I recall that Viet-Nam era secret writing was blown by an Admiral in his memoirs, causing all future terrorists and secret police to photocopy incoming and outgoing mail. This appears to be publicity we could have done without.
‘The capability of doing mass tracking is possible.’
EXTRACT
Around the world, TruePosition markets something it calls “location intelligence,” or LOCINT, to intelligence and law enforcement agencies. As a homeland security tool, it’s enticing. Imagine an “invisible barrier around sensitive sites like critical infrastructure,” such as oil refineries or power plants, TruePosition’s director of marketing, Brian Varano, tells Danger Room. The barrier contains a list of known phones belonging to people who work there, allowing them to pass freely through the covered radius. “If any phone enters that is not on the authorized list, [authorities] are immediately notified.”
KABUL, AFGHANISTAN The assassination of President Hamid Karzai’s half brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, along with the recent attack on the Intercontinental Hotel in the heart of the capital in Kabul, underscore the increasingly fragile security situation in Afghanistan.
Both events occurred soon after U.S. President Barack Obama announced his intention to begin withdrawing 30,000 “surge” troops beginning this month, with a goal of removing all American forces by the end of 2014.
With the death of Osama bin Laden and claims that his terror network had been crippled in Afghanistan, the president suggested the United States and its international partners had done all they could in the country.
Afghans would have to assume responsibility for security in Afghanistan, the president said.
The hotel attack, however, immediately raised questions about the Afghan military’s capabilities, with eight terrorists successfully overwhelming one of the most secure places in the capital. It was only after NATO helicopters were called in after an all-night firefight that the siege was brought to an end.
While many complain the assault laid bare the weakness of Afghanistan’s security forces, with some guards reportedly fleeing after the first shots were fired, others note that their response was about as good as could have been expected, given the Afghan forces’ level of equipment and training.
What the attack on the hotel did show was the pervasive presence of the Taliban and their growing alliance with other anti-government forces all across the country.
These insurgents in recent months have steadily ratcheted up the size, frequency and effectiveness of these attacks, while showing an alarming ability to penetrate seemingly impenetrable places.
Recent events included the wholesale escape of nearly 500 Talban captives from a prison in the southern province of Kandahar; the dramatic attack on the defence ministry headquarters in Kabul; and the suicide attack on a high-level military meeting in the northern Takhar province that killed one of Afghanistan’s best commanders and injured a NATO general.
Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida Lead List of “Toxic 20” States with Most Toxic Air Pollution from Power Plants
Worst States: OH, PA, FL, KY, MD, IN, MI, WV, GA, NC, SC, AL, TX, VA, TN, MO, IL, WI, NH, IA
WASHINGTON (July 20, 2011) — Residents of Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida live in states with the most toxic air pollution from coal- and oil-fired power plants, according to an analysis by the Natural Resources Defense Council.
The study used publicly-available data in the Environmental Protection Agency’s Toxics Release Inventory (TRI). The analysis, entitled “Toxic Power: How Power Plants Contaminate Our Air and States” was jointly released today by NRDC and Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR).
Among the key findings:
Nearly half of all the toxic air pollution reported from industrial sources in the United States comes from coal- and oil-fired power plants.
Power plants are the single largest industrial source of toxic air pollution in 28 states and the District of Columbia.
Koko Observes (in American Sign Language): The above is an excellent example of isolated concern that is going nowhere–never mind the blatant corruption of Congress. If it were combined with a 360 degree toxicity survey showing food poisoning, toxic chemicals in everyday materials, and so on, this would be a great deal more useful. If all of that were integrated into a true cost global game (or in this case, national game), there would be a compellingly useful basis for public outrage one district at a time.
Phi Beta Iota:Intelligence Online is the one subscription we cannot live without. See their other offerings as well. Reading between the lines, it would appear the Chinese no longer feel “behind” the English-language world, and are doing what the English-language world should have been doing since 1988: focusing on reality as it is depicted in all other languages.
As part of its expanding counterterrorism program in Somalia, the CIA also uses a secret prison buried in the basement of Somalia’s National Security Agency (NSA) headquarters, where prisoners suspected of being Shabab members or of having links to the group are held. Some of the prisoners have been snatched off the streets of Kenya and rendered by plane to Mogadishu. While the underground prison is officially run by the Somali NSA, US intelligence personnel pay the salaries of intelligence agents and also directly interrogate prisoners. The existence of both facilities and the CIA role was uncovered by The Nation during an extensive on-the-ground investigation in Mogadishu.
Does anyone still remember the GOP of the chowder and marching society, Jell-O salads, Buicks, and cloth coats? Is it conceivable that a Republican could have written the following? —
“Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes you can do these things. Among them are H. L. Hunt (you possibly know his background), a few other Texas oil millionaires, and an occasional politician or business man from other areas. Their number is negligible and they are stupid.”
That was President Eisenhower, writing to his brother Edgar in 1954.
But the Republican Party of 2011 is not your grandfather's GOP, not by a long shot. To be sure, the party always had its share of crackpots, like Robert K. Dornan or William E. Dannemeyer. But the crackpot outliers of two decades ago have become the vital center today: Steve King! Michele Bachman (now a leading presidential candidate as well)! Paul Broun! Patrick McHenry! Virginia Foxx! Louie Gohmert! The Congressional Directory now reads like a casebook of lunacy.
The Republican Party of 2011 believes in three principal tenets (the rest of their platform is essentially window dressing):
1. They solely and exclusively care about their rich contributors, and have built a whole catechism on the protection and further enrichment of America's plutocracy. Their caterwauling about deficit and debt is so much eyewash, intended to con the booboisie. Whatever else President Obama has accomplished (and many of his purported accomplishments are highly suspect), his $4-trillion deficit reduction package did perform the useful service of smoking out Republican hypocrisy. The GOP could not abide so much as a one-tenth of one percent increase on the tax rates of the Walton family (net worth: $86 billion) or the Koch brothers, much less a repeal of the carried interest rule that permits billionaire hedge fund managers to pay income tax at a lower effective rate than cops or nurses.
2. They worship at the altar of Mars. While the me-too Democrats have set a horrible example of keeping up with the Joneses with respect to waging war, they can never match GOP stalwarts such John McCain or Lindsey Graham in their sheer, libidinous enthusiasm for invading other countries. McCain wanted to mix it up with Russia — a nuclear-armed state — during the latter's conflict with Georgia in 2008 (remember? — “we are all Georgians now,” a slogan that did not, fortunately, catch on), while Graham has been persistently agitating for attacks on Iran and intervention in Syria. And these are not fringe elements of the party; they are the leading “defense experts” who always get tapped for the Sunday talk shows. If we are to believe Eric Cantor, a majority of House Republicans will not vote to raise the debt ceiling; yet these are the same people who just passed a defense appropriations bill that increases spending by $17 billion over the prior year's defense appropriation. To borrow Chris Hedges' formulation, war is the force that gives meaning to their lives.
3. Gimme that old time religion. Pandering to religious nuts is a full-time vocation in the GOP. Beginning in the 1970s, religious cranks ceased simply to be a minor public nuisance and grew into the major element of the Republican rank and file. Pat Robertson's strong showing in the 1988 Iowa Caucus signaled the gradual merger of politics and religion in the party. The results are all around us: if the American people poll more like Iranians or Nigerians than Europeans or Canadians on questions of evolution versus creationism, scriptural inerrancy, the existence of angels and demons, and so forth, that result is due to the rise of the Religious Right, its insertion into the public sphere by the Republican Party, and the consequent normalizing of formerly reactionary or quaint beliefs. The Constitution to the contrary notwithstanding, there is now a de facto religious test for the presidency: major candidates are encouraged (or coerced) to “share their feelings” about their “faith” in a revelatory speech; or, some televangelist like Rick Warren dragoons the candidates (as he did with Obama and McCain in 2008) to debate the finer points of Christology, with Warren himself, of course, as the arbiter. Politicized religion is also the sheet anchor of the culture wars. But how did this toxic stew of beliefs come completely to displace Eisenhower Republicanism?
