UK ‘Poll Of Polls’ Shows Support For Brexit Faded As Negotiations With EU Stalled
Over the three-plus years that have passed since the Brexit referendum, the fraught process of leaving the European Union has stretched the patience of many voters to the breaking point, while others have been driven to the point of near-hysteria by incessant warnings about the chaotic fallout should the UK leave the bloc without a withdrawal agreement in place.
So, perhaps it’s not all that surprising when researchers and journalists look at the aggregate poll results over the years to see support for ‘remain’ climb while support for ‘leave’ faltered as negotiations became increasingly fraught. In all honesty, the fact that ‘leave’ hasn’t seen a larger drop in support should be encouraging for supporters.
UK PM Boris Johnson and outgoing EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker
Whatever the case may be, with support for a second referendum on the rise, the Evening Standard has performed an analysis of more than 200 public opinion polls that have been conducted since the referendum. And it found that support for Leave has slumped while support for Remain has climbed.
The study shows that at the start of 2017, a majority of survey respondents favored quitting the EU, 51% to 49% (though their lead was down slightly compared with the results of the referendum. But during the first six months of 2018, remain was ahead 52% to 48%. By the first six months of this year, after two years of incessant and bombastic coverage of Parliament’s misadventures by the British press, ‘Remain’ led 54% to 46%.
In the most recent batch of polls, ‘Leave’ had bounced back, and was only trailing ‘Remain’ by six percentage points, or 53% to 47%.
These findings were announced together with ‘the People’s Vote”s latest campaign for a second Brexit referendum, entitled “Together for the Final Say.”
Hundreds of thousands of marchers are expected to join the demonstration, which is set to take place on the same day that the Commons is expected to sit for an emergency Saturday session to vote on its preferred path forward for Brexit (if Parliament doesn’t vote in favor of a ‘no-deal’ Brexit, then legally, PM Boris Johnson may be compelled to request another extension from Europe, kicking the Brexit can until early next year).
If Parliament succeeds in blocking ‘no deal’ on Oct. 31, MPs will have successfully delayed Brexit by nearly a year (the original ‘Article 50’ date was March 31, 2019). According to political analysts who have been closely following the situation, this would virtually guarantee a snap election (since Parliament has proven time and time again that it can’t come to an agreement on the withdrawal agreement). But when it comes to an actual vote, polling has been much less clear. According to Goldman Sachs, there’s a decent chance that a snap vote could return Johnson to power with a stronger majority.
According to the FT, which published a probable timeline for the as-yet-unconfirmed vote on Wednesday, Oct. 23 is the soonest possible date that the government could call for a Commons vote on the prospects for an election, with Britons likely heading to the polls on Dec. 5.
But with UK labor productivity falling, jobs leaving and growth slowing – all of which have been successfully blamed on Brexit, despite evidence of a Continent-spanning slowdown – Johnson could have his work cut out for him.
The Church of England is demanding that the United Kingdom use force and violence to ban pointy knives. A religious organization is now insisting that crime be reduced by further enslaving the population.
Last year, London’s murder rate briefly overtook that of New York City, a feat likely to be repeated as crime continues its decline in the U.S. while the latest U.K. figures show an increase in violent crimes committed with both guns and knives. In spite of all the laws restricting ownership of anything that could constitute a weapon, violent crimes are getting much worse. Instead of giving people more freedom and the human dignity of being able to defend themselves against these attacks, religious organizations and the government want to take steps to make sure only those committing violent acts have the means to do so.
“We the undersigned are professionals and community leaders from across the UK who call on Government to see the sale of pointed domestic kitchen knives as a thing of the past,” reads the not-a-parody open letter from the Diocese of Rochester, signed by church leaders, lawmakers, psychiatrists, academics, and the like. “Historically we needed a point on the end of our knife to pick up food because forks weren’t invented. Now we only need the point to open packets when we can’t be bothered to find the scissors.”
When the human condition resists perfection through legislation, the answer always seems to be more – and stupider – laws.
Just months ago, a Conservative member of Parliament made headlines when he took a different, but equally restrictive, approach to regulating sharp pieces of metal, reported Reason.
“Every knife sold in the UK should have a GPS tracker fitted in the handle,”insisted Scott Mann. “It’s time we had a national database like we do with guns.”
Mann took a lot of ribbing for the proposal, and even admitted that it was “a bit of a shit idea.”
But that’s just because he was a step ahead of the mob. If he’d stuck with grinding off the pointy bits, he would likely have been hailed as a model of responsible opinion.
Knife control is supposed to be a joke—where control freaks take their next efforts when gun laws prove unenforceable and criminals decline to discontinue their efforts just because they’ve been rendered even more illegal. But British politicians took that joke and turned it into national policy. Now they want to double down on that policy because the bad guys still won’t play along.
For The First Time Ever, Greece Issues Negative Yielding Debt
As armies of fixed income strategists battle over whether US Treasuries are facing higher or lower yields, Greece has no such qualms and in a historic shift today, the former bond market pariah and Eurozone’s most indebted nation, joined the exclusive club of negative-yielding European nations when bond investors lined up to pay the nation that was at the heart of Europe’s sovereign debt crisis.
A sale of €487.5 million of 13-week bills on Wednesday drew Greece’s first-ever negative yield of minus 0.02% as investors now pay Athens for the privilege of lending it cash, as Bloomberg first reported. Greece joins the likes of Ireland, Italy and Spain – not to mention virtually all core Eurozone nations – which benefit from the ECB’s insane monetary policy and deepening fears of a global recession.
It’s been an unprecedented turnaround for twice bankrupt Eurozone member, whose bondholders suffered massive losses back in March 2012 when the country was forced to accept the biggest bond restructuring in history, bringing the Eurozone to the verge of collapse.
Just a few years and several trillions in bond purchases by the ECB later, the region is grappling with an altogether different problem – the spread of negative yields, which reduces borrowing costs for governments in a form of soft default, one which is crushing savers, pension funds and insurers, and which has prompted some of the most respected names in finance to shriek in terror as the cost of money in even Europe’s most insolvent nations is now negative.
Jon Day, a fixed-income portfolio manager at Newton Investment Management, said the move was “another symptom” of the “global grab for yield, especially in euro-denominated bonds,” pointing out that short-dated Greek bonds were previously one of the few government markets where a positive return was on offer. Indeed, as recently as 2017, the Greek 13-week bills yielded a “generous” 2.70% before they started their journey to NIRP just over two years ago.
Still, despite Europe’s artificial, central bank-propped up bond market, nothing has been fixed with respect to the Greek economy: “There remain substantial risks around Greece’s financial position and it remains vulnerable to a significant economic slowdown,” Day said. “Current yields on their bonds do not reflect this risk.”
Greece foray into negative rates comes after the ECB cut its deposit rates even deeper into negative territory and said it would restart quantitative easing (unlike in the US, the ECB has no qualms about calling “not a QE” by its real name). Investors are also looking toward fiscal stimulus as the ability of monetary policy to stoke growth is tested to its limits, and unlike Germany, we expect Greece to fully take advantage of negative yields to stick it to creditors “investing” with other people’s pensions. Earlier this week, the nation also took advantage of record-low borrowing costs by selling 10-year bonds this week at a yield of 1.5%.
Greece’s government is forecasting 2.8% economic growth in 2020, which it says puts it on track to meet a budget target agreed with creditors while still enacting tax relief measures.
“Greece issuing negative-yielding bills is more evidence of the positive effect that negative interest rates and QE has on debt sustainability for governments,” said Mizuho’s head of rates strategy Peter Chatwell, even though it is not quite clear how Greece accumulating even more debt to “fix” a catastrophe that was the result of record debt actually works out in the long run… but that’s ok, by then it will be someone else’s problem.
“Side effects are large for banks and investors, but for the governments there are very significant benefits.”
Indeed: as the world’s banks and investors founder, at least perpetually corrupt and incompetent governments are rewarded, and all it took was several years of insane monetary policy by a former Goldmanite to unleash the biggest revolution in the European bond market in history, one which will end in the biggest bond bubble crash ever seen.
But – as the supporters of the ECB will tell you – “not yet”…
The British think-tank Policy Exchange, recently published a report,Eroding the Free Press, about a leaked draft of “Guidance for Reporting on Islam and Muslims”. The guidance was drafted by the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO), the UK’s independent press regulator, an initiative that IPSO announced in late 2018. In the past, IPSO has, among other issues, published guidance on the reporting of death and inquests, sexual offences, suicides, and transgender people.According to IPSO, its guidance is “designed to support editors and journalists” and “does not limit or restrict editorial decision making, but may inform that decision making”.
In a January 2019 blog on IPSO’s main priorities for 2019, IPSO Head of Standards Charlotte Urwin laid out the five priorities of the year. “Reporting of Islam and Muslims” was listed as the first priority and described in the following way:
“In October 2018, we began working towards producing guidance for journalists on the reporting of Islam and Muslims in the UK, an area of broad political and social concern. The guidance will help journalists to report on a sensitive area, whilst also ensuring that it does not impinge their right to criticise, challenge or stimulate debate. We have established an informal working group to help us draft the guidance, bringing together academics who have research experience in relation to Islam and Muslims in the UK and representatives of organisations interested in the coverage of Islam…”
Policy Exchange’s report on the leaked guidance gives rise for concern.
In the words of the report, the guidance, “seems designed to bind the hands of UK newspapers when it comes to reporting on stories relating to Islam and Muslims – with potentially serious long-term consequences for the workings of a free and independent press”.
According to the Policy Exchange report, the draft IPSO guidance states:
“Journalists should be aware that their content can have an impact on the wider community and on how minority communities are treated. Inaccuracies and insensitivities can damage communities and prevents their accurate representation. They can also contribute to members of communities feeling divorced from, or misunderstood, by the media. Finally, inaccuracies and unbalanced coverage can work to increase tension between communities, which can make harassment more likely”.
As the Policy Exchange authors write:
“In all of this, there seems to be a suggestion that journalists should take a different approach to covering Muslims than that employed towards other faith groups. This all seems remarkably ill-conceived. If we ruled out reporting on matters specific to Muslims not only would we miss some big issues – not least the threat from Islamist extremist terrorism, which continues to dwarf other global terrorist threats – but we would also be unable to report properly on discrimination against Muslims. More generally, we must ask: is it really the role of journalists to consider community cohesion before truth and accuracy? And what are the potential consequences of such an ethos?”
In addition, the draft guidance has a section on “accuracy in reporting”, which suggests that journalists should do one, or all of the following: “Provide contextualising information; present more than one opinion; verify the information from another source”. While sounding banal and innocuous in and of itself, the guidance goes on to say, more disturbingly:
“Identifying the ‘right’ person to speak to can be extremely challenging and journalists should be aware that individuals and organisations may have different interpretations of a particular belief. Journalists may find it helpful to consider the expertise of the person/organisation, their background and any previous comments on the issues, in deciding who to approach for comment.”
In a previous draft, the Policy Exchange report tells us, the word was not “expertise”, but “representativeness”.
It does appear to be the case that what is uppermost in the minds of the drafters of the guidance is not so much factually accurate reporting, but concerns of a far more political nature, namely those of accommodating religious and cultural “sensitivities” and avoiding the causing of any offense.
Another aspect also concerns the authors of the Policy Exchange report: The “informal working group” under IPSO that has authored the guidance apparently includes members who have publicly supported[3] the new definition of “Islamophobia” as defined by the All-Party Parliamentary Group on British Muslims (APPG). In December 2018 the APPG published Report on the inquiry into a working definition of Islamophobia / anti-Muslim hatred. The report, conflating religion with ethnic origin or nationality, defined “Islamophobia” as a form of racism: “Islamophobia is rooted in racism and is a type of racism that targets expressions of Muslimness or perceived Muslimness.” For a full account of that report, see Gatestone’s previous reporting on the issue here.
The authors of the Policy Exchange Report write:
“Against this backdrop, one might ask whether the IPSO ‘guidance’ process is being used to advance the kind of ‘anti-Islamophobia’ agenda promoted by the APPG on British Muslims… despite the fact that the Government has deemed that definition not fit for purpose… one of the things that makes the APPG’s attempts to institutionalise an illiberal definition of Islamophobia so unpalatable, is the fact that it resembles a form of blasphemy law, protecting Islam specifically, implemented by the back door“.
In conclusion, the Policy Exchange report states:
“Taken as a whole, the IPSO guidance document seems to mark a decisive shift in the purpose of the regulator – which takes it beyond considerations of accuracy or discrimination, as per the Editor’s Code. Instead, it is moving into the realm of ‘insensitivities’ and ‘unbalanced coverage’ – elastic and subjective terms”.
Policy Exchange’s description of the leaked guidance is hardly shocking if one recalls the campaigns and guidelines made by European journalists’ own organizations in recent years. As previously reported by Gatestone, the largest organization of journalists in Europe, the European Federation of Journalists (EJF) — which represents more than 320,000 journalists in 72 journalists’ organizations across 45 countries and claims that it “promotes and defends the rights to freedom of expression and information as guaranteed by Article 10 of the European convention on human rights” — ran a Europe-wide campaign, sponsored by the EU, called “Media against Hate” in 2016-2018. The purpose of it was to, “improve media coverage related to migration, refugees, religion and marginalised groups… counter hate speech, intolerance, racism and discrimination… improve implementation of legal frameworks regulating hate speech and freedom of speech…”
None of the above appears to have had much to do with freedom of expression or journalism. Rather, it was actually a political campaign, spearheaded by one of the largest journalism organizations and supported by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship (REC) Programme of the European Union. The Council of Europe, another international political body constituted by 47 European member states was also listed as a partner. The mix-up of government interests with journalistic principles seemed to bother no one.
Similarly, in September 2017, a project called respectwords.org published guidelines — the publication of which were financially supported by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship (REC) Programme of the European Union — on reporting about migration and minorities. According to those guidelines, “more than 150 European radio outlets and 1300 journalists from the eight RESPECT WORDS countries (Austria, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Slovenia and Spain) have joined together to strengthen media coverage of migrants and minorities, an indispensable tool in the fight against hate speech”.
One of the guidelines in the book, which IPSO’s recommendations seem to echo, was to “Remember that sensitive information (eg race and ethnicity, religious or philosophical beliefs, party affiliation or union affiliation, health and sexual information) should only be mentioned when it is necessary for the public’s understanding of the news”. The key here, again, seems to have been to respect “sensitivities” and avoid causing offense – not the factually correct reporting of newsworthy events. The guidelines also advised:
“Take care not to further stigmatise terms such as ‘Muslim’ or ‘Islam’ by associating them with particular acts… Don’t allow extremists’ claims about acting ‘in the name of Islam’ to stand unchallenged. Highlight… the diversity of Muslim communities…”
The respectwords.org guidelines, two years old, barely seek to hide that they are a political tool.
This, then, is the highly politicized atmosphere that journalists breathe and that their organizations openly promote. It is hardly surprising, then, that even independent regulators, such as IPSO, choose to take what looks like a similar path. As for the eroding of the freedom of the press, the question seems not so much to be “if” as “to what degree”.
The U.S. trade deficit in goods and services increased to $54.9 billion in August, up from $54.0 billion in July. That’s because imports grew more than exports overall. While President Donald Trump will see this higher trade deficit as a bad thing, we should not. It can be a bit confusing, but Trump and pretty much every president before him justified allowing imports as a price we must pay to allow American companies to sell their stuff abroad.
Consider former President Barack Obama. He once said during a State of the Union address, “Ninety-five percent of the world’s customers live outside our borders, and we can’t close ourselves off from those opportunities.” This was meant to explain why it was OK for him to lower tariffs on American goods: It was the key to gaining more access to foreign markets for domestic exporters.
Every multinational or bilateral trade agreement is based on this idea—an idea that reached its zenith in the 17th century. The underlying belief is that the only benefit we receive by agreeing to accept more imports is that other governments will allow their citizens to buy more of our exports. Such thinking has made free trade agreements possible; these, in turn, have made trade significantly freer. But we should nevertheless abandon this backward thinking.
Let’s consider some counterintuitive but true facts about imports:
In the long run, the level of exports is tied to the level of imports. The easiest (although not the only) way to think of this relationship is to recognize that the more a country imports, the more of its money its people spend (and send) abroad. With more of its money abroad, foreigners have more money with which to buy the home country’s exports. This is a simplified rendition of what in economics is known as the Lerner Symmetry theorem. This theorem explains why when our imports grow, so do our exports (though export growth may not be as much as the growth in imports because foreigners can also spend their U.S. dollars by investing in the United States or buying our debt).
The Lerner Symmetry theorem also explains why, when the North American Free Trade Agreement went into effect in 1994, U.S. imports increased significantly afterward, as predicted, but so did U.S. exports. And it explains why most economists consider any attempts to affect the balance of trade through export subsidies to be foolish. Reality doesn’t work this way. A better way to export more is to import more.
This economic understanding also means that the Trump strategy is bound to fail. Sure, with enough tariffs you can reduce imports from, say, China, on a bilateral basis. But you will also be reducing your exports. And in no case will any of these changes affect your global trade balance, but that’s another column for another day.
One more reason why imports are so important is that they are tremendously beneficial to middle- and lower-income consumers. The more imports, the better, as these lead to greater consumer choices and varieties, all at lower prices.
Moreover, final consumers aren’t the only ones to benefit from imports. U.S. manufacturers benefit from lower input prices. At least half of U.S. imports are not final consumer goods; they are, instead, inputs for U.S.-based producers, which help reduce imported-input costs. This reduces businesses’ overall production costs, which promotes employment possibilities and economic growth. We should welcome U.S. business and employment growth.
But what about domestic businesses that have to compete with these imports? Well, what about them? All businesses have to compete for consumers’ dollars. And in a country as large and economically dynamic as the United States, most competition comes not from imports but, instead, from other domestic producers. Just ask Blockbuster how it liked competing with Netflix.
The bottom line is that the U.S. businesses that lose customers because of imports are no more “victimized” or worthy of special consideration than are the far more numerous U.S. businesses who lose customers to other U.S. businesses.
Competition is an indispensable component of a healthy market economy, and we have every reason to welcome competition from abroad with all the sincere applause with which we welcome it from domestic firms and entrepreneurs. In that spirit, I welcome imports, and so should you.
The U.S. trade deficit in goods and services increased to $54.9 billion in August, up from $54.0 billion in July. That’s because imports grew more than exports overall. While President Donald Trump will see this higher trade deficit as a bad thing, we should not. It can be a bit confusing, but Trump and pretty much every president before him justified allowing imports as a price we must pay to allow American companies to sell their stuff abroad.
Consider former President Barack Obama. He once said during a State of the Union address, “Ninety-five percent of the world’s customers live outside our borders, and we can’t close ourselves off from those opportunities.” This was meant to explain why it was OK for him to lower tariffs on American goods: It was the key to gaining more access to foreign markets for domestic exporters.
Every multinational or bilateral trade agreement is based on this idea—an idea that reached its zenith in the 17th century. The underlying belief is that the only benefit we receive by agreeing to accept more imports is that other governments will allow their citizens to buy more of our exports. Such thinking has made free trade agreements possible; these, in turn, have made trade significantly freer. But we should nevertheless abandon this backward thinking.
Let’s consider some counterintuitive but true facts about imports:
In the long run, the level of exports is tied to the level of imports. The easiest (although not the only) way to think of this relationship is to recognize that the more a country imports, the more of its money its people spend (and send) abroad. With more of its money abroad, foreigners have more money with which to buy the home country’s exports. This is a simplified rendition of what in economics is known as the Lerner Symmetry theorem. This theorem explains why when our imports grow, so do our exports (though export growth may not be as much as the growth in imports because foreigners can also spend their U.S. dollars by investing in the United States or buying our debt).
The Lerner Symmetry theorem also explains why, when the North American Free Trade Agreement went into effect in 1994, U.S. imports increased significantly afterward, as predicted, but so did U.S. exports. And it explains why most economists consider any attempts to affect the balance of trade through export subsidies to be foolish. Reality doesn’t work this way. A better way to export more is to import more.
This economic understanding also means that the Trump strategy is bound to fail. Sure, with enough tariffs you can reduce imports from, say, China, on a bilateral basis. But you will also be reducing your exports. And in no case will any of these changes affect your global trade balance, but that’s another column for another day.
One more reason why imports are so important is that they are tremendously beneficial to middle- and lower-income consumers. The more imports, the better, as these lead to greater consumer choices and varieties, all at lower prices.
Moreover, final consumers aren’t the only ones to benefit from imports. U.S. manufacturers benefit from lower input prices. At least half of U.S. imports are not final consumer goods; they are, instead, inputs for U.S.-based producers, which help reduce imported-input costs. This reduces businesses’ overall production costs, which promotes employment possibilities and economic growth. We should welcome U.S. business and employment growth.
But what about domestic businesses that have to compete with these imports? Well, what about them? All businesses have to compete for consumers’ dollars. And in a country as large and economically dynamic as the United States, most competition comes not from imports but, instead, from other domestic producers. Just ask Blockbuster how it liked competing with Netflix.
The bottom line is that the U.S. businesses that lose customers because of imports are no more “victimized” or worthy of special consideration than are the far more numerous U.S. businesses who lose customers to other U.S. businesses.
Competition is an indispensable component of a healthy market economy, and we have every reason to welcome competition from abroad with all the sincere applause with which we welcome it from domestic firms and entrepreneurs. In that spirit, I welcome imports, and so should you.
These days, you can’t really go anywhere without encountering cameras. Going into a store? Chances are there are security cameras. Getting money at an ATM? More cameras. Driving through the streets of a city? More cameras still. Your neighbors may have those doorbells from Amazon that are surveilling the entire neighborhood.
And many of these cameras are tied into facial recognition databases, or the footage can be quite easily compared there if “authorities” are looking for somebody.
But as it turns out, it isn’t just facial recognition we have to worry about.
DHS has a new recognition system called HART.
Homeland Advanced Recognition Technology system is the alarming new identity system being put in place by the Department of Homeland Security.
DHS is retiring its old system that was based on facial recognition. It’s being replaced with HART, a cloud-based system that holds information about the identities of hundreds of millions of people.
The new cloud-based platform, called the Homeland Advanced Recognition Technology System, or HART, is expected to bring more processing power, new analytics capabilities and increased accuracy to the department’s biometrics operations. It will also allow the agency to look beyond the three types of biometric data it uses today—face, iris and fingerprint—to identify people through a variety of other characteristics, like palm prints, scars, tattoos, physical markings and even their voices. (source)
As HART becomes more established, that old saying “you can run but you can’t hide” is going to seem ever more true. The DHS is delighted at how much further the new system can take them into surveilling Americans.
And by freeing the agency from the limitations of its legacy system, HART could also let officials grow the network of external partners with whom they share biometric data and analytics capabilities, according to Patrick Nemeth, director of identity operations within Homeland Security’s Office of Biometric Identity Management.
“When we get to HART, we will be better, faster, stronger,” Nemeth said in an interview with Nextgov. “We’ll be relieved of a lot of the capacity issues that we have now … and then going forward from there we’ll be able to add [capabilities].” (source)
The DHS wants to break free of the limitations of the old system with their new and “improved” system. HART will use multiple pieces of biometric data to increase identification accuracy.
Today, when an official runs a person’s face, fingerprint or iris scans through IDENT’s massive database, the system doesn’t return a single result. Rather, it assembles a list of dozens of potential candidates with different levels of confidence, which a human analyst must then look through to make a final match. The system can only handle one modality at a time, so if agent is hypothetically trying to identify someone using two different datapoints, they need to assess two lists of candidates to find a single match. This isn’t a problem if the system identifies the same person as the most likely match for both fingerprint and face, for example, but because biometric identification is still an imperfect science, the results are rarely so clear cut.
However, the HART platform can include multiple datapoints in a single query, meaning it will rank potential matches based on all the information that’s available. That will not only make it easier for agents to analyze potential matches, but it will also help the agency overcome data quality issues that often plague biometric scans, Nemeth said. If the face image is pristine but the fingerprint is fuzzy, for example, the system will give the higher-quality datapoint more weight.
“We’re very hopeful that it will provide better identification surety than we can provide with any single modality today,” Nemeth said. And palm prints, scars, tattoos and other modalities are added in the years ahead, the system will be able to integrate those into its matching process. (source)
The phase-two solicitation also lists DNA-matching as a potential application of the HART system. While the department doesn’t currently analyze DNA, officials on Wednesday announced they would start adding DNA collected from hundreds of thousands of detained migrants to the FBI’s criminal database. During the interview, Nemeth said the agency is still working through the legal implications of storing and sharing such sensitive data. It’s also unclear whether DNA information would be housed in the HART system or a separate database, he said. (source)
Nifty.
The DHS is operating without any type of regulation.
Currently, there’s no regulation or oversight of government agencies collecting and using this kind of data. Civil liberty activists and some lawmakers are alarmed by this, citing concerns about privacy and discrimination. This hasn’t slowed down the DHS one iota, however.
Critics have taken particular issue with the government’s tangled web of information sharing agreements, which allow data to spread far beyond the borders of the agency that collected it. The Homeland Security Department currently shares its biometric data and capabilities with numerous groups, including but not limited to the Justice, Defense and State departments.
In the years ahead, HART promises to strengthen those partnerships and allow others to flourish, according to Nemeth. While today the department limits other agencies’ access to IDENT to ensure they don’t consume too much of its limited computing power, HART will do away with those constraints. (source)
Mana Azarmi, the policy counsel for the Freedom, Security and Technology Project at the Center for Democracy and Technology is one of those people voicing concern.
A person might give information to a single agency thinking it would be used for one specific purpose, but depending on how that information is shared, they could potentially find themselves subjected to unforeseen negative consequences, Azarmi said in a conversation with Nextgov.
“The government gets a lot of leeway to share information,” she said. “In this age of incredible data collection, I think we need to rethink some of the rules that are in place and some of the practices that we’ve allowed to flourish post-9/11. We may have overcorrected.” (source)
You think?
Many people voluntarily provide biometric data.
Many folks provide biometric data without giving it a second thought. They cheerfully swab a cheek and send it into sites like Ancestry.com, providing not only their DNA, but matches to many relatives who never gave permission for their DNA to be in a database.
Then there are cell phones. If you have a newer phone, it’s entirely possible that it has asked you to set up fingerprint login, facial recognition, and even voice recognition. It isn’t a stretch of the imagination to believe that those samples are shared with folks beyond the device in your hand. Add to this that your device is tracking you every place you go through a wide variety of seemingly innocuous apps, and you start to get the picture.
You can’t opt-out.
Back in 2013, I wrote an article called The Great American Dragnet. At that time, facial recognition was something that sounded like science fiction or some kind of joke. Our drivers’ licenses were the first foray into creating a database but even in 2013, it far exceeded that.
Another, even larger, database exists. The US State Department has a database with 230 million searchable images. Anyone with a passport or an immigration visa may find themselves an unwilling participant in this database. Here’s the breakdown of who has a photo database:
The State Department has about 15 million photos of passport or visa holders
The FBI has about15 million photos of people who have been arrested or convicted of crimes
The Department of Defense has about 6 million photos, mainly of Iraqis and Afghans
Various police agencies and states have at least 210 million driver’s license photos
This invasion of privacy is just another facet of the surveillance state, and should be no surprise considering the information Edward Snowden just shared about the over-reaching tentacles of the NSA into all of our communications. We are filing our identities with the government and they can identify us at will, without any requirement for probable cause. (source)
Some people don’t even seem to mind that their identities have been tagged and filed by the US government. And even those of us who do mind have no option. If you wish to drive a car or travel outside of the country or have any kind of government ID, like it or not, you’re in the database. Six years ago, I wrote:
The authorities that use this technology claim that the purpose of it is to make us safer, by helping to prevent identity fraud and to identify criminals. However, what freedom are we giving up for this “safety” cloaked in benevolence? We are giving up the freedom of having the most elemental form of privacy – that of being able to go about our daily business without being watched and identified. And once you’re identified, this connects to all sorts of other personal information that has been compiled: your address, your driving and criminal records, and potentially, whatever else that has been neatly filed away at your friendly neighborhood fusion center.
Think about it: You’re walking the dog and you fail to scoop the poop – if there’s a surveillance camera in the area, it would be a simple matter, given the technology, for you to be identified. If you are attending a protest that might be considered “anti-government”, don’t expect to be anonymous. A photo of the crowd could easily result in the identification of most of the participants.
Are you purchasing ammo, preparedness items, or books about a controversial topic? Paying cash won’t buy you much in the way of privacy – your purchase will most likely be captured on the CCTV camera at the checkout stand, making you easily identifiable to anyone who might wish to track these kinds of things. What if a person with access to this technology uses it for personal, less than ethical reasons, like stalking an attractive women he saw on the street? The potential for abuse is mind-boggling.
If you can’t leave your house without being identified, do you have any real freedom left, or are you just a resident in a very large cage? (source)
I’ve seen a lot of learned commentators on both sides of the impeachment debate arguing that the House *must* follow certain procedures (or not), or that the president *must* cooperate in the following ways (or not). What almost no one ever does is quote the relevant constitutional text, which is ridiculously sparse: “The House of Representatives shall chuse their Speaker and other Officers; and shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.” There is nothing about what procedures the House must or may use, nor is there any indication to what extent the president and other executive branch officials are required to cooperate.
What we do have is historical literature on what impeachment was thought to be in 1789, analogies to other civil, quasi-criminal, and criminal proceedings, past practice by both the executive branch and the House, and any relevant Supreme Court precedents on related matters (even though most impeachment disputes will not be justiciable, all parties still have to fulfill their constitutional obligations, which judicial precedent might speak to.)
But how, for example, would one weigh executive refusal to cooperate if, for example, historical practice, the “best” analogy, and SCOTUS precedent all provide different answers? Color me skeptical that there will generally be firm answers to the questions raised by impeachment other than however the political process sorts things out.
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I’ve seen a lot of learned commentators on both sides of the impeachment debate arguing that the House *must* follow certain procedures (or not), or that the president *must* cooperate in the following ways (or not). What almost no one ever does is quote the relevant constitutional text, which is ridiculously sparse: “The House of Representatives shall chuse their Speaker and other Officers; and shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.” There is nothing about what procedures the House must or may use, nor is there any indication to what extent the president and other executive branch officials are required to cooperate.
What we do have is historical literature on what impeachment was thought to be in 1789, analogies to other civil, quasi-criminal, and criminal proceedings, past practice by both the executive branch and the House, and any relevant Supreme Court precedents on related matters (even though most impeachment disputes will not be justiciable, all parties still have to fulfill their constitutional obligations, which judicial precedent might speak to.)
But how, for example, would one weigh executive refusal to cooperate if, for example, historical practice, the “best” analogy, and SCOTUS precedent all provide different answers? Color me skeptical that there will generally be firm answers to the questions raised by impeachment other than however the political process sorts things out.
from Latest – Reason.com https://ift.tt/35p9ZWr
via IFTTT
18-Year Old US Soldiers Now Entering Afghanistan 18 Years After War Began
This week America’s longest war in Afghanistan turned eighteen, and so did its youngest solder. To mark the occasion, ABC News profiled the US occupation’s newest American member: “Pvt. Hunter Nines is about to join a war nearly as old as he is,” the report said.
Reflecting on his first impending deployment with the Army Pvt. Nines said, “I didn’t have a lot of thoughts on Afghanistan in particular.” He was but 7 months when the war began with the arrival of US troops on Oct. 7, 2001 following the 9/11 attacks. “I honestly just had the notion of I wanted to serve, and wherever that is, that’s where I’ll go.”
Army Pvt. Hunter Nines, via ABC News.
Over the span of the now eighteen-year long war, an estimated 775,000 American troops have served at least one tour in the historically war-racked central Asian country, in a region which everyone from Alexander the Great to Genghis Khan to the British Empire had trouble subduing, as all were ultimately unsuccessful.
Very soon, the US will begin sending young service personnel who hadn’t even been born at the time of the start of Bush’s so-called ‘war on terror’. As this stunning line from the report emphasizes:
Department of Defense statistics reflect the increasing shift in demographics of service members such as Nines who were babies or not even yet born on Sept. 11, 2001, which led to what’s become America’s longest war.
By the numbers, there are 15,364 active-duty enlisted Army members who are 18, and among these 1,052 of whom were born after the 9/11 attacks, reported ABC.
And the much smaller (by total numbers), more elite branch, the Marine Corps, has 28,048 active-duty personnel aged 17 to 19.
It appears that Trump as Commander-In-Chief had this tragic reality of the country’s longest running quagmire in mind when he tweeted early this week, specifically in response to the unfolding crisis in Syria, that “it is time for us to get out of these ridiculous Endless Wars, many of them tribal, and bring our soldiers home.”
To be expected, the DC beltway blob had a collective conniption fit this week at the mere suggestion of a US troop exit from the Middle East.
To see inside the warped worldview of ‘official Washington’ it’s enough to recall this 2014 Washington Post op-ed (no, not The Onion) which argued, “War may be the worst way imaginable to create peaceful societies but it is pretty much the only way.”
Assuming the ‘deep state’ continues to have its way, we can expect many more 18-year olds to be sent to distant lands the American military machine has been active in since before they were born.
