Lagos, the New York of Africa

Nyanya, the Lagos of Abuja

Calgary, the Dallas of the North

North Bay, the Calgary of Northern Ontario

Tulsa, the buckle of the Bible Belt

Kirkuk, the Tulsa of Iraq

Midland, the Tulsa of Texas

Saint Augustine, the Newport of the South

Newport, the Charleston of the Northeast

Greer, South Carolina, the Taiwan of Germany

Taiwan, the Honolulu of China

Honolulu, the Miami of the Asia-Pacific

Miami, the capital of Latin America

Tel Aviv, the Miami of the Middle East

Ramallah, the Tel Aviv of Palestine

Izmir, the Miami of Turkey

San Diego, the Miami of the West Coast

Tucson, the San Diego of the desert

Munich, the Tucson of Europe

Fullerton, the Munich of Orange County

Cartagena, the Munich of Latin America

Girardot, the Cartagena of the poor

Qingdao, the Munich of China

Lowestoft, the Qingdao of Europe

Tehran, the Munich of the Cold War

Provo, the Tehran of Utah

Cleveland, the Munich of the Midwest

Birmingham, the Cleveland of England

Howrah, the Birmingham of the East

Cleveland, the San Antonio of the East

San Antonio, the Atlanta of the 80s

Harvard, the Munich of American education

02138, the Harvard of the luxury lifestyle magazines

Harvard Law, the Beirut of American law schools

Beirut, the Monte Carlo of Asia

Monte Carlo, the Long Beach of Europe

Long Beach, the Tacoma of Southern California

Tacoma, the Oakland of the Pacific Northwest

Macau, the Monte Carlo of the East

Bodog, the Macau of the internet

Macau, the Las Vegas of Asia
Dubai, the Las Vegas of the Middle East

Jamaica, the Dubai of the Caribbean

East St. Louis, the Jamaica of Illinois

Tangiers, the Dubai of North Africa
Herat, the Dubai of Afghanistan

Massachusetts, the Las Vegas of same-sex marriages

Onitsha, the Boston of Southern Nigeria
Burlington, the San Francisco of the East Coast
Melbourne, the Boston of the Southern Hemisphere

Sydney, the Atlanta of Australia

Barcelona, the Sydney of Europe

Leeds, the Barcelona of the West Riding of Yorkshire

Philadelphia, the Leeds of America

Merced, the Philadelphia of the Central Valley

Sacramento, the Omaha of the West Coast

Guadalajara, the Sacramento of Mexico
Monterey, the Nashville of Norteno

Nashville, the Athens of the South

Branson, the Nashville of Missouri

Provincetown, the Branson of Lesbian Comedy

Saugatuck, the Provincetown of the Midwest

Herb Lin, Bill Owens, and Ken Dam at the NRC have a new book.

The US armed forces, among other intelligence agencies, are increasingly dependent on information and information technology for both civilian and military purposes. Although there is ample literature written on the potential impact of an offensive or defensive cyberattack on societal infrastructure, little has been written about the use of cyberattack as a national policy tool. This book focuses on the potential for the use of such attacks by the United States and its policy implications.

Since the primary resource required for a cyberattack is technical expertise, these attacks can be implemented by terrorists, criminals, individuals and corporate actors. Cyberattacks can be used by U.S. adversaries against particular sectors of the U.S. economy and critical national infrastructure that depend on computer systems and networks. Conversely, they can be used by the U.S. intelligence community with adequate organizational structure and appropriate oversight.

Focusing on the use of cyberattack as an instrument of U.S. national policy, Technology, Policy, Law and Ethics Regarding U.S. Acquisition and Use of Cyberattack Capabilities explores the important characteristics of cyberattacks and why they are relatively ideal for covert action. Experts argue that the United States should establish a national policy for launching cyberattacks, whether for purposes of exploitation, offense or defense for all sectors of government. This book will be of special interest to the Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security, law enforcement, and the greater intelligence community.

See also:

The cyber domain is undergoing extraordinary changes that present both exceptional opportunities to and major challenges arising from malevolent actors who use cyberspace and the many security vulnerabilities that plague this sphere. Exploiting opportunities and overcoming challenges will require a balanced body of knowledge. Cyberpower and National Security assembles a group of experts, discusses pertinent issues, and identifies the important questions involved in building the human capacity to address cyber issues, balancing civil liberties with national security considerations, and developing the international partnerships needed to address cyber challenges. With more than two dozen contributors, this book covers it all.

Take note:

The National Security Agency announced that West Point cadets successfully defended their title to win their third straight Cyber Defense Exercise.

An extremely fit woman of indeterminate Los Angeles age pulled her Mercedes up to the curb on Adelaide Drive, popped open her trunk, pulled out a five-pound weight and began lifting.

Know your enemy:

For years, the US intelligence community worried that China’s government was attacking our cyber-infrastructure. Now one man has discovered it’s worse: It's hundreds of thousands of everyday civilians. And they’ve only just begun.

Be advised:

Russia retains the right to use nuclear weapons first against the means and forces of information warfare, and then against the aggressor state itself.

Technology, Policy, Law, and Ethics Regarding US Acquisition and Use of Cyberattack Capabilities

Steven Johnson and Paul Starr debate the future of news.

Falling sales and profits augur badly for serious news. Two leading US experts ask if an online renaissance is possible.

Recently, Steven Johnson:

In the long run, we’re going to look back at many facets of old media and realize that we were living in a desert disguised as a rain forest.

Recently, Paul Starr:

If we take seriously the notion of newspapers as a fourth estate or a fourth branch of government, the end of the age of newspapers implies a change in our political system itself. If we are to avoid a new era of corruption, we are going to have to summon that power in other ways. Our new technologies do not retire our old responsibilities.

Douglas Rushkoff:

Citizen bloggers and YouTubers believe we have now embraced a new "personal" democracy. But writing is not the capability being offered us by these tools at all. The capability is programming -- which almost none of us really know how to do.

Recently:

The Sunlight Foundation Labs has announced the winners for their transparency coding contest.

Matthias Felleisen:

Everyone should learn how to design programs.

Alan Perlis, via Peter Norvig:

Everyone can be taught to sculpt: Michelangelo would have had to be taught how not to. So it is with the great programmers.

Will the coming age of news be better than the old?

Andrea Wachner:

"I love taking things that exist in the world as given -- things that are mainstream, notions that people take for granted -- and making people re-think them."

Recently:

Contrary to the classical view, touch can shape what we see.

David Lynch:

So many things these days are made to look at later. Why not just have the experience and remember it?

From 2004:

A teenage boy posing as a banker duped an Ohio car dealership into delivering a $123,000 BMW to him at his high school, police said Thursday.

From 2006:

Some locals are furious about the ruse, worried that they might end up looking foolish on national television.

Dupery

Johnny Cash:

"It hurts so bad."

Sam Jones:

In physics, Markov chain processes underlie our most basic understanding of the world around us, from the way liquid turns to gas to the way a drop of vivid ink might slowly diffuse through a glass of water. If you treated people like atoms, the actuaries reasoned, you could apply the same maths.

By the time David Li got to New York, in 1998, the quants had taken over the asylum.

Nassim Nicholas Taleb:

"Anything that relies on correlation is charlatanism."

David Li, from Felix Salmon's article:

"The most dangerous part is when people believe everything coming out of it."

Of Couples and Copulas

How's free? Does free sound good?

Explore 4th Edition Now.

Download the Quick-Start Rules and H1: Keep on the Shadowfell — and Let the Adventure Begin.

From the archive:

Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition is going to change just about everything for the dice-rolling set.

I'm just, like, in his arms, all snug. I'm his first ever girlfriend and we've been together 18 months. My ideal night with him is playing Dungeons & Dragons on Xbox or painting Warhammer figurines.

D&D Test Drive

David Ignatius:

President Obama promised CIA officers that they won't be prosecuted for carrying out lawful orders, but the people on the firing line don't believe him. They think the memos have opened a new season of investigation and retribution.

The lesson for younger officers is obvious: Keep your head down. Duck the assignments that carry political risk. Stay away from a counterterrorism program that has become a career hazard.

Would you care for a little hogwash with that?

The job of the interrogator is to safely help the terrorist do his duty to Allah, so he then feels liberated to speak freely.

This is the secret to the program's success.

Apparently waterboarding is about catharsis for the captive.

You may also be interested in George Friedman's perspective:

While Sept. 11 was frightening enough, there were ample fears that al Qaeda had secured a “suitcase bomb” and that a nuclear attack on a major U.S. city could come at any moment. For individuals, such an attack was simply another possibility. For the government, however, the problem was having scraps of intelligence indicating that al Qaeda might have a nuclear weapon, but not having any way of telling whether those scraps had any value.

This lack of intelligence led directly to the most extreme fears, which in turn led to extreme measures. A lack of knowledge forces people to think of worst-case scenarios.

Collecting intelligence rapidly became the highest national priority. Given the genuine and reasonable fears, no action in pursuit of intelligence was out of the question, so long as it promised quick answers. This led to the authorization of torture, among other things. Torture offered a rapid means to accumulate intelligence, or at least — given the time lag on other means — it was something that had to be tried.

See also, from 2006, also in WaPo:

It should surprise no one that Human Rights Watch can write a persuasive anti-torture op-ed. However, as is often the case, there is more news in what's not in the papers than in what does appear. And what I don't see right now are op-eds from DNI Negroponte and DCI Hayden and the DDO telling us in no uncertain terms how essential these abusive practices are to their operational success.

Slow Roll Time at Langley

David Leonhardt:

As long as home prices are falling, foreclosures are likely to keep rising and the toxic assets polluting bank balance sheets are likely to stay toxic.

There are reasons, though, to think that prices may be on the verge of stabilizing. Relative to fundamentals, like household incomes and rents, houses nationwide now appear to be overvalued by only about 5 percent. You can make an argument that the end of the housing crash is near.

But that’s not what I found at the auctions.

The infographic is interactive.

The Bottom for Housing Is Probably Not Near

Charles Hugh Smith:

The financial MSM and government officials alike are looking for a recovery in the housing market to bubble valuations to "restart the economy." That is not going to happen -- not this year, not in five years or even in ten years. Here's why.

Why Housing Is Not Coming Back

In an April 21, 2008, New Yorker story, "Vengeance Is Ours," Pulitzer Prize-winning geography scholar Jared Diamond describes blood feuds that rage for decades among tribes in the Highlands of New Guinea. Diamond tells the story using a central protagonist: Daniel Wemp, member of the Handa clan, a blood-thirsty warrior bent on avenging his uncle's death. That quest, writes Diamond, touched off six years of warfare leading to the slaughter of 47 people and the theft of 300 pigs.

Now Diamond's protagonist is fighting Diamond. A two-page complaint filed in New York State Supreme Court on April 20 seeks $10 million from the New Yorker's publisher, Advance Publications, claiming Diamond's story falsely accused Wemp and fellow tribesman Isum Mandigo of "serious criminal activity" and "murder."

From the archive:

In the Highlands of New Guinea, rival clans have often fought wars lasting decades, in which each killing provokes another.

New Guinea Tribe Sues The 'New Yorker' For $10 Million