May 16, 2006
Yet Another Journalistic Fraud?
It appears another drive-by media attempt to discredit the President and advance the claim that Republicans are trying to usher in a new era of fascism has fallen flat on its face. Claims by USA Today using sources with “direct knowledge of the program” that the NSA has been collecting massive databases of phone calls don’t appear to match with the records of two of the three apparent participants, Verizon and Bell South.
Sure, they could be lying but that would be stupid considering they’re going to be on the frontline for litigation over this issue as it is easier to sue a company for breach of privacy then getting anything out of the NSA. If they took the time to search their records (as it appears they did) all they would have done was generate more evidence for such a relationship. However, it appears now that there really was no relationship at all, or for that matter, any requests by the NSA in the first place. Some of the bitter-enders will still insist the program exists and there is a massive cover-up, just like some continue to insist that 9/11 was staged despite the release of flight recorders, telephone calls, and video feeds that show the opposite.
Once again, we are faced with an “objective” journalistic medium that didn’t do enough footwork to verify the claims that were made before it splashed them on the front page and riled the population. The irony is that it appears the population would support such a database if it existed.
Time after time there are those who continue to make up claims (i.e. KoranGate and RatherGate) in the media who never seem to be held to account on their frauds. If the media wishes to continue to be seen as a serious medium of information (and more and more people are turning elsewhere for news) it needs to take seriously its responsibility to report accurately the news instead of pandering to the worst elements of the left.
Posted by John Bambenek at 10:23 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
May 8, 2006
Toward a More Perfect CIA
The appointment of General Hayden to run the Central Intelligence Agency is the ideal appointment to help reform the CIA at this critical point in time.
What many people don’t understand is the relationship between the military and the CIA. The military, quite obviously, is aligned with the Department of Defense and the CIA is aligned with the Department of State. While this doesn’t seem to have much of a meaning, the two departments really have very different ways of looking at the world and looking at conflict.
The purpose of the Department of Defense is to kill people and break things. That’s what the military does best. When the military looks at the world, they look at ways to win wars. When they find threats, they eliminate them.
The Department of State, however, looks at the world very differently. They look at the world diplomatically and seek to maximize the amount of information on adversaries or potential adversaries. When the CIA finds threats, they seek to get as much information as possible, including who is supporting or financing those threats, what their intentions are, and whom else they are working with.
To be perfectly clear, both are necessary. In order to adequately deal with threats, one needs to fully understand where those threats come from and who is involved to eliminate them. Knowing everything you can about the enemy is useless without eventual action. Knowing who the 9/11 hijackers are doesn’t, by itself, prevent them from flying into buildings.
The situation, combined with typical inter-agency rivalry, has led both Departments into a form of opposition. While the military (and Bush for that matter) have backed action into Iraq to end the conflict that has been going on for 12 years (at the time of the second invasion), State and the CIA was opposed because that conflict would end the information flow and diplomacy. That difference in world-view has been the source of much public contention on the Iraq War and the War on Terror in general.
By appointing Hayden to the CIA, it appears that the intent is to shift the viewpoint of the CIA to be more action-oriented. Hayden is in intelligence, so he obviously knows the value of information, however, as a soldier he also surely knows the value of action and that there comes a point to act on intelligence even if there is more information that could be gathered.
This change is a good thing, as it will help both Defense and State to moderate the poles that have been generated from the rivalry. This appointment is a good thing at a great time that will help both agencies to understand the values each provide and help them learn to work together in the future. The military will learn the value of diplomacy and information and the CIA will learn the value of action. Our national defense will be the clear winner.
Posted by John Bambenek at 10:39 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 15, 2006
For the Love of All That is America, Learn What The First Amendment Is…
Throughout the cartoon controversy people on both sides talk about free speech and a free press. While in general, these can be construed as the freedom to say what you want, people are conflating Constitutional protections with the idea that one shouldn't face any consequences to their speech.
Free speech, but more specifically, the Constitutional protection of free speech has absolutely nothing to do with private individuals and what they can do. The First Amendment is not a protection from your fellow citizens (or foreigners). It is a protection against what the government can do, and the government alone.
When the Dixie Chicks protested that people were boycotting their music, they claimed Free Speech. No one said they didn't have the right to say what they did; they were saying they weren't going to continue giving them money if they wanted to engage in that behavior. This is perfectly legal and why our country is so great. We don't need the government to create hate speech laws here; the free market system largely takes care of the problem. Yes, you have a right to say stupid things, but that doesn't mean you have the right to continue to get subsidized by the public if you do. This is the lesson that the creators of "Book of Daniel" learned.
When Islamic radicals (who are the minority) burn down embassies and threaten violence, it is shameful behavior. You don't protest the stereotype of being a fanatical murder by being a fanatical murder. However, Muslims hacking websites is not a Constitutional issue. There are laws to prevent it, sure. It's bad behavior, sure. But it is not an attack on the First Amendment. It is high time people on both sides realize what the First Amendment is and what it is not.
Posted by John Bambenek at 10:20 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
January 21, 2006
Food for Thought - Iran, Israel, and the bomb
The US's EIA chief has said we can't get by without Iranian oil. Can we get buy with a nuclear crater that used to be Tel Aviv?
War with Iran may be ugly and require some real sacrifice from the citizens, but if the alternative is sitting on our thumbs when Iran vaporizes Tel Aviv and tells us that they've got a nuke pointed at Paris if anyone does anything, then I think I can handle walking to work.
Posted by John Bambenek at 8:20 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
January 19, 2006
Weak attempt at an Anti-ACLU Post
There is a movement to intervene in the ACLU case so that real Americans can have real views represented in the NSA lawsuit filed by the ACLU...
Debbie Schlussel, blogger/investigative writer/lawyer, is extending an invitation to citizens interested in intervening in the ACLU's NSA lawsuit. She practices in Eastern Michigan, where the suit was filed.
Take a look and sign up.
Posted by John Bambenek at 8:56 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
January 6, 2006
Fearmongering for Fun and Profit
Come on! Space terrorists???. Let's analyze the last few terrorist attacks shall we? Let's start with 9/11. They bought plane tickets, got flight training, and had box cutters. All in all, low rent. Subway bombings? Homemade explosives. Then there was the husband-wife duo who's gear was so crappy that the wife's bomb didn't even go off.
I'm not suggesting there is no such thing as terrorism, but the term has become so widely used to pad budgets with grant money, we are making ourselves MORE vulnerable to terrorism. Instead of paying attention to real threats, we are going to be goosing millionaires to see if they have bombs before they board a space shuttle. How about we focus on the real threat?
Posted by John Bambenek at 8:01 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
January 1, 2006
Articles of Impeachment Being Written
I've just gotten wind that UI Law Professor Francis Boyle is writing new articles of impeachment against the President. (His old version, here consisted of mostly thought crimes). The local anti-war group will be meeting tonight to discuss this with him it looks like. What this means is that not only will they go after the NSA wiretaps, they'll go after the war also and put that in. It'll be interesting to see what the final product is.
UPDATE:
Sorry, fixed old impeachment articles link (http://www.counterpunch.org/boyle01172003.html) dated 2003. Included such crimes as appointing members of the Federalist Society to the bench, not creating opportunities for minorities, and getting Congress to pass the PATRIOT Act. Get that, because Congress passed the Patriot Act, Bush should be impeached.
Posted by John Bambenek at 3:00 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
September 22, 2005
Coalition for Darfur: Decent into Anarchy
Crossposted from Coalition for Darfur. More updates on the deteriotating condition there that the new and improved UN is still failing to do anything about.
====
One week ago, experts and observers warned that Darfur risked "sliding into a perpetual state of lawlessness." At a time when Khartoum and the Darfur rebels were preparing to meet in an attempt to move the essentially non-existent peace process forward, IRIN was reporting
Banditry and continuous attacks by armed groups on humanitarian workers, Arab nomads and villages in Darfur have increased significantly over the past weeks and threaten to destabilise the fragile ceasefire in the volatile western Sudanese region.The "fragile ceasefire" has never really existed
and fears of "perpetual" lawlessness are misplaced considering that Darfur has been essentially lawless for more than two years.
Last week, the World Food Program reported that "security levels deteriorated in Darfur during the reporting week." This week, the WFP reported that "despite precautionary security measures, attacks on commercial and humanitarian vehicles continue in Darfur."
And as the UN was expressing
its concern "about the recurrent attacks carried out by armed men and gangs in Darfur states, which target civilians and commercial vehicles hired by relief organizations," Norwegian Church Aid was reporting that "relief convoy has been raided at gunpoint by bandits in Darfur for the second time in a short period. The security situation in Darfur shows signs of deterioration"
A growing problem is also that aid convoys are now being ambushed with increasing regularity by bandits on horses and camels. Norwegian Church Aid vehicles have been raided at gunpoint twice in a matter of weeks ... The field teams who travel most often through the western and southern parts of Darfur regularly encounter en route, and are often chased by, heavily armed men riding on horses and camels. Since the aid operation began just over a year ago, security has presented a great challengeAnd the violence continues.
for the agencies. Yet whereas assault, exchanges of fire and attacks on villages were previously politically motivated, much of the violence seems now to be criminal in nature.
Just yesterday, it was reported that 40 were killed in fighting after an attack on the rebel Sudan Liberation Movement/Army by "armed nomadic tribesmen" [aka "the Janjaweed"]. This was followed by another report that 80 government soldiers had been killed by the SLM when they captured the town of Sheiria in a surprise attack in retaliation for earlier
government attacks on rebel-held territory.
The attack on Sheiria put at risk some 33,000 civilians who rely on humanitarian assistance after staff from three NGO's were withdrawn due to the fighting. And for good measure, the UN Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) "reported that the security situation in the Kalma camp housing displaced persons has further deteriorated with a large number of security incidents, including some 60 reported
attacks on women over the last week alone."
All of this took place while the sixth round of peace talks were being held in Nigeria.
It has now been more than a year since the United States declared the situation in Darfur a "genocide" - and the security situation on the ground is now even arguably worse. While government-orchestrated attacks on civilians have diminished, mainly because "there are not many villages left to burn down and destroy," the rampant insecurity in all likelihood still qualifies as part of Khartoum's genocidal campaign to "deliberately [inflict] on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part."
The genocide is not ending and the situation is not improving. The people of Darfur have, for all intents and purposes, been abandoned.
Posted by John Bambenek at 7:20 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
August 29, 2005
9/11: Still Not the Jews' Fault
An 11 year old turns an art project into a political statement by showing Bush referring to seeing the first plane crash into the World Trade Center. The contest was organized by the San Francisco Chapter of the 911 Truth Alliance, which the main organization distributed literature that suggests Israel and/or the Mossad were responsible for 9/11. There seems to be no end of those who espouse bizarre conspiracy theories linked Bush, the Mossad, Saudis, short sellers, and insurance companies with the 19 people who actually did hijack the planes on 9/11.
With the breaking news on Able Danger one wonders if the conspiracy theories will have to be rewritten. The Clinton Administration "wall of separation" prevented the military from sharing critical information that would have prevented 9/11 years before it happened. Even when some tried to share the information anyway, the information went ignored. It looks like more and more that terrorists did hijack planes and that the CIA dropped the ball long before Bush even hit office.
The conspiracy theorists will have you believe bizarre theories about the international neocon conspiracy (closely related to the international Zionist conspiracy) but a review of the facts once again shows that radical Islamic terrorists are targeting this country, the Clinton Administration did nothing about it, and they'll keep attacking until they are stopped. Iraq is the latest front and only victory there will provide protection against future attacks.
Blogs talking about this: PowerBlog!, Strate Sphere, Captain's Quarters, et al.
Posted by John Bambenek at 4:25 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
August 19, 2005
Al Qaeda Attacks US Navy Ships in Jordan, Come Up Short
Today Al Qaeda terrorists fired three rockets at US ships. According to a post on the website they threaten additional attacks:
…we warn the Americans, who are spreading theirfreedomcorruption throughout the world and who have stolen the wealth of the Muslim nation, to expect even more stinging attacks.
A source in the US Armed Services who declined to be identified because he was not authorized to speak to the press had this to say:
Buwahahahahahahahaha! Stinging attacks? They can't even hit a big fat boat docked at a pier.
Posted by John Bambenek at 10:00 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
August 18, 2005
La. ACLU Head Compares People Who Believe in Higher Power to Terrorists
On Monday, the school board of Tangipahoa Parish in Louisiana had their meeting and was asked by the ACLU to remind teachers not to allow prayer at school functions. In an astounding aside, the First Amendment has become a restriction on private individuals on where and when they can express their religion. The statement was not school sponsored prayer but prayer at all, including presumably spontaneous prayer by students. How the Louisiana ACLU can reconcile the position that no one be allowed to pray in school with their belief in the right of free expression and freedom of religion is left to the reader.
On this occasion the head of the Louisiana ACLU, Joe Cook, had this to say about people who believe in religion (HT: Lone Star Times:
”They believe that they answer to a higher power, in my opinion. Which is the kind of thinking that you had with the people who flew the airplanes into the buildings in this country, and the people who did the kind of things in London.”
No amount of parsing can take the meaning of this quote away. The head of the ACLU in Louisiana believes that if you believe in God you will eventually be led to fly planes into buildings, become a suicide bomber, or decapitate people on TV. You may believe that religion should be stricken in the public square even when the expresser is a private individual but the statement that people who believe in a higher power are on the road to terrorism should be offensive.
This was spoken by the head of the ACLU in Louisiana and therefore can be taken as an official position by that unit, if not the entire ACLU as a whole. If you are outraged by this, contact the Louisiana ACLU and the National ACLU to get them to repudiate such hateful and bigoted remarks.
ACLU of Louisiana
PO Box 56157
New Orleans, LA 70156-6157
(866) 522-0617
National ACLU Feedback Form here
Others talking about this: Mudville Gazette, Outside the Beltway, StoptheACLU
Posted by John Bambenek at 5:37 PM | Comments (8) | TrackBack
August 15, 2005
Cindy Sheehan and the Iraq War
I don't want to get dragged into this quagmireof Cindy Sheehan, I haven't blogged about it and I'm not going to. I agree with Chrenkoff (HT: Michelle Malkin) that this is a game that should not be played. If that faction of the Left wants to grab any club they can find to beat Bush with I have confidence that the American people will recognize it for what it is. All I know is that it's undermining the troops (HT: Cao's Blog) and Iraqis aren't too fond of it either. There are some games that shouldn't be played, some things that shouldn't be exploited, and some things left alone.
This has brought out the worst on both sides and really needs to stop.
UPDATE:
Wizbang and others are starting to agree.
Posted by John Bambenek at 11:01 AM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
August 13, 2005
The Insurgency is Over
Yesterday, the Dallas Morning News wrote an editorial banning the use of the word insurgent from their pages. They say that the fighting in Iraq is no longer an insurgency but a terrorist action because of the targeting of normal Iraqi men, women, and children. They correctly label the fighters as terrorists, but it hasn’t been an insurgency for a long time.
We’ve learned that Iran has sent and is sending bomb materials into Iraq. Foreign fighters have become the the biggest threat to Iraqi security, not dissident Iraqi groups. Most Iraqis realize that the way to get the US out is to vote on a Constitution in October and vote again in December. Our troops will start hitting the doors in 2006 and everyone knows that (assuming things are under control).
An insurgency implies that the fight is from within a nation. For months we’ve know that the biggest source of fighters and supplies has been other countries like Iran and Syria who are anxious to see the US fail in Iraq. There is nothing “insurgent” about that, the proper term is “invasion”. While the fringe Left celebrates each American causality coming home to Dover and claims that Iraqis don’t want us there, they fail to realize that the Iraqis are predominantly the targets of these attacks and that more often than not the bomb or the bomber was from another country.
You hear the phrase “one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter” from those same fringe leftists like Ted Rall. Unless George Washington was blowing up women and children of British families that claim is spurious at best. It’s time to stop granting legitimacy to those who attack civilians and it’s time to stop deluding ourselves that these fighters have Iraq’s best interests in mind. Not while they are being sent by other countries at least.
Posted by John Bambenek at 8:57 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
April 20, 2005
Airline Security
Michelle Malkin writes about the current state of airline insecurity. Federalizing the whole thing only insured to hire the same people at twice the pay and three times the waste with the fringe benefit of goosing grandmothers instead of looking for terrorists. There is one thing to note though. There will be new plane hijacking a la 9/11. The terrorists have moved on from that tactic because it was a one-time stunt and won't work again. The passangers will never let someone hijack another plane again. Remember Robert Reid - the Shoe Bomber? It wasn't airline security that prevented him (though it should have), it was the passengers who beat the man to a bloody stump with three doctors drugging him into a coma. Even if marshalls were on that flight, they'd have to climb over 50 people who all took turns beating this guy.
Terrorists are going to pick another vector. If they choose the same one all the time, it just causes people not to fly. A problem, but not a crisis. The next hit, if there is one, will be something entirely different an unexpected. That's how terrorism works. You make people afraid because they don't know where the next attack comes from.
--------
Posted by John Bambenek at 1:53 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
