Jerry Brown vetoes privacy bill for California | Hacker News Reader

Jerry Brown vetoes privacy bill for California

rt.com

28 pointsbifrost11 comments

Before you make a knee-jerk decision about this, read the (very short) bill here: http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/11-12/bill/sen/sb_1401-1450/sb...

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There seems to be a number of other provisions in this bill that the original article glossed over, specifically surrounding disclose of the number of warrants used. Why law enforcement is so squeamish about releasing numbers is mystifying. Is there some legitimate reason to not be forthcoming?

> "Why law enforcement is so squeamish about releasing numbers is mystifying."

Perhaps because once you release numbers, there are many ways others can use them to make you look bad/incompetent. I'm not justifying this position, merely pointing out a possible opinion.

This may be a little bit off-topic, but did anyone else notice we are reading a lot of news about the US from a news site in Russia?

As someone who grew up during the cold war, this sure feels weird...

I first noticed this during the election in 2012. The best coverage I could find on third-party candidates was from RT. I've since then noticed RT show up on HN a few times, mostly covering the NSA controversy.

Main stream media has been co-opted by the corporate state, e.g. CNN. We don't really have an independent press any more. It is no surprise that RT maybe the only avenue to stay informed.

This sums up the problem pretty well, I feel.

http://cdn.front.moveon.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/media...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soft_power

Britain has been doing the same thing for 80 years or so with the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBC_World_Service

Reason.tv (Reason magazine's video site) post videos from shows that their staff / contributors appear on. It has been interesting seeing the number of times RT has shown up. Weird world where libertarians appear on Russian owned media.

It is pretty funny, I got tuned into RT about 6-7 years ago because they actually carried US-libertarian oriented stories. I suspect its because they're former enemies of the western world, can't let a good story go to waste. I also like DeutscheWelle, but they're a bit more polite.

This is a story from last October. Why is it being posted now?

I'd guess it's related to the renewed interest in privacy prompted by Snowden's recent disclosures of the NSA's activities. It's interesting to see that it's not just the NSA that wants to do warrantless surveillance of U.S. citizens. (See also the recent articles about all the local governments that are scanning license plates and archiving the data on where everyone has been.)

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