This frightens me more then the terrorists...

Ashcroft vs. Americans
By A Boston Globe Editorial, 7/17/2002

OPERATION TIPS - the Terrorism Information and Prevention System -
is a scheme that Joseph Stalin would have appreciated. Plans for
its pilot phase, to start in August, have Operation TIPS
recruiting a million letter carriers, meter readers, cable
technicians, and other workers with access to private homes as
informants to report to the Justice Department any activities they
think suspicious.

This is not an updating of George Orwell's ''1984.'' It is not a
satire on the paranoid fantasies of right-wing kooks who see black
helicopters swooping across their big sky. It will be a nationwide
program run by Attorney General John Ashcroft's Justice
Department. If it is allowed to start up and gather steam, it will
begin in 10 cities and then expand everywhere, enrolling millions
of Americans to spy on their neighbors.

On the Web site of President Bush's new Citizen Corps program,
this assault on the Constitution is described without any hint of
irony as ''a national reporting system that allows these workers,
whose routines make them well-positioned to recognize unusual
events, to report suspicious activity.''
After the Berlin Wall came down and communism vanished into the
dustbin of history, Czechs, East Germans, Poles, and Hungarians
had to suffer through wrenching revelations about the reporting
systems their totalitarian regimes had instituted. The Communist
Party bosses in those captive nations justified the pervasive
recruitment of citizens to inform on their neighbors as a
requirement of security and a proof of loyalty to the party, the
revolution, or the working class.

If Ashcroft wishes to assess the likely effect of the snooping
regime he is about to implement, he could ask postal workers from
the old days in Prague to explain what happens to a society's
sense of solidarity when everybody on the block assumes that the
mailman is telling the secret police that Comrade X has been
reading bourgeois books.

For a bit of the shock therapy Ashcroft and his fellow travelers
seem to need, they ought to consult some of the citizens in the
former East Germany who discovered, when looking into their Stasi
files, that under the former regime they had been spied upon for
years by a husband or wife.

Ashcroft's informant corps is a vile idea not merely because it
violates civil liberties in a narrow legal sense or because it
will sabotage genuine efforts to prevent terrorism by overloading
law enforcement officials with irrelevant reports about Americans
who have nothing to do with terrorists. Operation TIPS should be
stopped because it is utterly anti-American. It would give Stalin
and the KGB a delayed triumph in the Cold War - in the name of the
Bush administration's war against terrorism.

This story ran on page A22 of the Boston Globe on 7/17/2002.
(c) Copyright 2002 Globe Newspaper Company.

This wasn't really much of a surprise.... I wonder how long the US government is going to be allowed to do such things before their citizens revolt.... "Land of the free" [img]tongue.gif[/img] More like "Land of the free to do whatever their government lets them do".....

Things like what is described in the article are why I am glad that I live on the 3rd floor and that ALL of my meters are outside. It is also why I always change the locks when I get a new apartment without telling anyone. I have had problems with nosey landlords in the past.You can tell if your landlord will look at your stuff by them asking for keys to the new locks.

With stuff like this going on you need an encryption code on your private life!!

Ah yes Neb, there's that sharp witr of yours again ;) :D
If this is done, then the terrorists have won with very little blood shed. Yea lets create spy bug's out of eachother, like we dont have enough to worry about as is. I believe in the persuit of justice, but you have to draw a line somewhere for criminy sakes, other wise there will be a lot of needless violence, I can see it now a man from Mississippi moves to Connecticut, away from his pig farm. He keeps ties with his family in mudsville and still get's his regular subscription to Pig's Today. The paranoid anti pork/ animals need more rights postal worker doesnt like him so he calls into the FBI about a non looking american , even though guy is perfectly normal looking, and say's something off the wall about him. So the man gets woken up at some ungodly hour by several men dressesd in black and brandishing fire arms telling at him

This is of course a ficticous reality but it could very well happen if it already hasnt. People are busy bodies by natire and if they were to start a program like this Melba and her croquet group who like to gossip would be in there hay day.
This si just my opinion but I say were screwed if they do this. ;)

<font color="#33ffcc"> Isn't there THREE legs to our government? Just because one branch or group supports an idea does not mean that the other two will go along with it. I seriously doubt there will be much in the way of support for this program. As for being "frightened" errr there are far worse thing out there than this program....you may need to look into getting some testosterone injections? (that was a joke) Seriously lets use the right word, we are concerned about this and against the whole proposition but I hope we are men enough to not be "frightened" of an idea. Fright, fear, afraid...all words that might best be reserved for more dire issues.</font>

[ 07-18-2002, 12:02 PM: Message edited by: MagiK ]

I agree, there's no reason to be frightened that the slightest bit of non-patriotism can get us locked up. Or that we have to watch what books we read, or movies we watch, or games we play. They might be unpatriotic and our neighbours might report us, or even our own family.

Or wait, not "we", "you". I'm not a US citizen, you're probably not afraid of losing freedom like we europeans are, after all, your country is so great, what it does couldn't possibly be wrong since it could nuke the rest of the world to irradiated ash.

I think that this is complete and utter anti-terrorist hysteria that the government is acting on. This will, unfortunately, undoubtedly pass because everyone wants to stay safe from the nasty, evil terrorists! Personally, I'm quite afraid of losing my freedom and privacy, as this program would accomplish. I'm not a big supporter of the Bush administration, or any of the recent plans for that matter, but this one takes the proverbial cake. I enjoy being able to talk on the phone with people without having to worry about if they're a member of the Thought Police or some such - which it sounds a lot like these agents will be. You all can give up your freedom to save yourselves from the unlikely terrorist attack on America to follow up - that's right, I said it's unlikely, because it is when you think about it with any hint of logic! - but I'll keep my freedoms.

Gee Magik that is a thoughtful response to a proposal by the government to turn us into a nation of informers. If your only response to this is to question my manhood then I am glad you have no way of reporting my 'unpatriotic' behavior of being frightened of what a program like this will do to American society. There has already been cases of people being tracked down and harassed for making perfectly legal and constitutional comments that disagree with the administrations view on world events.

But, do tell me. What is more dire then losing our constitutionally guaranteed right to speak out against the government when we feel it is moving in the wrong direction?

I agree, there's no reason to be frightened that the slightest bit of non-patriotism can get us locked up. Or that we have to watch what books we read, or movies we watch, or games we play. They might be unpatriotic and our neighbours might report us, or even our own family.

Or wait, not "we", "you". I'm not a US citizen, you're probably not afraid of losing freedom like we europeans are, after all, your country is so great, what it does couldn't possibly be wrong since it could nuke the rest of the world to irradiated ash.</font>[/QUOTE]<font color="#33ffcc"> Ahhh but don't you see? I AM a US citizen, and I HAVE been around for a while and I DO have a general idea what can happen. I just choose to be a bit more informed and possibly more aware of how things work in this country than some might. Fear is best left for when you have bullets hitting the dirt all around you....most people in the western world never know what real FEAR is. ahhh well it doesn't matter. (and yes Im generalizing here) </font>

<font color="#33ffcc"> Rokken, I never said it wasnt something to be concerned about, but I really believe that if youthink this is fear, then you have led a good life and never truely faced personal danger. Im just trying to keep people from getting carried away.
Ahhh well panic if you like I'll shut up now. </font>