I wouldn't want to let anything go to waste ...

"Hey, tubby! Want another Pop Tart, tubby?"

Are You Going to Eat That?

] Al-Qaida cells operate autonomously with sleeper agents
] among Muslim communities in most western, eastern and
] African countries. Bin Laden's capture -- dead or alive
] -- won't change the correlation of forces between
] terrorists and counter-terrorists. The growing
] wretchedness of West Africa's populations -- over a
] million a year die of malaria in Nigeria alone -- greatly
] facilitates the marabou's mission of recruiting Islamist
] desperadoes.
]
] The toughest among them survive the desert trek to
] Morocco and Algeria and from there take small craft to
] Spain. Their bodies wash up on Spanish beaches every day.
] Those who make it alive into Spain have also made it into
] the European Union.

United Press International: Commentary: Al-Qaida in Africa

] Many voters blamed outgoing Prime Minister Jose Maria
] Aznar's staunch support of the U.S.-led war in Iraq for a
] series of rush-hour bombings on commuter trains in Madrid
] Thursday that left 200 persons dead.

The government's rush to blame the ETA blew up in their face, if you'll excuse the poor choice of wording, driving home the "get out of the middle east" message even harder then it would have been driven had the government handled the situation objectively from the outset.

I think Al'Q ended up getting exactly what it wanted here in the short term. Also an indirect victory for the ETA. However, the real question will be how Europe reacts on the whole.

Spain's Socialist Party Claims Victory (washingtonpost.com)

A CNN Political analyst has called weblogs the Liberal answer to Conservative talk shows.

] WATSON: Democrats have a new secret weapon.
]
] For a long time, you have heard Democrats complain that
] Republicans have conservative talk radio, that Rush
] Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly and others have
] shaped the agenda and gotten people aroused and excited
] at the base. And finally, in 2004, Democrats have an
] answer. The answer is what? It's the blogs, the so-called
] Web logs, where people go online and write information,
] write commentary, post news stories.
]
] Very interesting study out of George Washington says
] about 15 to 20 million people are now actively using the
] Internet and these Web logs in particular, sites like
] Daily Kos and Talking Points Memo. And what's significant
] here is that Democrats are using this to shape the
] agenda, because, remember, lots of Washington reporters
] read these. They're using these to excite their own base,
] just like conservative talk show radio does.
]
] We've already seen that they use the Internet to raise
] money, but also they may turn out voters using this
] critical weapon.
]
] BLITZER: So you're thinking the these blogs on the
] Internet, these are sort of liberal-leaning, as talk
] radio is conservative- leaning?
]
] WATSON: Very much so. The blogs are the Democratic answer
] to conservative talk radio. The George Washington study
] says that of the people who they consider online
] political citizens, not 1 percent, not 2 percent, but 50
] percent are considered Democrat. Only 27 percent are
] considered Republicans.
]
] It doesn't mean that Republicans are not using the
] Internet. It doesn't mean they are not using blogs, just
] like there obviously are some liberal talk radio
] stations. But it means that right now liberals may have
] found their answer and the answer to conservative talk
] radio may be these blogs.

This is an interesting interpretation. The weblog community does seem to be heavily liberal.

The study, which you can grab from ipdi.org, is a discussion of whether online political citizens are what marketing people call "influentials." Basically, bell weathers who tell other people what to buy, who to vote for, etc... Apparently reading newspapers is still a better indicator that someone is an "influential" then using the internet, but for the most part "online political citizens" are people that campaigns need to be addressing.

The study draws a very different conclusion about the democratic bias then this commentator. They think its because the democrats have a primary this year. They seem to believe that if the U.S. had a democratic president the net would be swarming with republicans. I'm not sure I agree that its that simple.

Daily Kos || Weblogs are the liberal answer to talk shows.

] A top Clinton-era expert on Europe and security warns
] that if the deadly Madrid bombings prove to be the work
] of al-Qaida, it could transform politics throughout
] Europe

An interesting point in this analysis which is different then mine is that I would have thought that Al'Q would have supported the socialists in spain, because doing so would remove spain from the table in terms of the conflict in the middle east. But this guy says that they support the right, so that the issue is less likely to be resolved peacefully. To me that seems like a suprising result. As an asymetrical element fighting a democratic state, I would think that I would want to use the element of shock to encourage the election of a government which is pliable and will do things that I want them to do, rather then the election of a government which is rigid and will attempt to engage me directly in a conventional way that I can't defend myself against.

Can anyone point me at a resource that discusses this in more detail?

Salon.com News | Spanish bombs

] Tennessee could become a model for the nation when it
] comes to protecting the public from chemical, biological
] or radiological releases.
]
] Already, sensors that are part of Oak Ridge National
] Laboratory's SensorNet are deployed in Nashville,
] Knoxville and Oak Ridge, and in other parts of the
] nation.

SensorNet proposed as system to protect millions nationwide

] Researchers are reporting new evidence supporting their
] earlier discovery of an inexpensive "tabletop" device
] that uses sound waves to produce nuclear fusion
] reactions.
]
] The researchers believe the new evidence shows that
] "sonofusion" generates nuclear reactions by creating tiny
] bubbles that implode with tremendous force. Nuclear
] fusion reactors have historically required large,
] multibillion-dollar machines, but sonofusion devices
] might be built for a fraction of that cost.

Freakin cool

Evidence bubbles over to support tabletop nuclear fusion device

my new favorite site. Started by the guy who wrote the book (literally) on hacking Tivo, this site is for posting info on hacking ANYTHING. Yes kids, 2600 has finally grown up and become a useful tool for everyday life.

mehack

] Yesterday the FBI made public its new proposal for
] wiretapping powers that would powerfully extend such
] powers to broadband services such as DSL and cable-based
] access. The gist of the proposal is simple: the FBI wants
] to be able to to easily set up wiretapping on all kinds
] of Internet traffic, the key word here being easily. As
] this report notes, this could mean that to be compliant
] with the rules (should they pass), both ISPs and
] developers would need to build back-doors into their
] services and the technologies that run on top of them.

The compromise that allowed CALEA to pass is very clear. Telecommunications OK, Internet not OK. That fact that voice services are now carried on internet networks does not change the fundamental legislative compromise. Expanding the scope of this thing is well outside the FCC's jurisdiction. Only Congress has the power to do this.

Of course, in the wake of 9/11, I think that protecting the internet from being turned into a ubiquitous surveillance network will be almost impossible.

Ars Technica: Broadened FBI wiretapping powers would require net fixes

] An investigation that definitively pointed to an al-Qaeda
] engineered attack would sow panic in Spain. It would also
] work in favour of the Socialist candidate for prime
] minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, even though he
] has said in the past a Socialist government would be
] willing to meet "moderate demands" from separatist
] groups.
]
] Investigators are not likely to have any conclusive proof
] before tomorrow's vote on whether the attacks were the
] work of ETA, al-Qaeda or even both groups working
] together.
]
] As the millions of Spaniards who marched yesterday
] demonstrated, the authorship of the terrorist strikes
] should not be used as a campaign issue. Mr. Aznar and his
] government should wait for the facts instead of resorting
] to political expediency.

Ding...

National Post: Aznar fingured ETA for policial reasons