June 17, 2004

Intel, Proxim team up for WiMax gear | CNET News.com

WiMax appears to be the next big thing in broadband wireless access. If reliability and coverage is substantial, this may take off. Vermont has appropriated some seed $ for five municipalities to compete for grants to provide wide area coverage in the next two years. I hope the client device enablement is cheap.

My Way News - Clinton Hasn't Changed

Clinton lacks any morals and has no sense of right and wrong. What a shame a man of his talents is so rotten on the inside. He is not fit to be a leader.

Reuters News Article -Rumsfeld Acknowledges Hiding Iraqi Prisoner

The rules of war have changed. The war on terror requires stern measures for which the rules of previous wars may be outdated.

Other than the kamikazes who targeted ships and military installations, were suicide bombers in WW II targeting civilians? The world has changed. So must the rules of war.

June 16, 2004

Bell tolling for DSL? - News - ZDNet

On and on the battle rages. Bells should be properly compensated for investments it makes and services it is required to provide.

June 15, 2004

The War We Have Just begun to Fight

This catalog of battles in the war reminds us that terrorism must be struck down. The politics of it matter little. The will to fight and eradicate terrorists and find ways to change the radical Islam breeding grounds in the Arab world must transcend political lines. It disturbs me that many Americans don't seem up to the fight. Thankfully, some leaders are, including Bush. Kerry is not one of them. Neither is Dean.

People must see this as a war. What frustrates me particularly is Kerry, Dean and others criticizing the conduct of the war in Afghanistan and Iraq, yet offering no viable plan for a different approach. They are unworthy of leading this country if they refuse to face the fact that we must press hard the war on terror...and it is a war. There is no compromise with the radical Islamists. I think often of the time we attended the Daniel Pipes lecture in UVM's Ira Allen Chapel and how the kids opposed what he said and refused to recognize the truth of what we face.

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You have to read the catalogue of events in this brief piece. Then, ask yourself how anyone can take the position that all we have to do is bring our troops home from Iraq, sit back, re-set the snooze alarm, go back to sleep, and no one will ever bother us again.

In case you missed it, World War III began in November 1979... that alarm has been ringing for years.

U.S. Navy Captain Phil Ouimette, is the Executive Officer at Naval Air Station, Pensacola, Florida. Here is a copy of the speech he gave last month.

It is an accurate account of why we are in so much trouble today and why this action is so necessary.

AMERICA NEEDS TO WAKE UP!

That's what we think we heard on the 11th of September 2001 (When more than 3,000 Americans were killed -AD) and maybe it was, but I think it should have been "Get Out of Bed!". In fact, I think the alarm clock has been buzzing since 1979 and we have continued to hit the snooze button and roll over for a few more minutes of peaceful sleep since then.

It was a cool fall day in November 1979 in a country going through a religious and political upheaval when a group of Iranian students attacked and seized the American Embassy in Tehran. This seizure was an outright attack on American soil; it was an attack that held the world's most powerful country hostage and paralyzed a Presidency. The attack on this sovereign U. S. Embassy set the stage for events to follow for the next 23 years.

America was still reeling from the aftermath of the Vietnam experience and had a serious threat from the Soviet Union when then, President Carter, had to do some thing. He chose to conduct a clandestine raid in the desert.

The ill-fated mission ended in ruin, but stood as a symbol of America's inability to deal with terrorism.

America's military had been decimated and downsized/right sized since the end of the Vietnam War. A poorly trained, poorly equipped and poorly organized! zed military was called on to execute a complex mission that was doomed from the start.

Shortly after the Tehran experience, Americans began to be kidnapped and killed throughout the Middle East. America could do little to protect her citizens living and working abroad. The attacks against US soil continued.

In April of 1983 a large vehicle packed with high explosives was driven into the US Embassy compound in Beirut. When it explodes, it kills 63 people. The alarm went off again and America hit the Snooze Button once more.

Then just six short months later a large truck heavily laden down with over 2500 pounds of TNT smashed through the main gate of the US Marine Corps headquarters in Beirut and 241 US servicemen are killed. America mourns her dead and hit the Snooze Button once more.

Two months later in December 1983, another truck loaded with explosives is driven into the US Embassy in Kuwait, and America! continues her slumber.

The following year, in September 1984, another van was driven into the gates of the US Embassy in Beirut and America slept.

Soon the terrorism spreads to Europe. In April 1985 a bomb explodes in a restaurant frequented by US soldiers in Madrid.

Then in August a Volkswagen loaded with explosives is driven into the main gate of the US Air Force Base at Rhein-Main, 22 are killed and the snooze alarm is buzzing louder and louder as US interests are continually attacked.

Fifty-nine days later a cruise ship, the Achille Lauro is hijacked and we watched as an American in a wheelchair is singled out of the passenger list and executed.

The terrorists then shift their tactics to bombing civilian airliners when they bomb TWA Flight 840 in April of 1986 that killed 4 and the most tragic bombing! ng, Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988, killing 259

Clinton treated these terrorist acts as crimes; in fact we are still trying to bring these people to trial. These are acts of war.

The wake up alarm is getting louder and louder. The terrorists decide to bring the fight to America. In January 1993, two CIA agents are shot and killed as they enter CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia.

The following month, February 1993, a group of terrorists are arrested after a rented van packed with explosives is driven into the underground parking garage of the World Trade Center in New York City. Six people are killed and over 1000 are injured. Still this is a crime and not an act of war?

The Snooze alarm is depressed again. Then in November 1995 a car bomb explodes at a US military complex in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia killing seven service men
and women.

A few months later in June of 1996, another truck bomb explodes only 35 ! yards from the US military compound in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. It destroys the Khobar Towers, a US Air Force barracks, killing 19 and injuring over 500. The terrorists are getting braver and smarter as they see that America does not respond decisively.

They move to coordinate their attacks in a simultaneous attack on two US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. These attacks were planned with precision. They kill 224. America responds with cruise missile attacks and goes back to sleep.

The USS Cole was docked in the port of Aden, Yemen for refueling on 12 October 2000, when a small craft pulled along side the ship and exploded killing 17 US Navy Sailors. Attacking a US War Ship is an act of war, but we sent the FBI to investigate the crime and went back to sleep.

And of course you know the events of 11 September 2001. Most Americans think this was the first attack against US soil or in America. How wrong they are.

America has been under a constant attack since 1979 and we chose to hit the snooze alarm and roll over and go back to sleep.

In the news lately we have seen lots of finger pointing from every high officials in government over what they knew and what they didn't know.

But if you've read the papers and paid a little attention I think you can see exactly what they knew. You don't have to be in the FBI or CIA or on the National Security Council to see the pattern that has been developing since 1979.

The President is right on when he says we are engaged in a war. I think we have been in a war for the past 23 years and it will continue until we as a people decide enough is enough.

America needs to "Get out of Bed" and act decisively now. America has been changed forever. We have to be ready to pay the price and make the sacrifice to ensure our way of life continues. We cannot afford to keep hitting the snooze button again and again and roll over and go back to sleep.

After the attack on Pearl Harbor, Admiral Yamamoto said "...it seems all we have done is awakened a sleeping giant." This is the message we need to disseminate to terrorists around the world.

Support Our Troops and support President Bush for having the courage, political or militarily, to address what so many who preceded him didn't have the backbone to do both Democrat and Republican. This is not a political thing to be hashed over in an election year this is an ! AMERICAN thing. This is about our Freedom and the Freedom of our children in years to come.

Please forward this to as many people as you can especially to the young people and all those who dozed off in history class and who seem so quick to protest such a necessary military action.

The New York Times > Technology > Federal Agency Declines to Create Do-Not-Spam Registry

The FTC has it right. A list won't work. The only solution is a technical one from the big boys in the software business.

June 14, 2004

To Kill an American

Subject: Kill an American

You probably missed it in the rush of news last week, but there was actually a report that someone in Pakistan had published in a newspaper an offer of a reward to anyone who killed an American, any American.

So an Australian dentist wrote the following to let everyone know what an American is, so they would know when they found one. (Good on ya, mate!!!!)

An American is English, or French, or Italian, Irish, German, Spanish, Polish, Russian or Greek. An American may also be Canadian, Mexican, African, Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Australian, Iranian, Asian, or Arab, or Pakistani, or Afghan. An American may also be a Cherokee, Osage, Blackfoot, Navaho, Apache, Seminole or one of the many other tribes known as native Americans.

An American is Christian, or he could be Jewish, or Buddhist, or Muslim. Infact, there are more Muslims in America than in Afghanistan. The only difference is that in America they are free to worship as each of them chooses.

An American is also free to believe in no religion. For that he will answer only to God, not to the government, or to armed thugs claiming to speak for the government and for God.

An American is from the most prosperous land in the history of the world. The root of that prosperity can be found in the Declaration of Independence, which recognizes the God given right of each person the pursuit of happiness.

An American is generous. Americans have helped out just about every other nation in the world in their time of need. When Afghanistan was overrun by the Soviet army 20 years ago, Americans came with arms and supplies to enable the people to win back their country!

As of the morning of September 11, Americans had given more than any other nation to the poor in Afghanistan.

Americans welcome the best, the best products, the best books, the best music, the best food, the best athletes. But they also welcome the least. The national symbol of America, The Statue of Liberty, welcomes your tired and your poor, the wretched refuse of your teeming shores, the homeless, tempest tossed.

These in fact are the people who built America. Some of them were working in the Twin Towers the morning of September 11, 2001 earning a better life for their families. I've been told that the World Trade Center victims were from at least 30 other countries, cultures, and first languages, including those that aided and abetted the terrorists.

So you can try to kill an American if you must. Hitler did. So did General Tojo, and Stalin, and Mao Tse-Tung, and every bloodthirsty tyrant in the history of the world. But, in doing so you would just be killing yourself, because Americans are not a particular people from a particular place. They are the embodiment of the human spirit of freedom. Everyone who holds to that spirit, everywhere, is an American.

Author unknown

Ed Brill Email vs. RSS

The sands continue to shift as the Internet matures. I find RSS very helpful and expect that it will become more useful as time and talent are applied to it. Nevertheless, I expect to be using email for the rest of my natural life.

BBC NEWS | UK | Magazine | The seven-year-old bloggers

I spotted this on Dave Winer's Scripting News and he included it for the obvious reference to Manila, Radio's (from his company, Userland )engine.

But I'll bet kids, properly guided, really can benefit from the use of simple blogs and it gives a chance for them to practice and perhaps inspire them to good writing, not to mention all the peripheral learning that happens. The teacher, John Mill's site is here.

The New York Times > Opinion > Op-Ed Columnist: Taking the High Ground

A realistic piece of advice from Thomas to the Israelis. But can the rightists in the Likud be persuaded this is in their best interests? Can the Gaza settlers be convinced? What would be provided for them and where?
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