How's That iPhone Working Out For You?

From the Legal Dep't.:

There "is no constitutional bar" to acquiring "routine business records held by a communications service provider," said Mark Eckenwiler, a senior attorney in the criminal division of the Justice Department. He added, "The government is not required to use a warrant when it uses a tracking device."

This is the first federal appeals court to address warrantless location tracking, which raises novel issues of government surveillance and whether Americans have a reasonable expectation of privacy in their--or at least their cell phones' --whereabouts.

In other news, we see that some are missing the forest to admire the trees.

"My understanding -- I'm not a theologian -- but there's a prophecy in the Bible that says you'll have to receive a mark, or you can neither buy nor sell things in end times," Del. Mark L. Cole, the bill's sponsor, told the Post. "Some people think these computer chips might be that mark."

Cole reportedly said that he primarily sponsored the bill because of the privacy issues.

"I just think you should have the right to control your own body," he said. [This "right" applicable to White Xian Males only. — Ed.]

Yet some fundamentalist Christians see more serious concerns in the Book of Revelation in the Bible, which reads, "He causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name."

Those opposed to the legislation mocked the connection to the Bible story. Del. Robert Brink reportedly said he never heard voters on the campaign trail mention any concerns about microchips.

"I didn't hear anything about the danger of asteroids striking the Earth, about the threat posed by giant alligators in our cities' sewer systems or about the menace of forced implantation of microchips in human beings," he said.

We have seen the Mark of The Beast, & it is AT&T.