Just a quiet little story a lot of people will barely notice:
Homeland security officials plan to install more security cameras Downtown in time for the Super Bowl.
Sixty-eight cameras are mounted in key areas throughout Downtown. By year's end, officials plan to add seven more near Lucas Oil Stadium and six or more along Georgia Street.
"Any time public-safety improvements are made, it's great for our community," said Dianna L. Boyce, spokeswoman for the 2012 Super Bowl Host Committee. She added that the cameras will benefit residents and visitors.
Why, this is just 13 more cameras -- there are already 68 installed; this is barely worth mentioning. And, really, they're for the benefit of ordinary citizens and the community's public safety. Crimes can be solved, and bad guys can be spotted even before they act.
But note the presence in the story of Homeland Security and the fact that the cameras are federally funded, and see if you can read on without getting a little paranoid. First, a report from San Francisco:
The Department of Homeland Security will fund an effort by San Francisco to install real-time video cameras on 358 city buses, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. The existing system, installed a decade ago, stores footage on tape located on each vehicle.
According to city documents, “the new system will provide real-time viewing of images, inside and outside the bus, by law enforcement officers, emergency responders and other authorized personnel on a real-time basis from a distance of about 500 yards in case the bus is hijacked and used for terrorism activities.”
In March, it was reported the DHS planned to introduce new mobile surveillance technology at train stations, stadiums and streets.
[. . .]
The new technology allows the government to “track your eye movements, capture and record your facial dimensions for face-recognition processing, bathe you in X-rays to look under your clothes, and even image your naked body using whole-body infrared images that were banned from consumer video cameras because they allowed the camera owners to take
Comments
I kinda figure that if you're out in public anyway, cameras aren't taking away any privacy, because you don't have any, anyway. And it's a lot cheaper to have one person watching 20 video monitors and dispatching 2 cops than to pay 20 cops to watch those same scenes in person.
And when I was in the 3rd grade, I would have really loved for there to be cameras - with tapes running - on the school bus. I *told* you he started it!
It's the guy who's trying to hide what he's doing that bothers me. The vandal tagging stop signs on a lonely rural road. Old Roger, draft-dodger, sneaking out the basement door. Cards hidden up the sleeve. The bible talks of thieves coming in the dark of the night.
Dishonesty is the reason I don't like concealed carry permits. People should carry their guns OPENLY, where they will discourage miscreants from miscreating.
I live on a narrow street with no off-street parking, and as a result, I lose a rear-view mirror about once a year. I keep thinking I ought to put up a security camera, but I'm afraid that if I do, someone will steal it....
He's exactly right to be wary of these guys. I think Homeland Security is a bad idea, overreaction and will turn around to bite us in more profound ways then just that. In case he hadn't noticed we're already "a lot less free". We are awash in laws yet people like Harl still a lose a mirror about once a year. Someday we'll have to use all those guns nobody sees to remove all those cameras.
To improve security the government spends more, installs more cameras, develops new programs and in the end, we get ever diminishing returns for the cost.
In some ways, everyone should have and carry a gun so they can protect themselves. The movie death wish was pretty good, but I do not know if something like that would actually deter crime.
The problem with cameras is that they do not deter crime, but help solve it. The theft will still occur, the victim will still be a victim. Maybe the problem is too many laws not being enforced or too many law period with no punishment.
Hanging them high may had an impact on crime a century ago.