Comments on: Memphis Blue

By: Blue

Blue — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 18:45:45 +0000

As an anonymous blogger from Memphis, I find the police director's gestapo tactics troubling yet unsurprising, given the culture of corruption at the MPD. I personally know officers who are overt rascists, and I know others who use marijuana regularly. It's not hard to get a MPD officer to share war stories of brutality over a few beers. The worst part is, the corruption rises through the ranks. The Memphis Flyer (weekly tabloid) has a great interview with Dirk Diggler.

By: Dave

Dave — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 17:33:27 +0000

The internet as we know it is too great a threat to the Powers That Be to be left as it is.
Internet 2 is planned http://www.infowars.com/?p=2640
This is worth keeping a close eye on.

By: TC

TC — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 17:21:35 +0000

I wish MPD the very best!

By: doctom8175

doctom8175 — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 15:22:56 +0000

“The ACLU disagrees with the Supreme Court’s conclusion about the nature of the right protected by the Second Amendment. We do not, however, take a position on gun control itself. In our view, neither the possession of guns nor the regulation of guns raises a civil liberties issue.”

I have heard that the basic difference between liberals and conservatives is which books they want to burn…maybe this could be extended to which constitutional amendments the seek to ignore.

mike

By: perlhaqr

perlhaqr — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 15:14:38 +0000

The fact that the ACLU does defend stuff like this is what makes me so sad that their post-Heller 2A position still sucks so bad. I really want to give them money, but they have made it ethically impossible for me to do so. In case anyone missed it:

In striking down Washington D.C.'s handgun ban by a 5-4 vote, the Supreme Court's 2008 decision in D.C. v. Heller held for the first time that the Second Amendment protects an individual's right to keep and bear arms, whether or not associated with a state militia. The ACLU disagrees with the Supreme Court's conclusion about the nature of the right protected by the Second Amendment. We do not, however, take a position on gun control itself. In our view, neither the possession of guns nor the regulation of guns raises a civil liberties issue.

By: perlhaqr

perlhaqr — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 15:07:17 +0000

I strongly suspect that any sort of concerted effort by the government to seriously stifle bloggers would bring about a wave of electronic retribution that would make Anonymous’ efforts against the Church of Scientology look like a minor packetstorm.

By: Dave Krueger

Dave Krueger — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 14:26:13 +0000

William,

I don’t think for a minute that the government will never succeed in closing down all dissent on the internet. But, they can put a huge damper on it with some fairly simple laws.

If there’s anything I’ve learned in my lifetime, it’s that government, when it feels threatened, always responds with repression and it is very persistent. There will always be some people willing to pay the cost of speaking their mind, but not everyone wants to martyr themselves for a cause. Raising the cost of dissent will, therefore, reduce the numbers of people willing to protest government actions. Democracy is all about numbers. You never have to suppress the opposition completely. You only have to make them look like a small minority.

By: The Brown Acid

The Brown Acid — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 14:26:11 +0000

William, I’m in China right now. Let me tell you – the great firewall of China is at best, an inconvenience. It’s hardly an effective means of censorship, though right now they’re working overtime to change that. Olympic fever has fostered Olympic paranoia.

By: Brock

Brock — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 14:12:13 +0000

Nick,

The link is in the article, though like Radley’s links, it’s not visible until you mouse over it. The URL is

http://mpdenforcer20.blogspot.com/

By: CRNewsom

CRNewsom — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 14:01:20 +0000

From Fight Club:
“The people you’re after are the people you depend on. We cook your meals, we haul your trash, we connect your calls, we drive your ambulances. We guard you while you sleep. Do not fuck with us.”

It does not take extreme technical knowledge to skirt their efforts as described above. The backlash from something like this would be enormous, and I welcome it.

By: Nick T

Nick T — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 13:48:45 +0000

Sorry fi I missed it, but is there a link to this website? I would like to go there and support it.

By: William

William — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 13:33:34 +0000

Dave: You’re assuming that restrictions could even work. The internet is an interesting technology in that it is fairly resistant to government intervention when used by anyone with a decent grasp on it. Local regulations won’t simply can’t work because anything on the internet involves people in a variety of jurisdictions. Federal regulations face the problem of data traveling across international borders and being unable to really know if the sender or receiver are within their country. Even international regulations would be difficult to enforce because they would require the cooperation of every single country with access to the web.

China has one of the world’s most aggressive and sophisticated internet control bureaucracies and it still really manages to only restrict people without much technical knowledge. Theres a reason terrorists, drug dealers, and child porn peddlers have turned to the internet in order to communicate: because no one has yet managed to figure out how to catch anyone but the absolutely stupid or careless. Right now, for free, I could route my data traffic through a half dozen proxies on 6 continents with a click of a button. I could change those proxies every fifteen minutes and not repeat for decades. I could make a sterile e-mail address to use to get past requirements for blog comments. Even if my technique is imperfect, I would additionally shielded by the sheer volume of background noise. My computer came stock with the kind of data destruction software that would require an electron microscope to retrieve anything I deleted.

The thing is, I’m not an expert. I’m not even that good with computers. Hell, I’m a Mac user.

By: The Brown Acid

The Brown Acid — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 13:25:00 +0000

Dave, in sick way, I hope you’re correct. Open journalistic war between the MSM and establishment and the blogosphere will be quite a sight to behold.

By: mrk

mrk — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 13:17:15 +0000

Every blogger should probably be donating heavily to the ACLU. It’s the only organization with enough public and legal clout to protect them.

Don't forget the Institute for Justice

By: Dave Krueger

Dave Krueger — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 12:53:12 +0000

I think it’s only a matter of time before bloggers face restrictions of some kind. It’s too seditious a medium for governments not to feel threatened. Bloggers are not politically organized and don’t wield the institutional authority of the mainstream media, so they are vulnerable. In fact, the mainstream media will be more than willing to assist in reining them in, because “those amateurs” are stealing their market share. And it’s not like the First Amendment protects anything anymore. All you need to get past Constitutional constraints these days is the ability to spell the phrase “compelling need”.

Every blogger should probably be donating heavily to the ACLU. It’s the only organization with enough public and legal clout to protect them.