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You use "The Daily Show" as an example? Really? A show on Comedy Central? If that's the case, may I point you to THIS video of John Stewart.

No, they sure don't: Daily Show/Colbert Viewers Most Knowledgeable, Fox News Viewers Rank Lowest [thinkprogress.org]

From your article:

The results about Fox News echo findings of previous surveys. In 2003, University of Maryland researchers studied the public’s belief in three false claims — that Iraq possessed WMD, that Iraq was involved in 9/11, and that there was international support for the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

Strange. There WERE WMD's in Iraq, just not the numbers we were expecting to find.

Also, there was about the same international support for the second gulf war as the first. (34 countries sent troops in '92. 33 in '03)

(I can't speak for people thinking Iraq was involved in 9-11)

So, seeing that 66% these assumptions that are used to judge the "knowledge" of viewers are false, it does not bode well for the rest of the survey. Also, the survey does not consider that people that watch the "Daily Show" probably get their information from other sources as well. I would be interested in knowing what column they placed someone who watches Fox News, The Daily Show, reads the local paper and subscribes to news magazines. You have to consider that someone who enjoys the political humor of "The Daily Show" is more likely to also watch other news shows more than someone who watches "Dancing with the Stars".

That what it means to hold your own purse strings. The BBC doesn't beg the government for money, but raises their own taxes.

Yes, which is WORSE. How do you not get this? The press is supposed to watch the government, but in this case, the press IS A GOVERNMENT AGENCY. Do you really, honestly, expect the BBC to report objectively on itself?

Scientific analysis disagrees.

Nonsense. For example, both of them ask a form the question, "Has the U.S. found evidence of Iraqi WMD?" The factual answer is, of course, Yes. Absoutely. If you don't know that fact, then you're the uneducarted one. It is a fact. Now, it is also true that the WMD we found was probably unsuable due to age, being from before the Gulf War. But that's not what the question asked.

You could reasonably argue that the respondents to the polls didn't think of things that way, that they likely understood the question to refer to current, usable weapons. But that doesn't help the poll at all; it merely shows the question to be invalid.

So please don't believe you can trust the data from these "studies," as they are obviously, severely, flawed.

I think it's telling that you believe PBS/NPR is pushing a pro-big government statist regime, when really they have no such agenda.

NPR certainly does, and NewsHour leans that way. As for the rest of PBS, eh, it depends on the local station, but most of them seem to.

Exactly what is good about corporate media, when it's more costly, and sings to the tune of its corporate and political interests??

Apart from the fact that it is the only reasonable alternative to state-funded media which violates fundamental principles of liberty and free press?

Most of the opposition in New York seems to be coming from some nutcase who runs an embroidery firm, organizes GOP "Tea Parties", and rants about vaccines and autism.

Vaccines are safer than most over the counter medications. The US already has over 1000 swine flu deaths this year, and we're not even into winter yet. Getting vaccinated is definitely a statistical win. Getting medical personnel vaccinated is essential; they are going to encounter infected patients, and they can transmit the disease to others weakened by other illnesses.

General Charles Krulak (former Commandant of the United States Marine Corps, and one of the best ones) wrote this about the USMC mandatory anthrax vaccination program: "As we continue to broaden this program, I want to make you aware of a phenomenon we have observed: reluctance to take the anthrax vaccination is inversely proportional to the distance the marine is from the fighting hole. No marines engaged in Desert Thunder refused the vaccine." No nonsense there.

Android apps don't have to pass through a central app store to get widely distributed to a set of Android phones. ... Is there any way to do something like that on iPhones?

Uh, this is the Department of Defense.. They have a budget of two thirds of a trillion dollars. Do you think they could modify an iPhone if they wanted to?

It used to be printed on the SS cards that you couldn't use the SSN for anything other than government uses and corporations did it anyway.

By the time the phrase NOT TO BE USED FOR IDENTIFICATION was printed onto the cards, Roosevelt had issued an executive order[PDF file] allowing its use as such. His fault.

I should clarify, that the link I provided does in fact outline the use of the SSN by govt. agencies, but not by others, so my reply was inaccurate (it only points out the contradiction to the written injunction on the card). My own opinion is that it is one of those things that happened gradually (the use by non-governmental entities) and propagated/spawned.

Of course if that order never happened, you'd have pompous loud-mouths complaining how the government is wasting money and forcing everyone to keep track of X number of IDs for each Federal Agency they do business with; instead of sharing a single ID, like say the SSN registry, accross the whole Government.*shrug*

According to the LAWS that govern the use of a Social Security number: it is illegal to use that number for anything but social security tax purposes... In other words, you can only use it for Banks, Employment, and IRS Tax purposes.

But is it truly illegal? [warning: link is to pdf file]

It used to be printed on the SS cards that you couldn't use the SSN for anything other than government uses and corporations did it anyway.

By the time the phrase NOT TO BE USED FOR IDENTIFICATION was printed onto the cards, Roosevelt had issued an executive order[PDF file] allowing its use as such. His fault.

I should clarify, that the link I provided does in fact outline the use of the SSN by govt. agencies, but not by others, so my reply was inaccurate (it only points out the contradiction to the written injunction on the card). My own opinion is that it is one of those things that happened gradually (the use by non-governmental entities) and propagated/spawned.

It used to be printed on the SS cards that you couldn't use the SSN for anything other than government uses and corporations did it anyway.

By the time the phrase NOT TO BE USED FOR IDENTIFICATION was printed onto the cards, Roosevelt had issued an executive order[PDF file] allowing its use as such. His fault.

We know all about this guy *now*, but we didn't when he was first grabbed...

What are you talking about? The very next day after his arrest, Ashcroft held a nationally-televised press conference. Wolofwitz did one too on the same day.

Anyone with any critical thinking ability could see right through the BS in those press conferences and indeed when they finally figured out something to charge Padilla with it had absolutely nothing to do with any of the claims they made at the time of his arrest, ultimately he was convicted of nothing more than bearing ill-will towards the US.

I get tired of these stories. You could claim it's a waste of money to spend 18 million for setting up a transparency website and then running it for a few years. But put these stories into perspective by visiting DefenseLink every day to view how much of your tax dollars are being "invested."

http://www.defenselink.mil/contracts/contract.aspx?contractid=4067

Yesterday alone we awarded over 120 million dollars. The day before that we awarded over 500 million dollars in contracts - I got too disgusted to continue adding the numbers.

So, would I rather not waste 18 million dollars? Sure. But I'd rather spend it on something constructive than destructive. A website about government spending is way more valuable to me than another novel way to hunt and kill humans.

They defend "freedom."

I'm all for opening up completely the books of any government subcontractor. If you don't like transparency, then don't take government contracts. It may be tough to police, with companies trying to cheat with subsidiaries, but I think the payoff would be enormous.

On 9/10/2001, Rumsfeld gave a speech about wasteful military spending. Check it out in print, or a small piece on CBS. There was a link to his whole speech years ago - I don't know where that went. In it he states that up to 2.3 trillion dollars is "unaccounted" for, whatever that means. If you read between the lines, he is pushing for privatization of the military. We all know how well that worked out.

Here.

Trustees Reports issued over the last several years have indicated that Social Security's Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI) Trust Funds would become insolvent sometime in the next 30 to 40 years under the intermediate set of economic and demographic assumptions provided in each report. Various proposals have addressed this long-range solvency problem. These proposals are generally intended to restore, or largely restore, solvency for the long-range period (the next 75 years).

So, we need to come up with some changes to the system in order to keep it solvent in 40 years. This is not an emergency. Recent market events have once again illustrated what a terrible idea it is to tie retirement to something as volatile as the stock market.

And, like all of the fiscal nightmare scenarios cooked up lately, it's easily fixed by reducing our military spending. Here are the contracts we awarded just yesterday, which totals $1,250,643,816.00. And that only reports contracts worth less than 5 million dollars.

Secretary Gates just announced that he is tripling the number of "cyber experts" trained per year. Since he was really picky about which programs actually got increases in funding among several cuts, I'm pretty sure I wasn't the only one who wondered why he felt cyberwarfare to be deserving, when we haven't heard much about it in the news. Apparently someone in the media wondered the same thing and set out to answer that question.

But wait, there's more!

DefenseLink is a DoD site that lists all DoD sites. Forge.mil(.com) is not on that list. Of course, it could be bureaucracy acting slow.

Second, WHOIS contact connects to an individual at collab.net, another sourceforge-like site. Were this a government site, I would think they would have it registered to a position in a department, or at least a c/o address for a military/goverment institution, not an individual.

Just to be sure, popping the given address into Google Maps returns what looks like a residential area.

So this is either a horribly managed project (not surprising for the government), or some weird scam of sorts.

Or, because she has experience as a command and chief of a National Guard unit. http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=2483 [defenselink.mil] In the event of an attack, members of the Alaska Army National Guard's 49th Missile Defense Battalion based here would use sophisticated surveillance and radar systems to track the missile through its initial boost phase, explained Maj. Joe Miley, the unit's operations officer. If the missile reached the midcourse phase, the Alaska Guardsmen would await the order to engage it.

She was never in the military and was never in charge of a military unit. I also take issue with your next part. She may be "commander in chief" of Alaska's forces, but that doesn't actually mean she would be responsible for any military style of command. She would be responsible for only political, a.k.a. civilian command. It is not the same, and to say it's the same is to be misleading.

Also, an interesting tidbit I stumbled upon while fact-checking my post: two of Para Sailin's sons are named Trig and Track. Wow. ;)

How can someone like Palin possibly think she is capable of running the country?

Oh... maybe it's because she is successfully governing the state of Alaska, which involves more than just attending Illinois Senate sessions and voting "present" 130 timess or, as a US Senator, missing 314 of 1299 roll call votes (24%) since Jan 6, 2005. http://www.govtrack.us/congress/person.xpd?id=400629&tab=votes

Or, because she has experience as a command and chief of a National Guard unit.
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=2483
In the event of an attack, members of the Alaska Army National Guard's 49th Missile Defense Battalion based here would use sophisticated surveillance and radar systems to track the missile through its initial boost phase, explained Maj. Joe Miley, the unit's operations officer. If the missile reached the midcourse phase, the Alaska Guardsmen would await the order to engage it.

She's also the commander in chief of the Alaska State Defense Force (ASDF), a federally recognized militia incorporated into Homeland Security's counter terrorism plans.

While state governors generally do not need security clearances, as head of the Alaska ANG's 49th MDB, a permanent unit in a constant state of readiness, and the ASDF, part of Homeland Security, she probably has MORE security clearances than most other governors and state legislators or many US Senators.
http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/cfr_2003/julqtr/32cfr154.16.htm
(4) State governors do not require personnel security clearances.
They may be granted access to specifically designated classified information, on a ``need-to-know'' basis, based upon affirmation by the Secretary of Defense or the head of a DoD Component or single designee, that access, under the circumstances, serves the national interest.
Staff personnel of a governor's office requiring access to classified information shall be investigated and cleared in accordance with the prescribed procedures of this part when the head of a DoD Component, or single designee, affirms that such clearance serves the national interest. Access shall also be limited to specifically designated classified information on a ``need-to-know'' basis.

Amazingly, while many were quick to denigrate Palin over perceived slights or shortcomings, EVEN to the point of suggesting that because she was a WOMAN and a mother she "wasn't qualified" or shouldn't run for VP (with nary an outcry from extreme "feminists"), they continued on, insisting that two years a governor of a state ranked 47 in population wasn't enough experience to be a VP nominee. Yet, they see no problem with Obama running for President. Palin was a full time governor for 21 UNINTERRUPTED months before accepting the nomination. Obama was sworn in as a US Senator 48 months ago, but 23 months ago he began running for President, and missed nearly 90% of the Senate sessions during some quarters. So, he's had only 25 months experience as a Senator but is more qualified to run for President than Palin was to run for VP?

Nice double standard there, and sexist too.

BTW, Your denigration of Police officers may speak more to your personal experience with them than to their collective character. It suggests that they have arrested you more than once for something... drugs, wife beating, child abuse, peddling, theft, burglary? Which is it?

In small towns and villages, officers are usually respected members of the community, and chosen for that reason. In larger metropolitan areas (except L.A, Chicago, and other areas of high political corruption) putative officers are culled with a variety of physical, mental and emotional examinations, or failure to meet training standards. Those that meet the tests put their lives on the line to protect you

I don't think it's PC to think about projecting American power by means more complicated than just killing bad guys. Even the military knows better than that.

On a lighter note the DoD has a CIO http://www.defenselink.mil/cio-nii/ but I think a government wide CIO might not be looking at the same stuff. However, even knowing that such organizations exist takes an insider at this point. I think it's easy for a new president to show up and say we need to create X so we can start doing Y even when there is already a group trying to get that done. Often the problem is people ignoring groups promoting change.

PS: Dammit, when did I start talking like a government drone.

... than the alternative

I'm aware of the broken window fallacy, as you can see here. In this type of R&D, there are very few explosions. You don't randomly blow up your expensive, high-tech lasers.

Your Hummer dig is a typical argument from ignorance. It's the only piece of obvious military tech that has wandered into your life, so you assume it is the sum of all military developments. Take a look here for a counterexample (that is, defense technology that has some obvious applications for civilian use).

Of course research devoted strictly to defense won't go as far toward civilian ends as pure civilian funding. However, defense research can provide non-military benefits, while also contributing to (*shock*) national defense. And I believe that defense is a reasonable end to spend money on.

"You're under the mistaken impression that welfare benefits are a lot of money...they aren't. Hell, the home interest deduction, middle class welfare, costs the government more money."

Those taking any sort of government hand out aren't middle class. Those are people who are falling into lower class. You really dont think that Medicare/Medicaid/Social Security etc are cheap?

Take a look at page 10 http://www.defenselink.mil/comptroller/defbudget/fy2007/fy2007_greenbook.pdf

Medicare and social security alone are 425 billion, plus what ever other programs you can find. Thats nearly as much as the whole military.

People really DO live on these programs long term. I personally know people who have never held a job, and never plan to because they are satisfied with what they get for free. My neighbor from when I was a kid has never had a job, and gets nearly as much as I do from various welfare programs, and I'm working a full 50-60 hours a week. Fully capable of working, but they never have had to so they sit on their tuff and get drunk.

"The citizens of the UK/Australia/NZ/Canada/Sweden that I have communicated with seem to really really like their "socialist health care systems""

I call bull. I've lived in Europe and know first hand how poor the care is there. I only met one family who liked the free care system, and they were very much lower class. Austrailia, I dont know specificly, but I highly doubt it is much better there. The only ones who like it are the same ones who are milking all the other systems. Ya, its better than nothing for them, but for everyone else then it sucks.

How many dead Americans?

As of yesterday, the official count of Americans dead in Iraq is 4,158. As to the number of dead Iraqis, that number depends on how you count the dead.

I'd bet both numbers are extraordinarily low.

If you mean strictly civilians killed by American and other forces, that number will never be revealed. Obviously we don't want the civilians of Iraq to know how many of their neighbors were killed by the liberators. In fact, when the Iraqis tried to keep a running total based on the number of bodies brought to morgues, the Iraqi government was forced to stop counting the figures.

If you mean the number of civilians killed by American and other forces along with the number killed by their neighbors due to religious, cultural or other reasons, again, that number will never be revealed. Wouldn't want to reinflame sectarian violence, would we? However, based on interviews and other sources, as of November 2006, we have the following estimates:

Iraqi civilians deaths: 49,000 > 655,000

Those figures were derived from Iraq Body Count and a study published in Lancet in 2006.

If you mean the number of Iraqi civilians who took up arms against the occupying forces but who are considered insurgents/terrorists/member of Al Qaeda/etc, then the military will gladly give you that number. In fact, as of August 2007, the military reported 18,832 suspected insurgents killed.

For a report on why getting numbers is so difficult, see this story in The Guardian from March of this year.

Yeah, in September 2001 maybe he said he didn't do it. But check this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Videos_of_Osama_bin_Laden#December_13.2C_2001

Here's the most memorable quote from bin Laden. I got it from the defenselink.mil transcript; the one in Wikipedia omits much (the part about the iron structure melting is replaced with an ellipsis).

...we calculated in advance the number of casualties from the enemy, who would be killed based on the position of the tower. We calculated that the floors that would be hit would be three or four floors. I was the most optimistic of them all. (...Inaudible...) due to my experience in this field, I was thinking that the fire from the gas in the plane would melt the iron structure of the building and collapse the area where the plane hit and all the floors above it only. This is all that we had hoped for.

But wait! The 9/11 Truthers say that this was an actor doubling for bin Laden! Oh, then how about the ones broadcast by Al Jazeera, such as:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Videos_of_Osama_bin_Laden#October_29.2C_2004

He says it was his idea to strike the towers, and this direct quote: "If Bush says we hate freedom, let him tell us why we didn't attack Sweden, for example."

So, unless Al Jazeera is secretly working for Bush or cannot authenticate a bin Laden tape, there you have bin Laden refuting his claim that he had nothing to do with it.

steveha

try one of these programs. http://www.defenselink.mil/cio-nii/iasp/ https://www.sfs.opm.gov/ OR if you already have the skills then try any of the big defense contractors or even some of the small ones. For most of the jobs, you must have U.S. citizenship, the ability to obtain a clearance, and most importantly the ability to withstand hours of pointless meetings.

Camp rules are posted in four languages -- Arabic, Farsi, Urdu, and Pashto -- in the exercise yards in each of the camps. Recently, the enclosed bulletin boards have also featured posters with information about the Afghan elections. "It talks about the fact that 10 million Afghanis freely elected their own government," Rundle said. "So it's a bit of news from home ... for a chunk of the detainee population here."

Cultural sensitivity is consistently practiced in each of the camps. Respect for Islam is evident in many of the policies. For instance, in each cell in Camp 1, a Koran is stored hanging in a surgical mask from the cell wall. The purpose of the surgical mask is to hold the Muslim holy book "in a place of reverence," Padmore said.

In each cell block a painted arrow points toward Mecca, Saudi Arabia, so the detainees know which way to face during their daily prayers. During Ramadan, detainees were allowed to break their daily fast with water and dates at the appropriate time, and prayer calls are broadcast over loudspeakers five times a day.

Navy Muslim Chaplain to Help Lead White House Iftar Dinner

A native of Bangladesh, Saifulislam had a lot of firsts in his 15-year Navy career, the last eight years served as a Muslim chaplain. He was the first Muslim chaplain to be assigned to the Marine Corps, at Camp Pendleton, Calif. He helped organize the Marines' first iftar, in 2005. He was the first Muslim chaplain to be sent to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to administer to detainees there.

Joint Task Force Respects Detainees' Religious Practices

WASHINGTON, June 29, 2005 - Members of Joint Task Force Guantanamo, Cuba, go to great lengths to respect the religious practices and beliefs of an estimated 520 enemy combatants being detained there, senior task force leaders told Congress today.
Officials described a sweeping program that ranges from educating servicemembers about Muslim beliefs and sensitivities to incorporating those religious practices into nearly every aspect of camp life....

A loudspeaker at the camp signals the Muslim "call to prayer" five times a day - generally at 5:30 in the morning, 1 and 2:30 in the afternoon, and 7:30 and 9:30 at night, Mendez said.

Once the prayer call sounds, detainees get 20 minutes of uninterrupted time to practice their faith, he said. Those who choose to can take advantage of the prayer caps, beads and oil given to them as part of their basic-issue items and pray toward the Muslim holy city of Mecca, in the direction designated by arrows painted in each detainee cell and all common areas. Detainees who display good behavior and abide by camp rules receive traditional Islam prayer rugs as well, Mendez said.

The Joint Task Force Guantanamo Bay staff strives to ensure detainees aren't interrupted during the 20 minutes following the prayer call, even if they're not involved in religious activity, Mendez said.

Staff members schedule detainee medical appointments, interrogations and other activities in accordance with the prayer call schedule. They also post traffic triangles throughout Camp Delta to remind task force members not to disrupt the 20-minute observation period, Mendez explained.

Strict measures in place throughout the facility ensure appropriate treatment of the Koran, the Muslim holy book.

Every detainee at the facility is issued a personal copy of the Koran, and it is displayed in detainee cells "in plain view and above eye level," Mendez said. This serves two purposes, he said, discouraging detainees from hiding contraband inside its pages

That poor schmuck born in the ghetto? That was ME. That was MY FAMILY. We were dirt poor - not figuratively, but literally. Try living out of a 1967 Country Squire station wagon with a brother, sister, and mother for 2 months. Shopping at Goodwill because it was what you could afford. Delivering papers at 10 years old so you can have milk for the week. Getting the opportunity to attend Catholic high school because of good grades - good grades alone - because my grandparents drilled into me that the value of a man is only what he makes of himself, that you have to do what you must to get ahead. There are no free meals. And working 3-4 hours a day after school to earn the money to pay for it.

That ghetto kid is the one who now is comfortable in his life, who works productively. Who has patents to his name, and benefits mightily from working with "evil multinational corporations". I never had anything given to me other than my bastard birth (yes, out of wedlock) and the slap on my ass when I entered this life.

The similarities between us are, I surmise, quite limited. Our stations in life came from different ends. And I look at what I have done - and those around me who also came from similar stations as mine - and see that the tyranny of "compassion" and the "War on Poverty" do much more harm - irreparable harm - to the poorest among us than having no such War to begin.

Few things for you to consider: the DOD budget is $480 billion - see page 4 of that PDF. That's a fact. You can argue all you want, but you're wrong. We spend the same on education as we do on Defense - you've been brainwashed by all those "if only the DOD had to hold bake sales and the schools didn't!" bumperstickers. Defense is a Constitutional mandate, direct. Education? For the first 204 years of our country the Department of Education didn't even exist. How you can equate the two shows your disdain for the Constitution and formation of this country.

Yes, those Hamptons folks. The vast majority of whom did not get their money from inheritance but from work and reward. The class envy you try to espouse in your pot-shots at their wealth is quite revealing. How much should any one man make? Can you place a number on it? Do you realize that by simply placing that number you have, in effect, stated your own degree of socialism and fascism?

You judge a man by what he has and whether you see it as "fair", and expect to be able to regulate his payment according to your beliefs. In your eyes, he is not free to negotiate for compensation that he desires, nor to gather the fruits of his labor. You - via actions of the State as espoused by Hillary Clinton and Barak Obama - wish to force that man to accept only what you deem is fair, which means you then make him subservient, and take from him the fundamental Rights upon which this country was founded.

Economics IS the fundamental access for Liberty. Without it, other rights are worthless. Desires to place restraint on the free market (which we do not have; it is heavily burdened with regulation by the State) is a fascist/socialist desire. You are impinging the fundamental Rights of man with such actions. Ultimately it is the Machiavellian "ends justify the means" claim that fascists like you hold up to explain and assuage your feelings regarding your actions.

Sir Winston Churchill summed it up best with the following quotes:

"The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries."

America shot first, without provocation.

So much for trying to be funny... What, dry humor doesn't get points? Maybe I didn't phrase it right... Like if all the botnets were running threatfire, and told threatfire it was cool to run botnet software.

Then we'd have a phrase something like "Trusting in the sanity and restraint of Threatfire is not an option" (See George W Bush, and Dope ).

I want to raise some of the deeper issues behind the problem of cyber-warfare (or even just most plain cyber-crime related to fraud).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyberwar

Most of the movie "War Games" is silly, but this statement from it is profound: "the only winning move is not to play". Or to generalize it, there are finite games and infinite games, and infinite games are about continuing to play, not about winning (see author James P. Carse on _Finite and Infinite Games_).
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-962221125884493114
Now that we are confronted with global warfare, whether nuclear, biological, or cybernetic, we need to rethink what games we want to play. As Albert Einstein said "The release of atom power has changed everything except our way of thinking." The same might be said about genetic engineering or the internet. We need to somehow transcend these arms races instead of try to win them.

It continually boggles my mind that people are willing to admit to problems of such extreme magnitude caused by "progress" so far -- like the threat of nuclear war, the threat of bioengineered plagues (or even just cluster bombs and land mines), the threat of economic collapse (speculation, derivatives, etc.), the threat of widespread pollution with unexpected consequences (e.g. endocrine disruptors from plastics), the threat of global climate change, the threat of universal fascism (by "liberals" or "conservatives" :-), the threat (or opportunity) of an upcoming technological singularity, and so on
including the threat of cyber-warfare or cyber-crime (essentially the technological face of the usual horsemen: war, plague, famine, leading to death), but then, when faced with these huge threats, the solutions proposed are timid, piecemeal, or regressive. Why not consider that big systemic problems (sometimes resulting from incremental quantitative changes over time adding up to vast qualitative changes) may require widespread transcendental changes (even if just a change of the heart or the prevalent mythology)?

=== the need for mutual security and a resilient civilian infrastructure ===

As long as the US defense strategy is based on strategic dominance of others
"Joint Vision 2020 Emphasizes Full-spectrum Dominance"
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=45289
and not mutual security for all, the US will not be secure, because it will be a threat to everyone by its own logic. Such a one-sided strategy will promote the development of the very ruinous arms races which have already cost trillions and left both the USA and the now-defunct USSR as losers of the cold war (the USA just taking a little longer to fall from the financial punches of the past few decades).

These issues were outlined in the book _Brittle Power_ in the 1980s,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brittle_Power
mainly in regard to the US energy infrastructure, but the ideas apply everywhere including manufacturing and likely the internet. Systems which balance meshwork and hierarchy
http://www.t0.or.at/delanda/meshwork.htm
(and so are at least moderately decentralized, compared to hierarchical monopolies) will stand the greatest chance of survival. Unfortunately, the civilian systems which the General is charged with protecting are mainly not of that variety. The internet is more-so like this than almost any other system, but it still has its key weaknesses in practice (including widespread use of difficult-to-audit proprietary software like Microsoft Windows). That lack of resiliency is a product of the failure of decades of civilian governance in terms of

The owner of airforce.com is "TribalDDB Worldwide, 1999 Bryan St Ste 2400, Dallas TX". Does that sound official?

There's a US Department of Defense - Sites page with an "Air Force" link. It points to www.af.mil.

China is not some innocent, maligned party. It is a populous country with a burgeoning economy and rapidly modernizing military that also has an enormous chip on its shoulder, a racially-based national ideology, and an expansionist foreign policy.

They mean to take Taiwan forcibly, and know they have to get through the United States to do it. Therefore they are pursuing a comprehensive strategy that includes cyberwarfare to achieve that goal. Every year there is a report to Congress on it:

http://www.defenselink.mil/pubs/china.html

It is therefore not untoward to acknowledge that China is gunning for the United States, nor is it unnatural for Americans to react to that.

Putting it down to 'typical' American parochialism or some deep-seated bigotry is contrary to the facts and dangerously dismissive.

There's a Congressional whitepaper that gets put out every year or so on assessment of China as a rival/potential threat. This is a link to the 2005 version that Google found:

http://www.defenselink.mil/pubs/china.html

So yes, China is actively seeking U.S. military secrets. It's official policy. I've read in past versions before 2000 that Chinese govt. policy was also to employ all the means to deter U.S. intervention in armed conflict with Taiwan, among which was to use anti-satellite missiles to neutralize U.S. surveillance capabilities, cyberwarfare to bog down the U.S. military and country in general, and also to use economic warfare to make the United States too frightened of losing its standard of living to bother about a small island in the South China Sea.

Given China's recent successful test of Anti-Satellite weapons and forays into cyberwarfare, the level of U.S. debt China holds, and the Bush administration's willingness to sell it to them, is particularly alarming.

Interestingly enough, many of the U.S. military secrets they acquire they get via Israel, our good friends, who steal them from us at will and get a free pass from the U.S. Congress because they're our good friends. (NPR story on the leaders of AIPAC, spying on the U.S. and passing secrets to Israel: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4802479)

Yes, this submission to Slashdot refers to space shuttle technology. Maybe that technology is valuable, maybe it isn't. But if we don't shut this activity down, it will bite us in the ass more than it already has.

For instance, Clinton authorized the sale of sensitive satellite technology back in the late 90's that allowed the Chinese to significantly upgrade their long-range targeting capability. Now, the Chinese don't have that many long-range missiles, so being able to target more effectively works wonders for their nuclear capability.

Not more than a few months after the Chinese got the tech from Clinton, India, which has fought border wars with China and lost ( http://www.fas.org/irp/world/india/threat/china.htm ), suddenly declared itself a nuclear power. Pakistan, of course was right on their heels, being eager to let India know they can play too.

So Chinese espionage, and foolish U.S. administration policy, has already directly caused a nuclear standoff in South Asia and given the Chinese the ability to reach and hit cities on the western U.S. mainland.

The most devastating thing in the DoD arsenal is the bureaucracy.
Quite amazing what the DoD accomplishes in spite of itself--the truest testament to the unquenchable American spirit.
Case in point: http://www.defenselink.mil/comptroller/icenter/budget/ppbsint.htm

Feel free to look it up for yourself.

That patriotic civilian could be held for the duration of hostilities -- but not under the conditions the Guantanamo captives were held.

But, what should be said here is, the allegations the DoD has released against the captives largely don't support the claim that they were combatants.

The DoD has released Summary of Evidence memos listing the allegations against 572 of the 777 captives. If you read some of those allegation memos for yourself you will find that very few of them support the allegation that they were "captured on a battlefield."

In the eighteen months since the memos were first released I have read those 572 memos. Not only do a small fraction of them support this allegation. My assessment is that of the small fraction of those allegation memos that support the "captured on the battlefield" claim more that half of those captives were poor saps who were just unlucky enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. The real shooters in these skirmishes fled, and got away scot free.

Let me tell you two of the most memorable cases, that of two brothers: Naqeebyllah Shaheen Shahwali Zair Mohammed and Rasool Shahwali Zair Mohammed Mohammed. transcript at pages 64-76 and 22-28 of this .pdf and transcript at pages 13-28 of this .pdf.

Like a couple of million other Afghans their family fled the decades of warfare in Afghanistan. The brothers grew up as refugees, in Pakistan. They went to school there. They went to medical technician college. The more ambitious, or academically gifted brother worked his way through medical school.

When the Taliban was ousted, and Hamid Karzai took over, one of the problems his country faced was a terrible lack of professionals and literate men. Karzai broadcast a request for educated Afghan refugees to return home. And these two brother decided to heed his request.

So far this is a good news story. This is exactly what everyone hoping for Afghanistan becoming a peaceful, prosperous country would wish for.

The brothers returned the region where their family was from. They borrowed money to equip their medical clinic with modern lab equipment, so the clinic could supply modern medical care, take X-rays, do standard blood tests.

So far this is a good news story. This would almost certainly be the first modern medical care this area ever had. This would save the lives of dozens of babies, old folks, etc.

The Americans established a small firebase nearby.

Okay. Good news. Provide some security.

The first American CO was sensible. He sought out the doctor -- a respected local, who spoke English, and asked him to go around with him, and introduce him to the elders at the various local village councils, and help explain to them that the American intentions were to help the Afghan people, help provide security, help rebuild the country's infrastructure.

So far this is a good news story.

Our doctor agreed. And consequently the elders on these local village councils saw the doctor as the intermediary through whom they could direct requests to the American firebase commander. I imagine these were requests like: "could you allocate some of that discretionary reconstruction fund you control to put our idle young men to work rebuilding the irrigation canal east of here?"

And, so far this is a good news story.

The doctor was a busy guy. So, when the other locals made these kinds of requests he wrot

Feel free to look it up for yourself.

That patriotic civilian could be held for the duration of hostilities -- but not under the conditions the Guantanamo captives were held.

But, what should be said here is, the allegations the DoD has released against the captives largely don't support the claim that they were combatants.

The DoD has released Summary of Evidence memos listing the allegations against 572 of the 777 captives. If you read some of those allegation memos for yourself you will find that very few of them support the allegation that they were "captured on a battlefield."

In the eighteen months since the memos were first released I have read those 572 memos. Not only do a small fraction of them support this allegation. My assessment is that of the small fraction of those allegation memos that support the "captured on the battlefield" claim more that half of those captives were poor saps who were just unlucky enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. The real shooters in these skirmishes fled, and got away scot free.

Let me tell you two of the most memorable cases, that of two brothers: Naqeebyllah Shaheen Shahwali Zair Mohammed and Rasool Shahwali Zair Mohammed Mohammed. transcript at pages 64-76 and 22-28 of this .pdf and transcript at pages 13-28 of this .pdf.

Like a couple of million other Afghans their family fled the decades of warfare in Afghanistan. The brothers grew up as refugees, in Pakistan. They went to school there. They went to medical technician college. The more ambitious, or academically gifted brother worked his way through medical school.

When the Taliban was ousted, and Hamid Karzai took over, one of the problems his country faced was a terrible lack of professionals and literate men. Karzai broadcast a request for educated Afghan refugees to return home. And these two brother decided to heed his request.

So far this is a good news story. This is exactly what everyone hoping for Afghanistan becoming a peaceful, prosperous country would wish for.

The brothers returned the region where their family was from. They borrowed money to equip their medical clinic with modern lab equipment, so the clinic could supply modern medical care, take X-rays, do standard blood tests.

So far this is a good news story. This would almost certainly be the first modern medical care this area ever had. This would save the lives of dozens of babies, old folks, etc.

The Americans established a small firebase nearby.

Okay. Good news. Provide some security.

The first American CO was sensible. He sought out the doctor -- a respected local, who spoke English, and asked him to go around with him, and introduce him to the elders at the various local village councils, and help explain to them that the American intentions were to help the Afghan people, help provide security, help rebuild the country's infrastructure.

So far this is a good news story.

Our doctor agreed. And consequently the elders on these local village councils saw the doctor as the intermediary through whom they could direct requests to the American firebase commander. I imagine these were requests like: "could you allocate some of that discretionary reconstruction fund you control to put our idle young men to work rebuilding the irrigation canal east of here?"

And, so far this is a good news story.

The doctor was a busy guy. So, when the other locals made these kinds of requests he wrot

Maybe you should check the news about our failures more often. I hope it doesn't break your heart but things appear to be looking better over there.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/14/AR2007101401245_pf.html
  and
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=48001
  along with various reports of the violence at an all time low since the war seems to say that your not going to be smirking for a while. I'm sorry that our men and women dieing is such a joy for you. But I am gload that your not seeing as much joy now.

I could appreciate that conclusion except it flies in the face of the facts.

After I resigned and took time off I switched to Tea as the source of my caffeine, and drank an average of about 3-4 cups per day. I was drinking Tea as the symptoms as the systems subsided and went away.

I drank only ONE can of diet Dr. Pepper and it brought the symptoms back within 30 minutes. I can and have repeated that "test" to see if the sensitivity remains. After 15 years it sill does.

Currently I drink about 4-5 cups of Green Tea each day and never experience the symptoms.

Concerning the claim that Rumsfeld was never at R.G.Serle I offer these URLs, which says otherwise:
http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/transcript. aspx?transcriptid=3427
and this one which states he was the HEAD of the company... ...
He even took out a few years from 1977 to 1985 to make a living, and a very good living I might add, as the very successful head of G.D. Serle & Company
http://www.cfr.org/publication/6001/meeting_with_s ecretary_of_defense_donald_h_rumsfeld.html
and the 1985 Congressional Record: https://web.lexis-nexis.com/congcomp

Searle was being investigated by the U.S. Department of Justice for attempting to defraud the FDA into approving artificial aspartame as a safe artificial sweetener when lab tests proved it was a neurotoxic, carcinogenic drug. He was able to pull political strings to get Searle out of legal trouble and influenced President Reagan's appointment of Arthur Hull Hayes as FDA Commissioner to politically approve the sale of aspartame in 1981--over the objections of FDA scientists, independent researchers and consumer safety advocates. Monsanto bought Searle for $2.7 billion in 1985, and the Searle family walked away with about $1 billion. Rumsfeld's take was about $12 million.

OR
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0612/15/sit room.01.html
When he was CEO of a company, he took a company over, G.D. Serle, a pharmaceutical company, that was -- it was dying. And he fired people, he reorganized it, he turned it around, he brought synergies in ...

Now we know what the "synergies" were... his own people planted at the FDA to push approval of Aspartame through.

Several soft drink companies and Nutrasweet were taken to court in April of 2004 but I haven't heard how the case is going.

Then, there is this little bit of info about bird flu and Rumsfeld
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines06/0312-06.ht m

Please Mod the parent up. To my eyes, it look like a fake prop, which would likely be standard procedure. For example, here's a link to a known photo of the USS Ohio, the first Trident missile sub. Note that the propeller is fully submerged in the known photo.

Don't worry, they have slaughtering people faster covered

If you find a cannon on an old pirate ship at the bottom of the ocean, do you just call it a hunk of metal since it doesn't work anymore? Or do you call it a cannon?

Did we find Sarin Nerve Agent? Yes
Did we find weapons that were meant for the dispersal of Sarin (WMD)? Yes
Did we find weapons which contained Sarin? Yes
Did we find fully functional WMD? Maybe, but they were old and we weren't going to test them.
Did we find new WMD? No

See the clarification? Hell, some of our soldiers were even exposed to the effects of one. So to say they were useless or not considered WMD is hogwash.

There are plenty of reports outside of Fox News that say Sarin (WMD) was found. Here are a few:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4997808/
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?i d=15918
http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewNation.asp?Page=/Nation /archive/200606/NAT20060621e.html
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/07/06/iraq/mai n627580.shtml
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTI CLE_ID=40754

China's continued pursuit of area denial and anti-access strategies is expanding from the traditional land, air, and sea dimensions of the modern battlefield to include space and cyber-space.

Information Warfare. There has been much writing on information warfare among China's military thinkers, who indicate a strong conceptual understanding of its methods and uses. For example, a November 2006 Liberation Army Daily commentator argued:

[The] mechanism to get the upper hand of the enemy in a war under conditions of informatization finds prominent expression in whether or not we are capable of using various means to obtain information and of ensuring the effective circulation of information; whether or not we are capable of making full use of the permeability, sharable property, and connection of information to realize the organic merging of materials, energy, and information to form a combined fighting strength; [and,] whether or not we are capable of applying effective means to weaken the enemy side's information superiority and lower the operational efficiency of enemy information equipment.

The PLA is investing in electronic countermeasures, defenses against electronic attack (e.g., electronic and infrared decoys, angle refl ectors, and false target generators), and computer network operations (CNO). China's CNO concepts include computer network attack, computer network defense, and computer network exploitation. The PLA sees CNO as critical to achieving "electromagnetic dominance" early in a conflict. Although there is no evidence of a formal Chinese CNO doctrine, PLA theorists have coined the term "Integrated Network Electronic Warfare" to prescribe the use of electronic warfare, CNO, and kinetic strikes to disrupt battlefield network information systems.

The PLA has established information warfare units to develop viruses to attack enemy computer systems and networks, and tactics and measures to protect friendly computer systems and networks. In 2005, the PLA began to incorporate offensive CNO into its exercises, primarily in first strikes against enemy networks.

For constitutional purposes, the joint resolution passed with but a single dissenting vote by Congress on Sept. 14, 2001, was the equivalent of a formal declaration of war. The Supreme Court held in 1800 (Bas v. Tingy), and again in 1801 (Talbot v. Seamen), that Congress could formally authorize war by joint resolution without passing a formal declaration of war; and in the post-U.N. Charter era no state has issued a formal declaration of war. Such declarations, in fact, have become as much an anachronism as the power of Congress to issue letters of marque and reprisal (outlawed by treaty in 1856). Formal declarations were historically only required when a state was initiating an aggressive war, which today is unlawful. -- FISA vs. the Constitution by ROBERT F. TURNER, co-founder of the Center for National Security Law at the University of Virginia School of Law, served as counsel to the President's Intelligence Oversight Board, 1982-84

Victory in Iraq will come only when the country "can sustain itself, govern itself and defend itself,".... -- President Bush

Nope,
The steel drums arent thick enough.
Attach some heavy-ass chains to a drum however:
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?i d=44065

Now, there may be other valid reasons for blocking access to Wikipedia, but the reliability and credibility one is, from my perspective, pretty stupid.

how many businesses do you know, outside the aviation industry, that receive regular funding from the government?

...during the winter, in the interior. Certainly in Iraq. Colder still in Afghanistan (which in fairness is not in the middle east, but it is the other current war.) It's a fair bet people are familiar with ice.

I, for one, would be interested in finding Al Gore's home phone number and leaking that.