Schneier On the War On the Unexpected 405
jamie found this essay by Bruce Schneier, The War on the Unexpected. (It originally appeared in Wired but this version has all the links.) "We've opened up a new front on the war on terror. It's an attack on the unique, the unorthodox, the unexpected; it's a war on different. If you act different, you might find yourself investigated, questioned, and even arrested — even if you did nothing wrong, and had no intention of doing anything wrong. The problem is a combination of citizen informants and a CYA attitude among police that results in a knee-jerk escalation of reported threats... After someone reports a 'terrorist threat,' the whole system is biased towards escalation and CYA instead of a more realistic threat assessment... If you ask amateurs to act as front-line security personnel, you shouldn't be surprised when you get amateur security."
sounds about right (Score:5, Insightful)
unheard of in all of human history.
I tip my hat to your sarcasm... (Score:2, Interesting)
Hiding in plain sight (Score:3, Interesting)
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This tells me that the TSA agents are incredibly poorly trained. (No I'm not just now coming to this conclusion.) Whenever a TSA agent sees something suspicious, they absolutely have to investigate, but they need to know how to investigate. The first thing is they should have a list of things that could possibly damage an airplane. Bomb, wepon (gun, taser, etc.), maybe a tran
Re:I tip my hat to your sarcasm... (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:sounds about right (Score:4, Funny)
BURNS: Why is that man in pink?!
SMITHERS: Oh, that's Homer Simpson, sir. He's one of your boobs from Sector 7-G.
BURNS: Simpson, eh? Well, judging by his outlandish attire, he's some sort of free-thinking anarchist!
SMITHERS: I'll call security, sir.
BURNS: Excellent. Yes, these color monitors have already paid for themselves...
Dejavu (Score:3, Insightful)
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God help us.
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As in the poster I replied to is full of shit.
Tom
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Are you having trouble differentiating between future tense and present? The guy you invoked Godwin against (Yes, you were the first one with the SS reference, not him) is saying that we are actively being indoctrinated to mistrust everyone because they could be a terrorist, pedophile, or, worst of all, a homosexual with designs of marriage in his traitorous noggin. He didn't say we were all a bunch of indoctrinated chicken littles yet, and to accuse him of bein
Re:Dejavu (Score:5, Insightful)
You're right, they're not being dragged out into the street and shot. They're being secretly deported, flown in shackles to third-world dictatorships, and tortured by third parties with our implicit consent.
They're mostly Muslims. If it hasn't become clear to you yet: Muslims are the boogeyman whom neoconservatives hype in order to increase their own power, just as Jews were the boogeyman Nazis hyped to increase their own power. No, America is not anywhere near as bad as Nazi Germany at its height, but the direction and modus operandi are extremely similar.
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It's not perfect, and frankly, probably not right (I don't know both sides of the story, who says they're unjustified? The media?).
It's important to keep tabs and an eye on the situation. It is however, not important to listen to Bruce Schneier as he's just another idiot soap box screamer trying to push book sales. You can be pro-freedom and not listen to Bruce at the same time
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Some are released, some aren't. Some are tortured, some are just imprisoned and cut off from their families and friends as they grow old in confinement. Quite a few have been jailed for 6 years, since the start of the "War on Terror," without being charged with any crime.
To say "they are being released" is not meaningful. Are you saying that there is a decreasing trend of imprisoning peopl
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In this case, real criminals are really coming to and through the states (and other countries) to really do harm.
In the way it's not "right" to kill civilians in the course of a war, it's not "right" to detain people as suspected criminals. However, it's certainly a lot better than open war don't you think?
The goal shouldn't be to stop all security measures because mishaps
Re:Dejavu (Score:5, Insightful)
Until that happens, I believe we're much closer to "absolute security" than reasonable security.
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So what do you propose? We just let people on planes as if they were buses?
When was this brought up? It started out as *YOU* defending *KIDNAPPING AND TORTURING INNOCENT PEOPLE*. That's very different from not letting them on planes, which in and of itself is an entirely different argument.
You're one seriously sick, sick fuck if you think it's OK to send Americans to jail for years without trial and that it's OK to send foreigners passing through the US to the most shady governments on Earth to be tortured.
I'd rather die a free man in a free nation in a terrorist attack than live
Re:Dejavu (Score:5, Insightful)
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I'm not saying it's right to delay or deny someone because their name sounds similar to a known criminal. But it's the price we pay to have HUMANS do security. We're not perfect. It happens, it's how you deal with the mistakes that matters.
It's either we form things like no-fly lists, or we just let anyone fly and run the risk of transporting known crimina
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Re:Dejavu (Score:5, Insightful)
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No, you pull one aside for questioning, and then send him to Syria for torture [google.ca]. Then it's an inquisition.
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Maybe you people should actually go out and experience life before trying to talk about it?
Tom
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Tom
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Well, there's the "If you see something, say something" campaign in New York City. There is the rhetoric of posting the "alert level" daily in Washington, DC. There is the fact that if you're a foreign student you should inform Homeland Security of your whereabouts once you've been admitted into the country, and that if you happen to be studying something like Physics you may be delayed every time you come into the country. No-one's against checking the bags at the
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You're right that we have to be vigilant to not sacrifice actual freedom for security. Asking people to look out for suspicious behaviour sounds omnimous but you should anyways. Like if you saw someone drop a suitcase by a bridge or bus depot and walk away, wouldn't you think to at least get the persons atten
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No. Frankly, you should not. Not unless, you're calling out to the person who left the bag by accident, out of genuine concern that they get their bag back.
Here's the thing: Let me make some new commo
Re:Dejavu (Score:4, Insightful)
If I saw someone leave a bag, I'd be concerned that they get it back, and if they weren't interested in returning to get it, I'd be asking why. And not being stupid the first thought would be because there is something in it he doesn't want to be associated with.
You don't have to be "on the look for terrorists," you just have to not have blinders on to the world.
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Tell it to Carol Gotbaum. The message being "complain too loud and you'll be 'accidentally' killed".
This attitude can pretty much just
Re:Dejavu (Score:5, Interesting)
Basically, the problem of getting the bomb to the useful place has just changed the place: it used to be the plane. Now it can be the airport check in queues. Next would be the airport entrances. There will always be a mass of people checking in somewhere, at least until the damn flying cars are finally here.
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Re:Dejavu (Score:5, Insightful)
If we were really facing the kind of dedicated, wide-spread super-terrorist organization that most politicians preach about, there would be hundreds of thousands of dead across the country.
What's weird is that so few people have yet to see through the fear-mongering. It's almost as if having the threat of a super-al-queada boogeyman that our politicians are 'protecting' us from is a sort of security blanket.
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Re:Dejavu (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Dejavu (Score:5, Insightful)
I say having my laundry looked over is a small price to pay to fly 3000 miles in 6 hours to visit some friends.
And my problem with that attitude is this: I wouldn't mind that you're so willing to give up your freedom from unjustified search, your privacy, your status as a person innocent until proven guilty, if it wasn't for the fact that you want to give up MINE at the same time!
Re:Dejavu (Score:4, Insightful)
In your point of view, there apparently exists a small booklet that enlists everything you have a right to, the rest of your movements and possibilities are luxury items given to you by big government, which can be taken away at a whim. You might want to re-examine that position.
And yes, I think the government has good reasons to scan and search. It should however be re-examined often and thoroughly, and the procedures should be changed quickly when they are not productive, and are needlessly interfering with my freedom of movement.
Things that should go are: shoe search (whoever came up with that idea? One miserable failed attempt to light one's shoe means millions of hours, thousands of manyears, wasted on removing shoes?); no-fly list (700K people on the list, no procedure to get off; shady means to get on; wtf?); taking the laptop out (why? can't they see through the bag?). And these are just the innocent things.
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America is at war with terrorism. America has ALWAYS been at war with terrorism.
Thank you for the obligatory 1984 reference.
The problem is a combination of citizen informants
For the information of those who HAVEN'T read 1984, this is how the thought-police work. It isn't any magical "mind-reading powers". It is mainly brainwashing the children and giving them the authority to turn their parents over to the authorities.
Also, if I may be so bold as to do a little self-promotion (because it is relevant)... if you've got interests in post-modern societies, I would urge you to click the link in my signature to be taken to a page wh
Re:Dejavu (Score:5, Interesting)
"The tools of conquest do not necessarily come with bombs and explosions and fallout. There are weapons that are simply thoughts, attitudes, prejudices, to be found only in the minds of men. For the record: prejudices can kill, and suspicion can destroy, and the thoughtless, frightened search for a scapegoat has a fallout all of its own, for the children and the children yet unborn. And the pity of it is that such things cannot be confined... to The Twilight Zone."
Re:Dejavu (Score:4, Funny)
The War on Terror (Score:5, Insightful)
Terror vs Terrorism vs Terrorists (Score:5, Insightful)
A war on terror or fear is quite different than a war on terrorism.
And a war on terrorism is quite different than a war against terrorists.
And of course a war on terrorists is quite different that a war against a specific group.
A war against an generic term, a tactic or unspecified groups of people cannot be won.
(It cannot be lost either).
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(It cannot be lost either).
As long as your "enemy" is unquantifiable, ever shifting, and not discretely identifiable, you're just using a military pretense to dump mass amounts of public funds into private industry. Most likely because you and your cabinet buddies have huge stock options in the corporations that get the government checks.
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Like today's news conference on a bill discussing IED's in this country. You think I'm kidding? I saw a blurb this morning on CNN and here's the link [usatoday.com] to USA Today verifying the news conference will take place. Second item in the list.
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Eliminating people who want to kill you, or who do evil things, is a fine idea but this has been morphed into an exercise for chickenhawks.
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So can we have most politicians, reporters, and lawyers arrested since they "scare the hell out of me" more than "terrorism" ever has.
High School Politics (Score:5, Interesting)
Humans are exceptional at detecting differences, its part of our nature, intellectually - we integrate similar concepts and differentiate between different ones. Our brains pick out differences. Thats why profiling at airports actually works.
Its nice to see someone publish something about this, but its hardly insightful.
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I don't think "Upsetting other people" ought to be enough to get anyone arrested.
the naked rambler dude in the UK recently had his case upheld in court that he was perfectly allowed to wander around in the buff if he wanted to, as it wasn't a sexual or shocking thing. That's a good ruling, IMHO.
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This is why the law needs to based on harm, not on social or moral offence. That's a recipe for oppression.
Narrow minded. (Score:2, Interesting)
After someone reports a 'terrorist threat,' the whole system is biased towards escalation and CYA instead of a more realistic threat assessment...
You know why they do this? Because several times already, government agencies have learned about possible terrorist acts being planned and didn't act because they didn't consider the source 'credible'. This has nothing to do with your BS tangents about targeting the unexpected, the different, etc. This has to do with agencies trying to save peoples lives.
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1) Cite some examples. C'mon, you should know that's mandatory.
2) Even if that is the case, why is the proper reaction to just target anybody who's acting 'different'? Why isn't the proper action better training of our apparently inept government agencies? Isn't your point that said agencies aren't intelligent enough to know when
McCarthy-ism (Score:5, Insightful)
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Exactly. GWB's classic "you're either with us or against us" pitch was just an act of terrorism itself: it was telling the rest of the world that they must support the US policy even if they didn't like it, on pain of feeling the repercussions of the US acting against them next.
The trouble with taking this binary stance is that it doesn't allow anyone who wants to remain neutral to do so. On balance, you'll find most of them turning against you if you force them to take sides, and that's what we're seeing
The terrorists have won... (Score:5, Interesting)
The fear is real. I hate to admit it, but it affect me.
Everyone knows that there will be further terrorist attacks on the U. S. On the one hand, we're not serious about beefing up homeland security, which is a disappointment to me--I was expecting at least a competent, good-faith effort. But we're doing all the "security theatre" stuff and none of the expensive, difficult, serious stuff. On the other hand, the Iraq war has inflamed passions in the Muslim world and created enemies where we didn't have them before. So the threat is getting worse and our defenses are not getting much better and all the "security theatre" just keeps reminding us of the issue.
On my last plane trip, the gate was near security, and my wife and I were watching as some woman got some kind of very, very extended attention from the TSA people. She was dressed in some kind of dark robe that covered her body, her head, and most of her face; it looked to me like a burkha, but I don't really know anything about such things. She also had a somewhat disfigured face, with a golf-ball-sized lump of some kind on one side of her forehead.
From our vantage point it was all pantomime. I don't know why they were searching her. But they would ask her questions, then wave those handheld metal-detector frisking things, have her sit down for a while, go away and come back with other officials who would ask her more questions and so forth. After about a half an hour she was still sitting there in the security area waiting. They announced that our flight was boarding and we got on and don't know anything more.
What I hated myself for was that I personally was creeped out by this person and her appearance. And what I particularly hated myself for was that the things creeped me out were a) her style of dress, and b) her disfigured face.
Part of me was indignant at what looked from a distance to be discriminatory treatment. And part of it was great relief that she was not on my flight.
Re:The terrorists have won... (Score:5, Insightful)
I love how this "fact" is just thrown out there and accepted as true, without giving a time frame. It's technically true, but utterly meaningless. Sure, somewhere between now and infinity years from now, there will be a "further terrorist attack". Great, I better prepare!
By casually using this talking point, you're promoting the irrational fear that you argue that you are trying to avoid.
The important questions, which get glossed over by things like the above declarative talking point, are "What is the likelihood of an attack within the next N, N+1, N+2... years?" and "What is the expected severity/method of such an attack, should it occur?" and "What is the likelihood that any given person will be affected?"
Even if terrorists pulled off a 9/11 once every year or destroyed one shopping mall a week, your chances of actually dying in a terrorist attack are utterly miniscule [reason.com]. A rational person, when confronted with such numbers, should not be afraid.
You're pathetic (Score:3, Insightful)
The terorist threat is TINY and shouldn't have been allowed to affect life at all.
Whether that woman was wearing a burkha or not is immaterial. Your disproportionate levels of fear are the problem here.
Re:The terrorists have won... (Score:5, Insightful)
If everyone is scared shitless, they've won.
If we're willing to give up rights, they've won.
If our new and improved homeland security is nothing more than security theater, they've won.
If our retaliation is to wage war against a nation that wasn't affiliated with the attackers, thus causing us to waste lives, money, time, and goodwill in an effort that is only destabilizing the region, they've won.
Face it, we were attacked, and 6 years later we still don't have any meaningful protection.
"get with the freaking program", indeed.
Fun to be a public servant. (Score:5, Insightful)
Choice 2: Do nothing and be blamed when people die.
No wonder we only get shit bags running for public office.
Mu (Score:5, Insightful)
Choice 3: React appropriately and install security measures that work, without unduly stressing people?
The problem isn't that there are two extremes the people in power must choose from, the problem is that the two choices you gave are actually being done at the same time.
Re:Mu (Score:4, Insightful)
But when the rampage materialized, they were viciously criticized for not having massively overreacted, on the off chance that there could be a rampage.
Basically, the problem is people. No one in this country is willing to say, "They tried, it wasn't enough, it happens." Instead someone has to be blamed, and they have to take all the blame, even that that ought to just go to the damn perpetrator, because they should have been superhuman and seen it coming.
So is it any wonder that the people in charge constantly overreact? Schneier hit the nail on the head this time. If you're going to be crucified for taking a commonsense, measured response that happens to be wrong, and lionized for an off-the-charts overreaction, whether its right or wrong, which one will you do? Rewarded behaviour is repeated, and punished behaviour is not.
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If you do nothing, 80% of the people attack you for doing nothing, 2% of people call you a fascist anyway. If anything goes wrong, 99% of people blame you.
If you do something reasonable, 40% of the people attack you for not doing enough, 3% of the people call you a fascist. If anything goes wrong, 99% of people blame you.
If you act like a fascist, 20% of the people attack you for not doing enough, 6% of the people call you a fascist. If anything goes wrong, 99% of the
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However, the current batch of idiots isn't even TRYING to find some middle ground. They've decided that in the absence of objective criteria for definitively removing the problem, they're going to go with the actions that give them the most control over the populace (and, consequently, their money.)
[tinfoil]Osama isn't being brought to justice or killed because he's far more u
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blame the media for CYA (Score:4, Insightful)
so if something does happen the media jumps on it with all kinds of "investigative" reporting about how some insignificant clue had been dismissed or how some proposed law wasn't passed that could have prevented this. and they attack government agencies in the process along with congress getting involved with subpeonas and investigations. so the police to CYA just start to investigate idiotic things and bugging people
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Not too long after the London bus bombings a local TV crew took it on themselves to see if they could infiltrate a local bus depot. So they get in and film themselves walking around buses and sitting in a couple of them. The go and disclose this on TV but never get brought up on charges themselves since it's such an embarrassment to the local transit authority.
So what's it going to be, folks? Police, guards and cameras on every corner to satisfy the media? How mu
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Beyond Fear (Score:5, Informative)
The book takes a very general approach to security, analyzing it with the most basic categorizations, while using very clear real-life examples to illustrate. The final chapters deal specifically with security against terrorism, particularly since 9/11. His conclusion is that, from a security standpoint, most of the measures put in place - additional airport scrutiny, massive centralized databases looking for suspicious patterns, the move towards national ID cards, etc. - are largely ineffective as security measures. The massive trade-off of decreased privacy and liberty coupled with enormous cost for these measures make them especially unreasonable. In short, the widespread perceived risk and culture of fear it has fostered has made our response to the new terroristic threat wildly out-of-proportion with the actual risk.
It's mostly preaching to the choir here at Slashdot, but I think this book should be as widely read as possible.
What does this have to do with terrorism? (Score:4, Insightful)
But my real wondering is: Since when has Slashdot become the outpost for the war on terror articles? Everything posted here anymore seems to be political. What was that Taco was saying the other day about loosing control of his website? Dude, it's already happened.
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Dude, go to your Preferences Homepage and decide what YOU want to see instead of whining that the world is not feeding you exactly what you want in some kind of IV drip. Blocking the Politics category makes /. at lot more readable.
Sorry, Bruce, you're just wrong.... (Score:2, Interesting)
All security analysis, whether physical or electronic, starts with looking at patterns. An IDS is a perfect example, it looks for patterns and reports on them. Guess what, Bruce? IDS have false positives, a lot of them. It takes a trained security professional to analyze what the IDS thinks is an alert and determine whether it's a real threat.
Eventually someone came up with IDS systems that analyze your normal IDS traffic, and start to alert on things t
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Actually, he wrote a whole book on the subject. [slashdot.org] What have you done?
I'm sorry, but Shneier fails it (Score:2, Insightful)
Would slashdot post a counter-terror expert talking about computer security if he had no experience whatsoever in that field?
Then why would slashdot post a computer security expert talking about counter-terrorism or law enforcement when he has no experience whatsoever in that field?
"It Just Don't Look Right" is a time-tested law enforcement mantra. It isn't something George W. Bush cooked up after 9/11 -- it's around because so many crimes, and so many terrorist plots have been busted up by investigati
Re:I'm sorry, but Shneier fails it (Score:5, Insightful)
If that counter terror expert offered cogent arguments, sure, why not? If the arguments are wrong, refute them, don't engage in the logical fallacies of ad hominem attacks and appeals to authority. Security isn't some magical concern that only a few high priests can speak on. Security is a day-to-day issue that everyone needs to consider. Security is a matter of government a politics, an area that every interested citizen can debate and try to influence our government.
Indeed, it is. And Schneier agrees (although he calls it acting "hinky," [schneier.com] a word a custom's agent used to describe someone's behavior that led to their arrest). But you're suggesting a false dichotomy between ignoring everything and calling in the most minor of suspicions. Schneier's proposal is pretty clear: you need knowledge to be able to accurately identify hinky. [schneier.com]
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Then why would slashdot post a computer security expert talking about counter-terrorism or law enforcement when he has no experience whatsoever in that field?
You seem to have missed the major point of what Bruce is on about. He's talking about counter-terrorism and law enforcement from a systems level. And on that level, what they are trying to do just won't work. It really has little to do with the underlying application, or with the specific details. And I don't believe that he is laking the experience to make the critique at the level he is going for, his argument seems to stem from the application os systems thinking to a real world situation, that's al
Realistic Threat Assessment? (Score:3, Insightful)
The real problem is these idiots are in charge. When we start to respect knowledge and wisdom, and elevate those posessing both in abundance, only then will this crap end.
Very recent Dilbert strip... (Score:2)
eerily on topic. Like Scott Adams always seems to be.
http://news.yahoo.com/comics/071020/cx_dilbert_umedia/20072010;_ylt=AsHWX_8k1pgqX8DTJODSMEkA_b4F [yahoo.com]
(I'd post the "dilbert.com" link if my at-work web proxy weren't so restrictive.)
Don't forget AFHF (Score:2)
or Meatwad [boston.com] Shake and Frylock
Sure you're trying to fight terrorists (Score:2)
Why rename mccarthyism? (Score:2)
In the 50's anyone who was different or did something frowned upon by conservative interests was black balled as a communist.
welcome to the extreme end of the conservative vs liberal pendulum. The cycle seems to be 50-60 years.
mid 1800's saw the radically liberal concept of emancipation.
after that the condition of the lower class worker deteriorated until the establishment of organized labor in the early 1900's
conservatism crept in again as the secon
Boston Police Stopped Me (Score:3, Interesting)
The police were firm but polite in their in-park ten-minute interrogation. They said things like "maybe you shouldn't walk around in public parks." and "don't you think it's a bad idea to say 'good morning' to a complete stranger?". They believed me when I said I was Canadian -- after seeing my passport and driver's licence. (yeah, passport wasn't enough for them. I have no clue how they were able to authenticate an Ontario driver's licence, Massacheusets has something that looks like it's off a 1985 inkjet.)
It was really just one crazy woman -- I greeted many people during the week, and others, notably injured Kelly, and also fishing Steve, were exceptionally nice.
All the same, I was glad when they let me leave the country five days later.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:i was going to call this stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
"+1 Terrorist" and "-1 Sheep".
Whether you want to swap the signs depends on your political preference.
+1.5 Brilliant Use Of Zeitgeist In Rating System (Score:4, Funny)
oh good (Score:2)
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(for all you non-US folks)
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Its complementary twin is Plausible Deniability, where you very carefully avoid writing down orders that might be illegal, destroy expired records before they can be subpoenaed, and avoid calling their lawyer unt
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Re:Only one more year left... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Ruby Ridge, Waco, Oklahoma City.
And even that's not the beginning.
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