Lowell and Independence

For John, BLUF:  Belvidere, not Belvidere Village.  Just saying.

On this Independence Day, which built on the victories at Lexington and Concord, it is interesting to note that Lowell's own Pow-Wow Oak has its own page on Wikipedia.

Regards  —  Cliff

Happy Independence Day

For John, BLUF:  The Star Spangled Banner has four verses.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

Here can be found all four verses of our National Anthem.  This is the Fourth Verse:

Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war's desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust."
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

Regards  —  Cliff

Is It Domestic Terrorism (In Canada)?

For John, BLUF:  .  Nothing to see here; just move along.

On Canada Day (1 July 2013) the Royal Canadian Mounted Police arrested two individuals who were suspected of planting "pressure cooker" bombs.  Here is the lede and following paragraphs from Fox News:

John Stewart Nuttall and Amanda Marie Korody were inspired by Al Qaeda ideology but were self-radicalized, Royal Canadian Mounted Police Assistant Commissioner James Malizia said Tuesday.  He called it a domestic threat without international connections.

Malizia told a news conference there was no evidence or indication to suggest a connection to the deadly Boston Marathon bombings in April, which used bombs made from pressure cookers.

RCMP Supt. Wayne Rideout said the public was never at risk, and the threat was detected early.

Congratulations to the Mounties for uncovering this plot and picking up the suspects before anything untoward happened.

However, in explaining this incident to the public the Mounties seem to be tongue-tied.  This can be seen in the news report, linked above, and in an edited video of a Press Conference, found here.  One gets the impression that the police want to put this down to "domestic terrorism", as we have the Boston Marathon Bombing earlier this year.  However, in the video of the Press Conference once can sense frustration on the part of the Reporters.

From the paranoid anti-Muslim side one gets the impression that what is happening in this case is the police are unwilling to draw a line from the two bombers to al Qaeda's understanding of Islam.  The video linked to above is edited and put up on YouTube by someone who refers to himself as Mecalecahi Mecahinyho.  I have no idea who that is.

Let us not confuse ourselves.  This isn't a terror attack orchestrated by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards.  Nor is it a terror attack from some Sunni fringe group.  That said, the effort to say it is "inspired" by al Qaeda but isn't al Qaeda ignores the fact that the al Qaeda franchise is changing its method of operation and moving to a more decentralized and distributed approach to bombings.  For those in al Qaeda pushing this new concept of operation it doesn't matter if NSA can trace communications from the bomber to al Qaeda Central.  What works for al Qaeda Central is that bombers used Inspire Magazine or other al Qaeda publicans to learn about the mission and how to execute it.

To continue to think this is just isolated incidents of anarchist domestic terrorists is to ignore the broader possibilities.

You cannot defeat what you don't understand and can not articulate to your public.

UPDATE:  Edited for typos.

Regards  —  Cliff

Celebrating Independence Day

For John, BLUF:  Is Cheapskate TD Bank North YOUR bank?  Nothing to see here; just move along.

I noticed, today, that TD Bank North is open on this Thursday, Thursday the 4th of July, until 1:00 PM (1300).  I asked myself, isn't the Fourth, Independence Day, a Federal Holiday?

So, I used the Internet to go to the Web Site of the Federal Office of Personnel Management, which provides the authoritative list of Federal Holidays.  Sure enough, Independence Day was on the list and scheduled for Thursday, 4 July.

But, I had been pretty confident even before I got home and looked it up.  So, I asked some questions?

• Isn't it a Federal Holiday?—TD Bank North is a Canadian firm.
• Did you get Canada's National Day (Canada Day, 1 July) off?—No.
• Are you getting special "holiday premium pay" for this?♠—No.

Well, that doesn't look too good.

I might consider changing banks, but I remember my Father's experience as he tried to escape Bank of America.  BofA kept buying up the bank he would switch to.

Maybe someone at "Corporate" is responsible for surfing the web to make sure there isn't anything bad out there about TD Bank North and they will give us reason to update this posting.

In the mean time, looking at Lowell, I agree with City Life Producer John McDonough that the City Manager should give everyone (less the four people to put out the City Council Packet, and essential staff) Friday off.  A Happy, rested, workforce is a productive workforce and one that is a pleasure to interact with from a customer point of view.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Like with the US Department of Commerce.

Liberals Against Immigration Reform

For John, BLUF:  We might not get immigration reform this year, and we need it.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

The Atlantic Monthly has an article out, by Ms Molly Ball, asking if [modern day] liberals are turning against Immigration Reform.  The lede:

The Senate passed a sweeping immigration reform bill Thursday that now faces an uncertain future.  In the weeks ahead, the central challenge for immigration reformers will be finding a path through the Republican-led House.  But behind the scenes, they are also scrambling to shore up support from liberals who see the current legislation as too slanted toward border security and away from citizenship for undocumented immigrants.

Here is a sample of the leftist opposition, as expressed by in the article:

Most of the groups remain reluctantly supportive of the overall bill even as they condemn the Corker-Hoeven amendment.  A group called 18 Million Rising♠ issued a statement saying the amendment "will only further hurt immigrants, families, and the economy by making the path to citizenship more onerous and expensive, and by exacerbating the climate of fear created by criminalization and overreaching surveillance."  It was joined by MoveOn.org, Credo Action, and United We Dream in its stance.

I do think that concern about "overreaching surveillance" isn't very impressive, given the recent revelations about NSA and Government surveillance of American Citizens—supposedly protected by the Fourth Amendment.

I am hoping that some sort of immigration reform bill passes the US Congress this year.  We have a major problem with people illegally entering the country and settling in and not going home.  Those people come for jobs and contribute to our economy and help make up the deficit in reproduction on the part of the citizenry.♥

There are a lot of side issues that bother me.  For example, if you are French and come over on a work visa and your work visa expires, why should you go to the end of the queue, after some illegal immigrant from Ireland, who is going to get a green card and a patch to citizenship out of the immigration reform bill.  That is just a case of punishing the law abiding and rewarding those who break the law.  I don't care if the guy is French.  Then there is the question of the tsunami of close relatives back home, waiting for our illegal immigrants to become Citizens and able to sponsor those relatives to travel to the US.  I have heard the number 40 million mentioned with regard to this little glitch.

All that said, we need immigration reform and we need to regularize the situation of those currently in this country illegally.  What we don't need is a thousand page bill that gives endless employment to lawyers, accounts and social workers.  Are our Congresscritters and their staffers totally incapable of writing something simple and understandable?♦

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  18 Million Rising would be an Asian and Pacific Islander Group, not an Hispanic Group.  Credo Action is more like MoveOn.org.  As for United We Dream is a youth oriented immigrant reform organization.
♥  In case you forgot, the magic number is 2.1 and if you and your spouse are not pumping out a pair and a spare, some other couple needs to make up the difference.  It isn't about morality.  It is about demographics, and who is going to pay for your Social Security.
♦  Apparently.

German View of NSA, et al

For John, BLUF:  The Germans, experts in having a surveillance state, give us a lesson.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

The revelations from Mr Edward Snowden is causing problems in our relationship with our European Friends.  This item from The International Herald Tribune was written by a member of Germany's Green Party, Herr Malte Spitz, who is a member of the German Green Party’s executive committee and a candidate for the Bundestag in the September national election.  Here is a link to his TED talk from July of last year.

But it isn't just Mr Spitz.  Here is an item from Germany's Der Spiegal, from Sunday, "Spying 'Out of Control':  EU Official Questions Trade Negotiations".

"We need more precise information," said European Parliament President Martin Schulz.  "But if it is true, it is a huge scandal.  That would mean a huge burden for relations between the EU and the US. We now demand comprehensive information."

But, back to the Opinion piece from Mr Spitz in The International Herald Tribune, titled, "Germans Loved Obama. Now We Don’t Trust Him."

BERLIN — IN May 2010, I received a brown envelope.  In it was a CD with an encrypted file containing six months of my life. Six months of metadata, stored by my cellphone provider, T-Mobile.  This list of metadata contained 35,830 records.  That’s 35,830 times my phone company knew if, where and when I was surfing the Web, calling or texting.

The truth is that phone companies have this data on every customer.  I got mine because, in 2009, I filed a suit against T-Mobile for the release of all the data on me that had been gathered and stored.  The reason this information had been preserved for six months was because ofGermany’s implementation of a 2006 European Union directive.

All of this data had to be kept so that law enforcement agencies could gain access to it.  That meant that the metadata of 80 million Germans was being stored, without any concrete suspicions and without cause.

This “preventive measure” was met with huge opposition in Germany.  Lawyers, journalists, doctors, unions and civil liberties activists started to protest.  In 2008, almost 35,000 people signed on to a constitutional challenge to the law.  In Berlin, tens of thousands of people took to the streets to protest data retention.  In the end, the Constitutional Court ruled that the implementation of the European Union directive was, in fact, unconstitutional.

In Germany, whenever the government begins to infringe on individual freedom, society stands up.  Given our history, we Germans are not willing to trade in our liberty for potentially better security.  Germans have experienced firsthand what happens when the government knows too much about someone.  In the past 80 years, Germans have felt the betrayal of neighbors who informed for the Gestapo and the fear that best friends might be potential informants for the Stasi.  Homes were tapped.  Millions were monitored.

Although these two dictatorships, Nazi and Communist, are gone and we now live in a unified and stable democracy, we have not forgotten what happens when secret police or intelligence agencies disregard privacy.  It is an integral part of our history and gives young and old alike a critical perspective on state surveillance systems.

When Wolfgang Schäuble, the interior minister from 2005 to 2009, pushed for the implementation of the data-retention law, Germans remembered the Stasi’s blatant disregard for privacy, as portrayed in the 2006 film “The Lives of Others.”  They recalled their visits to the Hohenschönhausen district of Berlin, the site of the former Stasi detention center.

They were reminded of the stories of their grandparents, about the fear-mongering agents in the Gestapo. This is why Mr. Schäuble’s portrait was often tagged provocatively with the phrase “Stasi 2.0.”

This is a long OpEd, so let us cut to the chase:

Even as a Green Party politician, I wasn’t impressed with Mr. Obama’s focus on fighting global warming.  While his renewed enthusiasm is appreciated, it served as a distraction from the criticism he is currently facing for allowing invasive state surveillance.  He cannot simply change the subject.

His speech caused many Germans to question whether Americans actually share our understanding of the right balance between liberty and security.  In the past, we celebrated the fact that both countries valued this balance, and there was huge solidarity with America after 9/11.

But the policy decisions of the Bush administration after the attacks — from waterboarding to Guantánamo — appalled Germans.  We were shocked to see this mutual understanding disappear.  Now we are not sure where Mr. Obama stands.

When courts and judges negotiate secretly, when direct data transfers occur without limits, when huge data storage rather than targeted pursuit of individuals becomes the norm, all sense of proportionality and accountability is lost.

While our respective security services still need to collaborate on both sides of the Atlantic to pursue and prevent organized crime and terrorism, it must be done in a way that strengthens civil liberties and does not reduce them.  Although we would like to believe in the Mr. Obama we once knew, the trust and credibility he enjoyed in Germany have been undermined.  The challenge we face is to once again find shared values, so that trust between our countries is restored.

Perhaps instead of including a quote from James Madison in his speech, arguing that “No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare,” Mr. Obama should have been reminded of the quote from another founding father, Benjamin Franklin, when he said, “They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”

"Stasi 2.0".  Now there is a tag.  What a condemnation.

The other thing the author puts his finger on is President Obama trying to change the subject.  "Even as a Green Party politician, I wasn’t impressed with Mr. Obama’s focus on fighting global warming.  While his renewed enthusiasm is appreciated, it served as a distraction from the criticism he is currently facing for allowing invasive state surveillance."

Frankly, it is embarrassing to be schooled by the Germans, of all people, on personal privacy.  But, yet, they learned from their experience during the Nazi era.  When we were in Germany on our first tour (1967-1970) we ordered a second phone for our home on the economy, so it would be easier to talk to family in the States when we called.  What we found was that picking up one phone cut off the other—when I asked the person at the Bundespost I was told it was for privacy reasons.

We need to further understand the privacy issues we face and then we need to fix the problems.

At the same time we need to ask how do we heal this rift with Europe, or is it not necessary?

	What trade deal?
	Trade deal is not going to happen.
	We, as a nation, are in some trouble here.
	The Administration will smooth this over.
	The European economic situation will make the deal happen?
	Who cares what Europe Thinks?
	Another view, discussed in the Comments.
pollcode.com free polls

Regards  —  Cliff

Call For Impeachment

For John, BLUF:  If it was bad under Bush, why is it not bad under Obama?  Nothing to see here; just move along.

OK, this is a spoof, but it is a political spoof and thus political commentary.

As The InstaPundit says, "Venerable leftist weekly demands president’s impeachment over mass surveillance" in referring to this item in the DC Caller:

In the pages of The Nation, the oldest continuously published weekly in the country and the self-described ‘flagship of the left,’ a former member of the House of Representatives has called for the impeachment of the president over revelations of massive government surveillance of ordinary citizens.

The DC Caller Headline is "DC World Exclusive: Venerable leftist weekly demands president’s impeachment over mass surveillance".  It goes on to say:

Democrat Elizabeth Holtzman of New York, who sat on the House Judiciary Committee during the Watergate era, powerfully yet dispassionately lays out the case for the immediate impeachment of the president.

“Nothing less is necessary to protect our constitutional system and preserve our democracy,” she declares.

The thing is, this was an item from 11 January 2006 and about President George W Bush.  Ms Holtzman wrote a book about impeaching President Bush, along with Ms Cynthia L. Cooper, The impeachment of George W. Bush: a practical guide for concerned citizens.♠  And, she even mentions it in her blog at the Huffington Post.

It appears Ms Holtzman has been quiet as to the revelations of current US surveillance state activities.

In other words, this is a spoof of former US Representative Elizabeth Holtzman.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  At $9.99, it seems a little overpriced for Kindle, given its age and subject matter.