And here we thought that at least one amendment was still safe from gummint over-reach and thuggery. Sigh. Not so for one abused family in Nevada. Hey, lookee here. Yet another group has sprung up, pretending to be pro-gun but, you know, responsible (unlike the rest of us). This is at least the third in the last 20 years that’s used pro-gun cover to promote the full anti line. Bitter does a magnificent fisking, right down to uncovering their Obama affiliations. (Via Joel) So, you remember those “unsecured” guns the Mounties had to confiscate steal loot protect in a flooded…
Category: Privacy and self ownership
Owning our own information and telling Big Brother to get lost
A “Farewell to Arms” in Colorado — and as the Dutchman says, “Let the smuggling begin.” Speaking of the Dutchman (Mike Vanderboegh, of course), he’s just been interviewed on Freedom Feens. Only bureaucrats (aka “policymakers”) could be flummoxed by cannabis legalization — a trend that’s been ongoing for nearly 20 years. A former STASI snoop is appalled … … while the wits of Las Vegas make tourist hay out of the NSA. Wi-Vi. Ugh. (H/T MJR) Wait a minute. You stole their guns. And after the Glorious Leader of your Glorious Country says to give the darn things back (H/T…
You see this: Source for those who can’t see the embed. This is also a not-bad reminder that TPTB aren’t even remotely as powerful as they’d like us to believe they are. Silk Road and The Pirate Bay still live, and Kim Dotcom has never really stopped laughing at the you-know-whos. Freedom always finds a way.
Yesterday I installed the Firefox (and Chrome) extension, HTTPS Everywhere. This free add-on from the Electronic Frontier Foundation automatically forces a secure HTTPS connection in place of a regular HTTP connection, when HTTPS is available. Just now I belatedly downloaded the TOR Browser Bundle. Been meaning to do that for a long time. Although they each got to work quickly and without fuss, in both cases, I found myself plunged into a world of geekery and confusion. (Do you want to “use the SSL Observatory?” Shall we “check certificates even if TOR isn’t available?” No installation needed; just extract! “……
One databit that arose out of Edward Snowden’s NSA snooping revelations is one most of us missed. It’s another that comes in the category of tiny, fascinating, but completely unsurprising. To wit (according to The Guardian): Fisa court-approved policies allow the NSA to …. Retain and make use of “inadvertently acquired” domestic communications if they contain usable intelligence, information on criminal activity, threat of harm to people or property, are encrypted [emphasis mine], or are believed to contain any information relevant to cybersecurity; Never mind the “inadventently acquired” bit. That and James Clapper’s “not wittingly” whopper are just cover for…
Might have been too busy to post. Not to busy to collect tabstuff. If I fail to credit sources it’s because I’ve forgotten where some of it came from. Sigh. “How to disappear without a trace.” Not in a good way, unfortunately … Quietly, with almost no notice even in the financial press, France has outlawed any mailing of currency, coins, or precious metals — a ban that appears about to spread to other parts of Europe. What a coincidence that big, government-approved money launderers banks and investors don’t use mail to ship their loot resources. For the most part,…
“Survival Mom” Lisa Bedford had a dream about that, then asked a bunch of knowledgeable people for their $.02 on when it’s time to get out of Dodge. Balloon going up part 1. Balloon going up part 2.
Well, look at that. Here all these years you thought Microsoft products were just buggy. But where the NSA and MS are concerned, those aren’t bugs; they’re features. (H/T H) New: Prism-Break.org. Products to use instead of the Usual Suspects.* One of those is StartPage, of course. And while you’re in the position of having to take their word for it, this is a pretty good statement of principle. Why skipping college could be a good idea. And UnCollege.org. Jim Bovard (that is, Mr. Bovard, according to the WSJ bio; have I been too informal all these years?) on the…
It’s starting to feel as if “20,000 at the bottom of the sea” isn’t even a good beginning.* A requirement of the 2008 law is that the NSA “may not intentionally target any person known at the time of acquisition to be located in the United States.” A possible interpretation of that language, some legal experts said, is that the agency may vacuum up everything it can domestically — on the theory that indiscriminate data acquisition was not intended to “target” a specific American citizen. NSA admits pretty much the whole shebang. Filthy, lying, spying, Orwellian, totalitarian, anti-Bill of Rights…
(Source And big H/T to WL.) —– I’ve been trying to figure out the worst thing about the NSA revelations and it’s been hard to put my finger on that. It’s not the loss of privacy. I hate that. I really, really hate that and I assume that everybody with a brain hates that. But it’s Not News. It’s not the destruction of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Again: hate, hate, hate — but Not News. It’s not the lies or the preposterous Hollywood scenarios the securitators are cooking up to obfuscate the fact that they’re spying on…