Re: Wherein I argue for the inclusion of libnettle in Emacs 24.5

[David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org>]

"Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@xemacs.org> writes:

> David Kastrup writes:
>
>  > And since it is easiest to overstep authority if nobody notices or is
>  > allowed to take notice, the main overreach in practice is clandestine
>  > eavesdropping using generic tools that can be employed without requiring
>  > billable hours by specialists for particular cases.
>
> In case you hadn't noticed, we're in violent agreement on that last
> point.
>
> My point in this thread is that I think there is good reason to
> believe that availability of the "facilities"[1] Ted proposes is
> likely to make it *easier* for the FBI/NSA to snoop on some people who
> are *trying* as hard as they know how to be secure, while not really
> improving available security over the status quo for anybody.

General availability of facility is making dragnet snooping more
expensive.  More expense means it becomes harder to hide and justify.
Nobody will likely be able to withstand a focused intense effort of law
enforcement for arbitrary amounts of time.
<URL:http://xkcd.com/538/>

But that's not the point of a surveillance state.  The point of a
surveillance state is to proactively collect the dirt on everyone.

The U.S.A. is almost broke, and diverting large parts of its national
budget towards eroding privacy and civil liberties plays a significant
part with that.  Making it more expensive to run a surveillance state
might be what it takes.

>  > Mind you, he's been standing on the shoulders of giants.  Carthage
>  > was not razed in a day.
>
> Yeah, I know, I know.  I give him credit for *being* black[2], but it
> would seem that he's never had to live in fear of the cops the way my
> black highschool classmates did. :-(
>
> [2]  Yeah, I know it's bigoted but I still have a soft spot in my
> heart for members of "oppressed minorities" who make it to the top
> in spite of the glass ceiling.

If you want to think in terms of racial stereotypes, he seems to fit
better in the Mugabe administration than marching with Martin Luther
King.

At any rate, I disagree with your statement "it would seem that he's
never had to live in fear of the cops the way my black highschool
classmates did. :-(".  How else would an ingrained fear of getting
beaten up by the heavyweights express itself in politics?  "I'll save my
own hide, let all the rest be damned." is the current cornerstone of
U.S. interior and foreign policies and yes, that's a choice consistent
with fear.

Pete Seeger died, and the old "And before I'd be a slave, I'll be buried
in my grave, and go home, to my Lord, and be free." spiritual he
popularized during the civil rights era is buried along with him.

The only effective weapon one has against tyranny is numbers.  If enough
people say "no more snooping over me" and use effective encryption
habitually, it becomes too expensive to target every one.

-- 
David Kastrup