[ExI] Declaration of subservience

[spike]

>... On Behalf Of Rafal Smigrodzki
...

>...### This could imply something like 2 degrees of separation between me
and a major enemy of the USG. And only a couple of years ago it transpired
that another enemy, Julian Assange, frequented this same list...

Do you guys remember what happened when Julian came in?  I may be wrong on
this, so I should consult the archives.  As I vaguely recall from at least a
dozen yrs ago, he only posted a few times and posited some kind of central
anonymous repository for people to submit leaked info.  Generally he was a
hardline openness advocate.  He got into a big quarrel with one of our most
prolific posters who was a hardline privacy advocate.

>...Today, with detailed social graphs and awareness stretching in time for
decades, the USG can direct its attention to the always very small cadre of
real troublemakers, and will most likely leave irrelevant whiners like us
alone...

The problem with that line of reasoning is that once it takes care of the
small cadre of real troublemakers, there is a vacuum that draws from the
irrelevant whiners like us into the new small cadre of real troublemakers.
The process is repeated until it draws up all the irrelevant whiners.

>... but at least we are not likely to be dragged off in the night...

...yet.

>... So don't worry Spike, you are safe despite your crimethink.  Rafal
_______________________________________________

For now.  But we must recognize the real threat: if we allow this new power
to go unchallenged, it becomes established with a precedent.  Those on the
left seem to be unaware that it is the power that corrupts, absolutely
without regard to the position on the political spectrum of the person in
power.  We are due for another far right government, which we haven't had in
25 years.  When the new guys arrive, I suspect we will find the right is
just as corruptible as the left.

spike