Lieberman: We Want To Spy On You

[TehBorken]

  Lieberman calls for wider use of surveillance cameras                                                                                              [table class="contentpaneopen"][tbody][tr][td colspan="2" valign="top"] Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.), the chairman of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, said Sunday he wants to "more widely" use surveillance cameras across the country.

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  [/div]"The Brits have got something smart going in England, and it was part of why I believe they were able to so quickly apprehend suspects in the terrorist acts over the weekend, and that is they have cameras all over London and other of their major cities," Lieberman said.

"I think it's just common sense to do that here much more widely," he added. "And of course, we can do it without compromising anybody's real privacy."[/td][/tr][/tbody][/table]  
[a href="vny!://thehill.com/leading-the-news/lieberman-calls-for-wider-use-of-surveillance-cameras-2007-07-01.html"]vny!://thehill.com/leading-the-news/lieberman-calls-for-wider-use-of-surveillance-cameras-2007-07-01.html[/a]
[hr style="width: 100%; height: 2px;"]Oh, of course they can, sure sure. Tell me another one, Uncle Joe.    

[kitten]

Are you saying that people wouldn't want cameras trained on them no matter where they go?  I mean, it has the magic word "terrorist" in the concept, doesn't it?  Once you use the word "terrorist" anything goes, right?  Sort of makes you wonder how much the terrorists control the country.  They don't have to do a thing, just act ominous, and all rights are superceded by the government.

[Sportsdude]

Ever been to the UK? A camera is always watching you. There's even a camera watching the secruity people who are watching the cameras.  

[kitten]

No, I haven't.  But they seem to be far more threatened that the U.S.  So you do have a point, but I think it depends on what they are watching.  Britain is a small country compared to the U.S., and they are closer to the Mid-East.  It is harder to get into the States than it is to get into Britain, because a lot of people hold dual citizenship from colonial days.  Therefore the country is more vulnerable.

[P.C.]

I KNOW I have a real naive attitude about these matters, but I just don't have a problem with cameras watching the daily interactions on the streets. (in the change room of the swimwear store....you bet....it's despicable)[img style="CURSOR: pointer" onclick=url(this.src); src="vny!://www.cheesebuerger.de/images/more/bigs/c008.gif" border=0]

[Sportsdude]

oh and you can't have your hoodie up. it must be off your head. So the cameras can see your face.

 

[kitten]

It may be a reflection of the world we live in, but having cameras everywhere we go sounds just a little invasive.  And yet I realise there are cameras everywhere I shop, or when I do my banking.  I'm just saddened by the fact that the world has turned into such an ugly place.

[P.C.]

To me....invasion of privacy in truly private matters.....change rooms...washrooms...and the like are off limits.  Other than that....I could care less. ( I KNOW I'm missing a bigger picture here....but it doesn't seem to bother me.)

[kitten]

I think that once it starts, there will be more and more reasons why they should be watching more closely, until it comes to the point that "terrorists" could be lurking in washrooms and planting bombs in changing rooms.  But who watches the watchers?  How far can they go if their actions are accepted as necessary?

[tenkani]

Yes, I think that's a good point.

I'm not too fond of the slippery slope fallacy, but in this case I tend to also believe that if we don't speak up now we could wake up in a truly Orwellian society and wonder what happened.

  I like Lieberman's use of the phrase "real privacy". It's so subjective, and the more fear the warmongers can stir up in people, the narrower will become the definition of "real privacy". There is room for debate here, of course. Some people believe almost any intrusion into our privacy is justified if it saves lives. I am on the opposite end of the spectrum. Not that I want to see a nuke detonated in downtown L.A., but this is a dangerous world, and when Americans die it doesn't fill me with the kind of panic I see in so many of my countrymen.

  The cowardice and reptile-brain reactionary thinking demonstrated by so many Americans (seen so clearly after 9/11, but still widely evident) is much more frightening to me than any terrorist threat. The long term danger such thinking poses to my country dwarfs that of events like 9/11.  

[kitten]

There are people living in much more dangerous places without the surveillance he deems necessary.  Deaths occur from many causes, and more people are killed every year from car accidents than from terrorism.

[tenkani]

Good point. Not to minimize the importance of ANY death, or the suffering it causes, but let's be honest, Americans are insulated from the pain and suffering caused by our own foreign policy. Our wars of aggression, our atrocious history of black ops around the globe, our unquestioning support for the brutal regime in Israel. We wonder why so much of the world distrusts and in many cases hates us. Well, when the towers fell we were willing to toss all critical thinking aside and strike out blindly at a convenient nation of brown people regardless of their involvement. We lost a few thousand. How many civilians have the Iraqis lost? How many latin Americans have been murdered in U.S. sponsored coups and merciless repression of popular sentiment?

  Read an accurate history of the last 100 years of American foreign meddling and the amount of hysteria we displayed after 9/11 would be comical if it wasn't so pathetic and dangerous. We are like the schoolyard bully who finally gets his nose bloodied after terrorizing anyone he can push around.

  I'm a pacifist, and don't support violence as a general rule, but violence breeds violence, and our ignorance of our own country's foreign policy misadventures won't save us from the law of cause and effect. And before someone starts in about how 9/11 had nothing to do with our actions, do a little research about how Al Queda came to be. We have a long history of creating monsters and then having to deal with them.