d.c. – Page 19 – Andy Sternberg

April 14, 2006

Donate to Cheney’s Tax Re-fund by Monday

Yeah, file your taxes now, so Shooter Cheney doesn’t have to hold out on his nearly $2 MILLION refund. What, did he have Ken Lay’s accountant?

Andrea Seabrook reports on NPR’s Mixed Signals blog:

Vice President Cheney and his wife Lynne brought in a gross household income of $8,819,006. After they gave a lot — and I mean a lot — of that to charity, the family’s taxable income was $1,961,157. But because so much cash went through their accounts, the IRS withheld a whole lot more than the Cheneys owe — the result being, and I hope you’re sitting down here, a roughly $1.9 million tax refund.

I mean, I did feel for the Vice President in Overcharge just a little when his company Halliburton couldn’t get away with swindling the U.S. military for several hundred million…. But how on earth can the man in the bunker possibly get money back on that ginormous income?

We got till the 17th this year… so go, go, and get yr refund on!

April 13, 2006

Evidence of AT&T Secret ‘Spy’ Room Mounts

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed suit earlier this year against AT&T for their collaboration in invading privace by data-mining and providing wiretaps for the National Security Agency.

Last week, Wired broke the news of an affidavit filed by Mark Klein, a former AT&T employee. Klein describes a shady scenario in which the NSA came in to oversee a special hire.

“I learned that the person whom the NSA interviewed for the secret job was the person working to install equipment in this room,” Klein wrote. “The regular technician work force was not allowed in the room.”

He later observed that fiber optic cables wired to the “secret room” were piped into AT&T’s circuits.

While the president may or may not have the constitutional authority to demand domestic wiretaps, the involvement of a public corporation willingly cooperating without a warrant would seem to be a violation.

Michael Hiltzik writes in his L.A. Times weblog:

The NSA’s vacuuming of terabytes of personal data from AT&T’s network is an example of the government aggressively taking advantage of a tattered fabric of privacy protection.

Klein may seem a hero to some, for stepping forward with a smoking gun that has At&T scrambling to ask the judge to return all of their “highly classified” NSA-related documents. But as Martin McKeay reminds, Klein’s actions will be viewed by some as a criminal disclosure of government secrets.

Either way, this story has exploded with this new twist and is now receiving broad coverage.

Klein may be just a disgruntled former employee, but would he really take such a risk if he didn’t have the truth on his side?

Ars Technica has an in-depth look at the technology involved in this case and the Narus STA 6400, which apparently can literally vacuum data from the internet.

April 13, 2006

Does Anyone Outside the White House Like Rumsfeld?

Is Jefferson Davis available?

I mean, whose best friends would really have your back when no one in your Army trusts you, and in the worst of interests re: fellow man? Must be the White House.
A fifth retired general, Major Gen. John Riggs, added his voice to those opposing Rumsfeld. In an interview with National Public Radio, Riggs cited an atmosphere of “arrogance” among top civilian leaders at the Pentagon.

Rumsfeld “should step aside and let someone step in who can be more realistic,” he said.

Raw Story has a piece detailing further plans in which Rumsfeld along with Cheney intend to ignore recommendations from intelligence and use the forces of the detained Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK) — a right-wing Iranian terrorist organization — to intimidate Iran.

?These guys are nuts,” an anonymous intelligence source told Raw Story, regarding Tweedle Don and Tweedle Dick.
The Moderate Voice scours the papers and the web for various points of view on the Rummy Must Go symphony.

And never, ever by the “Rumsfeld tried to resign twice” nonsense. Friends don’t let friends cut and run.