I don’t necessarily believe that all correlation is more than coincidence. But here are a couple of really interesting entries from Julius and Biltud over at JuliusBlog:

This one shows the correlation between Bush’s approval rating and terrorism alerts:
Chart: Bush Ratings vs. Terror Alerts
Remember, though, that correlation does not imply causation.

And this entry details the timelines of alerts and how they relate to the national news headlines in the days just prior to the alert:
Timeline of Terror Alerts
I find this one less compelling, simply because it lists only headlines that were not flattering to the Bush Administration, and lists only headlines before each terror alert. It would be interesting to see what else was going on in the news at that time, both before and after each alert.

There’s a lot of info here, and it’s well worth checking out!

Not political? Suuuuuuuure. I have a hard time believing that. It’s also going to be hard to prove, though.

This in today from The New York Times:

A Candidate Who Says What He Means (Most of the Time)
By CARL HULSE
Published: August 5, 2004

This no doubt confirmed the worst fears of President Bush’s most severe critics.

As he signed a $417 billion Pentagon spending bill today, the president offered his own unique take on how the money would be used. “Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we,” Mr. Bush said. “They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people — and neither do we.”

Obviously, the president didn’t mean it quite that way.

Yeah… Sure he didn’t. 😆 😆 😆

The article continues with a report of John Kerry’s trip to Missouri, where he spoke to a convention of minority journalists. One of the questions he fielded had to do with how he would have reacted, had he been reading to school kids on 9/11. His response:

“First of all, had I been reading to children, and had my top aide whispered in my ear, `America is under attack,’ I would have told those kids very politely and nicely that the president of the United States had something that he needed to attend to, and I would have attended to it,” Mr. Kerry said to applause from the group.

Bush is speaking to the same group tomorrow. Gee, I hope they ask him the same question. 😈

In July, a computer engineer named Muhammad Naeem Noor Khan was arrested in Pakistan. He is accused of acting as an “e-postman” for al Qaeda, distributing coded messages from group to group. In the same raid, officials also “recovered” documents, computers, surveillance reports and sketches — much of it compiled before 09/11/2001 from information publically available on the net or through other open sources. The material apparently concerned US financial areas like Wall Street and the World Bank.

This in from Reuters:

Ridge Defends ‘Three-Year-Old’ U.S. Terror Alert
Tue Aug 3, 2004 12:05 PM ET

By Mark Egan
NEW YORK (Reuters) – The warning that U.S. financial centers may be attacked by al Qaeda was based largely on three-year-old information, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said on Tuesday, but some intelligence dated from January and he insisted the threat was still real.

Ridge’s appearance in New York at the Citigroup building named on Sunday as a potential al Qaeda target came as U.S. terrorism intelligence has come under fire again, this time for forcing police in New York, Washington and New Jersey to massively increase security based on old information.

“I don’t want anyone to disabuse themselves of the seriousness of this information simply because there are some reports that much of it is dated, it might be two or three years old,” Ridge said.

. . .

Ridge said there was no information on the potential timing of any attack and no evidence of more recent surveillance by al Qaeda of the buildings named in the latest terror alert.

So we’re now at “high threat level” (or “orange stars” for those of you following the Persistent Illusion magical Lucky Charms threat level) because of data that is at least three years old, was mostly compiled before 09/11/2001, and might have been updated 7 months ago? (I’ve seen stories that say that the info was updated in January, may have been updated in January, may have been updated at some unspecified time, or hasn’t been touched for years. You pick.)

Why is this coming out right on the heels of the Democrat Party convention?

Said Ridge:

“We don’t do politics in the Department of Homeland Security. This is not about politics. It’s about confidence in government.”

Uh… OK… so I feel really, really confident in my government now, oh yessiree bob! The Bush Administration will lead us to the promised land!

Oh, c’mon. Of course this is political. The guy was arrested earlier in July. Why wait until right after the Demo Con, why alert the nation to a three-year-old threat, if the motivation is not political? It’s obvious this was meant to crush Kerry’s bounce from the convention.

KPAM radio this morning quoted Ridge as saying he felt it was important to get this information in front of the American public so that we could defend ourselves. Huh? How am I supposed to defend myself against an attack by terrorists? Is this a statement that even makes sense?

Our friends overseas get it:

Allies Spurn U.S.-Style Color-Coded Terror Alerts
Tue Aug 3, 2004 10:11 AM ET
By Peter Graff
LONDON (Reuters) – The latest “code Orange” has drawn mild scorn from U.S. allies in the war on terror, who say Washington’s high-profile alerts cause undue panic and could make people less safe by undermining trust in intelligence. Most of Washington’s major allies have avoided color-coded alerts like those Washington introduced in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, saying the public can do little with warnings unless it is told specifically how to respond.

. . .

Kevin Rosser of Control Risks Group consultancy in London said Britain’s approach “is not to make color-coded warnings, not to publish every possible threat, but work closely with institutions that may be affected to help them tighten security and address threats in the least disruptive way possible.

“The problem (with the American approach) is that it creates public anxiety. If the goal of terrorists is to spread fear and unease then to some extent they’ve done that job for them without anybody carrying out an attack.”

Other countries take similar views. A spokeswoman for Germany’s Interior Ministry said it has an internal threat assessment system, but no equivalent of the public, color-coded U.S. scheme, and “we see no advantages” of introducing one.

. . .

“The security services collect intelligence not to issue warnings but to act on it,” Ami Ayalon, former chief of Israel’s Shin Bet security service told Reuters. “When intelligence is insufficient to guarantee a terrorist attack can be thwarted, you pass the partial information to the police, who often make it public.”

“But there is a price to this method, an emotional toll on the public,” he said. “When I was in the Shin Bet, I often preferred to take the risk and not to say anything, because I felt that regular terror alerts can in themselves lead to a terrorized society.”

Isn’t is amazing how it seems that everyone all over the world gets this — but not Dubya? Oh, no, he’s of the “keep them scared and stupid” school of governmental control.

But this is the kind of crap we’ve come to expect from the Bush administration. Prevarication and exaggeration.

Poor Dubya. He seems so far in over his head. He swaggers around like “I’m cool, look at me, I’m Pres-i-dent.” But it was worth the price of admission to Fahrenheit 911 to see the look on Dubya’s face as he is reading a story with a group of grade school kids and is informed that a plane has been flown into the World Trade Center. Does he jump up and excuse himself to the kids, explaining that he’d love to finish the story but important Presidential duties called? Nope. Not our Dubya. He sat there, shrub-like (pun intended) as though he were planted, for 7 minutes. He didn’t look very full of himself then. Doe-in-the-headlights does not begin to describe the look on his face.

Almost I felt sorry for him. Almost. Then I remembered that he wanted to be a war President. OK, Dubya, so don’t just sit there, lead.

I remember an joke I read right after the last election. The old farmer says that Dubya reminds him of a post turtle. “What’s a post turtle?” asks the author. “Did you ever drive down a country road and come across a fence post with a turtle balanced on top?” replied the old farmer. “You know he didn’t get there by himself, he doesn’t belong there, he can’t get anything done while he’s up there, and you just want to help the poor thing down. That’s a post turtle.”

On the heels of the article about the loss of voting data in Florida comes this article in SiliconValley.com:

Posted on Thu, Jul. 29, 2004

E-voting critic issues challenge to hackers

LAS VEGAS (AP) – A leading critic of paperless electronic voting machines issued a challenge Thursday to computer hackers attending their annual Black Hat conference, encouraging them to test whether it’s possible to rig an election.

Rebecca Mercuri, a Harvard University-affiliated research fellow, encouraged hackers to inspect software code made available on the Internet by VoteHere, an electronic voting software company based in Bellevue, Wash., and called upon other voting machine vendors to make their codes and products available.
. . .
Mercuri said her challenge was in response to a similar bet issued by Michael Shamos, a Carnegie Mellon University computer scientist and voting technology consultant. Shamos has promised $10,000 to anyone who can hack into a voting machine undetected.

Mercuri said Shamos’ challenge was impossible since the industry employs restrictive trade secret agreements that make it a felony to examine the equipment even when it’s not being used in an election.

But in a telephone interview from Pittsburgh, Shamos dismissed Mercuri’s criticism.
. . .
“Anybody can hack into anything,” Shamos said. “I can break into a bank. The question is are they going to know the money is gone.”
. . .
Voting rights advocates and computer scientists have called for stricter auditing procedures to ensure the integrity of votes. They say electronic voting systems expose elections to hackers, software bugs, hardware malfunctions, power outages and even cyber terrorists and that meaningful recounts are impossible without a printed record of every ballot cast.

“Everyone needs to grab an oar and row because we’re in trouble,” said Bev Harris, executive director of Black Box Voting, a Seattle-based nonprofit consumer protection organization.

Y’know, I have to agree with Harris, here. We all damn well better start paddling.

I have to wonder at the wisdom of asking Black Hat Conventioneers to test whether or not it is possible to hack an election. As Shamos points out, it’s always possible to hack anything. But is it really a good idea to set a bunch of people loose to rig an election? If we’re being honest, some hackers are of questionable moral integrity, and no doubt there’s one or two, crackers probably, who might think it would be just a hoot to see Ronald McDonald as Mayor of Chicago. These are people who may not be satisfied with just looking at the voting machine code. Hey… it’s a felony! Yeah… Meh.

What was Mercuri thinking? Or a better question: When an election is rigged by hackers, can Mercuri be prosecuted?

Or, maybe the states should just can the whole voting machine problem by going to vote-by-mail. It works just fine here in Oregon — we can even rip off our own hanging chad.

I have to comment on this story in USA Today.

Some Fla. election electronic records lost
MIAMI (AP) — A computer crash erased detailed records from Miami-Dade County’s first widespread use of touchscreen voting machines, raising again the specter of elections troubles in Florida, where the new technology was supposed to put an end to such problems.

The crashes occurred in May and November of 2003, erasing information from the September 2002 gubernatorial primaries and other elections, elections officials said Tuesday.

The malfunction was made public after the Miami-Dade Election Reform Coalition, a citizen’s group, requested all data from the 2002 gubernatorial primary between Democratic candidates Janet Reno and Bill McBride.

In December, officials began backing up the data daily, to help avoid similar data wipeouts in the future, said Seth Kaplan, spokesman for the county’s elections supervisor, Constance Kaplan.

The loss of data underscores problems with the touchscreen voting machines, the citizen’s group said. “This is a disaster waiting to happen,” said Lida Rodriguez-Taseff, chairwoman of the Miami-Dade Election Reform Coalition. “Of course it’s worrisome.”

The group is concerned about the machines’ effectiveness, following revelations about other problems with the system. Last month, state officials said the touchscreen systems used by 11 counties had a bug that would make a manual recount impossible.

So, Florida started using touch-screen voting machines as far back as November 2002. In May, 2003, and November, 2003, there were apparently “crashes” that somehow erased data from a bunch of elections, including the 2002 gubernatorial primary. In December, 2003, after the second of these “crashes,” somebody finally decided it might be a good idea to back the data up, just in case.

There is so much wrong with this picture.

First of all, who the hell was the Project Manager who apparently never thought of backing up what can only be considered mission critical data?

Who would build a voting machine that didn’t allow for an audit trail or a recount? Or, if the machine didn’t allow for it, why isn’t it part of a system that does?

Of course, given the recent history of elections in Florida, maybe that was the intent.

I don’t agree with the Miami-Dade Election Reform Coalition that the machines are to be blamed for the loss of data or the lack of a paper trail. I blame those who built them and those who installed them. Anybody who builds a voting machine that does not allow for the possibility of a recount is either very stupid or very naive. Ditto anyone who doesn’t allow for data backup.

If I were interested in moving to Florida, I might be tempted to hit the state officials with a proposition for a disaster recovery contract. It looks like they could use it.

Or maybe we should just cede Florida to Cuba, and Jeb along with it.

Ran across an interesting article in Yahoo news this morning. Here’s a quote:

Gov’t Search Engines Link to Kerry Critics

Wed Jul 14, 9:05 AM ET

By ELIZABETH WOLFE, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON – Searching for “Kerry” on the Department of Homeland Security’s Web site Tuesday afternoon turned up an unexpected top hit: a Republican attack on the Democratic presidential candidate.

A similar search on the Web site of the Department of Health and Human Services brought up the same link at the top — a news release from conservative Rep. C.L. Butch Otter, R-Idaho, that said a John Kerry administration “would embolden environmental extremists to press an aggressive agenda of restricting access and responsible use of public lands.”

Hmmm… one needs to be an “environmental extremist” to suggest that restricted access and responsible use of public lands might be a good idea? Guess I’m an extremist, then.

Actually, this is about what I’d expect from an Idaho Senator. And before I get flamed for that remark, I grew up in Idaho and lived there until I was 20. I’m familiar with Idaho politics. Granted, there have been some great Idaho statesman — Cecil Andrus and Frank Church come to mind — but that was in the long-ago days. The latter elected officials seem to be more of type with the guy my mama used to call “big, dumb Dane.” 🙂

Of course, the sites where this item was searchable now blame the government search portal on Firstgov.gov. And they, in turn, put the blame on a “technical glitch.” Yeah. Sure.

This morning the news release was still available on gop.gov, but as of this writing it appears to have been removed.

In other news, the Constitutional Amendment to ban gay marriages has been killed in the Senate. And I for one am glad, simply because I don’t believe it’s something that belongs in the US Constitution. It’s legislation that belongs in the states, if at all.

Other than that reason, I have a hard time getting my dog in that fight. I’m certainly not a gay activist, but neither am I a homophobe. In my mind, ones sexual preferences are just not relevant in most day-to-day interactions. It becomes relevant only when one side or the other forces it to become relevant. The far right with its gay bashing and its confusion of pedophilia with homosexuality is as guilty of this as the gay-rights activists with their “you must like me no matter what simply because I’m gay and I’m going to rub your nose in that fact over and over” attitude. I like a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy — sort of like the old movies that used to fade to black. You knew what that actor and actress were going to be doing during the fade. It wasn’t necessary to watch it.

And I’m still trying to come up with any profession where sexual preference would be relevant.

I don’t buy the “we can’t have gay scoutmasters/teachers/whatever because their agenda is to recruit our kids into their lifestyle.” Suuuuuuure. I mean, c’mon. That’s just dumb. And there are as many strange and dangerous heterosexuals out there — more, actually, since only a small percentage of the population identifies as gay or lesbian. What about the coach here in Oregon who ran off with one of his female players? The goal should be to weed out any sort of dangerous behavior on the part of adults who are in positions where they contact children — especially if it is a position of authority, like a teacher, coach, scout leader, or — dare we say it — priest. The sexual proclivities of that person are irrelevant. What is relevant is how he/she chooses to act on those proclivities.

I also don’t by the “gay marriage will bring down our country by undermining the sacred institution of marriage.” Nah. I haven’t seen any gay-marriage proposals that would outlaw the traditional kind. Seems to me that will still be legal. And our “sacred institution” is already pretty battered, what with almost half of all marriages ending in divorce and with the number of truly incompetent parents there are. That’s about as stable as a bowl of jello. I think we should celebrate all families, of whatever kind or makeup, that provide strong, safe and loving places for each other and for kids to grow up in.

But the whole schtick is just an election-year gambit by Dubya to try and rally the far-right-wing voters that sat out the last election and to take the focus off of things we really should be focusing on, like the economy, the price of gas, Iraq and Afganistan. Dubya needs to do something to rally the troops, since it seems a pretty fair bet that Jeb won’t be allowed to count the votes this time.

But I saw another article somewhere that reported that in this year’s Demo primary in Florida, touch-screen voting machines failed to count a vote something like 8 times more frequently than machines that scan paper ballots. So obviously there’s some technology issues there that Jeb might be able to use. 😆