Philosophy of Liberty

This was posted 2 years ago, and I just now found it. I have now seen it 3 times, examining it closely for any idea that I even in part disagree with. The only point I have found is a minor one that can wait until you've seen the clip.



Back to that point, When the author says that people should stop asking their governments to initiate force on their behalf, it assumes democratic governments. Dictators pursue ownership of the life and liberty of their subjects as an objective for their own life. And may cause global atrocities without the deliberate consent of their people.

Constitution? What Constitution?

Bush administration claimed that the 4th amendment doesn't apply to them.

For at least 16 months after the Sept. 11 terror attacks in 2001, the Bush administration believed that the Constitution's protection against unreasonable searches and seizures on U.S. soil didn't apply to its efforts to protect against terrorism.

That view was expressed in a Justice Department legal memo dated Oct. 23, 2001. The administration on Wednesday stressed that it now disavows that view.

I'm embarrassed to say that I'm rusty enough on the Constitution that I had to look this up.

Amendment IV

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

So far this is just an echo chamber post, Hat tip to MRogers @ slashdot. But I can't think of any commentary that won't sound like whining.

Second Life CIA

Concerns Over Online Economies as Breeding Grounds For Terror

U.S. intelligence officials are cautioning that popular Internet services that enable computer users to adopt cartoon-like personas in three-dimensional online spaces also are creating security vulnerabilities by opening novel ways for terrorists and criminals to move money, organize and conduct corporate espionage.

The CIA has created a few virtual islands for internal use, such as training and unclassified meetings, government officials said.

The CIA owns islands in Second Life! I'm glad I pay taxes.

Most virtual worlds are proprietary of some sort. World of Warcraft is owned by Blizzard Entertainment, Second Life is owned by Linden Labs, combined they constitute an estimated 22 Million users total, maybe 6-12 million of which are active more than once a week. For the time that they spend in these worlds, very few of their decisions are in any way affected by the laws of their respective real world governments. While the company has full access to all the data regarding chat, text, exchanges, etc.; the government can request that access.

Second Life gets more media attention because of real money that gets exchanged in that world on a daily basis. 18 Million Linden$ ($67 Thousand) was exchanged in Second Life this January. It is illegal, however, to exchange real money in World of Warcraft (it still happens though).

The All Seeing Eye - New policies

US drafting plan to allow government access to any email or Web search

Without this law, anybody plotting a terrorist attack is going to use encryption, so why bother? If you won't be able to understand the only people that you claim you want to watch, then why pass a law saying you can look at everything everywhere anytime with no notice or accountability?

I lack expertise in this area, but I've read some good stuff about the security features of the BSD operating system.

It seems the interest in encryption has been decreasing for the past 4 years or so. I wonder if this policy will have an effect on that trend.

Seagate has released a full encryption drive, which would not protect against this policy, but would protect against your data from theft of your drive physically.

What would help against this policy is OpenPGP.

Student Expelled For 'getting involved' on campus

Student expelled for student body activism

NEWSFLASH: When you make a stink about something, your target will look at you're background.
The real news is that they might expel you for making amateur movies (nothing indecent, either) for a contest. If you read it through, there was apparently an ad the student put together that scared the president so much he asked for a temporary bodyguard. But seriously, there was no real threat in the ad.

In a related story, from the article above:

FIRE is simultaneously pressuring Valdosta State to reverse its “free speech area” policy, which is unusually rigid in restricting student expression to a single stage on the 168-acre campus, only between the hours of 12 and 1 p.m. and 5 and 6 p.m., with prior registration.

GO MASON.
Go Mason Student Government.
Hat-tip to 'flutterecho' at Slashdot

Freedom

Libertarianism didn't used to be radical.

Sometimes, I randomly say 'freedom' to break a silence, or as a greeting, or any time really. Occasionally, when I do this, somebody gets confused and says, 'Freedom?' like they've never heard of it.

I now know why I say it. Many people don't know what I mean when I say 'freedom,' and it gives me a chance to tell them. Freedom is the liberty to say what you want, think what want, be what you want, love, hate, do, avoid, and try to change whatever you want as long as it doesn't hurt anybody else.

I promise not to go too overboard on these feel good posts. I don't promise that I might go overboard in my support of freedom.

Freedom or Welfare

Don Boudreaux: Rampaging Regulators

Professor Boudreaux explains again again the case for freedom to exercise good judgement.

Boudreaux for President!

Big brother in your lap

Laptops Searched and Confiscated at U.S. Border

The government can and apparently does search your laptop contents when you travel internationally.

For those of you who may want to be safe in this, here's a coupe of encryption programs that will help you hide your contraband data.

TrueCrypt
&
Omziff