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Conservatives Will Still Push For Attack on Iran

What, exactly, does president-elect Barack Obama’s mild-mannered choice to head the Department of Health and Human Services, former senator Tom Daschle, have to do with neo-conservatives who want to bomb Iran?

A familiar coalition of hawks, hardliners and neo-cons expects Obama’s proposed talks with Iran to fail - and they’re already proposing an escalating set of measures instead. Some are meant to occur alongside any future talks. These include steps to enhance coordination with Israel, tougher sanctions against Iran, and a region-wide military buildup of US strike forces, including the prepositioning of military supplies within striking distance of that country.

Once the future negotiations break down, as they are convinced will happen, they propose that Washington quickly escalate to war-like measures, including a US Navy-enforced embargo on Iranian fuel imports and a blockade of that country’s oil exports. Finally, of course, comes the strategic military attack against the Islamic Republic of Iran that so many of them have wanted for so long.

It’s tempting to dismiss the hawks now as twice-removed from power: first, figures like John Bolton, Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith were purged from top posts in the George W Bush administration after 2004; then the election of Obama and the announcement on Monday of his centrist, realist-minded team of establishment foreign policy gurus seemed to nail the doors to power shut for the neo-cons, who have bitterly criticized the president-elect’s plans to talk with Iran, withdraw US forces from Iraq, and abandon the reckless “war on terror” rhetoric of the Bush era.

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Tags: Bush, cheney, conservatives, Iran, neo-con, nuclear, nuke, terrorism, war, war on terror, weapon

China Pissed Over U.S. Congressional Report

China had a less than happy reaction to a US congressional report that accused Beijing of developing sophisticated cyber warfare and militarising its space program. The annual China report to Congress of the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission was aimed at misleading the public and impeding bilateral cooperation, foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang said.

“The commission has all along seen China through dark glasses and has deliberately attacked China with slanderous accusations aimed at misleading public opinion and obstructing the development of Sino-US relations,” Qin said.

“The report is unworthy of rebuttal and the aims of the commission are doomed to failure,” he said in a statement on his ministry’s website.

The report issued in Washington Thursday accused China of developing a sophisticated cyber warfare program aimed at penetrating US computer networks to extract sensitive information.

“China has an active cyber espionage program,” the report said.

“China is targeting US government and commercial computers.”

The panel also criticized Beijing of exercising “heavy handed government control” over its economy and “continuing arms sales and military support to rogue regimes” such as Sudan, Myanmar and Iran.

The commission also issued a warning about China’s space program. “China continues to make significant progress in developing space capabilities, many of which easily translate to enhanced military capacity,” it said.

Qin urged the commission to stop issuing such reports and refrain from interfering in China’s internal affairs.

Tags: beijing, china, cyber war, cyber warfare, cyberwar, qin, space weapons, weapon, Weapons

Congressman Broun Fears Obama Dictatorship

A Republican congressman from Georgia said Monday he fears that President-elect Obama will establish a Gestapo-like security force to impose a Marxist or fascist dictatorship.

“It may sound a bit crazy and off base, but the thing is, he’s the one who proposed this national security force,” Rep. Paul Broun said of Obama in an interview Monday with The Associated Press. “I’m just trying to bring attention to the fact that we may — may not, I hope not — but we may have a problem with that type of philosophy of radical socialism or Marxism.” Broun cited a July speech by Obama that has circulated on the Internet in which the then-Democratic presidential candidate called for a civilian force to take some of the national security burden off the military.

“That’s exactly what Hitler did in Nazi Germany and it’s exactly what the Soviet Union did,” Broun said. “When he’s proposing to have a national security force that’s answering to him, that is as strong as the U.S. military, he’s showing me signs of being Marxist.”

Obama’s comments about a national security force came during a speech in Colorado about building a new civil service corps. Among other things, he called for expanding the nation’s foreign service and doubling the size of the Peace Corps “to renew our diplomacy.”

“We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we’ve set,” Obama said in July. “We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded.”

Broun said he also believes Obama likely will move to ban gun ownership if he does build a national police force.

Obama has said he respects the Second Amendment right to bear arms and favors “common sense” gun laws. Gun rights advocates interpret that as meaning he’ll at least enact curbs on ownership of assault weapons and concealed weapons. As an Illinois state lawmaker, Obama supported a ban on semiautomatic weapons and tighter restrictions on firearms generally.

“We can’t be lulled into complacency,” Broun said. “You have to remember that Adolf Hitler was elected in a democratic Germany. I’m not comparing him to Adolf Hitler. What I’m saying is there is the potential.”

Obama’s transition office did not respond immediately to Broun’s remarks.

Tags: broun, congressman broun, dictator, germany, marxist, nazi, obama

Princeton Report Says Voting Machines Easily Hacked

With a few days to go before the presidential election, a report has been released by Princeton University and other groups that sharply criticizes the e-voting machines used in New Jersey and elsewhere as unreliable and potentially prone to hacking.

The 158-page report, which was ordered by a New Jersey judge as part of an ongoing four-year legal fight over the machines, says the e-voting machines can be “easily hacked” in about seven minutes by anyone with basic computer knowledge. Such hacking activity could enable fraudulent firmware to steal votes from one candidate and give them to another, the report said.

The controversy involves the Sequoia AVC Advantage 9.00H direct-recording electronic (DRE) touch-screen voting machines made by Oakland, Calif.-based Sequoia Voting Systems.

The report comes amid news stories in at least three states - West Virginia, Texas and Tennessee — where voters have told local election officials that they believe the e-voting machines they used tried to switch their votes to other candidates.

The AVC machines can be hacked by installing fraudulent software contained in a replacement chip that can be installed on the main circuit board, according to the report. Such a part replacement is very difficult to detect, it noted.

Andrew Appel, a Princeton University computer science professor who is one of the authors of the report, said that such security vulnerabilities cause doubts about the accuracy and reliability of the machines.

The plaintiffs, a group of public interest organizations, argue in their lawsuit against the state of New Jersey that the machines should be discarded because they can’t meet state election law requirements for security and accuracy. State officials who back the machines argue that the machines are adequate for the job.

The lawsuit is expected to go to trial in January, but in the meantime, the court allowed the Princeton report to be released to the public.

The report gives details on how the machines could be manipulated by someone who wanted to change the results of the election, and it strongly criticizes the designs and security of the devices.

At the same time, Appel said that while such a scenario is possible, “it doesn’t mean that somebody is dishonest enough to do it.”

“Even so, it’s an unpleasant place to be in to have to use these machines that are so hackable,” Appel said. “Early next week, I’m going to have to go out and cast my vote on one of these machines.”

The problem, according to the report, is that there are many opportunities in the storage, distribution and deployment of the DRE machines where an unauthorized person could manipulate them and not be detected.

“Somebody could have hacked it at any time” during those stages before an election, Appel said.

Michelle Shafer, a spokeswoman for Sequoia Voting Systems, said in an e-mailed response that the company emphatically denies the conclusions of the Princeton report.

In a 19-page response posted on Sequoia’s Web site, the company argues that the researchers who contributed to the report removed factory security hardware from the tested machine before they performed their analyses. The Sequoia response also says that an operator panel cover was not in place when the testing was conducted, which would have made a potential attack “far less likely to succeed before they are stopped, or at minimum, detected.”

The Sequoia response also harshly criticizes the researchers as having an “inflammatory tone” about the company’s DRE machines, while “editorializing on the wonders of paper ballots and optical scanning” as an alternative and more trusted method of voting. The company said the Princeton report includes “numerous factual errors and cases of intellectual dishonesty.”

Appel defended the report’s conclusions.

“There’s no perfect technology for e-voting, but I think the consensus of computer scientists is that precinct-counted, optically scanned paper ballots is the best method” in terms of reliability and accurate recount auditing, Appel said. “The voter fills out a paper ballot that is scanned and counted in their precinct. You have your numbers right at the close of the polls, with two independent records — the computerized numbers and the pile of paper ballots in the sealed ballot box.”

Tags: election, evoting, princeton, princeton report, Sequoia, voting

Recent Presidential Candidate Dr. Ron Paul Comments on Economic Crisis

Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) has been an opponent of the government’s financial bailout plan from the outset, and he doesn’t like it any better for the recent tweaks. “I don’t think it’s going to do any good whatsoever,” Dr. Paul said.

“The credit markets are starting to loosen up a bit,” Chetry suggested. “Is that a sign that maybe it is working?”

“Maybe to some degree on the short run,” Paul acknowledged. “But that just means that we’ll have more inflation. You can’t create $5 trillion out of thin air and not expect inflation. … In time, we’re going to all suffer and pay for this.”

“Economically, it’s a disaster,” continued Paul. “This is going to cause a great deal of harm. It’s like a drug addict taking a strong fix, and he feels better for a day or two, but believe me, we’re going to kill the patient … so I would say, let’s get off this addiction.”

Paul said he doesn’t see much to approve of in either major party candidate’s program, although he favors McCain’s approach to health care and Obama’s promise to bring the troops home from Iraq. However, he felt that on balance an Obama victory would be “a disaster for the country,” because at least with a Republican president confronting a Democratic Congress, “they’d be fighting a little bit instead of just having no restraints whatsoever.”

Paul believes that the current economic problems will be good for his own movement in the long run. “As this situation deteriorates,” he suggested, “more people are going to say, hey … maybe limited government and freedom work and this idea that we can depend on government for all these programs is an illusion.”

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Tags: bailout, Economy, ron paul