Re: [cdr] Re: The Register - eBay to Fees: come and get what you want (fwd)
Third function.Look out behind you! At 05:06 PM 9/20/03 +0200, you wrote: also sprach Jim Choate [EMAIL PROTECTED] [2003.09.20.1638 +0200]: http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/32936.html Don't want to open a can of worms here, but is cypherpunks secondary function to be Jim's link distribution list? I mean, we all know The Register and we all look around. -- martin; (greetings from the heart of the sun.) \ echo mailto: !#^.*|tr * mailto:; [EMAIL PROTECTED] snip
[cdr] What to do when gibbering cowardly eunuchs panic,a website.
Watching you prissy little twits running around flapping your hands has made my day! Thank you so much. (One rule of thumb I use is to never, ever use actual names of burrowcrats. Except for a few at the top, I don't even make any effort to remember the names. It's hard to be charged with making a direct, credible threat when no specific person is either named or alluded to.) Obey the five million laws at all times and make excuses for my senilty,gotcha chief. Allusions work, like the coke-snorting C student who drove his car drunk into somebody's hedge. I wouldn't necessarily leap to the conclusion Professor Rat lives in Australia. Perhaps he just has has a shell there. -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ Illusions work,like youse are some kind of free thinking revolutionaries.Oh you mean ALLUSIONS...like the Randite republican who was a snitch for Ed Meese and is now a senile racist nazi living in a bunker like Charles Ng Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law Shouldn't that read Obey Mongo who obeys all the laws all the time especially from Disneycops You eunuchs crack me up,do you ever read what your shovelling? That's libertarians for you - anarchists who want police protection from their slaves. kim stanley robinson http://world.std.com/~mhuben/leftlib.html
[cdr] Professor Rat lives in Australia.
Like kaZaA lives in Vanuatu Being that he's in Australia, as far as I know, I doubt extradition will occur. Wow...Fingered by Ed Mees's personal snitch.How will I ever repay you Mong? The questions being asked of Jim Don't you mean the 'Rat'? :) may have to do with the Feds making the only prosecution they can make: Anything,anywhere,anytime.RICO ...that those passing on such threats via mailing lists are somehow guilty of some crime. This is just speculation on my part. Watch what you say,watch what you do. You are with us or you are with the terrorists. Ring a bell moron? I hear there is a cure for Alziemers in the works. If so, the case may hinge on issues of common carrier status. Also, I believe Congress passed a bill explicitly saying that sysops are not liable for the e-mail passing through their systems...Declan will likely have the latest on this. Lives in Cali and swears by Congress,this leader of the eunuch circle is truly dangerous. Just remember like Nazi Germany the jails might be safer than the camps for a few years. Anyway, I'll bet good money That'll be the day,how about the SUV?...Mongo dead by Xmas? I'd buy that for a dollar! this is the series of messages in question. Nothing else I have seen either rises to this level or seems to involve Pennsylvania in any significant way. --Tim May There is a new MEESE style attack on the adult movie industry,(you know when grown ups play let's pretend - only these ones have GENITALs. You must remember them) Nothing is going on in Pennsylvania that will affect cypherpunk EUNUCHS that's for sure. Who wants to join the LAST revolution? The one to take down ALL the governments! James Dalton Bell.
[cdr] His posts are very direct threats
My comment is that this Professor Rat, whose posts I have not seen for as long as lne.com has been my feed, is probably in some real difficulty. His posts are very direct threats, not veiled in any of the vague, political politicians ought to be given a fair trial and then hanged or even the I hope Washington is nuked sorts. Well Mongo never tires of making a jackass of himself or displaying his cowardice either. I am charged with threats to kill Victorian police,under the crimes act,that has a 10 max penalty. Sometimes the circle of eunuchs is approached by men with gonads.You do remember gonads don't you Mong? Under the parchment you feeble minded freeper scum worship,that is not even a crime in yr shithole little nation.However - I am pleading NOT GUILTY and have made NO ADMISSIONS. So I am INNOCENT till proven guilty dickwad. Moron number two... hope this isn't going to be another one of those cases where some federal judge reads list messages completely out of context, and concludes that some plot is afoot to blow up the federal government. Please don't throw me in that ol briar patch massa Fox! Gee I hope I didn't frighten the eunuchs again. Perhaps Professor Rat is a federal agent hoping to bait some list member into publicly cheering when he criticizes high-ranking public officials. Oh you mean like confessed snitches Mongo (to MEESE!) Choate,(to the Fucking bureaucratic imbeciles.) or Peter Trei to CJ's parole filth.That was brazen.I did dob in some Kali Nazi wack job in to the ATF,I hope they are organizing a raid on his compound in the hills of Corralito's.I hope he is shot while shitting blood in terror like a gibbering coward.Maybe he is a survivalist who carries cyanide like his old mate Leonard. Or perhaps Professor Rat just made the mistake of playing Paintball on the weekends while subscribed to the Cypherpunks list. BR Nowt wrong with paintball or using this list as a toilet,don't worry the eunuchs here lap it all up. Threat's! You aint seen nothing yet.I promise you. I despise you. I despise your order, your laws, your force-propped authority. Hang me for it! Louis Lingg FREE JIM BELL!
[cdr] Mongo the greatest shrink since Radovan Karadizc?
Were he in the U.S., I'd expect he'd face serious charges. Being that he's in Australia, as far as I know, I doubt extradition will occur. Um,I am facing charges with a 10 year penalty under the crimes act,I guess that's nothing these days over there in the Soviet Unions of America.Trial date is Oct 20. (Terrantson measl) I disagree (although I would not have several years ago). The FBI has been learning to use international extradition over the last two years or so, and are actually getting to be quite good at it from what I hear. (measl is a weasel) And even if he were prosecuted, by Oz or by the U.S., his various articles indicate mental disturbance could be a winning defense, with him ordered to get back on his Prozac or Zoloft or whatever. Ha! The FBI threatened to extradite me early in 2002 over the 'Pacifier letter's' They applied enough pressure for the Australian Federal Police to visit with my psychiatrist and together they cooked up a 'management plan' that Soviet and Cuban shrinks would be proud of. This is, as far as I know ,a unique attempt to drug a dissident from another country! I have a lot of FOI papers on this and posted a lot about it to the archive at the time. Although almost nobbled and committed I managed to turn this telling incident to some advantage by passing a review with flying colors! From plain vanilla schizophrenia to paranoid schizophrenia courtesy of the FBI,my pension is secured till the old age one kicks in.Thank you FBI! The cascading agencies involved in my original bust make it easier to defend myself actually although it's nice to always have a 'Plan B'. (search on antipsychiatry non CoS) I am available for extradition though the CIA has passed on some new laws to their puppets here that make 'offensive' material illegal,'cyberstalking is illegal and ASIO now can disappear people so why would they bother? I would still consider it a propaganda coup,just less likely asSeppo's are not really flavor of the month here at the minute. Thanks for the 'diagnosis' Dr Mong,thanks a hell of a lot. I thought major league assholes like you were opposed to Soviet style psychiatry? I don't need any help to defend myself from this cypherpunk circle of eunuchs. FREE JIM BELL!
[cdr] Measl the Weasel - for the record
Though described by some as 'humourless' we can now see clearly what a bundle of laughs our friend JA Terranson is... would dearly love to see this idiot named an enemy combatant, if for no other reason that to laugh my ass off. To paraphrase both Tim *and* Mattd: Proffr Needs Killing - rlmao! What really cracks me up is that he still wont pledge any cash.This guy was ahead of his time though, way back before jya disgraced himself by acting as Mongo's echo chamber.The burn off of 20 million,etc Terranson was bending over in the showers for Tim with his gas them comment.Check the archives.To sum up a cheap plastic imitation Mongo wannabee who never was.Two of my countrymen have already been named EC's and spent over two years at Xray - For the record.
[cdr] Social Hack sets off security flappers.(and that just may be the point.)
Customs Minister Chris Ellison has signalled an independent review of Customs' security following the theft of two computer servers at Sydney Airport last week. The government has been embarrassed by the revelation that thieves posed as computer technicians to steal the computers from Australian Customs Service facilities at the airport. I will also be announcing an independent review of Customs security shortly and the form of that will be announced in a few days' time, Senator Ellison told ABC TV. He said the Australian Federal Police (AFP), the secretive Defence Signals Directorate (DSD) and Customs were investigating the theft. There has been a misrepresentation in the press as to what was actually taken, he said. For a start, there weren't thousands of confidential files taken and we've ascertained that there weren't sensitive details relating to Customs officials ... taken either. ASIO and the AFP did not complain to Customs about this matter. Senator Ellison said the two servers were to enable communication across the Customs network. We are concerned about it, we are investigating the matter but I think that to speculate whilst there is an investigation going would be inappropriate. He would not deny that the theft was terrorist-related. To assume things in this environment is very dangerous. We have the AFP and DSD on the job. They have reported to me the progress of the investigation. I'm happy with that. I'm not going to speculate as to the motive of the thief concerned, who was involved. http://news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,7200178%255E15306,00.html
[cdr] Open source cryptoanarchy.
Attempting to hold onto the intellectual property (cough) and then profit from carefully licensing it out to others is usually a lose. This also applies to land that is not being used and is needed by the Randite masses.You can keep your smelly house Mong but all the fences have to come down before we take them down. Attempting to hold on to yr SUV is also a 'lose' you loser. The modern conservative is engaged in one of mans oldest exercises in moral philosophy: that is the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. Galbraith Morons, mental defectives, epileptics, illiterates, paupers, unemployables, criminals, prostitutes and dope fiends of the world unite. Who wants to join the LAST revolution? The one to take down ALL the governments! James Dalton Bell. I was walking along the road with two friends. The sun was setting. I felt a breath of melancholy - Suddenly the sky turned blood-red as the atmosphere tipped over into runaway greenhouse, I stopped, and leaned against the railing, deathly tired - looking out across the flaming clouds that hung like blood and a sword over the blue-black fjord and town. My friends walked on - I stood there, trembling with fear. And I sensed a great, infinite scream pass through nature. The modern conservative is engaged in one of mans oldest exercises in moral philosophy: that is the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. John Kenneth Galbraith economist and author Conservatives are not necessarily stupid, but most stupid people are conservative. John Stuart Mill 1806-1873 British philosopher Free thought, necessarily involving freedom of speech press, I may tersely define thus: no opinion a law -- no opinion a crime. Alexander Berkman. 1915 -- Australia: Sterling work from the syndicalist Industrial Workers of the World Wobbly Tom Barker is arrested for his anti-war poster, Workers, follow your masters: stay at home. Anti-recruiting efforts finally get him 12 months hard labour. He is released after only 3 months, following a series of fires in stores factories. Is there a connection? For every day Barker is in jail, it will cost the capitalists £10,000. 2001 -- Australia: Government says it used the bones of 21,830 dead Australians in a nuclear radiation study without the consent of relatives, 1957-78. Wherever they burn books they will also, in the end, burn human beings. ---Heinrich Heine Allow me to quote a Chinese proverb which goes, 'If you are out to condemn someone, you can always trump up a charge.' Jiang Zemin The NY Court of Appeals ruled that it is not possible to disturb the peace of a police officer. The incident was in fact someone calling a cop a pig, and their subsequent arrest for disturbing the peace. Any cop who reacts to being called useless pig is, in fact, one,and should be removed from positions of authority. I'm not a believer in Anarchy because I believe that people will behave better without government than with, I'm a believer in Anarchy because then they can't hide behind lawyers and badges when they fuck someone. They can still hide behind guns, but that just makes their actions more honest. I don't believe in anarchy because I trust people. I believe in anarchy because I don't trust them. -- You don't expect governments to obey the law because of some higher moral development. You expect them to obey the law because they know that if they don't, those who aren't shot will be hanged. - -Michael Shirley The issue is not that allowing it is good, but that banning it would require drastic and draconian enforcement measures.) The problem with government is not that it is a conspiracy, it is an interlocking series of bureaucracies which all seek to avoid responsibility. I think that this Government is a threat to mankind. You can't protect freedom and liberties behind stock piles of chemical and biological weapons and nuclear weapons. I am more afraid of an army of a hundred sheep led by a lion than an army of a hundred lions led by a sheep- Charles Maurice de Talleyrand Legal principles of ultra vires and due process. That restricts how communities can police members. Decisions can't be made on a whim. They can't be out of proportion. See also defence of necessity,allows you to shoot down a passenger jet,broke law to save greater evil,defence of necessity. The power of Accurate Observation is often dubbed Cynicism by those who lack it* GBShaw It is a maxim among these lawyers, that whatever hath been done before, may legally be done again: and therefore they take special care to record all the decisions formerly made against common justice and the general reason of mankind. - Jonathan Swift. Gulliver, in Gulliver's Travels, A Voyage to the Country of the Houyhnhnms Only those beneath me can envy or hate me. I have never been envied nor hated; I am above no one. Only those above me can
Use of word 'vigilantes'.
Vigilantes clear streets of Iranian student protesters Hardline Islamic vigilantes used clubs and iron bars around a Tehran university campus overnight to disperse thousands of anti-regime protesters, reporters witnessed. MORE... http://www.abc.net.au/news/justin/default.htm They cant be to hardline if they have to be paid.
Govt oversees Hep C epidemic.
Law blamed for hep C epidemic By Misha Schubert June 13, 2003 Go to online feedback THE federal Government's conservative tough-on-drugs policies have triggered an explosion in hepatitis C infections, a secret health department report has found. And the disease has become an epidemic, with half a million Australians likely to have the debilitating virus by 2020. The paper, prepared by independent experts for the federal Health Department, lashes the Howard Government for abrogating responsibility and refusing to provide leadership and resources to fix the urgent public health problem. Health Minister Kay Patterson has kept the report from the public since she received it last November. But a copy obtained by The Australian reveals a damning critique of the Government's failure to act. The (Government's) strategy has not succeeded in controlling the hepatitis C epidemic in Australia. The urgency of this situation cannot be overstated, it says. The experts are particularly critical of zero tolerance policies adopted by conservative state and federal leaders. The zero tolerance approach tries to stamp out illicit drug use instead of trying to make their inevitable use safer. There is a growing recognition that criminalisation of injecting drug use . . . has contributed to increased transmission rates. The experts call for a national public awareness campaign and better partnerships with groups working with injecting drug users. The hepatitis C virus causes chronic liver disease in up to 85 per cent of those infected. It is transmitted through blood with up to 90 per cent of new infections from injecting drug use but rarely spread through sex. The report calls for drastic government action to boost prevention and safety. Otherwise too many people will continue to become infected and Australia will not be able to meet the substantial costs of treating and caring for the hepatitis C-affected community in 15 to 20 years' time, it says. The experts also say spending more money makes good economic sense. Expenditure on prevention of hepatitis C infection will be offset by future savings on end-stage treatment of hepatitis C-related liver disease and liver transplants. The expert panel included Howard Thomas, head of the department of medicine at St Mary's Hospital in London, Fran Baum, who heads the public health department at Flinders University, and Michael Levy, the population health director at the NSW Corrections Health Service. There is no vaccine for the virus. But a new treatment, which boosts the success rate from the present 30 per cent to 60 per cent and is available in many other Western nations, is languishing without taxpayer subsidy in Australia. Labor senator Jan McLucas said it was unforgiveable that Senator Patterson had refused to share the secret report with the public. It's simply appalling that she could let this languish in her in-tray when more people are infected every day. A spokesman for Senator Patterson said part of the report would be released next month, while the Government had allocated $16 million to reduce transmission. That's a significant amount of money, he said. But Ruth Verzeilberg, who contracted the virus from a shared needle while experimenting with heroin as a teenager, said more effort was needed to stop the suffering of people like herself. We should be doing so much more as a society to stop people needlessly going through this, she said. YOUR FEEDBACK How about a headline that reads: 'Death and crime epidemics lead to drug law that leads to hep C epidemic'. Now that would be a more honest summary, though less tasteful to those that would prefer to blame everything bad on prohibition instead of the drugs themselves. Or you could try: 'Irresponsible junkies give themselves hep C in spite of exposure to education programs since childhood'; or how about the snappier 'Determined druggies keener than customs to catch hep C'. Dave Edwards Brisbane, Qld It is not inevitable that anyone of any age will use illegal drugs and especially not inevitable that they would use intravenous drugs. This type of drug use usually comes at the end of a long period of experimentation with other types of substance abuse. If the probability of contracting a deadly disease is part of the package of intravenous drug use, then that will be one more consideration the drug user will have to take into account before they inject. Illegal drug use should not be glamorised, normalised or made safe in any way. There is anecdotal evidence to suggest the increase in teenage intravenous drug use is related to the ease of obtaining clean needles, making the injection of drugs appear just that little bit safer, just that little bit more glamorous. The figure of 500,000 cases of Hep C by 2020 probably assumes that the currently high level of illegal drug use in the community will continue, but the effects of the zero tolerance regime will kick in long before we reach 500,000
Dealing with the thing itself.
What's lewd to prudes is all the rage By Rosalie Higson June 13, 2003 THE pornography industry in the US has a turnover three times that of Hollywood. The information technology industry estimates that up to 70 per cent of internet searches are for porn. That makes it a potent cultural force: behind closed doors, the West is saturated in pornographic images. Opening today at the Australian Centre for Photography in Sydney is Staring in the Dark, an exhibition by nine Australian and English photo-media artists that subversively draws on and appropriates pornographic styles and formulas. It is the second in a series of three dealing with the interface between art and popular culture. Sandwiched between fashion and skate culture, it's sure to be the most contentious. Staring in the Dark comes with a warning that it is not suitable for children or the faint of heart (that is, those disturbed by sexual imagery). Indeed, one video film made for the exhibition by Brisbane's Scott Redford, dealing with Berlin's gay skinhead S M scene, will not be shown because it is too explicit, while girl come clothes are splashed with the patterns of Darwin-based Cee Speret's vaginal fluid her artistic signature. Centre director and curator Alasdair Foster calmly defends the works, saying that the challenge for viewers and artists is to get around the endemic hypocrisy that surrounds pornography. It is incredibly prevalent, yet it is treated always as if it is marginal. He says that because porn is almost always viewed alone or in a closed environment, when brought into public view it's not dissimilar from Duchamp bringing the urinal into the museum the piece of functional plumbing you'd rather not have in public becomes something that you can look at in a different way. The exhibition consists of a mix of video, computer-generated imagery, sculptural installations, a set of mock-historical images, light boxes, block prints and clothing such as jeans incorporating crocodile and kangaroo skin, a raincoat, gowns and handbags, as well as English photographer Paul M. Smith's humorous yet unsettling melanges of men's and women's bodies. It covers most sexual bases from radical to homely, with gay, S M, straight, bisexual and masturbatory subjects. There is plenty that is not specific, Foster says, but examines the patterns of mass media poses and general sexual behaviour that infiltrate society through things such as porn. Foster says the analysis and/or appropriation of pornography is happening across the world and articulates a mood of our time. There are large parts of the population, especially at the younger end, for whom this . . . is no problem at all. Collectively we don't do ourselves any good by pretending that it's marginal and minority and [doesn't really exist]. That's just kind of cosy. He says those who oppose the use of sexual imagery assume that monkey see, monkey does and should be more concerned about what is on television each night. Think about whodunits, which are considered to be the most family kind of entertainment, where people are killed with no real moral outrage at all. They are simply ciphers [that] allow a mathematical process of deduction to go on. He considers such violence is much more worrying for society than art, which looks head-on and which very often operates cathartically rather than in terms of patterning of activity or even blunting of sensibilities. I think you blunt sensibilities in terms of what you make cosy, like wife battering used to be made cosy by notions of sexual difference and domestic privacy and all of those things. He says critical responses to an issue such as this fall into it's a freedom of speech issue or protect our children, both of which are defence mechanisms for not dealing with the thing itself. Staring in the Dark, Australian Centre for Photography, Sydney, until July 20. http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,6586866%255E16953,00.html
Truth in advertising.
Vandals strike at police By JON RALPH 13jun03 EIGHT police stations were spray-painted with swastikas in a vandalism rampage across Melbourne's eastern suburbs yesterday. The unmanned stations were daubed with black, blue and grey paint. The word losers was also sprayed across the new Belgrave police station. The fast-moving vandals attacked stations in Murrumbeena, Diamond Creek, Hurstbridge, Mount Waverley, Warrandyte, Ashburton and two at Belgrave in the early hours of the morning. Police yesterday said they had no idea whether there was any motive for the vandalism. But security footage recorded at the new 24-hour Belgrave police station, which opens next week, might provide clues. Inspector Denis Collins, of the North Eastern Region, said police had no firm leads yet. It makes me angry, like anyone else in the community that is subjected to graffiti, because it is a waste of time. It is a waste of money in clearing it up and for a senseless crime it is a waste of police time when we could be investigating a lot more important offences, he said. Belgrave was the worst-hit suburb: paint was splashed on both its old and new stations as well as three police cars. Belgrave Senior-Sergeant Doug Berglund said the old station was checked by police patrols early in the morning. The damage was discovered by a policeman on the early shift. Mount Waverley Senior-Sergeant Peter Arnold said seven Nazi symbols were painted on the station's front brick wall. We have taken swabs of the paint and photographed it extensively, he said. Insp Collins said that revenge was a possible motive for the vandals' attacks. We are investigating all possible angles, he said. At this stage we have no links to particular groups but we will look at all possibilities, including revenge. Police will be questioning nearby residents, and the newer station at Belgrave has security cameras, so we will be reviewing those tapes. http://heraldsun.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5478,6586807%255E2862,00.html
Spammeister fingered.
Prince of Porn Crowned King of Spammers From The Miami Herald: Eddy Marin's a pathetic little guy I met three years ago in a deserted porn warehouse in Pompano Beach, a hustler trying to persuade me that he had a great Internet business he was trying to sell before he went off to jail on money laundering charges. Now, the BBC told me, Eddy's working out of Boca Raton and has been identified as ''king of the spammers'' by the London-based anti-spam detective group Spamhaus. This is a guy you'd love to hate, the kind of fellow who clogs your Inbox each time you sign on. Spamhaus says Eddy may put out 50 million e-mails a day. He is part of what The Observer in London calls the ''Boca Raton Spam Gang,'' which is said to churn out 250 million e-mails a day. Another British paper, The Evening Standard, said most messages focused on the ''cheap Viagra, big penis'' genre. When I met Eddy, he was just beginning his ''marketing'' career, though I didn't realize it at the time. I was researching a story on cyberporn, which back in 2000 was considered one of the few sectors making money on the Web. Eddy, who had done jail time for cocaine trafficking, agreed to talk to me because he wanted publicity to help sell his businesses, which included Internet Video Group and its websites, such as DoMe Live.com. (Note to leches: Don't bother searching for the site -- it no longer functions.) The Pompano operation had a 22,000-square-foot ''cyberbroadcast'' facility that included six small studios. Each studio was designed to contain a bed, a webcam and a woman. The idea was that a viewer visited the site, gave his credit card information and was assigned to a room, where a young lady -- generally a former lap dancer -- was sprawled on a bed. The viewer typed in a request -- ''scratch your back'' -- and the woman scratched her back. You get the picture. At its peak, 40 women were said to work at the warehouse in shifts around the clock. The average viewer spent $100 on a session. By the time Eddy took over, however, cyberporn was changing. Amateurs -- women working out of their homes with webcams -- had grabbed much of the market, and the big porn operators found that they could get cheaper product by filming Eastern European prostitutes in Amsterdam. Eddy told me he had shrunk the firm down to four employees and changed the business model, so that he was primarily servicing other websites -- porn and nonporn -- by developing sites, hosting them on servers and doing their ``marketing.'' He boasted that he brought in $750,000 during the first quarter of 2000 -- ``over 80 percent profit.'' His new name for the firm was ''Opt-In Services,'' the same name he's using today. He was beginning to focus, he said, on marketing data bases and ``opt-in mailings.'' ''Opt-in'' means you have asked for the e-mail, such as a buyer of a Dell computer requesting notices about new products. Spam, of course, is not opt-in, but groups like Spamhaus allege that many spammers use the term to dignify their work. ''What Eddy is doing is groundbreaking and cutting edge,'' one guy in the porn industry told me three years ago. Example: One of Eddy's marketing techniques was to offer a free photo -- you can guess what type -- just for providing your e-mail address. No credit card necessary. What would be wrong with that? Of course, now we can see that Eddy was gathering e-mail addresses for future ``marketing campaigns.'' As I was working on the cyberporn story, someone sent an anonymous e-mail to The Herald warning that, though Eddy was claiming to have become a legitimate Web-based business, his ``primary source of income is reportedly from sending spam . . . promoting porn sites.'' At the time, I was interested in the porn, not Eddy's ''marketing,'' and I didn't put that warning in the story. But this month, after hearing from the BBC, I did some checking. It turns out Eddy's been active in many areas. Last year, when the huge Atlanta credit-reporting company Equifax bought e-marketeer Naviant of Boca Raton, it found that some of Eddy's firms were dealing with a Naviant subsidiary. That relationship quickly ended, Equifax told me in an e-mail: ``Equifax absolutely does not believe in nor engage in spam of any kind.'' I called Eddy at his Boca office to ask what he felt about being the king of spam. The woman who answered the phone snickered nervously and said someone would get back to me. I gave her my phone number -- but not my e-mail address. http://www.therealgeneross.com/
Cell phones and ATM's alert.
New spy risk for ATMs By MICHELLE ROSE 13jun03 ATM users have been warned to be more vigilant amid fears webcam mobile phones could be used to film PINs. Tiny built-in video cameras could be secretly used by devious spies, consumer advocates warned yesterday. Banks and police said yesterday they had not yet had complaints about misuse of the phones, introduced to Australia in April. But Consumer Law Centre executive director Chris Field said it was only a matter of time before an ATM user was caught out. MORE ON... http://heraldsun.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5478,6587483%255E662,00.html Labor capitulates over ASIO powers By GERARD McMANUS 13jun03 ASIO is on the brink of gaining tough new powers to arrest and detain suspected terrorists after Labor gave tentative support to a watered-down Bill. Attorney-General Daryl Williams yesterday conceded that detaining suspected minors as young as 14 would now be dropped from the legislation in a bid to get it through the Senate. The Opposition has argued that the minimum age of suspects should be 18 years, but ALP leader Simon Crean hinted yesterday that Labor may agree to the Government's revised ASIO Bill. I think that there have been some significant movements on the part of the Government, and I welcome the fact, Mr Crean said. Mr Williams has agreed to raise the minimum arrestable age to 16, but warned Labor there would be no more concessions. ] The Bill still gives ASIO far broader powers than security organisations in the United States and Britain. Minor parties in the Senate, including the Australian Democrats and the Greens, are unconvinced by the Government's backdown and are urging Labor to block the Bill. Democrats Senator Brian Greig said ASIO could still become a form of secret police and that any Australian, regardless of their connections with terrorism or not, could be detained and interrogated for a week. Among other concessions the Government has agreed to are a sunset clause of three years, restrictions on questioning time of 24 hours in eight-hour blocks over seven days and access to a lawyer of choice. The Victorian Law Institute is critical of powers to remove lawyers during the questioning of detainees. ASIO can continue to veto or remove the lawyer chosen by a detained person, institute president Bill O'Shea said. ASIO has no obligation to inform the arrested person of the grounds on which they are being detained, so it will be very difficult for a lawyer to object to the detention. The Bill will be debated in the Senate next week. . inline: 542892f.jpginline: 542893b.jpginline: 5428947.jpg
Seppo wants his money back.
Odd Spot Donald Griffith, from Florida, has paid a monthly sewer bill to his city utility since 1979. But after recent plumbing problems he discovered he had a septic tank, and he wants his money back - $US16,000 plus interest. The utility is contesting his civil claim. More http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/media/jan-june03/brinkley_6-12.html David Brinkley was on the Lehreh report taking about tax collections after a nuclear war. DAVID BRINKLEY: It says in areas of the country hardest hit, delinquent taxpayers will be given a little extra time. Otherwise, taxes will be collected as usual.
Secrecy news.
Intelligence and Security Committee's 2002-2003 Annual Report (PDF) Select committee report on the state of the UK's 'national intelligence machinery' and its performance over the past year ( UK Parliament via Cabinet Office ) » See also this Telegraph coverage, and this Guardian coverage SECRECY NEWS from the FAS Project on Government Secrecy Volume 2003, Issue No. 49 June 12, 2003 **INTELLIGENCE BUDGETS DISCLOSED -- ABROAD **INTELLIGENCE OVERSIGHT TESTED BY IRAQI WMD DEBATE **ENHANCED WHISTLEBLOWER PROTECTION SOUGHT **PURSUING THE WEN HO LEE REPORT **AGROTERRORISM AND SECRECY **ABUSE OF FOIA OPERATIONAL FILES EXEMPTION INTELLIGENCE BUDGETS DISCLOSED -- ABROAD Intelligence services in other Western democracies are doing what the U.S. intelligence community says cannot and should not be done: They are routinely disclosing intelligence budget information to their citizens. Last week the Canadian Security Intelligence Service published its 2002 annual report. Following a review of the global threat environment and the CSIS response, the report presents a bar chart that displays the agency's budget totals over the past decade, and projects spending five years into the future. The totals are further broken down into operating costs, salaries and construction costs. See: http://www.csis-scrs.gc.ca/eng/publicrp/pub2002_e.html This week the United Kingdom's Intelligence and Security Committee presented its 2002-2003 parliamentary report on the UK's intelligence services. The report included publication of the single intelligence account which is the aggregate of expenditures for the GCHQ, the Security Service (MI5) and the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) for 2001-2006. See the new report (flagged by cryptome.org) reposted here: http://www.fas.org/irp/world/uk/isc0203.pdf In contrast, Director of Central Intelligence George J. Tenet recently declared under penalty of perjury that not even a single two year old aggregate figure for U.S. intelligence spending could be declassified. Disclosure of this number, he said, would result in damage to U.S. national security and the compromise of intelligence sources and methods. See: http://www.fas.org/sgp/foia/2002/tenet.html INTELLIGENCE OVERSIGHT TESTED BY IRAQI WMD DEBATE The mounting controversy over the accuracy and integrity of U.S. intelligence leading up to the war in Iraq has fractured the congressional intelligence committees along partisan lines. The Republican leadership is refusing to undertake anything resembling an investigation. The very word investigation is pejorative, said Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Senator Pat Roberts at a press briefing on June 11, and implies that there's something dreadfully wrong. Instead, the Committee will review the matter as part of [its] ongoing oversight responsibility. See: http://intelligence.senate.gov/030611.htm But closed hearings and review of documents presented by the administration are not sufficient, replied Committee Vice Chairman Senator John D. Rockefeller IV. A full fact-finding investigation is the usual mechanism for congressional oversight committees like the Senate Intelligence Committee in a circumstance like this one. See: http://rockefeller.senate.gov/2003/pr061103.html But the issue has already spilled over well beyond the control of the intelligence committees. Bush Administration Deceptions About Iraq Threaten Constitutional Democracy warned Rep. John Conyers, ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, in a June 11 floor statement that probably represents the kind of thing Senator Roberts hoped to forestall. See: http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2003_cr/h061103.html In a series of letters, Rep. Henry Waxman of the House Government Reform Committee has pressed the Administration to account for the false information on Iraqi acquisition of uranium that President Bush presented in the State of the Union address. See: http://www.house.gov/reform/min/inves_admin/admin_nuclear_evidence.htm Meanwhile, new information is entering the public domain not through the oversight process but through media accounts, such as CIA Did Not Share Doubt on Iraq on Iraq Data by Walter Pincus, Washington Post, June 12: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A46957-2003Jun11.html ENHANCED WHISTLEBLOWER PROTECTION SOUGHT New legislation to protect whistleblowers -- individuals who blow the whistle and expose fraudulent or wasteful activity -- was introduced this week by Senators Akaka, Leahy, Levin, Durbin and Dayton. Whistleblowers have proven to be important catalysts for much needed government change over the years, said Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT). From corporate fraud to governmental misconduct to media integrity, the importance of whistleblowers in galvanizing positive change cannot be questioned. Whistleblowing is never more important than when our national security is at stake, said Senator Carl Levin (D-MI), citing the case of FBI whistleblower Colleen Rowley and others.
Pope and Thai PM feature in death threat news watch.
Police say man attacked, made death threat on girlfriend Greenville News, SC - 10 Jun 2003 By Gwendolyn C. Young. Greenville County Sheriff's Special Weapons and Tactics team went to a home on Red Hawk Lane on Monday where ... Vatican Downplays Pope Death Threat Voice of America - 7 Jun 2003 The Vatican is downplaying an e-mail threat to attack Pope John Paul II during his trip to Croatia. On Friday, two Croatian news ... Death threat against protected witness Sydney Morning Herald, Australia - 9 Jun 2003 ... gathered evidence used to accuse a cabinet minister in the Carr Government of having sex with a teenage boy claims he has received an anonymous death threat. ... Parents sue teacher for making alleged death threat to daughter Montgomery Independent, AL - 29 May 2003 ... summons. David Morrison, a Biloxi lawyer representing the student and her parents, said the threat occurred in front of classmates. ... Assistant replaces Westview coach who resigned amid death threats Fort Wayne News Sentinel, IN - 1 hour ago ... would be taken out.. Maybe that's not a death threat, but that's how I interpret it, Neely said last month. Yoder, 33, was an ... Drugs death threat against Thai PM CNN Asia, Asia - 19 May 2003 PATTAYA, Thailand (Reuters) -- Drug lords and mafia bosses are trying to kill Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra because of his crackdown on drug dealers ... Thai PM cancels speech after death threat Hindustan Times, India - 24 May 2003 Thai premier Thaksin Shinawatra on Saturday apologised after he cancelled a speech to a public rally at the last minute, heightening speculation that his life ... Thai PM cancels speech after death threat Zee News, India - 23 May 2003 Bangkok, May 24: Thai premier Thaksin Shinawatra today cancelled a speech to a public rally at the last minute, heightening speculation that his life is in ... Police Finish Probe of Death Threat Made by East Providence Cop WLNE-TV (ABC6), RI - 22 May 2003 (Providence-AP) -- State police have completed their investigation of an East Providence police officer who's accused of making a telephone death threat to an ... Handwriting sample sought from suspect in Bethel College hate ... Minneapolis Star Tribune, MN - 5 hours ago ... Among the incidents police are seeking to connect to Glander is one on May 22, when a death threat was scribbled on bathroom stalls. ...
Expose the fascists and their shills.
Today, June 11th, the Bush is Taking the Shirts Off Our Back to Pay For This War (Shirts Off) Coalition opens a campaign against the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), with a press conference to expose this far-right think tank. AEI's current fellows include former Republican government officials, as well as many corporate executives, such as Newt Gingrich, Richard Perle, and former fellow, Ken Lay, of Enron. Twenty former AEI fellows are now employed by the Bush Administration. Richard Behan, Alternet, wrote, AEI and 2 other right-wing think tanks crafted or influenced virtually the entire agendas of both domestic and foreign policy for the George W. Bush Administration. AEI literally houses the notorious Project for the New American Century (PNAC), and the Defence Policy Board, making for lots of family ties in the Bush administration. AEI founded the pro-Iraq war NGO, Committee for the Liberation of Iraq and holds open forums on world domination. AEI has a race desk charged with popularizing unscientific and biological determinist racial theories from AEI fellow Charles Murray, Bell Curve, (genetic explanations for poverty in communities of color), and Dinesh D'Souza, The End of Racism (African-Americans should stop using institutional racism as an 'excuse' for their 'failure' to be on par with whites and Asians.) AEI promotes Oriana Fallaci's post 911 rant, The Rage and the Pride: They breed too much... At least half of the Moslem women you see in our streets are pregnant or surrounded by streams of children. Additionally, AEI held a seminar against funding for education, called Are Teachers Paid Too Little... or Too Much?, concluding that teachers are paid too much. The Men Who Stole the Show | The Neocons' Plan For World Domination | Comment
Nazi America.
The playwright Harold Pinter said: The US is really beyond reason now. It is beyond our imagining to know what they are going to do next and what they are prepared to do. There is only one comparison: Nazi Germany. Wednesday June 11, 2003 The Guardian The playwright Harold Pinter last night likened George W Bush's administration to Adolf Hitler's Nazi Germany, saying the US was charging towards world domination while the American public and Britain's mass-murdering prime minister sat back and watched. Pinter, 72, was at the National Theatre in London to read from War, a new collection of his anti-war poetry that had been published in the press in response to events in Iraq. In conversation on stage with Michael Billington, the Guardian's theatre critic, Pinter said the US government was the most dangerous power that had ever existed. The American detention centre in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where al-Qaida and Taliban suspects were being held, was a concentration camp. The US population had to accept responsibility for allowing an unelected president to take power and the British were exhausted from protesting and being ignored by Tony Blair, a deluded idiot Pinter hoped would resign. After a big operation for cancer, Pinter returned to public life last year to speak out against American belligerence. He called it a return from a personal nightmare to an infinitely more pervasive public nightmare. The playwright said: The US is really beyond reason now. It is beyond our imagining to know what they are going to do next and what they are prepared to do. There is only one comparison: Nazi Germany. Nazi Germany wanted total domination of Europe and they nearly did it. The US wants total domination of the world and is about to consolidate that. In a policy document, the US has used the term 'full-spectrum domination', that means control of land, sea, air and space, and that is exactly what's intended and what the US wants to fulfil. They are quite blatant about it. Pinter blamed millions of totally deluded American people for not staging a mass revolt. He said that because of propaganda and control of the media, millions of Americans believed that every word Mr Bush said was accurate and moral. The US population could not be let off scot-free for putting the country under the control of an illegally elected president - in other words, a fake. He asked: What objections have there been in the US to Guantanamo Bay? At this very moment there are 700 people chained, padlocked, handcuffed, hooded and treated like animals. It is actually a concentration camp. I haven't heard anything about the US population saying: 'We can't do this, we are Americans.' Nobody gives a damn. And nor does Tony Blair. Pinter added: Blair sees himself as a representative of moral rectitude. He is actually a mass murderer. But we forget that - we are as much victims of delusions as Americans are. In a British society where people were increasingly encouraged not to use their brains, the only way to protest was by thought, intelligence and solidarity. · www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,...
Certifiable incompetence or criminal negligence?
Minister attacked over hep C report The Age, Australia - 3 hours ago By David Wroe. Hepatitis C groups have criticised federal Health Minister Kay Patterson after claims she kept secret a report blaming ... Claims that zero tolerance has provoked rise in Hepatitis C ... ABC Online, Australia - 7 hours ago MARK COLVIN: The Federal Government is fending off allegations that its tough-on-drugs stance has fuelled an epidemic of Hepatitis C infections. ... Funds for suicide prevention network ABC Online, Australia - 12 hours ago PETER CAVE: The Federal Government has just announced a $70 package to provide a national network for community organisations involved in suicide prevention ... Minister denies concealing hepatitis C report ABC Online, Australia - 15 hours ago The Federal Health Minister has rejected suggestions she has concealed a report which reveals an explosion in hepatitis C infections in Australia. ...
Blixkreig.
Outgoing chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix has described certain members of the US administration as bastards who set out to undermine him during his three years at the helm. I have my detractors in Washington, Blix said in an uncharacteristic outburst to a British newspaper. There are bastards who spread things around, of course, who planted nasty things in the media. Not that I cared very much. In his interview with The Guardian, Blix also accused Washington of regarding the United Nations as an alien power which it hoped would sink without trace. Asked if he believed he had been the target of a deliberate smear campaign, Blix said: Yes, I probably was at a lower level. On the way he was treated over weapons inspections in Iraq, Blix said: By and large my relations with the US were good. But as the war against Iraq loomed, Washington leaned on his inspectors to produce more damning language in their reports, he said. He added that US President George W Bush's administration was particularly upset that the inspectors did not make more of their discovery in Iraq of cluster bombs and drones in the run-up to the US-led war. Blix, who retires in three weeks, says he is convinced that there are people in Bush's administration who say they don't care if the UN sinks under the East river, and other crude things. Rather than seeing the UN as a collective body of decision-making states, Blix said Washington viewed it as an alien power, even if it does hold considerable influence within it. Blix said he remained agnostic when asked if he believed weapons of mass destruction (WMD) would ever be found in Iraq. He said the prospect of them being uncovered was passing by quite fast and instead of talking about (finding) WMD they're talking about the programs. We know for sure that they did exist ... and we cannot exclude they (the coalition) may find something. http://theage.com.au/articles/2003/06/11/1055220633852.html So they lied,bribed,thieved and raped...and that was just to win Florida!
Remember when anarchists threw bombs in restaurants?
GCHQ IS DOING A FANTASTIC JOB 10:30 - 11 June 2003 ' name=cont4 Staff at GCHQ have been praised for doing a fantastic job. The 4,500 workers at the Cheltenham-based listening post have been honoured for helping keep our country safe. The praise is made in the Parliamentary intelligence and security committee's annual report. MP and committee chairman Ann Taylor said she is also pleased with the work being carried out by the Security Service and M16. We are impressed by the agencies' work, in particular by the staff's determination and professionalism, she said. While the report highlights areas about which the committee has concerns, these must not overshadow the tremendous efforts made, sometimes at great personal risk, to gain valuable secret intelligence, which is used to reduce the threat to the UK and its citizens. The praise comes despite GCHQ staff facing upheaval as they prepare to move to its new £330 million doughnut in Benhall in September. But the report does criticise ministers for failing to take enough interest in the work carried out by the listening post. It says Prime Minister Tony Blair and other senior politicians are not sufficiently engaged in setting long-term priorities for the UK's intelligence agencies. They are criticised for being too preoccupied with short-term crisis management, dealing with counter-terrorism work and the situations in Afghanistan and Iraq. The report says longer-term issues have been ignored. It says GCHQ has been forced to reduce analysis effort in a number of possible trouble spots because resources have been transferred to fight terrorism. The committee said: These developments confirm our belief that the problem of collection gaps has worsened and risks are being taken with national security. Intelligence assets are most useful when they can warn of and disrupt hostile action rather than being used to deal with current crises. With this focus, the agencies' long-term capacity to provide warnings is being eroded. This situation needs to be addressed. The report noted a key ministerial committee on intelligence, to be chaired by Mr Blair and including the Deputy Prime Minister, Chancellor and Home, Foreign and Defence Secretaries, has not yet met, as was recommended last year. It also said ministers did not see all the intelligence assessments they ought to. A GCHQ spokeswoman she is delighted MPs had recognised the contribution made by staff. She added any criticism of ministers' actions regarding intelligence agencies was a matter for the Government and ISC to resolve between themselves. Staff from the listening base played a key role in helping US and UK forces in the recent conflict in Iraq. They are credited with helping crack Saddam Hussein's secret telephone code, which led to a bomb strike at a Baghdad restaurant he was said to be eating in. http://www.thisisgloucestershire.co.uk/displayNode.jsp?nodeId=110954command=displayContentsourceNode=110953contentPK=5978055
Martin Hellman on Moores law in TC.
Moore's Law and Communications Last Sunday's column about Internet telephony brought a note from Martin Hellman, emeritus professor of electrical engineering at Stanford (and co-inventor of public-key crytpography, one of the crucial inventions of the information age). He sent along a short opinion piece he'd written about why Moore's Law hadn't fully asserted itself in telecommunications. At my request he posted it on his site. Read it here. Key quote: Since switching can be accomplished by computational means (e.g. packet switching), the $0.50 of switching cost can be accomplished today at an infintesmal cost, approximately a billionth of a cent per minute, if it is done in the most cost-effective manner. posted by Dan Gillmor 10:19 PM permanent link to this item
Lamalarkey.
Fearless Ted Steele storms Weismann barrierJune 12 2003 By John Mangan True Stories: Ted's Evolution It's not easy being a molecular immunologist. Australian Ted Steele's career has taken more twists and turns than an episode of Batman as he has battled scientific establishment villains all over the world, trying to prove that Darwin didn't get it all right with his theory of evolution. Not that Steele, a likeable, knockabout kind of molecular immunologist, believes that God created the world in seven days. As this clever Film Australia documentary (10pm, ABC) narrated by Michael Caton explains, Steele favours the theory first espoused by Jean Baptiste de Lamarck, well before Darwin, that animals inherit characteristics acquired from their parents. The classic example: the giraffe that stretches its neck to reach the higher branches has offspring with longer necks. That's all very well, but, late in the 19th century, August Weismann announced that it was impossible. He proposed a genetic barrier that became known as the Weismann barrier, which blocks body cells from messing with reproductive sex cells. His proof that animals can't inherit acquired characteristics such as stretched necks involved chopping the tails off hundreds of mice. Breeding 22 generations of these grimly abbreviated rodents failed to produce even one mouse born without a tail. That satisfied pretty well everybody that Lamarck had got it all wrong and that the Weismann barrier was impenetrable. In the late 1970s, however, Steele noticed work in his field of immunology that made sense if Lamarck were right, and he spent two decades trying to convince us, and the scientific establishment, of his case. Distilling this complex science story for a general audience is no mean feat. Producers David Noakes and Lou Petho have made an admirable job of it, mixing 20-year-old file footage with re-enactments and some remarkably candid fly-on-the-wall shots. Lightening the weight of the subject matter (they've left out most of the stuff about cDNA retrotranscipts, rearranged pre-mRNA of V genes and the like), we see Steele and his research buddy Reg Gorczynski sinking beers in the Toronto pub where they first discussed Steele's theory, as well as old ABC news footage announcing various steps of Steele's controversial journey. It's like Big Brother, except something interesting is happening when the cameras are present to capture Steele's immediate response to being sacked by the University of Wollongong. After Gorczynski, Steele teams up with others to battle the bad guys, including the brilliant Peter Medawar at Oxford, who banishes Steele to Australia in disgrace. Molecular immunology can be a harsh mistress, but tonight's True Stories shows that Steele, like any knockabout Aussie battler, doesn't know the meaning of the word defeat. http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/06/11/1055220638279.html
Land of the steel hanky.
Saudi Arabia's religious gestapo working on PR image Guardian | Submitted by: Ryan Besides ensuring that businesses close for the five daily prayers, and that women observe the dress code, they arrest unrelated men and women who are found together, and check text messages on teenagers' mobiles. During a school fire in Mecca in March they reportedly drove back girls who tried to escape without wearing headscarves, and prevented male rescuers from entering the building on the grounds that they would be 'mixing' with the opposite sex. Fourteen girls died in the blaze. But don't worry -- now they've undergone training to be more polite during the course of their duties. Read article...
FBI dot bomb.
The Justice Department's statements -- and what it did not say -- in a congressional inquiry on the use of broadened surveillance powers authorized after the Sept. 11 attacks is raising a red flag among civil liberties groups. A central concern is the lack of clarity regarding the scope of Internet surveillance powers granted in the controversial USA Patriot Act. In response to testimony last week by Attorney General John Ashcroft before the House Judiciary Committee, the American Civil Liberties Union published a memo criticizing the government's attempts to apply the methodology for tracing phone calls to tracking Internet use. Timothy Edgar, an ACLU legislative counsel and the report's author, argued that so-called trap and trace devices, traditionally used to capture telephone numbers but not the content of conversations, could potentially violate a subject's privacy if it's used to watch Web activity. On the Internet, investigators use trap and trace technology to monitor e-mail, Web surfing and other activity to search for clues about potentially illegal activity. The problem, according to Edgar, is that a URL, unlike a phone number, provides detailed information about the content a person is obtaining. It isn't always technologically feasible to separate content information from routing information, said Edgar. An overly intrusive application of tracing devices online was one of several Internet-related red flags raised by civil rights advocates following Ashcroft's testimony and the release last month of a Justice Department document answering lawmakers' questions about the Patriot Act. Another Net-related concern in the ACLU memo is the potential use of Web-surfing records in data-mining projects, allowing investigators to fish for illicit activity unrelated to the original inquiry. The ACLU also criticized the paucity of information provided by the Justice Department regarding what Internet content it considers off-limits in searches. It also questioned the application of some surveillance technologies in garden-variety criminal cases. The critique comes as the Justice Department is expected to seek an extension of authorities granted under the Patriot Act. The agency has not said when it will seek Congressional approval of a Patriot Act extension. But a draft proposal laying out a wish list of new powers, nicknamed Patriot II, surfaced earlier this year, indicating that the Justice Department has already expended considerable effort planning its appeal. The proposal would broadly expand the government's surveillance and detention powers, including extending authorization periods for secret wiretaps and Internet surveillance. The Justice Department has a limited time to seek a follow-up bill. Many of the authorities granted under the original Patriot Act -- enacted two months after the Sept.11 attacks -- expire at the end of 2005. But before approving broad new powers for federal investigators, civil rights groups say Congress must ensure that the government is doing what it can to see that existing powers are applied responsibly. That could be a difficult task, considering that thus far the Justice Department has been tight-lipped about Patriot Act-related activities, said Lee Tien, attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation. As far as Internet surveillance is concerned, Tien said the Justice Department's preference for minimal disclosure is aided by the fact that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act covers authorization for communications monitoring in anti-terrorism cases. Under FISA, investigators obtain authorization to conduct surveillance through a secret court, leaving the public out of the loop. What we're concerned about is you have a situation where the government, because there is less accountability, can engage in more surveillance without people knowing about it, Tien said. The ACLU, meanwhile, says it would like to see more disclosure regarding the amount and types of data investigators obtain when monitoring Internet use. So far, the Justice Department has provided limited guidance on this subject. A memo (PDF) authored last year by Deputy Attorney General Larry D. Thompson states that the policy of the Justice Department is to use reasonably available technology in order to avoid collection of any content when trap and trace devices are employed. If content still gets collected, the memo states that no affirmative investigative use may be made of that content. But the ACLU's Edgar maintains that the Patriot Act does not clearly define what constitutes content in the context of the Internet. For example, he notes, it is unclear whether an investigator, without probable cause, would find out only that a subject has visited the Google website, or also that he or she entered the search terms Bush and Halliburton, or Clinton and Whitewater. Edgar said the Department of Justice also failed to clarify
James Powers needs killing.
The FBI has arrested a Western Washington University student on charges that he was planning to bomb a Coast Guard station and an Army National Guard facility in Bellingham. Paul Revak, a 20-year-old history major who has no criminal history, faces up to life in federal prison if found guilty of threats to use a weapon of mass destruction. A search of Revak's dormitory room did not turn up any explosives and, although the investigation is continuing, it appears that Revak was acting alone. The native of Snohomish was also charged with solicitation to commit a crime of violence for allegedly seeking the help of another student in his plot. An attempt to draw another person into his fantasy was Revak's undoing, according to a vivid picture painted by court documents. Revak sought the help of the fellow student May 9 to join him in the plan to bomb the Coast Guard base, according to a complaint from FBI agent James Powers. Revak, a self-proclaimed anarchist, told the student that the bombing would make a statement and have an impact on starting a revolution against the U.S. government, according to the complaint. Revak showed the student a diagram of the Coast Guard station. He drove the student to the station to point out where he would cut the fence and enter with a bomb like the one that devastated the federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995. He presented the student with a copy of a grandiose manifesto. After a preamble that criticizes the U.S. government, the document lays out the option of unrest, protest, and if need be, revolution. You need not worry about Osama or Saddam or the boogeyman, but if you are part of this empire, you should fear us. Our will is strong, our message is just, and we will prevail. The alarmed student sought to dissuade Revak, and when it became apparent that Revak was not going to be talked out of his plan, the student began working with the FBI. Last Thursday, Revak and the student met with an undercover agent at the student's apartment, where the FBI secretly made audio and video recordings. Revak asked that the special agent help him obtain a powerful military explosive called C-4. He also wanted hand grenades. Revak told the agent that he had recently driven by an oil refinery at Cherry Point near Bellingham and had found it to be so friggin' tempting. Revak asked the agent whether he had heard of the abolitionist John Brown, whose raid on an Army arsenal in Harper's Ferry, Va., in 1859 was a step on the road to the Civil War. He then raised the specter of a possible assault on the Naval Air Station Whidbey Island with all those EP-3s sitting there on the tarmac. I would be like a kid in a candy store. On Monday, when agents tailing Revak spotted him emerging from a store with a pellet gun that is a replica of a semiautomatic pistol, they arrested him. He was ordered jailed, pending a bail hearing Friday. A shocked family member said last night that he has always been a good kid and has not shown any signs of mental illness. http://www.infoshop.org/inews/stories.php?story=03/06/11/5076293 Life! For some (possibly twinkie influenced) idle chit chat!WTF! Isn't that cruel and unusual punishment? And who amongst us has at one stage or another not threatened to use WOMD's against an unfeeling bureaucracy? This is thoughtcrime.1984.The forth reich.Brutal salami tactics.We need to start taking out a few of their Heydrichs.
Virtual Annalee.
TECHSPLOITATION: Sex in the Matrix By Annalee Newitz, AlterNet June 4, 2003 A lot of people seem troubled by the amount of sex in The Matrix Reloaded. This summer's sequel to 2000's science fiction smash hit The Matrix is the ultimate cyberaction flick, complete with hackers, exploding trucks, and fight sequences as visceral as the ones in a first-person shooter. But much to the confusion of audiences used to S.F. films full of burly but virginal astronauts, The Matrix Reloaded is also punctuated by two graphic, extended sex sequences. No kiss and cut away Star Wars-style moments here we get full-blown R-rated smut. One scene is a six-minute rave-orgy, the other a regrettable depiction of a computer code-induced clitoral orgasm. There are other seemingly gratuitous erotic moments, too: hero Neo makes out hungrily with hacker grrrl Trinity in an elevator; evil Persephone helps Neo find the valuable Keymaker in exchange for an intense, tight-close-up-on-the-spit-covered-lips kiss. So what's the deal with all this sexiness in a movie whose premise is that we can transcend our bodies using computers? After all, most of us went to see it for another taste of the eponymous virtual world where Neo can fly, Trinity can leap across tall buildings in a single bound, and ship captain Morpheus has to battle albino vampire bodyguards who can dematerialize at will. Adding insult to injury, sex in the matrix is pretty lame. The rave scene, with its sweaty, half-naked bodies and trying-to-be-hip jungle beats, feels hopelessly dated already. And the orgasm sequence well, let's just say that combining the scary grid special effects from Disney's Black Hole with female genital anatomy wasn't such a great idea. You can tell the Wachowski brothers grew up jacking off to ASCII p0rn. That's nice, but nobody really wants to think of her clitoris as a glowing dot on a graph, OK, boys? Yet the more I thought about Reloaded, the more I realized that the sex, as cartoony as it might be, is one of the most innovative parts of the movie. Think about it: When was the last time you saw a special-effects blockbuster with hot, sweaty sex in it? Especially multiracial, multipartner, out-of-wedlock sex that didn't spell doom for its practitioners? The heroes in Reloaded are frankly sexual, with no apologies. None of this would matter outside of the hotel bars at science fiction conventions if it weren't for the extraordinary popularity of the Matrix trilogy (the third movie comes out in November). Joel Silver, who produced Reloaded, told Entertainment Weekly that audience tracking by the National Research Group revealed the movie was the top choice for 43 percent of people polled an extremely high number in the industry. Ticket sales have been astronomical too. It grossed $365 million worldwide in its first two weekends. What those numbers mean is that Reloaded has saturated our culture as much as, if not more than, political propaganda coming from the Bush administration. People are watching Neo and Trinity grope each other with more relish than they are Attorney General John Ashcroft's latest salvo on the evils of Internet pornography. It's very possible that the war for human liberation in Reloaded has garnered higher audience awareness than the war for Iraqi freedom. As if in a kind of corollary to its sexual openness, the Matrix movies are self-consciously multicultural. Their human heroes are fighting against machines who have enslaved most of the human race, and it's hard to avoid comparing our heroes' rebellion to that of colonized peoples all over the world. As if to drive this point home, one of the outspoken members of the liberated human city Zion is played by progressive, antiracist intellectual Cornel West. Tellingly, most of our heroes are people of color and racially mixed. The bad guys are all white men in suits. More startling still, Zion is a city both pious and sexually liberated: The rave-orgy scene is a public celebration that follows a group prayer. What does it mean that Reloaded has become so mind-bendingly popular during one of the most politically conservative periods in the history of the United States? We've fallen in love with an epic of multicultural rebellion during an era of homeland security with more than a few racist overtones. And in a time of hysteria over everything from erotic cartoons on the Web to the ensoulment of stem cells, people are drinking in images of women having remote-controlled clitoral orgasms. Is Reloaded all the liberation we'll get this decade? Or are our preferences for progressive fantasies a hint of political preferences to come? Annalee Newitz ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) is a surly media nerd who was glad to see that nmap works much faster inside the matrix. Her column also appears in Metro, Silicon Valley's weekly newspaper.
Smoke and mirrors.
Global warming's sooty smokescreen revealed Fred Pearce, New Scientist Print Edition, 04 June 03 BERLIN - Smoke is clouding our view of global warming, protecting the planet from perhaps three-quarters of the greenhouse effect. That might sound like good news, but experts say that as the cover diminishes in coming decades, we are in for a dramatic escalation of warming that could be two or even three times as great as official best guesses. This was the dramatic conclusion reached last week at a workshop in Dahlem, Berlin, where top atmospheric scientists got together, including Nobel laureate Paul Crutzen and Swedish meteorologist Bert Bolin, former chairman of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). IPCC scientists have suspected for a decade that aerosols of smoke and other particles from burning rainforest, crop waste and fossil fuels are blocking sunlight and counteracting the warming effect of carbon dioxide emissions. Until now, they reckoned that aerosols reduced greenhouse warming by perhaps a quarter, cutting increases by 0.2 °C. So the 0.6 °C of warming over the past century would have been 0.8 °C without aerosols.\ Two views of future warming But the Berlin workshop concluded that the real figure is even higher - aerosols may have reduced global warming by as much as three-quarters, cutting increases by 1.8 °C. If so, the good news is that aerosols have prevented the world getting almost two degrees warmer than it is now. But the bad news is that the climate system is much more sensitive to greenhouse gases than previously guessed. As those gases are expected to continue accumulating in the atmosphere while aerosols stabilise or fall, that means dramatic consequences for estimates of future climate change, the scientists agreed in a draft report from the workshop. Parasol effect --- Past calculations of the cooling effect of aerosols have been inferred from missing global warming predicted by climate models. But direct measurements reported in Science (vol 300, p 1103) in May by Theodore Anderson of the University of Washington in Seattle show a much greater parasol effect. Anderson says climate sensitivity could be larger than climate models suggest. The Berlin meeting also heard evidence that past warm eras had higher temperatures than they ought to, if estimates of the atmospheric composition at the time and greenhouse models are correct. Again this suggests greater sensitivity. It looks like the warming today may be only about a quarter of what we would have got without aerosols, Crutzen told New Scientist. You could say the cooling has done us a big favour. But the health effects of many aerosols in smog are so great that even in the poor world, they are already cutting emissions. For good reasons, aerosol levels look set to fall. Moreover, most aerosol emissions only stay in the atmosphere for a few days. Most greenhouses gases remain for a century or longer. So as time goes on, aerosols will protect us less and less from global warming. They are giving us a false sense of security right now, said Crutzen. 'Sooner, not later' - One tentative estimate put warming two or even three times higher than current middle-range forecasts of 3 to 4 °C based on a doubling of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, which is likely by late this century. That suggests global warming well above the IPCC maximum forecast of 5.8 °C. Back-of-the-envelope calculations now suggest a worst case warming of 7 to 10 °C. Will Steffen of the Swedish Academy of Sciences says the message for policy makers is clear: We need to get on top of the greenhouse gas emissions problem sooner rather than later. www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns...
IPv6.You are being temporarily disconnected by the US Dept of Heimreich securitat.A predator drone with hellfire missile is on route to your GPS.
Maxis taps IPv6 for 3G TechCentral, Malaysia - 5 Jun 2003 KUALA LUMPUR: Telecommunications provider Maxis Communications Bhd plans to adopt IPv6 (Internet Protocol version 6) for its third generation (3G) mobile ... Computers/Electronics News PRNewswire (press release) - 9 Jun 2003 X-Force Warns of Increased Hacking Activity Taking Advantage of IPv6; Research Paper Outlines Risks and Implications of Next Generation Protocol ATLANTA, June ... Convergence : IPv6 migration - a necessary pain ? Silicon.com - 5 Jun 2003 There are so many reasons why IPv6 is a good thing - from allocating sufficient IP addresses to allowing more elegant networking. ... Intec NetCore and JPRS to Collaborate on IPv6 Transition Research Japan Corporate News, Japan - 26 May 2003 ... JPRS), which manages the JP domain name*1 and domain name system (DNS)*2 for Japan have announced they will jointly collaborate on the next generation IPv6 ... Exchange Provider's Network-Rich Centers Serve as Ideal IPv6 ... Business Wire (press release) - 14 May 2003 ... and Hurricane Electric have selected Equinix's Internet hubs as exchange points for their Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) operations. ... Consulintel Installs IPv6 in Hotel Light Reading - 14 May 2003 MADRID -- Consulintel, a Spanish Networking and System's Integrator, today announced the launch of the first permanent IPv6 service in a hotel. ... Next-Generation Internet Protocol is In Play
Kurtz has gone native.Terminate him.
A leading computer-security company is accused of software piracy. FORTUNE Monday, June 9, 2003 By Richard Behar George Kurtz may be his own worst enemy. In just four years Kurtz, CEO of Foundstone, and Stuart McClure, its president, created one of the best-known U.S. computer-security companies by exposing the vulnerabilities of software firms. Thousands of FORTUNE 500 executives and government officials--from the FBI and the National Security Agency to the Army, the Federal Reserve, and even the White House--have taken Foundstone's Ultimate Hacking courses, at up to $4,000 per person. Motorola and Bank of America have shelled out more than $300,000 each for Foundstone products, and the company recently installed software to protect the FAA. But it doesn't take the skills of a hacker to see that Foundstone, a privately owned $20-million-a-year company in Mission Viejo, Calif., is in trouble. It has been accused of widespread software piracy by a leading industry trade group, FORTUNE has learned--charges corroborated by current and former Foundstone employees and by computer printouts obtained by the magazine. The trade group, the Software Information Industry Association, informed Kurtz by letter in May that it intended to pursue copyright-infringement charges against Foundstone. It acted after a confidential source alleged that McClure and Gary Bahadur, Foundstone's chief information officer, routinely spread unlicensed software to the company's 125-member workforce; that Kurtz was aware of that practice; and that in early April the CEO ordered his staff to delete unlicensed software from their computers. They're gambling with their reputation, says Keith Kupferschmid, head of the association's antipiracy unit, which investigated and found the allegations credible. That's not a smart thing to do. Kurtz vehemently denies the company engaged in piracy. We have strict policies against piracy, he says. We take intellectual property very seriously, given that we are a software company. He adds that Foundstone conducted an internal audit in April, and we're in compliance. The evidence suggests otherwise. For years, according to former employees, top executives at Foundstone dumped a seemingly endless supply of the latest software onto a company server called Zeus and into a Microsoft Outlook folder called Tools, available to everyone on staff. Employees say they were told to download whatever programs they needed by using license keys registered only to McClure or Bahadur. (Legally Foundstone should have paid for each user.) The unauthorized software ranged in value from $35 to $15,000 per user and included everything from Acrobat to X-WinPro. They've stolen pretty much everything when it comes to software, says a founding employee who asked not to be named. The company even cracked Microsoft's operating system, Windows XP, says Dan Kuykendall, a former Foundstone software engineer, so you could install it on multiple computers without any problems. The founding employee estimates that only 5% of the software used at Foundstone was paid for. (Foundstone's lawyers say that only 5% was unlicensed and that the company has spent more than $1.5 million on software.) Foundstone also trained thousands of corporate and government security personnel on software that it duplicated in ways that avoided triggering license fees, according to Kurt Weiss, a training coordinator until last year, who says it was part of his job to copy software packages onto the drives of 40 laptops per class. The use of unlicensed software is a global problem--estimates of lost revenues range up to $13 billion a year--but it's rare among companies whose business is safeguarding intellectual property. We happen not to have any experience with other security-software companies' doing that, says William Plante, chief investigator at Symantec, a Foundstone competitor. Especially for a software company interested in protecting its own copyrighted material. If true, it's pretty unconscionable. One software package available on Foundstone's server was Teleport Pro, an offline browser program made by Tennyson Maxwell Information Systems. Only Bahadur had a license, says Michael Del Monte, Tennyson's top developer. That's a no-no, he says. Companies are pretty responsible about purchasing licenses for everybody who's going to be using the software. You would think that as a security company, they'd be more careful about that kind of thing. Another software package, UltraEdit, was in Foundstone's Tools folder in violation of its one-user license, the manufacturer says. In some ways the Foundstone tale is a microcosm of the ugly side of the dot-com craze--arrogance, greed, mismanagement, and stupidity. But those are indulgences the computer-security industry can no longer afford. The market for its services has gotten tougher. While large firms such as IBM, EDS, and Symantec still dominate, the midsized players--including Foundstone,
I love Nina butt...
Nina Hartley The Guardian posts: Nina Hartley, the daughter and granddaughter of communists, and one of America's best known porn stars, describes herself as a third-generation feminist and a secular Jew. While her parents, it's said, eventually became Zen Buddhist priests, she has been a vocal advocate of the empowering force of sex and an avowed leftist. I'm proud of my heritage's intellectual history and its empathy with the persecuted, she has said. Politically, I'm leftwing. I want everyone to have a job, everyone to have food, clothing, shelter and education. Utopia might be communist but in the meantime we have to have socialism.
What business does the government have in your living room?
What business does the government have in your bedroom? Can gay celibacy be imposed by law? The Supreme court is deciding a Texas Sodomy case. The GLBT community prepares to celebrate or protest. Transcript of Oral Arguement On September 17, 1998, John Lawrence and Tyron Garner were having sex in the bedroom of John's apartment in Houston. They were adults and the relationship was consensual. They left the front door unlocked. Police officers, responding to a false call and looking for an armed intruder, entered the apartment with their guns drawn. John and Tyron were arrested for violating the Texas sodomy law ? a relic of our intolerant past that no modern nation should tolerate still. The two men spent the night in jail, were fined $200 each, and are now considered sex offenders in several states. more The state should not have the power to go into the bedrooms of consenting adults in the middle of the night and arrest them, but that?s only the beginning of the damage done by this law and others like it around the country. These laws are widely used to justify discrimination against gay people in everyday life; they?re invoked in denying employment to gay people, in refusing custody or visitation for gay parents, and even in intimidating gay people out of exercising their First Amendment rights. - Ruth Harlow, Lead Attorney, Lambda Legal In a related story, there's been a little hub bub over a couple of gay men kissing on national television to celebrate their winning a Tony. http://www.indymedia.org/ And... During his keynote address at a black-tie dinner in Atlanta last month, U.S. Sen. John Edwards voiced his support for adoptions by gay parents. But Edwards, one of nine Democrats seeking the partys presidential nomination, isnt the only one courting gay voters. Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean has touted a law he signed allowing civil unions for gays and lesbians. U.S. Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, a decorated Vietnam veteran, has said gays should be allowed to serve in the military. Bill Clinton made history in 1992 by openly courting gay voters en route to the White House. Eleven years later, the courting of gay voters is under way like never before. In a crowded race or a close race, an energized and mobilized constituency can make a real difference, said Dave Noble, executive director of the National Stonewall Democrats, a group that promotes the agenda of gays within the party. Right now, weve got so many different candidates going after the community, and theres not one candidate the community has settled upon. Exit polls from the 2000 presidential election showed that 4 percent of voters were gay and that close to three-quarters of them voted for Democrat Al Gore. In the 2004 Democratic primaries, their influence could prove pivotal, activists argue. Several candidates for next years race, including Edwards, have hired staff members to advise them on gay issues. U.S. Rep. Richard Gephardt of Missouri has said his daughter, Chrissy, will be an ambassador to gay groups. She is a lesbian. The gay community has become one of the constituencies you have to meet to be a viable Democrat, said Steve Elmendorf, a top adviser to Gephardts campaign. That was clear during last months Democratic debate in South Carolina. The nine candidates each touted their gay-rights credentials and universally condemned anti-sodomy laws as an invasion of privacy. Six of the nine candidates have endorsed the idea of civil unions, though most wont go as far to say they support gay marriage. Edwards also spoke in Atlanta last month at an event held by the Human Rights Campaign, the nations largest gay-rights group. His speech also included calls for greater workplace protections and stepped-up efforts to find an AIDS vaccine. I was raised to believe in an America that embraces everybody, Edwards said. When speaking of adoptions by gay parents, Edwards said, In a world where far too many children are neglected or unwanted, we need to encourage responsible, loving adults to raise children, which is why I support the rights of gays and lesbians to adopt children. Quite a shift for Edwards who during his 1998 Senate race, said he was opposed to gay marriage. Although he does not object to states recognizing civil unions, he continues to have reservations about both gay marriage and civil unions, said Jennifer Palmieri, Edwards campaign spokeswoman. Its an issue he thinks the country and North Carolina is not ready for, Palmieri said. Meanwhile The New York Post writes: Activists on the other side of the spectrum are attacking Mary Cheney for not speaking out in favor of gays. Three years ago, during the 2000 presidential election, current Vice President Dick Cheney's lesbian daughter fell back into the closet the way Michael Jackson's career fell into the toilet - so completely that an industrial plunger couldn't pull it
RFID technology needed urgently to track rabid statists.
Microsoft is enlisting in a venture designed to help develop standards for radio frequency tags intended for use by retailers and manufacturers to track goods. The software maker said Tuesday that it will work with Auto ID, a joint venture of the Uniform Code Council and EAN International, to develop commercial and technical standards for radio frequency ID (or RFID) tags. The tags, which are extremely small, could one day replace bar codes on product packaging, using special microchips to communicate wirelessly with computers when scanned. The scanning can be automated to track goods as they flow through the supply chain--from manufacturers to distributors to stores and eventually to customers. The tags currently cost around 50 cents apiece, and will need to come way down in price before their use becomes practical on individual products, analysts say. But retailers are still pushing for them. Retailing giant Wal-Mart Stores is expected this week to ask its top 100 suppliers to begin using the chips to help track inventory by 2005. Privacy advocates also have raised warning flags about the technology, especially its inclusion in garments. The inventory-tracking chips are expected to include a kill switch before they end up in products. Auto ID will be developing standards for the Electronic Product Code Network, which uses radio frequency and network systems to identify products. Microsoft said its work will initially focus on supply chains in the manufacturing and retail sectors. Further ahead, the company said it would work with partners to develop RFID technology throughout the supply chain. http://news.com.com/2100-1020_3-1015058.html?tag=fd_top
Our super leaders.
supercilious ADJECTIVE: Overly convinced of one's own superiority and importance: arrogant, haughty, high-and-mighty, insolent, lofty, lordly, overbearing, overweening, prideful, proud, superior. Idioms: on one's high horse. See ATTITUDE. Jor bloody El from the planet kyneton.
Invisiblog.com
invisiblog.com lets you publish a weblog using GPG and the Mixmaster anonymous remailer network. You don't ever have to reveal your identity - not even to us. You don't have to trust us, because we'll never know who you are. Learn more, or start your own invisiblog now. Read system news and updates at Invisiblog News. New: help test the Invisiblog Client. http://invisiblog.com/
Driving back from the Washington Hilton.
Sector 5 In the world in which we live today safeguarding information assets and protecting the integrity of the networks, systems and computing infrastructures that are vital to both our business and society has become even more challenging and crucial. This Summit brings together two powerful conferences in creating the definitive event for both private and public-sector IT security professionals. The exceptional scope of this event will provide a range of strategic insight and tactical direction to fully serve the concerns and priorities of IT security executives from Fortune 2000 enterprises, the federal government and the nation's critical-infrastructure entities. The Enterprise IT Security and SECTOR 5 programs will run concurrently, offering morning keynotes and top-level content for the general audience, followed by break-out sessions in the afternoons geared toward topics on a more detailed level. Attendees may register for either conference exclusively, or a variety of combination packages. For more information, please visit the links below. At Sector 5, we are introducing our range of specialised security services including Pyramidion - a family of integrated Managed Security Services consisting of MIDS - Managed Intrusion Detection Service MVAAS - Managed Vulnerability Assessment and Alerting Service Merquery - Monitoring the Wired World We will also be featuring Security Health Check - accredited Physical and IT Assessment Services including penetration and application testing Digital Investigative Services - confidential Digital Forensics, Incident Response, and System Recovery Corporate Intelligence Services - specialized Risk and Threat Assessment Services Our comprehensive, proactive security solutions enable organizations to reduce the 'risk' in risk management. http://www.qinetiq.com/news_room/events_diary/sector_5.html inline: 2a87eab.jpginline: 2a87eba.jpg
They can be conducted in cipher, can be conducted anonymously, and they leave no trail.
The nature of electronic crime Electronic transactions take place at the speed of light. They can be conducted from anywhere in the world and can be routed through multiple jurisdictions to conceal their place origin and to place obstacles in the path of investigators. They can be conducted in cipher, can be conducted anonymously, and they leave no paper trail. It is never an easy task to investigate and prosecute commercial crime, even in a paper-based environment. Investigators and prosecutors have to build a case on the basis of what records are left when the relevant transactions have been completed. Even in a paper-based environment, the records are rarely complete, they are often misleading, and they only ever give a partial picture of what occurred. The problems are magnified in an electronic environment. Electronic records are easier to manipulate and disguise than paper-based records. They also do not have the handwriting, signatures and other physical features that can give clues to the identity of the people behind a paper-based transaction. If the records left by an electronic crime still exist by the time the investigators come to look for them, the investigators should be able to show what transactions took place, but it may still not be possible to identify the individuals behind those transactions. That is so even if the transactions were conducted under cover of a PIN number, password or other electronic identifier. MORE ON... http://www.austrac.gov.au/text/publications/agec/evidence.htm
Geek corner.
Geek corner: Ubik version 1 compatibility (hex dump format). N= (1 for CS1 compatibility). Ubik CipherSaber is a _javascript_ implementation of the CipherSaber 2 encryption standard. Written by Zzzen and XNormal, Lite skin by Pi.
Stronger than PGP? An 'echalone' beater?
Ubik CipherSaber (english) unknown 1:38pm Sun Jun 8 '03 [EMAIL PROTECTED] A Very powerfull encryption tool. Stronger then PGP. See you later echalone Ubik CipherSaber (english) (full story) http://www.indymedia.org/front.php3?group=webcastsort=date_descrate=nonep age=1
Richard Mellon Scaife needs strangling.
Considered stupidest member of his extended family, kicked out of Yale--twice. Kindest description: 'dark mysterious.' Known for never looking his employees in the eye. Has long history of using U.S. Justice Dept. to target his enemies. Got sister's fiance indicted; his sister married the poor chap, man ended up dead within a year--some say suicide, some say murder. Owns network of newspapers, refuses interviews. Gave million dollars to Nixon's Committee to Re-Elect the President (CREEP), instrumental to BUSH'S SECRET GOVERNMENT, is the biggest funder of right-wing think-tanks in the United States. Meet ... Richard Mellon Scaife. For 25 years, one the most powerful operators in the US: deploys wealth at instruction of Anglo-Amer. financial families. Richard Mellon Scaife: Who Is He Really? MORE ON... http://www.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=325077group=webcast
Wheelie? Into a police station? Followed up with a Mollie? Really?
Man arrested with 'bin bomb' June 9, 2003 A VICTORIAN man has been charged with conspiring to cause an explosion after being arrested with a wheelie bin allegedly full of fuel and explosive materials. Police said the 51-year-old man, from Geelong East, was arrested in Main Street, Stawell, early yesterday after he was seen pulling the wheelie bin through the town's central park. Police Senior Constable Dave Gamble said the material in the bin was capable of causing significant damage. Snr Const Gamble said the man would face charges including conspiracy to cause an explosion, attempted aggravated burglary and attempted criminal damage. He has been remanded to appear before Stawell Magistrates Court tomorrow. A second Geelong man, aged in his 30s, is being interviewed. http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,6567289%255E26462,00.html
Nobody has ever seen Big Brother. He is a face on the hoardings, a voice on the telescreen.
Learning to Love Big Brother Microsoft's digital rights management (DRM) may have implications for security professionals. By Scott Granneman Jun 04 2003 09:45AM PT But the physical difficulty of meeting was enormous. It was like trying to make a move at chess when you were already mated. Whichever way you turned, the telescreen faced you. (George Orwell's 1984) DRM: Digital Rights Management. Or, as some prefer to call it, Digital Restrictions Management. Basically, the idea is that the creators, and/or owners, of digital content - a song, a video, a document, even an email - should be able to dictate how that content is used and who can use it. It's an issue that security pros need to be intimately familiar with. In February, Microsoft announced that it is getting into the DRM business. In typical Microsoft fashion, they'll cover everything. Your servers: Windows Rights Management Services (RMS). Your workstations: Windows Rights Management client. Your Web browser: Rights Management Add-On for Internet Explorer. Your CDs, movie files, and MP3s: Windows Media DRM. Your Office suite: IRM, or Information Rights Management, for Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook. It's all covered. Covered like a carpet bombing. ...the very media companies interested in using DRM are the same companies who seek to deny consumers fair use rights. The telescreen received and transmitted simultaneously. ... There was of course no way of knowing whether you were being watched at any given moment. How often, or on what system, the Thought Police plugged in on any individual wire was guesswork. ... You had to live - did live, from habit that became instinct - in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every movement scrutinized. So how does it work? Let's say you're using Word 2003, part of Office 2003 (you have to be using Office 2003, the newest release), to create a document called Super Secret.doc. There's a new button labeled Permissions. You click the button and indicate that you want Ben to be able to read Super Secret.doc, but not print or copy it, and you want Denise to have the same permissions, except that she only has 48 hours to view the document before it self-destructs. Your boss, Jerry, can read, print, and copy Super Secret.doc all he wants. Now your copy of Office 2003 connects to the RMS server. The RMS server issues a license certificate that details your specified permissions, attaches that information to the Word doc, and then encrypts it. At that point, you can also save your document not just in its native Word format, but also as a Web page that you can post on your company intranet as an HTML document that ends not with the typical .htm or .html extension, but with .rmh instead. After setting up your document permissions, you decide to email it to Ben, Denise, and Jerry. You open Outlook 2003 and create an email. Using the new Permissions button, you specify that Ben can read the email, but cannot forward, print, or copy it. Denise gets the same treatment. Jerry, your boss, can once again do whatever he wants. You attach Super Secret.doc to your email, and also mention the new intranet page with the same information. You hit Send and off it goes. Everything is copacetic for Ben. He has Office 2003 with IRM installed, and already has the Windows Rights Management client on his Windows XP PC. He clicks on the email to open it. Outlook 2003 checks over the Local Area Network with the RMS server to verify that Ben has the right to view the email, and to find out what rights he possesses vis-a-vis the email. He can now read the email, so he double-clicks the attachment to open it. Word 2003 checks over the LAN with the RMS server to verify that Ben has the right to view the document, and to find out what rights he possesses vis-a-vis the document. Secret Stuff.doc is now decrypted, so Ben can now read the document, but he can't print or copy it. Things don't go quite as smoothly for Denise, who works at home. She's running Office XP, which doesn't work at this time with IRM. So she buys Office 2003. After installing it, she tries to open the email in Outlook. Unfortunately, she doesn't have Windows Rights Managment client installed. She finds it at microsoft.com, downloads, and installs it. Now Outlook knows what to do: connect over the Internet to the RMS server and verify her rights. However, she has trouble connecting to the corporate RMS server over the Internet. Something about a routing issue. Since Outlook (or Word) can't connect to the RMS server, she can't open the document. She calls you to complain. Use the Web page I put up, you reply, The one that ends in '.rmh'. Unfortunately, Denise likes Mozilla, and Mozilla doesn't have a Rights Management Add-On. She fires up Internet Explorer and tries to view the content. Nope. She doesn't have the Rights Managment Add-On installed. She goes to
Public opinion electroshocked.
Andrew Rawnsley, political journalist of the year Sunday June 8, 2003 The Observer The treacherous trades of politician and spy have a great deal of affinity. Both involve subterfuge, bluff, concealment and, sometimes, downright deceit. Both justify their use of the blacker arts as necessary means to serve higher ends for their country. Both professions attract an unusually large proportion of eccentrics, obsessives, paranoids and conspiracy theorists with a tendency to spot a plot in every shadow. Incidentally, I should add that this could also be said of journalism. The crucial difference between the politician and the spy is that the one acts in the glare and heat of the public stage while the other is concealed deep in the darkness of the wings. This collision of professional impulses and working cultures is what lies at the heart of the great storm over whether Tony Blair is guilty of a mass deception about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. For many months before the 'Did Blair lie?' frenzy, people inside the intelligence services were sucking their teeth about the Government's public use of their material. These were not the low- level 'rogue elements' railed against by John Reid, the Cabinet's rogue elephant, in an inflammation of the controversy from which Number 10 swiftly retreated for fear that attacking the spooks as seditious will only provoke them into retaliatory leaking. These were extremely senior figures in MI6 who didn't want the Government to publish anything claiming to have their endorsement to justify its case for going to war. This was partly because they didn't want to jeopardise their sources. It was partly from the very human instinct to cover their own arses. MI6 is rather proud that, unlike its domestic cousins in MI5, the work of the Secret Intelligence Service has not previously been a cause of all that much political contention. The more that the work of MI6 is drawn into the public domain, the more its judgments will be exposed to challenge, the more its mistakes will be revealed to scrutiny and the more the calls for it to be made accountable will swell. Public use of its material would also strip spying of much of its mystique. Intelligence would be seen for what it is: hit and miss, of variable accuracy and reliability, often confused and sometimes contradictory, not much of a science, more educated guesswork. The desire of the spies to maintain the veil clashes with the politician's need to win his argument in the public arena. Rarely has that need been felt so desperately as it was inside a besieged Number 10 during the build up to the invasion of Iraq. I don't doubt that Tony Blair sincerely felt that Saddam Hussein was some sort of menace. He had felt so for years before George W. Bush arrived in the White House with a score to settle. He had felt so not least because British intelligence was telling him so. Some months ago, I drew your attention to a fascinating gem in the diaries of Paddy Ashdown. He records a conversation with Blair about Iraq and Saddam as far back as November 1997. Ashdown quotes Blair saying: 'I have now seen some of the stuff on this. It really is pretty scary. He is very close to some appalling weapons of mass destruction... we cannot let him get away with it.' Mr Blair was persuaded that Saddam was a potential threat. His problem was convincing the British public that Saddam was a menace sufficiently imminent to justify a war to the timetable the Americans had become determined on. From what I have been able to discover, there was some intense argument between Number 10 and the spymasters about the political desire to turn the often turgid and hedged intelligence about Iraq into vivid headlines which would provide electric-shock treatment to public opinion. MORE... http://politics.guardian.co.uk/foreignaffairs/comment/0,11538,973145,00.html
Letter to a right wing troll.
A century-and-a-half ago, a former slave said this: If there is no struggle there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them, and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress. (Frederick Douglass. The Significance of Emancipation in the West Indies. 1857.) Those today who profess a belief in freedom yet condemn those who refuse to compromise; who mouth the words of liberty while decrying discomfort; who tremble silently before the gaze of the powerful while lashing out viciously against the outcasts; these are the men and the women whose submission to injustice expands the limits of tyrants and help to oppress us all. Such trolls deserve what they receive. The rest the best of us do not. Borrowed here... http://freedom.orlingrabbe.com/lfetimes/belief_in_freedom.htm
Tiny Blur's 'fascistic, corporate-style McLabour'
Loose tongues and liberty Edited version of a lecture delivered at the Hay Festival last month - 'One of the reasons we despise politicians is that we suspect they are speaking on their own behalf while purporting to speak on ours. Our words, being handed on by our representatives, are not getting through and they never will. Our speaking makes not a jot of difference. One way of looking at globalisation, for instance, is to say that it is a version of certain Orwellian authorities saying the same thing, over and over, the attempt being to keep new words, or any human doubt, need or creativity, out of the system' ( Hanif Kureishi via Guardian ) » Following the lecture, Kureishi reportedly expanded on its themes by denouncing Tony Blair's New Labour government as 'fascistic, corporate-style McLabour' - see this Guardian coverage » See also this audio stream (39min ASX) of the lecture
Kidnapped citizens father protests outside party of the 'individual's' conference.
Father of Taliban fighter in caged protest Sydney Morning Herald, Australia - 4 hours ago The father of Australian Taliban soldier David Hicks today stood in a wire cage outside the Liberal Party's national convention in a desperate plea for action ... PM avoids Hicks's father's protest ABC Online, Australia - 5 hours ago The father of alleged Taliban fighter David Hicks is staging a protest outside the Liberal Party convention in Adelaide. But Prime ... Hicks's father starts 'cage' protest ABC Online, Australia - 5 hours ago The father of alleged Taliban fighter, David Hicks, has placed himself in a cage outside the Liberal Party Convention in Adelaide today. ... Hicks's father to take protest to Howard ABC Online, Australia - 7 hours ago The father of suspected Australian Al Qaeda supporter David Hicks is taking his protest over his son's ongoing detention by the US military in Cuba directly to ... Hicks' dad to protest in cage NEWS.com.au, Australia - 18 hours ago THE father of an Australian terrorist suspect being held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba will set up a giant steel cage in protest at the government's refusal to bring ... Australian Taliban's father in cage protest over jailing Arab Times, Middle East - 49 minutes ago ADELAIDE, Australia, (AFP) - The father of an Australian imprisoned by the US military for allegedly fighting with the Taliban shut himself in a wire cage near ... Taliban fighter's father stages protest Ninemsn, Australia - 1 hour ago The father of Australian Taliban soldier David Hicks has stood in a wire cage outside the Liberal Party's national convention in a desperate plea for action ... eak
Burmese Days.
As far as tyrants go, Gen. Than Shwe is something of a chameleon. The 70-year-old leader of Burmas ruling junta gave up socialism for a system of state-sponsored corruption. He dabbled with democracy, agreeing to release opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest several times during the 1990s as the junta pondered giving her National League for Democracy a role in government. BUT THE GENERAL showed his true colors last week by tossing Suu Kyi and top NLD leaders back in jail. The juntas afraid they cannot control her, says a Thai Army general who watches Burma closely, so they [felt they] had to stop her now. The regime had been embarrassed by crowds flocking to see Suu Kyi on a swing through northern Burma, and made its move after clashes between pro-government thugs and followers of Suu Kyi left dozens dead or wounded. When the junta released her from house arrest in May 2002, it was no doubt hoping to encourage the lifting of crippling international sanctions. Instead Suu Kyi held out for real reform, and in the meantime traveled the country reopening offices of the NLD. Last October the junta cut off talks. The crowds that greeted Suu Kyi were subjected to increasing harassment from the Army and police. Supporters of Suu Kyi say the authorities acted now because they realized theyd opened a Pandoras box. The NLD won a landslide election in 1990 but was never allowed to take power, and more than a decade of crackdowns had apparently not dimmed its support. As Suu Kyi crisscrossed the country in recent months, the crowds swelled; some people walked several miles just to get a glimpse of her. She became increasingly bold, publicly chastising the generals for not beginning dialogue, and just last month she repeated the opposition demand that the junta accept the outcome of the 1990 election. In the last six weeks Gen. Than Shwe has become increasingly concerned at the visual evidence of her overwhelming acceptance and popularity among the people of Burma, says Janelle Saffin, a spokeswoman for the oppositions Thailand-based government in exile. The incident that sparked the violence is hotly disputed. Burmese officials claim pro-government supporters and NLD activists suddenly engaged in late-night clashes on May 30 near the northern town of Ye-u, and that Suu Kyi was taken into protective custody after four people were killed and 50 wounded. They deny that the NLD leader, known and widely revered in Burma as The Lady, was injured. Opposition groups, witnesses and Western and Asian diplomats tell a different story. According to several similar accounts, a military-backed political group that included armed soldiers and ex-prisoners wielding bamboo sticks attacked a motorcade carrying Suu Kyi and hundreds of supporters as it approached Ye-u. The attackers blocked the road with logs and charged the motorcade, opening fire into the cars. Foreign embassies could not confirm the death toll, but opposition officials claim about 70 people were killed and dozens wounded. U Tin Oo, the NLD vice chairman, was feared to have been severely wounded in the attack, and his whereabouts remain unknown. Suu Kyi is being held at an undisclosed location, possibly the Yemon military camp outside Rangoon. The junta has closed NLD offices nationwide, cut phone lines to Suu Kyis Rangoon home and shuttered universities indefinitely to prevent possible student uprisings. Burmese Foreign Ministry officials faced a firestorm of criticism when they met with Asian and Western diplomats last week to tell their side of the story. One Western diplomat based in Rangoon says, There was not a single person in the room satisfied by their explanations, especially that Aung San Suu Kyi should be held for her safety. In ordering the crackdown, Than Shwe may have overruled moderate junta members who favor a negotiated political settlement that would ease the countrys international isolation and economic decline. This year the Burmese kyat, officially pegged at 6.5 to the dollar, has fallen to 1,400 on the unofficial free market. Once considered a jewel of Asia, Burma now ranks 127 out of 173 countries on the U.N. index of social development, with incomes averaging a meager $300 per year. Than Shwe may be calculating that Burma no longer has the luxury of waiting for sanctions to be lifted. They are at a crossroads, says Gothom Arya of Forum Asia, a regional human-rights group, either to mend their relationships with the West and hope for some investment to come, or to show firmness because economic difficulties can snowball into domestic political upheaval. Regional actors like China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, which have traditionally been loath to pressure the Burmese regime, may be losing patience with its unsavory behavior. Now, some analysts say, those Asian powers are likely to support the United States, United Nations and European Union in posing an ultimatum: reconcile
Oz doing better than the UK in Indymedia.
yay yay ROCK yay woohoo etc perth.indymedia is now official. we are now part of the GLOBAL indymedia collective...[ perth.indymedia.org ] . thanks mobs to every person who has posted a story or comment or supported this project... perth.imc formed as a collective voice of dissent against the noise of corporate media.. [ perth.indymedia.org] REPEAT: we are official: that url again is [ perth.indymedia.org ]. post yr stories, comments and action-building ideas... lets go go go. viva la revolutiona. [ perth.indymedia.org ] join the mailing list to engage in the decision-making process of the group PLEASE POST regularly and frequently to perth.indymedia NEWSWIRES keep us fresh and relevant to underground culture and active networks. U R invited to the dismantling of the construct.|| be the fucking media...|| get active post your hed off. WAKE UP! FSU thankyou thankyou thankyou [ perth.indymedia.org] Post yr comments and congrats RIGHT here...
Territory out for the lighting.
http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2003/06/48597.php Viscious repression in a 'labour' held part of Oz. Also... AEC to focus on remote enrolmentThe Australian Electoral Commission is conducting a nationwide survey to find out ways of getting more people to enrol to vote.
Not reforming the media.
The Allied Media Conference is coming up this weekend, June 13-15, in Bowling Green, OH. If you were there last year, you know that it just might be the biggest, most enjoyable weekend of cross-media collaboration there is. It's a chance to learn new skills, share your experiences, and build networks. The emphasis is on making our own media, not reforming the mainstream system. Indymedia will be well-represented there, as will the communities of zinemakers, newspapers, videographers, microcinemas, radio, culturejammers, cartoonists, hip hop, street artists, and radical cheerleading. Last year, people from 36 states and Canada showed up. Now it's your turn to represent. [Allied Media Conference 2003]
I'm just a virtual hacker judge.
k-hell writes Researchers from the University of Michigan are using virtual machines to 'to provide security in an operating-system-independent manner.' They have designed and implemented a replay service for virtual machines called ReVirt, which 'logs enough information to replay a long-term execution of a virtual machine instruction-by-instruction.' A system called BackTracker 'automatically identifies potential sequences of steps that occurred in an intrusion,' and they provide a nice example of BackTracker's output for an attack against a machine that they set up as a honeypot, where an attacker gained access through httpd. Here's the source code. http://slashdot.org/articles/03/06/06/156230.shtml?tid=126tid=172
Pretty fly for a white guy.
Claiming to fight terrorism on two fronts, both internationally and at home against Basque separatists, president José María Aznar's government is limiting the right to free speech and peaceful political activity in Spain. James Badcock reports. President José María Aznar's conservative People's Party (PP) is using all legal means at its disposal to pursue its strongest critics from within the Basque community. Its most outspoken critics face state-sponsored libel charges and it has closed down the Batasuna party, political outlet for the Basque armed separatists ETA. Tensions in the Basque political sphere were heightened with the onset of the war in Iraq and the PP's controversial support for it, and in the months ahead of local and regional elections on 25 May. In February a newspaper linked to ETA, Euskaldunon Egunkaria, was closed down and its staff alleged that they were tortured while in custody. Prosecutors investigated a Basque regional parliamentarian who described the Spanish king as the torturers' boss. The latest Basque politician to be charged with libel on the instigation of government prosecutors is Javier Madrazo, leader of the Basque section of the United Left (IU) party. He is accused of slandering the king, the royal family and Aznar during speeches made against the war in Iraq on two occasions in early April. Aznar is a terrorist like those of ETA, he said in one speech, those who kill in Euskadi (the Basque Country) are just as much terrorists as those who lead the terrorist war in Iraq, just as Bush, Blair and Aznar are doing at this time. He lamented King Juan Carlos' silence over the Spanish government's support for the US-led war in the face of near total opposition to it from the Spanish people. He thought this underlined the undemocratic character of the monarchy. Seeing as we pay for their palaces, yachts, skiing and riding holidays, it wouldn't have been too much to ask that they shared society's worry about the war. Madrazo pointed out that as the king is constitutionally the head of state and captain general of the armed forces, Spain could not have entered the war coalition without his support. Although his comments spoke for many in Spain opposed to the war, Madrazo was facing a government on the offensive. State lawyers argue that to equate ETA with the president was equivalent to calling him murderer or violator of all kinds of rights and liberties. It was, they said, an intolerable attack on Aznar's public standing. They added that Madrazo's view of the King went beyond free speech and reasonably expressed opposition to monarchies as political system, an objectively respectable opinion. It showed contempt towards the royal family and therefore by extension, towards a regime supported by the enormous majority of Spanish people and approved in the constitution. A group of 1,800 opponents of government policy have counterattacked on another front, calling on Aznar to respond in court for the crimes against humanity that allied troops are committing in Iraq. The state lawyers took up the writ on 21 April, but as Spain did not declare war on Iraq and did not send combat forces, the complaint was dismissed. Meanwhile, a Spanish defence ministry proposal to ban anti-war protests was leaked to the daily El País. Although disowned by the justice ministry, the defence department called for a ban on protests against an armed conflict of an international nature in which Spain was involved with the aim of discrediting Spain's participation. El Mundo quoted a ministry spokesperson on 22 April as describing the proposal as just a draft and not a priority for this parliamentary session. The proposed 'crime' would have carried a prison sentence of between one and six years. Since coming to power, Aznar's government has led a legal assault on terrorist sympathisers in the Basque region. Aznar's key phrase is that Spain is an Estado de Derecho; basically a state in which the 'rule of law ' prevails, where constitutional rights and responsibilities must be exercised and protected. Under this doctrine, organisations, be they media or political groups, which support ETA forfeit their right to carry out their activities. On 25 May there were elections all over Spain for regional parliaments and municipal councils. The banned Batasuna was barred from taking part. This is not the first time the separatist party has been outlawed under this government. In recent years it has got round the prohibition by changing its name from Euskal Herritarrok to Herri Batasuna to simply Batasuna. This time the Supreme Court struck 241 candidates off the electoral lists on the grounds that they were ex-Batasuna activists standing under other party names, although the Constitutional Court later re-instated 16. Of these 16, six were winners of the elections in Basque country municipalities. Grass roots support for the banned party was also shown by the use of unofficial voting slips by party
Bush must be executed.
bush is a liar and a criminal against humanity,let alone a traitor bush declared again on thursday that saddam had wmds. what's that,an article of faith? where's the evidence? first evidence,then war.not the other way around. what are we supposed to believe,bush's (ass)holy word? if really saddam spent decades hiding tools of mass murder,then this would include the eighties when saddam was a reagan-bush sr-rummy protégé. and :first bush should destroy his own wmds,then he may criticize other people's. and: the 911 traitor co-conspirator massmurderer bush has no right to wage a war on terror,unless it's about committing suicide. US TROOPS OUT OF IRAQ NOW! BUSH IMPEACHED TRIED AND EXECUTED NOW! Comments... http://www.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=324749group=webcast
Please Please Please.
Infoshop.org has been a popular and valuable resource on the Internet since June 1995. We hope that it can continue to be that valuable resource for many years to come. However, as they say, there is no such thing as a free lunch. Infoshop.org has been coasting for many years on the volunteer labor provided by people who have or had jobs and stability, such as your favorite webmaster. More and more folks have been helping with this project of late and we have some big plans. The problem is that we can't continue to do this without any form of regular financial support. To put it another way, if you want to enjoy the show, the band has to be paid. Infoshop.org doesn't have any records or books to sell (yet) to raise funds for operating costs. We are grateful to those people who provide us with web hosting and bandwidth, but running a website like this takes alot more than just a computer running in the closet and a connection to the Internet. If you care about this project, please consider helping us out. Some of you have been good supporters in the past, but how about the rest of you who haven't contributed? Is $5 too much? How about those of you with groups or events that Infoshop has promoted? If you can't afford to help personally (many of us are in the same leaky financial boat), please consider doing a fundraiser for us. If you support this project, please consider donating online via PayPal, or send a check or money order made out to Chuck Munson or Alternative Media Project to Chuck Munson, 253 N Thomas St. #3, Arlington, VA 22203. Some of this money will be used to get us a PO Box. ern
From the Blac Block with Love.
In support of the solidarity messages from the blockaders in Lausanne because solidarity is our strength, and my thoughts about chosing to run with the Black Blockade on Sunday. I participated in the Black Blockade in Lausanne on Sunday and in the non-violent resistance to the invasion of the Bourdenette camp. I have just read the messages of Solidarity posted by members of Pink and Silver (PS) Blockade on Indymedia UK and was moved to tears. Solidarity is our strength. In the face of the massive repression going on now in Geneve, you make me feel strong again. I wanted to express my support for your views and to explain some of my personal reasons for chosing to run with the Black Blockade on Sunday. I have, in my lifetime, participated in many different kinds of action. My experience has shown police repression and state violence is not a response to violent demonstrationse, but to effective ones. We have the right to ineffective protest, outside the yellow zones which protect the powerful and enable them to ignore us. I took part along with millions of people world wide in the largely peaceful demonstrations on 15th February 2003. I watched as they ignored us, and went to war in the name of democracy. It made me sick and angry. It showed that the biggest demonstration in history will not change things if it just voices dissent. Direct action of all colours is the only way to make change. All the blockades on Sunday took place in this spirit. They were NOT about expressing an opinion. The people's opinion of the fucked up system we live in has been voiced load and clear, time and time again. The blockades were about direct disruption of a high profile meeting of heads of state - to actively make the G8 face resistance. Personally I felt that because our actions might be effective, we would certainly be attacked. I wanted to be able to defend myself and those around me. This was confirmed to me when the first police charges took place in Laussanne. The first charges were against the PS carnival, not the Black Block. The two Blocks were clearly seperate, acting in different areas. The police fired gas into the peaceful carnival because it got too close to the delegates route: i.e. because it was effective. Many of the PS Block ran to behind the Black Block who were more prepared to defend against the attack. If it wasn't for the active resistance slowing the police advance the space we held would have been cleared much more quickly. If it wasn't for the music and energy of the PS Block it would have been a very dark place to be. When the two blocks merged under police attack it gave the space life and refused to give it up without a fight. Being attacked by heavily armed riot police is terrifying. It has happened to me many times now and I think you never get over the fear. But I have come to feel more and more like fighting back and I have come to understand more the value of the Black Block. A Black Block is not the same as a riot. In the looting and street fighting I saw in Geneve the people were mostly local kids, some didn't even cover their faces. They broke any windows for the rush of it and threw anything at the police, in anger (launching plastic bottles at armoured riot police will not have much impact...) For me this popular anger is a response the result of alienation and the crushing of people's lives and spirits by wage slavery, media propaganda and consumerism. It is beatiful in its way but it is not the same as a Black Block. A well organised Black Block (like we were on Sunday) is made of autonomous groups of friends who are well prepared and take the streets with some common tactical understanding of what we are there for. To take spacea and defend it with barricades and projectiles, to use the fleeting moment in which we control the space to destroy the property and symbols of the disgusting system we are all forced to live under. This property damage is NOT random vandalism it is highly political and usually carefully targetted. On Sunday I saw debates between different groups (and languages!) about the politics of different targets, stones in hand. Some targets were attacked, others left intact as a result of these discussions. The smashing and burning created by the Black Block is as important as the music and colour created by the carnival. If we just fight and destroy we will create a very bleak new world, and Anti-capitalist movements are strong beacuse they are imaginative and diverse, but some messages are crystal clear: Capitalism Kills. People suffer and die because of Capitalist exploitation and wars. The planet is being consumed by pollution and destruction. Millions are made refugees by economic, ecological and military abuses. They are persecuted, detained and deported. The way of life in the G8 countries is based on this suffering and persecution... If we really mean this then to just go into the streets and party is an entirely inadequate response. It is
Hey Hey Paula.
Gene sez: Remember that hot, sexy chunk of change Paula Houston? The babe who was named to the porn czar's post in Utah? Houston got an awful lot of press when she first got put on the state dole back in 2001. But little, if nothing, has been heard of her since. I found the following interview with Houston posted on Penthouse's website and would like to pass it along to you before Penthouse themselves go out of business judging by the fact that even their own auditors don't want to deal with them. [Scroll down the page for that story.] Penthouse interview: I've got nothing against religious people, as long as they don't want to run my government. Unfortunately they do. Case in point is the appointment of former prosecutor Paula Houston to the newly created position of obscenity and pornography complaints ombudsman for the state of Utah. Dubbed the porn czar, Ms. Houston says her new role will involve advising local governments in regulating any kind of pornography or decency area, toughening state-wide obscenity laws, and assisting in prosecutions or investigations... requested and approved by the Attorney General. While I commend Ms. Houston for granting PENTHOUSE.COM an interview, I must also admit to finding her woefully uninformed on key issues. The danger with most public moralizers isn't evil intent, but a willingness to implement policies without a realistic examination of their results. Ms. Houston begins her new job with two completely untested assumptions -- that porn is inherently bad, and that society will benefit by having government strictly regulate it. History shows us how difficult it is to stop this kind of unholy alliance between religion and politics -- whether it's the Salem Witch trials of 1692, or the current brutal rule of the Taliban in Afghanistan. At one point in our interview, Ms. Houston claimed that for government to get involved in an obscenity case it would have to depict something, extreme... not just your everyday kind of sexual things. But later she announced that if there were sufficient complaints, banning a novel like Catcher in the Rye is something government should be able to look at and decide. Ms. Houston was quick to cite studies linking pornography to domestic violence, but five seconds later she agreed that studies of this kind are, definitely biased one way or the other. When asked about the Movie Buffs case from 1996, arguably the highest profile obscenity case in Utah in the last ten years -- in which a local video store manager spent three years on trial before being acquited of a misdemeanor -- Ms. Houston claimed to know only what was on the news. Just as the illegal drug trade will flourish as long as there is demand for the product, the religious right understands that they can never stop pornography. What they are truly seeking is political influence and government money -- and as long as well-meaning, but basically uninformed public officials like Ms. Houston are along for the ride, the personal liberties guaranteed to every American will continue to be at grave risk. For the entire QA check out David Bienenstock's interview at penthouse.com/exclusives/pornczar/ but hurry.
Kiddy porn case thrown out.
The oldest man in porn [the sacred ancient crypts of Egypt depict scenes of him having sex], Dave Cummings called in to KSEX last night about a story involving him and nymphette Melissa Ashley who has the smallest tits in porn. Because Wankus had a girl on, Kylie Rachelle, who pushes the credibility of the age,18, Cummings said he had a similar story involving Ashley. Cummings said the first time he filmed with Ashley she was 20. We did two sex scenes that day, said Cummings. However and a BIG however, apparently some of the pictures on Cummings' website were lifted and posted elsewhere. Ashley, according to Cummings, received an e-mail stating that a pedophile was being prosecuted in Hawaii and she was being required to send a birth certificate. I know what you're saying. It sounds fishy. But Cummings said he got on the phone with the defense attorney and mailed a copy of Ashley's model release. So they could see that she was at least 20 years old when we filmed. According to Cummings, Ashley then had to go to Hawaii to testify in the case. The judge, Cummings said, was so miffed at the prosecution bringing a flimsy case to the bench that he threw it out. Cummings hastened to point out that, while he'd hate to see a suspected pedophile go free, the pictures of him and Ashley were not child porn. http://www.therealgeneross.com/
Snohomish County crime zone.
Actor Pleads Not Guilty To Kiddie Rape Actor Scott Bairstow has pleaded not guilty to charges that he allegedly had sex with a 12-year-old girl. Bairstow didn't speak to reporters after entering his plea in Everett, Wash.. His lawyer says Bairstow didn't commit any crime. He says there's more to the story than what's been made public so far. Bairstow, best known for playing Neve Campbell's abusive boyfriend on the television show Party of Five, was charged May 21 with second-degree rape of a child in Snohomish County, Wash. Bairstow, who now lives in Los Angeles, formerly lived in Mukilteo, Wash. In a court document, the girl alleged that she started having sex with the actor in 1998. She also claimed that she slept with him three more times, most recently in 2001. According to the document, the girl is a relative of Bairstow's wife. The girl also alleged that Bairstow started calling her for phone sex earlier this year, and police ended up taping one of their phone conversations. According to The Associated Press, Mukilteo police reportedly obtained a court order to tape the telephone exchange between the two. Bairstow appeared on Party of Five from 1998 to 1999, and on Wolf Lake in 2001. In addition to 2002's Tuck Everlasting, he has also appeared in the films Wild America and The Postman. Bairstow also had roles in two Lonesome Dove television movies. inline: 146ee2c.jpg
Pay pals pinching off Porn.
PayPal Dumps Porn Next Week From techtv: The most popular online payment service, PayPal, is soon going PG. Beginning June 12, online adult merchants will have to take the PayPal option off their websites. Buyers can still get the merchandise in many cases, but they won't be able to use PayPal as their intermediary. PayPal's parent company, eBay, explains the move as a business decision. It says there's just too much fraud in the industry. One example cited by the company has a husband ordering raunchy movies online, but then disputing the charges with an it wasn't me excuse. San Francisco business owner Shar Rednour doesn't dispute the fact the industry has a large number of charge-backs. However, she says that doesn't include her company, S.I.R. Video. We've never had one charge-back. We've only been a gold-star business owner with them, Rednour says. S.I.R. Video has used PayPal services for one year. Rednour says that without PayPal, she'll stop selling merchandise from her site and stick with wholesale. She claims the other options available, such as opening a credit card merchant account, cost too much for her small business. Visa USA, for example, charges high risk fees to adult online businesses. We feel like we didn't do the crime, [so] why do the time? Rednour asks. She believes decisions should be made on a business-to-business basis, instead of penalizing the entire industry. It's just prejudice, she says. PayPal spokesman Kevin Pursglove says that's not the case. The mature audience category continued to be the single category where there were always additional costs involved -- administrative, charge-backs, transactions going bad, Pursglove says. As much as we appreciated the fact that it would be an inconvenience for some sellers, the bottom line [is] it was just a business decision. The ban includes eBay, which hosts auctions for adult products in its mature audience category. Buyers can use cash, money orders, or credit cards from issuers that haven't banned such transactions. EBay prohibits pornographic downloads. This isn't the first controversy between PayPal and online merchants. Last fall eBay banned the processing of online gaming transactions. Again, the company cited fraud and regulatory uncertainty. For business owners such as Rednour, however, those business decisions are going to hurt. If you're a small business, every dollar counts, she says. That money [brought via PayPal] is a small percentage, but it definitely helps pay the rent. Gene sez: One reader tells me they've been using Citibank's https://www.c2it.com/C2IT/Login inline: 1482fa8.jpg
You talking to me?
Man says he was verbally assaulted by MSNBC's Ventura St. Paul Pioneer Press Longtime Jesse Ventura critic Leslie Davis says the MSNBC personality threatened him and tried to break his styrofoam sign outside of a TV studio where Ventura was practicing his gig. Davis says Ventura barked at him: I'm not the governor anymore! Now you're talking to a Navy SEAL! You want to get it on with me? Well, let's get it on! St. Paul police are investigating the confrontation and Davis has filed a complaint. Posted at 9:46:13 AM E-mail this item | QuickLink: A36242 hat
Cybersecurity demotion.
Homeland Security creates cybersecurity division InfoWorld, CA - 13 hours ago WASHINGTON - The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has launched a new cybersecurity center, but not all cybersecurity experts welcomed the move of the ... Homeland Security creates cybersecurity division - Network World Fusion Homeland Security creates cybersecurity division - IDG.net Homeland Security Unveils Cybersecurity Agency Information Week - 12 hours ago ... Earlier this year, some security experts criticized Homeland Security's decision not to have whoever was responsible for cybersecurity higher up the ... DHS creates cybersecurity division - FCW.com Government Creates New Cybersecurity Office - Washington Post US Cybersecurity Agency Launched - Security Focus CNET News.com - GCN.com - and more » or=
More Law.
Take a holiday on June 3rd to celebrate a great Australian, Eddie Mabo, who overturned the two century fiction of Terra Nullius in a ten year campaign through the courts ending in the historic High Court Mabo Judgement. On the third of June 1992 the High Court of Australia rejected the ridiculous notion of Terra Nullius, that this land was not occupied before European colonisation. Eddie Mabo a Torres Strait man born on Mer in the Torres Strait and living in Townsville in Queensland conducted a ten year battle through the courts that led to this historic judgement. The Mabo Judgement states in law that indigenous Australians have by prior occupation, ownership of land where native title has not been extinguished. June the 3rd, eleven years ago marks the beginning of a reconciliation process between indigenous and non-indigenous Australians that is based in law, not charity. It opened up a new chapter in the often difficult relationship between indigenous and non-indigenous Australians. The Mabo decision is arguable the most important decision that the High Court of Australia has made since Federation. It states Indigenous people have Legal Rights not just Symbolic Rights to all Crown Land in this country, as well as possible rights to pastoral leases. Mabo Day marked the beginning of a new era for Indigenous people. It changed Australian's views of themselves and their rights to this land. It has forced mining companies and the corporate world to take stock of Indigenous peoples' claims. It has radically altered the relationship between Indigenous and non Indigenous people in this country. Last year on the tenth anniversary, Eddie Mabo's widow, Bonita Mabo, called for a national public holiday on the anniversary of the High Court's decision. Mrs Mabo said Eddie Mabo would be singing and dancing in delight over the progress made. He would be dancing and singing - I can see him doing it, she said. It's going to be a long time but at least we're starting to get somewhere which is great. Since '92 there was nothing like this around and you know people couldn't say, 'oh this is my land, this is my country, I'm a traditional owner', which makes them so proud of who they are. Mrs Mabo said a national holiday would be the most appropriate way of celebrating Mr Mabo's efforts. You know we don't have to have the Queen's birthday weekend. [ read more and discuss | Biographical Note (national library) | Eddie through his granddaughter's eyes ]
Lets review.
Let us review the list of achievements of the Liberal (conservative)Government: The introduction of GST where the poor pay the same amount of tax as the wealthy. The imprisonment of entire families, including children, whose only crime was to seek asylum in a country they mistakenly believed to be just and fair. The enslavement of the Australian worker who in 2003 works longer hours for less pay while CEOs take home multi-million dollar payouts. The oppression of poor and unemployed people whose lives are tortured by an inefficient and uncaring social welfare system. A higher cost of tertiary education to the point now where only children from wealthy families can afford to pursue a professional occupation. The systematic dismantling of our public health care system and the Americanisation of medicine. The wastage of one billion dollars on an illegal and unnecessary war while our farmers were going broke, our children are denied equitable education, and our public health care system is falling apart. Disrespect and disloyalty to the Australian people who opposed the war on Iraq and the illegal American invasion of another nation. Exploitation of the war against terrorism and the victims of 9-11 to justify the gradual introduction of a police state. Betrayal and desertion of two Australian citizens who have been illegally imprisoned and tortured by the American military for more than 18 months. This Australian voter finds the current Liberal Government guilty of exploitation, betrayal, abuse of power, deceit, cruelty, and crimes against humanity. More Details here
Internet Law in action.
Kenneth O'Connell lives in a $1million house in Miranda with swaying palm trees, a classic wrought-iron fireplace and his own vegetable patch. He was sleeping in the bush next door but last October discovered the house was abandoned and decided to move in. The only problem is that Sutherland Shire Council bought the property in December 2001 and planned to demolish it six months ago to make way for 2000 square metres of parkland. But the man they have referred to as an aggressive squatter stood in their way. The 39-year-old former electrician says he has a right to live in the house under the laws of vacant possession; the council has taken him to the equity division of the NSW Supreme Court to evict him. Representing himself yesterday, Mr O'Connell referred to legal definitions of vacant possession he found on the internet, including that found in Butterworths Australian Legal Dictionary: Where a person takes vacant possession of a property, the property is both unoccupied and free from any claim to a right to possession from anyone else. Acting Justice Daryl Davies told the court it did not apply to this situation and there was no Australian law which entitled Mr O'Connell to obtain an interest in the property simply by taking factual possession of it. But Mr O'Connell pushed on. I was hoping you would have a book with that law in it, your honour, he said yesterday. I have all the books with my trade in it; I thought you would have the books with your trade in it. Mr O'Connell told the court the property was left abandoned with metre-high grass and barrels of flammable liquids littering the yard. He cleaned it up, had the phone connected and built a system of pipes so that he could have a shower without paying water bills. Five months later, council representatives arrived at the door. Mr O'Connell told them: I'm in occupation here now. Now get off my property. Acting Justice Davies ordered Mr O'Connell to vacate the premises at 196 Port Hacking Road, Miranda, by 5pm next Friday. Friday the 13th, well that's appropriate, he replied, indicating he would appeal. I cannot leave, your honour; I have nowhere else to live. Mr O'Connell has planted trees, grown vegetables and kept a chicken at the property since moving in. Making stew from his own produce back at the house yesterday afternoon, he said that if he gave the property back the council would just turn it into the mess it was in when he found it. I've never lived in a place as good as this, even when I paid rent. It's my kingdom and they are going to take it off me. http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/06/05/1054700342156.html
AFP raid freedom fighters.
Police raids on Iranian 'rebels' By Patricia Karvelas and staff writers June 4, 2003 IN a series of dramatic simultaneous raids in three capital cities, Australian Federal Police agents swooped yesterday on alleged members of an Iranian resistance organisation linked to terrorism, seizing mobile phones and computers. The AFP's pre-dawn raids on 10 homes in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne of Iranian Australians believed to be supporters of Mujahidin e-Khalq (MEK) were aimed at establishing whether it or other Iranian groups had been involved in the financing of terrorism or had links to proscribed terror groups. AFP search warrants sought information on at least 12 other Iranian organisations, including Iranian refugee associations based in Australia as well as individual Iranian residents. MEK, a Marxist-leaning political organisation outlawed in Iran, is dedicated to the overthrow of the Tehran Government and has claimed responsibility for past terrorist bombings in the Iranian capital. Members of MEK have won refugee status in Australia on the basis of persecution by Iranian authorities. Jalal Hosseini's Maroubra home in Sydney was raided at 5am. He said AFP officers knocked at his door before spending three hours interrogating him on whether he was a member of the MEK. His mobile phone, computer and bags of files were confiscated in the raid. Yesterday he denied being involved in MEK but said he ideologically supported them. I told them I supported this group, but they asked me if I gave them money, but I have no money to give them, Mr Hosseini said. They asked me many questions and they said the Mujahidin were terrorist, but they knew nothing about them, they are not terrorists, they are freedom fighters. Cyrus Sarang, who received a knock on his Waterloo flat door in Sydney at 6.30am yesterday morning by six AFP officers, said he was harassed about his involvement in the group. He told them he was not a member, but did support the group's principles. They believe in Islam and I do not. I am not fundamental, Mr Sarang said. They gave me a handful of documents listing all these terrorist organisations. I told them I am not in them. They took my passport, my wife's passport and my daughter's, who is 10, passport, he said. I do support the Mujahidin but I am not part of them, but I support them because they fight for democracy. The Iranian regime is what we are against. They asked me if I sent them any money but I said no. He said he was also asked if he knew anything about Jemaah Islamiah, Hamas, or Hezbollah. The men told The Australian there was no formal MEK group in Australia, but rather a loose collective of people who met to read Mujahidin literature. A spokeswoman for federal Attorney-General Daryl Williams said last night a number of warrants had been issued for arrests and it would be inappropriate to comment further. MEK was named under a 2001 anti-terrorism resolution of the UN, which obliged member nations to freeze financial assets of people or entities involved in terrorism. But it has not been proscribed under Australian terrorism laws. Iranian authorities have repeatedly called on foreign governments, including Australia, to extradite MEK members wanted in connection with acts of terrorism against the Iranian state. Australian immigration authorities recently signed a memorandum of understanding with Tehran, which includes plans to repatriate Iranian detainees. Members of the organisation demonstrated against a visiting Iranian delegation last week and also took part in recent anti-Iraq war demonstrations in Australian cities, according to government sources. MEK supporters, including Mr Hosseini, took part in an attack on the Iranian embassy in Canberra in April 1992 in which an Iranian diplomat was badly injured. http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,6541568%255E421,00.html
More dodgy e-mails.
Newsreader resigns in wake of e-mails By Neil Melloy June 4, 2003 CHANNEL 9 weekend newsreader Mike London quit last night, three days after The Courier-Mail revealed he had allegedly sent e-mails criticising fellow newsreader Bruce Paige. London maintained that the e-mails had been doctored. Channel 9 Queensland issued a statement saying management had accepted London's resignation effective immediately and Paige read a news item about the resignation in last night's news broadcast. In e-mails obtained by The Courier-Mail London had allegedly asked Strathpine schoolteacher Karen Rolff to pass herself off as a viewer and then ring Nine to complain that Paige needed a personality bypass. London had been Nine's weekday newsreader until 1995 when Paige replaced him. London, who had been with Nine for 17 years, tendered his resignation in a brief letter, according to Nine. I am deeply saddened to be leaving my position at Channel 9 but believe this course of action to be in the best interests of my family, friends and Channel 9 Queensland, given the recent allegations printed in both The Courier-Mail and the Sunday Mail newspapers, it said. My family, colleagues and employer have suffered enough. Heather Foord will read the weekend news by herself from this weekend. London said he had resigned to enable him to resolve the matter privately and away from the media spotlight. The campaign against me over the last four days has been nothing short of harassment which has taken its toll on all those close to me, London said. On Friday, London told The Courier-Mail that Rolff, 33, had become obsessed with him and described her as a cyber stalker and a disturbed woman. He said she had been sent genuine e-mails as he had asked her to do some research for a charity, but he claimed they had been reworked. I still believe the e-mails in Queensland Newspapers' possession have been doctored, London said yesterday. Ms Rolff had denied London's claims and said they had met in an Internet meeting room because of their mutual interest in running and membership of the same church. An e-mail provided by Ms Rolff claims that London had given her an e-mail script to read so she could complain to Nine about Paige. Where did you get this guy (Paige)? He could do with a personality bypass ... the two you had reading last week were great! it said. In Nine's statement yesterday, Queensland managing director Neil Mooney thanked London for his contribution to the network and said he wished London and his family well. London thanked news director Lee Anderson and the news team for their support and friendship. Nine also said it had begun defamation action against Queensland Newspapers in relation to a story published yesterday. The Courier-Mail checked electronic copies of a large number of e-mails before publishing Saturday's report to confirm their veracity. http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,6541660%255E26462,00.html inline: 91a1199.jpg
Eat more dead cow America,eat your rotten heart out.
Bush's evangelising about food chills European hearts 'Today, 21% of the food grown in the developing world is destined for animal consumption. In many developing countries, more than a third of the grain is now being grown for livestock. The animals, in turn, will be eaten by the world's wealthiest consumers in the northern industrial countries. The result is that the world's richest consumers eat a diet high in animal protein, while the poorest people on earth are left with little land to grow food grain for their own families. And, even the land that is available is often owned by global agribusiness interests, further aggravating the plight of the rural poor. The introduction of GM food crops does nothing to change this fundamental reality' ( Jeremy Rifkin via Guardian ) » See also this blog entry from last week
Severe Acute US syndrome.
Fiachra Gibbons, arts correspondent Monday June 2, 2003 The Guardian The United States is a danger to the world because of its denial that it is a military and economic empire, according to Niall Ferguson, historian and new-found darling of the American right. Prof Ferguson is author of Empire: How Britain Made the Modern World, the book whose tie-in TV series controversially concentrated on the liberalising latter days of the British empire. He said that America's refusal to admit to what it was meant it risked never learning the lessons of British expansionism. The United States is the empire that dare not speak its name. It is an empire in denial, and US denial of this poses a real danger to the world. An empire that doesn't recognise its own power is a dangerous one. Prof Ferguson passed up a dinner invitation from the US secretary of state, Colin Powell, to address the Guardian Hay Festival. He told his audience that, with military bases in three-quarters of the countries of the world, and 31% of all wealth, America made the British empire at its zenith in 1920, when a quarter of the globe was pink, look like a half-baked thing. But he warned that America was too much of a military empire to last, too fond of short-term interventions in Haiti, Lebanon and now Iraq that lacked sustained commitment to the dirty work of rebuilding. Read More: http://books.guardian.co.uk/news/articles/0,6109,968533,00.html Source: http://books.guardian.co.uk/news/articles/0,6109,968533,00.html
Make them Accountable.
MakeThemAccountable.com George Bush says he needs time to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. He's giving himself the time he WOULDN'T give the UN inspectors to find the alleged weapons BEFORE he blew up as many as 7,000 innocent civilians. When do we start the impeachment proceedings? The owners of the news media conspired to help Bush sell his productof a war in Iraq. Rules to be passed today by the FCC will make it just that much easier for Bush to sell us more productsthat are just as goodfor us. After all, its all just soap, isnt it? Or is it K-Y jelly? The New York Times TV News That Looks Local, Even if It's Not By JIM RUTENBERG with MICHELINE MAYNARD June 2, 2003 If Mr. Hyman's tan looked out of place in central Michigan, or if his commentary seemed ill suited to a city with a large population of minority groups, there was good reason. Mr. Hyman was actually in a studio just outside Baltimore, not sharing a set with the Flint news team. As he does most nights, Mr. Hyman also addressed audiences of local news programs in cities across the country, including Pittsburgh, Oklahoma City and Rochester, from right where he sat in Hunt Valley, Md. Mr. Hyman is part of a national team of anchors, commentators and weathercasters that, when plans are complete, will report for all 62 television stations owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group. Sinclair calls it Central Casting. To the company, it is an efficient way to cut the costs of local journalism, bringing news to small stations that otherwise would go without. But to opponents of a proposal before the Federal Communications Commission to loosen media ownership rules, the set in Maryland is a frightening sign of things to come Carolyn Kay MakeThemAccountable.com George Bush visits Auschwitz, Poland, where his grandfather Prescott became very wealthy off the labor of slaves. Mo Paul, May 31, 2003 0
The Monger type.
The domestic terrorist Palm Beach Post Editorial Tuesday, June 3, 2003 Eric Robert Rudolph's North Carolina neighbors describe him as a self-sufficient carpenter with a healthy loyalty to his anti-Semitic beliefs. The more fitting description of the man suspected in the bombings at the 1996 Olympics, two clinics that performed abortions and a gay nightclub is simple: terrorist. Authorities say Rudolph planted the 40-pound pipe bomb that killed receptionist Alice Hawthorne and injured more than 100 at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta. He's also charged with a 1997 bombing outside an Atlanta-area clinic where doctors perform abortions. The explosions injured seven people. A month later, a bomb that investigators believe Rudolph set injured five at the nightclub in Atlanta. The next year, off-duty police officer Robert D. Sanderson was killed and nurse Emily Lyons was blinded in one eye when a bomb detonated outside a Birmingham, Ala., health-care center that also provided abortions. The license plate of a nearby truck was traced to Rudolph. Investigators believe, according to a retired FBI agent, that Rudolph acted out of anger with the government for refusing to approve a cancer drug that he believed would have cured his father. Teachers say he wrote a paper in ninth grade denying that the Holocaust occurred. Rudolph dropped out of high school, earned an equivalency diploma, dropped out of college and dropped out of the Army. An ex-sister-in-law says he made money growing and selling marijuana. Whatever the motive for Rudolph's hatred, he had sympathizers who say they would have treated him no differently than Dennis Malvasi and Loretta Marra treated James Kopp. In April, the married couple, anti-abortion activists, admitted that they tried to shelter and give money to Kopp, a one-time most-wanted FBI fugitive who was convicted in the sniper killing of Dr. Barnett Slepian of suburban Buffalo, N.Y., in 1998. The couple pleaded guilty to federal charges of conspiring to harbor Kopp, who last month was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison. Such networks hardly resemble Al-Qaeda, but they nevertheless are threats to domestic security and need to be broken up. Religious fanatics and white supremacists helped shape Rudolph's murderous beliefs against homosexuals, interracial marriage and abortion. The five-year, $24 million effort to capture Rudolph may have stopped the bomber himself, but the man investigators describe as a loner did not act alone. http://www.palmbeachpost.com/opinion/content/auto/epaper/editions/tuesday/opinion_e3bdec71464d610200c1.html
Fake e-mail from the AFP?
Fake email claimed Beazley coup MAY 28, 2003 OPPOSITION Leader Simon Crean demanded former leader Kim Beazley explain an email purporting to show an imminent leadership challenge. A spokesman for Mr Crean confirmed last night that at the meeting of the two men earlier this month, the opposition leader asked Mr Beazley about the email. The email, on Mr Beazley's own parliamentary email letterhead, suggested the former leader was about to launch a challenge to Mr Crean. But Mr Crean's spokesman said both Mr Crean and Mr Beazley agreed the email was fake. Mr Crean was of the view, as were senior staff, that the email was a fake, he said. Kim denied the email and said he also thought it was fake. The email had gone to a Labor staffer who brought it to the attention of Mr Crean's office. The meeting between Mr Crean and Mr Beazley followed a stand-off between the two following comments in The Bulletin magazine by the former leader. Mr Crean has said that Mr Beazley had promised not to launch a leadership challenge. Mr Crean's spokesman said there were concerns about how the email was faked. There are suggestions a person accessed a computer used by Mr Beazley to write the email. Mr Beazley and Mr Crean have spoken several times since the meeting, and Mr Beazley addressed Labor caucus yesterday . http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,6506197%5e15340%5e%5enbv%5e15306-15318,00.html The AFP recently claimed the worlds first working carnivore system in Melbourne au.in the late 90's.
Well organized anarchists.
Teach-ins, movie showings, marches and other events at Montreal's recent fourth annual anarchist book-fair, represented one of North America's largest festivals of anarchy, second only to San Francisco's. There are probably one thousand different people here throughout the course of the day,said Stefan Christoff, one of ten members of the book-fair's organizing collective. It shows the growth of our movement and the growth of struggle,he said. As many of the fair-goers did, I, and some other east-coast travellers, arrived at the festival via alternative means of transport; a long night of freight train hopping was followed by a run through the woods outside Moncton N.B. after we were spotted by a rail-yard worker. At that point we decided to hitchhike the rest of the way. Some fair-goers carried backpacks and sleeping mats, so others also made obvious sacrifices to attend. The CEDA adult education centre where the main fairgrounds were located is in the working class neighbourhood of St. Henri. Although chaos often accompanies large, activist gatherings, we were struck by the aura of calm and order. For a large gathering, it ran very smoothly. Anarchists moved some 50 tables into the main auditorium and set up chairs in the classrooms for a series of presentations. Free childcare was set up on the main-floor and the event's caterers members of the Montreal Political Prisoner/POW committee set up a food stand including two-dollar tofu pita-wraps, 50-cent freezies and fair trade coffee for 75 cents. By noon, the main auditorium was packed with people reading a variety of different books, pamphlets and zines. Anarchistic classics like Daniel Guerians No Gods, No Masters, Emma Goldman's Living my Life and works by Noam Chomsky and Ward Churchill were in abundance at the tables of such established distributors as AK press and Fernwood books. Some complained that these well-produced books, many of which advocated the abolition of money, were too expensive. And at an average of $20.00 each, these concerns are understandable. However, in a world of corporate controlled publishing, it must be difficult to print cost-effective anarchistic alternatives. When folks got tired of browsing, or attending presentations they went outside. It was a day fit for sleeveless shirts and urban camping. Children ran around in the sunshine, and a few people drank 40-ounce bottles of cheap beer or smoked grass to cool off. There were no shortages of wild-hairstyles, piercing, dreadlocks or black attire. The majority of the fair-goers were young and white, although there were solid numbers of middle-aged folks and relatively equal gender ratios. Along with the usual suspects, there was good involvement from people living near the fair in the St. Henri neighbourhood. And what anarchist gathering would be complete without a couple of raving conspiracy theorists, educating us about the constant presence of CSIS and other unsavoury organizations? Above the bustling table arena, smaller groups of activists gathered to listen to presentations from: Gaetan Heroux, an organizer with the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty; members of the committee for non-status Algerians in Montreal; and Ted Teddy, a member of the Secwepemec Nation who gave a moving address about indigenous resistance to the illegal expansion of the Sun Peaks ski resort onto Native Land in B.C. Stefan Christoff said the event received some donations from community groups and fundraisers and passed hats at the fair and various other events. But I don't think that's the right question,he said. That seemed to be the unique beauty of the event. Without mainstream funding, a large supply of union dues, paid door-to-door canvassers or government support, activists were able to organize a professional, savvy and informative event. It seems a good example of being able to create alternative institutions outside the control of what many consider a corporate state. The book-fair represents a new reality, joining First Nations' communal justice programs, anti-hunger initiatives like food not bombs, student organized free-schools and community-based healthcare clinics. At the book-fair, anarchists didn't fulfil the corporate media stereotype of angry, violent protestors. Through posters, e-mails and word of mouth, people came together to discuss important issues like housing, racism, poverty, war, immigration and economics. Participants weren't just complaining about problems, but were engaging people to work for solutions in a spirited realm, far cooler than politics or academia. According to Christoff, That's how real change happens, getting involved with struggles which actually affect people's lives. Chris Arsenault is a freelance journalist from Halifax. http://rabble.ca/in_their_own_words.shtml?x=21999
SpooksNews.
** JUSTICE DEPT BLOCKS RELEASE OF WEN HO LEE REPORT ** ANOTHER LOOK AT THOSE IRAQI TRAILERS ** DEFECTORS MAY SUE CIA ** IG REPORT ON SEPTEMBER 11 DETAINEES JUSTICE DEPT BLOCKS RELEASE OF WEN HO LEE REPORT The Justice Department Office of Professional Responsibility is refusing to release a new report on the Wen Ho Lee case despite earlier promises that it would be made public. Wen Ho Lee was a Los Alamos scientist who became the object of frenzied allegations, uncritically reported in the press, that he had stolen the crown jewels of the U.S. nuclear weapons program and transferred them to China. Lee was indicted in December 1999 on 59 felony counts and held for nine months of pre-trial detention under particularly harsh conditions. In the end, the government was unable to sustain its nuclear espionage case, and Lee was convicted in September 2000 of one felony count involving computer security violations. In an extraordinary turn of events, the judge hearing the case actually apologized to Lee and criticized the Justice Department and Energy Department officials who, he said, have embarrassed our entire nation and each of us who is a citizen of it. Dr. Lee, I tell you with great sadness that I feel I was led astray last December by the Executive Branch of our government through its Department of Justice, by its Federal Bureau of Investigation and by its United States Attorney for the District of New Mexico, who held the office at that time, said Judge James A. Parker at a September 13, 2000 hearing. http://www.fas.org/irp/ops/ci/whl_plea_transcript.html In response to Judge Parker's rebuke and the larger controversy surrounding the case, the Justice Department initiated an investigation by its Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR). The White House announced the OPR review at a September 22, 2000 press briefing and promised public accountability. The American public should look forward to an accounting there and I think that will be done, said White House press spokesman Joe Lockhart. http://www.fas.org/sgp/news/2000/09/wh092200.html The OPR report on the Wen Ho Lee case was finally completed this year. But contrary to official promises, the Justice Department indicated there would be no public accounting. In response to a request under the Freedom of Information Act from the Federation of American Scientists, Marlene W. Wahowiak, assistant counsel for freedom of information at the Justice Department, wrote on May 29 that I have determined that this report should be withheld in its entirety. She cited FOIA exemptions involving national security, personal privacy and law enforcement records. The denial of the request will be appealed. ANOTHER LOOK AT THOSE IRAQI TRAILERS President Bush hailed the discovery in Iraq of trailer-mounted biological agent production facilities as concrete evidence of a clandestine Iraqi biological weapons program. But the closer one looks at the Central Intelligence Agency report on the mobile facilities, the more ambiguous the case appears. In its report last week, the CIA said that the mobile plants could only be used for illicit production of biological weapons. We have investigated what other industrial processes may require such equipment -- a fermentor, refrigeration, and a gas capture system -- and agree with the experts that BW agent production is the only consistent, logical purpose for these vehicles, the CIA report said. But this seems to be an overly hasty conclusion. Mobile pilot plant fermentation facilities are not uncommon, observed chemist George C. Smith. In fact, they have a sufficient number of conventional applications, he noted, that they are commercially marketed. One such mobile fermentor is described here: http://www.johnmorris.com.au/html/NewBrunswick/bioflow5000.htm The CIA report said the Iraqi plant design could be specifically identified as a banned weapons system because of its device for capturing exhaust gases: The capability of the system to capture and compress exhaust gases produced during fermentation is not required for legitimate biological processes and strongly indicates attempts to conceal production activity. But that's not necessarily so either, said Smith, a senior fellow at GlobalSecurity.org. Thus, a design for a mobile bioreactor that is used to decontaminate soil at the U.S. Department of Energy Savannah River site features an optional noxious gas adsorber that has nothing to do with biological weapons production. See the schematic diagram on this page: http://www.wpi.org/Initiatives/2002/20020603.asp Perhaps the CIA analysts are correct when they claim the fermentors in Iraq are part of a biological weapons program, Dr. Smith said. But a vapor trap is no smoking gun indicating the labs must be for bioweapons production. Furthermore, it is not that difficult to think of legitimate reasons for the generation and uses of microbial products in Iraq. He cited the production of
It's the entertainment stupid.
THE information and communication technology sector has produced 30 per cent of Australia's productivity rise since the commercialisation of the internet in 1995, according to a new book. Co-author Professor Steve Burdon said many people were unaware of the importance of the ICT sector. I don't think there is an understanding of how much of our wealth is driven by that sector and why it's important for all of us in terms of schooling, training and everything, because if we want to have a good standard of living it's pretty clear what the biggest single factor is, he said. The book, Productivity and Organisational Transformation: Optimising Investment in ICT, was published by the National Office of Information Economy recently. Professor Burdon is working on a new subject, management of ICT. It is to be taught next year at the University of Technology, Sydney, as part of the School of Management's revised masters program. MICROSOFT and Sony have hit the Australian game console market with identical price cuts as the Xbox reels in PlayStation 2's sales lead. Both Microsoft and Sony cut the recommended retail price on their respective consoles from $399 to $329, with the announcements made within hours of each other. Microsoft said the Xbox price cut brought Australian pricing into line with Europe and the US. Similarly, Sony computer entertainment managing director Michael Ephraim said: Local market conditions have allowed us to facilitate more affordable prices in Australia. Microsoft's Xbox has been making steady progress against the PlayStation 2 (PS2) in the Australian market, said Phil Burnham, research director with market analyst Inform. Where the PlayStation had been outselling the Xbox by 3 to 1 in mid-February, the ratio was now closer to 1.5 to 1, he said. Xbox had also been making gains in software sales. In February, PS2 games accounted for 49 per cent of all sales, compared to 15 per cent for Xbox. May figures indicated PS2 software sales had dropped to 43 per cent, while Xbox had climbed to 20 per cent, Mr Burnham said. Both manufacturers plan to release online gaming services by the end of the year. Sony has already begun beta trials of its service, while Microsoft will commence trials in June, with a commercial release scheduled for October. Sony, meanwhile, has unveiled the latest version of the PlayStation, to be known as the PSX. Based on the PS2, the PSX will include a built-in DVD recorder and hard drive. The console will go on sale in Japan before the end of the year. http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,6516761%5E15321%5E%5Enbv%5E15306,00.html
Dole songs.
... enjoyed the article and comments about the Dole. http://www.melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2003/06/48326.php Years ago (20?) a study showed - if the CES and (Orwellian sounding) Social Security administration was removed and physical assets cashed in - people could have been paid $30,000 per annum on the Dole. Yes - it's a means of social control - not a genuine employment /training body. Up here - Centrelink are a also a useful means of controlling (and punishing) political activists. I imagine that's the case elsewhere - it's just more visible here. In reality - even if you're nearly braindead - you can a well-paying job if mummy and daddy are connected. I see webbies doing work I could knock off in my sleep, being paid a fortune because of their connections. -- Harold Hark on Richard Alston Then again, he has yet to fulfil those duties, having bungled every undertaking bar none. One of his latest bungles is the expenditure of $4 million to the con artists who developed his department's website.http://www.dcita.gov.au/Subject_Entry_Page/0,,0_1-2_1,00.html Yours truly is an entry-level web site designer and I could have done better than that after suffering a stroke! --- Harold is great! http://members.optusnet.com.au/~thesquiz/scatt.htm --- It is interesting to note that a plan to have the Dole office moved into the Darwin mall was knocked back because business people didn't want undesirables hanging around. I do not support such vilifications against the Centrelink staff - not even the Redneck that has it in for me. They are doing an unpleasant job - in an unpleasant system. Breaches - whereby you can lose up to $2000 for missing an interview - (even if you went to it) - piss struggling people off... Arson puts welfare office out of action By PAUL JACKSON June 3, 2003 Centrelink has set up a minibus shuttle service to take customers to its Casuarina and Palmerston offices after a fire destroyed most of their ground floor city premises. The fire, which caused tens of thousands of dollars in damage, was deliberately lit. Police said that about 11pm on Sunday someone smashed a side entrance glass door at the Knuckey St office and piled up papers behind the reception desk and set them alight. The fire alarm went off four minutes after the break-in alarm. Police and fire brigade officers were on the scene quickly and surrounding streets were cordoned off while officers fought the blaze. The premises suffered extensive smoke and water damage. Several computers, desks and photocopiers were destroyed in the blaze. Centrelink North Australia manager Gordon Pitts said it would take weeks before the premises would be open again. In the meantime we have set up a small, temporary office at the Knuckey St office and have relocated 35 employees from the first floor to the TCG building in the city,'' he said yesterday. The other 15 ground floor employees have been sent to Casuarina and Palmerston. We hope to find another city premises today to operate.'' He said that on a Monday, Centrelink employees normally saw about 120 people. Mr Pitts he did not know why anyone would want to set fire to Centrelink. We get the odd disgruntled customer from time to time and the worst thing that has happened is that a few windows have been broken,'' he said. Police would like to talk to the occupant or occupants of a light-coloured blue or silver Magna seen in the area at the time of the fire. They urged anyone who was in the area at the time and witnessed suspicious activity to call Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000. Northern Territory News members.optusnet.com.au/~thesquiz/scatt.htm
Making a killing with online betting.
AFP examines net-bet ad Simon Hayes JUNE 03, 2003 THE Department of Communications has handed the Federal Police a complaint that cricket's Baggy Green website has been linking to a site carrying gambling advertising. Last week, departmental lawyers considered a complaint that a firm contracted to provide scoring and news to the site, UK-based CricInfo, was running advertisements for British betting agencies on its pages, which were linked from Baggy Green. Baggy Green is licensed by the Australian Cricket Board to ninemsn, which in turn has contracted CricInfo to provide scoring and news content. The content is separately hosted by CricInfo but linked from Baggy Green. Some of the advertisements ran on pages directly linked from the Baggy Green site. A Communications Department spokeswoman confirmed the department's lawyers had assessed the site and had referred it to the AFP. A spokesman for CricInfo Australia said he had not been contacted about the complaint, and declined to comment. In a written response to The Australian, a ninemsn spokeswoman said: Ninemsn has had no complaint from the public regarding advertising appearing on Baggy Green, nor have we been contacted by the Department of Communications or the Australian Federal Police. Ninemsn has a vast network of websites and we act as a gateway to various websites where content is supplied by both local and international partners and suppliers. It is not unusual for consumers to be taken to an international website containing international ads - it is a situation that affects every online portal. Ninemsn does not host, serve or sell ads on online gambling, she said. A spokeswoman for the ACB declined to comment. When The Australian visited CricInfo, the site was running several gambling advertisements on its Australian home page. One advertiser was running a site specifically customised for Australian clients, offering local support numbers and bets on events ranging from Australian Rules to Big Brother. http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,6533625%5E15306%5E%5Enbv%5E,00.html
Squinty little pigs eyes.
On April 18, US Air Force Chief of Staff General John Jumper signed a memorandum endorsing a new citizen-snoop program, Eagle Eyes. According to the Air Force's office of special investigations, the Eagle Eyes program is an anti-terrorism initiative that enlists the eyes and ears of Air Force members and citizens in the war on terror. Eagle Eyes gives Operation TIPS new wings. The program creates a network of local, 24-hour telephone numbers for voyeuristic citizens to call whenever they observe suspicious activities. Eagle Eyes regards the use of still or video cameras, note-taking, drawing diagrams, using binoculars or annotating maps as suspicious activities that should be reported. Under its guidelines, most tourists visiting Yellowstone National Park could be regarded as suspicious persons. Operation TIPS exists under a different name, nothing has changed. The US Department of Defense recently renamed its Total Information Awareness project, a far-reaching surveillance and data collection program, to something it believes to be less threatening to American citizens. TIA now stands for Terrorism Information Awareness. Dropping the word total gives the project the appearance of being less universal, less inclusive. A good citizen might be lulled into thinking he or she wouldn't be targeted by the project. Wrong. The goals of TIA haven't changed. The project will still be data mining. Three months ago, Congress imposed a ban on funding for the TIA project until privacy safeguards were in place. Changing the name of the project didn't erect any privacy-protection barriers. TIA can collect medical records, credit card and financial data, travel, education and housing records. The Defense Department hopes its TIA project will predict terrorist attacks by detecting patterns of behaviour in the vast array of electronic records it collects on individuals. Despite the congressional ban on funding, the Defense Department continues to research and test TIA. It continues to provide other agencies with system/network infrastructure, software analytical tools, training in their use and evaluating the performance of the software. The Domestic Security Enhancement Act of 2003, a bill written by the Department of Justice, continues to loom. The DSEA has been nicknamed Patriot Act II, because it builds upon the provisions of the first act but is even more draconian in the powers it grants to law enforcement agencies of the Government. The DSEA would provide the Government with a carving knife with which to gut the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights. If liberty is still important to the American people, now is the time for Congress and the administration to hear our cry of outrage. This article first appeared in the Casper (Wyoming) Star-Tribune. FULL VERSION... http://theage.com.au/articles/2003/06/02/1054406120265.html
Exaggerated report of death.
http://uk.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=70367group=webcast G8 Police cut rope,M falls and suffers fracture injury.Details.
ATTAC!
Does Attac serves the police? by Guido 11:56am Sun Jun 1 '03 (Modified on 7:22pm Sun Jun 1 '03) [EMAIL PROTECTED] In some mainstreampress, some leaders from Attac were interviewed. Riots aren't to be expected, Lukas Engelmann, coordinator for Attac Germany, told the Associated Press. He predicted smaller scuffles, but said the hardcore violent groups weren't interested in Evian. Instead, he warned, they were preparing for the European Union summit in Thessaloniki, Greece in late June. http://www.dw-world.de/english/0,3367,1433_A_881656_1_A,00.html Jacques Nikonoff, president of the anti-globalisation movement Attac. We've taken steps, and those involved in vandalism or violence will be condemned in advance. They are not part of the alternative world movement, added Nikonoff. http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L26487521.htm Why still gice space on IMC for Attac? add your own comments Why defend troublemakers? by Thomas J 12:19pm Sun Jun 1 '03 People who just go to demonstrations to fight the police, throw molotovs around, and smash up shops are not going for the movement's sake. All they are doing is giving the right wing press ammuntion to denouce every anti-capitalist protester as such. And before the vitriol goes my way, I am fully aware that NOT all anti-capitalists or anarchists are like that, if you can really call the above that at all. These people are as supporting of the anti-capitalist movement as the racist thugs at football matches are supporters of the football team. Twattac by Mad Monk 12:27pm Sun Jun 1 '03 I agree. You could in fact argue that such arseholes like Attac are deeply reactionary and are in fact counter-revolutionary, because the only thing they will ever achieve is put thousands of people off progressive political action, tar all lefties with the mindless rioter smear and increase police and state repression. Well done lads, hope the macho sex thrill was worth it. Myself, I'll support people who actually understand what anarchism means (clue: Its NOT just the right to free cider.) MM Attac speaks two languages by guido 12:32pm Sun Jun 1 '03 [EMAIL PROTECTED] An article on their site about the riots. This night, a group of cagoulés young people equipped in black broke windows throughout a course in the center of Geneva. In the neighbourhoods of midnight in this anti-G8 demonstration day before we saw a group of young people of about fifty people, equipped with sweat shirt to hood black, to cross the place of Lime pit Palate without running. With calms and determination, making move back certain cars to ensure the passage, breaking avoid-break them others, breaking the window of the food chain of distribution Migros, they then engulfed themselves in a long ribbon in a small street. There, they set fire to the service station of Elf and two cars to slow down the police force which continued them. It will be necessary to await good fifteen minutes to see the firemen arriving. The police force, it also, intervened rather tardily on the spot. According to the conversations heard with the microphone of the police officers irritated parked along a pavement, the police force would have been concentrated around the airport what left the relatively empty city itself. The passage of the group of breakers was done in front of a prohibited and relatively amazed public. The badauds did not show hostility or a particular concern. After their passage in commercial main street, the windows of many stores are broken or broken. Nothing very systematic, just a blow by pane. Two hours after their passage, many people in the street to see the spectacle of the cords of police officers who block the passage on unquestionable section. The public of badauds is calm. No store seems to have been the subject of plundering. The police officers do not add any and let themselves photograph without stumbling. If the police officers are calm, the glaziers them are agitated already. They are already making the cutting of new windows. http://www.attac.info/g8evian/?NAVI=1023-113839-14fr I don't know what your getting at Mad Monk by Thomas J 12:37pm Sun Jun 1 '03 Yes, I hate people who just think anti-capitalist = mindless rioter, but for what I gathered from the article all Attac were doing were to condemn those who do just want to riot, which I think is fair enough. Could you clarify what you had to say? Whoops by Mad Monk 12:51pm Sun Jun 1 '03 Yes sorry about that, got my lines crosses somewhere along the way. It's Sunday - not at my best on Sundays. Anyway yes, what you said about Attac, definitely. Although the wider point about mindless rioter types still stands. Soz for the confusion. MM Peace by Jules 2:38pm Sun Jun 1 '03 I have just returned from the protest march which set out from Geneva and it was 99.9% peaceful with many people of all age groups and nationalities. The atmosphere was empowering, peaceful and
SS Agents need killing.
Secret Service indicts woman on wire fraud Wallowa County Chieftain, OR - 29 May 2003 ... It is our investigative assumption that there was no attempt to bring the babies forward,said US Secret Service Resident Agent in Charge John G. Kirkwood ... Hoping to get lucky, counterfeiters hit casinos Chicago Sun Times, IL - 1 hour ago ... about $1000 a week in counterfeit bills is found at the region's five casinos and nearby businesses, said Rob Gray, spokesman for the US Secret Service in ... By Martin Edwin Andersen © 2003 News World Communications Inc. At a time when federal law enforcement finds its resources stretched to the limit with the war on terrorism, an increasing number of retired U.S. Secret Service agents are taking advantage of an anomaly in the retirement system, unavailable to other federal law-enforcement agents, that gives them complete retirement benefits even if they return to service as full-time investigators in other government agencies, Insight has learned. One result of the legal but controversial special treatment extended to Secret Service retirees has been the packing of federal Offices of Inspectors General, or OIGs, with a good-old-boy network of former agents who frequently lack the specialized investigative skills needed to carry out the missions of the internal watchdog agencies, according to critics of this so-called double-dipping practice. Payment of full retirement benefits, along with postretirement salaries as federal investigators, enables Secret Service retirees to earn incomes far above those of members of Congress and even of the Cabinet. This bypassing of the normal rules of the federal personnel system which are applied to all other job applicants, no matter how qualified has allowed retired Secret Service agents to compete unfairly for jobs within the federal IG community, say rivals and other critics, and to network their colleagues into OIG positions throughout government. One example is the OIG at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, or HUD. As previously reported by Insight, the OIG there has been accused of patterns and practices of cronyism and patronage. The Secret Service guys end up getting hired, and it is claimed that their relevant experience comes from a background in credit-card fraud and counterfeiting investigations, says former HUD OIG assistant special agent in charge James Malloy. But counterfeiting and credit-card fraud aren't problems at HUD/IG, where work requires specific knowledge of the department's mission and clientele. Basically, the [former] Secret Service guys don't have a clue about what they are doing there. Since publication of the HUD exposé, Insight has been deluged with complaints of similar activity at other federal OIGs. However, while nearly all of those making the complaints were willing to provide documents to support their claims, most would talk only on the condition of anonymity, citing fear of reprisal from their retired Secret Service bosses and/or concerns about protecting pending litigation. Among those who have stepped forward openly are two of the most highly regarded senior field managers at the HUD OIG, Malloy and Larry Chapman. They have filed equal-employment complaints claiming that they were subjected to humiliating investigations and forced to resign by two senior executive-level OIG officials in Washington, both of whom also are retired Secret Service agents. In some cases, sources tell Insight, those daring to challenge decisions made by former Secret Service personnel working in the OIGs have been reminded that the retired agents including a number of those once assigned to the presidential-protection detail retain powerful friendships from their prior jobs. The other agents may hate their guts, but are scared to death because of potential reprisals, Malloy tells Insight. If you mess with these folks, says Dann Truxal, another HUD OIG special agent in charge and a retired Army officer who left the department after having been passed over for a key position in favor of a Secret Service retiree he thought less qualified, you'll have Internal Affairs after you. Critics say that among the OIGs which allegedly have fallen under the networking Secret Service retirees are those at the departments of Justice and Labor, both internal-affairs offices at Treasury, the Social Security Administration, or SSA, the Department of Veterans' Affairs and the Railroad Retirement Board. Similar circumstances also have been alleged at the Food and Drug Administration's Office of Criminal Investigations, the IRS, the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Glynco, Ga., the Office of Special Investigations in the General Accounting Office and the Office of Personnel Management, or OPM, investigations unit. The Secret Service, one congressional investigator tells Insight, has the most incredible network throughout the IG community. They are everywhere. This is because Secret Service agents are
KRON 4 Freedom!
OAKLAND (KRON) -- Some teachers in Oakland are rallying behind two students who were interrogated by the Secret Service. That followed remarks the teenagers made about the President during a class discussion. The incident has many people angry. For years the classroom has been the setting for the free _expression_ of ideas, but two weeks ago certain ideas led to two students being taken out of class and grilled by the United States Secret Service. It happened at Oakland High. The discussion was about the war in Iraq. That's when two students made comments about the President of the United States. While the exact wording is up for debate, the teacher didn't consider it mere criticism, but a direct threat and she called the Secret Service. Teacher Cassie Lopez says, They were so shaken up and afraid. Now, other teachers are coming to the aid of the two students and crying foul. I would start with the teacher, she made a poor judgement, Lopez says. Teacher Larry Felson says, What we're concerned about is academic freedom and that students have the right to free _expression_ in the classroom. Even worse, they say, is the fact that the students were grilled by federal agents without legal counsel or their parents present, just the principal. When one of the students asked, 'do we have to talk now? Can we be silent? Can we get legal council?' they were told, 'we own you, you don't have any legal rights,' Felson says. We don't want federal agents or police coming in our schools and interrogating our children at the whim of someone who has a hunch something might be wrong, Lopez says. The union representing Oakland teachers requires that students be afforded legal counsel and parental guidance before they're interrogated by authorities. It's too late for the two involved in this incident, and teachers say it's something they'll carry with them for years. I tell you the looks on those childrens faces. I don't know if they'll say anything about anything ever again. Is that what we want? I don't think we want that, says Lopez. (Copyright 2003, KRON 4. All rights reserved.) http://www.kron4.com/Global/story.asp?S=1268949
Put a Tivo in your tank.
Secret Service, Local Police Ready for Presidential Visit WISH, IN - 9 May 2003 One man has the responsibility for keeping the president safe in Indianapolis. Mark Parkman is the special agent in charge for the Secret Service. ... Story location: http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,59028,00.html 02:00 AM May. 31, 2003 PT Raffi Krikorian is an unapologetic TiVo fanatic. The MIT graduate student and blogger regularly takes apart his two beloved TiVo digital video recorders to soup them up and writes software code that makes the devices do party tricks, like changing the titles of TV shows or downloading weather maps off the Internet. Now Krikorian is taking his love affair to another level: Amazon.com is currently taking preliminary orders for Krikorian's new book, TiVo Hacks, a guide to 100 popular ways to score more features. The book, which O'Reilly Associates plans to release late this summer, provides step-by-step directions on everything from how to add storage space to your recorder to how to get a 30-second-skip feature on the remote control. TiVo spokeswoman Rebecca Baer said she was aware Krikorian was writing the book, but that the company did not have an opinion on it. Ever since the first TiVo hit the market in 1997, people have been breaking into them, she said. Overall, it's been a hands-off policy, Baer said. People can hack into their own (TiVo recorders), but as soon as they open them up, their warranty is voided. We wouldn't be able to help with their DVR or the delivery of the service at that point. But as Krikorian points out in his book, there are professional hackers willing to help nervous users break into their machines and get the services they want. Your TiVo runs Linux, Krikorian said. It is a very special-purpose PC sitting on your television. You can get it to do anything you want it to do, just like your PC. But even Krikorian admits he has limits. While he teaches his readers to tweak their TiVo recorders, he stays away from hacks that could hurt the company's business. For example, he doesn't tell people how to steal TiVo service, or how to download movies off the Internet, which, he says, could land TiVo into legal troubles with copyright attorneys. Baer said her company's legal department did meet with Krikorian briefly to learn what the parameters of the book were. But TiVo did not help Krikorian with the project. Krikorian described his relationship with the company as friendly and cooperative on both ends. Almost no one will talk to you about how to steal TiVo service because TiVo has been really friendly to hackers in the past, allowing us to get access to their box, he said. Not to mention, TiVo hackers love their DVRs, and would not want to see them become obsolete, he added. If you talk to any TiVo lover they will tell you, 'TiVo has changed the way I watch TV.' You have to wonder if TiVo puts it on the television screen because everyone says the exact same thing, he said. Among his favorite hacks is a way to gain more than 100 hours of recording time -- rather than the standard 80 hours -- by breaking open the machines and installing additional storage drives and software. Krikorian said he has heard of people getting up to 200 hours of recording time. Another party hack involves software that changes the names of television shows when their titles first appear on the TV screen. By running some code, viewers can change Late Night With Conan O'Brien to Conan O'Brien Fools Around at Night. His book also includes suggestions from the TiVo community at large. One trick an Arizona hacker claims to have accomplished is a way to get his e-mail read to him. The Arizonan wrote a script that checks his computer's inbox, converts e-mails to MP3 files and has the TiVo read them for him. One cheap thrill that has stirred a lot of controversy for TiVo is a 30-second-skip feature hackers developed, using the TiVo remote control. By pressing select, then play, then select again, the number 30 and select with the remote control, users can skip through programs for 30 seconds at a time. You don't even need to open up your box to make that happen, Krikorian said. TiVo has said the 30-second-skip feature is not officially part of the company's product and the company doesn't promote it. Industry analysts have said TiVo could find itself embroiled in a lawsuit if it was found that it developed a system that allowed customers to skip through commercials. http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,59028,00.html
This is Bushit.
From Islam Online LONDON (IslamOnline.net News Agencies) - U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell and his British counterpart Jack Straw privately voiced doubts over Iraq's weapons program, fueling the controversy worldwide over charges that London and Washington distorted intelligence assessments about Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction, a leading British newspaper revealed Saturday, May 31. The doubts emerged at a private meeting between Powell and Straw shortly before a crucial session of the U.N. security council on February 5, when Powell presented, in a 75-minute dramatic speech, what was described as declassified information about evidence of Iraq's weapons program, the Guardian reported. The meeting took place at the Waldorf hotel in New York, where they discussed the growing diplomatic crisis with Straw expressing concern that claims being made by U.S. President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair on Iraq's WMDs could not be proved. The exchange about the validity of their respective governments' intelligence reports on Iraq lasted less than 10 minutes, the daily said quoting unnamed diplomats who were supportive of the use of force against Baghdad at the time, but now feel they were lied to about its justification. The problem, explained Straw, was the lack of corroborative evidence to back up the WMD claims. The transcripts quoted Powell as saying he was apprehensive about intelligence assessments containing circumstantial evidence, and telling Straw he hoped the facts, when they came out, would not explode in their faces. 'Moved In' Powell shared the concern about intelligence assessments, especially those being presented by the Pentagon's Special Plans Unit (SPU) set up by U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz. He said he had all but moved in with U.S. intelligence to prepare his briefings for the UNSC, according to the transcripts. The respected Christian Science Monitor reported on May 23 that the CIA might be seeking to embarrass or discredit the SPU over Iraq's WMDs as voices were increasingly being raised in the U.S. and Britain demanding an explanation for why nothing had been found. The Monitor said that while CIA was questioning alleged ties between Al Qaeda and Iraq or the presence of WMDs in the country, it was the SPU that pushed what it claimed was evidence of Iraq-Al Qaeda ties and the presence of weapons of mass destruction in the war-scarred country. The British Foreign Office dismissed the Guardian report as simply untrue and insisted that no such meeting took place between Powell and Straw. In Warsaw on Friday, May 30, Blair dismissed as completely absurd the idea that intelligence agencies fabricated evidence that Iraq had such weapons in order to justify war. The Waldorf meeting took place a few days after Downing Street presented Powell with a separate dossier on Iraq's banned weapons. A few days later, Downing Street admitted that much of its dossier was lifted from academic sources and included a plagiarized section written by a PhD student, the Guardian said. An unnamed intelligence official told the BBC on Thursday, May 29, that a key claim in the British dossier - that Iraq could launch a chemical or biological attack within 45 minutes of an order - was inserted on the instructions of officials in 10 Downing Street. Adam Ingram, the armed forces minister, admitted the claim was made by a single source; it wasn't corroborated. Pressured Meanwhile, a U.S. weekly said Friday that Powell came under persistent pressure from the Pentagon and White House to include questionable intelligence in his report on Iraq's WMDs to the Security Council. U.S. News and World Report magazine said the first draft of the speech was prepared for Powell by Vice President Richard Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis Libby, in late January. According to the report, the draft contained such questionable material that Powell lost his temper, throwing several pages in the air and declaring, I'm not reading this. This is bullshit. Cheney's aides wanted Powell to include in his presentation information that Iraq has purchased computer software that would allow it to plan an attack on the United States, an allegation that was not supported by the CIA, the magazine said. The weekly further said that the White House also pressed Powell to include charges that the suspected leader of the September 11 hijackers, Mohammed Atta, had met in Prague with an Iraqi intelligence officer prior to the attacks, despite a refusal by U.S. and European intelligence agencies to confirm such a meeting. The pressure, added the American magazine, forced Powell to appoint his own review team that met several times with CIA Director George Tenet and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice to prepare the speech. U.S. News also said that the Defense Intelligence Agency had issued a classified assessment of Iraq's chemical weapons program last September, arguing that there is no reliable
Nomad war machine of one.
Story location: http://www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,59024,00.html 10:55 AM May. 29, 2003 PT Cingular can issue insurance to its mobile-phone customers to protect them against loss and damage, but it apparently can't ensure that hackers won't have full access to their personal data. Adrian Lamo, a hacker who in the past has broken into The New York Times and Yahoo, found a gaping security hole in a website run by a company that issues the insurance to Cingular customers. By accessing the site, Lamo said he could have pulled up millions of customer records had he wanted to. He said he discovered the problem this weekend through a random finding in a Sacramento Dumpster, where a Cingular store had discarded records about a customer's insurance claim for a lost phone. By simply typing in a URL listed on the detritus, Lamo was taken to the customer's claim page on a site run by lock\line LLC, which provides the claim management services to Cingular. Normally, this page should have been reachable only by passing through a password-protected gateway, but by simply entering the valid URL, Lamo discovered that individual claims pages could be accessed, no password authentication needed. Each page contained the customer's name, address and phone number, along with details on the insurance claim being made. Altering the claim ID numbers (which were assigned sequentially) in the URL gave Lamo access to the entire history of Cingular claims processed through lock\line, comprising some 2.5 million customer claims dating back to 1998. Lamo said the hack was similar to his discovery of a security hole at Microsoft in October 2001, where the server was configured to assume that if a user could reach a certain URL that was otherwise unpublished on the Internet, that user must be authorized to do so and must already be logged in. As with his other hacks, Lamo said he had no intent of profiting from the exploit, just pointing out a security flaw. Lamo first exposed the problem to Wired News. After this reporter pointed out the flaw, Cingular and lock\line closed the hole by Wednesday morning. Cingular spokesman Tony Carter said lock\line has enabled password protection for the site and has now incorporated obfuscation techniques that scramble URLs so that, even in the event of a site compromise, additional records should not be easily accessible. Lock\line spokesman Reed Garrett confirmed the hack. Carter noted that no financial information or social security number data were taken and the information wasn't even available to lock\line. We screwed up, said Carter. Our policy is that any time there is a document with customer information on it is to be shredded. They've been trained on this. They just didn't do it. There's no excuse for it. The event highlights the problems of managing vendor relationships when customer information needs to be shared but each company has different processes for handling that information. Carter says Cingular has nearly 40,000 vendors, and staying on top of them all is an arduous task, which the company continues to evaluate. Jerry Brady, CTO of security services company Guardent, said incidents like the Cingular episode are not that uncommon. This usually happens because people whip together quick-and-dirty front ends without much thought to the construction of the data, he said. You see this all the time, not just in the private sector, but in government systems as well. You just can't expect that outsourcer (to) treat confidential data the same way as the firm. They have no vested interest in worrying about the customer. Lamo noted that outsourcing arrangements continue to yield a treasure trove of weak links in electronic security. Said Lamo, As companies begin to outsource more and more of their businesses, the line of where security begins and ends gets blurry. He added that in this case, the security was tremendously bad. The Cingular discovery is the latest in a line of exploits from Lamo. In the past few years, Lamo has found his way into the database containing sources for the The New York Times, has altered news stories on Yahoo and has repeatedly compromised AOL. Companies have contemplated suing him, but security experts have lauded his efforts for pointing out flaws. Lamo, 22, doesn't have a permanent address. He wanders cross-country on foot or by public bus. Spring and summer usually bring him to Northern California. Until recently, he used terminals at Kinko's to perform his hacks. He has graduated to using a Wi-Fi-ready laptop at Starbucks to do his work. For Lamo, there's a bigger issue at stake with the Cingular hack. If only they had recycled the document instead of throwing it away, he quipped, this wouldn't have happened. http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,59024,00.html
Nazi collaborators using poison gas.Pics.
ANNEMASSE, France (Reuters) - French police fired teargas on Saturday to disperse several hundred anarchists in the first major disturbance ahead of a summit of the Group of Eight leading industrialized countries. Eyewitnesses said the incident came after the protesters marched from an anti-G8 campsite near the French town of Annemasse on the Swiss border to blockade a building where French Socialist Party activists were meeting. It was the first clash in what both protest leaders and police had said would be a series of peaceful marches and sit-ins during the three-day summit in the nearby French spa town of Evian, which opens on Sunday. Authorities on both sides of the border, fearful of a repetition of violence that rocked a G8 summit in Genoa, Italy, two years ago, have mounted a massive security operation involving some 25,000 police and security officials. It was not immediately clear why the anarchists, carrying their traditional black-and-red flags, decided to march against the socialists -- although hard-left movements generally regard social democratic parties as hirelings of capitalism. Marchers said they threw stones at the building where the socialists were meeting to discuss the G8 summit after guards inside fired a spray at them. There was no immediate comment from the socialists. The anarchists began setting up barricades but French riot police moved in, firing volleys of teargas to push them back to the campsite at Annemasse airfield, where earlier in the day protesters were instructed in passive resistance techniques. Police barricades were going up on both sides of the French-Swiss border around Lake Geneva to halt protesters trying to move off permitted routes. Army helicopters circled overhead. In Lausanne, across Lake Geneva from Evian, various groups denouncing the G8 leaders, who include President Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin, were considering ways to try to block water traffic. While most G8 leaders are staying around Evian, about a dozen prime ministers and presidents who are summit guests, including China's Hu Jintao, will stay in Lausanne and travel across Lake Geneva from the Swiss to the French side. Protesters accuse the G8 chiefs of acting like Masters of the Universe and say the poorer nation leaders -- who include Brazil's new left-wing President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva -- will get nothing more than crumbs from them. The G8 include Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and the United States. What We're Doing in Annemasse by Poon 1:55pm UK Indymedia Sat May 31 '03 A trip from the Intergalactique camp to the local supermarket took an unexpected turn today when we found ourselves in the midst of several hundred people on their way to protest at a meeting of the French Socialist Party. Much like New Labour in Britain, the Socialist Party in France has more in common with the G8 leaders in Evian than with those of us who want to expose the effects of their policies. Given this, a group decided to pay a visit to a meeting of the Socialists in Annemasse and we went along for the ride :-) For a tense 30 minutes or so outside the meeting, demonstraters banged on the windows and tried to get in to the hall. Eventually stones and other things to hand were thrown at, and then through, the windows. The police, who were nowhere to be seen before this point, soon arrived. They were very quick to use tear gas which sent the crowd slowly back towards the camp. Local people were cheering us on and throwing bottles of water from their windows and balconys for us to wash off the gas. One family were lowering a bucket from their balcony for our empty water bottles which they re-filled and passed back to us. The police then spent several hours pushing the crowd back towards the camp, firing a lot of gas as they went. I think the action was useful in that it made clear to the French Socialist Party that their version of Socialism (i.e. neo-liberalism!) is not a part of our movement of movements for social change and globalisation from below! It was also good to see so much support from local people :-) Photos at: Geneva, May 30 http://sf.indymedia.org/news/2003/05/1615019.php http://germany.indymedia.org/2003/05/52809.shtml http://www.indymedia.ch/fr/2003/05/9823.shtml http://www.indymedia.ch/fr/2003/05/9849.shtml http://switzerland.indymedia.org/fr/2003/05/9783.shtml http://sf.indymedia.org/news/2003/05/1615118.php http://ch.indymedia.org/itmix/2003/05/9833.shtml Lausanne, May 29 http://www.indymedia.ch/de/2003/05/9644.shtml http://sf.indymedia.org/news/2003/05/1614861.php Links at: http://indymedia.org/g8/ http://switzerland.indymedia.org/en/ http://uk.indymedia.org/ Link: http://indymedia.org/g8/
How much is that general in the window?
One of Saddam Hussein's top generals was not included in the US card deck of 55 most-wanted Iraqis. Now stories are circulating in European, Middle Eastern and other foreign press that he was paid off to ensure the quick fall of Baghdad. On May 25, the French paper Le Journal du Dimanche, citing an unnamed Iraqi source, claimed that General Maher Sufian al-Tikriti, Saddam's cousin and a Republican Guard commander, made a deal with US troops before leaving Iraq on a US military aircraft. Allegedly the deal had been secured in advance by the CIA, but by prearrangement was implemented only after US troops reached Baghdad's airport on April 4. Sufian was said to have left Iraq, along with a 20-man entourage, on April 8 -- the day before US forces captured Baghdad without resistance. An Arab diplomat told Le Journal that the CIA had hatched the plot more than a year before. Many suitcases filled with dollars were floating around, the diplomat said. This story has been picked up by newspapers around the world, including the London Times and the Sydney Morning Herald. But the only recent reference to Gen. Sufian in the US press was in early May, when it was reported that his home was now a base where survivors searched for records on the fate of missing loved ones. Other Arab sources have added details. Reportedly Sufian ordered the Republican Guard out of the city to fight in the countryside, where they were easily picked off. Gen. Sufian may also have betrayed the location of the house where Saddam Hussein met with his family on April 7, and where Saddam may or may not have been killed. A further report from Agence France Presse alleges that Saddam was betrayed by not one but three of his cousins, as well as other senior military officers, and a former cabinet minister. The Egyptian weekly Al-Usbua claimed that Gen Sufian had betrayed his cousin in exchange for $25 million, the guarantee to move to the United States and the promise of a future high position in Iraq. (One hopes that this last claim is not true, as Sufian was notorious as Saddam's partner in terroristic oppression.) The Lebanese newspaper Sawt al-Urouba has alleged that some of the human shields who had travelled to Baghdad before the war in the name of protecting civilian targets were in fact US agents who bribed Iraqi generals while in the city. In a May 19 article in the Defence News, retiring Chief of US Central Command, Gen. Tommy Franks, is quoted as telling a Defence News reporter on May 10 that, before the US invasion of Iraq, US Special Forces had gone in and bribed Iraqi generals not to fight. Franks told the reporter, I had letters from Iraqi generals saying, 'I now work for you.' If so, the US plans for occupying Iraq followed the model of the invasion of Afghanistan. There too, key warlords were bought off by liberal dispensations of CIA dollars, making military operations far easier than many had anticipated. The downside of these deals was to restore parts of Afghanistan to warlords whose traditional source of income has been the drug traffic. Whatever the details, it would appear that refinements in military strategy and high-tech materiel were not, as the Pentagon has suggested, the key to quick U.S. victory in Iraq. On April 24, the US-based online news site World Tribune.com noted that Gen. Sufian, the commander of several Republican Guard units defending Baghdad, did not appear on the US list of 55 most wanted Iraqis. It cited Arab diplomatic sources as saying that Sufian was believed to have ordered his units to abandon their weapons and return home. But US officials, it reported, had denied any deal with Sufian. On April 8, at the time of the alleged deal, US Marines announced that Gen. Sufian had been shot at a roadblock outside Baghdad. On April 9, Knight Ridder newspapers carried a report from Marine headquarters on how Gen. Sufian met his death in a white Toyota sedan, uniformed and alone except for his chauffeur. The fate of Gen Maher Sufian al-Takriti is key to a central mystery surrounding this poorly reported war: Why did Baghdad fall without a fight? http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_267294,0005.htm http://www.timesonline.co.uk/printFriendly/0,,1-6407692728,00.html
NYC Anarchs hotwired
Below you'll find a link to a new website newswire, utilizing PostNuke / PhP scripting technology. This newswire is linked to the www.anarco-nyc.net website resource. http://www.anarco-nyc.net/weblog/index.php The purpose of the newswire is to foment and encourage more communications amoung anarchists and anti-authoritarians in the NYC and surrounding region. You'll see several categories of topics devoted to this purpose alone. For instance, categories devoted to posting announcements about workshops, forums, study groups, and other events. This website is an open publishing website similar to the IMCs, but with the exception that one must register and contribute to the newswire community in order to have the permissions associated with posting news and items. Please take a few minutes to familiarize yourself with the website, sign up as a user, and begin posting news, events, and other announcements so that we can make it a kick ass communication tool! As of now it's a work in process. We are looking for feedback, both positive and critical. If you have any thoughts on how we can improve the site, please let us know. Thanks much, projects collective, brooklyn Link: http://www.anarco-nyc.net/weblog/index.php
Devil went down to Mesopotamia.
Christian Fundamentalists To Produce Iraqi News By Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman WASHINGTON, May 02, 2003 -- The U.S. government this week launched its Arabic language satellite TV news station for mostly Muslim Iraq. It is being produced in a studio - Grace Digital Media - controlled by fundamentalist Christians who are rabidly pro-Israel. That's grace as in by the grace of God. Grace Digital Media is controlled by a fundamentalist Christian millionaire, Cheryl Reagan, who last year wrested control of Federal News Service, a transcription news service, from its former owner, Cortes Randell. Randell says he met Reagan at a prayer meeting, brought her in as an investor in Federal News Service, and then she forced him out of his own company. Grace Digital Media and Federal News Service are housed in a downtown Washington, D.C. office building, along with Grace News Network. When you call the number for Grace News Network, you get a person answering Grace Digital Media/Federal News Service. According to its web site, Grace News Network is dedicated to transmitting the evidence of God's presence in the world today. Grace News Network will be reporting the current secular news, along with aggressive proclamations that will 'change the news' to reflect the Kingdom of God and its purposes, GNN proclaims. The Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), the U.S. government agency producing the television news broadcasts for Iraq, likes to say it is the BBC of the USA. BBG runs Radio Free Europe, Voice of America, and Radio Sawa - Arabic language radio for the Middle East. Our mission is clear, BBG's Joan Mower told us. To broadcast accurate and objective news about the United States and the world. We don't do propaganda, leafleting - we are like the BBC in that respect. Well, then why hook up with Grace? BBG's Joan Mower said that Grace Digital Media is a mainstream production house used by all kinds of mainstream news organizations. Grace will have nothing to do with the editorial side of the news broadcast, she said. They are renting us equipment, space, studio. The Grace personnel we use include technicians, production people but no editorial people. But Mower said she couldn't get us a copy of the contract between BBG and Grace Digital Media. Nor could she say how Grace Digital was chosen as the production studio. Grace News Network proclaims that it will be a unique tool in the Lord's ministry plan for the world, according to the company's mission statement. Grace News Network provides networking links and portals to various ministries and news services that will be of benefit to every Christian believer and seeker of truth. The CEO of Grace News Network is Thorne Auchter. The same Thorne Auchter who began the dismantling of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) under Presidents Reagan and George Bush I. Auchter did not return our calls seeking comment for this story. While it's unclear whether Grace News Network actually produces any news, it has produced a documentary movie titled Israel: Divine Destiny which it showed at the National Press Club in September 2002. The film is about Israel's destiny and the United States' role in that destiny, according to Grace News Network. Grace News said that it could not make a copy of the film available to us at this time, since it is now undergoing post-production editing. Nor could it provide a transcript. The mainstream media has documented strong and growing ties between right-wing Republican Christian fundamentalists and right-wing Sharonist Israeli expansionists. This alliance is personified in Ralph Reed's Stand Up for Israel, a group formed to mobilize Christians and other people of faith to support the State of Israel. President Bush has very strong ties to fundamentalist Christians, most notably Franklin Graham, the son of Rev. Billy Graham. Last week, Franklin Graham delivered a Good Friday message at the Pentagon, despite an uproar over his previous slander of Islam as a very evil and wicked religion. Don Wagner, a professor of religion and director of the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at North Park University, an evangelical Christian college in Chicago, has written extensively about what he calls Christian Zionism, whose leaders he identifies as, among others, Ralph Reed, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Gary Bauer, and Franklin Graham. Christian Zionists have historically pointed to Genesis 12:3-96 - I will bless those who bless you. And the one who curses you, I will curse, Dr. Wagner said. They have interpreted this to mean that individuals and nations who support the state of Israel will be blessed by God. It has come to mean political, economic and moral support, often uncritically rendered to the state of Israel. Grace News Network seems to fit the mold. Joan Mower says that BBG is currently producing and transmitting six hours of news into Iraq
All the trouble in the world.
Student Killed as Peru Protesters Defy President posted by Latin Revolt on Thursday May 29 2003 @ 05:59PM PDT A student was killed and nearly 50 people were injured on Thursday as demonstrators clashed with Peruvian troops in some of the worst violence since President Alejandro Toledo declared a state of emergency this week to curb a wave of strikes and protests. [...] Iraqis Revolt Against American Occupation and Burn Down Police Station posted by Iraqi Rebellion on Thursday May 29 2003 @ 06:25PM PDT Uproar ensued in the Sunni Muslim town of 155,000 as angry residents surged into the streets, burning police cars and throwing stones and handmade grenades at the Americans. [...] http://www.infoshop.org/inews/stories.php?page=2topic=
AOL's contain WASTE.
update A day after developers at America Online's Nullsoft unit quietly released file-sharing software, AOL pulled the link to the product from the subsidiary's Web site. The software, called Waste, lets groups set up private, secure file-sharing networks. The product became available on Nullsoft's Web site on Wednesday, just days shy of the four-year anniversary of being acquired by AOL. Waste is a software application that combines peer-to-peer file sharing with instant messaging, chat and file searches. Users can set up their own network of friends and share files between each other. The features of Waste are similar to those of file-swapping services such as Kazaa and the defunct Napster, but the difference is that only small networks of people (up to 50, according to the Web site) can use it. The software also offers encryption and authentication to prevent non-invitees from accessing the private networks. The quiet launch of Waste was the work of Nullsoft's principal developer, Justin Frankel, a soft-spoken 20-something known for his tech savvy and his streak of rebelliousness. Waste had been used internally to share files between AOL's San Francisco office, where Nullsoft is based, and its Dulles, Va., headquarters, according to Ian Rogers, a former founding member of Nullsoft. The real play is when you've got small networks of co-workers or friends who can share whatever they want securely, Rogers said in an interview. It could be a group of government officials sharing secure documents or it could be Justin sharing video files with AOL Dulles. An AOL representative did not return requests for comment. Nullsoft has had its conflicts with AOL in the past, such as in 2000 when Frankel developed a music file-swapping technology called Gnutella. AOL quickly pulled it off the Web fearing legal ramifications, but not before developers downloaded it and began creating services based on its software code. AOL also forced Nullsoft to shut down an MP3 search engine, fearing the legal consequences of the software. Then, Frankel and his cohorts caused a stir when they developed software called AIMazing, which replaced banner advertisements on AOL Instant Messenger into wiggling sound waves accompanied by music. That's not to say all of Nullsoft's products have been a thorn in AOL's side. AOL acquired Nullsoft in 1999 for its Winamp MP3 player and now uses the technology in its flagship online service. AOL also has been revamping its streaming-media delivery system by using another Nullsoft creation called Ultravox, which AOL claims can stream media more efficiently than other products on the market. AOL uses Ultravox to stream songs on its narrowband and broadband radio services. http://news.com.com/2100-1032_3-1011585.html?tag=fd_top inline: 125ff9a3.jpginline: 125ff9b2.jpginline: 125ff9c0.jpg
Who moved my cheese?
Who Moved My Cheese? An Amazing Way to Deal with Change in Your Work and in Your Life By Johnson, Spencer The Goal A Process of Ongoing Improvement By Goldratt, Eliyahu M.; 1 and 3 on Forbes top selling business books. http://www.forbes.com/2003/01/23/cz_qh_0123cisco.html
Now to get those deadbeats out of that young ladies pantyhose.
Vice President Cheney's office mobilized to DefCon 1 yesterday after New York Post gossip Cindy Adams claimed the veep had told subordinates: The way to lick this recession is to get all those deadbeats out of the soup kitchens. A Cheney press staffer spent the day fielding breathless calls from a swarm of print and broadcast journalists as she frantically attempted to reach Adams and New York Post Editor Coll Allan--repeating over and over that Cheney had never ever uttered such a thing. In due course Adams answered her phone and breezily explained to the Cheney aide that the quote--sandwiched between items on Phyllis Diller and Keifer Sutherland--was a joke. As in: Ha, ha. I don't see anything funny in this at all, said the staffer, who asked us not to name her. A New York Post editor said a clarification will be published today and the redoubtable Adams told us: Did you ever hear of anything so damned dumb in your entire life? It was a joke! Does Jay Leno go on the air and say, 'political joke coming!'?. . . Do people in Washington have no sense of humor at all? I've gotten quite a few annoying calls from the Cheney office today. All I can say is that young lady must have a poker up her pantyhose. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A55054-2003May29.html
All of the above.
Which French leader said of which American president that he doesnt even take the trouble to pretend that hes thinking? Charles de Gaulle, Lyndon Johnson Jacques Chirac, George W. Bush François Mitterand, Ronald Reagan François Mitterand, George H.W. Bush http://www.economist.com/ In many countries the stockmarket bubble has been replaced by a property-price bubble. Sooner or later it will burst, says Pam Woodall, our economics editor ...more
Anarchie Bunker.
A cynic might say that the only thing Republicans have to fear is the end of fear itself.E.J. Dionne, Washington Post, May 25, 2003 Finally! U.S. foreign policy explained so that humans can understand! Anarchie Bunker Questions and Answers about Foreign Policy (and the U.S. Invasion of Iraq) Q: Daddy, why did we have to attack Iraq? A: Because they had weapons of mass destruction. Q: But the inspectors didn't find any weapons of mass destruction. A: That's because the Iraqis were hiding them. Q: And that's why we invaded Iraq? A: Yep. Invasions always work better than inspections. Q: But after we invaded them, we STILL didn't find any weapons of mass destruction, did we? A: That's because the weapons are so well hidden. Don't worry, we'll find something, probably right before the 2004 election Q: What does a cruel dictator do that makes it OK to invade his country? A: Well, for one thing, he tortured his own people. Q: Kind of like what they do in China? A: Dont go comparing China to Iraq. China is a good economic competitor, where millions of people work for slave wages in sweatshops to make U.S. corporations richer. Q: So if a country lets its people be exploited for American corporate gain, its a good country, even if that country tortures people? A: Right [Click through to read on. Theres much, much more.Caro] Whopper of the Week: Donald Rumsfeld Don Rumsfeld, meet Dick Cheney. By Timothy Noah Posted Friday, May 23, 2003, at 12:51 PM PT I don't believe anyone that I know in the administration ever said that Iraq had nuclear weapons. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, at a hearing of the Senate's appropriations subcommittee on defense, May 14 We believe he has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons. Vice President Dick Cheney on NBC's Meet the Press, March 16 nbc New York Times For Partisan Gain, Republicans Decide Rules Were Meant to Be Broken By ADAM COHEN May 27, 2003 There was a lot not to like about the new Congressional district lines Republicans tried to push through in Texas this month, the ones that made Democratic legislators flee to Oklahoma to prevent a vote. Democratic Austin was sliced into four parts and parceled out to nearby Republican districts. A community on the Mexican border and one 300 miles away were painstakingly joined together and declared to be a single Congressional district. But the real problem was that Republicans were redrawing lines that had just been adopted in 2001, defying the rule that redistricting occurs only once a decade, after the census. The Texas power grab is part of a trend. Republicans, who now control all three branches of the federal government, are not just pushing through their political agenda. They are increasingly ignoring the rules of government to do it. While the Texas redistricting effort failed, Republicans succeeded in enacting an equally partisan redistricting plan in Colorado. And Republicans in the Senate notably those involved in the highly charged issue of judicial confirmations have been just as quick to throw out the rulebook. These partisan attacks on the rules of government may be more harmful, and more destabilizing, than bad policies, like the $320 billion tax cut. Modern states, the German sociologist Max Weber wrote, derive their legitimacy from rational authority, a system in which rules apply in equal and predictable ways, and even those who lead are reined in by limits on their power. When the rules of government are stripped away, people can begin to regard their government as illegitimate. The Texas redistricting effort was part of a national Republican effort to shore up the party's 229-to-205 House majority going into the 2004 elections. The House majority leader, Tom DeLay, who traveled to Austin to supervise the effort personally, was blunt about his motives: I'm the majority leader, and I want more seats. The Republicans' attack on the rules come at a time when they could easily afford to take a higher road. They have, by virtue of their control of the White House and Congress, extraordinary power to enact laws and shape the national agenda. And this administration is already getting far more of its judges confirmed, and more quickly, than the Clinton administration did Mr. DeLay recently revealed how he felt about rules of general applicability. When he tried smoking a cigar in a restaurant on federal property, the manager told him it violated federal law. His response, according to The Washington Post, was, I am the federal government. Higher horse? We dont need no stinking higher horse. Denver Post Article Published: Monday, May 26, 2003 - 12:00:00 AM MST Rancor becomes top D.C. export GOP leads charge in ideological war By John Aloysius Farrell, Denver Post Washington Bureau Chief WASHINGTON - When President Bush gave his first formal campaign speech as a candidate for re-election last week, he cited his efforts to curtail partisan rancor and change the tone in Washington. But the nasty redistricting
Will you take a cheque?
AUSTRALIA is to be billed several million dollars by the United States for bombs dropped on Iraq. A US B-52 bomber back from a mission in Iraq / AP (pic) Weeks after George W. Bush's public thank you to John Howard, the bills are due to arrive including the cost of US food eaten by some Diggers. Australia joined the President's coalition of the willing when the US was desperate for international support. The Australian Defence Force is now being asked to share the costs for its part in toppling Saddam Hussein under the user-pays principle of modern warfare. Australian jet fighters fired a number of US laser-guided bombs each worth a five-figure sum. The F/A-18 Hornets flew 350 combat missions, dropping 122 precision-guided weapons. ADF officials will not specify the types or quantity of bombs dropped. But defence analysts believe they include US-owned MK84s and GBU-series 220kg and 907kg weapons, worth $28,800 and $35,900 respectively. They said some Hornets appeared to be fitted with AIM-120 Slammer air-to-air missiles, which have a list price of $586,000. But Iraq's air force did not make it off the ground and the supersonic rockets were not fired. The ADF will also be required to pay an undisclosed amount believed to be up to $3 million for satellite time and band width to connect the Canberra war room with command in the Gulf, and enable it to talk directly with SAS troops on the ground. It was described as the first struggle in the war, to secure band width, said Derek Woolner, defence analysis director at the Australian Defence Studies Centre. They just needed it for command and control and they had to have it. It did allow headquarters in Australia to talk to special forces. They bought it commercially and someone was able to charge a premium. The ADF will also be invoiced by a private UK firm, which provided massive Ilyushin heavy-lift aircraft to move equipment to the Gulf. Analysts estimate the cost at up to $1 million a day. Defence was given an extra $645 million in this month's federal Budget to meet the cost of the war in Iraq. ADF first assistant secretary of finance George Veitch said the bills from allies represented only a small component of the overall cost. The Australian defence will not know the final cost of support provided to the ADF until all invoices are presented, Mr Veitch said. Most of the stuff we took over ourselves. In the overall scheme of $645 million, it's a drop in the ocean. The Budget top-upwill cover: COMBAT pay totalling $100 million the international campaign allowance of up to $200 a day on top of wages. SPECIALIST desert equipment plus bio-chemical protection and clothing to the tune of $150 million. UP TO $300 million on direct operational costs, including communication, fuel, munitions, ordnance and landing charges. $80 MILLION to bring troops home, repair and remove sand from equipment, replace stores, clear Customs and quarantine. On top of the $645 million, the ADF will find an estimated $155 million from within its own reserves to pay for wages and major assets used in the campaign a cost it says it would be paying whether or not there was a war. That breakdown, based on the ADF's 2003-04 budget statements, equates to: ABOUT $91 million for two frigates and the HMAS Kanimbla supply ship in the Gulf for three months. UP TO $30 million for SAS troops and logistics support. $34 MILLION for the 14 Hornet fighters and ground crew. Mr Veitch said the cost of the war was not as bad as expected. We expected we'd have troops over there for a longer period of time, he said. Partners in the coalition of the willing understood they would pay their way, Mr Veitch said. People pay for what they use . . . it's whoever is best placed to provide the logistics support. http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,6505693%255E1702,00.html
As Arthur Daly might say,'what a stroke!
Drug taskforce bill tops $2m EXCLUSIVE By GEOFF WILKINSON 28may03 THE cost of the taskforce investigating drug-related corruption in the Victoria Police has passed $2 million and the meter is still running. Police figures show the bill for the Ceja taskforce is likely to pass $5 million by the end of the year. But the officer overseeing the taskforce's work said yesterday it was money well spent. Assistant Commissioner for Ethical Standards Noel Perry said the cost of the taskforce was a sound investment to investigate improper and criminal behaviour. Documents obtained by the Herald Sun under FoI show that the Ceja taskforce's operating costs for the seven months to the end of February were $1.64 million. A further $317,000 had already been spent in the initial intelligence-gathering phase of the investigation, between January and July last year. A big increase in the number of investigators on the taskforce since February is expected to boost its costs to between $300,000 and $350,000 a month. The taskforce strength jumped to more than 50 this year when Chief Commissioner Christine Nixon agreed to add another 20 staff, including financial analysts. More than 80 allegations of criminal behaviour are believed to be being investigated by the Ceja taskforce. Most involve former members of the drug squad. Investigations are centred around drug squad operations between 1998-2001. Ceja investigations have delayed at least a dozen major drug prosecutions, which have been adjourned until taskforce inquiries are completed. The Office of Public Prosecutions is unwilling to proceed with those cases until police involved in them have been cleared of allegations that may be used against them in court. Several alleged drug importers and traffickers have been released on bail because of the long delays likely before their cases can be heard. A magistrate was told last Friday that the case against alleged billion-dollar drug boss Antonios Mokbel could now proceed because police involved had been cleared of wrongdoing. Mr Mokbel was freed on bail with a $1 million surety last September after spending almost a year in custody while the drug squad corruption probe delayed his prosecution. His assets, reportedly worth about $20 million, were frozen after his arrest on drug charges related to an alleged $2 billion drug ring. Documents obtained by the Herald Sun show that the Ceja taskforce had 36 members during the stage two investigation phase between July 29 last year and the end of February this year. A report obtained under FoI said stage two required significant investment in equipment and technology in support of all facets of the operation. Salaries, allowances and overtime costs during the seven-month period were $1,234,924. Plant and equipment costs were $245,024 and discretionary operating expenses totalled $165,984. The total bill at March 5 this year was $1,963,146. Assistant Commissioner Perry said the force was committed to the taskforce. This is a complex and thorough investigation involving specialist investigators and forensic accountants, Mr Perry said. Considerable resources have been assigned to this taskforce. The investigation, detection and prosecution of corrupt members is critical to the reputation of the force. It also maintains an operation standard within the force itself. The taskforce's work is being overseen by senior assistant ombudsman Brian Hardiman, who has been involved in police complaints investigation by the ombudsman's office since 1988. Mr Hardiman took over the management of serious misconduct allegations against police after State Ombudsman Dr Barry Perry suffered a severe stroke last month. Dr Perry is still seriously ill in the Alfred Hospital. The acting ombudsman in his absence is his former deputy, Bob Seamer. http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5478,6504659^661,00.html
Links.
Reconciliation between Indigenous and Non-indigenous people can only start when we recognise the hurt and pain that has been done by invasion and colonisation to Aboriginal people. A national apology is only the first step of a healing process which the Howard Government refuses to take. National Sorry Day celebrations in Melbourne kick off a series of Reconciliation Week and other indigenous events in Melbourne and around Australia, including the celebration of Mabo Day on June 3rd. The struggle for land rights, however, continues. [read about the Aboriginal Tent Embassy] [Discuss] [Journey of Healing] Historical Feature: Gary Foley's Koori History Website http://melbourne.indymedia.org/
Squatters unwaged workers news.
3CR and the SUWA show present A Benefit Film Night at The Trades Hall Friday June 6th 7-00pm Upstairs next to the Trades Hall Bar. Featuring Michael Moores TV Nation The acclaimed director of Bowling For Columbine takes on the KKK, Michigan Militia, Aryan Nations and various homophobes in the infamous Love Night episode of his 1996 U.S. TV show. Never before aired in Melbourne. Mark Thomas: The Product. Left wing British comedian Mark Thomas turns the tables on the British authorities by conducting his own weapons inspections of hallowed institutions such as Buckingham Palace as well as British and US war bases. Neither this program nor this episode have been shown before in Australia. Queeruption 2002 This British documentary follows the 5 days of Queer chaos that exploded during the 2002 London Queeruption festival. Australian debut. Food Not Bombs. A recent documentary that follows the Melbourne Food Not Bombs crew through a typical day of preparing and delivering free food to the homeless. Entry- $5(waged)/ Gold coin donation (unwaged) All proceeds to benefit 3CR and the SUWA show.
Return to sender.
150,000 terror kits returned to Govt, committee toldFederal Communications Minister Richard Alston says he will check on why it took so long to find out how many of the Federal Government's anti-terrorism kits* were returned. The Government sent a kit to every Australian household in February, but many felt they were a waste of money and returned them to sender. Australia Post has told a Senate committee today nearly 150,000 kits were sent back, before being destroyed in March on the orders of the Prime Minister's Department. Labor Senator Sue Mackay wanted to know why the first estimate of the numbers of kits returned was only provided last week. So let me just restate for the record, Australia Post very efficiently provided the answer in February, sent it through the department, the department then sends it through to the minister's office, where it sits for three and half months - this is on the return of the terrorism kits, she said. And the Friday before estimates, the minister's office gives the tick and the department very efficiently sends it to the estimates committee. *This was the recent 'most stupid security measure' award winner recently.
