Free Republic

"SCHWARZENEGGER FLEXES MUSCLE FOR MOSCOW, WHILE OBAMA IGNORES WARNINGS FROM RUSSIAN DISSIDENTS" International News Analysis Today June 29, 2010 By Toby Westerman SNIPPET: "California governor, and former film superhero, Arnold Schwarzenegger has pledged to lead a trade mission to Russia and assist "in any way possible" Russia's drive to develop its own high tech "Silicon Valley." U.S. president Barack Obama has also promised his backing in facilitating the flow of U.S. technology to Russia. The eager participation of Schwarzenegger and Obama in exporting U.S. technological capabilities came during Russian president Dmitry Medvedev's three day visit (June 22-24) to the United...

Dmitry Medvedev dining in San Francisco tonight Russian President Dmitry Medvedev is on a friendly visit to the Bay Area before flying across the country to meet with President Barack Obama, and he comes in peace. Which must be why he brought along the flagship of the Russian Navy's Pacific Fleet, the nuclear-capable missile cruiser Varyag. Makes total sense. Medvedev will be dining with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and former Secretary of State George Schultz Tuesday night. On Wednesday, he'll be visiting technology companies including Twitter, Apple, Google and Cisco Systems, in part to promote an "innovation center" modeled on Silicon...

He walks with a cane and is a bit hard of hearing. Yet Boris Chertok, 95, a former deputy chief designer in the Soviet bureau that put the first Sputnik satellite into orbit 50 years ago, still has strong opinions on the evolution of the country's space program. Chertok says the free-market changes instituted by President Boris Yeltsin after the Soviet Union fell apart were disastrous for Russian science. "We need to restore what we have lost over 15 years of destructive reforms," said Chertok, whose very name was once a state secret. "The market economy is incapable of fulfilling...

SAN JOSE -- As oil prices hit a record, drivers worried about $3-a-gallon gas and politicians feared the impact on elections, President Bush on Friday acknowledged the pain but seemed resigned to being able to do little about it. "I know the folks here are suffering at the gas pump," the president said while promoting his competitiveness initiative at the Silicon Valley headquarters of Internet networking company Cisco Systems Inc. "Rising gasoline prices is like taking a _ is like a tax, particularly on the working people and the small-business people." But to address the immediate problem, Bush offered only...

Toscana Country Club Indian Wells, California 6:05 P.M. PDT THE PRESIDENT: Please be seated. Thanks for coming. The lesson of the 1994 fundraiser is, I should have had a better chairman. (Laughter.) I want to thank you all for coming. I really appreciate your support for the Republican Party. We're the party that is the party of ideas, a party of optimism, and a party of people who know how to solve problems, which is exactly what we're doing. I, first, wish Laura were here. She's not, of course. About four people go through the photo-op line indicated that they...

Take that, Stanford. Two San Jose State students have been asked by the White House to represent budding Silicon Valley engineering talent and rub shoulders with President Bush on Friday when he visits Cisco Systems. College of Engineering Dean Belle Wei said she got a call Tuesday from a valley ``Republican heavyweight,'' asking for names. Wei said she thinks SJSU got the call because ``we have normal students, not Stanford students, privileged students.'' After all, Bush is in town to tout his plan for keeping American industry competitive in the computer age. Wei has tapped two of her top students,...

Today President Bush flew to the left coast to participate in a panel discussion on the American competitiveness Initiative at the Cisco Systems, Inc. headquarters building in San Jose, California, he was joined by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.

They've found reason to avoid each other in recent months, but President Bush is scheduled to meet Friday afternoon with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, officials with both administrations said. It won't be a long session -- just enough time for the governor to press his fellow Republican on such vital California issues as the state's fragile levee system and immigration, aides in both camps said Tuesday. Schwarzenegger will meet Bush at the airport in San Jose, then ride in the president's limousine for a joint appearance at Cisco Systems. Bush will pitch the American Competitiveness Initiative, which, if approved by Congress,...

<p>WASHINGTON -- President Bush heads to California next weekend where he will celebrate Earth Day on Saturday with a tour of the California Fuel Cell Partnership in West Sacramento.</p> <p>It will be the president's first visit to the Sacramento area since his 2000 election.</p>

WASHINGTON (AP) - Lawmakers on Wednesday accused U.S.-based Internet companies of giving in to pressure from China and helping to censor Web users in violation of American principles of free speech. They also criticized the four companies - Microsoft Corp., Yahoo Inc., Cisco Systems Inc. and Google Inc. - for failing to attend a congressional briefing that was staged to bring to light how Internet companies do business in China. Microsoft and Yahoo issued a joint statement saying that, by themselves, they lack the leverage to influence world governments. The statement suggested the four companies could work together with governments...

WASHINGTON - Gay and transgender workers were more likely than ever to receive domestic-partner health benefits last year, and more companies are adopting nondiscrimination policies to protect them, a leading gay- activist group reported. But gays' workplace gains have slowed since the '90s, according to figures that the group, the Washington-based Human Rights Campaign, compiled for its annual "State of the Workplace" report. That's probably because of the rising costs of health benefits. Social conservatives said their resistance to such efforts was a factor. Fortune 500 companies were most likely to protect gay and transgender workers, according to the survey....

SAN FRANCISCO, May 9 - The incident seemed alarming enough: a breach of a Cisco Systems network in which an intruder seized programming instructions for many of the computers that control the flow of the Internet. Now federal officials and computer security investigators have acknowledged that the Cisco break-in last year was only part of a more extensive operation - involving a single intruder or a small band, apparently based in Europe - in which thousands of computer systems were similarly penetrated. Investigators in the United States and Europe say they have spent almost a year pursuing the case involving...

A sweeping civil investigation released Monday into San Jose's bungled $8 million deal to install Cisco Systems equipment in the new downtown City Hall found that at least one official in the City Manager's Office knew of alleged problems with the contract before the technology scandal enveloped city government last summer. The report also provides the strongest evidence to date that City Manager Del Borgsdorf knew of at least some of Cisco's early involvement in developing the contract. According to the report, Borgsdorf was at a May meeting with a Cisco vice president in which the lucrative network and phone...

The San Jose City Council voted Tuesday to expand an investigation into potential favoritism in the city's decision to purchase $8 million in Cisco networking and phone equipment for its new downtown City Hall. Under the council's order, City Attorney Rick Doyle and City Auditor Gerald Silva will join forces to examine whether the city's early dealings with Cisco improperly put the San Jose networking giant in the position of advising the city on how much Cisco equipment to buy. Cisco's role in consulting with the city was first reported last week by the Mercury News. Since then, at least...

U.S. Businesses Help China Suppress Internet NewsMax.com Wires Wednesday, May 1, 2002 BEIJING – It's not easy being the father of the Chinese Internet. Children are running by, boats are paddling, the smell of roast lamb fills the air, and Michael Robinson, a young American computer engineer, sits rigidly, facing an empty cafe on the shore of Qinghai Lake, speaking in a low voice of the crackdown. "What is better? Big Brother Internet? Or no Internet at all?" he asks. Robinson was hired as the lead support engineer in 1996 by the Chinese government and Global One, a Sprint-France...