Slashdot Mirror

Taliban Seeks Vengeance in Wake of WikiLeaks

After WikiLeaks published a trove of U.S. intelligence documents—some of which listed the names and villages of Afghans who had been secretly cooperating with the American military—it didn’t take long for the Taliban to react. A spokesman for the group quickly threatened to “punish” any Afghan listed as having “collaborated” with the U.S. and the Kabul authorities against the growing Taliban insurgency. In recent days, the Taliban has demonstrated how seriously those threats should be considered. Late last week, just four days after the documents were published, death threats began arriving at the homes of key tribal elders in southern Afghanistan. And over the weekend one tribal elder, Khalifa Abdullah, who the Taliban believed had been in close contact with the Americans, was taken from his home in Monar village, in Kandahar province’s embattled Arghandab district, and executed by insurgent gunmen.

It might be handy to have some surviving informants among the Taliban since...
Suspect in Times Square bombing attempt was paid by Pakistani Taliban, indictment says

I couldn't get private insurance because I had a pre-exisiting condition.

At the time, the state program in Oregon was full and only accepting pregnant women, COBRA was 845 dollars a month and private insurers turned me down for pre-exsisting conditions.

The pre-exsisting condition listed as the cause for denial was that I had a prescription for a generic anti-siezure I needed for migraines.

I don't agree with the Obamacare plan is the best approach, the Swiss model and Japanese are much better, but the United States needs to join the rest of the industrialized world and fix it's healthcare system and close the gap on the uninsured.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=92106731

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/06/AR2009090601630.html

Jonathan Shapiro, a Fairfax defense attorney who first met Hudson when the two attended law school at American University, called him "gracious" and "professional," although he said he's always found Hudson to be a conservative thinker who tends to side with the government against criminal defendants.

In a 1983 Washington Post profile of Hudson, Shapiro recalled that he and Hudson were enrolled in a class called "Legal Problems of the Poor."

"I got the impression he thought it was supposed to be 'Giving Legal Problems to the Poor,' " Shapiro said then.

Shapiro remembers the quote now with a laugh. Hudson never seemed to hold the quip against him, he said.

See, he doesn't always rule against the government.

We don't have to wonder, since the SecDef has said that no US soldiers, missions, or security were harmed or jeapordized by the Wikileaks releases.

Not quite. Secretary of Defense Gates said that the release of the stolen classified documents by Wikileaks is "likely to cause significant harm or damage to national security interests of the United States".

Washington (CNN) -- The online leak of thousands of secret military documents from the war in Afghanistan by the website WikiLeaks did not disclose any sensitive intelligence sources or methods, the Department of Defense concluded.

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said there is still concern Afghans named in the published documents could be retaliated against by the Taliban, though a NATO official said there has been no indication that this has happened. (Re: NATO comment, see below. -CF) " We assess this risk as likely to cause significant harm or damage to national security interests of the United States and are examining mitigation options," Gates wrote in the letter. "We are working closely with our allies to determine what risks our mission partners may face as a result of the disclosure."...

Over the summer, the Pentagon created a team of more than 100 personnel made up of mostly intelligence analysts from various branches of the Defense Department as well as the FBI, who were involved in the round-the-clock review. Gates: Leaked documents don't reveal key intel, but risks remain

The phrase, "sensitive intelligence sources or methods" is primarily referring to satellites & signal intelligence. Allies and informants, key resources when fighting a counter-insurgency, have been put at risk by being named.

“My attitude on this is that there are two areas of culpability,” Gates said on ABC’s This Week. “One is legal culpability. And that's up to the Justice Department and others -- that's not my arena.

“But there's also a moral culpability,” he added. “And that's where I think the verdict is guilty on WikiLeaks. They have put this out without any regard whatsoever for the consequences.”

Those consequences could be the loss of innocent lives, Gates said, and not just those of American troops.

“If I'm angry, it is because I believe that this information puts those in Afghanistan who have helped us at risk. It puts our soldiers at risk because they can learn a lot -- our adversaries can learn a lot about our techniques, tactics and procedures from the body of these leaked documents,” the secretary said.

Gates said that having an intelligence background, he knows that “protecting your sources is sacrosanct.” He noted that “there was no sense of responsibility or accountability” associated with the leak of information. WikiLeaks Guilty on Moral Grounds, Gates Says

With apologies to an unnamed NATO official (what sort of job did he have?) the Taliban are starting to hunt down people. (The Taliban have assembled a group to examine the Wikileaks documents.)

After WikiLeaks published a trove of U.S. intelligence documents—some of which listed the names and villages of Afghans who had been secretly cooperating with the American military—it didn’t take long for the Taliban to react. A spokesman for the group quickly threatened to “punish” any Afghan listed as having “collaborated” with the U.S. and the Kabul authorities against the growing Taliban insurgency. In recent days, the Taliban has demonstrated

Hmmmm... The Washington Post article said Mach 5. In fact, it seemed more informative in general. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/10/AR2010121007437.html

While the defense budget is no doubt way out of control, this is not at all the sort of thing that worries me. It has no practical military value in the near term, and at least produced interesting results.

I'm more concerned about other high-tech anti-personel weapons or robots, that will inevitably be pointed at people, possible even at our own citizens before long.

Speaking of waste, and far more disturbing at that, take a look at what the anti-terrorism efforts have spawned. I really had no idea of the scale of it. Having this turned against our own citizens as the fascism ramps up is truly frightening.

How about the World Health Organization saying that climate change "is estimated to contribute to more than 150,000 deaths" each year?

More excuses?

Because it's a moral and logical certainty that all the interests of the USA are precisely the same as those of the entire world, and that any "opposing faction" using intelligence against the USA is, by definition, evil?

The "entire world" includes the Taliban and Al Qaeda. When Wikileaks released the names of Afghans who were working with the US against the Taliban, it made them targets. The Taliban formed groups to scour the documents for names and places. When the informants are killed or moved, they can no longer help in the battle against the terrorists of Al Qaeda and the Taliban. That isn't a good thing, especially as the Taliban are extending their reach to attacks in the US, India, possibly Europe, and other places. Now, if you have a plan to inform everybody in the world except the Taliban, Al Qaeda, and their associates, about the names of informants against them, critical sensitive targets, etc., I'm sure a lot of people would love to hear it.

WikiLeaks Reportedly Outs 100s of Afghan Informants

Hundreds of Afghan civilians who worked as informants for the U.S. military have been put at risk by WikiLeaks' publication of more than 90,000 classified intelligence reports which name and in many cases locate the individuals, The Times newspaper reported Wednesday.

The article says, in spite of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange's claim that sensitive information had been removed from the leaked documents, that reporters scanning the reports for just a couple hours found hundreds of Afghan names mentioned as aiding the U.S.-led war effort.

One specific example cited by the paper is a report on an interview conducted by military officers of a potential Taliban defector. The militant is named, along with his father and the village in which they live.

"The leaks certainly have put in real risk and danger the lives and integrity of many Afghans," a senior official at the Afghan foreign ministry told The Times on condition of anonymity. "The U.S. is both morally and legally responsible for any harm that the leaks might cause to the individuals, particularly those who have been named. It will further limit the U.S./international access to the uncensored views of Afghans."

One former intelligence official told the paper that the Taliban could launch revenge attacks on "traitors" in the coming days.

Suspect in Times Square bombing attempt was paid by Pakistani Taliban, indictment says

KUNG-FU TERRORISTS TO TARGET WEMBLEY

Now, if you don't think terrorists planning to crash an airplane into a stadium full of people is evil, I think there is something wrong with you.

The Washington Post ran a series of articles on it a few months ago. See the project on their website for more info.

No such thing was "determined", in either case - only questions raised about the solidity of the evidence.

In fact, the 1996 claim is now more solid than ever, and the 2010 claims are far from disproved at this time, only questioned.

Naturally your own creditbility suffers no such doubt.

Considering that they only released a tiny fraction of the cables, and those were redacted by professional journalists from several major newspapers, I don't think there's anything in there that would even remotely qualify it under that description

Not quite.
WikiLeaks Reportedly Outs 100s of Afghan Informants

Hundreds of Afghan civilians who worked as informants for the U.S. military have been put at risk by WikiLeaks' publication of more than 90,000 classified intelligence reports which name and in many cases locate the individuals, The Times newspaper reported Wednesday.

The article says, in spite of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange's claim that sensitive information had been removed from the leaked documents, that reporters scanning the reports for just a couple hours found hundreds of Afghan names mentioned as aiding the U.S.-led war effort.

One specific example cited by the paper is a report on an interview conducted by military officers of a potential Taliban defector. The militant is named, along with his father and the village in which they live.

"The leaks certainly have put in real risk and danger the lives and integrity of many Afghans," a senior official at the Afghan foreign ministry told The Times on condition of anonymity. "The U.S. is both morally and legally responsible for any harm that the leaks might cause to the individuals, particularly those who have been named. It will further limit the U.S./international access to the uncensored views of Afghans."

One former intelligence official told the paper that the Taliban could launch revenge attacks on "traitors" in the coming days.

Blood Already on Assange's Hands (and the WikiLeaks-Gitmo Connection)

It is especially interesting that Wikileaks has endangered informants against the Taliban since the Taliban are reaching into the United States to train terrorists and fund attacks:
Suspect in Times Square bombing attempt was paid by Pakistani Taliban, indictment says

Wow, it's so annoying to hear Obama-teleprompter jokes. Especially since they're from formerly disinterested morons who never realized that all politicians use them for speeches anyway. "But-but-he stutters and sounds like an idiot without one!" Remember the Presidential debates where he kicked the crap out of McCain 3-0 without one, or the open questions session with the House Republicans where he made the whole caucus look like buffoons (enough so that they publicly wished they hadn't done it)? After listening to polished PR-approved answers that provide no insight, I at least appreciate a President who tries to answer questions however much I might disagree with him.

According to the Washington Post, it's all due Mastercard no longer permitting donations via their services to Wikileaks.

However, I doubt the DDOS is going to change their mind.

We're not getting any orders via Mastercard from our payment processor any more. I'm pretty sure some loss of profit and bad publicity might at least prove a point - or at least make an impact to those who are ignoring the Wikileaks story.

According to the Washington Post, it's all due Mastercard no longer permitting donations via their services to Wikileaks.

However, I doubt the DDOS is going to change their mind.

'The risk of a terrorist attack is so infinitesimal and its impact so relatively insignificant that it doesn't make rational sense to accept the suspension of liberty for the sake of avoiding a statistical anomaly.

Your fancy statistics and rational thought got no place in American politics and national policy. Not these days anyway. Right now Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin are more popular than Stephen Hawking and James Watson. Good luck preaching about statistics to the populace that is justifying these privacy violations with fear!

'The risk of a terrorist attack is so infinitesimal and its impact so relatively insignificant that it doesn't make rational sense to accept the suspension of liberty for the sake of avoiding a statistical anomaly.

Your fancy statistics and rational thought got no place in American politics and national policy. Not these days anyway. Right now Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin are more popular than Stephen Hawking and James Watson. Good luck preaching about statistics to the populace that is justifying these privacy violations with fear!

Please excuse the karma whoring. Just noticed that Steven Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists said the same in these words:

"A more discriminating approach to classifying information would yield a smaller volume of information requiring protection, making it easier to protect"

I agree that supporting Wikileaks in any capacity right now is one of the more dangerous things we can do. I have made small donations, so I'm probably under the Witch Hunt radar for now, but I really wonder how surprised I would be to have Feds knocking on my door over the holidays. The US government has acted more like North Korea than I ever would have expected and I think it has taken many by surprise. This just means that the US government will do some serious damage before the people en masse get a clue and try to stop it.

The one thing that I hope comes from all of this damage is that the US government and military stop abusing their ability to classify information.

When the US government acted like this to black people, or communists, or white supremacists, or muslims, nobody paid any attention because it wasn't happening to them.

Now you see how ruthless the government is because their attention is directed toward you. The way to deal with government is to always stay on their good side.

The less attention they have on you generally the better off you are. When you associate with certain networks of people they don't like, even if you just donate a dollar, you'll be put on the radar and it's impossible to get off once you get put on it.

Depending on how smart you are, what your capabilities are, and how close you are to who they want, they'll use unlimited resources to threaten you to make you an informant. If you disagree and refuse to inform on your brother, they'll charge you with some crime like possession of child pornography, possession of drugs, a sex crime, they'll find something to convict you with just to have something to put you under their total control.

Once you are behind bars they'll have their informants leak out how you are a snitch, informant, child molesting pedophile, and leave you to fend for yourself against prison Nazi's and street thugs who hate your kind. You think I'm lying? Look at this

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/04/AR2010120403710.html

Interestingly, it's not quite that simple. This is a very interesting article by a defense attorney who was preparing to defend a similar case involving people passing secrets to Israel. If you're the person with approved access to secrets, and you violate that trust then you're going down. But, if you never promised to keep it secret and just received the information, the only law we have is the 1917 Espionage Act. That law bans '"willfully" disclosing "information relating to the national defense."'

So, was it willful? Wikileaks wrote to the US government multiple times offering to do any necessary redactions (ie, to minimize harm), but the US government refused to cooperate. Does that mean they "willfully" harmed the national defense? I would say no, since the US government offers that sort of cooperation to other organizations like the New York Times fairly often, and no one tries to jail the Times writers.

Is it Wikileaks' fault that the US government blew off their offer?

DIA still seems to employ them. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/26/AR2010112605017.html

But now researchers have uncovered a bacterium that has five of those essential elements but has, in effect, replaced phosphorus with its look-alike but toxic cousin, arsenic.

News of the discovery caused a scientific commotion, including calls to NASA from the White House and Congress asking if a second line of Earthly life has been found.

A NASA press conference Thursday and an accompanying article in the journal Science, gave the answer: No, the discovery does not prove the existence of a so-called "second genesis" on Earth. But the discovery very much opens the door to that possibility, and to the related existence of a theorized "shadow biosphere" on Earth--life evolved from a different common ancestor than all that we've known so far.

this one can: brazilian clown

But there are those that are in power (already elected) who feel the same way. Rep. Pete King (R-N.Y.), the incoming chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee wants to classify wikileaks as a terrorist organization.. I believe that this would make contributing money a federal felony. In addition, the Interpol connection has been ratcheted up. Assange is now on the most wanted list.

It's not just Sarah Palin, there are those in power that are clearly using their power on this matter. Kind of scary, actually. (Though not surprising, considering what Assange is doing).

Sure it is. Some of it, anyhow. Like this stuff - all effectively private, and IMO much worse that these classified cables

Remember, they govern . Even in the US. This is the real world face of the "consent of the governed".

I understand we have ideals that might state differently, but these people don't work for you or me, they work for institutions and bureaucracy.

The Anderson/Bear folks posted this a couple of places, and it was picked up a few other places. Here is the text of the most recent substantial message I sent them on the topic: http://cand.pglaf.org/bear-response.txt . The group has not provided the author/title (or PG eBook number) of any title they think was wrongly determined to be non-renewed, other than those mentioned in the email. They seem to have some theories about what is eligible for renewal, or who can renew, but these are not contested by Project Gutenberg (in fact, our policy is to NOT to question whether renewals were fully compliant with the law, nor whether a person had the correct standing to renew).

The issue is whether a renewal was made. For The Escape, part 1 was republished with a different title, complete with part 2. Part 1 was not individually renewed, but the newly titled complete work was. We were unaware of the subsequent retitled republication, so did not find the renewal. For the purposes of copyright and renewal, a major outcome of the legal advice we received concerning The Escape is that serialized works are treated as single acts of authorship. Thus, renewal of a part may be considered to apply to the whole -- provided it happens within a reasonable timespan (we have been advised to use +/- four years).

The Project Gutenberg Copyright How-To has details on our procedures, although the Rule 6 how-to there (for non-renewals) is older than the version we used for the original Anderson/Escape non-renewal determination. We are working on a revision that will include additional research for serials, and a few other variations like republication with different titles. The how-to is here: www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Gutenberg:Copyright_How-To

For those who aren't aware, Project Gutenberg is classified in the US as a 501(c)(3) charity, as a library. With over 35,000 published titles, and well over 50,000 unique instances of copyright research (thousands for our Rule 6), it's not surprising that we make occasional errors. To date (I've been doing this aspect of volunteer work for Project Gutenberg since around 1999), we've changed our stance on fewer than 1/2 dozen public domain determinations. Not perfect, but I believe we're doing a good job overall, and have some very solid procedures by copyright experts over the years.

I first initiated our Rule 6 nearly 10 years ago. This was because I saw that of all the books and serials published in the US from 1923-1963 (when renewal was required for copyright to still apply), 85--90% were never renewed. The US Library of Congress does annual reports on this. Statistically, that means there a million or so items from 1923-1964 whose copyright expired after a 28-year term. These items have been in the public domain in the US since 1992 or earlier (1964+28), and many are out of print. As a policy decision, Project Gutenberg decided it was worth the risk of occasionally missing a renewal, to be able to affirmatively identify the many items for which no renewal occurred. I still believe this decision was the right one.

For those who are paying attention to Project Gutenberg news today, there was a story in the Washington Post that, more or less, accused Amazon of abusing their customers by selling public domain Project Gutenberg works, with DRM added, for a fee. The article is here: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/fasterforward/2010/11/amazon_charges_kindle_users_fo.html . (I exchanged several emails with the author.) It's a weird coincidence that within the same 24 hour period there is another story that basically accuses Project Gutenberg of stealing.

Enough for now. I'm going back to reading Marusek's "Mind over Ship" (sequel to the excellent "Counting Heads"), one of the hundreds of printed books I purchase every year. Maybe before I shut down for the evening I'll post Doctorow's "Makers"

For example, embarrassing Iran and damaging US-Iranian relations

Ah, it was Wikileaks that damaged that special US-Iran relationship? And here I was thinking that calling Iran part of an "axis of evil" and designating their troops as "terrorists", and enforcing years of sanctions was what did it.

A government is not the same as a voting system. When a government tells it's people that it has to have secrets, and it has to lie to them, and that this is all for their own good, do you believe them? Would you believe it of the Chinese government? Or the Russians? Or Italian? Or any government, anywhere?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_the_European_Union
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_GDP

GDP of the EU is $33,052
GDP of the US is $46,442

Or is 33,000 higher than 46,000 now?

As to American Exceptionalism, it is the idea that the United States is unique and different, not that everything we do is better and we as a nation are always right.

For example, in 1974 when political rivals and the courts finally drove Nixon out of office, something that in many nations would have lead to outright revolution how many guns were in sight? Just those on the traffic cops.

The only people I've ever seen claim that American Exceptionalism is "we are better" are Howard Zinn and Chomsky, and sorry but Zinn and Chomsky don't get to decide what is and what isn't.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/style/longterm/books/chap1/americanexceptionalism.htm

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2010/11/why-american-exceptionalism-rules/67118/

Can't help but notice that you didn't include any actual citations. If you're going to bother quoting, then the least you could do is provide links.

You should be able to verify any of these quotes easily. This is a slashdot comment, not an academic paper. But just so everyone knows what I said is accurate:

At its launch, WikiLeaks said it was "founded by Chinese dissidents, journalists, mathematicians and start-up company technologists, from the US, Taiwan, Europe, Australia and South Africa", and that its "primary interest is in exposing oppressive regimes in Asia, the former Soviet bloc, Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East". - Source

Steven Aftergood, a veteran crusader against excessive government secrecy and director of the Federation of American Scientists' Project on Government Secrecy, notes, "WikiLeaks must be counted among the enemies of open society because it does not respect the rule of law nor does it honor the rights of individuals." - Source

And no, their efforts haven't just focused on the US because of the volume of materials involved. I don't care what has or hasn't been pulled from the web; the point is that the focus of WikiLeaks' efforts have changed to target primarily the US, instead of "oppressive regimes in Asia, the former Soviet bloc, Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East". Julian Assange's single-minded crusade against the US has caused rifts within WikiLeaks itself:

Despite latest coup, WikiLeaks facing challenges, Washington Post

Indeed, as WikiLeaks is trumpeting its latest coup, a number of former WikiLeaks activists are painting another picture of an organization that is out of control, still too driven by the personality and ego of its mercurial founder, Julian Assange.

"I'm too busy ending two wars," is the response one reporter got in an e-mail from Assange after asking for clarity on an issue, according to a source who saw the e-mail, and thought it captured Assange's crusading and peremptory nature.

[...]

But the phenomenal rise of WikiLeaks over the past six months has come at a price, former activists say. At least five people from the core group have left because of disagreements over the way Assange was running the operation, said Herbert Snorrason, a 25-year-old Icelandic activist who moderated a WikiLeaks chat room until about a month ago. "Quite a few others" who were more tangentially involved have also left, he said.

He said too many editorial decisions were being made solely by Assange, including to title the Baghdad video Collateral Murder, a move that suggested to some that WikiLeaks is not neutral. "It had unnecessary effects on how the project was perceived," he said.

Former colleagues questioned the focus on high-profile disclosures such as the Afghanistan records, which, they said, not only meant smaller projects languished but that the rushed staff was ill-prepared to vet so many records to ensure that names of civilians had been redacted.

WikiLeaks Founder on the Run, Trailed by Notoriety, New York Times

Mr. Assange’s detractors also accuse him of pursuing a vendetta against the United States. In London, Mr. Assange said America was an increasingly militarized society and a threat to democracy.

[...]

In an encrypted online chat, a transcript of which was passed to The Times, Mr. Assange was dismissive of his colleagues. He described them as “a confederacy of fools,” and asked his interlocutor, “Am I dealing with a complete retard?”

"I am the heart and soul of this organisation, its founde

Wikileaks was the conduit to the papers for the leaked information from the leaker, gay activist Private First Class Bradley Manning who smuggled it out on a CD labeled as Lady Gaga music.

You're being evasive in a tedious manner.

Take your head out of your anus.

Fine advice. You should heed it.

Getting rid of less than half of the defense budget would be sufficient to balance the budget, at least going on the numbers shown here: Robert J. Samuelson - Our burgeoning budget and the politics of avoidance.

It'd be good to get some up to date numbers, but if it is tracking the numbers there it's certainly something that I would expect true deficit hawks would be looking at.

It's quite absurd for you to call Iran dangerous; they haven't been at war for years.

You're joking right?

Longstanding Support for Terrorism

U.S. officials describe the Iranian regime as the world's "central banker of terrorism." Indeed, Tehran has a nine-figure line item in its budget to support terrorism, sending hundreds of millions of dollars to various groups each year; the payments to Hizballah alone are as much as $200 million annually. According to Canadian intelligence, "[I]n February 1999, it was reported that Palestinian police discovered documents that attest to the transfer of $35 million to Hamas from the Iranian Intelligence Service (MOIS), money reportedly meant to finance terrorist activities against Israeli targets." Illustrating how such support is part of official government policy, from 2001 to 2006, Iran transferred $50 million to Hizballah fronts in Lebanon by sending funds from its central bank through Bank Saderat's London subsidiary.

Iranian support for terrorism goes well beyond the financial realm, however. Its well-known sponsorship of Palestinian terrorist organizations, for example, has included training and related contributions. Shortly after the second intifada erupted in September 2000, the regime assigned Mughniyeh himself to help Palestinian militant groups. According to a former Clinton administration official, "Mughniyeh got orders from Tehran to work with Hamas"; he was tasked with assisting PIJ as well.

Similarly, according to the U.S. government, Iran's al-Qods Force -- a wing of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) -- has a "long history" of providing all types of support to Hizballah, including training, guidance, and arms. In addition to running training camps in Lebanon, al-Qods has trained more than 3,000 Hizballah operatives at its own facilities in Iran. The unit also played an important role in rearming Hizballah following the summer 2006 war with Israel. According to the Treasury Department, al-Qods has provided a wide variety of weapons and financial support to the Taliban as well, in support of the group's anti-coalition activity in Afghanistan.

Iran also keeps threatening to cut off the world's oil supply by closing the Straight of Hormuz.

Of course they are concerned that the US may invade since Iran has wealth to extract and won't play along with the US, so they're developing nuclear weapons.

That's a laugh. The US gets the oil it needs from other countries while Japan, China, and other US allies and friends buy Iran's oil. That also doesn't take into account the large oil reserves that the US has that are undeveloped.

No, the Iranian's have a very different outlook.
Ahmadinejad: Destroy Israel, End Crisis
Iran's missiles are ‘ready to destroy Israel’

“If this [an Israeli attack] happens, which, of course, we do not foresee, its ultimate result would be to expedite the last breath of the Zionist regime,” Ahmad Vahidi, the Iranian Defence Minister, said on state television.

Iran says can cut energy to Europe, hit enemies

“Iran is standing on 50 percent of the world’s energy and should it so decide Europe will have to spend the winter in cold,” Hossein Salami, deputy commander of the elite Revolutionary Guards, said in a meeting with war veterans and volunteers in Ker

Even if there was an alternative to the current DNS system of lookups, who says that we'd even be "allowed" to use it? There are already accusations of alternative DNS blocking by ISPs.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/03/AR2007050302138.html

http://www.usatoday.com/news/military/2010-11-17-banner17_ST_N.htm

http://www.politicsdaily.com/2010/11/19/bush-library-may-show-mission-accomplished-banner-from-2003-ir/

http://articles.cnn.com/2003-10-28/politics/mission.accomplished_1_aircraft-carrier-conrad-chun-banner?_s=PM:ALLPOLITICS

http://www.floppingaces.net/2008/05/01/who-was-responsible-for-the-mission-accomplished-banner/

You will note that Rumsfeld has admitted the banner was made by White House staff, and reflected wording from Bush's speech. Bush's production manager flew out to the ship five days earlier, checking every detail for his boss's triumphant deck-swagger in a flight suit. Being the commander in chief, if Bush told the Navy "Take the rap for me on this," they had no choice but to say, "Yeah, we asked for the banner."

And you openly display your pride in the man. Unbelievable.

Oh, it's unlikely that these leaks will much damage the U.S. Leaks of these types of mid level bureaucratic decision making processes were inevitable as soon as the federal government (and foreign governments) standardized on Microsoft Windows, and the accompanying plague of Windows-only viruses, trojans, botnets and worms. Frankly, I'm surprised it hasn't happened earlier.

The more interesting question is how the obsession with secrecy damages the national interests of the U.S. It's not at all clear that our current national obsession with secrecy is helping us. Notice that it has a certain "run amok" quality to it: Top Secret America

So "oarsman" is now a credible authority on the disposition of these bad loans? But let's ignore that and note that he claims the existence of "black holes" which might consume up to 200 billion dollars of TARP money (which in turn would make TARP unprofitable). Even if it turns out that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac weren't dumping grounds for bad loans from TARP recipients, there are other sources. The Fed, for example, has purchased $2.3 trillion in bonds. As I see it, even if we ignore the Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac problem, the US government has bought $3 trillion of bond assets and claimed a profit on $700 billion of those. That's pyramid scheme territory. If I did the same and got caught before I fled the country, I'd be facing jail time for fraud.

Well, there was ONE who went around raising HOPE that things would CHANGE.

But he turned out to be a snake-oil salesman:

Doctors say Medicare cuts force painful decision about elderly patients

Want an appointment with kidney specialist Adam Weinstein of Easton, Md.? If you're a senior covered by Medicare, the wait is eight weeks.

How about a checkup from geriatric specialist Michael Trahos? Expect to see him every six month...

Obama's over-promising is insane. Obamacare is probably the worst because of the devastating impact it's going to have not just on the medical system in the US but its crushing cost at a time when the government doesn't have any excess money because it's burning cash like a billion drunken sailors. (If you think "free health care" is FREE, I've got a bridge or ten to sell you...)

But the BP spill demonstrated that Obama's supposed "competence" is a sham. He mishandled the BP spill worse than Bush mishandled Katrina, and Obama didn't even have the handicap of having to deal with root-cause-idiots like Ray "those flooded school buses couldn't have been used to evacuate the city" Nagin.

We have found out what Hillary meant with those campaign commercials about who you wanted answering the phone a 3 AM. We got the worst guy possible - someone who has never had to run anything before in his entire live.

Obama: the penultimate embodiment of the Peter Principle.

It's not a coincidence that both North Korea and Iran are pushing towards war on Obama's watch...

In China this would be pointless because why would the government care what their people thought?

The Chinese government cares a lot about what their people think, that's why they have a lot of censorship. The Chinese government is well aware of history and of what happened to previous Chinese governments. Piss off too many (e.g. the peasants) and you die.

FWIW, a lot of the Chinese people support their own government (just look at the patriots out in full force during the Olympics).

Why?
1) The censorship and brainwashing. Control what people see and that affects what they think, and that's how you keep them supporting you.
2) Because there have actually been significant positive changes. Railways and highways have been built, many of the poor have benefited from those. Sure there's lots of bad stuff happening, but they can just look at a lot of other countries and go "We're doing better" or "we're doing pretty good given the hand we've been dealt".
3) They can see that at least some parts of the Government are trying to improve things for China, and not just a corrupt few. They're in the process of building very many nuclear reactors so that they don't have to burn so much coal and have so much pollution.

As for accountability: a number of high ranking officials actually get executed for corruption or screwing up big time[1]. Sure maybe at the very top there are untouchables, but is it really so different in the US or other countries? And how high up is this US guy anyway: http://www.vaildaily.com/article/20101104/NEWS/101109939/1078&ParentProfile=1062
They're possibly even slightly afraid of the people, they abolished the agricultural tax: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2005-03/06/content_422126.htm
http://www.taxfoundation.org/blog/show/1274.html

It's not that rosy, there are lots of problems and it could fall apart: http://www.china.org.cn/china/2010-01/21/content_19282590.htm
That "houses are way too expensive" problem does exist in many other countries too though.

You can see that many of the Chinese leaders are trying though. Wish my Government (in Malaysia) was even trying to improve the country- so far they've been doing a lot of stupid/bad things. The guy at the top says lots of nice stuff, but so far it's just been talk, whereas his underlings say and do pretty bad stuff.

[1] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/09/AR2007070900689_pf.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10535226
http://www.newkerala.com/news/world/fullnews-87512.html

Yes. Of course, there is the annoying element of Iraq being an unprovoked war of aggression, and, hence, a war crime. Not to mention Afghanistan just being moronic: $30 billion/year for a CIA estimated 100 al-qaeda in a country a little smaller than Texas. http://voices.washingtonpost.com/44/2010/06/cia-chief-maybe-50-to-100-al-q.html So which is the treason? Hosting the wars, or demonstrating that the emperor has no clothes? It could very well be that the greatest fear the U.S. has about Wikileaks is that it will expose government as a racket.

But we'll see what this next batch unveils...

This was entirely predictable. It's not easy to convince people to let other people--strangers of the same gender--touch them intimately as a form of protest.

It was also predictable that the media would spin it as a failure.

In fact, it probably helped speed security clearances on one of the busiest travel days of the year, because the TSA planned for a larger disruption. At least, that is what I would do, to be safe, and I'd imagine they did it.

The major media covers the story by repeating the TSA talking point that the majority of Americans support the scans. They base this on a Washington Post/ABC poll: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/polls/postpoll_11222010.html?sid=ST2009122902788

I do think you'd get different numbers if you polled at the airport.

Easy one. This might help. Avoiding interfering with and destabilizing other countries may go a long way. Above all you do not reward a nuclear proliferating dictatorship country with WMDs, with billions of dollars worth of military aid, while invading another on the same pretext. Especially if the said country has been where the principal architect of the 911 originated from, and one which had launched terrorist attacks repeatedly on its neighbor country.

Kudos to the Washington Post for putting the survey results up.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/polls/postpoll_11222010.html

Some interesting results (to me). On supporting the new scanners:
64% support, 37% strongly
32% oppose, 18% strongly

So overall it has support from those surveyed, but 45% are in the middle. The survey also asks people how much they fly, so I'd be interested to see how frequency of flying correlates with support of the scanners. I can see that if you fly once a year, you might not care too much. If you get frisked every week in your suit and tie, you may not be so supportive.

The pat-down is more polarized, with 48% saying it's justified, and 50% saying it's not.

70% support profiling

The top 3 criteria for profiling were Personal Behavior, Travel History, and Nationality. For Race and Religion, more people opposed it than supported it, which is refreshing, although there was more support than I would like (40%)

I work in the capitol of the wealthiest country on earth...and presumed by some to be the biggest terrorist target...and my biggest fear is that the freaking 30 year old train I have to ride to work will break down and strand me for hours. So please take your fancy x-ray machines and trade them in for new a few Chinese-made bullet trains to pull my sorry ass in to work so I don't get fired and contribute to America's more pressing worry of rising unemployment.

"And to the 82% of people who think this is good, Fuck all of you."

Of course, the 81% number was 2 weeks ago. (CBS poll Nov 7-10). Link.

More recent poll has approval at 64%. (ABC/Washington Post poll Nov-21). Link.

At this rate, expect to have it under 50% by early December. People are rapidly become educated about the absurdity, invasiveness, high cost, lack of security, lack of privacy, and radiation of this procedure.

by point-blank lying to the United Nations

Bush truly believed there were WMDs in Iraq. The intelligence available to him said so. Bill Clinton also said that the intelligence said so when he left office, as well as in 1998. Saddam Hussein said that he intended for the intelligence to indicate so, in an effort to scare off Iran while calling the US's bluff that they wouldn't invade.

Schabowski deserves a dozen medals for what he did for humanity, even if it was inadvertent.

This guy saved the world and ought to get a medal or two.

The Senate does not actually carry out actual filibusters anymore, where people get up and talk for hours, and the Republican party has voted in virtual lockstep in the past decade or so, ensuring they always have the votes if it comes down to it (Democrats tend to be in constant disarray, cf. Joe Lieberman.)

I agree the Republicans have been using filibusters much more than they were historically used. But it's simply untrue that the Republican party has voted in virtual lockstep the past decade. That's just political spin by one side trying to blame things on the other side. The Washington Post actually tracks how often Senators vote with their party, and there's been no real pattern other than members of the party in power tending to vote with their party more often.

107th Senate 88.4% Dem (50), 86.0% Rep (53)
108th Senate 84.9% Dem (48), 91.8% Rep (51)
109th Senate 85.1% Dem (45), 87.2% Rep (55)
110th Senate 87.5% Dem (49), 77.8% Rep (51)
111st Senate 90.1% Dem (63), 85.3% Rep (43)
10 year average: 87.2% Dem, 85.6% Rep

So you can see, during the last 4 years that the Democrats have been in control of the Senate, the Democrats have actually voted more in lock-step than the Republicans. (The Dems + 2 Independents controlled the 110th Senate, the 51 Republicans reflect 49 seats with 2 members replaced during the term.) You can go back further if you wish. Statistically, aside from increased filibusters, there hasn't been much difference in the voting patterns of the two parties in the last four years of the Senate than in previous years.

The Senate does not actually carry out actual filibusters anymore, where people get up and talk for hours, and the Republican party has voted in virtual lockstep in the past decade or so, ensuring they always have the votes if it comes down to it (Democrats tend to be in constant disarray, cf. Joe Lieberman.)

I agree the Republicans have been using filibusters much more than they were historically used. But it's simply untrue that the Republican party has voted in virtual lockstep the past decade. That's just political spin by one side trying to blame things on the other side. The Washington Post actually tracks how often Senators vote with their party, and there's been no real pattern other than members of the party in power tending to vote with their party more often.

107th Senate 88.4% Dem (50), 86.0% Rep (53)
108th Senate 84.9% Dem (48), 91.8% Rep (51)
109th Senate 85.1% Dem (45), 87.2% Rep (55)
110th Senate 87.5% Dem (49), 77.8% Rep (51)
111st Senate 90.1% Dem (63), 85.3% Rep (43)
10 year average: 87.2% Dem, 85.6% Rep

So you can see, during the last 4 years that the Democrats have been in control of the Senate, the Democrats have actually voted more in lock-step than the Republicans. (The Dems + 2 Independents controlled the 110th Senate, the 51 Republicans reflect 49 seats with 2 members replaced during the term.) You can go back further if you wish. Statistically, aside from increased filibusters, there hasn't been much difference in the voting patterns of the two parties in the last four years of the Senate than in previous years.

The Senate does not actually carry out actual filibusters anymore, where people get up and talk for hours, and the Republican party has voted in virtual lockstep in the past decade or so, ensuring they always have the votes if it comes down to it (Democrats tend to be in constant disarray, cf. Joe Lieberman.)

I agree the Republicans have been using filibusters much more than they were historically used. But it's simply untrue that the Republican party has voted in virtual lockstep the past decade. That's just political spin by one side trying to blame things on the other side. The Washington Post actually tracks how often Senators vote with their party, and there's been no real pattern other than members of the party in power tending to vote with their party more often.

107th Senate 88.4% Dem (50), 86.0% Rep (53)
108th Senate 84.9% Dem (48), 91.8% Rep (51)
109th Senate 85.1% Dem (45), 87.2% Rep (55)
110th Senate 87.5% Dem (49), 77.8% Rep (51)
111st Senate 90.1% Dem (63), 85.3% Rep (43)
10 year average: 87.2% Dem, 85.6% Rep

So you can see, during the last 4 years that the Democrats have been in control of the Senate, the Democrats have actually voted more in lock-step than the Republicans. (The Dems + 2 Independents controlled the 110th Senate, the 51 Republicans reflect 49 seats with 2 members replaced during the term.) You can go back further if you wish. Statistically, aside from increased filibusters, there hasn't been much difference in the voting patterns of the two parties in the last four years of the Senate than in previous years.

The Senate does not actually carry out actual filibusters anymore, where people get up and talk for hours, and the Republican party has voted in virtual lockstep in the past decade or so, ensuring they always have the votes if it comes down to it (Democrats tend to be in constant disarray, cf. Joe Lieberman.)

I agree the Republicans have been using filibusters much more than they were historically used. But it's simply untrue that the Republican party has voted in virtual lockstep the past decade. That's just political spin by one side trying to blame things on the other side. The Washington Post actually tracks how often Senators vote with their party, and there's been no real pattern other than members of the party in power tending to vote with their party more often.

107th Senate 88.4% Dem (50), 86.0% Rep (53)
108th Senate 84.9% Dem (48), 91.8% Rep (51)
109th Senate 85.1% Dem (45), 87.2% Rep (55)
110th Senate 87.5% Dem (49), 77.8% Rep (51)
111st Senate 90.1% Dem (63), 85.3% Rep (43)
10 year average: 87.2% Dem, 85.6% Rep

So you can see, during the last 4 years that the Democrats have been in control of the Senate, the Democrats have actually voted more in lock-step than the Republicans. (The Dems + 2 Independents controlled the 110th Senate, the 51 Republicans reflect 49 seats with 2 members replaced during the term.) You can go back further if you wish. Statistically, aside from increased filibusters, there hasn't been much difference in the voting patterns of the two parties in the last four years of the Senate than in previous years.

The Senate does not actually carry out actual filibusters anymore, where people get up and talk for hours, and the Republican party has voted in virtual lockstep in the past decade or so, ensuring they always have the votes if it comes down to it (Democrats tend to be in constant disarray, cf. Joe Lieberman.)

I agree the Republicans have been using filibusters much more than they were historically used. But it's simply untrue that the Republican party has voted in virtual lockstep the past decade. That's just political spin by one side trying to blame things on the other side. The Washington Post actually tracks how often Senators vote with their party, and there's been no real pattern other than members of the party in power tending to vote with their party more often.

107th Senate 88.4% Dem (50), 86.0% Rep (53)
108th Senate 84.9% Dem (48), 91.8% Rep (51)
109th Senate 85.1% Dem (45), 87.2% Rep (55)
110th Senate 87.5% Dem (49), 77.8% Rep (51)
111st Senate 90.1% Dem (63), 85.3% Rep (43)
10 year average: 87.2% Dem, 85.6% Rep

So you can see, during the last 4 years that the Democrats have been in control of the Senate, the Democrats have actually voted more in lock-step than the Republicans. (The Dems + 2 Independents controlled the 110th Senate, the 51 Republicans reflect 49 seats with 2 members replaced during the term.) You can go back further if you wish. Statistically, aside from increased filibusters, there hasn't been much difference in the voting patterns of the two parties in the last four years of the Senate than in previous years.