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Dan Gillmor writes that Bruce Schneier, a world-class authority on security-in-technology issues, is willing to name the flagrant lies told by the Bush administration’s Transportation Safety Administration about its scandalous handling of “private” passenger data. Associated Press wouldn’t use the word lie.
Gillmor: This is one reason why people don’t trust mass media — the too-common fear of telling things as they actually are, perhaps for fear of offending people in power. And it’s one more reason why domain experts like Schneier get increasing readerships.
A week or so ago, Viet Nam vet and former Green Beret friend of mine was involved in an anti-war act of civil disobedience, putting up anti-war banners in the middle of the night in prominent locations in Boston. He told me about it after the fact instead of before it happened. I said I wouldn’t blog it then because it was no longer news. He said he’d spoken with an editor at the Boston paper who told him they couldn’t write about it in advance because it would look like the paper was in on it.
That, I told him, is the difference between dead-tree media and bloggers. They’re afraid, we’re not.