NASA Requires JPL Scientists To Give Up Right To Privacy 446
Markmarkmark writes "Wired is reporting that all NASA JPL scientists must 'voluntarily' (or be fired) sign a document giving the government the right to investigate their personal lives and history 'without limit'. According to the Union of Concerned Scientists this includes snooping into sexual orientation, mental & physical health as well as credit history and 'personality conflict'. 28 senior NASA scientists and engineers, including Mars Rover team members, refused to sign by the deadline and are now subject to being fired despite a decade or more of exemplary service. None of them even work on anything classified or defense related. They are suing the government and documenting their fight for their jobs and right to personal privacy."
For comment suggestions ... (Score:4, Insightful)
CC.
Sounds like standard security clearance stuff... (Score:2, Informative)
Why would JP
Re:Sounds like standard security clearance stuff.. (Score:4, Informative)
I've been to JPL a couple times when I worked on some Mars Odyssey related stuff, and security is kind of tight for the whole facility. One of the software engineers in our lab is a Pakistani citizen and he wasn't even allowed to come to a party we had there once.
To my knowledge, there's little classified work that goes on there, but I'm sure there's sensitive stuff... it's literally rocket science. These background checks sound a little too intrusive for a bunch of science geeks, though.
Standard Crazy (Score:3, Insightful)
It's obviously new and forced. They want current employees to sign. That's changing the game on a captive work group and is second cousin to contract violations.
Then again, this is an abusive administration that lost it's mind long ago. Is ripping down posters from the gift shop at gunpoint [slashdot.org] crazy enough for you? How about tyring to deny the big bang and global warming [stallman.org]? Yes, that's crazy political censorship of scientists. The investigative powers demanded here go hand in hand with that. When scien
Re:Sounds like standard security clearance stuff.. (Score:5, Interesting)
This kind of invasive crud is becoming rampant in our society.
Recently the American Radio Relay League (ARRL) published a notice to the nation's radio amateurs advising them of a similar situation. Many hams are routinely involved in emergency communications support for the American Red Cross (ARC).
Without stating a position for or against, the ARRL advised potential communications volunteers to read very carefully any documents they might be asked to sign before volunteering.
It turns out that the ARC had recently implemented a policy of requiring background checks for all volunteers. The checks were outsourced to an outfit called MyBackgroundCheck.com http://www.mybackgroundcheck.com/ [mybackgroundcheck.com] which does the same kind of malarkey. The ARRL pointed out that, if you went to the web page to sign up for the check, you would be authorizing not only a criminal history check, but also credit and "lifestyle" checks. The nature of a "lifestyle check" was not specified (worst of all possibilities), but it can easily be guessed what it entails.
Again, the ARRL did not take a position on whether individual hams should go along with the terms, but only advised careful reading and consideration before authorizing investigations of such vague or unspecified scope. Personally, I have crossed the ARC off my list of organizations I will either volunteer for or provide financial support for.
It is my understanding that the ARC has backed off on the requirement for communications volunteers and restricted the requirement to "permanent" volunteers only. Sorry -- too late, too little. You shouldn't even have considered the scheme in the first place.
Now that I'm retired, I expect never again to be tested for drugs, smoking (quit thirty-five years ago anyway), use of alcohol nor to submit to intrusive examinations of any kind. I had to pee in a cup to be hired by IBM, but never again except as required by law. And certainly never when my intent is only to help some organization. If they feel a need to pull this crud on volunteers, then, as far as I'm concerned, their pool of volunteers is way too large.
i also quit helping with the youth group at my church over this kind of stuff. When the San Francisco archdiocese decided anyone who came into contact with kids had to be fingerprinted, that was where I drew the line. If my twenty-five years of involvement with the kids was not good enough to trust me, then a lousy set of fingerprints was superfluous. I told the youth coordinator that, if the policy was implemented, then she should look for another volunteer to drive kids to retreats, because I would refuse to comply with the policy. They did, so I won't
As she said, "It's a stupid policy anyway -- why are they bothering the catechists and helpers and not the priests, where the offenses against kids have occurred?"
By the way, I have already been fingerprinted five times for hiring on with a railroad for five summers, once more for hiring on permanently, once more when entering the military, once more to apply for a state teaching credential and one last time to sign up for the Block Parent program (police- and school district-sponsored) so little kids could have a safe place to go if injured or bullied outside of school hours.
Enough is enough!
Oh, I forgot to add up the number of times I've been thumb-printed to cash checks or to get my driver's license renewed (that was three days ago).
Re:Sounds like standard security clearance stuff.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Very Inappropriate (Score:5, Informative)
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Too many daipers in the closet (Score:2)
Sure there are no guarantees, but some heavy-duty background checking does cut down on wierdos.
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Re:Very Inappropriate (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.ntc.doe.gov/cita/CI_Awareness_Guide/S5improp/Ci.htm#Counterintelligence [doe.gov]
By the Numbers:
http://www.ntc.doe.gov/cita/CI_Awareness_Guide/Treason/Numbers.htm#Espionage%20by%20the%20Numbers [doe.gov]
Get this:
"Here are a few additional highlights from this database that give us additional understanding about motivations and situational factors leading to espionage:
* Over 42% of the offenders are known to have been involved in drug or alcohol abuse. The actual figure may be higher, as there are many cases in which the unclassified record is insufficient to make a judgment on this subject. Those who were caught before classified information was even passed were more likely to be substance abusers than those who succeeded in committing espionage.
* Of the 148 offenders, 6 were homosexual, 106 heterosexual, and the sexual orientation of the remaining 36 is not known from the unclassified record. Homosexuality is not known to have been a significant factor in any of the cases.
* Volunteer spies were more likely to fail in their effort to pass information to foreign interests. Almost 40% of the volunteers were caught in the act, whereas only 7% of the recruited spies were intercepted before they could damage national security."
Repeat for emphasis:
* Of the 148 offenders, 6 were homosexual...
I saw a flyer, around 1991, stating that of ALL the known cases of espionage, treason, and similar, some 98%-99% of the persons caught/convicted/shut down were:
-white
-make
-heterosexual
-Christian
This seems to turn on its head the "susceptibility of homosexual" prospects/targets.... But, don't have to believe me, just look at the section "By the Numbers" and look at drug abuser risk, etc.
It seems to me the DIA/NSA/DIS/NIS/et al can do all the searching they want WITHOUT dicking around in the private lives of scientists or military personnel. Just keep burning those who screw up, and let the others "be on the best behavior".
But, somehow I think the government is just pursuing this as another component of wrecking the public tenuous thread to rights and expectations of privacy and anonymity.
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I think the idea was not so much that "homosexual == ZOMG! SPY!" but rather that most homosexuals didn't want their preference known by their family, friends, et. al., for fear of rejection / discrimination. Thus, someone who found out about their preference could use that information to blackmail them into revealing classified information.
That may have been true in the 50's
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most research indicates it's higher than 10% and probably close to 20%
I'm gay and this sounds like bullshit. Studies on the prevalence of homosexuality range all over the place, but I've never heard of any serious studies claiming anywhere near 1 in 5 people were gay. Usually the people I hear these greatly exaggerated claims from are gay people who think being different is bad.
From Wikipedia:
Re:Very Inappropriate (Score:5, Insightful)
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It's been happening for a long time.
I turned down a job at JPL in the early '90's. My wife was pregnant at the time and I decided that I would rather give up my dream job (working in the Advanced Propulsion Group) than have my kid raised as an American (I am Canadian.) Even then I was concerned with where the U.S. was heading, and the current reality is worse than I could have imagined.
It turned out t
Re:Very Inappropriate (Score:4, Insightful)
It brings to mind the sad case of Alan Turing. He was one of the greatest minds in early computing and because he was gay he was hounded by the British government in to committing suicide depriving the world of decades more of his brilliant work. The work Turing did was crucial in cracking German codes and certainly shortened the war, and he well could have made the difference in winning it.
This isn't really new for JPL either. The rocket boys at CalTech started out doing peaceful research before World War II. They did pitch in to the war effort to defeat Fascism, but in 1946 many of them wanted to demilitarize and return to peaceful research. Unfortunately JPL turned in to a cold war military lab. One of their founding fathers Frank Malina resigned when his left leaning politics in 30's became known to the FBI. One of their best mathmeticians, Hsue-Shen Tsien [wikipedia.org], was fired and placed under house arrest because he was a suspected communist. When he was finally freed he did in fact return to China and became an integral part of their space program. Its an interesting question, was he really a communist spy when at JPL, or did the U.S. witch hunt drive him in to the arms of Communist China, when otherwise he would have been a priceless contributor to the American space program.
Some interesting tidbits on JPL's eary years are here [slashdot.org].
I hate to break it to you but a LOT of the world's most brilliant thinkers are non conformists in one way or another, sexual orientation, drug use, pacifism, political leanings etc. If you are going to build your society only on "normal" people you are going to lose many of your greatest thinkers and forego many great breakthroughs.
The only reason gays are a security risk in this day and age is because the defense industrial complex have forced them in to a closet by making homosexuality a basis for termination of their security clearance. Homosexuality isn't illegal in this country any more. If it was completely removed as an factor in granting security clearances it wouldn't be an effective means for blackmailing anyone any more. It used to be a legitimate concern for blackmail because it was illegal. It isn't anymore.
Easy fix (Score:2, Funny)
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Hopefully it will work out like you mapped it. However, the white house figures if they throw out enough fud, they'll be able to bust solidarity and get enough to cave and sign in order to make it effective. I would hope a group of the best scientists in the world would be able to stick this fight out.
Why not fire them all? (Score:5, Insightful)
Railroad workers, airline workers, even taxicab drivers - when any of these professions strike, it is felt immediately by the general population, so there is a push to resolve the issues amicably, so that they could return to work.
If all scientists in the US... not just the NASA rocket scientists... stop working RIGHT NOW... the vast majority of the population won't know, and the majority of those who know, won't care.
Why? Because nothing that these people do affects us EVERY DAY. Thus, they're not important. Which is why a post-doc at a top-tier academic institution, will be making <$32'000/year.
Oh no... obviously not important... (Score:2)
I know you don't exactly drink Tang every day, but exactly what percentage of the United State's population do you think is affected by weather satellites?
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Re:Oh no... obviously not important... (Score:5, Informative)
It's not like Tang would disappear, or their car's GPS system would suddenly turn off. It's just that things wouldn't advance. Progress would grind to a halt, but it's not like the immediate "oh shit" effect you get, when the garbagemen don't show up on Monday morning.
Probably the first thing most people would know is when they get told to start learning Mandarin, because their company just got bought.
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The amount paid to these researchers is more about market economics than anything else. There are a lot of talented researchers (more supply) driving their salaries down. The same is not true for Accountants, as very few of them go on to get doctoral degrees (and fewer still choose to stay in academia). Their salaries are not AT
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I live in New York City. We here have a state-sponsored monopoly known as the Metrop
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They might not care now, but they would in the future. The Bush administration is wacked up, but I have just a little bit of faith that it won't come to that. America is a big, old, resilient creature. Society itself has developed enough to where there are protections to keep from a crazy administration getting rid o
Re:Why not fire them all? (Score:5, Insightful)
American Scientist Show (Score:5, Funny)
p/Just imagine that Simon guy saying, You call THAT data! Get out of here!"
Re:Why not fire them all? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Why not fire them all? (Score:5, Insightful)
*Shrug* Who is John Galt?
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Unfortunately more than 90% of the roughly 5000 employees at JPL have already signed. Only a few hundred are actively protesting, and 28 are plaintiffs in the lawsuit.
If the appeals court hadn't granted a preliminary injuction, they would already have lost their jobs. Despite the fact that they are irreplaceable, NASA would rather fire them rather than back down on these new invasions of privacy.
Re:Easy fix (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately more than 90% of the roughly 5000 employees at JPL have already signed. Only a few hundred are actively protesting, and 28 are plaintiffs in the lawsuit.
We really have become a nation of sheep, haven't we? This is why our rights are going down the toilet, because most people simply do not care. It would be a vastly different story if that 90-10 ratio were reversed.
This reminds me of an incident (I'm going entirely on memory here) in the months after 9/11 in which some jurisdiction or other was conducting random bag/backpack searches of bus passengers. One guy filed a suit after refusing the search and being hauled in. In the article, it said that out of something like 1300 of these searches that had been conducted, fewer than half a dozen people objected or refused. When the populace has become that complacent and trusting, it's open season on the Constitution.
Re:Easy fix (Score:4, Informative)
Oh, now it's open season on the Constitution, is it? Not when Lincoln suspended habeas corpus. Not when Wilson nationalized industries, jailed protestors, and created an income tax. Not when Roosevelt put citizens in concentration camps, set up price controls, and nationalized some more industries. Not when the Senate held hearings of suspected Communists in show business. No, now that 1300 people let police conduct 10-second bag checks, now the Constitution is going down in flames.
Get some perspective.
Re:Easy fix (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Easy fix (Score:5, Informative)
"The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it" . The Southern States breaking away from the Union and firing on a Federal Fort sounds like "rebellion" to me.
"The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several states, and without regard to any census or enumeration"
You won't get any argument out of me that the original intent behind the Constitution has been/is being subverted. My favorite example is the interstate commerce clause becoming a blank check for Congress to do whatever they want (like controlling what I can put into my own body as a consenting adult). But using the income tax and Lincoln as your examples doesn't seem very justifiable.
Most of the examples I can think of (the Controlled Substances Act and the use of highway funding to blackmail state legislatures being the two that come to mind) are recent inventions.
Re:Easy fix (Score:4, Informative)
Granted, but what's your point? The Constitution provides for an amendment process and makes it pretty damn hard (75% of the States need to approve) to do so. If an amendment survives this process and is approved by the required number of states then whatever changes it makes have the same weight as the original text of the document. For better or worse this was the intent of the Founding Fathers.
The biggest negative effect I see to the income tax is that it has given the Federal Government "the power of the purse" over the States. I don't have any qualms with the concept of an income tax. I do take issue when Congress decides to blackmail (err, "convince") the states to do what it wants (raising the drinking age to 21) by threatening to withhold funding.
I don't see an easy solution to this either. The Libertarian in me is tempted to say that the Federal Government has no business funding ANYTHING for the states (be it education, highways, etc). If this were the case then the Federal Government would lose the ability to blackmail the states and the (Federal) income tax would go down. Personally I'd rather pay higher State taxes then Federal because my Assemblywoman is a hell of a lot more responsive to me then my Congressman or Senator. That said, I don't think a blanket ban is justifiable, because I can see legitimate scenarios where a small number of states may require the assistance of the union as a whole. Disaster relief is an obvious example. Funding for projects that benefit the nation as a whole might be another.
Anyway, if you want to pick on a specific amendment as being responsible for the rise of Washington at the expense of the States I'd probably point the finger less at the 16th and more at the 17th. One would assume that if Senators were responsible to the State Legislature back home that they'd be less inclined to do things that take power away from the States. Of course, there were problems with the Legislatures picking Senators too -- so I don't pretend that repealing the 17th wouldn't have it's downsides either. Perhaps allowing the people to elect Senators but giving the State Legislature some sort of "recall" authority over them?
Gerrymandering also comes to mind as one of the bigger problems that we face, but I'm not sure what sort of solution could be purposed that would be remotely Constitutional (short of an amendment). One of the ideas that I'm interested in is an expansion of the size of the House of Representatives. Presumably they'd be more responsive to the people if they represented less of them. Of course this wouldn't really solve the aforementioned problem, but one could argue that it might be easier to challenge a sitting Congressman for his seat if the district was smaller.
Anyway, I'm probably rambling here. But it's interesting to have a discussion like this with somebody that has actually read the Constitution :)
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Just because the FF provided an Amendment process doesn't mean that any Amendment automatically carries the same
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Not when Lincoln suspended habeas corpus.
During a war, mind you. We haven't been at war for 60 years.
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Not exactly. We (the USA) are not at war with anyone right now, and haven't been since WWII. We were never at war with Korea (either one); we only took part in a UN-mandated police action there.
North Korea and South Korea are still at war with each other, yes, but the USA has never declared war on either country.
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What do they want to do when no one signs this? Fire every scientist? Not going to happen.
That sounds a lot like Collective Bargaining... That just proves these scientists are unionized PINKO COMMIES, probably terrorists, and deserve to be fired to make way for patriotic ones.
Maybe the ESA will take them on for the Aurora project? /me ducks.
good for them (Score:4, Interesting)
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Re:good for them (Score:4, Informative)
Now, whether HSPD12 itself is f'ing stupid is a whole other ball of wax.
Re:good for them (Score:5, Insightful)
But he's President, so he gets to mandate these requirements to people who just want to keep their personal lives private.
Re:good for them (Score:5, Informative)
IANAL, but it sounds like there weren't any smart lawyers behind this idea anyway.
Re:good for them (Score:4, Insightful)
A quick rule of thumb: in any case where the government does anything that appears to be directed by the W administration, you may divine an approximation of their real objectives if you remember that their intentions are always the opposite of what they say. Then allow for incompetency, ass covering and capricious political maneuvering as they work towards their objectives. Although the actual outcome will surprise you in its undesirability, it will at least surprise you less if you consider this simple razor...
Ridiculous (Score:5, Insightful)
If that doesn't shed light on the fact that this is complete and utter nonsense, I don't know what will. As the article pointed out, that's Newspeak if I ever heard it.
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The problem isn't a nonsensical sentence.
The problem is that you're using a faulty definition of "privacy". [arstechnica.com]
The correct definition of privacy is "You divulge all the details of your life to the government, and the government protects it for you. From everyone. Except itself, of course. But you have nothing to fear from your government. After all, we're here to help you."
Welcome to every sensitive government job ever. (Score:4, Insightful)
Heck, you wouldn't believe the background checks I went through for the FBI. In the end, while maybe not ideal for the potential employee, I find nothing significantly reprehensible about the process.
Re:Welcome to every sensitive government job ever. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Welcome to every sensitive government job ever. (Score:5, Insightful)
You applied for the FBI and had your past checked in matters and ways very likely specifically laid out to you once before you get hired.
They already work for the government in non-sensitive areas and have to sign away their right on any privacy because of arbitrary unspecified background checks at will.
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The situation in the article, however, is different. These people already have their jobs (very senior ones too), and now they're expected to rev
Re:Welcome to every sensitive government job ever. (Score:5, Insightful)
Hmmmm.
Let's see - Federal Bureau of Investigation. Investigates, what? Oh, CRIME, TERRORISM, stuff like that.
And who? NASA? What are they doing? Just exploring the universe.
Sorry - NASA and the FBI are completely different. What we are seeing is just another aspect of the creeping fascism in American life, and yet another example of why I left the Empire.
And your offhand "Oh, this is no big deal" IDIOCY is just the exact kind of blithe ignorance that enables these fascist creeps in their unending grasp for power.
And it is just that kind of blithe ignorance that forms Yet Another reason why I left the Empire.
RS
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Whatever, Luke. You know he's your father right?
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Is this definitely justified? Not necessarily. However, it does not warrant a knee-jerk "The JBTs are taking away our privacy!" either.
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Normally I tend to lean a little to the right on most issues, but this bothers me.
It's one thing for this level of investigation for people in law enforcement, at any level, that have the right to arrest and detain people. And also have the right to shoot under certain circumstances.
But for the rest of the go
JPL!=government & 9th circuit already blocked (Score:4, Informative)
1. JPL is not the government
2. the scientists this would have applied to are the subset of JPL employees who do not work with classified material
3. many of this subset of JPL employees specifically elected years ago not to work with classified material because they didn't want to go through the clearance processes
4. all the way back in October the US Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit blocked (URL:http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/06/AR2007100601372.html/) this directive thereby obsolescing the portion of submitter's summary claim that these scientists were in danger of being fired at any moment for not having signed the permission slips by the due date.
Re:Welcome to every sensitive government job ever. (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, I would. Having worked in a similar environment (to the JPL folks) for the federal government, I am quiet familiar with the background checks that you went through. The issue is that since 9/11, our government has gone "secret happy". NASA is a civilian agency and most NASA missions are unclassified and in the public domain, like this one (CloudSat). [colostate.edu] There is quite simply no good reason that the scientists and engineers working on that mission (and others like it) need to be cleared. More importantly, science not directly related to defense belongs in the public domain. To remove it stifles innovation, creativity, and education.
Where would you draw the line? Would you start requiring background checks to go to college? Perhaps a basic background check for Physics 101 and a full secret clearance for Nuclear Physics? Following that train of thought, in the name of defense, would we start doing background checks (and clearing) workers in the financial industry? After all, an attack on that sector could cripple the country as well. As a quick aside, the baby background checks we all already go through to get jobs (criminal history, credit, etc.) are childsplay compared to what is required for a clearance. As such, there is no comparison. Back to my point, though. Following in the same vein, would we then require extensive background checks for all public sector IT workers/software engineers, in the name of security?
The reason the government can get away with the invasion of privacy is because smaller groups are targeted. That is, its fairly easy for someone to say "Yes, but since they work for the feds, they have no privacy...". However, it is not that simple. The government should be critically looking at the projects and missions of the organizations that they are requiring to go through these investigations. If it is REALLY needed, as it would be for the creation of defensive capabilities and intelligence gathering, by all means - require an investigation and clearance. If it is NOT really needed, as is likely the case with the JPL engineers in question, all the government is doing is expanding its powers and wasting your tax dollars (as getting cleared is an expensive proposition).
Re:Welcome to every sensitive government job ever. (Score:5, Funny)
Ironically, the FBI might not even exist today if its illustrious founder had been subject to these same background checks.
It is dangerous to expect civilian govt agencies (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Welcome to every sensitive government job ever. (Score:4, Insightful)
Of course you didnt. Firstly, you hadn't already been working there for 15 years. Secondly, most people who want to be cops *love* authority. They love to see it being exercised. They love to see the "bad guy" get "taken down". And "bad guy" includes people who smoke a joint or 2 now then and have never lifted a finger to hurt anyone in their life.
Did you notice you were applying for a job with the police?? That's what they do. take down bad guys, beat up protestors and direct traffic. wear body armour and sunglasses and carry big guns. hell.. and tase people for not obeying them fast enough.
Doesn't the FBI specifically want to hire people who see nothing wrong with slavish obedience to regulations with a disconnected conception of what the word 'freedom' means. (specifically it means the freedom to act without interference from other human beings). Don't Cops spend all day following orders, and complying with regulations. Is freedom of thought something they want to encourage. Some cops work in prisons.. can you believe that? who would EVER want to work in a prison???
You take it for granted that the government is doesn't need to respect civil liberties. You probably think the government Giveth and the government can taketh away. You think that is normal and necessary for any society to exist. I'll assume your motives are good. But such a police state was not the idea behind the founding of America. Try reading the declaration of independence.
But long story short... you weren't working for 15 years when your boss suddenly came in and saying "I no longer trust you because George Bush said so. Either you voluntarily waive your civil liberties, or else you lose your job, your home, your kids education, and start your entire life over again. Don't sweat it. It's voluntary".
human beings build relationships of trust. if the people you have been working with suddenly stop trusting you it feels like you are being punished. And if you did nothing wrong, it feels very humiliating and oppressive. maybe you see nothing wrong with humiliating and oppressing people. But then again.. what agency did you say you work for?
Not very objective, are we? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Exactly! Creative types like scientists and engineers probably tend to have less than conventional personal lives. I really don't think anyone needs to go poking into that and so killing off the goose that lays the golden eggs.
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NASA, the bureaucracy (Score:3, Insightful)
As an expert in abusive management... (Score:5, Interesting)
Say, if I was really callous and sociopathic, and I wanted to scale back operations and cut costs, I wouldn't fire or lay off anyone. I would require the employees to do things they wouldn't tolerate, but seem "necessary and proper" for their jobs. I'd switch reporting to 4:00am so that reports would be ready for management, give 3 hour lunches to people who live too far away to commute home for lunch, or other highly inconvenient tasks or requirements.
When they quit, you didn't have to report to investors you were scaling back operations, just that you couldn't fill the positions. Then you could cut the positions and claim better productivity.
If I wanted to scale NASA's budget back, and not catch tons of flak, I would do this. When the researchers refused to comply, I could just say "They're a security risk, we're all about security after 9/11, so you can't work on 90% of projects." When they quit, or I fired them for not complying, I could just say "We have a shortage of qualified engineers, we can't fill these positions."
And when nobody cared anymore, I'd scale back operations and cut the positions, shrinking the budget. It's a great way to handle a budget crisis and cut without making it look like one.
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Re:As an expert in abusive management... (Score:5, Insightful)
The people who quit in situations like this are your best employees. The ones who aren't afraid to lose their jobs because they're good enough to work just about anywhere. The ones you're left with are the people who are afraid they have no other options and will take it up the ass just to keep a job. It's not a smart way to run a company, unless you want to run it into the ground.
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What if (Score:4, Interesting)
Why are these investigations even needed? I mean, will he be fired, for example, if Joe Scientist is gay? Libertarian? Doesn't read the bible? Anti-bush? Anti-war? Prefers german Cars? Doesn't believe in Santa Claus? Prefers Pepsi? Etc.
Blackmail (Score:3, Informative)
The problem is that the Bush-Ashcroft era had
Wernher von Braun would have failed this check (Score:2)
Obviously they're ashamed (Score:4, Funny)
Some likely things that would be found among these 28:
7 are having electronic-only relationships or affairs in a MMORPG
3 are furries
2 use slide rules when planning their order at McDonald's
4 only wear glasses in public and at work (to look smarter)
5 Either dance or do karaoke very badly
1 wears diapers (but only for play)
McCarthyism - again? (Score:2, Insightful)
Gimme a break.
In related news... (Score:5, Funny)
NASA (Score:2)
Why do people apply for jobs at a organization, and yet have NO CLUE about who they are working for?
-Hack
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"The Congress further declares that such activities shall be the responsibility of, and shall be directed by, a civilian agency exercising control over aeronautical and space activities sponsored by the United States, except that activities peculiar to or primarily associated with the development of weapons systems, military operations, or the defense of the United States (including the research and development necessary to make effective provision for the defense of the U
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
JPL is not NASA. Got that. If you work for JPL you are not a NASA emplyee.
The following is a quote from the JPL web site.
JPL is a NASA center staffed and managed for the government by a leading private university, Caltech -- and thus we are known as a federally funded research and development center. I believe that this marriage of the government and university worlds lends us a wonderful intellectual
Well (Score:2)
If this kind of crap is going on, the country will snap!
About 50 years ago, it was Russia in top repression, searching people's luggage entering their borders, secrete police on the next corne; now US is severely going there and Russia is coming up again - not even talking about muslim countries, Far East or South America.
Maybe it's global warming heating some heads too much so they start to malfunction.
Freedom? Yukk, my ass!
Avoiding a repeat... (Score:2)
So what? (Score:3, Insightful)
Good for the ESA! (Score:5, Insightful)
and are now subject to being fired despite a decade or more of exemplary service.
Awesome idea! Do away with your best hires because of some silly policy, and wait for foreign space agencies to hire them for their uncommon expertise, experience and insight! If there's something that we've learn during the past years, it's that loyalty and malleability are far more important than competence anyways!
Quotes from the formin question SF85 (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.opm.gov/forms/pdf_fill/SF85.pdf [opm.gov]
INSTRUCTIONS
--------
Purpose of this Form
The U.S. Government conducts background investigations to establish
that applicants or incumbents either employed by the Government or
working for the Government under contract, are suitable for the job.
Information from this form is used primarily as the basis for this
investigation. Complete this form only after a conditional offer of
employment has been made.
Giving us the information we ask for is voluntary. However, we may
not be able to complete your investigation, or complete it in a timely
manner, if you dont give us each item of information we request. This
may affect your placement or employment prospects.
Authority to Request this Information
The U.S. Government is authorized to ask for this information under
Executive Order 10577, sections 3301 and 3302 of title 5, U.S. Code;
and parts 5, 731, and 736 of Title 5, Code of Federal Regulations.
Your Social Security Number is needed to keep records accurate,
because other people may have the same name and birth date. Executive
Order 9397 also asks Federal agencies to use this number to help
identify individuals in agency records.
The Investigative Process
Background investigations are conducted using your responses on this
form and on your Declaration for Federal Employment (OF 306) to
develop information to show whether you are reliable, trustworthy, and
of good conduct and character. Your current employer must be
contacted as part of the investigation, even if you have previously
indicated on applications or other forms that you do not want this.
Instructions for Completing this Form
1. Follow the instructions given to you by the person who gave you the
form and any other clarifying instructions furnished by that person to
assist you in completion of the form. Find out how many copies of the
form you are to turn in. You must sign and date, in black ink, the
original and each copy you submit.
2. Type or legibly print your answers in black ink (if your form is not
legible, it will not be accepted). You may also be asked to submit your
form in an approved electronic format.
3. All questions on this form must be answered. If no response is
necessary or applicable, indicate this on the form (for example, enter
"None" or "N/A"). If you find that you cannot report an exact date,
approximate or estimate the date to the best of your ability and indicate
this by marking "APPROX." or "EST."
4. Any changes that you make to this form after you sign it must be
initialed and dated by you. Under certain limited circumstances,
agencies may modify the form consistent with your intent.
5. You must use the State codes (abbreviations) listed on the back of
this page when you fill out this form. Do not abbreviate the names of
cities or foreign countries.
6. The 5-digit postal ZIP codes are needed to speed the processing of
your investigation. The office that provided the form will assist you in
completing the ZIP codes.
7. All telephone numbers must include area codes.
8. All dates provided on this form must be in Month/Day/Year or
Month/Year format. Use numbers (1-12) to indicate months. For
example, June 10, 1978, should be shown as 6/10/78.
9. Whenever "City (Country)" is shown in an address block, also
provide in that block the name of the country when the address is
outside the United States.
10. If you need additional space to list your residences or
employments/self-employments/unemployment or education, you
should use a continuation sheet, SF 86A. If additional space is needed
to answer other items, use a blank piece of paper. Each blank piece of
paper you use must contain your name and Social Secu
So how would that have looked for Von Braun? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:If you don't like it, leave your govt. job. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
JPL is involved with (among other things): Missie technologies (easily modified into ICBMs), precise guidance systems, the future of the US space program, nuclear reactor technologies, bleeding edge telescopes, and remote sensing technologies, etc..
Also, I would be shocked if current JPL E
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
And that's where you (and the government) are way wrong. Our rights are far more important than security because security only exists to protect our rights.
Re:If you don't like it, leave your govt. job. (Score:5, Interesting)
Given that this position is a philosophical one, I would argue that a need for national security over personal privacy indicates a fundamental flaw in either:
1. the nation's gov't, or
2. the society that exists within that nation's borders.
But it certainly is not an absolute.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
First - if they want to look for terrorists they could as well do standard background checks and have a psychometric test applied at you. But these are no simple background checks. They want to have access to EVERYTHING about you, about your past girlfriends, your emotional problems, what's in your closet, what religion you have, etc. etc.
In other words, they want to do a mental cavity search on you and fire you if you don't seem adequate for them. Still don't
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
1. They're not actually federal employees. They're employees of the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), working at a federally-funded research and development center.
2. 3% of JPL employees do have security clearance. They do work on secretive stuff. The other 97% do not. They don't even work in the same "building" - the secret buildings have all sorts of extra security measures. Would you think it's reasonable if a large university like UCLA or Harvard required ALL
Re: (Score:2)
So, by your logic, you can be owned by a private company.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
So, if you want a date, January 20, 1980 would probably do as a first approximation.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Doesn't matter. My paycheck comes from CSC, but I still hold a NASA contractor badge, which is the only way I have access to the NASA facility. Same with Caltech employees.
JPLers, BTW, have something of a reputation with other NASA centers as always having to be different. Personally, I wish them luck in this case. FWIW, I signed the forms. You pick and choose your battles, and when I found out we didn't ha