Potter and Leonard, Junior G-Men

The Potter/Leonard flap over their desire to get themselves Top Secret clearance - and their apparent willingness to back away from the Joint Terrorism Task Force if they don't - is filled with half-truths and misunderstandings. (For a good overview see here and here.)

First, what does it mean for something to be Top Secret vs. Secret? Boiling down the explanation I got from my source, who has Top Secret clearance as part of his job, the difference is generally Sources and Methods.

It is rarely a risk to National Security to let the public know that we know that (say) North Korea has nukes. It is almost always a very grave risk to disclose the Sources and Methods by which we may know it. Have we bugged someone's bedroom where he spills everything to his mistress? Revealing that could reveal who the source is and lead to the discovery of the bug. Is all the information coming from a given source about agriculture? That could point a finger at our mole in the Ministry of Agriculture.

So, one way to take a Top Secret document and render it merely Secret (or even releasable to the public) can be to edit out all the Sources and Methods. Smart intelligence officials may even wait until they have two or three sources before revealing a fact, so the enemy cannot figure out, based on the content, who the source must have been.

(The British famously had broken the Nazi "Enigma" code and were desparate to ensure the Nazis didn't know it, lest they stop using it. During the North Africa campaign the Brits regularly sank German supply ships based on intercepted schedule information - but they always flew a recon aircraft over the ship to be targeted, waited a while, then sank it. The Germans were baffled at how good those British recon flights were. They never suspected Enigma was broken.)

Which brings us to Potter and Leonard. If you want to oversee your people, you don't always need to know all of the details of their day. You do need to know enough to be sure they're doing the right things, and you may want to have their work audited by a third party from time to time.

So, a regular summary of their work could be edited down from Top Secret to Secret, and a trusted person (say anybody working for state government with an existing Top Secret clearance, such as a judge, Department of Justice lawyer, etc.) could periodically examine the Top Secret materials for compliance with departmental policies and ORS 181, the state law that forbids law enforcement from taking part in certain kinds of domestic spying.

Not enough teeth for you? Then consider having the Oregon Dept of Justice issue an opinion on whether FBI agents could be prosecuted in state court for breaking state law or - if they instructed local cops to violate ORS 181 - conspiring to break the law. Wouldn't that be enough of a safeguard?

The Portland City Council seems unable to distinguish between what they want to accomplish (in this case oversight), and a particular way to accomplish it (Top Secret clearances and Sekrit Decoder Rings for Potter and Leonard). This mental rigidity is visible in other ways as well, I believe.

March 25 - Salem, OR - Senate Democrats today announced plans for an ambitious new program to demonstrate that their party has a monopoly on caring and good intentions. SB 666, recently passed out of committee, will establish a "Bonfire of Compassion" - an eternal flame into which lawmakers will feed taxpayer dollars to demonstrate their deep commitment to various causes.

"We Democrats care deeply about Oregon, and Republicans don't," said Senate President Peter Courtney. "This bonfire will prove once and for all that we are the party of benevolence and humanity, whereas Republicans are heartless and cruel."

Members of both parties have long implicitly agreed that a lawmaker's level of interest in solving a problem can be measured by how much money they are willing to spend on that problem. This new program makes that relationship explicit, said Senate Majority Leader Kate Brown. "By ceremonially burning taxpayer dollars in this bonfire, we will show all Oregonians how much we care. The more we burn, the deeper our passion for nurturing progressive change."

Prior to the bonfire, Democrats had a harder time demonstrating their love for vulnerable people. Previously, expensive and symbolic spending binges were tied to projects and programs, some of which didn't manage to spend all of their money. This sometimes resulted in embarrassing cash balances at the end of the budget cycle, leaving Democrats feeling that their caring had been short-changed.

"When DHS [the Department of Human Services] managed to find over $150 million last year, after swearing they were broke, it really made us feel like we'd failed," said Majority Leader Brown.

Such unexpected non-spending will be a thing of the past with the new Bonfire of Compassion. "We'll burn that money ourselves," vowed Senator Courtney. "No more leftovers. Oregon taxpayers will witness first hand the profound extent of our kindness and generosity."

A Republican amendment to use only Monopoly or "play" money in the bonfire was defeated in a party-line vote. Senator Brown said the failed amendment demonstrated that Republicans are "soft" on social spending. "It's not what you accomplish that matters," said Brown, "it's how much money you burn."

Left-wing Liberal Democrats are creating a new kind of racism in America to replace the racism of the past.

For racism to exist, one must have two or three players: the oppressed minority, and the oppressive majority, and optionally an enlightened individual or group who identifies and condemns the problem. The oppressed minority must be oppressed on the basis of race. (Rarely, one finds an oppressing minority, as in South Africa under apartheid.)

American history is stained with racism, and is adorned with the bravery of those who fought to end it.

Today, it seems that the Liberal Democrats, after opposing and even filibustering the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and then redeeming themselves by fighting for equality for many decades, are about to head down a very dangerous path.

Their problem is, having won the war, they want to keep fighting it.

There can be little doubt that the war against anti-black racism is largely won. In entertainment, sports, and every other merit based activity, blacks compete and succeed on a level playing field against whites. Nowhere is there a law that singles out blacks for disadvantageous treatment. Nowhere can a company afford a perception of disparate treatment.

As proof, note that newly arrived black immigrants -- despite the disadvantages of not knowing the language and culture -- succeed economically in America at rates indistinguishable from other races.

Those who seek out evidence of racism must continually lower the bar. Recently, the taunts of the crowd at a Lake Oswego high school basketball game were branded 'racist' -- even though critics admit they don't think the taunts were motivated by race.[1]

How can a racist act not be motivated by race? When the racism exists only in the heads of white liberals. To the colorblind students who taunted, they were merely giving as good as they had gotten; the other side had taunted similarly. To the guilt-ridden white liberal, however, blacks can never be equal -- they must always and forever be lesser, be fragile, be needy and protected by brave white liberals.

That is why the liberal white reverse-racists have invented "unintended" racism -- thought crime without the thought -- in order to maintain their own position as saviors of the oppressed.

This is more dangerous than it appears. It keeps a liberal boot on blacks, institutionalizing them as perpetual victims whose rise to equality (and thus independence) cannot be allowed. And it teaches previously colorblind youth that a double standard exists, and that colorblindness will not be tolerated. Dr. King would be appalled.

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[1] Lake Oswego Review: LOHS Principal Bruce Plato spoke with a number of students involved in the incident and believes that the students weren't motivated to make the comments because of Leary's race. But Plato condemns the comments just the same. Lakers' fans are on hot seat by Alandra Johnson - 03/10/05 http://www.lakeoswegoreview.com/article/6629

The Jargon Lexicon The Jargon Lexicon

StrategyPage.com - Professional Wargames Page 2nd Edition. This is the text of the second edition, published in 1992, out of print in 1997.

Chicago Tribune | A question of ambition Another example: A 1983 U. of C. brain-twister put applicants in the role of a school superintendent forced to defend unavoidable budget cuts before the school board. What should be slashed--extracurricular activities such as music or athletics? Special academic programs for the gifted or handicapped? The number of schools? The number of teachers? Salaries of the district's entire staff?
(this is the question I answered that got me admitted. deja vu)

161.205 Use of physical force generally. The use of physical force upon another person that would otherwise constitute an offense is justifiable and not criminal under any of the following circumstances:
(1) A parent, guardian or other person entrusted with the care and supervision of a minor or an incompetent person may use reasonable physical force upon such minor or incompetent person when and to the extent the person reasonably believes it necessary to maintain discipline or to promote the welfare of the minor or incompetent person. A teacher may use reasonable physical force upon a student when and to the extent the teacher reasonably believes it necessary to maintain order in the school or classroom or at a school activity or event, whether or not it is held on school property.
(2) An authorized official of a jail, prison or correctional facility may use physical force when and to the extent that the official reasonably believes it necessary to maintain order and discipline or as is authorized by law.
(3) A person responsible for the maintenance of order in a common carrier of passengers, or a person acting under the direction of the person, may use physical force when and to the extent that the person reasonably believes it necessary to maintain order, but the person may use deadly physical force only when the person reasonably believes it necessary to prevent death or serious physical injury.
(4) A person acting under a reasonable belief that another person

Carnival Booth: An Algorithm for Defeating the Computer-Assisted Passenger Screening System In our paper, we show that although these intuitive foundations might be compelling, their implementation in CAPS is flawed. That is to say that any CAPS-like airport security system that uses profiles to select passengers for increased scrutiny is bound to be less secure than systems that randomly select passengers for thorough inspection. Using mathematical models and computer simulation, we show how a terrorist cell can increase their chances of mounting a successful attack under the CAPS system as opposed to a security system that uses only random searches. Instinct may suggest that CAPS strengthens security, but it in fact introduces a gaping security hole easily exploitable by terrorist cells.

Using Samba as a PDC Select any of these links to start the tutorial.

eServer Developer Domain: Tutorial Using Samba as a primary domain controller -- tutorial