Somebody's Watching Me

I try to catch the things that tend to slip under the radar, mostly because the major news stories and their fallacies are already covered better by other bloggers. But this is a minor local news story that I've been monitoring for a bit, and I think it may have larger significance and consequences across the nation.

Timeline:

Fri, Feb. 19, 2010
Student claims school spied on him via computer webcam

Sat, Feb. 20, 2010
Subpoena issued in Lower Merion webcam case

Federal prosecutors have subpoenaed the Lower Merion School District for documents related to the controversial use of remote-control cameras on students' school-issued computers, The Inquirer has learned.

Tue, Apr. 6, 2010
Subpoena stands in L. Merion Web-cam case

A federal judge said Monday that he would not throw out a subpoena for a Lower Merion School District technology coordinator in a laptop Web-cam lawsuit.

U.S. District Judge Jan E. DuBois said Carol Cafiero might have information useful to the case because she was able to activate the cameras on the student-issued computers. Cafiero is trying to block efforts to get her to testify in the case.

Sat, Apr. 10, 2010
Key figure in 'Webcamgate' invokes Fifth

Carol Cafiero, who had previously sought to quash a subpoena ordering her to testify, refused to answer questions pertaining to the district's controversial practice of remotely activating webcams on Apple MacBooks issued to high-school students.


Fri, Apr. 16, 2010
Family: Pa. school snared 1,000s of webcam images

A suburban Philadelphia school district snapped secret webcam pictures of a high school student when he was partially undressed or sleeping in his bed, and captured instant messages he exchanged with friends, the student charged in court papers this week.

Sat, Apr. 17, 2010
L. Merion to let parents see secretly snapped photos

The president of the Lower Merion school board said Friday that investigators had retrieved "a substantial number" of photos secretly snapped by laptops the district gave its high school students, and that officials were arranging for parents whose children were photographed to see the pictures in private.

Mon, Apr. 19, 2010
Lower Merion report: Web cams snapped 56,000 images

Lower Merion School District employees activated the web cameras and tracking software on laptops they gave to high school students about 80 times in the past two school years, snapping nearly 56,000 images that included photos of students, pictures inside their homes and copies of the programs or files running on their screens, district investigators have concluded.

Tue, Apr. 20, 2010
Lower Merion details scope of Web-cam surveillance

Lower Merion School District employees activated the Web cameras and Internet address tracking software on laptops they gave to high school students about 146 times during the last two school years, snapping nearly 56,000 images, district investigators have concluded.

In 48 of those activations, images were recovered; 68 showed only the computer's Internet address. The rest showed nothing or could not be recovered.

Ahh, yes, the old 'we can't recover the files' trick.

And since even their own investigation had to walk back the number of times and images that were accessed, one would think in the midst of a Federal investigation that they would give it up.

But no, not these stalwart protectors of the children school district. They doubled down:

Wed, Apr. 21, 2010
Filing states student broke rules and had no expectation of privacy

Even in his own home, the Harriton High School sophomore had "no legitimate expectation of privacy" from the camera on his school-issued laptop, information systems coordinator Carol Cafiero contended in a court filing on Tuesday.

And the latest news is:

Administrator agrees to surrender [home] computer in Web cam case

56,000 photos of kids!? I bet some members of the Catholic Church wish they'd thought of this sooner.

We Don't Need No Education

What's the latest wrongwing crazy? President Obama is giving a speech to the nation's school children. They are going nuts over it, and not just the crazies, but their leading politicians. Some schools are refusing to air it, parents are taking their kids out of school during it, and all because

the President will speak directly to the nation’s children and youth about persisting and succeeding in school. The president will challenge students to work hard, set educational goals, and take responsibility for their learning.
[...]
The Department of Education offers educators a menu of classroom activities—created by its teachers-in-residence, the Teaching Ambassador Fellows—to help engage students in the address and stimulate classroom discussions about the importance of education.

Now I understand this is a different approach than the previous WH resident, who's contribution to education consisted of "is our children learning" and continuing reading "My Pet Goat" after being informed hijacked airliners were being flown into the twin towers.

But seriously folks, it's a special level of crazy, bat-$hit crazy, to find some socialist, Maoist, communist indoctrination conspiracy involved in this. Jeebus, it's a 15 minute speech with optional suggestions for classroom activities designed by teachers!

We shouldn't have a terror-threat color coding, we should have a crazy republican coding for danger to the country.



Cross posted at VidiotSpeak

One Thing Leads To Another

The media posits, supposedly reflecting the peoples' view republican & MSM concern trolls' view that President Obama is spread too thin, has bit off more than he can chew, can't walk and chew gum at the same time.

After 8 years of a president that couldn't walk and chew gum at the same time, couldn't speak english with or without a telepromter, I welcome a president who can multitask.

And who can figure out that the financial meltdown, oil dependence, health care and education are all interrelated.

Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome President Obama:

"I know that there are some on Wall Street and in Washington who've said that we should only focus on the banking crisis and one problem at a time. Well, we're spending a lot of time focusing on this banking crisis, and we will continue to do so because until we get liquidity flowing again, we will not fully recover. But the American people don't have the luxury of just focusing on Wall Street. They don't have the luxury of choosing to pay either their mortgage or their medical bills. They don't get to pick between paying for their kids' college tuition and saving enough money for retirement. They have to do all these things. They have to confront all these problems. And as a consequence, so do we."
[...]
Now, there are those who say the plans in this budget are too ambitious to enact; to say that -- they say that in the face of challenges that we face, we should be trying to do less, than more. What I say is that the challenges we face are too large to ignore. The cost of our health care is too high to ignore. The dependence on oil is too dangerous to ignore. Our education deficit is growing too wide to ignore. To kick these problems down the road for another four years or another eight years would be to continue the same irresponsibility that led us to this point. That's not why I ran for this office. I didn't come here to pass on our problems to the next President or the next generation -- I came here to solve them.

Can anyone argue the points President Obama made?

The US pays more for health care than any country in the world, yet we are 37th in the world for actual health care.

But what about the children!?

29th on Infant Mortality

The infant mortality rate in this country declined sharply in the 20th century but then plateaued from 2000 to 2005.
[...]
In 1960, the United States ranked 12th lowest in the world in infant mortality. By 2004, the last year for which comparative data are available, it had dropped to 29th, tied with Poland and Slovakia.

Gee, I wonder what happened between 2000 and 2005!?

And that's just how health care is tied into our economic troubles. Don't get me started on energy dependence. And education? Well there might be a post soon on that!



Cross posted at VidiotSpeak