[HN Gopher] Boston police bought spy tech with a pot of money hi...
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Boston police bought spy tech with a pot of money hidden from the
public
Author : authed
Score : 194 points
Date : 2021-12-18 15:01 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.propublica.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.propublica.org)
| klyrs wrote:
| Civil asset forfeiture encourages criminality in police. This,
| along with qualified immunity, are significant drivers behind the
| 'defund' movement. Reforming these two policies would be entirely
| sensible, if the country wasn't so hopelessly polarized.
| syshum wrote:
| for most political reforms it seems the news media purposely
| chooses the most polarizing examples of the problem to
| highlight.
|
| Does not matter if police reform, abortion, welfare, or any
| other topic, the media chooses the examples that will most
| upset those opposing the reform.
|
| This results in nothing getting reform, maintaining the status
| quo, and the media;s reoccurring revenue stream
|
| The nation is hopelessly polarized as a direct result of media
| propaganda, I have encountered this everyday and when people
| are giving actual non-sensationalized facts it is very easy to
| come to compromise policy position.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| I've stuck to here, New Yorker, NYT, and The Atlantic, I've
| stayed off of social media, I don't have cable and I don't
| watch TV.
|
| This site's articles and comments are often the most
| polarizing media that I subject myself to daily.
|
| I think most polarization comes from media packaged with a
| comment section and low quality news outlets.
| syshum wrote:
| If the only news media on consume is New Yorker, NYT and
| The Atlantic (all of which are rated as Left Bias news
| sources) then you are likely already in an echo chamber, so
| when exposed to a non-echo chamber source with comments
| (like HN) you come way with a false attribution as to what
| is propaganda, and what the source of that propaganda is
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| I think you're in the "New Yorker, NYT, and The Atlantic
| are echo chambers" echo chamber.
|
| I don't believe or agree with everything that I read. I
| also read a fair amount of different opinions in these
| sources which leads me to believe it's more varied than
| you would like to believe.
|
| It's interesting because I've always considered myself
| center/center right politically.
| syshum wrote:
| My position on those organizations political bias is from
| ratings by several independent organizations such as
| Ground News (but not only them) which I have been using
| more recently.
|
| I read 100's of news sources weekly, and if topic I want
| information on I drill down beyond the news organization
| seeking out orginal sources (for example if a news
| organization is reporting on a COVID Study, I read the
| study. If they are reporting on the 6th circuits ruling,
| I go read the ruling.. etc)
|
| It is ironic that someone the proudly proclaims they only
| consume information from 3 sources proclaims I am in an
| echo chamber but they could never be... lol
|
| As for my political leanings, I more of a Political
| Compass person where by economics is Left/Right, under
| which I am almost exactly in the enter, but social is on
| a Authority / Liberty scale, of which I am on the extreme
| end of the liberty scale
| brigandish wrote:
| I thought those 3 publications were widely known to be
| left of centre so I have to agree with the person you're
| responding to, because if you don't know they're left of
| centre and that they clearly share an outlook, then you
| must be in an echo chamber.
|
| As a simple test, do you think someone who says "I read
| the Federalist, Spectator and the WSJ" would notice a
| change if they read the NYT?
|
| I know they all have some contributors that go against
| their own ideological grain, so to speak, but still, you
| provided a good example of what being in an echo chamber
| might look like.
|
| Just being honest.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| I'm unfamiliar with those so I took a look at Federalist
| and it's polarizing garbage.
|
| > Right Responds To Cancel Culture By Building Its Own
| Infrastructure, And The Left Goes Nuts
|
| > 10 Christmas Songs That Must Be Cancelled By The End Of
| 2021
|
| > BIDEN ADMINISTRATION ENDORSES MORE BABY KILLING BY
| GREEN-LIGHTING MAIL-ORDER ABORTION PILLS
|
| NYT right now:
|
| > Hidden pentagon records reveal patterns of failure in
| deadly airstrikes
|
| > As COVID surges, experts say U.S. booster effort is far
| behind.
|
| The Spectator or WSJ looks a lot better, if you told me
| Spectator was Atlantic or New Yorker at a glance I might
| believe you.
| [deleted]
| salimmadjd wrote:
| The same polarizing media conveniently blamed Facebook and
| Twitter (though to a lesser extent) for all the polarization
| that they have been fomenting for years. I guess that move
| wasn't as surprising for me as seeing the number of people in
| SV who bought into that narrative.
|
| Corporate media should not really be thought of as real
| journalistic entities.
|
| Simple example. How in the world does CNN allow Chris Cuomo
| to interview his own brother. The fact that no one inside CNN
| publicly objected to this, walked away, protested, it tells
| me everything I need to know about the entire organization.
|
| I don't remember anyone at MSNBC making a fuss about it, nor
| at the Washington Post (Democracy Dies in Darkness).
| kurthr wrote:
| Hmmm, yeah no. Whether it's Vanity Fair or other "liberal
| scions", they're as likely to point out the issues with
| this sort of self-serving coverage as your favorite hand
| wringer on Fox News, who themselves are almost entirely
| "entertainment" and have so much obvious conflict of
| interest in their coverage... and if the Jan 6 SMS messages
| are to be believed, simple out right lying.
|
| https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/03/02/chris-
| cuo...
| CoastalCoder wrote:
| > Civil asset forfeiture encourages criminality in police.
|
| If you'll forgive a moment of polemic: In my judgment, civil-
| asset forfeiture _is_ a crime, full-stop.
|
| As a regular citizen without special legal training, it seems
| like as blatant a violation of the 5th Amendment as one could
| imagine.
|
| Perhaps with more legal training I'd judge it differently. But
| I'm not ready to give the court system the benefit of the doubt
| on this. And I would be deeply skeptical of any argument to the
| contrary.
|
| If the SCOTUS can justify civil-asset forfeiture (in its
| current form), then I don't see how the Bill of Rights offers
| any protection at all.
| landemva wrote:
| Qualified immunity was created by USSC. It is widely abused by
| all levels of government, and can be fixed by legislature.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| I agree with you. I don't like that being pro police became a
| cult of letting them do whatever they want.
|
| I'm pro police and I believe they should be paid more, get more
| training, and be held to much higher standard which means
| relentlessly pursuing and strongly prosecuting corrupt police.
| It's a betrayal of an entire community in a profession where
| lives are often at stake.
|
| Being pro police also doesn't mean making their job as easy as
| possible to the detriment of everybody else.
| tehwebguy wrote:
| Good reminder to vote your district attorney or equivalent
| out of office every single election unless they are
| relentless about prosecuting police who break the law.
|
| Weird examples that never go away, you can see instances of
| these every single day:
|
| - Tons of LAPD drive with illegal tints & no tags on their
| personal vehicles
|
| - Tons of NYPD park in the bike lane or on the actual
| sidewalk
|
| There are twitter accounts that follow these easy to spot
| examples. Harder to track: abuses of power in small towns
| when no cameras are rolling.
|
| DAs have even more leeway in some states than others, for
| instance in New York felonies can only be charged via grand
| jury unless waived by the defendant. This gives a DA
| unilateral power to sandbag any indictment they don't feel
| like prosecuting without looking soft on bad cops (see the
| Buffalo shoving incident) with zero transparency.
| shakezula wrote:
| The Buffalo shoving incident was almost identical to an
| incident in my state, and had an almost identical outcome
| because of the same problem: DAs who want to take the easy
| route.
| ajb wrote:
| IMO it would be a good idea to have a separate prosecuting
| authority for crimes by police. The regular prosecuting
| authority needs a good working relationship with police
| forces and will always find it hard to hold them to
| account.
| verve_rat wrote:
| Are private prosecutions a thing in the States? Sounds
| like an ACLU style organisation but focused on private
| prosecution of cops doing illegal things is needed.
| ajb wrote:
| Don't know about the States. In the UK, private
| prosecution (for crimes) can occur but the DPP has the
| right to take them over (and drop them), so it's not
| usually worth it.
| klyrs wrote:
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_prosecution#Unite
| d_S...
|
| It doesn't appear to be a thing in quite a few states,
| and where it is, it seems quite limited. Thus, the only
| legal remedy is lawsuits, which is why qualified immunity
| is such an injustice.
| syshum wrote:
| Well IMO one of the problem here is thinking in either "pro"
| or "anti" group stances. I am neither pro police, nor anti
| police.
|
| I am pro enforcement of laws that protect people from being
| victimized by others. That is a very narrow statement that
| does not require me to be "pro police" or "anti police"
|
| >> I believe they should be paid more, get more training, and
| be held to much higher standard
|
| This is often a position people take, but if fails root cause
| analysis. I am not convinced that more training, more pay,
| and higher standards will fix anything.
|
| The root cause is 2 fold first over-criminalization of
| society, and the use of police to enforce things that should
| not be crimes in the first place, or should be left to civil
| enforcement. The second is then giving police more power than
| average citizen, and I am not just talking arresting power
| there is a solid case there. However governments pass all
| kinds of laws written that have specific carve outs for
| police, this creates a "higher class" member of society that
| allows the member of this class to believe they are the
| sovereign and we are the vessels this fly's in the face of
| governance "For the people, by the people" aka self
| governance.
|
| IMO the law itself creates the logical end result of the
| policing we have today, unless we change the law the police
| no matter the pay, training, or standards will still be a
| problem
| shakezula wrote:
| > this creates a "higher class" member of society
|
| This is a really good way of describing what people are
| really angry about. Cop worship in the states is only
| second to God.
| authed wrote:
| > Reforming these two policies would be entirely sensible, if
| the country wasn't so hopelessly polarized.
|
| I guess it will have to get a lot worst before it gets
| better...
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| One of the luxuries about being a one party state is that you[1]
| never have to think critically about the means because you always
| agree with the ends. Massachusetts is going to be one of the last
| states that has that tough discussion about reining in the
| enforcement arm of government because it is a) so one sided b)
| rich enough to paper over problems for a long time.
|
| [1] the theoretical average citizen who holds the average beliefs
| about everything
| throwawaymanbot wrote:
| A LOT of police forces operate these black "funds"
| black_13 wrote:
| I really think that when British sat foot in Boston they looked
| around and said ,,you keep it". Of the dysfunctional places in
| this country thats a topper.
| dillondoyle wrote:
| Do 5g cell towers or carriers have any tech that would stop these
| stingrays? Or is there anything consumers can do, maybe a
| whitelist app or something to authenticate real towers?
|
| need to force law enforcement to get warrants.
| sbuttgereit wrote:
| Reasonable time to plug one of the legal civil rights
| organizations that I try to financially support every year: The
| Institute for Justice.
|
| https://ij.org/issues/private-property/civil-forfeiture/
|
| They are consistently fighting these kinds of abuses in the
| courts and through lobbying.
| tempnow987 wrote:
| I'm also a supporter. I am a bit confused why groups I normally
| support on the left have this as a somewhat low priority
| relative to the equity issues. This has an equity component
| too. The folks most likely to be unbanked, carrying around cash
| etc are minorities.
| slavboj wrote:
| The favored solutions for "equity issues" usually involve
| jobs for left activists or NGOs - "defund the police"
| transmutes into "we need half a department worth of various
| flavors of social workers".
| landemva wrote:
| It's a low priority because fundamentally fixing a problem
| will put the group out of business. It's a tired outrage
| show. Wake me up when BLM starts demanding the removal of
| government immunity.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| >It's a low priority because fundamentally fixing a problem
| will put the group out of business
|
| Exactly. They can either go the way of urban democrats and
| persist by promising to solve problems you never solve (not
| that republicans have served rural voters any better) or
| they can go the way of MADD and actually make progress and
| then see interest wane. They chose the former.
| authed wrote:
| Democrats and Republicans appear to be different when you
| listen to their speeches... but in the end, when you look at
| their actions or inactions, they are very similar on many
| topics.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| Sounds similar to CIA "black budgets."
|
| Civil forfeiture is a dumpster fire. I don't know who thought
| giving an organization that has the power to extort -with legal
| backing, would result in anything else.
| TedDoesntTalk wrote:
| > Sounds similar to CIA "black budgets."
|
| Good comparison. Other federal organizations have these, too.
| Many NASA launches have a black project that the public does
| not hear about. We should probably change the phrasing from
| black to something else, though.
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