What would Yngwie Malmsteen do?
Archives for August 2006
Friday Terror Thread
Regarding the London arrests I highly recommend Defensetech for the most levelheaded analysis of what is going on.
UK Terror Plot: American Connections?
Countering Liquid Bombs
Mining for Terrorists
Terror Plot Deja Vu
Since I get paid to do something other than know the defense/intelligence business backwards and forwards I will defer to their judgment.
Or, if levelheaded isn’t your thing check out this entertaining post by Rogers at Kung Fu Monkey (from a link in the comments).
Addington Wins
An appeals district court has ruled that receiving and passing on classified information is a prosecutable offense.
In a momentous expansion of the government’s authority to regulate public disclosure of national security information, a federal court ruled that even private citizens who do not hold security clearances can be prosecuted for unauthorized receipt and disclosure of classified information.
The ruling (pdf) by Judge T.S. Ellis, III, denied a motion to dismiss the case of two former employees of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) who were charged under the Espionage Act with illegally receiving and transmitting classified information.
The decision is a major interpretation of the Espionage Act with implications that extend far beyond this particular case.
The Judge ruled that any First Amendment concerns regarding freedom of speech involving national defense information can be superseded by national security considerations.
It will shock me if this decision does not end up before the Supreme Court, for the simple reason that this is one of those rare decisions that fundamentally alters how America operates as a country. In the short term this means that investigative reporters like James Risen may now face prosecution for doing their job. Put that together with our government’s mania for overclassification and you have a decision that essentially nullifies the press as a useful check on government power.
The authoritarian Malkinites and LGFers and readers of Glenn Reynolds will of course celebrate. Any check on government power is too much for this new brand of “conservatism.” A minority party is a baleful enemy (of freedom!) that must be destroyed, the courts represent an out-of-control body of black-robed activists and individual critics should probably be shot for the traitors that they are. These are not exaggerations or Drum’s Rule violations but actual opinions by large numbers of high-traffic bloggers and television personalities. A child can see the authoritarian logic that would make true conservatives spin in their graves, or at least cry into their sparkling cider.
Amazingly, the people who will cheer on the trials that end investigative journalism (cries for which have already become deafening) show a poor grasp of basic market principles. Companies have independent boards and auditors for the simple reason that management that operates in total secrecy does its job poorly. Our government works the same way. Think about why the most embarrassing shows of incompetence that our country has seen – managing the Iraq occupation and FEMA’s meltdown in New Orleans – came from the most reflexively-secret branches of the US government, DoD and Homeland Security. Secrecy kills accountability and breeds incompetence.
I appreciate how galling it can be to imagine the enemies of freedom throwing a wine-tasting party when some leaker reveals that the vice president steals cable. The decision won’t be easy for everybody. But if you care about getting served by a government that operates slightly above the level of a Rummy or a Brownie then folks need to swallow a bitter pill and let the sunlight in.
I Know I am a Curmudgeon
I can’t help it, but I instinctively cringe when I hear the phrase “people power.”
It is just so hokey, so faux-populist, so nauseatingly poll-tested. There has to be a better phrase/word.
Oh yeah- there is. Democracy.
Kevin’s Law
“If you’re forced to rely on random blog commenters to make a point about the prevalence of some form or another of disagreeable behavior, you’ve pretty much made exactly the opposite point.”
Sounds good to me. If I had one quibble I would make it ‘Drum’s Law’ since the semantics of law naming usually call for last names.
We at BJ have a dispensation to defy semantics, because ‘F’s Law’ is too vague and ‘Cole’s Law’ sounds silly.
London Terror Arrests
I don’t know anything more than today’s news, so for now all I can give you is links to the latest:
British Police Thwart Aircraft Bomb Plot
How terrorists could have made a ‘liquid bomb’ (I’m sure that Chertoff appreciates that)
Foiled plane bomb plot suggestive of Qaeda-Chertoff
That last part confuses me. ‘Suggestive’ of al Qaeda? If the British police have suspects in custody then they should know whether there is some Qaeda connection. Strange.
What do you know? If anybody is traveling right now (with WiFi, obviously), what are things like? Discuss.
Shoe Drops
Who will pay for Joe’s independent campaign? Republicans. Marshall Wittmann doesn’t have that much money.
Who will staff Joe’s independent campaign? Republicans. Every Democrat with any experience is already working on some other campaign, and even the imaginary world-class, currently-unemployed Democratic operative wouldn’t commit career suicide by being seen with Joe.
Who will staff Joe’s GOTV operation? Republicans. The union endorsements expired yesterday.
Joe will be the GOP’s boy in this race. He may not know it yet, or he does know it and he’s lying about it, but that’s a simple fact.
So, will Joe go full-on Pub or will he read the cards and drop out? I suppose that depends on how entrenched is his sense of entitlement. My bet is that he will justify the first GOP hire as an emergency stopgap thing, plus a little Frist PAC money to keep Gerstein busy. The next hire will be a little easier, and by the fourth or the sixteenth GOP operative the pain will be gone. Or else Joe’s conscience will speak up and he’ll simply pull up stakes and go home. One or the other.
Housekeeping note: For now ‘General Stupidity’ will stand in for stupidity involving Joe Lieberman’s personal political party, Connecticut for Lieberman. Depending on how things turn out that category will either fold into ‘Republican Stupidity’ or else become irrelevant.