eightyone

From the article:

"The program is court-approved but does not require individual warrants."

So does this mean that the number of government requests released by Facebook, Microsoft, etc. within the last few weeks are essentially meaningless in regards to PRISM and most likely other top secret government spying programs?

There are a total of 41 slides related to this particular slideshow.

http://www.theverge.com/2013/6/29/4478572/prism-slides-surve...

> Do you think other countries are not hacking US telecoms to spy on US citizens?

I'm condemning all massive scale spying on foreign citizens regardless of country. Pretty sure there's a logical fallacy in that sentence of yours.

> I see no way for the NSA or CIA to be able to do their jobs without being permitted to spy on foreign citizens.

The U.S. is not just spying on specific citizens. They are hacking into major Chinese telecom services and sucking up all the information they can.

> The protections for American citizens against their government spying on them are intended to preserve political freedom in the US.

Is it ok to spy on American citizens living abroad or are they fair game?

"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Benjamin Franklin

It's not ok for the U.S. to hack major Chinese telecoms to spy on it's citizens.

I'm not sure exactly what your referencing, but if you are talking about all the stuff that's been going down in the U.S., Glenn Greenwald said at the Socialism Conference yesterday that a lot of what's going on isn't legal and has been ruled unconstitutional in the secret FISA court.

Link to video: http://youtu.be/Uulv4ve6RJ8

Skip to 45:00 and watch for a couple minutes if you're interested in hearing just that. Though if you have time I recommend watching the whole thing.

I never knew that he took a picture of the door to the room. Looking at it makes me sick to my stomach.

I made the same connection.

Imagine if every government bill was annotated or available online for the public/scholars to annotate. This would be really cool for terms of service, as well.

For an opposite view point, see the Salon article Tuition is too damn high. It argues for the vast majority of people tuition has increased because government has drastically cut funds to public education. Not because of Pell Grants or "easy money". The author has some interesting data, as well.

Here's a glimpse:

"The first step in grappling with the rise in the cost of higher education requires understanding where students go to school. There are three main categories — public schools (which include both four-year public universities and two-year community colleges), private nonprofits (the Ivys, most liberal arts colleges, etc.), and the for-profits (Kaplan, University of Phoenix, Corinthian Colleges, aka “career schools”). Here’s the key statistic: Fully 70 percent of the 19 million undergraduates and 3 million graduate students enrolled in post-secondary education in 2010 attended schools considered to be in the public sector — by which it is meant that some portion of their funding comes directly from government."

"The problem: The word “public” doesn’t mean as much as it used to. Direct state support for public colleges has cratered over the past 10 years, and really fell off the cliff after the financial crisis. Yes, tuitions have risen, but not by as much as state and local appropriations for higher education have fallen. Just between 2008 and 2009, for example, average tuition revenue at public research institutions increased by $369 per student, but the loss in state and local appropriations per student was $751. Similarly, at public community colleges, tuition revenue rose by $113 per student, while appropriations fell by $488. Since the recession of 2001, tuition hikes, as exorbitant as they have been, still haven’t kept pace with the fall in government support."

http://www.salon.com/2012/05/11/tuition_is_too_damn_high/

Maybe it's always been this way and I am just realizing it, but MSNBC has went to hell. Like you said, Chris Hayes is one of the only progressives on mainstream TV to actually standup for Snowden. Rachel Maddow, Lawrence O'Donnel, they're nothing but Obama apologists. I hope that Chris maintains good ratings because television really needs him. I've been watching way more independent sources now such as Democracy Now! with Amy Goodman. Really great program and they have a podcast.

Edit: For those who haven't seen his program, here's Chris Hayes at his best. (From today, June 27th, 2013)

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/chris-hayes-absolutely-nails-hypo...

"Deposits are made into your account in two business days in most cases."

This is awful copywriting. There's not even an asterisk with more information or anything.

Bill Maher has an excellent clip on this. He boils it down to, "Basically we're arming Al Qaeda."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M6paYu3GM2Y

I want a framework that is built around security, privacy, encryption, etc.

I would say it depends where you want to get a job. I think most start-ups would weigh you having a kick ass GitHub profile more than a Zend certificate. If you don't have that, then that's what you should work on. If you do already have that, and you have both money and time to spend on getting the Zend certificate, then go ahead and get it. It's an accomplishment and will only help you. Not much to lose. Also don't be afraid to look into cisco certificate, which may not be directly related to the job your applying for, but look really good on a resume and can give you a better overhead picture.

I recently stopped watching everyone on MSNBC but Chris Hayes. He has a great show. He's had Greenwald on a couple times in the past few weeks. Also, Democracy Now! is really great. One of the only programs on TV that talks about Wikileaks and Manning on a semi-regular basis.

> "I'll say that you are missing the fact that information campaigns don't reach the very people who are most at risk."

We could reach everyone in the country if we spent just a fraction of the trillion dollars we've spent on fighting the unsuccessful drug war. The key is that you have to be willing to give people unbiased information. In DARE they tried to tell us that acid drips down your spine which is absolute bullshit.

> "That would not change with drugs being legal, it would still be the cause of the destruction of families and communities."

The biggest reason why drugs tear apart communities is because they are illegal. Make them legal, give proper information, and let people decide on their own. Open up clinics to treat people and to use as a demonstration as one of the possible dangers if you do harder drugs.

Btw, do you think that cannabis, LSD, magic mushrooms, mescaline, and MDMA should be illegal? Do you think we should make Naloxone over the counter and be allowed to be sold everywhere?

> At the same time there is no guarantee that crime would go away, addicts will still need drugs very badly every day, so unless it was extremely cheap or free (I don't know what the price target would be) they would still need to be out hustling.

There is no guarantee in anything. Portugal has seen crime go down. That's data, baby. Also, when drugs are legal they are way cheaper than they are right now. The biggest reason why they can be expensive is because they are part of a black market which inflates the price artificially. Did you read my link above about how countries are experimenting with giving unadulterated heroin to heroin addicts and are helping treat them? They are seeing very successful results.

Once again: People who want to do heroin are already doing heroin. Stop parroting the false notion that people aren't doing drugs. They are.

> "Most of your argument revolves around comparing different substances, while I made a point specifically about crack, though I will allow heroin in the same category"

You're not refuting my comment because it's irrefutable. You can't argue with a decline in overdoses and HIV outbreaks attributed to drug use, so you're trying to shift the conversation.

> "Nobody with a little worldly experience would compare crack or heroin with tobacco or even alcohol."

That's absolutely ludicrous. Alcohol has killed millions of more people than heroin has and has been just as devastating if not more. If you are saying that we should ban heroin because of it's dangerous properties and alcohol shouldn't be banned that's a mighty big contradiction on your part. I have plenty of "worldly experience", thank you very much.

> "It destroys lives, families and communities, far beyond the addicts themselves, and it happens in a very nefarious way where addicts gradually lose control, without ever intending to go that route."

If heroin was legal we could remove next to all impurities, make a cheaper product, and have treatment facilities that could both treat addicts who need help and serve as a model for other citizens as the dangers involved if you decide to do a drug such as heroin. People have less of incentive to try to get clean because if they relapse they risk going to prison.

> "It destroys lives, families and communities, far beyond the addicts themselves, and it happens in a very nefarious way where addicts gradually lose control, without ever intending to go that route."

Yep. Same thing can happen with alcohol.

> "I have seen some of the smartest and most sensible people turn into zombies who would and did sell themselves, their kids' toys and baby's diapers for drugs."

Wait, I thought making drugs illegal was supposed to keep people from doing them? I know several high-functional members of society that partake in various drugs. You're anecdotal evidence doesn't mean anything to me.

> "A lot of people aren't capable of making this choice, they can't fathom the consequences, and those consequences affect many others than just themselves."

People are already making that choice, as you essentially just said in your last sentence.

> "A lot of people aren't capable of making this choice, they can't fathom the consequences, and those consequences affect many others than just themselves. That makes it a societal matter, not just about individual freedom."

If drugs were legal it doesn't mean that everyone is going to start doing them. Lowering HIV rates is a societal matter and so is lowering overdoes. So is not tearing families a apart by sending responsible parents to jail because they happen to like a specific drug that happens to be illegal.

> "The fact that underground markets exist with all their associated ills is neither here nor there, this is the case for anything illegal."

What? How is the fact that there is a multi-billion dollar underground market that is run by the cartels "neither here nor there". People are doing drugs no matter if you like it or not. It's never been easier to get drugs than it is right now. I am a responsible adult and deserve to ingest any god damn substance that I please. You want people like me to go to prison.

The drug war is hits the African-American community the hardest, police men aren't going after day traders who do blow. You should really read both the Glenn Greenwald paper I linked above and the book The New Jim Crow.

Some people are going to abuse some things and it's none of your business to tell them what they can and can't do with their own body.

Sending people to jail over drug offenses doesn't solve any thing. You're lying to yourself if you think that it does.

You're argument is full of holes.

"Today at TechCrunch Disrupt, the Rap Genius founders told me they plan to monetize by building installation of their site for big companies and government agencies. Biz Genius is coming."

http://techcrunch.com/2013/05/01/rap-genius-enterprise/

Reid Hoffman, founder of LinkedIn, has a similar quote, "If you're not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you've launched too late." I don't know if one came before the other. Reguardless it's a good sentiment to have. The only thing that matters is launching. You can find the perfect shade of blue for that button after you launch.

Oops. Thank you so much. I've corrected the error(s). I got so excited that I was bashing away on the keyboard and must have misspelled heroin and it autocorrected to heroine. I think I need to relearn how to type with Mavis Beacon, haha.

I'm not going to rehash my recently made above comment, but you should check it out. [1] Tylenol kills 500 people a year, so I guess that means we should make it illegal, huh?

Drugs are mostly destroying people and communities because they are illegal. Maybe if your dad went to prison for an ounce of weed, you would have a different sentiment.

When a drug can be produced in a sterile environment, you can yield greater purity and an overall safer product. Not to mention when drugs are legal people who are addicted are more apt to seek treatment. You might be surprised to hear several countries are treating heroine addictions via making heroine available under a controlled environment where addicts can seek help. They're seeing great results. [2] Also make sure to look at [1] to see how much HIV rates have dropped in Portugal because of decriminalization of drugs like heroine.

Do you want to ban alcohol, tobacco, stairs, cars, and swimming pools in the name of people you deem incapable of making wise decisions? You have no right to tell someone what they can put in their body or do to their body. Give people unbiased information and let them make their own decisions.

Stop making the assumption that people aren't going to do drugs if they're illegal. That's not true. Lower-classes, particularly poorer African-Americans have been devastated by the drug war. See the book the New Jim Crow laws for more information regarding this. If you're a young black kid with an ounce of weed you're probably going to jail, where as if you're a wealthy white executive who lives in a private gated community and happen to have a few grams of coke and you get caught, you'll get a fine and a slap on the wrist.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5951290

[2] http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1926160,00.ht...

There are plenty of things that are physically addictive and still legal: caffeine, alcohol, cigarettes and a cornucopia of various pharmaceuticals (both prescription and over the counter). Also, there are an abundance of illegal drugs that aren't physically addictive such as LSD [1], psilocybin mushrooms [2], DMT [3], mescaline [4], or MDMA [5]. So that's a pretty bad argument. I've not once said I have an "every man for himself" belief system. From your language, it seems that your may be assuming I'm a libertarian. I'm not. Not that it matters if I was because there's a solid case to be made against prohibition. Honestly that doesn't even make any sense in this context. We should give people unbiased information and let them make their own decisions. Society has no place telling me or anyone else what they can put in their body. Just like we do a wide variety of other things we consume and make use of daily. Should we take acetaminophen (Tylenol) off the market because 500 people per year overdose and die from it? [13] How about caffeine? That kills people too and is physically addictive. Should we go back to prohibiting alcohol, which kills 75,000 people per year in the United States alone? [14] How about tobacco which kills 5 million people per year? [15] What about all the research chemicals that no one knows the side effects of because they haven't been studied like the more popular drugs? They get banned and all you have to do is change a couple molecules and it's a new drug. heroin deaths are a pimple compared to alcohol deaths, a couple thousand per year most. And how much of that is because of a dealer who gave bad, impure product to a customer that required them to shoot up a ton to get a high? Who knows. I'm going to preemptively stop you. Don't you dare say that if heroin was legal that significantly more people would die from it. No one wakes up one day and says, "Gee I think I'd like to buy some China white heroin." If something like Naloxone, which is a drug used in hospitals as a counter to heroin and other opiate related overdoes was allowed to be sold everywhere I'm sure you would see that number go down, as well. [18]

The drug war is a colossal failure that has done nothing but contributed to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people (most likely millions worldwide, but I don't have stat for that.) and ripped families a part. In Mexico alone between 2006 and 2012 drug related violence hit 60,00 deaths. That's in Mexico alone in only a few years. [6] as well as make a select few richer. Statistics show that it disproportionately effects those in the African-American community. [7] You obviously haven't seen your father ripped from your arms for possessing an ounce of weed, a sheet of acid, or a couple grams of cocaine. History is a major indicator that the war on drugs is not going to get better. It's only going to get worse. Legalize and regulate drugs and you will see crime go down across the board. Not to mention that you can then control the quality of drugs. When you can produce heroin in a grade a chemical facility and not some guys shed you can make a drastically healthier product.

You're making the assertion that making drugs illegal makes them go away. Simple put: that's false. People who are physically addicted to drugs such as heroin can't seek out help as it currently lies because they are treated as criminals if they relapse and are sent to prison.

Portugal decriminalized a wide array of drugs including heroin, LSD, marijuana, and cocaine and they saw:

- More people opted to seek out treatment for their drug problems [8]

- Reduction in HIV among drug users by 17% [9]

- Drug use among adolescents declined [10]

- Decreased value of street drugs [11]

For more see See Drug Decriminalization in Portugal by Glenn Greenwald [6]

Further more I want to touch on the fact that the way scheduling is handled in the United States, several important drugs are kept from being studied by scientists in universities. That is absolutely ridiculous. Drugs like MDMA are going to pave the way in treating things like depression and PTSD. [16] LSD has been known to help alcoholics see the light and give it up. [17]

Marinol, a synthetic form of THC that costs thousands of percents more than the price of marijuana, is allowed to be prescribed and sold, but marijuana is illegal. That's messed up.

You're way of thinking is dangerous and is irrational and your certainty not being reasonable.

[1] http://www.erowid.org/chemicals/lsd/lsd_basics.shtml

[2] http://brown.edu/Student_Services/Health_Services/Health_Edu...

[3] http://www.erowid.org/chemicals/dmt/dmt_basics.shtml

[4] http://www.erowid.org/chemicals/mescaline/mescaline_basics.s...

[5] http://www.dartmouth.edu/~healthed/groups/dapa/otherdrugs/md...

[6] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-10681249

[7] http://newjimcrow.com/

[8] http://www.beckleyfoundation.org/bib/doc/bf/2007_Caitlin_211...

[9] http://www.idt.pt/PT/IDT/Documents/Ponto_Focal/2009_National...

[10] http://www.beckleyfoundation.org/bib/doc/bf/2010_Caitlin_211...

[11] http://www.beckleyfoundation.org/bib/doc/bf/2010_Caitlin_211...

[12] http://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/greenwald_...

[13] http://www.fda.gov/drugs/drugsafety/ucm239821.htm

[14] http://www.nbcnews.com/id/6089353/ns/health-addictions/t/alc...

[15] http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/fast_...

[16] http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2012/dec/27/mdma-ecstasy-p...

[17] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-17297714

[18] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naloxone

Edit: Some formatting and thanks to klearvue for bringing a prevalent spelling error to my attention. Sometimes I get ahead of myself.

Go to System Preferences > iCloud > Uncheck the option "Documents & Data" to change it via the GUI.

People should be allowed to put whatever they want in their body. The war on drugs is a seismic failure that does nothing but propagate the prison industrial complex. The most popular drugs on these sites are marijuana and psychedelics such as LSD and psilocybin mushrooms that are by no means "hard" drugs. Making things illegal, especially drugs, doesn't make them go away. Your just pushing them underground where they aren't regulated.

The way this has played out through social media has been amazing. The biggest thing I can think of is that someone falsified documents to make it look like the vote was taken before the 12:00 AM deadline, when it in fact took place several minutes after the deadline. Enough people on the Internet had the foresight to take screenshots and print hard copies of the original record, so that when the falsified document started circulating they could call the politicians on their fraudulence. I assume this information made its way up to the Democrats arguing against the bill.

https://twitter.com/becca_aa/status/349772548269027328/photo...

It is definitely getting worse. I had MSNBC on last night as background noise and heard several pundits speculate that Snowden may have sold or given information to China or Russia.

I can't find the tweet, but a little while back Greenwald said on Twitter he has thousands of documents from Snowden.

I don't mean to nitpick, but that's actually a quote from one of the last issues of The Whole Earth Catalog.

http://wikipedia.org/wiki/Whole_Earth_Catalog

Don't we already know that Yahoo fought hard against PRISM? Why are all of these companies lying so blatantly by saying they've never heard of it?