Archive for 2017
September 12, 2017
‘KNOWN WOLF’ TERROR SCANDAL: CIA Knew About 9-11 Hijackers, Didn’t Provide Intel to FBI.
THAT MEANS IT’S WORKING: Insurers make their pitch on how to rescue health-care system.
Funny that WaPo headlines with “health-care system” rather than “ObamaCare exchanges.”
IT’S COME TO THIS: NYC Pizza Fest Debacle Proves Yet Again that Sbarro Is Tops.
BOMB, BOMB, BOMB: Israel Has a Playbook for Dealing With North Korea.
[Israeli PM Menachem] Begin had no military expertise. But his family had been wiped out in the Holocaust. He looked at Saddam, who was openly threating Israel, and saw Hitler. To Begin, sitting around hoping for the best was not a strategy; it was an invitation to aggression. If there was going to be a cost — political, diplomatic, military — better to pay before, not after, the Iraqis had the bomb.
In the summer of 1981, Begin gave the order. The Israeli air force destroyed the Osirak reactor. The United Nations Security Council condemned the attack. The Europeans went bonkers. The New York Times called it “inexcusable.” But the Israeli prime minister wasn’t looking to be excused by the Times or the Europeans or even the usually friendly Ronald Reagan administration. He enunciated a simple rationale that would come to be known as the Begin Doctrine: Israel will not allow its avowed enemies to obtain the means of its destruction.
The wisdom of this doctrine became clear a decade later, during the Gulf War, when Saddam Hussein made good on his threat to fire Russian-made SCUD missiles at Israeli cities. The SCUDs landed, and caused some damage and a fair amount of panic, but they were not armed with unconventional warheads. Israel had taken that option off the table.
Similarly, in 2007, Israel confirmed what it had suspected for five years: Syria, with North Korean help, was trying to build a nuclear reactor. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, a Begin disciple, sent Mossad chief Meir Dagan to Washington, to ask for American intervention. The CIA chief, Michael Hayden, agreed with Israel’s contention that Damascus (with Iranian financing) was constructing the reactor. But Hayden convinced President George W. Bush that bombing the site would result in all-out war, and who wants that?
Acting on its own, Israel destroyed the Syrian site (reportedly killing a group of North Korean experts in the process). Hayden was wrong about how Syria would react, as he later admitted. If Israel had been reasonable and listened to the CIA, Bashar al-Assad would have nuclear weapons right now.
One big difference is that unlike Iraq and Syria, North Korea has a Great Power patron right next door — which really makes this China’s problem to deal with, should they ever want to sit at the grownup table of nations.
DELIBERATE ABUSE OF DMCA TAKEDOWNS SHOULD BE PROSECUTED AS A CRIMINAL CONSPIRACY TO DEPRIVE PEOPLE OF THEIR CIVIL RIGHTS: It Doesn’t Matter How Much Of An Asshole You Think Someone Is, That’s No Excuse To DMCA.
EQUIFAX DATA BREACH: Here’s What You Should Be Doing Right Now.
I WAS JUST BEING “PAINTERLY” WHEN I CALLED YOU AN EXTORTIONIST: Hyperbole is all the rage these days, but when reporters use words like “extort” they and their lawyers and editors really need to think it through. That’s especially hard when you advertise yourself as a “just the facts” news outfit and then turn around and plead “hyperbole” as a defense. The Second Circuit (the most press-friendly in the nation) reverses in part, dismissal of a libel claim:
“[A] reasonable reader could interpret the word “extort” here as more than just “rhetorical hyperbole” describing [the] belief that the lawsuit was frivolous. [They] did not simply state that [the reported upon] lawsuit was an attempt to extort money from the company. Instead, [it was] stated that Plaintiff “repeatedly” tried to extort money from them. This statement can be read as something other than a characterization of Plaintiff’s underlying lawsuit against and is reasonably susceptible to a defamatory meaning—that Plaintiff actually committed the criminal act of extortion—a statement that is capable of being proven false.”
DISCLOSURE: I served as Global Media Counsel to Bloomberg News for almost 14 years.
TAKING A CUE FROM THE PRIVATE SECTOR: New F-35 Roadmap Would Roll Out Updates Like iPhone.
“Envision in your head: the pilot jumps in a jet, fires it up, the panoramic cockpit display comes up,” said Vice Adm. Mat Winter, F-35 program executive officer, during an event Sept. 6. “Envision a little window that pops up that says, ‘Your latest [electro-optical distributed aperture system] software update is ready for download: yes or no?’ Similar to what you do on your smart phone.”
This new strategy will allow the F-35 Joint Program Office (JPO) to move ahead with follow-on development while still fixing software “deficiencies” that are less urgent to resolve, Winter said.
But what happens if a disgruntled tech releases the “gold master” software to the public?
FASTER, PLEASE: Immune-focused drug may be new weapon against advanced melanoma.
ASKING THE IMPORTANT QUESTIONS: Does eating pineapple really change the way your vagina smells?
THE APPROPRIATE REMEDY IS EXPULSION: Lectures for one of Reed College’s signature learning experiences, a humanities course centered on the ancient Mediterranean, were canceled after protesters attempted to interrupt the class to protest what they see as Eurocentrism. Unless Reed wants to go down the road taken by Mizzou, Evergreen State, Oberlin, etc.
CLAUDIA ROSETT: UN Passes Mega-Ultra-Jumbo Toughest-Ever North Korea Sanctions (Again).
But this time it’ll work for sure.
I LOST FAITH IN THE RED CROSS LONG AGO: Red Cross “didn’t show up” at Florida shelters during Irma. “Miami-Dade’s hurricane shelters experienced ‘chaos’ during Irma, and the Miami-Dade schools chief Alberto Carvalho says that’s because the Red Cross was missing in action. The Red Cross is contracted to run 42 shelters in Miami-Dade schools, but in many cases, Red Cross personnel were late to show up, and in others, no one showed up at all.”
FAKE NEWS: Clinton Cited False Study As Reason She Lost Wisconsin.
To be fair, she drank heavily while her book was being authored.
VICTOR DAVIS HANSON: Call It On — Or Call It Off?
AT AMAZON, on sale, Learn Spanish: Rosetta Stone Spanish (Latin America) – Level 1-3 Set.
Plus, Deal of the Day, CUISINART 12-Piece Stainless Steel Cookware Set.
NO. NEXT QUESTION? Can California Really Go 100 Percent Renewable Energy?
LATE-STAGE SOCIALISM: UN warns of possible crimes against humanity in Venezuela.
“My investigation suggests the possibility that crimes against humanity may have been committed, which can only be confirmed by a subsequent criminal investigation,” Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein told the UN Human Rights Council on Monday.
Venezuela’s foreign minister defended the record of the government of President Nicolas Maduro, rejecting the allegations as “baseless”.
Venezuela has been convulsed by months of demonstrations both for and against Maduro, who critics say has plunged the oil-rich country into the worst economic crisis in its history and is turning it into a dictatorship. At least 125 people have been killed in clashes with police since the protests began.
Zeid said the government was using criminal proceedings against opposition leaders, arbitrary detentions, excessive use of force and ill-treatment of detainees, which in some cases amounted to torture.
Socialism is a crime against humanity, and it’s one the people usually commit against themselves.
Related: Venezuela Supreme Court has staged effective coup.
In two rulings in March 2017, the Supreme Court of Justice “effectively claimed legislative powers for itself, depriving the National Assembly of its Constitutional powers and granting sweeping arbitrary powers to the executive,” it said.
“These decisions amount to a coup d’état against the Constitutional order and have ushered in a new reign of arbitrary rule,” Sam Zarifi, ICJ Secretary General, said in a statement.
Judges on the Supreme Court are mainly from the ruling Socialist Party and/or former officials of the government of Maduro, the Geneva-based jurists’ group said.
Does this mean that the right people are at long last in charge?
DEMAND CURVES SLOPE DOWNWARDS: Amazon’s price cuts at Whole Foods led to a 25% increase in customers.
IN THE MAIL: 400 Things Cops Know: Street-Smart Lessons from a Veteran Patrolman.
Plus, fresh Gold Box and Lightning Deals