Spy Satellite Photos Used To Fight Drug Smugglers 381
Hugh Pickens writes "The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, part of the Department of Defense, is using satellites to track the activities of drug cartels operating along the US-Mexican border. The agency is supplying photos to pinpoint Mexican narcotics operations and anticipate smuggling attempts into the United States. During a conference on border security held in Phoenix last week, Scott Zikmanis said his agency already has supplied some data to the El Paso Intelligence Center, a federal clearinghouse for investigating drug cartels. Any border-security surveillance will be done over Mexico, not the US says Zikmanis because a federal law, the Posse Comitatus Act, strictly limits US military operations on American soil unless such operations are authorized by Congress. Civil rights attorneys question the use of satellite technology in law enforcement. 'We are in the midst of a really dangerous time in terms of technology,' said Chris Calabrese, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union. 'The idea that such a powerful tool might be turned on US citizens is really troubling.'"
Re:query: (Score:3, Informative)
Once you get above the magic 100 km marker, its all international space.
Originally, when Sputnik flew over what might have been considered US airspace, the Eisenhower administration intelligently agreed that it was legal and valid... otherwise you couldn't have any kind of orbit that wasn't geostationary.
Re:Military required? (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Well (Score:3, Informative)
The LA Times has been on it much longer than CNN and Fox have.
http://projects.latimes.com/mexico-drug-war/#/its-a-war [latimes.com]
Re:Military required? (Score:3, Informative)
Next, legalize opium... I mean, if people can grow it themselves, why buy from Arif the Taliban drug thug?
For suggested reading I would recommend The Consumers Union Report on Licit and Illicit drugs http://www.druglibrary.org/Schaffer/LIBRARY/studies/cu/cumenu.htm [druglibrary.org] . It's free online. It details how prohibition got us from relatively harmless opium to the dangerous drugs such as heroin.
Re:pcp? meth? (Score:4, Informative)
PCP is a disassociative and is not habit forming. The only folks who claim it is claim MJ is addictive.
That you cannot use some drugs and walk away is again bullshit. No one gets addicted in one use, that takes time and effort. You have been believing to much propaganda.
If you do not have the freedom to decide what chemicals you can consume you are not very free.
Re:Military required? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Military required? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Military required? (Score:5, Informative)
If only there was some country that had already experimented with this... Oh wait. There is.
In 2001 Portugal did just this. They decriminalized everything. [opioids.com] and 7 years later it's working better than imagined [salon.com].
Everyone caught using is suggested to go to a class (but it's not required.). Sure they're a bit smaller than the US, but there's no reason it couldn't work here.
Re:alcohol isn't nrealy addictive as meth (Score:3, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Rational_scale_to_assess_the_harm_of_drugs_(mean_physical_harm_and_mean_dependence).svg [wikipedia.org]
moron:
alcohol isn't nearly addictive as meth
its a simple pharmacological fact
so there's a legal difference
does that radical concept have any meaning to you?