Re: A cypherpunk push-poll ? (Was Re: Dorothy and the four Horseman)

[Bill Stewart <stewarts@ix.netcom.com>]

At 10:32 AM 3/23/97 -0500, Robert Hettinga wrote:
>For instance, here's an example of a question that Dorothy and Winn
>*should* have asked:
>
>"In your extensive use of the internet in your professional capacity as the
>CIO of a Fortune 50 corporation, have you encountered the use of
>cryptography in acts of genocide?
>
>Ecologic holocaust?
>
>Thermonuclear terrorism?
>
>The use of asteroid impact to destroy all life on earth as we know it?"

Well, in my extensive use of computers back when I was a tool of the
military-industrial complex, I did encounter the use of computer security 
techniques in planning for thermonuclear terrorism; it's difficult to find
a better term for pointing tens of thousands of warheads at your enemies,
while they have tens of thousands of them pointed at you, and both of you are
plotting about what you think the other guys will do so you can do it to
them first, or so you can do something else to them to block it.
Ecological holocaust?  Nuclear winter was disbelieved, though I did know a 
meteorologist whose doctoral thesis advisor was working on germ warfare 
dispersal modelling, and The Customer didn't think in terms of genocide, 
just "nuking them till they glow" and "making the rubble bounce" and
"pre-emptive strikes".

Me?  I just kept the computers running while the physicists tried to model
what this sort of behaviour would do to the Phone Company, and how to
let the military get useful phone services pre-, trans-, and post-attack,
though once in a while I'd help them with some data structures..

On the other hand, while we did have occasional lectures on astronomy
from our Research folks, we were pretty well-behaved with asteroids.

But today we know that Eurasia and Oceania have always been friends,
and haven't figured out yet that Oceania and Eastasia have always 
been enemies, so the only nuclear terrorists we have to worry about are 
the ones who'll do sneaky things like hiding their bombs in bales of cocaine 
so nobody'll notice when they drive them across the border and up to the 
White House loading dock, and the Constitution explicitly doesn't say
that it's illegal to wiretap foreigners, so we're pretty safe for now.

#			Thanks;  Bill
# Bill Stewart, +1-415-442-2215 stewarts@ix.netcom.com
# You can get PGP outside the US at ftp.ox.ac.uk/pub/crypto/pgp
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