Houston PD secretly tests unmanned aircraft ...

[paul_valaru]

Feel free to ask my opinions on what a real good gov't would be sometime.

??

do tell.

 

[Professur]

Not you. You've heard me already.

 

[jimpeel]

Feel free to ask my opinions on what a real good gov't would be sometime.

Ours, if the politicians would but simply follow the Constitution, as written, and stop trying to make it something it was never intended to be.

 

[Professur]

Fourth word in, dude. you no longer have leaders, you have politicians. Until you correct that, you're doomed.

 

[chcr]

you no longer have leaders, you have politicians.

And the sheeple keep expecting other politicians to do a better job. They're still politicians. I don't think leaders can get elected under the current system. Not that I'm a monarchist, mind you but the current system is certainly broken.

 

[ResearchMonkey]

Feel free to ask my opinions on what a real good gov't would be sometime.

A few dozen local cycling elected positions per area, slight increases by state and nation, a common defense. Governed with a six iron on every hip.

 

[Professur]

Very close. Very very close.

 

[Gonz]

Fourth word in, dude. you no longer have leaders, you have politicians. Until you correct that, you're doomed.

I agree.

Of course, we've also learned to vote ourselves shares from the public coffers...so there is little incentive to change.

 

[jimpeel]

Fourth word in, dude. you no longer have leaders, you have politicians. Until you correct that, you're doomed.

They are not only politicians, they are professional politicians and will be so for life.

We ARE doomed.

 

[jimpeel]

Although wrongly attributed to Alexander Tytler, Lord Woodhouslee, and for which no author is known, this "quote" is still prescient in its content.

A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship.

The average age of the world's greatest civilizations from the beginning of history has been about 200 years. During those 200 years, these nations always progressed through the following sequence:

• From Bondage to spiritual faith;
• From spiritual faith to great courage;
• From courage to liberty;
• From liberty to abundance;
• From abundance to complacency;
• From complacency to apathy;
• From apathy to dependence;
• From dependence back into bondage.

It is my firm belief that we are in the apathetic stage right now.

 

[catocom]

We ARE doomed.

nah, it's the same as last time we had taxation without representation, and
it's bound to spark the same response, if not corrected soon.
(many states are already threatening secession proceedings)

 

[jimpeel]

nah, it's the same as last time we had taxation without representation, and
it's bound to spark the same response, if not corrected soon.
(many states are already threatening secession proceedings)

It is currently a race between Texas, Idaho, and Hawaii as to which will secede first. I think it will be Hawaii as they have the strongest secessionist movement. The secessionists want the islands to return to the days of King Kamehameha.

 

[catocom]

I thought Vermont was at the top.

 

[jimpeel]

I thought Vermont was at the top.

Not so. The socialist utopia isn't on the radar. They do have a secessionist movement but it is weak. http://carolynbaker.net/site/content/view/143/ If you read the interview you will find that they are a bunch of flakes:

The organization has been working for some time to establish The Second Vermont Republic which is a peaceful, democratic, grassroots, libertarian populist movement opposed to the tyranny of the U.S. Government, corporate America, and globalization and committed to the return of Vermont to its rightful status as an independent republic, as it was between 1777 and 1791. More of the history of Vermont and the Independence movement can be read at the VT Commons website.

How they plan on operating a land-locked state witout corporate America I have no idea.

There is the FREE STATE PROJECT movement which has chosen NH as the target state and that may have some effect on the "Live Free Or Die" state.

From their webpage:

There's no better place for freedom-loving Americans than New Hampshire... In a vote that ended in September 2003, FSP participants chose New Hampshire because it has the lowest state and local tax burden in the continental U.S., the second-lowest level of dependence on federal spending in the U.S., a citizen legislature where state house representatives have not raised their $100 per year salary since 1889, the lowest crime levels in the U.S., a dynamic economy with plenty of jobs and investment, and a culture of individual responsibility indicated by, for example, an absence of seatbelt and helmet requirements for adults.

Secessionist states and info:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Secession_in_the_United_States

 

[jimpeel]

I wonder what they will say when one of these 14 pound boat anchors falls out of the sky and kills someone.

http://www.reuters.com/article/dome...Type=RSS&feedName=domesticNews&rpc=22&sp=true

Spy-in-the-sky drone sets sights on Miami
Wed Mar 26, 2008 9:28am EDT

By Tom Brown

MIAMI (Reuters) - Miami police could soon be the first in the United States to use cutting-edge, spy-in-the-sky technology to beef up their fight against crime.

A small pilotless drone manufactured by Honeywell International, capable of hovering and "staring" using electro-optic or infrared sensors, is expected to make its debut soon in the skies over the Florida Everglades.

If use of the drone wins Federal Aviation Administration approval after tests, the Miami-Dade Police Department will start flying the 14-pound (6.3 kg) drone over urban areas with an eye toward full-fledged employment in crime fighting.

"Our intentions are to use it only in tactical situations as an extra set of eyes," said police department spokesman Juan Villalba.

"We intend to use this to benefit us in carrying out our mission," he added, saying the wingless Honeywell aircraft, which fits into a backpack and is capable of vertical takeoff and landing, seems ideally suited for use by SWAT teams in hostage situations or dealing with "barricaded subjects."

Miami-Dade police are not alone, however.

Taking their lead from the U.S. military, which has used drones in Iraq and Afghanistan for years, law enforcement agencies across the country have voiced a growing interest in using drones for domestic crime-fighting missions.

Known in the aerospace industry as UAVs, for unmanned aerial vehicles, drones have been under development for decades in the United States.

The CIA acknowledges that it developed a dragonfly-sized UAV known as the "Insectohopter" for laser-guided spy operations as long ago as the 1970s.

And other advanced work on robotic flyers has clearly been under way for quite some time.

"The FBI is experimenting with a variety of unmanned aerial vehicles," said Marcus Thomas, an assistant director of the bureau's Operational Technology Division.

"At this point they have been used mainly for search and rescue missions," he added. "It certainly is an up-and-coming technology and the FBI is researching additional uses for UAVs."

SAFETY, PRIVACY CONCERNS

U.S. Customs and Border Protection has been flying drones over the Arizona desert and southwest border with Mexico since 2006 and will soon deploy one in North Dakota to patrol the Canadian border as well.

This month, Customs and Border Protection spokesman Juan Munoz Torres said the agency would also begin test flights of a modified version of its large Predator B drones, built by General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, over the Gulf of Mexico.

Citing numerous safety concerns, the FAA -- the government agency responsible for regulating civil aviation -- has been slow in developing procedures for the use of UAVs by police departments.

"You don't want one of these coming down on grandma's windshield when she's on her way to the grocery store," said Doug Davis, the FAA's program manager for unmanned aerial systems.

He acknowledged strong interest from law enforcement agencies in getting UAVs up and running, however, and said the smaller aircraft particularly were likely to have a "huge economic impact" over the next 10 years.

Getting clearance for police and other civilian agencies to fly can't come soon enough for Billy Robinson, chief executive of Cyber Defense Systems Inc, a small start-up company in St. Petersburg, Florida. His company makes an 8-pound (3.6 kg) kite-sized UAV that was flown for a time by police in Palm Bay, Florida, and in other towns, before the FAA stepped in.

"We've had interest from dozens of law enforcement agencies," said Robinson. "They (the FAA) are preventing a bunch of small companies such as ours from becoming profitable," he said.

Some privacy advocates, however, say rules and ordinances need to be drafted to protect civil liberties during surveillance operations.

"There's been controversies all around about putting up surveillance cameras in public areas," said Howard Simon, Florida director of the American Civil Liberties Union.

"Technological developments can be used by law enforcement in a way that enhances public safety," he said. "But every enhanced technology also contains a threat of further erosion of privacy."

(Reporting by Tom Brown; Editing by Michael Christie and Eddie Evans)

 

[catocom]

I wonder what they will say when one of these 14 pound boat anchors falls out of the sky and kills someone.

surly they'll have enough since to have somewhat safer flight patterns...?

I'm sure eventually there might be a mishap, but still safer than even driving an automobile.

 

[jimpeel]

surly they'll have enough since to have somewhat safer flight patterns...?

I'm sure eventually there might be a mishap, but still safer than even driving an automobile.

Maybe they'll call it "Lightning" so they will have a ready headline when someone gets struck.