Jeff Taylor does an excellent job of explaining why the PATRIOT act can not, and will not, work.

Back in the early nineties BW (Before Web) there was a general belief that the National Security Agency (NSA) was monitoring email and Usenet posts. (Remember Usenet? If you don't remember think Google Groups, because that is actually Usenet with a Googley front-end.) The story went that the NSA was building a database of email addresses by looking for certain keywords in Internet traffic.

I don't know if this actually happened or if it was just another conspiracy theory, but I do know that many people decided to fight back by adding noise to the system. These were called SpookWords or NSA Fodder and they consisted of a sig-line you added to the bottom of your email or Usenet post made up of a series of words believed to be on the NSA's keyword list. Words like Kremlin, Infowar, attack, nuclear, spy, safe house, encryption, and so on.

The idea was that you could make the NSA's database useless because it would contain far too many false positives. As ideas go it wasn't too bad, although the same kinds of Bayesian algorithms now used to detect spam could probably filter out a big chunk of it. In any case the practice lost currency and dwindled away years ago. You would probably have to search Usenet posts prior to 1998 to find examples.

Well, Stephen Fishburn was a bit pissed off by President Bush's domestic spying program and decided that posting SpookWords to blogs and sig-lines for a few days might be a valid, and very visible, way to protest. Would it actually hurt the NSA's programs (if such exist)? Probably not. Are they a good way to raise awareness of this issue?

Damn skippy they are! And with this blog post let me register my own anger at Bush's actions: Whether legal or not, whether Consititutional or not, makes no difference. What matters is that spying on American citizens without judicial oversight is wrong, wrong, wrong and must stop now!

If you decide to pick this up, please link back to Stephen's original post. Also feel free to comment there with good additions to the list.

[SpookWords]

I am an American citizen. I am not an advocate for terrorism. If called upon by my country, I would gladly defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Inclusion of the following list of terms in this personal web log (or email) represents my opposition to the President's domestic spy program as well as my belief in the Bill of Rights and my 1st Amendment rights of free speech.

Al Qaeda, Taliban, Iraq, assassinate, 9/11, bomb, plutonium, George W. Bush, POTUS, uranium, target, airplane, train, bridge, tunnel, ship, building, kidnap, Afghanistan, explosives, C4, nuclear, infidel, Allah, Satan, suicide bomber, echelon, New York, Washington DC, White House, Congress, Senate, satellite, Army, Navy, soldier, insurgent, Osama bin Laden, jihad, police, Secret Service, FBI, National Security Agency, wiretap, surveillance, and Carnivore …

[/SpookWords]

Charlie Stross says terrorists might want to use different weapons than what you would see in your standard movie-plot scenario. Luckily, the terrorists appear just as focused on movie-plot scenarios as the people trying to catch them.

Michael Isikoff is reporting on two bills in Congress relaxing the rules on domestic spying:

Citing in part the need for "greater latitude" in the war on terror, the Senate Intelligence Committee recently approved broad-ranging legislation that gives the Defense Department a long sought and potentially crucial waiver: it would permit its intelligence agents, such as those working for the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), to covertly approach and cultivate "U.S. persons" and even recruit them as informants—without disclosing they are doing so on behalf of the U.S. government. The Senate committee’s action comes as President George W. Bush has talked of expanding military involvement in civil affairs, such as efforts to control pandemic disease outbreaks.

Do you trust your government to not misuse these powers?

I don't. Hell, I don't trust them not to misuse the powers already granted.

If this is the price-tag for greater safety, it is a price greater than I am willing to pay. I'd rather take my chances with the terrorists; at least they are honest about their motivations...

A while back I asked "Where is the Gandhi of Islam?" Then I pointed to a possible answer in "Could the Muslim Ghandi be a lesbian Canadian TV personality?"

Of course all that is hopeful speculation; but I am pretty certain I know who the Muslim Dante is. I hope we don't have to wait 200 years for a Muslim Luther.

A while back I asked "Where is the Gandhi of Islam?" Among other things, I said that what I really wanted to hear ". . . from the leaders of the various Muslim communities, in the immediate aftermath of such a horrible act, is an unconditional denouncement of the terrorists." And then I said that I expected to remain disappointed. I was wrong...

In an Arabic newspaper opinion piece, Amir Taheri says ". . . an increasing number of Muslims are aware of the harm that the ideology of suicide-killing, falsely presented as 'martyrdom' is causing Muslims throughout the world." I sincerely hope this is true.

In the Arab News (the Saudi royal news organ) Mohamad Alrumaihi says "We, the Arabs, condemn the London terrorist attacks that rattled the world in no uncertain terms." (Of course he couldn't resist bringing up Iraq and the Palestinian issue. But, in his defense, there was no mention of Western immorality or conspiracies involving Jewish bankers.)

The Iranian 'Islamic and Culture and Relations Organization' put out a statement which said (among other things) ". . . all the divine religions propagate peace, justice, co-existence and sympathy among followers of different religions." (However, based on reading some of their other statements, it seems that Jews are exempted from 'peace, justice, co-existence and sympathy.')

But forget all that! At best those are indications of conscience in the Muslim intelligencia rather than solid proof the Muslim world as a whole is becoming more tolerant and less attached to thirteenth-century values. At best they represent a beginning. A starting point. A small wedge that, might possibly, be used to drive open the door to a real conversation about our differences.

On the other hand there is at least one intelligent, lesbian, feminist Muslim out there. One who has written a book called 'The Trouble with Islam' and who is making exactly the kind of points I want to hear. Her name is Irshad Manji and the London Times has a recent profile:

Manji is a glamorous Canadian television presenter whose book, The Trouble with Islam, has made her so famous in America that she won something called the Oprah Winfrey Chutzpah award. Even at a conference in Oxford last week she felt unsafe — despite extra security — with police sifting through "disgusting e-mails" and threats after her appearance on Newsnight.

Doesn’t the violent Muslim minority show Islam is flawed? "I ask myself the same question," she grimaces. Far from regarding Muslims as oppressed they have a "supremacy complex — and that’s dangerous". This, she contends, is true even among moderates. "Literalists" who consider the Koran the "perfect manifesto of God" have taken over the mainstream; and far from misreading Islam, as Tony Blair and the Muslim Council of Britain insist, terrorists can find encouragement for murder in the Koran.

The underlying problem with Islam, observes Manji, is that far from spiritualising Arabia, it has been infected with the reactionary prejudices of the Middle East: "Colonialism is not the preserve of people with pink skin. What about Islamic imperialism? Eighty per cent of Muslims live outside the Arab world yet all Muslims must bow to Mecca." Fresh thinking, she contends, is suppressed by ignorant imams; you can see why she has been dubbed "Osama’s worst nightmare ".

"The good news," she insists, "is it doesn’t have to be like this." She wants a reformation in Islam, returning it to its clever, fun-loving roots.

Great article. Read the whole thing! The following grafs especially caught my attention:

"In continental Europe people of faith are regarded as second-class citizens. In America Muslims are allowed to earn their status by competing. In Europe, Britain included, your past establishes your identity much more than your future. If you don’t have the lineage here people might well feel disaffected." She points out that American mosques display signs proclaiming: "God bless America"; inconceivable here.

If we are at fault for not encouraging Muslims, they fail to "celebrate the precious gift" of British freedom: "Why do they protest against France for making it illegal to wear hijabs, but not against Saudi Arabia for making it illegal not to wear them?"; more Muslims, she contends, have been killed in recent years by fellow Muslims than by westerners.

Manji has a website called Muslim Refusenik. Go there for more.

This is a question that has been asked before. In the wake of the London attacks Charles Moore, writing in the London Telegraph, is asking it again:

But it is an important fact about Christianity in the past two or three centuries that it has conducted a great reinterpretation of these texts and of how the faithful should follow them. The struggle against the enemy in the Book of Joshua, say, or in Judges is now seen as a strictly spiritual one. The idea that these are divine 007 licences to kill has been explicitly repudiated.

Has the equivalent happened in Islam? Certainly, most Muslim leaders advocate peace and most are surely sincere in doing so. But push a bit harder, and you encounter some interesting problems.

I have asked, for example, if the Muslim Council of Britain, the mainstream umbrella organisation in this country, will condemn the killing of British troops in Iraq. They will not do so in absolute terms. They prefer instead to condemn the war itself, which is by no means the same thing.

. . .

As I write, I have beside me an article that appeared during our recent election campaign in Muslim Weekly. By Sheikh Dr Abdalqadir as-Sufi, it calls for the replacement of British parliamentary democracy with "a new civilisation based on the worship of Allah", attacks the Conservatives for being "in the hands of an illegal Jewish immigrant from Romania" and speaks of the "near-demented judaic banking elite".

These views are expressed by an educated Muslim in a Muslim publication. Are these Muslim views, non-Muslim views, anti-Muslim views?

Speaking for myself, I share Moore's mystification with those Muslims who describe Islam as a 'religion of peace' and yet do not unabigously condemn the terrorists and their actions. Certainly there have been a few, the Inmans in Spain who issued a fatwa against bin Laden for example, but overall the silence is near deafening. Even those who do speak out against the terrorists often weasel-word things to also condemn the West in the same statement.

Not that the West doesn't deserve its share of condemnation mind you, but that isn't my point. You see what I really want to hear from the leaders of the various Muslim communities, in the immediate aftermath of such a horrible act, is an unconditional denouncement of the terrorists. One that doesn't carry even a hint of "But then you deserved it, didn't you?" Later, after things have settled down, I want those same leaders (who have know established their bonafides as reasonable people) to open a dialog on the other problems they see. And to do it without also dragging in bizarre conspiracy theories prominently featuring Jews.

So far it looks like I am going to remain disappointed.

Ronald Bailey has a good article on ReasonOnline where he looks into scientists who think they should keep their biotech research a secret for the public good:

"There is no doubt that our progress in fundamental science for the benefit of mankind has also created tools that have incredible capacities for mischief," declared Elias Zerhouni, the director of the National Institutes of Health. "It is an unfortunate fact of life that there could be individuals out there who would use these very technologies and discoveries to terrorize nations and threaten the public's health."

The NSABB is tasked with devising policies aimed at preventing the misuse of "dual use" biotechnologies and information. "We want to help prevent the life sciences from becoming the death sciences," declared biologist Ronald Atlas who is also Co-director of the Center for the Deterrence of Biowarfare and Bioterrorism at the University of Louisville in Kentucky.

Two problems with this. (OK, two out of many.) First, this is a genie already long out of the bottle. You can slow it down, but you can't stop it. Second? The chilling effects of scientific secrecy and governmental ludditism won't stop the bad guys, but it will keep the good guys from coming up with countermeasures.

We can expect bioterrorism within a decade. Count on it. Wouldn't you rather have scientists sharing the information needed to help protect against it?

Other than the fact my heart goes out to those who were injured or killed (and their families) I have little to say about today's events in London. I cannot imagine how they feel; but I do feel horror, concern and anger myself.

However (and to continue yesterday's posting theme) there are some interesting things to say about news gathering in the digital age! To begin with, it appears that Wikinews' and Wikipedia's coverage of the London terror attack are hands-down the most complete and timely you can find. They were definitely the firstest with the mostest. And best of all we can count on that one Wikipedia entry continuing to get better as time goes on and more is known. Does Big Media have anything like that?

Then there are the blogs. Hundreds of on-the-spot bloggers in London and thousands more elsewhere covered things more completely, and from more angles, than CNN and the AP can possibly manage. There are too many links to list here, but you can find some amazing round-ups here and here.

And even people with nothing more than camera-equipped cell phones were getting better images than the press. Not better quality perhaps; but more immediate, more profound. The after-the-action photos now showing up on Flikr in the LondonExplosions group or even simply tagged with 'bomb' are pretty damn good as well. All in all I've got to say that todays citizen's media has performed rather well in the face of its first major catastrophe.

Even those who, like myself, are too far from the action to contribute directly can still bring something to the table. For one, I like Teresa Nielsen Hayden's 'Tips for an apocalypse'. She lists some damn good things to keep in mind should you ever find yourself dealing with a disaster of this magnitude.

This, friends, is the future of news gathering. You've seen it in action today and, I think you'll agree, it is as good as it gets.

(Note: Edited to add Wikinews and Flikr.)

I'm with Bruce Schneier on this one. Seriously. Why in the hell are Homeland Security Agents busting web sites for copyright infringement? In what way are bootleg copies of 'Revenge of the Sith' a terrorist threat?

In the meantime Bruce Sterling is reporting that Homeland Security is blowing it on the cyberwar front...

We need to shut these guys down. Stop the NID. Repudiate the Patriot Act. And basically get the government's nose out of our collective business. Because if we don't, we'll have no-one else to blame when the real gulags open for business.