Tim hates you

So after reading this article

Here is an excerpt:

Grins banned from passport pics
Travellers have been ordered not to look too happy in their passport photographs to avoid confusing facial recognition scanners.

Toothy, open mouthed grins are being outlawed from the tiny 35mm by 45mm photographs because they will throw off scanners used at airports.

Great we’re using biometrics, next thing we’ll have to do is paint red dots on our faces to help the scanners actually do the job right… *groan* (oops I’m probably not allowed to do this either.)

It’s not that I actually have anything against biometrics, well I do actually, but right now the technology is just pants.

On another note I have absolutely no faith or trust in the governments ability to introduce another computerised system and not have it go tits up.

Please please read A comparison between the U.S. to other rich nations

Now I haven’t had time to research all the data shown here but it is very very telling and quite disturbing infact.

I will admit that the originator of the article has a very strong political bias to their analysis and writing but it does make for fascinating reading.

All the articles concerning the economic data and their political analysis can be found here

So after reading this

40 GOATS TO BUY CHELSEA
Former US president Bill Clinton has been offered 40 goats and 20 cows for his daughter by a love-struck African government official.

I think Bill should hold out for maybe 60 goats and 40 cows. Bring the deal up to a nice even 100 live stock in total. I mean if he’s willing to go that far for the deal holding out for a little more on top surely couldn’t hurt.

Although to be brutally honest. I personally think she’s only worth 25 goats and 3 cows at most.

So the morons tried to bomb us again

Nothing happened. Don’t worry we’re all safe. We’re more annoyed by the sheer bloody inconvenience this is going to cause to our already substandard transport system. Today is going to be pain.

Reading some of the reports, it turns out the morons tried to blow it up and didn’t manage to do anything but ruin some backpacks… I guess all the smart ones got killed on the first run a couple of weeks ago. Ho hum… life goes on, albeit at a much more slower pace.

Edit: Just saw this

Apparently the police are currently searching for an individual who resembling the reconstruction below, who was seen on a tube train this morning carrying a bag with ‘ACME Suicide Bombing Kit’ stencilled on it.

Uncle Sam wants you – even if you’re 42 years old

The Defense Department quietly asked Congress on Monday to raise the maximum age for military recruits to 42 for all branches of the service.

More here.

You’re buggered aren’t you? I’m guessing Canada is looking pretty nice now… How’s your french?

Thanks to Visigothan from the Ars Technica forums for sharing this link maybe I should get her in touch with Biff hmmm…

Edit. After I sent this blog to Biff this conversation happens on IM

Biff: she ain’t bad
Biff: er if she lost a lot of weight
Tim: lol

http://moon.google.com/

Now zoom all the way in…

Extremism task force to be set up

A task force to tackle Muslim extremism “head on” is being set up in the wake of the London bombings.

Tony Blair said after meeting Muslim leaders and opposition politicians at Number 10 that it was time to confront and defeat “this evil ideology”.

The network will seek to dissuade young Muslims from turning to extremism.

More of this article can be read at the BBC News website here

Oh good grief I’m going to vomit now.

I mean seriously. Just seriously. An “Extremism Taskforce”? What on earth is that supposed to be? Are we going to find ourselves surrounded by crack teams of SWAT Hare Krishnas and New Agey Christians humming kum by yah, searching for unhappy people?

Now call me a cynic, and I am, but all I see from this “Taskforce EXTREME!” (cue: sound effects of armor clangs and explosions in the background) is a group of middle aged old farts sitting around with expenses paid for lunches on government tabs who will end up writing a 70,000 word report that no one but politicians and advocacy groups will ever read and quote endlessly in their interminably droning voices and complete boredom will settle upon all. The government will then say they would like to follow these recommendations but due to budgetary requirements, be unable to fulfill all but the most limited versions of the programs and initiatives that this report would actually recommend.

Follow it down to it’s logical conclusion of a few years later and then you’ll see that nothing will have happened, nothing will have actually changed and nothing will have been done. Unless that is they decide to tell the truth about things in this country. Yeah, right.. Bugger all chance of that ever happening.

P.S. Does anyone else remember the Centurions cartoon that was on Saturday mornings? BTW I thought the wild weasel was the best thing since sliced bread.

I’m trying to grow my hair here and it just doesn’t want to be normal. It’s too hot to grow my hair and I’m hating it. I will keep on growing my hair.

Welcome back and I hope you enjoyed the previous read.

Please bear with me, I think I need to reiterate previous issue I touched upon some more and then I’ll move on to my thoughts about what possible solutions there are.

My major problem with these and any of the current legislation we have in effect is that these Anti-terror laws do nothing. As such they could be called post facto laws, or in other words laws that will only apply to you after you have committed a crime. Now you could argue justly that almost all criminal laws can only be acted upon after a crime has been perpetrated and I agree this is the case but none the less we still act in an attempt to prevent the crimes from happening before hand.

But in dealing with a crime like terrorism this is in my opinion akin to trying to shut the barn door after the horses have bolted and particularly ineffective when dealing with people for whom death is not to be feared. If they’re not scared of dying I doubt they’ll be that terrified of sitting in prison for the rest of their lives.

What this means is that us trying to find even more ways to make sure we can keep these people in jail for what conceivably will be capital crimes in countries which still practice capital punishment or life sentences in others will not be much if any kind of deterrent.

So where does this leave us?

As I said before and has been uttered by many doctors throughout the world, “Prevention is better than the cure.� We must start utilising our intelligence gathering capabilities in a much more intelligent and targeted fashion. Whilst I disagree with racial/ethnic profiling on principle, I do also agree and understand that in limited, please note that I did say limited, and certain circumstances it could be a valid tool amongst others. Also increasing the funding that we have for our human intelligence gathering functions and relying less upon our electronic information gathering capabilities (Which we relied upon to almost certain disaster previously, is in my opinion foolish and dangerous.) You can’t beat a good pair of eyes and a smart brain on the ground. We need to start increasing the HUMINT (Human Intelligence) gathering capabilities a lot. We can do this a variety of ways and means and using the methods that work, we’ve got to stop recruiting fresh eyed faces from the university campuses who will only ever end up as paper pushers sitting behind desks without a real understanding of the risks involved and start using retired police officers and detectives, people who will already have a very good idea and understanding in how to go out into the world, work with a broken and fractured picture of events that have just happened and try to piece them together into something that can work. These people already work under stringent evidentiary procedures and understand and know how important it is to get it right or a major criminal case could fall apart. (Yes I do admit to ripping this idea off and if you recognize where I got it from congratulations. But a good idea, no matter where it comes from, is still a good idea.)

I’m not completely blind either to how an organisation like this could become perverted and a danger to the society they wish to protect but that is why governments and their agencies have checks and balances. It would be hard to do this in a way without stifling the organisation or creating a group without peer that is open to abuse but something that is worthwhile is never easy.

Secondly we need to start using our security forces in a better manner than in the way they have been deployed. I would like to impress a point here in that I do not agree with the view that the press has taken upon our situation in Iraq in that everything is falling apart. I disagree. I will however come forth and say that in my honest opinion things in Iraq are not going as well as we could be doing them. We need to understand from the lessons we learned in the past in how to deal with an insurgency situation. There are many experts from previous campaigns by insurgent forces, for example in the UK from dealing with the IRA and the Irish republican cause regarding Northern Ireland, mistakes in the past were made but please let us at least try and use some of the lessons we learned there and try to see if we can apply them there.

On another note please give me any feedback on what I write here at all it’s hard to write about these things in a vacuum. I need ideas and viewpoints to bounce of off and to react to and to make me think.