Big Brother's long fingers

It is perhaps due to my ignorance that I am noticing this now, or maybe I just dismissed it as impossible, but I was pretty shocked by a finding that struck me tonight

Especially after 9/11, it is a common occurrence that Europeans pity citizens of the United States, because their privacy is invaded at every corner, and all that newspeak and fear-mongering really remind us of Orwell's 1984. My father is even so concerned about his privacy and personal information, that he turned down an opportunity to go to the post-2001 USA several times.

In fact, when I was about to leave for the Land of Freedom to spend a semester there last fall, I even had to pay for being watched and tracked. My visa request would not be granted unless I paid a $100 fee to SEVIS, an organization whose very purpose is to spy on foreign students and visitors.

I always thought that compassion is all that we had to offer in this context, but it turns out I was wrong: Obviously, an agreement between US and EU [NY Times] is about to happen, that will give the US government access to personal data of EU citizens. Am I the only one who feels this is an outrage? Any reason we should trust Team America with this?

Of course, they claim they will only "look for suspicious activity", but just consider how the FBI abuses the Patriot Act. Do you remember that sweet pot of honey they were feeding everyone prior to the Patriot Act vote? This is a binding agreement, and indeed is a big deal. If the EU will have to turn over any such information US would ask for, I think I have yet another reason to move to Norway.

Fortunately, there are some respectable voices speaking out against this. “I am very worried that once this will be adopted, it will serve as a pretext to freely share our personal data with anyone, so I want it to be very clear about exactly what it means and how it will work,” said Sophia in ’t Veld, a member of the European Parliament from the Netherlands who has been an outspoken advocate of privacy rights.

Of course, “the fight against transnational crime and terrorism requires the ability to share personal data for law enforcement.” Naturally, I am going to feel safer immediately, knowing that Ahmed ibn Muhammad, who sells Gyros in Frankfurt, has his credit report resting safe within the hands of the DHS, right next to mine.

But wait, it gets better...! “The Europeans have agreed that the American government’s internal oversight system may be good enough to provide accountability for how Europeans’ data is used.” Yeah right. I wouldn't trust the American government's internal oversight system to oversee berries-picking in my backyard. They would probably lose an unencrypted laptop with full recordings of everything I said and did during the past 18 months.

Duh. Can someone please tell me that everything is going to be okay...?

And the new US president is...

Most people won't know the winner of US presidential elections until later this year. Initially, I thought that the next president will be decided by who can profit most from the insanely insecure voting machines...

Now, however, I have changed my mind and realised that security vulnerabilities are not as important anymore, as the most important and decisive factor of them all has decided to reveal himself and swing his weight behind Mike Huckabee! He would probably become the president himself, if only it wasn't so boring. Who needs the nuclear briefcase anyway, when a roundhouse kick right to the face can solve any and all problems?

Ladies and gentlemen, please bow low for Chuck Norris and his will of steel! :-)

Bombs or Cholera. Pick one?

It is expectable that poor people in a country with seriously damaged infrastructure would suffer from various diseases. Thus, it came as a little surprise that a few weeks ago, cases of cholera started to appear around Baghdad. According to BBC, at least 2000 cases have been confirmed, and the number is growing fast. It is also far from final, as there have been around 30 thousand cases of acute water diarrhea, which may later be confirmed as cholera.

Cholera is a disease often linked to contaminated supplies of drinking water. "It causes severe diarrhoea and vomiting, and patients, particularly children and the elderly, are vulnerable to dangerous dehydration as a result. Treating the condition - or rather alleviating these severe effects, requires only simple measures. However, the clean water and rehydration salts required are often in short supply in areas where they are needed most."
Indeed, the article also reports that only one in five Iraqis have access to effectively sanitised water. That struck me as little weird, so I started to dig around a little. Obviously, most waterworks in the city are now entirely without chlorine. Curious. Isn't chlorine cheap and easy to produce?

However, chlorine has been dubbed Evil™, and it's import banned. Why? Iraqi insurgents have used it as a payload for bombs a few times. According to WHO, there are 100 kilotons of water sanitiser waiting on border with Jordan, and because of fear someone could use it to make bombs, it can not get into the country.
As is often the case, the worst damage does not come from the terrorist actions themselves, but from our overreaction to them. Chlorine chemical bombs are not particularly effective, compared to other possible payloads, and their usage is dying out. According to wiki: "Higher levels of exposure can cause fatal lung damage; but because the gas is heavier than air it will not dissipate until well after an explosion, and so it is generally considered ineffective as an improvised chemical weapon." Although chlorine, particularly potassium chlorate, can also be used as an ingredient to produce some explosives, it generally is not effective either, and can be easily replaced.

But the "side-effects" of these bombings are adverse. They have caused the country to lose its supply of drinking water, which could cost thousands of people their lives. It definitely shows how US Army cares about civilians of the area. Also, surprisingly, no one thought of banning salt. :-P All you need to produce chlorine is salt, water, and electricity. Then again, we should probably also ban water. And electricity.

Now here's a thought for terrorists. Next time, mix a little wheat in your bombs. Following this pattern, the security forces will identify it as a bomb ingredient and issue a countrywide ban. Of course, people will be dying of famine, but that's only necessary to keep them safe from evil insurgents. In your face, terrorists!

Mother Russia, father bomb...

After last month's resumption of regular patrols of strategic bombers, which were suspended after the 1991 Soviet Union breakup, Red Army* flexes its muscles yet again, this time by testing of Father Of All Bombs, an air delivered fuel-air bomb, yielding the equivalent of 44 tons of TNT. That makes it approximately four times as powerful as US Army's MOAB. (Massive Ordnance Air Blast, or Mother Of All Bombs.) It's not the bomb I want to talk about, though, it's the propaganda and attitude of Russian officials that caught me breathless.
"The tests have shown that the new air-delivered ordnance is comparable to a nuclear weapon in its efficiency and capability,"' says Col.-Gen. Alexander Rukshin, deputy chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces. Gotta love that guy. This statement is misleading at the very least, because most nuclear bombs have way more power than that. For example, Fat Man, one of the first atomic bombs ever used, that was dropped on Nagasaki, had a yield of cca. 21 kilotons of TNT. That gives the mighty FOAB credit to merely 0.2 % of Fat Man's destructive power, which, while comparable, is nowhere close.

See the Russian report video for yourself:


But Alex is just awesome, he doesn't stop there. Sharing his wisdom, (estimated to be at least 23, ;-)) with the world, he claims, that the bomb is "environmentally friendly". Excuse me? Okay, maybe it does not have nuclear fallout with long half-life, but calling a bomb worth of 44 tons of TNT, that leaves "lunar landscape" in its wake, "environmentally friendly" is just outright funny.

Tu-160, the bomber that dropped daddy of all bombs earlier this week.

However, funny turns to insanely idiotic. As bloomberg.com reports:
The new weapon disperses a cloud of explosive material that is set off by a charge and produces "an ultrasonic shockwave and an incredibly high temperature," Perviy Kanal said on its Web site. After the blast, "the soil looks like a lunar landscape," according to the report.

The new bomb carries fewer explosives than the U.S. device, while the temperature at the center of its blast is twice as high and the area of damage much greater, Perviy Kanal said.

"This has made it possible to reduce the accuracy requirements and made it cheaper, which is necessary in the current situation," Yuri Balyko, head of the Defense Ministry's 30th Central Research Institute, told the channel.

The new weapon will allow Russia "to ensure the nation's security and at the same time battle international terrorism in any situation and in any region," Rukshin said.

Oh my. I feel dumber just for having read this exhibition of pure wisdom. So we have a weapon that turns an enormous area to lunar landscape, which, in turn, allows us to reduce the accuracy requirements, and, therefore, we can use it to battle international terrorism in any situation and in any region! Holy zombie Jesus, Russian military brains are just precious! :-D Now, if I were a Chechnyan partisan, that would be all I needed to hear to capture a building in the middle of Moscow, and wait for the brave Red Army to level their capital city with one of these babies.

__
* I know it's not called Red Army anymore. But hey, it seems that not many things have changed apart from the name...

Volksrepublik China ist wunderbar!

Newsweek, Aug. 20-27, 2007 issue:
In one of history's more absurd acts of totalitarianism, China has banned Buddhist monks in Tibet from reincarnating without government permission. According to a statement issued by the State Administration for Religious Affairs, the law, which goes into effect next month and strictly stipulates the procedures by which one is to reincarnate, is "an important move to institutionalize management of reincarnation."

Now this is quite interesting. I don't think I've seen a dictatorship reach into the afterlife like this before. The funny thing is, though, that by trying to control who reincarnates how, China has officially, although unintentionally admitted, that reincarnation is possible. Whoops! :-)

Of course, the true motive of very materialistic Communist Party is to strengthen its hold on Tibet. Fully abusing this law by Chinese government could effectively mean, that China would choose who gets to be the next Dalai Lama, the next symbol of resistance against the occupation. Just a quick history note, we've seen them meddle with Buddhist officials before, when some dozen years ago, or so, the Panchen Lama disappeared and wasn't heard from since.

Meanwhile, the current Dalai Lama proves his wits by proclaiming that he is not going to reincarnate in Tibet, as long as it's occupied, so his successor will probably be born in exile. I have to admit am a little jealous of his powers over his own reincarnation. ;-) Anyway, I'm rather curious to see this story unfold.

Edited to add: As my friend has remarked, we are quite curious about the methods used by the Chinese government to monitor reincarnations. Unless, of course, people brag about them, just like the Dalai Lama needs to. Also, we'd like to know if you have to pay the administration fees and fill out the reincarnation permits before you die. And what if you cannot actually control your own reincarnation process? Oh aye, China seems to have screwed up big time with this one.