from WTOPNEWS.com
31 January 2004
30 January 2004
Must read on Diebold voting machines
sunspot.net has this report on the voting machines being mass produced by Diebold:
Diebold "basically had no interest in putting actual security in this system," said Paul Franceus, one of the consultants. "It's not like they did it wrong. It's like they didn't bother."
Oh, and in case you forgot .juan cole on hutton inquiry
Juan Cole gives an excellent point-by-point rundown of the Hutton inquiry here .
Silliness
8 years? For being the weirdest freak currently walking the planet? BBC NEWS | Europe | Manslaughter verdict for cannibal
Could Linux sympathisers be behind the latest cyberattack?
an update here --------------- from The Economist A virus with a motive Jan 29th 2004 | SAN FRANCISCO From The Economist print edition Could Linux sympathisers be behind the latest cyberattack? A NEW computer virus, the fastest-spreading ever, was this week making the rounds among unprotected computers running on Microsoft Windows. Such incidents of online vandalism by what are often presumed to be geeky teenage hackers are, sadly, routine. But this virus, called MyDoom by some and Novarg by others, seems to be of a different nature-conspiratorial and political. That is because its main feature, besides humiliating Microsoft, is to turn infected machines into weapons against a controversial company called SCO. SCO, a tiny software firm in Utah, and Microsoft, the world's largest software firm, have only one thing in common. Both are passionately hated by "open-source" software programmers, who typically believe that computer code should be freely shared instead of sold as property. Microsoft is hated chiefly because it represents the opposite model, proprietary software, and because its operating system, Windows, is the main rival to Linux, the best-known open-source software today. SCO is hated even more intensely. That is because it claims-vaguely, so far-that Linux contains stolen code from an older operating system, called UNIX, the copyright for which SCO owns. So SCO has sued firms that distribute Linux, such as IBM, and intends soon to start to sue those that use Linux. Google, the popular search engine and a heavy user of Linux, is one potential target. As a result, malicious hackers have declared open season on SCO. MyDoom is the fourth attack against SCO's website so far. The code, upon infecting a computer, is designed to wait until the Superbowl on February 1st and then deluge SCO's website with so much internet traffic that it breaks down. Darl McBride, SCO's chief executive, says he will pay a reward of $250,000 to anybody who provides information to track the perpetrators down, and that the FBI is also on the case. "We believe it is somebody sympathetic to the Linux cause," he says. Linux leaders are outraged by suggestions that a member of their community could be behind MyDoom. Bruce Perens, an open-source evangelist, reminds sympathisers that Linux has been trouncing SCO in the public-relations battle, and urges his fellow open-sourcers "to deplore the attacks" and "always take the high road". As to who the perpetrators might be, Mr Perens thinks that SCO "would not balk at attacking their own site in order to paint their opponents in a bad light." As the war enters its second year, the gloves are clearly off.
29 January 2004
28 January 2004
Maryland's one armed bandits
Well, the slots issue is heating up in the Maryland legislature... and by all means it will be an interesting battle. Opponents will certainly trumpet the
27 January 2004
26 January 2004
on Iranian elections
An update on the struggle facing the Iranian government, coming to grips with the political change affecting their country. Two nearly identical stories out of Tehran; the first from the Saudi government sanctioned media outlet arabnews.com led with this headline: Reformists in Iran Challenge Hard-Liners while the BBC ran this: Iran hardliners 'reject reform. Hope to get a chance to revisit these later... but I'm struck by this closing statment in the arabnews.com story:
Reformist MP Hossein Ansari-Rad warned that the electoral reforms may only serve to heighten political tensions.
25 January 2004
Ilham Aliyev
A startling editorial in the WashingtonPost today titled Our Man in Baku surrounding the events following the elections in Azerbaijan. Not surprisingly, the newly-elected President plays the oil game. An excerpt:
American diplomats and oil executives portray Mr. Aliyev as an urbane pro-Westerner and a secret moderate who plans to liberalize the police state he inherited from his dad. This account strikes Azerbaijanis as ludicrous. Only 42 years old, Mr. Aliyev is renowned in Baku as a playboy with a bad gambling habit. During his tenure at the state oil company, Azerbaijan was rated the sixth most corrupt nation in the world by Transparency International. Following the election, a Human Rights Watch reporter described what he witnessed: The government clearly stole the election, and then brutally beat hundreds of people who poured out in the streets in protest. The day after the election, I watched from the roof of a hotel in Baku as thousands of riot police beat protesters unconscious. Afterward the riot police raised their shields to the sky and turned their batons into drumsticks, celebrating the victory of intimidation. Now hundreds have been arrested, while Isa Gambar, the opposition leader, is effectively under house arrest and activists from his Musavat party are being beaten and detained all over the country. Everyone I speak to is scared. The violence surrounding the election was shocking yet predictable, as the government for years has shut the opposition out of the political process. In the months leading up to the poll, Azerbaijani authorities blatantly manipulated the electoral process to ensure that Ilham Aliyev would inherit his father's presidency. The opposition had nowhere to go but the streets.The entire report can be viewed here. On January 23rd, Human Rights Watch published a more-detailed account of the arrests, beatings, and in some cases torture.... following what many believe to be a fraudulent election. Will the Bush administration come to the aid of the Azerbaijanis? Somehow I doubt it. Said Mr. Aliyev proudly: "The United States is a strategic partner."
22 January 2004
lobbying and racehorses
2 things mentioned in tonight's debate that seem to make this relevant. Ehrlich's pick draws praise, and questions Weisengoff: Former racetrack lobbyist is a shrewd pick, some say. Others contend his selection is a return to business as usual.
errors of omission
"What Bush Left Unsaid in State of the Union Address" FactCheck.org gives a quick look at the things WEREN'T mentioned in Tuesday night's State of the Union address.
21 January 2004
Another slam dunk by Marshall
Talking Points Memo: by Joshua Micah Marshall January 21, 2004 04:27 PM (Printable Format) The big fight is between Clark and Kerry. They’re after the same voters. And their pitch to the voters here is similar. Those voters are moderate-ish Democrats, people for whom the electability pitch is an important one, people who warm, for various reasons, to the candidates’ military credentials. So that’s the big fight.
20 January 2004
State of the Union
07 January 2004
Two Loud Words
By William Rivers Pitt, oringally published at Truthout.org (emphasis added is mine)
Monday 05 January 2004 There have always been 'third-rail' issues in American politics, subjects that, if touched upon, will lead to certain political death. For a long while, and until very recently, Social Security was one of these issues. A new one, surrounding the attacks of September 11, has been born in this political season. If September 11 is discussed, the only allowable sub-topic to be broached is whether or not the Bush administration is capable of keeping us safe from another onslaught. Friday's edition of the Boston Globe had a case in point on the front page. An article titled 'For Bush, Readiness is Key Issue' stated that, "In speech after speech, President Bush has emphasized his administration's pledge never to forget the lessons of Sept. 11. He says the top goal of his administration is to prevent another attack." The Globe article contained, in the next paragraph, the standardized rejoinder: "And while Democratic opponents of the administration are unanimous in their hope that that vulnerability is not exposed with deadly results, they have also argued that Bush has done far too little to protect the country from another attack. He has refused to adequately reimburse state and local officials for homeland security costs, they argue, and has ignored dangerous gaps in air cargo and port security." Thus, the 'preparedness-gap' becomes the whittled-down talking point du jour. This is a whiff of colossal proportions, the implications of which will echo down the halls of history unless someone develops enough spine to speak the truth into a large microphone. The talking point is not difficult to manage. It was splashed in gaudy multi-point font across the front page of the New York Post in May of 2002. Two words: 'Bush Knew.' It is, frankly, amazing that this has fallen down the memory hole. Recall two headlines from that period. The first, from the UK Guardian on May 19, 2002, was titled 'Bush Knew of Terrorist Plot to Hijack US Planes.' The first three paragraphs of this story read: "George Bush received specific warnings in the weeks before 11 September that an attack inside the United States was being planned by Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network, US government sources said yesterday. In a top-secret intelligence memo headlined 'Bin Laden determined to strike in the US', the President was told on 6 August that the Saudi-born terrorist hoped to 'bring the fight to America' in retaliation for missile strikes on al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan in 1998. Bush and his aides, who are facing withering criticism for failing to act on a series of warnings, have previously said intelligence experts had not advised them domestic targets were considered at risk. However, they have admitted they were specifically told that hijacks were being planned." Another story on the topic came from the New York Times on May 15, 2002, and was titled 'Bush Was Warned bin Laden Wanted to Hijack Planes.' Unlike the Guardian piece, the Times chose to lead the article with the Bush administration's cover story, one the administration has stuck with to this day: "The White House said tonight that President Bush had been warned by American intelligence agencies in early August that Osama bin Laden was seeking to hijack aircraft but that the warnings did not contemplate the possibility that the hijackers would turn the planes into guided missiles for a terrorist attack. 'It is widely known that we had information that bin Laden wanted to attack the United States or United States interests abroad,' Ari Fleischer, the president's press secretary, said this evening. 'The president was also provided information about bin Laden wanting to engage in hijacking in the traditional pre-9/11 sense, not for the use of suicide bombing, not for the use of an airplane as a missile.'" Yes, we were warned, said the Bush administration, but who could have conceived of terrorists using airplanes for suicide bombings? A lot of people, actually. According to a Time Magazine story that appeared on Friday, National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice is balking at requests to testify before Thomas Kean's September 11 commission under oath. She also wants her testimony to be taken behind closed doors, and not in public. The crux of her hesitation would appear on the surface to be her comments of May 16 2002, in which she used the above-referenced excuse that no one "could have predicted that they would try to use a hijacked airplane as a missile." If that excuse is reflective of reality, why does she fear to testify under oath? Perhaps Ms. Rice fears testifying because too many facts are now in hand, thanks in no small part to the work of 9/11 widows like Kristen Breitweiser, which fly in the face of the administration's demurrals. For example, in 1993, a $150,000 study was commissioned by the Pentagon to investigate the possibility of an airplane being used to bomb national landmarks. A draft document of this was circulated throughout the Pentagon, the Justice Department and to the Federal Emergency Management Agency. In 1994, a disgruntled Federal Express employee broke into the cockpit of a DC-10 with plans to crash it into a company building in Memphis. That same year, a lone pilot crashed a small plane into a tree on the White House grounds, narrowly missing the residence. An Air France flight was hijacked by members of the Armed Islamic Group, which intended to crash the plane into the Eiffel Tower. In September 1999, a report titled "The Sociology and Psychology of Terrorism" was prepared for U.S. intelligence by the Federal Research Division, an arm of the Library of Congress. It stated, "Suicide bombers belonging to al Qaeda's Martyrdom Battalion could crash-land an aircraft packed with high explosives (C-4 and Semtex) into the Pentagon, the headquarters of the CIA, or the White House." Throughout the spring and early summer of 2001, intelligence agencies flooded the government with warnings of possible terrorist attacks against American targets, including commercial aircraft, by al Qaeda and other groups. A July 5, 2001 White House gathering of the FAA, the Coast Guard, the FBI, Secret Service and INS had a top counter-terrorism official, Richard Clarke, state that "Something really spectacular is going to happen here, and it's going to happen soon." Donald Kerrick, who is a three-star general, was a deputy National Security Advisor in the late Clinton administration. He stayed on into the Bush administration. When the Bush administration came in, he wrote a memo about terrorism, al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden. The memo said, "We will be struck again." As a result of writing that memo, he was not invited to any more meetings. In a late November truthout interview, former Clinton advisor Sidney Blumenthal said, "Richard Clarke was Director of Counter-Terrorism in the National Security Council. He has since left. Clark urgently tried to draw the attention of the Bush administration to the threat of al Qaeda. Right at the present, the Bush administration is trying to withhold documents from the 9/11 bipartisan commission. I believe one of the things that they do not want to be known is what happened on August 6, 2001. It was on that day that George W. Bush received his last, and one of the few, briefings on terrorism. I believe he told Richard Clarke that he didn't want to be briefed on this again, even though Clarke was panicked about the alarms he was hearing regarding potential attacks. Bush was blithe, indifferent, ultimately irresponsible." "The public has a right to know what happened on August 6," continued Blumenthal, "what Bush did, what Condi Rice did, what all the rest of them did, and what Richard Clarke's memos and statements were. Then the public will be able to judge exactly what this presidency has done." George W. Bush is going to run in 2004 on the idea that his administration is the only one capable of protecting us from another attack like the ones which took place on September 11. Yet the record to date is clear. Not only did they fail in spectacular fashion to deal with those first threats, not only has their reaction caused us to be less safe, not only have they failed to sufficiently bolster our defenses, but they used the aftermath of the attacks to ram through policies they couldn't have dreamed of achieving on September 10. It is one of the most remarkable turnabouts in American political history: Never before has an administration used so grisly a personal failure to such excellent effect. Never mind the final insult: They received all these warnings and went on vacation for a month down in Texas. The August 6 briefing might as well have happened in a vacuum. September 11 could have and should have been prevented. Why? Because Bush knew. This administration must not be allowed to ride their criminal negligence into a second term. Someone needs to say those two words. Loudly. After all, Bush has proven with Social Security, and with September 11, that third rails can be danced across. All it takes is a little boldness. ------- William Rivers Pitt is the Managing Editor of truthout.org. He is a New York Times and international best-selling author of three books - "War On Iraq," available from Context Books, "The Greatest Sedition is Silence," available from Pluto Press, and "Our Flag, Too: The Paradox of Patriotism," available in August from Context Books.
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