The Evening Blues - 6-9-23



eb1pt12


The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: Detroit Junior

Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features Chicago blues piano player Detroit Junior. Enjoy!

Detroit Jr - The Way I Feel

"The most odious of all oppressions are those which mask as justice."

-- Robert H. Jackson


News and Opinion

Julian Assange loses his appeal against extradition to the US on espionage charges

Julian Assange has lost his appeal against extradition to the US on espionage charges.

The judgment was handed down privately on Monday at the High Court.

WikiLeaks founder Assange, 51, launched the appeal last June after then-Home Secretary Priti Patel signed an order authorizing his removal.

Yesterday his wife Stella said that he will appeal the decision. It will be Assange's last chance to overturn the ruling before his options in the UK courts are exhausted. ...

There is still a chance that his extradition could be blocked by a last minute intervention from judges in Europe.

In December, Assange appealed to the European Court of Human Rights.

To halt his extradition now, the European Court would have to issue an emergency injunction known as a Rule 39 order.

This allows a judge to effectively block any action until further legal proceedings to decide on the merits of a case.


Snowden Warns Today's Surveillance Technology Makes 2013 Look Like 'Child's Play'

With this week marking 10 years since whistleblower Edward Snowden disclosed information to journalists about widespread government spying by United States and British agencies, the former National Security Agency contractor on Thursday joined other advocates in warning that the fight for privacy rights, while making several inroads in the past decade, has grown harder due to major changes in technology.

"If we think about what we saw in 2013 and the capabilities of governments today," Snowden told The Guardian, "2013 seems like child's play."

Snowden said that the advent of commercially available surveillance products such as Ring cameras, Pegasus spyware, and facial recognition technology has posed new dangers.

As Common Dreams has reported, the home security company Ring has faced legal challenges due to security concerns and its products' vulnerability to hacking, and has faced criticism from rights groups for partnering with more than 1,000 police departments—including some with histories of police violence—and leaving community members vulnerable to harassment or wrongful arrests.

Law enforcement agencies have also begun using facial recognition technology to identify crime suspects despite the fact that the software is known to frequently misidentify people of color—leading to the wrongful arrest and detention earlier this year of Randal Reid in Georgia, among other cases.

Last month, journalists and civil society groups called for a global moratorium on the sale and transfer of spyware like Pegasus, which has been used to target dozens of journalists in at least 10 countries.

Protecting the public from surveillance "is an ongoing process," Snowden told The Guardian on Thursday. "And we will have to be working at it for the rest of our lives and our children's lives and beyond."

Republican Senators Introduce ‘End Endless Wars Act’ to Repeal 2001 AUMF

A group of Republican senators on Thursday introduced a bill to repeal the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) that was passed in the wake of the September 11th attacks and is still being used to justify wars today.

The End Endless Wars Act was introduced by Senators Rand Paul (R-KY), Mike Lee (R-UT), JD Vance (R-OH), and Mike Braun (R-IN). The legislation would repeal the 2001 AUMF 180 days after its enactment.

“If there exists any desire to reclaim our Constitutional power and send a message to the world that we are a nation of peace, Congress should pass this bill and repeal the 2001 Authorization for war. After all, the 2001 AUMF never intended to authorize worldwide war, all the time, everywhere, forever,” said Sen. Paul, according to a press release from his office. ...

The 2001 AUMF currently authorizes war in Syria, Iraq, Somalia, Yemen, and several other countries. There’s been a push in Congress to repeal the 2002 AUMF that was used for the 2003 invasion of Iraq, but that authorization is not used today, and repealing it won’t end any current wars.

Ukr Offensive Standstill, Leo2 Tanks Destroyed, No Ground Taken; China-Russia Increase Military Ties

Intense fighting reported as Ukrainian forces go on attack south of Zaporizhzhia

A substantial Ukrainian force was pushing an assault against Russian positions in the south on Thursday, in an intensification of fighting that some Ukrainian officials and western analysts said marked the start in earnest of Kyiv’s much-vaunted counteroffensive.

The combat against Russian positions south of Zaporizhzhia included western-supplied tanks and armoured vehicles and infantry backed by artillery. There were reports of intense fighting outside the town of Tokmak, a key Russian logistical hub.

Asked about US media reports that the counteroffensive had begun, a spokesperson for Ukraine’s general staff said: “We have no such information. And we do not comment on anonymous sources.”

Ukrainian officials, however, have insisted that they would not make an official announcement when the counteroffensive begins and have cautioned against focusing on a single area, suggesting it could involve a number of components.

The Institute for the Study of War, a US-based thinktank that has been producing daily updates on the war, said it had concluded on Thursday that the Ukrainian counteroffensive had begun.

Zelensky Says He’s Received a ‘Powerful Offer’ on F-16s

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Tuesday that Ukraine has received a “powerful offer” from countries that are willing to provide their American-made F-16 fighter jets.

Since President Biden approved the delivery of F-16s from Europe to Ukraine, it hasn’t been clear which countries will send the jets. European nations that are expected to arm Ukraine with their F-16s include the Netherlands, Belgium, and Denmark, but they haven’t made a commitment.

Zelensky signaled that a deal on the aircraft will be reached soon. “Our partners know how many aircraft we need,” he said. “I have already received an understanding of the number from some of our European partners … It is a serious, powerful offer.”

'Were you aware?': Russia wants US to answer about how its weapons used in Ukraine

The US authorities must give a concrete answer as to whether or not they know how American weapons are being used on the territory of Ukraine, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told a briefing in comments on the attack on the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant.

Against the backdrop of the recent attack on the Kakhovka HPP, she pointed to a statement made last December by Ukrainian General Andrey Kovalchuk in an interview with The Washington Post, in which he said that the Ukrainian army had already conducted a test strike from a US HIMARS system on one of the dam's gates to punch it and see how high the water level of the Dnieper River rises.

"Now, the question for [White House National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John] Kirby, [White House Press Secretary] Karin Jean-Pierre, all the people who are in charge of communications at the White House. [...] Were you aware of how American weapons, the weapons that are being supplied to Ukraine, are used?" she asked.

"That trial tests of a terrorist attack against civilian infrastructure in third countries are being made? These are the questions that we directly pose in the public space before the White House; you must answer them," she said, adding that the attack on the Kakhovka HPP "is certainly an act of terrorism."

Russia Says West Trying to Confuse the World Over Nord Stream Culprits

The Russian embassy in the United States said on Wednesday that a report the United States knew of a Ukrainian plan to attack the Nord Stream natural gas pipelines was part of a coordinated Western attempt to confuse the world over the truth.

The Washington Post reported on Tuesday, citing leaked information posted online that the CIA learned last June, through a European spy agency, that a six-person team of Ukrainian special operations forces intended to blow up the Russia-to-Germany project.

"The coordinated campaign of the West, led by the United States, to confuse the international community is sewn with white threads," Russian diplomat Andrey Ledenev was quoted as saying in a post on the embassy's Telegram messaging channel.

"The reason for the proliferating theories and versions, supported by the notorious 'confidential' data of the local intelligence community, is simple to the point of banality."

Ukraine Is NOT A Humanitarian War – Says RFK Jr.

China reportedly reaches secret deal with Cuba to host spy base on island

China has reached a secret deal with Cuba to establish an electronic eavesdropping facility on the island roughly 100 miles (160km) from Florida, the Wall Street Journal has reported, but the US and Cuban governments cast strong doubt on the report.

Such a spy installation would allow Beijing to gather electronic communications from the south-eastern United States, which houses many US military bases, as well as to monitor ship traffic, the newspaper reported.

The US Central Command headquarters is based in Tampa. Fort Liberty, formerly Fort Bragg, the largest US military base, is based in North Carolina.

The countries have reached an agreement in principle, the officials said, with China to pay Cuba “several billion dollars” to allow the eavesdropping station, according to the Journal.

“We have seen the report. It’s not accurate,” John Kirby, spokesperson for the White House national security council, told Reuters. But he did not specify what he thought was incorrect. He said the United States has had “real concerns” about China’s relationship with Cuba and was closely monitoring it.

DOJ vs. African People's Socialist Party: Omali Yeshitela Blasts Charges of Being Russian Agent

Republican states send national guard troops to Texas border in show of force

Republican governors from 14 states are sending national guard troops and other personnel to the Texas-Mexico border in a show of force that immigration advocates warn risks lives and critics denounce as “political stunts”.

Florida’s Ron DeSantis has assigned the most – 1,100 people, including 500 national guard and others such as law enforcement officers, a group about 10 times larger than the anti-immigration governor sent in 2021.

Others have promised troops are on the way or will arrive in the next three months from Arkansas, South Dakota, Tennessee, Virginia and elsewhere, with governors using words such as “crisis” or “war zone” and accusing Joe Biden of “failing to repel illegals” in their public announcements.

Their rush answers a call from the Texas governor, Greg Abbott, for reinforcements, citing an emergency, amid his repeated challenges to federal authority at the border. Abbott said that since 2021 “Texas has spent more than $4.5bn on essential border security operations, and the Texas legislature is currently contemplating an additional $4.6bn for the next two years.”

State personnel do not have the power to process people crossing the US-Mexico border to request asylum, which comes under federal authority, and experts caution their presence is confusing, intimidating and potentially dangerous.



the horse race



Alabama discriminated against Black voters, US supreme court rules

Alabama discriminated against Black voters when it drew its seven congressional districts last year, the supreme court has ruled, a decision that is a major victory for the Voting Rights Act (VRA).

The decision was 5-4, with Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh joining the court’s three liberal justices in the opinion. Writing for the majority of the court, Roberts noted the court was rejecting Alabama’s effort to get it to rewrite its longstanding interpretation of section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which outlaws voting practices that discriminate on the basis of race. The decision means that section 2 of the law, one of its last remaining powerful provisions, will remain intact. ...

The decision in the case, Allen v Milligan, means that Alabama will have to draw its congressional map to include a second majority-Black district. Black voters currently comprise a majority of the voting age population in just one district, despite making up a quarter of the state’s population.

“This decision is a crucial win against the continued onslaught of attacks on voting rights,” Deuel Ross, an attorney with the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund who argued on behalf of the plaintiffs, said in a statement. “Alabama attempted to rewrite federal law by saying race had no place in redistricting. But because of the state’s sordid and well-documented history of racial discrimination, race must be used to remedy that past and ensure communities of color are not boxed out of the electoral process.”

The ruling also is a boon to similar cases in Louisiana, Texas and Georgia, where litigants currently are suing to require the drawing of additional majority-minority districts. “This precedent also lays a foundation for fair map decisions in our other Section 2 cases,” said Marina Jenkins, the executive director of the National Redistricting Foundation, a Democratic-aligned group that is involved in those cases.

Indicted Again: Donald Trump Faces Federal Espionage & Conspiracy Charges in Classified Docs Probe

Donald Trump indicted on 7 counts in classified documents probe

Former President Donald Trump has been indicted on seven counts in the special counsel’s classified documents probe, a stunning development that marks the first time a former president has faced federal charges.

Trump is facing a charge under the Espionage Act, his attorney Jim Trusty said on CNN Thursday, as well as charges of obstruction of justice, destruction or falsification of records, conspiracy and false statements.

The special counsel has been investigating Trump’s handling of classified documents that were brought to his Mar-a-Lago Florida resort after he left the White House in 2021, as well as possible obstruction of the investigation and government efforts to retrieve the material.

The former president wrote on Truth Social that he had been informed by the Justice Department he was indicted and that he was “summoned to appear at the Federal Courthouse in Miami on Tuesday, at 3 PM.”

“The corrupt Biden Administration has informed my attorneys that I have been Indicted, seemingly over the Boxes Hoax,” Trump wrote.

Hillary Clinton's TONE-DEAF Trump Indictment Cash Grab: Sells 'But Her Emails' Hat, Rising Reacts



the evening greens


Air pollution in US from wildfire smoke is worst in recent recorded history

The US experienced its worst toxic air pollution from wildfire smoke in its recent recorded history on Wednesday, researchers have found, with people in New York exposed to levels of pollution more than five times above the national air quality standard.

The rapid analysis of the extreme event, shared with the Guardian, found that smoke billowing south from forest fires in Canada caused Americans to suffer the worst day of average exposure to such pollution since a dataset on smoky conditions started in 2006.

“It’s the worst by far, I mean, Jesus, it was bad,” said Marshall Burke, an environmental scientist at Stanford University who led the work. “It’s hard to believe to be honest, we had to quadruple check it to see if it was right. We have not seen events like this, or even close to this, on the east coast before. This is a historic event.”

The Stanford researchers calculated that the average American on Wednesday was exposed to 27.5 micrograms per cubic meter of small particulate matter carried within the plumes of smoke. These tiny flecks of soot, dust and other burned debris, known as PM2.5, bury deep in the lungs when inhaled and are linked to a variety of health conditions and can cause deaths.

Alarm at rightwing push to reverse clean-energy success in Texas and beyond

In the scramble before the end of Texas’s legislative session last week, a must-pass bill was amended to impose new costs upon renewable energy. This came amid a barrage of anti-solar and wind power measures pushed forward by Republicans to reshape a state that has become the US’s powerhouse of clean energy.

But the conservative lawmakers had help.

Sections of the bill that impose new burdens upon clean energy providers were directly crafted and edited by the Texas Public Policy Foundation (or TPPF), a conservative group that has led the backlash to renewables and to make what it calls “the moral case for fossil fuels”, according to a copy of the draft language seen by the Guardian.

Several dozen edits were made to the bill’s amendments by Brent Bennett, a TPPF policy staffer, the document shows, and Texas lawmakers subsequently passed parts of this language along with the key TPPF desires – to impose new transmission costs on renewables and require them to source fossil fuel “backup” power when the sun isn’t shining or wind isn’t blowing.

The passage of the bill, which funds the ongoing operation of the Public Utility Commission of Texas, was the flagship victory for TPPF even as a raft of other Republican bills that would have “shut down the renewable energy industry in Texas”, as energy analyst Doug Lewin put it, faltered.


Also of Interest

Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.

Is Russia’s Least Bad Option Now the Maximalist Stance of Taking Control of Western Ukraine?

Former NATO head raises prospect of “troops on the ground” in Ukraine

NY Times’ Pathetic Whitewashing Of N@zis In Ukraine!

Welcome to Dystopia: From Wildfires, to Flooding, to Serial Banking Crises and Crypto Frauds, It’s All Too Surreal

Quick Takes 2: The End Of Wild Fish Approaches, Decline Of The Dollar, And More

Dock Workers SHUT DOWN West Coast Ports!

MTG Claims CONFIRMATION Of Biden Burisma Bribery Scheme VP Term Under Obama


A Little Night Music

Detroit Jr - So Unhappy

Detroit Jr - Turn Up The Heat

Detroit Jr - Too Poor

Detroit Jr - Call My Job

Detroit Junior - All Through With Love

Detroit Junior - Dance with Me Baby

Detroit Jr. - I Got Money

Detroit Jr. - Money Crazy

Detroit Junior - Boogie Blues

Detroit Junior - If I Hadn't Been High


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16 users have voted.

Comments

ggersh's picture

https://www.theautomaticearth.com/2023/06/debt-rattle-june-9-2023/

https://www.rt.com/russia/577730-ukraine-counteroffensive-losses-cnn/

And Roger Waters shows what a farce the anti-semetic trope is


This is a Royal Mail stamp from 1981 bearing a profile of the late Queen – same hammer symbols, same tyrant uniform. McCarthyite fanatics opposed to any criticism at all of the apartheid Israeli state are trying to cancel this anti-fascist protest from our culture. @rogerwaters

up
14 users have voted.

I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

usefewersyllables's picture

@ggersh

that has me completely gobsmacked. This is the most blatant effort at revisionist history that I've seen in a long time. And people are going along with it.

Apparently, Bob Geldof chopped up his own eyebrows with a razor blade in vain. The memory hole here would stop a friggin' clock. I mourn the death of critical thinking, but I mourn the death of memory of things that have happened in my lifetime even more....

Gawd.

up
16 users have voted.

Twice bitten, permanently shy.

ggersh's picture

@usefewersyllables Why oh why is this being done at this level? Are tptb
that afraid? JD did a video where that shows tptb already
going after Tucker Carlson cuz you guessed it he's anti-semetic.
Like wtf is going down. Once you're against the narrative it automatically
makes one anti-semetic.

It scares the shit out of me cuz being Jewish already targets
me enough.

I'll add one thing, I don't believe that people believe the government
in what they're doing as much as the govt want us all to believe that
that is so. I.E.,the bubble isn't as big as they make it out to be.

up
18 users have voted.

I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

QMS's picture

@ggersh

even close to reality
seems the closer opinion gets
to exposing the lies, the more
they fight back with stupid shit
no! it was the aliens!!
sheewww

up
12 users have voted.

question everything

ggersh's picture

@QMS With Marvel leading the way courtesy of Thor, The Avengers
Captain Marvel, Iron Man, etc.etc.

Now I admit I'm a believer that we aren't alone in this
great universe and some aliens might be malevolent, they
could also be benevolent. But all the media that I've seen
has it that they are definitely evil. The empire always I
stress always has to have an enemy and never friends. Peace
just doesn't pay.....sigh

up
8 users have voted.

I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

TheOtherMaven's picture

@ggersh

and has been since 1938 (debut of Superman). On the other hand they can be just as rabidly Russophobic (in fact they're apparently gearing up for another round). They also destroy and re-create the universe on an annual basis, and even when they seem to be reverting to a previous continuity, you never get the exact same old one back - there are always differences, sometimes major. (DC tries to pretend there is continuity, but there isn't.)

Don't ask what DC history "is", because it will change.

up
7 users have voted.

There is no justice. There can be no peace.

ggersh's picture

@TheOtherMaven

up
3 users have voted.

I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

@ggersh

an article about trust in the media published last year. All time low is really low. So how are we meant to believe that everyone believes them?

https://news.gallup.com/poll/394817/media-confidence-ratings-record-lows...

JULY 18, 2022
Media Confidence Ratings at Record Lows
BY MEGAN BRENAN

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• 16% of Americans have a great deal/quite a lot of confidence in newspapers

• 11% have some the degree of confidence in television news

... Confidence in television news has never been higher than its initial 46% reading in 1993 and has averaged 27%, considerably higher than the current 11%. This is the fourth consecutive year that confidence in TV news is below 20%. And for just the second time in the trend, a majority of Americans, 53%, now say they have very little or no confidence at all in TV news.

... Although trust in the media in the U.S. has been scarce for many years, confidence ratings for newspapers and TV news have never been as low as they are now.

up
12 users have voted.
ggersh's picture

@Linda Wood Since 2016 it's been Russia did this, Russia did
that, Russia did everything.

I was just reading

@ggersh

an article about trust in the media published last year. All time low is really low. So how are we meant to believe that everyone believes them?

While Tucker Carlson got over 100 million views on his TwiiterCast
Fox/MSNBC/CNN got a total of 3 million in that same day. There is
a great disconnect in the force in amerika, the empire of lies

up
9 users have voted.

I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

joe shikspack's picture

@ggersh

thanks for the rt piece, it's kind of funny to see them quoting the u.s. government propaganda outlet cnn. Smile

i am hoping that the attacks on roger waters will backfire and the 33,000,000 people who bought copies of "the wall" will tell all of their friends that the government is full of shit.

up
12 users have voted.
ggersh's picture

@joe shikspack grilled them about Roger Waters....hurrah!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frbets8grts

up
7 users have voted.

I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

OLinda's picture

for the Assange news. I used to follow it on my own, but stopped some time ago. I still hold hope.

up
11 users have voted.
joe shikspack's picture

@OLinda

when i follow the news about assange, i console myself with the thought that he has checkmated the powers that be - no matter what the outcome of his tribulations, he will achieve his objective of exposing the powers that be for what they are in a way that nobody can really miss. if the powers that be were a smarter bunch, they would have let assange go long ago rather than making him a martyr.

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10 users have voted.
Pluto's Republic's picture

This appears to be true. This can affect any Apple iPhone in the US, or anywhere in the world. The virus was most likely designed by Apple for the NSA. I have not seen this reported in the US news yet.

Russia accuses US of cyberattack on Apple devices

AFPJune 2, 2023

Russia’s security service has accused the United States of being behind a cyberattack on thousands of Apple devices as cybersecurity firm Kaspersky Lab said it discovered spyware on iPhones used by its staff.

The FSB said on Thursday that the US National Security Agency was in “close cooperation” with Apple as thousands of devices were “infected” and that the telephone numbers of people working at Russian embassies abroad were leaked.

Separately, Kaspersky said its researchers found previously unknown malware on iOS devices and that dozens of its staff were targeted.

The antivirus software maker’s founder, Eugene Kaspersky, said the devices received an “invisible iMessage” with a malicious attachment which installs spyware.

He said the spyware then “quietly” transmits private information to remote servers, including microphone recordings, photos from instant messengers, geolocation and other data.

“We’re confident that Kaspersky was not the main target of this cyberattack,” he said in a blog post. The company said the oldest traces of infection date back to 2019 and that “the attack is ongoing”.

US regulators designated Kaspersky a “threat to national security” in March 2022, after Moscow sent troops into neighbouring Ukraine.

Founded in 1997, Kaspersky has been accused of being close to Russian intelligence services.

The company has 400 million customers worldwide.

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8 users have voted.
joe shikspack's picture

@Pluto's Republic

i think that regardless of what sort of cell phone you have, it is chock full of spyware as is all of the infrastructure of the network that it resides on and navigates.

i remember before cellphones, the spooks had found ways to spy using old phone technology, including being able to use hung-up phones as microphones to listen in on activities in a home or office. government is a pernicious force. it will not stop spying until we force it to.

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9 users have voted.
Pluto's Republic's picture

@joe shikspack

I remember when Apple fought so hard to maintain their encryption and refused to unlock the iPhone for government spying. (The San Bernardino terrorist attack.)

They took a stand and didn't fold like a cheap suit the way Google and Facebook did. Until they did, I suppose. I do know that any remote hack in iPhone technology can only be an inside job. It's not open source like the rest of the pack.

Apple, like our other Corporate Overlords, is an obvious collaborator in crushing US civil rights. Rights that have been blowing away, one by one, in the hot winds of a failed state.

up
8 users have voted.
joe shikspack's picture

@Pluto's Republic

i remember thinking that, too. then i wondered if it was really true or just a creative promotion for their line of stuff. i remember the last guy who really tried to shut the government out (qwest's ceo) who wound up probably getting screwed with lawfare:

The telecommunications company Qwest turned down requests by the National Security Agency for private telephone records because it concluded that doing so would violate federal privacy laws, a lawyer for the telephone company's former chief executive said today.

In a statement released this morning, the lawyer said that the former chief executive, Joseph N. Nacchio, made the decision after asking whether "a warrant or other legal process had been secured in support of that request."

Mr. Nacchio learned that no warrant had been granted and that there was a "disinclination on the part of the authorities to use any legal process," said the lawyer, Herbert J. Stern. As a result, the statement said, Mr. Nacchio concluded that "the requests violated the privacy requirements of the Telecommunications Act."

A Qwest spokesman, Robert Toevs, declined to discuss anything to do with security issues or the statement by Mr. Nacchio's lawyer.

Qwest was the only phone company to turn down requests from the security agency for phone records as part of a program to compile a vast database of numbers and other information on virtually all domestic calls.

-=-=-=-=-

Joseph P. Nacchio (born June 22, 1949 in Brooklyn, New York) is an American executive who was chairman of the board and chief executive officer of Qwest Communications International from 1997 to 2002. Nacchio was convicted of insider trading during his time heading Qwest. He claimed in court, with documentation, that his was the only company to demand legal authority for surreptitious mass surveillance demanded by the NSA which began prior to the 11 September 2001 attacks.

He was convicted of 19 counts of insider trading in Qwest stock on April 19, 2007 – charges his defense team claimed were U.S. government retaliation for his refusal to give customer data to the National Security Agency in February, 2001. This defense was not admissible in court because the U.S. Department of Justice filed an in limine motion, which is often used in national security cases, to exclude information which may reveal state secrets. Information from the Classified Information Procedures Act hearings in Nacchio's case was likewise ruled inadmissible.

On July 27, 2007, he was sentenced to six years in federal prison, and after appeals failed he reported to Federal Correctional Institution, Schuylkill in Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania on April 14, 2009 to serve his sentence. Nacchio finished serving his sentence on September 20, 2013.

so, now i just assume that apple is doing exactly what everybody else is doing, since i don't see its ceo going to jail on trumped-up charges or meeting some other fate of the sort dished out by the spooks.

as far as security of your communications go, if the powers that be want it, they will get it. and if it doesn't exist to be gotten, they will make it up. (see recent events involving roger waters for a relatively mild recent example)

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9 users have voted.
QMS's picture

@joe shikspack

the missing pieces in my mind is why do the authorities want all of this
superfluous information? Why bog down their mega computers with little
shit that has nothing to do with terrorism, homeland security, domestic
resistance et cetera? Harvesting data can be financially useful, I suppose
but really -- when it comes down to it -- what good is it?
Perhaps I'm missing something but aggregating that much data is way
beyond sorting anything out. It is like some of my autistic friends
memorizing license plate numbers of random vehicles on the road.
What useful purpose is having that quantum knowledge? Maybe it is
a net created to store data. For the sake of fulfilling the capacity of
info gleaners, IDK. Seems awfully paranoid.

up
4 users have voted.

question everything

joe shikspack's picture

@QMS

what it seems to me that you are missing is that they don't know just who they might want to threaten or implicate in crimes later, but having a vast database where you can virtually reconstruct someone's (anyone's) life (their communications, their associations, their locations, etc.) in whatever way that you like at the time of your choosing is tremendously valuable to them.

as for it seeming to be a lot of trouble, why do you think that the stasi went to so much trouble to collect buildings full of records on virtually an entire nation?

nothing is too extravagant for a government that wishes to maintain control of a population.

up
9 users have voted.
QMS's picture

@joe shikspack

it does make a certain amount of sense
if we are all potential terrorists
take your shoes off and dance
in front of the x-ray machine
before getting to the runway
empty your pockets and do not
have a bottle of water
it has become a bit extreme

up
8 users have voted.

question everything

Pluto's Republic's picture

@QMS

...pertaining to you for decades. Every landline phone call is recorded. Not just metadata — but full conversations. Everything you buy at the grocery store, if you use a store card. What you look at on the Internet and what you have posted. Where you have traveled, who you have called. All of your contacts, and all of their contacts. Where you go everyday, the routes you take. Your health, your habits, your attachments, your money. The food you eat, the pills you take, the music you listen to, the shows you watch is collected a bunch of different ways. You are photographed with surveillance cameras — about 70 times a day on average, and every time the software recognizes your face, your photo is tagged with the time and your location — and in your file it goes. If you have Siri or Alexa living in your computer or iPhone, it listens to everything, all the time. Even if you never used the application.

Every moment of your life is sent to Utah, tagged, and stored somewhere deep underground. An AI may scan for "keywords" and add them to the tags. But no-one reviews it or sorts through it. It's just collected and vaulted for the rest of your life. But look at it this way, you are among the first of the virtual human immortals.

I know it seems too enormous to be possible. But it is true. Congress has been briefed about it. National security, after all. Access is extremely limited, although during the Obama administration's attempted overthrow of the newly elected President, Susan Rice gained access to this NSA Data and had her students, at American University, access and analyze the data for incriminating evidence on every person that Donald Trump knew or spoke to. The NSA had a fit when they discovered the breach of their data.

However, should any American scare the rogue security state — by dropping truth bombs, for example — the NSA has the capacity to turn anyone's life upside down. The police state being what it is, it is estimated that Americans commit two to three felonies per week, or conspires to do so. NATO also operates in this fashion, but more ruthlessly.

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@Pluto's Republic sound a lot like what I experienced in my machines. It became apparent that my screen was being scraped and my keyboard was being logged when I was in the network. I believe that activities were also being tracked. Occasionally my system would hang in a web page but communications were occurring.

I tried everything I could think of to correct it but no matter what I did the infection would return. I believe that my router was corrupted, that the internal DNS was "adjusted". By hitting the power I could get it back for a day maybe. At this point I have replaced all my equipment except for my flip phone.

I would never trust an android device or android software. Bad enough that piece of crap suffers from shit code. BTW, I have found that just about every system I use for just about anything suffers from really bad design and implementation. Dumps all kinds of extra work on users and support staff.

They can take their app model and shove it. Every week or so I have to drop out and clean the crap out cause MSFT sticks it back in so that I can fully appreciate their Win 11 experience.

I know they are still there. Just because I'm paranoid...

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Pluto's Republic's picture

@exindy

I wanted to respond and tell you that you are not alone. I have been seeing complaints and concerns like your lately, coming from very credible people. It seems targeted, but it's more of an annoyance than a break-in. Still, it could be a threat of sorts. EFF.com keeps an eye on these things and offers some solutions.

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@Pluto's Republic
What I have found is that the functions described above by you and Joe and QMS are a fundamental operation within the Win 11 OS and also in the functions within other comms into the "new" IT operations.

In my earlier comments I guessed that there were different parties who had an interest in what I do on my systems. The most intrusive one is the basic MSFT OS and it reports back what I do. It then draws a profile to tune its "services" to me. Instead of the machine being a tool that I use to perform functions that I need done, it becomes a way to deliver me to its profit generators. My needs pale... rather than doing the editorial work on that manuscript, wouldn't you rather watch the NBA? Or play a game? Maybe check out the latest trumpathon?

That business model has become the standard. Eg, try to obtain a SIM card for a "non-sanctioned" cell phone. I have tried and failed. But, but, don't you want to take advantage of android auto? Aka, my honda becomes an extension of the cell phone.

Now comes the rub. Some of the parties who have an interest in what I do are nefarious (hmm, isn't anyone sniffing my whities nefarious?) MSFT doesn't really care as long as their needs are met. Anyone stealing my bank account or my identity isn't stealing from them, so, meh. Same with the deep state operatives.

Hel, didn't employers monitor their employees' activities on the company equipment? Or teachers watch the students' on their chromebook? The function is there.

All kinds of people tapping into that information about my urinary tract habits.

BTW, I found an alternative to Office, LibreOffice and the ODF. MSFT was quite perturbed.

Thanks for the opportunity. Watch your 6.

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Pluto's Republic's picture

“If there exists any desire to reclaim our Constitutional power and send a message to the world that we are a nation of peace, Congress should pass this bill and repeal the 2001 Authorization for war. After all, the 2001 AUMF never intended to authorize worldwide war, all the time, everywhere, forever,” said Sen. Paul.

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I regret to inform Senator Paul that that horse has already left the barn.

All the king's horses and all the king's men cannot rehabilitate this murderous Neocon insane asylum. Without a total regime change, a new constitution designed for the 21st century, and reparations paid to the millions of humans around the world that we have harmed, the US will always be an existential threat to the world.

I wish it wasn't so. But that's reality.

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joe shikspack's picture

@Pluto's Republic

the other thing that paul misses is that the insane neocons are lawless. they don't really care if you take away the aumf. it will not stop their juggernaut of destruction and subjugation.

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QMS's picture

@Pluto's Republic @Pluto's Republic

find the cost of freedom
the price to pay for spreading democracy
is not a small number, therefore we pay

I think this is how the permanent war state
markets their product
protecting them from consequence?

this was written as satire btw
I agree with your point

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question everything

Pluto's Republic's picture

[Simplicius The Thinker — In depth geopolitical and conflict analysis, with a dash of the sardonic.]

A sardonic footnote from today's report on the so-called Ukraine War:
:
Offensive Confirmed: AFU Strikes Hard But Leopards Get Spayed

Hilarious new Atlantic headline which further shows how far Western media have fallen from their earlier narrative goals. They no longer see Ukraine winning at all and are in fact slowly conditioning their demented readers towards the inevitable eventuality of Ukraine simply pushing for a desperate ceasefire:

Atlantic.jpg

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I got a chuckle out of this one. But not a happy one.
I remember when Anne Applebaum was sane and inspiring. Then she got involved with the Neoliberal psychopaths. Now she's a tool, which is such a waste.

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