"Prosecutors are vested with the extraordinary power to investigate, prosecute, bankrupt, and use the power of the state to imprison people for decades. They have the corresponding obligation to exercise judgment and restraint in how that power is used."Spoken like a babe in the woods. Power corrupts. Hoping otherwise is like spitting in the wind.
"Nobody contests the propriety of charging Swartz with some crime for what he did. Civil disobedience is supposed to have consequences. The issue is that he was punished completely out of proportion to what he did, for ends that have nothing to do with the proper administration of justice. That has consequences far beyond his case, and simply cannot be tolerated."Amazing naivety. Prosecutors care nothing for justice, ever. They care about convictions which lead to promotions.
More on Swartz and the legal system.
FBI surveillance techniques.
"In July 2012, the New York Times reported that federal, state, and local law enforcement officials had requested all kinds of cell phone data, including mappings of suspects’ locations, a staggering 1.3 million times in the previous year. Worse, the real number was “almost certainly much higher" given they often request multiple people’s data with one request. The FBI also employs highly controversial “tower dumps” where they get the location information on everyone within a particular radius, potentially violating the privacy of thousands of innocent people with one request."Yikes.
"In late 2012, we reported on the secretive new device the FBI has been increasingly using for surveillance known as a IMSI catcher, or “Stingray.” A Stingray acts as a fake cell phone tower and locks onto all devices in a certain area to find a cell phone’s location, or perhaps even intercept phone calls and texts. Given it potentially sucks up thousands of innocent persons’ data, we called it an “unconstitutional, all you can eat data buffet.”"Secret law. Amazing.
"In cities across the country, local police departments and other law enforcement agencies are installing automated license plate readers that create databases of location information about individual cars (and their drivers). These readers can be mounted by the side of a busy road, scanning every car that rolls by, or on the dash of a police car, allowing officers to drive through and scan all the plates in a parking lot."
"On top of all this, the FBI is one of just a few dozen public agencies that has an authorization to fly a drone in the U.S. There is no evidence at this time that they are actively pursuing or using a specific device. But we do know that other branches of the federal government, namely the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), are conducting drone surveillance along the U.S. border, and have at least occasionally loaned these capabilities to other departments."
"This is just the latest example of the Obama administration trying to interpret public laws in secret without adequately informing its citizens. Currently, EFF is suing the government for its secret interpretation of the Patriot Act Section 215, and for secret FISA court opinions that could shed light on the NSA warrantless wiretapping program."
The pervasive, immersive violence of government.
"Children are raised up in a society that is now openly contemptuous of the right of peaceful individuals to simply be left in peace, to not be told what to do in every last detail – or else – by others with guns and the apparatus of the state behind them. In which quite literally nothing is not – in principle and thus potential – on the table and up for a vote. They learn the forms and methods of democracy early on – drinking deeply of the soul-poison that a “majority” having voted may do as it wishes to anyone."
"They are also taught the necessary corollary: That absolute submission to authority in every last detail is the duty of every individual. But here is where it gets interesting: They come to understand that they can be the ones exercising this authority. This power.
This lawful violence."
"All they have to do is get elected – or appointed – and they will acquire the legal power to order other people around; to take and dispose of the property of others at whim – even to have them killed. It is a game played with great success by the more sophisticated sociopaths a society such as ours produces in ever greater abundance – the ones who appear neat and clean, suit-wearing and well-coiffed. Who never or rarely have to raise their voices – much less their own hands. Never doing the actual violence themselves, but merely ordering it be done by others on their behalf – and enjoying the rich sense of power it gives them."It starts with government schools.
"The lesson is simply this: We ought not to expect a peaceful society when the generally accepted basis of society is reciprocal plunder via the ballot box. When people can elect thieves and in which aggressive violence for any reason is approved of – or even tolerated. Such a society turns human beings into two-legged rats. Cornered rats, prepared – out of Darwinian necessity – to lash out, lest he be the one lashed out against."This is a really good article.
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