From: Bill Stewart <bill.stewart@pobox.com>
Date: Tue, 3 Nov 1998 16:15:23 +0800
To: cypherpunks@EINSTEIN.ssz.com (Cypherpunks Distributed Remailer)
Subject: RE: Bic-Assassins Convicted (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <199811030242.UAA02938@einstein.ssz.com>
Message-ID: <3.0.5.32.19981102233532.008b2d80@idiom.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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At 08:42 PM 11/2/98 -0600, Jim Choate wrote, though not in this order:
>>  (c) Definitions. - For purposes of this section -
>>    (2) the term ''weapon of mass destruction'' means - [...]
>>       (B) any weapon that is designed or intended to cause death or
>>      serious bodily injury through the release, dissemination, or
>>      impact of toxic or poisonous chemicals, or their precursors;
>>       (C) any weapon involving a disease organism; or
...
>Where is the definition of 'mass' in there? Hell, just about anything
>qualifies under this definition. It doesn't even require the death of 1
>single individual (it doesn't even require it to be lethal).

My reading is the same as yours -
the law was written carelessly, and wrong (unless JYA forgot the paragraph defining
"mass" as "intended to kill more than N people", but it doesn't look like it.)
That means that any chemical weapon, including your can of mace or pepper spray,
that might be construed as causing "serious bodily injury",
makes you a terrorist using weapons of mass destruction.
Might get worse - lead _is_ toxic, and causes injury by impact.
It's a bad law, and it's going to be abused, and this case is 
a great one for the Feds to use to set bad precedent with,
since the Republic of Texas are a bunch of incompetent wackos.

>> CHAPTER 113B - TERRORISM
>> Sec. 2332a. Use of weapons of mass destruction
>>  (a) Offense Against a National of the United States or Within the
>> United States. - A person who, without lawful authority, uses,
>> threatens, or attempts or conspires to use, a weapon of mass
>> destruction, including any biological agent, toxin, or vector (as
>> those terms are defined in section 178) -
>
>Where is 'lawful authority' defined?

Not sure, but it means that the Feds aren't terrorists if _they_
threaten or conspire to use weapons of mass destruction,
but you would be if you did.  It also probably means that 
foreign governments aren't covered here, but foreign NGOs are,
e.g. the IRA.

>> interstate commerce
The standard clause used to give the Feds jurisdiction over things;
given Roosevelt-era courts deciding that a farmer feeding his own grain
to his own hogs affects interstate commerce, surely email or the
World Wide Web counts as interstate, as does killing anybody
who might cross state lines or buy some product that does.
(Of course, given the number of politicians who are for sale,
removing a few of them from the market can pretty legitimately
be called affecting interstate commerce :-)



				Thanks! 
					Bill
Bill Stewart, bill.stewart@pobox.com
PGP Fingerprint D454 E202 CBC8 40BF  3C85 B884 0ABE 4639