[conspire] Surveillance-state temptations (was: For Deirdre Saoirse Moen)

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Ruben Safir (ruben at mrbrklyn.com):

> The most dngerous term being thrown about in the media is "The New
> Normal" ...  it is not new, and it is certainly not normal...

That phrase is on the mandated list of cliches, after a couple of months
of anything unusual.  Broader conclusions cannot reasonably be drawn.  
It's just a template-default topic, with zero semantic content.

Don't believe me?  Here's an exercise I've found useful, over the
decades:  Set aside a selection of the commodity news items of the day,
and re-visit them after a six-month (or, hell, three-month) delay.  How
many still seem to convey meaningful content, with months' more context?
In a good year, it's about one in thirty, and only if you're being picky
about what you read.  The rest were just ephemera.

-- 
Cheers,
Rick Moen            Diaeresis:  Keeping the cow out of co-worker since 700 AD.
rick at linuxmafia.com    
McQ! (4x80)