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Found the following links which all seem to point to the same company that is suspected of tearing up Democratic voter registration forms in Las Vegas. It has set up registration drives in Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Michigan, Ohio, West Virginia, Florida and Nevada and is accused of the same things in most if not all of these states.  Sproul & Associates is a Republican consulting firm run by Nathan Sproul, former head of the Arizona Republican party and Arizona Christian Coalition.

Nevada:
Voters Outreach of America AKA America Votes tears up Democratic voter registration forms in Nevada.

Oregon:
Company claiming affiliation with non-partisan ‘America Votes’ to register voters in Oregon is actually GOP consulting firm Sproul & Associates, Inc.

West Virginia and Pennsylvania:
Sproul & Associates AKA America Votes workers in WV and PA refuse to register Kerry voters.

Oregon
Democrats in Oregon have complained that canvassers for Arizona based Sproul & Associates have been pressuring residents to register as Republicans so that they can get paid.

Arizona
Arizona Nader campaign was assisted in its petition drive by an unlikely figure: the ultra-conservative former executive director of the Arizona Republican Party, Nathan Sproul.

About Sproul:
Good background story on Sproul and his political track record, cached on Google.

The link:
Here is the direct link between Sproul and Voters Outreach of America.

According to several sources, two of the contractors Sproul hired to oversee petition gathering for No Taxpayer Money For Politicians — Aaron “A.J.” James, who directs Voters’ Outreach of America, and Diane Burns — were also paid by Sproul to get as many signatures as possible for Nader.

Good stuff, so far. But the reader then asks the key question — who is paying for these efforts?

The answer?

KLAS-TV, Las Vegas:
“The company has been largely, if not entirely funded, by the Republican National Committee.”

CareerBuild.com listing:
Help wanted ad for Voters Outreach of America says “Paid for by the Republican National Committee”.

The Republican Party is funding these efforts. The link is direct and unambiguous.

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A man in central China has been refused permission to name his son “@” because it cannot be translated into Mandarin – as the law demands.

According to the Beijing Morning Post, the nomenclative dissident from Zhengzhou argued that the symbol is in common use on keyboards and therefore fair game. Mercifully for the infant in question, his dad does not live in the kind of fully-fledged democracy where parents can name their children after pretty well anything they want – including software upgrades.

Indeed, regular readers may recall the story of Jon Blake Cusack Version 2.0 – progeny of Jon Blake Cusack and wife Jamie, of Holland, Michigan. As we noted at the time: “Jon and his wife will certainly be spending many a sleepless night debugging little Jon Blake Cusack Version 2.0 and – in about 16 years’ time – having a very hard time explaining to their unfortunate offspring whose bright idea this was in the first place.”

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HERSH: I got a call last week from a soldier — it’s different now, a lot of communication, 800 numbers. He’s an American officer and he was in a unit halfway between Baghdad and the Syrian border. It’s a place where we claim we’ve done great work at cleaning out the insurgency. He was a platoon commander. First lieutenant, ROTC guy.

It was a call about this. He had been bivouacing outside of town with his platoon. It was near, it was an agricultural area, and there was a granary around. And the guys that owned the granary, the Iraqis that owned the granary… It was an area that the insurgency had some control, but it was very quiet, it was not Fallujah. It was a town that was off the mainstream. Not much violence there. And his guys, the guys that owned the granary, had hired, my guess is from his language, I wasn’t explicit — we’re talking not more than three dozen, thirty or so guards. Any kind of work people were dying to do. So Iraqis were guarding the granary. His troops were bivouaced, they were stationed there, they got to know everybody…

They were a couple weeks together, they knew each other. So orders came down from the generals in Baghdad, we want to clear the village, like in Samarra. And as he told the story, another platoon from his company came and executed all the guards, as his people were screaming, stop. And he said they just shot them one by one. He went nuts, and his soldiers went nuts. And he’s hysterical. He’s totally hysterical. And he went to the captain. He was a lieutenant, he went to the company captain. And the company captain said, “No, you don’t understand. That’s a kill. We got thirty-six insurgents.”

You read those stories where the Americans, we take a city, we had a combat, a hundred and fifteen insurgents are killed. You read those stories. It’s shades of Vietnam again, folks, body counts…

You know what I told him? I said, fella, I said: you’ve complained to the captain. He knows you think they committed murder. Your troops know their fellow soldiers committed murder. Shut up. Just shut up. Get through your tour and just shut up. You’re going to get a bullet in the back. You don’t need that. And that’s where we are with this war.

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Massive voter registration drives in Minnesota by campaigns, political parties and groups whose ideologies run across the political spectrum have caused the secretary of state to nearly exhaust a supply of 1.5 million voter registration forms this year, officials and activists said Tuesday.

Three groups trying to register and organize voters to defeat President Bush or elect Democrats and other progressive candidates complained Tuesday that a shortage of registration cards was threatening their efforts.

This whole registration thing is a huge invitation for fraud. Here in the Netherlands it’s simple – if you’re an adult, and your address is registered with municipal authorities, you’re on the roster and you get to vote. Much simpler.

Here’s another example:

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Employees of a private voter registration company allege that hundreds, perhaps thousands of voters who may think they are registered will be rudely surprised on election day. The company claims hundreds of registration forms were thrown in the trash.

Anyone who has recently registered or re-registered to vote outside a mall or grocery store or even government building may be affected.

The I-Team has obtained information about an alleged widespread pattern of potential registration fraud aimed at democrats. Thee focus of the story is a private registration company called Voters Outreach of America, AKA America Votes.

The out-of-state firm has been in Las Vegas for the past few months, registering voters. It employed up to 300 part-time workers and collected hundreds of registrations per day, but former employees of the company say that Voters Outreach of America only wanted Republican registrations.

Two former workers say they personally witnessed company supervisors rip up and trash registration forms signed by Democrats.

“We caught her taking Democrats out of my pile, handed them to her assistant and he ripped them up right in front of us. I grabbed some of them out of the garbage and she tells her assisatnt to get those from me,” said Eric Russell, former Voters Outreach employee.

Eric Russell managed to retrieve a pile of shredded paperwork including signed voter registration forms, all from Democrats. We took them to the Clark County Election Department and confirmed that they had not, in fact, been filed with the county as required by law.

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Germany might deploy troops in Iraq if conditions there change, Peter Struck, the German defence minister, indicated on Tuesday in a gesture that appears to provide backing for John Kerry, the US Democratic presidential challenger.

In an interview with the Financial Times, Mr Struck departed from his government’s resolve not to send troops to Iraq under any circumstances, saying: “At present I rule out the deployment of German troops in Iraq. In general, however, there is no one who can predict developments in Iraq in such a way that he could make a such a binding statement [about the future].�?

Mr Struck also welcomed Mr Kerry’s proposal that he would convene an international conference on Iraq including countries that opposed the war if he were to win next month’s election.

Germany would certainly attend, Mr Struck said. “This is a very sensible proposal. The situation in Iraq can only be cleared up when all those involved sit together at one table. Germany has taken on responsibilities in Iraq, including financial ones; this would naturally justify our involvement in such a conference.�?

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Former UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix has said the loss of control of Iraq’s nuclear sites by the US after it occupied the country was scandalous.

His comments were echoed by former senior US weapons inspector David Kay.

They were speaking after the UN nuclear inspectorate said items had disappeared from the sites which could have been used in nuclear programmes.

[..]

However, he added: “I think what is somewhat scandalous is that it’s been sitting there under an occupation. It was sitting there controlled when the inspections were there. But when the occupation comes in, it disappears…

“All these things were tagged and they were visited by the inspectors, and in comes the United States with 200,000 people on board and occupies the country in order, ostensibly, to take care of weapons of mass destruction, and they lose control and the instruments and equipment that could be helpful in nuclear production disappears.”

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Een gemiddeld huishouden gaat jaarlijks 150 euro meer betalen aan gas en licht. Dat meldt de Volkskrant. Energiebedrijven Nuon en Essent voorspellen dit op basis van offertes van de Gasunie. De prijsstijging zou te wijten zijn aan het liberaliseren van de energiemarkt. In het verleden waren energiebedrijven verplicht hun tarieven stapsgewijs te verhogen. Nu hoeft dat niet meer.

Het grote argument om de energie markt te liberaliseren was dat de prijzen omlaag zouden gaan. We zijn dus weer genaaid. Is er nog iemand die gelooft dat de overheid dit niet gewoon van te voren al wist?

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Novell is well aware of recent public discussion about patents relating to Linux and other open source products. To ensure that the marketplace has a clear understanding of Novell’s position, we offer the following statement:

• We believe that customers want and need freedom of choice in making decisions about technology solutions. Those considering Novell offerings, whether proprietary or open source, should be able to make their purchasing decisions based on technical merits, security, quality of service and value, not the threat of litigation. Novell intends to continue to compete based on such criteria.
• As with all purchasing considerations, customers should keep software patents in perspective. In reality, open source software poses no greater risk of patent infringement than does closed source software.
• Consistent with this belief, Novell will use its patent portfolio to protect itself against claims made against the Linux kernel or open source programs included in Novell’s offerings, as dictated by the actions of others.
• In the event of a patent claim against a Novell open source product, Novell would respond using the same measures generally used to defend proprietary software products accused of patent infringement. Among other things, Novell would seek to address the claim by identifying prior art that could invalidate the patent; demonstrating that the product does not infringe the patent; redesigning the product to avoid infringement; or pursuing a license with the patent owner.
• As appropriate, Novell is prepared to use our patents, which are highly relevant in today’s marketplace, to defend against those who might assert patents against open source products marketed, sold or supported by Novell. Some software vendors will attempt to counter the competitive threat of Linux by making arguments about the risk of violating patents. Vendors that assert patents against customers and competitors such as Novell do so at their own peril and with the certainty of provoking a response. We urge customers to remind vendors that all are best served by using innovation and competition to drive purchasing decisions, rather than the threat of litigation.
• Novell has previously used its ownership of UNIX copyrights and patents to protect customers against similar threats to open source software made by others.

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I get asked a lot why Apple’s customers are so loyal. It’s not because they belong to the Church of Mac! That’s ridiculous.

It’s because when you buy our products, and three months later you get stuck on something, you quickly figure out [how to get past it]. And you think, “Wow, someone over there at Apple actually thought of this!” And then three months later you try to do something you hadn’t tried before, and it works, and you think “Hey, they thought of that, too.” And then six months later it happens again. There’s almost no product in the world that you have that experience with, but you have it with a Mac. And you have it with an iPod.

– Steve Jobs

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De Amsterdamse officier van justitie J. Tonino legt zijn functie neer. Het Openbaar Ministerie heeft dat dinsdagavond bekendgemaakt.

Het college van procureurs-generaal heeft het verzoek van de officier om hem uit zijn functie te ontheffen, geaccepteerd. Tonino raakte vorige week in opspraak omdat hij zijn computer bij het huisvuil zette en gevoelige informatie zo op straat kwam te liggen. Justitie beraadt zich over een nieuwe functie voor Tonino.

Jammer dat de “Melkertbanen” niet meer bestaan…

It’s Hard Work!

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[Source: Article by Neil Mackay, Investigations Editor, *Sunday Herald* (Scotland), 10 Oct 2004]

The Royal Navy’s new, state-of-the-art destroyer has been fitted with combat management software that can be hacked into, crashes easily and is vulnerable to viruses, according to one of the system’s designers who was fired after raising his concerns.

Gerald Wilson, who has 25 years’ experience designing naval software, worked for Alenia Marconi Systems (AMS) in a joint venture with Bae Systems and the Italian company Finmeccanica on the combat system for the Type 45 destroyer, which will rely on Microsoft Windows 2000. System failure in action, he says, would leave the ship blind, defenceless, and as good as sunk.

Dismissed after voicing his fears to the Ministry of Defence and the Defence Procurement Agency (DPA), Wilson wants to give evidence to the parliamentary defence select committee about the software.

Last night he told Channel 4 news that “the use of Windows For Warships puts the ship and her crew at risk, and the defence of the realm”.

There are also plans to install a similar Microsoft Windows-based computerised command system on Britain’s nuclear submarines. Wilson said: “It is inconceivable that we could allow the possible accidental release of nuclear missiles. The people who survived such an exchange, if any, would certainly regard such a thing as a crime against humanity. And I can’t help feeling that even planning to deploy such systems on Windows, with its unreliability and lack of security, is itself some sort of crime in international law.”

Windows was chosen by AMS in order to cut costs, as the DPA has been encouraging a switch to off-the-shelf systems. Wilson says the Navy should stick to its current operating system, Unix, which is said to be more reliable. Designers can also customise Unix, which would allow unnecessary components to be removed to reduce risk.

A navy spokesman said: “Bae Systems, as the prime contractor for the Type 45, is responsible for ensuring that the warship meets the requirements placed on it by the DPA. Using Microsoft Windows within combat management systems was the subject of an independent review commissioned some while ago by the DPA. “The review found a proper engineering approach had been taken, both from a security perspective, as the system middleware isolated Windows from the remainder of the mission-critical systems, and from a safety perspective.

Comprehensive hardware mechanisms will be put in place where necessary to avoid any potential Windows-derived compromises. “We are satisfied that the solution recommended by the contractor will meet our requirements, as it has been subject to an independent review. This review was conducted by a team at the DPA who are independent of the Type 45 team.”

It’s hard to tell if this is a whistleblower or a somebody with just a gripe.