Month: January 2009

By Patrick Appel
A reader writes:

It might be worth pointing out that NOBODY in any position of clearance or national security  – especially the President of The United States – should use Blackberry email for official business. Anybody who has ever worked as an email admin and supported Blackberry users is fully aware that every message travels across national borders and into Canada and then back out of Canada again, using the public internet. Research In Motion, makers of the Blackberry, act as the delivery hub between email servers and cellular phone networks, and their servers are located in Waterloo, Ontario.

And I may remember this incorrectly, but I do not recall ever setting up or enabling encryption on the conversations between the Blackberry servers inside a private network, and Research In Motion. That would mean that all such correspondence travels "in the clear" and is readable as plain text.

It sounds like the Obama folks have thought of this.

Update: Another reader corrects:

I’m a former employee of Research In Motion and I have to note that your reader is incorrect. E-mail between the server behind a corporate firewall and a BlackBerry phone is encrypted end-to-end. I believe these messages do travel through Waterloo, but the content is encrypted with keys that are created and exchanged only within the private network of the corporation.

 

Having said that, I still wouldn’t suggest using any commercial wireless device for information relevant to national security!

by Chris Bodenner
But just in case, here’s how to defend yourself.

by Chris Bodenner
How I felt after our inaugural party:

by Patrick Appel

Ruffini lists the major themes of the last 13 presidential elections. His bottom line:

I don’t know that a very clear theme for 2012 suggests itself from these patterns. If the economy turns around, Obama will seek to execute the classic change-continuity pivot that has traditionally been hard to beat. If we really are in Great Depression II, there is an opportunity for a Reagan-like mandate to emerge from 2012 because at some point the "hope" has to actually kick in.

Whenever that opportunity emerges, however, what is clear from these historic patterns is that the Republican nominee be in a position to seek a broad change-driven mandate for conservative principles. If we want not just two-term Presidents, but popular two-term Presidents, you need someone who can lay claim to defining an era from its outset, aggressively re-assert that agenda for re-election, and ride it straight through eight years. Minimalist agendas of experience or personal integrity or pragmatism might work in individual elections, but they cost you in the long run once the immediate problems they were designed to fix are solved.

This is what today was about. Defining an era. It’s a big gamble, and one that could blow up in Obama’s face. But the theatrics are needed to give cover to big policy changes in a political system where change is designed to be difficult.

by Chris Bodenner
As practitioners of the Dark Ages, what goes around comes around:

At least 40 al-Qaeda fanatics died horribly after being struck down with [bubonic plague, which], swept through insurgents training at a forest camp in Algeria, North Africa. … Now al-Qaeda chiefs fear the plague has been passed to other terror cells — or Taliban fighters in Afghanistan. One security source said: "This is the deadliest weapon yet in the war against terror. Most of the terrorists do not have the basic medical supplies needed to treat the disease. It spreads quickly and kills within hours. This will be really worrying al-Qaeda."

However, after noting a "total blackout from the Algerian media," Olivier Guitta says that Western nations should also be worried:

[I]magine if one of the infected individuals board a flight to Paris, London or New York, this person could be the means of "delivering" the weapon. The damage could be enormous. 

While modern antibiotics can easily knock out the disease, it must be administered quickly, and still carries a 5% mortality rate.

by Patrick Appel
"Going forward, anytime the American people want to know something that I or a former president wants to withhold, we will have to consult with the Attorney General and the white house counsel, whose business it is to ensure compliance with the rule of law. Information will not be withheld just because I say so; it will be withheld because a separate authority believes my request is well-grounded in the Constitution. Let me say it as simply as I can: transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency," –President Barack H. Obama.

By Patrick Appel

Solangel Maldonado is wary of laws that allow individuals to sue "any person who wrongfully interferes with a person’s marriage, thereby causing that person to lose his or her spouse’s affection." Maldonado’s question:

…do courts that continue to entertain these claims know something I do not? These courts have reasoned that “[w]hen a third person is at fault for the breakdown of a marriage, the law ought to provide a remedy.” Norton v. Macfarlane (Utah 1991). Yet, given the complexity of human relationships, how exactly is a jury supposed to determine who is responsible for the breakdown of a marriage?

by Chris Bodenner
Begrudgingly, Jon Stewart holds Barry’s feet to the fire.

by Chris Bodenner

A little girl’s bye-bye to Bush.

By Patrick Appel

Podesta makes the case for Obama’s BlackBerry:

An off-line Obama isn’t just bad for Barack. It’s bad for all of us.

The president’s ability to reach outside his inner circle gives him access to fresh ideas and constructive critics; it underscores the difference between political "victories" and actual solutions; and it brings the American people into a battle we can only win by working together.

Ezra Klein adds:

Podesta’s op-ed suffers because it’s not clear on the culprit. There’s not some nefarious and shadowy "them" trying to grasp Obama’s Blackberry. Rather, there’s a nefarious and shadowy "it." More specifically, the Presidential Records Act of 1978, which was written 24 years before the Blackberry was brought to market. If Obama is to keep his Blackberry, Congress needs to reconsider the act. The speed and agility of the White House is too important to be hamstrung by a post-Watergate law that never considered the importance of cell phones, text messaging, IMs, or even e-mail.

I wonder if Ezra would be making this same argument if a tech savvy Republican was sworn in yesterday. The 1978 records act serves a purpose  – to check the executive branch’s power – and I, for one, was happy to have it in place during the Bush years, especially during the White House e-mail controversy. Laws should adapt to new technologies, but how does one amend this act without defeating its purpose?