Leaked 'Standing Rock' Documents Reveal Invasive Counterterrorism Measures (theintercept.com) 310
An anonymous reader writes:
"A shadowy international mercenary and security firm known as TigerSwan targeted the movement opposed to the Dakota Access Pipeline with military-style counterterrorism measures," reports The Intercept, decrying "the fusion of public and private intelligence operations." Saying the private firm started as a war-on-terror contractor for the U.S. military and State Department, the site details "sweeping and invasive" surveillance of protesters, citing over 100 documents leaked by one of the firm's contractors.
The documents show TigerSwan even havested information about the protesters from social media, and "provide extensive evidence of aerial surveillance and radio eavesdropping, as well as infiltration of camps and activist circles... The leaked materials not only highlight TigerSwan's militaristic approach to protecting its client's interests but also the company's profit-driven imperative to portray the nonviolent water protector movement as unpredictable and menacing enough to justify the continued need for extraordinary security measures... Internal TigerSwan communications describe the movement as 'an ideologically driven insurgency with a strong religious component' and compare the anti-pipeline water protectors to jihadist fighters."
The Intercept reports that recently "the company's role has expanded to include the surveillance of activist networks marginally related to the pipeline, with TigerSwan agents monitoring 'anti-Trump' protests from Chicago to Washington, D.C., as well as warning its client of growing dissent around other pipelines across the country." They also report that TigerSwan "has operated without a license in North Dakota for the entirety of the pipeline security operation."
The documents show TigerSwan even havested information about the protesters from social media, and "provide extensive evidence of aerial surveillance and radio eavesdropping, as well as infiltration of camps and activist circles... The leaked materials not only highlight TigerSwan's militaristic approach to protecting its client's interests but also the company's profit-driven imperative to portray the nonviolent water protector movement as unpredictable and menacing enough to justify the continued need for extraordinary security measures... Internal TigerSwan communications describe the movement as 'an ideologically driven insurgency with a strong religious component' and compare the anti-pipeline water protectors to jihadist fighters."
The Intercept reports that recently "the company's role has expanded to include the surveillance of activist networks marginally related to the pipeline, with TigerSwan agents monitoring 'anti-Trump' protests from Chicago to Washington, D.C., as well as warning its client of growing dissent around other pipelines across the country." They also report that TigerSwan "has operated without a license in North Dakota for the entirety of the pipeline security operation."
Priorities (Score:5, Insightful)
And this is legal how? Yet, don't copy that floppy or you'll get 10 years in a FPMITA prison.
Re:Priorities (Score:4, Interesting)
TigerSwan was acting on behalf of the Pipeline company, which having invested large sums and built nearly the entire pipeline before this even became an issue, had a right to try to protect their operations and investment from protestors trying to damage their operations and equipment. TigerSwan broke no laws in their collection of information about potential threats to their employer's equipment, personnel and operations.
Such a security company would of course be in contact with police agencies. I would be more concerned had they been operating without such contacts. The fact that they are passing information about what they are observing and their actions, indicates that they were concerned about not stepping across the line into illegal actions.
If someone can point to documents showing where the government agencies (local, state or federal) tasked them to collect such information then we have crossed into illegal actions. But all this "report" states is that they coordinated with law enforcement which means they provided information about what they were doing and seeing. Unless tasked to collect the information (thus making them an agent of the government) they are free to collect any information they so choose (as long as the collection method is not illegal but this article gave no indication of such).
Disagreeing with the pipeline does not make the pipeline company, or it's security company lawbreakers. Before you claim illegal or unconstitutional activities, you must know what qualifies as such.
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It's legal because TigerSwan was not operating on behalf of the government. The Constitution and the Bill of Rights restrict the actions of the government and of private companies and individuals acting on behalf of the government.
Absolutely false: nothing in the Bill of Rights prevents the application of fundamental rights against private entities. Claims to the contrary are pure myth. Certain specific items, such as the 1st Amendment, are limited to specific government entities - though even in these cases the 14th Amendment muddies the waters.
The open-ended items such as the 9th Amendment (unspecified rights retained by the people) and the the 10th Amendment (the part about unspecified rights reserved to the people) are not at a
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What exactly shouldn't be legal?
What the "there" there? (Score:2)
How is it illegal? Free country, remember? Everything, that is not explicitly prohibited, is implicitly allowed. Not the other way around.
There is nothing mentioned in the write-up, that should required a license...
Re: Priorities (Score:5, Insightful)
Many of the protesters, like my roommate, were paid
Of course they were. And Santa Claus helped as well since it's his off season.
This is like listening to RT or the lies coming out of Putin's mouth. Any time anyone disagrees with the government confiscating people's lands they're suddenly "subversive" or an "NGO" whose sole job is to take down the government.
The amount of disinformation is staggering and the worst part is the uneducated deplorables who voted for the con artist believe it.
Re: Priorities (Score:5, Informative)
Anytime Americans have taken a stance that conflicts with the status quo, there has been violence:
The Haymarket Riot [wikipedia.org] is just one of many occasions the US Government in it's many forms has used violence against workers.
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And still the last commenter didn't suggest that you should listen to anything RT is "reporting".
Propagands doesn't become true just because it supports your viewpoint. And even if some propaganda outlet reports something that is true, that doesn't make them a credible source for it.
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Re: Priorities (Score:4, Informative)
Did the protestors engage in anything illegal?
Yes. We don't even have to get into the gigantic mountain of trash they left once they weather turned and they went home. They trespassed repeatedly, blocked public roads - plenty of illegal things. But because they were well funded and backed by know-nothing celebrities, the usual get-yourself-arrested stuff wasn't worth the trouble to prosecute. It was obvious they were going to pull an Occupy Everything and wander off when it became inconvenient to stay. But other people still had to spend weeks cleaning up after them and trucking off their trash and abandoned dogs.
Re: Priorities (Score:5, Interesting)
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Legal means nothing. It's legal in North Korea to be locked up for saying li'l Kim is an idiot.
Re: Priorities (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh gosh, to mean the left is so terrible as to require open and public documentation of who is seeking to influence the government?
And then they expect to have the right to comment, criticize, and reject other people whose actions they find objectionable? My word, the horror.
Why, it is just like the boycott of South Africa over apartheid. Truly, the left is an abomination.
Of course, the fact that the hypocritical right calls for the firing or arrest of people who disagree with their views, tends to spoil your moral indignation. I've even heard a lot of Trump supporters say that people who oppose him should be deported.
Yammer all you want, you are just a phony.
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It's all their land.
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None of this occurred on tribal lands. It all occurred on Public roads through privately owned farmlands.
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Memorial Day is a good day to learn something new.
http://inter-american-law-revi... [miami.edu]
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Because laws are made by people. If those people are assholes, upholding those laws support a bad cause.
For reference, see Germany 1934-1945.
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There are illegal actions that will not result in convictions for various reasons. Among those are refusal to prosecute, insufficient evidence, and sympathetic judges and juries. Speeding to the hospital is illegal and frequently dangerous. Breaking into houses is criminal, but in practice there will be no prosecution unless the homeowner wants it. People who took marijuana for the best of reasons have wound up behind bars, because it's illegal.
Illegal actions can be extremely praiseworthy, but they'
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cremier is that you?
Re: Priorities (Score:3)
The things you mentioned are mechanisms to stop a prosecution. They are not reasons or legal principles to do so. A defendant can't appear in court and demand nolle prosequi. A defendant (or counsel) who even mentioned jury nullification in court would be found in contempt. A defendant moving for judicial dismissal would be told to explain why such dismissal is proper and required.
Re: Priorities (Score:5, Insightful)
Ah - then unconstitutional search and seizure is fully justified in protecting the motherland komrade - carry on.
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And if you were REALLY worried about constitutional matters, you'd be talking about last week's report about the FISA court's scathing rebuke of the Obama administration's funneling of NSA-collected surveillance of US citizens through the FBI to third parties, without any warrants or other court cover. I know, just because the court told them specifically to stop that
Re: Priorities (Score:2)
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Re: Priorities (Score:4, Insightful)
TFA is about a private company. Private companies cannot engage in "unconstitutional search and seizure" because they can't engage in "search and seizure" at all; that's a right reserved to the government.
Private companies do have a constitutional right to "harvest information about the protesters from social media", engage in "aerial surveillance and radio eavesdropping", and "infiltrate camps and activist circles" (as long as they don't violate private property rights or break into computer systems illegally).
Those are rights that we have because we live in a free society. People like you have not yet succeeded turning the US into a totalitarian state, much as you may want to, "komrade".
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Before you go lecturing other people, you might want to be more careful with your language. Governments don't have rights, they have *powers*. It is humans that have rights.
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We often refer to government powers as "government rights". That's why we talk about, for example, "states' rights". We tend to use the term "power" with government when emphasizing the limits on government power, and we tend to use the term "right" when emphasizing a power that a governmental entity has relative to some other entity. I hope that clears up your confusion.
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When "we" use the word "rights" about governments, we are being "stupid dickheads who fail to understand basic political concepts", even if we can find "historical precedent" in the words of "slave-owning racist assholes from the Civil War era" or make spurious and completely circular distinctions between "power being about the limits of government power, whereas rights are about government powers cf another body". I hope that clears things up for you.
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No, the owners of companies have rights. Do you think that people should be stripped of their rights just because they get together and do something socially useful?
Re: Priorities (Score:4, Insightful)
>> Did the protestors engage in anything illegal?
>
> Yes.
So did Rosa Parks.
Fuckwit.
Re: Priorities (Score:5, Funny)
Source: my other roommate says so.
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Who paid him or her?
(Note that professional coordinators are a different issue. Effective protests often need expertise these days. There is a difference between paying people to organise and paying people to show up. That's true no matter what side you're on.)
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Many of the protesters, like my roommate, were paid and had professionals help coordinate their actions, so why would it be illegal for the other side to do the same.
An AC said it so it must be true!
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Your roommate has access to military hardware and military training in counter intelligence? Damn, those protesters really are better organized than I gave them credit!
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Paid to protest? Oh sure. Where do I sign up? You are so full of it. Please dear AC tell us all where we can sign up to get paid to protest pipelines. Or did you mean you get paid in cheap hot dogs and bug juice?
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They're fighting for what is right so the people working for the corporations shouldn't be allowed the same rights.
The protestors (sic) are on the right side so it should be legal for them to but not legal for the other side.
Did I stumble across the fucking Onion dressed up as Slashdot?
Are you fucking kidding me?
Re: Priorities (Score:5, Insightful)
No, actually, the ACLU has fought for the KKK [upi.com] to get parade permits.
The ACLU should fight for American Civil Liberties. It is in the name. Their work is even more precious now than ever. Civil liberties does not mean just protecting causes you like.
Where Trump and his ilk can never ever be forgiven is not a freedom of speech or protest issue. He has the freedom of speech. His supporters have the right to protest and all the rest. We dare not take either away.
What can not and must not ever be forgiven is the attack on truth and the press and all rational voices of reason. To Trump nothing matters but winning. How doesn't matter. The subject matter doesn't matter. Do you think he cares about health care, that it is the cause of his life? Please, he doesn't appear to care at all beyond using it as a piggy bank to finance tax cuts that likely benefit himself disproportionately.
He manipulated the media to keep their eyes on him. He treated his much more qualified opponents like children by calling them childish names, and wouldn't you know it, I think almost every attack he made was something he himself was guilty of. Lying Ted. Crooked Hillary. He frequently and repeatedly accused experts of being complete and total morons, while saying only he knew the secret plan, and people bought it and still buy it. Hell a guy just body slammed a reporter and many of Trump's supporters think that is just and right.
Many seek the Road Map to Peace for the Israel Palestine conflict, but make no mistake people, with Trump we have our own Journey and I rather fear it will be more like a Nature Trail to Hell. Trump's bravado has already failed on North Korea, and if anything actually accelerated their efforts. That alone is an almost unsolvable problem. Bravado won't fix it. Our invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan probably precipitated their faster development. A military solution might be required. The key is to somehow make China comfortable with a reunited Korea and then maybe announce a plan to take back the land over a period of 30 years or something and I have no idea how to do that. If you could manage that, then If every move was careful, and you didn't threaten North Korea's current leaders you might survive a game of brinkmanship, maybe, but I sure as hell would not want a President Trump involved in such a mess. I'd rather have any of the other republicans first, well except Cruz. Clinton would also have worked.
Seriously, problems on the scale of North Korea are what our president _Must_ handle, and this guy just isn't qualified or capable. Twitter seems the extent of his talent. You can't just make a deal with North Korea since they are not trustworthly, or at the very least any deal must be heavy on the verify.
Hell, even if the US could make a deal with North Korea or any part of the world, it is nearly impossible now that we have Don the Con as president. Seriously, unless it is backed up with legislation from the Congress, who is going to trust us? One of the main German newspapers is calling for his impeachment and the new leader of the free world Angela Merkel has just said he can't be trusted.
The _only_ chance he has to salvage his presidency is to somehow have some epiphany, then turn over his taxes and all the rest and start cooperating with the investigations fully. If he did that and just stopped lying, the American people would probably forgive him and reelect him. We are stupid like that.
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The fact that you think a military solution might be the answer in North Korea says a lot about the US attitude towards the rest of the world. There is no way China would allow any of that.
You are completely right about how Trump got himself elected. The rest of the world is still wondering how that could have happened.
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I think almost every attack he made was something he himself was guilty of. Lying Ted. Crooked Hillary
He treated his much more qualified opponents like children by calling them childish names,
And now...
now that we have Don the Con as president.
While I kinda like that nickname, you should refrain from using childish names if you're blaming someone for doing the same thing....
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Go home Imgur cat. You're drunk!
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That works for any ideology that's entrenched in its dogma and impervious to logic and reason.
Re: Priorities (Score:5, Informative)
In case anyone didn't read that story: It doesn't claim that "many of the protesters were proven to be paid". It claims that the organisers accepted donations.
Professional organisation is completely normal on all sides of politics. People are paid to organise both pro-Trump and anti-Trump rallies because they are complex events which require professional expertise to pull off successfully. This is especially true if you're doing it 100% legally, where there are regulations and permits to take care of. As protests scale up, you need people who know what they are doing. That's the nature of the beast.
This is not even remotely the same thing as paying people just to show up.
Re: Priorities (Score:2)
What an interesting absolutist blanket statement... No doubt you have similar iron clad evidence to support this claim.
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It would surprise me if any protestors were being paid just to show up. It would not surprise me if people were being paid to help organise the logistics of the protest, because that is a requirement for any sufficiently large protest today.
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Do it to your average political party assembly.
See whether it's considered illegal.
Terrorists (Score:5, Informative)
Pinkertons, Debs, and the Unions (Score:5, Informative)
Boy this is Deja Vu. It's exactly what happened with the Unions, the Pinkerton Detective agency and the tacit support of the US government in the early part of last century. Look up Eugene Debs in Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] He helped form the first nation wide trade union in the US (for the trains). And when they struck the Pullman company arranged with the complicity of the US govt to acquire the US mail contract making it a federal crime not to couple pulman cars to trains. Along the way someone set off a bomb (probably the pinkertons to frame the union strikers) and the entire union leadership was imprisoned. there's a nice picture of them all in their sunday best taken together in jail on the wikipedia site. (ironically in Woodstock, a place more known for 60s rock concerts now) . While in prison together Debs started reading various socialist literature and when they were release formed the Socialist party in the USA. He ran for president several times getting millions of votes (6% of the popular vote). He became famous for a stump speech saying no working class person should be going to fight in World War II because it's just a richmans war making the munitions makers richer and killing the poor. He was arrested for treason and sedition, sentenced to 10 years in prison, stripped of his own right to vote, and still ran for president (getting 3.4% of the popular vote while in his jail cell). In the court room when asked to recant he said
"Your Honor, years ago I recognized my kinship with all living beings, and I made up my mind that I was not one bit better than the meanest on earth. I said then, and I say now, that while there is a lower class, I am in it, and while there is a criminal element, I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free."
While in prison he started the Prison Reform movement, and President Harding pardoned him partly hoping to quash that. He was nominated for the Nobel peace prize for his astute portrayl of World War I as the Capitalist war.
Nearly every use of the Sedition act has been against political prisoners and frequently for union busting.
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(ironically in Woodstock, a place more known for 60s rock concerts now)
Debs was imprisoned in Woodstock, IL. The rock concert was in NY, and not actually in the town of Woodstock, NY.
Re: Terrorists (Score:2)
Nice redefinition you tried there... Shame one group was engaged in violence... The other was not. Odd how this article is attacking the group who did not throw any molitov cocktails. Odd that eh?
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Activists as jihadists (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Activists as jihadists (Score:2)
Except the concept of irregular combatants is far older than the war on terror... And added to the international lexicon long ago, and for good reason.
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Where does this come from? What made you think the GP thinks that Obama is any better than any of the other assholes that recently doubled as president of the US?
Words fail (Score:2, Insightful)
They are comparing murderers who kill in the name of God to peaceful people who want to save their history, and more importantly, their watershed. What a bunch of follow-the-money bullshit.
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You say that like it would be a bad thing? It's not like this planet really needs more people littering it.
putting your business out there (Score:2)
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Any American trying to make an excuse for this kind of activity by either TigerSwan or the government is almost certainly a traitor, and should be dealt with accordingly.
Typo in summary (Score:2)
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Thank you for pointing out what really matters here, the spelling. -_-
Where is the problem actually? (Score:2)
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Nobody, no person, no organization, that holds that amount of information and hence power, stays independent and trustworthy for long. What kind of saint do you expect to take that position? Even with the best of all intentions he would fail.
Oil companies have lots of money (Score:4, Interesting)
I wish the builders of other infrastructure could afford a counter protest force like this one. We could get that telescope built on Maunakea, get some new-generation nuclear plants started if we wished to get serious about carbon, and California could finally finish its bullet train.
Even harvesting from social media?? (Score:3)
Who would of thought that a group tracking the actions of another group would stoop to harvesting information about them from social media.
Then to follow that up they used the term "militaristic" to describe them collecting data. So they started to attack them?
Overall rather bias article to describe one group that was tracking the actions of another group.
If you want an end to this (Score:5, Insightful)
Super Shadowy (Score:4, Informative)
All hush-hush top secret shadow organizations have a web site.
http://www.tigerswan.com/ [tigerswan.com]
And twitter feed.
https://twitter.com/TigerSwan [twitter.com]
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Oh noesss they have been found.
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You needn't be super secret just because you're a threat to freedom. All you need is government backing.
Propaganda (Score:2)
I'm commenting on how The Intercept is using language to portray the company in a certain light.
If you are trying to portray a company as "shadowy" when it has a fairly robust online presence, you aren't doing journalism, you're doing propaganda.
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Right. The word he should have used is "shady".
Stop virtue signalling (Score:4, Interesting)
Dont use your own equipment. If your wealthy enough to be able to afford to protest all day, buy an older weather sealed dslr camera and lens. No need for in camera wifi. Use the card to get your files to a computer of editing and upload later.
Ensure the serial number in the camera is not linked to your name with every file uploaded or created.
Take some images and video of the protest. Remove any camera serial numbers in the files, edit, add a voice over and your groups logo and branding, compress, then upload it using some existing network and on a computer that won't be used later.
Do not take a "computer" thats "fast" or "sealed against the weather" from protest to protest. Dont use wifi or networking from your computer like device.
Sneaker net your video file to a final separate, cheap device just for fast networking.
All MAC and any other unique details about all networks will be collected on.
Think about what device connects to that final network to send a file to the world. A random strangers offer of a free network, computer help could be an undercover contractor or police wanting to get more direct access to your hardware and software, OS.
Protect your devices and equipment from digital tracking and "new" best friends or "smart" friendly strangers with free offers of help.
Police and contractors can be anyone, thats why they are doing undercover work in protests. Some are past protesters who had to make a deal with the police to stay free. They have to collect it all and work very hard at making new friends.
While a protester might have been taking years of French or arts at some liberal university, police and contractors learned how to become "protesters" over the years.
The undercover officers offers will be for device access to help with "media" or "editing"
Every face at a protest will be stored for facial recognition. Any and all networks or networked devices will be collected on.
Read up on what the NSA, GCHQ, CIA and other 5 eye nations do when they "collect it all".
The same ability is now on the open market at a low cost for a city, state or contractor. Dont trust any hardware, software or OS thats been near a protest after a protest.
Anyone could have added code, altered the device, accessed the OS or collected its network details.
Ensure the only collection a city or federal gov or its contractors can do is facial recognition. Keep your hardware and software way from their networks.
A streaming cell phone is great for recoding an event and not having data erased on site but it comes with the cost of collection and device or OS alteration.
Dont bring malware pushed down a network home after a protest. If your security aware, use dedicated devices as bait and see if any devices are altered. Study bait hardware later under Tempest https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] conditions but don't allow your own deices to get altered to test for such gov/police/contractor pushed malware.
The final thing to consider is the new stranger in your group. Get them talking about their past and get their image and see what different free and other image search products find online.
City or state contractors might not have the skills to remove all past images or their story will not mach a few traces found online.
Federal and contractors working undercover have the ability to rewrite online social media so their undercover "story" will mach perfectly to any and all online data sets that can be searched for.
If your protest group has some international funding, take the image to any of the big national private detective groups in the USA.
Their social media databases are long term, static, always updating and do not get altered like the online consumer networks.
They can rewind most accounts to creation and see ho
giant pile of garbage (Score:2)
To my eye all these posts about the giant pile of garbage are a giant pile of bike-shed garbage.
It looks and smells like standard online disruption tactics, when there are far bigger fish to fry.
Also, any post (or poster) citing "roommate" as a source (with or without ambiguous irony) needs to mentally hell-banned. Don't waste mental effort attempting to parse ambiguous irony bait. Anyone with a constructive intent would know better than to further cloud a crap fight.
A worthwhile post: (1) does not mentio
social justice through private charity (Score:3)
One more thing about the money angle.
Over the years, I've listened to most of the EconTalk back catalog. I agree with Russ Roberts about 60% of the time, yet I have some pretty strong disagreements in the other 40%.
Part of his standard spiel about diminishing the role of government in all practical venues is his model of private charity. I just found this now, but it turns out he's actually written a paper on the subject:
A Positive Model of Private Charity and Public Transfers [uchicago.edu]
The whole point of relying le
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EconTalk is a great podcast, even if you disagree with most of what Roberts and his guests have to say. Although I would argue that Roberts is intelligent enough and reasonable enough that only a doctrinaire ideologue could disagree with a significant majority of what gets said.
My problem with private charity vs. government welfare is that private charity seems more prone to the moral hazard of putting its agenda ahead of its charity -- converting recipients to its faith, restricting its charity to organiza
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Can't find the aerial shot I wanted offhand, but this will do:
http://www.kfyrtv.com/content/... [kfyrtv.com]
https://heatst.com/politics/da... [heatst.com]
At about the halfway point, the total was 24,000 TONS of garbage. And about a dozen abandoned dogs.
Link for standing rock pollution (Score:2)
I forgot to include the link about Standing Rock protestors leaving literal tons of pollution [washingtontimes.com] behind.
Re:Link for standing rock pollution (Score:5, Insightful)
Wrong, they left many other things behind - includ (Score:2)
They left their tents and gear behind (and yes some trash)
That is totally wrong. They left over 200 cars [washingtontimes.com], with all of the leaking fluids you'd expect from cars too worn to take away. They did not leave "some trash", they left 48 million pounds of trash. That is not a typo, that is from the The North Dakota Department of Emergency Services who hand to pay for carting that off (over $1 million taxpayers had to pay).
But frankly what I thought was even worse (even though destroying hundreds of acres of grass
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Let's say that all of that were true, what's your argument? That they don't deserve clean water because they litter? Help me understand that position.
It's pretty clear, but I'll spell it out: The protesters are not adults to be taken seriously. They can't even manage the environmental stewardship issues that are well within their control. We're certainly not going to let them impose mob rule on infrastructure projects that have passed all the required regulatory approvals.
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I just hope you feel the same way when it's your water at stake.
There is no issue raised by the protesters that wasn't an item covered by the array of regulatory reviews that where required before construction could even begin. What fault do you find with the process that approved the pipeline and route? Where did the 50 agencies involved go wrong?
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Yes, how could we educated nobles leave half the planet to the unwashed masses?
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Let's say that all of that were true, what's your argument? That they don't deserve clean water because they litter? Help me understand that position.
It's pretty clear, but I'll spell it out: The protesters are not adults to be taken seriously. They can't even manage the environmental stewardship issues that are well within their control. We're certainly not going to let them impose mob rule on infrastructure projects that have passed all the required regulatory approvals.
One more time... what's your argument? That because they are [insert literally anything here], that in a first world democratic nation they do not deserve a basic survival commodity of clean water?
So what else don't they deserve? Protection of the law? Freedom of speech?
Land of the free, home of the [people I approve of]
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Let's say that all of that were true, what's your argument? That they don't deserve clean water because they litter? Help me understand that position.
It's pretty clear, but I'll spell it out: The protesters are not adults to be taken seriously. They can't even manage the environmental stewardship issues that are well within their control. We're certainly not going to let them impose mob rule on infrastructure projects that have passed all the required regulatory approvals.
One more time... what's your argument? That because they are [insert literally anything here], that in a first world democratic nation they do not deserve a basic survival commodity of clean water?
So what else don't they deserve? Protection of the law? Freedom of speech?
Land of the free, home of the [people I approve of]
There was no threat to clean water that wasn't addressed in the regulatory process that approved the pipeline to begin with. Tell me, what fault do you find with the laws, regulations, and agencies involved?
You don't have a serious answer because you're not a serious person. At best you're engaging in an emotional outburst that lets you paint yourself as the embattled hero. I'm not required to take you seriously. Yes, you have a right to the protection of law and freedom of speech. You don't have the right
They are not real, they do not care (Score:2)
Let's say that all of that were true, what's your argument? That they don't deserve clean water
First of all, I guess not because the PROTESTORS have polluted the water far more than the pipeline ever would have. If you are supporting the protestors you are supporting the POLLUTION of the local watershed.
But the main point is this - they were not REAL protestors in that they did not care about that which they were supposedly protesting for. They were just another group backed by some large corporate slush f
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They might have actually cleared their trash as they went along if doing so didn't involve running a gauntlet of law enforcement that wasn't particularly careful not to blow people's arms off, soak them to the bone in sub freezing weather, and such. Others have already explained the dogs and the cars.
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http://www.washingtontimes.com... [washingtontimes.com]
Who do you think he is - the EPA? (Score:2, Insightful)
Not to mention the sixty million gallons of contaminated water you dumped into the river.
Sorry but these days the only people contaminating the water that badly are with the EPA [denverpost.com].
But you'll be happy to know none of them will ever be punished because hey, government employees so no consequences for even the most horrific failures!
Re:Not Counterterrorism, Counter-Espionage... (Score:5, Insightful)
The pipeline people were paid by the corporations anyway. None of the oil goes to America anyway, it's being refined and sent to China. Whining about paid protesters while ignoring the paid mercenaries hired by corporations seems like a stretch.
Re: Not Counterterrorism, Counter-Espionage... (Score:2)
That's kinda one of those 'woah' posts, not for the content of its narrative, but for the existence of the narrative. If this security firm was collaborating with law enforcement/intelligence, and trying to induce the arrest or investigation of protestors as a deterrent to protest, that's playing with fire: if the result of extensive investigations of these people by the world's best intel agencies was that they are Native Americans trying to protect their land not Russians, and furthermore they wasted lots
Re:Not Counterterrorism, Counter-Espionage... (Score:4, Informative)
You didn't do the math, did you. The tribal council accepted $375,000. Assuming they passed 100% on to the protesters, that comes to the lordly sum of $125 each. Wow, they must be living large now in their new Lambos.
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Make it leak where the rivers aren't.
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Hey, we had a pipeline going across Alaska since the late 70's. With drunken idiots with guns trying to shoot holes in it and the occasional maintenance mishap leading to spills, Alaska has somehow not turned into a barren oil-soaked wasteland yet.
No Oil leaks in Alaska (Score:2)
Hey, we had a pipeline going across Alaska since the late 70's. With drunken idiots with guns trying to shoot holes in it and the occasional maintenance mishap leading to spills, Alaska has somehow not turned into a barren oil-soaked wasteland yet.
I never thought of it that way.
You are right, I'm sure. Never any damage caused to the environment in Alaska due to an oil spill.
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We are talking pipelines, not the Exxon Valdez.
You don't want oil tanker spills? Make up your mind then.
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Not everywhere, no.
But I somehow wouldn't really want to eat the snow within a mile of a pipeline...
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Yeah, how dare they speak their mind? If we don't stop them right here, next they'll even demand the right to peacefully assemble, and what we got then may not be stoppable anymore.
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So... all it takes to get holidays all year long is about 10k dead people?
Hand me that machine gun, please.