Motley Moose – Archive

This past week was the National Electric Sector Cybersecurity Organization Resource (NESCOR) Summit in Washington, DC. It was a useful and productive session and seemed to achieve the goals laid out.

Erfan Ibrahim from EPRI set the stage, we broke into working groups to dig deeper into three major subtopics and then came back to one room to tie it all together.

My favorite part was an impromptu panel with Justin Searle of InGuardians, Andrew Wright from N-Dimension and myself at the end (“would I like a stage and a microphone?” are you kidding?). Very good discourse and it was definitely informed by the work of preceding days.

The working groups are continuing and evolving to identify and dig into issues, outputting tangible deliverables to assist DoE and other organizations’ decision making.

In May my colleague Guillermo Grande attended an ISA event in Madrid where CNPIC is following a similar path of engaging pertinent parties, setting up working groups and grinding through the problem of industrial control system security.

Watching the various engines of civil society warm up and set to addressing the daunting task of critical infrastructure cybersecurity is very interesting, like an episode of Build it Bigger. Some would say it is also very depressing or even very frightening.

I would disagree with those folks.

(crossposted from Infosec Island)

I realize I haven’t been around all that much, but life and OFA have been a distraction and keeping me busy. I’ve dropped in Kos more than a bit, but dropping in and out there is easier than here. Here, I actually have to spend sometime and give some thought to what writers are saying in their posts. Speaks well of Moosers.

OK onto the subject at hand. THE DEBT CEILING!!!!!! The world coming to end as we know it. Either because we actually default because the Republicans have painted themselves so far into a corner on tax increases that they no longer can escape. Or that “A Grand Bargain” is reached, but in that bargain Obama does the unthinkable and touches the third rail of Medicare and Social Security.

And so it begins the right the Tea Party base is in full rage mode over taxes. The left is full rage mode over entitlements. We have been here before. I’ll leave the Tea Party loons out the rest of this diary

By: Inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/

Germany is a power on the rise. Unlike much of the Western world, the country’s economy is humming along as if the Great Recession had never even happened. Indeed, in the last quarter German GDP grew by a heady 2.2.%. This was the highest growth rate since the Berlin Wall fell two decades ago.

German employment is also holding up. At 7.6% in August 2010, German unemployment is actually lower than it was before the Great Recession. For those familiar with the depressing figures of American unemployment, this is quite shocking. How did Germany do it?

Not with an economic stimulus package.

More below.

Every once in awhile I take to the Google and check on the status of the training/certification process for DADT.

There have actually been some fairly major developments.  

Crossposted from the Worldwatch Institute’s Nourishing the Planet.

As the global population increases, so does the number of mouths to feed. The good news is that in addition to providing food, innovations in sustainable agriculture can provide a solution to many of the challenges that a growing population presents. Agriculture is emerging as a solution to mitigating climate change, reducing public health problems and costs, making cities more livable, and creating jobs in a stagnant global economy.

This year, the world’s population will hit 7 billion, according to the United Nations. Reaching this unprecedented level of population density has prompted the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA) to launch a “7 Billion Actions” campaign to promote individuals and organizations that are using successful new techniques for tackling global development challenges. By sharing these innovations in an open forum, the campaign aims to foster communication and collaboration as our world becomes more populated and increasingly interdependent.

Not even demographers can actually forecast how many people will be added to world population over the coming century, noted Robert Engelman, a population expert and Worldwatch Executive Director. As more women and their partners gain access to reproductive health services and manage their own childbearing, average family size has fallen significantly in recent decades and could continue to do so, assuming expanded support for reproductive health and improvements in women’s autonomy and status. The likelihood of continued population growth for some time, however, remains high. And that will add to the need to harness the ingenuity of human beings to sustain both people and the planet.

“We’ll have to learn how to moderate our consumption of materials and energy and to jumpstart new technologies that conserve them,” Engelman said. Innovations in farming will be among the most important: with planning, agriculture can operate not only as a less-consumptive industry, but also one that works in harmony with the environment.

Nourishing the Planet’s research in Africa has unveiled innovative and cost-effective approaches to agriculture where farmers are treating land as a resource rather than solely as a means for food production. Many of these solutions are scalable and can be adapted to farming systems around the world.

Nourishing the Planet recommends four ways that agriculture is helping to address the challenges that a growing global population will bring.

• Urban agriculture for nutritious food and a cooler climate. The U.N. predicts that 65 percent of the global population will live in cities by 2050. Urban agriculture provides an increasing number of city residents with fruits and vegetables, leading to improved nutrition and food security. Urban farms are already gaining popularity around the world, from the Victory Programs‘ ReVision Urban Farm in Boston, to Lufa Farms in Montreal, to the slums of Kibera in Nairobi, Kenya.

• Farming for employment and education. Opportunities in agriculture can reduce poverty and empower a growing population. In Los Angeles county, the organization Farmscape Gardens has helped tackle a 16 percent unemployment rate by hiring workers to establish and maintain edible gardens. To teach the local community about food and agriculture, L.A.’s Fremont High School established a school garden of 1.5 acres that is open to students and the greater community. And in Uganda, project DISC (Developing Innovations in School Cultivation) partnered with Slow Food International to develop 17 school gardens that are used to educate students about growing, harvesting, and preparing nutritious local foods.

• Agroecology for a healthier environment. Agroecology, which offers numerous benefits to the environment while also feeding  people, includes organic agriculture, agroforestry, conservation agriculture, and evergreen agriculture. In Niger, farmers promote the re-greening of dried farmland by allowing spontaneous regeneration of woody species. The restored growth has provided farmers with wind breaks, decreased evaporation, sequestered carbon, and provided non-timber forest products. In the United States, the Environmental Protection Agency has partnered with representatives from metropolitan Washington, D.C. to create the Chesapeake Bay Program watershed partnership. Through collaboration, the group has developed policies, laws, incentives and best practices for farmers whose production zone lies within the local watershed. These agroecological practices, including cover crops, planting riparian forest  butters, and practicing conservation tillage, have helped preserve the Bay.

• Innovations in food waste to make the most of what we have. According to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, industrialized countries waste 222 million tons of food annually, or almost as much as sub-Saharan Africa’s 230 million tons of net food production per year. Decreasing food waste makes it possible to feed people across the planet without increasing agricultural production. In Washington, D.C., the D.C. Central Kitchen Project partners with area restaurants and food suppliers to pick up food that would otherwise go to waste. Volunteers prepare the food and redistribute it as meals to the city’s poor. In central and eastern Africa, a partnership between Bayer Crop Science and the International Potato Center hopes to develop a sweet potato that is resistant to pests and diseases, which are responsible for 50 to 100 percent of crop losses among poor farmers in the region.

To purchase your own copy of State of the World 2011: Innovations that Nourish the Planet, please click HERE. And to watch the one minute book trailer, click HERE.

My FINAL UPDATE for US readers. In case this seems like a parochial issue, you ought to know that the Chief Executive of News International at the time when all these scandals took place was Les Hinton (pictured below), who is now is the publisher of the Wall Street Journal for Murdoch. Follow his scandalous coverup in Media Matters. Also Andy Coulson, former editor of News of the World and Prime Minister David Cameron’s former Head of Communications will be arrested tomorrow.

AMAZING NEWSFLASH! The News of the World (commonly known as ‘News of the Screws’ because of its salacious coverage) is to be axed for good. Though it was the biggest selling English language paper in the world, many major companies including Tesco had refused to advertise in it and the brand was damaged for good. This of course is a blow for the Murdoch Empire, but a tactical retreat. The pressure isn’t off. But it’s killed his main Sunday Paper in the UK

Full transcript of James Murdoch’s statement is here. But John Prescott, former Deputy PM whose phone was allegedly hacked too has said on BBC:

“a typical management stunt of Mr Murdoch. None of the management are going, all the poor old workers are going”.

Meanwhile the current Justice Minister, Kenneth Clarke has just said when doorstepped:

“All it will be is a rebranding exercise”

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It’s just been announced that because of over 100,000 submissions against Rupert Murdoch’s acquisition of the satellite channel BSkyB, government approval by our Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt – largely expected this week – will have to be deferred several months. The Government are still arguing that revelations of illegal activity among senior News executives should not affect the principle of the takeover – but everything is to play for.

(Left to right, Les Hinton, Andy Coulson, Rupert Murdoch and Rebekah Brooks together in 2005)

This could be a crucial moment for press freedom and media plurality in the UK. Murdoch’s takeover the largest broadcaster (by revenue) in the UK, would have given him a unique cross platform monopoly. Thanks to series of favours by cowed and appeasing politicians (especially Margaret Thatcher) Murdoch’s News International has been allowed to accumulate nearly 40 percent of the newspaper market. He also has key sports and film rights in the UK. A combination of BSkyB and News International would have made him much more powerful in the UK than Berlusconi is in Italy – and at least Berlusconi is an Italian citizen.

Steve Richards in the Independent puts it better than I could in his piece today ‘Politicians are finally free from Murdoch’s tyranny‘

The tyrants lose their swagger and those that lived in fear dare to speak out. The dynamics of the News International saga are similar to the ones that shape the fall of dictatorial regimes, except in this case it is some mighty media executives who are suddenly fearful and the politicians who are liberated.

Yesterday’s exchanges in the Commons were ones I thought I would never witness. They are of historic importance. Senior elected politicians dared to challenge the powerful Murdoch empire and there was an air of catharsis as they did so.

For more on Murdoch’s corrosive and corrupting effect on British journalism, and and his coarsening of public life and politics in the UK, follow me below the flip.  

By: Inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/

A fascinating part of politics is exploring what makes people vote as they do. The political belief that a person holds often is linked with something entirely unrelated. Several studies have shown correlations between, for instance, personality traits or hormone levels and support for the Democratic or Republican Party.

One such study was undertaken by Hotline and the National Journal, which can be found here. They compared the relationship between the sports people watch, the national parties they vote for, and their turn-out rate.

The results were graphed below:

More below.

In an age of fast food and even faster communication, one constant remains: the world’s still gotta get fed.

What so troubles in these partisan times is that fewer people–and fewer families–are doing the feeding.

No really, how do we save the world? I generally feel as if I have a clue, but then realize the complexity of humanity’s problems defy sanity.

Those were the words written 235 years ago today by George III in his personal diary.  Of course, with transoceanic communications being very different back in 1776 than they are today, he had no way of knowing that his American colonies, already in rebellion, had formally declared their independence.  By the time the delegates to the Continental Congress voted on Jefferson’s text, Rhode Island had already declared its independence two months earlier on May 4, 1776.  Meanwhile, New Yorkers remained British subjects for an additional five days before New York’s legislature ratified the Declaration of Independence on July 9, 1776.

Something of importance did happen that day.  It marked the first time colonies broke from their mother country to become a nation in their own right.  Within 50 years, most of the Western Hemisphere would become independent – only Canada, most of the Caribbean and the northern coast of South America would remain controlled by their European mother countries.  Little more than a decade later, America’s revolution would inspire France’s.  It marked an important point in the world’s slow, but steady, shift towards republicanism, whether de jure or de facto.