It may be worth pointing out that the protest march against the Iraq war in the UK was the largest ever recorded in that country and actually consisted of almost 3% of the entire population...
Depends on whose figures you use: "In London on Saturday, police said the turnout was 750,000, the largest demonstration ever in the British capital. The organizers put the figure at 2 million."
Except that we know we've become a target because of the US, who in fact created the whole mess in the first place.
Hardly. Although that might be a comforting notion for you in the short term, in the long term you are likely to be disabused of it by events. Europe has developed a rapidly growing Muslim population almost as large as Iraq, a growing number of which are disgruntled, and Islamist extremists. The trends don't look good:
...the report predicts that Europe's Muslim population is set to increase from around 13% today to between 22% and 37% of the population by 2025, potentially triggering tensions.The Scotsman
The Salafist Preaching and Combat Group is an offshoot of the Armed Islamic Group (GIA), which has been responsible for many killings in Algeria. It is led by Hassan Hattab, formerly the "emir" (commander) of the GIA's second region. An intelligence document seen by the Guardian asserts that Hattab was a member of the leadership group that authorised the GIA's bloody terrorists attacks on Paris in 1995. The Guardian
Guido Steinberg, a terrorism expert working in the office of German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, summed up the situation with these words: "Terrorism is coming home." And it's coming home to those countries whose governments may have believed they were immune from terror because for years they have provided safe haven to notorious Islamic extremists. Der Spiegel
PARIS, France (CNN) -- Two senior al Qaeda figures helped train the people now suspected of planning chemical and biological attacks in France and the United Kingdom, European intelligence and judicial sources tell CNN.
One of those figures is Abu Musab al Zarqawi, the man singled out by President Bush as a link between the terrorist group and Iraq.
The other is Abu Khabab whose voice has been identified by intelligence sources as the man on a videotape showing al Qaeda operatives performing chemical weapons experiments on dogs.
The information comes after a recent wave of arrests in France, the United Kingdom, Italy and Spain that investigators say helped uncover several cells of Islamic terrorists who had the material to make chemical and biological weapons. And, investigators say, the terrorists were apparently ready to use them. (France, Italy, Spain)CNN, Feb 15, 2003
Jihadist networks span Europe from Poland to Portugal, thanks to the spread of radical Islam among the descendants of guest workers once recruited to shore up Europe's postwar economic miracle. In smoky coffeehouses in Rotterdam and Copenhagen, makeshift prayer halls in Hamburg and Brussels, Islamic bookstalls in Birmingham and "Londonistan," and the prisons of Madrid, Milan, and Marseilles, immigrants or their descendants are volunteering for jihad against the West. It was a Dutch Muslim of Moroccan descent, born and socialized in Europe, who murdered the filmmaker Theo van Gogh in Amsterdam last November. A Nixon Center study of 373 mujahideen in western Europe and North America between 1993 and 2004 found more
Whatever your politics, you have to admit that the world's perception of the United States and it's government hasn't changed this drastically since World War II.
Opinion of the United States has waxed and waned since WW2. Viet Nam and the deployment of Pershing & cruise missiles in Europe weren't any more popular. If you judge by protests, they were less popular. More Europeans will come to see the light as the Islamists continue attacking Europeans in Europe. It is amazing how quickly that clears the mind.
Even our strongest allies no longer trust our good intentions.
Coalition forces in Iraq now number fewer than 23,000 from 24 countries, down from about 50,000 from 38 countries in 2003.
I'm not sure that counts as alone and mistrusted.
Most historians agree that the Cuban Missile Crisis would have resulted in the Global Thermonuclear War if Kennedy has listened to LeMay and invaded Cuba. Damn Massachusetts liberals.
The Cuban Missile Crisis, the Bay of Pigs, and then Viet Nam? Imagine if we had a President doing that sort of thing today. Would you be praising him, or cursing him?
I'm looking around, and I don't see a new FDR, JFK, or Eisenhower waiting in the wings.
Collin Powel could have been another Eisenhower, unfortunately, many on the left would find a black moderate Republican president intollerable. JF Kerry would probably have been president if he had been another JF Kennedy. Since he wasn't, Americans elected a Harvard MBA, former fighter pilot, and governor as president. Oddly enough, JF Kennedy is more similar to GWB in terms of foreign and domestic policy than to JF Kerry.
We've now been fighting the War on Terrorism longer than we fought WWII, how do you think the results stack up?
We joined WW2 long after it was in progress. (Almost 4.5 years) We joined this war at the beginning. Consider this to be 1941. We still have at least 4 years to go. We poured enormous resources into WW2. This war is being fought practically on a shoe string budget in comparison. I think we are doing fine.
There is some cause for concern since some Americans are actively working to undermine the war effort. What is especially troubling is that it is over a question of policy with a strong legal basis supporting it, as noted by former Clinton Associate Attorney General John Schmidt, and a long history. Why now? Just to undermine the President?
The relationship between ICANN and the US Government is morecomplicated than you suggest.
Given that as time goes on, control of domain names will come to be a vital resource that can make or break people and companies, the author is probably right that national governments should not be able to mess them around with impunity.
But businesses can operate them... with impunity? Without oversight? So, would you say that reassigning control of the Iraq domain from two jailed Palestinian immigrants in the United States was what... arbitrary? Unreasonable? Wouldn't it have made the US government more powerful by taking control of the.iq domain itself instead of handing it over to the Iraqi government? Why didn't it do that?
Now that it has control, the Iraqi government can run its TLD itself, hand it over it a business or committee, or whatever it wants. And now the Iraqi people will have a say, certainly more than they would have had before the reassignment.
Governments are involved because the internet is important to countries, commerce, education, and more. It isn't just a hang-out for geeks, email, and porn.
As to the source of the outrage, here is how the article ends:
And so a method was devised by Washington and ICANN to ensure that the rules could be bent. And so they have been. As a result no one single soul is better off, and governments have been given control over the internet by the backdoor. Now you know.
So, nobody in Iraq was better off because the democratically elected Iraqi government now controls Iraq's domain instead of two jailed men in the United States? Right...
Of course the even-handed manner in the Register article is further shown in this paragraph:
Control of Iraq's domain was far more complicated however. The.iq domain was registered instead to two brothers living in the US. The Elashi brothers and other members of their family at the time were also in US jail awaiting trial for funding terrorists - which in the end amounted to shipping computer parts to Libya and Syria and for which they all received hefty sentences.
Notice how the convictions for providing financial support for Hamas are left out?
As to censorship, you can always get a domain name in another TLD.
You seem to be painting this as if someone in the US was limiting internet access for Finland and they were somehow convinced by Linux to let Finland "join the club". I think it is more likely that changes in Finland's telecommunication regulations and deployment of ATM between Finnish Universities had more to do wtih it.
Apparently the main outrage comes from ICAAN reassigning control of the little used.iq Iraq domain from two Palestinian immiagrants living in the US, currently in jail after being convicted on a variety of charges resulting from their supporting terrorists organizations, and giving control to the Iraqi government (which just had an electionwith unexpected support). This seemed to have fairly strong support on Slashdot just a few months ago. It was viewed as a positive thing in Iraq.
I'm finding it difficult to get worked up about this.
More likely they will just become "undocumented citizens" with rights at least equal to those of "undocumented workers" AKA illegal aliens, who already have right (some of which vary by locality) including drivers licenses, certain medical treatments, basic education, labor rights, and many more, even voting in some localities.
I saw a documentary on the decision process for the design of the next generation of fighter planes that had numerous of the interviewed people invoke the "looks weird" nature of one of the designs as a reasonable grounds to reject it.
Was that clear enough?
Perfectly clear... I just don't believe that looks had any meaningful influence on the decision, even granting that is what they said.
What you saw in the documentary was a combination of inputs from:
- The producers / director (what they wanted to show or could dig up) - The editors ( this shot vs that one) - The Air Force, contractors, and associates (What they were willing to say or show) - The network (what they left in or cut out) - You (Your attention and understanding)
I am perfectly willing to believe you saw pretty much what you say you did. I just don't believe that looks played any meaningful role in the decision to select a fighter jet costing $258 million each. The only question in my mind is, who wasn't conveying the real, meaningful decision criterion? The Director? The Editors? The Air Force / contractors? Was the show aimed at the perceived audience who wouldn't be interested in the extensive technical minutia that would be a large part of the decision, but would accept "fast and pretty"? Was the decision reached because the engines were in Congressman X's district and the avionics were in Senator Y's district, and nobody would come out and say that? Was "looks" used as a proxy for, "We don't trust the continuous attitude feedback mechanism when combined with fly by wire for an inherently aerodynamically unstable airframe caused by the angle of attack in the wings", or some such? Was "looks" used as a distraction so that nobody would have to say that the new fight has a "quad damage" power-up button, and can shoot down anything else at a 6:1 ratio?
The only way you would convince me that "looks" had anything to do with it would be if it was in the context of "radar profile", as in "on radar, the F-22 looks to be the size of a humming bird."
If you could strap on wing, missiles, and engines to a toilet and shoot down F15s at a rate of 10:1, I have little doubt that the Air Force will fill the skies with militarized flying toilets as soon as they could. (Some might say that isn't too far off from describing an A-10.)
A recurring theme isn't necessarily an important theme. I think the reference to "looks" was one of: misdirection, bad editing, or targeting at a particular demographic (substitute fighter jet for hot rod car?).
There is no way that President Bush would ask, say, the NSA to do anything illegal is there?
And, although there may be a few renegades, there isn't much of official Washington that would use secrets for political gain.
But then there is the press which has recently developed some badly misplaced priorities, actively supporting and publicizing leaks of sensitive ongoing intelligence and military operations against the enemy over and over again. You would think it would be easy to understand that this harms our national security, yet much of the mainstream media passes over the issue in silence. On the other hand, they have endless energy and interest in a kerfuffle involving no crime.
Maybe the media will start taking the war more seriously if Al Qaeda makes significant progress in their announced goal of killing four million Americans. Or maybe not. If there are more successful large scale terrorist attacks in the United States, aided by the media's disclosure of on-going military and intelligence operations, I expect that the majority of the media won't engage in self-examination, but will rather most likely start banging the drums from the feverswamp. The fever swamp runs deep, and support for the President among the media is thin.
Irrelevant seeing as I was talking about the plans to have everyone use the X-32, which was scrapped in part because they didn't like the look of it, and in part because the navy wanted twin jet engines 'cause they luv their f-18 honnets so much, etc. It was a whole documentary ya know, not a 30s clip about how the only deciding factor was aesthetics. There were also engine requirements, and political connections of manufacturers, all that jazz.
I was watching a documentary on the race to build the next generation fighter jet, and time and time again, the main argument in favor of the X22 was that the other design looked weird.
Yeah, plan your multi-billion dollar expenses on the sexiness of the machine boys, not on the functionality. I too get "the willies" thinking that people this infantile are sitting with their finger on the metaphorical nuclear button.
and in response to this
rather than try to dig up classified information, or try to determine the objective criteria used in the decision(things like unrefueled range, weapons load, maintainability, cost, situation awareness aids, etc. ) that the producers
you wrote
But you suppose that all those factors wern't explored in said documentary. They were.
I think your real disagreement is with yourself,... and I'm not sure the better side is winning based on what was apparently your first (sexiness...infantile..finger...nuclear button) impulse.
1). Put software into production without checking all the settings 2). Put software into production without fully testing it 3). (probably) used software which they don't have the source to, and thus don't know if there are any backdoors.
I am worried about it from a National Security perspective - NSA using cookies worries me far less than Microsoft doing it - but the above issues could expose the NSA, and hence the USA to attack.
Don't trouble yourself. The web server was, no doubt, well tested. The problem was essentially a client side setting, and a minor one at that.
NSA separates classified and unclassified networks. The chance of exposing sensitive data is likely miniscule, the chance of exposing classified data is non-existent.
(Disclaimer: Yes, I am aware that the CIA and the NSA are different agencies. However, that shouldn't preclude one learning from the other's foul-ups.)
So either one or both agencies in question are simply incompetent, or lying to us. Which do you think is more plausible?
You're kidding, right? NSA and CIA are separate Federal agencies with tens of thousands of employees. Their web masters and IT departments probably pay about as much attention to what the other does as Ford Motor Company & Dodge. And this is hardly the first time that a Federal agency has handed out persistent cookies against policy. Do you think CIA & NSA are in cahoots with the Office of Personnel Management, Ames Laboratory, and Bureau of Labor Statistics?
I think that a more likely and equally plausible explanation is that NSA's sys admins, web developers, and IT staff are in about the same boat as most people in IT: overworked, understaffed, plagued by too many meetings, dealing with more hacking attempts than you could imagine, struggling with a software upgrade, and simply missed flipping one of a growing number of switches in software which changed a relatively minor behavior in the software. (Another possibility is that government employees are all 10 feet tall, super geniuses that never make mistakes. I think previous discussions on Slashdot have largely deprecated that possibility.)
Besides, if you were really concerned about avoiding their scrutiny, you wouldn't visit their web site any way.
"And I have again observed, my dear friend, in this trifling affair, that misunderstandings and neglect occasion more mischief in the world than even malice and wickedness. At all events, the two latter are of less frequent occurrence." -Goethe
I was watching a documentary on the race to build the next generation fighter jet, and time and time again, the main argument in favor of the X22 was that the other design looked weird.
Yeah, plan your multi-billion dollar expenses on the sexiness of the machine boys, not on the functionality. I too get "the willies" thinking that people this infantile are sitting with their finger on the metaphorical nuclear button.
You don't suppose that rather than try to dig up classified information, or try to determine the objective criteria used in the decision(things like unrefueled range, weapons load, maintainability, cost, situation awareness aids, etc. ) that the producers took an easy out and said it won because, " Oooooh, its pretty and fast!" I find that notion easier to believe than the assertion that a major defense program providing the primary air superiority fighter for the Air Force, the F-22 would be decided primarily on aesthetics and that said selection would survive scrutiney by the Department of the Air Force, DOD, Congress, and the President. There are many philosophical positions that can impact programs like this, (purpose built vs general purpose, heavy vs light) but ugly vs pretty isn't really one of them. If it were, two of the most effective aircraft the US has built would never have seen the light of day: the F-117 Nighthawk stealth figher, and the A-10 Thunderbold II, AKA Warthog.
Sharks attack in the water near beaches, not in bathrooms.
Since there aren't really any shark attacks that occur in bathrooms, I propose installing cameras and nets in the water at beaches to protect swimmers. The great thing about putting the cameras in the water at the beach is that it could actually help prevent shark attacks, and isn't unreasonably intrusive.
Is there some reason you proposed putting cameras in bathroom instead of in the water at beaches? One might wonder if you were trying to discredit the use of surveillance despite its utility.
You misunderstand the concept of "witch hunt" and in so doing you falsely ennoble any minority in conflict with a majority.
An actual witch hunt has a tendency to sweep up the innocent along with the guilty. Betrayals and denounciations without real evidence. Given our understanding of witches today, we would question if anyone could actually be guilty of a meaningful crime which doubles the offense implied in a witch hunt. In effect, the innocent are swept up with the guilty, and even the "guilty" may be innocent.
It should be obvious that an actual witch hunt has limited applicability, especially when actual harm is involved. Blaming the strange old woman in the next house for a bad corn harvest is not something we would consider today, especially if the agency is a "hex". On the otherhand, if the strange old woman has a tractor and a pile of weed killer cans, and tracks leading from your field to hers, and there is a sign that a number of other women were involved, looking for them isn't a witch hunt, is it?
What if the hunt is for KKK members? They dress like witches, and speak strange words. If there are strange deaths of people they despise, is it a witch hunt to investigate them? And if evidence is found, to follow it up to other members? I don't think that is a witch hunt.
What about secret communists in government jobs with access to sensitive information, like war plans, or diplomatic secrets? Is that a witch hunt? It might be, it might not. Agents for Communist China stole US nuclear warhead design plans and now China has some much more effective nuclear warheads for their missiles. Someone did it. This could turn into a witch hunt, or a painstaking inventigation.
And, the "terror situation" is blown out of proportion? They have an openly stated goal of killing 4,000,000 Americans. The World Trade Center that was attacked used to have, as I recall, more than 50,000 people a day move throught it, of which they were able to kill 3,000 in a single attack. They have sought premission from religous authorities for the use of nuclear and chemical weapons in attacks. They received permission to use those weapons. They will use them if they can.
So, is the search for terrorists a witch hunt? I don't think so.
If you invade other countries to root out terrorism, you breed even more terrorism.
Prior to the US intervention, Afghanistan was a criminal state with Al Qaeda essentially in charge. Al Qaeda was openly running terrorist training camps that drew radical Islamists from around the world and trained them by the tens of thousands. Perhaps more dangerous than the weapons training was the fostering of webs of association among the extremists. That has come to a halt, many of them captured or killed, the communications have been disrupted, and large amounts of intelligence have been gathered. A democratically elected government is now running the country and is gaining strength. NATO is assisting with the security needs of the country. That seems to be a huge loss for the terrorists.
Iraq was formerly a criminal state run by a blood thirsty maniac that openly sponsored terrorism and provided refuge to many terrorists, including the infamous Abu Nidal. His heirs were at least as bad, if not worse, feeding people to lions, putting Olympic athletes who lost into Iron Maidens, etc. Today, Iraq is well on the way to becoming a democracy, nationalist insurgents are joining the political process as well as threatening the Islamists to leave the polling stations alone, and desperate Islamist terrorists are being drawn to Iraq where they are being identified, captured, or killed. Iraq is heading towards being another huge loss for the terrorists.
Syria, another major state sponsor of terrorism, has taken measure of the US presence in Iraq and has moderated its behavior, including leaving Lebanon, which it had occupied for about 20 years. This is another blow to the terrorists.
Libya, which had been a major state sponsor of terrorism, took note of the US invasion of Iraq and surrendered its Weapons of Mass Destruction programs, and taken other favorable actions.
Arabs in other countries are seeing the results of democratic reform in Afghanistan and Iraq and are asking, "Why can't we have meaningful reform too?" Egypt is just one such example.
Iran still is a major state sponsor of terrorism, and is seeking nuclear arms while its leader declares that Israel should be wiped off the map, and making many other crazy statements. They have recently been condemned by much of the civilized world for denying the Holocaust. If they force the hand of the world against them it will be handy to have a major US presence near by, no?
You can't use military power to win against terrorism.
History records many successes against terrorist movements and guerillas as a direct result of military power paired with political action. We may not be able to totally eliminate them, but their major power centers will be broken, as will their ability to carry out meaningful attacks.
One of the most effective way to reduce terrorism would be to change your foreign policies.
We did change our policy, which is why the terrorists are in trouble. We stopped soaking up their attacks and took military action against the terrorist states of Afghanistan and Iraq. We are actively seizing their assets and pursuing them. We are bringing political change and reform to those states. We are moving in other areas to encourage reform. I would think that would meet with your approval, or did you have something else in mind?
all executive agencies operate PRECISELY by decree. EPA? They make the rules with no review. The FAA? FCC? DoEd? DoEn? The executive branch is allowed to issue mandates that have the full weight of law, ergo they are law.
Rule making follows an established process, is subject to law and Congressional oversight, and review by the Courts. You can even participate by commenting on proposed rules. There is also Presidential guidance and oversight of the rule making process. The world is far too complex and rapidly changing for Congress to have to pass a law about everything.
After TWA 800 went down President Clinton issued executive order 13039, eliminating whistleblower protection from the members of the primary recovery team: the president wanted to change the law so he changed the law by decree.
How long will we be at war? Is the war on terror ever over?
This sounds eerily similar to 1984 - as long as we're at war with somebody, we have to sacrifice our liberties so that Big Brother can protect us.
It will be over when they are capture, killed, or lose interest in attacking us. It is likely to go on for at least 5 to 10 years more as things are. It could go on much longer.
Are you advocating that we should stop trying to protect ourselves before their power to attack is destroyed? Is there any casualty level that would make you change your mind? Al Qaeda's leaders have stated that they want to kill 4 million Americans. Should we let them kill and destroy at whim and hope that they stop when they reach 4,000,000 American dead? (After all, if they did stop after reaching that point, it would undermine attaining one of their highest goals: reestablishing the Caliphate.* (You do know about that, right?)).
By the way, which rights have you had to give up? Voting? Free speech? Religion? Freedom of association? You can still criticize the government, right?
1984 is a great science fiction book, but it is hardly a lense of universal wisdom on war, politics, and free societies.
* An Islamic super state in which church and state are combined, run under Islamic (Sharia) law, and covering all Muslim lands, and which ultimately expands to cover the world. 9/11 and 3,000 dead Americans was just a small down payment on that "dream."
I don't know where you get your information, but a lot of it is bad.
To go to war, a formal declaration from the Congress is required under the War Powers Resolution.
No, it isn't required. Try going back and reading the "Provisions" section of your Wikipedia link. The War Powers Resolution theoretically (it may be unconstitutional) limits the President's ability to commit and maintain US troops in combat without Congressional approval.
Nor does it extend to creating a new category of enemy, namely "illegal combatants", who are neither civilans nor enemy soliders.
Its not new. The Geneva Convention protections have conditions. Unlawful combatants are those who fail to meet the tests to qualify for their protection. Likewise, spies have no protection. Try reading Article 4. All Al Qaeda fail it, and well as various associated organizations.
many Taliban soliders, who were members of the armed forces of an officially recognised (by the US!) government
Only three countries - Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates - recognize the Taliban as the legitimate government in Kabul.
The authority granted to the President under a resolution authorizing the use of force does not extend to spying on its own citizens,
Citizens can already be "spied" upon, its called surveillance. It is an ordinary investigative procedure used countless times each year in criminal and national security investigations.
What prevents Bush from declaring Homeland Security (which includes the very military Coast Guard) an extension of the armed forces?
What exactly is the point of that? Hmm? You're writing nonsense.
Government departments are run according to Law, not decree. The Department of Homeland Security didn't come into existence by decree, but by laws passed by Congress. It wasn't staffed by decree, but by the normal nomination of the President, and Advice & Consent of the Senate. The Department of Homeland Security doesn't get its budget by decree and seizure, but by Congressional oversight and taxes. The only reason the Coast Guard would be part of the Department of Homeland Security in peace time is because they were put there by who? Congress!! If Congress doesn't like the way they behave, they can cut of their money, or rewrite the laws they operate under. If President Bush doesn't comply with the law as Congress sees fit, who can remove President Bush from office? Congress!!
The Coast Guard can and has been under the operational control of the Navy in time of war, at least in war zones. This has a very long history, and it hasn't sunk the Republic yet.
When it comes to a parade of horribles, I think that you are showing a distinct lack of imagination. If you want to really start sweating, imagine the carnage that would result if President Bush declared the Army & Marines to be part of the IRS!!! Arrrgh! That is too horrible to imagine!! Black helicopters be darned! I'm worrying about the black copy machines!!
You just can't get that kind of gut-level understanding without a visit from the authorities. That is one kid who will have a deeper understanding of the material now than anyone else in class.
Either that or the anonymous "kid" is a plot device used by a couple of professors with an agenda.
I wonder exactly which part of the Department of Homeland Security these two were supposedly from? DHS is a big agency, after all. Which part is responsible for monitoring inter-library loans and sending out pairs of agents to check up on things, especially borrowers of Communist books available in libraries, used book stores, and Amazon.com?
It seems more likely that either this story is fiction, or there is more going on, on both sides, than is being told. Maybe the professors assigning visits to Al Qaeda web sites had something to do with it?
Dr. Williams said he had been planning to offer a course on terrorism next semester, but is reconsidering, because it might put his students at risk.
"I shudder to think of all the students I've had monitoring al-Qaeda Web sites, what the government must think of that," he said. "Mao Tse-Tung is completely harmless."
Any bets on the professors being Bush supporters and they were just trying to "help"?
The people in power now are the children of the cold war era.. terrorist, communist, witch or heretic. Same name, same tactic, different era.
So, do you believe that the Al Qaeda terrorists are mythical, or do witches do real harm?
Who would you fear more? A witch with a cursed birch twig who threatens to place a hex on Manhattan, or an Al Qaeda cell with a truck bomb somewhere in the Bronx?
Regarding Communist states and magic kingdoms, do they both exist, neither of them, or is it a mix?
Who deserves greater pity, the 3,000 who died on 9/11, or the Wicked Witch of the West?
Pretending, or God help us, actually believing, that witches, Communists, and terrorists are all conjured up by the state as an excuse to oppress people is lunacy.
Slashdot Mirror
Depends on whose figures you use: "In London on Saturday, police said the turnout was 750,000, the largest demonstration ever in the British capital. The organizers put the figure at 2 million."
Except that we know we've become a target because of the US, who in fact created the whole mess in the first place.
Hardly. Although that might be a comforting notion for you in the short term, in the long term you are likely to be disabused of it by events. Europe has developed a rapidly growing Muslim population almost as large as Iraq, a growing number of which are disgruntled, and Islamist extremists. The trends don't look good:
Chemical anlaysis of wine has been going on for some time for a variety of purposes.
Opinion of the United States has waxed and waned since WW2. Viet Nam and the deployment of Pershing & cruise missiles in Europe weren't any more popular. If you judge by protests, they were less popular. More Europeans will come to see the light as the Islamists continue attacking Europeans in Europe. It is amazing how quickly that clears the mind.
Even our strongest allies no longer trust our good intentions.
NATO is in Afghanistan.
And today in Iraq: I'm not sure that counts as alone and mistrusted.
Most historians agree that the Cuban Missile Crisis would have resulted in the Global Thermonuclear War if Kennedy has listened to LeMay and invaded Cuba. Damn Massachusetts liberals.
The Cuban Missile Crisis, the Bay of Pigs, and then Viet Nam? Imagine if we had a President doing that sort of thing today. Would you be praising him, or cursing him?
I'm looking around, and I don't see a new FDR, JFK, or Eisenhower waiting in the wings.
Collin Powel could have been another Eisenhower, unfortunately, many on the left would find a black moderate Republican president intollerable. JF Kerry would probably have been president if he had been another JF Kennedy. Since he wasn't, Americans elected a Harvard MBA, former fighter pilot, and governor as president. Oddly enough, JF Kennedy is more similar to GWB in terms of foreign and domestic policy than to JF Kerry.
We've now been fighting the War on Terrorism longer than we fought WWII, how do you think the results stack up?
We joined WW2 long after it was in progress. (Almost 4.5 years) We joined this war at the beginning. Consider this to be 1941. We still have at least 4 years to go. We poured enormous resources into WW2. This war is being fought practically on a shoe string budget in comparison. I think we are doing fine.
There is some cause for concern since some Americans are actively working to undermine the war effort. What is especially troubling is that it is over a question of policy with a strong legal basis supporting it, as noted by former Clinton Associate Attorney General John Schmidt, and a long history. Why now? Just to undermine the President?
Given that as time goes on, control of domain names will come to be a vital resource that can make or break people and companies, the author is probably right that national governments should not be able to mess them around with impunity.
But businesses can operate them... with impunity? Without oversight? So, would you say that reassigning control of the Iraq domain from two jailed Palestinian immigrants in the United States was what... arbitrary? Unreasonable? Wouldn't it have made the US government more powerful by taking control of the
Now that it has control, the Iraqi government can run its TLD itself, hand it over it a business or committee, or whatever it wants. And now the Iraqi people will have a say, certainly more than they would have had before the reassignment.
Governments are involved because the internet is important to countries, commerce, education, and more. It isn't just a hang-out for geeks, email, and porn.
As to the source of the outrage, here is how the article ends: So, nobody in Iraq was better off because the democratically elected Iraqi government now controls Iraq's domain instead of two jailed men in the United States? Right...
Of course the even-handed manner in the Register article is further shown in this paragraph: Notice how the convictions for providing financial support for Hamas are left out?
As to censorship, you can always get a domain name in another TLD.
You seem to be painting this as if someone in the US was limiting internet access for Finland and they were somehow convinced by Linux to let Finland "join the club". I think it is more likely that changes in Finland's telecommunication regulations and deployment of ATM between Finnish Universities had more to do wtih it.
Apparently the main outrage comes from ICAAN reassigning control of the little used
I'm finding it difficult to get worked up about this.
More likely they will just become "undocumented citizens" with rights at least equal to those of "undocumented workers" AKA illegal aliens, who already have right (some of which vary by locality) including drivers licenses, certain medical treatments, basic education, labor rights, and many more, even voting in some localities.
I will add a few links for commentary by:
Lawyer & blogger John Hinderaker of Powerline blog
Former Clinton administration Associate Attorney General John Schmidt
A Justice Department response to Congress by Assistant Attorney General, William Moschella
The quick & dirty version is: There is a very strong case this was prefectly legal.
And, of course, Congress was notified of the program.
I saw a documentary on the decision process for the design of the next generation of fighter planes that had numerous of the interviewed people invoke the "looks weird" nature of one of the designs as a reasonable grounds to reject it.
Was that clear enough?
Perfectly clear... I just don't believe that looks had any meaningful influence on the decision, even granting that is what they said.
What you saw in the documentary was a combination of inputs from:
- The producers / director (what they wanted to show or could dig up)
- The editors ( this shot vs that one)
- The Air Force, contractors, and associates (What they were willing to say or show)
- The network (what they left in or cut out)
- You (Your attention and understanding)
I am perfectly willing to believe you saw pretty much what you say you did. I just don't believe that looks played any meaningful role in the decision to select a fighter jet costing $258 million each. The only question in my mind is, who wasn't conveying the real, meaningful decision criterion? The Director? The Editors? The Air Force / contractors? Was the show aimed at the perceived audience who wouldn't be interested in the extensive technical minutia that would be a large part of the decision, but would accept "fast and pretty"? Was the decision reached because the engines were in Congressman X's district and the avionics were in Senator Y's district, and nobody would come out and say that? Was "looks" used as a proxy for, "We don't trust the continuous attitude feedback mechanism when combined with fly by wire for an inherently aerodynamically unstable airframe caused by the angle of attack in the wings", or some such? Was "looks" used as a distraction so that nobody would have to say that the new fight has a "quad damage" power-up button, and can shoot down anything else at a 6:1 ratio?
The only way you would convince me that "looks" had anything to do with it would be if it was in the context of "radar profile", as in "on radar, the F-22 looks to be the size of a humming bird."
If you could strap on wing, missiles, and engines to a toilet and shoot down F15s at a rate of 10:1, I have little doubt that the Air Force will fill the skies with militarized flying toilets as soon as they could. (Some might say that isn't too far off from describing an A-10.)
A recurring theme isn't necessarily an important theme. I think the reference to "looks" was one of: misdirection, bad editing, or targeting at a particular demographic (substitute fighter jet for hot rod car?).
I'm pretty much there with you.
There is no way that President Bush would ask, say, the NSA to do anything illegal is there?
And, although there may be a few renegades, there isn't much of official Washington that would use secrets for political gain.
But then there is the press which has recently developed some badly misplaced priorities, actively supporting and publicizing leaks of sensitive ongoing intelligence and military operations against the enemy over and over again. You would think it would be easy to understand that this harms our national security, yet much of the mainstream media passes over the issue in silence. On the other hand, they have endless energy and interest in a kerfuffle involving no crime.
Maybe the media will start taking the war more seriously if Al Qaeda makes significant progress in their announced goal of killing four million Americans. Or maybe not. If there are more successful large scale terrorist attacks in the United States, aided by the media's disclosure of on-going military and intelligence operations, I expect that the majority of the media won't engage in self-examination, but will rather most likely start banging the drums from the fever swamp. The fever swamp runs deep, and support for the President among the media is thin.
Well, if the other party gains power, maybe things will change... or maybe not.
Thank goodness we are a country where you can still engage in dissent against the mainstream.
and here you wrote: and in response to this you wrote
I think your real disagreement is with yourself,
1). Put software into production without checking all the settings
2). Put software into production without fully testing it
3). (probably) used software which they don't have the source to, and thus don't know if there are any backdoors.
I am worried about it from a National Security perspective - NSA using cookies worries me far less than Microsoft doing it - but the above issues could expose the NSA, and hence the USA to attack.
Don't trouble yourself. The web server was, no doubt, well tested. The problem was essentially a client side setting, and a minor one at that.
NSA separates classified and unclassified networks. The chance of exposing sensitive data is likely miniscule, the chance of exposing classified data is non-existent.
So either one or both agencies in question are simply incompetent, or lying to us. Which do you think is more plausible?
You're kidding, right? NSA and CIA are separate Federal agencies with tens of thousands of employees. Their web masters and IT departments probably pay about as much attention to what the other does as Ford Motor Company & Dodge. And this is hardly the first time that a Federal agency has handed out persistent cookies against policy. Do you think CIA & NSA are in cahoots with the Office of Personnel Management, Ames Laboratory, and Bureau of Labor Statistics?
I think that a more likely and equally plausible explanation is that NSA's sys admins, web developers, and IT staff are in about the same boat as most people in IT: overworked, understaffed, plagued by too many meetings, dealing with more hacking attempts than you could imagine, struggling with a software upgrade, and simply missed flipping one of a growing number of switches in software which changed a relatively minor behavior in the software. (Another possibility is that government employees are all 10 feet tall, super geniuses that never make mistakes. I think previous discussions on Slashdot have largely deprecated that possibility.)
Besides, if you were really concerned about avoiding their scrutiny, you wouldn't visit their web site any way.
I was watching a documentary on the race to build the next generation fighter jet, and time and time again, the main argument in favor of the X22 was that the other design looked weird.
Yeah, plan your multi-billion dollar expenses on the sexiness of the machine boys, not on the functionality. I too get "the willies" thinking that people this infantile are sitting with their finger on the metaphorical nuclear button.
You don't suppose that rather than try to dig up classified information, or try to determine the objective criteria used in the decision(things like unrefueled range, weapons load, maintainability, cost, situation awareness aids, etc. ) that the producers took an easy out and said it won because, " Oooooh, its pretty and fast!" I find that notion easier to believe than the assertion that a major defense program providing the primary air superiority fighter for the Air Force, the F-22 would be decided primarily on aesthetics and that said selection would survive scrutiney by the Department of the Air Force, DOD, Congress, and the President. There are many philosophical positions that can impact programs like this, (purpose built vs general purpose, heavy vs light) but ugly vs pretty isn't really one of them. If it were, two of the most effective aircraft the US has built would never have seen the light of day: the F-117 Nighthawk stealth figher, and the A-10 Thunderbold II, AKA Warthog.
If a group of men can do it to a different group of men, what is it?
Overwhelming advantage which should lead to an easy battlefield victory, and hopefully, a short war.
Sharks attack in the water near beaches, not in bathrooms.
Since there aren't really any shark attacks that occur in bathrooms, I propose installing cameras and nets in the water at beaches to protect swimmers. The great thing about putting the cameras in the water at the beach is that it could actually help prevent shark attacks, and isn't unreasonably intrusive.
Is there some reason you proposed putting cameras in bathroom instead of in the water at beaches? One might wonder if you were trying to discredit the use of surveillance despite its utility.
You misunderstand the concept of "witch hunt" and in so doing you falsely ennoble any minority in conflict with a majority.
An actual witch hunt has a tendency to sweep up the innocent along with the guilty. Betrayals and denounciations without real evidence. Given our understanding of witches today, we would question if anyone could actually be guilty of a meaningful crime which doubles the offense implied in a witch hunt. In effect, the innocent are swept up with the guilty, and even the "guilty" may be innocent.
It should be obvious that an actual witch hunt has limited applicability, especially when actual harm is involved. Blaming the strange old woman in the next house for a bad corn harvest is not something we would consider today, especially if the agency is a "hex". On the otherhand, if the strange old woman has a tractor and a pile of weed killer cans, and tracks leading from your field to hers, and there is a sign that a number of other women were involved, looking for them isn't a witch hunt, is it?
What if the hunt is for KKK members? They dress like witches, and speak strange words. If there are strange deaths of people they despise, is it a witch hunt to investigate them? And if evidence is found, to follow it up to other members? I don't think that is a witch hunt.
What about secret communists in government jobs with access to sensitive information, like war plans, or diplomatic secrets? Is that a witch hunt? It might be, it might not. Agents for Communist China stole US nuclear warhead design plans and now China has some much more effective nuclear warheads for their missiles. Someone did it. This could turn into a witch hunt, or a painstaking inventigation.
And, the "terror situation" is blown out of proportion? They have an openly stated goal of killing 4,000,000 Americans. The World Trade Center that was attacked used to have, as I recall, more than 50,000 people a day move throught it, of which they were able to kill 3,000 in a single attack. They have sought premission from religous authorities for the use of nuclear and chemical weapons in attacks. They received permission to use those weapons. They will use them if they can.
So, is the search for terrorists a witch hunt? I don't think so.
If you invade other countries to root out terrorism, you breed even more terrorism.
Prior to the US intervention, Afghanistan was a criminal state with Al Qaeda essentially in charge. Al Qaeda was openly running terrorist training camps that drew radical Islamists from around the world and trained them by the tens of thousands. Perhaps more dangerous than the weapons training was the fostering of webs of association among the extremists. That has come to a halt, many of them captured or killed, the communications have been disrupted, and large amounts of intelligence have been gathered. A democratically elected government is now running the country and is gaining strength. NATO is assisting with the security needs of the country. That seems to be a huge loss for the terrorists.
Iraq was formerly a criminal state run by a blood thirsty maniac that openly sponsored terrorism and provided refuge to many terrorists, including the infamous Abu Nidal. His heirs were at least as bad, if not worse, feeding people to lions, putting Olympic athletes who lost into Iron Maidens, etc. Today, Iraq is well on the way to becoming a democracy, nationalist insurgents are joining the political process as well as threatening the Islamists to leave the polling stations alone, and desperate Islamist terrorists are being drawn to Iraq where they are being identified, captured, or killed. Iraq is heading towards being another huge loss for the terrorists.
Syria, another major state sponsor of terrorism, has taken measure of the US presence in Iraq and has moderated its behavior, including leaving Lebanon, which it had occupied for about 20 years. This is another blow to the terrorists.
Libya, which had been a major state sponsor of terrorism, took note of the US invasion of Iraq and surrendered its Weapons of Mass Destruction programs, and taken other favorable actions.
Arabs in other countries are seeing the results of democratic reform in Afghanistan and Iraq and are asking, "Why can't we have meaningful reform too?" Egypt is just one such example.
Iran still is a major state sponsor of terrorism, and is seeking nuclear arms while its leader declares that Israel should be wiped off the map, and making many other crazy statements. They have recently been condemned by much of the civilized world for denying the Holocaust. If they force the hand of the world against them it will be handy to have a major US presence near by, no?
You can't use military power to win against terrorism.
History records many successes against terrorist movements and guerillas as a direct result of military power paired with political action. We may not be able to totally eliminate them, but their major power centers will be broken, as will their ability to carry out meaningful attacks.
One of the most effective way to reduce terrorism would be to change your foreign policies.
We did change our policy, which is why the terrorists are in trouble. We stopped soaking up their attacks and took military action against the terrorist states of Afghanistan and Iraq. We are actively seizing their assets and pursuing them. We are bringing political change and reform to those states. We are moving in other areas to encourage reform. I would think that would meet with your approval, or did you have something else in mind?
all executive agencies operate PRECISELY by decree. EPA? They make the rules with no review. The FAA? FCC? DoEd? DoEn? The executive branch is allowed to issue mandates that have the full weight of law, ergo they are law.
Rule making follows an established process, is subject to law and Congressional oversight, and review by the Courts. You can even participate by commenting on proposed rules. There is also Presidential guidance and oversight of the rule making process. The world is far too complex and rapidly changing for Congress to have to pass a law about everything.
After TWA 800 went down President Clinton issued executive order 13039, eliminating whistleblower protection from the members of the primary recovery team: the president wanted to change the law so he changed the law by decree.
Sorry, but no.
How long will we be at war? Is the war on terror ever over?
This sounds eerily similar to 1984 - as long as we're at war with somebody, we have to sacrifice our liberties so that Big Brother can protect us.
It will be over when they are capture, killed, or lose interest in attacking us. It is likely to go on for at least 5 to 10 years more as things are. It could go on much longer.
Are you advocating that we should stop trying to protect ourselves before their power to attack is destroyed? Is there any casualty level that would make you change your mind? Al Qaeda's leaders have stated that they want to kill 4 million Americans. Should we let them kill and destroy at whim and hope that they stop when they reach 4,000,000 American dead? (After all, if they did stop after reaching that point, it would undermine attaining one of their highest goals: reestablishing the Caliphate.* (You do know about that, right?)).
By the way, which rights have you had to give up? Voting? Free speech? Religion? Freedom of association? You can still criticize the government, right?
1984 is a great science fiction book, but it is hardly a lense of universal wisdom on war, politics, and free societies.
* An Islamic super state in which church and state are combined, run under Islamic (Sharia) law, and covering all Muslim lands, and which ultimately expands to cover the world. 9/11 and 3,000 dead Americans was just a small down payment on that "dream."
To go to war, a formal declaration from the Congress is required under the War Powers Resolution.
No, it isn't required. Try going back and reading the "Provisions" section of your Wikipedia link. The War Powers Resolution theoretically (it may be unconstitutional) limits the President's ability to commit and maintain US troops in combat without Congressional approval.
Nor does it extend to creating a new category of enemy, namely "illegal combatants", who are neither civilans nor enemy soliders.
Its not new. The Geneva Convention protections have conditions. Unlawful combatants are those who fail to meet the tests to qualify for their protection. Likewise, spies have no protection. Try reading Article 4. All Al Qaeda fail it, and well as various associated organizations.
many Taliban soliders, who were members of the armed forces of an officially recognised (by the US!) government
Nope.
The authority granted to the President under a resolution authorizing the use of force does not extend to spying on its own citizens,
Citizens can already be "spied" upon, its called surveillance. It is an ordinary investigative procedure used countless times each year in criminal and national security investigations.
I could go on...
What prevents Bush from declaring Homeland Security (which includes the very military Coast Guard) an extension of the armed forces?
What exactly is the point of that? Hmm? You're writing nonsense.
Government departments are run according to Law, not decree. The Department of Homeland Security didn't come into existence by decree, but by laws passed by Congress. It wasn't staffed by decree, but by the normal nomination of the President, and Advice & Consent of the Senate. The Department of Homeland Security doesn't get its budget by decree and seizure, but by Congressional oversight and taxes. The only reason the Coast Guard would be part of the Department of Homeland Security in peace time is because they were put there by who? Congress!! If Congress doesn't like the way they behave, they can cut of their money, or rewrite the laws they operate under. If President Bush doesn't comply with the law as Congress sees fit, who can remove President Bush from office? Congress!!
The Coast Guard can and has been under the operational control of the Navy in time of war, at least in war zones. This has a very long history, and it hasn't sunk the Republic yet.
When it comes to a parade of horribles, I think that you are showing a distinct lack of imagination. If you want to really start sweating, imagine the carnage that would result if President Bush declared the Army & Marines to be part of the IRS!!! Arrrgh! That is too horrible to imagine!! Black helicopters be darned! I'm worrying about the black copy machines!!
Either that or the anonymous "kid" is a plot device used by a couple of professors with an agenda.
I wonder exactly which part of the Department of Homeland Security these two were supposedly from? DHS is a big agency, after all. Which part is responsible for monitoring inter-library loans and sending out pairs of agents to check up on things, especially borrowers of Communist books available in libraries, used book stores, and Amazon.com?
It seems more likely that either this story is fiction, or there is more going on, on both sides, than is being told. Maybe the professors assigning visits to Al Qaeda web sites had something to do with it?
Any bets on the professors being Bush supporters and they were just trying to "help"?
The people in power now are the children of the cold war era.. terrorist, communist, witch or heretic. Same name, same tactic, different era.
So, do you believe that the Al Qaeda terrorists are mythical, or do witches do real harm?
Who would you fear more? A witch with a cursed birch twig who threatens to place a hex on Manhattan, or an Al Qaeda cell with a truck bomb somewhere in the Bronx?
Regarding Communist states and magic kingdoms, do they both exist, neither of them, or is it a mix?
Who deserves greater pity, the 3,000 who died on 9/11, or the Wicked Witch of the West?
Pretending, or God help us, actually believing, that witches, Communists, and terrorists are all conjured up by the state as an excuse to oppress people is lunacy.
War Is Peace
Freedom Is Slavery
Ignorance Is Strength
I'll add one more to your list:
Wisdom is unquestioning belief of everything in print or on the internet.