Journalist Michael Hastings is dead at 33

[jfshade]

So Cenk has gone from counseling us to calm down and let the LAPD sort this all out to being shocked, SHOCKED! that the technology not only exists to cause the sort of out of control fireball crash that ended Michael Hasting's life, but that it's relatively easy to do, and that this incident is - in the words of a former U.S. National Coordinator for Security, Infrastructure Protection, and Counter-terrorism - “consistent with a car cyber attack.”

It takes Richard effing Clarke's assertions to make it OK for guys like Cenk to even raise this possibility? Dude, did you happen to notice this video featuring Dr. Kathleen Fisher of Tufts/DARPA that's received heavy linkage on the internet the last two months?

[Hunter]

well if he was ordering and getting NA beer while his 'critics' he invited out get the real stuff, that would be a good way to learn things, and it's not so hard to seem drunk to a drunk you've been drinking with. So, could have been a handy trick.

Could be. But the one article with the guy he's just met clearly says, 'Hastings and I got pretty drunk that night.' It sticks out as an unnecessary throwaway to the story, unlike say, "after getting drunk, Hastings loosened up and gave up his real feelings about..." The revelation that is in there isn't anything you wouldn't expect from Hastings.

I see exactly what you mean, the statement is forced and feels out of place and unnecessary. Good god I hate getting all conspiratarded and thinking of plants and moles and shills everywhere but this entire ever changing Hastings narrative is becoming almost surreal in its madness with a new revelation that goes against everything we know about him and what his OWN WORDS TELL US ABOUT HIMSELF, every hour on the hour....


Holy shit, we are all being attacked by some sort of fucking strange psy op.

[Forgetting2]

Actually the guy who owns up to being a critic says Hastings invited him to drinks, but doesn't say what Hasting had to drink if anything. It's the guy who's s self proclaimed fan who explicitly says they got very drunk together.

I'm thinking of Charlton Heston in Planet of the Apes, screaming "It's a madhouse!" It sure as hell feels like that.

I don't much like where this all takes me, and I am hesitant to voice things like the seeming forced prose above. It's just intuition with no hard facts, and I'm sure I'll get a new asshole ripped for that.

[Hunter]

If you are referring to my forced prose that is ok, I wont rip anything new for it, I welcome any criticism of my beliefs in fact, by all means I think I understand where you are coming from, maybe not, always hard to tell on these forums without the benefit of body language and other helpful hints, but I ALSO do not like where any of this crap is taking me, it is hurtful and offensive that people might actually be working hard to smear this man's name after his death just to cover up what could be a murder.

[Karmamatterz]

Anybody who seriously understands computers and networks will tell you nothing is safe from being hacked. Somethings are harder to get into than other, cars are not on the extremely difficult list, they are niche targets with little payoff. Avi gets into the discussion about hacking automobiles about 5:00 into the clip.

http://www.ted.com/talks/avi_rubin_all_ ... acked.html

This might already be posted in this thread, not sure, not a lot of time to read every post.

http://www.autosec.org/pubs/cars-usenixsec2011.pdf

Hasting's Mercedes could easily have been hacked by someone with a few tools and no worries of being caught. I'm sure the LAPD was told not to , or is too stupid or lazy to know how to look for the right logs that would identify access into systems. Unless you wipe the log, which any really clever person would do, there is possibly a record timestamped somewhere if his car was hacked. This would also highly depend on methods of access.

[Hunter]

Anybody who seriously understands computers and networks will tell you nothing is safe from being hacked. Somethings are harder to get into than other, cars are not on the extremely difficult list, they are niche targets with little payoff. Avi gets into the discussion about hacking automobiles about 5:00 into the clip.

http://www.ted.com/talks/avi_rubin_all_ ... acked.html

This might already be posted in this thread, not sure, not a lot of time to read every post.

http://www.autosec.org/pubs/cars-usenixsec2011.pdf

Hasting's Mercedes could easily have been hacked by someone with a few tools and no worries of being caught. I'm sure the LAPD was told not to , or is too stupid or lazy to know how to look for the right logs that would identify access into systems. Unless you wipe the log, which any really clever person would do, there is possibly a record timestamped somewhere if his car was hacked. This would also highly depend on methods of access.

Great links keep them coming, this is the sort of information that is making this a very helpful and interesting thread.

[Forgetting2]

If you are referring to my forced prose that is ok, I wont rip anything new for it, I welcome any criticism of my beliefs in fact, by all means I think I understand where you are coming from, maybe not, always hard to tell on these forums without the benefit of body language and other helpful hints, but I ALSO do not like where any of this crap is taking me, it is hurtful and offensive that people might actually be working hard to smear this man's name after his death just to cover up what could be a murder.

Oh no, not at all. I meant the forced prose of the guy who stuck the bit in his article about Hastings and him getting drunk. And when I think about it, if the guy's really a fan of Hastings, then he knows that Hastings is a recovering addict. And willy nilly throwing that out there just after after they guy died?

This whole thing has got me depressed and angry and feeling helpless.

[Hunter]

So Cenk has gone from counseling us to calm down and let the LAPD sort this all out to being shocked, SHOCKED! that the technology not only exists to cause the sort of out of control fireball crash that ended Michael Hasting's life, but that it's relatively easy to do, and that this incident is - in the words of a former U.S. National Coordinator for Security, Infrastructure Protection, and Counter-terrorism - “consistent with a car cyber attack.”

It takes Richard effing Clarke's assertions to make it OK for guys like Cenk to even raise this possibility? Dude, did you happen to notice this video featuring Dr. Kathleen Fisher of Tufts/DARPA that's received heavy linkage on the internet the last two months?

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(bad old embed code originally meant for old windows media player embeds of some sort. now removed from main posting screen.)
here's what was enclosed in old wonky embed tags:
http://youtu.be/3D6jxBDy8k8
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I want to like Cenk so bad but you really are spot on here, his fake indignation and utter shock that this sort of thing can be done is just so transparent, it is ugly to watch, it makes me uncomfortable. I really want to like the guy too and then he goes and does this same song and dance again.


SALON has been putting out tweets every hour on the hour since the accident admonishing everyone that Hastings would frown at us all and be very disappointed in us for speculating about his death and we should all just clam up and forget about it until we get the official story from the authorities so that it can be put to rest once and for all.

They make me sick, physically sick.

[Hunter]

If you are referring to my forced prose that is ok, I wont rip anything new for it, I welcome any criticism of my beliefs in fact, by all means I think I understand where you are coming from, maybe not, always hard to tell on these forums without the benefit of body language and other helpful hints, but I ALSO do not like where any of this crap is taking me, it is hurtful and offensive that people might actually be working hard to smear this man's name after his death just to cover up what could be a murder.

Oh no, not at all. I meant the forced prose of the guy who stuck the bit in his article about Hastings and him getting drunk. And when I think about it, if the guy's really a fan of Hastings, then he knows that Hastings is a recovering addict. And willy nilly throwing that out there just after after they guy died?

This whole thing has got me depressed and angry and feeling helpless.

Yea I figured I sort of misread you there but I get what you mean now and I am in the same boat it is terribly depressing, smearing Hastings name after his death, these people are disgusting IF that is what they are doing, just disgusting.

[Forgetting2]

Maybe Cenk just finally felt safe saying what he wanted to when he can now point to Clarke.

Clarke sure is a mystery to me. From the "I failed you" talk to the revelations that he was out of the loop on the San Diego hijackers and now this. Love to know what's making that guy tick.

It is speculation and depressing to think even if it is true he was murdered, it may never be able to be proved.

[Hunter]

Yea Clarke is a real wild card isnt he? He has been showing up on the scene as an "Official insider dude who agrees with us nutcases and conspiracy theorists" since what, just right after 9-11? Although I have always loved what he brings to our little gatherings I am just not sure what role he is playing or what side he is even on anymore, didnt he actually work for Reagan, both Bush's and then Clinton also, the guy has played all sides for years, yea just what the fuck is this guy all about?

But hey, if it takes Clarke to get people to take notice of this story that is great, Huffpo is now even writing stories about his car being hacked since Clarke came to the rescue.

[8bitagent]

it's too bad the thing is focused on batting down "government agents" as the culprit. That should not even be the main focus of suspicion. There are individuals who have motive and likely means.

Our own Jason Torchinsky did a thorough debunking of why this is so unlikely, including how modern cars' internal networks aren't normally equipped to receive wireless instructions and how it's absurd to think that mechanical systems can somehow be easily overridden by a remote signal

I long ago stipulated that most likely they would have had to gain access to the car and install a wireless interface to the computer port.

Revenge is the motive, and we already have a threat to "hunt down and kill" on record.

trying to make this about 'da gubamint did it' is a distraction.

but hell, it's not as though we can trust the LAPD to conduct and investigation worth a damn.

I can see both school of thoughts(intel related hit vs private revenge hit)

Did Hastings really say he had been threatened by Mcchrystal's crew at some point? It's a damn shame that the meme is "OBAMA/THE GUBMENT KILLED HASTINGS". Yes, it's disgusting that the government killed an American 16 year old boy in a drone strike because his late father was a suspected jihadist supporter. But something like this, on American soil(if it is a hit), would be so far off the books that it would most likely be a private hit.
We know Mcchrystal approved the coverup and lies surrounding Pat Tilman, and that his death itself may have been an intentional fragging. But I can see both school of thoughts regarding the assassination scenario:
1) If it was revenge for the General, why three years later(almost to the day strangely) 2) Is it possible it was to silence him for a story he could have been leaking/was about to highlight/send a message?
If that is the case, then it may indeed tie back into people within the NSA or other intel agencies.

[Hunter]

Yes Hastings said that in his follow up book The Operators that they said they would hunt him down and kill him if they didnt like what he wrote, although he seemed to imply it was a joke. HOWEVER, he did a REDDIT AMA and someone asked him if he ever got any death threats for all the stuff he wrote and he said yes, it happens, "I have had people tell me they will hunt me down and kill me if they dont like what I write..." Then he goes on to talk about other types of threats that he gets like what he called "Cocktail party whisper campaigns and they just try and ruin your reputation and make you seem controversial etc."


Go check out his reddit ama, you can probably just google "Michael Hastings Reddit AMA" and get a direct link to it, he did it about this time last year and there is some good stuff in there."


The context of the threat from the generals staff was this, Hastings asked the general and his staff if there were any GROUND RULES, anything that was off limits for his story about the general and the general responded that he doesnt roll that way and he wasnt going to to try and tell Hastings how to write the story and he had all the freedom he wanted and then Hastings says, "right after the general said that one of his staff members said 'we will hunt you down and kill you if we dont like what you write.'" and then Hastings goes on to say that this was an incredible opportunity for him to really tell his readers about things exactly as he experienced them with no ground rules put on him.


Hastings also says in the book that the whole time he was with the general there were only TWO OCCASIONS when the general asked to be OFF RECORD and Hastings said in his book that he honored and continues to honor those two occasions to this day.

[justdrew]

well if he was ordering and getting NA beer while his 'critics' he invited out get the real stuff, that would be a good way to learn things, and it's not so hard to seem drunk to a drunk you've been drinking with. So, could have been a handy trick.

Could be. But the one article with the guy he's just met clearly says, 'Hastings and I got pretty drunk that night.' It sticks out as an unnecessary throwaway to the story, unlike say, "after getting drunk, Hastings loosened up and gave up his real feelings about..." The revelation that is in there isn't anything you wouldn't expect from Hastings.

who cares what they guy clearly says. All he's saying is his PERCEPTION, which is not even close to infallible.

"it's not so hard to seem drunk to a drunk you've been drinking with"

[8bitagent]

Hot damn, was not expecting to see this. I don't even know what to say. I've long enjoyed and really liked Cenk's demeanor, approach and views but being the lone visible voice in the visible alternative left media
asking these questions has got to be rough. And he's gotta be taking some flack.

As much as Im feeling very celebratory for DOMA and Prop 8 being struck down, it's just sour to know that there's even a remote possibility a journalist could be killed inside of America.
Or as Cenk says, the notion that spooks can hack a car.