reply@grouponly.com wrote:

On Tue, 11 Jul 2006 11:30:47 -0700, "Lumpy" <lumpy@digitalcartography.com> wrote:

reply@grouponly.com wrote:

What DOES worry me much more is when the Feds contract their security
to private companies that may leave your bones drying in desert and
where is the oversight? What rights need they respect? They're not
"Agents", just two guys ridin' around in a truck and you are really
vulnerable then, IMHO.

The cammos are human beings. What makes them any less
likely to have respect for your rights than a human
who is a federal officer?

There are a  LOT of answers to this. Let me try one or two:

Members of the Federal Gov't are (theoretically, anyway) beholden to
uphold the Constitution, to follow Fed. Regulation at all times which
said rules are subject to review and/or public display, to  hold themselves
and their behavior accountable to the authority and a hierarchy of other
Federal Employees whose said heirarchy ultimately is a Public & Politcal
Appointee who is answerable to same public at least thru Congressional
Review - if not more. They ARE (or ought to be) Public Servants plain
and simple.

But a Cammo Dude? What is he but a Coporate Minion? He owes such
loyalty as he has to B,G&G - or whomever. NOT to the electorate on whose
property he's employed. NOT to the Elected Representatives of same people.
HIS records are not subject to a FOIA request - they are the private property
of a coporate entity whose actual controllers or principles may be only vaguely
known and whose operations or not, in general, subject to public scrutiny
except by subpoena power which authority is subject to dubious interpretations
of due process far more difficult to overcome than those directly employed by
the Federal Gov't.

I know of NO criminal conduct by ANY Cammo Dude nor have I ever heard
report of same. But, considering the sensitivity of the activity presumed to be
at Groom Lake, and having read the two previous paragraphs of my post, it
should be obvious the clear advantages in diminished accountablity and
enhanced deniabilty of replacing, say a soldier on patrol, with just exactly
such Cammo Dudes.

Humans are humans. Most are pretty uninformed.
Most are pretty selfish. But when it comes right
down to it, most will do the right thing
in a pinch.

 Sadly, history offers too many examples to the contrary to make
that seem like any reassurance worth respecting over the Rule of Law.

Lumpy

If you read the old desert rat newsletters, the dudes were not always
so kindler and gentler. It took repeated encounters with "tourists" to
get them to learn to respect civil rights. They used to harass people
on the free side of the border.