Obviously I’m missing something.

La me ln apple san bernardino security 2016021 001

The FBI went to a judge and apparently whined they couldn’t access the data in one of the San Bernardino Terrorist’s phones. 

A Judge ordered Apple to assist the FBI.

Apple responded that the programming doesn’t exist (by design) which would allow even them (Apple) to break into the phone.

Then Trump gets in on the action and says we need to get the information on that phone.

To which I say;

NO WE DON’T

I’d like to tell Trump to be quiet and let the adults talk.

Just because the information happens to exist on a phone, doesn’t mean that we have to access it. If the data were written on paper that had been burned, the FBI wouldn’t have access to it would they? Data locked on a phone is essentially the same.

The FBI does have other phones belonging to the San Bernardino Terrorists. They have access to all the bills and phone records of calls made to and from each of the phones in question.

Along with that information the FBI no doubt has access to all the text messages, or at least the source and destination phone numbers associated with those text messages. Just as I have that information for SMS messages printed on my cell phone bill every month.

What the FBI doesn’t have is information that may have been sent from that iPhone 5C to other iPhones, iPads, or Macs. This is because the information was sent via data channels instead of via SMS.

To quote another famous phrase, “What does it matter at this point anyway?

The FBI has the terrorist’s computers, the odds are damn high that any communications carried out on the phone were replicated on the computers.  These terrorists are dead on the pavement, they’ve been disavowed by ISIS, Al Qaeda, and the Taliban. 

This strikes me as nothing more than an end run around the issues of encryption by the FBI. 

Apple doesn’t have the software to break into the phone, because creation of that software would eventually mean that the software would get out. After all we all know how secure Data at the Office of Personnel Management was. How about the IRS data? Or the Healthcare.GOV data? Or, Or, Or…

Once a program capable of cracking the encryption on an iPhone or Samsung phone is out in the world, no-one has privacy.

This is the fundamental argument Tim Cook of Apple has been making all along.

Apple is very explicit in their encryption warnings on their computers. If you loose this password and you don’t have a recovery key we can’t help you. My computer’s drive is encrypted, I have the key stored and I know the password. But I don’t expect Apple to be able to decrypt my drive, or my iPhone, or my iPad. Even if I was stupid enough to loose or forget the passwords…

I don’t want Apple to be able to decrypt my stuff ever!

Beyond that is this point.

MIT recently reported there were something like 586 different encryption programs freely available from a variety of sources. So even if Apple compromises it’s principals (I hope to God they don’t) Criminals will simply choose an alternative encryption technique.

When that happens, what’s the FBI going to do? Bitch, piss, and moan their way into making a manufacturer in Switzerland, for example build them a backdoor?  If that day comes I’d be curious to see the response the FBI gets.

According to the LA Times article Farook disabled the icloud backup 6 weeks prior to the attack. It’s entirely likely that Farook disabled the GPS function and deleted messages as well. So even if the FBI gains access, it’s questionable if there will be any useful data recovered.

Regardless, the damage done to American privacy will be done.

Trump!

Donald_Trump_by_Gage_SkidmoreI’m still highly unlikely to vote for Donald Trump.

But I gotta hand it to him, he’s turning things upside down and doing his country a service by exposing the true colors of candidates, both Republican and Democrat.

He’s also ripping away the masks of smug progressive newspeople.

Almost makes me wish I’d watched the debates… Almost.

I think I still prefer reading about them the day after. By that time the left has managed to spin themselves into a self righteous santorum froth.

One thing I can say is that even if Trump is a complete buffoon, (and I’m not saying he is, that jury is still out.) he’s got to be causing some consternation among the enemies of this country.

syrian-refugees-turkey.jpg_736776827Lets look at some of the things he’s been taken to task over.

Close our borders to Middle Eastern refugees until we know what is happening and our vetting process works.

This seems to be a logical and reasonable approach, since it’s become obvious our vetting process isn’t weeding out jihadists even with the cooperation of so called “Friendly” Middle Eastern countries.

The media and other candidates practically lost their minds about this Trump suggestion.

Some called this plan unconstitutional, others called it racist. I call it neither.

Every Sovereign Nation on the planet has the right to protect itself and it’s people from threats. Our constitution conveys, codifies, and supposedly insures certain rights to the citizens of our country. International law, treaties, and agreements apply to non-citizens.

In many cases our constitution and international law parallel each other.

However, our constitution doesn’t guarantee that any foreign born person will be allowed to enter our country, or given citizenship.

Saudi-Prince-Alwaleed-bin-Talal-370x231The fact that a Saudi Prince, ISIS and CAIR all condemned Trump’s suggestion could indicate he’s on the right track.

Then Trump suggested shutting down part of the internet, particularly those parts of the internet that service the Middle East which are under control of ISIS or other radical well known groups that have stated directly that they want to destroy America specifically or the West in general.

This is WAR 101.

Deny your enemies command, communication, coordination, and supplies.

I personally ave never understood why we didn’t plant C-4 on every cell tower our troops encountered in Iraq, and Afghanistan.

Deny communication.
Thereby denying command and coordination.

Extending this philosophy to the internet makes damn good sense and it’s technically possible. But it’s better.

internet_1By killing internet connections into and out of Jihadi, ISIS, Terrorists areas.

You deny their ability to easily recruit, send money, (As Bitcoin or other e-currencies ) or communicate their agenda.

Wth the internet gone these groups lose their ability to brag about their successes in battle.  You deprive folks like ISIS the grandstanding moments of executing their enemies or destroying monuments on worldwide tv.

SanbernardiLets face it ISIS is a media whore. They want, and need the attention afforded them by distribution of shock videos. They need to romanticize themselves as the feisty righteous underdog on social media sites to attract young recruits.

If we were to cut those lines of communication, then we have a much easier time of controlling their message and we can follow their couriers back to bases of operation.

We know that the videos will still be made. We know that ISIS will try to distribute these videos. By narrowing the channels to Al Jezera, Satellite uplinks, or refugees, we make it really easy to identify sympathizers from whom we may get information. We can target the bases uplinks originate from, and easily vet refugees. (If a refugee is carrying a video, they don’t get refugee status, ever!)

So Trump’s suggestion about the internet is technically possible, easily implemented with changes to settings in routers, and no-one gets shot by doing it. Cheap & easy!

I like the minimum effort —> maximum result equation.

We own and control the technology, why let our self-declared enemies use it to potentially harm us?

Cutting ISIS off from the rest of the world is step one in containment.

Who cares if some people will call it censorship? Back in the bad ‘ol days reporters would send film or magnetic tape to their editors from Viet Nam.

Yeah, remember that? Without the instantaneous communication the internet provides, reporters turned in thoughtful well written articles. Their competition wasn’t confined solely to who could report an event the fastest, but also who reported an event correctly.

Trump’s suggestion simply takes the area back to the 1960’s. Messages written on paper, videos on physical media instead of youtube. If you think about it, It’s not actually censorship, it’s just slowing information down.

19n04planes-483393I’d bet President Putin would be agreeable to a little phone and internet silence.

After all, It’s a lot safer to fly your planes when you don’t have spotters sending info about the planes, to anti-aircraft guns all along the flight path.

I’d love to see the entire area cut off. I’d love to see what happened next.

🎶It’s Starting to look a lot like Trump’s right!🎶 AGAIN!

LA-school-closureIn the wake of the San Bernardino shootings, now LA Schools are under threat. San Bernardino Valley College is closed as well due to a threat.

Tell me again why is Trump wrong saying that we need to temporarily stop immigration from muslim countries?

Tell me again how there is no threat.

Tell me how efficient our vetting process is.

Tell me again how crazy Republicans are when they say we need to implement control over our borders.

Tell me lovely platitudes and stories about unicorns and rainbows.

I’m expecting CAIR to blather on about how Islam is a religion of peace. I expect Stompy Foot to tell us that we’re safe here in America and immediately after the words leave his mouth some insanity will unfold.

Just because Trump is strident, in your face, and direct, doesn’t mean he’s necessarily wrong. We really need to get back to listening carefully and thinking for ourselves.

I’d be happy if common sense made a comeback.

Again I find myself saying WTF?

Picture this if you will.

True story.

Sometime after 9/11, I get on a plane at LAX. There’s a young lady sitting at the window, I’m on the aisle. The middle seat is unoccupied. After a few minutes a guy dressed in a fluffy, hunting orange down jacket stops at our row. Having a jacket isn’t unusual since it’s February and this flight is heading to the midwest, the hunters orange is uhh interesting.

He’s the middle seat. It’s blazing hot in the plane and this guy doesn’t take his jacket off. My jacket is stuffed in my backpack under the seat in front of me, I’ve got the little vents in the overhead wide open, and I’m still sweating like a pig.

The young lady in the window seat flashes me a quizzical look while Mr. Middle seat is getting settled. I shrug back at her thinking, “To each his own.”

After a few minutes more of passengers boarding there’s the distinct “pop” you feel in your ears as the doors are closed and the plane starts building positive cabin pressure. Then the engines spin up and we’re backing away from the gate.

At this point Mr. Middle seat pulls a book out of his backpack.

It’s an ornate thing, gold lettering, red lettering, and looks a lot like the old illuminated books you see in museums. I happen to notice that the lettering is one of the Arabic typestyles. (You don’t test printers for years and not recognize on sight, the written characters of every language, even if you can’t read the language.) Mr. Middle Seat flips to a passage and begins reading. As he’s reading he’s rocking back and forth.

The lady at the window is now ashen, wide eyed, and clearly ready to jump out the window. We’ve just left the ground and are in the climb portion of the flight. Out the window past the clearly frightened face of the young lady I see the Pacific glittering and beautiful. The sun tracks across the cabin as the plane turns, coming to its prescribed course and heading, for a moment sunlight warms my face and I think, “I could be dead in the next few minutes.”

You see, for some reason my mind has always worked by simulating a situation. It’s a defense mechanism, a way to distance myself from shitty stuff that’s happened or happening in my life. I usually get into trouble when I actually exist in the moment experiencing an event real time.

For instance, if I were going to blow up a plane it wouldn’t be over an ocean.

With that thought in mind, I was calculating the altitude and visualizing a fully fueled 727 exploding into a fireball over the heavily populated downtown areas of either Los Angeles or Long Beach.

Yeah, if you’re going to do it go for maximum damage and chaos.

Even if a bomb didn’t take the plane out of the sky in a rain of flaming pieces…

During the climb phase of the the flight, a catastrophic event still leaves the pilot with little control and very few options to land a severely damaged plane short of crashing into the aforementioned downtown areas. Visions of the World Trade center buildings falling replay in my head.

Then I have the inescapable thought;

Here I am, completely vulnerable, bereft of even the basic ability to defend myself and strapped into a chair from which, if I’m lucky someone will be able to retrieve my charred remains. There’s nothing I can do except pray that it’s quick and relatively painless.

So I prayed. I took comfort in prayer and in those few moments calmed the panic that had begun to take hold in my gut.

Calmer, I removed my shiny metal pen from my pocket, and gripped it tightly. I thought, “If there is a bomb and it’s not using some kind of altitude detonator then this guy if he’s a terrorist, may have a switch of some kind. If that’s the case, there’s a chance that it’s not armed or at least isn’t a deadman switch because I can see his hands. Therefore, if he makes the slightest twitchy move toward a pocket or something inside that jacket, I’m gonna do my best to shove this pen through his eye and swirl it like I’ve heard doctors in insane asylums used to do during lobotomies. I’ll hope to God I’m right, and I’ll pray for forgiveness if I’m wrong.”

And that’s the way we flew to Dallas.


In retrospect the guy may simply have been afraid of flying. Lots of people are, and many of them pray through the entire flight.

Which brings me to my point(s).

Post San Bernardino it is clear that we can not know who is radicalized and who is not. We can’t know where the next attack is likely to come from. So I, like many Americans am interested more than ever in owning a gun, and obtaining a concealed carry permit.

If you’ve ever known a woman who was raped, she’ll tell you being vulnerable and feeling incapable of defending herself is almost as bad as the rape itself, because that vulnerability and fear is persistent.

Unfortunately, I’ve known several women who were raped. (Unfortunate because they had to endure rape and it’s aftermath.)

Every single one of these women carried a lot more in their purses than mints and powder. One of the women was attacked a second time by the same man, she put a bullet in him and experienced a sense of closure.

Her gun was illegal, she had no carry permit, and the kind police officers doctored the scene to make it look like the rapist had brought the gun and during the struggle my friend got the gun and fired point blank into his chest.

She lost the gun, but she knew where to get another one and called the loss, the “cost of doing business.”

Having seen the toll vulnerability and fear takes, and experienced similar vulnerability personally, I can say without hesitation that it’s not something anyone seeks out.

To fight fear some people pray. This brings them comfort, peace, and clarity, in the face of unimaginable horror or adversity. Sometimes, prayer makes people more merciful and provides a much needed time out, thus allowing clearer heads to rule the day.

Others take a proactive stance, attempting to control a situation and in asserting control, they achieve a clarity of purpose. I’m a control freak and therefore in the latter category.

I shamelessly want to get training in self defense. I will be carrying the biggest knife I can legally and practically carry, and want the appropriate training to be a concealed carry permit holder. I can’t see myself leaving my home unarmed ever again.

This is not fear… this is being prepared. I for one do not want to be put down like an ailing pet, or slaughtered in some mindless act of violence in service of a religion that is not my own.

Make no mistake, the terrorists are here in our country. They like to think of themselves as lone wolves. I want to join a pack of American Gray Wolves, (The gray wolf is the largest of the wolves,) and be ready to rip a lone wolf terrorist apart.

Indeed this shit has to stop, but it’s obviously not going to stop if we willingly become victims.

I’m confused and honestly angry that The President, Hillary Clinton, Dianne Feinstein, and innumerable other politicians, reporters and celebrities saw fit to start with the anti-gun rhetoric before the bodies had even been removed from the IRC in San Bernardino.

I can’t believe that these so called leaders are advocating making us all easy targets and therefore victims. A body count is all we get from being unable to defend ourselves.

If just one or two guards, or people in that room had been able to shoot back and hit their target, there might be more people alive today. It’s possible that a six month old little girl abandoned at her grandmother’s house, might have her mommy and daddy albeit they’d be in prison but they’d be alive.

Another thing I’ve found really offensive over the past two days is the shaming, and denigration of prayer.

I had dismissed out of hand the concept that Christianity was under attack in this country. I’m re-evaluating that dismissal.

When did it become OK, even required to allow Muslims to pray while at the same time a Christian or Jew who prays is treated in the media as some kind of moron?

Regardless of your beliefs everyone prays in one way or another. There’s the old saying; “There are no atheists in a foxhole.” I personally believe that is a true statement.

Everyone in a dire situation calls upon a higher power. It’s human nature to ask for miraculous intervention. See every story about every deity ever named.

There is no shame in being human.


There is plenty of shame to go around when, in this country we try to deny people a simple moment of silence.

The shame can be spread like a thick layer of manure, when our leaders and journalists are disrespectful of the beliefs of Christians while at the same time pandering to the beliefs and demands of CAIR or Muslims in general.

The stench of shame rises like that of an overflowing porta-potty on a hot summer day when we accept that the NRA, Christians, Republicans, Gun Owners and Victims are conflated into one group, then blamed for somehow being responsible for Radicalized Jihadists legally obtaining guns then shooting innocent people in an orgy of Islamic religious ecstasy.

We all should feel shame that we’ve allowed ourselves to be inculcated against speaking our concerns about suspicious behavior out for fear of being called islamophobic or racist. That foul reek wafts across our land like rotting fish in sweltering August heat.

Our leaders are steeped in all this shame. And still they have the floor, they are safe behind their tax payer supplied armed security forces.

Standing on heaped bodies, they call for gun control, they call to end our 2nd ammendment rights, even as they blame everyone except the criminals for the heinous crime.

They ignore our demands for control, not of our guns, but control of our sovereign borders. They refuse to speak the name of our enemy.

In their profound arrogance, our leaders use anyone and any situation to forward their agendas and too many of us swallow partisan rhetoric dolled out in sound bites by the media resource we prefer to listen to, never once stopping to question the message.

Our leaders are right, this must stop, just not the way so many of them advocate.

Holy Shit!

You know, the San Bernardino shooting shouldn’t come as any surprise.

Honestly, I’m surprised it took ‘em this long to take advantage of the “Safe Space” that is Kalifornia.

San Bernardino came as a bit of a surprise though. I’d have expected LA, San Francisco, or San Diego to have been targets before San Bernardino.

San Bernardino is kind of off the usual radar, but then again maybe that’s the point.

Perhaps these animals thought that a target in San Bernardino would be less well defended. They miscalculated slightly.

While the building apparently had no armed guards and 14 people were murdered. That didn’t stop Law Enforcement from giving two of them fatal lead poisoning.

Everyone is tap dancing around the issue of this being terrorism. The FBI is right, we don’t know for sure that this is some kind of Jihadi shit.

I think we all suspect this is exactly what it looks like.

Crazy Jihadis following the “Religion of Peace”