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Gen. Alexander, Obama, Bush, Feinstein, all these people's arguments basically boil down to "trust us." I always want to ask those people this question: Sure,

by davidp 13y ago

Gen. Alexander, Obama, Bush, Feinstein, all these people's arguments basically boil down to "trust us." I always want to ask those people this question: Sure, maybe you're a trustworthy, good man. What mechanism is in place to guarantee that the next person is? And the next one? And the person after that? Without an external mechanism -- as external as the courts are to the Justice Department -- we're putting our trust in men and not in laws. This nation's foundation is the rule of law, not the rule of men. "Trust us" only works when there's another trusted adversary overseeing the trusted, who are themselves subject to scrutiny.

snitko 13y ago
There's a fundamental flaw with this idea. The existence of multiple participants in the chain of decision making doesn't make it secure and trustworthy. If those participants have little to risk or lose anything by being corrupt, then it doesn't matter how many of them there are, they'll find ways to hack it. You can't just call a judge trustworthy because he's a judge and he's supposed to be honest and uncorrupt. If you ask me, I'd say that judges should probably be even more corrupt, since they don't even risk losing their seat. In order for trust to work, a price tag should be put on it. That's why it works so great in business: if you give money to Apple and they don't deliver you your iPhone, their reputation would be severely damaged and they might lose a lot of money as a result. With politicians it doesn't work this way, because the maximum they can lose is their seat, and even then they just go and work for some company as a lobbyist.
- davidp 13y ago
  I agree with most of your points actually. It's the problem that I was addressing with "who are themselves subject to scrutiny"; note that somehow we find that corrupt judges are the exception rather than the rule, in no small part because we are able to publicly examine their work. So the idea of a secret court poses its own especially difficult problems. On the other hand, it's impossible to have a society anything like ours if you build around zero-trust systems. If you say that fundamentally nobody in power can be trusted, for any length of time and under any system of checks and balances, then you may as well advocate true anarchy or survival-of-the-fittest.
  - snitko 13y ago
    I do think you can't fundamentally trust anyone in power, because the incentives for them are in the wrong place. The problem with people's view of government and democratic systems is that they judge it by intentions, not results. The result will almost always be the same: abuse. Even democratically elected government will have distorted intentions, because there are no true market mechanisms preventing it from disserving its customers: you can vote once in 4 years and even then you're not guaranteed any results. If a politician fails to deliver on his promises (which they always do), there are no severe sanctions. Anarchy doesn't mean lack of rules, poor people dying on the street and violent gangs killing each other. In fact, violent gangs ruling people is what we have now with governments - it's just that it is presented in a good light. But the true nature of violence can still be occasionally seen, as recent events prove. The demand for safety net, protection and all other things government currently provides doesn't suddenly evaporate when you don't have a government. If people want something, market provides it. If the majority of people don't want poor to starve, there is nothing in the world that can stop them from donating to charities. If they believe a charity fails to deliver, they withdraw money immediately.
anologwintermut 13y ago
It's a very good question and should be the focus of criticizing the NSA's programs unless we have evidence that what they did was malicious (blackmail, etc). But I don't think they mean that when they say trust us. They typically mean: trust us, if you knew the threats we face and the fact that this is effective, you'd think the risks were worth it too. In addition they mean trust us not to abuse that power, but that is the smaller point. In fact, I suspect they'd argue the risk for abuse is outweighed by the consequences of terrorism(a statement I'd disagree with), even if you aren't sure they are honest.
- davidp 13y ago
  > they'd argue the risk for abuse is outweighed by the consequences of terrorism( I statement I'd disagree with) Precisely, and I agree with your disagreement there. They tout "zero deaths from terrorism" as though that were the primary objective. It isn't. I'd rather die in a terrorist attack while living free than live in fear of the state.

by davidp 13y ago

snitko 13y ago

There's a fundamental flaw with this idea. The existence of multiple participants in the chain of decision making doesn't make it secure and trustworthy. If those participants have little to risk or lose anything by being corrupt, then it doesn't matter how many of them there are, they'll find ways to hack it. You can't just call a judge trustworthy because he's a judge and he's supposed to be honest and uncorrupt. If you ask me, I'd say that judges should probably be even more corrupt, since they don't even risk losing their seat. In order for trust to work, a price tag should be put on it. That's why it works so great in business: if you give money to Apple and they don't deliver you your iPhone, their reputation would be severely damaged and they might lose a lot of money as a result. With politicians it doesn't work this way, because the maximum they can lose is their seat, and even then they just go and work for some company as a lobbyist.

davidp 13y ago
I agree with most of your points actually. It's the problem that I was addressing with "who are themselves subject to scrutiny"; note that somehow we find that corrupt judges are the exception rather than the rule, in no small part because we are able to publicly examine their work. So the idea of a secret court poses its own especially difficult problems. On the other hand, it's impossible to have a society anything like ours if you build around zero-trust systems. If you say that fundamentally nobody in power can be trusted, for any length of time and under any system of checks and balances, then you may as well advocate true anarchy or survival-of-the-fittest.
- snitko 13y ago
  I do think you can't fundamentally trust anyone in power, because the incentives for them are in the wrong place. The problem with people's view of government and democratic systems is that they judge it by intentions, not results. The result will almost always be the same: abuse. Even democratically elected government will have distorted intentions, because there are no true market mechanisms preventing it from disserving its customers: you can vote once in 4 years and even then you're not guaranteed any results. If a politician fails to deliver on his promises (which they always do), there are no severe sanctions. Anarchy doesn't mean lack of rules, poor people dying on the street and violent gangs killing each other. In fact, violent gangs ruling people is what we have now with governments - it's just that it is presented in a good light. But the true nature of violence can still be occasionally seen, as recent events prove. The demand for safety net, protection and all other things government currently provides doesn't suddenly evaporate when you don't have a government. If people want something, market provides it. If the majority of people don't want poor to starve, there is nothing in the world that can stop them from donating to charities. If they believe a charity fails to deliver, they withdraw money immediately.

anologwintermut 13y ago

It's a very good question and should be the focus of criticizing the NSA's programs unless we have evidence that what they did was malicious (blackmail, etc). But I don't think they mean that when they say trust us. They typically mean: trust us, if you knew the threats we face and the fact that this is effective, you'd think the risks were worth it too. In addition they mean trust us not to abuse that power, but that is the smaller point. In fact, I suspect they'd argue the risk for abuse is outweighed by the consequences of terrorism(a statement I'd disagree with), even if you aren't sure they are honest.

davidp 13y ago
> they'd argue the risk for abuse is outweighed by the consequences of terrorism( I statement I'd disagree with) Precisely, and I agree with your disagreement there. They tout "zero deaths from terrorism" as though that were the primary objective. It isn't. I'd rather die in a terrorist attack while living free than live in fear of the state.