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Archive for the 'News and politics' Category

Hope for the future

I read this page a few weeks ago and I don’t agree with a lot of the things the author seems to pine for, like paddling kids, but the examples he uses of the “current alternative” would be amusing if they weren’t so appallingly likely to happen. For instance:

Scenario: Johnny […]

Encryption in the UK now legally irrelevant

Ars Technica reports that a new law going into effect today make it a criminal offense to refuse an order to decrypt your own data.

Individuals who are believed to have the cryptographic keys necessary for such decryption will face up to 5 years in prison for failing to comply with police or military orders to […]

On Burma

Technocrat carries two informative articles on the current savage military lockdown in Burma.
The Risk of Journalism discusses Courage against the Junta, an article I found painful to read.

We disguised his identity before putting the interview to air. Later, I learned he had been arrested by secret police. For telling the […]

A Greater Depression

“The words of my grandfather always go through my head […]. He would always tell me, the only people who survived the Great Depression were those who had money to spend when everyone else was broke. Those who saved while everyone else spent like crazy”.
“I think the best case scenario is that the dollar […]

Student tasered at John Kerry speech

People who start who start yelling “Rodney King!” make it look like the police get abusive only once every fifteen years.

Update: A much better angle which shows that the guy was restrained and already in handcuffs when he was tasered.

Loss of Privacy

There’s an article on the L.A. Times detailing how putting all your communication eggs in the basket of a single unscrupulous provider can have serious privacy implications. For example:

There are red flags to be found in each telecom provider’s privacy policy. A close reading of Time Warner’s policy reveals:
[…]

Iran: We don’t want dollars

From the United Press:

Faced with U.S. economic sanctions and a weak dollar, Tehran is demanding foreign energy companies do business in yen and euros, despite increasingly desperate need for investment.
In a deal announced last week, Japan’s Nippon Oil agreed to buy oil from Iran using yen instead […]

Judge suggests all-UK DNA database

A British judge is suggesting an all-inclusive DNA database. The twisted thing is the rationale:

The present database in England and Wales holds details of 4m people who are guilty or cleared of a crime.
Lord Justice Sedley said this was indefensible and biased against ethnic minorities, and […]

Star Wars Conspiracy Theory

Not the movies, but the Strategic Defense Initiative proposed under Reagan.

Fifty-year-old Alistair Beckham was a successful British aerospace- projects engineer. His specialty was designing computer software for sophisticated naval defense systems. Like hundreds of other British scientists, he was working on a pilot program for America’s Strategic Defense Initiative–better known as […]

Massive attack against Iran?

Maccabee on The Daily KOS has an superb post on a Navy officer discussing the current military situation, and how impending an attack on Iran is:

Like most Marines and former Marines, she is largely apolitical. The fact is, most Marines are trigger pullers and most trigger pullers could care less who […]