ANALYSIS By BARADAN KUPPUSAMY
baradan@pc.jaring.my
There is little chance of reconciliation between the Penang Chief Minister, who takes pride in bringing logic and rationalism to politics, and his detractors in the PKR.
DAP secretary-general and Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng is in the spotlight along with Pakatan Rakyat leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, but for radically different reasons.
While Anwar, who is charged with sodomy, is fighting for his political life, Guan Eng is under attack from PKR MPs in Penang and elsewhere for alleged arrogance, ignoring political allies and running Penang as his personal fiefdom.
Former PKR state chief Datuk Seri Zahrain Hashim opened the floodgates, famously calling Guan Eng “a dictator, a chauvinist and a communist-minded leader”, and unfit to lead the state.
Zahrain was joined by Nibong Tebal MP Tan Tee Beng, who comes from solid Gerakan stock and joined PKR in 2008.
Tan alleged that Guan Eng does not share decision-making, does not consult others, including DAP leaders, and has “no class”, whatever that means.
A third PKR MP, Noordin Zulkifli, then entered the fray, lending support to what the other two MPs said.
The DAP, on its part, sees the vitriolic attacks as part of a wider plot to dethrone Guan Eng, break up the Pakatan coalition and possibly recapture Penang.
Personally, Guan Eng, the prime target of the criticism, has not opened up against his allies.
His response is muted and confined to dismissing the accusations as false and painting the critics as “frustrated” people who, while with PKR, had their hearts more with Umno.
The PKR has referred the three MPs to the party’s disciplinary committee but there is no nerve among the leadership — all focused on the sodomy danger to the chief — to court more problem by decisively acting against the them.
As a result, reconciliation seems impossible after such an open breach of Pakatan discipline and failure to maintain etiquette between allies and partners.
“It is quite obvious all three are prepared to burn their bridges with the PKR and Pakatan Rakyat,” said a DAP leader.
“There is no more reconciliation with them … absolutely zero!
“Our party members will not allow it … They will rebel if we embrace them again, not after what they have said and done,” the leader said.
The core of the criticism is Guan Eng’s ability to run a complex and economically developed state like Penang, and his alleged domineering style and unwillingness to share power with allies.
Guan Eng brings a lot of experience to his job but unfortunately, much of it is as a committed opposition rabble-rouser who was suddenly alleviated to high power, not because of anything he achieved but because of what Barisan Nasional did or did not do.
The euphoria of sudden and unexpected victory has easily covered the scars - personal and party as well.
The public also saw the unexpected winners as heroes and were forgiving and ready to overlook the warts.
Power and high office did not sit comfortably on some of the new leaders that the 2008 political tsunami threw up.
For all his dedication and single-minded pursuit of his CAT (competency, accountability and transparency) principles in administration, Guan Eng lacks the warmth and humanism of the elder Lim (Kit Siang) and others like Dr Chen Man Hin enjoy, both in the party and society.
The Kampung Buah Pala crisis was also an example of the lack of humanism.
While Lim and Dr Chen are loved, Guan Eng is feared, DAP insiders say.
“Guan Eng is a coldly efficient leader,” they said.
“He takes great pride in logic, rationalism and being correct and accurate all the time. Once his mind is made up, it is unshakable.
“He brings cold mathematics to politics,” said a former DAP leader.
“The heart, warmth and humanism are all lacking. That’s why he is feared, because he is too efficient.”
Guan Eng, an accountant and former bank executive, started his political career under pressure. He had an illustrious father in the elder Lim to match up to.
He was only 26 when he was elected Kota Melaka MP, defeating the nationally famous football captain Soh Chin Aun with a huge majority of 17,606 votes.
Ops Lalang saw him detained under the Internal Security Act (ISA) for 18 months from October 1987.
In 1990 and 1995, he was easily returned as Kota Melaka MP but could not shake off his “cold fish” image.
Charged under the Sedition Act the same year, he was jailed for 18 months for criticising the handling of a statutory rape charge against a former chief minister.
The rigours of the Kajang Prison were a far cry from ISA detention.
“He was tough, hard and focused, and he survived,” a former inmate who befriended Guan Eng in jail said. “He did not break.”
Released 12 months later, a bitter Guan Eng had to sit out the 1999 and 2004 general elections because of the five-year bar against convicted persons from contesting.
He made a sterling comeback back in 2008, winning the Bagan parliamentary seat and Air Putih state seat, and made history by being made Pakatan’s Chief Minister for Penang.
The problem is, a DAP insider said, he sees himself as the DAP Chief Minister and not the Pakatan.
“He has also set a very high standard for himself, his party colleagues and allies.”
It is a level of commitment that many allies and colleagues are either unable or unwilling to match.
Saturday, 6 February 2010
7 Gadgets That Changed the World
7 Gadgets That Changed the World
By Stephanie Pappas, TechNewsDaily Contributor
Companies like to call their new gadgets revolutionary. Amazon did it when it introduced its Kindle e-book reader in 2007, and Apple CEO Steve Jobs used the word often last week while unveiling his company's new iPad – a tablet computer that also doubles as an e-reader. Jobs even threw in a "magical" here and there when describing the device.
Corporations aren't the only ones predicting that the digitization of books will bring great change. Take author and journalist Steven Johnson, who's Kindle moved him to envision a paperless future:
"I knew then that the book's migration to the digital realm would not be a simple matter of trading ink for pixels, but would likely change the way we read, write and sell books in profound ways," Johnson wrote in The Wall Street Journal in April 2009. "It will make it easier for us to buy books, but at the same time make it easier to stop reading them. It will expand the universe of books at our fingertips, and transform the solitary act of reading into something far more social. It will give writers and publishers the chance to sell more obscure books, but it may well end up undermining some of the core attributes that we have associated with book reading for more than 500 years."
Only time will tell if these devices will live up to the hype, but throughout history, the truly revolutionary innovations are those that so fundamentally changed how we work and play that it's hard to imagine modern life without them.
With all due respect to many other game-changing inventions and technologies, here are seven gadgets dating back to the 15th Century that sent transformative ripples throughout society and whose legacies still make waves today.
7. The Printing Press
The original game-changing gadget was too big to fit in your pocket, but it revolutionized literacy all the same. Around 1450, German goldsmith Johannes Gutenburg transformed printing with his press, a table-sized machine modeled after the wine presses of the day. The invention used thousands of movable metal letters to quickly and cheaply copy text. Gutenburg's press took the spread of ideas out of the hands of elites and paved the way for the Protestant Reformation and the Enlightenment.
6. The point-and-shoot camera
George Eastman brought photography to the masses in 1888 with the Kodak camera. For the first time, the average person could freeze reality in images, which became worth, well, a thousand words. With the advent of digital cameras 100 years later, photography became even more ubiquitous. Now almost every cell phone comes equipped with a camera, and low-cost digital recorders like the Flip camera are democratizing video as well.
5. Radio
When Guglielmo Marconi patented his radiotelegraph system in 1901, he envisioned it as a way for ships to wirelessly communicate with one another. But by the 1920s, regular broadcasts of music and news exploded, ushering in a new era of mass media. From baby monitors to military radar, radio is now firmly entrenched in everyday life. The ability to harness radio waves eventually made possible all forms of wireless networking, from cell phones to Wi-Fi.
4. TV
Barely 20 years after radio shook the entertainment landscape, broadcast television sent out another temblor in the 1930s and 1940s. Television changed everything from the way people got their news to how advertising was done.
Despite being blamed for everything from our sedentary lifestyles to societal violence, TV isn't going anywhere, and in fact an incredible number of waking ours are spent in front of the boob tube. Last year, a Nielson report estimated that Americans watch more than 5 hours a day, on average. The Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) recently estimated that, recession be danged, ownership of high-definition TVs in U.S. households has doubled in the past two years.
3. The PC
Once upon a time, computers were room-sized behemoths well outside the price range of the average Joe. Home computers were available in the 1970s, but the market only really took off in 1981 with IBM's PC, which cost less than $1,600.
Since then, PCs have of course become smaller and more powerful, and they have paved the way for laptops, netbooks, smartbooks, smartphones and other mobile computing. Oh, and they made the Internet possible. By 2007, 75 percent of U.S. households had a broadband connection, and more than 230 million PCs were in use nationwide.
2. Smartphones
Continuing the trend toward smaller and mobile, smartphones enable users to surf the Web, send email and run applications, or "apps," from their phones. As with the PC, IBM took the lead on the world's first smartphone, introducing the "Simon" in 1993. Weighing in at more than a pound, the Simon offered a touch-screen keyboard, email and fax capabilities, and functions like a calendar and address book. It cost $900.
Smart phones got smaller and cheaper throughout the '90s, and the first decade of the 21st century saw Treos, Blackberries and iPhones becoming household names. Whether it's text messaging, social networking or Googling the answers at Trivia Night, constant connectedness is a given in the era of the smartphone. The Pew Internet & American Life Project estimates that on any typical day, nearly one-fifth of Americans use the Internet on a mobile device such as a smartphone or laptop.
All that convenience may make traditional cellular phones a thing of the past: According to Pyramid Research, by 2014, 60 percent of new handsets sold in the U.S. will be smartphones.
1. E-readers
As a relative newcomer, e-readers have huge potential to change the way we consume media, Dan Schechter, vice president for media and entertainment at L.E.K. consulting, told TechNewsDaily.
A recent L.E.K. study found that almost half of people who bought e-readers reported reading more newspapers, books and magazines than they otherwise would have. E-readers also offer the chance to make reading more interactive. Imagine a fashion magazine with embedded links to the designers' Web sites, or a scheme that would offer discounted e-books for readers who didn't mind seeing advertisements in the margins.
And while it remains to be seen whether Apple's new iPad will usher in a new era of tablet computing, the device has already had an effect on the e-book market, as seen in last week's e-book price dispute between Amazon and publisher Macmillan. Allowing publishers freedom to set prices could mean that the iPad (and other e-reading gadgets) won't hurt the publishing industry the way the iPod damaged the music industry.
While only about 10 percent of people currently use e-readers, the gadgets are "taking off," L.E.K.'s Schechter said. The tech analyst firm Forrester Research expects 10 million of the devices will be sold by the end of 2010.
"These are still first generation products and you're already seeing vast increases in reading," Schechter said. "It's pretty exciting stuff, and they're selling like hotcakes."
* 10 Profound Innovations Ahead
* iPads Could Encourage Bad Posture, Experts Say
* E-Book Wars: Other Publishers Likely to Raise Prices
By Stephanie Pappas, TechNewsDaily Contributor
Companies like to call their new gadgets revolutionary. Amazon did it when it introduced its Kindle e-book reader in 2007, and Apple CEO Steve Jobs used the word often last week while unveiling his company's new iPad – a tablet computer that also doubles as an e-reader. Jobs even threw in a "magical" here and there when describing the device.
Corporations aren't the only ones predicting that the digitization of books will bring great change. Take author and journalist Steven Johnson, who's Kindle moved him to envision a paperless future:
"I knew then that the book's migration to the digital realm would not be a simple matter of trading ink for pixels, but would likely change the way we read, write and sell books in profound ways," Johnson wrote in The Wall Street Journal in April 2009. "It will make it easier for us to buy books, but at the same time make it easier to stop reading them. It will expand the universe of books at our fingertips, and transform the solitary act of reading into something far more social. It will give writers and publishers the chance to sell more obscure books, but it may well end up undermining some of the core attributes that we have associated with book reading for more than 500 years."
Only time will tell if these devices will live up to the hype, but throughout history, the truly revolutionary innovations are those that so fundamentally changed how we work and play that it's hard to imagine modern life without them.
With all due respect to many other game-changing inventions and technologies, here are seven gadgets dating back to the 15th Century that sent transformative ripples throughout society and whose legacies still make waves today.
7. The Printing Press
The original game-changing gadget was too big to fit in your pocket, but it revolutionized literacy all the same. Around 1450, German goldsmith Johannes Gutenburg transformed printing with his press, a table-sized machine modeled after the wine presses of the day. The invention used thousands of movable metal letters to quickly and cheaply copy text. Gutenburg's press took the spread of ideas out of the hands of elites and paved the way for the Protestant Reformation and the Enlightenment.
6. The point-and-shoot camera
George Eastman brought photography to the masses in 1888 with the Kodak camera. For the first time, the average person could freeze reality in images, which became worth, well, a thousand words. With the advent of digital cameras 100 years later, photography became even more ubiquitous. Now almost every cell phone comes equipped with a camera, and low-cost digital recorders like the Flip camera are democratizing video as well.
5. Radio
When Guglielmo Marconi patented his radiotelegraph system in 1901, he envisioned it as a way for ships to wirelessly communicate with one another. But by the 1920s, regular broadcasts of music and news exploded, ushering in a new era of mass media. From baby monitors to military radar, radio is now firmly entrenched in everyday life. The ability to harness radio waves eventually made possible all forms of wireless networking, from cell phones to Wi-Fi.
4. TV
Barely 20 years after radio shook the entertainment landscape, broadcast television sent out another temblor in the 1930s and 1940s. Television changed everything from the way people got their news to how advertising was done.
Despite being blamed for everything from our sedentary lifestyles to societal violence, TV isn't going anywhere, and in fact an incredible number of waking ours are spent in front of the boob tube. Last year, a Nielson report estimated that Americans watch more than 5 hours a day, on average. The Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) recently estimated that, recession be danged, ownership of high-definition TVs in U.S. households has doubled in the past two years.
3. The PC
Once upon a time, computers were room-sized behemoths well outside the price range of the average Joe. Home computers were available in the 1970s, but the market only really took off in 1981 with IBM's PC, which cost less than $1,600.
Since then, PCs have of course become smaller and more powerful, and they have paved the way for laptops, netbooks, smartbooks, smartphones and other mobile computing. Oh, and they made the Internet possible. By 2007, 75 percent of U.S. households had a broadband connection, and more than 230 million PCs were in use nationwide.
2. Smartphones
Continuing the trend toward smaller and mobile, smartphones enable users to surf the Web, send email and run applications, or "apps," from their phones. As with the PC, IBM took the lead on the world's first smartphone, introducing the "Simon" in 1993. Weighing in at more than a pound, the Simon offered a touch-screen keyboard, email and fax capabilities, and functions like a calendar and address book. It cost $900.
Smart phones got smaller and cheaper throughout the '90s, and the first decade of the 21st century saw Treos, Blackberries and iPhones becoming household names. Whether it's text messaging, social networking or Googling the answers at Trivia Night, constant connectedness is a given in the era of the smartphone. The Pew Internet & American Life Project estimates that on any typical day, nearly one-fifth of Americans use the Internet on a mobile device such as a smartphone or laptop.
All that convenience may make traditional cellular phones a thing of the past: According to Pyramid Research, by 2014, 60 percent of new handsets sold in the U.S. will be smartphones.
1. E-readers
As a relative newcomer, e-readers have huge potential to change the way we consume media, Dan Schechter, vice president for media and entertainment at L.E.K. consulting, told TechNewsDaily.
A recent L.E.K. study found that almost half of people who bought e-readers reported reading more newspapers, books and magazines than they otherwise would have. E-readers also offer the chance to make reading more interactive. Imagine a fashion magazine with embedded links to the designers' Web sites, or a scheme that would offer discounted e-books for readers who didn't mind seeing advertisements in the margins.
And while it remains to be seen whether Apple's new iPad will usher in a new era of tablet computing, the device has already had an effect on the e-book market, as seen in last week's e-book price dispute between Amazon and publisher Macmillan. Allowing publishers freedom to set prices could mean that the iPad (and other e-reading gadgets) won't hurt the publishing industry the way the iPod damaged the music industry.
While only about 10 percent of people currently use e-readers, the gadgets are "taking off," L.E.K.'s Schechter said. The tech analyst firm Forrester Research expects 10 million of the devices will be sold by the end of 2010.
"These are still first generation products and you're already seeing vast increases in reading," Schechter said. "It's pretty exciting stuff, and they're selling like hotcakes."
* 10 Profound Innovations Ahead
* iPads Could Encourage Bad Posture, Experts Say
* E-Book Wars: Other Publishers Likely to Raise Prices
Friday, 5 February 2010
Loopholes Allow Tainted Money Into U.S., Report Says
Real estate agents, escrow agents, lawyers, attorneys and others are involved in scandal
Feb. 4 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. lawyers, real estate and escrow agents and other professionals are enabling the flow of tens of millions of tainted dollars into the country due to loopholes in anti-money laundering laws, a Senate report says.
In one case, the son of Equatorial Guinea’s president relied on lawyers, shell companies, bankers and real estate agents to help move more than $110 million in “suspect funds” into the U.S., the report said. The money was used to buy a $30 million home in Malibu, California, and a $38.5 million Gulfstream jet, the report said.
“With the help of U.S. lawyers, real estate and escrow agents, lobbyists and others, politically powerful foreign officials, and those close to them, have found ways to use the U.S. financial system to protect and enhance their ill-gotten gains,” Senator Carl Levin, a Michigan Democrat and chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, said at a hearing today.
“While U.S. financial institutions have become more vigilant and built stronger barriers to keep out suspect funds, their anti-money-laundering safeguards still have holes,” he said.
The first three witnesses at the hearing, two lawyers and a lobbyist, invoked their constitutional right against self- incrimination and declined to answer questions from Levin.
Circumventing Laws
The subcommittee’s investigation examined how some powerful foreign politicians, their family members and associates may be circumventing U.S. laws and safeguards to bring money into the U.S. financial system that may be the product of corruption.
The report said financial institutions generally have become more vigilant since the 2001 Patriot Act required more scrutiny of such private banking accounts.
Still, the 325-page report cited a series of lapses by banks. For example, an HSBC Holdings Plc bank in New York gave an Angolan bank, Banco Africano de Investimentos, “ready access to the U.S. financial system” despite the latter institution’s ties to corrupt oil and diamond industries, the report said.
HSBC Bank USA’s director of anti-money laundering compliance, Wiecher H. Mandemaker, testified today that the bank’s “broader practices today exceed even the more robust post-Sept. 11 federal regulations in a number of important respects.”
Source of Funds
Politically powerful people and their associates in other countries are able to bring into the U.S. millions of dollars without having to provide information on the source of the funds because of lax controls in other professions, the report said.
“Real estate agents, escrow agents, attorneys and others do not have the legal obligation the way banks do at the moment to take action to prevent their participation in suspect transactions,” Levin said at a briefing with reporters on Feb. 2.
Levin said today that as the U.S. leads efforts to stop the flow of illegal money into places such as Iraq and Afghanistan, it must do a better job of halting the movement of suspect funds into the U.S.
Among the report’s recommendations are that Congress enact a law and the U.S Treasury issue rules that would strengthen bank screening of politically powerful foreign clients.
The report called on the Treasury to repeal a 2002 exemption given to real estate and escrow agents for anti-money- laundering programs under the Patriot Act, which gave law enforcement greater latitude to investigate terrorism.
Names of Owners
Congress also should pass a law that requires people forming U.S. corporations to disclose the names of the beneficial owners, the report said. Professional groups such as the American Bar Association and National Association of Realtors should issue guidelines involving acceptance of funds from potentially suspect foreign sources, it said.
The report centered on examples from four oil-producing African nations that have been cited for corruption by organizations such as the U.S. State Department and Transparency International, a global group working against corruption.
Aside from Equatorial Guinea, they are Angola, Gabon and Nigeria.
In the case of Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, the son of the president of Equatorial Guinea, the report said two lawyers helped him bypass anti-money-laundering laws by allowing him to use shell company accounts as conduits for his funds without telling U.S. bankers that Obiang was using the accounts.
‘Set Up Another’
“If a bank later uncovered Mr. Obiang’s use of an account and closed it, the lawyers helped him set up another,” it said.
Many of the professionals in the Obiang case were under no legal obligation to take anti-money-laundering precautions, the report said.
Attorneys Michael Jay Berger and George I. Nagler, both of Beverly Hills, California, invoked their constitutional right against self-incrimination and declined to testify today.
The report said Nagler worked with a colleague in the insurance industry to provide insurance coverage for Obiang’s 32 motorcycles and cars, which included seven Ferraris, five Bentleys, four Rolls-Royces and two Lamborghinis.
The report cited a 2007 U.S. Justice Department memorandum that said it was “investigating suspected criminal conduct” of Obiang, who is the minister of agriculture and forests.
Obiang hasn’t been criminally charged. The subcommittee investigators couldn’t confirm the investigation, the report said. A lawyer for Obiang didn’t return phone calls seeking comment.
Lobbyist Cites Rights
Another witness, Jeffrey C. Birrell, a lobbyist with the Grace Group in McLean, Virginia, also invoked his constitutional right against self-incrimination today.
The report said Birrell was hired by the late president of Gabon, Omar Bongo, to help buy six U.S.-built armored vehicles and get government permission to buy six C-130 military cargo aircraft from Saudi Arabia. The aircraft sale never occurred.
Birrell’s attorney, Ian Pitz of Madison, Wisconsin, said in an interview yesterday that the transactions were “undertaken with complete transparency and with required approval from the United States government.”
“We’re not aware of any wrongdoing by any party related to those transactions,” he said.
To contact the reporters on this story: Catherine Dodge in Washington at cdodge1@bloomberg.net; David Voreacos in Newark, New Jersey, at dvoreacos@bloomberg.net.
Feb. 4 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. lawyers, real estate and escrow agents and other professionals are enabling the flow of tens of millions of tainted dollars into the country due to loopholes in anti-money laundering laws, a Senate report says.
In one case, the son of Equatorial Guinea’s president relied on lawyers, shell companies, bankers and real estate agents to help move more than $110 million in “suspect funds” into the U.S., the report said. The money was used to buy a $30 million home in Malibu, California, and a $38.5 million Gulfstream jet, the report said.
“With the help of U.S. lawyers, real estate and escrow agents, lobbyists and others, politically powerful foreign officials, and those close to them, have found ways to use the U.S. financial system to protect and enhance their ill-gotten gains,” Senator Carl Levin, a Michigan Democrat and chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, said at a hearing today.
“While U.S. financial institutions have become more vigilant and built stronger barriers to keep out suspect funds, their anti-money-laundering safeguards still have holes,” he said.
The first three witnesses at the hearing, two lawyers and a lobbyist, invoked their constitutional right against self- incrimination and declined to answer questions from Levin.
Circumventing Laws
The subcommittee’s investigation examined how some powerful foreign politicians, their family members and associates may be circumventing U.S. laws and safeguards to bring money into the U.S. financial system that may be the product of corruption.
The report said financial institutions generally have become more vigilant since the 2001 Patriot Act required more scrutiny of such private banking accounts.
Still, the 325-page report cited a series of lapses by banks. For example, an HSBC Holdings Plc bank in New York gave an Angolan bank, Banco Africano de Investimentos, “ready access to the U.S. financial system” despite the latter institution’s ties to corrupt oil and diamond industries, the report said.
HSBC Bank USA’s director of anti-money laundering compliance, Wiecher H. Mandemaker, testified today that the bank’s “broader practices today exceed even the more robust post-Sept. 11 federal regulations in a number of important respects.”
Source of Funds
Politically powerful people and their associates in other countries are able to bring into the U.S. millions of dollars without having to provide information on the source of the funds because of lax controls in other professions, the report said.
“Real estate agents, escrow agents, attorneys and others do not have the legal obligation the way banks do at the moment to take action to prevent their participation in suspect transactions,” Levin said at a briefing with reporters on Feb. 2.
Levin said today that as the U.S. leads efforts to stop the flow of illegal money into places such as Iraq and Afghanistan, it must do a better job of halting the movement of suspect funds into the U.S.
Among the report’s recommendations are that Congress enact a law and the U.S Treasury issue rules that would strengthen bank screening of politically powerful foreign clients.
The report called on the Treasury to repeal a 2002 exemption given to real estate and escrow agents for anti-money- laundering programs under the Patriot Act, which gave law enforcement greater latitude to investigate terrorism.
Names of Owners
Congress also should pass a law that requires people forming U.S. corporations to disclose the names of the beneficial owners, the report said. Professional groups such as the American Bar Association and National Association of Realtors should issue guidelines involving acceptance of funds from potentially suspect foreign sources, it said.
The report centered on examples from four oil-producing African nations that have been cited for corruption by organizations such as the U.S. State Department and Transparency International, a global group working against corruption.
Aside from Equatorial Guinea, they are Angola, Gabon and Nigeria.
In the case of Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, the son of the president of Equatorial Guinea, the report said two lawyers helped him bypass anti-money-laundering laws by allowing him to use shell company accounts as conduits for his funds without telling U.S. bankers that Obiang was using the accounts.
‘Set Up Another’
“If a bank later uncovered Mr. Obiang’s use of an account and closed it, the lawyers helped him set up another,” it said.
Many of the professionals in the Obiang case were under no legal obligation to take anti-money-laundering precautions, the report said.
Attorneys Michael Jay Berger and George I. Nagler, both of Beverly Hills, California, invoked their constitutional right against self-incrimination and declined to testify today.
The report said Nagler worked with a colleague in the insurance industry to provide insurance coverage for Obiang’s 32 motorcycles and cars, which included seven Ferraris, five Bentleys, four Rolls-Royces and two Lamborghinis.
The report cited a 2007 U.S. Justice Department memorandum that said it was “investigating suspected criminal conduct” of Obiang, who is the minister of agriculture and forests.
Obiang hasn’t been criminally charged. The subcommittee investigators couldn’t confirm the investigation, the report said. A lawyer for Obiang didn’t return phone calls seeking comment.
Lobbyist Cites Rights
Another witness, Jeffrey C. Birrell, a lobbyist with the Grace Group in McLean, Virginia, also invoked his constitutional right against self-incrimination today.
The report said Birrell was hired by the late president of Gabon, Omar Bongo, to help buy six U.S.-built armored vehicles and get government permission to buy six C-130 military cargo aircraft from Saudi Arabia. The aircraft sale never occurred.
Birrell’s attorney, Ian Pitz of Madison, Wisconsin, said in an interview yesterday that the transactions were “undertaken with complete transparency and with required approval from the United States government.”
“We’re not aware of any wrongdoing by any party related to those transactions,” he said.
To contact the reporters on this story: Catherine Dodge in Washington at cdodge1@bloomberg.net; David Voreacos in Newark, New Jersey, at dvoreacos@bloomberg.net.
Thursday, 4 February 2010
Apple Takes On Intel
Apple Takes On Intel
Lee Gomes, 02.04.10, 06:00 AM EST
Why chipmakers might not be necessary anymore.
BURLINGAME, CALIF. -- Besides Apple's stock prices and Steve Jobs' reputation for visionary entrepreneurship, something else is riding on the success or failure of the new iPad: The future of the semiconductor industry.
The chip inside the new iPad is a microprocessor called the A4 that was designed in-house by Apple ( AAPL - news - people ), most likely using the expertise it acquired via its 2008 acquisition of PA Semi, a Silicon Valley start-up. Selection of the A4 was described as a blow to both Intel ( INTC - news - people ) and Qualcomm ( QCOM - news - people ), since products from those companies were spurned in the process.
It certainly was that, but it also suggested that semiconductor technology has matured to the point where for many applications, the Intels of the world might not be necessary anymore.
Everyone knows about Moore's Law, which describes the tendency for electronics to regularly double in capacity with no accompanying change in price. What is often forgotten is that Moore's Law isn't some force of nature like gravity, one that occurs independent of human intervention. To the contrary, it is an extraordinarily expensive process, requiring billions of dollars a year in R&D. Spend the money and your chips can keep packing in the extra circuits. Skimp, and they stop improving.
Intel has skillfully taken advantage of this dynamic over the last 20-odd years. It had a dominant position in Pentium-style processors, one that made it billions in profits, which it alone was able to invest to design and manufacture the next generation of even-better products. Advanced Micro Devices ( AMD - news - people ) proved to be a valiant rival to Intel, but it was an expensive fight for AMD. And the fact that Intel has a market cap nearly 20 times that of AMD suggests that investors are unsure if the smaller chipmaker has the staying power to keep at it.
One of the fundamental rules of technology is that things that start out hard and complicated, able to be tackled by only a few people, eventually get easier to do, allowing more people to handle them. Dell ( DELL - news - people ) grew enormously during the 1990s because it figured out the complex art and science involved in running an efficient PC manufacturing process. Once it cracked the code, though, others were able to do the same thing.
Reader Comments
Surely you're not suggesting that Apple has designed its own completely new CPU from scratch? This makes no sense at all! The time and resources required would be considerable. The fact that the i
Currently, only mammoth companies like Google ( GOOG - news - people ) and Microsoft ( MSFT - news - people ) know how to run big data centers. But that knowledge, too, will one day cease being a black art known only to a few and instead emerge as a straightforward bit of engineering that anyone can master.
It's clear that this "democratization" process is occurring right now in semiconductor design. The iPad is a relatively high-end device, yet Apple believed it didn't need to look outside its own walls for a CPU, and thus could forgo paying any form of "Intel tax." By contrast, the iPhones and iPods tend to use a chip called ARM that Apple, like many other ARM customers, need to license.
Of course, Apple is a very big company and, especially for the sort of high-volume product it hopes the iPad to be, it can afford the sorts of up-front engineering expenses that would make smaller companies reel. But if it can afford to make an in-house chip good enough for the iPad in 2010, might it not also be able to make one good enough for the Macintosh in 2013? And if it can do so by then, why couldn't Hewlett-Packard ( HPQ - news - people ) and Dell also?
To be sure, a walk through recent tech history involved stepping over the cadavers of any number of would-be Intel competitors. They might have been simply ahead of their time. Making chips seems to be getting easy enough that a company best known for marketing and branding is able to take it on.
To read more of Lee Gomes' stories, click here. Contact the writer at lgomes@forbes.com.
Lee Gomes, 02.04.10, 06:00 AM EST
Why chipmakers might not be necessary anymore.
BURLINGAME, CALIF. -- Besides Apple's stock prices and Steve Jobs' reputation for visionary entrepreneurship, something else is riding on the success or failure of the new iPad: The future of the semiconductor industry.
The chip inside the new iPad is a microprocessor called the A4 that was designed in-house by Apple ( AAPL - news - people ), most likely using the expertise it acquired via its 2008 acquisition of PA Semi, a Silicon Valley start-up. Selection of the A4 was described as a blow to both Intel ( INTC - news - people ) and Qualcomm ( QCOM - news - people ), since products from those companies were spurned in the process.
It certainly was that, but it also suggested that semiconductor technology has matured to the point where for many applications, the Intels of the world might not be necessary anymore.
Everyone knows about Moore's Law, which describes the tendency for electronics to regularly double in capacity with no accompanying change in price. What is often forgotten is that Moore's Law isn't some force of nature like gravity, one that occurs independent of human intervention. To the contrary, it is an extraordinarily expensive process, requiring billions of dollars a year in R&D. Spend the money and your chips can keep packing in the extra circuits. Skimp, and they stop improving.
Intel has skillfully taken advantage of this dynamic over the last 20-odd years. It had a dominant position in Pentium-style processors, one that made it billions in profits, which it alone was able to invest to design and manufacture the next generation of even-better products. Advanced Micro Devices ( AMD - news - people ) proved to be a valiant rival to Intel, but it was an expensive fight for AMD. And the fact that Intel has a market cap nearly 20 times that of AMD suggests that investors are unsure if the smaller chipmaker has the staying power to keep at it.
One of the fundamental rules of technology is that things that start out hard and complicated, able to be tackled by only a few people, eventually get easier to do, allowing more people to handle them. Dell ( DELL - news - people ) grew enormously during the 1990s because it figured out the complex art and science involved in running an efficient PC manufacturing process. Once it cracked the code, though, others were able to do the same thing.
Reader Comments
Surely you're not suggesting that Apple has designed its own completely new CPU from scratch? This makes no sense at all! The time and resources required would be considerable. The fact that the i
Currently, only mammoth companies like Google ( GOOG - news - people ) and Microsoft ( MSFT - news - people ) know how to run big data centers. But that knowledge, too, will one day cease being a black art known only to a few and instead emerge as a straightforward bit of engineering that anyone can master.
It's clear that this "democratization" process is occurring right now in semiconductor design. The iPad is a relatively high-end device, yet Apple believed it didn't need to look outside its own walls for a CPU, and thus could forgo paying any form of "Intel tax." By contrast, the iPhones and iPods tend to use a chip called ARM that Apple, like many other ARM customers, need to license.
Of course, Apple is a very big company and, especially for the sort of high-volume product it hopes the iPad to be, it can afford the sorts of up-front engineering expenses that would make smaller companies reel. But if it can afford to make an in-house chip good enough for the iPad in 2010, might it not also be able to make one good enough for the Macintosh in 2013? And if it can do so by then, why couldn't Hewlett-Packard ( HPQ - news - people ) and Dell also?
To be sure, a walk through recent tech history involved stepping over the cadavers of any number of would-be Intel competitors. They might have been simply ahead of their time. Making chips seems to be getting easy enough that a company best known for marketing and branding is able to take it on.
To read more of Lee Gomes' stories, click here. Contact the writer at lgomes@forbes.com.
USAINS allocates RM10mil to centre of excellence
USAINS allocates RM10mil to centre of excellence
By DAVID TAN
GEORGE TOWN: USAINS Holdings Sdn Bhd is allocating RM10mil to acquire equipment, software, and machinery for its Centre of Excellence for Electrical & Electronics (COE-E&E) over the next two years.
Dr Gan Ee Kiang (left) receiving the end user licence from Adrian Ng Siong Teck.Gan spoke after receiving the end user licence for the electronic design automation (EDA) software from Synopsys (Singapore) Pte Ltd senior executive account manager Adrian Ng Siong Teck.
USAINS had utilised a portion of the RM10mil from North Corridor Implementation Authority (NCIA) to purchase the Synopsys EDA software, Gan added.
”We are now involved in doing designing work outsourced to us by five Penang-based multinational corporations (MNCs).
”We hope to get three more MNCs here to outsource their chip designing work to us.
”Our work for MNCs generates some 70% of the centre’s revenue.
”We will also be going for jobs from small and medium enterprises in the electronics industry,” he said.
Gan said that for the 2010 financial year, COE-E&E was targeting to generate RM1.5mil in profit on the back of RM3mil in revenue.
”The centre will also be launching its master of science programme, in collaboration with Universiti Sains Malaysia’s school of electrical and electronic engineering soon, in micro-electronics soon at USM.
”In 2011, we will be producing the first batch of graduates,” he added.
Penang WiFi hotspots ‘sabotaged, vandalised’
Penang WiFi hotspots ‘sabotaged, vandalised’
We will no longer reveal their locations, says Ooi
BY MANJIT KAUR
THE exact location of the WiFi hotspots will no longer be revealed publicly as there have been cases of vandalism where people have cut off the supply.
Jeff Ooi, the chairman of the state-appointed special task force to handle telecommunications infrastructure issues, said this was rampant especially in George Town, but did not provide figures.
One of the ways to overcome the problem, he said, was to fix WiFi hotspots at 24-hour restaurants so that restaurant owners could keep a watch over them.
“We will also not give details on the locations to avoid further sabotage and vandalism,” he said but did not provide the number of cases.
Speaking at a press conference to update the media on theWireless@Penang project and telecommunications infrastructure in Komtar yesterday, he however said that “as at end-December, there were 355 hotspots and we hope to reach the target of 750 hotspots by end of the year”.
Ooi said there was also network congestion due to peer-to-peer (P2P) download at the WiFi hotspots.
He said there were over 20,000 subscribers who were “maximising” the 355 hotspots.
“To avoid excessive download problems, we are looking at implementing auto-log off every 15 minutes,” he added.
On telecommunications towers, he said there were 849 rooftop and free-standing structures in the state.
“Those that don’t appear on the master list will be demolished, while those on the list must comply with the rationalisation process by the June 30 deadline,” he said.
He said out of the 849 structures, 285 had been approved.
On structures placed at several drains by PenangFon to offer faster connectivity using Fiber optic broadband connection unlike the conventional copper cable, Ooi said the management was adamant that the concept was approved by the previous state government and that the strategy was being used worldwide.
“We have complaints that the drains get clogged and rubbish get stuck in the fibres.
“We want to make Penang a world-class city, and using fibre optic in drains is not the right way. We are giving them time to comply with the guidelines, otherwise we cut off their lines,” he said.
PenangFon chief executive officer Robin Wong, when contacted, said the company was willing to cooperate with the state government and other agencies.
“If anyone googles and search for fibre optic, you will see that the strategy to place the structures in drains is widely used.
“Fibre is not hazardous, and the method has been used in many developed countries for better broadband service,” he added.
Jeff Ooi, the chairman of the state-appointed special task force to handle telecommunications infrastructure issues, said this was rampant especially in George Town, but did not provide figures.
One of the ways to overcome the problem, he said, was to fix WiFi hotspots at 24-hour restaurants so that restaurant owners could keep a watch over them.
“We will also not give details on the locations to avoid further sabotage and vandalism,” he said but did not provide the number of cases.
Speaking at a press conference to update the media on theWireless@Penang project and telecommunications infrastructure in Komtar yesterday, he however said that “as at end-December, there were 355 hotspots and we hope to reach the target of 750 hotspots by end of the year”.
Ooi said there was also network congestion due to peer-to-peer (P2P) download at the WiFi hotspots.
He said there were over 20,000 subscribers who were “maximising” the 355 hotspots.
“To avoid excessive download problems, we are looking at implementing auto-log off every 15 minutes,” he added.
On telecommunications towers, he said there were 849 rooftop and free-standing structures in the state.
“Those that don’t appear on the master list will be demolished, while those on the list must comply with the rationalisation process by the June 30 deadline,” he said.
He said out of the 849 structures, 285 had been approved.
On structures placed at several drains by PenangFon to offer faster connectivity using Fiber optic broadband connection unlike the conventional copper cable, Ooi said the management was adamant that the concept was approved by the previous state government and that the strategy was being used worldwide.
“We have complaints that the drains get clogged and rubbish get stuck in the fibres.
“We want to make Penang a world-class city, and using fibre optic in drains is not the right way. We are giving them time to comply with the guidelines, otherwise we cut off their lines,” he said.
PenangFon chief executive officer Robin Wong, when contacted, said the company was willing to cooperate with the state government and other agencies.
“If anyone googles and search for fibre optic, you will see that the strategy to place the structures in drains is widely used.
“Fibre is not hazardous, and the method has been used in many developed countries for better broadband service,” he added.
Huawei E5 3G modem and Wi-Fi hotspot Better known as the 3 MiFi
Huawei E5 3G modem and Wi-Fi hotspot
Better known as the 3 MiFi
4th February 2010 08:02 GMT
Huawei E5 / 3 MiFi
A 3G dongle you don't need to connect by cable. And handy if you want to share your 3G connection among multiple devices.- Suggested Price:
- £180 (Sim free) £0-50 (Contract)
- More info:
- Huawei's E5 page 3's MiFi page
Rating
Review Huawei's E5 is one of a growing line of compact, standalone HSDPA 3G modems that double-up as impromptu Wi-Fi hotspots. You may have heard of it as 3's MiFi.
Rather than hook the E5 up to a single device - your laptop, typically - the built-in access point means you can share its 3G link among all your gadgets: phones, tablets and so on. That said, the E5 can also connect directly to a computer and operate as a typical 3G dongle.
Huawei's E5: no bigger than an old-style 3G dongle, but with a Wi-Fi router on board
Don't have any other Wi-Fi devices? Then just treat the E5 as a dongle you don't need to plug in. Or even take out of your bag.
The Wi-Fi support is limited to 802.11b/g, but then most small mobile devices don't have 802.11n either, so this is perhaps no great loss. The E5's 3G radio operates in both the 900MHz and 2100MHz UMTS bands, and it has quad-band GSM/GPRS/Edge support too should find yourself too far from a 3G basestation.
When you are in range, the device will support upload speeds to 5.76Mb/s and download speeds of up to 7.2Mb/s. These are theoretical maxima, so you won't get them in the real world, even if the network you're using supports them.
And, of course, you don't mind paying inflated data-roaming rates when you're traveling beyond your national borders.
USB or battery powered
The E5 is powered by its own, removable lithium-ion battery, charged over USB. A computer's USB port will do, as will any suitable AC adaptor, though you don't get one in the box, just a short cable.
Flipping out the battery - which, Huawei claims, is good for four hours' continuous usage; that's about right - reveals the modem's Sim card slot. On the side of the device is a separate bay, for Micro SDHC cards should you need to use the modem as USB Flash drive too - it isn't shared over Wi-Fi, though.
The web UI presents the same controls any other router has
You'll need to remove the battery not only to slip in the Sim card but also to find out the unit's pre-loaded WPA password and the WLAN SSID. Our review sample had a different SSID to the one printed inside the battery compartment, though the WPA key proved to be correct.
Not that it made much difference. Huawei states that the E5 is compatible with Windows and Mac OS X. That may the case with the dial-up software you use when you want the E5 to operate as a dongle, but we couldn't get Mac OS X 10.6 to accept the WPA key, even with a '0x' in front to indicate it's a hexadecimal one.
A handy Windows XP machine would relay the key correctly, but modem and PC refused to communicate sufficiently well for the Huawei to provide the computer with an IP address. So to change the WPA key into something more sensible, we had to resort to connecting the E5 with a cable so we could access the device's admin web page.
This despite restoring the E5's settings to factory defaults.
The UI is crude, but functional
Once in the management console, you have full access to the E5 and all the settings you'd expect from any standard Wi-Fi router. It isn't the best laid-out console we've seen - the options could be more logically organised, for example - but with a little exploration time you can find all the you need to enter your carrier's network login details and to set up your ad hoc WLAN the way you like it.
You can set the E5 to instigate a 3G connection when your computer is sending a request for internet data, or have it simply connect when it's powered up. You can also tell it only to connect when you push the tiny Dial button on the side of the modem, but 'auto' is so much easier and saves the inevitable pauses between browser requesting page and modem dialling in to deliver it. They always feel longer than they are.
3 calls the E5 the MiFi
Huawei is a past master in the art of 3G modem creation, so we weren't surpised at the E5's ability to establish a mobile broadband connection. The device's Wi-Fi abilities aren't bad either. As long as you don't expect expect the house-filling coverage a regular, mains-powered router can provide, you won't be disappointed. This is an on-the-go product for meeting places, hotel rooms and the like, and the coverage it provides is enough for that.
Our only beef with the unit is its display. Brightly coloured LED icons are great for photographs. But to conserve power, they have to be switched off, so you have to press a button on the E5 every time you want to check the battery status, 3G signal strength or even if there's a 3G connection present. We'd rather have a low-power LCD readout, please, even though it wouldn't look as good.
The E5 will set you back around £180 for an unlocked, Sim-less unit, or less if you buy it with an airtime contract. 3's prices vary from nothing to £50 for the E5, plus £7.50-23 a month for 18 or 24 months. Data allowances range from 1GB to 5GB.
Rather than hook the E5 up to a single device - your laptop, typically - the built-in access point means you can share its 3G link among all your gadgets: phones, tablets and so on. That said, the E5 can also connect directly to a computer and operate as a typical 3G dongle.
Huawei's E5: no bigger than an old-style 3G dongle, but with a Wi-Fi router on boardThe Wi-Fi support is limited to 802.11b/g, but then most small mobile devices don't have 802.11n either, so this is perhaps no great loss. The E5's 3G radio operates in both the 900MHz and 2100MHz UMTS bands, and it has quad-band GSM/GPRS/Edge support too should find yourself too far from a 3G basestation.
When you are in range, the device will support upload speeds to 5.76Mb/s and download speeds of up to 7.2Mb/s. These are theoretical maxima, so you won't get them in the real world, even if the network you're using supports them.
And, of course, you don't mind paying inflated data-roaming rates when you're traveling beyond your national borders.
USB or battery poweredFlipping out the battery - which, Huawei claims, is good for four hours' continuous usage; that's about right - reveals the modem's Sim card slot. On the side of the device is a separate bay, for Micro SDHC cards should you need to use the modem as USB Flash drive too - it isn't shared over Wi-Fi, though.
The web UI presents the same controls any other router hasNot that it made much difference. Huawei states that the E5 is compatible with Windows and Mac OS X. That may the case with the dial-up software you use when you want the E5 to operate as a dongle, but we couldn't get Mac OS X 10.6 to accept the WPA key, even with a '0x' in front to indicate it's a hexadecimal one.
A handy Windows XP machine would relay the key correctly, but modem and PC refused to communicate sufficiently well for the Huawei to provide the computer with an IP address. So to change the WPA key into something more sensible, we had to resort to connecting the E5 with a cable so we could access the device's admin web page.
This despite restoring the E5's settings to factory defaults.
The UI is crude, but functionalYou can set the E5 to instigate a 3G connection when your computer is sending a request for internet data, or have it simply connect when it's powered up. You can also tell it only to connect when you push the tiny Dial button on the side of the modem, but 'auto' is so much easier and saves the inevitable pauses between browser requesting page and modem dialling in to deliver it. They always feel longer than they are.
3 calls the E5 the MiFiOur only beef with the unit is its display. Brightly coloured LED icons are great for photographs. But to conserve power, they have to be switched off, so you have to press a button on the E5 every time you want to check the battery status, 3G signal strength or even if there's a 3G connection present. We'd rather have a low-power LCD readout, please, even though it wouldn't look as good.
The E5 will set you back around £180 for an unlocked, Sim-less unit, or less if you buy it with an airtime contract. 3's prices vary from nothing to £50 for the E5, plus £7.50-23 a month for 18 or 24 months. Data allowances range from 1GB to 5GB.
Verdict
The E5 is a great gadget, but how often are you likely to need it? There's no shortage of Wi-Fi hotspots, and many hotels rooms have it too. Those that don't often have wired links instead, and these you can set your notebook to share through its own Wi-Fi adaptor. Its utility depends on how often you need Wi-Fi coverage when there's only 3G to be had. It's a pricey device to buy on the off-chance. ®
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