Category: Journal ISSN 1078-1935

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NIGHTWATCH: Chinese Dream Centers on Rejuvenation Through Muscular Economic Renewal and Outreach, Disciplined and Powerful Military

02 China

China: During this Watch, Xi Jinping has been elected President of China.

Xinhua reported on 13 March that “The Chinese Dream” is a new hot topic among Chinese and has drawn international attention from scholars and foreign policy experts.

“China's new Communist Party leader Xi Jinping said during a museum tour last November the Chinese dream meant for him the ‘great renewal of the Chinese nation.' He has pledged to pursue the shared Chinese dream of national rejuvenation,” Xinhua reported.

Comment: For the benefit and support of the billion plus Chinese, sophisticated national strategies are always reduced to easy-to-remember slogans or motivational statements. This was a trait of Soviet communism. The North Koreans have refined it into something they consider an art form.

“The Chinese dream” is being introduced on the margins of the National People's Congress (NPC) as the new strategic concept that replaces “China's peaceful rise.”

Today's Wall Street Journal contains an insightful and detailed article on the background and some of the implications of the new strategic concept. The publicity it is receiving in Xinhua and on the web site of the NPC indicates “The Chinese Dream” is the concept that will guide Xi Jinping's tenure as Party General Secretary and President.

Comment: The Journal article establishes that idea of The Chinese Dream is not necessarily new and not only applicable to international affairs. It has many domestic implications as well.

What is new is that Xi appears to be making it the theme of his term of office. It implies that he and the collective leadership judge that the period of China's rise is over. They perceive a new situation.

This is a strategic inflection point for China. The rise will be replaced by pursuit of “The Chinese Dream” of national renewal or rejuvenation.

Continue reading “NIGHTWATCH: Chinese Dream Centers on Rejuvenation Through Muscular Economic Renewal and Outreach, Disciplined and Powerful Military”

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Jon Lebkoswky: Bruce Schneir — The Internet Goes to War

IO Deeds of War, IO Impotency
Jon Lebkowsky
Jon Lebkowsky

The Internet inherits war

Bruce Schneier at Technology Review:

Arms races are fueled by two things: ignorance and fear. We don’t know the capabilities of the other side, and we fear that they are more capable than we are. So we spend more, just in case. The other side, of course, does the same. That spending will result in more cyber weapons for attack and more cyber-surveillance for defense. It will result in move government control over the protocols of the Internet, and less free-market innovation over the same. At its worst, we might be about to enter an information-age Cold War: one with more than two “superpowers.” Aside from this being a bad future for the Internet, this is inherently destabilizing. It’s just too easy for this amount of antagonistic power and advanced weaponry to get used: for a mistaken attribution to be reacted to with a counterattack, for a misunderstanding to become a cause for offensive action, or for a minor skirmish to escalate into a full-fledged cyberwar.

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Craig Hamilton: Questions for Reflection

Ethics
Craig Hamilton
Craig Hamilton

It is my hope that our collective reflection on these questions will help create a powerful focus for Thursday's FREE  event, Activating the Impulse of Evolution, and will serve as a foundation for the journey we'll be going on together:

1) What is your deepest or highest aspiration for your own spiritual development?

2) In your deepest moments of awareness and clarity, what have you sensed is possible for the evolution of your life, and for human life as a whole?

3) Where have you noticed that you get stopped or blocked in your spiritual evolution? To what degree have you seen that the obstacles to your deepest awakening are actually habits that you have the power to stop enacting?

4) How would you most deeply wish to serve life and humanity, if you had all the capacities you needed? What is your vision for your highest contribution in this life and this world?

5) What do you see as the relationship between your own evolution and the advancement of humanity? In what ways can you see that the highest potentials you want to fulfill and the changes you need to make are not merely personal, but universal to all human beings?

6) What are you most hoping to learn at this seminar?

12 Mar to 30 Apr 2013 Online Consciousness Conversations ($249)

Who’s Who in Collective Intelligence: Craig Hamilton

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SchwartzReport: If the Dalai Lama Were Pope

Ethics

schwartz reportThis piece illustrates for me the difference between religion (The Roman Catholic Church) and spirituality.

I was stunned to learn, and checked and it is correct: “Less than five percent of money flowing through Catholic charities and hospitals comes from Catholic offering plates. Powerful Christian organizations have secured government funds to underwrite” their costs.

This essay gave me pause and made me think, and I hope it does the same for you.

dalai lamaDespite Vatican efforts to keep the public eye focused on pomp and circumstance, speculation about the real reason for Pope Benedict’s resignation dominates conversation about the papal succession: Is it the Vatileaks money laundering? Is it the pedophilia scandal? Might it have something to do with criminal charges filed in European courts? How about the impact of all three on Catholic Church coffers and pews? Is this about immunity or power or finances or brand management?

The Vatican claims to promote a “comprehensive culture of life,” but it is the Church’s comprehensive culture of corruption that refuses to die. Consider yesterday’s scandal in which Scottish Cardinal Keith O’Brien, resigned amid allegations of sexual contacts with priests. Last year O’Brien had called marriage equality a “grotesque subversion of a universally accepted human right.” In fact, in 2012, he received a “bigot of the year” award from the British gay rights group, Stonewall. The combination makes him a poster boy for the notion that homophobia is a symptom of denial. Methinks he doth protest too much.

From the October death of Savita Halappanavar for lack of an abortion in Catholic controlled Ireland, to the pedophilia cover-up being unveiled gradually this spring in California, to the infighting exposed when the Pope’s butler leaked inside Vatican documents, to Cardinal Timothy Dolan’s efforts to obstruct contraceptive access regardless of the public health consequences—Catholic priorities increasingly appear to have two products: harm and hypocrisy. Those who still consider the Catholic hierarchy to be a source of moral leadership are living in a fantasy.

As someone who thinks the world could use a little moral leadership, I can’t resist indulging in a little fantasy of my own: Imagine how different things would be if the Dalai Lama were the next pope.

Continue reading “SchwartzReport: If the Dalai Lama Were Pope”

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Reference: DNI Global Threat Testimony 2013

Director of National Intelligence et al (IC)
Hon James Clapper
Hon James Clapper

2013-03-12 DNI to SSCI Threat Assessment

HIGHLIGHTS:

Recognizes how quickly and radically the world — and our threat environment — are changing.

“This environment is demanding reevaluations of the way we do business, expanding our analytic envelope, and altering the vocabulary of intellignece.  Threats are more diverse, interconnected, and viral than at any other time in history.”

Recognizes the importance of integration across disciplines and domains — working toward multidisciplinary and multidomain.

The Introduction alone is reason enough to take the time to download the document.

Robert David STEELE Vivas
Robert David STEELE Vivas

ROBERT STEELE:  This is a good read.  I am particularly delighted that the introduction embraces the specific recommendations I have been making since 1988 within the government and since 1992 publicly.  There is more that could be done in terms of outreach to people who will never have clearances, but this is a very fine start.  I offer the following supplemental observations in support of the DNI's testimony.

Cyber

Among the mission areas assigned to the National Security Agency (NSA), the assurance of trusted communications for US commercial communications and computing including domestic supervisory control and data acquisition systems across all functionalities appears to require a great deal more oversight and performance evaluation; at the same time, the US Government appears to need a Center for Computational Mathematics and a Center for Real-Time Financial Transaction Analytics.

Given the central role played by digital financial transactions in relation to multi-billion dollar money laundering by US banks that have operated with virtual impunity for decades, a decision needs to be made, and appropriate resources devoted to, the application of NSA's proven capabilities against global financial crime rooted in US banks.

Francesca Musiani
Francesca Musiani

Internet Governance is a vital topic and its inclusion in this report is noteworthy.  One of the most promising and innovative experts in the world on emerging alternative paradigms for Internet Governance is here in Washington DC completing a Yahoo! Fellowship with the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy at Georgetown University.  Dr. Francesca Musiani does not have a clearance and is not a US citizen.  She leaves in June.  Her email is francesca.musiani AT gmail DOT com.  It would also be beneficial for the IC to be paying Dr. Gordon Cook for Reference: Cook Report on Internet Protocol and at least quarterly consulting, his email is cook AT cookreport.com.  Stephen E. Arnold continues to be my virtual CTO and remains a genius.  Arnold IT is critical starting point and second opinion for anyone that wants to be moderately tuned in or better.

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Search: develop intelligence through civil affairs

Searches
Robert David STEELE Vivas
Robert David STEELE Vivas

This search by a number of you, using the same words, is one that I feel compelled to respond to personally.  When I was putting together the Smart Nation Act, with Congressman Rob Simmons (R-CT-02) positioned to introduce it in his next term, we specifically addressed an absolute prohibition against any use by any covert or clandestine or even overt intelligence organization, of civil affairs as a cover.  That provision fell out in the simplified version of the Act.  If I were God, anyone caught using civil affairs as a cover would be reduced one grade in rank and expeditiously dischanged from government service–this would apply to both SOF and all elements of the IC.

Civil Affairs today has three strikes against it:

Continue reading “Search: develop intelligence through civil affairs”

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