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Ted Cruz

7 (6.5%)

Rick Santorum

16 (14.8%)

Michelle Bachmann

13 (12%)

Chris Christie

23 (21.3%)

Rand Paul

49 (45.4%)

Total Members Voted: 107

[misko27]

Now what Government Narrative? Who are these People in charge? Surely Obama and congressional leaders aren't making plans to disrupt protests. The Dept. of Justice? The FBI? NSA? Neither of the three previous have control over media.

[Sergarr]

At least in Germany, that was true. Occupy in my city was a bunch of dudes sitting around in a circle on a marketplace, with around a fifth of them being competent union activists, three fifths doing not much, and one fifth being paranoid about the gub'mint. Hell, one of them introduced himself by his internet nick (!), fearing that stating his real name might lead to surveillance!

*might*? It will. Without any real doubt.

[Darvi]

The Dept. of Justice? The FBI? NSA? Neither of the three previous have control over media.

Misko confirmed for undercover shill.

[GlyphGryph]

Now what Government Narrative? Who are these People in charge? Surely Obama and congressional leaders aren't making plans to disrupt protests. The Dept. of Justice? The FBI? NSA? Neither of the three previous have control over media.

The government doesn't have to have control over the media to introduce a competing narrative. And the Media generally doesn't bite unless it's in their own best interest.

I know you absolutely love to jump to conspiracies, which you've done time after fucking time, but that's not really the way the world tends to work. There was no conspiracy, and that's not what anyone was arguing. (Although there were a great many government organizations that had plans, many executed, some successful, to disrupt occupy, for obvious reasons, I'm pretty sure even you would admit that)

But if you think the government doesn't try to set narratives, and the media never decides to pick them up, well, I hear there's some weapons of mass destruction in Iraq we should probably get over there and deal with! :V

[Helgoland]

At least in Germany, that was true. Occupy in my city was a bunch of dudes sitting around in a circle on a marketplace, with around a fifth of them being competent union activists, three fifths doing not much, and one fifth being paranoid about the gub'mint. Hell, one of them introduced himself by his internet nick (!), fearing that stating his real name might lead to surveillance!

*might*? It will. Without any real doubt.

I think he meant being bugged and so on, not having his emails read by automated software. Also, that happens reagardless of whether you make an ass of yourself in public or not.

[Duuvian]

I remember reading that some wealthy individuals or organizations paid for insurance covering police actions for some of the departments involved in the crackdown on Occupy protests, meaning if the police were sued the insurance covered any costs. If I recall correctly the FBI was involved in the planning of this idea somehow but I might be wrong.

[SalmonGod]

I remember reading that some wealthy individuals or organizations paid for insurance covering police actions for some of the departments involved in the crackdown on Occupy protests, meaning if the police were sued the insurance covered any costs. If I recall correctly the FBI was involved in the planning of this idea somehow but I might be wrong.

This has been standard practice in dealing with major protest events for over a decade.  This allows police to use whatever means necessary to disperse and arrest protesters, without having to worry about what rights they're violating in the process.  You're probably recalling a big post I wrote about this previously.

[palsch]

Not specifically an American issue, but want to made a modest proposal with regards the American government.

A look at the 'demise' of TrueCrypt. It's an interesting story and this is a reasonably level-headed look at it (if you want conspiracy theories they are just a google away...).

But these parts stuck out;

But beyond that, the episode re-emphasizes the challenge of an “open source” method of security. ... As with Heartbleed, open source methods work only for as long as volunteers are willing to work on the project. ...

Finally, the episode serves to also illuminate how broken our system of security is. We can’t trust the government to provide it; we can’t trust private corporations to provide it; and we can’t rely on the kindness of strangers to provide it either. Unless you are one of the rare individuals who can build and install their own encryption code (I am =not=!) you are inevitably reliant on somebody else for your security. Yet nobody is somebody you can trust. And that leaves us hopelessly vulnerable – not just to mistrusted governments but to malevolent actors across the globe. The Russian cyber gangs must rejoice at the demise of TrueCrypt.

One thing the US fully has the power to do is create a cryptographic locker system that can be trusted. While there is absolutely no reason to trust any closed system created by the government, we are perfectly willing to use crypto algorithms created by them because they are open and tested widely. They originate from the government but by and large abide by the mathematical equivalent of open source philosophy. Hell, if they didn't they'd be useless to the government.

Is there any reason that a government with a strong interest in protecting individual privacy (stop sniggering), corporate security and general liberty couldn't pony up the investment and seed talent needed to create and manage an open source cryptographic locker similar to TrueCrypt? I mean, the corporate security angle alone is worthwhile.

As a rough outline;

1) The government provides funding to pay a full time development team to create and maintain the software. The team should be recruited from the general population.

2) The software in question should be mandated for use for all government agencies using on-disk cryptography, with all users required to use the latest official build (within reason).

3) Audit teams should be formed with rotating members to periodically do deep examinations of the software. These teams should include members from or nominated by various government departments as well as NGOs and other bodies. At a minimum I'd say you want permanent members from the DoD and NSA, as well as the ACLU, EFF and maybe straight up partisan political nominees from each party. Each audit completes a full report which is open to the public, along with any changes suggested and implemented by the coding team.

4) The code is fully open source, and public contributions are possible, but changes to the main build can only be implemented by the main team and official version releases are only done after a complete audit and report cycle. Licensing should allow alternative builds and parallel development efforts based on the code base.

[GlyphGryph]

Is anyone else weirded out by the consistently growing belief in "court magic"? An exasperated Canada wrote a document (http://www.albertacourts.ab.ca/jdb/2003-/qb/Family/2012/2012abqb0571ed1.pdf) about his dealings with a member of one of these groups, an OCPA guy, and its a good read, but these groups seem to have started in and are are of growing popularity in the US - Free Staters and Sovereign Citizens appear to be the two largest groups casting themselves as "legal wizards" (of the magical, rather than skilled, variety).

I'm honestly not even sure if this is the right thread for this, since the stuff is only superficially political. I just wanted to share that link - it's really good stuff.

[Bauglir]

I get the feeling that reading this would make Truean's head explode.

[Sirus]

I get the feeling that reading this would make Truean's head explode.

Oh, I'm sure she's heard all this and probably worse.

[Bauglir]

You know, that's a good point. Rather than head explode, her response would probably be closer to, "Oh, it's Thursday already, is it?"

[RedKing]

*reads PDF*


*head asplode by page 37*

[Culise]

Heh, that was worth the price of admission.  I love some of the snark that made it in here.  For instance, while discussing "magic hats" (that is, the term he uses for some particular pseudo-legal fiction(s) that, once donned, were intended to 'magically" protected the wearer from all court action, and could be doffed and replaced by another when convenient), and right between a discussion of "aboriginal immunity" (in the context of self-styled "Moors" who claim to be the original inhabitants of the American continent by virtue of a treaty with the Olmecs) and a discussion of immunity from taxation, this little gem of idiocy appears:

[312] Henry also has worn a literal ‘magic hat’! In the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench Henry v. Starwood Hotels (1 September 2010) Edmonton 1003-01152 (Alberta Q.B.) before Justice Shelley, Henry appeared wearing what is best described as ceremonial garb, with a robe and red fez, that he indicated had special significance. Subsequently, Henry has appeared in Chambers wearing what appeared to be a lawyer’s robes. It seems that Moorish Law advocates place special weight on court dress, particularly since Henry appealed Justice Shelley’s findings in part on the basis that he had garbed himself in a manner appropriate for the occasion, but she had not: Henry v. Starwood Hotels, 2010 ABCA 367 at para. 4, leave refused [2010] S.C.C.A. No. 475.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

68% of US supports euthanasia.