April 30, 2014

Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams arrested in 1972 IRA killing

Northern Ireland police Wednesday arrested Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams for questioning about the notorious 1972 abduction and murder of a widow wrongly suspected of informing against the Irish Republican Army........

Researchers taped confessional interviews with former loyalist and republican paramilitaries, and two IRA operativesimplicated Adams in the McConville's abduction and slaying.The tapes weren't supposed to remain private until their deaths, but Northern Ireland officials persuaded U.S. courts to release some material because of the serious crimes discussed.


http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/04/30/gerry-adams-ira/8528317/

April 26, 2014

'black boy', 'those people' - cliven bundy, the gift that keeps on giving

“If I say 'Negro' or 'black boy' or 'slave,' if those people cannot take those kind of words and not be (offended), then Martin Luther King hasn't got his job done yet," he added. "We need to get over this prejudice stuff."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/04/25/cliven-bundy-racist-mlk_n_5212526.html?ncid=txtlnkusaolp00000592

April 25, 2014

it must change or die

There are conservative models of mainstream american philosophy I could imagine being electorally viable in the increasingly pluralistic and multicultural and ethnic country America is rapidly becoming. I don't see the GOP embracing them anytime soon. The white supremacy strain is like electoral crack cocaine bin that they have to keep hitting that pipe more and more to get an ever diminishing result but putting it down right now is out of the question. Like any addict they have to hit rock bottom before they change.

April 24, 2014

no bundy news on fox website

not just a lack of stories about his pro slavery racist shit. the whole issue seems to have disapeared.

April 24, 2014

it's not about bundy

Rick Perry has already started that meme.

April 22, 2014

Walter Pincus: The question Snowden should have asked Putin

http://m.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/in-questioning-russias-putin-about-surveillance-snowden-misses-the-point/2014/04/21/c3e09352-c732-11e3-bf7a-be01a9b69cf1_story.html


The question Edward Snowden should have asked Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday was: “Would you please describe how the three versions of SORM operate and what is done with the intercepted phone, e-mail and other electronic media those systems collect?” The former National Security Agency contractor who in May leaked tens of thousands of highly classified NSA documents that described hundreds of U.S. electronic interception programs, must know about SORM (System of Operative-Investigative Measures), the decades-old but continually upgraded Russian electronic surveillance system.

........

One final word about the Snowden-Putin exchange. In his published response to critics Thursday, Snowden seemed to acknowledge SORM’s scope when he said journalists should ask Putin “for clarification as to how millions of indi apoloiduals’ communications are not being intercepted, analyzed or stored, when at least on a technical level the [Russian] systems that are in place must do precisely that in order to function.”Snowden offers Putin the opportunity to clarify his denial that his country intercepts, analyzes or stores millions of individual communications.

On the other hand, Snowden refers to Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper Jr.’s answer at a Senate Select Committee on Intelligence as a “lie,” when Clapper said that the NSA was not collecting records on millions of Americans. Snowden then ignores Clapper’s apology and fuller statements about NSA programs. Different strokes?

April 21, 2014

Obama Plans Clemency for Hundreds of non-violent Drug Offenders

Now, in his final years in office, Obama has trained his sights on prisoners like Scrivner, and wants to use his previously dormant pardon power as part of a larger strategy to restore fairness to the criminal-justice system. A senior administration official tells Yahoo News the president could grant clemency to "hundreds, perhaps thousands" of people locked up for nonviolent drug crimes by the time he leaves office — a stunning number that hasn't been seen since Gerald Ford extended amnesty to Vietnam draft dodgers in the 1970s.

http://news.yahoo.com/obama-plans-clemency-for-hundreds-of-drug-offenders--162714911.html

April 21, 2014

If human beings develop the ability to live forever, is that good for the species as a whole?

I am watching Morgan Spurlock's show on CNN and he is discussing cutting edge biotechnology that some say someday might make living forever possible. A couple of concerns pop in to my head. If everyone one can live forever, where is the room for the new people going to come from? Or, more likely, it won't be everyone but an elite group of very wealthy people who will become the immortals who have yet another advantage over the rest of us. Think of the trouble the Koch brothers could cause if they lived forever. Yes I know that when they die other Koch-like people will come along. They have always been with us and always will. But an immortal Koch brother would be a super predator version - one that didn't have to learn everything anew. They would be able to accumulate hundreds, or rather infinite, years of personal experience that others didn't, which is quite different that the collective cumulative knowledge we all benefit from. I am just sort of thinking out loud (or as I write) but wouldn't these be problems?

April 20, 2014

For The Record: Snowden Gave Classified US Intel to the Chinese. It is a fact.

Ever since this first happened I have gotten the "oh yeah, prove it" response from the Snowdenistas whenever I mentioned it. I got tired of posting it for every low information (that didn't validate their point of view) DUr that claimed I was making shit up. Apparently I have only one more free visit to the paper's site and people are STILL going "oh yeah prove it." So instead of posting it individually for everyone who's google button broke off:

EXCLUSIVE: NSA targeted China's Tsinghua University in extensive hacking attacks, says Snowden

Tsinghua University, widely regarded as the mainland’s top education and research institute, was the target of extensive hacking by US spies this year
Tsinghua University in Beijing, widely regarded as the mainland’s top education and research institute, was the target of extensive hacking by US spies this year, according to information leaked by Edward Snowden.

It is not known how many times the prestigious university has been attacked by the NSA but details shown to the Post by Snowden reveal that one of the most recent breaches was this January.

The information also showed that the attacks on Tsinghua University were intensive and concerted efforts. In one single day of January, at least 63 computers and servers in Tsinghua University have been hacked by the NSA.

http://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/1266892/exclusive-nsa-targeted-chinas-tsinghua-university-extensive-hacking?page=all

There it is. Snowden went to China and gave a Chinese newspaper the individual servers the US is hacking in China.

April 20, 2014

yes!