Watch your language, Shabbir.

When the Leahy bill was proposed, BTW was one of the organizations that came out in favor of it.  Despite later substantial criticism and direct contacts, Mr. Safdar never defended his original position on this bill against these objections.  I just saw something which may explain  a bit about VTW's positions:


                               VTW BillWatch #41

       VTW BillWatch: A weekly newsletter tracking US Federal legislation
     affecting civil liberties.  BillWatch is published at the end of every
        week as long as Congress is in session. (Congress is in session)
                   BillWatch is produced and published by the
                 Voters Telecommunications Watch (vtw@vtw.org)
                             (We're not the EFF :-)
                 Issue #41, Date: Wed Apr  3 12:41:46 EST 1996
     Do not remove this banner.  See distribution instructions at the end.
___________________________________________________________________________
TABLE OF CONTENTS
        Introduction from the Editor (Steven Cherry)
        A tragic story about a wiretap (Shabbir J. Safdar)
 [stuff deleted]

A TRAGIC STORY ABOUT A WIRETAP
by Shabbir J. Safdar, VTW Board (New York, NY)

This week most of VTW's staff attended the Computers, Freedom, and Privacy
conference in Cambridge Massachusetts.  I go to the conference every
year to recharge my batteries, put names to faces, and enjoy the synergy that
can only come with face-to-face dialogue.
[stuff deleted]
One, while wiretaps have probably been effective in other cases, they
were not effective in this one.  While we can grant law enforcement the
benefit of the doubt in other cases, the existence of this one shows
that a wiretap is not the "silver bullet" of law enforcement that we
have been led to believe.

Another observation that can be made is that this parallels the key
escrow debate very closely.  No reasonable person is objecting to the
FBI's right to conduct a wiretap.  However what is being debated is the
extent to which individuals and law enforcement can go to accomplish
their duties.  The Clinton Administration is striving for a world where
everyone is forced to speak in a form of encryption that is easily decoded
by law enforcement.  The public and industry is striving for a world where
they continue to have private conversations.
[end of quote]

Look, very carefully, at the last paragraph quoted above.  Mr. Safdar says, 
"No reasonable person is objecting to the FBI's right to conduct a wiretap."

Huh?  "FBI's right"????  Maybe this is a bit too basic for comprehension, 
but governments have no "rights" by any definition I've ever heard.  
"Rights" are the possessions of individuals, and occasionally individuals 
authorize governments to do things.  But that does not mean that those 
governments possess a "right," especially not one on such a flimsy and 
transitory principles as wiretaps.  Government certainly does not possess a 
"right" that supercedes the wishes of the public, or the Constitution.

Safdar's note appears to pre-date my commentary where I pointed out that 
before 1968, wiretaps in America were illegal, but were done anyway simply 
because the cops wanted to.  That doesn't sound like a "right," now, does 
it?  If it were a "right" then it couldn't be given by law, or taken away by 
law.  But nobody I've ever  met claims that the cops aren't at least legally 
obligated to follow the law, whether or not they actually do.

I don't like sloppy rhetoric.  Even worse, claiming that "no reasonable 
person" would object to a non-existent "right" is truly outrageous. I know 
_plenty_ of people  who would claim that the government, and by extension 
the FBI, possesses no "right" to do wiretaps (this position would be echoed 
by essentially every libertarian). I know many people who think that the 
government shouldn't be able to do wiretaps at all. 

VTW's header above claims "We're not the EFF," but it's hard to tell this 
from Mr. Safdar's propaganda.  Now I understand why he didn't defend his 
position on the Leahy bill against criticism.  VTW is sounding more and more 
like "EFF" all the time.

Jim Bell
jimbell@pacifier.com

On Tue, 9 Apr 1996, jim bell wrote:

> Look, very carefully, at the last paragraph quoted above.  Mr. Safdar says, 
> "No reasonable person is objecting to the FBI's right to conduct a wiretap."

That's right. Because no reasonable person thinks they can convince Congress
or the Supremes otherwise. It isn't impossible, but energies are best spent 
elsewhere, like getting the Burns bill passed. 

Now none of us think wiretaps are a right and I presume Shabbir isn't 
much of a fan either or he wouldn't take the trouble of supporting 
something that makes wiretapping pointless (crypto). But we and he are 
not Washington and there lies all the difference.

Do remember, Jim, that just 'cause most of this list is libertarian 
doesn't mean that the rest of the world is. I'm thankful that they can 
occasionally agree with us horsepeople, despite the hysteria. Be polite.


Flames > /dev/null

s1113645@tesla.cc.uottawa.ca wrote:
> > Look, very carefully, at the last paragraph quoted above.  Mr. Safdar
> > says, "No reasonable person is objecting to the FBI's right to conduct
> > a wiretap."
> 
> That's right. Because no reasonable person thinks they can convince Congress
> or the Supremes otherwise. It isn't impossible, but energies are best spent
> elsewhere, like getting the Burns bill passed.

The choice of words was exceedlingly poor if that's what he really meant.
Though I agree that it's unlikely any LEA will give up capabilities it's
grown to imagine is has a "right" to have, I haven't stopped objecting.

______c_____________________________________________________________________
Mike M Nally * Tiv^H^H^H IBM * Austin TX    * pain is inevitable  
       m5@tivoli.com * m101@io.com          *
      <URL:http://www.io.com/~m101>         * suffering is optional

I promise myself to go back to lurking mode after this.

On Sun, 14 Apr 1996, Mike McNally wrote:

> The choice of words was exceedlingly poor if that's what he really meant.
> Though I agree that it's unlikely any LEA will give up capabilities it's
> grown to imagine is has a "right" to have, I haven't stopped objecting.

None of us have stopped objecting, except that now we have methods of 
preventing it on our own. One must remember that while the basic uses of 
crypto are not only reasonable and even essential in some cases, the full
application leads to some very objectionable extremes (regulatory 
arbitrage, full anon digicash, easier drug sales, gutting of income 
taxes...). 

Now being one of those people who enthusiastically supports those extremes,
I have to ask myself, how will we get there with the least interference?

Now for one thing I wouldn't go around repeating the indignant 
"unconstitutional US government" threads on oh let's say 
talk.politics.libertarian (or .crypto) to the faces of legislators and 
the media. One doesn't get the ITAR repealled by telling congress that 
child porn and mafia conversations will become impossible to police and that
the first amendment lets us shout "fire" in a theatre (though I think it 
does).

I would leave all the carping and "four horsemen"ing to Louis Freeh.
That makes him sound unreasonable. "Sounding" reasonable may be the best way
for our crowd to keep legal the tools that will help us do "unreasonable" 
(though not from our perspective) things. So as long as Shabbir & co 
insert statements supportive of crypto deregulation, I really don't care 
what the rest of their speeches say, the rest is only packaging.
(Though one must determine what's the packaging and what's the content.)

(And if I were in his shoes, I probably wouldn't be saying anything 
different. I may be an anarchist, but I call myself a free-marketeer.
Same thing but not the same-sounding thing, get it? Politics is 
unfortunately very backwards. As long as the civil lib'ers tow enough of our 
party line and get the job done, I'm happy with 'em.)

I leave the judgement call up to you, Mike.