one may only hope they are armed.

Gosh, the UK is extending their police state.

If I wasn't an American, and thus living in a worse place for authoritarianism, I'd point my finger condemningly at them.

Ok, I'll point my finger anyway. Bad UK. Bad! No biscuit!

Someone go get me a rolled up newspaper . . .

-abs wishes he could whack his own government on the nose with a rolled up newspaper but is pretty sure he'd get a free "vacation" in Gitmo for trying. *waves at Takuan*

bigods! It appears someone has hijacked Absimliard's handle! This is most serious, the miscreant faces severe sanctions for this heinous transgression! (urinating dog, urinating dog)

I can only assume "stop vehicles for the purpose of testing" covers all manner of sports cars.

"Sir, I need to verify that your car is not using any performance-enhancing substances by driving it through the country."

The first line of the quote is kind of funny by itself "Dominic Grieve, the Conservative shadow home secretary". I suppose the US has plenty of conservative shadows, but I doubt they are the ones calling for less surveillance. Then again, it might be stretching the definition of conservative just a bit to apply it to those who currently run the government. Also, is the last name pronounced 'Grieve'?

That's it! I'm going for my rolled up newspaper!

Seriously, don't you wish you could whack our government on the nose with a rolled up newspaper the way you do to train a new puppy when it does stupid/offensive stuff like this?

I know I wish I could.

-abs approved this message!

This is exciting. Which country will reach full-on Oceana status first, the UK or the US? It's neck and neck, and I feel like we're entering the home stretch.

Dominic Grieve, the Conservative shadow home secretary, said the scheme was the latest example of the unjustified extension of surveillance powers under Labour.

This is the same Grieve (and yes, it's fittingly pronounced as in "grief") who The Register reported recently as wanting "changes to the RIPA (Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act) framework so that police do not need authorisation to use CCTV, Automatic Number Plate Recognition, plain clothes patrols, operations using sting vehicles or premises, surveillance using x-ray, thermal or radar imaging."

Mr Pot, may I introduce the Right Honourable Member for Kettleton East? This is what happens once you have two major parties battling over the same piece of centre-right territory.

BTW: "shadow" in UK politics refers to the MP in the opposition (ie: out of power) seat. If the Tories were in power, Grieve would be Home Secretary and his opposite number, Jacqui Smith, would be the shadow.

Anything to not spend money on a real police-force, doing actual policey things.

This is why I'm heading to the US to go jobhunting in a couple of weeks. Wish me luck, it's gone bloody mad here in the Uck.

i don't see what all the hub-bub is about. there is no way that joe pour-me-a-pint-guvna would ever abuse this kind of power...gimme that camera!

Alright, I can kinda see issuing fines for littering and dog crap. Mostly because these are two huge issues in the neighborhood where I live. Not a day goes by where I couldn't sit in the doorway and watch someone walk by and just toss a soda can or chip bag into the street, or walk their dog and not even bother to pick up when it goes on our lawn (er, bed of dirt and dead weeds), or do both. Because really, you get tired of picking up used condoms from the sidewalk in front of your own home, and being able to issue fines is a lot less violent than shoving their trash and dog waste down their pants.

But the idea of being able to stop a vehicle.... that's just really bad in terms of safety. We've had problems here in Southern California with guys posing as officials, pulling women over, then raping and killing them. Maybe some of you have heard of Cara Knotts, a California teenager who was murdered in such a manner. Young women here whose family lived here at the time, are still warned about not pulling their car over for just anyone. Even if they claim to be a cop.

Has the UK developed the Ludovigo treatment yet?

Stopping traffic a bit much, but ticketing for litter and dog poo should be a power given to everyone. Or at least immunity if you wing a dog's poo at it's owner.

Lets have "dope slaps for dog crap".
Now that's something I could get behind.

Landowner, I agree. I'm so over lazy people not cleaning up after their dogs.

ja?
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4738396

Nothing "center right" about this. Just amazing that someone would give "pretend police" actual power. UK and US need to take our countries back.

I took to carrying a piece of chalk and a lump of orange play-doh with me on daily early-hours dog walks through a trading/industrial area near my home after an officious security guard on the local trading estate stopped me and demanded that I pick up my dog's eggs. I hate picking up the stuff while 'fresh' so I always get in on the trip back; and told him so. He told me that he'd be making sure the cctv cameras were on me all the way on each walk and he'd make sure I was reported for the hefty £1000 fine in my area.

The play-doh was dropped near the offending egg if it was wet and the chalk was used to scrawl offensive messages to him nearby when the weather was clement. Nothing he could do. I was delighted to hear he was fired for stealing from the firm less than two months after starting there. The sad thing is the lengths one has to go to in order to foil these idiot's power dreams.

I'd accept the fines from fake cops, provided I could pay with Monopoly money.

Absimiliard, no one hits puppies with newpaper anymore - crate training and positive reinforcement are the thing.

However, the image of giving your country a "time out" is nowhere near as powerful.

"Call Harriet Jones, MP!!!"

This is wrong on so many levels. To those of you claiming that handing out fines is acceptable, I ask you, how does one prove/disprove these fines? I can just as easily walk up to random person on the street, claim I saw them littering, give them a ticket, and be on my merry way. How can they prove they didn't litter?

The difference with an actual police force is a) selection, which the police have severe regulations on, b) monitoring, which police have an entire department aimed at their own, c) authority, which we the people gave to the police force, but which we did not choose to give to these random security guards.

The abuse that runs rampant in private security firms is becoming quite publicly visible lately. Let's not give them any more power to corrupt them.

Magnetite... your dog lays eggs? Are you sure he's not, say... a duck?

That aside, I don't quite understand. A guard asked you to pick up the poop, and you instead chose carry around chalk so that you could write offensive messages to the guard near the still-wet poop?

I must have misunderstood something.

In reply, and explanation, to #22 - SAMSAM

It's a tad rough around these parts, so his hut was behind a fenced off area with the more valuable goods and prestigious companies. The messages frequently just devolved into his name (which he readily told me during our first confrontation) and an arrow pointing to the 'egg' - a euphemism for cack - itself. I didn't scrawl some magnum opus next to them. My reasoning was that if he had been petty enough to provide video evidence to our local town council then the ensuing mockery would have made his case all the more laughable. I didn't use this equipment until he threatened to report me and my hound for fouling.

Marking the eggs also saved me from the problem of whether what I was scooping on the return journey was actually my dog's output - though in hindsight it wouldn't have mattered as I'd still be scooping on a like-for-like basis. Always thoughtful I'd wash off the chalk with bottled water, though I did leave the play-doh to be squashed into bright medallions along my route. I'm still glad he got the push, as it was a pain in the behind - even with my predilection for being contrary in the face of sham authority. Funny thing is the police patrols never seemd to have a problem with my delayed scooping.

Also to SAMSAM

That is, however, nothing in comparison to my distaste for sham religions. In the days before widespread cctv my friends and I used to exhort fellow weekend revellers to join us in urinating through the letterbox of our local Dianetics Information Centre (That's Scientologists to our US friends. Old L. Ron's mob are shy about revealing exactly who they are over here). Childish, yes; but also a delightful diversion on a night out.

#23, Magnetite. So first off, you were irritating the guard for no reason. Then you leave the Play-Doh on the street, leaving a mess no better than chewing gum. And, the police probably left you alone because you appeared to be scrawling stuff on the street, washing it off, and dropping lumps of Play-Doh next to dog faeces. These are typical behaviours of what I would call a nutter.

In reply to #21 posted by RevEng:

Come by my house, and for a week you can pick up used condoms, soda cups and cans, food wrappers, newspaper, magazine, plastic bags and dog poo. Because the cops around my neighborhood have more important stuff to deal with, like the drug dealers down the road and the frequent stabbings and shootings.

I understand your message. Power corrupts and all that. But at the same time, the police (at least where I live) really don't have the time to deal with such minor offenses. Which leaves residents who actually care about our neighborhood in the position of constantly playing the maid.

To, #23 - CYBERGIBBONS

You are obviously unaware of the properties of Play-doh, which quickly turns into a powdery substance; especially when exposed to the elements. Unlike chewing gum which could be easily be used to reclaim land from the sea, it is that durable.

Also bear in mind that, nutter or not, I had to use sizeable letters in order for it to be seen in that guard's little monitor screen so I wasn't next to any faeces. Also I was irritating him because of his appalling attitude toward me in the first place, and his insistence on tracking me instead of doing his job of securing his employer's property. Perhaps a relative of his had suffered blindness from Toxicara, but he gave to intimation of a vested interest other than unpleasntly and officiously lording it over others.

The day shift guard loathed him with a vengeance, and did me no harm, bore me no ill-will and so I was my usual pleasant self to him. However I thank you for your kind input.

Well I AM English and if one of these bastards tried to fine me I would tell him to fuck off and walk away! Being as I imagine that they have no power to arrest you, if they laid a hand on me they would be committing assault. Sounds like a fun test case.

Local government officials already can issue fines via the post for what my local council calls envirocrime. I got one a couple of weeks ago for fifty quid for leaving a rubbish bag on the street for a day after they failed to collect it. (I'd elected to travel elsewhere rather than anxiously wait at home to check).

They sent me 12 photos of the contents and of the bag after they'd repaired it with special tape with the word 'envirocrime' printed on it.

Good-o to the Shadow Home Secretary for declaiming the surveillance culture, but I would be very surprised indeed if the Conservatives rolled back any of these things when they're next in government.

We walked in, sat down, Obie came in with the twenty seven eight-by-ten
colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back
of each one, sat down. Man came in said, "All rise." We all stood up,
and Obie stood up with the twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy
pictures, and the judge walked in sat down with a seeing eye dog, and he
sat down, we sat down. Obie looked at the seeing eye dog, and then at the
twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows
and a paragraph on the back of each one, and looked at the seeing eye dog.
And then at twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles
and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one and began to cry,
'cause Obie came to the realization that it was a typical case of American
blind justice, and there wasn't nothing he could do about it, and the
judge wasn't going to look at the twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy
pictures with the circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each
one explaining what each one was to be used as evidence against us. And
we was fined $50 and had to pick up the garbage in the snow, but thats not
what I came to tell you about.

@31 Takuan - Damn it ! The restaurant receipt. With my credit card number on it.

Jan 12 2008 11:31AM EST
Japanese Garbage Datapoints of the Day

The value of indium in Japan's garbage dumps: $833 million
The value of lead in Japan's garbage dumps: $15 billion
The value of silver in Japan's garbage dumps: $30 billion
The value of gold in Japan's garbage dumps: $178 billion
The value of copper in Japan's garbage dumps: $283 billion

The 6,800 tons of gold in Japan's "urban mines" compares to 765 tons in Japan's official reserves; it's more even than the official reserves of Germany and the IMF combined.

I get the littering and dog poop fines thing. That's the kind of dumb little petty offense that eats time police could be spending on important crimes, and maybe with something useful to throw around their weight about the rentacops will chill on the cameras. Philly could use those laws, in fact - there's way too much crap on our streets, figurative and literal both. Although more garbage cans and trash guys who don't leave more mess than they clean up would have a bigger effect on the littering front. And of course, anyone want to take a bet the guys issuing the fines then turn around and toss their ciggarette butts in the street?

But stopping cars? What could POSSIBLY go wrong? Lawsuit in 3...2....

but I would be very surprised indeed if the Conservatives rolled back any of these things when they're next in government.

You, me and many others. I noted above that Dominic Grieve is quite eager to increase the scope of the surveillance state, not reduce it.

I recommend fighting theater with theater. If one of these pretend-cops writes you a ticket, pull out a pad specially made (any print shop can make a pad out of anything you type up. -Something like this perhaps, but with check boxes next to options on why they are a bad pretend-cop) and write them a ticket of your own.

If we let private companies have pseudo-legal powers, maybe the world will end up a bit like Shadowrun!

"The year is 2050, and megaplexes are monsters casting long shadows..."

Sign me up first for a cyberdeck implant.