Dots
This movie was inspired by a comment to one of our posts. It’s the TV ad that the administration should run re the data-gathering “scandal.”
Here’s the mpeg4 Windows Media movie.
And here’s the Quicktime. Both movies are silent. If your computer can handle it, the WinMedia file is cleaner and downloads muuuuch faster than the Quicktime.
Files hosted by Putfile.
BACKGROUND on dot-connecting here
DIPPIN’ DOTS: The Old Gray Liar is apparently of the opinion that, because all of the dots NSA collected didn’t lead directly and immediately to Mohammad Atta’s flight school cousin, the whole program is one ginormous waste of time and manpower. The Times’ opinion is dressed up as a news story, which has become its modus operandi:
In the anxious months after the Sept. 11 attacks, the National Security Agency began sending a steady stream of telephone numbers, e-mail addresses and names to the F.B.I. in search of terrorists. The stream soon became a flood, requiring hundreds of agents to check out thousands of tips a month. But virtually all of them, current and former officials say, led to dead ends or innocent Americans.
Virtually all…which means a few actually led to real terrorists, and innocent people went about their lives unmolested? Where is Al Gore’s police state? In light of what just 19 terrorists did on 9-11, searching for the proverbial needles in haystacks seems like a worthwhile thing to do. As Adm. Bobby Inman puts it:
“It isn’t at all surprising to me that people not accustomed to doing this would say, ‘Boy, this is an awful lot of work to get a tiny bit of information,’ ” said Adm. Bobby R. Inman, a former N.S.A. director. “But the rejoinder to that is, Have you got anything better?”
The tiny bit of information may lead to the little cell of four or five fellows who are planning to kill thousands. The tiny bit of information, culled from a huge data mine via painstaking work and analysis, may save a city.
That is how this war has been fought since 9-11, and if serious minds prevail in the coming Beltway surveillance debate, it is how this war will be fought until al Qaeda is a distant memory. Have you got anything better?
Would the Times and its bubbled readers prefer the Hillary Clinton approach—with fully funded first responders only on the scene after terrorists have succeeded? It seems that they, and the ACLU and the entire left (even Hitchens?), would actually prefer to fight the war that way. First responders are the only component of the war that the left has consistently supported, probably because it will mean Washington sends more money to Democrat strongholds in major cities. They essentially see the war as an opportunity to dole out a little pork. For those of us who actually want to win the war, though, first responders should be the last line of defense.
For those of us who actually want to win the war, the NSA should be allowed to do its job—collecting dots for the rest of the intel community to connect.
(thanks to Chris)