Court Upholds 1st Amendment Rights for Bloggers! (Big Win for Bloggers!) February 14, 2014
Posted by Chris Mark in Uncategorized.Tags: 1st Amendment, 9th Circuit Court, AT&T, bloggers, Chris Mark, Gertz, Gertz v. Robert Welch Inc
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According to an article in USA Today, On January 17th, 2014 the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that “..bloggers and the public have the same First Amendment protections as journalists when sued for defamation: If the issue is of public concern, plaintiffs have to prove negligence to win damages.” At a high level, the Appeals Court ruled that Standards set by a 1974 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, Gertz v. Robert Welch Inc., apply to everyone, not just journalists. What does this mean? Quite simply if you want to blog about a company, public figure, or anyone else and your blogs are in the ‘public interest’ and not driven by malice and are not negligent, then you have a right to do so without being sued for defamation. The court said specifically: “Because Cox’s blog post addressed a matter of public concern, even assuming that Gertz is limited to such speech, the district court should have instructed the jury that it could not find Cox liable for defamation unless it found that she acted negligently,” judge Andrew D. Hurwitz wrote. “We hold that liability for a defamatory blog post involving a matter of public concern cannot be imposed without proof of fault and actual damages.”
This is a great ruling for bloggers and individuals as it protects their comments and opinions under the 1st Amendment.
Chris Mark in February 2014 SC Magazine “The Need & the Challenge” February 14, 2014
Posted by Chris Mark in Uncategorized.Tags: AT&T, Chris Mark, cybercrime, information security, InfoSec, SCMagazine, security
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Chris Mark’s (this author) article “The Need and the Challenge” has been published in the February, 2014 edition of Secure Computing Magazine. The article focuses upon the need to define the term ‘security’ and the challenge associated with denoting such a term. Here is an intro “While used every day, the term “security” can be deceptively difficult to define and may contain various meanings to different people in divergent contexts. The industry at large seems to have adopted a stance of “I know it when I see it,” as opposed to objectively defining the concept. Unfortunately, this creates numerous problems for those who have a need to ‘secure’ data, or any other asset.” Continue reading here!
Randy Abbott admitting he lied…. February 3, 2014
Posted by Chris Mark in Uncategorized.add a comment
Sorry for the posts about Stolen Valor but this is important to me. This man, and others, have stolen the valor of those who earned the right to call themselves Recon Marines and Scout/Snipers. There are many brave men who have willingly gone into harm’s way and many who came back wounded or not at all. Randy Abbott claimed an honor that he did not earn. He has been publicly exposed and now recorded admitting to Jonn Lillea of ThisAintHell that he lied. Is this enough? Depends upon who you ask….
Randy Abbott – “paralyzed surfer who was robbed” AND A Recon/Sniper? Yeah..OK… February 3, 2014
Posted by Chris Mark in Uncategorized.Tags: GoFundMe, randy abbott, Recon, Scout Sniper, sniper, Stolen Valor, the view from 42
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UPDATE: The fine folks at This Aint Hell (but you can see it from here) just published a story on Randy Abbott and included his DD214s as well as a speech he gave at the Travis Manion 2013 Hero Run. While he claims he: “…spent (his) first eight years assigned to Special Operations Command with a counter terrorist unit”..His DD214s confirm what we already knew…he was NOT a Recon Marine and NOT a Marine Corps Scout/Sniper. Mr. Abbott was a BulkFuel specialist (ran a gas station) and an Admin Marine (Made sure Marines got paid and had records updated). Thanks to A Buncha Damn Cowboys for their work on outing this guy. Who is this shadowing group? Pretty simple. It is a group of Recon Marines, Scout/Snipers and SARCs who were tired of people claiming honors which they had not earned.
Two weeks ago I (and a lot of my friends) read a story about Randy Abbott. Randy is a paralyzed surfer who said his surfboards were stolen at the beach. According to Randy he hit one of the guys with an uppercut but they ran away with his boards. By most accounts a pretty decent guy.
Since the report of the theft and his status as a ‘disabled vet Recon/Sniper’ there has been an international outpouring of support and numerous people donated thousands of dollars in response. In the story, they state that after spending “fourteen years as a Marine Corps recon scout sniper”, his body was banged up. Randy was not just a Scout/Sniper but a real life “Recon Sniper”? WOW!…I had to do more research as the Marine Reconnaissance and Scout/Sniper community is VERY small and I had not heard of this guy! Why..I am a Recon Marine and Scout/Sniper!! So I did some research and found a picture on his Facebook page that was a giant tattoo of non other than the 1st MarDiv Scout/Sniper School with the motto: “Suffer patiently and patiently suffer”. Nobody would go so far as to get a tattoo of a sacred sniper HOG (Hunter Of Gunmen) logo unless they were ‘legit’. Since nobody could find Mr. Abbott in any of the secret ‘invite only’ Facebook pages for Recon Marines and Snipers (yup…they exist), the Sniper School “God book” or any other places that we use to verify Recon Marines and Snipers (instructors, classes, people who served with him etc.) the question was raised as to whether or not Mr. Abbott was really a Scout Sniper or Reconnaissance Marine? A few former Recon Marines reached out and Randy said he served with “1st Recon BN, Sniper Platoon” That seemed odd since nobody can remember a ‘sniper platoon’ in 1st Recon Bn. More research and NOTHING…his DD214 has been requested but if you know how to contact Randy, please ask him to shoot me an email and we can clear all this up. I have posted my own DD214 to show how easy it is to demonstrate you are Recon Marine or Scout/Sniper. Until then, it appears as if this man is simply making things up…
UPDATE – The Story of McBean Elementary School has More than One Shade… November 10, 2013
Posted by Chris Mark in Uncategorized.Tags: dr. janina dallas, mcbean elementary, race, racism, Tanya Mount, title i
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UPDATE – it appears as if Ms. Mount has filed a lawsuit against the school, the district police AND the principal Janina Dallas. You can read more here.
In doing some research, there are some interesting points to consider about the article posted on McBean Elementary School. Read and decide for yourself. If Ms. Mount was a concealed weapons permit holder in Richmond county, she would have had a background check and been fingerprinted. You can read the requirements here.
Next, it should be noted that on August 9th, 2013 McBean Elementary School was identified as a school to receive Title I federal assistance. This means the school receives federal money to “assist students in meeting state achievement standards”. If one looks at the demographics of the town in which McBean is located and the school there are some interesting trends. According to City-Data.com, in 2011, there were 39,640 people listed as living in the city. Of those, 23,137 were black and 13,219 were white. This related to 58.3% black and 33.3% white, repsectively. this means there is a 2/1 ratio of blacks to whites. If one looks at the demographics of McBean elementary school, the statistics are shocking. It is about 21% black and almost 68% white. This means there is only 1 black student to every 3.23 white students. It should be noted that I am making assumptions but Ms. Mount, who was banned from McBean Elementary school appears to be black and I am making another assumption that her daughter is black, as well. If one looks at Goshen Elementary School, which is 3.9 miles from McBean, the ratios begin to change. They are roughly 29% black and 60% white. If one goes another 2.3 miles to Gracewood elementary, the ratios continue in the trend. Now we are at 53.6% black and 41.3% white, respectively. Finally, we move another 1.8 miles to Tobacco Road Elementary School and we are at 95% black and 1.4% white. Tocacco Road is only about 13 miles from McBean. In zip code 30906 there are 57,748 residents of which 61% are black and 32% are white…yet the elementary school in this zip code is 95% black? Lets look closer to home. Hephzibah middle school and Hphzibah High school are both located in the same small town as McBean Elementary and they are both roughly 50% black adn 50% white.
Considering that Ms. Mount would have had a background check, it seems prudent that she would have been a lower risk than a person without a backgruond check. In fact, those wtih a CCW are 17 times less likely to commit a crime than the general population and veterans are no more liklely to commit crime than the general population. The question that comes to my mind is this: “What was Dr. Dallas really so afraid of that she would get an order or protection against Ms. Mount? Was Dr. Dallas really ‘scared’ of Ms. Mount because she was an Army Veteran and had a CCW permit or was it because her daughter was the wrong color for McBean Elementary School and would impact their Federal Funding?”.…the answer to me is clear.
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