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Rep. Gabbard on Dave Rubin

Posted by Arik on Wednesday September 11 2019, @09:14AM (#4575)
23 Comments
Code
I'm a few days late catching this but given the site I may still be ahead of the curve.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gy797D3cAY - Rigged Debates, Media Smears, & Taking On The DNC

She talks about the Google lawsuit too, right at the beginning. Quite a lengthy and wide ranging discussion, and it left me even more certain that she really could beat Trump.

how to enable potential school shooters

Posted by Runaway1956 on Tuesday September 10 2019, @10:27PM (#4573)
19 Comments
Topics

https://dailycaller.com/2019/09/09/nikolas-cruz-parkland-shooting-stories/

‘I Want To Kill!’ — The 7 Most Shocking Stories About Parkland Shooter Nikolas Cruz Revealed In New Book

A new book co-written by Andrew Pollack, the father of a teenager killed during the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas (MSD) High School in February 2018, contains a number of shocking details about the shooter Nikolas Cruz and his erratic behavior in school.

Pollack, whose 18-year-old daughter Meadow was killed in the shooting, co-wrote the new book “Why Meadow Died: The People and Policies that Created the Parkland Shooter and Endanger America’s Students” along with Max Eden.

An excerpt from the book was published in the New York Post Monday, and the details are bizarre. Here are the seven most staggering stories.
Cruz Was Caught Masturbating In School

According to the excerpt, a female student named Paige first met Cruz and he tried to give her a hug. After the hug, a teacher told Paige, “Don’t touch him. He just got caught jerking off.”

Cruz Shouted: “I Want To Kill!”

In another incident, Cruz’s eighth grade teacher Carrie Yon told him that he was a “good kid.”

In response, he yelled, “I’m a bad kid! I want to kill!”
A Teacher Wrote That Cruz Didn’t Understand The Difference Between Violent Video Games And Reality

The same teacher, Carrie Yon, wrote in a “Functional Behavioral Analysis” of Cruz that she didn’t think he “understands the difference between his violent video games and reality.”

“He is constantly showing aggressive behavior and poor judgment. His drawings in class show violent acts (people shooting at each other) or creepy sexual pictures (dogs with large penises) … I would like to see him sent to a facility that is more prepared and has the proper setting to deal with this type of child,” she wrote.
Cruz Attempted To Commit Suicide After School

As an eighth grader, Cruz reportedly tried to commit suicide by jumping into traffic. This incident was recorded by teachers as a “minor disruption.”
Cruz Was Obsessed With “Terrorist Topics” And Was An “Excessive” Gamer

After Cruz enrolled in a special school in early 2014, a psychiatrist wrote in a report that due to “excessive gaming,” the future school shooter had a preoccupation with war and terrorism.

“He goes to YouTube to research wars, military material, and terrorist topics. Wears military related items before he goes to school. Parent stated that all of these ideas are related to his excessive gaming,” Dr. Nyrma Ortiz wrote.
School Psychiatrists Warned That Cruz Has “Dreams Of Killing Others”

In a note written by Ortiz and another therapist Rona Kelly, they report that he admitted to having “dreams of killing others and [being] covered in blood.”
Despite All Of This, Cruz Was Able To Go To MSD High School And Join JROTC

Finally, the most interesting bit of information from the excerpt is that after a short period of good behavior, Cruz was sent to MSD High, and even temporarily joined the school’s Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (JROTC) program.

Eden and Pollack write:

        Nikolas Cruz couldn’t possibly have made himself any clearer. Broward schools staff knew exactly who and what he was. Yet they not only allowed him to enroll in Marjory Stoneman Douglas, they literally gave him an air gun, shaped like an AR-15, and let him practice shooting.

Indeed, there were many warning signs about Cruz and his potential for violence.

Immediately after the shooting, one MSD student told a local news reporter that “everyone predicted” Cruz being a shooter.

“Honestly, a lot of people were saying it was gonna be him.”

        “Everyone predicted it,” a student said about the #Parkland shooting. pic.twitter.com/mbzBIw8iUa

        — Vic Micolucci WJXT (@WJXTvic) February 14, 2018

Reports also indicate that the FBI was previously warned about someone posting on YouTube under the name “Nikolas Cruz,” saying he wanted to be a school shooter. (RELATED: Report: Broward School Officials ‘Did Not Follow Through’ On Nikolas Cruz’s Pleas For Help Before Massacre)

Upon being arrested, Cruz told officers that he heard “demons” and “voices.”

A few more details from CNN https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/14/us/nikolas-cruz-florida-shooting-suspect/index.html

Cruz's digital footprint
Cruz's social media posts paint what Israel called a "very, very disturbing" picture.
Israel said Cruz's digital profile contains troubling content that included a variety of gun- and violence-related posts on social media.
A user going by the name of Nikolas Cruz also included slurs against blacks and Muslims in his posts.
A law enforcement source said authorities are aware of Cruz's extremist views on social media. The investigation is in early stages and so they are gathering information. One question for investigators is whether Cruz simply espoused extremist views and used related language or was in fact tied to any groups.
Cruz's disturbing behavior also included several threatening comments under videos on YouTube and other sites. They include:

        "I whana shoot people with my AR-15"
        "I wanna die Fighting killing s**t ton of people"
        "I am going to kill law enforcement one day they go after the good people."

In September, a YouTube user going by Nikolas Cruz posted a comment to a vlogger's YouTube page, saying, "Im going to be a professional school shooter." A law enforcement official confirms the FBI received a report about the post.
A law enforcement official told CNN earlier Thursday the FBI had received two reports regarding potential threats from the shooter.
But later Thursday, a separate law enforcement official said authorities believe they only received one report, regarding the comment on YouTube. The investigation is in its early stages, the source said, and information could change as leads are investigated.

Hong Kong Protests

Posted by Arik on Monday September 09 2019, @07:24AM (#4565)
32 Comments
Code
I'm not going to post a bunch of links for the main text this time.

You want links? I won't say I'm going to just link anything you want but I can produce a bunch of them, from different points of view.

I'm more interested in some broader questions though. And I'll put myself out by just saying what I think on them.

The PRC is probably the most oppressive regime in the world, not by depth but by breadth. So many people under their heel.

We were at war with the PRC until Richard Nixon, good old 'tricky dick' worked out a deal whereby our richest and best connected families and theirs could exploit the masses of rich dumb buyers in our country AND the masses of poor ignorant peasants in the PRC and GET RICH.

Also part of the deal, the Taiwan relations act that demoted the Republic of China to an area we were supposed to supply and defend, for no apparent reason.

Many decades later, we run up against the wall. For all this time, they were happy to play nice, in "Taiwan," in regard to Hong Kong (which, had Nixon not gone to Beijing, would have been handed back to the Republic) and most especially in regard to dramatically lower prices on common equipment. One nation two systems was always very vague and begged for divurging interpretations. And it leaves us both vulnerable to disruption should the understanding break down.

The PRC, for decades, has pretty much abided by the agreement. And reaped great profits from doing so. Recently, this has broken down.

I'm not asking you whose fault it is that it broke down, though of course some may want to scream about that instead. But I'm asking you to think about whether or not Nixon's offer lead to the current Hong Kong protests, and whether there is any way out of them aside from mass murder and state terrorism.

Can't resist a video link that will break in the future for an ending, sorry.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IasCZL072fQ [Missing Persons - Words]

So, it has come to this!

Posted by Runaway1956 on Saturday September 07 2019, @12:25AM (#4562)
18 Comments
News

Yeah, I stole my title - https://www.xkcd.com/1022/

Exclusive: Feds Demand Apple And Google Hand Over Names Of 10,000+ Users Of A Gun Scope App

Own a rifle? Got a scope to go with it? The U.S. government might soon know who you are, where you live and how to reach you.

That’s because the government wants Apple and Google to hand over names, phone numbers and other identifying data of at least 10,000 users of a single gun scope app, Forbes has discovered. It’s an unprecedented move: Never before has a case been disclosed in which American investigators demanded personal data of users of a single app from Apple and Google. And never has an order been made public where the feds have asked the Silicon Valley giants for info on so many thousands of people in one go.

According to an application for a court order filed by the Department of Justice (DOJ) on September 5, investigators want information on users of Obsidian 4, a tool used to control rifle scopes made by night-vision specialist American Technologies Network Corp. The app allows gun owners to get a live stream, take video and calibrate their gun scope from an Android or iPhone device. According to the Google Play page for Obsidian 4, it has more than 10,000 downloads. Apple doesn’t provide download numbers, so it’s unclear how many iPhone owners could be swept up in this latest government data grab.

If the court approves the demand, and Apple and Google decide to hand over the information, it could include data on thousands of people who have nothing to do with the crimes being investigated, privacy activists warned. Edin Omanovic, lead on Privacy International's State Surveillance program, said it would set a dangerous precedent and scoop up “huge amounts of innocent people’s personal data.”

“Such orders need to be based on suspicion and be particularized—this is neither,” Omanovic added.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2019/09/06/exclusive-feds-demand-apple-and-google-hand-over-names-of-10000-users-of-a-gun-scope-app/#4bf4c5ca2423

Also,
Exclusive: ATN gun scope maker responds about feds demanding its app user data from Apple and Google

The Department of Justice did not contact rifle scope manufacturer American Technologies Network Corp. (ATN) before filing a court order on Thursday demanding Apple and Google turn over user data from ATN’s mobile app.

Following initial reporting on the government demand from Apple and Google of user data for the Obsidian 4 app, ATN stated on Friday that they were not aware of the government’s request for information from the tech giants until a Forbes article broke the story. ATN advised they would not be turning over user information to the DOJ unless required by law.

“ATN has not been contacted by the Department of Justice, Apple, or Google,” the company said in a statement to American Military News on Friday.

“ATN will protect its customers and their identifying data to the absolute extent possible under U.S. law. And, it will not provide any information regarding the identity of our customers to any third party unless specifically required by law,” the statement continued.

The turnover of data could affect up to 10,000 app users who have downloaded the app through the Apple Store and Google Play.

The Obsidian 4 app allows its users to pair their phone with their rifle scopes, helping users calibrate their scopes and allowing them to take video and live streams.

Initial reporting of the DOJ information request, indicated the court order was later sealed from public viewing.

Before the court documents were sealed, Forbes reported that part of the court order alleges the company’s scopes have been found in shipments to Hong Kong, Canada and The Netherlands but have not had the necessary import licenses required by the International Traffic in Arms Regulation.

A report published by the Terrorism Research & Analysis Consortium also claims the scopes in question had made it into the hands of Taliban fighters.

“The manner in which the ATN Obsidian 4 application is paired with this scope manufactured by Company A supports the conclusion that the information requested herein will assist the government in identifying networks engaged in the unlawful export of this rifle scope,” part of the order reportedly read.

The DOJ’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement department is apparently seeking the data to find end users connected to the shipments of rifle scopes that violated the arms export laws.

Though the import of their products is facing government scrutiny, ATN itself is not under investigation for the alleged export violations.

  The government’s requests for app user information sparked backlash from privacy advocates who warned the court order is overly broad and threatens to gather data from innocent users.

Tor Ekeland, a privacy lawyer, said the DOJ order amounted to a “fishing expedition.”

Ekeland warned the government may begin with a focus on one specific case but eventually use the overturned data to pursue other cases against unrelated app users.

Does anyone wonder what, and who, the government might target with their next fishing expedition? How secure is your baby monitoring hardware and software? Your GPS device? Your vehicle?

Office Phone musings

Posted by DannyB on Friday September 06 2019, @03:13PM (#4560)
2 Comments
Career & Education

We have the dreaded Polycom 4xx phones and equally dreaded Plantronics headsets.

It's all neatly integrated with the PC, Outlook, Skype, VOIP etc. Make a call from the computer mouse / screen and use the headset, or even handset on the phone. Set up favorite contacts in skype and they are the contacts on the tiny screen of your phone desk set. Just as Outlook and Skype show green, yellow, red or blank indicators of whether someone is present, away from desk for xx minutes, in a meeting or not logged in, the phone screen shows these same colors around the icon of each person on the directory listing on the desk set's screen.

When it all works it's neat.

Sometimes you have to log your phone in to your corporate account. Using the phone's ten key pad. This is a horrible life altering experience suitable only as an enhanced interrogation technique.

But there is the BToE (better together over ethernet) software you can add to the computer so that the computer logs the phone into the account of whoever is using the computer. Nifty. But this software is hard to find. Even for IT departments apparently. But with sufficient Google-fu and multiple tries, I found it.

Last I would mention that both the Polycom and Plantronics units each come with an AC adapter. Similar looking barrel connectors from the AC adapter to the respective desk units. But one unit is 9 volts and the other (phone) is 48 volts. I'm just waiting until someone, in one of the numerous offices in US / Canada, who happens to use this particular equipment, mixes up which power supply goes with which unit.

Anyone else like Jimmy Dore?

Posted by Arik on Friday September 06 2019, @04:32AM (#4558)
16 Comments
Code
Only comedians are allowed to tell the truth. And maybe not for much longer.

Anyway, great show, every day. Anyone else into him?

If you don't know him here are a couple of recent examples.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzYGese55-Q Former Host Rips MSNBC For Russiagate Propaganda

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gukpKO91dA Bernie Pushes Russiagate But Establishment Still Hates Him

Sanders takes on the "poisonous topic"

Posted by shortscreen on Thursday September 05 2019, @04:36PM (#4557)
52 Comments
News

when asked about over-population at a climate-focused "town hall", Sanders says US should promote womens' reproductive rights abroad
https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/patrick-goodenough/bernie-sanders-ascribes-population-climate-change-link-touts-funding

Hardware recommendations

Posted by Arik on Wednesday September 04 2019, @09:29AM (#4553)
35 Comments
Code
I need to build a new machine and it's been some time since I've done it. I'm dreading it, because I'm sure there's no way to do it without using insane hardware, and I absolutely loathe rewarding defective design with a purchase, but it's time I have to find the best I can find and get it working.

So I'm looking around and quite confused and hoping some of the regular readers who are more up to date than I will fill me in.

http://pcpartspicker.com/ was recommended to me, it seems to have some obvious utility. It doesn't know which boards have ps/2 but that's a fairly minor annoyance, I can narrow everything else down then search the board and figure it out. Gamer boards seem to often have them still, and that would be a very nice feature to have. But it's still tier 2.

Tier 1 is ECC. My mind boggles that this is not standard equipment. It's freaking 2019. This was old tech in 1981. If it was standard equipment it would add an estimated 2.5 cents to the cost of a PC, several years ago, even less now.

Anyway, so far it seems that;

Ryzen supports ECC up to Ryzen5. However Ryzen motherboards do not support ECC, rendering this pointless.

Intel quit supporting ECC at the chipset level on 'consumer' chips after the i3.

So it seems that to get decent i/o I have to buy a gamer board. But to use RAM sanely I have to get a server board. Or maybe I could get both if I settle for an i3.

Is it possible to get a 24 core i3 and has gcc gotten good enough at multithreading to make it worthwhile?

So, educate me if you know something I'm missing. Shouldn't be hard, I hope.

Shiver Me Timbers

Posted by turgid on Tuesday September 03 2019, @08:03PM (#4552)
4 Comments
/dev/random

I think I may just have earned my RYA Dinghy Sailing Level 2 badge. Can I call myself Captain now?

Update: I have in my hand a piece of paper.

Mad dog put down after seven killed, and 20+ injured

Posted by Runaway1956 on Monday September 02 2019, @04:06PM (#4547)
7 Comments
News

by: LISA MARIE PANE, Associated Press

Posted: Sep 2, 2019 / 12:19 AM EDT / Updated: Sep 2, 2019 / 12:00 PM EDT

When law enforcement authorities gathered to discuss details of a mass shooting in West Texas that left seven people dead, there was one bit of information they refused to provide on live television: the name of the gunman.

Instead, they decided to release the name through a Facebook post. Odessa Police Chief Michael Gerke made it plain why he wouldn’t mention the name at the news conference: “I’m not going to give him any notoriety for what he did.”

Even with such restraint, it remained a challenge to curb the spread of the gunman’s name. The Odessa Police Department has fewer than 25,000 followers of its Facebook page, but the social media platform easily reaches millions of Facebook’s members around the globe and the post was shared hundreds of times. Within minutes, Twitter lit up with posts mentioning his name. Journalists and advocates on both sides of the gun debate also began spreading the word, spewing a firehose of information about the suspect.

In this era of a saturation of social media and around-the-clock news, it’s next to impossible to keep a lid on such information.

“Ultimately, the police department can only directly control what they do, and that name, that information can be reposted and retweeted and republished hundreds of thousands of time,” said Adam Lankford, a criminologist at the University of Alabama who has studied the influence of media coverage on future shooters. He and others appeal to the media to limit the volume of information about these perpetrators, saying it does little to understand the reasons for the violence or stop it in the future.

The Associated Press names suspects identified by law enforcement in major crimes. However, in cases in which the crime is carried out seeking publicity, the AP strives to restrict the mention of the name to the minimum needed to inform the public, while avoiding descriptions that might serve a criminal’s desire for publicity or self-glorification.

The “No Notoriety” movement was partly inspired by the 1999 Columbine school shooting outside Denver. The gunmen became household names and even in death appeared to motivate a whole new crop of mass shooters.

In in recent years, it has gained momentum amid a seemingly steady stream of mass shootings. The idea is to urge news organizations to refrain from naming the shooters in mass slayings and to curb the volume of biographical information about them. In New Zealand, after a mass shooter there killed 51 people at two mosques, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern refused to mention the perpetrator’s name at all.

FBI leaders, leery of inspiring copycat killers and hesitant to give them what they see as undue attention, have occasionally been reluctant in recent years to refer to them by name.

Former FBI Director James Comey expressed that concern in a briefing with reporters the day after a 2016 rampage at an Orlando nightclub, repeatedly referring to the gunman not by his name but simply as “the killer.”

“You will notice that I am not using the killer’s name, and I will try not to do that,” Comey said. “Part of what motivates sick people to do this kind of thing is some twisted notion of fame or glory, and I don’t want to be part of that for the sake of the victims and their families.”

FBI special agent Christopher Combs, who previously worked at FBI headquarters leading the bureau’s efforts to respond to mass shootings, has held to that view. As the top FBI official in San Antonio, he has overseen the bureau’s response to multiple mass shootings in Texas, including a 2017 massacre at a church in Sutherland Springs that killed more than two dozen people.

At a news conference after the shooting where officials refrained from naming the gunman, Combs said, “We don’t talk about the shooter.”

And in a television interview after the shooting, Combs said he understood that the media had to name a shooter “once,” but “after that, we certainly don’t want to draw any type of positive attention to the shooter. And we have found through studies that there are people out there that are troubled, and when they see that, they believe this is how I can show the wrongdoings that have been done to me.”

All these years later, the Columbine attack continues to motivate mass shooters, including two men who this year stormed their former school in Brazil, killing seven people. The gunman in New Zealand was said to have been inspired by the man who in 2015 killed nine black worshippers at a church in Charleston, South Carolina.

The University of Alabama’s Lankford urges journalists to refrain from using shooters’ names or go into exhaustive detail about their crimes. These attackers are trying to outdo previous shooters with higher death tolls, he said, and media coverage serves only to encourage copycats. Experts call it the “contagion” effect.

Lankford lauded the approach in Texas to avoid mentioning the name on live television. That medium is especially problematic, he said.

“There’s the issue of B-roll where the sound bite can be played over and over and over again,” he said. “They’re trying to set a moral position and a lead they hope the media will follow.”

Tom Manger, senior associate director of the Major Cities Chiefs Association, said there are a number of challenges. The name of the shooter is considered public information that must be disseminated, and there’s a general thirst for information about mass shooters. As Americans consider ways to prevent future shootings, knowing more about the gunman might help figure out effective solutions.

But there are practical issues at play, too: How can the information be contained?

“It goes out in a hundred different ways,” Manger said. “Once it goes out on social media, it goes everywhere.”

For Caren Teves, the issue is personal. Her son, Alex, was among those killed in an Aurora, Colorado, movie theater in 2012. She and her husband, Tom, created the No Notoriety movement, encouraging media to stick to reporting relevant facts rather than the smallest of biographical details.

“It is a tough thing to navigate. But it’s a start,” Teves said. “We’ve never said it’s the only solution. It’s just one of them.”

It's an AP story, found on many sites - here's one - https://www.mywabashvalley.com/news/national/not-so-easy-to-prevent-the-spread-of-mass-shooters-names/