From: Jeff Davis (jdavis@socketscience.com)
Date: Mon Apr 03 2000 - 20:07:46 MDT
EvMick@aol.com got it exactly right when he wrote:
>A more accurate statement would be....."these programs are a new source of
>revenue while incindently they can be spun as a saftey program".
But it is not the safety "spin" which is incidental, but the safety itself.
And, of course, the real driving force behind this is, as always, more
money for more government. The enhancement of authoritarianism; the
pleasant exercise of crude power and control; automated extortion and petit
terrorism, well, they're just icing on the cake.
How will this play out? Initially revenue will expand. Lockmart will use
this to sell the tech to as many other cities as they can. Governments
being what they are, this will be many other cities. Then, as people
modify their driving habits, and run fewer red lights, the revenue will
decrease. In an effort to maintain the revenue, the fines will be
increased, and the program will be expanded to other areas, as variations
on the technology make it feasible. I would guess speeding would be the
next big payoff. Then you'll be pretty much well along the path to
ubiquitous government surveillance. And of course only a perp or a
sociopath would object. After all, it's government's job to keep you safe.
Rodney King gets the shit kicked out of him. Everyone else gets nickel and
dimed to death.
If someone has a solution, I'm ready to hear about it.
(I've always felt that cops should not have the liability for their
misdeeds transferred to the city, and thence to the taxpayer, but that they
should bear the responsibility themselves, as do most (should be all) other
professionals. Then they have to get insurance (or self insure backed by
the cop pension funds). That would bring them in line real fast. By a
similar logic, all fines for criminal and traffic offenses should be
rebated directly and in full to the citizens. This would take the "revenue
source" motivation out of any govenment action that generated money through
fines.) If democracy was anything but fraudulent, approaches like this
might work. In the real world (the world as I see it), it's like expecting
water to run uphill.
Work hard. Pay your taxes. Work some more. Smile. Was it good for you?
Die quietly.
Only the unsophisticated camel owner breaks the beast's back with that last
straw--and even that is a myth. In the real world, the beast is worked to
the limit, and then eaten. Not to worry. Camels make more camels, an
endless supply. It's the same with people.
Best, Jeff Davis
"Everything's hard till you know how to do it."
Ray Charles
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