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Tuesday, February 21, 2006
w
Subject: Mac OS/X Vuln, MS
Patches, Great "botnet" article
Dr. Pournelle:
Three important issues:
1) Mac OS/X users are warned about a problem with
Safara (default web browser on that OS), and it's handling of ZIP files. By
default, ZIP files are automatically opened when downloaded. If the ZIP file
contains an evil executable, then damage will occur. Internet Storm Center
article here http://isc.sans.org//diary.php?storyid=1138 has pointers to the
full text of the discovery by a German researcher.
2) Microsoft patches released last week; evildoers
have released nasty code to exploit those vulns. Updating is important.
There was an initial problem with automatic updates on one of the patches;
since fixed. Users with automatic updates enabled are OK.
3) Brian Krebs of the Washington Post has an
execellent article on 'botnets' (a network of remotely controlled infected
computers). Great financial incentives for controlling a botnet, allowing
the hacker to send out spam, grab financial information, or all of your
on-line banking transaction information. Mr. Krebs profiles one 19-year-old
hacker that makes an average of US$ 6800/month from online marketing
companies that use his botnet. Great article here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/14/AR2006021401342.html
. BTW, his "Security Fix" blog is one of my daily web stops for computer
security info.
Regards, Rick Hellewell
=============
Subject: May we at this stage
remind our Muslim brothers that they do not have the monopoly of violence in
this nation buffy willow - Civil War in a major oil producing state? Shades
of Biafra redux?
http://www.anglicancommunion.org/acns/articles/41/00/acns4113.cfm
Reaction of the President of the Christian
Association of Nigeria, The Most Revd Peter Akinola on recent events in
Nigeria
Having watched with sadness and dismay the
recent development in some States in the Northern part of this Country where
many Christian Churches and other property have been wantonly destroyed by
some Islamic fundamentalists, the Christian Association of Nigeria is
compelled to issue the following statements:
From all indications, it is very clear now that
the sacrifices of the Christians in this country for peaceful co-existence
with people of other faiths has been sadly misunderstood to be weakness
We have for a long time now watched helplessly
the killing, maiming and destruction of Christians and their property by
Muslim fanatics and fundamentalists at the slightest or no provocation at
all. We are not unaware of the fact that these religious extremists have the
full backup and support of some influential Muslims who are yet to
appreciate the value of peaceful co-existence.
That an incident in far away Denmark which does
not claim to be representing Christianity could elicit such an unfortunate
reaction here in Nigeria, leading to the destruction of Christian Churches,
is not only embarrassing, but also disturbing and unfortunate.
It is no longer a hidden fact that a long
standing agenda to make this Nigeria an Islamic nation is being
surreptitiously pursued. The willingness of Muslim Youth to descend with
violence on the innocent Christians from time to time is from all intents
and purposes a design to actualize their dream.
It is sad to note that all acts of hostility
meted against Christians by Muslims in the past have remained unaddressed
with nobody paying compensations or the culprits brought to justice.
We do appreciate the fact that at this stage of
our national development, peace is absolutely necessary for realizing our
dreams and aspirations. It is in view of this that Christians in Nigeria
agreed to participate in the forthcoming National Census as sacrifice for
the peace and progress of this nation, in spite of our protest over the
non-inclusion of Religion and Ethnicity as necessary demographic data.
May we at this stage remind our Muslim brothers
that they do not have the monopoly of violence in this nation. Nigeria
belongs to all of us – Christians, Muslims and members of other faiths. No
amount of intimidation can Change this time-honoured arrangement in this
nation. C.A.N. may no longer be able to contain our restive youths should
this ugly trend continue.
We now demand that further destruction of
Christian Churches and property in this nation be permanently put to an end.
All levels of Government in this country should
take adequate steps to protect the lives and property of Christians
everywhere in this land as no further destructions will be tolerated or
ignored.
The Federal Government and those States where
Christian Churches have been destroyed are hereby urged to take urgent steps
at rebuilding those structures and paying adequate compensation while
assuring Christians of adequate protection in this country. These
governments should now show in practical terms that Nigeria belongs to all
of us by going beyond mere promises of rebuilding destroyed Churches and
property as in the past to actual reconstruction, which will help the
victims to quickly put this unfortunate incident behind them. A stitch in
time saves nine.
Signed
Most Revd. Peter J. Akinola (CON, DD.)
President, Christian Association of Nigeria
This REFUSAL of the press to mount a HUGE OUTCRY is
GETTING US KILLED. . . . If they'd all come out in unison and HOWLED THEIR
DISGUST, it might have quelled the riots and shamed the Muslims into ceasing
this obscene behaviour. As it is, Muslims see nothing is going to happen to
them for howling and they are going to up the ante. The REAL STORY IS THE
PRESS REFUSAL TO COVER THIS. WHY?
http://abcnews.go.com/International/print?id=1644177
ABC News"
Anti-Muslim Riot in Nigeria Turns Deadly
At Least Six Reported Killed in Anti-Muslim
Riot in Nigeria, Seen As Reaction to Cartoon Riot
By DULUE MBACHU
The Associated Press
LAGOS, Nigeria - Christian mobs rampaged
through a southern Nigerian city Tuesday, burning mosques and killing
several people in an outbreak of anti-Muslim violence that followed deadly
protests against caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad over the weekend.
Well, you don't understand the media, and who they
see as the enemies of civilization.
=============
Subject: homeland security in the library chasing porn
users
Bob Porter's report on the "Homeland Defense" officers
chasing porn users in a library:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/16/AR2006021602066.html>
/article/2006/02/16/AR2006021602066.html <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/16/AR2006021602066.html>
seems to have missed the crucial point that the
officers in question were NOT from the Federal government.
The article states:
They were officers of the security division of
Montgomery County's Homeland Security Department, an unarmed force that
patrols about 300 county buildings
Now why Montgomery County needs a special Homeland
Security Department is a question I would love to see addressed. I sense
another example of Pournelle's Iron Law Of Bureaucracy is slowly setting in
at lower and lower levels of government, as the concept of "security" is
such a "growth area" in government.
I can just see bureaucrats at all levels rubbing their
hands in glee the past few years at the prospect of an entire new arena
within which to build empires of clerks and staffers and rulebooks full of
beautiful regulation's piled chockablock upon rules and procedures, all
subject to "interpretation" by glorious hordes of "authorized persons".
Ah, sweet idiocy!
Petronius The Arbiter Of Taste
Well, that's a relief. It's also Montgombery
County's problem...
==========
Warning: long post
Subject: Ian Campbell and those bad American energy
wasters who take all the credit
Your correspondent Ian Campbell, on
February 18, 2006 in a post on:
Subject: Command economies in a global crisis
Made a few comments that raised my hackles, and which
just cried out for a little clarification, or correction and/or questioning.
First example: It is little-known that during World
War II the economy of the UK, nominally a democracy, was much more of a
command economy than was that of Nazi Germany. Apparently, until about
mid-1943 German factories were only operating one shift, and consumer goods
were in free supply, while the UK bust a gut to produce everything they
possibly could for the war effort.
I cannot say how "little-known" to the average
intelligent reader of this site that fact is, but it's something I was well
aware of. Anyone who has read Albert Speer's memoirs, or virtually anything
James F. Dunnigan (sui generis) has written on the Second World War would
have imbibed this basic fact-set early on.
Campbell continues:
(It might be mentioned that we were doing it alone, or
nearly so; it took the US two years to get into the war, and all the
Lend-Lease goods were well and truly paid for, in money or in overseas bases
or…)
Well I would like to point out that the destroyers for
overseas bases deal was in 1940, and Lend-lease was not passed until 1941.
Minor detail.
Yes, England was doing it alone, with only the men and
resources of Australia, New Zealand, Canada, South Africa, Rhodesia
(Zimbabwe today), India, Pakistan, Palestine, Jordan, Egypt, Persia
(effectively under British control through the Shah), Iraq (after they
tossed out a pro-German regime in a pre-emptive and aggressive war,
horrors!), British Honduras, Fiji, Malaysia, Burma, Singapore, Brunei,
Sarawak, (fingers getting tired) Nigeria, Kenya, Italian East Africa
(conquered form the Italians), Northern Ireland, The Dutch East Indies
(Indonesia, and since the Dutch were allies, effectively on the British side
economically), the Belgian Congo (Belgium also an ally of the British), and
then there was Portugal (the old "Ancient Ally" of the British, their
longest strategic relationship) with Mozambique and Angola.
Only about a quarter of the worlds resources,
including population. Working around the clock, as Campbell points out.
Meanwhile the Germans, all eighty million of them, are working one shift AND
BEATING THE PANTS OFF THE BRITISH! Okay, the Germans did have most of the
European economies working with them or for them. Still, the British
couldn't do "alone". They needed to buy stuff from the USA.
And they were running out of money.
So House Bill 1776 (!) in early 1941 was passed, the
so-called "Lend-Lease Act", where, in President Roosevelt's famous phrase,
we got rid of "that silly old dollar sign" in our accounts with the British
Empire/Commonwealth. We wouldn't charge for the war materiel the British
needed, we'd just open the gates and tally what was taken by the British,
and have a gentleman's agreement they would return it in kind at some
unspecified future time. No "silly old dollar signs"!
A sum of $50 billion was appropriated by Congress for
Lend-Lease. The money went to 38 different countries with Great Britain
receiving over $31 billion (62 per cent). Over the next few years the
British government repaid $650 million of this sum.
At the end of the war a loan was negotiated to cover
some of the debt incurred through Lend-Lease. Technology transfers (atomic
weapons development work, microwave radar, similar high tech British
research results) were also given to the USA in partial payment.
Campbell continued:
The reason why it worked? There was a job to be done,
only the British to do it, and everyone (or mostly everyone) knew what
needed to be done.
This is laughable. Only the British to do it? Along
with the quarter of the world that was listed above, and then from June of
1941 onwards, the Soviet Union, another 240 million people and the second or
third largest industrial economy of the time.
But the Germans were STILL cleaning the barroom floor,
and working just one shift. You could still by brand new washing machines
and Mercedes sedans along the Kurfuerstendamm in Berlin. The Reeperbahn in
Hamburg was going full-tilt while former British "working girls" were
working three shifts making shells.
So finally, when the Germans made the undeclared war
official by declaring war on the USA, we stepped in and did the heavy
lifting.
Yes, the Red Army of the USSR did most of the
fighting. Let's see: eighty per cent of the trucks that carried Red Army men
and supplies were American built. 50% of the explosives in the bombs,
bullets and shells were American made. 75% of the cloth that was used to
make Red Army uniforms was from American mills. Half of the leather for
boots and gear came from American cattle. 25% of the food for the Red Army
was from American farms.
Similar numbers held for the British forces. All done
while the USA was also fielding a 16 million strong military, fully equipped
and armed from American sources, and deployed world wide.
Imagine British and Soviet Armies with half the
firepower, a fifth of the transport, wearing rags and boots with holes in
the soles, and hungry due to the three-quarters rations. Would they have won
the war single-handed? So I think one can say the American economy was more
than important. It was essential.
Oxford students were vowing, "I will not fight for
king or country." The British Labor Party at its annual convention in 1933 —
with Hitler already in power — voted overwhelmingly for total abolition of
the Royal Air Force. Fortunately, the Labor Party was then in opposition as
it continued to be in 1938 when it voted against conscription while Hitler
was taking over the Sudetenland.
The British and their French allies allowed the
Germans to scrap the treaty limitations put in place after the victory
secured by a quarter million American dead soldiers in 1918, they allowed
Germany to rearm and pursue a revanchist policy, and then when it was too
late to stop them short of a full scale world war, then, THEN the British
went to war, unprepared and barely half-heartedly until the French and
British armies folded in May, 1940 like a cheap suit in a spring shower.
SO the British got everything in a cockup, then
screamed bloody murder for help, we did everything we could, and our thanks
is some sixty years on to have a Brit cock his snoot verbally at us for
believing economic freedom works, and that we were "two years getting into
the war" the last time they got their panties in a wad over there on the far
side of the Atlantic.
Sorry about that, mate!
Now the real point that grates in this irritating
little screed. when Campbell asked:
As for the central point, that the cost of the needed
measures would be greater than the benefit, what precisely is good about
wasting energy?
May I be so politically incorrect as to ask, "What's
so good about conserving energy?"
I ask honestly. Look at the universe. Nature spends
energy prodigiously. The universe is awash in floods of energy. The only
thing lacking in abundance is the human ingenuity to harness that energy.
There is, never was and never will be an energy shortage. There is only a
shortage of the will, determination and ingenuity to USE the energy that is
there.
The point, as you have often pointed out Doctor
Pournelle, is that if we accept the "goodness" of conserving energy as a
basic "moral" position, those like Ian Campbell accomplish two things: They
set themselves up as existing on a higher moral plane than those profligate,
wastrel energy "spenders", AND they can also use the purported need for
"limiting our energy use" to control the behavior of others.
It's a trait of some human's to take an abiding
interest and great joy in controlling the behavior of others. Most of us
have it to some degree, some more than others. To a certain type of person
it just warms their heart and burnishes their self-esteem to be able to wag
their fingers at those they label as "bad" and say to them things such as
Ian Campbell's::
Never mind, maybe Americans will come around to the
point of view of the rest of the West when the category 6 hurricanes have
scoured off the topsoil of Florida, and the Southwest is an uninhabitable
desert. Maybe then Americans will stop using a 2-ton SUV, capable of hauling
a ton up a 45-degree slope, to haul a couple of bags of groceries back from
the supermarket.
Maybe. Maybe not. Then again, maybe the British will
wake up, tell little minds like Ian Campbell to "sod off" (if that is a term
still used in England), and use some of that British grit and pluck he
appropriates for himself to help build a world where we can have a decent
environment AND feed everyone AND have enough resources to let everyone live
the way the British and Americans and other First Worlders live.
We'll never do it by limiting ourselves. Dream big,
build big, and solve big problems. The experiment on controlled economies
was run. The Soviet one needed massive USA support to beat the Nazi's. The
British one, with a quarter of the earths resources, needed massive American
economic aid just to avoid defeat, and only won with the additional aid of
the American Army and Air Forces.
Admittedly the USA economy of the period was partially
controlled. But the economy was able to expand and handle the load because
of the uncontrolled resources it had been allowed to develop in blessed
freedom from the "planners" and "limiters" such as Ian Campbell.
Petronius The Arbiter of Taste
===========
Subject: Girls' approach to the
study of math
Jerry,
You may publish this with my name attached if you wish
to do so.
You wrote:
> Those who can do abstract reasoning can do so
with symbols and can learn the rules of symbol manipulation. Which still
doesn't explain why girls do so much better than boys in verbal skills and
so much worse in mathematics.<
It's very simple, really. There are 10 kinds of people
who understand women: Those who do and those who do not. We learn very early
in life that most of us will never have the muscular strength of the average
man, and the only way we can influence him to play nicely is to let him
think he is superior to us. Mathematics is one of those harmless fields
where it is easy enough for us to pretend indifference without being
politically incorrect while doing so.
That said, however, woe unto the woman who actually
does well in math and wants to pursue it seriously. She is frequently
discouraged by many of her teachers and guidance counselors who try to point
out to her that she will encounter serious discrimination if she persists in
her efforts. Unfortunately, they are all too often very correct in their
predictions.
Elizabeth A. Strohm bstrohm@juno.com
I went through the PhD program in psychology and I
never met anyone who understood women. (Well, perhaps the women did, but
they sure couldn't explain it to me.)
I do know a few women mathematicians. On the other
hand, one of the best known women in computing famously ended up advertising
for someone to date (and she's quite pretty, too).
On the gripping hand, a PhD in science and a
position on the Harvard faculty apparently doesn't stop women scientists
from getting the vapors when the President of the University suggests
something she doesn't agree with. Shallow breathing, had to flee the room...
============
Reclassification.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/21/politics/
21reclassify.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&pagewanted=all&oref=slogin
--- Roland Dobbins
There may be more to this story than meets the eye.
Do note that Ed Teller always believed that secrecy
was worse than openness and was in favor of classification only of
operational documents and ship schedules and the like. He claimed that
secrecy impedes progress, and certainly case can be made for that.
Then there's Sandy Berger who stuffs the documents
in his pants.
=========
From an American resident in Japan:
From the mysterious east:
1. Japan has won *no* medals so far in the Olympics.
Local commentators has speculated on the cause of the medal drought, but a
recent morning show zeroed in on the probable reason. Even though they were
told otherwise, the athlete's village, unbelievably, does not serve Japanese
food! On morning show expert said, "I've been abroad and I know how it feels
to be faced with *bread* at every meal." The other guests nodded solemnly.
Fortunately an emergency group of volunteers made up of Japanese living in
Italy has tried to rescue the Olympic team by making Japanese lunch boxes,
but it lacks money and manpower and sadly cannot meet the demand fully.
The more likely reason is that in Japan, athletes are
supported by (actually employed by) companies. Companies have hockey,
basketball, football, rugby, marathon, etc. teams. The athlete's do little
real work and just train mostly. The downturn in the Japanese economy during
the 1990's caused many companies to cut back on these teams and thus the
Olympic athletes lacked support and facilities to prepare properly.
BTW, every Japanese athlete, it seems, has a beloved
mother or father who died of cancer, and their sole motivation for being in
the Olympics was to perform an act of *filial piety* that they somehow were
not able to perform while the parent was alive. Now that dream has been
dashed, but perhaps that parent is looking down, smiling, watching the
child's truly brave effort in magnificently coming in 17th under such
difficult conditions. Now is the time for everyone in the TV studio to break
down crying...
2. As far as I can see, the Cheney shooting incident
was not reported on Japanese TV *even once*. No doubt it got some minor
mention in the newspapers, but why it didn't get on TV is a mystery to me.
Granted most Japanese have no idea who the American VP is or what he does,
but this one is a real puzzler...
I thought they'd have a field day with this story. The
Japanese call America a "gun society" and are constantly shocked when some
some Japanese tourist gets shot in the USA--even when it turns out to be an
insurance scam by the victim's husband.
Steve
=========
90 years ago today.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_verdun
-- Roland Dobbins
Do we still encounter this in school?
Grass
Carl Sandburg
(1878–1967)
PILE the bodies high at
Austerlitz and Waterloo.
Shovel them under and let me work—
I am the grass; I cover all.
And pile them high at Gettysburg
And pile them high at Ypres and Verdun.
Shovel them under and let me
work.
Two years, ten years, and passengers ask the conductor:
What place is this?
Where are we now?
I am the grass.
Let me work.
http://www.web-books.com/classics/
poetry/anthology/Sandburg/Grass.htm
=============
Microsoft is developing handhelds and music
downloading services aimed at challenging Apple's iPod hegemony. What do you
think? Forget it. Apple's commanding lead of the digital music download
market is impregnable 55.4 %
Microsoft, RealNetworks, Napster and others can cut
down Apple's lead over time 40.3 %
Not sure 4.3 %
Total votes: 926
-- Richard F. Doherty, Research Director, The
Envisioneering Group
===============
Subject: Comparables
You said...
"I will confess that I am a bit astonished that
I have received so little comment on my short piece about Ortega y Gasset
and aristocracy. Is it that you all agree? Astounding."
Ortega had said...
"It is illusory to imagine that the mass-man of
to-day will be able to control, by himself, the process of civilization. I
say process, and not progress. The simple process of preserving our present
civilization is supremely complex, and demands incalculably subtle powers.
Ill-fitted to direct it is this average man who has learned to use much of
the machinery of civilization, but who is characterized by root-ignorance of
the very principles of that civilization."
Heinlein said...
"Throughout history, poverty is the normal
condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded--here and
there, now and then--are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently
despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking
people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes
happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject
poverty. This is known as "bad luck."
Now exactly why are you astonished that your
readership, by and large, is familiar with and agrees with the concept?
Charles Brumbelow
Senior moment? OK, Ok...
===========
Subject: It's more than just
Safari
It's a bigger problem with LaunchSevices; Mail is
vulnerable, too:
http://www.heise.de/english/newsticker/news/69919
Fix from Unsanity:
http://www.unsanity.org/archives/000449.php
-- Roland Dobbins
=
Further details on OS/X vuln.
http://isc.sans.org/diary.php?storyid=1138&rss
Nobody learns from anyone else's prior mistakes.
Apparently, Apple are dead-set on making all the stupid application design
mistakes that Microsoft have made over the years.
>sigh<
--- Roland Dobbins
==============
Subject: "Potomac fever" Infects
Republicans
Interesting observations from a long-time watcher of
the Beltway scene, Dr. Pournelle.
http://insider.washingtontimes.com/
articles/normal.php?StoryID=20060221-122951-2550r
"M. Stanton Evans has watched conservatives
come and go for 50 years, and has long lamented their tendency to catch
"Potomac fever" as soon as they come to power. "When our people get to the
point where they can do us some good, they stop being our people," he said
in enunciating what he calls "Evans' Law of Politics."<snip>
Charles Brumbelow
In one of his Cold War books Evans managed to call
me a Communist and identify as a Communist plot a study I did at North
American for US Air Force on the consequences of "full and compete
disarmament" which the Department of State was advocating in the early 60's.
I has written a scenario in which it might make sense for US to disarm to
pre-World War II levels. As I recall, I had Mao commit suicide after
disbanding the Communist Party. I forget how we got the USSR with the Red
Army poised to get to the Rhine in two weeks to get out of the picture. It
was a sarcastic scenario intended to demonstrate the absurdity of a great
power disarming down to constabulary and scrapping the Air Force. The report
was stolen off my desk by an engineer who was a devotee of the Reverend Bob
Wells of Orange County. The Reverend Bob was selling copies of my draft
report for $25 as "The most frightening document I have ever read." The
Reverend Billy James Hargis then got into the act and went national with
tghis story of how North American Aviation was in a conspiracy with the Air
Force to undermine national security, and I was their agent.
The engineer involved was met at the plant gates
and told his employment was terminated and we'd send him anything in his
desk we thought was his. I went through a couple of bad weeks there; even
though it wasn't my fault, I had brought the company to unfavorable
attention. It worked out well: the Air Force was quite happy with what we'd
done, and gave us another study contract with me as Principal, and later
gave Pepperdine Research an important study on strategic stability, again
with me as Principal after I had left North American to go to Pepperdine.
Several years later Evans put this story into one
of his books as if it were all real, and North American and the US Air Force
had been part of some conspiracy to disarm the United States and turn us
over to the USSR. He didn't bother to talk to me, or to Russell Kirk; North
American had actually asked Kirk to talk to Hargis and assure him that we
weren't really part of a conspiracy. Did no good, of course. Hargis had his
own agenda. But it wouldn't have been difficult for Evans to check the
story. He'd actually met me several times before he put that in his book and
named me in it.
I don't now where Evans got the story, but he
reported it in his book as if it were all real. I met him later at some
Republican fundraiser. He explained that he had some research assistant
write that chapter and he hadn't had time to pay much attention to it. He
apologized, and while I accepted his apology, I have since paid about as
much attention to Evans as he did to this story he put his name on.
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