Mueller Is Telling Us: He's Got Trump on Collusion; The Daily Beast, December 7, 2018

Max Bergmann, Sam Berger, The Daily Beast; Mueller Is Telling Us: He's Got Trump on Collusion

"Mueller is coming. And he is clearly coming for Trump. Not simply for obstructing justice but for conspiring with a hostile foreign power to win an election. This is a scandal unlike any America has ever seen."

The memoir I wish George H.W. Bush had written; The Washington Post, December 1, 2018

Carlos Lozada, The Washington Post; The memoir I wish George H.W. Bush had written

"So many of the things Bush said and wrote may seem quaint, but today they are also vital and increasingly fragile. “It is not fashionable in these days of tearing down our institutions to say ‘trust me,’ ” he said in a 1976 speech as CIA director. “Yet Americans have to have faith and trust in some degree or none of our governmental systems will work."

If Trump is cornered, the judges he disdains may finally bring him down; The Guardian, November 24, 2018

Walter Shapiro, The Guardian; If Trump is cornered, the judges he disdains may finally bring him down

"Concepts like democracy, a free press, due process, an independent judiciary and the rule of law are lost on Trump. As far as his understanding goes, the constitution might just as well be carved in cuneiform characters on stone tablets."

The walls are closing in on Trump, says “Enemies: The President, Justice & the FBI” author Weiner; Salon, November 18, 2018

Melanie McFarland, Salon; The walls are closing in on Trump, says “Enemies: The President, Justice & the FBI” author Weiner


[Kip Currier: Good advice from author Tim Weiner in the Q & A exchange below, for anyone writing and creating:]

"You know, I've been a reporter on deadline most of my life. You gotta press the button. You gotta hit 'send.’"

[Salon's Melanie McFarland] "Why does the series end at the Comey firing and his testimony? I'm imagining that a number of people who view it may have questions as to why it halted there, given everything that's happened since.

[Tim Weiner] It's the fact of Mueller and Comey, the two men who ran the FBI from the fall of 2001 to the spring of 2017 — 15 and a half years — who are now, by turns, special counsel and star witness.

It’s reminding people about how they teamed up to stop President Bush's assault on the Constitution, and trying to drive home that when Trump fired Comey, the counter-intelligence investigation into the Russian attack on the 2016 election became a criminal investigation, led to the appointment of Mueller and lead to a charge for Mueller that he could investigate anything. He was not delimited to the question of Russia.

You can bet your bottom dollar that there is going to be a sequel. And we talked, the directors, producers and Alex and I, we talked more than once about, you know, when we get to that Sunday in November, what Mueller brings the hammer down on that Friday? The grand jury meets on Fridays.
And you know, we decided we'd just saddle up and start again.

You know, I've been a reporter on deadline most of my life. You gotta press the button. You gotta hit 'send.’

A book needs a back cover. So we've got to decide what is the strongest structure that we can present."

Yes, Facebook made mistakes in 2016. But we weren’t the only ones.; The Washington Post, November 17, 2018

Alex Stamos, The Washington Post; Yes, Facebook made mistakes in 2016. But we weren’t the only ones.

"Alex Stamos is a Hoover fellow and adjunct professor at Stanford University. He served as the chief security officer at Facebook until August...

It is time for us to come together to protect our society from future information operations. While it appears Russia and other U.S. adversaries sat out the 2018 midterms, our good fortune is unlikely to extend through a contentious Democratic presidential primary season and raucous 2020 election.

First, Congress needs to codify standards around political advertising. The current rules restricting the use of powerful online advertising platforms have been adopted voluntarily and by only a handful of companies. Congress needs to update Nixon-era laws to require transparency and limit the ability of all players, including legitimate domestic actors, to micro-target tiny segments of the population with divisive political narratives. It would be great to see Facebook, Google and Twitter propose helpful additions to legislation instead of quietly opposing it.

Second, we need to draw a thoughtful line between the responsibilities of government and the large technology companies. The latter group will always need to act in a quasi-governmental manner, making judgments on political speech and operating teams in parallel to the U.S. intelligence community, but we need more clarity on how these companies make decisions and what powers we want to reserve to our duly elected government. Many areas of cybersecurity demand cooperation between government and corporations, and our allies in France and Germany provide models of how competent defensive cybersecurity responsibility can be built in a democracy."

 

Hundreds of '#ProtectMueller' Trump protests planned for Thursday November 8; BoingBoing, November 7, 2018

Xeni Jardin, BoingBoing; Hundreds of '#ProtectMueller' Trump protests planned for Thursday November 8

"Hundreds of #ProtectMueller protests and other events are planned for Thursday, November, 8, at 5pm local time.

Here is a list by state and town.


From the organizers, civic.moveon.org:

NOBODY IS ABOVE THE LAW—MUELLER PROTECTION RAPID RESPONSE
PROTESTS CALLED FOR THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 5 PM LOCAL TIME.
Donald Trump has installed a crony to oversee the special counsel's Trump-Russia investigation, crossing a red line set to protect the investigation. By replacing Rod Rosenstein with just-named Acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker as special counsel Robert Mueller's boss on the investigation, Trump has undercut the independence of the investigation. Whitaker has publicly outlined strategies to stifle the investigation and cannot be allowed to remain in charge of it. The Nobody Is Above the Law network demands that Whitaker immediately commit not to assume supervision of the investigation. Our hundreds of response events are being launched to demonstrate the public demand for action to correct this injustice. We will update this page as the situation develops.Donald Trump just crossed a red line, violating the independence of the investigation pursuing criminal charges in the Trump-Russia scandal and cover-up.
Trump putting himself above the law is a threat to our democracy, and we’ve got to get Congress to stop him.
We're mobilizing immediately to demand accountability, because Trump is not above the law.
Please make note of the date, time, and description below to confirm that the host is able to organize the event on such short notice! In general, rallies are suggested to begin @ 5 PM local time. But individual local events may vary—please confirm details on your event page.
Once you sign up, make sure to invite friends to join you at the event!
Note: If you choose to attend an event, you agree to engage in nonviolent, peaceful action, to act lawfully, and to strive to de-escalate any potential confrontations with those who may disagree with our values.
Create an event in your area!"

Libraries are about democracy, not just books; The Age (Melbourne, Australia), October 9, 2018

Christie Nieman, The Age (Melbourne, Australia); Libraries are about democracy, not just books

[Kip Currier: This article provides a persuasive, nuanced first-hand account by a librarian in Victoria, Australia about the vital role of libraries in communities as incubators for democratic values like access to information, analog and digital literacy, and an informed, educated electorate.

It can be easy to talk about and wax eloquently about the importance of democracy--at least, in places where, thankfully, free speech enables that kind of discourse.

The harder job of walking the talk, in terms of public infrastructure development and sustainability, is what the author of this piece unpacks for us:

Informing, reminding, and inspiring people why democracy requires necessary investment--in the short-term and for the long-term public interest--for civil societies to take root and thrive. Investment in public interest-committed institutions like libraries. For the benefit of everyone.

As quantitative and qualitative data (see here and here) and experiential stories demonstrate time and time again, libraries are local community, regional, national, and transnational anchors and portals to the kinds of activities and values that are necessary for democracies to grow and flourish. For people of all walks of life.]

"Certainly, once upon a time, a public library was a collection of books. But it was never only that. The mission of a public library is, and always was, to allow whole community access to knowledge, information, literature, and cultural participation. Every single day, your public library aims to provide something necessary or enriching – for free – for you and every individual in its locality. It aims to do this even for those who never darken its door, just in case one day they do. A public library is an instrument of democracy. Its mission is access for all, no one left behind...

These days access and full participation is simply not possible without some level of digital literacy. Teaching this skill has become fundamental to the age-old library mission. Daily, I teach older people and new arrivals how to use email and show people from all walks of life how to scan their documents, search for jobs, submit online forms to Centrelink...

Not by mistake is "Libraries Change Lives" the name of the new Public Libraries Victoria Network campaign - a slogan for a collaborative effort to educate people about libraries and ensure they are well funded, now and far into the future.

Libraries need to be protected. By all of us, for each other. And and we need to remember that libraries are not just nice, they are necessary."

Myanmar’s Assault on a Truthful Press; The New York Times, September 16, 2018

 Stephen J. Adler, The New York Times; Myanmar’s Assault on a Truthful Press

"Mr. Adler, the president and editor in chief of Reuters, sits on the board of the Committee to Protect Journalists."

"With the world’s nations preparing for the opening this week of the United Nations General Assembly, it is time to affirm not only the facts of this case but the value of facts themselves — to declare our certainty that some things are true and others are not. We must reject the cynical and dangerous idea that everyone is entitled to their own facts. We can see where this has gotten us in Myanmar and elsewhere. And we need to reaffirm the essential role of a free press in uncovering facts.

Journalists, being people, are imperfect. But journalism, done right, serves a high public purpose. It produces transparency in markets, holds governments and businesses to account, gives people tools to make well-informed decisions, uncovers wrongdoing, inspires reforms, and tells true and remarkable stories that move and inspire. The United Nations must insist that the suppression of a free press contradicts the very nature of democracy and cannot be tolerated. And other multinational institutions, alongside governments, should make it forcefully clear to Myanmar’s leaders that Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo must be freed."

Want to revive the political center? Fight corruption.; The Washington Post, August 31, 2018

Anne Applebaum, The Washington Post;

Want to revive the political center? Fight corruption.

"Any serious anti-corruption, anti-fraud platform should also have an international angle, because the spread of corruption in the United States is part of a larger sickness that now afflicts the entire Western alliance. Jointly, the United States, Britain, Germany, France, the rest of Europe — as well as Japan and Australia — are now locked in a real, life-and-death struggle against international kleptocracy. All of our political systems are now vulnerable to Russian and Chinese bribery and influence-buying. All of our online media is now the target of full-time political manipulation.

To preserve our democracies and maintain rule of law, we need to push back, as allies, using not just sanctions but also new laws limiting — or eliminating — the use of tax havens and the broader money-laundering toolkit."

Can Facebook, or Anybody, Solve the Internet’s Misinformation Problem?; The New York Times, August 22, 2018

Farhad Manjoo, The New York Times;Can Facebook, or Anybody, Solve the Internet’s Misinformation Problem?

"Alex Stamos, who until recently was Facebook’s chief security officer, has a dimmer view. 

In an article published on Wednesday on Lawfare, a news site that covers national security, Mr. Stamos wrote that the string of attacks revealed by Facebook, Microsoft and others were evidence that “America’s adversaries believe that it is still both safe and effective to attack U.S. democracy using American technologies and the freedoms we cherish.”

The government’s failure to address these threats have left the United States “unprepared to protect the 2018 elections,” Mr. Stamos said. He outlined a set of legislative, regulatory and law enforcement steps Americans might take to secure their digital house.

If we move fast, he said, we might be able to salvage 2020."

Stop calling it ‘meddling.’ It’s actually information warfare.; The Washington Post, July 17, 2018

Brian Klaas, The Washington Post; Stop calling it ‘meddling.’ It’s actually information warfare.

"“And I would have gotten away with it, too, if it weren’t for you meddling kids!” That’s the catchphrase that comes at the end of “Scooby-Doo” cartoons, always right at the moment when some monster turns out to just be a creepy old man in a mask. The zany adventures are over — until the next episode.

That’s the appropriate use of the word “meddling.” It is not, however, an appropriate word to use when referring to the ongoing Russian attacks on American democracy that gained prominence in the 2016 presidential election and will accelerate as we head into the November midterms. This isn’t “Scooby-Doo.” The stakes couldn’t be higher, and the monsters we face are real...

But that phrase is woefully inadequate. These continuing attacks are neither meddling nor “interference,” another euphemism. They’re a part of gibridnaya voyna — Russian for “hybrid warfare.” The best term for what we’re talking about would be “information warfare.

One of the jarring realizations of the 21st century is that democratic governments are only as good as the quality of information that their voters receive. Influence the information flow voters receive, and you’ll eventually influence the government."

The Guardian view on privacy online: a human right; The Guardian, April 26, 2018

Editorial Board, The Guardian; The Guardian view on privacy online: a human right

"Encryption on the internet will be abused, but better that than a society where no one is allowed secrets from the government"

It’s not just America: Zuckerberg has to answer for Facebook’s actions around the world; The Washington Post, April 10, 2018

Karen Attiah, The Washington Post; It’s not just America: Zuckerberg has to answer for Facebook’s actions around the world

"In many countries around the world, Facebook is the Internet. And with little ability to influence how the social media site operates, such nations are vulnerable to any policy action — or inaction — the company decides to take.

So while Zuckerberg struggles to answer for how his company is affecting Americans, let’s not forget that he has a lot more to answer for...

Time will tell if countries outside of the United States will ever be able to compel Zuckerberg to appear before their citizens and lawmakers to answer for Facebook’s actions. He may never appear in say, Germany, India, or Nigeria on his whirlwind apology tour. Nevertheless, he should not be absolved from the global consequences of the digital empire that he has built."

A radical proposal to keep your personal data safe; Guardian, April 3, 2018

Richard Stallman, Guardian; A radical proposal to keep your personal data safe

"Journalists have been asking me whether the revulsion against the abuse of Facebook data could be a turning point for the campaign to recover privacy. That could happen, if the public makes its campaign broader and deeper.

Broader, meaning extending to all surveillance systems, not just Facebook. Deeper, meaning to advance from regulating the use of data to regulating the accumulation of data. Because surveillance is so pervasive, restoring privacy is necessarily a big change, and requires powerful measures.

The surveillance imposed on us today far exceeds that of the Soviet Union. For freedom and democracy’s sake, we need to eliminate most of it. There are so many ways to use data to hurt people that the only safe database is the one that was never collected. Thus, instead of the EU’s approach of mainly regulating how personal data may be used (in its General Data Protection Regulation or GDPR), I propose a law to stop systems from collecting personal data."

Sinclair's Propaganda Bomb Is What Media Critics Have Warned About Since Reagan; Esquire, April 2, 2018

Charles P. Pierce, Esquire; Sinclair's Propaganda Bomb Is What Media Critics Have Warned About Since Reagan

[Kip Currier: 
During my undergraduate degree at the University of Pittsburgh, I spent my junior year in Kobe, Japan, attending a Japanese university and living with a Japanese chemistry professor emeritus and his wife. Toward the end of my year there, my Japanese skills had gotten proficient enough to have some really "meaty", impactful discussions. I've never forgotten a conversation I had with my host mother, Haruko, who shared her experiences as a 20-something housewife raising her young sons in the waning days of World War II, while her husband taught at one of the Japanese Naval Colleges on the Japan Sea.

U.S. forces were poised to land in Japan and the Japanese state media were disseminating stories about all manner of alleged atrocities the media said would occur if the Americans were to step on Japanese soil. My host mother Haruko said that because the Japanese Imperial Army controlled the media, the populace, people like her, had no access to information other than what the state media put out via radio and newspapers. As an island archipelago with no land borders with other nations, this was especially true for Japan. Years later, she said she came to understand how they had been misled by the Imperial Army's disinformation and propaganda. I never forgot how important information--access to the truth--is.

Access to information--truthful, trusted, verifiable information--is the linchpin of a free and independent press, informed citizenry, and healthy, functioning, questioning democracies. James Madison's 1822 admonition about information, cited in the excerpt below, is as timely as ever.]

"Not only is this a cautionary tale about media consolidation—Sinclair is inches away from owning stations in Chicago and Los Angeles—it’s also a cautionary tale about the imbalance between labor and management in a very visible industry. When the mash-up appeared this weekend, anonymous Sinclair employees leapt to the electric Twitter machine to talk about the read-or-die pressure on the employees in the company’s local stations. And, when this happens in the context of an administration dedicated to keeping people stupid enough to believe all its lies, you have reached a critical mass driving the country inexorably toward the result of Mr. Madison’s great warning:

“A popular Government, without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy; or, perhaps both.”"

As Sinclair’s sound-alike anchors draw criticism for ‘fake news’ promos, Trump praises broadcaster; Washington Post, April 2, 2018

Paul Farhi, Washington Post; As Sinclair’s sound-alike anchors draw criticism for ‘fake news’ promos, Trump praises broadcaster

"Tim Burke had a simple idea: Take clips of dozens of TV news anchors all spouting the same lines and mash them up into one video. The idea, he said, was to expose how one company, Sinclair Broadcast Group, had turned its many local newscasts into a national megaphone for its corporate views.

So Burke, the video director at Deadspin, pieced together video of anchors at 45 Sinclair-owned stations across the United States, all reading from a script that the ­Maryland-based company recently distributed to its stations about the perils of “fake news” and how it is “extremely dangerous to our democracy.”

The result was a massively viral video that sparked broad mainstream media attention, incited an angry tweet from President Trump, and prompted a national conversation about the perils of enabling companies such as Sinclair to control an ever-larger number of TV stations."

Beware the smart toaster: 18 tips for surviving the surveillance age; Guardian, March 28, 2018

Alex Hern and Arwa Mahdawi, Guardian; Beware the smart toaster: 18 tips for surviving the surveillance age

"Awareness of our digital footprint is one thing, but what are we to do about it? In the wake of the Facebook revelations, it’s clear that we can’t all keep clicking as usual if we value our privacy or our democracy. It’s still relatively early in the internet era and we are all still figuring it out as we go along. However, best practices when it comes to security and online etiquette are starting to emerge. Here’s a guide to some of the new rules of the internet."

The technology industry needs a set of professional ethics; Baltimore Sun, March 8, 2018

Adil E. Shamoo. Baltimore Sun; The technology industry needs a set of professional ethics

"In a wider view, using an ethical framework in scientific enterprise disperses ethical principles throughout society; patients and consumers adopt these ethical standards and come to expect and even extend these standards to other endeavors.

But we have failed to develop an ethical framework when it comes to technology or to understand the impact new media would have on our behavior and societal relationships.

We need to examine the current landscape of ethics within the rapidly expanding technology sector. Just as scientific research has added requirements for classes in ethics in research, the tech sector must develop widespread ethical educational efforts. The lack of firm ethical principles allowed a serious disruption to our 2016 political election and is changing the brains of social media users and rapidly changing the workplace and our economy. What has become commonplace has become acceptable. Robots replace humans in jobs; testing of consumer behavior without consent is unquestioned; acceptability of facial and voice recognition is rarely challenged even though misuse and privacy issues are frightening; and vitriolic, divisive missives are the norm on social media."

Donald Trump Sure Has a Problem with Democracy; New York Times, March 4, 2018

Editorial Board, New York Times; Donald Trump Sure Has a Problem with Democracy

"Though George Washington was elected unanimously, he was always a reluctant president. He pursued a second term in 1792 only at the urging of his cabinet, and in 1796, when he insisted it was time to step down, he famously warned that not to do so risked a return to the very tyranny Americans had fought to overthrow...

Mr. Trump was surely joking about becoming president for life himself. But there can be little doubt now that he truly sees no danger in Mr. Xi’s “great” decision to extend his own rule until death. That craven reaction is in line with Mr. Trump’s consistent support and even admiration for men ruling with increasing brutal and autocratic methods — Vladimir Putin of Russia, Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines, to name a few."

Whatever Trump Is Hiding Is Hurting All of Us Now; New York Times, February 18, 2018

Thomas L. Friedman, New York Times; Whatever Trump Is Hiding Is Hurting All of Us Now

"Putin used cyberwarfare to poison American politics, to spread fake news, to help elect a chaos candidate, all in order to weaken our democracy. We should be using our cyber-capabilities to spread the truth about Putin —just how much money he has stolen, just how many lies he has spread, just how many rivals he has jailed or made disappear — all to weaken his autocracy. That is what a real president would be doing right now.

My guess is what Trump is hiding has to do with money. It’s something about his financial ties to business elites tied to the Kremlin. They may own a big stake in him. Who can forget that quote from his son Donald Trump Jr. from back in 2008: “Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross section of a lot of our assets.” They may own our president.

But whatever it is, Trump is either trying so hard to hide it or is so naïve about Russia that he is ready to not only resist mounting a proper defense of our democracy, he’s actually ready to undermine some of our most important institutions, the F.B.I. and Justice Department, to keep his compromised status hidden.

That must not be tolerated. This is code red. The biggest threat to the integrity of our democracy today is in the Oval Office."