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You don't abide by it, like the Weapons in Space, all of it's agreements with the U.N. including financial, it's agreements with individual powers such as Tibet.

You're wrong and that's why you think people who are right are meaningless, as far as the rest of the world is concerned the U.S. has no honour (how many undeclared wars does that make?)... They're just a thorn in the side, and their upcomming economic colapse can't come soon enough.

Excellent point. I just wanted to mention that Clinton had three assassination attempts in his first year. To quote the New York Times "Since Mr. Clinton moved to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, the White House has come under assault by a small plane that crashed under the President's bedroom last September and a deranged gunman who was recently convicted of trying to assassinate the President a month later when he fired shots that struck the building but did not injure anyone. In December, the mansion was struck by bullets fired from somewhere to the south, but investigators never determined if they were aimed at the White House." (link). He was the one who closed the road (see the congressional record here.
These kind of things don't make it into the mass media, you have to dig for them (it would upset people, after all.)

A big part of this debate has to do with many factors.

1) The general dislike for the current administration (whether applicable or not, it's still there).
2) The big question of whether national security trumps personal privacy.
3) How much personal privacy is given up in the interest of national security.
4) Just what information was gathered by the surveillance program.

The first issue we'll just not discuss, since it's really irrelevant in the overall discussion. Basically, if your decision to NOT allow this type of surveillance is based solely on the fact it's Bush in the Whitehouse, then you are being irrational.

Second, can national security trump personal privacy and if so, how much personal privacy? History shows that, in the United States, during times of war or national crisis, personal privacy gets trumped by national security for what was deemed at the time as being for the public good. For example, Bill Clinton issued an executive order on February 9, 1995 allowing the attorney general to conduct warrantless searches in the interest of national security. Likewise, during World War II, Franklin Roosevelt interned Japanese-Americans to prevent them from spying or otherwise being a nuisance.

Third and fourth, just how much is too much? Well, surveillance in this program was more interested in envelope information such as from where the call is coming from and where it is going to. Phone numbers, without any information attached to them, is basically public record. I could pick up my phone and make a call to a random number right now, that's public information.

Now, who you call is another story. Should the phone companies be tracking this information at all? Well, yes, they use it for billing. Who called who and for how long determines how much they charge you, or at the very least how much it costs them for you to make that phone call. They need this information to run their business. Now the question is, who does this information belong to? You? The telephone company? Well, both! You need this information, possibly, for your own personal information. However, as mentioned, the telco needs it for billing. Since you're using their services, they have the right to this information.

With that in mind, the telco has the right to use that information as they wish, no matter what any Terms of Service say, because you agree to their service and as part of that service, they need to gather said information in order to get you to pay for that service. So, in essence, the telco has every right to provide this information to the federal gov't if they want to (whether it's in their own best interest or not).

So now the question is, should the FCC investigate this activity? Well, technically they could, but the question is whether it's worth it. The question is whether the NSA broke any law under FISA (pointing back to the first link of Clinton's executive order) allows this type of surveillance. But that's not up to the FCC to decide, but for the court to decide. So, is the Congress suing the administration in order to obtain this information? Because that's the only way to properly obtain all the necessary information. Ask your congressman. Because I bet you the Democrats would lose that one in Federal court and they know it. Which is why they chose to argue this one in the court of public opinion.

If you think this is bad what about one of their own ....

A 62 year old researcher who reported missing vials and ended up getting reamed by the same sort of asshats. Here's a great link from the Federation of American Scientists. http://www.fas.org/butler/ The Butler case makes this look good. When are you folks gonna get off your asses and set it straight again ... at least minimize this bullshit.

This case is also old but the poor guy only recently got out of jail. Bankrupt, jobless and lost medical liscense. All over technicalities in paperwork and contract disputes (previously civil matters).

Here is a letter written by collegues that say all that he had done was SOP http://www.fas.org/butler/letter0305.pdf

If you think this is bad what about one of their own ....

A 62 year old researcher who reported missing vials and ended up getting reamed by the same sort of asshats. Here's a great link from the Federation of American Scientists. http://www.fas.org/butler/ The Butler case makes this look good. When are you folks gonna get off your asses and set it straight again ... at least minimize this bullshit.

This case is also old but the poor guy only recently got out of jail. Bankrupt, jobless and lost medical liscense. All over technicalities in paperwork and contract disputes (previously civil matters).

Here is a letter written by collegues that say all that he had done was SOP http://www.fas.org/butler/letter0305.pdf

There is also the little problem of the Fifth Amendment: "no person shall...be deprived of...property without due process of law". The government are depriving the EFF of their potential property (court damages) retroactively after their case has been filed by declaring the defendant immune from suit. I don't call that "due process of law".

Here is the bill that the Bush administration and telcos are demanding be passed. It retroactively bans any court from hearing any criminal or civil case (including those pending) against "any person" if the Attorney General (or anyone to whom he delegates such power) declares that the defendant's action "is, was, would be, or would have been intended to protect the United States from a terrorist attack".

This effectively gives the Executive the power to halt any court case.

1. Each State Party undertakes not to carry out any nuclear weapon test explosion or any other nuclear explosion, and to prohibit and prevent any such nuclear explosion at any place under its jurisdiction or control.

2. Each State Party undertakes, furthermore, to refrain from causing, encouraging, or in any way participating in the carrying out of any nuclear weapon test explosion or any other nuclear explosion.

This prevents any government department, agency, or quango using NPP (section 1), or any University or private corporation receiving government support (section 2), and the Non-Proliferation treaty would greatly restrict the ability of an NGO to provide the nuclear explosives, since these would be virtually indistinguishable from a large tactical nuclear weapon. Furthermore, the Partial Test Ban Treaty almost certainly forbids the use of NPP, also in article I, which states:

1. Each of the Parties to this Treaty undertakes to prohibit, to prevent, and not to carry out any nuclear weapon test explosion, or any other nuclear explosion, at any place under its jurisdiction or control: (a) in the atmosphere; beyond its limits, including outer space; or under water, including territorial waters or high seas; or
(b) in any other environment if such explosion causes radioactive debris to be present outside the territorial limits of the State under whose jurisdiction or control such explosion is conducted. < snip>

2. Each of the Parties to this Treaty undertakes furthermore to refrain from causing, encouraging, or in any way participating in, the carrying out of any nuclear weapon test explosion, or any other nuclear explosion, anywhere which would take place in any of the environments described, or have the effect referred to, in paragraph 1 of this Article.

The Apollo program has paid for itself at least a hundred times over, in direct economic benefits, by creating entire new industries, and spawning more new technology than you can imagine, much of which is used in every day life.

http://www.ethicalatheist.com/docs/benefits_of_space_program.html

http://www.thespaceplace.com/nasa/spinoffs.html

http://techtran.msfc.nasa.gov/at_home.html

http://www.fas.org/news/usa/2000/usa-001012.htm

http://www.look-to-the-skies.com/space_program_spinoffs.htm

http://www.cnn.com/HEALTH/9811/02/space.medical/index.html

And on and on and on.

As far as what is feasible to attack with what here is a nice diagram: http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/russia/bomber/range.gif

Only Florida is safe? It's a sick sick world.

I agree, Tu 160 does not have anything to do with that. Now TU-22M Backfire is a completely different matter. It was designed as an antifleet weapon, built as an antifleet weapon and is still considered by the USA to be the most dangerous antifleet weapon in the Russian arms inventory.

As far as what is feasible to attack with what here is a nice diagram: http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/russia/bomber/range.gif

As you can see most of USA is within range even without considering the use of cruise missiles.

Oh, so here you go and another.
This one does not talk about the design, but it is still the same.
The TU-160 was NOT designed for attacking our ships. It was designed for long range bombing missions, but capable of multi-missions. It was capable of attacking our ships by launching cruise missles, which could also be launched via the Mig 25, 29 or 31, at a fraction of the costs and risk. The tu-160 even to this day, is expected to be used for a nuclear run into America, though it normally loaded with regular ordnance.

Your previous posting shows that you have no clue about the timelines. You mixed up the fact that the F14 and aim-54 came along LONG before the tu-160. For that matter, when the tu-160 was designed the arctic was rarely open, so we had a minimal group up there. It was far cheaper to have planes and missles do the work. That will most likely change in the future. We will probably post a small group off Alaska as it can make it a fast run for China.

My suggestion; you should take your expertise elsewhere.

it'd be unwise to assume that nobody else has got one. (large phased-array radars)

There's been less progress in large phased-array radars than one might expect. One would think that air traffic control and weather radar installations would be using them by now, but no. They're still using rotating dishes. The Navy's AEGIS SPY-1 radar, a good phased array radar from the early 1980s, is still roughly the state of the art. There have been upgrades to the signal processing, but the transmitters are still vacuum-tube powered, with tubes for each cell of the phased array antenna. That's why the things cost so much.

This is one of the few vacuum tube applications left, and since nobody is doing R&D on tubes any more, there's not much progress. Semiconductors still don't quite have the power handling capacity for those multi-megawatt nanosecond pulses.

The US has had the Ground Based-Electro-Optical Deep Space Surveillance system since the early 1980s. GEODSS is an automated sky search telescope system. Multiple sites with multiple 40-inch telescopes search the sky automatically every night, looking for anything that isn't in the catalogues. GEODSS will even detect dark objects that occult stars. Everybody has automated astronomy now, but it started with GEODSS, around 1980.

GEODSS has an unusual feature for a telescope - illumination. The system can use one of the telescopes at a site to aim a laser light source, while the other telescope looks at the target with the imager. This allows a good look at low-orbit satellites.

The original test installation for GEODSS, at White Sands, NM, is now used by MIT to look for near-Earth objects. They've found 1622 so far. It wouldn't hurt to have more systems working on that problem. A French version of GEODSS would be a win for everyone.

No, the event is a B-52 landing with unauthorized nukes.

According to the FAS, the last time a bomber was loaded with nuclear weapons was over 15 years ago. The last time a bomber flew with nuclear weapons was nearly 40 years ago. So it would appear GP was correct, and you are not

Right, because a B-52 is state of the art.


Practically everything but the airframe and engines is new in those jets - and some systems on the B-52 are more modern than those on the B-1 and B-2 bombers.

There's a nice list and diagram on this page outlining some of the upgrades to keep the B-52 effective, despite its large radar cross section. If Congress ever lets Boeing upgrade the engines, (4xCFM-56, last time I heard) it'll be able to fly farther on less fuel and with less maintenance, too.

The B-52 is quite state of the art - nothing quite compares, except for maybe stuffing the latest computer hardware inside of an original IBM XT case.

The Chinese spy on us. We spy on them. While it's inane, expensive, and annoying, it will go on for a long time yet. Heck, the CIA spies on various European countries too...

They were also bragging about how amazing their navy is, veen if they only have about three subs left. In particular, the Akula class subs were designed especially to combat US Navy carrier groups in the Cold War. They are the quietest subs known, AFAIK, can dive extremely deeply, deeper than any other SSN, and they don't have to sneak up to sonar or visual range to attack carrier groups. What they do is close to missile range, and then fire the topredo tube launched SS-N-16 or SS-N-15 anti-ship cruise missiles. The missiles can be topped with anything from nucelar to toprpedo warheads.

If an Akula (or any other modern sub, since they all seem to be headed in that direction), were to launch an attack on a carrier, it would most likely launch a saturation attack against which the chances of succesful defense by point defense weapons like those of the Aegis destroyers or Phalanx gun decrease drastically.

Fortunately, back in reality, Russia and the USA are not likey to go to war any time soon. If Bush and Cheney do start (the third in 8 years) another conflict, it will be against Iran, which has some very good anti-aircraft missiles (Russian S-300 monsters) and some very powerful anti-ship missiles.

But all of this is just lunacy anyway. Haven't enough people died for vague and obscure reasons in recent years?

They were also bragging about how amazing their navy is, veen if they only have about three subs left. In particular, the Akula class subs were designed especially to combat US Navy carrier groups in the Cold War. They are the quietest subs known, AFAIK, can dive extremely deeply, deeper than any other SSN, and they don't have to sneak up to sonar or visual range to attack carrier groups. What they do is close to missile range, and then fire the topredo tube launched SS-N-16 or SS-N-15 anti-ship cruise missiles. The missiles can be topped with anything from nucelar to toprpedo warheads.

If an Akula (or any other modern sub, since they all seem to be headed in that direction), were to launch an attack on a carrier, it would most likely launch a saturation attack against which the chances of succesful defense by point defense weapons like those of the Aegis destroyers or Phalanx gun decrease drastically.

Fortunately, back in reality, Russia and the USA are not likey to go to war any time soon. If Bush and Cheney do start (the third in 8 years) another conflict, it will be against Iran, which has some very good anti-aircraft missiles (Russian S-300 monsters) and some very powerful anti-ship missiles.

But all of this is just lunacy anyway. Haven't enough people died for vague and obscure reasons in recent years?

Allow me to introduce you to a bit of oceanography. Read and understand.

• an explanation of the Deep water Sound Channel
• And if that doesn't help, this even has drawings to help you.

Go forth my young Padawan Learner and let the force educate you.

She can also run as fast as most nuclear boats for this time, so having a silent propeller is a major factor.

Err...quoth Wikipedia, "The AIP endurance of the 1,500 ton boats is around 14 days at five knots (9 km/h)"; the FAS Seawolf page reports a 20-knot silent speed, presumably with unlimited endurance.

New air-independent systems are definitely nifty and far more accessible, but still, nothing beats nuclear for subs.

One week before the Washington Times hyped the ONI report, the nominated commander of Pacific Command, Admiral Timothy J. Keating, testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee where he dismissed alarmist reports of recent gains in Chinese submarine development.

"If the reports are fairly accurate, they are well behind us technologically. We enjoy significant advantages across the spectrum of defensive and offensive systems, in particular undersea warfare," he said according to Taipei Times. In an interview with the paper, Keating added: "Should it become necessary for us to put our forces [in harm's way], the development of Chinese submarines are [sic] a concern to us, but it is hardly an insurmountable concern."

The implications of the low patrol rate are significant. The total operational experience for the entire Chinese submarine force is only 49 patrols in 25 years, corresponding to each submarine conducting an average of one patrol every third year.

As a result, Chinese submarine crews appear to have relatively little operational experience and consequently limited skills in operating their boats safely and competently. It suggests that the tactical skills that would be needed for the Chinese submarine force to operate effectively in a war may be limited.

China continues - at least for now - to use its submarine force as a coastal defense force.

One week before the Washington Times hyped the ONI report, the nominated commander of Pacific Command, Admiral Timothy J. Keating, testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee where he dismissed alarmist reports of recent gains in Chinese submarine development.

"If the reports are fairly accurate, they are well behind us technologically. We enjoy significant advantages across the spectrum of defensive and offensive systems, in particular undersea warfare," he said according to Taipei Times. In an interview with the paper, Keating added: "Should it become necessary for us to put our forces [in harm's way], the development of Chinese submarines are [sic] a concern to us, but it is hardly an insurmountable concern."

The implications of the low patrol rate are significant. The total operational experience for the entire Chinese submarine force is only 49 patrols in 25 years, corresponding to each submarine conducting an average of one patrol every third year.

As a result, Chinese submarine crews appear to have relatively little operational experience and consequently limited skills in operating their boats safely and competently. It suggests that the tactical skills that would be needed for the Chinese submarine force to operate effectively in a war may be limited.

China continues - at least for now - to use its submarine force as a coastal defense force.

One week before the Washington Times hyped the ONI report, the nominated commander of Pacific Command, Admiral Timothy J. Keating, testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee where he dismissed alarmist reports of recent gains in Chinese submarine development.

"If the reports are fairly accurate, they are well behind us technologically. We enjoy significant advantages across the spectrum of defensive and offensive systems, in particular undersea warfare," he said according to Taipei Times. In an interview with the paper, Keating added: "Should it become necessary for us to put our forces [in harm's way], the development of Chinese submarines are [sic] a concern to us, but it is hardly an insurmountable concern."

The implications of the low patrol rate are significant. The total operational experience for the entire Chinese submarine force is only 49 patrols in 25 years, corresponding to each submarine conducting an average of one patrol every third year.

As a result, Chinese submarine crews appear to have relatively little operational experience and consequently limited skills in operating their boats safely and competently. It suggests that the tactical skills that would be needed for the Chinese submarine force to operate effectively in a war may be limited.

China continues - at least for now - to use its submarine force as a coastal defense force.

One week before the Washington Times hyped the ONI report, the nominated commander of Pacific Command, Admiral Timothy J. Keating, testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee where he dismissed alarmist reports of recent gains in Chinese submarine development.

"If the reports are fairly accurate, they are well behind us technologically. We enjoy significant advantages across the spectrum of defensive and offensive systems, in particular undersea warfare," he said according to Taipei Times. In an interview with the paper, Keating added: "Should it become necessary for us to put our forces [in harm's way], the development of Chinese submarines are [sic] a concern to us, but it is hardly an insurmountable concern."

The implications of the low patrol rate are significant. The total operational experience for the entire Chinese submarine force is only 49 patrols in 25 years, corresponding to each submarine conducting an average of one patrol every third year.

As a result, Chinese submarine crews appear to have relatively little operational experience and consequently limited skills in operating their boats safely and competently. It suggests that the tactical skills that would be needed for the Chinese submarine force to operate effectively in a war may be limited.

China continues - at least for now - to use its submarine force as a coastal defense force.

Of course it doesn't. It's not about blackmail, it's about desperation. Desperate people do desperate things, like sell secrets. See: Aldrich Ames, John Walker, Joseph Helmich, et al. Greed plays a role, but desperation is typically the spark.

Also, just because these people don't have access to classified information doesn't mean they don't have access to sensitive information which could be leveraged to gain access to classified information. I think a background check is a perfectly reasonable measure for employees at any government facility, and in fact I think they would be remiss if they did not.

Ohhh, I don't know... Maybe this could offer up a few pointers.

> He-he http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/russia/icbm/rt-2pmu. htm

Then what? The free world defeated USSR in the cold war on technology. They couldn't match (neither specs, nor afford the money) our stealth planes, AWACS systems, super-sensitive sonar and super-quiet submarine propulsions, they couldn't even design or produce a fuel efficient hi-bypass turbofan aircraft engine until they stole one from a DC-10 during their 1979 afghan invasion and duly copied it, that later became the PS-90 engine. Guess what, even their dreaded Tu-95 Bear bomber runs on shaft turbines that were designed by a german engineer in a POW camp in the late 40s. Russian tanks are no match for the Abrams or the west german Leopard2, neither armour, nor accuracy of fire. Russian planes cannot match the electronic finesse of the F-22 Raptor which provides total human- and systems integration. They are cannon-fodder for the american AMRAAMS. In fact the modernized russian Sukhoi Su-27 planes fly on an electronic wire steering controlled by four american-made Intel 486DX33 CPUs. They are totally at our mercy!

If the russians put their hope in echelons of new Topol-M ICBM missiles, the USA will simply start to produce the H-bomb powered gamma-ray satellites, which were designed by late anti-communist hero Prof. Dr. Ede Teller during the SDI programme. The explosion of the miniature H-bomb inside a high-orbiting satellite excites specially shaped ferrite rods, which produce nano-second burts of intense gamma-laser beams, which destroy any incoming missile or warhead at the distance of several thousands of miles. Each such self-sacrificing single use satellite carries about 100 independently targetable ferrite rods, so a few of these can stop even a massive russkie attack at once, it literally evaporates the missiles alongside itself. On the ground nobody will be hurt, except the few who are looking at the sky directly, as their retinas will burn due to the satellite's atomic explosion flash.

The material and spiritual creative capacity of a forced labour country can never match that of free world, which heralds individual enterprise and enjoys the support of God and capital!

Putin is a loser! The USSR will never return, the west will not allow that!

He-he http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/russia/icbm/rt-2pmu. htm

President-VICE Richard B. Cheney WITH the help of YOUR CONGRESS will change the deficit into a surplus with gunrunning.

Remember: Be Patriotic:Fuck Bush

Actually, that's incorrect.

Many nations have equivalent parallel classification schemes, including using the terminology "top secret". Long-standing agreements between various nations allow sharing of information in the same categories.

See here and here for details.

If FTS is a contractor on terrorism investigations, it could very well be handling "top secret" data. The article refers to it as "top secret", but you're correct: it's not clear if "top secret" is merely being inappropriately applied here, or whether the information really could be technically "top secret".

It is (PowerPoint) quite routine for contractors to handle classified information in the US and UK.

There is no memo, but you did miss Executive Order 12958 (http://www.fas.org/sgp/clinton/eo12958.html) You may find Sec. 3.1 (c) informative. Libertarianism is abusive of liberty because it is equivalent to anarchy, and anarchy is abusive of liberty.

We will give ZERO food and money to ANY nation. We will simply take care of ourselves, and fuck the rest of you.

Most of the difficulties with starvation and poverty are caused by political problems. Giving food and money to places with these problems will only make them worse, for the most part. And incidentally, hasn't the US got a long and rich history of dicking with other nations politically, not for any noble cause, but in order to get 100% back on the dollar?

We will put every one of our troops on our border and shoot anyone trying to get in.

And how are you going to pay your mighty armies without foreign loans?

Just don't come crying and bitching to us when a giant wave floods your entire country or when lava buries your villages.

Yes, the whole world outside the US is only composed of extras from Ghandi: The Movie.

We (America) will pull every troop out of every nation we are operating in

Don't let the door hit you on the arse.

What a turkey.

A Phalanx weighs about 6 tons loaded. The system carries enough ammo for a few engagements. It's no problem to bring in a second truck for reloading. 20mm rounds weigh 100 g apiece, so a full ammo load (1500 rounds) is about 150 kg.

That's no worse than having to supply the fuel for a laser.

The original Predator UAV had auto return home on data link loss capability. And there have been upgrades since. So yes, it is a true robot.

Boeing recently demonstrated the ScanEagle, a smaller UAV able to lock onto and follow a truck autonomously. So autonomous operation is getting serious. The goal is to have more air vehicles than operators, with long-endurance UAVs cruising around looking for something to image or kill. Operators take over when things get interesting.

Incidentally, the ground control station for Predators runs X-Windows and Motif.

In addition, the pictures of the broken dams proved to be a morale boost to the Allies, especially to the British, still suffering under German bombing.

And of course, a major effect was to pursuade Harris to support Barnes Wallis's greatest contribution, the Tallboy and Grand Slam supersonic precision earth penetrators. These stopped the V2 and the V3, and sunk the Tirpitz, and well as the U-Boat pens at St Nazaire.

The Americans wished they had something like them, and are only now developing something similar for use against Iran.

In addition, the pictures of the broken dams proved to be a morale boost to the Allies, especially to the British, still suffering under German bombing.

And of course, a major effect was to pursuade Harris to support Barnes Wallis's greatest contribution, the Tallboy and Grand Slam supersonic precision earth penetrators. These stopped the V2 and the V3, and sunk the Tirpitz, and well as the U-Boat pens at St Nazaire.

The Americans wished they had something like them, and are only now developing something similar for use against Iran.

In addition, the pictures of the broken dams proved to be a morale boost to the Allies, especially to the British, still suffering under German bombing.

And of course, a major effect was to pursuade Harris to support Barnes Wallis's greatest contribution, the Tallboy and Grand Slam supersonic precision earth penetrators. These stopped the V2 and the V3, and sunk the Tirpitz, and well as the U-Boat pens at St Nazaire.

The Americans wished they had something like them, and are only now developing something similar for use against Iran.

Guh... I mostly agree with you, but Jesus titty-fucking Christ...

blockquote>We did not go to war with any nation under President Clinton. http://www.fas.org/irp///////congress/1998_cr/h981 005-iraq.htm

Read that. It's a declaration of war. In 1998. Against Iraq... Seriously. Am I the only one who remembers that we were technically at war from 1991-2003 (Resolution 687 was not an armistice, it was a cease fire!)

As law states now, that is not the case:

Subsection C of Section 1.2 of Executive Order 12958

(c) Classified information shall not be declassified automatically as a result of any unauthorized disclosure of identical or similar information.

Still stands. Has not been stricken.

So, unfortunately, the transcripts are still classified information. It is however still evidence and subject to evidenciary procedure. Meaning it is logged and viable as evidence exhibition; although by what I can tell testimony can only be offered on the subjects' memory of the exhibit as it is now being held in a secure information vault by court order.

This does not mean that the issue is dropped and can be covered up. If the transcript cannot be pulled back up for judicial review, if it disappears, the court CAN and WILL prosecute the officers responsible. That will be brought to the public eye.

And for those of you thinking that particular law keeping this transcript confidential is one of Bush's ideas, it wasn't, it was Clinton's. That particular subsection was not present before Clinton put it there ;)

Or we could, I don't know, just use the friggin official definition of what makes an agent covert... but it seems to me you'd rather substitute your own Hollywood-inspired fantasies for that.

Well - turns out the article is WRONG -
Here is what the language of the act SAYS!
(4) The term "covert agent" means

  (A) a present or retired officer or employee of an intelligence agency or a present or retired member of the Armed Forces assigned to duty with an intelligence agency
  (i) whose identity as such an officer, employee, or member is classified information, and
  (ii) who is serving outside the United States or has within the last five years served outside the United States;

Note the part that says she has to serve outside the US within the last 5 years? Well - guess what - the release occurred after that 5 year window.

SO - I stand by the "SPIN" I'm accused of, i.e. NO SPIN but FACT.

The act I'm referencing is here:

http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/laws/iipa.html

A nuke in the upper atmosphere?
Holey Rusted Metal, Batman! That's the worst idea I've heard all week. And I've heard some doozies. Here.

I do not understand what nutcase modded this Troll.

It is somewhat confused about a few details, but it is mostly just a restatement of well-known (and well-known-for-a-long-time) facts.

That said, let me add a few clarifications:

My understanding is that the CIA is releasing information as a public relations gesture.

The CIA collects information when and where they think it is useful for them. They release information when and where they think it is useful for them. This does not distinguish the CIA from any other person, group, corporation, or other identifiable entity (government or otherwise). In particular it does not distinguish them from you or anybody you know.

In the case of the CIA, "collecting information" is their job description. Consequently they are happy to err on the side of collecting and storing too much too early too eagerly since, after all, that's their taxpayer-funded mandate. "Disseminating information" is NOT in their job description and thus they do not go out of their way to hand it to every passer-by on the street.

There are many agencies with names and purposes you are not allowed to know.

You've read too many spy novels. The US (and most other governments) has learned long ago that the easiest way to hide something is in plain view. Yes, there's several dozen intelligence agencies in the US. But there's no point in (trying to) make their existence a secret. Why should anybody try? As long as the operations are classified, why create more black holes for crackpots to spin conspiracy theories around?

Googling "intelligence agency" right now yields a plethora of links, for example this one (the current number three for me) which lists dozens of them. Does it help you to know that there is an "Office for Intelligence" tucked away in the Energy Department? No. Do you know what they're doing that they're not talking about on their webpage? No. Do you care? No, because you're obsessing over "secret agencies" that you imagine you don't even know the identity of.

It turns out that a lot of the Security breaches at Los Alamos in the past were mistakes of the FBI. Due to a database reporting error, they "lost" documents that didn't exist, and still others were recovered inside the area.

So the "Los Alamos security breach" stories got big headlines and the "FBI screws up" got little headlines. Maybe there is a pattern there. As the newly privatized single-source nuclear weapons manufacturing company for the USA had a walk-out of 500 security guards over 36-hour work shifts and poor security protocols that didn't make headlines.

I think there is a dangerous move to privatize a lot of key military functions. And the FBI seems to bring up a lot of accusations before verifying the actual security risk.

Couple this with their seeming lack of interest in securing laptops and databases of American citizens. The rates is about a few million records a month. No biggie if some third party has your SSN right? The government can't have a Total Information Awareness database, but it appears that a private company can. Check out what John Poindexter (Iran/Contra felon) is still up to these days. Who knew he was such a great database expert?

Los Alamos is now privatized, and the good old "employee takes laptop with sensitive files and gets it stolen" oops is happening at rapid pace. Anyone want to be whether THAT particular employee gets reprimanded? My bet they will get a promotion. As does everyone who seems to fail upwards in this current administration.
http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/2007/05/los_alamos _blocks_researcher_a_1.html

I know it's slightly offtopic, but I always wonder why a highly speculative and fragile concept like the space elevator which is barely theoretically possible is getting so much press, while space guns, which are cheaper, more robust and don't require any new technology, are practically ignored.

In case you're not familiar with the concept: It's basically about accelerating a small vessel (by a light gas gun, a RAM accelerator, electromagnetically or a combination thereof) in a relatively short (about the order of one km) barrel / tunnel to about orbital speed. The vessel itself will only require enough fuel for circularizing its orbit, so unlike conventional boosters, a much bigger part of its mass can be actual payload as the exponential regime of the rocket equation can be mostly avoided.

While the capital costs will be high, a space gun is still dirt cheap compared to a space elevator, and isn't prone to be completely destroyed when hit by lightning, space debris or, for the matter, a shotgun.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_gun
http://www.fas.org/news/iraq/1998/05/980500-bull.h tm
http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/julncher.htm

Don't for a minute believe that the Canadian government necessarily knows what is going on. Chances are that they don't, even though these things are taking place in their own country.

20 years ago I would have thought such claims to be paranoid conspiracies. I remember rumours about the existence of ECHELON, and strenuous denials of its existence from my own government (the government of New Zealand) and other involved governments. Then, five or six years ago, the Australians admitted it existed, and that is now an established fact.

So, shouldn't members of the New Zealand governments of the 1970s-80s be held responsible for misleading the public? You would think so, since they built an ECHELON station at Waihopai in New Zealand (I remember lefties at the time correctly identifying its purpose, and being mocked for their troubles).

In fact, the New Zealand government of the time was blameless, because THEY didn't even know. That's right. The New Zealand government allowed a satellite tracking station to be built in our country, and had no idea that it was part of ECHELON. David Lange, the Prime Minister at the time later expressed his disgust when the truth came out (in a book he wrote the forward to). You can read it here

http://www.fas.org/irp/eprint/sp/sp_f1.htm

So Canadians should be worried. There's a reasonable chance that the Canadian government is being kept in the dark.

While that is true, everyone except Canadians assumes they are just an informal 51st state.

OTOH, if I were France and had behaved like they have the last 60 years, then I'd be paranoid too. http://fas.org/irp/offdocs/nsam-lbj/nsam-336.htm
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2005/03/27/wfran27.xml
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/htmlContent.jhtml?html= /archive/1998/05/28/wjup28.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osirak
http://beta.morons.org/tally-ho/article/read/11

There's plenty of stupidity in the USA too. http://www.slate.com/id/2077874/

I recall being told never to trust the shredders in French hotel rooms: they may have a scanner. Can't find that online, though.