MAYBE WE SHOULD MAKE THOSE PHONES SOMEWHERE ELSE. Secret Backdoor in Some U.S. Phones Sent Data to China, Analysts Say. “The episode shows how companies throughout the technology supply chain can compromise privacy, with or without the knowledge of manufacturers or customers. It also offers a look at one way that Chinese companies — and by extension the government — can monitor cellphone behavior.”
Archive for 2016
November 15, 2016
GOOD POINT: Trump should learn from Obama’s mistakes: A win is not a coronation, and the presidency is not the only office that matters. And, as Barack Obama never seemed to grasp, there’s always another election coming up.
For eight years, Obama pretended that his victories over John McCain and Mitt Romney somehow invalidated all opposition to his proposals. Only raw partisanship could explain his opponents’ positions because, after all, he had won.
But the Republicans who were opposing his agenda had won too. They were elected by real Americans who had real reservations about Obama’s policies. Their voices deserved to be heard. Our republican system of government was designed specifically to empower them. And yet Obama spent two entire presidential terms telling them to get lost.
And he chose . . . poorly.
SHOT: Harry Reid blames Trump for ‘wave of hate crimes.’
Chaser: FBI: Legit Hate Crimes More Prevalent in Blue States.
Remember when Harry lied about Mitt’s taxes? And now he’s still around to see the Democrats reduced to a rump, regional party.
THAT’S GOING WELL: Clinton camp blames white female ‘internalized misogyny’ for loss.
CHANGE: GOP rushes to embrace Trump.
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PAST PERFORMANCE IS NO GUARANTEE OF FUTURE RESULTS:
“We need to talk about the online radicalisation of young, white men. With the appointment of Breitbart News’s chair to Trump’s staff we need to be clear about the links between misogyny, racism and neofascism on alt-right websites.”
— Abi Wilkinson, the London Guardian, Tuesday.
If I’m asked about 7/7, I—a Yorkshire lad, born and bred—will respond first by giving an out-clause to being labelled a terrorist lover. I think what happened in London was a sad day and not the way to express your political anger. Then there’s the “but”. If, as police announced yesterday, four men (at least three from Yorkshire) blew themselves up in the name of Islam, then please let us do ourselves a favour and not act shocked.
* * * * * * * *
Shocked would be to say that we don’t understand how, in the green hills of Yorkshire, a group of men given all the liberties they could have wished for could do this.
The Muslim community is no monolithic whole. Yet there are some common features. Second- and third-generation Muslims are without the don’t-rock-the-boat attitude that restricted our forefathers. We’re much sassier with our opinions, not caring if the boat rocks or not.
—“We rock the boat,” Dilpazier Aslam, Guardian trainee journalist and member of radical Islamic group Hizb ut-Tahrir, July 23, 2005.
The west’s occupation of our countries is old, but takes new forms. The struggle between us and them began centuries ago, and will continue. There can be no dialogue with occupiers except through arms. Throughout the past century, Islamic countries have not been liberated from occupation except through jihad. But, under the pretext of fighting terrorism, the west today is doing its utmost to besmirch this jihad, supported by hypocrites. Jihad is the path, so seek it.
—“Resist the new Rome,” Osama bin Laden, the Guardian, January 5th, 2004.
MOLLIE HEMINGWAY: Jim Webb For Secretary Of Defense.
WELL, THAT’S NOT GOOD: Study: West Nile Virus Is Deadlier Than the CDC Says. “Disease researchers in Atlanta today announced the results of a study that found that West Nile virus is more dangerous than previously believed, with a mortality rate more than triple what the Centers for Disease Control previously tallied.”
GREAT MOMENTS IN INCOME EQUALITY: “Check out the $12,495 Armani jacket that Hillary is wearing. The word hideous comes to mind. I know it’s unfair for female politicians to be judged on their clothes and figures that most men, except Chris Christie, aren’t. It seems a real challenge for designers to put together an attractive outfit for a woman of Hillary’s build. I would think that designers would like to take on that challenge. Not all women are slim; why not show that you can design for a woman with Hillary’s…er…fashion challenges. And then there is the delicious irony that she wore a jacket costing over $12,000 while delivering a speech in which she decried income inequality and criticizing wealthy hedge fund managers for conspicuous consumption.”
THEY LOOK FRIENDLY: The Texas Department of Public Safety says it arrested 6 members of a local communist group, Red Guards Austin, for assaulting pro-Trump members in Sunday’s protest.
Any romantic flashbacks to Dr. Zhivago will quickly be forgotten looking at this Red Guard group’s mugshots.
IT’S COME TO THIS: NPR Puts Trigger Warning at Start of Steve Bannon Story.
Flashback: Taxpayer-Funded Immaturity: NPR Teaches Readers ‘To Speak Tea Bag.’
21ST CENTURY HEADLINES: Military May Boost Soldier Performance With Brain Stimulation.
HEH: Hillary Clinton Was The Lady Ghostbusters Of Presidential Candidates.
As they said in the earlier, funnier, original Ghostbusters, choose the form of your destructor.
ACE ON WHY MIKE ROGERS IS OFF THE TEAM: Something to do with his wife, probably.
HOW THE VEGAN SAUSAGE GETS MADE: “Stunned By Trump, The New York Times Finds Time For Some Soul-Searching,” former Timesman Michael Cieply writes at that vast rightwing conspiracy scandal-mongering hate rag, Deadline Hollywood:
Having left the Times on July 25, after almost 12 years as an editor and correspondent, I missed the main heat of the presidential campaign; so I can’t add a word to those self-assessments of the recent political coverage. But these recent mornings-after leave me with some hard-earned thoughts about the Times’ drift from its moorings in the nation at-large.
For starters, it’s important to accept that the New York Times has always — or at least for many decades — been a far more editor-driven, and self-conscious, publication than many of those with which it competes. Historically, the Los Angeles Times, where I worked twice, for instance, was a reporter-driven, bottom-up newspaper. Most editors wanted to know, every day, before the first morning meeting: “What are you hearing? What have you got?”
It was a shock on arriving at the New York Times in 2004, as the paper’s movie editor, to realize that its editorial dynamic was essentially the reverse. By and large, talented reporters scrambled to match stories with what internally was often called “the narrative.” We were occasionally asked to map a narrative for our various beats a year in advance, square the plan with editors, then generate stories that fit the pre-designated line.
As John Crudele writes at the New York Post, “The New York Times can’t improve until it admits bias”; eliminating that obsession with The Narrative might be a good place for the Times to start, if they wish to put a Band-Aid on all the hemorrhaging:
The New York Times is so, so very sorry that its presidential election coverage was so, so very wrong.
Please have pity on them, Times publisher Arthur “Pinch” Sulzberger Jr. begged his paper’s readers the other day. “We aim to rededicate ourselves to the fundamental mission of Times journalism. That is to report America and the world honestly, without fear or favor…,” Sulzberger said in a letter.
Tell me, how is the paper going to “rededicate” itself to “honesty” if it can’t even admit that it was dishonest during this past election? The Times’ coverage was blatantly slanted against Republican Donald Trump, so much so, in fact, that even its own Public Editor — who is supposed to be the referee of ethics — slammed her employer.
“We believe we reported on both candidates fairly during the presidential campaign,” Sulzberger added in the letter.
If the boss truly believes that, he might as well shut the paper down right now because he’s going to lose subscribers faster than Hillary Clinton lost her “expected” electoral votes.
I dunno — if there’s one thing we’ve seen over the past week, the vast majority of leftists want to stay permanently bundled-up in the safe space woobie that is the Liberal Cocoon. And nobody, not even the Washington Post, cocoons its readers like the Gray Lady.
QED: Actual headline at the Times: “A Newly Vibrant Washington Fears That Trump Will Drain Its Culture.” As Heather Wilhelm writes at NRO, “One could write a doctoral thesis regarding the multiple-layered ironies within this headline, or merely stare at it and marvel for days.”
Sadly, it will receive no such analysis from the editorial offices of the Times itself, aka, the school cafeteria from Saved By the Bell.
DAVID P. GOLDMAN (AKA SPENGLER): WHY THE BIG LIE ABOUT STEVE BANNON?
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GOOD: Zika Infection in U.S. Is Still Rare So Far, Blood Donations Indicate. “Screenings in a dozen states suggest that Zika infection remains exceedingly rare. Among the approximately 800,000 blood donations tested in the past six months or so, about 40 were initially positive for the virus.”
On the other hand, there’s this: “Still, she noted, it may not be surprising there are so few possibly positive cases, because blood banks have been dissuading people from donating if they recently traveled to an area in which the virus is circulating.”
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