It's No Secret

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Monday November 13, 2006 · 7:56 AM PST

2006/11/13 · 07:56

Glenn Greenwald's post Why the Beltway class can't comprehend the Russ Feingolds of the world documents the failures of the of the pundits and politicians highlighted by Russ Feingold's announcement that he will not run for president in 2008.

Senator Feingold's announcement is doubly disappointing in a way because it not only removes him from contention, but it illustrates the dedication, compassion and, commitment to the American People that would have made him a good choice. Greenwald does a good job of giving Senator Feingold the credit he deserves for his character and commitment.

Greenwald also states that the reasons the politician and pundits cannot understand Senator Feingold is because, "They believe in nothing" and here I am afraid his analysis is off the mark. The truth is far worse than that.

The truth is they believe that everyone is like themselves.

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The NSA and Disney/Pixar

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Thursday September 07, 2006 · 8:35 AM PDT

2006/09/07 · 08:35

Meet Dr. Eric Haseltine Associate Director of National Intelligence for Science and Technology.

Dr. Haseltine works for General Micheal V. Hayden the Principle Deputy Director of National Intelligence who works for Ambassador John D. Negropontethe Director of National Intelligence. (It is nice to see that Negroponte's involvement with the covert funding of the contras, cover-up of human rights abuses by the CIA in the Honduras and, association with Kyle "Dusty" Foggo, former Executive Director of the CIA, under investigation for involvement in the Cunningham Bribery Case, has not prevented him from holding a critical intelligence position in the bush administration.)

Dr. Haseltine was the former Director of Research, at the National Security Agency from 2002 until his new appointment with the Director of National Intelligence in June 2005. Before joining NSA Dr. Haseltine was the Executive Vice President of Research and Development at Walt Disney Imagineering, Disney's R&D division...

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Wednesday August 30, 2006 · 9:54 AM PDT

2006/08/30 · 09:54

The new pejorative "Islamic Fascist" or "Islamofascist" bothers me. It is created from two words that do not work well together, that lack meaning in the same phrase. What is an Islamic fascist?

The truth is I don't believe the words are intended to work together; they were never intended to be given any great thought.(and seems to be a favorite of pundits lacking the capacity for thought) The intent behind the phrase is to equate by co-location, Islam and the emotional reaction, the aversion, moral disgust, most people have to the word "Fascism".

This is an oft used trick of the neoconservatives. They create phrases like "Compassionate Conservative" and "Islamic Fascist" to create associations in the minds of people where no link exists in reality. These phrases are not merely wordplay, they are psychological tactics.

More below on which group really represents the ideology of fascism.
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FTC hearings on Net Neutrality

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Wednesday August 23, 2006 · 5:56 AM PDT

2006/08/23 · 05:56

The Federal Trade Commission has formed an Internet Access Task Force to examine Net neutrality. The FTC will also host a conference called Protecting Consumers in the Next Tech-Ade and public hearings from Nov. 6 to 8. A pdf of the preliminary agenda is here.

This is an important hearing for Net Neutrality. Whether it is a positive development is questionable. Chairwoman Deborah Platt Majoras has already indicated her preferences as to the outcome:

Chairwoman Deborah Platt Majoras on Monday also called on lawmakers to be cautious about passing a Net neutrality law, which could prohibit broadband providers such as AT&T Inc. and Comcast Corp. from giving their own Internet content top priority, or from charging Web sites additional fees for faster service.
Net neutrality advocates are sincere in their concerns, Majoras said during a speech at the Progress & Freedom Foundation's Aspen Summit in Colorado. "I just question the starting assumption that government regulation, rather than the market itself under existing laws, will provide the best solution to a problem," she said.

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Thursday June 29, 2006 · 8:41 AM PDT

2006/06/29 · 08:41

Imagine for a moment that salespeople had to give a chunk of their commissions to the airports they flew out of, and you'd have an idea of why the Internet community is horrified by Internet isolationism.

Computer World has an excellent opinion article by Dan Kaminsky explaining HR 5252 for what it is; A protection racket, extortion by the telcos.

Essentially what Comcast and Verizon are saying is, "Say that is a nice site you have there, making some money are you? It would be a shame if something were to happen to it, packets get lost you know. Tell you what, for a small fee we'll keep an eye on it, make sure nothing happens." Read More

The dangers of Social Network Analysis

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Monday May 15, 2006 · 10:23 AM PDT

2006/05/15 · 10:23

Administration apologists, right wing pundits and some just plain ignorant people are trying to dismiss the revelation of the NSA database of domestic phone calls as unimportant because information on individuals and the conversations themselves are not collected.

The concerns about the invasion of privacy, the possible misuse of personal data, the monitoring of individual phone calls are all dismissed because the NSA and the administration are only going to use this information for social network analysis. Nothing to worry about, see!

Do not be alarmed. Be very, very frightened.

Social Network Analysis, despite its academic and impersonal sounding name is probably the most dangerous use of this information and is a far greater danger to our democracy than the monitoring of individual phone calls.
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A great republican

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Monday January 30, 2006 · 8:17 AM PST

2006/01/30 · 08:17

In anticipation of the SOTU address, I think now would be a good time to reflect on the words of a real Presicent and Commander in Chief, Dwight D. Eisenhower. From his 1961 Farewell Speech:

Another factor in maintaining balance involves the element of time. As we peer into society's future, we -- you and I, and our government -- must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow. We cannot mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow.

Tax cuts anyone?

This is the 'Military Industrial Complex Speech' so the following quote is often used:

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Friday January 27, 2006 · 1:40 PM PST

2006/01/27 · 13:40

From the Anchorage Daily News

The state Division of Elections has refused to turn over its electronic voting files to the Democrats, arguing that the data format belongs to a private company and can't be made public.

...

At this point, it's impossible to say whether the correct candidates were declared the winner in all Alaska races from 2004, Brown said.

The private contractor hired to provide Alaska's electronic voting machines is Diebold Election Systems. It has told Alaska officials it owns the "structure of the database" though the data itself is public.

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Wednesday January 25, 2006 · 9:55 AM PST

2006/01/25 · 09:55

Media pundits, most notably, Chris Matthews, have shamelessly been calling anyone disagreeing with the bush Administration allies of Osama bin Laden.

The basis for this slur is the idea that because someone agrees with bin Laden on Factual information, e.g. the earth is round, or that Iraq is descending into chaos and becoming a training ground for terrorists, implies that someone agrees with the goals or methods of bin Laden. Aside from being a truly gross reasoning error, it is insulting to the vast majority of people who want the best for our country and don't think bush is delivering it.

There are people in the U.S. though who do agree with bin Laden's goals and put their own personal ambitions above the wellbeing of their neighbors and country.

Would you like to know who they are? Take the quiz.

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Tuesday January 24, 2006 · 10:51 AM PST

2006/01/24 · 10:51

Just in case you thought that the administration's domestic spying couldn't happen to you, let's talk about CIFA. From NewsWeek

Created three years ago by the Defense Department, CIFA's role is "force protection"--tracking threats and terrorist plots against military installations and personnel inside the United States. In May 2003, Paul Wolfowitz, then deputy Defense secretary, authorized a fact-gathering operation code-named TALON--short for Threat and Local Observation Notice--that would collect "raw information" about "suspicious incidents." The data would be fed to CIFA to help the Pentagon's "terrorism threat warning process," according to an internal Pentagon memo.

Another NSA program? No, Its the Army this time and they are set up for domestic surveillance. According an opinion article in the Washington Post by William Arkin Read More

Great answer by Diebold

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Monday January 23, 2006 · 9:16 AM PST

2006/01/23 · 09:16

A particularly interesting article in ComputerWorld: Q&A: E-voting systems hacker sees `particularly bad' security issues

In this article Herbert Thompson, director of research at Wilmington, Mass.-based Security Innovation, talks about e-voting security.

Can you tell us about some of your e-voting machine hacking activities? On Tuesday, Dec. 13, we conducted a hack of the Diebold AccuVote optical scan device. I wrote a five-line script in Visual Basic that would allow you to go into the central tabulator and change any vote total you wanted, leaving no logs.

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Friday October 14, 2005 · 2:06 PM PDT

2005/10/14 · 14:06

From the life imitates art department.

The president in particular is very much a figurehead - he wields no real power whatsoever. He is apparently chosen by the government, but the qualities he is required to display are not those of leadership but those of finely judged outrage. For this reason the president is always a controversial choice, always an infuriating but fascinating character. His job is not to wield power but to draw attention away from it...

- Douglas Adams from the 'Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy'

More below the fold on how relevant this quote is to understanding the bush administration and where your money is going.

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It's No Secret

The NSA and Disney/Pixar

Neo-Conservative Fascist

FTC hearings on Net Neutrality

Internet Extortion

The dangers of Social Network Analysis

A great republican

Diebold Wins

Americans for Osama

Wave to your intelligence analyst

Great answer by Diebold

The bush Sideshow ( Check to see if your wallet is there.)