What a wonderful and terrible story (Newsday). It’s some kind of miracle. Let’s pray for the family that all turns out well.
Monthly Archives: March 2004
They Sound Like Script Kiddies
A three-month investigation by the Senate’s top law enforcement officer found a systematic downloading of thousands of Democratic computer files by Republican staffers over the past few years as well as serious flaws in the chamber’s computer security system.
…Some Republicans on the committee — and many conservative groups on the outside — said the Senate should have probed the contents of the memos, which they contended demonstrated the collusion between Democrats and liberal advocacy groups, rather than how the memos ended up in Republican hands.
GOP Aides Implicated In Memo Downloads (Washington Post).
Let’s get this straight:
1. Some Republicans downloaded Democratic memos that were thought secure.
2. They say that it’s weak security’s fault.
3. They say the investigation should delve into the contents of those memos.
Don’t you just love the absolute lack of principal here? They sound like your average script kiddie cracker.
Stern Thinks It’s Over
“If you don’ t think me going after Bush got me thrown off those stations, you got another thing coming,” said Stern. “This has nothing to do with anything I said.”
“come clean with the American people”
In the fall of 2002, Hoeffel voted for the use of military power in Iraq because he said he was “mislead” by the White House.
“I believed we needed to disarm Saddam Hussein of Weapons of Mass Destruction,” he said. “Congress was misled by the President. We need to look into the intelligence reports.”
According to Hoeffel, intelligence reports available to the White House in August 2002, were not available to Congress until the spring of 2003.
“The findings were filled with uncertainty,” he said, “but the White House presented it as fact.”
Local U.S. Rep. Joseph Hoeffel says Bush misled him (The Northeast Breeze).
David Kay, the man who led the CIA’s postwar effort to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, has called on the Bush administration to “come clean with the American people” and admit it was wrong about the existence of the weapons.
In an interview with the Guardian, Mr Kay said the administration’s reluctance to make that admission was delaying essential reforms of US intelligence agencies, and further undermining its credibility at home and abroad.
He welcomed the creation of a bipartisan commission to investigate prewar intelligence on Iraq, and said the wide-ranging US investigation was much more likely to get to the truth than the Butler inquiry in Britain. That, he noted, had “so many limitations it’s going to be almost impossible” to come to meaningful conclusions.
Read more at the Guardian Unlimited.
It’s Kerry vs. Bush
Pennsylvania gets the short end of the stick when it comes to the nomination process. This state now has zero chance of influencing who will become the Democratic nominee. While I am happy that Kerry looks to be our choice – it still would have been great to express that via the primary vote.
I should add that I liked Edwards. I may have voted for him if I had the chance. I think he’ll be in some future campaign for President. It just wasn’t his year. Edwards as VP? Maybe.
I predict many more cultural war issues to be emphasized in coming months. It’s going to almost drown out the discussions that are relevent to governing: balanced bugets, social security, taxes, education and defense. Just watch.
It’s About Creating and Communicating
According to Pew: 44% of U.S. users have contributed their thoughts and files to the online world. Expect that figure to go higher.
More and more we are being given the tools to not only contribute, but compete where before the resources were out of reach, for example making movies. Or more immediately, punditry and opinion from weblogs has completely replaced it from traditional media for me. Same with music/TV/movie news and reviews and so much more.