Atom Feed
May 12, 2003
Lawrence Lessig reminds us all to register our opinion about the upcoming rule change that will allow US media to be rolled up into a small ball that fits conveniently in Rupert Murdoch’s pocket.
I blogged about this a few days ago, but it’s important enough to nag y’all about.
Donald Rumsfeld, the US defence secretary, sat on the board of a company which three years ago sold two light water nuclear reactors to North Korea – a country he now regards as part of the “axis of evil” and which has been targeted for regime change by Washington because of its efforts to build nuclear weapons.
The Guardian, May 9
May 9, 2003
From MoveOn.org:
On June 2, the Federal Communications Commission intends to lift restrictions on media ownership that could allow your local newspaper, cable provider, radio stations, and TV channels all to be owned by one company. The result could be the disappearance of the checks and balances provided by a competitive media marketplace — and huge cutbacks in local news and reporting. Good, balanced information is the basis for our democracy. That’s why we’re asking that: “Congress and the FCC should stop media deregulation and work to make the media diverse, competitive, balanced, and fair.”
Register your thoughts here. (Here are mine: Increasing the concentration of media is bad for the democracy the the Congress and FCC are supposed to be safeguarding.)
May 4, 2003
A story from MSNBC, forwarded by Jamie McCarthy to a mailing list I’m on:
Iraqi nuclear site is found looted
Team unable to determine whether materials are missing
By Barton GellmanNEAR KUT, Iraq, May 3 — A specially trained Defense Department team, dispatched after a month of official indecision to survey a major Iraqi radioactive waste repository, today found the site heavily looted and said it was impossible to tell whether nuclear materials were missing.
THE DISCOVERY at the Baghdad Nuclear Research Facility was the second since the end of the war in which a known nuclear cache was plundered extensively enough that authorities could not rule out the possibility that deadly materials had been stolen. The survey, conducted by a U.S. Special Forces detachment and eight nuclear experts from a Pentagon office called the Direct Support Team, appeared to offer fresh evidence that the war has dispersed the country’s most dangerous technologies beyond anyone’s knowledge or control.
In all, seven sites associated with Iraq’s nuclear program have been visited by the Pentagon’s “special nuclear programs” teams since the war ended last month. None was found to be intact, though it remains unclear what materials — if any — had been removed. […]
Meanwhile, at the nearby Tuwaitha storage site, security remains a concern…
Jamie notes: “Tuwaitha is the ‘smoking gun’ that Rush Limbaugh calls ‘Saddam’s Secret Atomic City.'” Says Jamie:
Remind me why we went into Iraq? Wasn’t it to prevent materials such as dirty-bomb components from falling into the hands of terrorists?
Update from Jamie:
My MSNBC link was the Washington Post story; there was a story on the same subject, same day, in the New York Times
Slate’s “Today’s Papers” looks at both and points out a few differences (search down on “Baghdad Nuclear Research Facility”).
The NYT adds in an “unconfirmed report” of missing anthrax, which I accord the status of rumor until it gets, well, confirmed. On the subject of the looting and lax security, it has some more details.
May 1, 2003
A disappointing editorial in the Boston Globe today urges presidential candidates to be more guarded and boring. Jeez, is that even possible?
The Globe is bothered by Kerry calling for “regime change in the United States” and by Dean who. while “advocating a foreign policy that relies more on diplomacy,” said that “we won’t always have the strongest military.” The Globe thinks Kerry is guilty of “bad taste” and that Dean’s explanation, although “not contradictory,” leaves him with “the task of detailing his plans for the military.”
Aarrgghh. So, Kerry should always be tasteful, and Dean shouldn’t raise the obvious and important point that the US has not entirely slipped the bonds of history?
The editorial’s reasoning is that because presidents need to choose their words carefully. “it makes sense” that presidential candidates should be held to a similarly high standard.
It doesn’t make no stinkin’ sense to me.
The Globe’s example of why a president needs to be careful is W declaring a “crusade” against Moslem terrorists and the countries that harbor them. But the words of a president when making foreign policy statements can be performative: like saying “I do” at a wedding or “I promise” to your mother, such words are events. But the words of presidential candidates are not performatives. Candidates need to be permitted to speak casually, off the cuff and from the heart — for our sakes.
So, here’s the editorial I would have written:
No more mush from the wimps
Congratulations to Kerry and Dean for speaking out. Give us more! If sometimes their words may inflame or seem intemperate, our democracy is still stronger for their overall candor and frankness. So, as a responsible newspaper, we will provide you with the context as opponents quote one another out of context. Indeed, as a society, we need to give one another the permission to speak freely, because otherwise free speech just isn’t very interesting.
April 21, 2003
Now that Frank Paynter has changed his name to “Freedom Paynter” because “Frank sounds too French somehow,” and the NeoReactionary Republicans are accusing the Right-Wing Republicans of being “Franco-Republicans,” I feel impelled to take a stand and say:
Not only is the country beautiful and the art is beautiful and the food is beautiful, but the people are friendly and warm and I agree with France’s position on the Iraqi war: If this was a war about WMDs, we should have given the inspectors more time.
So, to protest the “French” to “Freedom” translation, I am going to start referring to the Republicans as the “Gaullist Party.”
PS: Frank was joking.
April 20, 2003
Valdis Krebs, who works on the automated mapping of social networks, points out that the late Mark Lombardi’s astounding, hand-drawn maps of political connections have been gathered into a traveling exhibition. As Valdis points out, even the titles of the works are provocative. You can see some examples here.
April 18, 2003
Common Dreams has published a clear, concise, straightforward statement by Howard Dean about what’s wrong with The Bush Doctrine. It may not be anything you haven’t heard before, but it’s not something you’ve heard any of the plausible presidential candidates say. And that matters.
An excerpt:
Our nation should be viewed as a moral and just power, a power that seeks to do good, one that has led by example and with a spirit of generosity, and one that works with the world community in advancing the ideals of human dignity and rule of law across the globe.
The people of this country must understand that this Administration has a far different concept of the role of America in the world. This concept involves imposing our will on sovereign nations. This concept involves dismantling the multilateral institutions that we have spent decades building. And this concept involves distorting the rule of law to suit their narrow purposes. When did we become a nation of fear and anxiety when we were once known the world around as a land of hope and liberty?
If your answer to his last question is “On September 11,” you’re blaming the terrorists for our reaction to their terrorism. As the Rev. Jackson says: Keep hope alive.
April 12, 2003
A new strip is out.
David Reed has an important, brief piece on the way in which the government’s Total Information Awareness program is similar to the ESP research done in the 50s and 60s.
… the so-called scientists (including Adm. Poindexter) who are leading this are about as clueless as the ESP researchers were, as to their biases, etc. Clever computer science, even powerful and correct computer science, will serve the same role in this process that the powerful statistical methods served in the Dr. Rhine’s ESP research enterprise. The math was not wrong… but it helped create a delusion.
The result in the TIA case will be very dangerous pseudo-scientific bullshit, I suspect. Unfortunately it will be turned on us.
As David points out, the civil libertarians among us (and why aren’t we all civil libertarians?) who are raising alarms about privacy in the land of the TIA “tend to reinforce the belief that there is any real investigatory information that can be extracted by inference from a very noisy and randomly selected pile of information.” In short, TIA needs to be debunked as well as denounced.
Joho the Blog uses WordPress blogging software.
Thank you, WordPress!
