] Civil liberties group the Electronic Frontier Foundation
] (EFF) has joined a legal fight between three US online
] journalists and Apple.
]
]
] Apple wants the reporters to reveal 20 sources used for
] stories which leaked information about forthcoming
] products, including the Mac Mini.
]
]
] The EFF, representing the reporters, has asked
] California's Superior court to stop Apple pursuing the
] sources.
]
]
] It argues that the journalists are protected by the
] American constitution.
]
]
] The EFF says the case threatens the basic freedoms of the
] press.
]
]
] Code-named Asteroid
]Apple is particularly keen to find the source for information about
] an unreleased product code-named Asteroid and has asked the
]journalists' e-mail providers to hand over communications relevant
]to that.
]"Rather than confronting the issue of reporter's privilege head-on,
] Apple is going to the journalist's ISPs for his e-mails," said EFF
] lawyer Kurt Opsahl.

BBC NEWS | Technology | Apple attacked over sources row

] Thought might not be dependent on language, according to
] new research published in the Proceedings of National
] Academy of Sciences.
]
]
] A UK team has shown that patients who have lost the
] ability to understand grammar can still complete hard
] sums.
]
]
] This suggests mathematical reasoning can exist without
] language.
]
]
] The study undermines the assumption that language is the
] key quality that makes our thought processes more
] advanced than those of other animals.

BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Key to intelligence questioned

] The nun who inspired the acclaimed Hollywood movie Dead
] Man Walking believes death row Scot Kenny Richey should
] be set free.
]
]
] Sister Helen Prejean also told BBC Radio Scotland's
] Sunday Live programme that the 40-year-old should be
] recompensed for his 18 years in prison.
]
]
] Richey's conviction for killing a child in a fire was
] quashed last month.
]
]
] Sister Prejean said: "The people who withheld evidence or
] who distorted evidence should be held accountable."

BBC NEWS | Scotland | Death row movie nun backs Richey

] Iran's hard-line Revolutionary Guards have declared the
] death sentence on British author Salman Rushdie is still
] valid - 16 years after it was issued.
]
]
] The military organisation, loyal to Iran's supreme leader
] - said the order was "irrevocable" on the eve of the
] anniversary of the 1989 fatwa.

later in the article

]The guards' statement comes a month after Ayatollah Khomeini's ]successor Ayatollah Khamenei said he still believed the British ]novelist deserved to die.

]"They talk of respect for all religions but they support an ]apostate worthy of death like Rushdie," he said.

Tolerence clearly should mean kill, kill, kill. Burn the heretics.
Ahhhh the hardliners on both sides. I LOVE 'EM.

BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Iran adamant over Rushdie fatwa

] Do you think that the British government does nothing about
] the IRA because they feel like they can't stop it?

Numerous British Governments have tried very hard and used various more or less draconian measures to "win" the war. We saw the Anti-terrorism law, Diplock courts and internment. Nobody could say that Margaret Thatcher didn't vigorously pursue the war especially after the IRA murdered her close friend and confidant Airey Neave, a man who escaped from Colditz.
However as to when a British Government last thought it could win militarily is a difficult question. We call it the Long War and it isn't over yet note the very latest troubles in the peace process after the IRA was alledged by senior Northern Irish policemen of being deeply involved in one the biggest bank robberies in British history.
But and it is a major but the British Government wasn't in a position to cut off the "support network". The IRA was largely funded through an organisation called Noraid, funded by US citizens and though racketeering in Northern Ireland. Also the British Government couldn't invade Eire where the IRA had training camps.
It would be usuful to know more about the support networks for Eta the Spanish Basque separatists.
Having said that I remain unconvinced that the war on terrorism can be won militarily

RE: Iraqis crowd the polls | csmonitor.com

]http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/200303/msg00323.html

fasinating

do you think that the US should invade Iran?

do you think that it is any more within the power of the Saudi authorities to stop Al'Q than it was within the power of the British government to stop the IRA in Northern Ireland or to stop its mainland Britain bombing campaign?

RE: Iraqis crowd the polls | csmonitor.com

This is an important, and infuriating issue.

] "The Supreme Court's decision to place this extraordinary
] power to sentence a person solely in the hands of a
] single federal judge - who is accountable to no one -
] flies in the face of the clear will of Congress," Mr.
] Feeney said in a statement.

1. In general, we have a problem, and we won't talk about it because its extremely unpopular to do so. The problem is that our democratically elected government is selected based on the whims of a fully and readily manipulated populace. More then half the people in this country think Sadam Hussien was connected with Al'Q. Do we think their opinions about crime are any more informed?

The "I'm gunna get tough on crime" story gets votes, and it is played entirely for marketing reasons. It has absolutely no relationship to a reasonable, considered view about how to actually lower crime rates. I'm not interested in having important matters of policy be constantly dominated by "what sells."

Congressmen refer to their democratic legitimacy because they can't refer to the credibility of their policies. Congress is a constant slew of bad ideas. I'd prefer to have certain questions be more isolated from the political process, particularly when lives are at stake.

2. Federal judges are certainly accountable for their decisions, which are vetted by several levels of hierarchy. People don't get to be federal justices because they fell out of bed this morning and figured they'd get into law.

3. No one knows more about the specifics of an individual case then the people who are handling it. Different cases have different specific circumstances and should result in different sentences.

] "We are disappointed that the decision made the guidelines
] advisory in nature," Assistant Attorney General Christopher
] A. Wray said in a statement. "District courts are still
] required to consult the federal sentencing guidelines, and
] any sentence may be appealed by either defense counsel or
] prosecutors on the grounds that it is unreasonable. To the
] extent that the guidelines are now advisory, however, the
] risk increases that sentences across the country will become
] wildly inconsistent."

I'd accuse Christopher Wray of intentionally lying, but thats what politicians do, isn't it?

What you want is consistency of standards. Two people who commit the same crime in the same circumstances should get the same sentence. You want to avoid favoritism or situations where different judges have wildly different approaches.

Wray isn't offering consistency of standards. He is offering consistency of results. Thats not the same thing. He offers one while complaining about the lack of the other. Consistency of result is unfair, because two people who commit the same crime in wildly different circumstances get the same sentence. Congressmen cannot fairly apply a blanket rule that impacts every case in the country.

Congressmen, as previously pointed out, don't even have experience with the subject matter. They are making their rules base on political fads and not based on a knowledge of how to address real problems.

If their is a problem with inconsistency of standards among judges it ought to be addressed by looking at the decision making process involved in sentencing and the selection process for judges rather then by creating a system that could as easily be operated by a computer as by a human.

As usual, you're not going to see that, because that would be reasonable. This isn't about reason. Its about power.

The New York Times - Reactions: New Fight Over Controlling Punishments Is Widely Seen

]Bush has in fact changed the rules of the game considerably

How do you think Bush has changed the rules of the game?

]the neocons are an odd group of conservative
] intellectuals. They have certainly influenced the Bush
] administration but he stops short of being a neocon.

The perspective on this side of the Atlantic is that Bush has very much aligned himself, and virtually got into bed, with the neocons. However I agree the USA has neither the resources, the military might or the will to pursue a broad based strategy of reforming world governments. The cost in lives alone would be astonishing. There will be no invasion of China.

]The administration is acting in what it feels its
] interests are in Iraq specifically, and specifically with
] respect to a broader fight against Al'Q.

but before the invasion there wasn't a clear connection between Sadaam and Al'Q. But Bush has given the impression to the Muslim world that that the West is at war with Islam. Peculiar when Iraq was a secular state, which is why Bin Laden hated it.

]Americans do not beleive that the UN should have the power to
] veto their military actions.

But are those Americans right? The UN was formed after one group of nation states had tried to impose their beliefs and way of life on others by force. The international community should have the right to maintain the stability whereby one member state is not forcing its will upon others without due regard to international opinion and ultimately international law.

]There is a lot of frustration around about UN processes that put
] western nations on equal footing with terror states.

Only certain members of the Security Council have the veto and since when could France be classed as a terror state.

] gutting these institutions without replacing
] them with something more effective the US is returning
] international law to a state of nature, which will ultimately
] result in serious problems.

I completely agree

]Well, ostensibly the US is acting in self defense against a
] bunch of crazy fundamentalists bent on murder and destruction.

Again there was no connection between Sadaam and Al'Q.

]Sometimes you can't win the arguement by rational means
] because the person you are arguing with isn't rational.

Yes Al'Q isn't like the Imperial era British Government they are more like the Nazis and force must be restisted resolutely. The audience for the argument is global Muslim opinion which is very much accessable to rational argument. Al'Q is only a tiny group maybe not much bigger than the Baader-Meinhof gang. By stoking the fire the US acts as a recuiting sergeant for Al'Q just as the British government did for the IRA with its policy of internment.

]They did not do this because they did not care.

that is unfair

RE: Iraqis crowd the polls | csmonitor.com

] What do you call a group of black holes ... a flock, a
] brace, a swarm? Monitoring a region around the center of
] our Galaxy, astronomers have indeed found evidence for a
] surprisingly large number of variable x-ray sources -
] likely black holes or neutron stars in binary star
] systems - swarming around the Milky Way's own central
] supermassive black hole.

APOD: 2005 January 28 - The Swarm

] WASHINGTON %u2013 The White House has eliminated funding
] for a mission to service the Hubble Space Telescope from
] its 2006 budget request and directed NASA to focus solely
] on de-orbiting the popular spacecraft at the end of its
] life, according to government and industry sources.
]
]

White House Cuts Hubble Servicing Mission from 2006 Budget Request