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Missile Defense

Russian military leaders have expressed concern about US plans for a national missile defense system. Will defense technology be limited by possibilities for a strategic imbalance? Is this just SDI all over again?

lunarchick - 09:22pm Sep 5, 2001 EST (#8526 of 8536)
lunarchick@www.com

Back to lawyers: .. Secrets, Too ...

Existing federal criminal law states that whoever has "information relating to the national defense" and has "reason to believe [it] could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation" and "willfully" transmits that information to "any person not entitled to receive it" shall be ... etc

term "national defense" has been broadly defined by the courts, and "advantage" to a foreign nation need not be disadvantageous to the United States

leaks “Sometimes we can't respond to stories based on leaks” (Ronald Reagan).

bits of information can, when assembled together, be deemed classifed under the so-called mosaic theory

different agencies to assign different classification levels to essentially the same information

lunarchick - 09:53pm Sep 5, 2001 EST (#8527 of 8536)
lunarchick@www.com

Seems here that if GeorgeWilly an American innovates a string with extra 'twang' and lets Harold of Hastings in on the act ... then GeorgeWilly could be thrown in a steel-box - to rot!

But what if the twanging string had multiple applications?

Comes back to the point that anything the USA deems to be classified immediately has 'value' and can be sold. One would assume, that in this day and age, when hackers can break through firewalls .. there'd be more USA classified outside the gvt domain than in it.

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Looking along the line of data/information/knowledge/wisdom .. information is very basic ... thinking of this in pyramid terms, data and information underpin knowledge ...

Is 'knowing' arrived at via deduction .. or visa vers via induction.

data
information
knowledge
wisdom
knowledge
information
data

Take Solomon .. was he born with a wisdom gene? Did he have a framework of wisdom into which he fitted knowledge, information, data? Was he a top down or bottom up thinker?

Is there really a linear association, or, is arriving at understandings, fitting the bits and pieces over time, somewhat more varied or complex?

Back to governments. Is the 'information' they classify unique to them .. or, can it be gathered by most folks via a common environment.

Is there such a thing as 'information' that can be isolated, or is it a factor/s from a holistic environment. Note how different agencies classify 'the same' at different levels. How does a snippet of info fit in with the needs of each organisation - who determines?

Can holding and locking information - that has general application - actually paralyse a National economy. Isn't this the way with stem cell research matters currently. The more the USA plays games .. the weaker it becomes as holistic factors such as cash for research move off-shore.

Is the USA due for reformatting wrt it's attitudes to 'secrecy'. Does the existing paralytic structure fulfil a function, or, should it be scrapped and a new perspective employed?

It seems the USA has moved in a few short months from a position where it held Superpower status and rank, to one of pariah - it has 'Texicuted' itself!

Freedom of information, the ability of people to freely talk on issues (as per London Guardian) is the base that underpins individual freedom in truely democratic societies - isn't that so Alex?

lunarchick - 09:55pm Sep 5, 2001 EST (#8528 of 8536)
lunarchick@www.com

Flashy

lunarchick - 10:05pm Sep 5, 2001 EST (#8529 of 8536)
lunarchick@www.com

Hyde Park Corner and free speech ... essential to democracy.

lunarchick - 10:11pm Sep 5, 2001 EST (#8530 of 8536)
lunarchick@www.com

Missile Defence - too ugly a concept to feature here? see

Speaker's Corner In 1866 Edmund Beales' Reform League had marched on Hyde Park where great scuffles broke out between the league and the police. Eventually the Prime Minister rescinded and allowed the meetings to continue. Since 1872, people have been allowed to speak at speakers corner on any subject they want to.

lunarchick - 10:24pm Sep 5, 2001 EST (#8531 of 8536)
lunarchick@www.com

Close Shave:

1. A U-brain at the U-Adelaide flying school determined to start the plane's motor by hand, he pulled down on the propeller ... not having put chocks under the wheel .. the plane moved forward .. along the line of the U's half dozen parked planes. The propeller sliced through each plane as it passed. News pictures revealed the art-works it created ... the greatest ever since sliced bread! Plane and cucumber, or plane and tomato?

2. The woman who told Martin Luther king that she'd had a dream .. isn't the only one to dream in the USA ... where information and knowledge can drift down from the sky: see

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