News stories of interest to clients working in the non-profit community.

Nuclear Terrorism

One of the things that worries me, is that because everyone is concentrating on how terrorists can use planes as weapons, they will forget about weapons of mass destruction. Osama Bin Laden came very close to getting his hands on some HEU in 1998. You can read the latest plans to combat this at an article I wrote for Physics Today.

Tragic, tragic week.

Paul Guinnessy
posted by Paul Guinnessy at 8:30 AM

Exclusive interview with Dan Goldin, NASA Chief

In Febraury I was lucky enough to interview Dan Goldin for 75 minutes. The interview is published in the April issue of Physics Today magazine, a copy of which is available here. The complete transcript can be found here.
posted by Paul Guinnessy at 11:29 AM

Panel proposes new links between national security, education, and space

A congressionally-mandated blue ribbon panel has endorsed a shake-up of how U.S. senior officials oversee national security policy. The Hart-Rudman Commission on National Security for the 21st Century calls for an overhaul in federal security policy recommends a Senior Interagency Group for Space be established, staffed, and operated within the President’s National Security Council. The group’s recommendations went further than the recent Rumsfeld panel in suggesting that the SIG-Space shop be responsible for both civil and military space policy operations and coordination. It also called for a re-alignment in some functions now in the Defense Department. The report calls for a doubling in the science budget by 2010 and a beefed up role for the Presidential Science Advisor. It can be accessed here.

This is the second defense report release recently. Before Christmas, Rumsfeld Commission released a report that is very gungho on missile defense. That report is available from Space Command
posted by Paul Guinnessy at 5:29 PM

Whitehouse site archived

The national archives and record administration has decided to archive the official Clinton White House web site and a special one-time snapshot of the public web sites of Federal agencies before the close of the Clinton Administration. . The press release describing the snapshot is here The actual site can be accessed at www.nara.gov/presidential/address.html after 20 January 2001.
posted by Paul Guinnessy at 7:42 PM

Ted Turner announces $250 m fund against Nuclear Weapons

The head of CNN has decided to fund attempts to reduce nuclear non-proliferation. A press release is here.
posted by Paul Guinnessy at 1:33 PM

China plans its own internet

The Chinese government has been concerned for years over two conflicting goals in information technology: how to stop its population from reading foreign and uncensored news, while at the same time, exploit all the benefits of high speed low cost communications technology. In the past, it has controlled the information flow by licensing only 'approved' internet providers, and, through the use of proxy servers, banned news sources such as the BBC. According to Salon magazine they have decided to take this one step further, and create their own version of the internet - with no links to the outside world. It is hard to see how successful this will be as the finance in constructing such a network is enormous. The story is available here.
posted by Paul Guinnessy at 7:29 PM

Astronomers take over NSA station.

The Baltimore Sun is reporting that a falicity sold to an astronomy group is revealing hidden secrets of what the NSA get up to. The site, called NSA Station F61 Rosman is based in North Carolina. It shares several tasks with the MOONPENNY operations at Menwith Hill, according to some obtained documents. Rosman's function was to track low Earth orbit (LEO) Soviet satellites as they crossed the US. According to the newspaper one of the dishes was never turned on and shipped to England. The site itself is ideal for radio astronomy as it is hidden in a valley, thereby reducing man-made radio interference. As an added bonus the installation came equipped with some heavy duty networking and other toys that suggest it could even survive a nuclear attack.
posted by Paul Guinnessy at 7:13 PM