The only hope for a resolution to a disagreement is when there is a reasonable way to find out who is right and who is wrong.
The FBI and DOJ have presented a mountain of evidence showing that Dr. Bruce Ivins was the anthrax mailer. Those who disagree, not only fail to present better evidence to support their beliefs, they often present no evidence at all on key issues. They present only questions or opinions.
For example, there is solid evidence that Dr. Ivins had full access to the "murder weapon,' i.e., flask RMR-1029 which contained "morphs" identical to the "morphs" found in the powders in the anthrax letters. Ivins helped create the contents of the flask and controlled who had access to it.
Those who believe Dr. Ivins was innocent, however, have no evidence that someone else took a sample from flask RMR-1029, grew more bacteria from the sample, and then used it in the anthrax letters. All they have are endless "possibilities" which have not been disproved. Instead of proving that their own suspects sent the anthrax letters, those who disagree with the FBI attempt to shift the burden of proof to the FBI to prove that their suspects could not possibly have made the powders and sent the anthrax letters.
Asking the other side to prove themselves wrong is not a reasonable way to resolve a disagreement.
Some issues in dispute should be easily resolvable. For example, R. Rowley (in an email) CLAIMS that the misspelled word "PENACILIN" in the media letters is a deliberate attempt to appear "foreign." The FBI, on the other hand, agrees that the misspelling is deliberate, but they provide compelling evidence that it was part of a coded message Dr. Ivins put in the media letter. (Click HERE for details.) They CLAIM that the misspelled word is part of a coding technique explained in the book Godel, Escher, Bach, which Dr. Ivins was observed throwing away after a search of his home.
Mr. Rowley's CLAIM is just a CLAIM, without evidence. (Unless you have a confession, there is no way to prove that the writer deliberately misspelled a word in order to appear foreign or semi-literate.) And Mr. Rowley refuses to accept the FBI's evidence-supported CLAIM, bizarrely arguing his new CLAIM that the FBI's evidence wouldn't be allowed in court because the FBI agent who deciphered the hidden message was not a certified cryptographer.
That last CLAIM seems like it could be resolvable. But, even if enough facts were found to convince Mr. Rowley that there would be no problem with the FBI agent presenting his findings in court though he is not a certified cryptographer, Mr. Rowley would just argue that it doesn't make any difference, he's still going to believe what he wants to believe about who sent the anthrax letters.
So, at this point in time, it appears that the only real question worthy of discussion is: Is there any way to get someone who refuses to compare facts and evidence to stop making baseless claims and to argue only whose evidence makes a better criminal case proving who sent the anthrax letters?
Ed
For example, R. Rowley (in an email) CLAIMS that the misspelled word "PENACILIN" in the media letters is a deliberate attempt to appear "foreign."
ReplyDelete=======================================
I haven't sent you an email in months, March 1st to be exact. Haven't sent you anything on forensic linguistics via email since.....2007?
R. Rowley wrote: "I haven't sent you an email in months, March 1st to be exact. Haven't sent you anything on forensic linguistics via email since.....2007?"
ReplyDeleteRight. June 1, 2007 to be exact
=======================================================
Then why did you write:
For example, R. Rowley (in an email) CLAIMS that the misspelled word "PENACILIN" in the media letters is a deliberate attempt to appear "foreign."
when the last time I talked about that subject was here in a public venue?
And why are you quoting my email in a public venue WITHOUT PERMISSION?
And why are you acting like we haven't discussed this SEVERAL TIMES at this very venue?
I just did a Google search with search terms "r rowley" and "penacilin" and got 7 hits all of them from THIS VERY VENUE (including today's instance above):
http://www.google.com/#q=%22r+rowley%22+penacilin&nfpr=1&sa=X&ei=TDe2UdOaC8XCyAHG_YDYDg&ved=0CCkQvgUoAQ&bav=on.2,or.r_qf.&fp=417ae025c6c87176&biw=1132&bih=824
Don't you even remember our prior discussions!?!?!?
What is there to say about this subject that hasn't been said already?
Mr. Rowley,
DeleteI went back and deleted the quote I used from your 2007 emails. As a result, your response is now in front of my revised comment.
You kept mentioning that I should read those 2007 emails because you explained everything there. And, when I did read them and quoted from them you get upset.
I used the information from the 2007 email because it was a good lead-in to the issue about testimony from an FBI agent who is not a cryptographer. Nothing you wrote recently provides a good lead-in to that subject.
R. Rowley wrote: "Don't you even remember our prior discussions!?!?!?"
There's not much in them worth remembering. I remember facts and evidence. Baseless claims and discussions of beliefs just go in one ear and out the other.
R. Rowley also wrote: "What is there to say about this subject that hasn't been said already?"
As it says in the introduction to this thread,
the only real question worthy of discussion is: Is there any way to get someone who refuses to compare facts and evidence to stop making baseless claims and to argue only whose evidence makes a better criminal case proving who sent the anthrax letters?
Ed
R. Rowley wrote: "I haven't sent you an email in months, March 1st to be exact. Haven't sent you anything on forensic linguistics via email since.....2007?"
ReplyDeleteRight. June 1, 2007 to be exact. You kept complaining that you had explained to me your theory back in 2006 or 2007, so I went through my archives and found your emails from 2007, where you used a different name with the initials WG. In it, you explained your theory about the misspelling of PENACILIN in about 1,462 words.
That pretty much shoots down any claim of being concise and precise.
Ed
Right. June 1, 2007 to be exact. You kept complaining that you had explained to me your theory back in 2006 or 2007, so I went through my archives and found your emails from 2007, where you used a different name with the initials WG. In it, you explained your theory about the misspelling of PENACILIN in about 1,462 words.
DeleteThat pretty much shoots down any claim of being concise and precise.
====================================================
In analyzing linguistic mistakes, real and feigned, there's no particular virtue to being 'concise' if 'concise' means leaving stuff out.
Contrary to your characterization, my analysis was of TWO
LINES OF DECEPTION (in the writing of Amerithrax) and that's why I named the document "TWO LINES OF DECEPTION IN THE ANTHRAX LETTERS", so evidently Mister Lake didn't even bother to reread the document fully. It deals with BOTH the Islamist slogans and the elements which suggest a (possible) foreign printer.
I take up possible German, Russian/Cyrillic, and Hebrew elements either spontaneously generated by the printer or
purposely interpolated.
But it ill behooves someone who brags about how long the AMERITHAX INVESTIGATIVE SUMMARY is (ie touts length as some sort of virtue!), and how copious the background documents are, to then say that OPPONENTS of the government's case are to be judged primarily on conciseness.
R. Rowley wrote: But it ill behooves someone who brags about how long the AMERITHAX INVESTIGATIVE SUMMARY is (ie touts length as some sort of virtue!), and how copious the background documents are, to then say that OPPONENTS of the government's case are to be judged primarily on conciseness.
DeleteJust more distortions to create arguments. No one "brags about how long the AMERITHRAX INVESTIGATIVE SUMMARY is." And no one judges opponents of the government's case "primarily on conciseness."
The government's case is being weighed against your case by the amount of evidence offered. In court, LOTS of evidence is better than NO evidence when arguing a case.
You argued that you like to be concise. I showed you how you are usually verbose and long-winded, the opposite of "concise." There was no attempt to judge your case based upon your verboseness, there was merely an attempt to explain to you that what you consider to be "concise," others would likely consider to be "verbose."
Ed
R. Rowley wrote: But it ill behooves someone who brags about how long the AMERITHAX INVESTIGATIVE SUMMARY is (ie touts length as some sort of virtue!), and how copious the background documents are, to then say that OPPONENTS of the government's case are to be judged primarily on conciseness.
DeleteJust more distortions to create arguments. No one "brags about how long the AMERITHRAX INVESTIGATIVE SUMMARY is."
==============================================
Let the reader judge: (this is a full paragraph together with its header from:
Monday, June 3, 2013
Subject: Claims, Arguments and Evidence
------------------
Examples of supplying evidence to support a claim:
The evidence supplied by the Department of Justice begins with the 92 page Amerithax Investigative Summary, which is supported by 2,720 pages of detail documents HERE. Additional documents related to the scientific aspects of the case may be obtained in the form of a CD from the National Academy of Sciences.
================================================
I think 9 out of 10 third-party readers of that paragraph are going to take that to be bragging about the QUANTITY of (alleged) evidence, since no mention of the contents is in the paragraph (or in the subsequent paragraph).
My response in the thread?
----------------
This is the triumph of quantity over quality....[and much more!]
========================================
http://anthraxdebate.blogspot.com/2013/06/subject-claims-arguments-and-evidence_3.html#comment-form
R. Rowley wrote: "This is the triumph of quantity over quality."
DeleteOnly in your fantasies. So, again we are in another MORONIC argument over WORDS!?
The "quality" of the FBI's evidence is only an issue to people who have their own personal theories about who did it.
The high quantity of high-quality evidence in the FBI's case appears infinitely better than the low quantity of the low-quality evidence you use to argue your case.
Generally speaking, the more evidence you have in a case based upon circumstantial evidence, the more convincing your case will appear to the jury. In other words, the "quantity" of the FBI's evidence against Ivins means they have a "high-quality" legal case.
Ed
Hello Mr Lake.
ReplyDelete+ I thought the CIA could only work outside the United States.
+ Between Friday and Saturday, someone from the CIA visited my Blog:
+ URL reference:
http://www.cia.gov/studies/open_source_inteligence/article777.html
+ Redirect me to:
https://www.cia.gov/redirects/ciaredirect.html
I do not know what it means.
+ I was hoping someone FBI someday he would tell me something about my interpretation of the mysterious notes of Mccormick, but nothing happens.
+In the CIA someone has gone mad / paranoid .
Goodbye from Spain
JSP.
Joseph from Spain wrote: "I thought the CIA could only work outside the United States."
ReplyDeleteThat's basically true, but things get into gray areas when someone in the U.S. calls some terrorist in Afghanistan or Malaysia.
I think to many people were trying to hack into the CIA's site, and that's why they changed their URL from http to https.
Ed
Hello Mr Lake.
DeleteNow I know what is "Open Source":
https://www.cia.gov/careers/opportunities/analytical/open-source-officer-foreign-media-analyst.html
No More Secrets: Open Source Information and the Reshaping of U.S. Intelligence
Hamilton Bean, (Santa Barbara CA: Praeger, 2011), 218 pp, bibliography, index.
https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol.-56-no.-1/no-more-secrets-open-source-information-and-the-reshaping-of-u.s.-intelligence.html
+ Certainly, there are no borders on the Internet. And it seems that there can be no privacy in this world.
....but for those who have important friends, never been a problem to discover secrets sealed. So Obama destroyed the political career and fame of Jack Ryan.
INFO: Subsequent to his withdrawal from the U.S. Senate race in Illinois, Jack Ryan has characterized what happened to him as a "new low for politics in America". According to Ryan, it was unprecedented in American politics for a newspaper to sue for access to sealed custody documents. Ryan opposed unsealing the divorce records of Senator John Kerry during Kerry's race against George W. Bush in 2004, and Kerry's divorce records remained sealed. Ryan has made the following request: "let me be the only person this has happened to. Don’t ask for Ted Kennedy’s. Don’t ask for John McCain’s. Don’t ask for Joe Lieberman’s. Just stop. This is not a good precedent for American society if you really want the best and brightest to run.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Ryan_%28politician%29
Joseph from SPAIN wrote: "So Obama destroyed the political career and fame of Jack Ryan."
ReplyDeleteYour post is totally off-topic, and I probably should delete it. But, since you do not post here very often, I'll respond:
Jack Ryan's wife was Jeri Ryan. She's a super-hot actress who is best known for playing Seven-of-Nine on the TV series "Star Trek: Voyager." Click HERE for images.
According to Wikipedia: "on April 2, 2004, Barack Obama formally established his position about the Ryans' soon-to-be-released divorce records, and called on Democrats not to inject them into the campaign. The Ryan campaign characterized Obama's stance as hypocritical, because people they alleged to be Obama's backers had been emailing reports about the divorce records prior to Judge Schnider's decision, and urging the press to seek to open them"
So, Obama was not part of the campaign to get Ryan's divorce records released. It was mostly just the media seeing a hot SEX story. Here's what CNN said about the case:
"Jeri Ryan said her then-husband took her on three "surprise trips" in the spring of 1998 to New Orleans, New York and Paris, during which he took her to sex clubs. She said she refused to go in the first and went into the second at his insistence.
"It was a bizarre club with cages, whips and other apparatus hanging from the ceiling," she said in the court document, adding that her husband "wanted me to have sex with him there, with another couple watching. I refused."
She said on arriving at the third club, in Paris, "people were having sex everywhere. I cried. I was physically ill. [He] became very upset with me and said it was not a 'turn on' for me to cry."
That's the kind of thing the media loves. And, a judge felt that it was something the voters should know about.
I don't think it has much to do with Obama. And, I wouldn't call Jack Ryan one of our "best and brightest." I'd call him one of our sleaziest and dumbest.
Ed
Joseph from Spain wrote: Now I know what is "Open Source"
ReplyDeleteDuring the American Civil war (1861-65), Generals in the North would send spies down into the South to buy newspapers and bring them back. The newspapers gave a good indication of how the South was fighting the war and what they were worried about.
So, analyzing "Open Source" material has probably been going on since ancient times. In the 1975 movie "Three Days of the Condor," the hero is an open source CIA analyst who just reads newspapers and books, but he figures out something that gets everyone else in his department killed.
I would assume that every country in the world does "open source" analysis to some degree. They'd be stupid to not do it. It CAN tell you what's going on, and it CAN give you "the big picture" that explains the actions of other kinds of spies and secret agents.
Ed
Too bad the text of the bicycle bomber's manifesto isn't available:
ReplyDeleteit would be fun!
"Evidently, the same person (or persons) then mailed letters to as many as 10 members of Congress declaring "We did it!""
ReplyDeleteBaloney. That was just a letter from an anti-war activist in California.
Anonymous wrote: "Baloney. That was just a letter from an anti-war activist in California."
ReplyDeleteApparently, what "Anonymous" meant to say is that ABC News provided a link to an ABC News article from March 6, 2008, which indicated that the same person who planted the Times Square bomb also sent the "We Did It!" letters to members of Congress, BUT an article in the Toronto Star from the next day, March 7, 2008, says that the sender of the "We Did It!" letters was actually an anti-war activist in California who was not involved in the Times Square bombing.
ABC News: http://abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/Blotter/story?id=4398877&page=1#.UcCNy9gQNkB
Toronto Star: http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2008/03/07/canadian_border_stop_probed_in_times_square_blast.html
Good find. Thanks.
Ed