Slashdot Mirror
Slashback: Hawash, Monomania, Rocketships
Yes, charges are nice after six weeks of unexplained incarceration. purdue_thor writes "The various news agencies (CNN, FoxNews) are reporting that after being held for six weeks, software engineer Mike Hawash has finally been charged. His detainment as a material witness and subsequent incarceration without formal charges was discussed previously on /. Friends of Mike Hawash have created a website to publicize his case and have released a statement regarding the charges."
Randolpho adds "The Free Mike Hawash website has released the following affidavit (PDF file) received from the Federal Terrorism Task Force. The affidavit states that Hawash traveled to China in 2001 with several co-conspirators 'in an attempt to enter Afghanistan to fight against United States forces.'"
This just in from the cork-topped bottle. danny writes "One of the disadvantages of living in Australia is that my review copies arrive late. But my review of Google Hacks may be of interest, even after honestpuck's earlier review."
Free as in books. Author John F.X. Sundman writes: "PDFs of the complete Acts of the Apostles and Cheap Complex Devices are available for free download from wetmachine.com under the Creative Commons license."
And Robotech_Master writes "Remember the Honor Harrington CD-ROM, which Baen packaged with its most recent Honor Harrington book? The one that included over three dozen e-books and came with explicit permission to copy and share but not sell?
Well, Baen's done it again. The new CD comes with the fourth book in John Ringo's Aldenata trilogy, Hell's Faire . It includes still more free e-books, mp3s, and even a D20 Aldenata roleplaying game in electronic form. The book hits the stands this month, and the ISO is already available on-line. (Scarywater guy, please take note. :) Download it, burn it, give it to your friends...or buy the book and support one of the most Internet-clueful publishers out there today."
Free as in "you pay money." An anonymous reader submits "The original Douglas Adams Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, was first a book, then a radio series. Adams edited both. All 7 hrs and 30 minutes of the Radio series have been released by the BBC in MP3 CD format. If you only caught the TV series this is a must."
I wish more audio books would arrive like this (compressed, so as to occupy fewer disks), though I'd choose a better method of audio compression ;) If you want to hear the HHGttG, though, a few minutes on Google will probably turn up some fan sites with recordings from the BBC broadcasts. (innocent whistling)
Yeah, but there's no Epcot Center. Sacarino writes "Las Vegas is *almost* on par with Disney now. The regularly-updated Monorail Society website has tons of pictures of the progress. Vegas' monorails are the same type as Disney's (Bombardier Mark VI), only with inwardly opening doors... slick! Also mentions the old MGM-Bally's monorail that's getting absorbed into the new automated network."
Is this what Microsoft thinks of viral licensing? Vagary writes "One of my friends just got a Microsoft router and asked me to check the security features for it. The ping denial doesn't work, which is good because a port scan found some pretty interesting things, including this string in the TCP/IP fingerprint: 'i586-pc-linux-gnu'. Does that mean Microsoft must provide Linux source to purchasers of this product?"
Can anyone confirm, deny or explain this interesting claim?
Click here to discuss the size of a fictional spacecraft ... photozz writes "The infamously slashdotted site comparing the relative sizes of several hundred starships from various Sci-Fi series has been mirrored to a somewhat more robust server. So cool. It's in draggable format, so you can put King Kong on top of Deep Space 9 and re-create a dream I had last night......."
You are doing a disservice to those who live with real memories of what being "disappeared" really meant. This guy is being held, and charged, on really indisputable evidence, and it is a matter of public record. The fact that he worked in your beloved computer industry does not change these facts. Take your whining elsewhere.
taken! (by Davidleeroth) Thanks Bingo Foo!
"The Free Mike Hawash website has released the following affidavit (PDF file) received from the Federal Terrorism Task Force. The affidavit states that Hawash traveled to China in 2001 with several co-cospirators 'in an attempt to enter Afghanistan to fight against United States forces.'"
Oh, so he is An Offical Enemy of the State, I say send him to Guantanamo and lock him up for life - due process? Pfth, who needs it.
HH was a radio series first, then a book.
I recommend "Don't Panic" for the whole story...
Great. Glad to hear that you know so much about the case. Could you perhaps share with the rest of us this "indisputable" evidence?
-- MarkusQ
I've always agreed to the concept of voting with my wallet. If I don't the a company I don't buy their products.
The reverse of that is of course, companies that have a clue(tm) get my hard earned cash.
I picked up the new John Ringo book this Sunday and wrote John Baen a thank you e-mail on Monday.
As a matter of minor irony, if they hadn't had the CD in the latest Honor Harrington, I wouldn't have read the first John Ringo book, and wouldn't had subsquently dropped $25 for the latest. But, so far the e-book thing is working well for me. Ten of the last fifteen books I've purchased have been electronic versions from Baen online bookstore.
*A)bort, R)etry, I)nfluence with large hammer.*
Nonetheless, I'm going to withhold judgement on the Mike Hawash case, because at this point, assuming the evidence is as presented in the articles I have read, there certainly sounds like enough, that with some dotted I's and crossed T's, adds up to at least probable cause. I just wish our government would abide by its own rules in the way it prosecutes cases like this, and just show the evidence that lead them to make a detention in the first place. If the guy is really a flight risk, or potential danger to others, and there isn't enough to hold him on, then they could have him followed and monitored until the evidence is available, the same as is done with other criminals and potential criminals. I worry about all the exceptions that are made for terrorism, when increasingly, membership in certain non-terrorist organizations, or computer crimes, or other "mysterious" or "destructive" behavior seems to get bunched in with terrorism.
I'll be the first person to tell you that terrorism is never legitimate, and always criminal, and that we should arrest and prosecute and punish terrorists and attempted terrorists to the fullest extent of the law, and Americans who travel to fight in illegal combat with other terrorists get no sympathy from me. But how can we use different standards of evidence and prosecutorial conduct for cases that we don't _know_ are terrorism until they have gone through the courts? Due process doesn't mean due process when we feel like it - it applies to all citizens and residents, and even others within our borders.
The thing about Hawash sounds like about the most half-baked allegation I have heard in a long time. Come on, Feds. When you fuck up, admit it and free the man. (Do a Google search on FBI Perez affidavit to find out how much credibity these things have. Read the same used to justify the Waco, TX, invasion. That particular affidavit makes you wonder what basis for balancing allegations over evidence some of our nation's judges use. Little to about none when they grant these things.)
It's called circling the wagons. There's enough illegal activity boasted about and promoted on this site to put the fear of arrest into these script kiddies.
By making a big deal out of this would-be terrorist, Slashbots are sending a signal to each other to be more careful in their lawbreaking.
I don't know who moded the parent as flamebait, but he raises a legitmate issue.
We'll just see how robust a server it is!
I do security
One of my friends just got a Microsoft router and asked me to check the security features for it.
:-).
Hey, just post the ip here on slashdot, and we can give it a REAL security check for you
If he is not a U.S. citizen and/or is committing acts that demomonstrate a lack of allegiance to the U.S., I don't see why he should be treated as such.
He is a U.S. Citizen, idiot.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
You'll find you can't drag the buildings/ships/monsters in the browser who was forced to change their logo at the request of a certain GODZILLA who just happens to appear in the comparison.
Coincidence? I THINK NOT!
I'm not defending the six weeks of "unexplained incarceration" (nice objective terminology there, there was an explanation, he was being held as a material witness which is not a new practice -- okay, maybe I am defending it a little bit), but if the guy was trying to wage war against his country's military, then in *any* country, you'd expect him to be arrested and charged. (Note: in China or Cuba, you're lucky if you are only sent to jail for speaking out against your government. Some people just get shot.)
I don't see why he should be entitled to special protection just because he's a software engineer or for any other reason. I don't care if he has friends!
This reminds me a lot of the Randal Schwartz trial (although let me be clear that I'm not saying Randal committed treason! I'm just talking about popular software types being charged with crimes). While I don't know all of the facts, it always seemed like people are especially ready to jump to the defense of someone, even without all of the facts, just because of their professional standing. This seems particularly true of people in the computer industry. (Maybe that's just because I tend to read technically-oriented forums like Slashdot.)
Anyway, treason is treason, alleged crimes are alleged crimes. It shouldn't matter if the guy was a software engineer or a shoe salesman.
Victory! Isn't that what every one wanted, for Mike to be charged or released? So now he's charged. And he's in some deep shit too.
And it does include an American football field for comparison, but not the end to end length of a LOC...
Michael and Timothy hate that slashdot isn't more like K5 because they have political agendas that they want to promote. So any piece of news that conforms with their political agenda and might have a programmer involved is immediately pushed up the queue.
> The ping denial doesn't work, which is good because a port scan found some pretty interesting things, including this string in the TCP/IP fingerprint: 'i586-pc-linux-gnu'. Does that mean Microsoft must provide Linux source to purchasers of this product?
Answer: No.
I'm 99% certain that you've misinterpreted nmap's output. When nmap doesn't find a matching fingerprint, it displays the parameters in a parsable format used in nmap-os-fingerprints. More recently (i.e. not originally, but it's been this way for some time), nmap also prints out the OS it was compiled on (presumably to weed out any OSs that mangle the data and prevent bad fingerprints from being distributed with nmap.) This information is printed out in a line like:
SInfo(V=3.20%P=i586-pc-linux-gnu%D=4/29%Time=3EAF1 974%O=-1%C=80)
I'm guessing that this was seen and the submitter jumped to conclusions... At any rate, I believe they'd be required to give source (if they changed it) to anyone per the GPL.
Between the time I submitted the story and the time it was run, the website hosting the ISO went offline, undoubtedly due to bandwidth issues. However, Scarywater did pick it up, and has quite a few people torrenting it now. I hardly think I need to remind people to leave their BitTorrent clients open for a while after their own download finishes, do I? :)
Editor Emeritus and Senior Writer, TeleRead.org
At any rate, I believe they'd be required to give source (if they changed it) to anyone per the GPL.
Slightly wrong. They don't have to change it one bit to be required to give away the source.
I have been pwned because my
ITYM "Jim".
Editor Emeritus and Senior Writer, TeleRead.org
but what about SpaceBall One (They've gone to plaid!)
Did you mount a military-grade, variable-focus MASER on an unlicensed artificial intelligence?
Why not release these "books" as a text document so weasel reader and all the other e-book readers can read them?
Why is it that we need to free the books that are supposedly free?
anyone able to convert PDF to standard ASCII text without markup?
Are criminals who happen to be techies now lesser criminals or better humans because of this?
Dude, he's not necessarily a criminal. He's a *suspect*. And the constitution has clauses that protect people from being improperly incarcerated; the big deal is this: the US is being fucked over by our own government. We are losing our constitionally-guaranteed rights to a bunch of morons who courted Saddam Hussein 20 years ago (while he was gassing Iranians), and now are suddenly outraged because he *might* have chemical weapons?!?!?
No fucking way! We stand up for our rights, right here, right now. We tell them they will not take another one of us without due process.
We take our country back.
If Hawash is guilty, let it be proven in a court of law, the old-fashioned way.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
I'm new to Slashdot. I find the articles to be very interesting and thought provoking. This is my first post by the way!! Which brings me to my question... Do you think that the following post is appropriate for this story?
King Kong is not smaller than a B2 bomber. I remember clearly that in Godzilla vs. King Kong it was an even fight in height and weight.
Also, there are too many Star Trek ships on that chart. Star Trek sux. There are some Star Wars ships, but where's the death star? Where's the star destroyers? Did I miss them?
Also the SDF-1 Macross is still missing. I am of the opinion that in a 1 on 1 fight the Macross can beat any other single starship of any category. The Valkyries will dominate!
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
First, bear in mind that I've not been following the Hawash case. I don't think that "Geek Criminals Are More Important". However, people are more likely to right an injustice against someone they can identify with than otherwise, all other things being equal. Hawash is being discussed on "geek sites" not because it's something that geeks enjoy, it's because it's about injustice that affects a fellow geek.
Why can't we have the ships from the Wing Commander series on there? Espcially the alien ships from Prophecy, as I recall, length of the final battleship was measured in miles. Flying around required a fair bit of time or a lot of afterburner fuel. That, and it had to whole squid looking thing going for it. And it was a very fun game, shame it doesn't get along with Win2K.
You can download an updated firmware for the MN-100 from Microsoft. Go to the page and select the MN-100 from the second pulldown box and download the self-extracting exe.
Other than the readme.html, there's a MN100_runtime_v1.08.003.dlf file. DLF is a downloadable firmware format used by several embedded device manufacturers, but I can't find any info on it's format.
There's no visible strings, so I assume it's compressed, but neither file(1) or I have any idea.
Could someone with some file format skills please have a look at it and post instructions for extracting the image?
I've had one of the Baen Books CDs available on-line for a while. My GF received it in a copy of War of Honor, and according to the license I can redistribute it electronically as long as I don't charge... Being the geek that I am, the first thing that I did was put it on-line. :)
http://honorverse.ghostwheel.com/
Enjoy!
-Chris
-- This sig is only a test. If this were a real sig it would say something witty. --
An AMD engineer would never have done anything like that.
Couldn't Mr. Hawash write a letter to the Supreme Court asking for relief? Or at least to the Attorney general's office! I mean, there is no instructions available as to what a person should do if held under those circumstances. Are they even allowed to send letters to friends/family? Isn't it easy to overturn these kinds of draconian laws if your done wrong by them, sort of like the Gideon Vs Wainwright (1963) case? IT might take time, and Mr. Hawash may have to spend a great deal more time in prison without due process, or being party to his lawyer, and lack of "innocent until proven guilty", as set forth in the bill of rights. Indeed the founders wanted to prevent this type of maneuver by the British at the time of the revolution. It is utterly sad that we have come full circle to become the tyrants we once spilt blood to reject. I guess 300 hundred years does that to the collective memory of a nation. A person should have the right to travel where they want, associate with anybody they wish, and conduct themselves in a militia if they so choose. These are the things that the Bill of rights initially sough to protect. Would Benjamin Franklin have been arrested as a terrorist if he were alive today! Still, I have a hard time believing this Mr. Hawash was even participating in the alleged activities he is believed to be held for. Indeed, the government is keeping this a big secret! If this were in a public court we could all know the truth, but the secret police doesn't have to obey the laws. Oh wait, that's right! WE allowed them to have the law changed in the knee-jerk reaction of a law known as the "Patriot Act", signed by the Retard... err... president of the United States of America, Mr. George W. Bush! Like Mr. Bush suggested/insinuated to the Iraqi' public durring one of his televised speeches to them, the situation of a tyranical leader could be solved with one bullet. I leave that last sentence to your own interpretation. I feel sorry for him being the guy that was in office durring the 9/11 fiasco, and I feel even sadder for the people under his rule, including myself. If this keeps going, the Chinies might endup having more freedom that the folks inthe USA.
It isn't a lie if you belive it.
"The New American Gulag Archipelago."
That shows an ignorance of history and the crimes of the Soviet system.
In the 19th century the Czarist Russian government deported around 1.2 million prisoners to Siberia.
After the Revolution the labour camps in Siberia were closed down. These were later reopened by Joseph Stalin and opponents of the regime were sent to what became known as Glavnoye Upravleniye Lagere (Gulag).
Large numbers of people living along the western frontier of the Soviet Union (Georgian, Ukranian, Baltic) and Chinese and Koreans who lived along the eastern border were deported to Gulags in the interior just before the outbreak of WW2.
Others were sent to labour camps because of their religious beliefs including Catholics, Baptists and members of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.
It is estimated that around 50 million perished in Soviet gulags between 1930 and 1950.
I know it's fun to consider the United States as bad as the Soviet system.
But it's not at all accurate.
All of the people killed in all the wars with the United States since 1776 don't add up to the number of citizens killed by the Soviet Union.
If the United States had a "Gulag Archipelago" then there would not have been a 9-11 or Oklahoma City bombing. All of the fringe people in the US that might do something like that would in in a chain of prisons in Alaska, dying by the millions. Or maybe they'd be in prison being tortured with psychiatry like Communist systems are so fond of. Or maybe they'd have thier hearts and livers sold to the highest bidder.
Likewise you can't just plug someone walking in front of your house because he's wearing an old World War II German helmet.
In between there is no black and white line that separates 'combat' from 'peacetime'. If you think there is, please tell me what's the current situation in Iraq. Is it war? Is it peace?
And the 'Patriot Act' has nothing to do with this continuum. In the Civil War US citizens were routinely incarcerated without due process - if someone got caught by Union troops wearing a Confederate uniform the person caught wasn't going to get a trial and access to a lawyer - he was going to a POW camp, unless he was deemed a 'spy' and sent to a military tribunal or a civilian court - pretty depending on what who caught the "spy" desired.
Same thing in WWII - a US citizen was executed by a military tribunal as an enemy combatant for aiding German spys/saboteurs in the US. The Supreme Court upheld the execution.
Probably the best analogy to Al Qaeda from history is the Barbary Pirates - that was pretty much state-sponsored terrorism against Mediterranean shipping in the early 1800s. But that's not really accurate enough because Al Qaeda is an organization the by its declarations and actions is at war with the US - thus making a member of Al Qaeda a military target and not only subject to civil or criminal actions such as arrest, prosecution, and jail but also to military tribunals and direct and not necessarily announced military action - like those schlubs driving across the Yemeni desert that a Hellfire missile sent to meet their 72 virgins.
The simple fact is that governments have always had this power, and have always used it - getting labelled an "enemy combatant" by a sovereign government has pretty much been a death sentence since Hammurabi's day, and I don't see any government ever giving up that power. Heck, even the French manage to kill a few Germans in the twice-a-century march to Paris.
Real fucking useful that!
Explain to me how the UN isn't utterly useless in dealing with the likes of Saddam or North Korea. Remember that 1994 agreement with Bill Clinton where they stopped their nuclear program? Yeah right.
[Lyle] You'll be given cushy jobs!
[Crowd] Monorail! Monorail!
--Simpsons episode 9F10
Since the U.S. defeated Iraq, and MS defeated the U.S., I think we can safely draw the conclusion that Microsoft is a tougher, more ruthless enemy than Saddam Hussein.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
I know it's fun to consider the United States as bad as the Soviet system.
But it's not at all accurate.
No one is seriously saying that the US is presently as bad as the soviet system became (the closest thing, I've seen is a few people pointing out similarities between our present foreign policy and that of early nazi germany).
But consider: the soviets didn't just get up one morning, send all those people off and kill them in one fell swoop before lunch. They sent one person, and then another, and then another, and then another...the MO of a state that does not respect the rights of its citizens is much more like that of a serial killer than of a suicide bomber.
The big problem is, just like with serial killers, once they've done it a few times, it gets easier and easier for them to justify (at least to themselves). You violate a handful of people's rights here, a few dozen there, maybe take a few liberties with the rights of a few hundred more for standing up for the first lot...and pretty soon you're talking about a serious human rights problem. That is the reason for the outrage.
-- MarkusQ
Ooops. It was a radio series first.(Still the
best version) Then a book. A modified/re-recorded version
of the radio series was released on vinyl.
Then came the TV adaption.
Then came the book of the radio scripts.
When all information such as this is a few clicks
away via google, why do people get it wrong?
Is this what Microsoft thinks of viral licensing? Vagary writes "One of my friends just got a Microsoft router and asked me to check the security features for it. The ping denial doesn't work, which is good because a port scan found some pretty interesting things, including this string in the TCP/IP fingerprint: 'i586-pc-linux-gnu'. Does that mean Microsoft must provide Linux source to purchasers of this product?"
This means that the box you're running nmap on is a 586 PC running GNU/Linux.
Where's the Star Destroyer?!?
(And borg cube)
John Susek
ok if im wrong here someone straighten me out.
here is what i gathered to be fact.
1. he grew a beard and was less then friendly to his neihbors after sept 11 (sounds like most white american trash). ALSO was seen shooting firearms in a gravel pit which i in canada have done with mine (ever hear of the NRA?).
2. alledgedly he went to china and accosiated with suspected terrorists, but i have no reason to believe he was there on business.
3. he may have made a pledge to a charity that WAS under investigation for terrorist links (take waht you want from that one)
4. after 6 weeks of being held he is finally charged with something.
Here is what I think:
it is a direct violation of his rights as a human being let alone as an american to be detained without charge this reflects poorly on me as they likely had no case. also there have been no direct link of money transfers to even alleged terrorist orginisations. last time i checked your constitution protects his right to associate with whomever he wants. so chatting with suspected terrorists is allowed. he was not in afganistan and he has not commited any terrorist acts. under canada's laws CASE CLOSED.
under the US "stupid paranoid fucks laws resembaling mccarthur era" rules this guy might actually get charged. however i think that currently there is too little evidence supporting the prosicution. i think he will go home in the end. im surprised he was even detained.
all i have to say is thank god i live in canada.
The scariest part of that 43 page affidavit is where some of the evidence came from. On page 7:
Since when does the FBI collect trash as evidence based on the recommendation of a random neighbor? Or is this a special exception since it contained, huge shock, Arabic writing?
More on page 36:
So, let's get this straight. The first neighbor called the FBI because he recognized that one of the people who had been arrested had been to Hawash's house. That, I can almost understand, especially if there was media attention from the first arrests (seems likely).
The second neighbor, on the other hand, called the FBI because.. why? Let's see, first, Hawash spent more time at home after 9/11. Gee, yes, that's suspicious, only like 80% of the people I know decided to spend more time with their family after that. And second, he wasn't as friendly as usual. But gee, huge tradgedies usually make people so *cheerful*, what could be his problem?
Then, when the FBI actually followed up on this inane call, they found that he started attending a Mosque, dressing in "eastern" clothes, grew a beard, and became withdrawn from his neighbors, in turn associating with other Muslims. Gee, that certainly sounds like he found religion, doesn't it? And while that's arguably not the brightest thing to do, last time I checked it wasn't illegal, even if it's an officially unpopular religion like Islam.
This whole thing is sick. Yes, there's other evidence in there that links him to the other people, that's fine. I'm not saying he's innocent. But the fact that the points above, particularly the 'second neighbor', made it into the report is just wrong.
>>Hawash's neighbors became suspicious after the September 11 terrorist attacks and called the FBI, according to the affidavit. One of the neighbors said Hawash, who worked for Intel, was "spending more time at home following September 11, 2001" and "was not as friendly as usual."
Given the rampant anti-Arab sentiment after 9/11, is this any surprise?
I've got the ISO mirrored here. Take it easy on it guys ;)
--you'd have to lock up a boatload of US government employees then. Frankly, I wish "we the people" could. Al queda and the bin laden networks were trained and supported for years by the US government. All those caves and bunkers we are blowing up over there got built by the bin laden construction company, financed by combined joint US/saudi funds. The KLA went over night from being labeled a "narco terrorist" gang to "good allies in our fight against "whomever". They said it was milosevich, I say it was to consolidate some drug smuggling routes and grab some mines. Same with some bosnian muslims. Same with a lot of central american goons. And it's still going on, last week a very under-reported story, something like 57 top US companies all getting little joke toy fines for "trading with the enemy",iran, whomever, the "axis of todays badguys" list. None of those CEOs are locked up. I'm sure big fat campaign contributions and serious cash under the table has nothing to do with it. The elite try to not eat their own, they are content with being predators on the herd. Once in awhile they will sacrafice one of their own, that's about as far as it gets.
Naw, the government/corporate cartel is a big fat hypocrite. They can pick and choose and change their minds daily, anyone else is forced to be psychic. We were shipping cash-43 million or so- to the taliban when they were actually destroying poppy fields, whoops! That sure didn't set well with the CIA drug smuggling cartel. Now our "allies" in what used to be called "the northern alliance"-those were the "commies" before and the "bad guys", remember?-well, those guys now have a bumper crop of opium, with supposedly the US all over ashcanistan. Funny how that stuff works, yes? It never really dawned on those in the crooked shadow government, being the chronic serial liars they are, that someone else might actually not lie, and really do what they said they would do, that the taliban would actualy DESTROY the 100 to 200 billion a year opium poppy crop, they thought they would play act at it, like they do in south america with coca. Now that don't excuse any other heinous bogus stuff the taliban did, but destroy that poppy crop they almost completed.
Funny how all the top US administration guys from the twig on down all got long, well established close and complex business ties with the wahabists, isn't it? See any of those bozos getting arrested? Nope, because they are "the government" now and they can "change their minds" and you can't. They can "support" some nation or faction one day, the next day call them "terrorists" and if you as joe peon supported the same exact guys previously now YOU can be a terrorist while joe government just "changed it's mind".
Fat, foul, vulgar stinking hypocrites. Saddam Hussein, old time, long time serious CIA asset, they used him on contract as a hitman, that's how he got his start. He was supported fully for more than a decade, then he just got double crossed by bush 1. That's what really happened. Once saddam was no longer usefull to the goon faction, he got automagically turned into the "badguy". Sure, he was ALWAYS a badguy, so what does that make guys in our own government who worked with him and supplied him all those years, and why ain't they in jail? Oh ya, they can change their minds, they are the "elite", VIPs, *you can't* though.
Sorry, the US government and it's "law and intelligence" divisions are the biggest hypocrites and liars you'll ever meet, at least up into the upper management level I mean. The grunts just follow orders, same as any other regime on the planet. That's why they are using a lot of the same police saddam was using, the same police who dragged people into saddams prisons, who tortured people and killed them, now they are "good guys", on the US taxpayer payroll now. We did that after ww2, operation paper clip, bring over all the foul and disgusting german nazi scientists they could get their hands on, they become "good citizens" magically, got put on the payroll.
Hy
...include some John Ringo story-specific themed Sluggy Freelance cartoons in the back of the book - if you're a fan of the stories & Sluggy Freelance, you'll love 'em! Plus it's great to see a drawing of the Bun-Bun Sheva. :)
Alot of you people are so gullible. Just because a guy is a programmer in this country doesn't mean he's a nice guy. He's a plant by extremists or has loyalties to them.
Quit your sympathies for the guy and let the gornment do it's work.
Would Hawash rather be tried under Treason charges?
...
Fro those of us who dont remember wwII
a citizen can be tried fro treason on grounds of takign up arms against the US..
The treason trial and charges are conducted by the military..
and you either get life or hanging..
Hawash should thank himself that he is in FBI custody as a Material witness
He could be in a military brig instead..
Don't Tread on OpenSource
"The ping denial doesn't work, which is good because a port scan found some pretty interesting things, including this string in the TCP/IP fingerprint: 'i586-pc-linux-gnu'. Does that mean Microsoft must provide Linux source to purchasers of this product?"
I'm thinking "no." Ping denial also doesn't work on my XP Pro box running ICP, so it sounds like the router is running Microsoft's own software. I doubt a router running Linux would have that problem.
Mike was working in Israel for some time. I am pretty sure that during that time he worked with Israeli Intel employees who considered him, at the least, a "decent guy" and would like to help him.
However, they may be reluctant to associate with a site that includes in Mike's biography statements like "Mike's family was exiled from the Palestinian Territory by the Israeli government in the early 1970s".
It does not matter what is your stance regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, statements like this (especially when presented without any context) do not help Mike's case.
1. Gort in his patrol ship would clean all their clocks (and no, this is not a joke entry)
2. Giant light bulb ship from ToS
3. Death Stars (main laser only)
4. Hypothetical Federation ship with phase cloaking and some of the other balls-out stuff hidden in the secret vaults of the Federation, to say nothing of the futuristic stuff Janeway brought back, including the 26th century holo emitter and data gleaned from the borg baby who temporarily absorbed it. (M5 [or Data, for that matter] in charge of a ship based on the neutronium hull of the doomsday machine, armed with genesis-derived crap? Ex-queeze me? "The Klingons, the Romulans, the Borg, the Dominion? They're nothing compared to the coming of the Federation." Actually, the death star couldn't kill this, nor the light bulb ship. Gort could, tho'.)
5. Some crazy ship from some Japanimation I rented when I was on a kick some years back, they opened up dozens upon dozens of blasters and fired continuously and violently for minutes on end. Probably a more realistic space battle, they only last minutes.
6. Monitor class from "In Death Ground..." book duo-logy. My god, if you're tired of the wimpy battles in Star Trek and Star Wars and on TV..., not to mention the ferocious "game over, man!" ass-kicking humanity & friends receive for the first half of the series...
7. Vader's command super star destroyer
"Has [being a kidnapped teenage girl, raped repeatedly for months] changed you?" - Katie Couric to Elizabeth Smart
learn what the fucking words mean! I mean, dammit
All men are created equal, but you're really pushing the fucking boundaries here, asshat.
The Declaration of Independence of the Thirteen Colonies
In CONGRESS, July 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. --Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain [George III] is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices,
Did you ever consider that antitrust legislation is so vague that the govt. can make up whatever rules on the fly they want to to persecute any company they choose? Given this, the outcome against MS was just. The govt. simply declared them a monopoly and set some ground rules.
Vote for Pedro
Would the RIAA people please look at the sales figure of Baen and get a freakin' clue?
--
Mad science! Robots! Underwear! Cute girls! Full comic online! http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/
Spotty record and full of holes.
Go die somewhere.
"Actually, he was held without charge but with the public's knowledge. The parent post is right, this isn't even close to being disappeared,"
Actually, the government wouldn't even admit that they had him for several weeks. And he certainly wasn't given access to legal representation. Then the government declared a fair bit of the information surrounding his case was "secret" and therefore did not have to be revealed in court.
Except for the "never seen again" part, that sounds pretty damn close to "disappeared" to me.
And now that the time initially set by the judge was about to expire, and the court would likely set him free, the feds have charged Hawash with every crime the can think of (If he were a little older, no doubt he would also be charged with the Lindburgh kidnapping) figuring that they can hold him for another year before it is even likely to come to trial.
Then, in 6 months or so, they might offer him a plea bargain "he can't refuse", all the while making noises about executions, life imprisonment, taking away his family's citizenship, etc. Then, once they extort a guilty plea from him, he won't even be able to appeal!
I don't know what we have here, but it sure ain't justice.
You make some interesting arguments regarding some events you seem to have imagined in your head, but they have very little to do with the actual case of Mike Hawash. Reading the links provided would easily show that.
1. There was no explanation. Through unknown channels, stories appeared in the press about how he was held as a material witness, but Mikes friends and family got no answers to any inquiries about his status. Also, unless he is called to testify in some case, which nothing seems to indicate will happen, the "material witness" label was phony.
2. "in *any* country, you'd expect him to be arrested and charged" Did you miss that the main complaint here is that he was not arrested and charged?
3. Nobody is asking for him to get special treatment. Just his constitutional right to a fair trial, like all other Americans.
4. Are you under the impression that anyone is holding up China or Cuba as models for better legal treatment? Or are you saying that as long as the US is marginally better than the most oppressive regimes on the planet, we should not complain?
5. The crime he is charged with seems to be that he travelled to China and back. Nobody is even alleged to have been hurt by these actions.
Even if he is guilty, which would be very unfortunate especially in this case, that is entirely beside the point. The important point here is the loss of rights under which US citizens can now be detained in this manner. This is what people are protesting, and the point stands that this is a serious problem whether or not he is actually guilty in this case.
Sadly, if it turns out that he is guilty, then many people will forget the important point here - because they will inevitably confuse the concept of defending his basic rights (that all US citizens are supposed to share), with the concept of defending him.
If you actually read the links you will find that he was in fact not held as a material witness as a matter of public record. Stories appeared in the press claiming he was held as a material witness, but there was no public record of it, and the authorities refused to answer any questions about what had happened to him.
As far as I can tell he was disappeared in the Argentinian sense for those 6 weeks, but now that he is charged with a crime that is no longer so. Even in Argentina, some of the disappeared were eventually found alive and well.
And if you think it's bad now, wait to see what happens if the US does get hit again like 9/11 - or worse. Then things will really get nasty - with about 90%+ approval ratings. And if the US does get hit with a suitcase nuke or smallpox I'm not sure I'd care if the FBI preemptively bugged every mosque in the US.
But I'd still be willing to bet that the US is one of the few societies that has open debates on the rights of someone who pretty obviously had thrown in with a group intent in murdering as many members of that society as possible.
The Romulan D'Deridex (bottom right) seems way too big, as I recall these were roughly the size of the Enterprise D
Does anyone else just hate the Enterprise D? I've thought about it a lot and decided that it is because it is way too top-heavy. The saucer section is just so much larger than the middle other hull and the warp nacelles, it just looks awful.
Gotta give this guy marks for completeness for including the Battlestar Galactica ship and the Eagle from 'Space 1999' TV Series. That makes this an "A" project not an "A-". Wow, does anyone remember Space 1999? Don't think it reruns anywhere.
Suggestions for future additions: Nostromo from Alien, Valley Forge from Silent Running, ships from Enemy Mine
Oh I get it, it's alright to hang out with Fundamentalist Christian Militias but not with Fundamentalist Islamic Militias (if in fact that is what he did, nothing has been proved yet).
I was intrigued by your equivocation, so I ran the numbers real fast. Here's what I came up with:
Number of American citizens slain by "fundamentalist Islamic militias" since Sept. 2001: at least 3,000.
Number of American citizens slain by "fundamentalist Christian militias" since Sept. 2001: approximately 0
Yep, about the same.
All employees must wash hands before seeking equitable relief.
I'm rather taken aback at the idea that antitrust legislation is abused. AFAIK it's only been used against bonafide damaging monopolists, and it's worked rather well at busting up until now.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
and its clear this guy was in deep with the rest of the them. And it really makes you wonder what was going on when somebody who files adjusted gross income of 357,668 in 2000 and 184,873 in 2001 is associating with this bunch. And its just as striking that before leaving he signed everything over to his wife, who then tossed 5,000 in a bank account for him. Why? Sounds to me like he was worried about becoming the source of funding for this band of thugs. Probably thanked his lucky stars when they couln't get to Afghanistan.
Well, neither the US nor Al Qaeda signed a treaty that you can't fly planes into someone's buildings. So what makes the war of Al Qaeda against the US illegal?
The US doesn't care whether Al Qaeda terrorist attacks were "legal" or not. It cares about whether or not they will happen again.
"International law" is a silly game for people to play if they don't have to worry about whether anyone's trying to kill them. The League of Nations didn't do Abyssinia a whole lot of good - or the Rotterdammers, or the Chinese. In fact, the Kellogg-Briand Pact of 1928 outlawed war entirely. That's nice. That must be why there haven't been any wars since then.
All employees must wash hands before seeking equitable relief.
Being arrested and held for six weeks without charges isn't really in the same league as vanishing without a trace and showing up a decade later in a mass grave with signs of being tortured to death. Which is what's normally meant by "disappeared". How many people have been held six weeks without charges in the US in the last 20 years? I doubt anyone here knows. I think it's pretty common, though. It's just rare that the prisoner has a group of friends to put up a nationwide stink about it.
What seems to have drawn attention to the group was that the group, not including Hawash, were found practicing with guns in a gravel pit in Washington State on September 29, 2001. This discovery cranked up a major FBI effort. After a while, the FBI had two informants in the group. The members of the group, other than Hawash, were indicted last October.
These guys aren't big-time terrorists. They come across more like a bunch of bozos. If they'd achieved their goal of going to Afghanistan to fight on the Taliban side, they would have been just a few extra guys with guns. They didn't even get that far. All they really did was go to China for three weeks. Some of them made it to Bangladesh. Then they turned around and came back to the US. Thus, they're not charged with treason, only "conspiracy to levy war against the United States".
Ultimately, the courts will have to sort out who did what here.
"When four sit down to talk revolution, three are fools and the fourth is a police spy."
If anyone's interested, I have the first CD Baen Books put out with David Weber's War of Honor up on a BT torrent. It's not an ISO image, though, it's a zipped copy of all the files.
.torrent file is available for download at http://www.liberty4me.com/tracker .
The
Whine #1. you're holding him without charging him!
Whine #2. you're charging him without enough evidence!
future whine #3..
He was convicted with a rigged system!
Guess what? There law was followed.. rules codified into a law that, when you get off your lazy asses, go read, and try to change.
The FBI apparently believes they have a case and will have to prove it in front of a U.S. District Court Judge, this man will get his day in court.
Was his handling heavy-handed? yes.. was it justified under the circumstances? time will tell..
Either way, to hear the people around here go on you'd believe he was lying in a ditch with a bullet in his head.
The world is a messy place.. someone has to deal with it, be glad they are people who believe in the values of this(USA) country.
-an immigrant
Kudos to the BBC for releasing the hitchhiker's guide audio. I still have the whole thing on 6 audio tapes, but I know they're not going to last forever.
Here's a link to the home page, alowing you to see the Deathstar, Vader's Destroyer, etc.
It is spelled America, not amerika. It is still the best place to live as evidenced by the fact that most of you are still here and by the fact that people break the law to come here you sound just like the left wingers that i knew 30 years ago
Diplomacy is the art of saying "Nice doggie" until you can find a rock. Will Rogers
You might convince someone if the US government had only recently started treating suspects to the following:
"We have evidence you were at Location A, at Time B, which other evidence shows was the time and place Crime C was committed. You can claim 5th Amendment rights against incriminating yourself, or you MUST tell us what happened, as mere witnesses do not benefit at all from the 5th's protection against SELF-incrimination."
In other words, testify, confess, or refuse to speak lest you self-incriminate. Three choices -- no magic 4th choice pulled out your ass. That's as old as the hills, and perfectly legal and proper -- and unpleasant, but that's real life law for you.
But that's not far from the same thing, though, is it? :-)
* And remember, it's spelled N-e-t-s-c-a-p-e, but it's pronounced "Mozilla."
I corrected your post somewhat:
Number of American citizens slain by "fundamentalist Islamic militias" since April 19, 1995: at least 3,000.
Number of American citizens slain by "fundamentalist Christian militias" since April 19. 1995: at least 168
Darn - the truth keeps messing up your little fox-based world again!
No, I don't trust in god. He'll have to pay up front, like everybody else.
Except for the "never seen again" part, that sounds pretty damn close to "disappeared" to me.
Except for him not being dead, and us knowing where he is, and him currently on the way to the store to get some coffee... someone shot him and dumped the body in an unknown location.
'Standards' in computing only impress those who are impressed by things like 'standards'.
Soon Iraq will be declared to be "democratic",
just like Afghanistan (according to the US State Dept.
Human Rights report).
Kuwait is described as a "constitutional monarchy", can
Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states and even Iran
(already a democracy) be far behind?
Obviously it makes sense for the US to support
the oil-rich "good guys" in the "new Mideast".
The "bad guys" will then become the Israelis
with their illegal nukes and their occupied
territories in violation of UN resolutions.
Unlikely? Remember how quickly Osama and the
Chechen rebels went from being "freedom fighters"
to "terrorists" (CNN was quite confused for a while there).
The Jewish lobby is rich and powerful but Bush
has noticed that there are lots of Iraqis and
other Arabs in Dearborn etc. who also have votes.
I think we may wake up one day to hear that all
those Jews who go to fight for Israel are now
classified as terrorists or "enemy combatatants".
I won't even try to address all the comments here -- they represent a wide spectrum of opinion.
/.ers:
...)
I'm Steven McGeady, I know Mike, and I have this to say to
You have absolutely no reason to consider Mike Hawash innocent of the charges being levelled against him -- no reason except one: the implied social contract present in our society that if *you*, or someone you love, was accused of a terrible crime, that other citizens would withold their judgement until all the facts came out.
All the liberties we enjoy are based on this social contract, in all its parts -- I don't condemn you because of the way you look, how you pray, or with whom you associate.
Recall that the Complaint -- the affidavit that we posted willingly on the "Free Mike Hawash" website -- is the U.S. government's side of the story. Mike has not been given a chance to tell his yet. I don't know the answers, nor does anyone else.
Mike doesn't deserve a free pass because he's a software engineer, because he's Palestinian, or because he's my friends. If he is proven guilty, then he will pay the price.
But I hope that this audience, more so than many others, will not judge him because of facial hair, based on scant but one-sided evidence, or because of his faith.
You are right to be skeptical. But you can contain both skepticism and a presumption of innocence, in the same way you can contain skepticism both toward those of us who believe the charges will ultimately prove groundless, and those who find sinister motives hidden among weak and circumstantial evidence.
S. McGeady
(dammit, now I've blown my (weak) pseudonym -- time to sign up for a new account
No, they'd be required to give it to anyone to whom they provided a binary. RTFL.
HOGWASH; to me...
Sure, they might come back an get us--even more so because they precive us as weak for showing to principle and not fear. Not instilling fear in OUR OWN PEOPLE is what makes us strong! not a big army with lots of smart bombs. Or big corps that can buy foreign dictators. Or a mouthy Prez.
Like the guy or not, the cops are cheating the system. They're lying too. The guy was home for months before they got him. They obviously weren't looking for him to start. Being held as a material witness means in general you can't be prosecuted for what you're witness for--or they would have just charged you. You also don't have the same rights as you are assumed by the court to be innocent [one of the rare cases] and can treated as a hostile witness. Changing the charges now is borderline illegal--in normal criminal cases a good lawyer would get you out right there. He was denied council and Habeous Corpus. Things he said w/o access to a lawyer will now be used against him--even though at the time he wasn't under arrest. Our President has been more than willing to bend the laws to get what he wants. In this case the guy is a US citizen who did or didn't do something abroad. He didn't ever actually fight with them, he was denied at the China border, and they didn't deem him enough of a threat to pick him up with the rest of the bunch [who were outright arrested].
Remember boys and girls, we're still at war with DRUGS! They've been more than willing to bend the laws for that sham too. How else would they have a list ready of what to ask for? Hope you don't know any pot dealers on campus guys--this could happen to you! That's why this is so wrong. Many of the early National Security laws of the 60's and 70's have been used in the drug war. The "patriot" act was written expressly to allow these "foriegn powers" provisions to be used in as many civilian criminal cases as they could get away with! I live in Michigan: There was a Detroit procecutor who wanted to try out the new spouse abuse law and spent 18+ month of taxpayer time and a family's lives on a case that didn't have any merit...just to get a score for being "baddest a$$" Don't think for a minute that a procecutor or police chief somewhere won't try to extend these crazy laws to everyone. It's not if, it's when!!!
This discussion is almost laughable. Realize that when the constitution was written most of the nation was still wild. People could be attacked by indians [no offence] at any time! The British answer was exactly yours--they demanded that troops accountable only to the Army be installed in everyone's house for protection. They couldn't be accountable or punished for much of anything [hope you didn't have lots of chickens or daughters!] The people that wrote the Constitution lived under constant threat of attack. They knew exactly what they were writing. They had lived under what you propose: a rights-for-saftey deal and found it to be undesireable enough to start a war over it. The american revolution was started over far less than what GW has done lately! Much less! They were taxed, abused by unaccountable officers, tariffed, told they didn't need representation because the corps in charge of the Colony represented them in London...History seems to be repeating itself. We even get a George! Maybe we should wake up and get a clue.
As far as preventing 9/11 it would have been & still is impossible! Those men went onto the planes like normal passangers. They would have passed any inspection--I'm sure they even left their carkeys and metal eyelet shoes at home. Even today's security wouldn't help because they carried no weapons onboard!! only hatred [they bribed the food crew to leave boxcutters!] there's still no body who watches the prep crew 100% of the time--we can't make a law about that.
...but really, the fourth book in a trilogy?
Big deal. He's in the US justice system. I would like to think that Israeli Intel employees don't hold as much sway there as US citizens.
How could Israeli Intel employees help him now, even if they wanted to?
I'd rather read the blunt truth than appeasment paplum.
The old South African government (pre 1990s) had laws that allowed them to detain people without being charged for 90 days without even informing their families of their arrest. The 90 days was renewable, so people could dissapear for arbitrarily long periods of time.
The government said that the people they detained were guilty of treason but most were doing nothing but passively resisting the apartheid policies. For instance, many people who attended the Congress of the People at which the Freedom Charter was drawn up, dissapeared for months afterwards (the leaders of the congress were formally tried for treason).
Citizens of the United States should watch very carefully what happens to their human rights. They pay a lot of lip service to 'liberty', but don't seem really concerned that it's liberty for some. If I was a Muslim in the United States right now I would be very worried about my future freedom.
The origrinal slashdotted site started to redirect here after a couple of days. This is just the standard editorial sloppiness that ensures I'll never pay for slashdot.
They have to report *everything* related to the case, no matter how small. It's up to the courts to decide what's relevant, not you.
It amounts to the same thing. Who cares if the stupid lawyers are calling it something different?
I'm not sure how they came up with some of these sizes - it's a cool site but some of the sizes are just plain wrong.
The Kurzon (sp?) ships are way to big, as is one of the Jem'ar (sp?) ships. The same goes for a couple of the Star Wars ships.
Granted there might be parts of the series where sizes are reflected poorly, but it's misleading to reflect them grossly distorted.
Yeeeess, and if they embed it into some hardware device which I bought, they provided me a binary. Or are you suggesting that maybe hardware devices are deliberately shipped with blank EEPROMS?
Do you like Japanese imports?
But as Jefferson more wisely advised, "The price of liberty is eternal vigilance." Noticing the flames under our Bill of Rights - indeed, more deeply, as Hawash's case shows, under the very principle of habeas corpus itself - is actually the first step to putting out the fire.
The Eldridge is the space ship you see in the beginning of Xenogears, the RPG by Squaresoft that no sci-fi fan should miss. With a wingspan of 42 kilometers and a length of 100 kilometers, it has everything on that chart easily outclassed in size, except maybe the space slug. There's some other pretty cool ships from Xenogears too, like Excalibur, Ezekiel, Merkavah, and Yggdrasil IV which transforms into a giant robot :D
"indisputable" in this context probably means that those trying to dispute the evidence risk sharing a cell with Mr. Hawash soon thereafter.
*laugh* Good point. Since most of there case seems to rest on him giving money to people that the government disagrees with, I suppose even donating to his defense fund (if there is one) could be risky.
-- MarkusQ
No it doesn't.
Christ. You're like a bunch of three-year-olds!
It's important to remember that, despite that fact that it's well known NOW where he is and what's going on, for the first 2 weeks, the government didn't even admit to having taken him! That's disappeared by any definition.
I just didn't think the 'and/or' had any merit. Anyone can be accused of being 'un-American' or whatever, even you (by the vary virtue of your comment).
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
If it stops here, it could be a tetralogy, but I think the word you're looking for here is series.
--one idea I thought of was a total ban on career government "jobs" and zero pensions. Make it something like a grand total of ten years, any government job, mix and match, then you are out, can never have a government job again. NO PENSIONS. No "career" politicians or bureaucrats or civil servants. That goes for any military service as well. The reserve militia is quite adequate, and creating new ncos and officers. that's sort of a different subject as some sort of national SELF DEFENSE force is needed, but exterior wars should be very infrequent, rare, based on extremely verifiable reasons of import.
We had a somewhat good idea on that in the past, no large standing full time army, just citizen soldiers-the militia-and they were only used for like invasions or whatnot. The national guard now is just a clever way to have full time standing federal army "lite". And professional politicians? No way! Also make it illegal for any "corporation" to donate campaign money, or donate "gifts" or anything along those lines. And make it stick, for profit, non profit, whatever, no exceptions. Lobbying and the bribe and the hijacked two party junta "system" has been a failure. When you can have so called "national presidential debates" and only two parties are represented on the stage, that is an example of a junta.
Several other ideas but those are the bigees, that and eliminating the federal reserve. The idea that they can poof create money out of thin air then "loan it" to the government then somehow we owe them "interest" back is beyond loony. Along with fractional reserve banking. Being able to loan that which you do not possess is crazy. Those economic policies lead to monopolies, serious abuse, and nutso boom/bust cycles, instead of slow steady positive economic growth based on wealth that has actually been created and exists in reality.
There are many more reasons why the RIAA is one of the most vilified organizations in the US. Look, Baen doesn't send the police after students. They don't buy a law that trample the 4th Amendment and then use it against people who are merely suspect.
As for differences between digital copies of audio and books, you are right. However, consider that someone who loves a band will actually go out and buy their CDs, often on the mere recommendation of other fans, even if they already own MP3s of the songs. They value the physical object, the cover art, etc. A fan who has the disposable income and loves the band will fork out the $18 and buy the CD. If the disposable income is not there, then the guy is not a potential customer anyway.
Of course, this presupposes that there are bands and artistst that can gather a real fan audience and that aren't mere disposable products of a targetted marketing. If the studios had their way, we'd all be buying tepid crap.
So of course, casual listeners will just as well listen to the MP3. But please note that casual readers would just borrow the book!
--
Mad science! Robots! Underwear! Cute girls! Full comic online! http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/
The GPL states they have to provide the source code *at a reasonable cost* to anyone they provided the binary to. They cannot prevent some that has obtained the source from redistributing it.
ex: NeXT used GNU C as the basis of its Objective C compiler. If you wanted the source code, you had to buy it ($500?). Once that person had it, they could post it for free, sell it for $$$, etc. But NeXT couldn't prevent that person from distributing the code.
There was no requirement that *NeXT* provide the source for free.
It used to be "The land of the free, and the home of the brave" because it takes bravery to have freedom.
"I'll have a Guinness, no wait, make that a Coors Light" -Grad student I work with, who shall remain anonymous...
You misunderstood ubernostrum. S/he was replying to the "(if they changed it)" in the parent post. It doesn't matter if Microsoft changed it, if they hand out binaries they must hand out source.
The yesterday's Wall Street Journal had a front page article about this. There is no denying, he went to China (after paying off his mortgage and transfering the house ownership to his Christian wife) in October 2001, while telling friends he was going to Palestine (his family lives there). He said, he went there to search for business opportunities, but made no phone calls to China prior to going there -- FBI has his phone records. His friends he say he was becoming increasingly Muslim in recent years, but rejected violence. His lawyer (yes, unlike the really "disappeared" people, he has a lawyer) explains his sudden mortgage payoff by Islam's prohibition to borrow money at interest. May be. But there are plenty of other unanswered questions.
While the government's behaviour does seem heavy-handed to me, I see no reason to doubt their sincerety (as over-rated as this virtue might be -- the sincerety). He will not be the first innocent person in history to be held -- that's just the unfortunate drawback of the best legal systems currently known. But the evidence against him -- as presented so far to the public -- is not the weakest in the history of such legal systems either.
If you want to fight human rights violations -- consult Amnesty International. They spend time and money researching and fighting some real abuses. Just pick any one instead of charging nearby windmills...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Thanks. I'll check it out. The most concrete thing I had seen todate was the deposition posted on the web. So far, none of this looks as bad as people are making out (if they were to lock people up for traveling to foreign countries or lieing to their friends almost all of us would be behind bars). But I do not doubt that there is much more that we don't know yet.
-- MarkusQ
I don't know what comment you think you're responding to . . . the post I replied to claimed that making modifications to GPL code somehow means you must distribute its source, which is not true. You only have to give people the source if you give them a binary, and then you only have to give it to people to whom you've provided a binary. Parent poster seemed to think making any changes under the GPL mandates worldwide distribution, which is incorrect; you can make all the changes you want and keep them to yourself.
I'm not too sure either; I wanted to make sure that somebody make clear that distributing GPL software as the firmware BIOS for something is just as much distrobution as putting it onto a CD and shelving it as a Linux distrobution.
Do you like Japanese imports?
I know that lots of people would like a copy of this CD, but running wget against my site isn't the way to do it. wget is sloppy, and there is no compression.
n .z ip
I have placed a zip copy of the CD on my site. Please download it if you want the whole thing:
http://honorverse.ghostwheel.com/HonorHarringto
Cheers!
-Chris
-- This sig is only a test. If this were a real sig it would say something witty. --