December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

Smoking and IDs
by Blanc 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Lucky Green wrote: >As signs in any liquor store have been informing tobacco customers for >months, new FDA regulations require stores to check the ID of any tobacco >customer under 25. This despite the fact that you are legally allowed to >purchase tobacco products at age 18. If the store fails to check the ID of >a person legally permitted to conduct the purchase but is under age 25, the >store faces hefty fines. ........................................................ Thanks for providing more details on this, Lucky, I overlooked the fact that not everyone on the list will understand the situation was referring to. Another odd thing: I was talking to the clerk at a convenience store about the ID sign next to the register, and she said that on the other hand, there aren't any such requirements for the purchase of any of the cigars which were on display on the counter. Another odd thing is how popular cigars have become lately. Last month I bought a copy of "Cigar Aficionado" magazine to peruse, even though I don't smoke, because it was so pretty :>) and spent quite some time looking at their web site. It is a curious matter that when one "vice" is squelched, another grows in its place. This magazine really emphasizes living "the good life", and I discovered that there are places springing up all over the U.S. (and I expect elsewhere) which are smoking clubs - people can actually go there just to smoke their cigar, perhaps with a glass of after-dinner liquor. I thought this was a great idea, myself, because here these people can be with others who enjoy the same activity, and there's no one outside who can complain (not yet, anyway). I think sometimes it is not only a Truth, but a great & useful Means to an End, that "living well is the best revenge". Not sure how this will apply to transponder implants, though. A subject for late-night speculation.

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Re: Big Brother is watching
by nobody＠REPLAY.COM 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Lucky Green wrote: > I read in this morning's paper that in the wake of Diana's death, bills are > being proposed to require licensing for the use of high powered telescopic > lenses such as those used by celebrity photographers. Ignoring for a moment > that such an act would make physical confrontation with said photographers > even more likely, I note the similarity in language used to describe camera > lenses to language used to describe certain firearms. Soon we will hear > about the dangers of "assault lenses". The sheeple will eat it up. For some reason this made me think of the thread containing light-bulb jokes, and some warped wit saying, "Sure, light bulb jokes are funny, until someone burns a retina..." Though I laughed my ass off, at the time, have things really begun to deteriorate so rapidly that I am justified in now wondering if there will be a "Light Bulb Joke Amendment" to the "Telescopic Lens Registration" legislation? TruthMonger

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We have a WINNER!!!
by Dead Lucky 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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by Jim＠Famailcrt.com 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

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Re: Big Brother is watching
by Brian B. Riley 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On 9/4/97 12:51 AM, Tim May (tcmay(a)got.net) passed this wisdom: >At 8:28 PM -0700 9/3/97, Sean Roach wrote: >>At 03:43 AM 9/4/97 +0200, Anonymous wrote: >>... >>>>With this wonderful sucess, We can all look forward to this items being >>>>placed in our domiciles in order to further protect us from crime. >>> >>>And I'll give my kids a can of spray paint and a ladder. Maybe I'll offer >>>bonus prizes if they can figure out an inventive, undetectable way to disable >>>the fucker. >>... >>In Altus, it is illegal to sell spray paint to persons under the age of 18. >>That makes two violations of their rights that I know of. >>The curfue which was enacted a couple years ago being the first. >>All because the local politicians are fully aware that they are too young to >>vote. > >In my community, it is even illegal to buy spray paints and give them or >make them available to those under some age (18 or 21...I don't know). > >I like my solution a lot better: anyone can buy the fucking spray paint, >but taggers are shot down by those whose property they're trespassing on. > >Seems consistent with personal freedom and responsibility. I don't know if the law is still on the books, but when I was an undergrad at Univ of Penn in the 60's you could not buy a water pistol/squirtgun of any kind, because there had been some incidents where people were squirted in the face with ammonia bu a couple of miscreants, so the city council took it upon themselves to 'protect' us all! Brian B. Riley --> http://www.macconnect.com/~brianbr For PGP Keys - Send Email Subject "Get PGP Key" "The more you run over a dead cat, the flatter it gets!"

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Re: Big Brother is watching
by Brian B. Riley 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

On 9/4/97 1:17 AM, Lucky Green (shamrock(a)netcom.com) passed this wisdom: >BTW, just for the record, I believe that we live in a consumer society and >the People choose the government they want. The average person doesn't care >who thinks for them as long as they don't have to think for themselves and >can pretend to themselves that it was in fact they who did the thinking. .. among other things, I teach school. Mostly one on one tutoring and occasional Calculus or Physics fill-in ... (nice when you already have a pension to be able to work leisurely and play with your computer!) I am in the process of rereading "Fahrenheit 451" - the recent printing of this in paperback features a Marquis that says somethig like "Now, more relevant than ever" - as much as I hate having someone else tell me what to think ... they certainly seem to be right. It has been over twenty years since I read it and now ... it surely seems to be right on the path mentioned above and then some ... William Lederer also had it right years ago when he penned "A Nation of Sheep" Brian B. Riley --> http://www.macconnect.com/~brianbr For PGP Keys - Send Email Subject "Get PGP Key" "...Those of you who turned your swords into plowshares will soon find yourselves under the yokes of those of us who kept our swords..." -- author unknown

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Re: Comparing encryption to airbags: both hurt the public
by Declan McCullagh 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

That Subject: line should have been, of course, that airbags and crypto controls both hurt the public. --Declan

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Comparing encryption to airbags: both hurt the public
by Declan McCullagh 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 4 Sep 1997 07:38:05 -0700 (PDT) From: Declan McCullagh <declan(a)well.com> To: fight-censorship(a)vorlon.mit.edu Subject: Comparing encryption to airbags: both hurt the public ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 4 Sep 1997 09:48:53 -0400 From: Julie DeFalco <defalco(a)cei.org> To: declan(a)well.com Subject: Airbags Actually, the similarity between airbags and encryption is a good comparison. The public will be hurt by encryption controls, just as the public has been hurt by airbags. A few facts: Airbags were promoted by Joan Claybrook in the 1970s and 1980s as a wonderful technology which worked for everybody from large males to little children. She claimed that they would save thousands and thousands of lives each year, and that they would work for unbelted occupants. Claybrook even pressured the manufacturers to use the technologies which she now condemns today (don't get me started on Claybrook's mendacity on the airbag issue. She is a flat-out liar). Well, while airbags have indeed saved some people who otherwise would have died, they have not worked nearly as well as promised. They specifically hurt the weakest people in our society -- small children, short women, and the elderly. They add about six hundred dollars to the price of new cars, which encourages poorer people to keep older, possibly less safe cars longer. Now Claybrook even claims that airbags would work better if people weren't "out of position" -- i.e. if they were wearing seatbelts, even though the entire point of airbags was to provide "passive restraints" because people didn't wear seatbelts. Encryption controls will, like airbags, be far more dangerous to the public than currently promoted. And once given the power, it will be pretty difficult, if not impossible, to take it away from government agencies. Even with airbags documented as killing people, the government won't let us have the choice whether to have them in the car at all. The biggest concession the government will make is allowing car companies to include an on-off switch. This is why CEI will soon publish directions on our website on how to dismantle your own airbags (well, as soon as we square away the legal stuff). Ciao! Julie ________________________________ Julie DeFalco Policy Analyst Competitive Enterprise Institute 1001 Connecticut Ave., NW Suite 1250 Washington, DC 20036 (202) 331-1010 Fax: (202) 331-0640 http://www.cei.org

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NEWS: Re: Big Brother is watching
by Sean Roach 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 10:17 PM 9/3/97 -0700, Lucky Green wrote: ... >BTW, just for the record, I believe that we live in a consumer society and >the People choose the government they want. The average person doesn't care >who thinks for them as long as they don't have to think for themselves and >can pretend to themselves that it was in fact they who did the thinking. > >The People desire a master, not a revolution. ... Excerpt from the not so distant future. The FBI, NSA, and all local fire departments merged today in an unexpected congressional action. This merger was supported highly by the good populus of our great nation as it makes it easier for the authorities to keep tabs on those thinkers that keep stirring the people up. Various professors were unavailable for comment. Said one congressman. "We needed this merger and throwing in the fire departments seemed a good idea since everyone knows that all buildings are now fireproofed. We feel that the firemen's experience with containing the blazes will do well for creating controlled fires with which to destroy contraband. It is also noted that the water trucks that they use can readily be converted to carry kerosine. First on the list to be destroyed is every copy of the constitution, which has caused too much grief of late. Everyone has a 14 day leneniency in which to turn in their copies. Please remember that all media is included including, but not limited to, CD-ROM's with the terrible screed, pages in encyclopedias with the infamous words, and handwritten copies.

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Cars Re: FBI calls for mandatory key escrow
by Sean Roach 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 08:43 AM 9/4/97 -0500, amp wrote: > >> >> I noticed that strange air bag analogy myself. Clearly, Freeh and his >> puppet masters are trying to skew the discussion towards "public safety". >> Of course, requiring GAK is more like requiring a remote kill switch in >the >> ignition of all new cars so cops can just type a license plate number >into >> their terminal to halt a fleeing car. [BTW, such kill switches will be >> required before long. I trust we all know this]. > >Already implemented actually. All modern automobiles have a rather >respectable amount of computing power that is vulnerable to directed radio >frequency weapons, whose effect to microelectronics is similar to an >electromatic pulse. =This= is what is driving the push to get older >vehicles off the road, not environmentalist's arguments about 'global >warming'. Actually, the current trick is to launch a little rocket-powered cart with some form of electronic measure under the fleeing car from behind. It fizzles the electronics pretty well on contact with the bottom of the oilpan. Anyone know if one of those protectors that you can get for your oil pan would deflect this if it were mounted on rubber washers with teflon screws?

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