Re: Mad as Hell

At 11:23 am -0500 on 11/13/97, Tim May wrote:

> >:-). Actually, Tim, I don't think it's dangerous, at least to me
> >personally, and to anyone else on this list, for that matter. What I said
> >was, you're counterproductive to your own cause (you could become a poster
> >for statism, as I said before), and, if you continued to directly threaten
> >the lives of people who had the power to hurt you, in public, with direct
>
> You have now repeated this "Tim has directly threatened the life of a
> federal judge" charge several times.
>
> This is false.


Well, I certainly used two forms of the word 'direct', right there in black
and white, didn't I?

And, having just watched Nat Hentoff say on TV that a threat would be
something where you specified the time and place of some kind of violence
against a person, maybe your saying something like,

> But in many ways, this is good news. The war is coming faster than I
> thought.
>
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.

was *not* a threat against a judge?

Right, Tim, if you say so.

I expect that, in the legal, Hentoff sense, it's not a threat. After all,
you didn't specify a date and time, and you didn't even say you,
personally, were going to do anything at all. However, it's probably more
than enough reason for someone with too may kevlar coats back in the office
closet to trump something up and force a confrontation with you, just like
they did with Bell. Well, no. Bell's arrest was just a byproduct of his
car's siezure, like they said in the papers, wasn't it?

Nonetheless, it's  well within conception that, since everyone's breaking
the law somehow, that something you're doing or have done would be used to
cause a percipitating event, which you yourself say you would respond to
with force.

Astoundingly, it also seems like you're *trying* to create a confrontation.
You seem to dare to them to do something so that you can meet them at the
door, Mossberg in hand. "Please don't throw me in that briar patch", in
other words. For instance, just last night, you said,

> And the rumors are mounting about a series of possible raids around the
> holidays this Thanksgiving Day. The FBI has acknowledge the fax sent out as
> legitimate.
>
> While militia members and Cypherpunks may not be able to withstand a full
> out war for very long, the mere willingness to defend oneself can itself
> act as a deterrent. This is basic game theory, basic strategy.

It sounds an awful lot like Fort Apache, Corrolitos, to me, Tim.

> You claim I am doing "the cause" a disservice.

Well, your "cause", whatever it is, certainly. I'm not sure, for instance,
that holing yourself up behind a steel-reinforced door with lots of fun
firepower is doing much for the spread of strong cryptography, I'll grant
you that...

> I claim you are spreading
> misinformation and trumping up a charge which you must hope is being read
> by the Feds.

Right. And when Thanksgiving day comes, Tim, and the no-knock doesn't
happen, or, even more interesting, nothing happens anywhere on Thanksgiving
day, what are you going to say about my "misinformation" attack, then? That
it "failed"?

Remarkable. You win no matter what, right? Prove to me that there is no
conspiracy? Or flying saucers, or whatever else?

:-).


Frankly, Tim, I don't think the Feds really care about you, or anything
you've done, to date. Or at least they wouldn't, if you weren't, like the
forest knight in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, daring them to hack off
another limb all the time.

It seems to me that, before this little interchange we've been in, where
someone finally stood up and said that the emperor had no clothes (at least
as far as kevlar outerware and the global conspiracy to destroy the
American Way is concerned) you would have continued to try to bait the
federales, imaginary or not, with inflamatory trolls like those above,
apparently in the hope that you could force a showdown with them.

Hell, maybe you'll actually make it happen, someday. I guess I won't be
surprised when it does. Or particularly care, even, given your vitriolic
reception the mirror in your face.

> You sicken me.

Um, well... Take a pill, maybe?

Cheers,
Bob Hettinga


-----------------
Robert Hettinga (rah@shipwright.com), Philodox
e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
The e$ Home Page: http://www.shipwright.com/
Ask me about FC98 in Anguilla!: <http://www.fc98.ai/>

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> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.





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Geiger Consulting    Cooking With Warp 4.0

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At 02:11 PM 11/13/97 -0500, Robert Hettinga wrote:

>> But in many ways, this is good news. The war is coming faster than I
>> thought.
>>
>> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
>
>was *not* a threat against a judge?
>
>Right, Tim, if you say so.

The phrase "capital crime" (literaly "head crime") just means "worst crime".  
It does not imply punishment.  Punishment for capital crimes varies with time 
and place.  Saying someone is guilty of an infamous crime is not a death 
threat.  It's not even a death threat to say, "I think X should be arrested, 
tried by a court, and gassed."  You are merely expressing opinions about 
criminal guilt and perhaps capital punishment but you are not making a 
threat.

"Hey, hey, LBJ.  How many kids did you kill today?"

Tim was *not* threatening to set up his own court and try anyone himself and 
carry out a punishment.

"You shall receive more than you deserve.  You shall receive justice."

>> You sicken me.
>
>Um, well... Take a pill, maybe?
>
>Cheers,
>Bob Hettinga

Bob, Tim's is just a different approach.  It shouldn't sicken you.  Tim and I 
are members of the same birth cohort and I think you are a little bit younger 
but it seems to me that he has absorbed the major message of modern education 
better.  You know -- Multi Culturalism.  Or as Mao said "let a thousand 
flowers bloom".  Tim's a very Multi Culti guy.  Individuation.  Big time.  
Micro Cultures.  He believes in letting other people explore the rich 
diversity of their lives and experiences as long as they let him do the same. 
 He's trying to make sure that everyone is aware that Multi Culturalism is 
*real*.  Too many proponents of same treat it as some bland mush.  Tim is 
keeping them aware of the spice.

Or as my grandfather said "It doesn't matter what your race, creed or color 
is.  You can still be a son of a bitch."  True equality requires true 
liberty.

DCF


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At 7:08 am -0500 on 11/14/97, frissell@panix.com wrote:


> >> But in many ways, this is good news. The war is coming faster than I
> >> thought.
> >>
> >> The judge in this case has committed a capital crime.
> >
> >was *not* a threat against a judge?
> >
> >Right, Tim, if you say so.
>
> The phrase "capital crime" (literaly "head crime") just means "worst
>crime".
> It does not imply punishment.  Punishment for capital crimes varies with
>time
> and place.  Saying someone is guilty of an infamous crime is not a death
> threat.  It's not even a death threat to say, "I think X should be arrested,
> tried by a court, and gassed."  You are merely expressing opinions about
> criminal guilt and perhaps capital punishment but you are not making a
> threat.

C'mon, Duncan, you know you're equivocating here, and you know better.

Tim says we're going to war. He says that a judge commits a capital crime,
by whatever definition he, or you, choose to use. Most people, and it
doesn't have to be you, or me, or even Tim himself, would call that a
threat, and, in the above case, against a judge. "Most people" especially
includes those folks with aptly-named "criminal justice" degrees, too much
military hardware and not enough understanding of rhetorical nuance.
*That's* the kind of threat Tim made, and the kind of people who will
interpret it.

At this point, I guess, it's moot. Tim can bay at the moon all he wants. It
is, after all, a free country. "Consider it evolution in action", as Tim's
favorite Pournelle quote goes.

But, up until he made that remark, I still had some respect for him. What
he said there was the breaking branch which turned loose this entire
landslide of disrepect for him on my part. As far as I was concerned, he
crossed the border into loonyland, and I decided to call him it. "Call a
spade a spade." Or a loon a loon.

Now, frankly, Tim still says stuff here worth reading, but I'm finding,
more and more, that other people say the same things I used to hear him
say, and they say it much better. At the moment, I expect, someday, to put
him in my own killfile, just like Chrispin, or Vulis, or Detweiller/Nuri,
or even poor Phill Hallam, who can't help himself ;-), just to keep me from
going off on him like I did this time. I'll try to restrain myself a little
bit better in the meantime.

> Tim was *not* threatening to set up his own court and try anyone himself and
> carry out a punishment.

No, he said that war was coming, and that a sitting judge had committed a
capital crime. You figure it out.

> >> You sicken me.
> >
> >Um, well... Take a pill, maybe?
> >
> >Cheers,
> >Bob Hettinga
>
> Bob, Tim's is just a different approach.  It shouldn't sicken you.

Watch your attributions, there, Duncan. Tim's the one who needs to take a
pill, not me.

I'm fine. I *was* mildly apoplectic, but I feel *much* better, now. :-).

> Tim and I
> are members of the same birth cohort and I think you are a little bit
>younger
> but it seems to me that he has absorbed the major message of modern
>education
> better.  You know -- Multi Culturalism.  Or as Mao said "let a thousand
> flowers bloom".  Tim's a very Multi Culti guy.  Individuation.  Big time.
> Micro Cultures.  He believes in letting other people explore the rich
> diversity of their lives and experiences as long as they let him do the
>same.
>  He's trying to make sure that everyone is aware that Multi Culturalism is
> *real*.  Too many proponents of same treat it as some bland mush.  Tim is
> keeping them aware of the spice.
>
> Or as my grandfather said "It doesn't matter what your race, creed or color
> is.  You can still be a son of a bitch."  True equality requires true
> liberty.

I agree with everything you said there, Duncan. All of it. Except the part
where Tim, metaphorically or not, calmly goes out into the street one nice
afternoon and throws rocks at cop cars to get their attention about how
fascist they all are.

That's not revolution. It's the act of a loon.

Cheers,
Bob Hettinga

-----------------
Robert Hettinga (rah@shipwright.com), Philodox
e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
The e$ Home Page: http://www.shipwright.com/
Ask me about FC98 in Anguilla!: <http://www.fc98.ai/>

Robert Hettinga, leaping logical chasms with a single bound, wrote:

> At 7:08 am -0500 on 11/14/97, frissell@panix.com wrote:
> > The phrase "capital crime" (literaly "head crime") just means "worst
> >crime".
> > It does not imply punishment.  Punishment for capital crimes varies with
> >time
> > and place.  Saying someone is guilty of an infamous crime is not a death
> > threat.  It's not even a death threat to say, "I think X should be arrested,
> > tried by a court, and gassed."  You are merely expressing opinions about
> > criminal guilt and perhaps capital punishment but you are not making a
> > threat.

> Tim says we're going to war. He says that a judge commits a capital crime,
> by whatever definition he, or you, choose to use. Most people, and it
> doesn't have to be you, or me, or even Tim himself, would call that a
> threat, and, in the above case, against a judge. 

  Get real, begins-with-a-'b'-ends-with-a-'b'.
  Every President in recent history has committed capital crimes.
Pointing
that out can hardly be considered some kind of threat, since we all know
that they have always done so, and will continue to do so, with
impunity.
  A 'threat' would be to imply that anyone assassinating a judge or a
President would get to sleep with Jody Foster.

  The mainstream press is pushing the smoking-gun confirmation of Tricky
Dicky Nixy as a multiple-felon as "News" <har-har-snicker-snicker>.
  The millions of people who recognized his treason against the nation,
despite the lies of our politicians and press, could hardly be seen as
'threatening' ElTrickster, since I don't know anyone who thought he was
worth wasting a bullet on.
  As a matter of fact, I believe that a Peephole's Kourt in Kalifornia
tried Tricky Dicky, found him guilty, and sentenced him to live the
rest of his life as himself. (Cruel and unusual punishment?)

TruthMonger