The BBC provides some sad commentary on how Donald Rumsfeld undermined American soldiers who tried to protect their country:

When the accused soldiers were finally removed from the base, [Joe Darby] thought his troubles were over.

And then he was sitting in a crowded Iraqi canteen with hundreds of soldiers and Donald Rumsfeld came on the television to thank Joe Darby by name for handing in the photographs.

“I don’t think it was an accident because those things are pretty much scripted,” Mr Darby says.

“But I did receive a letter from him which said he had no malicious intent, he was only doing it to praise me and he had no idea about my anonymity.

“I really find it hard to believe that the secretary of defence of the United States has no idea about the star witness for a criminal case being anonymous.”

Rather than turn on him for betraying colleagues, most of the soldiers in his unit shook his hand. It was at home where the real trouble started.

Even if Rumsfeld was told by his staff that there was no anonymity necessary, one would think that he could have cared enough to confirm or figure it out himself for a high profile and sensitive operation. The bottom line is he was entirely removed from the welfare of the Americans serving under him. And that makes for VERY ineffective security management.

The BBC tells of a book about a Jewish child who survived the Nazis by being taken in as their prodigy.

In 1997, after raising a family in Melbourne with his Australian bride, he finally revealed himself. He told how, at the age of five, he had been adopted by the SS and became a Nazi mascot.

Amazing story of identity.

The Onion’s A.V. Club has an amusing review of seventeen dangerous computers seen on the big screen:

From 2001: A Space Odyssey to your parents’ attempts to check their e-mail, there’s been an ongoing war between humans and computers that have gotten too big for their binary britches. Save for maybe Windows ’95, no computer-based foe has ever been as diabolical as Master Control Program, the code-munching behemoth in Disney’s Tron.

Funny stuff. Seems like they’re missing some really good ones, like Red Dwarf’s Holly who develops Computer Senility, but I like the concept. Reminds me of an old cartoon…

Or maybe this one:

Someone should put together a list of the most dangerous computers in comics and books, since they seem to be the ones that are eventually launched to the screen.