Month: July 2013

The New Zealand military received help from US spy agencies to monitor the phone calls of Kiwi journalist Jon Stephenson and his associates while he was in Afghanistan reporting on the war. 

Stephenson has described the revelation as a serious violation of his privacy, and the intrusion into New Zealand media freedom has been slammed as an abuse of human rights.
The spying came at a time when the New Zealand Defence Force was unhappy at Stephenson’s reporting of its handling of Afghan prisoners and was trying to find out who was giving him confidential information. 

The monitoring occurred in the second half of last year when Stephenson was working as Kabul correspondent for the US McClatchy news service and for various New Zealand news organisations. 

The Sunday Star-Times has learned that New Zealand Defence Force personnel had copies of intercepted phone “metadata” for Stephenson, the type of intelligence publicised by US intelligence whistleblower Edward Snowden. The intelligence reports showed who Stephenson had phoned and then who those people had phoned, creating what the sources called a “tree” of the journalist’s associates. 

New Zealand SAS troops in Kabul had access to the reports and were using them in active investigations into Stephenson. 

The sources believed the phone monitoring was being done to try to identify Stephenson’s journalistic contacts and sources. They drew a picture of a metadata tree the Defence Force had obtained, which included Stephenson and named contacts in the Afghan government and military. 

The sources who described the monitoring of Stephenson’s phone calls in Afghanistan said that the NZSIS has an officer based in Kabul who was known to be involved in the Stephenson investigations. 

And since early in the Afghanistan war, the GCSB has secretly posted staff to the main US intelligence centre at Bagram, north of Kabul. They work in a special “signals intelligence” unit that co-ordinates electronic surveillance to assist military targeting. It is likely to be this organisation that monitored Stephenson.

This should sound familiar:

The news has emerged as the Government prepares to pass legislation which will allow the Defence Force to use the GCSB to spy on New Zealanders. 

The Stephenson surveillance suggests the Defence Force may be seeking the GCSB assistance, in part, for investigating leaks and whistleblowers. 

Stephenson said monitoring a journalist’s communications could also threaten the safety of their sources “by enabling security authorities to track down and intimidate people disclosing information to that journalist”. 

He said there was “a world of difference between investigating a genuine security threat and monitoring a journalist because his reporting is inconvenient or embarrassing to politicians and defence officials”.
[…]
An internal Defence document leaked to the Star-Times reveals that defence security staff viewed investigative journalists as “hostile” threats requiring “counteraction”. The classified security manual lists security threats, including “certain investigative journalists” who may attempt to obtain “politically sensitive information”. 

The manual says Chief of Defence Force approval is required before any NZDF participation in “counter intelligence activity” is undertaken. (See separate story)
Stephenson took defamation action against the Defence Force after Jones claimed that Stephenson had invented a story about visiting an Afghan base as part of an article about mishandling of prisoners. 

Although the case ended with a hung jury two weeks ago, Jones conceded during the hearing that he now accepted Stephenson had visited the base and interviewed its Afghan commander. 

Victoria University lecturer in media studies Peter Thompson said the Afghanistan monitoring and the security manual’s view of investigative journalists confirmed the concerns raised in the High Court case. 

There was “a concerted and deliberate effort to denigrate that journalist’s reputation for political ends”.

But hey, don’t worry.  That could never happen here, right? Cuz’ we’re good and they’re evil.  And anyway, at least we don’t have anything like this:

A leaked New Zealand Defence Force security manual reveals it sees three main “subversion” threats it needs to protect itself against: foreign intelligence services, organisations with extreme ideologies and “certain investigative journalists”. 

In the minds of the defence chiefs, probing journalists apparently belong on the same list as the KGB and al Qaeda. 

The manual’s first chapter is called “Basic Principles of Defence Security”. It says a key part of protecting classified information is investigating the “capabilities and intentions of hostile organisations and individuals” and taking counteraction against them. 

The manual, which was issued as an order by the Chief of Defence Force, places journalists among the hostile individuals. It defines “The Threat” as espionage, sabotage, subversion and terrorism, and includes investigative journalists under the heading “subversion”. Subversion, it says, is action designed to “weaken the military, economic or political strength of a nation by undermining the morale, loyalty or reliability of its citizens.” It highlights people acquiring classified information to “bring the Government into disrepute”.

To reinforce its concern, the defence security manual raises investigative journalists a second time under a category called “non-traditional threats”. The threat of investigative journalists, it says, is that they may attempt to obtain “politically sensitive information”. 

Politically sensitive information, such as the kind of stories that Stephenson was writing, is however about politics and political accountability, not security. Metro magazine editor Simon Wilson, who has published a number of Jon Stephenson’s prisoner stories, said the Defence Force seemed to see Stephenson as the “enemy”, as a threat to the Defence Force. 

“But that’s not how Jon works and how journalism works,” he said. “Jon is just going about his business as a journalist.” 

The New Zealand Defence Force “seems to be confusing national security with its own desire not to be embarrassed by disclosures that reveal it has broken the rules”, he said.

Right. But our defense department ‘s Insider Threat Manual doesn’t specifically mention investigative journalists, so we can rest easy:

Seriously, how much of this stuff is being used to ferret out whistleblowers and sources to protect the government from embarrassment? It’s very easy to see how they can conflate the revelation of their own foibles, bad policies, errors and malpractice with a threat to the nation, isn’t it?

Update: McClatchy is not happy about this.

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The House GOP beats a dead horse then runs over it with a tractor. Repeatedly.

by digby

This is so idiotic, I honestly cannot understand it. It is the most perfect illustration of the “beating a dead horse” metaphor I’ve ever seen:

[L]anguage to bar ACORN from receiving any money made the final cut [of the Defense appropriations bill.] Section 8097 of the bill reads, “None of the funds made available under this Act may be distributed to the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) or its subsidiaries.”

ACORN cannot receive any funding from the U.S. government under any legislation, of course, because ACORN does not exist. Similarly, ACORN has no subsidiaries because ACORN does not exist.

A spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) referred questions on the provision to House Appropriations Committee spokeswoman Jennifer Hing. “I don’t believe our response has changed since the last time you asked this question,” Hing told HuffPost.

In June, the last time HuffPost asked Hing about ACORN defunding language, she replied, “These provisions are typically carried every year in appropriations bills.”

The time before that, in March, Hing called ACORN defunding language “a typical provision that is included in most appropriations bills.”

There has to be a reason for this. What’s the point? Are people running on their record of repeatedly defunding ACORN? What else could it be?

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“The disastrous rise of misplaced power exists”

by digby

Somebody’s happy with our new surveillance state. Can you guess who?

Some of the country’s most influential venture capitalists and former spy chiefs are investing in companies now providing the government with the sweeping electronic spy system and evolving cyberwarfare programs exposed by Mr. Snowden.

More than 80 companies work with the NSA on cybersecurity and surveillance, according to a recent report in the German magazine Der Spiegel that was based on top secret documents provided by Mr. Snowden. They include firms like the one that employed Mr. Snowden as an infrastructure analyst in Hawaii, Booz Allen Hamilton Inc.,as well as scores of new players.

Last year, venture capitalists pumped about $700 million into security startups, almost a 10th of the estimated market, according to Lawrence Pingree, research director at Gartner Inc., IT +0.88% the U.S. information technology research company.

That’s a small part of a broader technology market expected to grow from $67.1 billion this year to more than $93 billion in 2017, he said.

The increases are driven by budget shifts toward cyberwarfare and surveillance and away from ground forces. In his most recent Pentagon budget proposal, President Barack Obama sought cuts in most areas, but is seeking more money for military cyber operations.

“Money always follows problems,” said Mr. Pingree.

One prominent player, Endgame Inc., is an Atlanta-based company that provides the U.S. government with the technological tools and know-how to conduct surveillance and, when needed, cyberattacks.

“Endgame is part of an emerging industrial-cyber complex that provides capabilities to our federal agencies much in the same way one might sell bullets to the government,” said David Cowan, a partner at Bessemer Venture Partners, a leading venture capital firm that is one of several investors that have given Endgame $80 million.
[…]
Paladin Capital Group, the Washington-based private-equity firm led by former Central Intelligence Agency Director James Woolsey, has given the company millions of dollars. Endgame’s new board chairman is Christopher Darby, president of In-Q-Tel, the CIA-backed venture capital fund. Mr. Darby is joined on the board by Kenneth Minihan, a retired Air Force general who once served as head of the NSA.

The private-sector intelligence world has driven perceptions that the government is cultivating what former NSA Director Michael Hayden has called a “digital Blackwater.” That 2011 comparison to the private security contractor was meant to be complimentary. But it suggested to some possible conflicts between public service and private aims.

“Where do we want to draw the line as a country for what should only be reserved for government intelligence officers?” asks Tim Shorrock, author of “Spies for Hire: The Secret World of Intelligence Outsourcing,” a 2008 book about the role of contractors in intelligence. “Beneath that veil of secrecy, these companies can be helping agencies and making decisions that are colored by their financial interest.“

Investors say they understand the concerns, but argue the U.S. government doesn’t have enough institutional talent to keep pace with metastasizing dangers in cyberspace.

“Do you go out and hire a mercenary force to defend the kingdom?” said Bob Ackerman, founder of Allegis Capital LLC, which funds a variety of cybersecurity companies. “It’s probably not the first choice, but you may have to out of necessity.”

The article goes on to point out that they prefer to be thought of as defense contractors, which is just hilarious.

Let’s just say that all the shrieking about how these contractors are “protecting America” from terrorists sounds a lot more like they are protecting their profits from being questioned by Americans.

This is what it’s all about folks. And my original belief that the major problem here is that the people heading up these programs for the US Government are clueless luddites who are seeking power without the requisite knowledge to contain it is also confirmed.

But hey, there’s unlimited tax payers dollars to be had and all those former public servants and current master of the universe have a God-given right to get rich. That’s how we do it.

“In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists, and will persist.”

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Grand Bargains, good and bad

by digby

First the good news:

As fall approaches, White House chief of staff Denis McDonough has met frequently with Republican senators in the hopes of finding consensus on an overarching fiscal deal. But the two sides are stuck in the same-old tax-and-spending debate — Democrats want to raise revenue, while Republicans refuse.

The lack of progress underscores a growing belief in Washington: The long-sought grand bargain could very well be out of reach during the Obama presidency.

The negotiations come against the backdrop of a double dose of fiscal drama — Congress must act to continue government spending by Sept. 30, or a government shutdown could ensue, and the debt ceiling must be hiked or the country could go into default sometime this fall. 

A short-term solution to the country’s fiscal woes seems more likely, but even that may not happen.

Senators said Monday evening that a decision needs to be made: Should the two sides continue to focus on the grand bargain — a major reform of tax and entitlement programs — or instead on a much smaller goal of reforming the automatic sequestration cuts.
“We’re a sounding board for our conference, so our conference is going to have to be on board with whatever we do,” Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.) said Monday. “The administration still wants higher taxes. I’m telling you: That’s a problem. For our conference, that’s a problem.”

Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) said there are still “major hurdles” despite the pressure to reform entitlement programs and the Tax Code.

“I’m not too optimistic at this point that we’re going to get there,” he said.

Talks will continue this week, and there is still time to avoid a budget crisis, particularly as fall approaches and fear increases among GOP defense hawks about the deepening sequester cuts affecting the military.

Last week, McDonough, his deputy Rob Nabors and budget director Sylvia Mathews Burwell met twice privately with Senate Republicans, representing an uptick in talks after they had mostly stalled in June.

If the sequestration cuts to the military are finally starting to bite in a way that the administration and the congress can no longer mitigate or ignore, then it’s possible they could finally come together to fix these automatic cuts. That was the original idea, after all.

It should strike everyone that the Village newspaper writes about it in these particular terms, however:

The long-sought grand bargain could very well be out of reach during the Obama presidency.

Unfortunately, it’s entered the beltway lexicon now and we can expect it to be the holy bipartisan grail going forward. Thanks a lot.

Also, think about what it is that’s reportedly holding up an agreement:

Republicans and the White House both agree on proposals to cut Social Security known as chained CPI, referring to reduced payments to beneficiaries because of how annual cost-of-living adjustments are calculated. And the two sides seem to be on the same page regarding reducing benefits that wealthy seniors now receive from entitlement programs, a proposal known as means testing.

But the White House wants new taxes in exchange for those entitlement cuts, something at which the GOP continues to balk. And Republicans have pushed for the two sides to agree on going beyond the typical 10-year budget projections and instead examine how much the budget picture will worsen over the next 30 years. But the White House is resisting a 30-year budget projection, believing the numbers are unrealistic.

I continue to be amazed that the White House thinks temporary tax hikes are a good “bargain” in exchange for making the elderly suffer. I guess they really do believe Democrats love taxes so much would do anything in order to raise them — even destroy their own legacy. The good news is that Republicans hate taxes even more than Democrats supposedly love them. So far, that’s good enough to keep this thing from happening.

But one cannot worry a little bit if somehow this new Grand Bargain is going to be folded into the old one — after all, it cuts taxes:

“Obama wants to cut the corporate tax rate of 35 percent down to 28 percent and give manufacturers a preferred rate of 25 percent. He also wants a minimum tax on foreign earnings as a tool against corporate tax evasion and increased use of tax havens. The new twist is that in exchange for his support for a corporate tax reduction, he wants money generated by the tax overhaul to be used on a mix of proposals such as funding infrastructure projects like repairing roads and bridges, improving education at community colleges, and promoting manufacturing, senior administration officials said. Obama’s proposal would generate a one-time source of revenue, for example, by reforming depreciation or putting a fee on accumulated foreign earnings.”

As a stand alone, this seems fine to me. I don’t think corporations need to have their taxes cut but if the GOP corporate tax cut plan (and that’s basically what it is) can bring in enough pin money temporarily to do some investment spending, then maybe it makes some sense — as long as they don’t decide to sweeten the pot by throwing in the already agreed upon Social Security cuts.

Because if they do that, we’re looking at the Grand Bargain that was set forth a long time ago, aren’t we?

At the end of the day, are you really talking about over the course of your campaign some kind of grand bargain? That you have tax reform, healthcare reform, entitlement reform including Social Security and Medicare, where everybody in the country is going to have to sacrifice something, accept change for the greater good?”

“Yes,” Obama said.

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An “A” in cheating for the cult of conservatism

by David Atkins

Republicans do seem to be experts at fixing the facts around the policy in so many ways:

Former Indiana and current Florida schools chief Tony Bennett built his national star by promising to hold “failing” schools accountable. But when it appeared an Indianapolis charter school run by a prominent Republican donor might receive a poor grade, Bennett’s education team frantically overhauled his signature “A-F” school grading system to improve the school’s marks.

Emails obtained by The Associated Press show Bennett and his staff scrambled last fall to ensure influential donor Christel DeHaan’s school received an “A,” despite poor test scores in algebra that initially earned it a “C.”

The next quote is my favorite:

“They need to understand that anything less than an A for Christel House compromises all of our accountability work,” Bennett wrote in a Sept. 12 email to then-chief of staff Heather Neal, who is now Gov. Mike Pence’s chief lobbyist.”

If Republicans don’t cheat to make big-donor charter schools look better than public schools, accountability will be compromised!

My first thought when reading a sentence like that is to wonder whether the person who wrote it was cackling with knowing evil maniacal laughter when he did, or if Mr. Bennett is simply so dedicated to his ideology that he actually meant it with a straight face–that only accountability for public schools matters, and any cheating to make public schools look worse justifies the means.

I think the latter is probably more terrifying. The dead, determined eyes of the cult member are far more terrifying that the greedy gleam of the malicious huckster. You can bargain with or intimidate the huckster. The cultist, not so much.

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Your moment of zen: Indigo

by digby

Ok, this is even cuter than kittens. And kittens are really cute:

Via Laura Beck at Jezebel who writes:

Sam Cornwell, a photographer from England, took a second of video a day and stitched into a video of his son Indigo’s first year on planet earth…It’s cool to watch Indigo’s transition from a high needs pet to a little boy. That’s not to knock on any part of a child’s development, but they get a lot more fun as time goes on, right? Well, at least cuter and more capable of staying alive. Good job, kiddo.

Little Indigo may not be adorable every second of every day but he’s certainly adorable every second his daddy caught on film during his first year, even on day one.

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Zombie rising

by digby

Apparently, no matter how low the deficit goes or how much the president publicly repudiates the deficit framework,  the White House is still offering what it offered back when the deficit was widely considered the greatest threat the world has ever known:

During an hour long interview looking back on his time at the White House and on the economic challenges that lay ahead, Krueger said Obama has not given up on reaching a so-called “grand bargain” debt and deficit deal with congressional Republicans.

“The president’s last offer to Speaker [John] Boehner is still on the table,” he said. “I think he had a very sensible balanced compromise on the table.”

The president admitted in his NY Times interview that the deficit “framework” has been “damaging” and perhaps he finally believes that. But that means he must really believe that the elderly are living high on the hog on their Social Security and need to be forced to shop a little more smartly. How else to explain why they continue to offer this deal?

Certainly that’s what the Washington Post editorial board believes. Here’s their comment on the President’s speech:

By the tendentious standards of politics, it was okay for the president to challenge Republicans to come up with better ideas than his, while simultaneously portraying most of them as mindlessly bent on a government shutdown. What’s rather less forgivable, however, is that, even though the president of the United States is well into a highly promoted series of major addresses on the future of the U.S. economy, searching the text of his speeches for “entitlement reform” or “entitlement” yields nothing but “phrase not found.”

Yes, Mr. Obama told Democrats that they “can’t just stand pat and just defend whatever government is doing.” Addressing Republicans, he pronounced himself “ready to work” on tax reform, or a “balanced, long-term fiscal plan that replaces the mindless cuts currently in place.”

But that’s a far cry from leveling with the public about the fact that Social Security, Medicare and the rest are crowding out other domestic priorities — including those that the president emphasized in his speeches — and that these programs are at the heart of the country’s long-term fiscal challenges, which have still not been addressed even as the deficit has declined in the short term.

Absent that kind of candor, Mr. Obama’s demand for “a long-term American strategy, based on steady, persistent effort, to reverse the forces that have conspired against the middle class for decades” rang hollow.

The Villagers are far from willing to give up their favorite stale tropes. They never are. Remember, there was a time not long ago when the deficit was gone and we had a projected surplus. They still fretted about the old people stealing the food out of baby’s mouths.

Here’s a little reminder of the deficit hawk record on these projections:

August 28, 1996

CHICAGO – Sen. Bob Kerrey smells an odor coming from the Republican and Democratic stands on entitlements.

“It’s one of the cruelest things we do, when we say, Republicans or Democrats, `Oh, we can wait and reform Social Security later,’ ” the Nebraska Democrat said.

Mr. Kerrey says that without reform, entitlements will claim 100 percent of the Treasury in 2012.

“This is not caused by liberals, not caused by conservatives, but by a simple demographic fact,” Mr. Kerrey warned at a meeting of the Democratic Leadership Council.

“We [will have] converted the federal government into an ATM machine.”

Even official projections have been, shall we say, off the mark …

And yet the wealthy celebrities and aristocrats of the Village will never stop fear mongering that these programs are going to swallow up everything.  If the president is on the same page then he could very well have been saying in his interview that “austerity” is damaging while still believing we need to destroy these programs in order to save them. This belief is not a policy in Washington DC — it’s a religion.

Leaving this December “offer” on the table after the change in numbers (as well as his welcome change in rhetoric) is not reassuring.

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They may not believe in climate change, but climate change believes in them

by David Atkins

I wish I could make myself feel more sympathy for the plight of farmers in the Deep South, but it’s difficult:

Peaches, the gem of the Southern summer, are just not so sweet this year.

The tomatoes in Tennessee are splitting. Tobacco in North Carolina is drowning. And watermelons, which seem as if they would like all the rain that has soaked the South, have taken perhaps the biggest hit of all.

Some watermelon farmers in South Georgia say they have lost half their crop. The melons that did survive are not anywhere as good as a Southern watermelon ought to be.

“They are awful,” said Daisha Frost, 39, who works in Decatur, Ga. “And this is the time of year when they should be the bomb.”

Day after day, the rains have come to a part of the country that relies on the hot summer sun for everything from backyard-tomato sandwiches to billions of dollars in commercial row crops, fruit and peanuts.

While the contiguous United States as a whole is about only 6 percent above its normal rainfall this year, Southern states are swamped. Through June, Georgia was 34 percent above normal, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Climatic Data Center. Both South Carolina and North Carolina were about 25 percent above normal. Alabama’s rainfall was up 22 percent.

The weather is a particular shock because more than two-thirds of the region was abnormally dry or suffering a drought last year.

Although the total cost to farmers has yet to be tallied, agricultural officials in several states in the Deep South predict severe losses this year that could be in the billions of dollars.

“Nobody’s ever seen it this wet this long,” said Randy Ellis, a Georgia farmer who grows wheat and watermelons, the latter of which end up at East Coast grocery stores.

He usually he pulls about 60,000 pounds of melons from an acre of land. This year, he said, he barely got 30,000 pounds. What is worse, the cooler, rainy weather meant the crop was ready after the important Fourth of July window, when prices are at their peak.

Standing water has made cornfields look like rice paddies in some parts of the rural South. Mold is growing on ears of corn, and in some fields entire stalls have toppled. Late blight, a fungus-like pathogen, is creeping into tomato fields early and with unusual vigor.

This is what climate change does. It’s not just warming. It’s extreme and unusual weather patterns. And it’s only going to get worse.

One would hope that even the Deep South wakes up and realizes that whatever ideological reasons they might have to protect the oil industry, they’re not worth the cost.

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Dispatch from Taser Nation: fighting off canes and shoehorns

by digby

Hey, 95 is the new 85 …

A 95-year-old resident of an Illinois nursing home died early Saturday, hours after being shocked with a Taser and bean bag rounds in a confrontation with police.

Authorities said John Warna was a resident at Victory Centre of Park Forest, on the 100 block of South Main Street in the south suburb. He was threatening paramedics and staff with a cane and a metal shoehorn when police arrived at the complex, they said.

Police said they struck him with a Taser and bean bag rounds after he threatened officers with a 12-inch butcher knife.

Warna was taken to Advocate Christ Medical Center, where he later died.

I’m sure they had no alternatives. These strapping police officers must have felt terribly frightened by a senile 95 year old man. They had to shoot him full of electricity and kill him. What else could they do?

And anyway, no harm no foul. If they hadn’t tasered him to death they would have had to shoot him dead with their guns. Because everyone knows that tasers are only used in cases where officers would otherwise use their service revolvers. Amirite?

You know, I suspect that cops used to have a few other tricks up their sleeves to deal with frail, demented geriatrics other than torturing them with electricity. I guess those are lost arts. Torture is the number one go-to when authorities want cooperation from anyone, regardless of the situation, no matter how much overkill it is. It saves time and teaches the public a lesson in bowing down to authority on command.

I’ll bet that old man won’t try that again any time soon.

Oh wait …

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Let the majority rule on gay marriage

by digby

This poll on whether we should make gay marriage legal in all 50 states is very clarifying:

Across the nation’s major demographic, political, and religious groups, support for the proposed law ranges from as high as 77% among self-described liberal Americans, and 76% among those with no religious affiliation, to as low as 23% among weekly churchgoers, and 30% among Republicans and conservatives.

Other groups showing at least 60% support for legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide include Democrats, adults aged 18 to 34, those who rarely or never attend a church or other place of worship, moderates, Easterners, and Catholics. Others showing less than 50% support include Protestants, adults 55 and older, Southerners, and men.

Is anyone surprised at who and where the majority against is? Didn’t think so.

By the way, it might be time for the president to evolve on this again as well. The last we heard he was “personally” in favor but felt that states had a right to say otherwise because people have “different beliefs.” At this point the majority of this country is in favor of nationally recognized equal rights for a minority. Yes, we believe in “majority rules, but protect the minority.” But the idea that the rights of the minority means that one minority group has a right to prohibit another minority group from equality under the law is a perversion of that principle.

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