#1
You have to wonder about this one. While the odds are quite good that it's for real, it was probably discovered when he turned in a work laptop, which has no admissible chain of evidence. That would kill the charge dead in a civilian court. Not so much in a military court.
What could be going on behind the scenes is that he was recruited specifically for language skills, but he might have been suspected of joining to get combat and weapons skills, intending to bring that knowledge back to the Muslim community for nefarious ends.
A CP charge is pretty rough to beat, unless it was a setup and whoever did it didn't change the file date/time stamps. Internet records would also offer strong proof one way or another.
#2
My first thought was to check the files for messages hidden via steganography.
Posted by: Rob Crawford ||
06/16/2011 11:34 Comments ||
Top||
#3
yup. At the Burg we tend to snicker re: Muslims and pornography - and it's often a snicker-worthy situation. But porn images are indeed often used to hide steganographic messages.
#4
If you are going to use steganography to hide things that would get you sent to jail, best not to use images that will get you sent to jail all on their own.
#3
Actually, I think this is a good idea. As much as I enjoy ogling a woman's cleavage, the cleavage has no place in a professional workplace.
Of course, what bothers me most is that if I a) ogle the cleavage or b) comment on it to the woman, I will be up on charges of sexual harassment so fast my head will spin.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
06/16/2011 7:47 Comments ||
Top||
[Iran Press TV] Ernesto Che Guevara's 83th birthday anniversary has been celebrated in the central Cuban province of Sancti Spiritus, where he carried out important military actions. I hate to point this out, but he's dead. He hasn't had a birthday in near onto 35 years.
The municipality of Fomento was the venue of a cultural show in honor of Che, which was the first territory of the former province of Las Villas to be liberated by the Rebel Army commanded by Cuban revolutionaries, AP reports.
"Guevara was loyal to his principles in the times he lived. He had an iron will, an extraordinary courage, a deep sense of dignity and humanity and the will to fight for his homeland until the last minute. His deeds, heroism and qualities together with his revolutionary and anti-imperialist feelings led him to fight for noble and just causes," reads a note published on Tuesday by Granma newspaper on the occasion of the anniversary of his birthday.
More than 50 years after the fact, Cuba has published the diary, entitled Diary of a Combatant, that Ernesto kept during the armed struggle he waged alongside Fidel Castro from the Sierra Maestra Mountains.
According to Guevara's widow, Aleida March, the goal is "to show his work, his thoughts, his life, so that the Cuban people and the entire world get to know him and don't distort things anymore."
As a young medical student, Guevara traveled throughout Latin America and was radically transformed by the endemic poverty and alienation he witnessed. His experiences and observations during these trips led him to conclude that the region's ingrained economic inequalities were an intrinsic result of capitalism, monopolism, neocolonialism, and imperialism, with the only remedy being world revolution.
Commonly known as 'El Che' or simply 'Che', he was an Argentine revolutionary, physician, author, intellectual, guerrilla leader, diplomat and military man. A major figure of the Cuban Revolution, his stylized visage has become a ubiquitous countercultural symbol of rebellion and global insignia within popular culture.
Che (June 14, 1928 - October 9, 1967) was executed in cold blood by a US-lead death squad that captured him in Bolivia. He had emerged as a prominent symbol of uncompromising opposition to US domination.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/16/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under: Commies
[An Nahar] Residents of a southern Chinese town on Wednesday described frightening scenes of overturned cars engulfed in flames and armed police out in force after days of violent festivities.
A heavy security presence remained on the streets of Zengcheng, which is part of the greater Guangzhou area -- a bustling city in China's industrial heartland packed with migrant workers that lies near the border with Hong Kong.
The festivities, sparked by rumors spread on the Internet that police had beaten a street hawker to death and manhandled his pregnant wife, have so far led to 25 arrests.
"It was very scary -- the scariest thing I have encountered since I was born," said Chao, a 27-year-old owner of a denim shop in Xintang, a garment district in Zengcheng, which is about 90 minutes by car from central Guangzhou.
Chao said at one point in the melee, there were a "few thousand rioters" facing off against a massive police force, adding: "They burnt down one of the buildings."
"Together they flipped police cars and set them on fire. A few hundred coppers then came. They started beating people indiscriminately with metal batons," he told Agence La Belle France Presse, declining to give his full name.
More than 1,000 coppers were reportedly deployed to Xintang over the weekend.
On Wednesday, the streets of Xintang were quiet, according to an AFP news hound, but many shops and restaurants remained closed, while police armed with batons and shields carried out regular patrols.
Burn marks could also be seen on the ground and on a three-storey building. Many locals were too afraid to speak about the incident.
"The atmosphere is tense and we all feel a bit nervous. We are not supposed to talk about it," said You, a 42-year-old garment worker who also refused to give her full name.
The man rumored to have been killed during the police operation targeting street hawkers appeared at a presser held by the local government on Sunday, saying he, his wife and their unborn baby girl were "doing very well".
The police operation quickly escalated into violence, with the crowd hurling bricks, rocks and bottles at local officials and police, as well as vandalizing ATMs and police posts.
Armed coppers reportedly used tear gas to disperse the crowd.
"All around the village you can see burn marks on the ground because of the fires. I have been stopped five times by coppers asking what I was doing here," said a 59-year-old cycle of violence taxi driver surnamed Chen.
"On the first day of the riot, the fighting continued from 11:00 pm to 6:00 am the next day -- it was very bad. You can see today it's much quieter but authorities are still out in full force," he added.
China sees tens of thousands of protests and other public disturbances each year, often linked to anger over official corruption, government abuses and the illegal seizure of land for development.
Such incidents have been prominent in recent weeks.
Ethnic Mongols in north China protested for days against the encroachment of grasslands by mining concerns, while in late May a disgruntled man killed four people including himself in Dire Revenge™ bombings over property confiscation in the south of the country.
Two officials were meanwhile jugged in central China after 1,500 protesters clashed with riot squads following the alleged death in police custody of a local politician, state press said on Saturday.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/16/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
ION SINA-NOT-XENA, WAFF > [StrategyPage]THE GROWING THREAT FROM CHINA. China tells the Philippines to halt any + all oil exploration in the Spratleys.
versus
Vietnam's response ...
* CHINESE MIL FORUM > VIETNAM SIGNS MILITARY ORDER [mil draft/conscription] AMID TENSION, wid China in South China Sea.
Vietnam PM Nguyen Tan Dung.
* TOPIX > VIETNAM REJECTS CHINA DEMAND TO HALT OIL EXPLORATION IN DISPUTED WATERS, ANNOUNCES LIVE-FIRE DRILL.
* SAME/WORLD NEWS > CHINA'S NAVY ATTEMPTS TO ATTEMPT SOVEREIGNTY IN DISPUTED WATERS.
* SAME/WORLD NEWS > VIETNAM TO CONTINUE OIL EXPLORATION DESPITE CHINA DISPUTE.
MIL FORUM POSTER = argues that iff the Philippines gets to rename the South China Sea as the "WEST PHILIPPINE SEA", then China gets the right to rename the Philippines as "SOUTH CHINA ISLANDS"???
All things equal, ambitious RISING CHINA needs to protect = "guarantee" its overseas Air-Sea-Space access vee the Malaccas, + Taiwan-Philippines maritime corridor into WESTPAC + SOPAC.
Moreover, its perceived "Manifest Destiny" as POST-US "SOLE" SUCCESSOR TO GLOBAL LEADERSHIP, + its curren label as World #2 [future World #1] Econ behind the "weakening/declining" USA, allows China to demand an larger = abnormal principal share of any dev of SCS-specific underwater resources.
Yesterday it was the Empire State manufacturing index that turned unexpectedly negative. Today, its the Philadelphia Feds manufacturing index that dropped into the red unexpectedly. The report comes amid decidedly mixed economic signals today:
Factory activity in the U.S. Mid-Atlantic region unexpectedly shrank in June in another sign of weakness in the manufacturing sector, a survey showed on Thursday.
The Philadelphia Federal Reserve Bank said its business activity index fell to minus 7.7 in June from positive 3.9 the month before. It fell far short of economists expectations for a rise to 6.8, according to a Reuters poll. It was the lowest level since July 2009.
The new orders index also fell, coming in at minus 7.6 from 5.4 in May, while inventories dropped to minus 8.5 from minus 5.4. New orders were at their lowest since June 2009.
As Reuters reports, anything below a zero in both reports indicates contraction in the manufacturing sector. The drop in orders portends further contraction during the summer, which will certainly not help job creation. If the trend continues, manufacturing could start shedding jobs especially since inventories are hitting record levels already. Slack demand and overstocking leads fairly logically to curtailed manufacturing, and this is merely the consequence of a long series of reversals in the economy.
[Iran Press TV] Recent housing figures show that home prices in Southern Caliphornia have plunged more than eight percent in May, realty company DataQuick reports.
The Caliphornia-based company says sales have fallen by 17 percent from the same period last year, the 11th straight year-over-year decline, a Press TV correspondent reported on Wednesday.
Some experts have cited consumers' weak confidence, low job creation and absence of government incentives among reasons behind the sale decline.
The drop in southern Caliphornia home prices last month was the steepest since September 2009 and the number of new homes sold was the lowest recorded in the past two decades.
Economists say this excess amount of distressed properties will draw out recovery in Caliphornia, predicting that the housing market will remain troubled until 2013.
"We have got a lot of potential for closures. This is a default of countdown a little bit, but there is still very high level for closure activity," economist Edward Leamer said.
DataQuick says this means Caliphornia lacks the fundamental driver of job growth required to increase the housing demand.
Economists believe this would be troublesome for an area like Southern Caliphornia, which relies heavily on the real estate market.
"The trouble, the lingering troubles and housing markets are going to limit the contribution that homes can make during the economic recovery this time," Leamer added.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/16/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Bets that the county assessors are updating the valuation of the properties to reflect the drops? /sarc
#3
I bought the home of my dreams in Riverside for $675,000 in early 2006. By mid-2008, it was worth $329,000. It took the county until 2009 to revalue the house to $550,000. If my house has lost this much more value, my home worth less than $200K right now.
Thank you Democratic congress, thank you Fannie, Freddie and Wall Street.
The rape of the middle class continues.
Posted by: Bill Clinton ||
06/16/2011 10:34 Comments ||
Top||
#4
Oh wow gee! I better get to buying some houses in California then! Why am I throwing away money in rent when I can own a depreciating and over taxed asset!?!?!?!
#5
Caliphornia lacks the fundamental driver of job growth required to increase the housing demand. That was true before, during, and after the Gollyvornia housing bubble expanded and then burst. It was also true for the rest of the USA, perhaps with the exception of North Dakota. But CA is the epicenter of wretched housing excess.
The bubble was entirely based on excessive / too easy credit and the madness of crowds. 'Dream house' is a metaphor that cuts in different ways. Some people's housing dreams are now nightmares.
[Al Jazeera] George Papandreou, the Greek prime minister, has in a televised address said he will form a new government on Thursday and seek a vote of confidence from his PASOK parliamentary group.
His announcement on Wednesday came shortly after the opposition turned down his offer to stand down to facilitate the formation of a unity government for passing tough austerity measures.
"I will continue on the same course. This is the road of duty, together with PASOK's parliamentary group, its
members, and the Greek people," Papandreou said.
"Tomorrow I will form a new government, and then I will ask for a vote of confidence," he said.
He had earlier said the proposed new unity government must support the European Union and International Monetary Fund (IMF) bailout, and should not seek to overhaul it.
But opposition conservatives insisted a unity government was only possible if the bailout was renegotiated.
Street festivities
The day's political developments came as the government debated fresh austerity measures that would extend beyond its term in office amid violence on the streets of capital.
Protesters rallied outside parliament chanting "thieves, traitors" and asked "where did the money go?" as they demonstrated amid a 24-hour national strike organised by major labour unions which saw hospitals, transport and other public services crippled.
Small groups of youths threw stones and petrol bombs at police cordons, and smashed the windows of a luxury hotel on Syntagma square, outside the parliament building.
Police responded to the violence with tear gas.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/16/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[5 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Protesters rallied outside parliament chanting "thieves, traitors" and asked "where did the money go?"
Are they really so stupid as to not understand it was SPENT ON THEM?!
Wait... Greeks... yeah, I guess they are.
Posted by: Rob Crawford ||
06/16/2011 11:38 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Seems to me that this is the equivalent of rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
[An Nahar] Offices were closed and public transport on land and sea across Greece was seriously disrupted early Wednesday as a mass general strike got under way against government austerity plans.
Hundreds of demonstrators belonging to the popular protest group calling itself "The indignants", modeled on a similar mobilization in Spain, flooded into the central Syntagma Square in Athens in front of parliament where members are debating a new austerity package.
The square was awash with Greek national and Spanish flags and banners reading "Resist" and the battle cry from the Spanish civil war, "No pasaran" (They shall not pass).
Protest organizers, who have been camping out in the square for the past three weeks, said a human chain would be formed round the legislative chamber as deputies started debating a new controversial round of austerity cuts.
Early Wednesday police had erected a metal barrier across the street leading to the parliament building and dozens of police vans were parked in front to allow the deputies unhindered access and keep at bay the crowd of protestors.
Several main thoroughfares around parliament were also closed to traffic and pedestrians and the city center was also cordoned off.
Rallies called by trade unions were due to begin in the late morning.
Tension has been rising in Greece in the past few days with protestors voicing their discontent over plans for a new wave of spending cuts and tax hikes. The austerity measures are needed to secure a new package of financial help from creditors and debate on the cuts opens in the Greek parliament on Wednesday.
Eurozone finance ministers failed to reach accord at talks on Tuesday on a second bailout package to avert a Greek default.
Opinion polls show most Greeks have lost confidence in their country's government and a political and judicial system that has conspicuously failed to root out endemic corruption.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/16/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[6 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Greece just needs to raise the income taxes enough to cover all the public employee pay and benefits - and of course withhold it from their paychecks (while non-public employees continue to hide income and evade the taxes the same as always.)
#2
When I lived there, most Greeks went through great lengths to hide income and evade taxes. They also voted for more social services and borrowed money to pay for it. It was only a matter of time before the whole U.S. Greek house of cards fell down.
Yesterdays vote failed for procedural reasons but they cleaned it up today and nailed down a remarkably bipartisan consensus. Eyeball the roll: 38 Democrats, 33 Republicans, and both independents voted yes, with no votes coming mainly from plains-states senators eager to keep the campaign cash flowing. When youve got both senators from California and both senators from Oklahoma on the same side of an issue, youre working magic, my friends.
The vote also could have ramifications on future votes to reduce the deficit. Much of the GOP conference supported Feinsteins bill even though it does not include another tax break to offset the elimination of the ethanol tax credit.
As such, the vote could also represent a setback for influential conservative Grover Norquist, head of Americans for Tax Reform (ATR), who said a vote for the plan would violate the anti-tax pledge most Republicans have signed unless paired with a separate tax-cutting amendment
Feinsteins amendment to an economic development bill would quickly end the credit of 45 cents for each gallon of ethanol that fuel blenders mix into gasoline. The credit led to $5.4 billion in foregone revenue last year, according to the Government Accountability Office.
The amendment also ends the 54-cent per gallon import tariff that protects the domestic ethanol industry.
It was a vote about ethanol but it wasnt really a vote about ethanol. For instance, although this bill would strip away federal subsidies, it does nothing about the federal mandate specifying U.S. consumption of 36 billion gallons in renewable fuels each year until 2022, which means theres plenty of business still to come for ethanol special interests. What the vote is really about, at least to the Norquistians among us, is whether this might signal a new willingness by GOP leaders to strike a grand bargain with Democrats on deficit reduction that would include tax hikes. Tom Coburn, the anti-Norquist, insists that theres no signaling here for the simple reason that lifting a subsidy isnt the same as raising taxes, even if both have the effect of raising revenue. The rebuttal is that Coburn actually did vote for tax hikes when he supported the Bowles/Simpson Deficit Commission plan that ended up failing last winter. Ethanol is the flashpoint, but the wider war is over whether theres room for compromise on taxes in the name of finally solving Americas debt problem which explains why the sniping between Team Coburn and Team Norquist has turned remarkably nasty at times. This dispute isnt going away on the contrary, itll get hotter so watch Coburns floor speech today and then spend five minutes with this excellent backgrounder from Andrew Stiles on the deepening conservative wedge. Itll serve you well down the road if/when a deficit package finally hits the floor.
[Iran Press TV] A divided Wisconsin Supreme Court has upheld an anti-union law passed by the Republican-controlled legislature back in March despite a massive public outrage.
The controversial measure, which sparked weeks of protests when Wisconsin's Republican governor Scott Walker signed it, strips most public employees of their collective bargaining rights, Rooters reported on Tuesday.
Tens of thousands of demonstrators descended on the state capitol for weeks and Democratic senators decamped the state to avert a vote last March.
On Tuesday, the State Supreme Court overturned a lower court's ruling that politicians violated Wisconsin's open meetings law when they passed the legislation in March.
However, Houston lies southeast of Dallas... the 68-page decision reflected the sharp divide in the high court as some dissidents opposed it.
The controversial law eliminates most collective bargaining rights for Wisconsin public workers and requires them to pay more for pensions and health coverage. The move has prompted a national debate over unions.
Walker welcomed Tuesday's judgment, saying the measure was needed to help the state fix its finances. It "provides our state the opportunity to move forward together and focus on getting Wisconsin working again," he added.
While the governor might have won the battle for the time being, there is little doubt that the controversy has helped shift public focus to collective-bargaining rights and the economic health of the middle class.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/16/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
The most interesting part of this decision was the 4-3 vote. One set of those justices should never hold public office again. I am still surprised the Dem state senators who absconded a few months ago to block the passage of the bill in question have not had recall petitions launched against them. Rather, some GOP state senators are facing recall petitions, courtesy of the union / Dem political machine.
Here in Ohio I keep getting robo calls from the state head of the AFL-CIO saying the state GOP is intent on destroying the middle class. This is part of their petition process to overturn legislation curtailing public unions in Ohio, similar to that passed in Wisconsin.
#2
I believe the recall elections are occurring this summer. The primaries are in July, and the elections in August. There are (3)Dems and (6)Reps on the agenda. I have no idea the probability of anybody losing their seats.
[Dawn] The district coordination officers were not playing their role, outlined in National Polio Emergency Plan by the prime minister, as a child was tested positive for poliomyelitis in Torghar district on Tuesday bringing number of polio cases in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa ... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central... to six, sources said.
"Torghar is among the seven districts where district coordination officers are not cooperating in anti-polio campaign. The DCOs are supposed to play lead role in polio immunisation campaigns as announced by prime minister on January 16," said officials of health department.
According to them, health department wrote letters to the administrations of eight districts to revisit their plans before the June 13 campaigns and make them workable.
"All the districts were given one week time to redress their weaknesses. Only Swat ...a valley and an administrative district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistain, located 99 mi from Islamabad. It is inhabited mostly by Pashto speakers. The place has gone steadily downhill since the days when Babe Ruth was the Sultan of Swat... responded positively and the department gave go-ahead for the three-day campaign there," they added. The directives didn`t find receptive ears in seven districts, they said.
"Now the department wants result-oriented activities at union council level in all high-risk districts. Volunteers would stay on the teams but they would play second fiddle," they said.
According to the criteria, every team of vaccinators should have at least one government`s employee, who can be held responsible for any slackness. The officials said that in the past majority of the teams consisted of volunteers, who could not be questioned.
The formation of teams of vaccinators depended on the willingness of district administration, they said.
The matter had been reported to Islamabad as according to National Emergency Plan DCOs must play important part in formation of teams and other administrative support to ensure success of the drive.
The health department had to postponed polio campaign in seven districts, including Beautiful Downtown Peshawar, Nowshera, Kohat, Karak, Shangla, Buner and Torghar on June 13 owing to lack of homework there.
"The preparatory arrangements were analysed and the department decided to postpone campaign in these districts," said an official of health department. Now campaigns have been scheduled for June 20 and health authorities in these districts have also been asked to keep in close contact with their respective district coordination officers.
They said that the province was exposed to virus because of the high transmission in Federally Administered Tribal Areas, which had recorded 18 cases this year, the highest in the total 50 cases recorded in the country.
A reporting and response system have been established in all districts to monitor and analyse situation and send report about the cooperation of DCOs to Prime Minister`s Secretariat.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/16/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[5 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
[Dawn] Pakistain warned Wednesday that floods triggered by monsoon rains could affect millions more people this year, but claimed it was better prepared after a massive humanitarian crisis in 2010.
Last year, monsoon-triggered floods affected up to 21 million people and killed an estimated 1,750 people, causing an estimated $10 billion in losses and hammering the already depressed economy.
"There is a very little chance of flooding at the scale of last year and not more than two million people are likely to be affected by floods this year," said Zafar Qadir, the head of the national disaster management authority. Last year's floods were the worst in Pak history.
"Even if there is flooding like last year, not more than six million people will be affected and we are prepared for that," Qadir said.
Qadir said normal annual rain fall in Pakistain is 137.5 millimetres and that this year a 10 per cent decline is forecast, except in northern regions where a 10 per cent increase is likely.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/16/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Ernesto Che Guevara's 83th birthday anniversary has been celebrated in the central Cuban province of Sancti Spiritus, where he carried out important military actions.
Yesterday it was the Empire State manufacturing index that turned unexpectedly negative. Today, its the Philadelphia Feds manufacturing index that dropped into the red
unexpectedly. The report comes amid decidedly mixed economic signals today:
[Al Jazeera] George Papandreou, the Greek prime minister, has in a televised address said he will form a new government on Thursday and seek a vote of confidence from his PASOK parliamentary group.
Yesterdays vote failed for procedural reasons but they cleaned it up today and nailed down a remarkably bipartisan consensus. Eyeball the roll: 38 Democrats, 33 Republicans, and both independents voted yes, with no votes coming mainly from plains-states senators eager to keep the campaign cash flowing. When youve got both senators from California and both senators from Oklahoma on the same side of an issue, youre working magic, my friends.
The district coordination officers were not playing their role, outlined in National Polio Emergency Plan by the prime minister, as a child was tested positive for poliomyelitis in Torghar district on Tuesday bringing number of polio cases in 
