Joho the Blog
An Entry from the Archives

It never fails to amaze me how idiotic governments have become over the last year and a half. I seriously doubt that people of a nefarious bent are busy sitting in libraries looking through large books called 'How to Make a Really Nasty Bomb' or 'Terrorism For Beginners' whilst they hatch their darstedly plots.

The correlation between 'suspicious' reading matter and bad intent is weak to non-existent, and the chances of someone's reading list accurately flagging them up as a potential terrorist is so close to nil as to be indistinguishable from it. To me, this whole Patriot Act (like the anti-terrorism acts here in the UK) is designed more to put the wind up the general populace whilst simultaneously giving the authorities free reign to do whatever they fancy in the name of 'homeland security' than it is to provide any sort of useful data as regards possible terrorist activity.

Maybe I'm missing the point here, but this type of data mining is always going to be futile. Looking for meaningful patterns in library/bookstore data is like looking for patterns in the stars - you'll always find what you're looking for if you look hard enough, but seeing a lion in Leo doesn't mean there's a giant furry moggy flying through the sky.

Thankfully here in the UK the government quietly caved in to the realisation that carrying out similar widespread data mining through our emails was not only highly unpopular but also totally unfeasible. Certainly any poor sap (or computer program) that had to mine my emails would drown in drivel long before they found anything even remotely interesting.

I can only hope that the patriot act is flattened reasonably quickly and your right to read in peace restored.

I'd be alittle more impressed with the effort if they were not only seeking sponsorship by the minority members in the House. It looks like right now it's just a partisan thing, I have no doubts there are Republicans who support this issue.

Not to dismiss the idea, I like it, I just think they should reach out there efforts.