over the individual.
It is the intersection of political reality and real world impacts.
I don't believe NSA data is being used to Blackmail Elite individuals as you state.it will take more than Binny to convince me of that. but I'm open to the evidence.this would be a monumental dysfunction and threat 2 democracy if true.
You suffer normalcy bias. Good luck.
ad hominem
If you think that was an ad hominem attack, you probably shouldn't venture outside in the open air.....my God....talk about thin-skinned. You must have thought we were on the Love Boat, and I was Gopher and you're Captain Stubing.
Bon Voyage!
....good luck.
Ron, I write mainly because I agree we should expand both the High Court and the lower courts and thought it might be useful if I injected some examples of how I would present the case.
To start, whereas in 1869 the number of justices was set at nine—one justice assigned to one of the nine federal circuit courts and whereas today there are thirteen circuit courts, I would contend that Senate Dems should either modify or set aside the filibuster and join the House majority (presuming we hold the House) to add four justices to the High Court.
I noted Jim Remedes, who’s part of this thread, suggested enlisting term limits. While conceptually I support, say, 18-year term limits, wherein justices presumably could rotate out to the appellate courts, because enlisting term limits would require amending the Constitution, which would require ratification by three-fourths of the state legislatures, I would set that recommendation aside.
Regarding you rightly suggesting expansion of the lower courts, I would underscore that it’s past time for the country to expand said courts. We merely need consider that the last time the federal circuit and district courts were meaningfully expanded was in 1990 and that the country’s population since then has increased by one-third.
Ultimately, I view a big part of our job as pressing our voters to prioritize judicial expansion as a crucial electoral issue.
I agree, except 18 years is too long.
Pat, I write, first, to note I viewed a poll earlier today that showed that establishing term limits for Supreme Court Justices is growing increasingly popular among all segments of the population. Additionally, I expect, that because our Founders conferred life service upon all federal judges, the term limit agreed upon for High Court justices probably would be 18 years, give or take. I view this as a positive development 1) because it would provide a more regulated and greater degree of turnover and 2) because vacancies could be staggered so that they occurred every 2 years.
As a final point, I would note, contrary to my original comment, that because justices rotated out could continue to work as fully compensated federal judges in senior status, term limits could be enacted through statute that would not necessarily require amending the Constitution.
Ron, If you would post, I certainly would be interested in hearing your thoughts.
I believe the seminal, primary issue is neutering the whacked out Republican majority on the U.S. Supreme Court, who are not finished but just getting started on crushing and disposing of our right-to-privacy rights and expectations and a laundry list of U.S. Const. rights we have been accustomed to our entire lives.
President Biden and Democrats must expand the Supreme Court and lower courts with a Democratic Party majority - or else this GOP Supreme Court majority will continue to destroy landmark U.S. Supreme Court cases Americans have relied upon to protect their U.S. Const. rights, privileges and immunities for decades, until nothing is left.
Next month this dangerous rightwingnut majority is going to issue a ruling which could literally eviscerate the U.S. Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Const. which mandates that federal law and the free exercise of an individual's U.S. Const. rights supercede states rights and state constitutions.
That would be the ultimate constitutional crisis ever because such a ruling would spell the end of democracy, the end of the federal government as we have known it and the return of the Days of the Confederacy where a Confederate state held absolute dominion over an individual's freedoms and rights.
The Republican Party is barreling towards their long-term goal to neuter the power of the federal government over the states, and empower the states over the individual.
By this potential GOP Supreme Court ruling, red states could theoretically reinstitute slavery and the federal government wouldn't be able to defeat them in the Republican-dominated courts.
That is why Biden and Democrats must expand the Supreme Court and lower courts with a Democratic Party majority. Problem is, I do not believe Biden will move to expand the Court or the filibuster; and consequently, we are in deep doo-doo as long as this insane, tone-deaf, racist, misogynist GOP Court remains seated as the majority on the Court.
It is the intersection of political reality and real world impacts.
progressives2022.com
Ron, I presume the Supreme Court dispute to which you are referring is Moore vs. Harper, a case entailing the fringe Independent State Legislature Theory that the justices have agreed to hear next term.
As I understand, this fringe ISL legal theory, that has advanced to the Supreme Court, argues, that because the Constitution says that state legislatures redistrict and set the time, place, and manner of elections, that it means only the legislature has the power to determine how Congressional elections are conducted (thus also impacting how Presidential electors are chosen) without any checks and balances from state constitutions or state courts, or perhaps even from a Governor’s veto.
Whereas I understand, technically, that ISL does not assert that the legislatures are above the U.S. Constitution’s guarantees of equal protection and due process, still, I worry about a High Court that would ignore 50 years of settled precedent in Roe, and would overturn a fundamental right relied upon by tens of millions every year. Clearly, a court willing to do that with a protection, over and over again reaffirmed, would do it to another fundamental protection.
As for legislatures being subject to regulations of Congress, while state legislatures are not exempt from federal regulations, as we saw last January with the Freedom to Vote: John R. Lewis Act, enforcing federal regulations requires either reaching the Senate’s 60-vote threshold or modifying the Senate’s filibuster rule to allow for debate and an up or down majority vote.
Hence, as you intimated, if Democrats don’t retain control of the House and pick up at least two Senate seats, the future I imagine we all see unfolding is one of utter chaos, the breakdown of the rule of law, and the loss of trust both in government and also in mainstream institutions of American life.
As a final point, I would be remiss were I not to note, along with defending democracy at the federal level, that mobilizing at the state and local levels is equally important. Here I am particularly indebted to The States Project that has worked tirelessly to out-organize Republicans, who ruthlessly are organizing to fill state and local positions with their own people—people who don’t believe in free and fair elections.
"Blackmail" is the ability of THEM to see what YOU do, but more importantly, SHAME you about it. That way, you will imprison yourself.
Hi Steve....I don't think this means exactly what you may think this means.
When I say "political blackmail" I'm not referring to you and I and the unwashed masses; I'm referring to what Binney was referring to, which are elite individuals and high-ranking officials accessing NSA data and using that data to blackmail very powerful wealthy individuals and U.S. government agency officials, Senators, Congresspersons, party leaders and members, etc.
not to mention what epstein and his buddy drumpf have....
“…they want to shrink the federal government down enough so they can drown it in a bathtub”
Given the control “small government“ Republicans want to have over our lives it is more accurate to say: They want to shrink the government down just enough so they can fit it into your bedroom.
This screams of returning to the Articles of Confederation that were a FAILURE— giving rise to our Constitution that bonded the states much more closely into an actual nation, with a federal government that overruled the states in many, many issues, especially those that involved the rights of citizens and cross-border regulation — rather than staying a loose bunch of associated ‘states.’
The drawbacks to remaining small, loosely-connected-through-language-and-customs ‘city states’ were, I thought, recognized around the world, as regions formalized their associations and declared themselves fully-realized nations — it happened all over Europe, at least …
Now, these guys wanna go back to being “Balkanized”?
They crazy.
Christian nationalism doesn't work.Christ doesn't harm,harass or discriminate.The Nationalism stupidity is from Xi and Putin.
You've hit on the >very thing< that has >never< made sense to me about all the missing Secret Service text messages. They should have all been on an NSA secure server in a SCIF somewhere in the backwoods of nowhere, and easily retrieved!
If they hate the federal government so much they shouldn’t take money from it.
EXCUUUUSE ME! The government’s money is not the government’s money. It is the people’s money. So, what you say is just self-flagellation … or something. But don’t make no sense.
I don’t understand your comment. Federal judges and legislators get their salaries from the federal government. If they disapprove of their employer so much why are they working for it?
If you are talking to me, I still hold that working for the people is not inconsistent with objecting to some policies of government. The government is not a “them”: it is an “us.” You work for “us,” not “it.”
If you take issue with some policies and practices and don’t do anything about that. — don’t speak up or resist — I can see criticizing that as valid.
Of course it’s acceptable to object to policies of the federal government and work for it. What makes no sense is to work for an employer you want to do away with. Republicans want to get rid of the federal government except for defense. Why be a judge or a legislator for a body you believe has no right to exist except for conducting war?
I see that point, for sure, and I hope they are not doing it to help bring it down.
I guess all these issues are not circumscribed and isolated, so being a part of the machine you decry may have its value in change from within. But trying to bring it down? Well, that sounds like Steve Bannon, who hoped to help DJT “blow it all up.”
We live in scary times [I say this having lived through the Kennedy assassination and Watergate …]
Paula, I recommend not wasting your breath on a Libertarian liike him.
This is so scary and dangerous. The idea of even doctors being surveilled to ensure that they are working fast enough is horrifying and will lead to serious misdiagnoses, along with all the health damage that will be done to people who are too scared to go to the toilet or take a moment to catch their breath, for fear that it will cost them money. I can't think of anything more horrific than being told which bar to go to in a strange town and finding that the bartender has my favourite drink ready - that is just freakily weird!
But if this surveillance is appropriate, then why don't we see it applied to all the managers and bosses. Why are people like Zuckerberg and Bezos not being subjected to such surveillance so that we can see what they get up to to justify their obscene wealth.
I actually worked in a wire mill where an older woman was afraid to leave her machine to go to the bathroom. She ended up with GI. problems that led to the end of her employment. This was before the internet. Oppression can happen without high technology.
Teachers face the same hostility in many places. Drs ability for sensible reasoned decisions are “managed” by systems that take no account for the time required for understanding and investment in an individual patient.
Elizabeth, you are right to mention teachers and doctors. There is a move, though to treat those professions as though they can be monitored like a machine. I am sure everyone can recall a doctor's visit that was unsatisfactory because the doctor didn't have time to really understand the problem the patient brought. It has happened to me often and I would realize after I left that I needed to have said more. Teachers are now being blamed for children's academic losses during COVID as if we had not faced the most horrific medical situation in a century. They call it "the lost year" not realizing that students learned a lot during the COVID experience and that new knowledge needs to be tapped into. Even though high school seniors didn't get the full "senior experience," they did get a unique opportunity to see education differently which might let them be more empathetic in the future of others who are experiencing problems. Teachers are given a curriculum that often does not allow for "teachable moments" where a lot of learning happens. We as a society can do better and need to make that better, happen.
Unfortunately children also were taught how horrible living in a Trump nation was and why so many are depressed.
This is so true Elizabeth. I was an obstetrician specialising in the care of high risk women and those who had suffered perinatal bereavement (in the UK NHS). I was fortunate enough that, for most of my career, the payment system meant the organisation was paid for every visit and so I was 'allowed' to offer care that was truly personalised to each woman, seeing many of them twice a week from very early in pregnancy until they were delivered and giving them as much time as they needed. Then I broke my wrist very badly just as the payment system changed to severely limit the amount of care that could be offered. Now appointment systems are totally managed by so called time and motion experts who know absolutely nothing about medicine and so there is no way that I could work as I had done for so many years. "Fortunately', I was forced tot take early retirement so I don't have to cope with the insanity that now prevails - but my heart breaks for the women who are now shovelled through the system as if they were 'product' on an assembly line and the staff who know that the care they are providing is way below the level that it should be. But of course nobody in the government we have had for the last 12 years has their medical treatment in the NHS so they don't give a s**t!
Insurance companies started that years ago when they developed protocols for disease management and started to dictate what treatments doctors can prescribe. Many doctors have lost the art of listening any longer, and unfortunately it’s probably the way they are being taught nowadays.
Laurie, I am so sorry to learn of your coworker's fate. Oh yes, oppression is older than modern tech, but now, it has the force of collusion by internet. I have been lucky to work jobs that respected my personal needs. Teaching was hard to get time to use the bathroom, but I often covered for teachers who had to go and I would go between classes. People in factories often don't get that kind of break and it is wrong whether low or high tech. That's why we need many more good unions.
Yes Ruth; It's nice to see more unions starting up.
It truly is horrible what some people are prepared to do to their fellow human beings just to get a bit more money.
Kind of like selling one's soul to the devil.
Totally agree Laurie - but sucking the souls of vast numbers of innocent people as well.
Seonaid ; If not their souls, certainly their blood.
There were reports of cashiers wearing Depends because their employers would not give them breaks to go to the restroom. That problem has been “solved” by requiring the customers to be their own cashier and checking themselves out as they are surveilled.
Seonaid ; How do we know they are not being surveilled?
Right Laurie, I would think they would have much more to keep watch over than the average person.
I can believe that they have massive surveillance for their 'possessions' so that nobody can get even a tiny little bit of what they believe is rightfully theirs, but I'm not sure who would actually be surveilling what they do to gain those possessions. Surveillance of that sort is just for us little people who are there to get their possessions for them.
They think WE are their possession. Which is why they watch us. It is all about control. Kind of like a narcissistic/ codependent relationship.
Maybe they are watched, but because they're a major part of the powerful source of the info gathering it seems they're puppet masters to me.
yikes. a friend of mine, now passed due to cancer secondary to Crohn's Disease, understood that her disease was a direct epigenetic issue because of her grandfather's experience in WW1, when he forced himself to avoid eliminating because he had to take over leadership of the rest of his unit. He was the first to develop what is now known as Crohn's, and everyone down the line develops it. my friend's son has it as well. chances are HIS children will also develop it.
the rich are the ones who surveil, the poor and working class are those surveilled, it's slavery pure and simple and no longer restricted along racial/ethnic lines...
Crohn’s disease is genetic, not caused by not eliminating.
Seonaid, OMG you have this right! I would hate walking into anywhere, especially if I don't know the people, and they have my meal pre-prepared since they think they have surveilled me so well. I think it would be hilarious to see what Bezos and Zuckerberg et al are doing all day. I suspect playing video games with a few phone calls to sycophants to get stuff done for them. Those privileged white boys never had to grow up, so whatever looks new and hurtful to others would catch their attention and they'd gleefully want to employ it on others, not themselves, of course.
Hi Ruth - I suspect if I could see what they do all day I would not find it hilarious but would be even more infuriated than I am already about the lives that these people lead, the houses and possessions that they have and the ruination of our world that they are creating solely for their own benefit and enjoyment. Now being able to surveill them with the ability to give them an electric shock (mild) and remove some of their millions every time they do something that all of us here would consider unacceptable, THAT I would find hilarious!
Surveillance is one of those things that is & will be part of our lives whether we like it or not. So, rather than wasting energy fighting it, we need to learn all we can about it and make sure we have a seat at the table when decisions are being made. I’m certain we’re going to have legislation that addresses it, much like legislation re wiretapping phones. Yes, surveillance is more extensive than wiretaps & more complicated as well, so we need to break it down. I’m thinking it should be defined by its purpose first--for example, is the purpose of it to surveil employees or the public? Once the purpose of it is known, the next step would be to brainstorm about how any particular aspect of it could be used in a corrupt and/or illegal and/or unfair manner. Once that’s nailed down, crafting legislation should be pretty easy...unless you have a plethora of republicans hell-bent on making problems where there are none so they can use it as an issue to campaign on.
Susan, yeah, there is always a downside, those pesky Republicans who have no clue but don't want anyone else to have a clue either, that is, until they get surveilled and find they actually hate it.
Surveillance is one of those things that is & will be part of our lives whether we like it or not
and the reason this is true is what?
One reason is greed: people compromise our shared values by shifting the burden of responsibility away from themselves and onto some vague, nebulous thing which is always outside of arm's reach (e.g. "the property insurance company", "the company", etc.); is a small discount on premiums really worth such a compromise? (Only a *real* idiot would say so!)
PS: Surveillance - failed mentalities aside - is not inevitable; the EFF helps activists pass surveillance bans across the country!
Asimov wrote about this. In one story, the authorities gave free robots to do cleaning, babysitting, house chores but then they captured all personal data and the authorities could control the family.
If trump gets elected in 2024, you can bet he'd deploy this technology as far as he could...
The NSA debacle occurred on Obama’s watch, so it’s not defined by party lines; the Deep State is globally managed.
I'm skeptical of this "Deep State" concept. How do you understand it?
And is it different from the Military Industrial Complex?
Political resistance to the intentions and decisions of the executive branch sound so much scarier and intimidating if someone gives it a label as undefined as "deep state."
Mark Gray ; In his book 'Permanent Record' , Ed Snowden says that the NSA was infiltrated by corporate interests. Kind of sums it up, in my view.
It reinforces the us against them notion and keeps us all divided.
From my research, the controllers of the power; a global conglomerate, if you will, are the money houses, as they’ve been since very early on. History records it’s beginnings before the fall of the Roman Empire. It’s a relatively small group who have managed to buy and control politicians and government agencies for years. They control the media and tech now as well. They hide in plain sight with ideas “for the good of mankind”, but power and profit is their only agenda. It’s not difficult to find if you’ve the stomach for it. Humans are the most despicable species with regard to how they use and mistreat their own.
Mark, I,too find the concept of "deep state" unreliable. I think it has been a tool used to get more people to be scared enough to put into place all kinds of harsh laws that do not protect anyone from anything but give more power to those who want those restrictive laws. I need evidence of the "deep state."
I agree. I think it’s a concept cooked up from watching too much TV.
except on himself and his friends.
Mary E. Ulrich ; the fun part is ; How does he know who his friends really are? You know : honor among thieves and all that.
Mary, ain't it the truth. Trump and Kump can't stand being surveilled the way they want everyone else to be watched and monitored. They really didn't like cameras noting that the FBI did not destroy Mar a Lago or steal anything that didn't already belong to the US people when they went to collect the stolen documents. Trump lied about it anyway, just what one would expect from a serial liar.
Mary, trump would deploy this tech on everyone. He’d love to have dirt on his “friends”. Perhaps dirt is the only thing that makes them “friends”. He’s such a grifter, it may be how he gets some of his “donations”.
Probably most if those “top secret” docs that Trump squirreled away at Mar-a-Lago is probably sensitive info about all the people that have blackmail potential for him to use.
Mark Gray, you are so right because Trump has no clue, so will parrot whatever his handlers at the time want done. And, those guys who will have given up their souls to Trump will be willing to do anything to scuttle our democracy, including installing massive surveillance tech. Those who vote for Trump will be easily pacified by Fox Not Really News et al so won't even protest that every time they leave their seat at work, they will be docked pay. They will be brain-dead to it and just go along because their demigod Donnie is in charge, or they think he is.
It's enough to make me a Luddite.
What do they need all this data for? I already see ads pop up repetitiously when I order something online. It’s creepy. I almost never buy anything twice and tend to shop predominantly brick and mortar rather than internet. They must be selectively discriminating in who to collect data on because Trump should already be in jail based on his tweet addiction.
If you take your phone with you, they can know where you are. If you use a credit card, they know what you buy, even at brick and mortar.
May the revolution come soon
I agree with you 100% that this is disturbing, and that the U.S. is not as different as we would like to believe we are. Facebook sent me a questionnaire yesterday, and I shared how disturbed I am about how they use and share data, yet how they allow blatant lies and calls for violence to be shared on their platform. I like connecting with faraway friends and family, but I wish we had an alternative to FB and others that track and sell our info. Great article!
After you listen to former NSA Technical Director William Binney speak, you realize that one of the primary purposes of US government data surveillance inside the United States is not to protect against terrorist attacks as much as it is for political blackmail.
William Binney emphasizes this point when he tells the story about during his career, once in awhile a government employee would come in to the office and hand a piece of paper with a phone number, date and time on it to one of his NSA operator co-workers and ask them to pull the audio file on that cell phone call and the NSA operator would do it for them. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M66saPW2Gq8
Wasn't it Patric Henry who said
"GIVE ME LIBERTY OR GIVE ME DEATH"
How much control do we have to endure? Have we morphed into a slave state and, if so, who is controlling the slaves?
I often wonder what Edward Snowden is doing in Russia. He certainly had a lot of knowledge of 'cybersecurity.' In his book, 'Permanent Record', he suggests removing the camera from your cell phone if you want to avoid being spied on. I have lately had the experience of my phone and computer screen flashing almost unperceptively ; like a picture is being taken. Creepy. Am I just paranoid? I really doubt it.
Excellent insights regarding a silently advancing and ubiquitous problem that we seem to either be ignoring or accepting, at our peril.
But as with so many opinion pieces by Mr. Reich, and to be fair, many other progressive observers of our fraught situation, their is no culminating specific call to action for the readers who may be alarmed by the situation illuminated by the writer. So what do we do about this advancing security and surveillance state? Clearly, we need a broad social conversation, which more articles and books, like Ms. Zuboff's, should help stimulate. But the people, mostly intellectually lazy and somehow willing to accept the state of affairs as they exist unless it impacts their perception of their identities or their wallets, need much more stimulation to act than such articles and books provide, rare as these written alarms are.
Well, I feel certain that elected representatives such as Elizabeth Warren and Pramila Jayapal and Katie Porter either are or would be very interested in doing something legislative about the issue of surveillance. They would study it seriously and attempt, if they could persuade enough other legislators and cabinet officials, to codify recommendations that meet Constitutional standards and tilt the scales toward workers and the public without infringing upon the legal rights of corporations (expansive as they unfortunately have become within American case law). How does such an effort gain momentum? BY ELECTING MORE DEMOCRATS TO CONGRESS! THE REPUBLICAN PARTY, WITH ITS DONOR BASE SIGNIFICANTLY POPULATED BY WEALTHY PEOPLE AT THE TOPS OF CORPORATIONS AND ITS CURRENT STATE OF FIDELITY TO OLIGARCHY AND POWER, WILL DO NOTHING ABOUT SURVEILLANCE BECAUSE TO DISCUSS IT DOES NOT BENEFIT THEM EITHER POLITICALLY OR FINANCIALLY.
Yes, I will end with my oft-repeated directive: Vote for Democrats at all levels and in all branches of government in 2022, 2024, 2026 and 2028 at a minimum. The surveillance issue, like many others of importance such as climate change, inequality, voting rights, the right of people to control their own bodies and much else, will not be beneficially addressed unless Democrats control the levers of political power in this country for the foreseeable future.
MR. REICH: I KNOW IT GOES AGAINST YOUR CREDENTIALS AS AN IMPARTIAL OBSERVER, BUT NOW IS THE TIME FOR YOU AND ROBERT KUTTNER AND JOSEPH STIGLITZ AND YOUR OTHER PROGRESSIVE FRIENDS OF INFLUENCE TO BECOME PARTISAN. FOR THE SAKE OF THE COUNTRY. SPEAK OUT NOW, WITH LESS THAN 50 DAYS BEFORE THE 2022 MIDTERMS, TO ADVOCATE FOR THE REPUDIATION OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY AND THE ELECTION OF AS MANY DEMOCRATS AS POSSIBLE. There will be Democrats elected that will be less helpful than others, akin to Joe Manchin. But those types of Democrats are a concern for a later time. PLEASE, VOICE THE NEED NOW.
Yes, you are right, and No, they are really not that different. Where and how to counter this? Our institutions seem well-programed to promote the interests of Bezos and Musk, etc.