We’re so much safer now!
October 14th, 2006 | 
Author: Yesterday was Friday the 13th. An unfortunate day indeed.
President Bush signed into law bill H.R. 4954: Security and Accountability For Every Port Act or the SAFE Port Act.
Official title: To improve maritime and cargo security through enhanced layered defenses, and for other purposes.
Sounds good eh? Cost: $26 per American over a four year period. Good AND cheap!
Votes: 421 Ayes, 2 Nays (9 no votes). Good, cheap and popular.
Congress hammered this through on their last day ‘at work’. Probably noone cared to actually read the damned thing. Who cares about the details .. we all want to be safe, right?
Here’s how the American people gets screwed by an increasingly sleazy and sneaky government: the catch: look at the last four words of the official title given above!
Yes. Other purposes.
What are those other purposes?
Well … whatever some really sneaky politician decides to sneak in there. So, if, for instance, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist and the Speaker of the house Dennis Hastert (yes, that guy from the Foley scandal), based on their righteous ideas of what is ‘moral’, decide that all those millions of Americans who play that wildly popular Texas Holdem Poker game online are engaging in immoral activities and therefore should be banned from doing so, then, yes, they can in fact sneak in some rules that practically bans this form of innocent entertainment. Even in a bill about protecting our sea ports!
Not only can they do that. They did do just that.
As of yesterday, I can no longer legally fund my accounts at online poker sites in order to engage in my beloved 5 cents poker games. All in the name of making our sea ports more secure.
We live in a free country. And we have many freedoms that other countries don’t have.
But make no mistake, those freedoms, even the ones that concern only what we do in our own houses, in our own time and affect noone else, are being eroded at an alarmingly increasing rate.
This war on terrorism is quickly becoming a war on our privacy.
Americans, once again (remember the Patriot Act?) … you’re being screwed!
You’re being conned out of your freedoms by self-righteous, deceptive, manipulative, insincere, dishonest, machiavellian, cheating, lying, powerhungry and zealously selfserving politicians. Considering the oaths they took, their actions border on treason.
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Posted in Emotions, Opinions, Poker, Politics, Spitting Nails
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What? No comments? Doesn’t anyone play poker online?
Where is the outrage?
Well, anyway, 5 days after posting the above I noticed that I share my opinion of politics with quite a few Americans.
About 50% of them: Link to poll
Well, the same here. It may not be as heavy as in the USA, but privacy restrictions in the name of “home security” and W.O.T. (war on terrorism) are happening here as well. there is even a law that you shoud carry your ID with you all times. We remember the second worls war: Ausweis bitte!
I’m waiting for the day that muslims should carry a sign on their jackets…
when are we learning from history?
@simski: I know! And not only do you need to carry that Dutch ID with you at all times, but it (the new passort -just got mine-) even has an RFID chip in it, so that ANYONE can read all your data from some distance away. Now THAT’s really gonna make us all a lot safer!
BONEHEADS!
is rfid blockable by some metal shielding? would make a excellent product. or a EHT generator. ( i have a neon power converter lying around somewhere)
maybe i read to much Philip K. Dick stories.
@Simon: Wrapping it in aluminum foil will do.
Do a google on: shield rfid ..
Also see:
http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/15/difrwears-rfid-wallet-wear/
http://www.emvelope.com/
http://www.idstronghold.com/securesleeve.php?s=2
And… as always, Bruce Schneier’s comments on the issue:
http://www.schneier.com/crypto-gram-0610.html#3