"Spy Court Judge Quits In Protest:" : washingtonpost.com

~ This Spy-gate thing is going to be serious news for a while. When both Democrats & Republican Senate leaders are expressing civil liberties concerns, all citizens should be concerned. Nixon -- and those Presidents before him -- walked over civil liberties regularly. No one wants to go back to those times , with Presidential Enemy lists , covert wire taps, & etc. The Bush Team must feel the Power of Checks and Balances here.
Hopefully Congress is up to the job ~~ TP
-----------------------------

"Jurist Concerned Bush Order Tainted Work of Secret Panel"

By Carol D. Leonnig and Dafna Linzer
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, December 21, 2005; Page A01

"A federal judge has resigned from the court that oversees government surveillance in intelligence cases in protest of President Bush's secret authorization of a domestic spying program, according to two sources. U.S. District Judge James Robertson, one of 11 members of the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court,, sent a letter to Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. late Monday notifying him of his resignation without providing an explanation".

"Word of Robertson's resignation came as two Senate Republicans joined the call for congressional investigations into the National Security Agency's warrantless interception of telephone calls and e-mails to overseas locations by U.S. citizens suspected of links to terrorist groups. They questioned the legality of the operation and the extent to which the White House kept Congress informed."

"Sens. Chuck Hagel (Neb.) and Olympia J. Snowe (Maine) echoed concerns raised by Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who has promised hearings in the new year."

"Hagel and Snowe joined Democrats Dianne Feinstein (Calif.), Carl M. Levin (Mich.) and Ron Wyden (Ore.) in calling for a joint investigation by the Senate judiciary and intelligence panels into the classified program."

Wired News: Fatal Flaw Weakens RFID Passports

Wired News: Fatal Flaw Weakens RFID Passports: "RFID chips are passive, and broadcast information to any reader that queries the chip. So critics, myself included, were worried that the new passports would reveal your identity without your consent or even your knowledge. Thieves could collect the personal data of people as they walk down a street, criminals could scan passports looking for Westerners to kidnap or rob and terrorists could rig bombs to explode only when four Americans are nearby. The police could use the chips to conduct surveillance on an individual; stores could use the technology to identify customers without their knowledge."

Very Very interesting !

Internet satellite imagery under fire over security - Yahoo! News

Internet satellite imagery under fire over security - Yahoo! News: "South Korean government officials have said they will contact officials in Washington to express their security concerns about the Google Earth product.

Among the buildings that can be seen on Google Earth, with a high-resolution package, are the South Korean president's residence, military bases and the defense security command. The government restricts information about the location of these facilities and their construction."
TECHNOLOGY UNSTOPPABLE

Sri Lanka's military spokesman, Brigadier Daya Ratnayake, said it was a serious concern if anyone could get detailed images of sensitive installations and buildings. "But this is a new trend, we will first have to see whether, in this day and age, if this a considerable threat to national security."

"In this era of technology -- you have to live with the fact that almost everything is on the Internet -- from bomb-making instructions to assembling aircraft. So it's something the military has to learn to live with and adapt," Ratnayake said.

A security official in India said the issue of satellite imagery had been discussed at the highest level but the government had concluded that "technology cannot be stopped."

"U.S. Sells the Most Weapons to Others" : Congressional Research Service: http://www.crs.gov

~~ Oh what a surprise.

I never would have guesed this one.

I would have guessed Texas.

{ Well Texas used to be a country.}
~` tp
--------------

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/30/AR2005083001353.html
"U.S. Sells the Most Weapons to Others"

"Developing countries are the weapons' primary buyers. And the U.S. has been the most active seller for the past eight years, resulting mainly from agreements made in the aftermath of the first Gulf War.

The U.S. was responsible for more than 42 percent of the deliveries to developing nations in 2004.

Russia, which ranks second, sells mostly to China and India, as well as a number of smaller, poorer countries.

The CRS study, which is done each year, was written by national defense specialist Richard Grimmett.

___

On the Net:

Congressional Research Service: http://www.crs.gov
===================

Data Mining Found to Flunk Privacy Rules -

Data Mining Found to Flunk Privacy Rules - Yahoo! News: "WASHINGTON - None of five federal agencies using electronic data mining to track terrorists, catch criminals or prevent fraud complied with all rules for gathering citizen information."

" As a result, they cannot ensure that individual privacy rights are appropriately protected, congressional investigators said Monday."

FBI and State claimed they were exempt from the assessments required by the E-Government Act of 2002, the FBI because it was a national security system and State because its data dealt with federal employees, not the public.

=========

~~~ I find this above hard to believe.

I mean the Government--

-- our Government , of the People , by the People , for the People --

would NEVER make a mistake like this,

over and over and over again !!

This has to just another one of those vailed liberal media

attacks on the Bush administration

that my hero ,

Rush "I only do pharmaceutical drugs" Limbaugh,

keeps telling me about !! ~~

~ ` ` ~ tp
=

Handsets' Deadly Use: Detonators - Yahoo! News

~~ ` All technologies that can , will be utilized as weaponry. Not to sound cold here, but it is the unfortunate truth of human history ~ ~ ~TP

-------------------
----
-
Handsets' Deadly Use: Detonators - Yahoo! News:
""Handsets' Deadly Use: Detonators"
Mike Angell
Fri Aug 26,
7:00 PM ET :

"More and more terrorists are using cell phones to remotely detonate bombs -- and there's not much authorities can do about it. At least, not that they can say."

Terrorists Turn to the Web as Base of Operations

~~ Every body uses the web these days to make their lives simpler ; even Bin Laden & Co.
.
The question is: Am I prepared to give up some cyber-liberty to increase Government's need for cyber-counter-terrorism?

Is terrorism -- or the threat of -- the price we pay for living in a free society?

Or must we allow our governments to ask citizens to show a passport to go onto the internet. Am I as a law abiding citizen, prepared to surrender privacy for the privilege of using the internet?

Or as a citizen with a voice, am I not entitled to unfettered access to the Internet, without any government interference?

To tell you the truth, I really do not know how I feel here. When human lives are at stake, the balances between rights, privileges and principles are not simple.
~~ Technopol~ ~ ~

Terrorists Turn to the Web as Base

www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/05/AR2005080501138_pf.html

Al Qaeda's innovation on the Web "erodes the ability of our security services to hit them when they're most vulnerable, when they're moving," said Michael Scheuer, former chief of the CIA unit that tracked bin Laden. "It used to be they had to go to Sudan, they had to go to Yemen, they had to go to Afghanistan to train," he added. Now, even when such travel is necessary, an al Qaeda operative "no longer has to carry anything that's incriminating. He doesn't need his schematics, he doesn't need his blueprints, he doesn't need formulas." Everything is posted on the Web or "can be sent ahead by encrypted Internet, and it gets lost in the billions of messages that are out there."

Brits happy to ditch civil liberties | The Register

~~~ Not a good sign. ~` TP ~~~

Brits happy to ditch civil liberties

Original URL: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/08/22/civil_libs_ditch/

By Lucy Sherriff (lucy.sherriff at theregister.co.uk)

Published Monday 22nd August 2005 16:03 GMT

Three out of four Brits would happily hand over their civil liberties in exchange for better security against terrorist attacks, according figures from pollsters ICM.

It is interesting to note that this is the same general public that rails against any attempts to make them drive more slowly, or with more care. This is in spite of the fact that in 2004, 671 pedestrians were killed in traffic accidents, and a further 2,550 people died in other road accidents

ABC News: Most New York Voters Back Subway Searches

ABC News: Most New York Voters Back Subway Searches

"New Poll Shows That 72 Percent of N.Y. Voters Support Random Police Searches of Bags in Subways"

~~~ Majority opinion does not overcome the US Consitution. The searches are too random to be effective. And any profiling WILL NOT stand a Court test . The searches simply give the politicians a new mega-phone with which to speak staunchly on Terrorism. All while avoiding the substance of the core issue, that being : the War in Iraq is not going well. ~~~ technopolitical ~~

"Bush Denies U.S. Plans to Attack Iran " By TOM RAUM, Associated Press Writer

Do you believe him? ~~~TP

Bush Denies U.S. Plans to Attack Iran
By TOM RAUM, Associated Press Writer
BRUSSELS, Belgium - President Bush said Tuesday that it is "simply ridiculous" to assume that the United States has plans to attack Iran over its alleged nuclear weapons program after discussing the issue with European allies.
-------------------------------------------------

By WILLIAM SAFIRE ; Rights of Terror Suspects

July 5, 2004

OP-ED COLUMNIST

Rights of Terror Suspects

By WILLIAM SAFIRE

ARPERS FERRY, W.Va. — "Misadvised by a frustrated and panic-stricken attorney general, a president of the United States has just assumed what amounts to dictatorial power to jail or execute aliens."

So wrote a purpling libertarian kook on Nov. 15, 2001, the day after President Bush issued an executive order cracking down on suspected terrorist captives. "At a time when even liberals are debating the ethics of torture of suspects," this soft-on-terror wimp went on, "weighing the distaste for barbarism against the need to save innocent lives — it's time for conservative iconoclasts and card-carrying hard-liners to stand up for American values."

They did not, of course; hard-line commentators dismissed the wimp as a "professional hysteric" akin to "antebellum Southern belles suffering the vapors." Attorney General John Ashcroft said such diatribes "aid terrorists."

At the same time, most liberals — supposed advocates of the rights of the accused — did not want to appear to be insufficiently outraged at terrorists. Only two months after the shock of 9/11, with polls showing strong public approval of Bush's harsh measures to protect us, these liberals turned out to be civil liberty's summer soldiers. No senator from Massachusetts rose promptly to challenge Bush's draconian order, thereby to etch a profile in courage.

But one cabinet member reacted curiously. Despite the White House order to give enemy combatants no legal rights in what the vaporing wimp sniffled were "kangaroo courts," Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld convened a panel of serious outside lawyers aware of the wartime mistakes of Lincoln, Wilson and F.D.R. They reshaped the Bush order to give accused noncitizens before military tribunals the rights to counsel, public trial, appellate review and other protections in the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

Then Ashcroft Justice dug in its heels and the system stalled for years. Military tribunals of aliens captured in Afghanistan were placed in abeyance while Justice claimed in court that the president has the authority to impose open-ended detention on citizens and noncitizens alike. Such wholesale denial of due process is what the soft-on-terror professional hysteric had called "the seizure of dictatorial power."

Last week the Supreme Court that helped put Bush in office intervened to prevent his abuse of it. "The very core of liberty secured by our Anglo-Saxon system of separated powers," wrote Justice Antonin Scalia in agreement with the majority, "has been freedom from indefinite imprisonment at the will of the executive."

The right of a prisoner — even a noncitizen suspected of plotting to blow up a city — to take his case before some sort of judge has been reaffirmed. The panicked Ashcroft and the hapless White House counsel, Alberto Gonzales, clearly misadvised the president; both should depart in a second term. Separation of powers lives, and we should extend habeas corpus to all four corners of the earth.

Though coverage of the Supreme Court's rulings led with "a state of war is not a blank check for the president," its decisions were also deferential. Provided that an accused combatant has a chance to rebut, there should be "a presumption in favor of the government's evidence"; hearsay might be allowed. With military tribunals now tilted toward the prosecution, we should stop delaying and start prosecuting.

Liberals, in the aftermath of Abu Ghraib and now with Supreme Court restraints on executive power, are piling on. It's safe; civil liberty is suddenly in vogue, at least until the next terror strike. That's why the bosoms of Bush critics are now heaving in hypocritical hyperventilation. But where were they on Nov. 15, 2001, when due process needed them? In spider holes all their own.

There's a lesson, too, for conservatives and other hard-liners: Libertarians are not to be despised even when infuriatingly contrarian. Remember our Jeremiah-like presence in your ranks on the privacy issue when you demand a national ID, or when you hamstring embryonic stem-cell research, or when you make a show of festooning the Constitution with a marriage amendment.

Why do I fear no libel suit from that wimpish professional hysteric, that antebellum Southern belle suffering the vapors, that aider of terrorists? Because I'm him. (It's uncool to say I told you so, but I have not had many chances to say it lately.)

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

The War on the Web Sites to see on the road to Baghdad.

Article URL: http://slate.msn.com/id/2080407/
The War on the Web
Sites to see on the road to Baghdad.
By Avi Zenilman
Updated Wednesday, March 19, 2003, at 3:05 PM PT

The Iraq invasion will be the first major war on the Web. When the bombs start dropping, millions of Americans will crowd the Internet to catch up on the latest news, see pictures, and send e-mail to loved ones in danger. After you've checked out Slate—your first stop, right?—here's where you should you go for updates, speculation, on-the-ground blogging, official statements, and even war comedy.

Mainstream Media
The special Iraq Web sites for the Washington Post, the New York Times, MSNBC, and CNN are all good sources for late-breaking news, streaming video, maps, and nifty interactive backgrounders.

If you find the American Iraq pages overwhelming, then jump across the Atlantic to England's Guardian newspaper's Special Report: Iraq. The page's efficient organization and solid reporting make it easier to use than the American news sites. Don't miss the Guardian's "Weblog," which is less a blog than a portal to the day's best journalism. Track the effects of the war on the global economy and on oil markets at Bloomberg's energy markets page.

Background Information
What exactly is a BLU-118 Thermobaric bomb? How about a GBU-16 Paveway II? Globalsecurity.org has an excellent encyclopedia of the weapons and vehicles the United States will use in the war. Its Target Iraq page is jam-packed with links and specific military information. The site also publishes U.N. documents and resolutions.

Defensetech.org is a blog that provides a boatload of information on new military technologies and national security. While not organized in any systematic way, it always has something new and interesting.

The Council on Foreign Relations runs a superb Iraq Resource Center with everything from a timeline to journal articles.

The Official Story
(Almost) daily State Department briefings can be found here. The White House posts free video of all presidential speeches and announcements (as well as Ari Fleischer's press briefings). Britain's official briefings are also available.

Also online is the Iraq News Agency, a mouthpiece for Saddam's positions and propaganda.

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty's Iraq crisis section shows how the U.S. government is conveying the news to the people of the Middle East.

The United Nations' official Iraq page is hopelessly cluttered and often unresponsive (not unlike the organization itself), but if you can get it to work, it's a great clearinghouse.

Blogwar
Dear_raed is a must-read blog by a current Baghdad resident. Read his fascinating March 16 ramble about how he reluctantly supports the U.S. march to war and doubts the influence of fundamentalist Islamism in Iraq. It's not clear how the author manages to evade Saddamite censorship and scrutiny. We sent an e-mail asking how he does it. If he replies, we will tell you.

Www.kevinsites.net is a blog by Kevin Sites, a CNN correspondent stationed in northern Iraq. Sites' reporting is unvarnished, direct, and full of the nitty-gritty details of war reporting A March 17 post, "Whispers of War," is a window on the professional rivalries that persist, even a war zone.

The Middle-East Reaction
Arab News is an English-language, semiofficial Saudi media outlet. Although its reporting may not always be reliable, it suggests how this war is playing in Riyadh. Lebanon's Daily Star is more trustworthy but much less entertaining. For a quick digest of how the Middle-East media portrays the war, the World Press Review's Middle-East section is excellent.

Al Jazeera video is available at www.favo.tv, an English-language Web site that streams from various TV and radio stations worldwide. It is often unreliable, so if you understand Arabic, the official Al Jazeera site may be a better source for the broadcasts.

Ha'aretz's special Iraq section will be a valuable source of news if Saddam decides to attack Israel. For a more offbeat Israeli view of the war, check out the Iraq-centric ribbityfrog.blogspot.com.

If Chatterbox's Kurd Sellout Watch isn't enough, visit KurdMedia, a news site/portal for all things Kurdish.

Curiosities
We can't find any real-time satellite photographs on the Web that would help track the war, but Terraserver posts satellite images of nearly every world city, including Baghdad. It's hard to make out what exactly is going on in the pictures, but it's very cool nonetheless.

Should United States troops worry about sandstorms? Check out this Iraq weather map.

Who's going to lead Iraq after the war? What are the odds of capturing Osama Bin Laden by October? What will the terror alert level be in June 2003? At Tradesports you can now bet on international politics, with nothing at stake but fake money and bragging rights.

Humor
If you need a brief respite from the grim news, take a breather at Iraq Humor Central. Be sure not to miss the parody slide show. Also, check out the Saddam games section, where you can do everything from playing the role of a crazed U.N. weapons inspector to creating a goofy press conference.

Article URL: http://slate.msn.com/id/2080407

TERRORISTS SENT FOR WMD, CYBER TRAINING

TERRORISTS SENT FOR WMD, CYBER TRAINING
Middle East Newsline.

Sunday, January 06, 2002

http://www.menewsline.com/stories/2002/january/01_07_1.html

TEL AVIV [MENL] -- Islamic insurgency groups and their Middle East government sponsors are sending agents to the West for training in weapons of mass destruction as well as cyber warfare.