11.11.2006

enigma_foundry has moved

No longer here, but here:

http://enigmafoundry.wordpress.com/



Rather unhappy with the templates found here.

The ones at Wordpress are just slightly better.

Why can't anyone design a simple theme, that re-sizes columns.

I HATE FIXED WIDTH COLUMNS!

Running at a reasonably high res (1280 x 1024 is a reasonable current (November 2006) minimal assumed resolution) all themes look rather silly, with lots of wasted space.

So please explain why almost all themes have fixed width columns?

8.28.2006

History Test---->REVISED VERSION

Many of you may have received a "History Test" which was really a long
series of extremely filtered information, filtered to create hatred and
fear of Islamic people. The test started like this:

>"Please pause a moment, reflect back, and take the following multiple
>choice test. The events are actual cuts from past history.. They
>actually happened!!!
>
>Do you remember?

>-1968 Bobby Kennedy was shot and killed by
>a. Superman
>b. Jay Lenno
>c. Harry Potter
>d. Muslim male extremist between the ages of 17 and 40

>1. In 1972 at the Munich Olympics, athletes were kidnapped and massacred
>by
>a. Olga Corbett
>b. Sitting Bull
>c. Arnold Schwarzenegger
>d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
>
>2. In 1979, the US embassy in Iran was taken over by:..."

The test went on and on. Since even the most cursory reading of
History teaches us that no particular group has a monopoly on violence, I
thought that this kind of mis-information should be fought with:
corrected information! So to combat this kind of a selective reading of
history I have created a new test, to wit:

HISTORY TEST--->REVISED

CAN YOU ANSWER THESE?????????

1. In July 1995, when the town of Srebrenica was captured, it had a
population of over 20,000 people. At least 8,000 Bosniak men and boys,
almost all of whom where Muslim, were executed by the end of that month.

Note that the death toll is several thousand more than that of 9/11.

Who committed this genocide?

a. The army of an avowedly 'Christian' country
b. Islamic terrorists
c. The KGB
d. The CIA

2. Who opposed the deployment of US troops to participate in the UN
Peacekeeping mission in Bosnia, to stop events like those described above?

a. Republicans
b. Democrats
c. Greens
d. Islamic Terrorists

3. Who assassinated UN Peace Mediator Count Folke Bernadotte to protest his
diplomatic efforts in the Middle East on September 17, 1948?

a. LEHI, a Jewish terrorist group under the leadership of Yitzhak Shamir
b. The British
c. Islamic Terrorists
d. The CIA

Hint: Those responsible were pardoned and given honors by the Israeli govt.

Also note: Just before the end of World War II Count Folke gained much good
will leading a rescue operation transporting interned Norwegians, Danes and
other West-Europeans inmates from German Concentration Camps to hospitals in
Sweden. In the "White Buses" of the Bernadotte-expedition 15,000 persons
were liberated, mostly Scandinavians but also quite a few Jews.

4. Who killed 168 people in a terrorist attack at the Alfred P. Murrah Federal
Office Building on April 19, 1995 in Oklahoma City?

a. A gulf war veteran, with ties to white supremacist organizations
b. Islamic Terrorists
c. French Canadians
d. Ann Coulter

5. At the Shatila UNRWA refugee camp near Beirut, who killed approximately 800
civilians in Sept 1982? This slaughter was declared on December 16, 1982, to
be an act of genocide by the United Nations General Assembly.

a. Christian Militias, while Israeli Defense Forces which surrounded
the camp, watched, aware of what was occurring?
b. Islamic Terrorists
c. the CIA
d. the KGB

6. On Sunday July 3, 1988, an Iranian Airways Airbus aircraft was shot down
killing all 290 passengers and crew aboard, including 38 non-Iranians and 66
children. Who shot down this unarmed civilian airplane?

a. US Navy
b. Iraqi Air Force
c. Israeli Air Force
d. Islamic Terrorists

7. Who killed approximately 100 to 120 Palestinian civilians in Deir Yasin in
1948?

a. Israeli Paramilitary groups, who were never prosecuted
b. Islamic Terrorists
c. CIA
d. Iranians

8. What group's members killed Alan Berg, an outspoken Jewish talk show host,
in Colorado on June 18, 1984?

a. The Order, a white supremacist group
b. Al-Qaida, an Islamic terrorist group
c. Ann Coulter
d. The CIA

9. In the early hours of December 3, 1984, in Bhopal India a holding tank with
stored MIC overheated and released toxic heavier-than-air MIC gas, which
rolled along the ground through the surrounding streets killing thousands
outright. The transportation system in the city collapsed and many people
were trampled trying to escape. The gases also injured anywhere from 150,000
to 600,000 people, at least 15,000 of whom later died.

Note that this is many,many times the death toll from 9/11.

Who was deemed responsible for these deaths?

a. An American Corporation
b. Islamic terrorists
c. Israeli terrorists
d. Walter Winchell

10. The following is a list of Palestinian towns, and dates on which the
indicated numbers of civilians were killed.

(This is just a partial listing..)
Balad al-Shaykh December 31, 1947 12-60 dead
al-Husayniyya March 13, 1948, 30 dead
Abu Shusha May 14, 1948 60-70 dead
al-Dawayima October 29, 1948 80-100 dead
Safsaf October 29, 1948 50-70 dead
Saliha October 30, 1948 60-80 dead
Hula October 1948 35-50 dead
Arab al-Mawasi November 2, 1948 14 dead

Who committed these murders, which resulted (predictably) in a mass exodus of
Islamic Arabs in Palestine, from lands under this organization's control?

a. Israeli paramilitary organizations, which later became the IDF
b. Islamic terrorists
c. the CIA
d. the KGB

11. On 6 November 1944, who assassinated Lord Moyne in Cairo, Egypt?

a. The Stern Group, a Jewish terrorist organization
b. Islamic Terrorists
c. CIA
d. FBI

12. Who wrote a memorandum justify the use of torture against detained
combatants, in violation of the Geneva Convention?

a. Alberto Gonzales, the Attorney General of the US
b. President Bush (hint: he can't write)
c. Ann Coulter (hint:she can't either)
d. Islamic terrorists

13. In March, 1980 Archbishop Oscar Romero was shot while celebrating Mass.
What group was later shown to be responsible for his death?

a. Death Squads comprised of those trained at the U.S. 'School of the
Americas, (still operating at the Army base of Fort Benning, Georgia
under a different name)
b. Islamic terrorists
c. Israeli terrorists
d. White Supremacists

14. On November 16, 1989, Six Salvadoran Jesuit Priests, their housekeeper,
and her teenage daughter were murdered at the University of Central America
(UCA) Of the 27 soldiers, part of a right wing death squad, who committed
this act, 19 of them (including all of the officers present) were trained at:

a. the School of the America's, at Fort Benning GA, at which text books on
torture methods are part of the curriculum.
b. Patrice Lumumba University, Moscow
c. MIT
d. Harvard

15. Another Priest was killed by a repressive regime in the 1980's. His name
was Fr. Jerzy Popieluszko. Almost all Americans know his name, as his
murder was widely reported in the US media. What is the proportion of
evening news air time given to the reports of the Six Central America
Jesuits' murder to the evening news air time given to reports of Fr Jerzy
Popiełuszko's murder?

a. less than 1:100
b. about 1:50
c. about 1:8
d. about 1:3

16. Extra Credit: Can you name ANY of the Six Salvadoran Jesuits, mentioned in
question 15?

You guessed it, the answer to the multiple choice questions is: a.

Those killed on November 16, 1989:

- Ignacio Ellacuria, SJ, rector of the University.
- Ignacio Martin Baro, SJ who studied the effects of war on the human psyche
- Segundo Montes, SJ a strong advocate for refugees and human rights
- Amano Lopez, SJ a gifted counselor and pastoral worker
- Joaquin Lopez y Lopez, SJ director of an education program in poor
communities
- Juan Ramon Moreno, SJ a gifted preacher and retreat leader
- Elba Ramos, the Jesuits’ housekeeper, remembered as sensitive and intuitive
- Celina Ramos, Elba’s 14-year-old daughter who had worked as a catechist

More information on the School for the Americas, now renamed Western
Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation, see the website
http://www.soaw.org, which also tracks the victims of the graduates from the
School of the Americas, estimated now in the tens of thousands. The
annual vigil held each November now attracts almost 20,000 protesters.

"Sources at the [SOA] say that when…soldiers go through the urban-combat
exercise with blanks in their weapons, half the time the village priest
(played by a U.S. Army chaplain) is killed or roughed up."
–Newsweek Magazine, August 9, 1993

REVISON TO THE TEST PRODUCED BY: enigma_foundrynospam@eml.cc

**********END REVISIONS********************

This is the full version of the original test:

"HISTORY TEST


Please pause a moment, reflect back, and take the following multiple
choice test. The events are actual cuts from past history.. They
actually happened!!!

Do you remember?

-1968 Bobby Kennedy was shot and killed by
a. Superman
b. Jay Lenno
c. Harry Potter
d. Muslim male extremist between the ages of 17 and 40

1. In 1972 at the Munich Olympics, athletes were kidnapped and massacred by
a. Olga Corbett
b. Sitting Bull
c. Arnold Schwarzenegger
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

2. In 1979, the US embassy in Iran was taken over by:
a. Lost Norwegians
b. Elvis
c. A tour bus full of 80-year-old women
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

3.During the 1980's a number of Americans were kidnapped in Lebanon by:
a. John Dillinger
b. The King of Sweden
c. The Boy Scouts
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

4. In 1983, the US Marine barracks in Beirut was blown up by:
a. A pizza delivery boy
b. Pee Wee Herman
c. Geraldo Rivera
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

5. In 1985 the cruise ship Achille Lauro was hijacked and a 70 year old
American passenger was murdered and thrown overboard in his wheelchair by:
a. The Smurfs
b. Davy Jones
c. The Little Mermaid
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

6.In 1985 TWA flight 847 was hijacked at Athens , and a US Navy diver
trying to rescue passengers was murdered by:
a. Captain Kidd
b. Charles Lindberg
c. Mother Teresa
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

7.In 1988, Pan Am Flight 103 was bombed by:
a. Scooby Doo
b. The Tooth Fairy
c. Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

8. In 1993 the World Trade Center was bombed the first time by:
a. Richard Simmons
b Grandma Moses
c. Michael Jordan
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

9. In 1998, the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed by:
a. Mr. Rogers
b. Hillary Clinton, to distract attention from Wild Bill' s women problems
c. The World Wrestling Federation
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

10.On 9/11/01, four airliners were hijacked; two were used as missiles
to take out the World Trade Centers and of the remaining two, one
crashed into the US Pentagon and the other was diverted and crashed by
the passengers.Thousands of people were killed by:
a. Bugs Bunny, Wiley E. Coyote, Daffy Duck and Elmer Fudd
b. The Supreme Court of Florida
c. Mr Bean
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

11.In 2002 the United States fought a war in Afghanistan against:
a. Enron
b. The Lutheran Church
c. The NFL
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

12. In 2002 reporter Daniel Pearl was kidnapped and murdered by:
a. Bonnie and Clyde
b. Captain Kangaroo
c. Billy Graham
d. Muslim male extremist s mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

13. In 2004 - Spain's Railwayy was bombed by:
a. Bishop of St. Louis
b. Spiderman
c. Molly Brown
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

AND NOW !

14. 2005 London and Mumbai Railway were bombed by:;
a. Gw Bush
b. Newt Gingrich
c. VP Dick Cheney
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

Nope, I really don't see a pattern here to justify profiling, do you?

So, according to the ACLU, to ensure we Americans never offend anyone,
particularly fanatics intent on killing us, airport security screeners
will no longer be allowed to profile certain people. They must conduct
random searches of 80-year-old women, little kids, airline pilots with
proper identification, secret agents of the President's security detail,
85-year old Congressmen with metal hips, and Medal of Honor winning and
former Governor Joe Foss, but leave Muslim Males between the ages
17 and 40 alone because of profiling.

Let's send this to as many people as we can so that the Gloria Aldreds
and other dunder-headed liberal airhead ACLU attorneys along with
Federal Justices that want to thwart common sense, feel doubly ashamed
of themselves - if they have any such sense.

As the writer of the award winning story "Forrest Gump" so aptly put it,
"Stupid is as stupid does."

Come on people wake up!!! Keep this going. Pass it on to everyone in
your address book. Our Country and our troops need our support and pray
ers."

END OF QUOTED MATERIAL

8.17.2006

OK, the PirateBay is back, so Now WHAT...?

A two pronged attack, methinks is best: (1) Bite the Hand(s) that tried to Slap down the Pirate Bay, and (2) feed your friends....

First:

Here we have a list of files that were allegedly being tracked by pirate bay, and were objected to by the folks trying to take down the Pirate Bay:

_Activision Publishing Inc_:
1. Call of Duty
2. Call of Duty 2
3. GUN

_Blizzard Entertainment Inc_:
1. World of WarCraft
2. Diablo II

_Sierra Entertainment Inc_:
1. FEAR
2. Swat 4
3. Empire Earth II
4. Tribes Vengeance

Yes, the Blizzard is the Blizzard, as in Blizzard v. BnetD decision, one of the worst, most poorly thought through decisions in the last decade or so.

So these are who we should boycott: Activision, Blizzard Entertainment, and Sierra Entertainment.

Second, can we do more than boycott those whose actions we disagree with?  

Yes!  Support the Pirate Bay, teaching those who would oppress that they cannot succeed.  And if they try, their attempts will have the opposite of the intended effect.

I feel that we to do more to let the corporate fascists know that we're not gonna take it.

My suggestion: Go order some merchandise. Support the Pirate Bay. I just ordered a tee shirt from their site, and you should too, if you support the PirateBay.

Full Disclosure: I am receiving no kickbacks or reward of any kind for promoting Pirate Bay merchandise. (Unless you count the extreme joy of watching a cause I believe in  emerge...victorious!)

So here's the link: The Pirate Bay

Their Success would be the best revenge......

6.02.2006

A Little Imagination, Please


Winston Churchill had said something like this: "The next world war will be fought only peripherally in the battlefield, and the great battles in this next war will be fought in the minds of men."

I would submit that Al-Qaeda understand this, and the US/Great Britian/Alliance (with exception of the Poles--I would refer all to Stanislav Lem's recent articles in Tygodnik Powszechny) do not. As evidence, compare the Madrid train bombings, (highly effective and public opinion savvy) with the frequent misstates of GWB. The crusade quote comes to mind.

If one truly accepts that the battle is truly being fought "primarily in the minds of men" I think a profound difference would arise in how the war is conducted. For example, after 9/11, this outlook suggests that the correct way to proceed would through international police action, using existing Treaties and legal mechanisms to bring those responsible to justice. This could have either succeeded or failed in its stated objective of bringing those responsible, e.g., bin Laden, to justice.

But it would have succeeded, IMHO, in its unstated objective: to not squander the moral/PR advantage of being the victim, and would not have had the effect the present war in Iraq is having which is: a giant recruiting drive for Al-Qaeda. Every new story of Arabs or Muslims being killed driving the anger against the USA. And where is bin Laden today? We don't know. So the Bush administrations policy has a fundamental conceptual flaw: It is fighting an ad hoc network by trying to kill those it believes are part of the network. But this ad hoc network is feed by a fundamental belief, which is: The US is evil, it is out to kill Muslims, and it is therefore the duty of good people to destroy this evil killing machine. Now, to defeat this network we need to fight this fundamental belief, not to kill those who hold it, because this would just demonstrate that the belief is correct. Every time we win, we lose.

Hence my conlusion: the US response is flawed at a deep, conceptual level that no amount of perfection in the execution can remedy. Understanding this elementary truth requires conceptual thinking far beyond beyond what anyone in the present US administration has demonstrated, so I must conclude we could very well lose the war.

And while we are using our imagination, here is a bad scenario: Could it be that what Al-Qaeda is waiting for is a sufficiently massive atrocity to be committed by the Allies or their proxies so they can use WMD's against the US without losing to much of their support in the Muslim world? In this scenario, the WMD's they would chose to use will probably be knowledge based (biological or large scale chemical warfare) and, will probably not leave any "fingerprints." Those in US will believe the attack was by Al-Qaeda, those in Arab world will not believe this, rightly noting that the evidence is circumstantial. If this attack is successful, there could arise in the US enormous pressure to react, perhaps with WMD's. This reaction by the US would be perceived as justified by Americans, and unjustified by most of the rest of the World. The measure of our enemies success is the difference, the delta if you will, between these two different perceptions of the same event. (Repeat Churchill quote above) Our enemies will then have then won the war. The international geo-political power balance would be fundamentally altered by the scenario described above, with the US isolated, perhaps for a very long time from most of the rest of the world.

A Paranoid scenario? I hope so. But we need to keep our eye on the ball (win the war), and not get distracted by side issues and dead ends, such as Iraq.

(originally posted 7.20.05)

7.10.2005

Thoughts about the Judith Miller Imprisonment

Particular attention has been focused on the outcome of United States
Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Case No. 04-3138. This
is the decision that has ordered Judith Miller and Matthew Cooper to
inform the government of their source for the leak of Valerie Plame's
identity as a CIA operative.

However, as wrong as that outcome was, there are other aspects of
this case that demand an extraordinary level of scrutiny in public
discourse. Special, detailed, and focused, attention should be paid
to pages 72 through 78 of the above decision, which contain the core
arguments of why the journalists should be jailed. Everyone should
be deeply concerned about what is on those pages, which is: nothing.
That's right, these pages are blank. At the request of U.S. attorney
Patrick Fitzgerald, the core arguments of why Judith Miller can be
placed under arrest are secret. What is even more shocking is
that the Judge has allowed this request.

How then can we know what the rules are? How can we citizens
function in an alleged democracy, forming informed opinions about
matters of public importance? The answer is, of course, we can't.
With regards to this issue (and many more like it) it appears that
the spoken word of the executive branch is the only admissible
source of law and truth. Those with power apparently believe that
the maximum exercise and extension of that power, be it arbitrary,
belligerent and arrogant, is the way to solve their problems.

Even if this were an isolated event, it would certainly be a cause
for concern. Therefore, the question of whether this is an isolated
event or whether there exists a larger pattern can not go unasked.
Consider this: Rather than engage in a public, honest debate about
global warming, the Administration has had the scientific conclusion
of it own EPA scientists expunged from a critical report for reasons
they themselves refuse to clearly articulate. The position paper
of the U.S. for the recent G-8 summit (leaked to the press)
allowed the U.S. team no room to negotiate on the administration's
beliefs that there was no urgency to address Global Warming.
Never mind that the Academies of Science of all G-8 countries
have issued statements that it is, in fact, critical to address Global
Warming now. As the Republican Governor of California has said:
"The debate is over. We know the science. We see the threat posed
by changes in our climate. And we know the time for action is now."
So everyone knows this, but the administration still bullied the other
members of the G-8 to produce a watered down half-truth, easily
forgotten. Never mind that the future of my children is being
very greatly diminished by inaction on this issue.

Damn Kyoto--even if it is the consensus of the rest world--full
speed ahead. Public Opinion about the war in Iraq isn't important.
Stay the Course. Send our military to a foreign land to fight a
war for a lie. The Will will Triumph, won't it? Remember, Stay
the Course. It's hard work. But don't remember a single
instance when you've made a mistake. That would destroy the
illusion--do you want anyone to see the man behind the curtain?

I see a dangerous and very slippery slope here, that needs to be
approached with caution and urgency in equal measure, as we pry
this administration away from power, through the process of
Impeachment. Why? The pattern of behavior I see is this:
don't use argument, don't use truth, don't use science, don't listen
to your CIA analysts, or the French, or the Scientists, use power.
Power, what this administration understands and (ab)uses, all
to well. The problem is arbitrary exercise of power has always,
and will again, lead to the a reaction against that power, which
those in power will, predictably but unfortunately, answer with
a greater extension of that power. The Bush Administration
has displayed a singular inability to learn any lessons from their
failures in Iraq. It is not an accident that the primary failure in
Iraq was to (not) imagine how human beings react to the exercise
of power.

And I look, in vain, for any sign that those in power are not
about to repeat the same pattern of errors here, in America...