Carole Adams, Mom Who Lost Son In San Bernardino Shooting, Sides With Apple (washingtontimes.com) 341
HughPickens.com writes: The Washington Times reports that Carole Adams, the mother of Robert Adams -- a 40-year-old environmental health specialist who was shot dead in the San Bernardino, Calif., massacre by Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife in December -- is siding with Apple in its battle to protect consumer's privacy rights. Adams says she stands by Apple's decision to fight a federal court order to create software that would allow federal authorities to access the shooter's password-blocked iPhone. She understands the FBI's need to search Farook's phone, but says it has to be done without putting others at risk. "This is what separates us from communism, isn't it? The fact we have the right to privacy," she told the New York Post. "I think Apple is definitely within their rights to protect the privacy of all Americans. This is what makes America great to begin with, that we abide by a Constitution that gives us the right of privacy, the right to bear arms, and the right to vote."
Well, not "Communism".... (Score:5, Insightful)
...as1) even as a capitalist I acknowledge that the Soviet bloc wasn't Communist; 2) the US is already way more intrusive than even the Stasi could have dreamed of... ...but that said, hoorah for Carole Adams! She GETS it. If you give the government free reign over the people, rather than the other way round - and the government uses "terror!" as justification - then the terrorists are getting exactly what they wanted.
I.e. to side with Apple is to carry on with the free lifestyle that makes America a less-than-despotic place to live; to side with the government is to kowtow to terror AND to encourage more of it, as terrorists will be strengthened by the knowledge that it works.
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the US is already way more intrusive than even the Stasi could have dreamed of...
In the Soviet era, in the Eastern block, typewriters and photocopiers were licensed and closely watched, and ordinary people were restricted from owning one.
Here in the 'intrusive' US you could go to Sears or JC Penneys and buy a typewriter any time you wished.
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I'm not sure exactly what your argument is here. If you're saying the US Government doesn't impose as much restriction in order to carry out surv
Re:Well, not "Communism".... (Score:4, Interesting)
I worked in government (in a very relevant position to this argument).
The USG is significantly more intrusive and oppressive than the Stasi. You just haven't been exposed to it because they are very good and very evolved in their ways. They use Orwellian doublespeak to say they are "protecting the kids" and "defending your rights" and "stopping terrorists". Ever heard of the Constitution Free Zones? What about the Patriot Act? Ever seen a no-knock raid done for the 'war on drugs'? Ever heard of civil forfeiture? What about everything Edward Snowden whistleblew? The TSA grabbing your junk? The TSA or DHS searching your car and you at airports without a warrant? The IRS being used against conservative 501c3 organizations (and even genuine liberal ones too!). etc...
Mom and apple pie... (Score:2)
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In the world of Facebook, who has privacy anymore?
Those of us that care about protecting it, and don't use facebook.
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Facebook? You mean that thing I got tired of and quit posting to 3+ years ago?
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I use Facebook plenty, but you can control what is posted to it. I can't say Facebook has diminished my privacy in any meaningful way.
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In the world of Facebook, who has privacy anymore?
That's not a question as much as it is a statement.
Here, let me clarify.
Because of the world of Facebook, who wants privacy anymore.
Really? (Score:2)
The fact we have the right to privacy,
I seriously doubt that .
Right to Privacy (Score:5, Interesting)
Would it make much difference? Could the things that Snowden revealed have taken place if an explicit privacy amendment had existed? (Many here would argue that the 4th amendment ought to have prevented it, so what good would another amendment do?) Would the FBI have much of an argument against Apple if such an amendment existed? Could Google do what it does and not run afoul of violating citizens' privacy rights, a la the "right to be forgotten" rulings in Europe? Could Roe v. Wade, which hinged heavily on an implied right to privacy, ever be overturned?
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The constitution does not grant people rights; it grants the federal government rights. Anything not explicitly disallowed by the constitution (plus each state's constitution) is a right of the people. The constitution does not give the federal government the right to inhibit to privacy, therefor you have the right to it.
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The constitution does not give the federal government the right to inhibit to privacy, therefor you have the right to it.
Wow, that's spectacularly simple-minded.
The Constitution requires a periodic census. Doesn't that "inhibit privacy"?
The Constitution authorizes the government to raise and fund an army; this was widely understood from the very beginning to imply conscription. Doesn't that "inhibit privacy"?
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The beauty of the constitution is that is is so simple-minded. The first 3 words of the document are "We the people". "We the people" do hereby form a government and grant it the following explicit functions and duties. And just to make sure, there were 12 original Bill of Rights just to put an exclamation point on the fact that the people are the ones with the power and not the government. In fact, the current 10th amendment spells it out explicitly, that the powers not explicitly enumerated are reserved f
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A simple count of nameless people isn't much of an intrusion on privacy. Conscription is a complex and somewhat controversial case but privacy isn't really the problem with it.
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The Constitution requires a periodic census. Doesn't that "inhibit privacy"?
A census does not. What they actually do in the name of a census does.
Re:Right to Privacy (Score:4, Informative)
Using your logic, rights come from the government. This is sadly the biggest threat to our country - people like you who are un-educated or indoctrinated by a socialist government. If that's the kind of philosophy you want to live under, please go to Cuba, Venezuela, China, Italy, Spain, former USSR, and so on. In the USA, the government DOES NOT GIVE YOU RIGHTS. Rights are AUTOMATICALLY YOURS. What he said is 200% correct. The government can restrict some things if the Constitution ALLOWS the government to do so. That's why whenever you go to court, a lawyer will question the "authority" of something. If the government doesn't have the "authority" to do something, then it is illegal. This is why they are so afraid of Edward Snowden. They know they are violating the Constitution so they have to "classify" things in order to hide their illegal activities.
The term you used: "reasonable" is very nebulous and relativistic. This is the same relativistic argument that fascist, socialist (e.g. Nazis = National Socialism), communist governments use to enact incremental change. Think of all the WWII vets who are disgusted at what kids your age are willing to put up with in terms of governmental overreach.
Incidentally, it is not the job of the government to protect you domestically. That is your job (hence the 2nd ammendment). The government is supposed to protect the country (the people and land) using the military. This is why the civilian police cannot be prosecuted for "not protecting you" as has been re-clarified by several court cases where people tried to sue the police for not protecting them. Basically, the court said that protecting you is not the job of the police. The police are not there to jump on the grenade for you - only the military is.
The Matrix comes to mind.... you sound like someone who is so hopelessly lost in your misunderstanding of the world you have gained through careful and deliberate social programming from corporations (MSNBC, CNN, Fox, etc.) and the government (public education) that it would fundamentally destroy you to know what our country is really about.
Have a read about the 9th Amendment to the Constitution.
Wikipedia: Ninth Amendment
Main article: Ninth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.[78]
The Ninth Amendment clarifies that the specific individual rights stated in the Constitution, particularly in the Bill of Rights, does not constitute an explicit and exhaustive listing of all individual rights possessed by the people, and cannot be used by the federal government to increase its powers in areas not stated.
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Yes, they are illegal insomuch as they are not authorized by the constitution. Perhaps the interstate commerce clause is something that should be looked at.
And by the way, Very few prosecutions happen on a federal level compared to state laws concerning the same subjects. There is a reason for that and it happened to be because federal jurisdiction is not absolute.
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vague?
>The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated
Yeah no. not vague.
Re:Right to Privacy (Score:4, Informative)
There are lots of vague deductions, but the Constitution is perfectly clear: it ensures the right of people to be secure in their persons, homes, papers, and effects. It is reasonable to suggest that transmitting data over the internet, trusting in its care to someone else, relieves one of that security, but it is not reasonable whatsoever to suggest that the person or entity you are entrusting it to does not also have the right to be secure in their papers and effects.
Ultimately it doesn't really matter how we define "privacy" culturally, because there is basically no definition under which you could argue that the data on your smartphone is not part of one of those four categories. It only begins to get interesting when you reach the point where someone has encrypted data, is served a valid warrant, and refuses to decrypt it.
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There are lots of vague deductions, but the Constitution is perfectly clear: it ensures the right of people to be secure in their persons, homes, papers, and effects.
Yes, but that's not what the Supreme Court has invoked when it struck down laws against contraception, abortion and sodomy. The way it's been framed in US is as a right to non-interference in deeply personal and intimate matters. While that's certainly a question of freedom, for me that's not privacy. To me privacy is the degree to which the government can collect information on me, dealing with all aspects of that process. Like what sources they can use, what means they can use, to what degree or level of
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"There is no explicit right to privacy to be found anywhere in the Constitution or amendments."
There is no explicit right to breath either. There is, however, a pre-dating right of trespass and that is exactly what privacy was back then. You had land, you didn't want anyone on it then you could throw them off or stop them coming onto it without permission.
This isn't about the San Bernardino shooter (Score:2, Insightful)
CA and NY have proposed legislation to require that phones have law enforcement backdoors to encryption turned on by default. FBI director James Comey has testified before Congress saying they need the ability to read encrypted communications over services like iMessage. I don't think the FBI is picking this fight because they need information about the San Bernardino shooter. They're making a scene because they want backdoors to all encryption. While they may not be able to see the contents of messages sen
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I don't think the FBI is picking this fight because they need information about the San Bernardino shooter. They're making a scene because they want backdoors to all encryption.
Right. Seems like they picked this case because they don't anticipate either the judicial branch or the public siding with Apple against a terr'ist. Once they have precedent that Apple can be compelled to provide this service, they'll start using it to unlock phones of suspected marijuana dealers, etc. Same as the USA PATRIOT act, it was pushed through under the guise of fighting terrorism but is mostly used for drug cases [eff.org] instead.
God bless you, Carole Adams (Score:5, Insightful)
I know it's extremely unlikely you'll ever see this, but - thank you.
It's easy for those of us who haven't experienced a loss like this to weigh in with our opinions. In all honesty, I think these sorts of subjects are best discussed dispassionately, as much as possible. But, having said that, it takes a lot of character and wisdom to see what's important and to stand for your principles in a matter that has impacted you in such a horrible, tragic way.
Thank you.
Re:God bless you, Carole Adams (Score:5, Informative)
We had a similar thing here in Canada. The government, a conservative authoritarian law, order and national security type, kept trying to push through spying laws, in particular forcing ISPs to keep all kinds of data and give it to the government for the asking, because you know, getting a search warrant is too much hassle.
They started with the think of the children line and got a lot of push back when they called everyone child molesters, then tried the terrorist angle and still got enough push back to back down. Finally a 13 year old girl committed suicide due to online bullying and they managed to push through their law. The mother was on TV crying about as horrible as it was to lose her daughter, she did not want such an invasive law passed.
It was quite uplifting to see a mother who lost her young daughter still completely supporting our right to privacy.
Unluckily it also showed that the government can just keep trying to pass bad laws and the people will get tired of fighting it and eventually they'll succeed.
Re:God bless you, Carole Adams (Score:4, Insightful)
What principles is Carole Adams standing behind??
Not allowing her son to be used as a pawn in Comey's war on encryption.
I don't even (Score:5, Interesting)
I think Apple is definitely within their rights to protect the privacy of all Americans.
We're now in a world where a for-profit corporation (two, if you count Google) is directly battling the US Government to protect human rights. I'm don't know if there's even a term to describe this political/societal situation.
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Public relations. Both Apple and to a lesser extend Google have decided that globally it is better PR to fight to protect rights.
This can change really quick as both companies are most interested in profit.
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I certainly know the author, but haven't had a chance to look through his works. I'll definitely put it on my list; thanks.
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Interesting, but also missing the point.
Should I really care why Apple chose to fight against a government that wishes to act outside of its authority?
Imagine this was a manufacturer of a safe, they say the safe cannot be opened without destroying the contents. The government tells them to open the safe, or else. The company comes back with drawings, material lists, and so forth to back up their claim that the safe cannot be opened. A court orders them to open the safe. What do you expect them to say no
Thank you Carole Adams (Score:5, Insightful)
Everyone here appreciates your standing up for America's right to privacy and safety. Even the ones who nitpick about your using "communism" as a synonym for "authoritarian".
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All communist ideologues on this planet led the people to authoritarian systems.
I was born in the ex ussr, we were socialist, with communism always being 5 years into the future. I am against all authiritarian systems and i see socialism as authoritarian because it destroys private property rights, self determination. I am against all forms of redistribution, against all forms of income and wealth confiscation (taxation). I am not against voluntary communism as long as I am not forced to participate.
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I am against all forms of income and wealth taxes
Do you support any form of tax? I know you support contracts. So, who pays for the courts and enforcement?
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Do you support any form of tax? I know you support contracts. So, who pays for the courts and enforcement?
You already know the answer. Whoever has the money can afford "justice". Everyone else gets run over.
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Arguing against individual liberty, as always, i see? That is precisely what you have now, with government oppression.
Right. What is needed is a system which improves the situation, not more of the same.
You will get much more of that with more government oppression under a more collectivist system, whether socialist or fascist, doesn't matter much at all.
There is no evidence to support that. Increasing economic influence (currently corporate control) is associated with loss of human rights, and making people pay directly for their day in court will only make things worse, not better.
My position is freedom and liberty from oppressive governments and free market solution to everything that collectivism screwed horribly, including justice and police.
There is no such thing as a free market in the real world since it contains malicious actors, and the only way to even approach one is with regulation and control to prevent people from being ab
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"if your phone is stolen. Apple or the carrier could know exactly where it is because it's reporting its GPS coordinates back to them, they will not be able to tell you, the rightful owner, or law enforcement where the phone is. Because the privacy of the criminal in possession of your property outweighs your rights as the property owner."
Wrong. If your iPhone is stolen, you log onto icloud.com with your Apple ID and go to the Find My Phone app. It shows you exactly where your device is.
Ignoring the red peril aspects of what she's... (Score:5, Insightful)
...saying - she's correct.
That IS what made America a great country. That we weren't such cowards that we traded liberty for a false sense of security.
The red peril part is what's so perfect (Score:2)
No, no, the red peril is the best part of this! It was perfect.
Nothing undermines the government better than associating their behavior with that of totalitarian communism. It's so perfect because the irony is like kryptonite -- the security state always uses protecting freedom and the American way as their justification and mission, they can't possibly doing something in contradiction to their mission, can they?
It's like the Star Trek episode with Nomad, where their give it an illogical problem to solve
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This woman is either a idiot savant, or she's a political genius who should have run for office
Or she's a normal 60 year-old woman of average intelligence, who lived through the Cold War and isn't a poli-sci major, and therefore conflates authoritarianism and communism because for most of her life political discourse drew no distinction between the two. So she just used what she knew to be a pointed "synonym" for authoritarianism.
The fact that this is a beautiful smear of the government policy was intentional, but inevitably so, not due to particular cleverness on her part. The reason "communism" i
Slavery (Score:5, Insightful)
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Apparently the government has asked Apple to undertake a very exhaustive and expensive effort to develop new software to enable breaking the encryption.
Uh no. It would be a trivial job. While it might be slavery, it would be microslavery at most, little more arduous than being legally required to cross streets at crosswalks when they are provided. The problem is the ramifications for users, not for the developer who would have to do the work.
Amend the constitution.... (Score:2)
IF you guys in the USA want the government 100% access to your gadgets, passwords, bank accounts and all other accounts and family settlements then why not set up some sort of constitutional amendment? HOW EASY WOULD THAT BE?
Of course you could continue as the USA and GB are doing and get the data anyway by hook or crook and fudge.
A tipping moment for you guys. Obviously going to the Supreme Court. (Watching with cynical interest.)
To me, everybody is missing the point (Score:2)
The presumption is that apple can update the OS running in the phone in a way that it circumvents the cryptography in the phone, i.e. disables the HW mechanism securing the key storage.
There are several options:
a) the keystore mechanisms (which i would have supposed to be on a lower level) ignores such a change.
a1) the keystore mechanism accepts "signed binaries" as OS (like TPM does), which makes the request to apple less a "make changes to the OS" but more a "sign off the changes for us"
b) it does not ign
Re:Nope (Score:4, Insightful)
In her favor, her son was 40, so she is at least late 50s, if not much older. She grew up with the cold war and having to fight the dirty pinko bastards who spy on their own.
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It would be wise to remember that Americans began to question authority and their own government in large numbers in the 60's.
Perhaps that reckoning is just as influential as any lessons ingrained during the Cold War.
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It would be wise to remember that Americans began to question authority and their own government in large numbers in the 60's.
Questioning our government started with the Revolution.
Re:Nope (Score:5, Insightful)
As opposed to Joe McCarthy and J Edgar?
Re: Nope (Score:2)
Your riposte tells me you might not be aware of just how much the commies spied on their own.
The Stasi are just one example of a practice that is/was a hallmark of all communist states.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stasi
These guys didn't abuse their power, their entire purpose was to take snitching and spying on your own to an industrial level.
Comparing current US security institutions' spying to commie spying can be rightfully construed as insulting to the employees of said institutions.
The woman is spot
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Indeed. And she will have been told that "communism" means "no personal freedom and no privacy". A few decades earlier she might have heard the same thing about fascism. Important thing is that she understands privacy is important and that the FBI (and others) are threatening it. And that she speaks up about it.
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Re:Nope (Score:5, Insightful)
In the sense of "Russia" (meaning the USSR) and East Germany and their extensive spying on their own citizens, then yes.
She grew up in an era where it was common to conflate communism (the economic system) with poverty and an Orwellian government such as the USSR. She likely learned it that way in school.
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That's basically what communism is. (Score:2)
History has taught us that communism leads to poverty and Orwellian government control. The former is a consequence of removing the incentive for innovation & hard work, the latter is necessary to enforce a planned economy and to prevent an uprising once the population notices that the grass sure looks greener on the capitalist side of the fence.
Re:That's basically what communism is. (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't think we can say that history shows communism leads to poverty. Most nations that attempt communism are already poor and rarely get any worse. The USSR actually became less poor under communism than it had been under capitalism, and has again struggled to develop post-communism. The best case example would be East Germany, but even they started in poverty after WWII and we can't prove they'd have developed as fast as West Germany with capitalism if both halves were left to their own devices. Maybe you could make a case out of China, but that's more about Mao's personal mistakes.
Orwellian government control, on the other hand, does appear to be a near-universal result -- presumably because the wealthy won't give up their property voluntarily and thus an oppressive government enforcement system is necessary.
Re:That's basically what communism is. (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually no. Pure Communism is a benign society that actually does very well. In fact, the US and Canada have many examples of it with the Amish and Hutterite colonies. The problem is SCALE. Both of these groups know if the colony gets too large - more than a few hundred members, the societal ties that make Communism work start to break down, which is why once a certain size is reached the colony sends a large chosen section of its members off to start another colony.
When you try to apply Communism to a country, you inevitably end up with a hellish blend of Communism and Totalitarianism to try and keep control of the monster.
It's about a totalitarian society (Score:2)
The problem arises from a totalitarian society, which can exist at both extremes, whether is is left or right. We saw this in the USSR, but we also saw this with Hitler's Germany. In certain way we are seeing elements of this in the current UK system, which while not being far right has an extrodinary amount of monitoring.
Getting the balance of freedom and checking for dangerous societal elements is hard, but important if we aren't to slip into constant oversight and control.
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In the sense of "Russia" (meaning the USSR) and East Germany and their extensive spying on their own citizens, then yes.
She grew up in an era where it was common to conflate communism (the economic system) with poverty and an Orwellian government such as the USSR. She likely learned it that way in school.
With all due respect to the KGB and the Stasi, I think organisations like the NSA and it's various friends and allies around the world have developed information gathering capabilities the KGB and Stasi could not even have dreamt of for the simple reason that they would not have been able to conceive of a future where such things were possible. Comparing what the NSA and co. are doing to the Soviet/E-German mass surveillance systems is like comparing a 1975 Ford Escort with a Tesla Model X.
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You're a deep and confusing person aren't you?
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Yes, they have much better tech for it now than KGB and Stasi did. Worse, they are developing a taste for using it en masse now. The NSA and FBI are doing their best to turn us into the once hated commies.
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If only there was someone in charge that we could blame and hold accountable for the action of the NSA and FBI. Problem is, most of the people here voted for that person, so that's not really a possibility.
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Indeed. Not really less propaganda in the "free" world, only more freedom to ignore it if you notice what is going on.
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It is still appropriate to conflate communism with poverty and orwellian governments. History and reality have not changed. What has changed is the political makeup of the education system. If one is taught by communists, obviously negative experiences will be left out of the curriculum.
Re:Nope (Score:5, Insightful)
Please understand that this is a 60-year-old or so woman. She grew up with the Cold War. Don't hold this woman to the standards that you would someone who has learned about systems of government from textbooks. To her, communist is a synonym for authoritarian. Communists were all about "papers, please" and preventing their citizenry from critique or even travel.
Re:Nope (Score:5, Insightful)
Please understand that this is a 60-year-old or so woman. She grew up with the Cold War. Don't hold this woman to the standards that you would someone who has learned about systems of government from textbooks. To her, communist is a synonym for authoritarian. Communists were all about "papers, please" and preventing their citizenry from critique or even travel.
One of the grand flaws most people have is failing to understand an issue from any point of view other than their own.
You do not have this issue, you have put yourself in this woman's shoes and seen the light from her angle.
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She's not "brainwashed". She lived through (or just shortly after) both Stalin and Mao. That communism does not necessarily imply authoritarianism is purely academic - anyone who lived through the cold war can certainly be forgiven from learning that the two seemed to go together in practice. Perhaps this woman seems ignorant to a poli-sci major. She probably feels the same way about ivory tower types with no sense of reality.
In any event, whether she used the words "authoritarian" or "communist", her meani
Non-authoritarian communist countries? (Score:2)
Can you provide a list of these, please?
Maybe this woman understands how authoritarianism is an inevitable consequence of communism.
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Don't hold this woman to the standards that you would someone who has learned about systems of government from textbooks.
Communism has always sounded much more viable when described in a textbook than when implemented in practice.
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Communism has always sounded much more viable when described in a textbook than when implemented in practice.
This. The problem with communism is that it goes completely against the inherently selfish nature of humans. And no, you can't change people to be more accepting of it. Every single time it has been tried, it has failed. (With the possible exception of China, but who really wants to live there?) There will always be those among us who strive for greatness, not to serve humanity at large, but because of self-interest. It is this desire that has led to much of human progress. The problem with communism is tha
Re: Nope (Score:2)
People arenâ(TM)t inherently selfish. Iâ(TM)m very generous to my family and friends. Iâ(TM)m even sufficiently generous that I donâ(TM)t grumble too much at my taxes because I know that other people need that money. I donâ(TM)t want to be the sort of person that denies the needy when I can afford to help.
But thereâ(TM)s a matter of scale and community at work here. Iâ(TM)m not so generous that I want to give you money (sorry). I donâ(TM)t know you. I donâ(TM)t e
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But has any communist government ever respected rights? No.
I am not sure Cuba's government has the appropriate infrastructure to invade its citizen's privacy
Public behavior is watched through local groups, but that is not enough to spy private life
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Sweden.
On a somewhat related note, I'm thinking about joining the Swedish Communist Party, just to piss off the Stas---er, NSA.
Ett spöke går runt Europa - kommunismens spöke. Alla gamla Europas makter har ingått en helig hetsjakt mot detta spöke... Proletärer i alla länder, förena er!
After more than a century, in any language, those words still scare the almighty shit out of the privileged class. I love it.
Re: Nope (Score:5, Insightful)
First of all, you have no idea what a republican or what communism is... that's ok... 99% of the people in the world don't.
American republicans have pretty much absolutely nothing to do with what a republican is. In fact, a republican and a communist is almost the same thing. Compare Marx and Plato's writings and you'll find they're very similar by Plato comes dangerously close to Scientology at times.
I am for example a communist... and I am a capitalist. I earn as much money as I need and then quite a bit more to pay large amounts of taxes to attempt to redistribute wealth so the guy working at the gas station around the corner for minimum wage will have additional money to live closer by or afford the higher cost of commuting to work. I don't resent him for not trying harder to be more in life. If everyone did, then who would run the gas station which I need. So, I need him to be satisfied collecting the salary his boss pays him while my tax money helps subsidize his income to make him feel motivated enough to do a good job without fear of greater monthly debt.
Welfare is an incredibly important component of civilization. I makes it possible for all of us to benefit. In order for my personal wealth to increase, the general value of said wealth needs to decrease through inflation. Therefore as I earn more, the money I "borrowed" when I was younger will be less expensive for me to pay as I get older. The lower earning classes will continue to be paid less and their ability to negotiate better wages will impede their ability to increase at the same rate as the people like me. They also won't accumulate as much legitimate debt that will leave them with assets increasing in value while the debt decreases. As such, they will never establish themselves and will always require our assistance to provide the services we need like washing the car, mowing the lawn, cleaning the house, etc...
So we pay welfare which is basically paying the wages we should have payed at the cash register to Walmart but instead, we trust the government to pass the additional cost to the people who work at Walmart more than we trust Walmart who actually pays dividends each quarter roughly equal to the amount of welfare being paid to their employees. By doing so, we produce more jobs... at walmart... requiring more welfare to be paid... to allow higher dividends to be paid... to produce more jobs.... etc...
The truth is, whether you support communism and wealth redistribution or not, it will happen all the same
Either you choose to structure a system which supports keeping these people fed, healthy and hopefully with enough money that they can in fact budget it and make do... or you force them into higher paying position leaving the service industry stripped of the labor.... or you leave it as it is, with millions of people digging deeper debt... systems tightening the nooses on them... people being forced more and more into desperation and desperate acts... then people going to prison for trying to steal money to buy milk for their hungry babies... then you can pay to support the p
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Re:Nope (Score:4, Insightful)
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Provided the iPhone is San Bernardino's county property, the privacy issue is nullified. Apple should stop playing the wrong game here and give the FBI what it asks for in this particular case, given everyone knows Apple's security is an illusion anyway. To crack a 4 digit password by brute force attack you simply need to have the delay between attempts set to 0 and the code wiping the data on the iPhone being neutralized. Which is a two lines of code modification in the firmware. No magic here. WIth a 4 digit password using potentially 75 different characters (upper/lower case + number + special characters) you have to try 30 million combinations at most. Something that can be easily done without any specialized hardware or on-steroids computer.
The security is just something you get because someone cannot try 30 million combinations in minutes on your iPhone because he has to wait a few seconds between each trial and is limited in the number of trials before cracking the iPhone becomes useless due to data deletion.
They already likely have the meta data and all history of calls/tests to/from that number. Isn't that enough?
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They already likely have the meta data and all history of calls/tests to/from that number. Isn't that enough?
And probably more, judging by the reports of "accidental" or "automated" collection of data, which they do not include as surveillance. To answer your question, though, no, that is not enough, because that is nominally illegal.
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Re:Nope (Score:5, Insightful)
Provided the iPhone is San Bernardino's county property, the privacy issue is nullified. Apple should stop playing the wrong game here and give the FBI what it asks for in this particular case, given everyone knows Apple's security is an illusion anyway.
This isn't about the San Bernardino shooter's privacy, it's about other iPhone customers' privacy (and by extension, all citizens who would like to be secure in their pap-- use encryption)
To crack a 4 digit password by brute force attack you simply need to have the delay between attempts set to 0 and the code wiping the data on the iPhone being neutralized.
Which is why Apple made prevented this from happening on their device through firmware, while simultaneously requiring that to be signed by Apple.
The security is just something you get because someone cannot try 30 million combinations in minutes on your iPhone because he has to wait a few seconds between each trial and is limited in the number of trials before cracking the iPhone becomes useless due to data deletion.
Kind of at odds with what you said earlier, don't you think? Let's take a look again:
Apple's security is an illusion anyway
It's hardly an illusion if it would take literal years to brute force, and only then if you didn't enable the option to auto-wipe your phone after x number of unsuccessful attempts. How is that illusory at all?
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Can they even do that? I don't see why apple would be making a fuss if it were just about the terrorists phone. Aren't the FBI asking for all iPhones to be back-doored so that they can get easy access in the future.
Sounds
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Apple should stop playing the wrong game here and give the FBI what it asks for in this particular case, given everyone knows Apple's security is an illusion anyway.
You are probably the only one who doesn't realise how stupid it is what you are saying. If Apple's security "is an illusion", then what the fuck is the FBI doing, asking them to unlock that phone?
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Yes, and much like games consoles, the device is designed to resist hacking attempts even by someone who has physical access - and for exactly the same reason. The best technicians the government has might be able to carefully open up a chip enclosure in a cleanroom and find the right places to apply probes, but they'd risk destroying it in the attempt.
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There's almost no system possible that is less communist than the theocratic oligarchy that Americans currently live in. You really should look up what "communist" means.
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I had a conversation the other day with two brothers. One is a doctor that works for the CDC, the other is a college professor of philosophy. The subject of healthcare came up, and they both told me we need to move to single payer. They said people couldn't comprehend the multitude of health insurance option available to them so we needed to create a law that simplified it with a one size fits all solution. I said "so basically you're saying that Americans are too dumb to decide for themselves what is i
Re: Nope (Score:5, Informative)
I love it when people defend our current health care system. The abomination that is our current system is utterly indefensible. If we had set out to create such a fucked up system we could not have achieved it. The levels of stupidity, inefficiency, and insanity which are present in every single facet of our health care system boggle the fucking mind. There is no one left in America who does not know someone personally who is going/has gone bankrupt due to medical bills. So defending this system when so many people are suffering under it is the absolute height of willful ignorance. But then again willful ignorance is the hallmark of our age. There are no people left in America who are "ignorant" about such things. Which is why arguing with people about whether global warming/climate change is real or man-made is so futile. Americans have become so cynical that hardly anyone gives a flying fuck about any so-called truth.
I guess what kills me the most is not that so many Americans are willfully ignorant about so damned much, for frankly the "truth" is about as relevant as my asshole, but that willful ignorance absolves one of any culpability for any basic level of personal honesty or integrity. Now of course willful ignorance is almost synonymous with "opinion", and everyones got one right? If I meet someone who face to face lies to me about shit they know is true they simply will never get to know me, their loss. I don't argue with them, not anymore, they don't respect themselves enough to be worth it. We may not agree with one another on suggested solutions(single-payer vs. x number of alternatives), but defending what we currently have ?really? I won't engage in that kind of intellectual dishonesty, and you can call it an opinion, but we know what it is. Maybe someday you'll join us, looking forward to getting to know you.
But having said all that, one of the greatest freedoms is the freedom to be full of shit. And I am mighty glad that we have that freedom, for if it were not for the right to be full of shit, there would be remarkably little humor in the world and we would be poorer for it. So instead of walking around with hatred towards my fellow Americans, most of the time, I succeed in realizing that there is just a very fashionable level of bullshit which has become normative, and I allow humor to overcome my anger and simply laugh at that for which it is-bullshit.
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Every time you construct a massive generalisation of millions of people you might as well replace it with the following text:
"I do not understand nor care for logic. I am willing to say whatever I want in order to attempt to win an argument or make a point. I don't care if I am posting absolute nonsense - just me hammering out words is enough for me. Screw everyone who reads this".
You are not very good at thinking logically, clearly.
Re:Why is her opinion relevant? (Score:5, Insightful)
Because the FBI is trying to play on emotion and sympathy for the victims and their families to get what it wants. They made her opinion relevant by trying to use her in that sympathy ploy.
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If her opinion as an involved party is irrelevant then your opinion as a yap-flapper on Slashdot is even less than irrelevant. It's a waste of electrons' time. Won't someone think of the electrons?
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If you know and have talked with people that lived in the USSR in it's heyday, you know that she's right. People didn't have privacy in that society. When the concept of private property went out of style, so to did the concept of personal privacy - not just privacy from the government, but from others as well.
My parents left England partially due to the lack of privacy, not from the government but from the neighbours. While there is some small truth to the saying that if you have nothing to hide, the government won't bother you, that is not true for the common people who will shame you for the smallest transgression such as not keeping your steps well enough scrubbed.
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My parents left England partially due to the lack of privacy, not from the government but from the neighbours.
That sounds... extreme. Dickhead neighbours exist everywhere in the world. Generally one doesn't need to move quite that far from them.
that is not true for the common people who will shame you for the smallest transgression such as not keeping your steps well enough scrubbed.
Social pressure cuts both ways. It's that social pressure that also stops many front yards looking like a hoarder lives there.
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Read Daily Mail Online. People there still get reamed for offenses of this kind.
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Fuck karma.
I'm guessing he's about 13, thinks he's clever, and he's apparently stuck in that wonderful moment when Junior or Missy first learns the word "No" that usually occurs around age 3.
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One thing is that it would set a dangerous precedent. One thought is that this is why the FBI are trying so hard to get this done. Farook destroyed both his and his wifes personal phones beyond recovery, and hid their computers hard drive (no doubt destroyed that as well). The iPhone in question was his work phone and it's likely that there's nothing of actual use on it (though we'll never know, even if the order goes through).
If the FBI can get Apple to do this, then it will be much easier the next time