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WillyT
WillyT's Journal
WillyT's Journal
January 15, 2014
Do You Think Anybody In The Democratic Party Pays Attention To Voters Who Post Online ???
Because they should...
When they start the same old tired pablum in September... I think many will tune out.
Does the Democratic Party even have a person or two tuned into what's going down online?
Anybody know?
January 15, 2014
By MICHAEL POWELL - NYT
Published: October 10, 2013
Bennett A. Barlyn was dismissed as a Hunterdon County prosecutor after claiming that the state attorney general killed an indictment to protect prominent supporters of Gov. Chris Christie.
<snip>
FLEMINGTON, N.J. — Prosecutors sent tremors through rural Hunterdon County when they announced a sweeping indictment of the local Republican sheriff and her two deputies in 2010.
The 43-count grand jury indictment read like a primer in small-town abuse of power. It accused Sheriff Deborah Trout of hiring deputies without conducting proper background checks, and making employees sign loyalty oaths. Her deputies, the indictment charged, threatened one of their critics and manufactured fake police badges for a prominent donor to Gov. Chris Christie.
When the charges became public, the indicted undersheriff, Michael Russo, shrugged it off. Governor Christie, he assured an aide, would “have this whole thing thrown out,” according to The Hunterdon County Democrat. That sounded like bluster. Then the state killed the case.
On the day the indictment was unsealed, the state attorney general, a Christie appointee, took over the Hunterdon prosecutor’s office. Within a few months, three of its most respected veterans lost their jobs there, including the one who led the case.
Not long after, a deputy attorney general walked into a local courtroom and handed in papers that, with little explanation, declared that the indictments were littered with “legal and factual deficiencies.”
A judge dismissed the indictments. Soon after, officials took the unusual step of shipping all evidence to the capital, Trenton.
The killing of an indictment is a rare event...
<snip>
More: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/11/nyregion/43-count-indictment-of-a-christie-ally-quashed.html
MUST READ: The Quashing Of A Case Against A Christie Ally - NYT
The Quashing of a Case Against a Christie AllyBy MICHAEL POWELL - NYT
Published: October 10, 2013
Bennett A. Barlyn was dismissed as a Hunterdon County prosecutor after claiming that the state attorney general killed an indictment to protect prominent supporters of Gov. Chris Christie.
<snip>
FLEMINGTON, N.J. — Prosecutors sent tremors through rural Hunterdon County when they announced a sweeping indictment of the local Republican sheriff and her two deputies in 2010.
The 43-count grand jury indictment read like a primer in small-town abuse of power. It accused Sheriff Deborah Trout of hiring deputies without conducting proper background checks, and making employees sign loyalty oaths. Her deputies, the indictment charged, threatened one of their critics and manufactured fake police badges for a prominent donor to Gov. Chris Christie.
When the charges became public, the indicted undersheriff, Michael Russo, shrugged it off. Governor Christie, he assured an aide, would “have this whole thing thrown out,” according to The Hunterdon County Democrat. That sounded like bluster. Then the state killed the case.
On the day the indictment was unsealed, the state attorney general, a Christie appointee, took over the Hunterdon prosecutor’s office. Within a few months, three of its most respected veterans lost their jobs there, including the one who led the case.
Not long after, a deputy attorney general walked into a local courtroom and handed in papers that, with little explanation, declared that the indictments were littered with “legal and factual deficiencies.”
A judge dismissed the indictments. Soon after, officials took the unusual step of shipping all evidence to the capital, Trenton.
The killing of an indictment is a rare event...
<snip>
More: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/11/nyregion/43-count-indictment-of-a-christie-ally-quashed.html
January 15, 2014
William M. Welch, USA TODAY
9:41 p.m. EST January 14, 2014
<snip>
The National Security Agency has placed software on nearly 100,000 computers around the world that allows it to conduct covert surveillance on the machines, the New York Times reports. The technology gives the agency access to private computer networks yet could also create a virtual highway for cyberattacks, the Times said in a story published on its website Tuesday.
The agency describes its efforts as part of an "active defense" against foreign cyberattacks rather than an offensive tool. But U.S. officials have protested when similar software was discovered to have been placed on computers in this country by Chinese attackers.
"What's new here is the scale and the sophistication of the intelligence agency's ability to get into computers and networks to which no one has ever had access before," James Andrew Lewis, the cybersecurity expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, told the Times.
The report said most of the software is inserted into individual computers by gaining access through computer networks. But citing agency documents and computer experts, it said the NSA has also made use of secret technology that allows it to enter or alter data even in computers not connected to the Internet.
The technology, in use since 2008...
<snip>
More: http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/01/14/nsa-computer-surveillance/4483433/
Report: NSA Spying On Computers Around World - USAToday
Report: NSA spying on computers around worldWilliam M. Welch, USA TODAY
9:41 p.m. EST January 14, 2014
<snip>
The National Security Agency has placed software on nearly 100,000 computers around the world that allows it to conduct covert surveillance on the machines, the New York Times reports. The technology gives the agency access to private computer networks yet could also create a virtual highway for cyberattacks, the Times said in a story published on its website Tuesday.
The agency describes its efforts as part of an "active defense" against foreign cyberattacks rather than an offensive tool. But U.S. officials have protested when similar software was discovered to have been placed on computers in this country by Chinese attackers.
"What's new here is the scale and the sophistication of the intelligence agency's ability to get into computers and networks to which no one has ever had access before," James Andrew Lewis, the cybersecurity expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, told the Times.
The report said most of the software is inserted into individual computers by gaining access through computer networks. But citing agency documents and computer experts, it said the NSA has also made use of secret technology that allows it to enter or alter data even in computers not connected to the Internet.
The technology, in use since 2008...
<snip>
More: http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/01/14/nsa-computer-surveillance/4483433/
January 15, 2014
How Will YOU Know When The Overthrow Of Our Democracy Is Complete ???
TPP gets ratified and signed ???
Supreme Court affirms the NSA's right to total awareness ???
Electronic voting, purge lists, etc.
Or... has it already happened...
Election 2000 ???
Patriot Act, post 9-11 ???
January 15, 2014
HuffPo
Posted: 01/14/2014 7:55 am EST | Updated: 01/14/2014 4:43 pm EST
More: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/14/shakespeare-words_n_4590819.html?utm_hp_ref=mostpopular
LOL !!!
13 Words You Probably Didn't Know Were Invented By ShakespeareHuffPo
Posted: 01/14/2014 7:55 am EST | Updated: 01/14/2014 4:43 pm EST
"Rant"
Definition: To talk loudly and in a way that shows anger: to complain in a way that is unreasonable
Origin: Derived from the Dutch "randten," meaning "talk foolishly."
Quote: "I'll rant as well as thou." - Hamlet
Definition: To talk loudly and in a way that shows anger: to complain in a way that is unreasonable
Origin: Derived from the Dutch "randten," meaning "talk foolishly."
Quote: "I'll rant as well as thou." - Hamlet
More: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/14/shakespeare-words_n_4590819.html?utm_hp_ref=mostpopular
January 15, 2014
With Today's Various Depressing News Stories... What Do You Think Turn-Out Will Be In 2014 ???
I have no idea, yet I live in California.
We ain't perfect... (Feinstein, Harmon...)...
And... I vote EVERY Election.
My question is, in the final analysis... how do we get the rest of the country to treat 2014, as a Presidential Election?
I think it's our only hope.
January 14, 2014
Are You Willing To Forgive New Jersey Dems Who Backed Christie, If...
they roll over on him now?
Seems like a great opportunity to get this particular monkey off their backs.
Or is the threat of corruption way too deep for that?
January 14, 2014
George Packer - TheNewYorker
1/14/14
<snip>
...
...
...
On the scale of Teapot Dome and Iran-Contra and even Monica, the four-day closing of two approach lanes to the George Washington Bridge is very minor league.
So why do I keep having flashbacks to 1972? Some of the parallels are weirdly exact. Whether or not he ordered the Watergate bugging, Richard Nixon ran a campaign of dirty tricks for two reasons: he wanted to run up the score going into his second term, and he was a supremely mean-spirited man. Nixon’s reëlection campaign reached out to as many Democrats as possible (not just elected officials but rank-and-file blue-collar workers and Catholics). Nixon ran not as the Republican Party’s leader but, in the words of his bumper sticker, as just “President Nixon.” His landslide win over George McGovern translated into no Republican advantage in congressional races—the Democrats more than held their own. The Washington Post’s David Broder later called it “an extraordinarily selfish victory.”
Christie’s 2013 reëlection tracks closely with this story: an all-out effort to court Democrats in order to maximize his personal power, and a landslide victory in November, with all the benefit going to the Governor, not to his fellow-Republicans in the state legislature. On Christmas, the Times published a piece about Christie’s long record of bullying and retribution. In it, the Fort Lee traffic jam was mentioned as just one of many cases (and, I have to admit, not the one that stayed with me) of vengefulness so petty that it inescapably called to mind the American President who incarnated that quality, and was brought down by it.
In the e-mails that went public last week when the scandal broke, the tone of Christie’s aides and appointees displays the thuggery and overweening arrogance that were characteristic of Nixon’s men when the President was at the height of his popularity—utter contempt for opponents, not the slightest anxiety about getting caught. In both cases, whether or not the boss sanctioned these actions, the tone came from the top. It’s the way officials talk when they feel they have nothing to fear, when there’s a kind of competition to sound toughest, because that’s what the boss wants and rewards. Once all hell broke loose, Christie insisted, in a compelling and self-indulgent press conference that, like his keynote speech, was all about himself, that he was the scandal’s biggest victim. “I am not a bully,” he said, in an echo of one of Nixon’s most famous remarks.
Character is destiny, and politicians usually get the scandals they deserve, with a sense of inevitability about them. Warren G. Harding surrounded himself with corrupt pols and businessmen, then checked out, leading to the most sensational case of bribery in American history. Ronald Reagan combined zealotry and fantasy, and Oliver North acted them out. Bill Clinton was libidinous and truth-parsing but also cautious, while George W. Bush was an incurious crusader who believed himself chosen by God and drove almost the entire national-security establishment into lawlessness without thinking twice. Christie, more than any of these, is reminiscent of the President whose petty hatefulness destroyed him—which is why, as NBC’s newscaster said when signing off on an early report on that long-ago burglary, I don’t think we’ve heard the last of this.
<snip>
The rest: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/comment/2014/01/the-trouble-with-christie.html
The Trouble With Christie - George Packer/TheNewYorker
The Trouble With ChristieGeorge Packer - TheNewYorker
1/14/14
<snip>
...
...
...
On the scale of Teapot Dome and Iran-Contra and even Monica, the four-day closing of two approach lanes to the George Washington Bridge is very minor league.
So why do I keep having flashbacks to 1972? Some of the parallels are weirdly exact. Whether or not he ordered the Watergate bugging, Richard Nixon ran a campaign of dirty tricks for two reasons: he wanted to run up the score going into his second term, and he was a supremely mean-spirited man. Nixon’s reëlection campaign reached out to as many Democrats as possible (not just elected officials but rank-and-file blue-collar workers and Catholics). Nixon ran not as the Republican Party’s leader but, in the words of his bumper sticker, as just “President Nixon.” His landslide win over George McGovern translated into no Republican advantage in congressional races—the Democrats more than held their own. The Washington Post’s David Broder later called it “an extraordinarily selfish victory.”
Christie’s 2013 reëlection tracks closely with this story: an all-out effort to court Democrats in order to maximize his personal power, and a landslide victory in November, with all the benefit going to the Governor, not to his fellow-Republicans in the state legislature. On Christmas, the Times published a piece about Christie’s long record of bullying and retribution. In it, the Fort Lee traffic jam was mentioned as just one of many cases (and, I have to admit, not the one that stayed with me) of vengefulness so petty that it inescapably called to mind the American President who incarnated that quality, and was brought down by it.
In the e-mails that went public last week when the scandal broke, the tone of Christie’s aides and appointees displays the thuggery and overweening arrogance that were characteristic of Nixon’s men when the President was at the height of his popularity—utter contempt for opponents, not the slightest anxiety about getting caught. In both cases, whether or not the boss sanctioned these actions, the tone came from the top. It’s the way officials talk when they feel they have nothing to fear, when there’s a kind of competition to sound toughest, because that’s what the boss wants and rewards. Once all hell broke loose, Christie insisted, in a compelling and self-indulgent press conference that, like his keynote speech, was all about himself, that he was the scandal’s biggest victim. “I am not a bully,” he said, in an echo of one of Nixon’s most famous remarks.
Character is destiny, and politicians usually get the scandals they deserve, with a sense of inevitability about them. Warren G. Harding surrounded himself with corrupt pols and businessmen, then checked out, leading to the most sensational case of bribery in American history. Ronald Reagan combined zealotry and fantasy, and Oliver North acted them out. Bill Clinton was libidinous and truth-parsing but also cautious, while George W. Bush was an incurious crusader who believed himself chosen by God and drove almost the entire national-security establishment into lawlessness without thinking twice. Christie, more than any of these, is reminiscent of the President whose petty hatefulness destroyed him—which is why, as NBC’s newscaster said when signing off on an early report on that long-ago burglary, I don’t think we’ve heard the last of this.
<snip>
The rest: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/comment/2014/01/the-trouble-with-christie.html
January 14, 2014
By KATE ZERNIKE - NYT
Published: December 24, 2013
<snip>
In 2010, John F. McKeon, a New Jersey assemblyman, made what he thought was a mild comment on a radio program: Some of the public employees that Gov. Chris Christie was then vilifying had been some of the governor’s biggest supporters.
He was surprised to receive a handwritten note from Mr. Christie, telling him that he had heard the comments, and that he didn’t like them.
“I thought it was a joke,” Mr. McKeon recalled. “What governor would take the time to write a personal note over a relatively innocuous comment?”
But the gesture would come to seem genteel compared with the fate suffered by others in disagreements with Mr. Christie: a former governor who was stripped of police security at public events; a Rutgers professor who lost state financing for cherished programs; a state senator whose candidate for a judgeship suddenly stalled; another senator who was disinvited from an event with the governor in his own district.
In almost every case, Mr. Christie waved off any suggestion that he had meted out retribution. But to many, the incidents have left that impression, and it has been just as powerful in scaring off others who might dare to cross him...
<snip>
More: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/25/nyregion/accounts-of-petty-retribution-reinforce-christies-bullying-image.html?_r=0&pagewanted=all
Wow !!! - In Case You Missed This... Because Of Christmas...
Stories Add Up as Bully Image Trails ChristieBy KATE ZERNIKE - NYT
Published: December 24, 2013
<snip>
In 2010, John F. McKeon, a New Jersey assemblyman, made what he thought was a mild comment on a radio program: Some of the public employees that Gov. Chris Christie was then vilifying had been some of the governor’s biggest supporters.
He was surprised to receive a handwritten note from Mr. Christie, telling him that he had heard the comments, and that he didn’t like them.
“I thought it was a joke,” Mr. McKeon recalled. “What governor would take the time to write a personal note over a relatively innocuous comment?”
But the gesture would come to seem genteel compared with the fate suffered by others in disagreements with Mr. Christie: a former governor who was stripped of police security at public events; a Rutgers professor who lost state financing for cherished programs; a state senator whose candidate for a judgeship suddenly stalled; another senator who was disinvited from an event with the governor in his own district.
In almost every case, Mr. Christie waved off any suggestion that he had meted out retribution. But to many, the incidents have left that impression, and it has been just as powerful in scaring off others who might dare to cross him...
<snip>
More: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/25/nyregion/accounts-of-petty-retribution-reinforce-christies-bullying-image.html?_r=0&pagewanted=all
January 14, 2014
By Robert Parry - ConsortiumNews
1/14/14
<snip>
Even those who trust President Barack Obama not to exploit the National Security Agency’s vast stockpiles of metadata to wreak havoc on some political rival or citizen should take pause at the evidence that New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s staff orchestrated a massive traffic jam as apparent retribution to Democratic officeholders who got in his way.
Until the evidence of this skullduggery traced back to Christie’s personal staff last week, the Republican governor was considered a favorite to win the GOP presidential nomination and was given a decent chance to win the White House in 2016.
So, what if the evidence of his staff’s role hadn’t come to light and the American people had no idea how vindictive a President Christie or his staff might be? What if Mr. “I Am Not a Bully” had gotten control of the NSA’s metadata detailing how virtually every American moves through life leaving behind electronic traces of their personal routines, habits and secrets?
There was a reason why John Adams and other Founders sought a government of laws, not of men. They understood that all sorts of people were likely to achieve power during the course of a nation’s history and that – while some would respect the rights of others – some surely would abuse their powers.
Laws were needed to constrain how far a powerful person could go in such abuse by holding out the possibility of legal accountability. In a nation of laws, even the highest official could be brought down by engaging in some egregious misuse of power.
But the current danger is worse than the Founders could have ever imagined...
<snip>
More: http://consortiumnews.com/2014/01/14/if-gov-christie-had-nsas-metadata/
(In A Nutshell) - If Gov. Christie Had NSA’s Metadata - Robert Parry/ConsortiumNews
If Gov. Christie Had NSA’s MetadataBy Robert Parry - ConsortiumNews
1/14/14
<snip>
Even those who trust President Barack Obama not to exploit the National Security Agency’s vast stockpiles of metadata to wreak havoc on some political rival or citizen should take pause at the evidence that New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s staff orchestrated a massive traffic jam as apparent retribution to Democratic officeholders who got in his way.
Until the evidence of this skullduggery traced back to Christie’s personal staff last week, the Republican governor was considered a favorite to win the GOP presidential nomination and was given a decent chance to win the White House in 2016.
So, what if the evidence of his staff’s role hadn’t come to light and the American people had no idea how vindictive a President Christie or his staff might be? What if Mr. “I Am Not a Bully” had gotten control of the NSA’s metadata detailing how virtually every American moves through life leaving behind electronic traces of their personal routines, habits and secrets?
There was a reason why John Adams and other Founders sought a government of laws, not of men. They understood that all sorts of people were likely to achieve power during the course of a nation’s history and that – while some would respect the rights of others – some surely would abuse their powers.
Laws were needed to constrain how far a powerful person could go in such abuse by holding out the possibility of legal accountability. In a nation of laws, even the highest official could be brought down by engaging in some egregious misuse of power.
But the current danger is worse than the Founders could have ever imagined...
<snip>
More: http://consortiumnews.com/2014/01/14/if-gov-christie-had-nsas-metadata/
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