Drones. Killer Drones, Spy Drones, Predator Drones, there are all kinds of drones, but they’re just used to track and kill enemies overseas right? WRONG.
Congress passed a bill in February that would have 30,000 surveillance drones in US airspace by 2020. In addition to those, there are Predator Drones being used on our borders right now, and the Justice Department is working with the drone industry to get lightweight drones into the arsenals of metropolitan police and county sheriffs.
Well, ok, so the government is using drones, that’s OK Calamity, there’s oversight and I’m sure they are only used against “bad” people. WRONG. There’s a House committee, the House Unmanned Systems Caucus, looking at the drone rollout in America. Sounds good, but in reality, the members are all receiving campaign contributions from drone manufacturers and Representatives are drooling at the thought of drone bases and drone manufacturing coming to their districts. The caucus hasn’t uttered a peep about domestic liberties or reining in the big brother surveillance. As if that wasn’t bad enough, the price tag for this domestic drone attack is estimated to be $34 Billion.
Drones are proliferating with virtually no governmental oversight.
Yet the mission of the bipartisan drone caucus, which includes liberal and conservative representatives, is not to regulate drone operations but to promote them.
Over the past three years, the concerns of the drone caucus have mirrored the concerns of the drone industry about access to domestic airspace, export controls and the modestly declining military budget.
The lack of oversight over drone operations and the booming international drone industry has alarming implications for war and peace. Drone proliferation is also rapidly advancing on the home front.
Congress recently mandated that the Federal Aviation Administration open up domestic airspace to private and commercial drones by 2015 and that it immediately speed up the licensing process to permit the deployment of government (military, homeland security and law enforcement) drones in commercial U.S. airways.
Drones can be as small as model aircraft or have the wingspan of a full-size jet and are operated remotely by pilots. The USAF intelligence brief says that if any of those drones should “accidentally” capture footage of Americans, the data can be stored for three months to be scrutinized by the Pentagon. No warrant, no consent, just pure 1984-style surveillance on US soil. As drones become a weapon to use against American citizens, it’s time to educate yourself and think about ways to protect your family and your information from them. If history has taught us anything, it’s that governments abuse their powers. 30,000 drones is a lot of potential abuse. Will they watch farmers to tally up potential food stores? Will they watch “terrorists” and track their weapons and food preparations? Will they be watching YOU?
- Calamity Jane
this is not good
This why I shoot Skeet and trap! IF I see one ow eough to I.D. Im gona SMOKE IT!:)
AMEN !!!!!!
Spook;
This is why the good persons at RBKA, GOA, and JPFO have been working for decades (unlike those turkeys at NRA) to get the GCA 68 and the NFA 34 repealed so that you the people can purchase direct from the defense contractor (take Thales for example) a brand spanking new Rapier Surface to Air Missile system so you too can determine if your Aerospace Rights are being violated, and take the appropriate action (think of Castle Doctrine and take up to 8,000 meters above your homestead). This is the logical outcome in the so-called “Drone-Wars.” Either that or using their own technologies against them, buy your self the latest wonder from IAI and go and take a look at your local DHS Center, from 6,000 meters up, with high resolution-high speed data-buses you could get encrypted streaming video feeds into your hardened command cell getting a good gander at the latest in domestic internment technologies, to be employed at a theater or drive-in (pun intended) near you! Perhaps a directional limited power Electro Magnetic Pulse system will come on-line in the near future, like a particle beam, pulse the jokers out of the neighborhood. Isn’t it great that Science Fiction has become Science Fact?
Yesterday on Fox News, Charles Krauthammer made a statement that I totally agree with. He stated the drones over American airspace should be banned outright and that he supported any citizen exercising his 2nd amendment right to take them down.
i’ve been a model airplane enthusiast (wannabe) almost as long as i’ve been an “airplane nut”.
i agree with kevin, this is not good.
i don’t dare fly anything except small rubber powered models, or a kite, until i renew my model flying insurance. (i can see them attempting to ground the “modelers” in favor of the drone interests)
there is always some risk associated with flying objects. people have been killed when struck by “toy” airplanes. remotely controlled aircraft are as difficult to fly as manned aircraft. they are inviting disasters by allowing drones in the same airspace as general aviation aircraft.
Star date 2020 ….
A family is planning a beach day & checks the weather forecast and it says “sunny & clear with a chance of scattered drones”. Dad comments “hmmmmm ….. summertime beach days always brings out those government perverts, checking out the babes. I remember last year when 2 of those drones crashed into each other over Malibu beach.”
Our tax dollars making life more interesting …. and less private.
I think we’re making too much of this kind of issue. If we didn’t expect people to see us when we left the house we wouldn’t bother getting dressed. If the government wants to use a spy plane to track my commute to work and my stop at the grocery store or even the gun shop I don’t have any problem with it. My problem is when they use that data to infringe on my right to do those things. Using drones or cameras is no different than having a cop on every corner watching everything that’s going on.
Novice, the only way to keep them from using the data to infringe on your rights is to keep the drones out of American airspace…
Don’t forget GPS coordinates for every house courtesy of the census. Yes, we have been promised it will not be used for illegal purposes and that a firewall exists between the census data and other branches. Including the front door steps to rural family farms, something that did exist before, not the mail box, the actual dwelling.
Don’t forget Obama’s executive order giving Interpol free reign from all accountability on USA soil, something our own CIA does not have.
We are now members of the United Socialists of America.
So, I think we need more red light cameras to keep us safe.
Watch “Enemy of the State” with Will Smith
Reply to Novice:
How do you know they won’t use these things to infringe on any rights you have? You trust the government too much, my friend. Give them a foot and they’ll take a mile wasn’t written yesterday.
So, in peoples view here, what is the difference between a manned police helicopter with a camera, and a drone? What is it about one that is so evil, and yet there are no protests about the other?
They both do the same thing, the difference is noise, cost and safety. So if your argument is just about ‘government looking at us’ then you have to include what has been around for decades too.
Was watching OJ drive down the highway an infringement of liberties?
I’m just wondering how they plan on keeping these rascals from colliding with one another. With birds, helicoptors, air planes, power lines, radio antenna and other whatnot, it seems to me a situation ripe for ‘accidents’ to happen. Not to mention weather conditions which play havoc with the smaller aircraft and their equipment.
Well all you computer geeks and electronic hackers out there ………..Your country and your people need you …….. gear up soldier and find a way to scram the controle centers so they crash . You will be the partizans , the freedom fighters of the new age . To everything electronic , there is a counter measure ………..put your heads together , you can do it , you must do it .
I’m not worried about drones since I have it on good authority that the U.S. put up at least two Hubble telescopes pointed earthward before the one that looks into space went up. And so as not to leave doubt about what I just said, I’ll tell you that the good authority was a statement made by a speaker at TED, a convention held periodically at various spots where experts in certain fields make usually twenty minute presentations to an audience, and most of those presentations are currently online. When the French
Airbus went down off Brazil several years ago, the first thing they did was ask the U.S. whether they knew what happened and where the wreckage was. The reply was negative, since the Hubbles are pointed at various spots at various times, and at that time neither was apparently concentrating on the ocean off Brazil. They know within a knat’s ass where everything is and many times what people are doing. Let’s just hope that big brother stays docile – if he is docile.
OJ was a felon being pursued, so the helicopter became an airborne unit.
It was not used for spying, unlike like the guys in AZ that were caught peeking into windows at night at people having sex.
I object to helicopters being used for targeting pot growers with IR, same as I would with drones. FWIW: Your gun safes show up on FLIR too.
Just as I object to them using helicopters for seeking out building code violations. Now, every Barney Fife with a StimUwaste budget will want a drone. Just like all the police departments that wasted untold millions buying watercraft at $80,000 a pop. Yea, those crazy Arabs are know worldwide for their amphibious landings. At least most of the yacht builders were in the USA.
Here in Australia it has become common practice for the police to ‘co-ordinate’ with news choppers to track people (their budget isn’t as impressive as the US cops). Because of this there has already been a big push for these drones over here – under the guise of “saving money” – just something you might want to watch out for.
The Defense Department says the demand for drones and their expanding missions requires routine and unfettered access to domestic airspace, including around airports and cities. In a report last October, the Pentagon called for flights first by small drones both solo and in groups, day and night, expanding over several years. Flights by large and medium-sized drones would follow in the latter half of this decade.
Does anyone know where these drones are built?
You are never out of anyone’s sight. If you don’t want to be bothered then don’t stand out. Don’t brag about your latest purchase of a firearm or how much food you have stashed away. The use of a drone, camera, telescope, police officer or even a citizen to notice something out of the ordinary and report it is not beyond our duty as human beings and as Americans . The first time that drone spots a van with a nuclear device as it crossing the border and it’s stopped before it detonates in your home town then all of the sudden you become a supporter of it. We now live in a age where every email you sent on this subject has been recorded somewhere. Our every action is recorded by something or someone everyday, drones are just more noticeable than the camera that recorded your grocery shopping, I wonder if they noticed that you keep stocking up on rice?. The best thing you can do is to support your local authorities, they are under paid and under staffed, pay attention to your surroundings. Be prepared for that next disaster that will happen both natural and man made so that you won’t become a burden to the system. If we a citizens took a more proactive approach and didn’t just worry about me, myself, and I maybe the use of drones would not be in the discussion. The attitude needs to be more of how do we work together and less of hoarding supplies that you will never be able to use in a life time. We should never give up our liberties but we must also be willing to adjust for the greater good. If the use of a drone would protect my family because of it technology than so be it. Anyone can abuse anything even a firearm so that is why guidelines need to be set just as there are guideline as to our freedom of owning firearms. And if you never played around with google earth than you would know that a drone is no big deal!
For those who are concerned that drones will interfere with “regular” aircraft, my husband has been an Army drone pilot for nearly a decade. While some CAN most drones DON’T fly in the same airspace as regular planes…some because they aren’t capable, some because it just isn’t safe. This lesson was learned a long time ago, when neither drones nor helicopters were monitored by air traffic control and we had crashes. He had to go through the very same pilot ground school as any manned aircraft pilot.
We are all recorded everywhere, every day. Get over it. In today’s world, “they” are not only watching you buy groceries, they know which credit card you used to pay for them, what car you drove them home in, and how much you pay per month for the house you store them in. Welcome to the 21st century.
For reasons of self-preservation, any pilot is guaranteed to pay greater attention while actually aboard the aircraft. Just wait until one of these things crashes into a crowded schoolyard while the (less disciplined, nonmilitary) pilot is cleaning up his spilled coffee.