Why the hell wouldn't he feel that he has a right to criticize the administration? Do you really need to be reminded about the first amendment? And as a former member of the administration I would say he's in a position where his critique is relevant. And as a former member of four administrations, I would say he's in a unique position to criticize this one quite credibly. The fact that he's hardly the only former Bush Administration criticizing it (Scheuer, O'Neill, Kwiatkowski, Wilson all come to mind, for example) only underlines that he has a point worth listening to.
As for him grandstanding, that's ludicrous. There's not a shred of evidence in his career of that kind of move. Have you even read his book? Read it and then tell me you don't think he's being sincere. What would his motive be for grandstanding? This is someone who remained a public servant for decades; do you think he suddenly had a change of heart or that he was planning for over thirty years for this final move? Anyway, it's silly. His book would have sold whether or not he apologized. His criticism would have had roughly the same impact. He apologized because he was part of an administration that failed the American people. The problem is the Bush administration won't admit mistakes, no matter how deadly they are.
Great. Call the White House; someone named "Anonymous Coward" wants Clarke's old job. I'm sure you'll be rushed through the nomination process.
You're right about the expertise of people at the top of large govt agencies -- primarily, their expertise is in directing policy. That's why that's what they do. Clarke's expertise in security and terrorism issues extends back over three decades, and his expertise in cybersecurity issues extends back to before the rest of the country even knew what the hell "cybersecurity" is. Not as a fucking console jockey but as an administrator whose job is directing policy. He's not offering suggestions on recompiling your kernel, or discussing his favorite package manager; he's offering his opinion on the policy choices that should be made by government agencies. I could care less if he can manage his own ipfw preferences, but I think his expertise on matters of threats to government security at least make him worth listening to. He's not an "expert" himself, but he knows how to surround himself with experts and learn the relevant issues, something he did incredibly well on the terrorism issue and then the cybersecurity issue. I don't necessarily agree with his thoughts in general though on this issue I do -- given MS's proven track record of security problems, as well as the fundamental advantages of building on open source software (minute control of the details of the software under the control of your agency, responsiveness, tailoring it to a specific purpose, etc.) it's patently obvious that the best choice for public agencies from a security perspective is not MS. You don't need to have that much technical knowledge to understand this.
That's what's amazing about your comments (and I assume you're susan otter from the great grand parent post or whatever) -- nobody is saying this guy is always right, just that his opinion here is both substantive and relevant. Instead of responding to it you whine about his qualifications. (And then you accuse me of ad hominem!) What I don't understand is whether your knee jerk reaction comes because you want to defend MS or because you want to bash Clarke.
I don't know what you saw, but he certainly doesn't think the answer is to give up civil liberties either (in fact he's been pretty adamant about that).
If Richard Clarke was in a position to represent the executive branch that would be different.
Ummm, he was Counterterrorism Czar. In other words, he was in a position to represent the executive branch, and the executive branch had failed the public in the months leading up to 9/11. That's why he felt the obligation to apologize.
And mod that susan otter whatever the fuck troll down. Clarke was cybersecurity czar because he has expertise in the field, and as cybersecurity czar, he made it a point to inform himself about the issue (and he had a staff that saw to it that he did a damn good job of it). I'm not sure why people are in attack mode on Clarke about this issue -- this is different from attacking the Bush Administration during an election year. But the trolls, apparently, are out in force. You don't like Clarke's qualifications -- fine -- but then please at the very least name someone more qualified who contradicts him on this point.
If you want a frightening read, you should pick up the January 2005 issue of the Atlantic, which has an article by Clarke that is supposed to be a voice from the future (Sept 11, 2011) -- assessing the war on terror ten years later. He has some chillingly realistic scenarios for massive terrorist attacks on the American homeland which start in July 2005 as I recall. Not only do the scenarios seem realistic; he also footnotes each one extensively, showing with evidence how realistic these ideas are.
The U.S. needs more people like Clarke in public service. Not because he spins a good yarn, but because he has consistently offered lucid and nonpartisan analysis of the terrorist threat throughout his career. It is shameful that rather than responding to his arguments the Bush Administration went into attack mode, and even more shameful that the Democrats were unwilling to make Bush's failure in the war on terrorism a bigger campaign issue.
Yeah, right, because the Clinton Administration was communist. Remember how he nationalized the computer industry and sent millions of computer programmers to labor on the collective farm system? And how he used to speak eloquently about the noble plight of the lumpenproletariat? And don't get me started on Al Gore's poetic musings about the withering away of the state....
The ruling, while good for privacy, seems extremely frustrating for those hoping to use the logs as evidence.
Which is precisely why the ruling is good for privacy. You should not be allowed to use logs of private conversations as evidence if the logs are obtained illegally.
Yeah but it's made from "easily available components." Hmmm, I think I've seen that before, at the University of Virginia. Don't G5s qualify as "easily available"?
I don't see any reason that presumption would be against the free flow of information, which seems to be what you're arguing. Especially considering the chilling effect this case would have on any other journalist who learns potentially significant news about a corporation.
They thought a program like this would go great with poor documentation and inadequate maintenance. After reading this slashdot article they figured OSS was the way to go.
This case relates to the confidentiality between a journalist and his source. This has nothing to do with the First Amendment.
As the above poster noted, Supreme Court interpretation of the Constitution has established that the confidentiality between a journalist and his source has everything to do with the First Amendment.
So why not run darwin, and leave all the apple gooey goodness in the box. You can install darwin alone, install X and whatever free window manager floats your boat. Then you'd have a fully open source BSD system that's optimized for your hardware.
Don't get me wrong - I think it's great that linux is ported to every new mac that comes out within weeks. But personally I wouldn't bother with this on new hardware. Linux runs great on my old Power Tower Pro 225, and I wouldn't even think of putting OSX on it (which is possible even though it's just a 604, but it runs dog slow). But if a machine is fast enough to run OS X reasonably that's what I would run on it.
Slashdot Mirror
They've gone from D to D+ -- sure, there's still room for more improvement, but why do you guys always have to look at the negative side of things?
Imagine that. A billion dollar news organization with acres of public credibility reported a news story before slashdot reported it!
As for him grandstanding, that's ludicrous. There's not a shred of evidence in his career of that kind of move. Have you even read his book? Read it and then tell me you don't think he's being sincere. What would his motive be for grandstanding? This is someone who remained a public servant for decades; do you think he suddenly had a change of heart or that he was planning for over thirty years for this final move? Anyway, it's silly. His book would have sold whether or not he apologized. His criticism would have had roughly the same impact. He apologized because he was part of an administration that failed the American people. The problem is the Bush administration won't admit mistakes, no matter how deadly they are.
You're right about the expertise of people at the top of large govt agencies -- primarily, their expertise is in directing policy. That's why that's what they do. Clarke's expertise in security and terrorism issues extends back over three decades, and his expertise in cybersecurity issues extends back to before the rest of the country even knew what the hell "cybersecurity" is. Not as a fucking console jockey but as an administrator whose job is directing policy. He's not offering suggestions on recompiling your kernel, or discussing his favorite package manager; he's offering his opinion on the policy choices that should be made by government agencies. I could care less if he can manage his own ipfw preferences, but I think his expertise on matters of threats to government security at least make him worth listening to. He's not an "expert" himself, but he knows how to surround himself with experts and learn the relevant issues, something he did incredibly well on the terrorism issue and then the cybersecurity issue. I don't necessarily agree with his thoughts in general though on this issue I do -- given MS's proven track record of security problems, as well as the fundamental advantages of building on open source software (minute control of the details of the software under the control of your agency, responsiveness, tailoring it to a specific purpose, etc.) it's patently obvious that the best choice for public agencies from a security perspective is not MS. You don't need to have that much technical knowledge to understand this.
That's what's amazing about your comments (and I assume you're susan otter from the great grand parent post or whatever) -- nobody is saying this guy is always right, just that his opinion here is both substantive and relevant. Instead of responding to it you whine about his qualifications. (And then you accuse me of ad hominem!) What I don't understand is whether your knee jerk reaction comes because you want to defend MS or because you want to bash Clarke.
I don't know what you saw, but he certainly doesn't think the answer is to give up civil liberties either (in fact he's been pretty adamant about that).
Ummm, he was Counterterrorism Czar. In other words, he was in a position to represent the executive branch, and the executive branch had failed the public in the months leading up to 9/11. That's why he felt the obligation to apologize.
Actually, that was Richard Clarke. Richard Clark is an entertainer, I believe. :)
And mod that susan otter whatever the fuck troll down. Clarke was cybersecurity czar because he has expertise in the field, and as cybersecurity czar, he made it a point to inform himself about the issue (and he had a staff that saw to it that he did a damn good job of it). I'm not sure why people are in attack mode on Clarke about this issue -- this is different from attacking the Bush Administration during an election year. But the trolls, apparently, are out in force. You don't like Clarke's qualifications -- fine -- but then please at the very least name someone more qualified who contradicts him on this point.
The U.S. needs more people like Clarke in public service. Not because he spins a good yarn, but because he has consistently offered lucid and nonpartisan analysis of the terrorist threat throughout his career. It is shameful that rather than responding to his arguments the Bush Administration went into attack mode, and even more shameful that the Democrats were unwilling to make Bush's failure in the war on terrorism a bigger campaign issue.
</sarcasm>
Which is precisely why the ruling is good for privacy. You should not be allowed to use logs of private conversations as evidence if the logs are obtained illegally.
Beer users still have no problems getting to the site.
Yeah but it's made from "easily available components." Hmmm, I think I've seen that before, at the University of Virginia. Don't G5s qualify as "easily available"?
Well, if one of those books is Beowulf... ummm, never mind.
Does it go to eleven?
He spelled it wrong. It meant to say calling the kettle GNU/communist.
There's only one way to tell for sure if usenet is truly dying.
Count the number of posts to usenet that mention usenet.
I don't see any reason that presumption would be against the free flow of information, which seems to be what you're arguing. Especially considering the chilling effect this case would have on any other journalist who learns potentially significant news about a corporation.
They thought a program like this would go great with poor documentation and inadequate maintenance. After reading this slashdot article they figured OSS was the way to go.
It's not the size of the floppy that matters; it's how you format it.
As the above poster noted, Supreme Court interpretation of the Constitution has established that the confidentiality between a journalist and his source has everything to do with the First Amendment.
That's hilarious coming from someone with "Los Angeles style rock 'n' roll" in their sig.... ;^)
You're not interested in getting laid at all, either, are you.
Don't get me wrong - I think it's great that linux is ported to every new mac that comes out within weeks. But personally I wouldn't bother with this on new hardware. Linux runs great on my old Power Tower Pro 225, and I wouldn't even think of putting OSX on it (which is possible even though it's just a 604, but it runs dog slow). But if a machine is fast enough to run OS X reasonably that's what I would run on it.
Yet another reason to drop 5 bills on that new Mac :)