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Oh come on. You can reduce almost anything that way. ‘What is wrong with a surveillance balloon hovering over every city following all citizens and logging t

Oh come on. You can reduce almost anything that way. ‘What is wrong with a surveillance balloon hovering over every city following all citizens and logging their activity? It’s no different to the police officer on the corner observing the public’. It’s a matter of scale, efficiency and generality. The scariest thing imaginable is a truly efficient government. Our system works because there is room for rebels and alternate ways of thinking and living to bubble into the whole polity. Gay rights for example. If the government had had the ability to monitor all homosexuals back when the laws were truly terrible - they’d all be in prison. Runaway slaves? Same deal.

kolbe 8y ago
On the other hand: Murder and rape? Same deal. I think it's perfectly correct to believe that the US government in its current state is pure shit for more than just the reasons you mentioned. But forced inefficiency sounds like a ridiculous way to go about fixing it. If society takes issue with the laws, fix the laws. But having a law that relies on selective and inefficient enforcement is a stupid law.
- rtkwe 8y ago
  Searching and following a particular person with probably cause is fine under the constitution allowing the police effectively follow anyone 24/7 strips away a lot of 4th amendment protections. The fact that the laws haven't quite caught up to the ability of police to spy on people en mass should not be a justification for them doing so. Law makers lag behind the public and the state of technology by decades.
- gowld 8y ago
  We tried to fix the laws, but the tyrants won. Next step is to try to stymie the tyrants. Imagine trying to argue your point to the USA Founders, who seceded from the government they found oppressive.
HillaryBriss 8y ago
> The scariest thing imaginable is a truly efficient government. but, doesn't it depend upon what the government's doing? if the government is efficiently preventing mining companies from pouring cyanide into waterways, regulating large Wall Street banks and building safe and ubiquitous mass transit to replace large swarms of polluting vehicles -- is that scarier than every other scary thing?
- pc86 8y ago
  You can't give it efficiency in some areas and hope it stays inefficient in others. I would rather have a government that is incapable for preventing the next major civil rights battle and let a bad corporate actor emerge every now and then, than have a government that is able to crush even the slightest populist uprising without missing a beat.

kolbe 8y ago

On the other hand: Murder and rape? Same deal. I think it's perfectly correct to believe that the US government in its current state is pure shit for more than just the reasons you mentioned. But forced inefficiency sounds like a ridiculous way to go about fixing it. If society takes issue with the laws, fix the laws. But having a law that relies on selective and inefficient enforcement is a stupid law.

rtkwe 8y ago
Searching and following a particular person with probably cause is fine under the constitution allowing the police effectively follow anyone 24/7 strips away a lot of 4th amendment protections. The fact that the laws haven't quite caught up to the ability of police to spy on people en mass should not be a justification for them doing so. Law makers lag behind the public and the state of technology by decades.
gowld 8y ago
We tried to fix the laws, but the tyrants won. Next step is to try to stymie the tyrants. Imagine trying to argue your point to the USA Founders, who seceded from the government they found oppressive.

HillaryBriss 8y ago

> The scariest thing imaginable is a truly efficient government. but, doesn't it depend upon what the government's doing? if the government is efficiently preventing mining companies from pouring cyanide into waterways, regulating large Wall Street banks and building safe and ubiquitous mass transit to replace large swarms of polluting vehicles -- is that scarier than every other scary thing?

pc86 8y ago
You can't give it efficiency in some areas and hope it stays inefficient in others. I would rather have a government that is incapable for preventing the next major civil rights battle and let a bad corporate actor emerge every now and then, than have a government that is able to crush even the slightest populist uprising without missing a beat.