Letters to the Editor
Scientician
Published Letters: 525 Editor's Choice: 1
-
NotOrbitBoy
[Read the article: What FISA capitulations are Democrats planning next?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]@ Scientician: How does the spying empower Bush? Any evidence that they have used it against political opponents? (reminds me of the ex-bouncer in the Clinton admin who got FBI files on Republicans). If Bush is spying on political opponents, why are they giving him the go ahead to keep it up? Do you know more than his opponents do?
I don't have to prove he's abusing it. That's not how power works in a free society. The onus is on the government to show the power is being used responsibly.
So, how do you know he isn't abusing it?
You are demonstrating a highly authoritarian mindset regarding Bush. Ok, so that "ex bouncer" from the Clinton admin abused his power (I have no idea what you're talking about, but I'll go with it) - so would you fear a new Clinton administration might abuse these powers? It doesn't have to be Bush abusing it, it could be any president.
I quoted Nixon because we know for a fact that a past president did spy on his political opponents with absolutely no national security reason.
This is elementary governance. Nobody gets spying power with impunity. It doesn't work any other way.
-
Conservativeslayer:
[Read the article: What FISA capitulations are Democrats planning next?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]You're replying to "notorbitboy" but you quoted it as if I wrote that.
But good reply to the sentiment notorbitboy expressed anyway.
(just protecting my psuedononymous reputation)
-
Government by Wikipedia
[Read the article: Joe Klein's defense of warrantless eavesdropping and telecom amnesty]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"Assume good faith" is the principle by which wiki editors are supposed to settle differences when wrangling over articles.
While it keeps the acrimony to a low boil, and has some effect for a place like Wikipedia, since when did this become the operating principle for th US government?
Sorry McConnell is making bad faith edits to the US code. Revert all changes and ban his IP.
-
roystgnr, on encryption
[Read the article: The conservative vision of America, by National Review]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I don't doubt that Al Qaeda and other terrorists do use encryption and various other means of obscuring their communications.
However, I don't doubt for a second that the NSA keeps a stable of mathematicians on staff whose job it is to break such codes.
Encryption isn't such a barrier to an organization with the computing power of the NSA behind it. Even if they have to brute force break a well encrypted message, they could do it.
Worse, many commercially available encryption technologies are flawed such that adept people can break the messages without resorting to brute force methods. As always, the the problems of key transmission exist. Most commercial encryption works on the basis that it's not worth someone's time to break AES-128 just to get your credit card info. But if the message encoded is the location of Osama Bin Laden, or the Colonel's secret recipe, than it becomes worth investing more time to break it.
Also, recently the Chinese announced they broke the SHA-1 hash algorythm. SHA-2 is still safe as far as we know, but for how long? Also, it tells us the NSA isn't the only ones working to break various encryption technologies in non-linear ways.
It is a cat-and-mouse game, and this is one area where I will give a decisive advantage to the NSA over the terrorists. You just can't shoestring substitute the banks of supercomputers and PhD mathematician code-breakers.
-
The Update is the best part
[Read the article: Nepotistic tough guys and their coddling parents]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]They actually have the temerity to write apologetics to nepotism and cronyism? Uproarious.
The bootstraps/umbilical cords line deserves to become an internet meme. Hopefully other bloggers will take it up.
I'm thinking we can get some mileage constantly jabbing all these guys as mamma's boys and daddy's little helpers. Ridicule and satire are a vital element in crushing their political influence.
Oh, and note to Glenn, you used "meretricious" in a comment where I believe you meant "meritorious." Meretricious refers to an argument that is plausible but false, and the implication is that the arguer knows its false. A disingenuous person uses a meretricious argument.