A Guy in New York

Faster daddy! Faster!

The “War on Drugs” has attracted numerous rent seekers, including the DEA, police, prosecutors, brewers, distillers, prison guards, and more. Prohibition didn’t work in the 1920s and 30s, and it isn’t working today.

Federalism appears to be on the rise. About time.

But in the meantime, we just don’t have enough no-knock raids.

You will respect John O’Donnell’s authoritah!

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Tags: Albany Airport, baby monitor, Dormi, drug prohibition, drug war, Federalism, Jh3d_Qo3jTI, John O’Donnell, libertarian, police misconduct, police state, prison guards, prohibition, Rand Paul, TSA, war on drugs, ZTpn30Pms8I

Posted 2014/02/19, 7:17 am · Category: Cowards, Government, History, Ozymandias, Police Misconduct, Technology, Tips, Tyranny, U.S. Constitution · Comments Off

Security Theater and the Police State

A couple of weeks ago, I was scheduled to take a trip from New York (JFK) to Los Angeles on JetBlue. Every year, my family goes on a one-week pilgrimage, where we put our work on hold and spend time visiting temples, praying, and spending time with family and friends. To my Jewish friends, I often explain this trip as vaguely similar to the Sabbath, except we take one week of rest per year, rather than one day per week.

Our family is not Muslim, but by coincidence, this year, our trip happened to be during the last week of Ramadan.
. . .
The onslaught of NYPD agents was broken when a South Asian man with a Homeland Security badge walked in and said something that sounded unintelligible. After a second, I realized he was speaking Hindi.

“Sorry, I don’t speak Hindi.”

“Oh!” he said, noticeably surprised at how “Americanized” this suspect was. We chatted for a few moments, during which time I learned that his family was Pakistani, and that he was Muslim, though he was not fasting for Ramadan. He asked me the standard repertoire of questions that I had been answering for other agents all day.

Finally, the FBI agent returned.

“How are you feeling right now?” he asked. I wasn’t sure if he was expressing genuine concern or interrogating me further, but by this point, I had very little energy left.

“A bit nauseous, and very thirsty.”

“You’ll have to understand, when a person of your… background walks into here, travelling alone, and sets off our alarms, people start to get a bit nervous. I’m sure you’ve been following what’s been going on in the news recently. You’ve got people from five different branches of government all in here – we don’t do this just for fun.”

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Tags: 63e8v7lXDoM, 6QkRgV8v31E, Bruce Schneier, cPIf0V8wv2U, Ozymandias, police state, security theater, TSA

Posted 2013/08/28, 6:47 am · Category: Forward!, Government, Liberty, Moral Preening, Ozymandias, Public Policy, Statolatry, Thugocracy, Tyranny, You Can't Fix Stupid · Comments Off

Trust and Security Theater

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[Bruce Schnier:] Without trust, society collapses. And without societal pressures, there’s no trust.
. . .
As an individual, what security threats scare you the most?

[Bruce Schnier:] My primary concerns are threats from the powerful. I’m not worried about criminals, even organised crime. Or terrorists, even organised terrorists. Those groups have always existed, always will, and they’ll always operate on the fringes of society. Societal pressures have done a good job of keeping them that way. It’s much more dangerous when those in power use that power to subvert trust. Specifically, I am thinking of governments and corporations.

Bruce Schneier, on Trust

Schneier on Security (blog)