Justice Dept Says Can't Share Lobbying Data B/C Computer System Will Crash

[CShine]

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Bush administration is offering a novel reason for denying a request seeking the Justice Department's database on foreign lobbyists: Copying the information would bring down the computer system.

"Implementing such a request risks a crash that cannot be fixed and could result in a major loss of data, which would be devastating," wrote Thomas J. McIntyre, chief in the Justice Department's office for information requests.

Advocates for open government said the government's assertion that it could not copy data from its computers was unprecedented but representative of generally negative responses to Freedom of Information Act requests.

"This was a new one on us. We weren't aware there were databases that could be destroyed just by copying them," Bob Williams of the Center for Public Integrity said Tuesday. The watchdog group in Washington made the request in January. He said the group expects to appeal the Justice Department's decision.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBDP9DE2WD.html

[fertilizeonarbusto]

1. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Dat Asscrack sure is a hoot!

[sendero]

42. These morons....

... must think everyone is as FUCKING STUPID as they are.

Memo to the misadministration, you are all fools.

[tom_paine]

2. Good GOD HOW THEY LIE!

If we do not stop them, then is is a 99% certainty that a could of Totalitarian Darkness will descend upon the Amerika that will make the past 3+ years look like The Good Old Days.

This election is Life Or Death for the American Experiment in Self-Rule.

[nolabels]

6. Have you ever read this ?

http://www.antiwar.com/
http://www.fff.org/freedom/fd0403a.asp

How Hitler Became a Dictator
by Jacob G. Hornberger, Posted June 28, 2004

Whenever U.S. officials wish to demonize someone, they inevitably compare him to Adolf Hitler. The message immediately resonates with people because everyone knows that Hitler was a brutal dictator.

But how many people know how Hitler actually became a dictator? My bet is, very few. I’d also bet that more than a few people would be surprised at how he pulled it off, especially given that after World War I Germany had become a democratic republic.

The story of how Hitler became a dictator is set forth in The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, by William Shirer, on which this article is based.

In the presidential election held on March 13, 1932, there were four candidates: the incumbent, Field Marshall Paul von Hindenburg, Hitler, and two minor candidates, Ernst Thaelmann and Theodore Duesterberg. The results were:

Hindenburg 49.6 percent
Hitler 30.1 percent
Thaelmann 13.2 percent
Duesterberg 6.8 percent
(snip)

[tom_paine]

14. Not that particular publication, but I'm well-aware of the history

And of course, with our OWN Recihstag Fire and our OWN Enabling Acts and our OWN Transformation of the Judiciary into a Loyalist Enclave answering to no law but the Will of Der Fuhrer, we here in the Empire, sitting and watching it happen AGAIN (though differently owing to the different era and different mores of Amerika vs. Germany), have a unique perspective on this issue perhaps unequalled by our intimate personal experience of the EARLY STAGES of Totalitarian Subjugation.

[nolabels]

23. I saw mikes movie yesterday

I don't know what MM understands about what is really going on but the movie was good for people that do not know or think they did. This was the same thing it seemed to me when I read this article.

Hitler was a sick puppy, and beat up and abused kid growing up, but he did not rise without the push from puppetmastere also. I did not know much about Hitler before I came here to DU either. The minutia can also be overwhelming, but that's why I posted it. It seems to hit the basics well. It shows the process and how it took awhile for it to materialize.

The several threads on DU that get into the subject with the assumption people know all about it, when they really don't or have been misinformed about it. What struck me most about it was how it parallels what is going on now.

[tom_paine]

36. You are correct. And it IS an illustrative article

Problem is the same one I always run into when I use the Nazi term, true as the parallels are.

Once people hear term, all the qualifications, caveats and subtleties don't matter anymore.

Nazi= Nazism 1943-1945 and all the explanations about how Hitler wasn't even Hitler (which is eesentially the point that article demonstrates) until 1942 at least...are lost.

sad but true, considering the vast number of similarities in your article and Imperial Amerika 2001-2004.

[Swamp Rat]

53. This is why I took umbrage with David Wolper in another thread.

He has yet to return and answer my questions.

"Bush is NOT like Hitler, so stop saying that!"

-Bob Boudelang

[Name removed]

56. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

60. That makes three of us. That guy was either incredibly naive,....

...or he was, as you stated, a Freeper.

Even if he wasn't a Freeper, I personally found him to be overbearing and condescending to the max.

[Swamp Rat]

72. I suspected that he might be a freeper...

especially since he appeared to do a tag team post with another (who was tombstoned in the other thread).

Nevertheless, it seemed cowardly to post an attack on DUers and then leave.

"... a Jewish Nazi who could become so primarily BECAUSE he thinks it "can't happen again"."

Yes, that's why I dropped Wolfowitz's name and asked him to respond, concerning a Jewish Nazi - Paul Wolfowitz.

... are you lurking Wolper? I just called Wolfowitz a JEWISH NAZI! This juxtaposition of words should really soil your undies, Wolper.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

63. My Dad is an 84-year-old WWII vet, and he tells me constantly that...

...we've become what he fought against in Europe, and THAT really pisses him off. He can't understand how the NeoCons weren't put in their place a long time ago. He also taught history at the high school level and is also well aware of the parallels between the NeoCons and the Nazis.

[JayS]

7. This is too stupid to be a lie. Some new form of sarcasm? n/t

n/t

[benfranklin1776]

20. Yes Thomas you are right. This is monstrous idiocy.

However the fact that they feel free to utter it with impunity speaks volumes. They know they will not be seriously challenged on the truth of this ASSertion by their allies in the corporate controlled media nor their fellow appartchiks in the new Politburo (formerly the people's house of Congress) thus they feel free to lie with impunity to our faces secure in the knowledge their mendacity will go unpunished. They lie in plain view and know that it will be buried in an avalanche of news about Laci Peterson and, soon ,shark attacks. No sure fire fix will be found except the remedy afforded by the ballot box on November 2nd.

[tom_paine]

38. Ben, I am not even sure our Third-World "Voting" System is up to the task

The sad truth is: No matter WHAT happens, I won't believe the results.

A sad commentary on these Imperial Times.

You are also correct in that they lie with impunity. Throughout history, the cry of the Totalitarian is "Just TRY and stopus with your pathetic laws and weak civility!"

When nobody stops them, lies become truth or laws become meaningless (or in the case of Imperial Amerika, both).

When will the Democrats learn that IS WHAT THE IMPERIALS ARE! They are not Civilized Human Beings as Free Americans are. They are barabrians like the Nazis and Commies, with the SAME level of scruple and the SAME "respect" for Liberal Democracy, which they consider to be weak and decadent.

[benfranklin1776]

52. Yes Krugman made a similar point in the preface of his book.

He essentially said these people are extremists who do not share common values that American political adversaries have traditionally shared, namely respect for the democratic process and constitutional structures. His point was that they are radicals who challenge the very legitimacy of the democratic system itself. They want autocracy and sneer at the concept of government of the people by the people and for the people. Such is evident from their actions. This like Cheney's outburst shows their true contemptuous nature and they must be fought tooth and nail, not appeased.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

64. Excellent post...one that I agree with 100%.

[benfranklin1776]

69. It is really a dark echo of Alexander Hamilton's monarchist attitudes

.....except now the Hamiltonians have metastasized into the neocons and they are not so overt as to openly advocate for a king. They instead seek to establish autocratic rule through actions while cloaking themselves in the rhetoric and guise of "patriots."
Incidentally my father was in the Navy in World War II and had a similar observation about the neocons as your father (post 63). Having faced totalitarian regimes our fathers recognize power hungry tyrants when they see them.

[Karenina]

75. MUST READ on DU's front page

that supports Benfranklin1776's astute post...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/articles/04/06/29_unravel.html

[Eloriel]

93. Sometimes, when I think about it, I become more enraged

by the contempt they show for us than the lies themselves.

[struggle4progress]

35. "I've never heard the excuse that making the equivalent of a backup copy

would somehow cause steam to rise out of the computer."

[Mokito]

71. That then must be the easiest counterintelligence job in the world.

AFTER you steal the info the original source will, as a protective measure, self-destruct. :crazy:

[Hutzpa]

88. hahahaha...........this datacentre will self destruct in 10 sec after...

copying. :wtf:

[Beetwasher]

3. These People Are Pathological

Completely and totally without shame...Incredible...

[Cronus Protagonist]

4. They should just provide their backup tapes then

That would do it. And despite their lie about the system crashing, they can have no excuse for not having backup tapes.

BrainButtons.com - Fair & Balanced buttons, such as, "Anybody But Bush" and "Drop Bush Not Bombs"

[MadHound]

27. But don't you understand?

Running those backup tapes will erase them, then where will you be? With a crashed computer and blank tapes, that's where!

[Tight_rope]

82. LMAO!

[Old and In the Way]

5. Diebold Memory Architecture?

[TahitiNut]

8. These dolts are hallucinating!

Unfreakingbelievable! In over 35 years in MIS/IT, that's one I've never heard before. If anyone whe'd ever worked for me said something like that they'd immediately be looking for work in another profession.

[htuttle]

11. Didn't they outsource the Justice Dept's computer system?

For some reason, I'm remembering that it was recently rebuilt and maintained by some Bush crony -- Dyncorp or Arthur Anderson ('Accenture'), I think.

You're right, in any case. I'd fire someone for giving me an excuse this lame...

[htuttle]

17. Found the answer

Looks like Dyncorp and Computer Sciences Corp (which recently bought Dyncorp).

http://articles.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_pjus/is_/ai_1593792504

Pug Winokur hard at work...

[TahitiNut]

51. IT/EDP Slave Galleys

Computer Sciences Corporation of Rockville, Maryland
DynCorp Information & Enterprise Technology, Inc. of Fairfax, Virginia
Keane Federal Systems, Inc. of Rockville, Maryland
Lockheed Martin Service, Inc. of Cherry Hill, New Jersey
Logicon Information Systems & Services of Falls Church, Virginia
Pragmatics, Inc. of McLean, Virginia


Man, what a cast of characters! These are privateers, in the worst sense of the word. Bottom-feeders (i.e. not kosher) in the industry - top-heavy with overpaid people whose hands-on IT/MIS credentials are virtually non-existent and staffed with burnt-out drones.

[PassingFair]

70. Dyncorp...ain't they the same jerks

...that sent armed "contractors" to raid Chalabi's house? By the way, anyone heard anything about Chalabi lately? Why wasn't he arrested for being a spy for Iran?

[notadmblnd]

48. even if they did outsource the job

They'll have their original backups from the migration. Industry standards calls for it daily, weekly, monthly and yearly. 28 years of experience tells me that there is not system that can't be recovered.

[mmonk]

9. Bwahahaha *snort*

ahhhh bullsh*t.

[cthrumatrix]

10. LOL....rolling on the floor..... quick call EDS to save the data

where is the democratic response to this madness..?

[LiberalFighter]

47. I bet Ross Perot would be willing to offer his services

I don't believe he is friendly with any of the bushies

[notadmblnd]

50. EDS is a repuke supporting company

both cheney and Baker served on it's board back in the day.

[Bluebear]

12. Insert 1950's laugh track here! HahhhAHHhhaaahahHHAHaa

That's rich! And people will buy it, that's what is sad.

[gratuitous]

13. This is the same Justice Department . . .

Remember the Enron tapes? The energy traders gloating about how they'd screwed poor old grandmothers out of their life savings to line their pockets? Those very same tapes were in the possession of the Justice Department for the last THREE YEARS, untranscribed.

Why didn't Justice transcribe them? It would (get this) COST TOO MUCH! Insert :wtf: here.

So, in a separate lawsuit, the People's Utility District of Snohomish, Washington, got the tapes and paid $100,000 to transcribe them, and bring them in as evidence in their suit. A hundred thousand dollars. Quick quiz: What is the annual budget of the U.S. Department of Justice?

A. $90,000 - no wonder they couldn't afford a transcript
B. $23 billion - Are you Cheneyin' kidding me?
C. Aren't costs recoverable if you win a lawsuit, so what does it matter?

[orthogonal]

15. Let's get some big publicity for this

We can get a lot more publicity for this --- and outside of just Democratic circles -- if everyone will submit this to Slashdot.

Go here, and submit: http://slashdot.org/submit.pl

[POed_Ex_Repub]

46. Good idea... and done n/t

[orthogonal]

65. Thanks. And we got it posted too!

Thanks. And we got it posted too!

[TahitiNut]

61. My /. compatriots are having fun with this.

As usual, however, in a group populated with some really whacked-out savants, the typical trolling surfaces clad in jackboots and infected body-piercings.

http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/06/29/217209&mode=thread&tid=103&tid=164&tid=185&tid=99

[catmandu57]

16. As dullwitted as I am about computers

It would seem to me that there would be a hardcopy somewhere.

[cap]

18. i'm sure all the unemployed computer programmers

would be glad to have a contract to come in and "fix" the system. It aint that hard!!!

[DeepModem Mom]

19. "You can't make this stuff up!" --

as Imus (whose show is a sometime "guilty" pastime of mine) very often says. LOL!!!

[yellowcanine]

If Imus said it, than it is "shit", not "stuff" . Or is it forbidden to

say "shit" on the air?

[DeepModem Mom]

30. He says he tries not to curse on the air, but sometimes slips --

generally, he says "stuff."

[stickdog]

21. Are you out there, Jon Stewart? (nt)

[tranche]

22. select total(contribution) from lobbyists where country = 'saudi arabia';

this query could concievably bring down the database....

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

43. It's sum(), not total()

Signed: your friendly neighborhood SQL Nazi. :evilgrin:

[LifeDuringWartime]

24. impossible

how the hell would they know? this is blatant lying at its worst. their IT staff needs to be subpoenaed.

[stickdog]

25. The DOJ needs to cancel its contract with Heisenberg Software Systems.

[timtom]

86. Heisenberg??!!

What an unusual name for a software systems outfit. Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle -- isn't that where the act of observing a process actually changes that process by the mere act of observing it? Coincidence or a dark sense of irony...?

Does this strike anybody else as odd?

It's kinda like an abortion pill called RU486. Are You For 86 (86 being the term used in diners, for example, to mean scuttle. "86 the veal special!" I'm surprised no one else has ever picked up on this.

Okay, you may now flame me as a tinfoil hat man.

[stickdog]

98. Um, joke?

What an unusual name for a software systems outfit. Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle -- isn't that where the act of observing a process actually changes that process by the mere act of observing it? Coincidence or a dark sense of irony...?

RU469?

[rocktivity]

26. What kind of computer operating system are they using?

:headbang:
rocknation

[nolabels]

32. But what about a router?

http://www.ssfnet.org/InternetDocs/ssfnetTutorial-1-vlsm.html

:argh:

[Mel]

33. Bwaaaah! haa! ha!

I don't even think it's that sophisticated Rocknation!

Personally, I think they are stupid LIARS!

I know we have some DU'ers out of work that could probably fix it for them what a buncho' dumb cheneys!

[Ivan Zero]

28. Maybe we should stop using the Internet

It might crash! <smirk>

[nolabels]

29. Okay folks here is the plot

It's very simple, for you people that hate links (and are partial simpletons like me), here is what they say latter in the article

"The government said an overhaul of the system should be finished by December and copies should be available then"

[htuttle]

34. Well, that's convenient

Gee, sure hope they don't need to go looking up any terrorist information before December. Maybe we could get al Queda to hold off until the Bush administration is more ready?

:eyes:

[hatrack]

31. What the Cheney are they talking about?

This is the lamest Cheneying excuse I've heard from this bunch - and I've heard some pretty shitty ones in the past!

[KittyWampus]

37. This Is Not Just An Outrageous Lie... It's Comic Relief

[TrogL]

39. So, do a report or a dump

Here's the code.

Select * from tablespace;

[Jose Diablo]

40. What is justice doing about backing-up their data

don't say they don't back-up their data. Thats a steaming pile of grass processed by a bovine.

[muriel_volestrangler]

41. maybe it's all recorded on punch cards?

Wasn't the excuse for not recounting in Florida that the punch cards were so fragile that sending them through the system again would damage them, so that they couldn't be read again? Are they too lazy to make up a new fictitious excuse this time?

[Cerridwen]

44. OMG!

There's a Microsoft monopoly dig/joke/lambaste in there somewhere.

Someone please find it and post it; my brain is just too stunned at this obvious prevarication to get the joke.


:argh:

[stickdog]

99. Microsoft's new, improved toy database: No Access.

[myrna minx]

45. Oh muh gawd...

bwahahahaha. They have all gone completely mad. :silly:

[gatlingforme]

49. I think it's unprecedented that this administration is acting so

beligerant towards the FOIA.

[Nlighten1]

54. So they don't do backups then?

If copying the database breaks it they must not be backing their data up.

[InkAddict]

85. Probably hasn't been backed up

Since BC - blame his penis!

[POed_Ex_Repub]

55. IT MADE SLASHDOT- Nerds going wild!

Top story on http://www.slashdot.org

:-D

[htuttle]

57. It just hit me after reading slashdot

An excuse this insane could only come from one system operator.

The BoFH must be working at the Justice Department now...

[muriel_volestrangler]

62. Or maybe Wally

if he didn't want to do any work. Or if the message was relayed via the Pointy Haired Boss ...

[hunter]

96. Yeah, it was probably Wally...

Wally was sitting on the can drinking his coffee and reading the morning news, and he didn't want to get up, so he told the intern, "I wouldn't do that, you'll crash the computer."

In intern repeated that, and it went through the pipeline of PHB's until it reached Justice Department's IT chief Thomas J. McIntyre, who said, "Implementing such a request risks a crash that cannot be fixed and could result in a major loss of data, which would be devestating."

[truthisfreedom]

58. why, because all of the beads on the abacus might roll to one side?

[mtnester]

59. That is about THE

biggest crock of shit I have ever heard. What are they running, Win 3.0 with 8MB memory on a 4KB hard drive? And we are paying Dynacorp to handle computers how much? Are they using 5 1/4 floppies? Copy that shit to a DVD or CD NOW...better yet, mirror that sucker to another computer, and give em the hard drive..

They really do think everyone besides themselves are imbeciles...how freaking arrogant.

"The sky is green"......NOT!!!!!

[laylah]

66. What a bunch of

Cheney a$$holes! The scarey thing, for me, is that there are morans still in our midst that will believe it! (stupid question time :silly:)Will these Cheney freaks stop at nothing? :mad:

Jenn

[T Bone]

67. Article does say the info will be available in DECEMBER

after they massage the computer/database for seven months, and of course, after the election. Nothing to see here, now just move along.

What has this McIntyre dude done before being the IT shill for Ashcroft?

[Hutzpa]

94. Answer............Anonymous n/t

:shrug:

[Cerridwen]

68. Here's the 2002 list - short form

Thanks to my fellow computer geeks at Slashdot

http://www.usdoj.gov/criminal/fara/Fara1st02/INDEX.HTM

Er, what's changed in 2 years that it went from on-line to antiquated and inaccessible?

[mike1963]

78. Maybe their hard drive is old and tired and nobody oiled it...

:eyes:

[Swamp Rat]

73. BULLSHIT!

BULLSHIT!

BULLSHIT!

BULLSHIT!

[DavidMS]

87. Can I second that?

Whoever made that assertion to a court aught to immedately be charged with contempt of court.

[lovedems]

74. According to my network administrator husband

A. There is no such thing as a crash that cannot be fixed. If that were the case, there wouldn't be a need for IT professionals such as him.

B. He is certain that the United States Government has the most comprehensive data recovery system you could imagine.

He read this at my request and said that excuse is so stupid, it is embarrassing.

[rooboy]

77. More importantly...

the idea that the system would crash from retrieving this data in the first place is laughable.

[lovedems]

79. Yeah, that probably goes without saying for him

He worked for the Illinois State Board of Education and was responsible for 800+ servers in which data needed to be retrieved all the freaking time. I am no MCSE or anything of the sort but isn't that what a server does? Holds retrievable data?

He stated they should be embarrassed by giving this kind of excuse and just gave me some examples, besides basics to show that it is really friggin' stupid.

[lovedems]

101. Correction.

I am sure there were some "what? 800 servers?" It was 80. I added an extra 0 typo!

[Eloriel]

95. It's a little more than embarrassing, IMO

It OUGHT to be actionable. Whether it is or not is another story. Of course, lying is not just fashionable, not just accepted, not just approved, but encouraged REQUIRED in Washington these days.

[havocmom]

76. Has anybody 'Dobbs-ed' this yet?

The Lou-ster could run far with this DOJ hogwash.

Lou, you out there reading this?

[Tight_rope]

80. Ok...the lies are starting to get really funny...n/t

[mike1963]

81. Remember the old WORM term? (write once read many) this must be WORN

Write Often, Read Never

:eyes: :crazy:

[Jackpine Radical]

83. Of COURSE the effort to copy would destroy them.

They'd have to erase everything before "trying" to copy it. Dontcha know nuttin?

[InkAddict]

84. Yup, computer will crash!

That's a PROMIS

[Hutzpa]

89. Calling all HackToPussy..........RePresent.. N/T

[JohnLocke]

90. READ THIS [SLASHDOT]

"Oh, c'mon. If our government can build cruise missiles that can reliably fly through the goalposts of a football field after being launched from hundreds of miles away, I don't think they'd be using Bronze age technology for storing our vital public records.
I'm sure that they designed a new high-density storage medium that encodes bits of information as the polarizations of photons bouncing around in nanoscale optical cavities.
After storing all that data, the government realized that thanks to Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, if we now attempt to read the information, we will destroy its quantum state, thus destroying the data in the process.
I'm sure that's it- they're just dumbing down the details so that us SlashDotters can understand it... *snicker*"
http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/04/06/29/217209.shtml?tid=103&tid=164&tid=185&tid=99

[T Bone]

91. needs a kick for night time in America

:kick:

[TahitiNut]

92. I've figured it out.

They found huge amounts of old core memory. They had to fix the circuits but forgot about write-after-read. Ooops!

[hunter]

97. Actually, their database is an old guy and a bunch of boxes...

They are afraid if they ask the old guy to scan all this stuff into the computer, he'll quit or fall down dead. Unfortunately he has filed everything into the boxes using his own "system." Or at least that's what he claims. Some observers says he just stuffs the papers they hand him into the nearest box.

[jumptheshadow]

100. Hmmmm.....the word "backups" comes to mind

I don't know which I prefer:

* The guy is lying through his teeth option,

or,

* The guy believes what he said option.

Either way it's sick.

[AngryWhiteLiberal]

102. copy/paste vs. cut/paste

Uh, this is a new one to me. Maybe they are not aware that you can copy/paste instead of cut/paste? Not likely...

JB