Mister, you’re going to answer to the Coca Cola Bottling Company for that!
Why? Other than it offends you? You’re never going to have equality among the nations of the world, because different countries aren’t equal. Sierra Leone doesn’t have the resources, the economy, and the military of the United States or China, for example. So if Sierra Leone, by itself, was in a dispute with the US or China, by itself, Sierra Leone would have to be the one to back down. That’s why nations form alliances and economic pacts…because if they can form a coalition that pools their power, they’re all stronger.
So that being the case, right now there are only a few countries who “matter”…only a few countries who have enough power, militarily, economically, and diplomatically, to guarantee that they’ll be listened to. For purposes of this post, I’m going to call these countries “hegemons”. Please remember, this isn’t fixed, and a country that’s a hegemon now, won’t be forever. Equally, there are some countries that are insigificant now that might someday in the future become hegemons. The US right now is one of these hegemons.
The other thing to remember is that one of the main goals of any country…whether it’s the US, China, Luxembourg, Sierra Leone, whatver, no matter how big or how small, is to try to increase its security, and to try to increase its power and influence over the rest of the world. This is because having more influence helps the state…it means that it can negotiate better economic deals and trades with other countries, that it has more access to resources, and that it can influence other states in ways that help it.
So that being the case, why is it good to reveal embarrassing secrets about our government if that will hurt our international standing? How does it benefit the US if its international reputation is hurt and its world standing is decreased?
You can’t be serious. This has got to be a whoosh.
The idea that those in power should be shielded from having their dirty secrets revealed, just to keep the boat from rocking, is the thinking undrlying the old English common-law crime of “seditious libel” – to which the truth of the statement was no defense; to the contrary, the rule was, “The greater the truth, the greater the libel.” Our society consciously rejected that concept when we adopted the First Amendment, and it was in disrepute here long before independence. (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Peter_Zenger.) I hope you would not think of trying to revive it. Protecting the reputation of an international “hegemon” from the disclosure of embarassing truths is fundamentally no different from protecting the reputation of a political official within a state from the same. All crimes and injustices should be revealed, else how can they ever be redressed? That’s the American way.
::considered current gov administration::
The CIA must’ve missed the auxiliary gate or something.
Oh, come on - it’s not that hard to come up with scenarios that are neither A) despicably evil, or B) irrelevant to national security.
For example: Let’s say the NSA had developed a technique to eavesdrop on the private conversations of the leader of a state. Say, Pakistan. Maybe they even have a bug in his private quarters. Since they are a nuclear power and somewhat unstable, it might be nice to know what they are up to. But the political ramifications of it becoming known would be terrible, even fifty years from now.
Or if the government has a mole in the highest levels of a dangerous country. Don’t want that getting out for a long, long time.
Or if the NSA has some exotic capability that they expect to be useful for a long, long time. As a hypothetical, let’s say they have the capability of reading what’s being printed on a computer screen from outside of a building, by picking up the slight electromagnetic changes in the monitor or something. You’d want to keep that a secret for as long as that type of monitor was in use, not only so that you can continue to gather information that way, but so that bad guys don’t learn that it can be done and use it against your own government or against private citizens.
You can come up with scenarios like this all day, if you’re actually interested in answering the question rather than sputtering about how the Bush administration is evil.
Well it works the same way with demons that it does with drug traffickers. You can control the flow of demons in the same way you control the flow of cocaine, by making a deal with one guy in order to control all the others. ;p
We have to deal with the Reptilians in order to keep the fouler demons in check. I mean do you really want a Tanar’ri riding a Lava Worm cruising down the boulevard or wouldn’t you rather have the Reptile willing to put on a mask and a business suit?
Some people sell their souls to Jesus in return for his protection. But no matter what you do, you gotta deal with a Devil, there just ain’t two ways about it. They’re everywhere man.
Erek
Or they are subcontracting to private corporations like Halliburton or Carlyle.
Or there is conclusive evidence that HAARP caused an electromagnetic disturbance that shifted the Hurricane paths a little bit.
Or they really do monitor every single electronic communication on the planet.
Erek
Or maybe they have developed a new truth serum made from the cadavers of babies! But only the cutest of babies.
OK, you want speculation, you get speculation.
Maybe they’ve figured out how to make the TV a transmitter, not just a receiver. This brings to mind 1984 & Brazil. I don’t want to hear about how this is impossible, because when is the last time you opened your TV – and even then, how could you know what every one of those hundreds of IC’s are doing? You can’t know. Maybe the infrared receiver is also an infrared camera, I don’t know, but it’s not inconceivable.
Maybe they’re listening to all the phone calls, and listening to all the phones, even when they’re not calling someone. All the phones microphones are on, all the time, so every conversation is heard.
Maybe they’ve figured out how to make the electrical wires act as microphones. Every outlet is a potential microphone.
Maybe they’ve tapped into every company HR, bank, grocery store, record shop, coffeehouse, and any other customer database, so they know every penny you make, deposit, and spend. This one’s certainly possible now, but I’m talking comprehensive data maintained routinely on everyone, not just with special effort taking time.
Maybe they have newspaper reading satellites, which can follow the movements of multiple targets with precision, in all weather.
Maybe they’ve figured out a way to mine all the above for useful correlations – probably the biggest technical hurdle of all.
Ask an open-ended conspiracy question, get closed-minded conspiracy theories.
How were they closed minded? The answer is ‘we don’t know the answer because it’s classified, and if we did know the answer we wouldn’t tell YOU because it’s classified.’
So you get speculation. I’m still leaning toward monitoring the gates of hell.
Erek
But not with scenarios that are neither A) nor B), and also are C) worth keeping under wraps indefinitely.
:rolleyes: “Even fifty years from now”? Nonsense!
I’d say the secrecy on that point need last no longer than, say, 5-10 years after the mole is no longer in government. Maybe less.
:eek: If NSA can do that, I want the whole country and the whole world to know about it NOW! TODAY!!!
It’s not entirely clear from that site whether they actually managed to make it work.
http://www.eskimo.com/~joelm/tempest.html
We have affirmations that it works, as well as some claims people managed to DIY it.
It’s also known as van Eck phreaking
http://upe.acm.jhu.edu/websites/Jon_Grover/page2.htm
. . .
I guess we actually have reached the “zero privacy” point. http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=352758
Unless there’s some way to shield computers from van Eck phreaking?
In which case, somebody will come up with ways to beat the shielding . . . And new shields will be invented . . .
See “The Ingenious Patriot,” by Ambrose Bierce: Short Stories: The Ingenious Patriot by Ambrose Bierce
E-sabbath link indicates that phreaking works for electron guns, seemingly not on LCDs. I suppose you could still capture the signal, but decoding would be different.
Is that available in hat form? 