An Easter like no other

Crystal Cross (Bergeron Image)

The cross depicted in the photo that accompanies this post sits on the meeting rail of a window before my writing desk.  It has rested there undisturbed for years, catching the rays of the sun as it rises above the eastern edge of the Second Watchung ridgeline in Bridgewater.

Each day, the morning light of the eastern sky casts a different hue on it, reflecting nature’s mood on any particular day.  In July, 2011, when I composed this shot, the sun beamed brightly upon it, framing it against a cloudlessly blue sky.  It left a penetrating burst of white light near the crystal crossbeam.

Sounds so serene and almost poetic, doesn’t it?  But there is a one-hundred-and-eighty-degree difference in meaning between a wooden crucifix and an innocent looking crystal cross – the former bears the body of Jesus crucified, while the other brings the hope of a Jesus resurrected:  Body gone.  Memory alive forever.

That wooden cross which stood on the hill of Golgotha centuries ago carried the body of Jesus nailed to its crossbar by the Romans, cast in the role of a common criminal, and left there to suffocate to death.

 

The penalty of crucifixion was so savagely brutal and tortuously slow that it was reserved only for non-Romans living within the Empire.  It was administered to people who dared to step out-of-line, or who were deemed to have breached or challenged the authoritarian rule of Rome.

Apple Stonewalls FBI Request, Part II

Gatehouse, Swain's Lock, C&O Canal, Potomac, MD (Bergeron Image)

(Author’s Note:  In my prior post of Sunday, March 13, 2016, I discussed the problems facing U.S. security agencies as they attempt to obtain release of encrypted information stored on the iPhones of actual and potential terrorists.  The post below is the second half of that topic.)

American high-tech firms with international operations continue to expand production in mainland China.  Luring them is the siren song of higher profit margins made available by an apparently endless supply of low-cost labor, as well as the prospect of expanded revenues for products and services sold within the Chinese internal market.

One American firm with such ambitions is Apple.  That company, according to my assessment of Herman’s article referred to in my previous post, has responded to demands by Chinese government officials concerning customer information much differently than it has to the recent request made by the FBI to unlock the iPhone of the San Bernardino terrorist shooter.

Herman writes that “Apple is the first foreign company that has agreed to let China carry out security checks on its devices in obedience to the counterterrorism and national security law passed [in China] in November, 2014.”

He adds that “Apple obligingly stores its information on Chinese users on servers in China; it has also agreed to inspections by Internet police of the data stored there.”

His revelations get to the very core (no pun intended!) of why Apple may be so intransigently hypocritical about its refusal to share information with the FBI while simultaneously caving in to Chinese government demands for customer surveillance.

Apple Stonewalls FBI Request, Part I.

A March 2016 Bridgewater Sunset, (Bergeron Image)

Apple continues to resist the FBI’s request to unlock the iPhone of San Bernardino terrorist shooter Syed Rizwan Farook.  U.S. Security experts have made unsuccessful attempts to unlock that phone and are now in court petitioning the judicial branch to compel Apple to cooperate.

 

Apple’s stance in resisting the FBI’s request is that to unlock the iPhone used by shooter Syed Farook would set an alarming precedent that would lead to weakening the privacy of all iPhone users.

However, Apple seems to have employed a very dissimilar set of standards in its approach to Internet security in its business dealings with mainland Chinese government officials.  The latter have very different ideas about how Internet security should be controlled and monitored within their borders.

This is not the first time that Apple’s CEO, Tim Cook, has been embroiled in controversy:

On December 20, 2015, when Cook appeared on 60 Minutes, Charlie Rose pressed him as to why Apple produces the preponderance of its iPhones [70 percent overseas] in China-based manufacturing plants.  Conditions in some of these factories are reported to be onerous:  In at least several such company facilities, suicide nets were placed on the outside to discourage overstressed workers from jumping.

Significant Stories of March 1, 2016

12/05/2013 Bedminster Mtg., KDC Power Plant (Bergeron Image)

BIGGEST LOCAL IMPACT STORY:

KDC RECONSIDERS ITS PROPOSAL FOR A BADLY-SITED POWER PLANT IN BEDMINSTER

OTHERS STORIES OF INTEREST:

Editorial Discusses Impact of Pacific Research Institute’s Study on New Jersey Schools.  

New Hampshire Newspaper Mirrors Star-Ledger’s Reversal of its Prior Christie Endorsement.  

 

National GOP Stalls on Obama Appointment to U.S. Supreme Court: Sweeney Returns Favor by Blocking Christie Appointment to N.J. Supreme Court!

Unions Lose Supreme Court Appeal over Pensions. 

  

Controversy over Trump Continues to Soak up the Oxygen.  

 

Globally Prominent Boston Cardinal Praises Spotlight’s Critical Role [of] Investigative Journalism.

Note:  Below I offer an aphorism from an ancient, trustworthy source:  It’s as good today as it was centuries ago.  Particularly applicable to the politics of the day, don’t you think?

 “He taught them saying: ‘Be careful not to parade your uprightness in public to attract attention; otherwise you will lose all reward. . . ‘” Very pithy.  Very deep.

 Thanks for reading.