Rough notes from the 2009 BOF session -- Jon Pincus


Analogy to voting: bring in domain experts
- who's got the domain expertise here?
-- reach out to ex-NSA/intelligence


whole body imaging: cost basis, $170K each -- how many are there?
-- Bruce's math about TSA: ratio of false positives/false negatives
***** how do we get the numbers to let the tech people do the analysis?
- how many people go through system
- how many people get enhanced search
- how many are bad: drugs, terrorists
- average time
- statistics from people testing the system
do numbers exist in public record
Privacy Coalition works with TSA, ask 'em?
possibly work with local airport authorities -- e.g. San Francisco? observers at airports?
FOIA it?
can pro forma numbers lead to political pressure to release real numbers?

-- look at companies making the devices. how much money's being made.
***** approach it as anti-corporate activism.
--- investigative journalists, researchers
--- need to get somebody registered into trade show
--- Steve Eggmont, registered arms dealer
--- what pctg of the labor force is employed in the panopticon
***** model on anti-torture activism, grassroots CSR work: look at dual use-purposes: (Amnesty Int'l etc.) litigation

bring in psychology, anthropology perspectives

***** focus on cost basis. getting numbers for that.

***** get higher resolution image, do a life-size poster

memes:
"digital strip search" as a bridge to FISA -- all kinds of analogies to virtual searches
"surveillance-industrial complex"

***** getting celebrities involved
- Penn Jillette on whole body imaging
- Drew Carey
- who else?

visual images

chip: unitary executive theory: torture, military commissions

***** disenchantment with Obama: "but we won't"
there's an easy media meme: "liberals disenchanted"
- when's the right time? by late in the year, we're likely to be seeing a meme of "liberals giving up in Obama"; can we tie into that
- right now people still want to believe, "it's a young administration", concerned that they don't want to undercut him
- focus on specific issues to accomplish specific objectives. e.g., on Sotomayor, he got involved
- "he's a constitutional law professor". give him wiggle room to do the right thing
[no consensus here]
- more general focus on government -- "it's not an or"


***** broad diverse coalition
"it's about human rights" "dignity"
- immigrant rights group
- military and veterans community (Brandon Franklin)
- BORDC
- work with libertarians.
- build off real id coalition
- NRA (worked with BORDC against PATRIOT Act)
- AARP
- faith networks

what about international pressure?



PATRIOT Act campaigns:
- using the Fox anchor "we don't fucking torture"
- build off BORDC contest of reacronymizing the patriot act
"change the name"
viral video contest

Strategies:
- tie it all together: torture, military commissions, human rights, PATRIOT Act, FISA
- focus on very specific issues, e.g. strip search, get enough intensity that they have to respond, building a meme
- focus on Congress for PATRIOT Act reauthorization, demonstrate political capital
-- potentially focus on Reid, Pelosi, DiFi, Jane Harman, ....
- broad diverse coalition

PATRIOT Act reauth
- We need a head count
- Will there be a committee discussion? Might just go through rules committee ... ACLU, Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights under law, CCR, Center for National Security Studies (Lisa Graves)
- We want a debate