From: Tim May <tcmay@got.net>
Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 01:59:27 +0800
To: Trevor Goodchild <trevorg@dhp.com>
Subject: Re: Cypherpunks as a Terrorist Organization
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.3.95.970819115820.27997A-100000@dhp.com>
Message-ID: <v03102802b01f85816bc0@[207.167.93.63]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



At 9:00 AM -0700 8/19/97, Trevor Goodchild wrote:

>Hey Tim, speaking of DejaNews, how soon do you think it will be before
>there is a Ministry of Truth (minitru) in place to correct incorrect
>postings of the past, to update them a bit and airbrush out those who, um,
>never existed?

As a matter of fact, I expect there have already been actions demanding
that DejaNews purge their data bases of some posting or another. After all,
they are truly a form of "eternity server."

(I don't mean "no archive," I mean cases where Individual A or Company B
finds something they don't like--libel, trade secrets, whatever--and
demands that references be expunged.)

And on the Cypherpunks list, we saw a similar rewriting of history. Once
the censor decided that any posts critical of a certain company's security
products were not to be allowed on the censored list, then he had to block
posts which even _referenced_ this act of censorship. Such has it always
been with censors, such shall it always be.

....
>No bigger a threat than the HUAC saw those who didn't believe the Hoover
>vision.  Nothing's really changed since then other than the faces and the
>names.  The issues remain.

Indeed, the HUAC has effectively been reconstituted. For PR and
administrative reasons, it is no longer the House UnAmerican Activities
Committee. No political mileage in such a form. And lots of PR downside.
But it's still there, of course. The Four Horsemen: Terrorists, Drug
Dealers, Pornographers, and Money Launderers. These are invoked to pass
more draconial laws and to imprison dissidents.

...
>> and will open fire. (A Sheriff's Deputy once told me that even saying I
>> would defend my home against unwelcome intruders constituted a "threat"
>and
>> that he might order a detachment to visit my compound. So far, two years
>> later, he hasn't made good on _his_ threat. And now I'm more ready for
>him
>> than ever.)
>
>A theat to him perhaps.  What ever happened to self defense I wonder?

It's been very tough for many years to win a case of killing police based
on "self defense" arguments. Had Abner Louima tried to shoot his sodomizers
they would have just drawn down on him and zapped him. It then wouldn't
have even made the news, except on page 17.

(And had he died during his toilet plunger experience, they'd have shot
him, then planted a piece on him. Case closed.)


>Congress was indeed a horrid idea.  We need no laws other that "do what
>you will as long as you don't physically injure, or steal."  All else is
>congressional bullshit paid in bloody tax money.

Amen, brother.


>My parents having left a socialist state (read fascist) for freedom, I
>find freedom fleeting.  The same scum that ran the communist block are
>here running our country.  Sure they were born here, but their spirit and
>beliefs are the same as the scum that were in power in the old country.

Indeed. And much more basic than "left" vs. "right" are the usual issues of
control" those in power want to stay in power and want to extend their
power. The alleged "leftists" (communists, socialists) in power in Eastern
Europe and the U.S.S.R. were of course not leftists first and foremost.
They were just the leaders, the gangleaders, the company presidents, of the
monopoly force. (No time for a political discussion, but both fascism and
communism, as practiced this century, are cases of a "corporate state,"
with the corporation = the state. As Mussolini said, "fascism is
corporatism.")

>How soon before they stop teaching highschool kids about the revolution
>for fear it will happen again?  How soon before they edit the constitution
>and pretend it was always that way?  How soon before we'll need passports
>to travel between one part of the country and another?  Between one 'burb
>to another?

Well, I graduated from a pretty good high school in Fairfax County,
Virginia, a suburb of D.C., in 1970. Even by the time I took U.S. history
in 1968 or so, more time was spent discussing "Crispus Attuck," the noble
black man who fought in some battle in Boston or Lexington or somesuch,
than in discussing the Founder's warnings that a revolution would probably
have to be fought again in a generation (20 years).  It seems that
discussing the "relevance" (a totemic word back in '68) of the American
Revolution to the lives of blacks and to the assassination of Martin Luther
King, Jr. was more important than exploring what the Revolution really
means to the struggle against central authoritarian governments.

So, if my high school was teaching this crap almost 30 years ago, I can
only imagine what time has done.


>knife and fork and other sharp objects? How soon before night curfews?

Many communities have night curfews. I got into a heated discussion here in
Santa Cruz, California, when I said on a local newsgroup that my son had
been instructed to ignore the illegal restriction on his movements, and
that if he was arrested he should expect to sit in jail, as I was not going
to drive down to the jail and bail him out or sign for him, or whatever.

(I was hoping to get one of those famous calls from "Child Protective
Services," based on this post, so I could tell them to fuck off and watch
the sparks fly. Maybe even get one of their vans pulling into my parking
lot. Alas, no such call. And nearly all the folks in scruz.general who
commented on the issue seemed to agree that curfews are unconstitutional
restrictions on their freedom to decide where their children should be at
various times.)


>They've already silenced us, they've already taken our guns, they've
>already thrown us in jail for feeding others, for speaking, thinking and
>protesting, and demanding privacy, they've already stripped our privacy,
>they've already murdered us, they've already licensed everything we can do
>and can't, they've already filled the streets with jackbooted gun and
>nightstick toting thugs who wear blue and use bathroom plungers as means
>of interrogation.
>
>What next?  And how soon?

They've _tried_ to take our guns, you mean. Here in Kalifornia, something
like 80% of "assault rifle" owners have failed to comply with the laws
requiring registration, licensing, taxes, etc.

(Many of us bought Colt AR-15s and Valmet AK-47 lookalikes in the 1970s and
80s, and made damn sure we bought them at gun shows, for cash. With no
identities being disclosed. These rifles are now the backbone of the
militia movement, and the authorities are basically unwilling to try to
enforce the unconsitutional laws about these "black guns.")

--Tim May, still a felon under their bullshit laws, for which the
politicians will eventually pay a price

There's something wrong when I'm a felon under an increasing number of laws.
Only one response to the key grabbers is warranted: "Death to Tyrants!"
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
tcmay@got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Higher Power: 2^1398269     | black markets, collapse of governments.
"National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."