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will recent successes in fighting internet controls be enough to stave off tyranny? it depends largely on public outcry... 
from corbett report:
The focus is back on Internet censorship this week as a pair of articles from Time Magazine and The New York Times came out almost simultaneously advocating for licences to operate web sites. These articles were skillfully skewered by Paul Joseph Watson as lame attempts to shore up a disintegrating establishment media in the face of a blogosphere that is increasingly replacing them.
The articles follow on calls by Craig Mundie—Microsoft's chief research and strategy officer—for an Internet licencing system. Introducing the idea, he said "We need a kind of World Health Organization for the Internet." Evidently unaware of the ongoing investigation into the WHO's role in manufacturing the H1N1 pandemic hoax to line the pockets of Big Pharma, Mundie added that an international Internet authority should be given the same kind of authority that the WHO has in dealing with a pandemic. "When there is a pandemic, it organizes the quarantine of cases. We are not allowed to organize the systematic quarantine of machines that are compromised." These calls are worrying because they represent only the latest instance of influential figures proposing increasingly tyrannical controls on free speech on the Internet.
The Obama presidency has seen an increase in hype over cybersecurity threats, with the influential CSIS "think tank" having written white papers proposing cybersecurity as a key issue for the 44th president. As we reported last July, CSIS argued for "minimium standards for securing cyberspace" because "voluntary action is not enough."
from kurt nimmo:
Following the Halloween-esque scare fest on Capitol Hill earlier this week - where National Intelligence director Dennis Blair and CIA director Leon Panetta warned of impending terrorist doom - the has House has The Cybersecurity Enhancement Act (H.R. 4061).
“The House today overwhelmingly passed a bill aimed at building up the United States’ cybersecurity army and expertise, amid growing alarm over the country’s vulnerability online,” reports the New York Times. “The bill, which passed 422-5, requires the Obama administration to conduct an agency-by-agency assessment of cybersecurity workforce skills and establishes a scholarship program for undergraduate and graduate students who agree to work as cybersecurity specialists for the government after graduation.”
The new law will create a mega-agency to “represent the government in negotiations over international standards and orders the White House office of technology to convene a cybersecurity university-industry task force to guide the direction of future research,” according to Slashdot. Michael Arcuri, a New York Democrat who sponsored the bill, called cybersecurity the “Manhattan Project of our generation” and estimated the U.S. needs 500 to 1,000 more “cyber warriors” every year in order to keep up with potential enemies.
google re-establishes relationship with government spies 
from danger room:
The company once known for its “don’t be evil” motto is now in bed with the spy agency known for the mass surveillance of American citizens.
The National Security Agency is widely understood to have the government’s biggest and smartest collection of geeks — the guys that are more skilled at network warfare than just about anyone on the planet. So, in a sense, it’s only natural that Google would turn to the NSA after the company was hit by an ultra-sophisticated hack attack. After all, the military has basically done the same thing, putting the NSA in charge of its new “Cyber Command.” The Department of Homeland Security is leaning heavily on the NSA to secure .gov networks.
But there’s a problem. The NSA and its predecessors also have a long history of spying on huge numbers of people, both at home and abroad. During the Cold War, the agency worked with companies like Western Union to intercept and read millions of telegrams. During the war on terror years, the NSA teamed up with the telecommunications companies to eavesdrop on customers’ phone calls and internet traffic right from the telcos’ switching stations. And even after the agency pledged to clean up its act — and was given wide new latitude to spy on whom they liked – the NSA was still caught “overcollecting” on U.S. citizens. According to The New York Times, the agency even “tried to wiretap a member of Congress without a warrant.”
All of which makes the NSA a particularly untrustworthy partner for a company that is almost wholly reliant on its customers’ trust and goodwill.
from computerworld:
Reports surfacing this week say that the White House plans to put a stop to NASA's plans to return to the moon. The Orlando Sentinel, quoting an unnamed White House source, reported yesterday that President Barack Obama is looking to push the space agency in a new direction.
David Steitz, a spokeperson at NASA Headquarters in Washington D.C., said he wouldn't comment on such reports until the White House budget proposal is announced. The plan is expected to be released on Monday.
NASA has been looking to not only return astronauts to the moon, but also to build a lunar outpost there by 2020. The NASA plan includes first sending next-generation robots and machines to the moon to create a landing area for spacecraft, and a base where humans can live.
NASA scientists have been preparing what the agency calls the Constellation moon landing plan, which was set forth by former President George W. Bush.updates: proposed nasa budget plots entrepreneur-friendly course & obama aide says plans for new moon mission are 'dead'
