Re: Kiddie porn on the Internet

At 04:33 PM 9/16/96 -0400, hallam@ai.mit.edu wrote:
>
>>Yet another obligatory AP (Assassination Politics) reference:  If a person 
>>is really interested in helping out "starving children" he may be able to do 
>>far more good by purchasing the death of the local tyrant(s), rather than 
>>(just) buying more food.
>
>
>The problem is that assasination rarely leads to the installation of
>a government that is any better. In most cases it gets worse.


There is an enormous difference in significance between the following two 
scenarios:

1.  Tyrant A, speaking outside, gets struck by a meteorite and is instantly 
killed.  He is immediately replaced by his second-in-command.

2.  Tyrant B is told that he has been threatened with a meteorite strike by 
an opponent in an hour if he goes on with his speech, he ignores the 
"unbelievable" warning, and dies on schedule, just as he was warned, struck 
by a meteorite.  What should his vice-thug do in THIS case?!?

 Physically, the same thing happened:  Big boom.  But the implications are 
vastly different.   Incident 1 looks like a freak of nature that's unlikely 
to be repeated. It leads to very few policy changes or changes in 
precautions. It was a fluke.   Incident 2 looks like somebody has developed 
a new weapon of practically supernatural capabilities. 

This difference is why I scoff at your attempts to equate political 
assassination in the past with what will be accomplished in the future.  
(other people have made this mistake as well; it's a common 
misunderstanding.)   In the past, assassinations have often led to worse 
replacements, but that is because there is no likely prospect that the 
assassination will be repeated, as many times as needed, until the job is 
done.  Partly that's because assassinations were often seen to be the work 
of "lone nuts" (who don't come around all that often), or because they were 
done by the very people who take over.  In either case, the prospects of a 
repeat are rather low.

As anyone who really understands my AP theory recognizes, getting rid of an 
unwanted leader will become so easy and cheap (on a per-citizen basis) that 
nobody would dare take the job who angered more than a tiny fraction of the 
population.  A "worse" government would simply never be formed, unless they 
were suicidal.


>In the past the US excuse for supporting bloodthirsty murderers like
>Pinochet, Saddam, Marcos and Noriega was that the alternative was
>worse.


The _truth_, however, is that the alternative was worse...for the US 
government.  It's really very simple: Let me draw an analogy.  Modern 
organophosphate pesticides were initially developed by German chemists in 
the 1930's.  These materials are closely related to Sarin, the well-known 
nerve agent that killed people in the Tokyo subway attack over a year ago. 
It turns out that Sarin is a rather simple molecule.  Why not use it to kill 
bugs?  Well, it kills bugs just fine.  The problem, of course, is that it 
kills farmers just as well.
  
Since you presumably don't want to do that, you have to go to all the 
trouble to find compounds that kill bugs, but are as non-toxic as possible 
to farmers.  And if you look at the description of the contents of modern 
organophosphate pesticides on the bottles, you see names that only a chemist 
could possibly pronounce, names so long (because their molecules were so 
complex) that you often have to take a breath in the middle to recite.  
These compounds were found by individually synthesizing thousands, or even 
tens of thousands of compounds, and testing each one.  Individually.  
Eventually, they found compounds which were as toxic to bugs as Sarin is to 
humans, but were far less toxic to humans.  They found the needle in the 
haystack.

Likewise, as I've discovered through AP, it will be easy to get rid of 
tyrants.  The exquisitely difficult task is to get rid of ONLY SOME of the 
tyrants, for example Saddam Hussein, Moammar Khadafi, etc, and leaving most 
of the rest behind.  _THAT'S_ the tricky part.   I have the easy task:  
describing a system to get rid of them all, with no exceptions.  But that's 
the system that nobody in the leadership of any current country wants to see. 

That is why you won't see Clinton announcing that he's going to use my idea 
to get rid of Saddam Hussein, and instead will waste hundreds of millions or 
even billions of dollars in a failed bid to eject the thug.

Doesn't that make you feel a lot safer?





Jim Bell
jimbell@pacifier.com

[AP drivel deleted]

Go talk to someone who is a member of an organisation like the PLO or
Hammas and pretty near the top. If you think that they would be intimidated
for a moment by AP you have another think comming.

If it could the US would have assasinated Saddam by now. It can't because it
is too difficult to find out where exactly a person will be. Assasination
attempts against Castro similarly failed. 

If you care to look at the history of Cambodia you will see that Lon Nol
assumed the presidency despite the knowledge that there was practically no ch
chance of defeating the Khumer Rouge and that he would almost certainly be dead
in less than a week as a result. 

Both the assumption AP rests on are utterly false. It is neither possible
to assasinate people at will nor will it intimidate. 

In addition *ANYONE* who attempted to implement AP would be someone *I*
would regard as a tyrant and therefore a legitimate target by the rules
of AP. I would naturally consider it permissable to engage the support of 
others in their suppression. Since we now live in the fantasy land of AP
I can now wipe out anyone anywhere so I eliminate all AP leaders.


I think that this type of talk is incredibly dangerous. There are plenty of
people on the net who are psychos and if you spread AP drivel arround someone
is going to act on it. Probably not Jim Bell, more likely a psychopath who
lurks on the list but does not post. 

If you call for people to be murdered - and let us not forget that this is
what AP is about you bear the responsibility when someone acts on it.



I consider AP to be very close to calling for the assasination of the 
President of the USA. That is a federal crime and there is a law that 
requires the investigation of any such threats. I suggest that people
think *very* carefully before engaging in this dangerous nonsense any
further. 

	Phill

PS it is not censorship to stop people from advocating murder.

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On Sat, 21 Sep 1996 hallam@vesuvius.ai.mit.edu wrote:

> If you call for people to be murdered - and let us not forget that this is
> what AP is about you bear the responsibility when someone acts on it.

So much for free speech.  Do you think people distributing bomb-making material
should be held responsible for any terrorist incidents.  Quite a few people
on this list who posted bomb-making material would be arrested.  Same with
chemistry book publishers and news magazines that had some pretty detailed
information about pipe bombs.  I fail to see any difference between the
two.

> I consider AP to be very close to calling for the assasination of the 
> President of the USA. That is a federal crime and there is a law that 
> requires the investigation of any such threats. I suggest that people
> think *very* carefully before engaging in this dangerous nonsense any
> further. 

Do you really consider speech to be "dangerous."  The law requiring
investigation of threats against the president is a stupid one.  The maintainer
of the exploding head page was investigated by the USSS after putting up
computer-generated pictures of Bob Dole's head exploding (Presidential
candidates are also covered under this law).  There's too much potential for
abuse.

> PS it is not censorship to stop people from advocating murder.

Then all prosecuters pushing for the death penalty, death penalty advocates,
and anyone who advocates going to war with another country should all be
thrown in jail.  I might as well ask the common question again: "What part of
'Congress shall make no law' don't you understand?"

Mark
- -- 
PGP encrypted mail prefered.
Key fingerprint = d61734f2800486ae6f79bfeb70f95348
http://www.voicenet.com/~markm/

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hallam@vesuvius.ai.mit.edu wrote:
> Go talk to someone who is a member of an organisation like the PLO or
> Hammas and pretty near the top. If you think that they would be
> intimidated for a moment by AP you have another think comming.
> If it could the US would have assasinated Saddam by now. It can't
> because it is too difficult to find out where exactly a person will 
> be. Assasination
> attempts against Castro similarly failed.
> If you care to look at the history of Cambodia you will see that Lon
> Nol assumed the presidency despite the knowledge that there was
> practically no chance of defeating the Khumer Rouge and that he would 
> almost certainly be dead
> in less than a week as a result.
> Both the assumption AP rests on are utterly false. It is neither
> possible to assasinate people at will nor will it intimidate.
> In addition *ANYONE* who attempted to implement AP would be someone
> *I* would regard as a tyrant and therefore a legitimate target by the 
> rules of AP. I would naturally consider it permissable to engage the
> support of others in their suppression. Since we now live in the
> fantasy land of AP I can now wipe out anyone anywhere so I eliminate 
> all AP leaders.
> I think that this type of talk is incredibly dangerous. There are
> plenty of people on the net who are psychos and if you spread AP
> drivel arround someone is going to act on it. Probably not Jim Bell, 
> more likely a psychopath who
> lurks on the list but does not post.
> If you call for people to be murdered - and let us not forget that
> this is what AP is about you bear the responsibility when someone acts 
> on it.
> I consider AP to be very close to calling for the assasination of the
> President of the USA. That is a federal crime and there is a law that
> requires the investigation of any such threats. I suggest that people
> think *very* carefully before engaging in this dangerous nonsense any
> further.

Come now, surely you don't think putting assassination into the hands of 
the common people (Democracy, yes?  The same stuff Clinton is preaching 
all the time, remember?) is going to be worse than letting governments 
control all the action?  If you're going to allow governments to do the 
job, you and your fellow citizens should have been more involved in the 
political arena, to monitor these kinds of activities, so the government 
(of the U.S., for example) didn't have to get such a bad reputation.

A few years ago, William Torbitt (pseudonym) wrote in part: "Penal codes 
have had two historic purposes - to deter crime and reform the offender.
.....However, when the head of the National Police agency joins with a 
handful of other govt. leaders, and they both in turn throw in with 
organized crime to murder the president, and the people have an uneasy 
feeling that something of this nature has taken place, it is only 
natural that crime and violence increase, and the basic deterrent to 
crime has broken down." (quote approximate)

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HAL wrote:
> [AP drivel deleted]
> Go talk to someone who is a member of an organisation like the PLO or
> Hammas and pretty near the top. If you think that they would be intimidated
> for a moment by AP you have another think comming.
> If it could the US would have assasinated Saddam by now. It can't because it
> is too difficult to find out where exactly a person will be. Assasination
> attempts against Castro similarly failed. 

     Some would say that 1) Saddam (as a problem) was _created_ by the US, 
and it would not be in the interest of certain people to have him die.
Along the same lines, Castro, while not exactly friendly (and who can blame 
him) to the US, is also not a threat, and never really has been. Killing 
him would serve no purpose.

     Killing some one (the physical act, not the emotional consequences) is
easy. Denyability is a little (only a little) tougher. 

> If you care to look at the history of Cambodia you will see that Lon Nol
> assumed the presidency despite the knowledge that there was practically no ch
> chance of defeating the Khumer Rouge and that he would almost certainly be dead
> in less than a week as a result. 

     There are always Captians who go down with the ship, Boys who stick 
their fingers in dykes, and Some fool leading the charge when the odds
are overwhelming. This is either the highest calling (to fight back against 
all odds, and refuse to give in) or pure stupidity (he who runs away lives
to fight another day). You pick. 

> 
> Both the assumption AP rests on are utterly false. It is neither possible
> to assasinate people at will nor will it intimidate. 

    If by "at will" you mean _any time_ _any where_, yeah. Short of building
your own nuclear device, yeah. If you mean there are people who can't be 
gotten to, then no. Everyman has his price, and his coin. 


    The second time AP is implicated in a murder, and is not stopped, then 
it will _start_ to intimidate. More likely it will be stopped. 

> In addition *ANYONE* who attempted to implement AP would be someone *I*
> would regard as a tyrant and therefore a legitimate target by the rules
> of AP. I would naturally consider it permissable to engage the support of 
> others in their suppression. Since we now live in the fantasy land of AP
> I can now wipe out anyone anywhere so I eliminate all AP leaders.

     There are no illegitimate targets. 

> I think that this type of talk is incredibly dangerous. There are plenty of
> people on the net who are psychos and if you spread AP drivel arround someone
> is going to act on it. Probably not Jim Bell, more likely a psychopath who
> lurks on the list but does not post. 

     Doubtful. It would take more than one talented person. It would take
an organization, and a permanent net connextion. This would be difficult for
a lone psychopath to carry out.

> If you call for people to be murdered - and let us not forget that this is
> what AP is about you bear the responsibility when someone acts on it.

     Bullshit. Is Einstein morally responsible for the Atomic Bomb? 

     Col. Colt for the murders that the guns he created accomplished? 

     Ronald McDonald & his PR firm for all of the obese people in this 
     country?

> I consider AP to be very close to calling for the assasination of the 
> President of the USA. That is a federal crime and there is a law that 
> requires the investigation of any such threats. I suggest that people
> think *very* carefully before engaging in this dangerous nonsense any
> further. 

     Driving 65 is very close to driving 66, which is against the law.
I suggest that people think very carefully before driving at 65 miles 
per hour. 

> PS it is not censorship to stop people from advocating murder.

     Yes, it is. Especially when other people do it all the time, and don't
get punished. Clinton just "murdered" a bunch of people in Iraq. He talked
about it, then he did it. He calls it "War". So do I. I am involved in a 
war for _my_ rights. I will probably loose, but I must do what I determine
is right. Assinating the president would not further my goals. At no time 
in the foreseeable future would killing the president bring me any closer to
my goals. This being so, killing the president would be a stupid idea.

     When I joined the Marine Corps, I took an oath to protect this country,
the constitution, and the government against all enemies foreign and 
domestic. To me, the order I wrote them is the order of presidence. The
government is attacking the constitution regularly. I do what I can to stop 
that. If that means taking up arms as either a part of organized revolt, or
a long lunatic, so be it. 

    

Petro, Christopher C.
petro@suba.com <prefered for any non-list stuff>
snow@smoke.suba.com

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On Wed, 25 Sep 1996, snow wrote:

>      Some would say that 1) Saddam (as a problem) was _created_ by the US, 
> and it would not be in the interest of certain people to have him die.
> Along the same lines, Castro, while not exactly friendly (and who can blame 
> him) to the US, is also not a threat, and never really has been. Killing 
> him would serve no purpose.

Shortly after the Gulf War elements in the Iraqi military tried to
overthrow Hussein; they apparently tried to co-ordinate with the U.S., who
tried to co-ordinate with Saudi Arabia, who warned Saddam that there was
going to be a coup attempt; gotta stop that Ol' power vaccuum...

The fact that the people who performed the Bay of Pigs were enticed into
it by promised but withdrawn U.S. military support is a matter of public
record; would Castro still be in power had the United States not 
(intentionally? I don't know) destroyed the core resistance against him
in that fashion?


Phil Fraering          The above is the opinion of neither my internet
pgf@acadian.net        service provider nor my employer.
318/261-9649