Archive for December, 2006

Farewell to the lion of the gulf

Saturday, December 30th, 2006

Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi
The government of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi announced a three-day official mourning period following Saddam Hussein’s execution and canceled all celebrations of the Islamic Eid al-Adha feast. In an official statement, the government ordered all its branches to lower the national flag to half mast. “All celebrations all around the country should also be canceled,” the statement said.

Burn in hell, Mr. President

Wednesday, December 27th, 2006

By DOUG THOMPSON
Nov 14, 2005, 07:51

My first reaction when I read the transcript of President George W. Bush’s Veteran’s Day speech was anger. No, not anger. Rage. Blind rage.

How dare he, I thought. Not even the lowest, scum-sucking son of a bitch in politics would stoop to using a day to honor those who served to instead promote his lies-based, illegal, immoral exercise in mass murder called the invasion of Iraq.

Yes he would. George W. Bush is a pathetic, pitiless scrap of sub-human trash that lacks any shred of decency or morality. So why wouldn’t he desecrate the memories of those who serve our nation?

As a journalist, I’m expected to be dispassionate about events and those who shape them. But I cannot be so when it comes to Bush. He’s a liar and a traitor to the oath he swore when he became President of the country he now works so hard to destroy.

Bush is much, much more than just a bad president. He is a genuinely evil man, a raving lunatic who cannot face the fact that his insane policies have destroyed a once-great country called America. George Bush’s America is an arrogant bully distrusted by its allies, hated by most of the rest of the world and divided internally by his divisive, duplicitous actions.

I can no longer regard this maniac with journalistic dispassion. I may be a journalist but I’m an American first and, as an American, I cannot stand silent as a truly evil man destroys the country I love.

Polls show most Americans share my distrust of Bush. We all see him for what he is – a dishonest, opportunistic political beast who lets nothing stand in the way of his unbridled lust for power. He speaks of God at one moment and calls those who dare disagree with him “motherfuckers” the next. He has, without blinking an eye, sent more than 2,000 American military men and women, along with countless thousands of Iraqi civilians, to their deaths in a senseless invasion based on manufactured “evidence” and outright lies.

Then he has the gall to stand up on the day we set aside to honor those who served and continue to promote his lies and call those who see the truth traitors who aid the enemy.

Sorry George. Your lies don’t play here or with the majority of American citizens. It is you who has sold out your country, who is a traitor and who has committed treason against your office, your country and humanity.

God may one day forgive you for your sins but I cannot. Neither can the wives, husbands, parents and relatives of those you sent to die in your dirty little war. Neither can memories of those who served, those we honored on Veterans Day and those whose memory you so callously dishonored with your propagandist pap.

On second thought, I’m not even sure God can forgive you for what you have done. You have lied and you have killed and those are sins that even an understanding God may have trouble forgiving.

If there is justice in the afterlife, you will stand and face that justice for your sins. And may you burn in hell for them.

Capitol Hill Blue

[…]

I like it!

Burglar Who Wasn’t

Friday, December 22nd, 2006

[…]

Police who knocked on Raymond Easton’s door in Swindon, England, in 1999 were certain he had committed burglary at a house 200 miles (300 kilometers) away. DNA found at the scene was a 37 million-to-1 match with Easton’s sample, which had been taken three years earlier.

Easton, a former construction worker, had Parkinson’s disease and could barely dress himself. He was still charged. Further tests proved he had never been to Bolton, where the burglary occurred, according to the Greater Manchester police. “Britain’s DNA database is spiraling out of control,” said Helen Wallace, deputy director of GeneWatch U.K., which campaigns for responsible use of genetic science. “It could allow an unprecedented level of government surveillance”.

Other government plans include loading the confidential medical records of 50 million patients in the state-run health system onto a central database without their consent.

Most controversial of all are Blair’s biometric ID cards linked to a national register holding every citizen’s fingerprints, iris or face scan. Starting in 2010, anyone renewing or applying for a passport will have to get one.

“Desperate for some sort of legacy, the prime minister has nothing to offer but Blair’s Big Brother Britain”, said Phil Booth, national coordinator of the anti-ID card group NO2ID. […]

Snarfed from the FIPR mailing list…..

Read the rest of this entry »

Rather than suffer mass rebellion….

Tuesday, December 19th, 2006

Here we go….

Rethink on ID card computer plan

This is yet another lie. Saying that it is a ‘rethink’ implies that there was thought given in the first place. This is demonstrably not the case.

The government has abandoned plans to build a new computer system as part of the national identity cards scheme.

Instead information will be held on three existing and separate databases.

So, we will have three times as many points of access than before. Well done! And in any case, these three DBs will have to be synchronized for the real time magic to happen, so it will for all intents and purposes act like a single database.

This data, wether it is held on one or a thousand different computers should not be held at all. That is the thing that needs to be understood by HMG.

Home Secretary John Reid denied this was a “U-turn” saying it would save money, lead to greater efficiency and lower the risk of fraud.

Lies lies and more lies. They now know for sure that these measures will not prevent people from getting fake ID issued to them, complete with bogus NIR entry. The whole thing is a sham and a lie, and they all know it. This is being done to line the coffers at Schlumberger and the other vendors who look to make a trans-generational killing on the fleecing of the UK citizenry.

All non-Europeans already in the UK – not just those arriving from 2008 – would have to register biometrics, such as fingerprints or iris scans.

This is bollocks. Imagine a piece of legislation saying that you had to be fingerprinted like a criminal just to enter or stay in the UK…uh oh, thats exactly what they are talking about. When the millions of people who came to live here did so over the last forty years, they did so on the premise that they were coming to live in a free country. Now they are changing the agreement, and saying that you must now sign up for their fascist police state, or get out. This is so wrong it beggars belief.

The controversial National Identity Register (NIR) was originally proposed as a single “clean” computer system built from scratch to avoid repeating mistakes and duplications in the government’s computer systems.

We have been through this garbage soooo many times, and over such a length of time….now we are winning. Finally.

‘Lower risk’

Now the information will be spread across three existing IT systems, including the Department of Work and Pensions’ (DWP) Customer Information Service, which holds national insurance records.

Once again, it will be held between three different systems, all of which will need to be synchronized. It is a disaster times three, no doubt about it.

Mr Reid denied IT companies had wasted millions on preparation work for an entirely new system, saying the industry had been consulted on the move.

AT WHOSE INSTRUCTIONS WAS THIS MONEY WASTED you dirty swine? And now you are going to spend MORE money putting in a system that millions will reject out of principle, knowing full well that it will do nothing to stem the tide of people, stop any crime whatsoever etc etc.

“Doing something sensible is not necessarily a U-turn,” Mr Reid told reporters.

White is black, day is night, right is wrong, up is down, hot is cold, war is peace, freedom is slavery.

“We have decided it is lower risk, more efficient and faster to take the infrastructure that already exists, although the data will be drawn from other sources.”

YOU have decided this? Upon consultation with whom? Based on what parameters? This is more bullshit….and they know it.

Iris scans

The move was welcomed by campaign group No2ID.

Spokesman Michael Parker said campaigners had been warning the Home Office for years about the dangers of “putting all your eggs in one basket” when storing data.

Indeed.

Biometric information will be stored, initially, on systems currently used for asylum seekers, while biographical information will be stored on the DWP’s system.

So, your prints (should you be stupid enough to hand them over) will be stored with asylum seekers, where, thanks to the imperfections of biometric systems, you can be mistaken for someone who is not British, and who is in fact, the lowest creature in the Neulabour mind-set. That MIGHT be OK if you are not brown. And I don’t mean Gordon Brown.

Other information, on the issue and use of ID cards, will be stored on the existing passport service computer system.

Which we already know is a broken system that can allow near instant cloned passports, and which of course is open to all the insider abuse that Whitehall is already renowned for.

Mr Reid also announced proposals to force foreign nationals from outside the European Economic Area (EEA), who are already in the UK, to register their biometrics, such as fingerprints and iris scans.

And just how is he going to do that, and who in their right mind is going to agree to it?

This is already due to happen for those applying for visas to come to the UK from 2008, but Mr Reid said: “We are going to look at how we could do it for people who are already here.”

I would suggest that you look very hard at all of this and then throw it all in the garbage. There is no way that any self respecting person is going to knuckle under to your fascist bullshit.

Fake identity

He said the ultimate aim was to make all foreign nationals from outside the EU to register their biometric details but the scheme would begin with people re-applying to stay in the UK.

This will be challenged in court, and they will fail. You cannot treat people like criminals. Period.

He said he wanted to tighten up exit controls at ports and airports, as well as entry requirements.

“We want to count everybody in and count everybody out,” said Mr Reid.

Why? What will this achieve? What crime will it prevent? The answer is there is no reason for this, it will achieve nothing and that it will not prevent a single crime.

Foreigners from outside the EU would not be able to get a National Insurance number unless they have a biometric identity.

Like they even CARE. All the illegal workers DONT WANT A NATIONAL INSURANCE NUMBER YOU NUMBSKULL.

Immigration Minister Liam Byrne said a consultation paper would be published in the New Year.

Will this be like the previous consultation, where 5000 ‘noes’ were counted as one ‘no’ simply because they originated from a single website? Like that consultation that got all the facts right, that you are admitting were right only after MILLIONS of pounds have been wasted?

Don’t even PRETEND that this consultation paper will have any weight, its just an insult, and we are tired of these insults and your lies you dirty bastard.

Mr Reid said ID cards would help tackle illegal immigration, identity fraud, fight organised crime and terrorism, help protect vulnerable children by allowing better background checks and improve public services.

He said that? really?!?!?!?!?

They would not stop people having a fake identity, he conceded, but would prevent people having multiple identities, which he said were most often used by “crooks, terrorists and fraudsters”.

You have GOT to be kidding!!!!!! This is the STUPIDEST thing I have ever heard from Fascist Labor. If your prints are in the DB and a system operator is compromised, then you can have multiple identities. Period.

“You can go around claiming the first time you are John Reid, but you can not then come round a second time claiming you are Liam Byrne,” he said, by way of illustrating his point.

No one, would ever claim to be John Reid. That is just ABSURD. Honestly, even CRIMINALS have some shame.

Civil liberties

The plans were laid out in an action plan which Mr Reid said was a “countdown” to the introduction of ID cards.

The only thing we are ‘counting down’ to is the end of your evil regime you dog.

ID cards are due from 2009, becoming compulsory for anyone applying for a passport from 2010. Critics question their cost and the impact on civil liberties.

The card will contain basic identification information including the name, address, gender, date of birth and photo of the cardholder.

A microchip would also hold biometric information.

BBQ

And yet again, (and no surprise) BBQ fails to live up to its responsibilities, and lets this all slide by.

Pure unadulterated evil, and its ever compliant supporter.

SHAME ON YOU!

The Opt Out that is no Opt Out

Saturday, December 16th, 2006

The Guardian has a piece today, as Jane Affleck reports, which trails plans to offer patients an opt-out from having their details uploaded to the NHS ‘Shared Care Record’ next year:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/story/0,,1973338,00.html

There is a story on the BBC website that tells the exact opposite story, namely that no-one will get an opt out except in the most extreme circumstances:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6184043.stm

Isn’t this curious?

We suspect that the Department of Health is planning to announce on Monday an opt-out that they know will be attacked as fraudulent, and is trying to see to it that by Monday the story will be ‘old news’.

The background is this. We understand that the firms writing the software to support the opt-out have been instructed to use the following algorithm:

(1) Each GP’s surgery records will first be uploaded to a hosting centre run by a department of Health contractor;

(2) Then a program will trawl through the data creating a ‘Shared Care Record’ for upload to a central system; this will contain your current prescriptions and things like that;

(3) In respect of each patient who has ‘opted out’, a blank shared care record will then be created and uploaded ‘on top of’ the first one to the central system (whose audit facility will ensure that the original upload can still be reconstructed).

This clearly makes a mockery of the concept of ‘opt out’. If you don’t opt out, then your medical data will be available to any hospital that gives you emergency treatment, and also to the Department of Health. If you ‘opt out’, the data will be available to the Department, but not to a hospital treating you. This is clearly the wrong way round.

The shared care record is just the first step in creating a ‘Care Records Service’ which will unify GP and hospital records, but whose main function is to allow health data to be siphoned off for many other uses. (See yesterday’s BCS report on NHS computing at http://www.bcs.org/upload/pdf/BCS-HIF-report.pdf). That is the cornerstone of the NHS IT strategy and no change in it is proposed.

There is a press release from TheBigOptOut.org at

www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~rja14/Papers/tboo-pr-2006dec16.pdf

So it seems the BBC has a better grasp of what’s going on than the Guardian (though to be fair to them, their usual health man seems to be away this week),

Ross Anderson

The Animal Hypocrite

Friday, December 15th, 2006

A new civil liberties controversy has flared up over the news that police chiefs are considering using high-powered microphones to “eavesdrop” – as critics will see it – on crowds at the London 2012 Olympics.

A high-ranking officer told the BBC the proposal to strengthen security by using microphones alongside closed-circuit TV involved “taking public surveillance to an entirely new level”.

But the former home secretary David Blunkett called publicly on the government to block the scheme.

He told BBC Radio Five Live’s Weekend News programme that the suggestion was “simply unacceptable”, and smacked of the “surveillance state”.

As you walk down the street you expect to be able to have a private conversation
David Blunkett

Mr Blunkett said the idea echoed the fictional authoritarian Brave New World of Aldous Huxley’s novel.

“As you walk down the street you expect to be able to have a private conversation,” he said.

“If you can’t guarantee that – and here is someone speaking who has been pretty tough in terms of what should be available to protect society – I believe we have slipped over the edge.”

As you walk down the street, you expect to be able to have a private conversation.

This simply CANNOT be real.

Does the subhuman adulterer actually think this? Is he joking? This is the very same loathsome David Blunkett that did all the evil that we railed against…..

But Mimi Majick chimes in:

Its because he is BLIND; sound to him is equivalent to sight for us. That is why he understands this. It shows you why you shouldn’t have somebody who is disabled in a position like Home Secretary, because they cannot represent us. He cannot possibly understand what having CCTV cameras in the street means, because he has no sight.

And I agree totally, and have said this before; a blind Home Secratary cannot judge what is obscene and what is not obscene because he cannot see porn.

But I digress.

This BASTARD now wants to defect from the dark side (no pun intended) and join the side of what is right?

What utter rubbish.

This proves yet again that the people behind the push for ID cards, biometrics and all that other hogwash simply don’t understand what it is that they are doing. They don’t understand the consequences, the ramifications, the results, and if it all gets rolled out, the police will be in charge and they will have the power to silence any politician that goes up against them because they will be able to see into every bedroom, every bank account and every nook and cranny of this great country. No one in any position of power will dare defy them because it means, as in the case of asshole Blunkett, that adulterous affairs will be exposed, and in the case of Bliar, bribery uncovered.

Told you so!

and this from Bruce’s November newsletter:

We can’t turn back technology; electronic communications are here to stay. But as technology makes our conversations less ephemeral, we need laws to step in and safeguard our privacy. We need a comprehensive data privacy law, protecting our data and communications regardless of where it is stored or how it is processed. We need laws forcing companies to keep it private and to delete it as soon as it is no longer needed.

And we need to remember, whenever we type and send, we’re being watched.

Foley is an anomaly. Most of us do not send instant messages in order to solicit sex with minors. Law enforcement might have a legitimate need to access Foley’s IMs, e-mails and cell phone calling logs, but that’s why there are warrants supported by probable cause–they help ensure that investigations are properly focused on suspected pedophiles, terrorists and other criminals. We saw this in the recent UK terrorist arrests; focused investigations on suspected terrorists foiled the plot, not broad surveillance of everyone without probable cause.

Without legal privacy protections, the world becomes one giant airport security area, where the slightest joke — or comment made years before — lands you in hot water. The world becomes one giant market-research study, where we are all life-long subjects. The world becomes a police state, where we all are assumed to be Foleys and terrorists in the eyes of the government.

http://tinyurl.com/ymmnee

Yes indeed. What you are describing is not a ‘giant airport security area’ but a Prison Planet.

Me too Me too!!!! :

Passengers at Heathrow had their fingerprints taken for the first time yesterday, in tests which could lead to routine biometric scanning at Britain’s airports.

A high-tech scanner was unveiled by the Government and eventually all passengers could be required to have iris and face scans.

Initially, passengers are being invited to have their fingerprints scanned in return for skipping boarding queues. If the scheme, known as miSense, proves succesful, it could be rolled out across the UK…

Telegraph

Copycat imbeciles!

Millions may resist database, says poll

Friday, December 15th, 2006

Telegraph Online

By Philip Johnston, Home Affairs Editor
Last Updated: 2:33am GMT 04/12/2006

The first signs of a significant popular revolt against the Government’s identity card scheme have been uncovered by a YouGov poll for The Daily Telegraph.

It suggests that hundreds of thousands of people, maybe even millions, would refuse to register on the proposed database that will underpin the scheme, even if this meant a fine or going to jail.

Despite ministerial claims during the passage of the ID Cards Act through parliament that there was widespread public support for the multi-billion pound plan, the opinion survey shows a country split in two on the issue. It also indicates growing public concern at the encroachment of the so-called “surveillance society”, with large proportions suspicious of the Government’s intentions…

Telegraph

The sleeper is awakening!

3 Note Oddity And Uk Telephone Error Beeps

Thursday, December 14th, 2006

Someone with very good ears writes:

Hi,

Just thought I would write in on the off-chance that no-one has noticed this, though I’m sure someone must have done already.

I was thinking that the normal 3 note tone when you misdial a number or leave the ‘phone off the hook sounded, to my ear, identical to how the “Three Note Oddity” ( tcp_d1_12_three_note_odditiy_irdial.mp3 ) would sound if it was upped by an octave and played at double the speed.

I decided to stick the two into a wave editor, with the Irdial 3 note oddity in the left channel, and the telephone message in the right, and it turns out that the 3 notes are exactly the same.

I have no idea what it means, but it just seemed like a cool co-incidence. :-)

I’ve attached an mp3 (with the ‘phone notes slowed down by 50% and shifted down an octave to match the Irdial)
The ‘phone error in this is from the Telewest system, been a while since I’ve heard BT’s but from memory I think the tones are the same.

Mark

The never-ending strangeness of Numbers Stations; a constant source of pleasure.

Driver Tax

Friday, December 1st, 2006

It is hardly surprising to me that a report on how to tax driving written by an ex-chairman of British Airways favours ‘road pricing’ over a system based on fuel taxation. I’ve mentioned my views on fuel tax before (in the comments here)

[…] If fuel duties could be determined at regional level it would have a greater impact on congestion/road usage, it would also get rid of the complaints of rural users being disproportionately affected if Birmingham could increase fuel duty without affecting rural Warwickshire. And you wouldn’t need a network of electricity gobbling cameras […]

(I obviously don’t trust a centrally levied and collected tax to be used effectively)

In any case a report from a person who has been successful in an industry that enjoys minimal taxation is hardly likely to want to promote it anywhere else. I’m not pro-taxation per se, however ‘road pricing’ will have exactly the same economic effect as fuel taxation but be more costly to run, more intrusive to the driver (as it will depend on mass surveillance infrastructure), not easily linked to the actual performance of drivers and their cars, etc.

With fuel tax as high as it is anyway, there would obviously be no appetite for a higher rate (which is no doubt why Rod Eddington was appointed to return this sort of report) when the government is so obviously failing to spend such tax money effectively on transport infrastructure.