Elliott C. Back: Internet & Technology

Today is the 8th anniversary of the terrorist attacks in New York against the World Trade Center. On September 11, 2001 suicidal jihadists flew fully fueled airplanes into the World Trade Center, the pentagon, and other targets. America’s most gut-wrenching 21st century moment cost 3,000 lives, and permanently scarred the memories of New Yorkers:

In light of the anniversary, it’s worth spending some time to ask yourself “what has America done to make them hate us so much?” Consider the recent imperialist unjust wars fought in Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yugoslavia and the illicit actions of the CIA around the world, or the hundreds of military bases we maintain in other countries. The aid dollars we dole out to dictators to preserve the status quo, our arbitrary tariffs and immigration policies that alienate foreigners, and the eroding of Americans’ own civil liberties in the name of “freedom” and the “war against terror.”

America was once respected as a nation of justice, wisdom, and opportunity. Perhaps over time the Obama administration can repair America’s reputation.

“So, let’s imagine how [the September 11th attacks] could have been worse for example. Suppose that on September 11, Al-Qaeda had bombed the White House and killed the President, instituted a murderous, brutal regime which killed maybe 50,000 to 100,000 people and tortured about 700,000, set up a major international terrorist center in Washington, which was overthrowing governments all over the world, and installing brutal vicious neo-Nazi dictatorships, assassinating people. Suppose he called in a bunch of economists, let’s call them the ‘Kandahar Boys’ to run the American economy, who within a couple of years had driven the economy into one of the worst collapses of its history. Suppose this had happened. That would have been worse than 9/11, right? But it did happen. And it happened on 9/11. That happened on September 11, 1973 in Chile. The only thing you have to change is this per capita equivalence, which is the right way to look at it. Well, did that change the world? Yeah, it did but not from our point of view, in fact, who even knows about it? Incidentally, just to finish, because we [the U.S.] were responsible for that one.” — Noam Chomsky.

Is McCain going to steal the election? The poor performance of uncalibrated electronic voting machines, which can check a different box than you touch if they are intentionally, or accidentally miscalibrated, may lead to voter confusion this year. For example, the following photo shows the actual difference between where you touch, and what candidate registers:

I took it from the following youtube video:

You can read WIDESPREAD TOUCH SCREEN VOTE FLIPPING!! at Daily Kos for an emotional rundown:

It’s been the ES&S iVotronic touch-screen machines that have failed, flipping votes from one candidate to another not chosen by the voter. In virtually every instance, it’s been an attempted Democratic vote, that has flipped to a Republican, or been flipped another party (third party candidate).

While this could be dismissed as small, technical error, coupled with ineptitude, it could also be the only part of a conspiracy to keep the Bush legacy in office. The so-called “tip of the iceberg” of the Bush/Republican dynasty. In a way, it’s good that widespread technology is being brought into the public awareness–for too long people have “trusted the system” without realizing how fragile it actually is. Your heat, electricity, transportation, and water are all controlled by computer systems. If those fail (like the election systems appear to be), your basic necessities will no longer be met.

I am extremely impressed with Obama ‘08: The Official iPhone Application. It’s slick, down-to-earth, full-featured, breathtakingly gorgeous, fast, and functional. Its blue theme coherently extends the Obama ‘08 campaign branding to mobile devices. Check out these screens:

It’s interesting that the Obama campaign application shows your friends (classified by zip code) as a checklist to call off and recruit. Will it work to get more people out on voting day? Who can say. It’s certainly aggressive, and the only big turn-off of the application. In a way, it reminds me of the moronic Facebook applications “Vampires and Werewolves” or “Pirates vs Ninjas” which both try to coerce you into harassing your friends.

The local news is what I’m looking for, Obama news and updates for the US and NYC.

The issues pages are also nice; it would be better, perhaps if they included a summary of other candidates views, with rebuttals from the Obama camp, but you can’t wish for everything to be perfectly balanced–this is politics.

Gizmodo rants, “This is something like what politicking at the grassroots level will look like by the next election—local and immediate, but definitely national in scope. It makes you feel like a part of the campaign.” For me, this might be the first opportunity to follow Obama’s announcements without being harassed by email or sms-spammed.

Go download it now in the iTunes store, it’s free!