hillary clinton

If you were paying attention last month, you might remember alarming headlines reporting an anti-Islam YouTube video "sparks violence in Libya," is "inciting violence," and caused "U.S. embassy workers' deaths."

One problem: those reports were untrue.

A flurry of disclosures in Washington, D.C., this week revealed that the Obama administration's blaming of the YouTube video for prompting a military-style attack that killed four Americans in Benghazi was wrong. And those revelations have reignited a long-running partisan debate over national security and security funding.

Republicans suggested that the White House's efforts … Read more

Google has found itself embroiled in a high-profile dispute pitting the traditional western value of free speech against Islam's strict proscription against blasphemy.

The company confirmed today that it "temporarily" blocked YouTube users in Libya and Egypt from accessing a YouTube video trailer from an amateur movie sharply critical of the Prophet Muhammad. And Afghanistan retaliated by unilaterally blocking all of YouTube for its citizens.

Those restrictions came less than a day after the U.S. ambassador to Libya, J. Christopher Stevens, and three other Americans were killed in an attack by Muslim protesters. Protesters also entered … Read more

Microsoft has hired a new vice president with strong ties to Washington and public relations.

Mark Penn will join the company as corporate vice president for strategic and special projects. Leading a small team focused on "key consumer initiatives," Penn will report directly to CEO Steve Ballmer.

Microsoft will rely on its new hire's experience in "strategic development, branding, and positioning" to come up with "breakthrough" ideas designed to meet consumers' changing needs, the company said today.

Dubbed "one of the best-known political and campaign strategists in Washington" according to The … Read more

The war on terror has gone cyber.

The U.S. State Department has been hacking into al-Qaeda websites in Yemen to change al-Qaeda propaganda that bragged about killing Americans, according to an Associated Press report.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton made mention of the covert cyber operations on Wednesday, saying a team of State Department hackers plastered al-Qaeda sites with with altered versions of the ads. These new ads portrayed how al-Qaeda attacks have affected the Yemeni people. The missions were carried out in a 48 hour-period.

"Extremists are publicly venting their frustration and asking supporters not to … Read more

"Memes really do come true."

For Adam Smith and Stacy Lambe, it's been a week of seriously whirlwind proportions. But after seeing their mega-hit Tumblr blog, "Texts from Hillary", get international attention and even inspire a submission from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton herself, the two Washington, D.C., men are shutting it all down.

If you haven't followed this phenomenon, picture LOLCats crossed with pictures of Hillary Clinton texting. Add tens of thousands of viewers around the world, some hilarious captions, and a surprise invitation by Clinton to Smith and Lambe to meet … Read more

How much fun can you have adding funny text to someone else's photograph? If you're the U.S. secretary of state, apparently quite a lot.

It's already been proven that if you let the general public add their own cute sayings to pictures of cats, you can build an entire empire on top of it. And now, thanks to the Tumblr blog Texts from Hillary, you too can create your own snarky narrative involving, yes, pictures of U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton texting.

It started as a quirky site where random people can make submissions … Read more

With freedom--both in the real world and online--much in the news lately, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton delivered a speech in Washington, D.C., yesterday that cautioned nations that try to block the Internet and other vital services as a way of stifling their citizens.

In her address at George Washington University on Internet freedom, Clinton pointed out that Egypt's efforts to control the protests of its citizens by cutting their lines of communication ultimately failed. Instead, people continued to protest, the government turned the Internet back on, and in the end, former President Hosni Mubarak was forced to … Read more

Links from Tuesday's episode of Loaded:

The U.S. State Department plans to announce new policies on Internet freedom

HTC unveils its first tablet, along with five new phones

Facebook launches an SMS version of its site for non-smartphones

Skype launches the Skype Mobile Partner Program for low-bandwidth Skype use in markets without reliable 3G

The FAA may consider repealing the ban on cell phone use during air travel

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers considers awarding the rights for the .gay domain

Japanese researchers are working on robot babies

It's set to become the new waiting game in Washington, D.C.: how long will it be before the U.S. government puts the legal smackdown on WikiLeaks?

That there is an investigation into how WikiLeaks obtained classified documents is, of course, no secret. In July, the Pentagon publicly confirmed a criminal probe into the matter.

A month later, that probe had expanded to include the FBI. "The Army's Criminal Investigation Division and the FBI are conducting an investigation into the leak of the documents," the Pentagon said on August 18.

Attorney General Eric Holder didn'… Read more