Global: The recent Wi-Fi “KRACK” vulnerability, which allowed anyone to get onto a secure network (and which was quickly patched by reputable vendors), had been in plain sight behind a corporate-level paywall for 13 years. This raises a number of relevant, interesting, and uncomfortable questions.
When a system is forced to run at four to six times its capacity for years on end, it doesn’t break – it was always broken. Elphinstone Road is the story of almost all urban infrastructure in our cities. It’s a template. It’s a warning. It’s our history, our everyday, and our future. It’s horrifying. … Continue reading To Elphinstone Road
Activism: The German newspaper Die Zeit has a long feature this week about IMSI catchers and their countermeasures, words that were long heard only in countersurveillance cultures at Black Hat and Defcon.
The last time we looked at Ted Lieu's infrastructure legislation there were 33 co-sponsors. That was back at the end of May when he introduced it-- HCR 63-- "Supporting efforts to enact a bold jobs and infrastructure package that benefits all Americans, not just billionaires." Now there are 85 co-sponsors-- including, not just the progressives who backed Lieu's plan originally, but even some of the most reactionary Democrats in Congress.
WOLFFORTH, Texas – As many as 63 million people – nearly a fifth of the country – from rural central California to the boroughs of New York City, were exposed to potentially unsafe water more than once during the past decade, according to a News21 investigation of 680,000 water quality and monitoring violations from the Environmental Protection Agency.
We'll look at the mess the Trump Regime has made of infrastructure in a moment. First though, I want to highlight one crucial part of that in my part of the country. The Republican-led Congress and the Trump Regime are screwing with California, Oregon and Washington over the earthquake early warning system-- enough time for people to take cover or pull their cars over-- the federal government was committed to, something NPR highlighted this week.
The idea that massive government spending on infrastructure will create jobs is another myth. If you recall the $787 billion 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), the Obama Administration told us that such fiscal stimulus would create jobs and promote economic recovery. There is simply no credible evidence that such Keynesian stimulus did anything to help economic recovery.
Robert Reich explains the theft plan buried within Trump's so-called "infrastructure" plan (h/t Jennifer Nix on Facebook)by Gaius PubliusAll you need to know about Donald Trump's theft of your dollars under the guise of an "infrastructure" plan is explained neatly in the video above. I call it "theft" because as Reich points out, it steals from the public twice — once with a massive tax giveaway and once more with a bunch of extracted tolls ("usage fees").
It's hard to say exactly when, but sometime in the early part of the 21st century downtown Los Angeles's skyline changed. And not in an inspiring way.What lent it somewhat of a depressing feel was the nature of the name tenants on its tall buildings.
