Posts from — January 2006

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So the Shrubbery looked into Vladimir’s soul and saw a mirror image, another power-mad megalomaniac.Upset that the Ukrainians failed to follow his instructions in the recent elections, Vlodya decided to up the price of natural gas from $50/unit to $250/unit. The justification was that it was about time they paid the market rate, instead the special former Soviet Socialist Republic rate, with the implication being that if the Ukrainians want to be part of Western Europe they can, by Marx and Lenin, pay Western European prices.

The gas was shut off for a while and a lot of posturing went on about who said what, and who did what, and who was a criminal. The Russians claim that the EU should back them because this is about the free market economic system replacing the old Communist paternalism…blah, blah, blah.

Not to start anything, but Russia sends the bulk of its natural gas to Western Europe through a pipeline across the Ukraine. Now if the Russians what to go all “free market”, how long before the Ukrainians start taking about a increase in the fee charged for the passage of the pipeline? How are the Russians going to respond if the Ukrainians decide that the passage to Western markets is worth $300/unit? This is something that can get out of hand rather quickly.

For the sake of those heating with natural gas in Europe, I hope that reality sets in and the problem is resolved in a reasonable fashion, because the Ukraine needs the gas at the moment, and the Russians need the pipeline.

[* – a bad multilingual pun]

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From a Time article in this week’s edition:

…Because the NSA program was so sensitive, Administration officials tell TIME, the “lawyers’ group,” an organization of fewer than half a dozen government attorneys the National Security Council convenes to review top-secret intelligence programs, was bypassed. Instead, the legal vetting was given to Alberto Gonzales, then White House counsel.

So, they didn’t run it by the special court that is staffed with a dozen judges who have been cleared to hear top secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act cases, nor their own National Security Council’s team of Justice Department lawyers. Alberto Gonzales was the only opinion they had on the legality of this program.

The only thing that made this program “so sensitive” was the fact that it was a violation of the Fourth Amendment.

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Today marks the second year since the Spirit rover landed on Mars. It was only expected to last 4 months, but Spirit and it’s sibling Opportunity keep puttering along doing their job of exploring the Mars-scape.

More information at the NASA Rover site.

Think about what this represents: a vehicle designed by a government funded project that has lasted eight times longer than expected, runs on sunlight, produces no pollution. We are still capable of solving problems when we are allowed to without corporate interference except for the product tie-in to LEGO.

[Update: This is the LEGO Mars Rover.]

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As only one of the Seven Wonders of the World, the Great Pyramid, still exists, the CBC reports on the efforts of the The New 7 Wonders Foundation to create a new list.

The Foundation, based in Switzerland, has a list of choices and wants people to vote for their favorites via the Internet or telephone. The voting will take place all year. Go and vote for your favorites.

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The Australian opposition is upset that the current government is talking about removing an amendment to the US-Australian Free Trade Agreement that stabilizes drug prices for Australians.

Apparently the US is unhappy that the Australians specifically protected their pricing policies restricting the ability of pharmaceutical companies to dictate prices to patients.

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Laura Rosen looked at the Newsweek article about the Shrubbery scrambling to get the Justice Department to sign off on his data mining in March of 2004.

Laura wonders if the leaks to the New York Times came from the Justice Department, rather than the intelligence community. I think her guess is good, as it is almost unknown for anything to be leaked by the people at NSA. NSA is a military staff function and the people who work there don’t hang around with the media or go to Washington parties. The people in the Justice Department have a lot of contact with the media, and this article points to Justice Department sources.

This also points to another problem with the White House talking points: this was apparently the first time the Justice Department had heard of the program. It started after 9/11/01, but no one talked to the Justice Department until March 2004. How can they claim that it was legal if they didn’t ask? This was done without a Justice Department opinion to back it up, and when asked, the Justice Department didn’t go along. This would be the point at which all of the Federal prosecutors got religion and prayed that this never came out, because it would flush all of their cases based on wiretaps down the toilet.

If they knew what they were doing was legal, what was the rush to cover their tracks in an election year? How could a Democratic administration find fault with a “legal” national security program?

I realize that a lot of people are frightened spitless by terrorists, but I live in a hurricane prone area. What are terrorists going to do to me that Mama Nature can’t? The Shrubbery isn’t going to get anything useful from this Poindexter punt and he is violating my right to be left alone.

[Edited for clarity]

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As NTodd points out, the original story was about an over-reaching government wiretapping program, but the Shrubbery keeps revealing the mechanics of the system, essentially telling people about our capabilities.

He should have started a leak investigation when the Times contacted him before the election, and not made any comments on the story. He is endangering national security by talking about this because he doesn’t understand the system well enough to know what not to say.

Negroponte or his ex-DIRNSA deputy should warn the White House off making further comments.

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Most people have never noticed Miami Herald columnist, Carl Hiaasen, when he writes books about South Florida; Dave Barry is in semi-retirement with his tales of life down on the Peninsula; Miami Vice is gone; Elian went home; so Florida should be getting a break.

Then we get the 2000 election, the Schiavo affair, the legalized gunslinging, the hurricanes…it keep getting worse.

Via the Apostropher that there are three different books due out on weird Florida.

I guess we know why the Bush family was forced to leave New England.

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