From: "James A. Donald" <jamesd@echeque.com>
Date: Sun, 5 Nov 1995 07:12:08 +0800
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: FBI seeks huge wiretapping system
Message-ID: <199511042303.PAA29063@blob.best.net>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


> What is very odd however is the FBI request for $500 million.
> [to tap phones]

What is odd about that? -- when I visited Cuba a couple of years 
ago it looked to me as if a major chunk of the GNP went into
watching people.  (I hear the situation has improved since then,
perhaps thanks to their continuing bankruptcy.)


At 12:09 PM 11/2/95 -0500, hallam@w3.org wrote:
> When the NSA are being asked to comment on an export license they
> are being asked "is this thing dangerous", not "should it be exported".
> But when the response comes back to commerce "its dangerous" you can 
> hardly expect the person on the other end to put their neck out on the
> line and risk allowing [...]

This of course is the basic evil of government regulation:  Bricks are
dangerous.  Two by fours are dangerous.  Water is dangerous.  Playgrounds
are dangerous.  Everything is dangerous, because everything could be used 
to cause harm, deliberately or accidentally.

Therefore every action needs to be supervised, controlled, and directed
by your wise and benevolent government, and any attempt to avoid the
benevolent observation of the all seeing eye shows that you must be a 
child pornographer-terrorist-drug-trafficker-money-launderer.
 ---------------------------------------------------------------------
              				|  
We have the right to defend ourselves	|   http://www.jim.com/jamesd/
and our property, because of the kind	|  
of animals that we are. True law	|   James A. Donald
derives from this right, not from the	|  
arbitrary power of the state.		|   jamesd@echeque.com