From: Robert Hettinga <rah@shipwright.com>
Date: Sat, 27 Sep 1997 09:56:37 +0800
To: Jonah Seiger <cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: In response to Declan's questions about crypto.com
In-Reply-To: <v03102816b051a8b024d2@[207.226.3.4]>
Message-ID: <v03110709b051fc403566@[139.167.130.248]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



At 3:09 pm -0400 on 9/26/97, Jonah Seiger wrote:

> We believe that passage of SAFE
> with the White-Markey amendment, despite the problems with the criminal
> provisions, is on balance, a step forward in the fight for encryption
> policy reform.

And *I* "believe" that anyone who would spout such dreck, evidently out of
both sides of his mouth, is an ironclad fuckwit, no matter his talent for
such copralalic oral gymnastics.

I also "believe" that the combination of words like "Center",  and
"Democracy", and "Technology" in any *sentence*, much less in an
organization's name, is a three-dimensional oxymoron, especially in this
day and age, and particularly on issues like cryptography and digital
commerce.

You folks at CDT have proven, time and time again, to be comically, if not
criminally, negligent in the defense of freedom, and, worse, :-),
economics, which, fortunately, can take care of itself without any "help"
from "Centers" for "Democracy" and Technology like yours, thank you very
much.


Paradoxically, fools like you *are* helpful, but not in the grandiose way
you imagine. You are the crypto equivalents of Lenin's "useful idiots".
That is, you'll keep the dance band on the Titanic playing "Nearer My God
to Thee" in the bar while the rest of us with any sense are making for the
lifeboats. There's more room that way, so it's nice of you to oblige, and
all...


Better yet, you guys are like courtiers in Madrid, knifing each other in
back alleys and sleeping with each other's wives while the rest of us are
out making something useful out of the new world's wilderness.


It seems to me the less you know about what we can do with cryptography,
particularly financial cryptography, the better off all of us probably are.
You keep winning your increasingly less relevant turf wars, and we'll keep
making the world safer from people like you. Sounds perfectly fair to me.

The way I understand it, it took Madrid a good 300 years before it realized
it never had control over the western hemisphere to begin with. Same with
London, now that I think about it, but it only took us in North America 200
years or so to get rid of statist empire-builders like you. Must be the
colder climate, or something.


So, I guess the rest of us, those who want to make money with cryptography,
had better get on with it, and get used to your antics as part of the
background noise. If we convert 200 years into internet dog-years, we have
another 30 years of your incessant nattering to live with. Fortunately,
it'll be annoying, but not fatal.


The old Californios had an expression. It went something like: "God is in
Heaven. The King is in Spain. The Governor is in Mexico City. And I,
mercifully, am right here, as far away as possible from all three."

Via Con Dios, Bunky. Stay out of those back alleys, and always keep your
sword nearby when fucking your neighbor's (or your supposed
"constituent's") wife.


Cheers,
Bob Hettinga





-----------------
Robert Hettinga (rah@shipwright.com), Philodox
e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
The e$ Home Page: http://www.shipwright.com/