If you think the Valerie Plame saga is worth flogging compared to Snowden you have a very serious gap in your judgment and sense of proportionality.

But if you want to continue, maybe you should get it right.

Valerie Plame

And no, "Richard Armitage" isn't an anagram for Richard Cheney.

When massive amounts of detailed information on intelligence programs and alliances is stolen and released to all comers and people try to claim that it doesn't cause any harm, as many here do, they might have a case to describe some of those people as "idiots."

Al-Qaeda's Embrace Of Encryption Technology - Part II: 2011-2014, And The Impact Of Edward Snowden

The CIA was about having an American intelligence agency suitable to face the challenge of the Cold War: the enormously powerful and dangerous Communist bloc lead by the nuclear armed Soviet Union which was further fortified by the Warsaw Pact nations, Communist China, and the growing number of Communist insurgencies across the world. Trying to explain the CIA as "making the world safe for American business" is silly.

The Communists killed 100,000,000 people in the last century in all manner of cruel tortures, executions, forced starvations, and many other crimes against humanity. Why wouldn't countries want to prevent that from befalling their people? Of course! The real danger is "Wall Street bankers and lawyers!" Please.

The Soviet Story - trailer

http://www.amazon.com/gp/featu...

Yes.

It's demonstrable.

How Al-Qaeda Uses Encryption Post-Snowden (Part 2) – New Analysis in Collaboration With ReversingLabs

Except that doesn't actually seem to matter.
People in the most godforsaken areas of the planet, well past their carrying capacity, continue to have children like it's going out of style.

If you claim "people can't live in that dense a space because there's not enough water" I'd point to the Sahel.

Slave trade exists only where people are considered property. We (the western world) are existing in a "slave" market, where the owners take from the sweat of supposedly "free" people (in the form of "Feudal taxes") not by consent, but by threat of government guns. We've only traded one type of owner for another. The only difference is we supposedly elect our kings and queens, rather than have them born into royalty.

We aren't free.

Ahhh, the good old Strawman from leftwingnut crowd.

meanwhile, existing towns are running out of water.

For the umpteenth time: desalination is a solved problem. There is no reason — other than incompetence of irrational fears of nuclear power — for any coastal city to lack water in the 21st century.

Russian, yes. American? Not so much.

Except They are the Cavalry — according to their own page — are focusing on Cyber Safety, not privacy.

And our privacy — as far as cars are concerned anyway — has been shot for over a century already, when New York (always the Illiberal) mandated license plates in 1901.

They could not think, of course, that some day automatic license-plate readers will be archiving our driving histories. But the move — targeting "the rich", of course — was just as invasive even back then, as mandating that people carry identification at all times would be. And not just carry, but keep it visible from distance too...

Cars' new electronics may make it easier for the State to track us, but it has not been that hard before...

Why would you even want to do that?

Because I want more fellow human beings to exist. More artists, more scientists, more outright geniuses. Sure, more thieves too, but criminals affect the same share of population, whereas a single brilliant scientist may invent FTL travel or cure cancer for all...

But my wants are a moot point — the population will rise whether or not I (or you) want it, according to TFA.

What do you think filters out all of the crap we're putting into it?

Why do you hate humanity?

This individual and a Mr. Fusion, perhaps.

Mr. Fission — Mr. Fusion's older brother — would do just fine, thank you very much.

Not such a bright idea to plan on rearranging the world

I'm not planning on anything. I'm not even talking about rearranging the world — only the regions, Man may decide to populate when his technology allows.

The "rearranging" will not be any worse — nor seem any more "Star-Trekian" — than damming rivers or dredging waterways.

And you forgot all about 'ol Murphy.

He's always been with us, but we've grown in numbers anyway and are hardly starving today.

Yes but that food is already being grown

What the fook are you talking about? Israelis grow food in their own desert. The same methods can be used in Sahara and all other "hot" deserts — including the giant Sinai peninsula, which remains bare and barren since its return to Egypt.

It is possible and we know how to do it. We aren't doing it, but we can. And, should a compelling need arise, we will.

(and the water being overexploited)

There is no such thing.

I'm not sure that can be done cost effectively just yet.

It does not need to be done today. By 2100 we will be able to.

Though given that much of the non-populated near arctic is tundra on top of granite I am not sure how feasible that really is.

Is it really worse than Svalbard? People live there too. Longyearbyen may not be much today, but it is likely to expand, if more habitable areas elsewhere become too crowded.