Update no.620

Update from the Heartland

No.620

28.10.13 – 3.11.13

Blog version:  http://heartlandupdate.blogspot.com/

To all,

The follow-up news items:

-- We had a bevy of supposed Snowden disclosures [599 & sub] this week.  While it continues to qualify in the follow-up category, this perpetual story is wearing me out.  I have also been involved in several threads related to the Snowden betrayal.  This week, the threads below should be sufficient.

The first of the independent threats began with this article:

“N.S.A. Said to Tap Google and Yahoo Abroad”

by Charlie Savage, Claire Cain Miller and Nicole Perlroth

New York Times

Published: October 30, 2013

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/31/technology/nsa-is-mining-google-and-yahoo-abroad.html?_r=0

“Well now Cap, what was I saying last week.”

My response:

            These incessant, trickled, Snowden disclosures are getting quite tiresome.  We are trusting the Press in all this.  What means do they have to validate the documents they are supposedly seeing?  The vast majority of folks who are “shocked,” “disturbed,” and “disgusted” (et al) about the extent of Allied espionage activities as portrayed by the Press, have never seen actual classified material and even further have never seen the raw data.  I’m getting to the point where I’m saying, oh yeah, you go boys.  Allied intelligence should be looking everywhere they can to find data – the more dots, the clearer the picture.  Back in my day, just the names NSA, NRO, et cetera were classified.  I want the collective Allied IC looking everywhere for clues.  The bad guys in this war want to kill a lot of innocent people; they are not out to rob a bank or steal a car.  The issue for me has always been the inappropriate, collateral use of intelligence data by politicos, moralists, over zealous or unscrupulous prosecutors, Press, and any of the others who seek to violate our fundamental right to privacy.  To me, our focus should be on proper reforms to filter the processing of collected material rather than the collection process.  The dilemma for me is, we are all flawed people, and not everyone possesses the moral integrity to act properly with raw data or lightly processed intelligence information, which is why most folks should never be allowed access.  I still cannot believe a contractor like Snowden could gain access to such material without someone noticing . . . I see him as a hacker who was allowed inside the gates and even worse allowed to wander around at will.

            Out of curiosity, have you seen one of these actual so-called Snowden documents?  I haven’t.  I am beginning to get suspicious of the Press.  It would be so easy for them to make stuff up for their political purposes, or to be fooled by a clever con-man who decided to peddle pseudo-documents that look real.  How would they know authenticity?  Because they got them from Snowden, or Greenwald, or some other conduit.  It would be a perfect way to damage governments.

   I’m just sayin’.

   “That’s my opinion, but I could be wrong.”

   Have a great weekend.  Take care and enjoy.

Cheers,

Cap

A follow-up comment:

“Cap, yes indeed you do put a new slant to the entire farrago none of 'us' have seen these damaging documents which are too sensitive to publish. I have found nothing but reference to them.

“It is reported that Snowden took 30,000 documents or copies of with him for disclosure to anyone who would give him safe harbour. 30,000! As I hinted at earlier who the hell was supervising this man, who allowed him to drive the ship onto the rocks?

“Thanks for your wishes for a good weekend, we have a Festival of Remembrance this evening, this is a 'booted and spurred' event. Next weekend Ann and I are at 'The Albert Hall' in London for the annual remembrance Legion event, we come back from that in the early hours to our own event in the village. On the 11th November we have our two minute silence at 11am with bugle playing the last post and children from our primary school placing wooden crosses in the grass at the village war memorial. There are 28 names from the two world wars. The youngsters will have written the names of the fallen on each cross. It's a very moving occasion. 28 names from a small village, heart wrenching. We still have family names in the village that are descendants of the first and second world wars.

“Get hold of your traitors Cap and I'll take them to the war memorials and show them what war and tyranny results in and how brainless and futile their traitorous acts are.”

And, my follow-up response:

            I do not have a clue what can be done to stop the persistent trickle of Snowden documents.  I am finding it progressively more troubling that we have no way to judge or validate the veracity of Press reporting on this topic.  I have been suspicious of The Guardian from the get-go.  Other newspapers have joined the frenzy.  Yet, we are left in the trust-me mode.  The government cannot or will not validate the Snowden “documents.”  I guess the only way for the IC to respond is to go quiet, adapt to the compromised environment, and get back to the business of finding the bad guys.

            I wish you the very best for your Remembrance ceremonies.  I hope the appeal is bountiful.  May God bless all our veterans who have manned the gates of freedom.

            I have confidence the security services will get the traitors eventually.  I also believe the traitors will feel justice for their betrayal.

Another contribution to this related topic:

“GCHQ and European spy agencies worked together on mass surveillance – Edward Snowden papers unmask close technical cooperation and loose alliance between British, German, French, Spanish and Swedish spy agencies”

by Julian Borger

The Guardian

Published: Friday, 1 November 2013; 13.02 EDT

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/nov/01/gchq-europe-spy-agencies-mass-surveillance-snowden

“Cap, certain you'll find this of interest especially para 5 and the last para. (it is a long doc mind).”

My response:

Thanks.  It is nice to see The Guardian offered at least a modicum of balance to their perception of the Intelligence Community.  They are also persistent in their desire for us to trust them with a fair and balanced assessment of the IC.  Thanks for sharing.

On a different topic and a new thread:

“Throw the Rascals Out?”

by Thomas Sowell

Published: Oct 29, 2013

http://townhall.com/columnists/thomassowell/2013/10/29/throw-the-rascals-out-n1732671/page/full

My opinion:

As I have written numerous times in this humble forum, it is an easy step to endorse Sowell’s argument, as it is my own, with only one exception.  He points the fickled finger of fate at President Obama as if he was the only president who sought more than one term, which we know not to be true.  Nonetheless, throwing the rascals out would have positive symbolic effect.  However, as we are all flawed men, I suspect the new rookies would be easy prey for the permanent staffers and lobbyists with their footlockers of cash.  Regardless, it would be a good start.  Somehow we must break the cycle of corruption using earmarks, hidden amendments, buried language and many other means of obfuscated spending.  Our next shot at this comes next year – 468 of the rascals will be up for election.  We must find the will to throw the rascals out.

The contributor’s follow-up comment:

“As I mentioned to friends at lunch yesterday, while it would be courageous and revolutionary to throw corrupted politicos out of office and reboot, the years of upheaval and violence would not be pretty for any of us. Our BIG GOV has tremendous resources to resist/crush any insurrection and to maintain COG (Continuity of Government) even with the most catastrophic physical fragmentation of government (e.g., nuke war). This might explain the massive ammo purchases by just one agency the DHS.

“Your opinion [above] is worthy, and well written. I've also previously mentioned that we'd better know who to place in to the replaced slots, because power vacuums can be chaotic and most unpredictable.

“I'd like to say the only way to do it is through our electoral process/system, and hope that using that we end up with a better situation in the future, though not so sure I trust the process/system nor the ones that seem to rise to the top.”

My follow-up comment:

Darren,

            We would not be attacking the USG, only exercising our right to vote in unison.  Those Members of Congress might interpret the mass action as a threat, but I do not see how the Supremes could possibly support resistance to such an action.  In any election, there would still be 67 senators remaining in office, but the message certainly would be clear – we’ve had enough and we’re not going to take it anymore.  That alone would alter behavior at least for a while.  Even if we were not 100% successful in any given election, the remainder would surely be looking over their shoulder, as they would be next.

            Yes, we most assuredly should be careful and deliberate with our votes when we decide upon replacements.

            Re: “power vacuum.”  Yes, thus my comment earlier about the near instantaneous increase in power & influence to the congressional staffers and lobbyists.  I almost feel anything would be better than what we have and have had for the last few decades.  This juvenile nonsense must stop!

News from the economic front:

-- The U.S. Federal Reserve Open Market Committee made no changes to policy at its October meeting, maintaining its US$85B per month bond purchasing program.  The Feds statement suggested they have not seen significant economic impact from a three-week government shutdown last month.

London Inter-Bank Offered Rate (LIBOR) Debacle [552]:

-- Rabobank (Netherlands), a cooperative bank founded by Dutch farmers, admitted its role in the LIBOR-rigging scandal and has been fined a total of €774M (£663M, US$1.06B), after its staff were found to have attempted to manipulate benchmark borrowing rates.  Further, the bank’s chairman, Piet Moerland, resigned with immediate effect and apologized for what he said was "inappropriate conduct" by 30 of the bank's staff.

-- The mortgage-finance giant Fannie Mae filed a civil suit in federal court in Manhattan against nine of the world’s largest banks for their participation in the LIBOR interest rate manipulation scandal.  The mortgage lender claims it suffered an estimated US$800M in damages from the banks’ actions in the scandal.

-- So we don’t lose focus . . . the infamous 16, involved, international banks are:

·      Barclays [UK] – US$454M fine [550]; Singapore sanctions [600]

·      Bank of America [U.S.] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      BTMU [Japan] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      Citigroup [U.S.] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      Credit Suisse [Switzerland] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      Deutsche Bank [Germany] – US$654M LIBOR profit [578]; set aside €500M (US$641M) for LIBOR liability [589]; Singapore sanctions [600]

·      Lloyds TSB [UK]

·      HSBC [UK] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      HBOS [UK]

·      JPMorgan Chase [U.S.] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      Norinchuckin [Japan]

·      Rabobank [Netherlands] – fined €774M (£663M, US$1.06B), CEO resigned, 30 others censured [620]

·      RBC [Canada]

·      RBS [UK] – £390M (US$612.6M) in fines, 21 employees involved [582]; Singapore sanctions [600]

·      UBS [Switzerland] – US$1.5B fine, two charged [575]; Singapore sanctions [600]

·      West LB [Germany]

Added to the list by the Monetary Authority of Singapore [600]:

·      ING [Netherlands] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      BNP Paribas [France] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      Crédit Agricole [France] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      DBS [Singapore] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation [Singapore] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      Standard Chartered [UK] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      United Overseas Bank [Singapore] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Ltd. [Australia] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      Macquarie [Australia] – Singapore sanctions [600]

·      Commerzbank [Germany] – Singapore sanctions [600]

Others involved:

·      ICAP [UK] – fined US$87M + three executives charged [615]

I trust none of us will lose sight of what these banks have done.  Lest we forget!

Continuation from Update no.618:

This is actually round four:

 “I never suggested we make anything public in any direct way, nor did I suggest anything unilateral. Indeed I did not advocated for any specific action. I stated that knowing secrecy to be extremely difficult or impossible will change the entire spy community's situation, therefore changing their actions.”

My reply to round four:

            My apologies as apparently I misinterpreted your words.

            The IC’s means and methods are going to change or have already changed.  Once compromised [by Snowden], they are no longer surreptitious and thus subject to counter-measures and more susceptible to mis-information campaigns.

            Considering the number of people who collect, analyze, work with and have access to SCI material, I’d say the USG’s success at keeping secrets is pretty damn good.  The greatest threats are the politicos, who are motivated by an entirely bizarre, crazy set of factors of party parochialism and self-election.  Snowden was quite unusual.  He apparently had root access to many, if not most or all, of the computer systems.  I suspect rather few people had the practical access he did.  I am fairly certain the IC has already taken steps to limit such vulnerabilities in the future.

 . . . round five:

“Ultimately, transparency will increase because the nature and extreme usefulness of the Internet lends itself to openness, not secrecy. More than techniques must change to meet this change in the nature of the world.

“In the meantime, the threat to secrecy, it seems to me, comes primarily from sloppiness rather than intent. Privatization aggravates that by introducing the profit motive. Thus, Edward Snowden and others who oppose the system, or come to oppose it, slide into their positions unnoticed by those whose positions are set up to support quantity rather than quality.”

 . . . my reply to round five:

            Re: Internet.  Very good point.  The Internet has already altered a lot of things, and as you note, the Internet will probably change the intelligence process as well.

            Re: sloppiness.  Again, very good points.  The USG was clearly sloppy in supervising a contractor who had root access to a vast array of SCI material and even more clearly had nothing even close to “need to know.”  That reality means those in the USG who had responsibility for clearances and access to SCI material.  The USG made a lot of mistakes to enable Snowden’s betrayal.

Comments and contributions from Update no.619:

Comment to the Blog:

“We might call your largesse fund by some other name, but it’s as reasonable an idea as I have seen to date for allowing politicians to repay their contributors. I still favor public financing of campaigns, though. So long as our elected officials account to anyone other than the public as a whole for election money, corruption will continue.

“The economy continues to confuse forecasters. That supports the Federal Reserve’s proposal to require the big banks to have reasonable reserves. Think of those rules as having similarity to traffic laws. People (or banks) will never really like them, but they protect all parties.

“On one of last week’s topics, I heard on a radio agricultural report today that the Ohio River does indeed have “an outdated system of locks and dams.” Perhaps Senator McConnell has a legitimate object for his largesse, although I surely agree that his timing could have been far better.

“I am not sure how you come by your assertions of Edward Snowden’s (and many others’) mental state and intentions. Mind reading is not merely an inexact science; it’s not any kind of science. My guess of Mr. Snowden’s intention is that he intended to improve the United States in the long term by restraining those who would do such foolishness as spying on Angela Merkel’s cell phone and such grossly unethical behaviors as the dozen or more known instances of personal spying on spouses and others.”

My response to the Blog:

            Re: Largesse Fund.  We can call it anything; I was simply calling what it would be . . . solely to constraint the corruption of Members of Congress.  Public financing is not the answer either.  Yet, it would be better now that the Supremes have opened the gates of hell with their Citizens United decision.

            Re: banks.  IMHO, the banking reform necessary to minimize the impact of a market collapse like the Fall of 2008; however, these are positive moves, it seems to me.

            Re: dams & locks.  As I acknowledged, the Ohio River project may well be a worthy endeavor.  If it is, it can and should stand alone with proper scrutiny.  Hiding it away is like sneaking around in the death of night; it looks, smells and tastes bad by the way it was done.  And, it is morally worse, the Minority Leader will condemn President Obama for spending too much.  It is hypocrisy and duplicity that enrages me.

            Re: Snowden.  I make no claims to reading anyone’s mind.  I only see the dots and connect them to create a picture.  I simply report upon what I see in that picture.  He may have had the best of intentions; however, his chosen path to achieve his objective(s) was about as wrong as it could be.

            Re: espionage.  It is a nasty business, much like the sausage-making process.  This kind of illumination is NEVER healthy.  The Church Commission hobbled the IC for decades.  The U.S. IC had essentially no effective Human Intelligence (HumInt) when compared to the British, Russians, French, Chinese, et cetera.  Then, 9/11 struck our blind eye and we scrambled to recover; good people died as a consequence.  Now, here we are yet again back in 1976.  Instead of dealing with the actual abuser, we are heading down a road to once again hobble our entire intelligence apparatus.  I may be the lone voice in the wind, but I shall speak out vigorously against restriction . . . reform, yes, absolutely; restrictions on access, yes; list goes on.  The issue is not what we collect, it is how we use the information that is critical.

 . . . a follow-up comment:

“If public financing of elections is ‘not the answer’ and we have clearly never had a way to make private financing anything other than corrupt, what do you propose? Your ‘largesse fun’ will not prevent corruption; it will merely make those involved find yet another way around the intent of the law. When large amounts of money from interested parties finance elections, those interests will be served regardless of the letter of the law.”

My follow-up response:

            Perhaps a Freudian slip: “largesse fun” vice “Largesse Fund”; nonetheless, you have a valid point.  My proposal is an attempt to constrain the corruption in Congress.  As long as the Supremes’ Citizen United decision remains law and money remains speech, control of Congress will remain with the monied elite, and We, the People, must endure a new royalty until the next rebellion.  The best we can hope for is to get the money into the daylight, so at least we can see it.

My very best wishes to all.  Take care of yourselves and each other.

Cheers,

Cap                 :-)