New York Times on the Web Forums Science

Missile Defense

Technology has always found its greatest consumer in a nation's war and defense efforts. Since the last attempts at a "Star Wars" defense system, has technology changed considerably enough to make the latest Missile Defense initiatives more successful? Can such an application of science be successful? Is a militarized space inevitable, necessary or impossible?

Read Debates, a new Web-only feature culled from Readers' Opinions, published every Thursday.

rshow55 - 12:11pm Oct 21, 2003 EST (# 15352 of 15354)
Can we do a better job of finding truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have done and worked for on this thread.

Cantabb says: "And, as to your role on matters as sensitive as MD, you depend ONLY on information already in the public domain, and don't even have access to classified information."

Common ground. Whatever you may think of my "story" - I've never said that I had access to any classified information after 1986 - and not much after 1975. The procedures set out in http://www.mrshowalter.net/TruthHope.html and elsewhere on this thread deal only with open literature information - which in the missile defense case is the key data that matters.

Challenge, questions, and invokation of the need for force:

MD728 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.nuh0baUyQqR.3872931@.f28e622/906 ... MD729 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.nuh0baUyQqR.3872931@.f28e622/907 MD730 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.nuh0baUyQqR.3872931@.f28e622/908 .

Counterchallenge:

MD764 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.nuh0baUyQqR.3872931@.f28e622/956 .

Comment and response:

MD780 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.nuh0baUyQqR.3872931@.f28e622/976 ... MD783-784 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.nuh0baUyQqR.3872931@.f28e622/981 ... MD84 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.nuh0baUyQqR.3872931@.f28e622/99 .

By the way, did you see the links to BadNewsWade in http://www.mrshowalter.net/TruthHope.html ?

Cantabb says: " A newspaper may care and comment on all kinds of issues, BUT it's generally NOT the one doing the negotiations or responsible for them."

That's the general case - but my circumstances are exceptional. And the amount of manipulation I've been subjected to by New York Times employees has been exceptional.

Nor do I necessarily need the NYT to be either doing the negotiations between CIA and I - or responsible for them - though I'd appreciate the help in getting my situation clarified. The New York Times should be responsible for their interactions with me - which have been exceptional indeed - especially after May 1999 - when a person who I had every reason to believe was a NYT reporter interrogated me, for months - under circumstances where he made it clear that he was in contact with the CIA. It was an unbelievably awkward situation for me - that could only have been decently resolved with a face-to-face meeting with some responsible, named person. That was refused. By now, the NYT has plenty of responsibility about me - I believe - and I think very many others would believe that, too.

Perhaps naming names and specific sources isn't necessary - but The New York Times needs to take responsibility for what they have done - for what actually happened in its relationship with me. I'd be willing to make some concessions to get that. But to sort out my life - I have to have some clarification - I deserve it - and I'll act to get it.

rshow55 - 01:08pm Oct 21, 2003 EST (# 15353 of 15354)
Can we do a better job of finding truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have done and worked for on this thread.

About 1000 posts ago - from October 7 14507-8 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.nuh0baUyQqR.3872931@.f28e622/16217 - includes this:

A lot has gone on since this was filed and accepted - and much of it is to the credit of the Times. http://www.mrshowalter.net/CommendationTo_Kolata_EichwaldandNYT.htm

Not all. And the meaning of things change with changes in context that can come with time. http://www.mrshowalter.net/CommendationTo_Kolata_EichwaldandNYT.htm links to a great deal. . . .

An article this Sunday casts an interesting light on issues connected to this.

Leaks and the Courts: There's Law, but Little Order By ADAM LIPTAK http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/05/weekinreview/05LIPT.html

"If they subpoenaed Mr. Novak, for instance, a court would very likely order him to testify.

"Which is not to say he would comply. Reporters ordered to reveal their sources almost never do, on the theory that they and their colleagues would have little chance of persuading other sources to trust them if they did. They generally prefer to be held in contempt of court. Reporters have spent time in jail and publishers have paid substantial fines as a consequence.

What if the issue is an unwillingness of reporters to reveal who they are? And a willingness of reporters to use the implicit presumption of their connections - without taking responsibility for them - to obscure and defame?

( Responsibility here doesn't necessarily mean that specific people have to admit who they are . )

The exercise of irresponsible power that I've been subjected to is significant - of long standing - and much that has happened is not to the credit of the Times. Though some is.

Those issues are involved here - and contexts are serious. The NYT isn't automatically in the right about this. The issues connected to the Jayson Blair case are small by comparison to the issues here.

(1 following message)

New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense