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From Los Angeles Times

U.S., Mexican governments reject report calling for drug legalization

In separate statements, the governments signaled that they would not back away from current strategies in the war on drugs, which in Mexico has resulted in more than 38,000 deaths in 4 1/2 years and is backed by more than $1 billion in U.S. aid under the Merida Initiative.

As The Times reported Thursday from Mexico City and Washington, the Global Commission on Drug Policy is urging governments to decriminalize drug consumption and experiment with legalization and regulation of some narcotics, especially marijuana. The report calls the 4-decade-old war on drugs a failure.

"We can no longer ignore the extent to which drug-related violence, crime and corruption in Latin America are the results of failed drug war policies," former Colombian President Cesar Gaviria said in a prepared statement tied to the report's release. "Now is the time to break the taboo on discussion of all drug policy options, including alternatives to drug prohibition."

Here's the commission's website , where visitors can download the full report in English or Spanish. The commission includes a former president of Brazil, a former president of Mexico, former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan and several business leaders.

On Thursday, as the drug-policy report was being released in New York, the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy issued a statement arguing against its recommendations.

"The Obama administration's efforts to reduce drug use are not born out of a culture war or drug war mentality, but out of the recognition that drug use strains our economy, health, and public safety," the statement said.

In Mexico, President Felipe Calderon's government has consistently stated that it does not support the legalization of drugs but remains open to debate. The position was reaffirmed this week by the president's top national-security spokesman, Alejandro Piore (link in Spanish).

Piore said the Mexican government "categorically rejects the impression that in Mexico, by definition, a stronger application of the law on the part of the authorities shall result in an increase in violence on the part of the narco-traffickers."

Legalization, his statement also said, "does not do away with organized crime, nor with its rivalries and violence."

Read the full L.A. Times story on the commission's report here .

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/laplaza/2011/06/obama-calderon-drug-war-report-commission-reject.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+LaPlaza+%28La+Plaza%29

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John Edwards denies federal charges

The former Democratic presidential candidate says he didn't break the law when he used funds from two supporters to hide his mistress and their daughter.

by Robin Abcarian

June 3, 2011

Reporting from Los Angeles and Washington

Former Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards has insisted that he broke no laws when he hid his pregnant mistress while seeking the nomination in 2008. Now, he's made that position official, pleading not guilty to federal criminal charges that he accepted nearly $1 million from two supporters to fund the deception.

On Friday, a federal grand jury indicted Edwards, 57, on six counts of violating campaign finance laws, lying to the government and conspiring to protect his candidacy by breaking the law.

The case against Edwards could rise or fall on whether the government is reaching too far and trying to hold Edwards to a higher election law standard than usual. Notably, the first paragraph of the 19-page indictment said that a "centerpiece" of Edwards candidacy in 2008 was "his public image as a devoted family man" and that he often stressed to voters that "family comes first."

The government maintains that by accepting money to keep his mistress, Rielle Hunter, and eventually their daughter, Frances Quinn Hunter, out of sight, he was trying to maintain the viability of his candidacy. Therefore, the government said, the money constituted undeclared campaign contributions.

The indictment, and Edwards' plea, are the latest episodes in an all-too-familiar story of a political and personal implosion. But the details — the lies about who fathered the child, the extent of the cover-up, and the illness and subsequent death of Edwards' wife — lend an especially sordid air to Edwards' fall. If Edwards does not reach a deal with prosecutors, he will go to trial — and his disgrace will continue to be played out in a most public arena.

"There is no question that I have done wrong, and I take full responsibility for having done wrong," the former North Carolina senator told a throng of reporters Friday afternoon after emerging from the federal courthouse in Winston-Salem, N.C. "I will regret for the rest of my life the pain and the harm that I have caused to others. But I did not break the law, and I never, ever thought I was breaking the law. Thank you all very much."

Edwards, whose daughter Cate, 29, stood behind him, did not take questions. Nor did he mention his wife, Elizabeth, who had incurable cancer when he began his affair. She died in December.

It is unclear what penalties Edwards might face if convicted, although the maximum for each count is five years, plus a $250,000 fine.

"As this indictment shows," said Assistant U.S. Atty. Gen. Lanny A. Breuer in a statement, "we will not permit candidates for high office to abuse their special ability to access the coffers of their political supporters to circumvent our election law."

Edwards's attorney, former White House counsel Gregory Craig, called the prosecution "unprecedented."

"No one has ever been charged, either civilly or criminally, with the claims that have been brought against Sen. Edwards today," Craig, who managed President Clinton's impeachment defense, said upon his arrival at the courthouse. "No one would have known, or should have known, or could have been expected to know, that these payments would be treated or should be considered as campaign contributions. And there was no way Sen. Edwards knew that fact either."

Story unravels

According to the indictment, the result of a grand jury investigation that lasted more than two years, Edwards solicited and accepted approximately $725,000 from Rachel "Bunny" Mellon, the 100-year-old banking heiress who is identified as "Person B," and more than $200,000 from the late Fred Baron, his national campaign finance chairman, identified as "Person D." Edwards, the indictment said, "failed to disclose these illegal contributions" to the Federal Election Commission.

Edwards' former aide, Andrew Young, was a key witness. He helped solicit the money, falsely claimed he was the father of Hunter's child, took his wife and three children into hiding with Hunter, and ultimately became an object of derision for his role.

Young was blamed for the scandal by Elizabeth Edwards. In a telephone interview in March 2010, as she wrote a new epilogue for her book "Resilience," Elizabeth Edwards said she believed that Young had orchestrated the cover-up, and had approached Mellon for the money. "I don't think they will indict anybody," she said. "I don't think there was a criminal offense here, unless it's fraud against Bunny Mellon."

She said her husband continued to maintain that he had had a one-night stand with Hunter and did not admit he fathered Quinn, now 3, until the couple was in therapy in summer 2009. The Edwardses separated in January 2010, days after John Edwards admitted publicly that he was the child's father.

Two months later, Elizabeth Edwards said she was still angry with her husband, but added, "I am completely at peace."

On Friday, Young's attorney, David Geneson, said that Young feels "vindicated."

Last year, Young wrote a book about the Edwards scandal, "The Politician." The indictment mirrors the tale he told. "The story is accurate," Geneson said. "The government has corroborated it." (In a separate case that is pending, Young is being sued for privacy invasion by Hunter, who is demanding the return of a purported sex tape she made with Edwards.)

Geneson said Young made no deal with the government but has been promised in writing that, if he continues to cooperate, he will not be prosecuted.

Mellon first began giving money to Edwards in spring 2007, when the presidential campaign was in full swing. She was upset that he was being criticized for two $400 haircuts — and at that point she decided to give money that would not be reported on his federal disclosure forms.

"From now on, all haircuts, etc., that are necessary and important for his campaign," she wrote in a note to Young, "please send the bills to me.... It is a way to help our friend without government restrictions."

Baron, who died in October 2008, paid for at least five chartered planes to whisk Hunter and the Youngs from Florida to Aspen, Colo., (where, Young wrote in his book, they stayed at Baron's ski chalet), San Diego and Santa Barbara. He spent nearly $20,000 on hotels in Hollywood, Fla., and San Diego, and more than $58,000 on rent for a Santa Barbara mansion.

The case's merits

Several experts in election law said they did not know of any case in which prosecutors brought criminal charges against a candidate for using money from a wealthy contributor to hide a personal matter. Normally such violations are handled as civil penalties and result in fines and requirements for the candidates to repay the money.

Six weeks ago, Scott E. Thomas, a former chairman of the Federal Election Commission, met quietly with prosecutors on Edwards' behalf to persuade them not to seek criminal charges.

"I do not believe that there is any prior case that states that the conduct at issue in the Edwards matter, or even conduct substantially similar to it, constituted a violation of the statute," Thomas said.

Others familiar with election law agreed.

"This is a real stretch," said Michael Toner, a former FEC chairman. "And I say that as a Republican who is no fan of John Edwards."

Melanie Sloan, executive director of the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a nonprofit legal watchdog, predicted the government would encounter serious problems if the case goes to trial.

Although Edwards' conduct was "despicable," she said, "that alone does not provide solid grounds for a criminal case."

But other election law experts believe the government's case may be sound.

If prosecutors can show that Edwards conspired to receive donations that he wouldn't have to report and that false reports were filed under his signature, they may be able to show a "fairly straightforward conspiracy," said Matt Miner, a former chief counsel for the Senate Judiciary Committee.

"Federal prosecutors," he said, "clearly took their time in building this case and developing a record before the grand jury."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-john-edwards-20110604,0,7271258,print.story

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A U.S. strategy for fighting cyberattacks

The Pentagon is developing a new cyberwarfare strategy that calls for the use of military force in response to certain kinds of damaging online attacks on U.S. institutions.

June 3, 2011

The Pentagon is developing a new cyberwarfare strategy that calls for the use of military force — including conventional weapons — in response to certain kinds of damaging online attacks on U.S. institutions. That's fine in theory; if foreign agents launch a cyberattack on, say, the nation's electrical grid, it may be both reasonable and proportionate to fire missiles at, say, the attacker's energy supplies. But as recent hacks and phishing attacks on Google's Gmail service and on defense contractor Lockheed Martin indicate, the theory may not translate well to the murky, messy reality of what's happening online.

It's no surprise that the United States would reserve the right to use force against those who threaten it through the Internet. That's standard operating procedure for governments around the world in response to any new type of attack. The Obama administration stated its position simply in the International Strategy for Cyberspace policy paper released May 17, which declared that the United States "will respond to hostile acts in cyberspace as we would to any other threat to our country."

But what constitutes an act of cyberwarfare? When would a military response be appropriate? And what are the rules of engagement? These are questions that U.S. administrations and defense officials have been struggling to answer for more than a decade.

The new cyberwarfare strategy, which the Pentagon is expected to finish drafting this month, may not provide all the answers. That's not necessarily a bad thing. It's not in the country's interests to be too specific about when and how it will respond to cyberattacks, because that could weaken the potential deterrent effect. What the report may do, according to the Wall Street Journal, is categorize electronic attacks as acts of war if they result in the same level of damage and casualties as a conventional military attack. Such a designation could trigger a military response.

With governmental and corporate networks under seemingly incessant assault, it would certainly help to have a better deterrent, military or otherwise. The tricky part, however, is figuring out where the assaults are coming from, what their motives are and what damage they're inflicting.

Witness the serious, sophisticated attacks this year on EMC Corp.'s RSA Security Division, L-3 Communications Corp., Lockheed Martin and Google. The RSA Security intrusion enabled hackers to collect undisclosed information about SecurID, a technology in widespread use by governments and corporations to protect internal networks and facilities. Several defense contractors that rely on SecurID, including L-3 and Lockheed Martin, later reported intrusions, although they did not disclose whether any sensitive information was stolen or damage inflicted.

These incidents may be acts of espionage aimed at gathering sensitive information about U.S. weapons systems and military capabilities. One would expect that intelligence officials here are doing the same things in their efforts to identify potential foreign threats to the United States. In a sense, it's a new Cold War, though with far more combatants.

Other attacks have more ambiguous intentions and are harder to distinguish from the work of the cybercriminals who have proliferated online. On Wednesday, Google disclosed that unidentified attackers had tried to dupe hundreds of Gmail users into revealing their passwords. The victims targeted included "senior U.S. government officials, Chinese political activists, officials in several Asian countries (predominantly South Korea), military personnel and journalists," a Google executive said on a company blog, adding that the attack "appears to originate from Jinan, China."

Jinan, a provincial capital, just happens to be home to an important Chinese military installation and a military-backed vocational school that teaches computer science — the same school that investigators say was linked to a sophisticated attack on Gmail that started in 2009. Predictably, Chinese authorities have denied involvement in either episode.

The frequency of these attacks and the seeming impunity enjoyed by those responsible are alarming, and the federal government clearly has to step up its efforts to deter them. The new Pentagon policy will help, but only with the most egregious instances. Meanwhile, as the latest Gmail incident shows, government agencies need to do more to educate officials about online threats and the risks associated with public communications networks. Being conned into disclosing a password is a common occurrence online, which is why officials using Gmail and similar services should behave as if nothing they communicate stays secret.

The Pentagon's effort follows a series of steps by the Bush and Obama administrations to make the military and the federal government less vulnerable and improve Washington's response to cyberattacks. But the attacks on EMC and defense contractors are a reminder that private companies control most of the critical networks and infrastructure in the United States, and they have to do a better job of identifying risks, taking preventive steps and alerting authorities when they detect the first signs of trouble.

Last month the White House sent Congress a broad cybersecurity proposal that would have the government designate which companies control critical infrastructure, identify the ones subject to the greatest threats and declare which risks they must guard against. It would not, however, have the government tell them how to ward off cyberattacks or take control of critical facilities in the event of a cyberwar. Instead, it would require those companies to have cybersecurity plans that passed muster with independent evaluators. It's a modest but important step in response to a glaring cybersecurity gap that Congress should move quickly to fill.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/opinionla/la-ed-google-20110603,0,5384486,print.story

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From Google News

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Summer safety tips for parents

by Tatiana Pina

Journal Staff Writer

With summer just around the corner, it's time for the kids to get outside, go to the beach or pool and enjoy a less structured schedule.

Prevent Child Abuse Rhode Island says parents need to be aware of the dangers that come with summer activities and remember that children still need careful supervision when they are out of school.

In the water

All children need to be supervised while they are in the water. Young children need to be closely watched anytime they are around water. Whether you are heading to the beach or just staying by the pool, keep these safety tips in mind:

• Do not leave your child alone in the water, not even for a second. • Empty and put away the kiddie pool after each use. • Swim only in areas of the beach supervised by a lifeguard. • Install fencing (with safety latches) around your pool. • Learn CPR in case of an emergency.

Children will wander

Every year young children are reported missing after they have wandered away from their homes. Some of these children are seriously injured, killed or never found. During the summer months, families often leave their doors and windows open; however, when young children live in the house, precautions need to be taken:

• Keep doors leading outside locked at all times. • Do not depend on door handle locks, as many children can operate these. Install a slider lock or dead bolt high enough so your child cannot reach it. • Look around your home for possible ways your child could get outdoors. For instance, pet doors are an easy way for young children to get outside. • Teach your children that they should never leave the house without your permission. • Remember that locks are not a substitute for careful supervision.

Hot weather

The inside temperature of a car can reach over 120 degrees in less than 20 minutes on a hot summer day. Your child's body temperature rises three to five times faster than that of an adult, leading to heat stroke and death within a matter of minutes. Approximately 400 children have died over the last 10 years when they were left alone in a car. Some of these children became trapped while playing in the car and others were left while their parent ran an errand. Sadly, many of these incidents happened when a caregiver accidentally forgot a child was in the car.

Some tips:

• Never leave your child alone in the car. • Lock the doors and trunk when your car is parked in the driveway. • Teach your children not to play in or around cars. • Put your child's diaper bag or other belongings on the front seat so you will be reminded she/he is in the car. • Keep keys and remote devices out of reach of children.

http://www.projo.com/news/content/SUMMER_SAFETY_06-04-11_LMODSAA_v12.3041b54.html

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