(Second in a series.) I recently picked up a copy of Robert Wuthnow’s Be Very Afraid: The Cultural Response to Terror, Pandemics, Environmental Devastation, Nuclear Annihilation, and Other Threats. According to the dust cover, the Princeton sociologist’s book “examines the human response to existential threats…” Contrary to common belief, we do not deny such threats [...]
Testifying in a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing today, Trey Hodgkins of technology trade association “TechAmerica” offered some pretty bogus excuses for resisting transparency in government contracts. [I]f disclosure included posting to a public website the unredacted contract, a number of critical elements would be exposed. Something as simple as identifying the [...]
I was amused to read that a draft Army intelligence report identified micro-blogging service Twitter as a potential tool for terrorists. On the other hand, it’s regrettable that this terrorism mania persists to foster this kind of report and media attention. There’s no distinct terror threat from Twitter. (Do check out the send-up of an [...]
It exalts terrorists and terrorism to try chasing their videos off the Internet, and it doesn’t work. Senator Lieberman’s quest to cleanse the Internet of terrorism has won a battle in a losing war by convincing Google to take down such videos. They can still be found on LiveLeak and can be hosted on any [...]