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Guest Post: Precrime In America
Submitted by Azizonomics
Precrime In America
The U.S. Department of Homeland security is working on a project called FAST, the Future Attribute Screening Technology. FAST will remotely monitor physiological and behavioural signals like elevated heart rate, eye movement, body temperature, facial patterns, and body language, and analyse these signals algorithmically for statistical aberrance in an attempt to identify people with criminal or terroristic intentions.
It’s useful to briefly talk about a few of the practical problems that such a system would face.
Firstly, the level of accuracy in remote monitoring. Is it possible to engineer a system that can remotely tell you the heart-rate of a hundred passengers passing through a TSA checkpoint? Yes. Is it possible to do so accurately? That is much, much harder. The obvious conclusion is that such a system, were it to be deployed in the wilds of airports (and presumably, other locations where our ever-benevolent technocratic overlords determine “terrorists” or “criminals” may be operating) would — given a large enough number of scans — produce a lot of false positives stemming from erroneous data.
But let’s assume that such a system can be calibrated to produce a relatively accurate data set. Now we are faced with the problem of defining “suspicious” behaviour. Surely a passenger with the flu or a cold — who might have an elevated body temperature and a faster heart rate — would set alarm bells ringing. So too would someone suffering from pre-flight anxiety, people taking certain medications, the elderly and so on. Given that TSA screening protocols have prevented precisely zero terrorist attacks on American soil since 9/11 (even in spite of the fact that 630 million passengers fly each year ) this merely suggests that vulnerable people will end up getting hassled by the TSA to an even greater extent than they already would be today. This is no laughing matter — a nervous but otherwise perfectly innocent passenger might end up getting tasered and die — something which of course has happened multiple times already. Or — under the NDAA (2011) — false-positives might end up being indefinitely detained on totally erroneous grounds.
Of course, the next problem is distinguishing the guilty from the innocent. Simply, this system would seem to produce nothing other than circumstantial evidence. Given that no crime would have yet been committed, how would it be possible to prove nefarious intent? Perhaps one day a terrorist or drug smuggler (got to keep fighting the war on drugs…) will be foolish enough to try to carry a gun or a knife through a TSA checkpoint and onto an aeroplane, but given that a metal detector could have detected that anyway, what is the point of this new technology? Surely it is to pinpoint potential terrorists who would otherwise not be picked out by the body scanners? In that case, would the end result just be that people — with no real evidence against other than a fast heart rate and some perspiration — end up being thrown off their flight? Would people who are subject to a false positive and as a result miss a flight try to sue the TSA for wasting their time and money?
Next, just as a committed and composed liar can fool a polygraph, surely terrorists and drug smugglers out in the wild would adapt their behaviour to avoid detection. There are of course prescription drugs that can be taken to reduce the physiological symptoms of anxiety, and thus fool the detector.
Then there are the problems in testing. Subjects in the laboratory trials (taxpayer-funded, of course) have been told to go through the system with the intent to cause a disruptive act. The system has been fine-tuned to detect subjects in a controlled laboratory environment. Simply, there is no data on the effectiveness of this system against terrorists in the wild. The wild is a totally different environment, and the mindset and physiological cues of a real terrorist may well be entirely different to those of a laboratory subject who is pretending (we just don’t know until we try it on a large enough sample of real terrorists). The notion that it can catch terrorist seems wholly pseudo-scientific, and based on the false premise that terrorism has an identifiable set of physiological cues. The entire operation is based on the (possibly flawed) premise that a terrorist will be nervous, and that therefore we should cast an extremely wide dragnet to further interrogate and intimidate nervous people. That is guesswork, not science.
As Alexander Furnas writing in the Atlantic states:
We should ask, in a world where we are already pass through full-body scanners, take off our shoes, belts, coats and only carry 3.5 oz containers of liquid, is more stringent screening really what we need and will it make us any safer? Or will it merely brand hundreds of innocent people as potential terrorists and provide the justification of pseudo-scientific algorithmic behavioral screening to greater invasions of their privacy?
It is ridiculous — and totally contrary to the Fourth Amendment — that the courts have franked the notion that air travellers can be subject to invasive pat-downs and body scans without probably cause. But they did. In U.S. vs Davis, 482 F.2d 893, 908 the judge ruled that ”airport screenings are considered to be administrative searches because they are conducted as part of a general regulatory scheme, where the essential administrative purpose is to prevent the carrying of weapons or explosives aboard aircraft” and that “an administrative search is allowed if no more intrusive or intensive than necessary, in light of current technology, to detect weapons or explosives, confined in good faith to that purpose, and passengers may avoid the search by electing not to fly.”
But to effectively conduct a medical scan on passengers? Surely this goes well beyond being “no more intrusive or intensive than necessary“? How many successful terrorist attacks occurred after 9/11, even before the more invasive pat-downs and body scans were brought in? None. So why would deepening the security regime be necessary?
And now that the TSA has expanded its regime beyond airports and out onto the roads of America we must ask ourselves what the endgame of all of this is? Could it be to deploy these technologies on a widespread basis throughout American cities, malls, sports stadiums and using it to scout out potential troublemakers? Would that be deemed an “administrative search” too (and thus not subject to the Fourth Amendment)?
This logic — of giving incontrovertible and unchallengeable power to our benevolent administrative overlords and then hoping for the best — takes us to a dark and nasty place. It requires us to assume they have our bests interests at heart, and it requires us to assume that they will not abuse their power. The power to monitor these kinds of cues is a power that could easily be abused. A corrupt TSA agent might call a person they find attractive — even a child — out of the queue for a secondary search so that he or she can molest them with an enhanced pat-down. These new tools just enhance that power, providing a cloak of pseudo-scientific justification to the reality of citizens bowing down at the feet of their government and kissing the ring of power. Unquestioning obedience to power is a recipe for social catastrophe.
As Jefferson put it:
When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny.
Would I be picked out of the queue at the airport? Sure. I already am for my Arabic name. But I am nervous. And the things that make me nervous? Encroaching Orwellianism. The potential for the abuse of power. The potential for tyranny. The demand of unquestioning obedience. The money spent and debt accrued to develop these technologies. The fact that our governments are obsessed with terrorism to the extent that they will put tighter and tighter controls in place at airports, even though more people are crushed to death by furniture or televisions every year than are killed in terrorist attacks, while ignoring real threats to our society like excessive systemic risk in the global financial system.
That all scares the shit out of me.
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I agree as well. Who would have thought (see username).
Just say no!
Caveat-May require the discharge of high-velocity lead projectiles toward oppressor.
Uncle Sam and his band of johns in the secret service appear to think they have the moral superiority and right to perform these things on their fellow man.
There are options, leave the country, stay away from places TSA lurks like almost everywhere and live free and brave as the place that advertises it is no longer free and brave but a society governed by useless technocrats who love to look down their noses at other nations and peoples while taking their spoils, women, drugs and booze.
Optimum distance to protest road blocks is 300 to 600 meters away. Most of them can not effectively reply to a dialog directed at them from that distance.
Fast and Furious needs to be ignored by the MSM. Therefore we have a new program, FAST, to confuse the issues. The MSM will therefore avoid any attempt to report on either.
I'd suggest that US citizens write letters of protest to their congresscritters, but expressing dissatisfaction with government is now a pre-crime.
This technology is complete nonsense.
The brain patterns of a nut who is going to meet Allah shortly for blowing up a plane... is going to be in a state of bliss... try again...
(Alternate reading in parens)
The brain patterns of a nut who is going to meet (the Fed) shortly (be)for(e) blowing up a(n) (economy) ... is going to be in a state of bliss.
True that.
Sociopaths believe what they do is correct and have no qualms. See: banksters, etc.
Yet, the very behavior which is designated as "suspicious", such as elevated heart rate, sweaty palms, darting eyes, and pacing about would mean that all teenage boys thinking about asking out that cute hottie would be the first to be arrested! I can see it now...FEMA camps filled with lovesick teenagers...and God forbid you be a lovesick Middle Eastern boy....
Precrime in America? No doubt, but for what reason? If your mind is open and you don't worry about it being so open that your brains will fall out, then I suggest that you read the linked very short article.
http://projectcamelot.org/big_picture.html
The coordinated actions of the banks, government and media (read: "the self-appointed insiders") make very little sense to me if "We the People" are one race/species/etc and are all in this together. (However, that may be an incorrect assumption)... unless there is a reason why all of these pre-emptive actions are taking place and that is because there is knowledge of the future and they have been guiding the world around certain events (think: the 3rd Fatima prophecy) and to a certain goal.... theirs.
If there is an alternative timeline, and I have only small doubts about the multidimensionality of time (as well as space) and the Cuban missile crisis wiped out the world, or Pope John Paul I did something stupid OR an Islamic leader rose out of the Middle East (wearing a blue turban) to roll his armies through Europe before being stopped by the combined effort of the US and Russia, those eventualities may have been stopped along our time-line by actions of those on the inside (and secrecy would have to be prime, since how many people can one trust with the knowledge of the future or higher powers, etc ... if one wants to stay in power).... the continuing wars in the Middle East and our own police state may be for similar reasons ... but we might never know.
The question, if true, would be: did the information fall into the right hands or the wrong hands? Right now, it looks as if the jury is still out.
What is the importance of Dec.12, 2012? Supposedly that is where the timelines converge and there is a gap in time (hmmm, interesting, no?). And even if you do not believe this to be true, others do ... and some of them may be making decision for the rest of us... scary, no?
The following is just a paranoid dream. Nothing like this could ever happen in the USA:
"Suspicious" eye movement ?!
Haul that person out of line.
Seize the laptop and baggage.
("Don't taze me, bro")
Anyone who protests is obviously hiding something.
This may warrant a strip search.
(Is "resisting" to a TSA search a felony yet?)
Sit still while you are strapped to a lie detector and asked a few questions.
Wrong answers may provide cause for further interrogation and detainment.
Do you think TSA searches are unreasonable?
Do you associate with anyone who believes the President acts unConstitutionally?
Do you think most violators of drug laws are not really criminals who should be locked up?
Do you fully support our government's "war on terror"?
There is simply a shortage of terrorists. Other agencies have no shortage of drug users or people willing to live off the government teat, or sick people needing medical care. What to do?
This program simply allows for agency growth and ability to seek more funds by creating terrorists through widening the definition. Now you can be defined as a terrorist by being cranky or sweating. If a few thousands lives are ruined by false labeling society can afford it. Look at all the off-setting gains in Federal employment.
....you can be defined as a terrorist for being cranky or sweating.
Millions of pre-menopausal and menopausal women and those suffering from some hypoglycermic moments will be in big trouble.
Geez, such a program will result in biologic profiling and harassment. Next they'll use that data to pin anything on their profiled folks and as time passes maybe the population will end up being "cleansed", hmmm?
Bonus. We need to winnow out those goddamn psychotic bitches and leave the moderately "sane" women available (all 3 of them). This technology is a godsend! /sarc off
Thank God for the insane Bitches, it's the only way a guy like me get's laid..
http://bit.ly/I4Ezli
I think we can make more terrorists the same way we make drug users...Just make the system even shittier than it is and people will want to do more dope to get high or get so pissed they'll drop their joint and pick up a gun..(But most likely a bag of Doritos)...
Hey guys, I know, let's sit around complaining on the internet about the totalitarian fascist American police state. That'll show 'em! Yea, and if we get really riled up we can make sure to say something stupid that gets flagged and has our name added to a profile for constant monitoring by the intel/LE/surveillance establishment!
Cool story bros.
Pathetic. Liquidate everything you have and leave the country. Or you deserve what's coming. The writing is on the wall.
Choosing to stay in the United States now, while you can still leave, before the gates come crashing down, is choosing to embrace the brutal fascist tyranny that has become associated with the United States throughout the world.
The founding fathers would be sickened by the sight of the modern American self-styled "patriot." So comfortable in your chains that you do nothing but complain on the internet. Which is little more than keeping a private diary about how the "big mean bully" stole your lunch money again today. Digging in and stock piling silver dollars, food, and ammo in your wooden shit shack on 2 acres in the middle of bum fuck America for the day "shit hits the fan" and "Obama and the Blue Helmeted U.N. soldiers come for our guns." Living out your paranoid survivalist fantasies where society collapses and you seize control of your county and build a little fiefdom with your stockpile of Jim Beam and bullion.
Pathetic.
Says the guy complaining on th Internet saying stupid shit.
Lol good one.
ZeroHedge, where we can always find a tool even if we don't need one...
Scary stuff - we are becoming players in a real "Minority Report".
I have tachycardia at times - things might not look good for me. All because of a benign condition. Oh-oh.
You see a gorgeous young Woman wearing a short skirt with a slit, perfect cleavage, intoxicating perfume, red full lips and eyes you fall into- she smiles at you in that certain way..."
"Woop! Woop! Woop!"
Tazer hits you in the ass.
Only terrorists get sexually aroused.
These devices will be just like voting machines. The input will not match the output. Suddenly, the people who are anti-government will magically be "flagged."
I just want to know, what are the parameters programmed in that red flags you? And, who-m set the go, no-go tollerences?
My 4 year old daughter would fail while Attila the Hun get's a green light, see? All in the matter of who programmed it.
Last question, are we allowed to screen our screener before we get screened?
That's very true. Who screens the screeners?! Maybe there will be no screeners, and computers will have become self-aware. ut oh!
Your 4 year old daughter will fail for the same reason they have to run her through the body scanner multiple times. The pedophiles working at the TSA are really into the 4 to 6 age range.
Everything Receeds to the Mean. Including this.
All it will take is a "flash mob" of artist who fake the high heart rate, sweat, nervous behavior, etc.
Too much money, too many people with too much time on their hands - that's what leads to these hair-brained schemes. Indeed, our entire government resembles the Academy of Lagado from "Gulliver's Travels."
Gulliver visits the academy, where he meets a man engaged in a project to extract sunbeams from cucumbers. He also meets a scientist trying to turn excrement back into food. Another is attempting to turn ice into gunpowder and is writing a treatise about the malleability of fire, hoping to have it published. An architect is designing a way to build houses from the roof down, and a blind master is teaching his blind apprentices to mix colors for painters according to smell and touch. An agronomist is designing a method of plowing fields with hogs by first burying food in the ground and then letting the hogs loose to dig it out. A doctor in another room tries to cure patients by blowing air through them. Gulliver leaves him trying to revive a dog that he has killed by supposedly curing it in this way.
On the other side of the academy there are people engaged in speculative learning. One professor has a class full of boys working from a machine that produces random sets of words. Using this machine, the teacher claims, anyone can write a book on philosophy or politics. A linguist in another room is attempting to remove all the elements of language except nouns. Such pruning, he claims, would make language more concise and prolong lives, since every word spoken is detrimental to the human body. Since nouns are only things, furthermore, it would be even easier to carry things and never speak at all. Another professor tries to teach mathematics by having his students eat wafers that have mathematical proofs written on them.
Thank You, enjoyed that.
Sounds like economists and bureaucrats in D.C.
May as well suck this all up, because the fact is, the technology isn't going away. This is going to happen. If it's not implemented by the TSA in some quasi-governmental capacity, it's going to be implemented to stop shoplifters at Wal-Mart.
It's not like you ever had a RIGHT to fly on a plane. If you want to play, you give up a tremendous amount of "liberty" for the privilege of being chaffeured through the sky at 500MPH.
The good news is you can wail and moan and gnash your teeth all you like. There's some tremendous INJUSTICE here, right? Unless maybe it's just the flailing of a bunch of not-too-smart people trying to come up with a way to prevent dangerous folks from getting on airplanes.
Who knows, though. Maybe this thing can be made to WORK. Shit, they managed to make the stealth bomber fly, contradicting most instincts about aeronautics.
Maybe the free market should take care of things. There could be secure and non-secure airlines. If you're more upset by the idea of being groped by a TSA employee or having nude digital photos taken, in a proper free market, you could just pay extra to fly in a plane with no security-screening of passengers.
(I expect to get grief here, but nothing I've written should be interpreted as *support* for the deployment of FAST technology. This is obviously just another tech-boondoggle. Some campaign-contributor has designed technology that they can't sell to anyone, so they're pushing the idea it should be bought by the gummit, with its infinitely-deep pockets. Obviously there's no money in the private-sector to spend on bullshit like this.)
Or you can just leave the fascist totalitarian police state known as the United States of America. That's what I'm doing. Because of people like you.
You are a coward. So terrified of death that you'd gladly give up any amount of liberty in exchange for the illusion of security. The irony, of course, being that you probably proclaim yourself to be Christian and believe in an afterlife. If you believe in heaven, and that you're going there, why are you so afraid of death?
I'm an atheist and believe there is nothing after death. But I am not afraid to die. Why are Christians such cowards?
That is all a bunch of batshit-crazy projection. I'm not "in favor" of our current airport security policies, but it's stupid to think that the technology is going to cease to exist because folks like you are big into calling people names. As I mentioned, if it doesn't show up as airport security, it's going to be implemented in the private sector. Good luck escaping the march of technological progress, no matter where you go. Aside from disconnecting from electronic infrastructure, THERE IS NOWHERE TO GO unless you're willing to give up the past 70 years (or so) of advances in electronic communications.
You may hate the government, and one could hardly blame you, but in what way is it better that your ISP or your pharmacy or your credit-card company knows everything about your life? The best part is: if you give up all this stuff (which admittedly is mostly bullshit anyway), you won't have an extensive electronic history, but you'll also be so limited in your ability to affect the world that NO ONE will care what you do. Go farm cabbages to eat, live in a shack, burn wood in your stove, and no one will ever even know you existed.
You'll be totally free...to do almost nothing.
Or...just maybe you acknowledge that there are actually certain PHYSICAL constraints you're unable to ignore, and try to decide intelligently how some obviously shared goals can be achieved. I don't fly much, but even if I never flew again, I still wouldn't want planes hijacked. So when stupid people come up with the idea of monitoring people on line at the security checkpoint for elevated heart-rate and BP, I'd say instead--instead of worrying about folks moods, why don't we focus more on making it impossible for a hijacker to take control of the aircraft?
Have fun in Chad, or Belize, or wherever it is you're going to be "free."
(Incidentally: I'm struck that you're proudly claiming to run away from the "fascist totalitarian police state" but you call ME the coward. It's funny. That's not even hypocrisy--that's self-hating neurosis.)
You are really a grade-A asshole, and just another spineless, servile, compliant lemming.
The fact that you cannot be bothered to summon up ANY level of indignation or outrage over our growing loss of privacy and freedom in this technology-driven nightmare of a society, deigning only to chastise the poster who does manage to do so and blithely and smugly (and approvingly?) stating that the Orwellian madhouse is "inevitable", tells me all I need to know about which direction your moral compass is pointing --- and it is diametrically opposite that of mine.
You may be a willing and supine slave to an increasingly totalitarian system, but NO system is "inevitable" merely because the capability for it exists, so fuck you and your blind worship at the altar of technology. I am guessing that you are just another typical e-gadget-obsessed 20-something who runs into people all day while mindlessly jabbering on your cell phone and furiously texting the earth-shaking news of your latest bowel movement to all your 20-something friends.
I'm outraged not that this technology exists and that someone is trying to put it to use, but that this ZeroHedge place, where it used to be possible to carry on an intelligent conversation, has been so overrun by zealots who won't even attempt to understand anyone who doesn't mindlessly repeat their preferred jingoist chants.
akak, you are FAR TOO STUPID to do anyone any good in a battle for freedom. Despite the fact that your interests are reasonably well-aligned with my own, the only thing you've ever offered in response to my posts here is name-calling.
"The Orwellian nightmare" is not a function of technology, it is a function of what the technology is USED TO DO. Using technology to prevent people from pursuing their interests and to enslave them in work they hate is "the Orwellian nightmare." Using technology to aggregate power in smaller and smaller groups while killing anyone who refuses to obey the commands dictated by the flow of money is "the Orwellian nightmare."
Using technology to prevent criminals from blowing up planes is common sense. Using technology to make it easier for a shopper to buy what they want, or find deals on their preferred products, is not "the Orwellian nightmare." This is where you seem to have trouble distinguishing the technology from its usage. You know you're on the Internet, right? This is the SAME Internet where your every move is recorded, and where data about everything you do here is packaged and sent to some shadowy organization where men in darkened rooms talk about how best to squeeze money out of you, where clicking on the wrong ad will install software on your PC to do who-the-fuck-knows what.
If that's "Orwellian nightmare" shit, why do you participate? Why enable it? Why grant these people more power?
To touch on another point: something that has already happened is EFFECTIVELY inevitable...because it has already happened. There's no way to make things "unhappen," and whenever I've pointed this out to you, you've responded with a tantrum.
This technology already exists. If you don't want it to be implemented at airports, I'm with you. Good luck figuring a way to influence that decision-making process. If you have any good ideas on that, or any good efforts, I'll join you. I don't want my naked photos on the Internet either, nor do I want to be groped by TSA employees. On the other hand, if I need to get to Texas, I'm going to have to put up with such things because it's the current policy, and the only thing I can achieve at the airport by refusing is getting thrown out and/or arrested. (IE: real-world physical constraints.)
Most folks are going to dismiss you as a hysterical (and abusive) Internet crank, as well they should, because YOU ARE. Even though you may have some good morals and principles and whatever it is you're trying to communicate, you're not going prevent things from happening by cursing through your keyboard. Grow up. Infants don't get to set policy.
What I took issue with in your prior post was what I took to be your implicit assumption, so widespread if not almost ubiquitous among the e-gadget-obsessed in modern society, that all technological advancement somehow automatically represents "progress" and is inherently good, as well as your implication that the implimentation of every new possible surveillance and privacy-destroying technology is "inevitable" and therefore only "cranks" oppose its "inevitable" use by increasingly authoritarian governments.
It is lamentable that most people consistently fail to realize that any and EVERY new technological advancement comes with a downside and a frequently heavy price, such as the erosion of civility and decorum in the widespread anywhere-and-everywhere use of cell phones, or the ability of the government to instantly track every cell phone user through their phon. I despair at the not only ongoing but accelerating loss of privacy in ALL spheres of life, much of it freely surrendered by sheep too enamored of their latest toy to consider the negative implications of its use. Mark my words, it will not be long before anyone even demanding or asking for privacy, no matter what the circumstance, will be labeled a "kook" and "subversive".
Even George Orwell in his nightmare "1984" never envisioned the near-complete loss of privacy that already prevails today, and the very death of the concept in the near future.
Stop making assumptions and try to remain focused on what I'm WRITING. I assure you my views are not boilerplate lifted from some other source or herd.
Mark my words, it will not be long before anyone even demanding or asking for privacy, no matter what the circumstance, will be labeled a "kook" and "subversive".
I doubt this. If people had any idea just how much personal information is already extracted from their records/transactions/activities, many of them would make significant changes in how they conduct their lives. The first step is to get the information out about what is currently happening. Most folks don't have a clue.
Once people begin to come to terms with what's already going on, we may be able to discuss the subject rationally, and as a society we can try to figure out how best to forge the compromise between "information that has to be shared in order for something to happen" and "information that's no one's business and needn't be shared at all."
The problem with our current situation is that it is so UNIVERSAL that we're asked to click "I accept" or "sign here" or "can I see some ID" that most people submit UNCONSCIOUSLY. It's not a failing on their part--we're humans, we adapt. But when you stop and think about it, anytime anyone asks you for ANY piece of information, you're perfectly justified in asking why and what the information is going to be used for.
I've made a practice of doing this, myself. Most of the time, the person making the request has no idea at all why they're doing it, so you can pretty easily avoid giving anyone ANYTHING. Why write a SS# when any 9-digit number would suffice, for example?
If I incorrectly put words into your mouth, or attributed to you thoughts or ideas that are not your own, then I apologize. My points still stand, however, as such an overwhelming majority within out society DO in fact appear to think as I described, and dismiss privacy as some quaint notion, if they ever even bother to think about it at all. When I hear a woman loudly and publicly arguing with her husband over her cell phone about why she feels that he needs to go out and get that Viagra prescription, all the while standing in the checkout line of a busy supermarket (yes, I actually witnessed such a situation recently), or when I see lit-up houses close to the street in a crowded subdivision at night with no curtains or blinds over the windows, and with the occupants in their underwear walking around for the world to see with apparently no self-consciousness whatsoever, then I have to wonder if the concept of privacy is not dead already.
Good points! I routinely ask people, especially officials at all levels, WHY they are asking for specific, seemingly non-necessary information, and whether I MUST give them the personal information they are automatically requesting, and they are invariably flustered by my questioning --- I usually get the feeling that they have NEVER been challenged in such a manner previously by anyone.
Next step would be a machine to catch devious fetuses in the womb and abort them. It's a step they won't take as the future bankster population would plummet.
That all depends on who defines what "deviant behavior" is. In a corrupt totalitarian society the deviant is in fact the man with scruples and individualistic leanings that refuses to accept corruption and be subjugated by the central state.
So it will, in fact, be the future Ron Paul's and libertarians that are aborted in the womb by the scientifically managed totalitarian police state.
"pre"-crime. just like getting charged with resisting arrest. total bull shit.
MillionDollar is either one of the better satirist's around, or he is a computer testing new Government "auto posting" technologies.
Nah, he's Max Fischer's bull fairy.
Yeah, it's a real waste of money. They should have hired Temple Grandin, the autistic professor of veternary science who perfected the calm inducing cattle ramps into the slaughterhouse.
Homeland security money is huge. It doesn't matter that this won't work as advertised in its brochure. It will however work wonderfully at its true purpose: to make the remote-physiological-monitor-machine-making company execs a shitload of easy money.
So old news... They already have a TV show... Person of Interest... the guy with the gimpy leg and glasses designed this...
"... a project called FAST".........
Jeez...you'd think these dummies might avoid that acronym after the wonderful results of 'Fast and Furious'.....so we'll be getting just the first half of that idiotic operation.....
Just a thought for all of us here on ZH.....our names are on a soon to be enforced, 'do not fly list'....make your vacation plans accordingly.
Just a thought for all of us here on ZH.....our names are on a soon to be enforced, 'do not fly list'....make your vacation plans accordingly.
Join the TED NUGENT CLUB.
..thereby not only getting my name on the 'do not fly list' but being put under house arrest???
I see ALGN skyrocketing on Botox sales.
My new favorite word: Malintent.
Newspeak at it's finest...
Surely nobody is ever anxious or stressed at the airport! Why with all of the relaxing envionments at your local plane depot I'd be very "suprised" if a system that measures physiological registers ever caught false positives.
Soon there will be an option via designated taxi cabs to get an enroute body cavity search so at least you don't miss your flight. Hopefully they can piggy back a medical exam as well to kill two birds with one stone, maybe save some medical dianostic costs too!! Think of the savings!
There you go - I can see it now: Full intrusive body scan for flight #290 has uncovered a mass in passenger's left lung. Passenger advised to have further medical intervention.
A few years back, it was easy to get a grant to develop procedural routines to analyze that kind of data.
US citizens've thrown a lot of money to achieve this kind of surveillance technology.
It will select people who are comfortable with US citizen society and people who are not.
Dont get a bad day at the office, or have anger management problems...
Well fitted US citizens will thrive.
And finally, as they say, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
In the days of wood, monkeys spun the glassy breezes.
But then the berserker unicorns launched a thousand trapezoids.
They overwhelmed the armies of tuna, who sprankled furiously to no avail.
Eternally seductive as leprosy was, Napoleon was defeated by Russian snowflakes.
And through it all, the Tibetans continue being blobbed-up by inscrutable algebraic coconuts.
And finally, as they say, the road to hell is lined by a billion Chinese citizenism citizens shitting on the side of it.
AnAnonymous said:
Sure, sure, typical Chinese citizenism response, with cause and effect being reversed.
US citizens have created this kind of technology to have a lot of money thrown at it. It doesn't need to be effective and reliable at detecting anything, because that is not its purpose. Its purpose is to be a "cutting edge security system which shows great potential" while never quite working as advertised in order to justify throwing even larger piles of money at it.
Expect occasional slight, but not quite fully effective, improvements to be rolled out every two or three years, requiring expensive upgrades and even more development and testing. If this process can be stretched out over a period of ten to fifteen years, the system could probably soak up tens of billions of Reichland Security dollars before everyone is forced to acknowledge that it is a useless waste of money. If this is how it plays out, its designers will have to consider it a smashing success.
Indeed, there is such funny quote: the road to Hell is paved with good intentions.
Quite funny.
Where are the bad intentions? Do they pave the road to hell too?
Do good intentions pave the road to heaven? And is the road to heavens is also paved with bad intentions?
And do Chinese citizenism citizens crap on the side of the road to Heaven? Or Hell?
Isnt a funny quote indeed?
Shanghai is such a significant part of the Chinese citizenism empire.
Chinese citizenism citizens know well that without this city, all will be all. The rotten apple in the bag of apples...
One could have much better chances trying to argue that they were introduced to fit the fall guy part, when things were already so advanced it was useless to hope another outcome than the current outcome.
Kicking the can, fictional world. That is the legacy of Chinese citizenism to the world.
Terrorist furniture? More pertinently, it seems we are all likelier to die as a result of pilot error than insurgent action against a civilian airliner. Then too, the day security measures become effective enough to thwart professionals, they will simply pick new targets of equal political value up/downstream of airline check-in and, as far as I can gather so far, all the TSA bells & whistles will end up terribly disappointing only the amateur unabomber wannabe.
Still to be fair, some of the issues the precrime system will not be able to pinpoint can be resolved by adding the right questions into the passenger interview.
Nonetheless, there is method to this madness, as Shakespeare put it: the ultimate aims of this latest piece of nonsense would appear to be to (1) transfer tax base content into private pockets more efficaciously and (2) pacify the US citizenry.
Personally, I find an indisputable need to wean Americans off their gunlove: after all, the original business plan in Boston/1776 was to skip the tea tax that would have paid for professional soldiers to kill off all the pesky Indians and get defence services for free from less wealthy immigrants but nowadays there are almost no Indians left and they are mostly docile. Once 55 million strong in Canada/USA, there seem to be only 5 million left. So that's the nice side of these security ameliorations.
On the downside, if the taxpayers' interest had ever been considered, I dare guess it would still be cheaper for the US Government to insure airlines out of its own pocket for any losses due to insurgent action and automatically extend to passengers the same life insurance coverage it offers every member of its armed forces -- but economizing on taxpayer dollars does not seem to be the prime concern. How much do scanners and TSA salaries/training amount to as overheads? Any reader here know?
As for passenger inconvenience, well, there was this sweet cartoon depicting a granny walking up to a check-in desk and telling the airline staffer: "I'm not going anywhere. I'm just here for the patdown."
Have a great day, folks!
Keep flying sheep. You couldn't do a better job of destroying the Fourth Amendment. Yeah I blame the sheeple just as much as the sociopaths implementing this stuff. Stop flying for a week and watch this entire scenario change. But no such luck. Sheeple can not be bothered with anything outside there brain-dead normalcy of day-to-day distractions. So sheep, enjoy totalitarianism. Heck, doubt if you'll even notice.
"Are American Idol re-runs on yet? Honey look, we're getting credit card applications again! Let's go shopping for a new plasma TV!"