GOP to Trump: The best defense is a good silence

Rex Tillerson allegedly referred to Trump as a "moron." Senator Bob Corker spoke of Trump as an unruly child who might ignite World War III in a fit of pique.

You know what really impresses me? The response of all the other GOP congressfolk. The way they have rushed to defend their president will be remembered for generations to come.

Pillory Hillary. Trump still has loyalists, and they have decided to defend their God Emperor by beating up a woman. Specifically: They blame Hillary Clinton for the sexual sins of a movie producer named Harvey Weinstein. She made him do it.

During the primary battle, a BernieBot on Democratic Underground posted an instantly-notorious post blaming Hillary Clinton for not ending apartheid while she was the wife of the governor of Arkansas. You won't be able to find that post now because the avalanche of hilarious responses shamed the original poster into removing his inane claim. (A clever Googler can retrieve a cached version of the thread.) The non-Berniebots really got into the spirit of the occasion, blaming Hillary for the JFK assassination and failing to prevent 9/11 and not coming over to do the dishes.

Somewhere along the way, one Hillary defender pointed out that Nelson Mandela greatly admired the Clintons. In response to this news, another BernieBro sneered that Mandela was a sellout corporatist phony who played no role in ending apartheid; true credit for that victory should apparently go to the Messiah from Vermont. All hail Glorious Leader Bernie Sanders, savior of South Africa!

Who writes this nonsense? Are these "bros" actually Russian trolls? I can't say for certain, but I wouldn't hesitate to ask them where to find the best Shaslik in St. Petersburg.

(I presume you've already read this important story.)

Is your antivirus spying on you? Fascinating piece in the NYT: "How Israel Caught Russian Hackers Scouring the World for U.S. Secrets."

What gave the Russian hacking, detected more than two years ago, such global reach was its improvised search tool — antivirus software made by a Russian company, Kaspersky Lab, that is used by 400 million people worldwide, including by officials at some two dozen American government agencies.

The Israeli officials who had hacked into Kaspersky’s own network alerted the United States to the broad Russian intrusion, which has not been previously reported, leading to a decision just last month to order Kaspersky software removed from government computers.

The Russian operation, described by multiple people who have been briefed on the matter, is known to have stolen classified documents from a National Security Agency employee who had improperly stored them on his home computer, on which Kaspersky’s antivirus software was installed. What additional American secrets the Russian hackers may have gleaned from multiple agencies, by turning the Kaspersky software into a sort of Google search for sensitive information, is not yet publicly known.

The NYT won't ask the obvious question: What about the other vendors of anti-malware apps? Take, for example, ZoneAlarm, the popular free firewall: ZoneAlarm is made by Checkpoint, which is basically an offshoot of Israel's Unit 8200 (their version of the NSA).

One should also note that most pirated versions of expensive apps come from Russian and Chinese sources.

A few years ago, I indulged in some mildly paranoid speculation:

In the 1980s (according to an oft-told story), a gang lord stood accused of being involved with the cocaine trade. The government proved that cash in his possession tested positive for trace evidence of the drug. The defense countered by proving that all folding money contains trace evidence of cocaine.

Similarly, perhaps your computer has kiddie porn imagery nestled somewhere on it. Perhaps most computers do.

We all download freeware programs -- including the firewall ZoneAlarm, which is provided to you gratis by people who are at least rumored to be connected to Israeli intelligence. There are numerous other free apps out there: Video converters, music players, anti-spyware, registry utilities, so on and so-forth.

How do you know -- how can you be 100% certain -- that these apps do not place a tiny illegal image in some deeply hidden folder on your system? Perhaps the program automatically erases the illegal image seconds after placing it on your computer. The image would still be visible to a cop or federal agent doing a forensic analysis of your system.

From the standpoint of a totalitarian ruler, it would be very useful to engineer a society in which nearly everyone can (potentially) be proven in court to be a lawbreaker. Let's posit that the "Occupy Wall Street" movement whelps up an actual leader. To discredit him, the government need merely gin up an accusation of pedophilia -- and lo, the evidence will appear on his system. The forensic computer detective who examines the drive will believe that he has made a legitimate find.