John McCain Don?t Know Much About History

John McCain has expressed skepticism at Obama's approach to Syria

Photo by Samantha Sais/Reuters

In Dexter Filkins? otherwise probing article in the May 13 New Yorker on the problem-from-hell that is Syria, Sen. John McCain fumes over the recent disclosure that all of President Obama?s top advisers?Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey, and CIA director David Petraeus?had advised him to arm the Syrian rebels.

?There may be another time in history when a president?s entire national-security team recommended a course of action and he overruled them,? Filkins quotes McCain as saying, ?but if there is, I?m not aware of it.?

For a military specialist who often regards himself as aligned with the right side of history, McCain (as the song goes) ?don?t know much about history.? There are in fact many instances of presidents defying the advice of their national-security teams, and probably many more instances of presidents wishing that they had done so. A few:

• On the final day of the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, all of President John F. Kennedy?s advisers urged him to bomb the Soviet missile sites in Cuba and, even more, to reject Premier Nikita Khrushchev?s offer of a Cuba-for-Turkey trade?that is, to pull his missiles out of Cuba if JFK pulled his out of Turkey. Kennedy took the offer.
  
• From late 1962 into 1963, all of Kennedy?s advisers supported the Joint Chiefs? recommendation to send ?combat troops? to Vietnam. Kennedy refused.
  
• In 1983, all of President Ronald Reagan?s advisers tried to talk him down from his enthusiasm for the ?star wars? missile defense program?and, in 1986, they all opposed his stab at negotiating a deal with Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev to eliminate all nuclear weapons. Reagan ignored them.
  
• In late 2006, all of President George W. Bush?s top advisers opposed the ?surge? in Iraq. Bush sided with the midlevel officials and retired officers who were pushing for the surge and a change of strategy. (This is ironic, as McCain now condemns those who opposed the surge, saying that they?ve been proved wrong by history.)

This is not to say that Obama was necessarily right, or that his advisers were wrong, on the issue of arming the Syrian rebels. But it is worth noting that Obama is far from the first president to take a pass on his advisers? suggestions. In that sense, McCain misleads when he says that Obama ?overruled? them. Obama is the president, the commander-in-chief. Panetta, Clinton, Dempsey, and Petraeus were his advisers; they have no decision-making authority to ?overrule.?

So was Obama right to ignore their advice on Syria? There are two standards for making these sorts of judgments: First, did he have good reasons for acting (or not acting) the way he did? Second, did he turn out to be right?

On the first standard, Obama had plenty of reasons to justify holding off arms shipments. His advisers may have assured him that they could funnel the weapons only to the good rebels and keep them out of the hands of the bad rebels. But some of the weapons supplied to the rebels in Libya had somehow wound up in the hands of jihadists in Mali.* His advisers may have argued that backing the good rebels would buy us influence in the aftermath. Maybe, but 10 years of not just arming but fighting and dying on behalf of Nour al-Maliki?s government in Iraq hasn?t had that effect. (Governments tend to pursue their interests, regardless of who installed them; hence President George Washington?s neutrality in the British-French wars of the 1790s, despite the crucial support he?d received from France in America?s own recent war against the Crown.)

On the second standard, whether Obama was right, we obviously don?t yet know. There is the awkward matter of ?red lines.? Obama had after all declared, five times in eight months (not an ?off-the-cuff? remark), that if Bashar Assad or elements of his regime used chemical weapons, that would cross a ?red line.? It would be ?a game-changer from our perspective,? there would be ?enormous consequences,? Assad would be ?held accountable,? and so forth.

There is still some uncertainty on the who, what, and when of this line-crossing. Assad?s soldiers seem to have fired chemical weapons, but there are reports that the rebels did, too. Is this like a ?double technical? in basketball? The referees scowl at both teams, but neither gets a free shot? Maybe. For a moment, Obama wins a reprieve. But at some point, he will have to do something. The question is what.

Here John McCain?s favorite subject, History, might be invoked?specifically, another anecdote from the Cuban missile crisis. On what turned out to be the final day of the crisis, Oct. 27, 1962, President Kennedy and his national-security advisers received a report that one of their U-2 spy planes, flying over Cuba, had been shot down by a Soviet surface-to-air missile. The plane had crashed; the pilot was dead. On the tape that was secretly recording the deliberations, Kennedy is heard saying, ?This is much of an escalation by them, isn?t it??

Source: http://feeds.slate.com/click.phdo?i=72476a3ae298733500cd7402b11225eb

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Google Japan's View Of The City

Tom Anderson, co-founder of MySpace, was at Google's Japan office a few weeks ago and took a picture of the view from the office. Just look at that view.

Tom said there was a "a dramatic sunset that night, it started looking ominous." So he took a picture and then yesterday posted it on Google+ for all to see.

He did drop a hint about making working at Google. He said, "How fun would it be to work for Google in such an exciting city?"

This post is part of our daily Search Photo of the Day column, where we find fun and interesting photos related to the search industry and share them with our readers.

Source: http://feeds.seroundtable.com/~r/SearchEngineRoundtable1/~3/myJGpwZMCWA/google-japan-view-16764.html

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U.S. report quantifies risk of listeria in deli foods

By Toni Clarke

(Reuters) - Some simple safety techniques for food handling and preparation could help delicatessens and other food stores cut the risk of customers developing the potentially deadly foodborne illness of listeriosis, according to a U.S. government report released on Friday.

The report by the Department of Agriculture and the Food and Drug Administration, recommended strict control of temperature during refrigeration, better cleaning and sanitizing of food contact surfaces and wearing gloves while serving customers.

The report analyzed the risk of illness associated with listeria monocytogenes, or L. monocytogenes pathogen, from food prepared and sold in delicatessens and other retail food stores.

L. monocytogenes is a pathogen that has long been of concern to public health officials. The CDC estimates that it causes about 1,600 illnesses, 1,500 hospitalizations, and 260 deaths a year. Though relatively rare compared with other major foodborne illnesses, it has a fatality rate of about 16 percent, compared with just 0.5 percent for Salmonella or Escherichia coli.

Investigators simulated the retail deli environment and evaluated how certain sanitary and food handling practices could influence the risk of developing listeriosis from ready-to-eat foods that are sliced, prepared or packaged in retail grocery delis.

They found that employing basic practices that prevent growth of the bacteria dramatically reduced the predicted risk of listeriosis.

Some of the main sources of L. monocytogenes are the slicer for deli meats and cheeses and salad utensils for the deli salads. These can lead to cross-contamination of other foods. Controlling cross-contamination at these points reduced the predicted risk of listeriosis, according to the report.

The study "improves our understanding of L. monocytogenes in the retail deli and should encourage improvements to retail food safety practices and mitigation strategies," the report notes, adding that additional data would be useful to further explore how more specific retail practices and conditions such as equipment design, impact the risk of listeriosis.

(Reporting By Toni Clarke in Washington; Editing by David Gregorio)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/u-report-quantifies-risk-listeria-deli-foods-224821218.html

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Icy Arctic rising as economic, security hot spot (The Arizona Republic)

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Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/304960352?client_source=feed&format=rss

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Megapixels and Ultrapixels: The Galaxy S4 versus HTC One camera shootout

We compare image quality on the HTC One and Samsung Galaxy S4 rear cameras

Though they're direct competitors, the HTC One and Samsung Galaxy S4 are two very different smartphones. That's especially evident when you look at the way they handle photography. The Galaxy S4 packs a 13-megapixel shooter with f/2.2 aperture, improving upon the 8-megapixel, f/2.6 unit in last year's S3 with the potential to capture even more detailed images. The HTC One trades sheer megapixel count for larger (2-micron) pixels on the sensor itself, allowing for improved low-light capabilities when combined with its wide-angle f/2.0 lens.

That's the basic hardware at work, but specs only go so far. That's why we've prepared a few direct comparison shots from the European HTC One (on the latest 1.29 firmware) and the international Samsung Galaxy S4 (GT-i9505). Check 'em out after the break.

read more

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/O60ylV6gPiY/story01.htm

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RBS names Van Saun CEO of US business Citizens

LONDON (AP) ? The Royal Bank of Scotland says it has named Bruce Van Saun chief executive of Citizens Bank, its U.S. business, ahead of its expected partial stock market flotation.

Van Saun, currently RBS's finance director, will replace Ellen Alemany, who is retiring after more than six years. Nathan Bostock, currently RBS's chief risk officer, will replace Van Saun.

RBS CEO Stephen Hester says 55-year-old Van Saun, who is originally from New Jersey, will lead Citizens in the run-up to the anticipated flotation.

Regulators have been pressuring for the Citizens sale as RBS tries to return to private ownership following a government bailout in 2008.

But Investec analyst Ian Gordon says RBS is merely buying time and that a Citizens sale is years away.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/rbs-names-van-saun-ceo-us-business-citizens-135207153.html

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Obama administration weighs options for expanding wiretap laws

By Joseph Menn and Mark Hosenball

SAN FRANCISCO/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration may seek to end a long-running debate over Internet wiretaps with proposed legislation that would enable law-enforcement agencies to tap into many types of Internet communications, U.S. officials with knowledge of the matter said.

The proposal is aimed at getting past the technical and legal obstacles that make it difficult for the FBI and other agencies with court orders to check so-called voice-over-Internet-protocol (VoIP) services such as those offered by Microsoft Corp's Skype.

It would also apply to real-time chat services offered by Facebook, Google and others.

The FBI has long sought new policies that would enable it to eavesdrop on the Internet in the same way that it does on traditional telephone calls. But tech companies have fiercely opposed the idea, and it would likely face stiff opposition in Congress.

Though officials can seek court approval to wiretap almost anything, only traditional telecommunications carriers are required to make it easy.

"The real question here is VoIP," said a former senior U.S. security official familiar with the debate. Microsoft and other VoIP providers have said they are exempt from existing law.

"The U.S. law, Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, does not apply to any of Microsoft's services, including Skype, as Microsoft is not a telecommunications carrier," Microsoft wrote in a March corporate blog post.

Microsoft, Facebook and Google had no comment on the Obama administration's draft proposal, which has been reported with varying details by The Washington Post, The New York Times and others.

As described to Reuters by U.S. officials and outsiders, the proposal would encompass VoIP, chat and other Internet communication services.

It remains unclear whether and how companies could be compelled to help police and intelligence agencies unscramble encrypted communications, in addition to providing access.

Al Gidari Jr., an attorney for Google and other tech companies, said he had been informed of the key provisions in the text and that providers would have to come up with a way to translate encrypted communications when required to do so by a judge, or else face escalating fines.

"It says if you offer a communication service it has to come with wiretapping capabilities or if not, you better be able to get that capability," said Gidari.

SERIES OF COMPROMISES

FBI officials had originally sought a blanket requirement that Internet companies give authorized law enforcement officials the same kind of sweeping, turn-key access to their networks that phone companies do.

Tech companies, civil libertarians and some government officials argued that such a mandate would be impractical for smaller, innovative companies and that "back doors" created for law enforcement present serious security risks.

Over the past year, a task force convened by FBI Director Robert Mueller has offered a series of compromises, said technologist Joe Hall of the Center for Democracy & Technology.

The result would leave specific cases to judges overseeing warrant requests and give companies time to comply.

Evidently that has been enough to overcome objections at the Commerce Department and bring the matter to the White House, which is likely to back the plan, Gidari said. He predicted it would still face a tough fight in the divided Congress. A Commerce Department spokesman declined to comment.

U.S. officials said the legislative proposals are still being studied by an interagency group. It is unclear when the group might finalize it for presentation to President Barack Obama, they said.

Current and former officials said frustration over the difficulty of executing court-approved wiretaps in the Internet era has been building for years as new communications services become invisible to the carriers, often described as "going dark."

"The Department of Justice is working with other agencies on a way forward that protects privacy of Americans, preserves corporate innovation, and provides the tools that our law enforcement and counterterrorism professionals require," a White House statement said. "We have nothing new to announce on that process today."

Dean Boyd, a spokesman for the Justice Department's National Security Division, said that solutions "would not create any new surveillance authority."

Retired General Michael Hayden, a former director of the CIA and the National Security Agency, said in an interview with Reuters that there should be no controversy over proposals to expand wiretap laws "to the extent that this allows the FBI to continue its lawful interception capabilities" with new technologies.

(Reporting by Mark Hosenball in Washington and Joseph Menn in San Francisco; Editing by Jonathan Weber and Xavier Briand)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/obama-administration-weighs-options-expanding-wiretap-laws-231727674.html

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