Just got Bruce Schneier's Latest Cryptogram

[el_gato]

Here are a few nuggets:

snip

The U.S. system of government has a basic unwritten rule: the government should be granted only limited power, and for limited purposes, because of the certainty that government power will be abused. We've already seen the US-PATRIOT Act powers granted to the government to combat terrorism directed against common crimes. Allowing the government to create the infrastructure to collect biometric information on everyone it can is not a power we should grant the government lightly. It's something we would have expected in former East Germany, Iraq, or the Soviet Union. In all of these countries greater government control meant less security for citizens, and the results in the U.S. will be no different. It's bad civic hygiene to build an infrastructure that can be used to facilitate a police state.

snip

It's so bizarre it's almost self-parody. The FBI issued a warning to police across the nation to be on the watch for people carrying almanacs, because terrorists may use these reference books "to assist with target selection and pre-operational planning."

Gadzooks! People with information are not suspect. Almanacs, reference books, and informational websites are not dangerous tools that aid terrorism. They're useful tools for all of us, and people who use them are better people because of them. I worry about alerts like these, because they reinforce the myth that information is inherently dangerous.