Julie Amero, a 40-year-old substitute teacher from Connecticut is facing up to 40 years in prison for exposing her seventh grade class to a cascade of pornographic imagery. Amero maintains that she is a victim of a malicious software infestation that caused her computer to spawn porn uncontrollably.
Adware, spyware and other infectious software are known hazards to security and privacy — and when lax cybersecurity meets anti-porn hysteria, a mailware infection can even land you in jail. Malicious coders are getting more sophisticated all the time, but law enforcement and the criminal justice system aren’t keeping up. A criminal conviction can hang on the difference between a deliberate mouse click and an involuntary redirect on an infested computer. Too often, even so-called experts can’t tell the difference.
On the morning of Oct. 19, 2004, Julie Amero’s life changed forever when pornographic ads flooded her web browser during a class. According to the prosecuting attorney, David Smith, Amero’s computer began displaying images of naked men and women, couples performing sexual acts, and “bodily fluids.”
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At trial, six of Amero’s former students testified that they saw pornographic images on her monitor, either from their seats, or when they came up to her desk. One student told the court that Amero pushed his face away from the screen when she saw him looking at the racy ads.
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Detective Mark Lounsbury, a computer crimes officer at the Norwich Police Department testified as an expert witness for the prosecution. He maintained that Amero was intentionally surfing for pornography while her seventh grade class busied itself with language arts.
Lounsbury told the court that Amero musts have “physically clicked” on pornographic links during class time in order to unleash the pornographic pictures. However, he admitted under cross-examination that the prosecution never even checked the computer for malware.
Why didn’t the police check for malicious software? According to prosecutor David Smith, the police didn’t check for malware because the defense didn’t raise the possibility of a malware attack during the pretrial phase, as required by law. Defense attorney Cocheo could not be reached for comment as of press time.
I haven’t read Carter’s book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, but judging by his TV appearances there’s a real problem with his analysis—it’s not radical enough. And because the radical analysis is in fact the accurate analysis, the non-radical story Carter tells has some gaping holes in it. For instance, here he is on Hardball back in November:
PRESIDENT CARTER: So the persecution of the Palestinians now in the occupied territories under the occupation forces is one of the worst examples of human rights deprivation that I know. And I think it’s –
MR. SHUSTER: Even worse, though, than a place like Rwanda?…
PRESIDENT CARTER: I’m not going back into ancient history about Rwanda. Right now the persecution of the Palestinians is one of the worst examples of human rights abuse I know, because the Palestinians –
MR. SHUSTER: You’re talking about right now. You’re not talking about, say…
PRESIDENT CARTER: You can talk about Rwanda if you want to. I want to talk about Palestine. What is being done to the Palestinians now is horrendous in their own territory by the occupying powers, which is Israel.
This actually does seem shifty on his part, and leaves him open to criticism like that of Deborah Lipstadt:
Carter’s minimization of the Holocaust is compounded by his recent behavior. On MSNBC in December, he described conditions for Palestinians as “one of the worst examples of human rights deprivation” in the world. When the interviewer asked “Worse than Rwanda?” Carter said that he did not want to discuss the “ancient history” of Rwanda.
To give Carter the benefit of the doubt, let’s say that he meant an ongoing crisis. Is the Palestinians’ situation equivalent to Darfur, which our own government has branded genocide?
Here’s what Carter should have said:
While the situation in Palestine is very bad—far worse than most people in the U.S. know—it’s true it doesn’t compare to the genocide in Rwanda or Darfur.
But Americans should care about it, for several reasons. First, we’re paying for it, unlike Rwanda or Darfur. It wouldn’t happen without us. Second, it’s the source for enormous hatred toward the U.S. in the Muslim world. This means would-be terrorists can think—as Osama bin Laden did with 9/11—that casting themselves as champions of the Palestinians will make them politically popular if they attack the U.S. So it’s really a matter of life and death for Americans.
It’s also important to understand why many in the third world, Muslim and not, feel so strongly about Palestine. Here in the U.S. people often ask exactly the question you just did about why it gets so much attention, when on an absolute scale it’s not close to something like Darfur. No one here ever gives an honest answer, which leads some well-meaning individuals to believe there really is a double-standard for Israel, perhaps due to anti-Semitism.
So let me give an honest answer, even though it’s one many people won’t like. It’s this—in Europe and the U.S., we look at the past few hundred years and see two great evils: fascism and communism. But for most places on earth, there have been three great evils: fascism, communism, and colonialism. The colonization of the world by Europe and the U.S. killed tens of millions, just as many people as fascism and communism. It was just as cruel. If you ever doubt this, read up on what Belgium did to the Congo, or the British to Tasmania.
And whether it’s fair or not, to people in the third world, Israel is a symbol of colonialism. That’s not going to change. And they see it just as the victims of fascism would see a fascist state, or the victims of communism would see a communist state.
I realize it’s very difficult for Americans to get their minds around all this, but we have to, both for our own sake and the sake of the world.
Of course, Planet Earth would have exploded if a U.S president had said that on live national television. So maybe we should be grateful he didn’t. Still, Carter’s case will never be convincing as long as he leaves this out.
Since Bob hasn’t posted his thoughts here on Hillary Clinton’s announcement she’s running for president, I must direct you to read them on his site:
In the wake of 9-11, it wasn’t just George W. Bush telling the world "every nation has to be either with us or against us." It was Hillary, as you can hear for yourself.
In October 2002, during the debate about giving Bush authorization to invade Iraq, it wasn’t just Dick Cheney telling the world in that Saddam Hussein had links to Al-Qaeda. It was Hillary, from the floor of Congress.
And in February 2005, it wasn’t just John McCain claiming that democracy was taking root in Iraq, and that the insurgency was in its last throes. It was Hillary, standing right at John McCain’s side.
Yeah. So President Hillary would be soooooo much better about Iraq. Clap louder, everybody. Make it come true.
I’d forgotten at least half of that. And then there are the other things Bob mentions. God, she’s awful.
Yes, the White House Correspondent’s Dinner is playing it safe this year. But this isn’t the first time they’ve done so. The only time I ever attended was in 1998, when I was treated to the comic stylings of Ray Romano. Arianna was there as well, and wrote at the time:
In recent years, the evening’s entertainment has been provided by the Fourth Estate’s designated presidential satirist of the moment. But this year the organizers chose Ray Romano, the amiable star of the CBS sitcom “Everybody Loves Raymond,” who started his act by admitting that he knows nothing about politics. When they learned that, Romano told the audience, they offered to double his fee. Not bad, but not much of a bridge-building tension release.
One place they are certainly loving Raymond at the moment is the White House. He avoided Clinton and controversy like a hunting dog evading skunks.
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At the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, just about the only political reference that Romano could muster was a criticism of Burton’s “cursing.” It was as if the fawning multitude simply wanted to have a good time and be reassured that all is well. But real political satire is supposed to be about rage not delight — about exposing hypocrisies, not endorsing them.
Clinton actually gave the press hell that year, under the guise of some pretty barbed “jokes.” But the designated comedian of the evening stayed as far away from the controversy du jour as was humanly possible.
A reader transcribed this exchange concerning habeas corpus from today’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearings (no official transcript yet):
Specter: Now wait a minute, wait a minute. The Constitution says you can’t take it away except in the case of invasion or rebellion. Doesn’t that mean you have the right of habeas corpus?
Gonzales: I meant by that comment that the Constitution doesn’t say that every individual in the United States or every citizen has or is assured the right of habeas corpus. It doesn’t say that. It simply says that the right of habeas corpus shall not be suspended.
Article I, Section 9:
The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it.
Alberto Gonzales should not only be impeached for his willfully obtuse interpretations of the Constitution, he should be disbarred.
Sometimes, thanks to the miracle of the internets, you get a glimpse into someone’s soul. And sometimes what you see there isn’t too pretty. TBogg has a good example, and honestly, it gets even more appalling if you click through his link and read the whole thing. Some human beings are carrying a whole bucket load of ugly inside them.
Whenever a new study suggests that the wimmenfolk are gettin’ a mite too uppity, you can always count on David Brooks to react with (a) alarm and (b) some Deep Thoughts about Things Society Needs to Do if it Hopes to Earn David Brooks’ Approval. So when this piece ran a couple of days ago, highlighting the alarming (to men) news that an increasing number of women are less dependent (on men), you knew it wouldn’t be long before Mr. McBobo would be weighing in with some helpful advice for the ladies. (And golly, why wouldn’t the little dears want to listen to a man who thinks they should stay at home raising babies until the age of forty, at which point they’ll be all set to enter the workplace for the first time?)
Actually this morning’s column is mostly boilerplate Brooks, full of generalizations about people, and classes of people, of whom David Brooks appears to have no personal, first-hand knowledge. I probably wouldn’t have bothered to even mention it, except for one thing that stood out to me — the obvious contempt with which he views his own core readership:
If all the world were south of 96th Street, what a happy place it would be! If all the world were south of 96th Street, then we could greet with unalloyed joy the news that after decades of social change, more American women are living without husbands than with them.
We could revel in the stories of women — from Riverside Drive all the way to TriBeCa! — liberated from constraining marriages and no longer smothered by self-absorbed spouses. We could celebrate with those — the ad executives as well as the law partners! — who now have the time and freedom to go back to school and travel abroad, and who are choosing not to get remarried.
But alas, there are people in this country who do not live within five miles of MoMA, and for them, the fact that many more people are getting divorced or never marrying at all is not such good news.
Since he’s clearly such a red-stater at heart, he should really consider leaving those obnoxious city folk behind and setting out for a new life on the prairie, not unlike Eddie Albert’s character in Green Acres. There are plenty of places that could use the infusion of new blood — my own birthplace of Kansas, for instance, is losing population at an alarming rate, and would undoubtedly welcome the Brooks family with open arms.
Kansas is a poster child for migration out of the rural areas. Fifty-four of the state’s 105 counties have less population now than in 1900. Fifty counties lost population between 1990 and 2000, 12 by more than 10 percent.
When William Allen White wrote his famous “What’s the matter with Kansas?” screed in 1896, he complained about eight years of slow population growth.
“Little does he know that it is going to go on for the next 110 years,” said Jim Hays, a research specialist for the Kansas Association of School Boards. “How quickly the world changed. The Kansas of the late 19th century — the growth, the vigor — it quickly changed. We had eight members of Congress back then, now we have four, and we’re probably going to go down to three in the next census,” he said.
But if Kansas isn’t to his liking, there are plenty of other states out there that could use a smart feller like Mr. Brooks. Heck, I remember reading an article about a town in South Dakota that was actually paying city folk like him to move there. Is there any question that he has more in common with the good, decent, salt-of-the-earth Americans he’d undoubtedly find there than with the decadent urban metrosexuals among whom he so miserably dwells at present? I think not.
I just want the man to be happy, you know?
(…adding: per your command, Kingpin! I hear and I obey!)
… to Jonathan’s post below. I can’t find the link right now, but at some point in the run up, I wrote something very much in line with what Avedon Carol is saying — something to the effect that “the burden must always be on those who want a war to explain why it is necessary.” It will not surprise those of you with any passing familiarity with the stupidity of the debate, then and now, to hear that one of the first responses I got was from a reader countering that “the burden must always be on those who oppose war to explain why it is not necessary.”
