On Saturday, November 23, 2002, at 05:50 AM, Ken Hirsch wrote:
Slide show about "Total Information Awareness"Interesting logo/symbol the Information Awareness Office has: the Illuminati-inspired eye in the pyramid looking down on the entire world.
http://www.afcea.org/pastevents/fallintel2002/DARPAPresentation_files/ frame.htm
AFCEA is Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association
Found link on volokh.blogspot.com
(Yes, Illuminati stuff is often thought of as fringe conspiracy buff material. Any unbiased look at the history of the founding of the U.S. as a government, the role of Washington and other Masonic Temple members, the influence in the 1770s and 80s of the Bavarian Illuminati, the symbology used by the Masons, would see the significance of the all-seeing eye in the pyramid, part of the U.S.'s Great Seal, on its currency, etc.)
Poindexter is no dummy. And criticism of TIA based on his past felony trial, the basis of William Safire's main attack, is on the wrong track. Would TIA be more acceptable if it were being pushed by a true Boy Scout? Of course not.
Much of the TIA plan has resonances with long-discussed Cypherpunk issues: local trust formation, various types of interaction, belief networks. The difference is that TIA wants Men with Guns (TM) to control the formation and distribution of these belief networks, whereas Cypherpunks understand that the formation will be largely anarchic and will ultimately undermine central authority in the usual ways.
A matter of ideological core beliefs. (And we believe things will mostly go our way with little external pressure, whereas keeping governments in control requires a lot of work, coercion, and money. Money taken at gunpoint, of course.)
Granted, many of us hope for the promised tactical nuke which destroys much of Big Brother's infrastructure in Washington (plus removes a million or so inner city welfare mutants). This would set back BB and accelerate trends in our direction.
But, alas, I doubt thermonuclear pest removal is in the cards. So it will take longer.
--Tim May
"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves money from the Public Treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits from the Public Treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy always followed by dictatorship." --Alexander Fraser Tyler
