Dealing with Blogger has been almost impossible recently -- the comments don't work, and many of my posts haven't shown up. Those posts which do appear require six or seven time-consuming attempts at publication.
I shouldn't complain. After all, Blogger is a terrific service which allows folks like me to communicate with thousands of people for free.
But...I note a pattern....
Remember a few days ago, when I went to the Democratic Underground site only to discover that a (very temporary) hijack had led me to a page filled with jolly obscenities? So far as I know, I'm the only one who caught sight of that oddity and went on to mention it in public.
However, a more serious attempted hijacking happened recently to the Daily Kos site.
The Kossacks blame the hijack attempt on the Freepers, not on the Bush administration. Of course, those who delved deeply into Gannongate know that the dividing line between Rove and the Free Republic is not nearly so wide as some believe.
Blogger, of course, also serves right-wingers and a great many non-political bloggers. Even so (and please note that I'm operating in speculative mode here), I've begun to wonder: What if the recent problems constitute a coordinated warm-up exercise?
Let us posit that a new terrorist event is planned for our future. And let us further posit that the powers-the-be do not want "uncontrolled" commentators to offer their views on said event, at least not for the first day or so. Finally, let us posit that those same powers-that-be are now testing a contingency plan...
Paranoid? Yeah, sure. But am I wrong?
5 comments:
You're not wrong. This is the reality in which we now live.
I take Zoloft pills for that sort of thinking; it is not paranoia, but obsessive-compulsive disorder. "They" are out to get us, so we are not paranoid, but we should not waste our brainpower worrying that every bug in our life is "them" out to get us. Blogger is probably being unstable because there is some hardware or software transition going on, or because of a bug somewhere.
If we are serious about getting word around despite "them," we ought to set up the infrastructure. Blogger ain't it; if, say, FEMA asks Blogger to shut itself down temporary, likely it'll do so; likely FEMA could also have the Internet put out of general use. Maybe in some cases that's what would be needed, for instance to clear data channels for emergency use.
Last year before the election, that well-known and experienced computer professor teaching in the Netherlands (name?)set up a website map to show trends in the polls of Kerry vs Bush. He finally had to install a 4 or 5 step protection system to prevent hackers from crashing him -- and he really knew what he was dealing with!
Judy Down Maine
I imagine you've seen Kurt Nimmo's "Master Plan for the Internet" at
http://www.counterpunch.org/nimmo01022003.html
which is one of the more sober discussions of that kind.
There is no doubt that Bush & minions dislike the presence of so powerful a realm of free expression as the internet, and would like to exert control over it, whether by Nimmo's Carnivore system or some other, with the optio of denying it to non-government traffic altogether if the "hundred flowers keep blooming" despite them.
(How Maoist they do seem in some respects!)
Granted that would be hard. For one thing it is a worldwide resource, so other countries come into play. It has no center. So the international internet might split away from the U.S. (and UK) one and constitute a sort of Free America in Exile. For another it is the principal highway for scientists and businessmen the world over, so the denial would have to be intricate and probably messy.
The question is, if the worst happens, how do WE, to use barry schwartz's phrases, set up the infrastructure? How do we clear data channels for our own emergency use?
Is it too alarmist to suggest we begin banding together now (and I admit I have no idea how this would work in detail) exchanging info, setting up alternate communications, whether by phone, snailmail or other (alternate electronic communications would be an exciting possibility, if workable by cellphone for instance), so that if the worst happens, we have the makings of an Underground?
I hope I'm being too alarmist. But I have a strong feeling it's not too early to think in those terms.
I know of no solution to the problem of publishing openly in a free speech shutdown. Perhaps the folk at IndyMedia are those who have tought it out best. I suggest we do our best to avoid the need to take free exchange underground.
The key thing is the elections; the Bushist Arbeiterspartei feels it can go "nuclear" because they count on the consequences of their actions making it unnecessary to win elections. We need a way to make it necessary for Bushists to win elections. Maybe, as J.C. suggests, there is no way without outside help.
If the world is serious about this global warming, they must intervene here. I've lived in Minnesota for thirteen and a half years, during which my sense of weather has been sharpened, and just in that time the winters have gotten appreciably warmer. Someone greets me with an "Isn't this a great day!" and I frown, say I don't like it at all. Those "delightful" days are going to get us killed.
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