Michael B. Mukasey…

The New Neo Posted on by

…does not think Snowden’s any kind of hero, and believes the brouhaha over the NSA program is overblown. I don’t find his arguments all that compelling, although I’m not part of the unequivocal “Snowden’s a hero” bandwagon, either.

I see Mukasey as naive about the strength of the government’s motivation and willingness to misuse the NSA data, as well as about its ability to use the information wisely and well even when its goal is stopping terrorists. For example, what kept authorities from finding Tamerlan Tsarnaev (who wasn’t even a citizen) to be seriously suspicious and worthy of deportation long before he committed the Marathon bombings? Is the government inappropriately focusing on the wrong (and objectionably intrusive) information, while at the same time ignoring simpler tools that would be more effective in actually fighting terrorism?

[ADDENDUM: Also, why Snowden’s not a whistleblower.]

[ADDEDUM II: From Scott Johnson at Powerline:

Read the Guardian profile and the Post articles and you will see that Snowden professes no loyalty to the United States. He conceives of himself as a citizen of the world, or of the realm of Digitalia. He does not sound like anyone to be trusted with an assessment on our behalf the costs and benefits of the course of action he has undertaken.]

Daniel Ellsberg on Edward Snowden: leaks then and now

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Not surprisingly, Daniel Ellsberg thinks Edward Snowden’s a great hero.

I’ve written at length about Ellsberg before: a historical look here, and especially this one about his more recent activities (including, interestingly enough, a group he formed a few years ago to assist security-cleared operatives like Snowden who would like to divulge national secrets they feel need divulging).

The title of today’s Ellsberg piece is purposely inflammatory: “Edward Snowden: saving us from the United Stasi of America,” despite the disclaimer in the body of the article, “Obviously, the United States is not now a police state.” Ellsberg is a man of the left, but he seems to think we should distrust the government. And that’s certainly where most of us are at these days, with good reason. But he also seems to think we should trust the impeccable judgment of individuals such as himself, Bradley Manning, and now Edward Snowden to determine what’s a dangerous violation of national security and what is not, and to reveal only the latter and not the former. Of course, given Ellsberg’s history, he would think that.

But I don’t, although I also don’t see an obvious solution to the dilemma, other than the safeguards the Founders built into the Constitution. But they did not foresee the centralization of information possible in the computer age, and that’s what we’re facing now. That centralization gives the government unprecedented tools to reach into people’s lives and use the information to no good, and it gives a great many more employees such as Snowden (many of whom might have either very bad judgment or very bad motives, despite their security clearances) unprecedented access to scads of such information.

As far as Ellsberg’s history goes, I urge you to read in its entirety this piece I wrote on that subject back in 2006. It’s the third section of an in-depth four-part series on the dilemmas connected with security leakers and whistleblowers on matters related to national security. Ellsberg’s disclosure was (as far as I know) the first time the press participated in printing such a leak; before that, the press would have declined, probably out of patriotism or fear. But Vietnam changed that picture, as well as so many others

Come to think of it, I urge you to also read the other three parts of the series I wrote back then. It all seems relevant. Here’s Part I, here’s Part II, and this is Part IV. It may actually be that fourth essay that is most relevant, because it concerns whether leakers should be prosecuted, and if so, how.

And what about the role of newspapers in showcasing the information provided by the leakers? Ellsberg and his Pentagon papers were presented in a certain way by the press, but as we already know the press is not especially interested in scrupulous devotion to the objective truth. Political agenda? Of course.

Here’s an excerpt from a post I wrote about the Pentagon Papers’ press coverage, which contains the following quote from a WSJ article by James Q. Wilson:

Journalist Edward Jay Epstein has shown that in crucial respects, the Times coverage was at odds with what the [Pentagon Papers] documents actually said. The lead of the Times story was that in 1964 the Johnson administration reached a consensus to bomb North Vietnam at a time when the president was publicly saying that he would not bomb the north. In fact, the Pentagon papers actually said that, in 1964, the White House had rejected the idea of bombing the north. The Times went on to assert that American forces had deliberately provoked the alleged attacks on its ships in the Gulf of Tonkin to justify a congressional resolution supporting our war efforts. In fact, the Pentagon papers said the opposite: there was no evidence that we had provoked whatever attacks may have occurred.

In short, a key newspaper said that politicians had manipulated us into a war by means of deception. This claim, wrong as it was, was part of a chain of reporting and editorializing that helped convince upper-middle-class Americans that the government could not be trusted.

The present case—Snowden and the NSA data—presents a curious and I believe unprecedented hybrid of things. If not for the IRS scandal, the NSA revelations would not have had nearly the same impact as they do coming now. The IRS abuses were of the domestic rather than the foreign sort, and did not rely on the disclosure of national security information but were uncovered in an investigation sparked by complaints by the Tea Party victims themselves. But the IRS actions that were uncovered constitute such strong evidence of egregious abuse of sensitive information about American citizens by a government entity for political purposes that it is no longer possible to imagine that the sweeping NSA information would not be used for similar purposes. The fact that the NSA data was gathered by asserting a national security anti-terrorism motive was what makes it somewhat similar to the Pentagon Papers, with their foreign policy subject matter. But the NSA case is quite different in representing the interface of questions on how best to fight that war on terror with questions that are essentially concerned with the domestic liberty of citizens vis-a-vis big government.

[NOTE: I want to remind all who are tempted to think Snowden a hero that his fleeing to China must be regarded as a potential huge red flag. China, bastion of libertarianism?

I myself am conflicted between being grateful about the leaking of the content, and concerned about the method and the precedent it sets, as well as skeptical about what Snowden is really all about, who has helped him, and what they are expecting him to provide for them in return.]

Where are the Edward Snowdens of yesteryear?

The New Neo Posted on by

Gone to Hong Kong, at least for now.

The plot thickens as Edward Snowden, 29—IT guy, apparent Ron Paul supporter and disillusioned Obama-hoper—declares himself as the leaker of the NSA data-collection disclosure and then hot-foots it to Hong Kong because China is such a bastion of free speech and lack of government intrusion (???).

I don’t know whether this guy is telling the truth or not, and whether his real motive is as he says, but I do know his reasons for fleeing to that particular venue seem highly suspicious and/or at the very least highly naive. And correct me if I’m wrong, but whether you think he should have done what he did and is a hero, or whether you think he’s a traitor (or whether you think it’s possible that he’s both simultaneously), isn’t part of the accepted deal with civil disobedience (in this case, violation of a confidentiality pledge) to be willing to face the music and go to prison if you violate it even for conscientious reasons?

I’m no computer expert; I use one a lot, of course but the technical aspects are Greek to me. Nevertheless it seems rather obvious that in the pre-computer past, low level workers like Snowden couldn’t get access to such a huge amount of information. But now:

Mr. Snowden’s announcement likely will reignite questions about the number of federal contractors who are cleared to access troves of classified documents. As of last October, nearly five million people held government security clearances. Of that, 1.4 million held top-secret clearances. More than a third of those with top-secret clearances are contractors, which would appear to include Mr. Snowden.

Mr. Snowden attributed his access to documents seemingly beyond the purview of his job to his work in network security, which would allow him to access a wide variety of secret files.

I also found this interesting and possibly relevant comment at Althouse:

At the NSA office in Hawaii where he was working, he copied the last set of documents he intended to disclose.

Okay, just how in the hell did that happen? How did this copy files out of a secure facility.

I’ve been in secure facilities, which shall remain nameless, and no writable media was let in or out. Guards searched all bags. The PC’s had any writable devices like USBs & DVD-RW disabled (which is easy to do with products like this). The secure network has either no link to the outside internet or one that’s firewalled and logged within an inch of its life.

Either that NSA facility in Hawaii went all tropical loosey-goosey or Snowden had very highly placed help (like e.g. a Congressional staffer who received the briefing).

So whether you’re happy that Snowden did this or angry about it (or both), the issue is whether so many people should have access to so much—and of course whether the next time something will be released that will be a great deal more damaging to national security than this.

[NOTE: If you haven’t read Catch-22, you might not understand the title of this piece.]

Welcome back, cicada

The New Neo Posted on by

Here’s the scoop on the little buggers.

I remember them well from my youth, circa 1962. In the well-arbored suburbs of New York and New Jersey, they sang in the trees and then carpeted the ground like fallen leaves in autumn, making an ominous crunching sound as one walked, the whole extravaganza a sort of cicadesque supernova explosion that signified their own demise and the launching of the next generation into subterranean abodes where they would hang out for the next seventeen years.

To wit:

Adult periodical cicadas live only for a few weeks””by mid-July, all have disappeared. Their short adult life has one purpose: reproduction. The males “sing” a species-specific mating song; like other cicadas, they produce loud sounds using their tymbals. Singing males of a single Magicicada species form aggregations (choruses) that are sexually attractive to females. Males in these choruses alternate bouts of singing with short flights from tree to tree in search of receptive females. Most matings occur in “chorus” trees.

Receptive females respond to the calls of conspecific males with timed wing-flicks, which attract the males for mating. The sounds of a “chorus”””a group of males””can be deafening and reach 100 dB. In addition to their “calling” or “congregating” song, males produce a distinctive courtship song when approaching an individual female.

Fortunately, New England doesn’t have too much of that particular plague, except for parts of southern and western Connecticut. This year’s invasion is of the very large Brood II (see also this).

And here, if you’re feeling like participating in the fun, is a video. It’s not Brood II, but it’s a similar brood of 17-year lovelies from Illinois:

A shame about that narrative

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National Journal‘s Ron Fournier (who used to be Washington bureau chief at the AP), is puzzled and perturbed by the disconnect between his preferred vision and the recent news:

I like government. I don’t like what the fallout from these past few weeks might do to the public’s faith in it…

The core argument of President Obama’s rise to power, and a uniting belief of his coalition of young, minority and well-educated voters, is that government can do good things — and do them well.

Damn. Look at what cliches the past few weeks wrought.

Fournier goes on to list these “cliches” and describe how the crises seem to support them. The title of the piece, which Fournier may or may not have chosen (journalists often don’t write the headlines for their own work, but since Fournier is also the the head editor of the National Journal it’s my guess that he did), is “How Obama Scandals Threaten to Kill ‘Good Government’: Emerging narrative supports claims that Washington is intrusive, incompetent, untrustworthy and heartless.”

So the idea is that government is basically good and can do good things and do them well. And that Obama is basically good, and means well too, and is competent. But somehow, for some unknown reason (bad luck? Republican sabotage? An unfortunate and fluky emerging narrative?) things have gone sadly wrong, and the impression the public gets is that government is neither so very good nor so very competent.

In the body of the article, Fournier adds the following adjectives (“cliches”?) to those in the subtitle: “Orwellian,” “corrupt,” “complicated,” “secretive,” and “can’t be trusted.” Wow, you’d almost think that was written by Glenn Beck or Ron Paul, except for that “narrative” and “cliche” part, and the “good government” disclaimer at the outset.

This is how cognitive dissonance works. The sufferer struggles to try to reconcile two opposing beliefs, or one belief with a set of opposing facts. Note that Fournier hasn’t yet said that perhaps he was wrong about the inherently “good” characteristics of government, or that conservatives might have been, you know, correct about that as a basic principle, or at the very least correct about the Obama administration in particular. That would be an easy way to resolve his dilemma—just change the first belief (“government=good”) in the light of evidence to the contrary, because if even the great and noble Obama fell prey to the seduction of power that Big Government represents, then wouldn’t practically anyone?

But that conclusion is simply too threatening. Believe me, I know how difficult it is to change a mind’s basic assumptions. And so we have strange hybrid articles like Fournier’s, with its useful concepts such as “narrative” and “cliche.” After all, is there any inherent truth to a narrative? A cliche is a bit more dangerous, because it often involves truth, but it’s a truth that lacks the nuance and sophistication of the liberal—ahem—narrative.

Another Obama half-brother

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I’d heard about some of Obama’s half-siblings, but not much about this guy Mark Okoth Obama Ndesandjo, who really does resemble Obama physically and even vocally, although his affect is different. Even his body language and movement is somewhat similar at times, as well as his body type and his face. It’s sort of uncanny, like a harmonic vibration in a different key (is that an oxymoron, you music theory experts?)

They did not know each other growing up and have only met a few times. Unlike Barack Junior, Mark got to actually live for some time with Barack Obama Senior, his father, and if it was a dream from his father the dream was of the nightmare variety, because he reports him as having been an abusive wife-beater.

Mark is a highly trained pianist and obviously bright; he went to several fine universities. I never read Dreams From My Father and was unaware that Obama Sr. had a wife after Obama Jr.’s mother Stanley (I knew he had a wife before her—actually, concurrently with her). Nor did I know that this third wife Ruth Baker (Mark’s mother) was Jewish. So Barack Jr. has a half-Jewish half-brother who somewhat resembles him.

Here Mark’s story, at least the part he cares to tell (he has lived in China for years, and is married to a Chinese woman):

So, the Obama/Bloomberg ricin letter-sender…

The New Neo Posted on by

…was a 35-year-old pregnant sometime-actress and mother of five who was trying to frame the husband who had initiated divorce proceedings against her?

Egad.

You can’t make this stuff up. Well, maybe you can, if you’re a grade-B movie writer. Or Shannon Guess Richardson, the alleged perp who came up with the scheme.

The uses of metadata

The New Neo Posted on by

From Jane Mayer at the New Yorker:

…[A]ccording to the mathematician and former Sun Microsystems engineer Susan Landau…it’s worse than many might think.

“The public doesn’t understand,” she told me, speaking about so-called metadata. “It’s much more intrusive than content.” She explained that the government can learn immense amounts of proprietary information by studying “who you call, and who they call. If you can track that, you know exactly what is happening””you don’t need the content.”

For example, she said, in the world of business, a pattern of phone calls from key executives can reveal impending corporate takeovers. Personal phone calls can also reveal sensitive medical information: “You can see a call to a gynecologist, and then a call to an oncologist, and then a call to close family members.” And information from cell-phone towers can reveal the caller’s location. Metadata, she pointed out, can be so revelatory about whom reporters talk to in order to get sensitive stories that it can make more traditional tools in leak investigations, like search warrants and subpoenas, look quaint. “You can see the sources,” she said. When the F.B.I. obtains such records from news agencies, the Attorney General is required to sign off on each invasion of privacy. When the N.S.A. sweeps up millions of records a minute, it’s unclear if any such brakes are applied.

Metadata, Landau noted, can also reveal sensitive political information, showing, for instance, if opposition leaders are meeting, who is involved, where they gather, and for how long. Such data can reveal, too, who is romantically involved with whom, by tracking the locations of cell phones at night.

Actually, I think the public does understand the broad outlines, and in particular the “romantically involved” part. That’s not rocket science.

Birth orgasms

The New Neo Posted on by

And now for something completely different.

You may not have heard of it but there are some women who claim to have orgasms during birth.

Not their birth, that is; while giving birth to their babies. Each seems equally improbable, though.

Plus, the article calls it a “common ocurrence.” Don’t think so. Even if one construes the figures in a liberal way (868 noticed per 200,000 births), the actual incidence of orgasm during birth would then be .00434, not exactly what you’d call common.

Let’s get real here. For most women, giving birth is excruciating, and a bunch of breathing exercises doesn’t even begin to touch the pain. Epidurals do, but my guess is that women given epidurals would experience numbness that would preclude an orgasm even if a women were inclined in that direction for the occasion.

But for some women (supposedly a few percentage points, although I can’t seem to find a link right now) the nerves to that area of their body are so configured that they don’t have much pain in childbirth at all. I’ve known such women, and the ones I know tend not to have cramps with their menstrual cycles, either. They just seem to be wired differently. My guess is that some of the orgasmic-birth women might also be women with that unusual nerve construction, because otherwise the thing is simply incomprehensible.

Although I must say that human beings are almost immeasurably surprising.

And note, also, that the women in the study were all French.

Gathering the phone records data: why it’s not okay

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The WSJ isn’t perturbed by the revelation of the data-mining continuation by the Obama administration:

…[U]unlike the other White House scandals there seems to be little here that is scandalous. The existence of the program was exposed years ago and such surveillance is a core part of the war on terror, if we can still use that term…

The outrage this time seems to stem from the fact that the government is widely collecting call records, not merely those associated with a particular suspect or group. But this fear misunderstands how the program works. From what we know, the NSA runs algorithms over the call log database, searching for suspicious patterns over time.

The effectiveness of data-mining is proportional to the size of the sample, so the NSA must sweep broadly to learn what is normal and refine the deviations…

If the NSA’s version of a computer science department operates like the rest of FISA, the government is cautious to ensure that its searches are narrowly tailored and specific protocols are reviewed by FISA judges.

Later in the piece, the editors do point out some reasons to be alarmed, but the general tone is soothing:

An Administration can hide behind the judge’s approval if the request goes too far, or likewise if a judge says no and there is a terror attack. That is why war powers belong to the executive with appropriate Congressional oversight, and the entire FISA system ought to be scrapped…Americans would worry less about the government spying on them if, for example, the Justice Department wasn’t secretly spying on the Associated Press and Fox News. Or if the IRS wasn’t targeting White House critics…The liberals who spent the Bush years warning about a knock on the door at least have the virtue of consistency, if not the Republicans who are now depicting the NSA program as some J. Edgar Hoover-Bill Moyers operation to target domestic enemies…

Amid many real abuses of power, the political temptation will be to tie data-mining into a narrative about a government out of control. Such opportunism can only weaken our counterterror defenses and endanger the country.

I disagree.

Perhaps the piece was a result of a fight among the editors, because it reads as a compromise with a split personality. It is precisely because of the IRS, AP, and Rosen stories that this news has been so disturbing to the public. And that public is correct to be disturbed.

Just imagine if the story had come out on its own, without any of the other scandals having been revealed. The reaction probably would have been ho-hum. At the very least it would have been far more muted. But the scandals are not unrelated, although they occurred in different venues: the IRS targeting is about a government willing to take the data it is supposed to deal with objectively and use it for naked political purposes, and the AP/Rosen action is about a government willing to extend and bend the law (judge-shopping and lying in the warrant) to gather information on the press under the guise of fighting terrorism.

It is the synergistic effect with the other scandals that makes these recent revelations so exceedingly troubling, coupled with three additional things: Obama’s own words that the war on terror is pretty much over, weakening his argument about the need for it; his recent speeches about how one should trust big government and not be afraid of it; and the glaring hypocrisy of his campaign promises to end this sort of thing once he was president.

The public—if not the WSJ—is starting to realize that there is no reason to trust big government in general, and the Obama administration in particular. Yes, we need tools to fight terrorism. But we need reasonable ones. What’s more, we need an administration that does not falsely declare the fight over, is not hypocritical, and is not willing to do almost anything to gain political victory.