Biometric scanning at UNBC · Thursday November 29, 2007 by colin newell
University of the North, in Prince George, British Columbia has caught the eye of the media today – as they have just started rolling out some new technology in the Athletics department…
Biometric scanning… of fingerprints.
To allow access to sports facilities, UNBC students are now required to give up their valuable, unique and very personal identity to the University… so they can get into the gym.
The American made technology was quickly implemented with little discussion. It has, not surprisingly, raised the ire of the student body.
I was curious about this so I did a little scanning myself.
And I found a 2002 article about a hotel in Saskatchewan that instituted biometric scanning to replace punch clocks for staff…
Ostensibly because staff kept losing their ID cards.
That and finger prints do not rub off.
I have a problem with all of this – just a little too much big-brother for my taste.
Back to Saskatchewan for a moment – the Human Rights commission and the Labor relations board said it was OK and that there is nothing Illegal about demanding peoples finger-prints as a condition of employment.
Right. And there is nothing ethical about it either.
Additional reading: A website in the UK called Leave Them Kids Alone dedicated to fighting the trend towards fingerprinting all children…
CBC picks up the story here
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Too dangerous to fly - Too innocent to arrest 3 · Monday October 15, 2007 by colin newell
The U.S. government has angered Canada’s airlines with a proposal to order them to hand over personal information about passengers who take flights that go south over U.S. airspace en route to sunny destinations.
Although the planes wouldn’t take off from or land on American soil, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security is proposing that Canadian carriers send passenger manifests up to 72 hours in advance of departures to popular winter escapes such as Mexico and the Caribbean.
Uhm. Uncle Sam? Get stuffed.
No, seriously. Get stuffed.
The U.S. does not have a right to our personal information and should not get any cooperation on this issue. It is as simple as that.
We already have a no-fly list that was largely cooked up by the current U.S. administration and swallowed in obsequious genuflection by a largely conservative Canadian government.
No. A thousand times no!
Our American brothers and sisters would be well served to get onside with us on this – as it is the case that many open-minded Americans now travel to a free Cuba via Canadian shores. Those brave souls would then be under the scrutiny of a hawkish and hegemonic bureaucracy.
Save us.
Warmonger report #2 · Thursday October 4, 2007 by colin newell
U.S. President George W. Bush on Wednesday vetoed a measure to expand a popular children’s health care program, launching the first in a series of major battles with Democrats over domestic spending.
Picture at left – An afghan boy stands among unexploded cluster bombs in Afghani schoolyard.
Bush was noted saying: “The policies of the government ought to be to help people find private insurance, not federal coverage,” Bush said.”
George. They are poor people. Poor children. They cannot afford any insurance. Hello!
Representative Rahm Emanuel, an Illinois Democrat quipped – “Today the president showed the nation his true priorities: $700 billion for a war in Iraq, but no health care for low-income kids,”. “Millions of American children and their families won’t forget that they are on the bottom of the president’s priority list.”
The veto came as a Washington Post-ABC News poll showed more than seven in 10 Americans supported the $35 billion increase proposed under the bill. By contrast, the same poll showed many wanted to see a reduction in Bush’s spending proposal for the Iraq war.
This president is obviously out of control.
In other news, the Korea’s are in the process of mending fences… and this fact alone must set off alarm bells in the Bush-Cheny war camp.
One less country to attack.
Russia deploys the Father of Bombs · Wednesday September 12, 2007 by colin newell
Moscow, Sept. 12 : Russia has tested the world’s most powerful non-nuclear vacuum bomb, the military said, dubbing it the “father of all bombs”.
Russia’s ORT First Channel TV yesterday showed a strategic bomber dropping the vacuum bomb over a testing ground, which exploded in a massive fireball. Pictures of crumpled multi-story apartment blocks were also broadcast.
“Test results of the new airborne weapon have shown that its efficiency and power is commensurate with a nuclear weapon,” Russian Deputy Armed Forces Chief of Staff General Alexander Rushkin told the channel.
According to General Rushkin, the new bomb is smaller than the United States “mother of all bombs” but much deadlier because, due to nanotechnology, the temperature at the epicentre of the blast is twice as high.
“You will see it in action, the bomb which has no match in the world… Despite its destructive qualities, the vacuum bomb is environmentally friendly,” he claimed. The same report was later shown on state sponsored ‘Vesti’ channel.
Wow. The father of bombs. And environmentally friendly too! No carbon credits to buy. Win win if you ask me.
Question: Do the people that get blown up by this bomb not create an environmental impact where their body parts are scattered?
Just asking.
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