Thursday, June 17, 2010

9-11 Truther detained for questioning officer's identity

He was detained in the hall after asking to see the officers’ ID cards before he left the building. They are required according to their own manual to provide ID upon request, but apparently don’t like to be asked for it. When the supervising officer ordered Bruno to turn around and put his hands behind his back, Bruno instantly turned around and put his hands behind his back with absolutely no resistance.


This story was forwarded to me from Tim Biancalana, musician and friend.  9-11 Truthers have long been in the intelligence crosshairs for questioning the events surrounding the September 11th bombings in America.  Everyone has a post 9-11 story.   Some people got more involved in securing our nation.  Others embarked on a seemingly endless quest to uncover esoteric truth in efforts to mitigate individual accountabilities for the direction our country pursued into the Iraq-Afghanistan oil and drug wars.  


This story is about an activist who may have unwisely provoked criminal justice authorities, but it is also an illustration of our freedom to non-violently and legally challenge authority on the basis of our Bill of Rights.  9-11 Truthers have been labeled, among other things, conspiracy theorists.  Obama appointed Cass Sunstein to put together a task force of special emphasis on those who continually question the government sprawl into fascism and human rights violations with their unproven guesswork.  The point is in asking who makes you more uncomfortable: the hystrionic error prone propagandists or the executive government with a task force employed to silence them as noisy targets with your tax dollars?  You can get annoyed and decide to opt out of only one of the two.


Someone asked me yesterday about my history with 9-11 Truth.  I explained: regardless of whether or not the government was "behind 9-11" - the outcomes for our nation are exactly the same: we subsidize torture, rendition, continuous denial of due process, the subversion of Habeas Corpus and sedition,  human rights violations (including experimentation), pre-emptive war, established exceptionalism as the new standard to conserve the erosions of basic civil rights and civil liberty, bankruptcy, and multinational corporate sociopathy emerging as untouchable power over US and International ethics and rule of law.  All of these things were successively exposed from the populist plumblines surrounding the 9-11 Truth movement.  My other point is if you have the intestinal fortitude to explore dystopian theory, then you might have enough to be a serial resister to totalitarian government. 


I don't stand with 9-11 Truth because I love their tinfoil hats.  I stand with them for their right to wear a hat which, however flimsy, has the mettle to defy authoritarian conventions established to dominate their right to question criminal acts of governance.   


-Sheila M. Dean

Delaware DMV unveils new secure ID cards

:: NCard :: MiddleTownTranscript::Dover Post

Dover, Del. —Starting July 1, Delaware’s blue and gold drivers’ licenses will change from simple cards with basic information to high-tech pieces of plastic designed to be more secure and harder to forge than anything that’s come before.

The new identification cards are designed to comply with federal regulations formulated in the wake of the September 11 attacks and crafted to unify procedures and security measures that vary greatly from state to state.

Beginning in 2014, only identification cards designed to the federal standards will be accepted when boarding an airplane or entering a federal building, though no one will be forced to obtain a federally compliant ID.

Delaware Division of Motor Vehicles Director Jennifer Cohan said the First State has been able to move quickly and get a jump on the federal mandates, unlike larger states that remain mired in logistical problems.

“Delaware is in a fortunate spot; we’re a small state,” she said. “We received $1 million from the federal government and we have a whole new computer system.”

To get a new ID, citizens must produce more detailed documentation than before to verify their identities and prove their citizenship.

Before issuing an ID, staff at the DMV will need to see an original birth certificate or valid passport, as well as an original social security card and a recent piece of mail received at a current in-state address.

Even though producing more detailed documentation can mean a bit more hassle for residents, Cohan said the new computer systems would make renewing an ID easier in the future.  :::MORE HERE:::

AZ SB 1070: privacy handling not added to law enforcement training

BTC -  While racial profiling potentials dominate media coverage of Arizona's new law, SB 1070, the privacy concerns of those profiled have been overshadowed.  Tempe Ariz. resident, David Huerta, a privacy code engineer for Haystackproject.org, expressed concerns about massive transfer of citizen data and how the handling of his private information could be insecure.   Huerta is also a speaker this week at the Computing, Freedom and Privacy Conference in San Jose, Calif.

Unfortunately for Huerta, and other hispanics, Arizona's law enforcement will not be trained on any additional privacy handling practices specific to SB 1070, according to Executive Director, Lyle Mann, for Arizona Peace Officer Standards and Training Board. No privacy impact assessments were conveyed to AZPOST, the agency who develops training for Arizona's law enforcement practices.   Agencies responsible for policies to implement to the new law are the Arizona's Sherriff's Departments, the Arizona Department of Public Safety and any agency who may recruited as First Responders.

Law enforcement training to implement SB 1070 is expected to commence soon according to DPS Seargant,  Kevin Wood.   Privacy impact assessments for the new law were unkown or unavailable to Seargant Wood. Officers may be responsible for enforcing the law as soon as July, 29th 2010.

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

CFP Conference coverage - Live Blog