Separation of Powers? Leave Prez's BlackBerry Out of It

Bushies' conjurings 'know few bounds'

(NEWSER) - The simultaneous arrival of Karl Rove's memoir and Liz Cheney's "right-wing noise machine" means the "revisionist floodgates have opened," writes Frank Rich for the New York Times , a "rewriting of history that knows few bounds." And while Rove's book better passes for fiction and Cheney's "al-Qaeda Seven" attack is a McCarthy-esque smear at best, the Bushies' "non-reality-based schtick" is "relentless and shameless." More»

Problem with IM software at fault, RIM urges upgrade

(AP) - BlackBerry email service in North America was restored this morning following its second outage in less than a week. Research In Motion said the root cause of the 8-hour lapse is still under review, but a flaw in two recently released versions of its BlackBerry Messenger instant messaging software appears to be the culprit. RIM has also provided a new version of BlackBerry Messenger (version 5.0.0.57) and is encouraging anyone who downloaded or upgraded the software since Dec. 14 to upgrade to this latest version, which resolves the issue. More»

Top adviser's near absolute power corrupted absolutely

(NEWSER) - Liberals like to think of Karl Rove as a malevolent demigod, using his powers to obstruct the greater good. But, former Bush speechwriter Matt Latimer writes in the Washington Post, the legacy of “Bush’s Brain” is far more mundane: “It is a story not of grand strategy or evil genius but of human foolishness and the love of power.” And if Republicans want to recapture the imagination of Americans, they’ll have to dissect what went wrong during the “Rove-o-lution,” Latimer says. More»

(NEWSER) - Karl Rove was intimately involved in the firing of at least three of the US Attorneys sacked for purportedly political reasons during the Bush administration, emails obtained by the Washington Post show. One note mentions a senator who “asked that we remove the US Atty” and “couldn’t be more serious about this request.” Though Rove says, “I’m not even sure I was still there”—he was—the attorney was fired. More»

Spy-proof smartphone tech means Obama won't have to give up beloved 'BarackBerry'

(NEWSER) - Security agents aren't going to have to pry the BlackBerry out of Barack Obama's hands after all, Marc Ambinder reports in the Atlantic. A government agency has added super-encryption technology to a standard BlackBerry, which the president will be allowed to use for routine and personal messages. It's not known if the tech-addicted president already has the device. More»