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atomheartbevo

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Posts posted by atomheartbevo

  1. 3 hours ago, Pescado_Rojo said:

    She was pretty obviously next in line for the dems from the moment Obama was sworn in. They had 8 years to focus on her and focus they did. The dem field in 2020 will be pretty crowded, so they can't laser focus on any one potential candidate like they did Hillary. You did see a little of it when Oprah's name got floated. I'd guess it took less than 24 hrs for the right wing memes to start showing up on the usual suspect's Facebook posts, but then she downplayed it and the memes stopped. Since the nomination likely won't be decided before summer of 2020, it will be much harder for them to gin up the hate like they did with H.  

    They will also most likely be heavily defensive over Trump at that point, and/or trying to preserve seats in Congress.  The GOP will be spread very thin. 

  2. 46 minutes ago, Tom said:

    Lulz.  One of the influential voices in this country is stoking paranoia and civil unrest at the idea of corruption in government being uncovered to a couple of callers while millions are listening who share their views.  

    We get it, man.  You're too cool for school and nothing matters to you.  It's all just a game. 

    If Rush Limbaugh’s audience were to suddenly disappear, the company that makes Rascal scooters would go under. 

    • Haha 1
  3. Relevant article for Austin.

    https://www.mystatesman.com/news/crime--law/documents-austin-police-embracing-wider-use-license-plate-readers/6kZ9vnEgeVKofJehgwn4GO/

    Quote

    About two years ago, Austin police began exploring the acquisition of equipment that automatically reads license plates with the intention of becoming better at finding stolen vehicles.

    But as plans developed, police ideas became grander as they considered expanding the scope of the program to collect data from several hundreds of thousands of drivers each day and allow police access to a vast license plate database, according to an American-Statesman analysis of more than two years of reports, memos, contracts and emails obtained through a public information request.

    The automatic license plate readers — or ALPRs — are essentially high-speed cameras that snap photos of license plates and use software to check plate numbers against a database of stolen cars. The technology has been pitched by police as a way to reduce auto thefts, increase the number of stolen vehicles recovered and save taxpayer dollars by indirectly reducing local insurance costs.

    But the equipment’s ability to track local drivers’ daily movements has ruffled privacy advocates.

    An analysis of the documents found that police have proposed expanding the use of ALPRs to:

    • Collect data on all drivers entering the city through major highways by documenting the time and date through a network of cameras affixed on Interstate 35, MoPac Boulevard (Loop 1), U.S. 183, U.S. 290 and Texas 71, which would essentially encircle the city.
    • Create so-called “virtual stakeouts” by using up to five trailers equipped with automatic license plate readers that can be moved throughout the city, allowing police to aim the cameras at specific locations.
    • Collect license plate data from time-sensitive crime scenes, such as robberies or homicides.

    The implications for law enforcement are compelling. ALPRs are considered by police to be a “force multiplier” — a way to make policing more effective without increasing the number of officers on the street. At its best, an ALPR could help a cop catch the plate of a car wanted in an Amber Alert and lead to the rescue of a kidnapped child. At its most worrisome, privacy advocates say, it could be used to monitor drivers who frequent certain religious centers or buildings associated with political groups.

    Privacy advocates also worry about possible abuse because of the manufacturers’ policy of maintaining all data collected by the cameras unless directed otherwise.

    “The longer they keep the data and the more data points you have, the more you can learn about a person’s behavior — where someone goes to church, what doctors they have or where they slept at night,” said Dave Maass, an investigative researcher at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a privacy watchdog group. “Maybe we can predict where somebody is going to be, and we can tell you who their associates are. It can be very invasive over time.”

    Data collected from Austin police plate readers would be held indefinitely for now because no policy has been formalized. However, documents show police officials have suggested data retention of one year.

    Earlier this month, police started a $50,000 pilot program, which did not require Austin City Council approval, that affixed cameras to three unmarked patrol vehicles. Officers began uploading plate data to a server maintained by Vigilant Solutions, the California-based company that makes the equipment and its software.

    Vigilant officials confirmed that Austin police now have access to a license plate database made possible by plate readers attached to Vigilant’s private clients, mainly tow truck drivers and repo men.

    Quote

    An original proposal asked for cameras to be placed on all of Austin’s major highways, but that was amended to reduce costs. Instead, police would ask for a bank of cameras to be placed in far North Austin on I-35 to track southbound traffic as it moves into town and likewise in far South Austin for traffic headed north.

    The highway cameras lend themselves to monitoring drug or human trafficking, and police consider them a valuable tool in those cases, the documents showed.

    Quote

    At least one other Central Texas community, though, remains wary about the license plate readers. Last month Kyle City Council Member Daphne Tenorio called the technology “a little too Big Brother-ish” at a meeting where she moved to rescind the city’s no-cost contract with Vigilant Solutions.

    Kyle’s agreement with Vigilant was akin to what was being used by some officers in Guadalupe County. The technology would flag drivers with any warrant, including those for unpaid traffic citations.

    Vigilant would provide the equipment free as long as it got 25 percent of the fees paid, according to Vigilant Vice President Joe Harzewski, who made his case for the technology to the council before members voted 6-1 to cancel Kyle’s contract.

    “It’s a little too invasive for me,” Tenorio said in making the motion. “And while I understand the data isn’t quite kept here and it is in Virginia and locked away, I am uncomfortable with it.”

    The council had approved entering Vigilant’s program in January but began questioning the deal after it became unclear whether Vigilant could sell the data to a private company.

    Harzewski said Vigilant kept its law enforcement data on a separate server from business data and said that any private company working with Vigilant will not have access to the data.

    All Texas law enforcement agencies using Vigilant’s ALPRs do share data, Harzewski said. Vigilant’s software allows for interagency sharing to be turned on and off at the push of a button, he said.

    Harzewski said the company’s law enforcement server has never been hacked but noted that data collected by the license plate readers has been abused in the past.

    “We’ve had people hand out access where they shouldn’t have,” he said. “We give bulletproof technology to our clients, and they’re free to do with it as they see fit.”

    Vigilant estimates that it has collected 3.5 billion license plate impressions, according to company documents provided to Austin police, and is collecting the impressions at the rate of 100 million a month.

    ALPRs have been proposed for uses that worry privacy advocates, such as a proposal in Los Angeles to send letters to the homes of drivers whose cars have been recorded driving through areas known for a high amount of prostitution.

    Reyes said Austin police would use license plate data stored from vehicles without warrants.

    “If we have the data available, why wouldn’t we use it?” Reyes said. “I think what is important is that the information that we collect is for law enforcement purposes only.”

     

  4. 3 minutes ago, Captainant said:

    Back on topic though, 4th circuit actually just had a ruling that suspicionless forensic searches of electronic devices at the border are unconstitutional, in a rare protection of 4th amendment rights

    https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/05/fourth-circuit-rules-suspicionless-forensic-searches-electronic-devices-border-are

    Holy shit, that's amazing.  Company I worked at for several years had a policy of sending folks going overseas with a wiped laptop, or shipping the laptop ahead, to be loaded at the overseas site, because Customs/etc. could be very overzealous with checking laptops.  There was a serious concern that those chucklekfucks were imaging HDDs and going through the data at their will/pleasure.

    We never travelled with any laptops or tablets that had any personal stuff on it, because we don't need some dipshits looking through our photos or documents or email.

  5. 21 hours ago, TahoeHorn said:

    We shouldn't be compelled to provide info on our movements even if we can do so without active measures.  If the police want to electronically read our license plate and have a database of our moves that's ok.  The 1900 Sheriff did that with 1900 technology.  But he couldn't track us all the time.

    Most of us in Austin have seen the Austin PD cop cars with the license plate scanners.  That info is saved in a database, and ostensibly it's about tracking stolen cars, Amber/Silver Alerts, etc. and the argument is that the police could compile that info simply by having a cop stand on a corner and write down license plates.  That data is supposed to be destroyed at some point.

    If you save that information over time, especially if you equip more and more cop cars with the scanners, the cops are able to build up a helluva profile on where you travel to, and even who you associate with (scanning your plate while parked at a friend's, or at your boss's house whose wife you're banging).

    The problem is that it would be too easy to go from being used in active investigations (stolen cars, robberies, Amber Alerts, etc.) to fishing expeditions where they start looking for trouble with people who have done nothing else to arouse suspicion, or they start building up profiles on said people who have done nothing else to arouse suspicion.  

  6. 1 hour ago, Whitman said:

    Same here for West Virginia.  Will we be 96 or 95% white.  Cletus isn't going to be happy.

    LOL.  So at 90%, does Cletus feel like the minorities would have taken over?

    Census Bureau was off on their prediction of how fast Texas would become a minority-majority state - I think it happened about 5 years before they predicted it.  With whites making up less than 45% of Texans,  I'm curious to see what the trends are as far as ages and how many will be hitting 18 within the decade - that's where the GOP needs to be shitting itself over.

  7. 48 minutes ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

    Most believe that mueller has shared enough with other doj officials that the case can continue.  The real interesting part is that if trump fired mueller, he most likely would pardon everyone involved including himself.   

    I don’t think Trump can pardon himself, and he can’t hand out pardons in the NY cases anyways.  They’ll probably run a train on Jared as it is  

  8. 3 hours ago, sheeeit said:

    The Prince stuff is great.  As I have said, I do not think Prince will get accused of doing anything by Mueller.  

    Trump gave Prince's sister a cabinet position that she wasn't qualified to even be an assistant admin for, and then we find this stuff out about Prince.   There's always been something odd about that whole thing, and not because of any donations.

  9. StoryBundle has a large bundle up if you want a bunch of new/different stuff to throw on a tablet/e-reader. 

    https://www.storybundle.com/scifi

    Quote

    The Sci-Fi SFWA Space Bundle, curated by The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America:

    This massive bundle curated by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) has 18 different authors and twenty books, and can be yours for a price you name! It features New York Times Bestselling authors Michael Cooper, Mike Shepard, and Felix R. Savage, USA Today Bestselling Author Kevin McLaughlin, International Bestselling Authors Glynn Stewart, Craig Martelle, Jennifer Foehner Wells, Terry Mixon, Amy DuBoff, and much more!

     

    • Like 1
  10. 5 minutes ago, CowboyFred said:

    All his dumbassery aside, he’s the biggest pussy we’ve had in office since I’ve been alive (30).  If he stopped worrying about the media so much, I mean since they’re so wrong, he’d be able to focus on shit that actually matters but we know he can’t/won’t.

    I’m pretty sure a swamp rabbit would make him shit his pants. 

  11. 21 minutes ago, 4th&Five said:

    Totally normal statement from a president. 

     

    He is such a little bitch when it comes to the media.   Did Obama yank a Fox News’s credentials for the birthed bullshit?  Did George W. yank credentials over the 2000 election or Iraq?

  12. 59 minutes ago, MaybeACoordinator said:

    It's been written out of American history save for the Haymarket case and the Sacco / Vanzetti trial, but there was a decades long wave of assassinations and bombings that came in the wake of the Gilded Age and ushered in the progressive reforms that came in the teens. If we continue on the course we are on right now we are about to see another wave of assassinations and bombings. 

    Every time somebody gets their panties in a wad over some "terrorist" killing a small number of people, it's just reinforced how tone-deaf we are to our history - we had some eras that make today's attacks and school shootings look fairly tame.  

    Nearly a century ago, we had a school bombing that killed dozens of kids.  A century ago, we had a major newspaper bombed, killing 21.  A century ago, we had a police station bombed, killing around 10.  A bombing on Wall Street in the 1920s killed 40 and wounded 400.

    People have truly forgotten that Americans are extremely good at getting pissed off and blowing shit up or assassinating people.

    This is from 1920 (Washington Post) after the Wall Street bombing, where people wanted to shut off immigration from Europe.

    CeKRZkPUAAAlMfn.jpg

    • Like 2
  13. 4 hours ago, Lat22 said:

    You guys that don’t know about Roy Benavidez should read this book. 

     

    https://www.amazon.com/Legend-Incredible-Sergeant-Benavidezs-Mission/dp/0804139539

    Going to have to read that - not many biographies get such high ratings from hundreds of reviewers.

    Reading the Houston ISD website about the school named after him, turns out that they made a G.I.Joe action figure of him about 15 years ago.

    Anybody else mentioned in this thread have a G.I. Joe action figure created for them?  Didn't think so. 

  14. 10 minutes ago, Jhawk said:

    My biggest determining factor when I went to get a new car in 2016 was the safety features.  I was 31, single, no kids or pets.  Safety features.

    When our second kid was on our way (I was a man at that point), I didn't think twice about buying a minivan (since there was a potential for a third kid).

    After a few weeks of having the minivan, I began thinking it would have been cool to have it 10-15 years earlier with no kids - we would have spent every weekend camping/fishing out of it.

  15. 2 hours ago, krevo said:

    I keep the deluxe version of the Dock Demon in my car.   It's got a better cork grip and a slightly nicer (although still cheap plastic spinning reel)   I took the shit reel off and put an older Shimano 500 sized spinning reel on it with 10lb braid.   Use it for throwing Roadrunners and wacky rigged senkos.  Texas rigs with any sort of weight will not result in a very good hookset on these little rods but any open hook or treble hook lure will do fine.   Also, they are fairly easy to cast although not very far.  

    Personally - I'd rather lug around a single high quality rod and reel than have to mess around with a cheap one.  

    Could do something like your Dock Demon setup, since I have several orphaned reels.  Eventually we will be doing more serous fishing, and I'll haul out the high-quality stuff I used many years ago, but right now, I'm just thinking in terms of having something simple.  We're basically within a quick walk (15-20 minutes)  to Shoal Creek, Central Park (aka Turtle Pond at Central Market).  A little bit longer walk to the pond at The Triangle, although that thing was a moss-covered clusterfuck last time I went by it, and I'm not sure if that's even public property.

    Dock Demon appeals to me because it's short, and a lot of the areas I want to try along Shoal Creek have trees overhead or right next to you, and I wouldn't be casting more than 20 feet or so.

    When I went to look at cheap but fairly decent telescopic rigs, it was nothing but Chinese manufacturer after Chinese manufacturer.  Actually, I need to check Craigslist.

  16. Go back 140 years in America - people were having huge families, because hey, the family farm ain't gonna run itself.

    Cram everybody into cities and give them jobs that don't require having kids running around milking cows and gathering eggs, etc., and the birthrate drops.

    So figure out how to give the third world jobs in cubicles and we can slow down the birthrate or even watch it go negative.

  17. Along those lines, I'm not dragging out my more expensive/larger gear (bass fishing gear) to go fishing at some of these places.  I'm going to pick up a fairly cheap little telescopic combo and holy shit, it seems like Amazon only sells Chinese-brand gear.  I'll see the exact same gear under different names with highly-different customer ratings.

    Anybody got any recommendations for a decent telescopic combo under $50?

    Alternatively, I could just grab the spinning version of the $10 Zebco Dock Demon my kid picked out (he's got the spincast version).  It's only 2 feet long, which will make casting interesting, but I don't have to worry about it hanging up in trees/brush, and we can take it just about everybody you could take a smaller rod.

  18. My 5 year-old has finally decided he wants to fish (yay!).  Picked up a nice little rod for him and let him pick out some lures.   We have a state park pass already, and know the state parks are free to fish (don't need a license), but I'll be picking up a license anyways

    First off, as long as it's not marked "no fishing" and is publicly accessed, can we fish the public areas around Austin?  We are just doing catch-and-release (basically getting his toes wet).  

    Obviously we will hit up Mueller and Town Lake at some point, but we have the flood-control ponds near Central Market on North Lamar fairly close, and we are close to Shoal Creek and have walked it a lot and seen plenty of fish.  I see people fishing those areas all the time, although maybe not so much the ponds near Central Market (too many fucking turtles).

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