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Huh?

Chinese firm paid insider ‘to kill my company,' American CEO says

A Chinese energy firm offered big money and access to women to entice an engineer at a U.S. company to launch a cyber raid on his employer, stealing sensitive computer codes and “thereby cheating (the firm) … out of more than $800 million,” according to newly unsealed court documents and internal messages and emails obtained by NBC News.

Federal prosecutors call the alleged cyber theft from American Superconductor (AMSC) in Devens, Mass., one of the most brazen cases yet of Chinese economic espionage in the United States. The techniques the Chinese used to rob the company of three quarters of its revenue, half its workforce, and more than $1 billion in market value were straight out of a “spy novel,” the firm's CEO said in an interview with NBC News.

Read full article.

Continue reading “Mini-Me: Chinese Methods, American Sour Grapes”

2013/08/10

Chuck Spinney: Newt Gingrich as Dr. Evil, Bill Clinton as Dr. Lesser [But Still Very] Evil

01 Poverty, 03 Economy, 07 Other Atrocities, 11 Society, Corruption, Government

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Jeff St. Claire and the late, and much missed, Alexander Cockburn have written an excellent and important history of how the democrats under Clinton sold out their heritage and, in effect, became the enablers of the Republicans in the construction of the emerging American police.

WEEKEND EDITION AUGUST 9-11, 2013

Welfare Reform and an Ever-Expanding Police State

The Origins of the Neoliberal War on the Poor

by JEFFREY ST. CLAIR and ALEXANDER COCKBURN

Counterpunch

In November of 1994 two years of ramshackle government, breached pledges and the Clinton administration’s frequently manifested contempt for its traditional base, exacted their price. In the midterm elections Republicans seized control of both the House and the Senate for the first time since the Eisenhower era. The rout extended to governors’ mansions across the country, where the Republicans captured the majority of governorships for the first time in a quarter-century. Newt Gingrich, the new Speaker of the House, became the nation’s political wunderkind.

Continue reading “Chuck Spinney: Newt Gingrich as Dr. Evil, Bill Clinton as Dr. Lesser [But Still Very] Evil”

2013/08/10

Penguin: Fukushima and the Pacific Ocean

03 Environmental Degradation, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Proliferation, Commerce, Corruption, Earth Intelligence, Government, Idiocy, Ineptitude, Media

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Water leaks at Fukushima could contaminate entire Pacific Ocean

Two and a half years after the Fukashima tragedy Japan does not want to admit how serious it is, but it is obvious the drastic environmental implications are to follow, Harvey Wasserman, journalist and advocate for renewable energy, told RT.

RT: Japanese officials have admitted a leak at Fukushima has been happening for two years and is worse than earlier thought. Why did it take so long to evaluate the actual repercussions of the tragedy and take decisive measures to tackle them?

HW: The Japanese authorities have been covering up the true depth of the disaster because they don’t want to embarrass themselves and the global nuclear industry and they are trying to open up another nuclear plant in Japan. When the Japanese people now find out that the accident is worse than we thought and they have been leaking many tons of radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean for almost two and a half years, this is a catastrophe. Tokyo Electric has no idea how to control this accident. This is absolutely terrifying after two and a half years. To find out that these reactors have been out of control, now that they can’t control this they don’t know what’s going on. This is not a primitive backward country; this is Japan with advanced technology. It has very serious implications for nuclear power all over the world.

RT: Why the plant's operator failed to contain the leak?

HW: Because they don’t know what to do. This has never happened before. You have three explosions; you have four nuclear reactors that are severely compromised. No one ever planned for this. This is an apocalyptic event. This is something that could contaminate the entire Pacific Ocean. It is extremely serious. The reality is that Tokyo Electric does not know what is happening and does not know how to control what is going on. Our entire planet is at risk here. This is two and a half years after these explosions and they are still in the dark. It’s terrifying.

Read full interview.

2013/08/10

SchwartzReport: 10 US Foods Banned Elsewhere

Commerce, Corruption, Government

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I have been urging SR readers for several years now to become pro-actively involved with the food they eat, and feed to their families. It is a terrific pain-in-the-ass I know, but one has to read every label, and constantly search out information on food. You cannot assume anyone is going to protect you, and there can be major health consequences. This is not easy to accept, I know, but here are some examples of what I mean.

10 American Foods That Are Banned in Other Countries

Phi Beta Iota: Here is the list only (each explained in full post above). Each item represents a lack of INTEGRITY at every point in the government-corporate-retail chain.

#1: Farm-Raised Salmon
#2: Genetically Engineered Papaya
#3: Ractopamine-Tainted Meat
#4: Flame Retardant Drinks
#5: Processed Foods Containing Artificial Food Colors and Dyes
#6: Arsenic-Laced Chicken
#7: Bread with Potassium Bromate
#8: Olestra/Olean
#9: Preservatives BHA and BHT
#10: Milk and Dairy Products Laced with rBGH

2013/08/09

Marcus Aurelius: Ode to the Chopper Pilots

Cultural Intelligence, Ethics, Military

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For those who have not seen. Most of us have significant experience with the Huey. In my case, my takeoffs exceed by a considerable number my landings in the airframe. Some of us know Ranger Nightengale personally. Some of us have been involved in emergency landings or other aircraft mishaps. Some of us owe something, perhaps a lot, to a pilot or aircrew.

The Sound that Binds

by Keith Nightingale

SWJ Blog Post | October 5, 2012 – 8:12pm

Unique to all that served in Vietnam is the UH1H helicopter. It was both devil and angel and it served as both extremely well. Whether a LRRP, US or RVN soldier or civilian, whether, NVA, VC, Allied or civilian, it provided a sound and sense that lives with us all today. It is the one sound that immediately clears the clouds of time and freshens the forgotten images within our mind. It will be the sound track of our last moments on earth. It was a simple machine-a single engine, a single blade and four man crew-yet like the Model T, it transformed us all and performed tasks the engineers and designers never imagined. For soldiers, it was the worst and best of friends but it was the one binding material in a tapestry of a war of many pieces.

The smell was always hot, filled with diesel fumes, sharp drafts accentuated by gritty sand, laterite and anxious vibrations. It always held the spell of the unknown and the anxiety of learning what was next and what might be. It was an unavoidable magnet for the heavily laden soldier who donkey-trotted to its squat shaking shape through the haze and blast of dirt, stepped on the OD skid, turned and dropped his ruck on the cool aluminum deck. Reaching inside with his rifle or machine gun, a soldier would grasp a floor ring with a finger as an extra precaution of physics for those moments when the now airborne bird would break into a sharp turn revealing all ground or all sky to the helpless riders all very mindful of the impeding weight on their backs. The relentless weight of the ruck combined with the stress of varying motion caused fingers and floor rings to bind almost as one. Constant was the vibration, smell of hydraulic fluid, flashes of visionary images and the occasional burst of a ground-fed odor-rotting fish, dank swampy heat, cordite or simply the continuous sinuous currents of Vietnam’s weather-cold and driven mist in the Northern monsoon or the wall of heated humidity in the southern dry season. Blotting it out and shading the effect was the constant sound of the single rotating blade as it ate a piece of the air, struggling to overcome the momentary physics of the weather.

Continue reading “Marcus Aurelius: Ode to the Chopper Pilots”

2013/08/09

Berto Jongman: How We Lost Yemen….

Government, Ineptitude, Military

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How We Lost Yemen

The United States used the Pakistan playbook on Yemen's terrorists. It didn't work.

For much of the past four years the United States has been firing missiles into Yemen. Drones, ships, and planes have all taken part in the bombardment, carrying out at least 75 strikes — including an alleged drone attack that killed five on the night of Monday, Aug. 5, bringing the death toll to a minimum of 600 souls, according to the best estimates.

But for all that, for all the strikes and all the dead, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) continues to attract more members, growing from 300 in 2009 to well over a thousand today. U.S. officials almost invariably refer to it as the most dangerous branch of al Qaeda's network, a designation that has remained constant since the United States started bombing Yemen in 2009. And the group, as the ongoing terrorism alert that has closed U.S. embassies has shown in dramatic fashion, remains capable of paralyzing U.S. diplomatic efforts across an entire region.

All this raises a rather simple question: Why? Why, if the U.S. counterterrorism approach is working in Yemen, as Barack Obama's administration claims, is AQAP still growing? Why, after nearly four years of bombing raids, is the group capable of putting together the type of plot that leads to the United States shuttering embassies and missions from North Africa to the Persian Gulf?

The answer is simple, if rather disheartening: Faulty assumptions and a mistaken focus paired with a resilient, adaptive enemy have created a serious problem for the United States.

Read full article.

2013/08/092013/08/09

Berto Jongman: Computer Language Imitates Human Brain?

Advanced Cyber/IO

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New Computer Programming Language Imitates The Human Brain

As we pointed out earlier this week, we’re still far from being able to replicate the awesome power of the human brain. So rather than use traditional models of computing, IBM has decided to design an entirely new computer architecture — one that’s taking inspiration from nature.

For nearly 70 years, computer scientists have depended upon the Von Neumann architecture. The computer that you’re working on right now still uses this paradigm — an electronic digital system driven by processors and consisting of various processing units, including an arithmetic logic unit, a control unit, memory, and input/output mechanisms. These separate units store and process information sequentially, and they use programming languages designed specifically for those architectures.

Continue reading “Berto Jongman: Computer Language Imitates Human Brain?”