Chinese hack attacks

CNET News reported Security experts have revealed details about a group of Chinese hackers who are suspected of launching intelligence-gathering attacks against the U.S. government.

The internet is a very good thing, but it can be used for bad things too. This is why it is so important that control of the root servers remain under the control of the US, and not taken over by the UN.

The hackers, believed to be based in the Chinese province of Guangdong, are thought to have stolen U.S. military secrets, including aviation specifications and flight-planning software. The U.S. government has coined the term "Titan Rain" to describe the hackers.

The author Tom Clancy is very in tune with the military; he also wrote a series Net Force, set in 2010 and charts the actions of Net Force: a federal agency set up to combat increasing crime on the internet. I think it is time to set up Net Force now (if it has not already been done).

"From the Redstone Arsenal, home to the Army Aviation and Missile Command, the attackers grabbed specs for the aviation mission-planning system for Army helicopters, as well as Falconview 3.2, the flight-planning software used by the Army and Air Force," Alan Paller, the director of the SANS Institute, said on Tuesday. The team is thought to consist of 20 hackers. Paller said that the Chinese government is the most likely recipient of the information they intercepted. "Of course, it's the government. Governments will pay anything for control of other governments' computers. All governments will pay anything. It's so much better than tapping a phone," Paller said at an event at the British Department of Trade and Industry.

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The Ultimate Guide to Google Services

TipMonkies posted an extremely complete list of Google Services, including some I was not aware of:

• Google Analytics crawls your website and keeps track of your visitors through a small piece of Javascript. Great tool for webmasters trying to improve their stats and AdSense revenue.
• Google Base looks like its going to be Google’s massive content library, with all sorts of content, uploadable by anyone. Oddly enough, it sounds like EPIC and Google Grid mentioned in this video. Many people are comparing this service to Craigslist.
• Google Movie Showtimes lets you type in a zip code or address, and it will find movie theaters and showtimes near that area.
• Google Ridefinder lets you easily find taxis in some of the major cities around the United States.
• Google Scholar searches things such as theses, papers, and other research and technical information.
• Google Send to Phone is a little Firefox extension which lets you send text messages to mobile phones via SMS.
• Google Sitemap helps create particular searches for a web address which can be very useful for webmasters looking to index their own site, or see who is linking to it.
• Google Video and Google Video Upload offer an archive of freely available video clips.

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Still Searching for a Strategy

Adam Liptak wrote in an opinion piece which pretends to be "News Analysis" in NYT Four years after the terrorist attacks of 2001, the government has yet to settle on a consistent strategy for holding and punishing people it says are terrorists.

Actually they settled on a strategy right away. Bleeding heart liberals like the NYT have not liked that strategy (apparently the NYT has not seen the big hole in the ground where two big buildings used to be, prior to 9/11), so they have been pressing the government to be nicer to people who want to kill us.

Its efforts remain a work in progress, notable for false starts and a reluctance to have the executive branch's broadest claims tested in the courts. Last year, three Supreme Court decisions turned back the administration's boldest positions. Government lawyers do not seem eager to give the justices a vehicle for elaboration, at least not one that involves Jose Padilla, an American citizen captured on American soil.

Or perhaps they don't want to have to expose in open court the sources and methods by which they learn the terrorists plans.

Mr. Padilla's lawyers filed an appeal in the Supreme Court last month, asking a fundamental question: "Does the president have the power to seize American citizens in civilian settings on American soil and subject them to indefinite military detention without criminal charge or trial?" The administration says there is no need to answer that question just now. President Bush, in a directive signed on Sunday and made public yesterday, ordered the Defense Department, which had been holding Mr. Padilla as an "enemy combatant," to transfer him to the Justice Department "for the purpose of criminal proceedings against him." That move, the administration says, renders Mr. Padilla's appeal to the Supreme Court moot.

The Supreme Court has already accepted one case this month concerning the scope of the president's power to fight terror. That one involves whether he has the authority to try detainees held at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, for terrorist offenses before military commissions there.

New York still has a lot of tall buildings. Does the NYT want some of the detainees at Guantánamo Bay to fly some planes into them as well? Would the editors at the NYT be willing to be on those planes?

The administration had vigorously urged the court not to hear the case.

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US pushes Bosnia leaders into deal after 10 years of ethnic divide

Guardian reported Bosnia's rival leaders agreed yesterday to the biggest shift towards centralising power in their partitioned country since the war ended 10 years ago. A pact reached in Washington under heavy American pressure aimed to overhaul the creaking constitutional machinery that ended the 42-month war in November 1995, but left the country partitioned and dysfunctional.

Good news. The Bush Administration is fixing the problem that Clinton created in Bosnia.

At ceremonies in Washington to mark a decade since the Dayton accords ending the war were sealed, leaders of parties representing Bosnian Muslims, Serbs, and Croats, as well as leaders of non-ethnic parties, agreed "to streamline" parliament and the tripartite presidency and "embark on a process of constitutional reform" that will strengthen a national government. The ambitious US-authored scheme aims to turn Bosnia into a "normal" parliamentary democracy and reduce the role played by ethnic factors. The plan has been pushed by the US state department. Its progress is crucial to Bosnia's chances of entering the European mainstream. On Monday the EU launched Bosnia on the path of integration, but made plain that it needs to speed up reforms to become "a fully functioning and viable state" if ultimate accession to the EU is to succeed. Yesterday's agreement, if implemented, should also bring closer the end of the international mission in Bosnia.

How long did Clinton say those troops would have to be there? Wasn't it just one year? This shows how incompetent Democrats are at military matters.

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3 Brigades May Be Cut in Iraq Early in 2006

WaPo reports Barring any major surprises in Iraq, the Pentagon tentatively plans to reduce the number of U.S. forces there early next year by as many as three combat brigades, from 18 now, but to keep at least one brigade "on call" in Kuwait in case more troops are needed quickly, several senior military officers said.

The operative words there are Barring any major surprises the Pentagon tentatively plans to reduce the number of U.S. forces there early next year by as many as three combat brigades. We are not going to stay any longer than the Iraqi government wants us to stay, but we are not going to abandon them and let the insurgents win, and turn Iraq into a bed of terrorism.

Pentagon authorities also have set a series of "decision points" during 2006 to consider further force cuts that, under a "moderately optimistic" scenario, would drop the total number of troops from more than 150,000 now to fewer than 100,000, including 10 combat brigades, by the end of the year, the officers said.... The current number of U.S. forces in Iraq represents an increase of more than 15,000 troops over a base level this year of about 138,000, including 17 combat brigades. The equivalent of another brigade's worth of combat power was added this fall to bolster security for the Oct. 15 constitutional referendum and the coming Dec. 15 vote on a new national government. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld spoke over the weekend of plans to bring the force level back down to 138,000 after the elections, effectively removing the extra brigade equivalent added for the election period.

That makes sense. Cutting and running like the Dems want, does not make sense.

In addition, officers said, two combat brigades that had been slated to move into Iraq to replace units coming out are now expected to be held back. One of those units -- a brigade of the 1st Armored Division based in Germany -- will probably be positioned in Kuwait. The other unit -- a brigade of the 1st Infantry Division -- will probably remain at its home base of Fort Riley, Kan., the officers said. The plan to keep at least one brigade in Kuwait represents what one senior officer called a "hybrid option." It is intended to hedge against events in Iraq deteriorating once U.S. force levels begin to drop, the officer said, adding that the Pentagon probably will place troops on alert elsewhere as well.

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Texas sues Sony BMG for spyware violations

Yahoo! News reported Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott filed a civil lawsuit on Monday against Sony BMG Music Entertainment (6758.T) for hiding "spyware" software on its compact discs in a bid to thwart music copying. According to the lawsuit filed in Travis County, several of the company's music compact discs require customers to download Sony's media players if they want to listen to the CDs on a computer. Software included with that media player "remains hidden and active" after installation, the Attorney General's office said, and makes users vulnerable to security risks and possible identity theft.

Users should be able to use any Media Player they want.

Sony said on its Web site that it had recalled all CDs that were installed with its XCP technology designed to prevent illegal music copying, Abbott said, but Texas investigators were able to purchase several of the CDs at Austin retailers on Sunday. Texas is seeking civil penalties of $100,000 per violation of the state's Consumer Protection Against Computer Spyware Act, which was enacted earlier this year. "Sony has engaged in a technological version of cloak and dagger deceit against consumers by hiding secret files on their computers," Abbott said. Sony announced on Friday that customers could exchange CDs that contained XCP software for new copies without the spyware, and download software designed to fix the security vulnerabilities.

Since they are willing to let you exchange to get CDs that don't contain it, and let you download software to disable the XCP software, it appears they are admitting it is spyware.

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Iraq's a lost cause? Ask the real experts

Max Boot wrote in Los Angeles Times When it comes to the future of Iraq, there is a deep disconnect between those who have firsthand knowledge of the situation — Iraqis and U.S. soldiers serving in Iraq — and those whose impressions are shaped by doomsday press coverage and the imperatives of domestic politics.

And who are being influenced by the false reports printed by the Left Wing Main Stream Media (MSM).

A large majority of the American public is convinced that the liberation of Iraq was a mistake, while a smaller but growing number thinks that we are losing and that we need to pull out soon.

They are getting more strident in those claims, because they realize we are so close to victory, and they desperately want us to fail.

Those sentiments are echoed by finger-in-the-wind politicians, including many — such as John Kerry, Harry Reid, John Edwards, John Murtha and Bill Clinton — who supported the invasion. Yet in a survey last month from the U.S.-based International Republican Institute, 47% of Iraqis polled said their country was headed in the right direction, as opposed to 37% who said they thought that it was going in the wrong direction. And 56% thought things would be better in six months. Only 16% thought they would be worse.

American soldiers are also much more optimistic than American civilians. The Pew Research Center and the Council on Foreign Relations just released a survey of American elites that found that 64% of military officers are confident that we will succeed in establishing a stable democracy in Iraq. The comparable figures for journalists and academics are 33% and 27%, respectively. Even more impressive than the Pew poll is the evidence of how our service members are voting with their feet. Although both the Army and the Marine Corps are having trouble attracting fresh recruits — no surprise, given the state of public opinion regarding Iraq — reenlistment rates continue to exceed expectations. Veterans are expressing their confidence in the war effort by signing up to continue fighting.

So the people being shot at are reenlisting because they know they are doing good, and they want to be there for the victory.

Now, it could be that the Iraqi public and the U.S. armed forces are delusional. Maybe things really are on an irreversible downward slope.

And maybe Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny are real. Maybe. But not likely.

But before reaching such an apocalyptic conclusion, stop to consider why so many with firsthand experience have more hope than those without any. For starters, one can point to two successful elections this year, on Jan. 30 and Oct. 15, in which the majority of Iraqis braved insurgent threats to vote.

And the election December 15 will be another major milestone.

The constitutional referendum in October was particularly significant because it marked the first wholesale engagement of Sunnis in the political process. Since then, Sunni political parties have made clear their determination to also participate in the Dec. 15 parliamentary election. This is big news. The most disaffected group in Iraq is starting to realize that it must achieve its objectives through ballots, not bullets.

There are also positive economic indicators that receive little or no coverage in the Western media. For all the insurgents' attempts to sabotage the Iraqi economy, the Brookings Institution reports that per capita income has doubled since 2003 and is now 30% higher than it was before the war. Thanks primarily to the increase in oil prices, the Iraqi economy is projected to grow at a whopping 16.8% next year. According to Brookings' Iraq index, there are five times more cars on the streets than in Saddam Hussein's day, five times more telephone subscribers and 32 times more Internet users.

The growth of the independent media — a prerequisite of liberal democracy — is even more inspiring. Before 2003 there was not a single independent media outlet in Iraq. Today, Brookings reports, there are 44 commercial TV stations, 72 radio stations and more than 100 newspapers.

But aren't bombs still going off at an alarming rate? Of course. It's almost impossible to stop a few thousand fanatics who are willing to commit suicide to slaughter others.

Yet there is hope on the security front. Since the Jan. 30 election, not a single Iraqi unit has crumbled in battle, according to Army Lt. Gen. David H. Petraeus, who until September was in charge of their training. Iraqi soldiers are showing impressive determination in fighting the terrorists, notwithstanding the terrible casualties they have taken. Their increasing success is evident on "Route Irish," from Baghdad International Airport. Once the most dangerous road in Iraq, it is now one of the safest. The last coalition fatality there that was a result of enemy action occurred in March.

This is not meant to suggest that everything is wonderful in Iraq. The situation remains grim in many respects. But the most disheartening indicator of all is simply the American public's loss of confidence in the war effort. Abu Musab Zarqawi may be losing on the Arab street (his own family has disowned him), but he's winning on Main Street.

That is because the Democrats have decided that since they have no new ideas, the only way they can hope to be reelected is if they can convince the American People that the Iraq War will fail, and that it is all the Republican's fault, and the MSM sees it as their job to help the Dems sell that lie.

And, as the Vietnam War showed, defeatism on the home front can become self-fulfilling.

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Louisiana Sees Faded Urgency in Relief Effort

NYT reported Less than three months after Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans, relief legislation remains dormant in Washington and despair is growing among officials here who fear that Congress and the Bush administration are losing interest in their plight. As evidence, the state and local officials cite an array of stalled bills and policy changes they say are crucial to rebuilding the city and persuading some of its hundreds of thousands of evacuated residents to return, including measures to finance long-term hurricane protection, revive small businesses and compensate the uninsured.

I am not surprised. The extreme incompetence of the local and state governments, the obscene greed shown by the demand for an additional $200 Billion in money for many things besides fixing things damaged by the flood, and the insistence on building up the levees to protect land 7 to 15 feet below sea level even with a Cat 5 storm, when the rainfall from such a storm would fill up the "bowl" and flood it out anyway makes the US wonder why the other 49 states should pay for Louisiana's stupidity. Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida were hit by hurricanes as well, and their state and local governments worked much better with FEMA, and they did not make obscene requests for huge amounts of money, or ask for protection of land 7 to 15 feet below sea level.

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Iraqi Factions Seek Timetable for U.S. Pullout

NYT reported For the first time, Iraq's political factions on Monday collectively called for a timetable for withdrawal of foreign forces, in a moment of consensus that comes as the Bush administration battles pressure at home to commit itself to a pullout schedule. The announcement, made at the conclusion of a reconciliation conference here backed by the Arab League, was a public reaching out by Shiites, who now dominate Iraq's government, to Sunni Arabs on the eve of parliamentary elections that have been put on shaky ground by weeks of sectarian violence.

If the elected Iraqi government requests such a timetable, or even if it just asks us to leave, we certainly should do so. I am not certain how much weight should be given to a "consensus" that attendees to a meeting of the Arab League, with many countries that want Iraq's Democratic Government to fail.

About 100 Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish leaders, many of whom will run in the election on Dec. 15, signed a closing memorandum on Monday that "demands a withdrawal of foreign troops on a specified timetable, dependent on an immediate national program for rebuilding the security forces," the statement said. "The Iraqi people are looking forward to the day when foreign forces will leave Iraq, when its armed and security forces will be rebuilt and when they can enjoy peace and stability and an end to terrorism," it continued.

I assure the Iraqi people that the American forces would love to be back home with their families. But they are dedicated to helping the Iraqi people form a Democratic Government responsive to the needs of all of the Iraqi people.

Astute Blogger blogged I believe that the Sunnis who are attacking Shias in Iraq will either be unmoved by this appeasement, or encouraged to be more brutal in order to win more concessions.

Mahablog blogged I guess they really can work together and agree on something. The television pundits still talk about staying in Iraq another two or three years, but I think we’ll be out in a matter of months (see “Speaking With One Voice,” below). The only question is, will it be an orderly and honorable withdrawal or something more ignominious? The Bushies and their rightie supporters will be the last people on the planet to realize that a withdrawal will happen, but once they catch on they’ll find some way to argue that withdrawal was the plan all along.

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Pajamas Returns

Charles Johnson & Roger L. Simon at OSM blogged Once upon a time, some friends who met in the casual atmosphere of the blogosphere (us) got together and decided it would be groovy to start a blog company. "We could call it Pajamas Media," we said, referring to the now-famous quote by whatshisface, who disparaged bloggers as a bunch of guys sitting around in their sleepwear. Well, we were as surprised as anyone when we managed to raise a significant amount of capital to form said company.

At our swanky launch party in the Rainbow Room at New York’s Rockefeller Center on November 16, we changed out of our "pajamas" both literally and figuratively. We went from being www.pajamasmedia.com to OSM™ Media, LLC, the OSM being short for Open Source Media. And oh, what a drubbing we took. Many, many readers pointed out to us that OSM™ was an oxymoron; the open source tech community expressed concern; and a very fine gentleman named Christopher Lydon at Open Source (www.radioopensource.org) politely pointed out that we might be trampling on his space. (We’re sending him a pair of warm, fuzzy slippers, a heartfelt apology, and his name back, as we speak.)

All of which, as it turns out, has led us to make a change for the better. We are re-assuming our identity as Pajamas Media. (Just give us a few days to sort the technical issues out.) In short, the whole experience of being caught with our pajamas down has been a bit embarrassing, but in the end, when we realized we could get our beloved name back, we were overjoyed. So a warm, hearty thanks to all of you who expressed your displeasure with our phony identity.

Whoopee!!! I joined Pajamas Media, and liked the name, and was disappointed by the change in names, but I still like the concept. But I am even happier now that they have gone back to the original name.

So how did this happen in the first place? Back at the beginning, certain, shall we say, paternalistically minded parties (i.e., the guys in suits) decided that we should act like grownups, and being as yet somewhat immature—at least as businesspeople--we did as we were told.

Which is how, one day, we ended up sitting around a conference table listening to representatives from a "branding" company. What followed is still a bit of a nightmarish blur, but it involved a PowerPoint presentation on the history of names, and such probing questions as, "If you were an animal, what animal would you be?" (Which is how we almost ended up as Jellyfish Media.)

Enough said. So, in the spirit of "open source," we thought we’d tell you the real story behind the reason for our name change. And hope that our corporate parents will be satisfied with good grades and healthy revenue.

LaShawn Barber blogged OSM has reverted to its original name, Pajamas Media. Trademark issues aside, the name Pajamas Media has more character. I was disappointed when I heard the name would change and even more disappointed when I heard it was Open Source Media. But that’s the past. Onward to the future, baby! We are the pajamahadeen and ought to say so. The name not only mocks Jonathan Klein, but it invokes a rebellious and defiant spirit. A new medium has emerged and will continue to challenge traditional media to at least do accurate, if not objective, reporting. (I’ve come to the conclusion that not many human beings can be objective.) Unfortunately, we can’t expect anything more of leftist journalists, can we?

Eric Deamer blogged I agree with commenter Benjamin at Jeff Jarvis's that the marketing people were right and Pajamas Media is a bad name. (My problem with it being that it relates to an extremely inside baseball joke that can only be appreciated by blog geeks). The problem wasn't changing the name, but changing it to Open Source Media, which goes too far in the other direction, sounding too dull and corporate. And it was already in use to begin with. I'm not saying I can come up with a better name. Names are hard. Even if I could think of one I wouldn't post it for fear of somebody using it.

Decision08 blogged I think it’s a good move…and I also think Pajamas should take advantage of this second chance and re-launch, as it were, with more content…HuffPo may be a joke, but they launched with an incredible amount of material. I may have been one of the few who liked Open Source Media, but hey, Pajamas it is (and it fits my lifestyle much better)…

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CNN Xs VP

Drudge Report reported At 11:04:45 AM ET Monday CNN was airing Vice President Dick Cheney's speech live from the American Enterprise Institute in Washington -- when a large black 'X' repeatedly flashed over the vice president's face! The 'X' over Cheney's face appeared each time less than a second, creating an odd subliminal effect.

One top White House source expressed concern about what was aired over CNN. "Is someone in Atlanta trying to tell us something?" A CNN spokesman did not return repeated calls late Monday night.

I am not surprised that the Clinton News Network would do this; it is another example of how the MSM, including CNN, is in the pocket of the Democratic Party

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Barricaded in Paris

National Post reported French Jews are leaving the country in ever-growing numbers, fleeing a wave of anti-Semitism. They are moving to Israel, the United States, and increasingly, Montreal -- where the mostly English-speaking Jewish community is preparing for its greatest demographic change in decades. In the first of three stories, Mireille Silcoff examines the fear in France that is driving the emigration.

I am not surprised. Even before the Muslim youths started burning cars, the French have been very anti-Semetic, and also very anti-religious. Christians were not allowed to wear large crosses, Jewish skullcaps were forbidden, as were several items of Muslim dress.

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Angry AOL bloggers now push boycotts

BusinessWeek Bloggspotting blogged The anger over banner ads on AOL Journals is reaching a fever pitch. Bloggers are organizing boycotts of advertisers, presumably including Bank of America, whose ad appears on the Journals I've seen today

Here is an example of one of their posts: To ALL Interested Parties!

This is the letter being sent to all the advertisers, all the Execs, Every single Possible person who will listen!

CAN YOU TELL THAT WE MEAN BUSINESS?????

To whom it may concern,

A significant number of AOL paying-customers were recently ambushed by America On Line with advertising from your organization on OUR paid journal/blog sites.

Paid journal/blog sites? Does AoL charge you extra for a journal/blog site, or is it something they have added as an additional freebie to their customers? The monthly fee you are paying is for internet connectivity. I will agree you are paying a lot more than you should ($23.90 a month); that is why Netscape (owned by AoL) can afford to provide their web accellerator for free for $9.95 a month, when they are competing against independent NetZero, since AoL customers are paying so much excess for their internet access they are a cash cow that subsidizes Netscape's much lower rate.

AOL chose to break our trust by invading our paid-for sites and there is a significant gathering of journalers, soon to be joined by nationally syndicated reporting, who are aggressively fighting this invasion of our AOL JOURNAL sites.

As one of the agencies whose advertisements appear on these Journals, we are calling for a boycott of your organizations and affiliates until the unwanted advertising on our AOL JOURNALS is permanently removed.

Other blogging sites PAY the host for the advertising.

AoL is the host for your blog, and I suspect that Bank of America, Free Credit Report, Classmates.com, Elidel, and Kodak/Nascar, as well as any other advertiser whose ads are appearing in your blog, are paying AoL for running those ads. There are a number of blog providers that charge you a monthly fee to host your blog, and then you are free to either accept advertising, for which you will be paid, or to not accept advertising, in which case your blogs will have no ads. But when you get your blog for free, the company providing it may well decide to show ads on it. The same is true for free websites.

AOL doesn't even give us the courtesy of warning us that advertising will appear on our blogs, nor do they offer any semblance of an option regarding these highly intrusive ads.

We are calling on each and every one of your organizations to protect your integrity, despite the lack of AOL's own integrity, and immediately remove your advertising from AOL JOURNALS.

Sincerely,
Armand T
Tacoma, WA

AoL Users are usually regarded as clueless, and there is nothing about this that would change that notion. They should realize that TANSTAAFL still applies: There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch

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Muslim fanatics terrorise a nation

The Australian reported Islamist murders and threats have transformed the once-tolerant Netherlands into a place of armed bodyguards and fear, writes Anthony Browne. A film about gay rights should hardly raise an eyebrow in The Netherlands, which for centuries has prided itself as a beacon of freedom of expression and was the first country to legalise gay marriage. But when Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Somali refugee turned Dutch MP, started making a new film about the oppression of homosexuals under Islam, the threat to everyone taking part was deemed so great that she decided there would be no faces shown on screen and no end credits and that the entire production team would remain anonymous. Ali, a "lapsed Muslim" who revealed this week that she had finished the script, lives in a safe house under 24-hour protection. The precaution is as wise as the courage is extraordinary: Theo van Gogh, the director of Ali's previous film, about domestic violence under Islam, was killed -- repeatedly shot and almost decapitated in broad daylight in the streets of Amsterdam by an Islamic extremist. Impaled on a knife in van Gogh's chest was a five-page note declaring holy war on The Netherlands and threatening death to other public figures deemed "enemies of Islam".

If a person chooses to move to Israel, he should expect that the country will be very Jewish, and that he might or might not feel free to practice his religion if he is not a Jew. (Actually in Israel Christians and Muslims are free to practice their faith, but they might be somewhat uncomfortable when the country celebrates Jewish holidays). If a person chooses to move to an Arab country, he should expect that the country will be very Muslim, and he may find either severe restrictions or even (depending on the country) outright inability to practice his own religion. This is something he should consider before deciding to move there.

A muslim moving to The Netherlands should be aware of the liberal nature of that country, and if he finds that sexual liberation uncomfortable, he should move to a country more attuned to his sensibilities. He should not kill, or threaten to kill, someone that says something, or even makes a movie about something, that offends him.

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New climate deal

Guardian reported Britain is to open the door for other nations to abandon setting compulsory targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions: the principle at the heart of the Kyoto agreement to tackle climate change. Margaret Beckett, the Environment Secretary, has told The Observer she is prepared to accept voluntary targets - a move hinted at this autumn by Tony Blair.

Voluntary targets will not do any good. You need mandatory targets, but you cannot exclude China and India. They must sign on and it must be verifyable before any of the western nations join in.

The news caused consternation among green campaigners last night. 'Voluntary targets are not worth the paper they are written on,' said Stephen Tindale, head of Greenpeace UK. 'Without mandatory targets [the Kyoto Protocol] is effectively dead.'

It is dead anyway. No western nation is going to destroy their economy when China and India are not included, because they will add more emissions than everyone else put together cuts back.

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Journalism Versus Reality in Iraq

Strategy Page blogged American troops are developing a hate-hate relation with journalists.

Just as conservative bloggers do.

The basic problem is that soldiers and marines in Iraq have access, usually via the Internet, to what the mass media is saying about what they think is happening in Iraq. These news reports, all too often, do not reflect what the troops experience. It gets uglier when the troops realize that reporters are spending most of their time in the Green Zone or some well guarded hotel, leaving it to local Iraqi stringers to collect information and photos for the reporters stories. Relations are a bit better with the few embedded journalists who still travel with the troops out in field. But even the embeds are often mistrusted and disliked, because some of them are blatantly out for dirt, not an accurate story.

That is because that is all the MSM wants to print. They are in the pocket of the Dems, and the Dems don't want any good news from Iraq. They can't hurt the Bush administration with Good News from Iraq.

Few of the troops understand that the news business is driven by dramatic events, not the tedious kind of process the troops go through every day to defeat the terrorists. To the troops, the war is being won. They see bad guys killed in large numbers, and few Americans getting hurt (it’s fairly common for their to be about twenty enemy dead for each American loss). The troops see tangible evidence, every day, of Iraqis having a better life. The troops cannot understand why that is not news, and why journalists always seem to be looking for a negative angle. To the average G.I., the attitude is, “what are these reporters looking for?” They are looking for a story, and bad news is a story. Good news is not.

It should be. If the Democrats held the White House the MSM would be printing every Good News item it could find.

As a result of this clash of cultures, reporters are increasingly seen as a potentially dangerous enemy. For the troops, this is already accepted as true for many Arab journalists. Some of those have been arrested for hostile activity, or later revealed as al Qaeda agents. European journalists are seen as particularly clueless, so wrapped up in their anti-American fantasies, that communication is nearly impossible. But after watching a CNN clip on the net, or viewing an online story from the New York Times or Washington Post, it’s hard to view U.S. journalists as fellow Americans.

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Al-Zarqawi's Jordan Family Renounces Him

Yahoo! News reported Family members of Jordanian-born Abu Musab al-Zarqawi renounced the terrorist leader Sunday after his al-Qaida in
Iraq group claimed responsibility for the Nov. 9 suicide attacks on three Amman hotels that killed 59 people.

He has killed many more than 59 Muslims in Iraq, and they said nothing, but killing Muslims in Jordan must somehow be worse than killing Muslims in Iraq.

The family of al-Zarqawi, whose real name is Ahmed Fadheel Nazzal al-Khalayleh, reiterated their strong allegiance to Jordan's King Abdullah II in half-page advertisements in the kingdom's three main newspapers. Al-Zarqawi threatened to kill the king in an audiotape released Friday. "A Jordanian doesn't stab himself with his own spear," said the statement by 57 members of the al-Khalayleh family, including al-Zarqawi's brother and cousin. "We sever links with him until doomsday." The statement is a serious blow to al-Zarqawi, who no longer will enjoy the protection of his tribe and whose family members may seek to kill him.

Al Zarqawi, would you like to take a vacation, and go home to visit your family. <grin>

"As we pledge to maintain homage to your throne and to our precious Jordan ... we denounce in the clearest terms all the terrorist actions claimed by the so-called Ahmed Fadheel Nazzal al-Khalayleh, who calls himself Abu Musab al-Zarqawi," the family members said. "We announce, and all the people are our witnesses, that we — the sons of the al-Khalayleh tribe — are innocent of him and all that emanates from him, whether action, assertion or decision." The statement said anyone who carried out such violence in the kingdom does not enjoy its protection. The al-Khalayleh tribe is a branch of the Bani Hassan, one of the area's largest and most prominent Bedouin tribes, which help form the bedrock of support for the royal family's Hashemite dynasty.

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With all due respect Sir, I completely disagree

Major K blogged Congressman and Col John Murtha, USMCR - Ret. is by all accounts a bona fide American Hero. He has bled for this nation in a foreign land and shown great courage. He has now called for the establishent of a rapid timetable for the withdrawal of US Troops from Iraq, stating that we “have done all we can do.” Colonel, I could not disagree more. Unlike the mudslingers in Washington D.C. and the Media, I don’t believe that Col. Murtha has anything but the best of intentions and the welfare of the troops at heart, so I will not slight the man’s character in the least.

Your point is well taken. When I first heard what Congressman Murtha said I said that he had sold out to Al Qaeda, but I retract that. I believe that he has just been unduly influenced by the extreme left in his party to make a foolish statement.

I do, however, believe he is making a critical error. The case has been made many times, and well, by others that establishing a timetable for withdrawal merely tells our enemies how long they need to go underground to conspire and train their thugs before unleashing them on the people full-scale. I will not bother with repeating that argument.

It is an extremely important point however. Not only should no timeline be established, but we need to be vague about the conditions that must exist before we withdraw, so that the insurgents will believe that we will be there forever.

I wish to explore a few other points instead.

We are far from having done all we can do. Part of the US Military Culture that makes us so effective is our qualitative approach. This is especially the case in combat units. In my 13 years in the service, I have heard: “We work to a standard, not to a schedule” a countless number of times. Quitting time comes when the task is accomplished to standard, which is almost never 5pm. We have our objectives to meet:

• Kill or capture terrorists
• Restore Infrastructure and Services
• Establish and protect a functional Iraqi version of Democracy
• Establish better respect for individual human rights
• Train the Iraqi Security Forces to do/facilitate the same

All of these objectives are intertwined. And from my view, we are not done yet by a long shot. The killing and capturing of terrorists has slowed down the progress of all the other objectives. Americans seem to have a “microwave popcorn mentality” about these things. I know that most Americans will forego the 10-minute popcorn on the stove for the 2-minute popcorn in the microwave oven. This is one of the many nice things about living in an industrialized nation. The problem is that war is not popcorn and countries are not appliances. Instant gratification is not on the menu.

This country has a culture with different sensibilities from our own. Like many others in the world, this has never been a full-scale first world nation. When it was growing, starting to move toward that end and prospering, it was taken over by what can only be called a mafia family and driven into the ground by 3 horribly destructive wars leaving its people in fear, it’s infrastructure destroyed, and the landscape crawling with thugs and criminals formerly employed by the government or recently released from prison. The land mass is about the size of California and population is greater than that of Texas. What has happened to this country makes hurricane Katrina look like spit on the sidewalk. THERE IS A HUGE MESS TO CLEAN UP AND A CULTURE TO REHABILITATE, not to mention an army to rebuild. Three years, with fighting continuing, is a blink. It took over a dozen years to get from the declaration of the Declaration of Independence to the ratification of the US Constitution, and there were still several rebellions and a horribly bloody civil war to follow. The Iraqis are way ahead of the power curve on a historical basis.

We left this this job half done before, and the vipers’ nest remained. Thousands of Shia in the south were murdered because they thought we would help them in their uprising.

Thanks to George HW Bush (41). But the errors of the father are being fixed by the son.

Our aircraft enforcing the UN mandated no-fly zones were fired upon daily - read: Acts of War. And this remained a preferred retirement home/vacation spot/training academy/financial endowment for terrorists. It was not the only one, but it was a prominent one. Now the terrorists have been put out of the government and into the shadows, where for three years they have been hunted. We have culled the herd, but the population is still large enough to warrant keeping the guard dogs busy. If we leave or give notice, we will, like in Somalia, leave the power to be restored to the vermin. Saddam will have been replaced, but it will be the same vermin surrounding the new boss. If you ask me, I really don’t care if my cement shoes are made by Gambino or Gotti. Iraq was not a peaceful place before we came here, it will be worse if we leave before we have met the standard. It’s going to take a few more years. If I have to do another tour, so be it. I won’t like it, but I’ll do it because it needs to be done.

More and more Islamoterrorists are coming in to Iraq to kill innocent Iraqi citizens, and we are confronting them there. Would you not prefer that we confront them in Iraq rather than here at home, and if innocent citizens are going to be killed, would you prefer that they be American citizens or Iraqi citizens. Our military is confronting the Islamoterrists in Baghdad and Basrah rahter than Broken Arrow, Boston, or Beumont; in Mosul rather than Muskogee, Memphis, or Mesquite; in Karkuk and Karbala rather than Ketchum, Kansas City, or Kilgore; in Tall Afar and Tikrit rather than Tahlequah, Texas City, or Texarkana.

I have to give Congressman Murtha credit in yet another regard. Of all of the carping, nitpicking and fault-finding I have heard from those complaining about how badly this is going, he is one of the few with the guts to offer another idea. Many have said, “well we never should have gone there.” Nice sentiment from a Monday-morning quarterback, but no longer relevant. The question is, what now? Unless you are going to step up and suffer the backlash of those who call for a pull out, shut up if you don’t have a better idea. Again, I think a pullout or notifying our enemies, who may yet be pursued elsewhere, of our pullout date is a horrible idea. But empty nit-picking is worse. Our military has always been strong, but our national will seems constantly in doubt.

We have a standard to meet, and if allowed to do so by our people and our leaders, we will.

Hat Tip to Deb at EIMC

This was a fabulous post

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Mr. Woodward's Sources

WaPo editorialized We've said from the start of the investigation into the leak of Valerie Plame's identity that if administration officials deliberately set out to unmask a secret agent, they should be punished.

That never was the case. Some low level CIA employees decided to attempt a coup, and affect the outcome of an election, and blame the VP's office at the same time, and the VP's office was just making it clear that they did not send Wilson to investigate something he had no expertise in.

But we've also said that, absent evidence of such behavior, criminalizing communication by officials to journalists would run counter to the public interest. Special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald's investigation is continuing -- he said yesterday he's going back to a grand jury -- and new facts may come to light. But the principle remains valid: It's not in the public interest for reporters to be forced to reveal their confidential sources in cases such as this. That's why Post reporter Bob Woodward should not be vilified for protecting the identity of his source in this complex affair.

Actually there are WAY too many "confidential sources" and I wish every reporter printing something just attributed to "confidential sources" should be required to reveal those sources. But this should not be selectively done.

Here we remind readers that the editorial page operates separately from those who gather and publish news in The Post. Mr. Woodward doesn't answer to us, and he has no input on our page. Like other interested observers, we have noted that Executive Editor Leonard Downie, to whom Mr. Woodward does report, has faulted his investigative reporter for failing to tell him sooner what was going on and for expressing personal opinions on television about the Fitzgerald investigation, and Mr. Woodward has apologized. Both rebukes strike us as reasonable -- as does Mr. Downie's characterization of Mr. Woodward as "one of the most careful, accurate and fair journalists I have ever worked with." But the Woodward flap has significance beyond The Post's newsroom. The longtime Post reporter disclosed this week that, while conducting research for a book, he received information from an administration official about Ms. Plame before her identity was revealed by Robert D. Novak in a July 2003 column. That information was potentially relevant to Fitzgerald's investigation and to a news story that has been extensively covered in this and other papers. Mr. Woodward said he told one Post reporter at the time what he had learned but did not disclose the source. Mr. Woodward recently testified to the prosecutor, with the source's permission and after the source had spoken with Mr. Fitzgerald, but still (again according to his agreement) has not publicly identified the source.

Much of the public finds the media's extensive use of confidential sources objectionable, and understandably so.

Then why do you continue to do it.

Their use should be as limited as possible. When they are relied upon, reporters should impart as much information as possible about the sources' motives. Those guidelines are accepted but too often ignored by the press.

But over the years innumerable cases of official corruption and malfeasance have come to light thanks to sources being able to count on confidentiality.

And the left wing MSM has been able to make use of unnamed, "confidential" sources (that may or may not be real) to hurt the administration.

It's astonishing to see so many people -- especially in the journalism establishment -- forget that now. Many of those who condemn Mr. Woodward applauded when The Post recently revealed the existence of CIA prisons around the world, a story that relied on unnamed sources.

I believe the reporter that wrote that story should be brought befor a grand jury and compelled to reveal the source, and if the source is not revealed, the reported should be sent to jail.

Is there a distinction to be made based on the motives of the leakers? If so, Mr. Woodward might have had to pass up his first big scoops three decades ago, because his Watergate source, Deep Throat -- recently revealed as FBI official W. Mark Felt -- was disgruntled at having been passed over for the post of FBI director. Newspapers face difficult questions all the time in evaluating the reliability of sources and the appropriateness of publishing their secrets. But if potential sources come to believe that they cannot count on promises of confidentiality, more than the media will suffer.

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Watcher of Weasels

Watcher of Weasels hilighted a piece by The Anchoress called Attention GOP Leadership. I agree with them. I missed it when it was first posted (I was still getting caught up from my time in the hospital), but I urge everyone to read it now. Here are some highlights If your plan was to make people so disgusted with your cowardice

Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) asking Bill Frist to hold off on a probe of the disclosure of classified information on secret prisons to The Washington Post

, your disorganization

A leak suspected to have come from the office of Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) complicated, confused and nearly derailed a joint effort by Senate and House Republican leaders to seek an investigation of the unauthorized release of classified information related to how The Washington Post discovered of the existence of CIA-run detention and interrogation facilities in eight foreign countries.

and your political tone-deafness

House Drops Arctic Drilling From Bill

that they either stop contributing to the RNC, or they decide to just sit out the next election (because what’s the point), or they decide to vote out every stinking one of you in the next elections, because you freaking well deserve ouster for literally doing nothing constructive and squandering your majority…well…you have succeeded spectacularly! Beyond your wildest imaginings, I am sure. I can’t think of a single reason to vote to re-elect a any one of you.

The only possible reason would be that a Democrat might be elected instead. What should be done is that reliable conservatives need to challenge the RINOs and the weak-backbone Republicans in the primaries.

The world is tilting, and you useless, ineffectual, dithering moneysuckers seem increasingly to be empty suits, given shape and movement not by ideas and a willingness to serve the electorate, but by wispy tufts of ambitious smoke. You seem directed toward nothing more than keeping your almighty Senate or House seat in your name. You give away your power, you give away your advantages in committee, you leave in place utterly feckless people like Arlen Specter and then, when you finally seem like you are on the cusp of doing something productive and right, like investigating the CIA or okaying drilling in a bare, muddly, uninhabitable tundra, you fall into a faint and go slinking back to your states and districts to gladhand and pump for money and then gladhand some more.....

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