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Activist, writer, researcher, addicted to sharing information and facts.

Twitter Says Russian Bots Retweeted Trump 470,000 Times

By
Gerrit De Vynck

and

Selina Wang

January 26, 2018, 6:41 PM EST

Updated on
January 26, 2018, 7:13 PM EST

Russian-linked Twitter bots shared Donald Trump’s tweets almost half a million times during the final months of the 2016 election, Twitter Inc. said in a submission to Congress.

The automated accounts retweeted the Republican candidate’s @realDonaldTrump posts almost 470,000 times, accounting for just more than 4 percent of the re-tweets he received from Sept. 1 to Nov. 15, 2016. Hillary Clinton’s account got less than 50,000 retweets by the Russian-linked automated accounts during the same period of time, the company said in documents posted Friday by the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The information further underscores how Russian-linked accounts sought to stir up discord during the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Congress has been investigating exactly how social-media platforms like Twitter, Facebook Inc. and Alphabet Inc.’s YouTube were manipulated during the election. The documents are Twitter’s response to follow-up questions from the Senate committee following an Oct. 31 hearing on the issue of Russian infiltration of the media platforms.

Twitter also found that Russian-linked accounts were responsible for 48 percent to 73 percent of the retweets of WikiLeaks’ Twitter accounts during the same time period. During the campaign WikiLeaks published emails from hacked Democratic party servers.

In this further assessment, Twitter said it identified about 2.12 million automated, election-related tweets from Russian-linked accounts that collectively received about 455 million impressions within the first seven days of posting. This is significantly higher than the number of impressions Twitter had previously reported.

Twitter also said accounts linked to the Russian government-backed Internet Research Agency exhibited non-automated patterns of activity, such as trying to reach out to journalists and “prominent individuals” through mentions. Some of those accounts represented themselves as news outlets, members of activist organizations, or politically engaged Americans, the company said. Bloomberg News has previously reported that the IRA operated dozens of Twitter accounts masquerading as local American news sources that collectively garnered more than half-a-million followers. More than 100 news outlets also published stories containing those handles in the run-up to the election, and some of them were even tweeted by a top presidential aide.

“Some of the accounts appear to have attempted to organize rallies and demonstrations, and several engaged in abusive behavior and harassment,” Twitter said.

The new disclosures from Twitter demonstrate how Russian meddlers are complementing their networks of bots with human activity, which the company said makes it harder for Twitter’s algorithms to detect the difference. Twitter previously said it had suspended 3,814 IRA-linked accounts.

The company has made several changes to address the manipulation in the past several months. It has banned Russian state media accounts from buying ads and is creating a “transparency center” to show how much political campaigns spend on advertising, the identity of the organization funding the campaign, and what demographics the ads targeted.

Facebook told a Senate panel in a written response to questions released earlier this week that it has detected “only what appears to be insignificant overlap” between targeting of ads and content promoted by a pro-Kremlin Russia group and by Trump’s presidential campaign. The company said it “does not believe it is in a position to substantiate or disprove allegations of possible collusion” between Russia and the campaign.

Tech firms let Russia probe software widely used by U.S. government

via aleksey godin

WASHINGTON/MOSCOW (Reuters) – Major global technology providers SAP (SAPG.DE), Symantec (SYMC.O) and McAfee have allowed Russian authorities to hunt for vulnerabilities in software deeply embedded across the U.S. government, a Reuters investigation has found.

The practice potentially jeopardizes the security of computer networks in at least a dozen federal agencies, U.S. lawmakers and security experts said. It involves more companies and a broader swath of the government than previously reported.

In order to sell in the Russian market, the tech companies let a Russian defense agency scour the inner workings, or source code, of some of their products. Russian authorities say the reviews are necessary to detect flaws that could be exploited by hackers.

(Graphic: tmsnrt.rs/2sZudWT)

But those same products protect some of the most sensitive areas of the U.S government, including the Pentagon, NASA, the State Department, the FBI and the intelligence community, against hacking by sophisticated cyber adversaries like Russia.

Reuters revealed in October that Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE.N) software known as ArcSight, used to help secure the Pentagon’s computers, had been reviewed by a Russian military contractor with close ties to Russia’s security services.

Now, a Reuters review of hundreds of U.S. federal procurement documents and Russian regulatory records shows that the potential risks to the U.S. government from Russian source code reviews are more widespread.

Beyond the Pentagon, ArcSight is used in at least seven other agencies, including the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the State Department’s intelligence unit, the review showed. Additionally, products made by SAP, Symantec and McAfee and reviewed by Russian authorities are used in at least eight agencies. Some agencies use more than one of the four products. (Graphic: tmsnrt.rs/2C30rp8)

McAfee, SAP, Symantec and Micro Focus (MCRO.L), the British firm that now owns ArcSight, all said that any source code reviews were conducted under the software maker’s supervision in secure facilities where the code could not be removed or altered. The process does not compromise product security, they said. Amid growing concerns over the process, Symantec and McAfee no longer allow such reviews and Micro Focus moved to sharply restrict them late last year.

The Pentagon said in a previously unreported letter (tmsnrt.rs/2C6o2p2) to Democratic Senator Jeanne Shaheen that source code reviews by Russia and China “may aid such countries in discovering vulnerabilities in those products.”

Reuters has not found any instances where a source code review played a role in a cyberattack, and some security experts say hackers are more likely to find other ways to infiltrate network systems.

But the Pentagon is not alone in expressing concern. Private sector cyber experts, former U.S. security officials and some U.S. tech companies told Reuters that allowing Russia to review the source code may expose unknown vulnerabilities that could be used to undermine U.S. network defenses.

“Even letting people look at source code for a minute is incredibly dangerous,” said Steve Quane, executive vice president for network defense at Trend Micro, which sells TippingPoint security software to the U.S. military.

Worried about those risks to the U.S. government, Trend Micro has refused to allow the Russians to conduct a source code review of TippingPoint, Quane said.

Quane said top security researchers can quickly spot exploitable vulnerabilities just by examining source code.

“We know there are people who can do that, because we have people like that who work for us,” he said.

In contrast to Russia, the U.S. government seldom requests source code reviews when buying commercially available software products, U.S. trade attorneys and security experts say.

OPENING THE DOOR

Many of the Russian reviews have occurred since 2014, when U.S.-Russia relations plunged to new lows following Moscow’s annexation of Crimea. Western nations have accused Russia of sharply escalating its use of cyber attacks during that time, an allegation Moscow denies.

Some U.S. lawmakers worry source code reviews could be yet another entry point for Moscow to wage cyberattacks.

“I fear that access to our security infrastructure – whether it be overt or covert – by adversaries may have already opened the door to harmful security vulnerabilities,” Shaheen told Reuters.

In its Dec. 7 letter to Shaheen, the Pentagon said it was “exploring the feasibility” of requiring vendors to disclose when they have allowed foreign governments to access source code. Shaheen had questioned the Pentagon about the practice following the Reuters report on ArcSight, which also prompted Micro Focus to say it would restrict government source code reviews in the future. HPE said none of its current products have undergone Russian source code review.

Lamar Smith, the Republican chairman of the House Science, Space and Technology Committee, said legislation to better secure the federal cybersecurity supply chain was clearly needed.

Responding to the Reuters report on Thursday, Democratic Congressman Jim Langevin, a senior member of the House Armed Services Committee, said the Pentagon must consider “any access adversaries may have to source code when it is making purchasing decisions.”

Slideshow (8 Images)

Most U.S. government agencies declined to comment when asked whether they were aware technology installed within their networks had been inspected by Russian military contractors. Others said security was of paramount concern but that they could not comment on the use of specific software.

A Pentagon spokeswoman said it continually monitors the commercial technology it uses for security weaknesses.

NO PENCILS ALLOWED

Tech companies wanting to access Russia’s large market are often required to seek certification for their products from Russian agencies, including the FSB security service and Russia’s Federal Service for Technical and Export Control (FSTEC), a defense agency tasked with countering cyber espionage.

FSTEC declined to comment and the FSB did not respond to requests for comment. The Kremlin referred all questions to the FSB and FSTEC.

FSTEC often requires companies to permit a Russian government contractor to test the software’s source code.

SAP HANA, a database system, underwent a source code review in order to obtain certification in 2016, according to Russian regulatory records. The software stores and analyzes information for the State Department, Internal Revenue Service, NASA and the Army.

An SAP spokeswoman said any source code reviews were conducted in a secure, company-supervised facility where recording devices or even pencils are “are strictly forbidden.”

“All governments and governmental organizations are treated the same with no exceptions,” the spokeswoman said.

While some companies have since stopped allowing Russia to review source code in their products, the same products often remain embedded in the U.S. government, which can take decades to upgrade technology.

Security concerns caused Symantec to halt all government source code reviews in 2016, the company’s chief executive told Reuters in October. But Symantec Endpoint Protection antivirus software, which was reviewed by Russia in 2012, remains in use by the Pentagon, the FBI, and the Social Security Administration, among other agencies, according to federal contracting records reviewed by Reuters.

In a statement, a Symantec spokeswoman said the newest version of Endpoint Protection, released in late 2016, never underwent a source code review and that the earlier version has received numerous updates since being tested by Russia. The California-based company said it had no reason to believe earlier reviews had compromised product security. Symantec continued to sell the older version through 2017 and will provide updates through 2019.

McAfee also announced last year that it would no longer allow government-mandated source code reviews.

The cyber firm’s Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) software was reviewed in 2015 by a Moscow-based government contractor, Echelon, on behalf of FSTEC, according to Russian regulatory documents. McAfee confirmed this.

The Treasury Department and Defense Security Service, a Pentagon agency tasked with guarding the military’s classified information, continue to rely on the product to protect their networks, contracting records show.

McAfee declined to comment, citing customer confidentiality agreements, but it has previously said the Russian reviews are conducted at company-owned premises in the United States.

‘YOU CAN‘T TRUST ANYONE’

On its website, Echelon describes itself as an official laboratory of the FSB, FSTEC, and Russia’s defense ministry.

Alexey Markov, the president of Echelon, which also inspected the source code for ArcSight, said U.S. companies often initially expressed concerns about the certification process.

“Did they have any? Absolutely!!” Markov wrote in an email.

“The less the person making the decision understands about programming, the more paranoia they have. However, in the process of clarifying the details of performing the certification procedure, the dangers and risks are smoothed out.”

Markov said his team always informs tech companies before handing over any discovered vulnerabilities to Russian authorities, allowing the firms to fix the detected flaw. The source code reviews of products “significantly improves their safety,” he said.

Chris Inglis, the former deputy director of the National Security Agency, the United States’ premier electronic spy agency, disagrees.

“When you’re sitting at the table with card sharks, you can’t trust anyone,” he said. “I wouldn’t show anybody the code.”

(Graphic on U.S. government cybersecurity tools scrutinized by Russians – http://tmsnrt.rs/2C30rp8)

Reporting by Dustin Volz and Joel Schectman in Washington and Jack Stubbs in Moscow.; Editing by Jonathan Weber and Ross Colvin

Jewish extremists burn Arab cars and write on walls death to the Arabs in Jerusalem

Jerusalem /PNN/

Israeli Jewish settlers overnight spray-painted anti-Palestinian graffiti on walls and torched a Palestinian-owned vehicle after raiding East Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Safafa.

Settlers reportedly spray-painted “death to the Arabs” and “price tag” graffiti in Hebrew before setting a vehicle on fire.

“Price tag” refers to an underground anti-Palestinian Israeli group that routinely attack Palestinians in the occupied territories and inside Israel.

The Israeli government still refuses to label it as a terrorist organization and considers it only as group of vandals.

Settler violence against Palestinians and their property is routine in the West Bank and is rarely prosecuted by Israeli authorities.

Settlers’ violence includes property and mosque arsons, stone-throwing, uprooting of crops and olive trees, attacks on vulnerable homes, among others.

Between 500,000 and 600,000 Israelis live in Jewish-only settlements across occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank in violation of international law.

All settlements across the West Bank are illegal under international law, particularly article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which establishes that the occupying power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.


Facebook ‘repeatedly disabled and restored terror suspect account’

all about clicks and money for Facebook

4381.jpg?w=300&q=55&auto=format&usm=12&f

Abdulrahman Alcharbati had account disabled nine times after posting Isis videos, court told

Facebook disabled the account of a terror suspect nine times but repeatedly reactivated it, even as he continued posting violent Islamic State propaganda videos, a court has heard.

Abdulrahman Alcharbati, 31, is standing trial accused of sharing scores of links from his Facebook account that encouraged acts of terror. The engineer is also charged with possessing a bomb-making manual, called Easy Explosives Fourth Edition, on his mobile phone when he was arrested last year.

Continue reading…

العيش في الحضيض

All agony; no ecstasy :>(

نادية حرحش

نبدأ دائما الكلام في التحذير من الوصول الى الحضيض. وصلنا الى النهاية. نهاية الطريق في قعر الجحيم. هل من الطبيعي ان نستمر في الكتابة او الحديث بينما نجلد الذات ؟ نحتاج لما يشجعنا ويرفع من معنوياتنا ويمنحنا بصيص الامل . ولكن هل من امل ؟ هل من مكان للتفاؤل وسط كل المجريات ؟

اسرائيل ترتفع الى اعلى المنازل : دعم عالمي واقليمي، يبدأ بأمريكا ويعلو صوته من مآذن السعودية. وحكم فلسطيني مفكك، مهتريء، لم يبق لنا حتى مكانا للكلام .

من اين ممكن البدء في حديث التشاؤم الواقعي ؟

عن القدس ورفع رايات الصهيونية العالمية على معالمها ؟ عن مجتمع تحول الى افراد ، يخشى المرء منهم على قوت يومه ، فيلوذ الى مأمن على ابواب الداخلية الاسرائيلية ، عله يصبح مواطنا ليستطيع ان يبقى في مدينته بلا تهديد؟

عن تطبيع تحول الى تطويع اختياري ، امام لقمة العيش واستغلال الموارد ، فيصبح فيها رامي ليفي منارة للاستثمار الفلسطيني في…

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Dutch agencies provide crucial intel about Russia’s interference in US-elections – Light up the Dutch Masters cigars; Russia was in the house and at Putin’s pleasure!

Hackers from the Dutch intelligence service AIVD have provided the FBI with crucial information about Russian interference with the American elections. For years, AIVD had access to the infamous Russian hacker group Cozy Bear. That’s what de Volkskrant and Nieuwsuur have uncovered in their investigation.

Source: Dutch agencies provide crucial intel about Russia’s interference in US-elections

Dutch agencies provide crucial intel about Russia’s interference in US-elections

It’s the summer of 2014. A hacker from the Dutch intelligence agency AIVD has penetrated the computer network of a university building next to the Red Square in Moscow, oblivious to the implications. One year later, from the AIVD headquarters in Zoetermeer, he and his colleagues witness Russian hackers launching an attack on the Democratic Party in the United States. The AIVD hackers had not infiltrated just any building; they were in the computer network of the infamous Russian hacker group Cozy Bear. And unbeknownst to the Russians, they could see everything.

That’s how the AIVD becomes witness to the Russian hackers harassing and penetrating the leaders of the Democratic Party, transferring thousands of emails and documents. It won’t be the last time they alert their American counterparts. And yet, it will be months before the United States realize what this warning means: that with these hacks the Russians have interfered with the American elections. And the AIVD hackers have seen it happening before their very eyes.

The Dutch access provides crucial evidence of the Russian involvement in the hacking of the Democratic Party, according to six American and Dutch sources who are familiar with the material, but wish to remain anonymous. It’s also grounds for the FBI to start an investigation into the influence of the Russian interference on the election race between the Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton and the Republican candidate Donald Trump.

‘High confidence’

After Trump’s election in May 2017, this investigation was taken over by special prosecutor Robert Mueller. While it also aims to uncover contacts between Trump’s presidential campaign and the Russian government, the prime objective is bringing to light the Russian interference with the elections. An attempt to undermine the democratic process, and an act that caused tensions between the two superpowers to rise to new heights, bringing about a string of diplomatic acts of revenge.

Three American intelligence services state with ‘high confidence’ that the Kremlin was behind the attack on the Democratic Party. That certainty, sources say, is derived from the AIVD hackers having had access to the office-like space in the center of Moscow for years. This is so exceptional that the directors of the foremost American intelligence services are all too happy to receive the Dutchmen. They provide technical evidence for the attack on the Democratic Party, and it becomes apparent that they know a lot more.

The prime objective is bringing to light the Russian interference with the elections

Cozy Bear

Specialists from the best intelligence services have been hunting them for years

It’s somewhat of a ‘fluke’ that the AIVD hackers were able to acquire such useful information in 2014. The team uses a CNA, which stands for Computer Network Attack. These hackers are permitted to perform offensive operations: to penetrate and attack hostile networks. It’s a relatively small team within a larger digital business unit of about 80-100 people. All cyberoperations converge here. Part of the unit is focused on intercepting or managing sources, while another team is dedicated to Computer Network Defence. In turn, this team is part of the Joint Sigint Cyber Unit, a collaborative unit of the AIVD and the Dutch Military Intelligence and Security Service MIVD, of about 300 people.

It’s unknown what exact information the hackers acquire about the Russians, but it is clear that it contains a clue as to the whereabouts of one of the most well-known hacker groups in the world: Cozy Bear, also referred to as APT29. Since 2010, this group has attacked governments, energy corporations and telecom companies around the world, including Dutch companies and ministries. Specialists from the best intelligence services, among them the British, the Israelis and the Americans, have been hunting Cozy Bear for years, as have analysts from major cybersecurity companies.

Vital information

The Dutch hacker team spends weeks preparing itself. Then, in the summer of 2014, the attack takes place, most likely before the tragic crash of flight MH17. With some effort and patience, the team manages to penetrate the internal computer network. The AIVD can now trace the Russian hackers’ every step. But that’s not all.

The Cozy Bear hackers are in a space in a university building near the Red Square. The group’s composition varies, usually about ten people are active. The entrance is in a curved hallway. A security camera records who enters and who exits the room. The AIVD hackers manage to gain access to that camera. Not only can the intelligence service now see what the Russians are doing, they can also see who’s doing it. Pictures are taken of every visitor. In Zoetermeer, these pictures are analyzed and compared to known Russian spies. Again, they’ve acquired information that will later prove to be vital.

The AIVD hackers manage to gain access to a security camera

Rare battle

What follows is a rare battle between the attackers and its defenders

The Dutch access to the Russian hackers’ network soon pays off. In November, the Russians prepare for an attack on one of their prime targets: the American State Department. By now, they’ve obtained e-mail addresses and the login credentials of several civil servants. They manage to enter the non-classified part of the computer network.

The AIVD and her military counterpart MIVD inform the NSA-liaison at the American embassy in The Hague. He immediately alerts the different American intelligence services.

What follows is a rare battle between the attackers, who are attempting to further infiltrate the State Department, and its defenders, FBI and NSA teams – with clues and intelligence provided by the Dutch. This battle lasts 24 hours, according to American media.

The Russians are extremely aggressive but do not know they’re being spied on. Thanks to the Dutch spies, the NSA and FBI are able to counter the enemy with enormous speed. The Dutch intel is so crucial that the NSA opens a direct line with Zoetermeer, to get the information to the United States as soon as possible.

Back and forth

We could see how they were changing their methods

Richard Ledgett, NSA

Using so-called command and control servers, digital command centres, the Russians attempt to establish a connection to the malware in the Department, in order to request and transfer information. The Americans, having been told by the Dutch where the servers are, repeatedly and swiftly cut off access to these servers, followed each time by another attempt by the Russians. It goes back and forth like this for 24 hours. Afterwards, sources tell CNN that this was ‘the worst hack attack ever’ on the American government. The Department has to cut off access to the e-mail system for a whole weekend in order to upgrade the security.

Luckily, the NSA was able to find out the means and tactics of their attackers, deputy director of the NSA Richard Ledgett states at a discussion forum in Aspen in March 2017. ‘So we could see how they were changing their methods. That’s very useful information.’ On the authority of intelligence services, American media write that this was thanks to a ‘western ally’. Eventually, the Americans manage to dispel the Russians from the Department, but not before Russian attackers use their access to send an e-mail to a person in the White House.

Sources tell CNN that this was ‘the worst hack attack ever’ on the American government

Fake e-mail

He thinks he’s received an e-mail from the State Department – the e-mail address is similar – and clicks a link in the message. The link opens a website where the White House employee then enters his login credentials, now obtained by the Russians. And that is how the Russians infiltrate the White House.

They even gain access to the email servers containing the sent and received emails of president Barack Obama, but fail to penetrate the servers that control the message traffic from his personal BlackBerry, which holds state secrets, sources tell The New York Times. They do, however, manage to access e-mail traffic with embassies and diplomats, agendas, notes on policy and legislation. And again, it’s the Dutch intelligence agencies who alert the Americans about this.

Goldmine

Access to Cozy Bear turns out to be a goldmine for the Dutch hackers. For years, it supplies them with valuable intelligence about targets, methods and the interests of the highest ranking officials of the Russian security service. From the pictures taken of visitors, the AIVD deduces that the hacker group is led by Russia’s external intelligence agency SVR.

There’s a reason the AIVD writes in its annual report about 2014 that many Russian government officials, including president Putin, use secret services to obtain information. Recently, the head of the AIVD, Rob Bertholee, said on the Dutch TV program CollegeTour that there is ‘no question’ that the Kremlin is behind the Russian hacking activities.

There is ‘no question’ that the Kremlin is behind the Russian hacking activities

Rob Bertholee, head of the AIVD

Unprepared

We’d never expected that the Russians would do this

Chris Painter

The Americans were taken completely by surprise by the Russian aggression, says Chris Painter in Washington. For years, Painter was responsible for America’s cyber policy. He resigned last August. ‘We’d never expected that the Russians would do this, attacking our vital infrastructure and undermining our democracy.’

The American intelligence services were unprepared for that, he says. That is one of the reasons the Dutch access is so appreciated. The Americans even sent ‘cake’ and ‘flowers’ to Zoetermeer, sources tell. And not just that. Intelligence is a commodity: it can be traded. In 2016, the heads of the AIVD and MIVD, Rob Bertholee and Pieter Bindt, personally discuss the access to the Russian hacker group with James Clapper, then the highest ranking official of the American intelligence services, and Michael Rogers, head of the NSA.

In return, the Dutch are given knowledge, technology and intelligence. According to one American source, in late 2015, the NSA hackers manage to penetrate the mobile devices of several high ranking Russian intelligence officers. They learn that right before a hacking attack, the Russians search the internet for any news about the oncoming attack. According to the Americans, this indirectly proves that the Russian government is involved in the hacks. Another source says it’s ‘highly likely’ that in return for the intelligence, the Dutch were given access to this specific American information. Whether any intelligence about MH17 was exchanged, is unknown.

Aftermath

There’s a long aftermath to the Russian attacks, particularly the attack on the Democratic Party. Moreover, the FBI investigation into the Russian interference adds a political dimension. After her defeat in November 2016, Clinton will say that the controversy about her leaked emails are what cost her the presidency. President elect Donald Trump categorically refuses to explicitly acknowledge the Russian interference. It would tarnish the gleam of his electoral victory. He has also frequently praised Russia, and president Putin in particular. This is one of the reasons the American intelligence services eagerly leak information: to prove that the Russians did in fact interfere with the elections. And that is why intelligence services have told American media about the amazing access of a ‘western ally’.

This has led to anger in Zoetermeer and The Hague. Some Dutchmen even feel betrayed. It’s absolutely not done to reveal the methods of a friendly intelligence service, especially if you’re benefiting from their intelligence. But no matter how vehemently the heads of the AIVD and MIVD express their displeasure, they don’t feel understood by the Americans. It’s made the AIVD and MIVD a lot more cautious when it comes to sharing intelligence. They’ve become increasingly suspicious since Trump was elected president.

It’s absolutely not done to reveal the methods of a friendly intelligence service

The AIVD hackers are no longer in Cozy Bear’s computer network. The Dutch espionage lasted between 1 and 2,5 years. Hacker groups frequently change their methods and even a different firewall can cut off access. The AIVD declined to respond to de Volkskrant’s findings.

Translated by: Lisa Negrijn

Ursula K. Le Guin on “Spare Time,” What It Means to Be a Working Artist, and the Vital Difference Between Being Busy with Doing and Being Occupied with Living

In praise of the mundane, unquantifiable, impractical activities that feed creative work and fill life with meaning.


Ursula K. Le Guin on “Spare Time,” What It Means to Be a Working Artist, and the Vital Difference Between Being Busy with Doing and Being Occupied with Living

Most people are products of their time. Only the rare few are its creators. Ursula K. Le Guin (October 21, 1929–January 22, 2018) was one.

A fierce thinker and largehearted, beautiful writer who considered writing an act of falling in love, Le Guin left behind a vast, varied body of work and wisdom, stretching from her illuminations of the artist’s task and storytelling as an instrument of freedom to her advocacy for public libraries to her feminist translation of the Tao Te Ching and her classic unsexing of gender.

In her final years, Le Guin examined what makes life worth living in a splendid piece full of her wakeful, winkful wisdom, titled “In Your Spare Time” and included as the opening essay in No Time to Spare: Thinking About What Matters (public library) — the final nonfiction collection published in her lifetime, which also gave us Le Guin on the uses and misuses of anger.

ursulakleguin_benjaminreed.jpg?w=680&sslUrsula K. Le Guin by Benjamin Reed

Two decades after her nuanced meditation on growing older, Le Guin revisits the subject from another angle, perhaps the most perspectival angle there is — the question of how we measure the light of a life as it nears its sunset. Like any great writer who finds her prompts in the most improbable of places, Le Guin springboards into the existential while answering a questionnaire mailed to the Harvard class of 1951 — alumni who, if living, would all be in their eighties. (What is it about eighty being such a catalyst for existential reflection? Henry Miller modeled it, Donald Hall followed, and Oliver Sacks set the gold standard.)

Arrested by the implications of one particular question in the survey — “In your spare time, what do you do?” — and by its menu of twenty-seven options, including golf, shopping, and bridge, Le Guin pauses over the seventh offering on the list: “Creative activities (paint, write, photograph, etc.).” She considers this disquieting valuation of creative work in a capitalist society where the practical is the primary currency of existential worth:

Here I stopped reading and sat and thought for quite a while.

The key words are spare time. What do they mean?

To a working person — supermarket checker, lawyer, highway crewman, housewife, cellist, computer repairer, teacher, waitress — spare time is the time not spent at your job or at otherwise keeping yourself alive, cooking, keeping clean, getting the car fixed, getting the kids to school. To people in the midst of life, spare time is free time, and valued as such.

But to people in their eighties? What do retired people have but “spare” time?

I am not exactly retired, because I never had a job to retire from. I still work, though not as hard as I did. I have always been and am proud to consider myself a working woman. But to the Questioners of Harvard my lifework has been a “creative activity,” a hobby, something you do to fill up spare time. Perhaps if they knew I’d made a living out of it they’d move it to a more respectable category, but I rather doubt it.

virginiawoolf1.jpgVirginia Woolf and her sister, the artist Vanessa Bell, illustrated by Nina Cosford for Virginia Woolf: An Illustrated Biography by Zena Alkayat.

A century and half after Kierkegaard extolled the creative value of unbusied hours and ninety years after Bertrand Russell made his exquisite case for why “fruitful monotony” is essential for happiness, Le Guin examines the meanings and misconstruings of “spare” time in modern life:

The question remains: When all the time you have is spare, is free, what do you make of it?

And what’s the difference, really, between that and the time you used to have when you were fifty, or thirty, or fifteen?

Kids used to have a whole lot of spare time, middle-class kids anyhow. Outside of school and if they weren’t into a sport, most of their time was spare, and they figured out more or less successfully what to do with it. I had whole spare summers when I was a teenager. Three spare months. No stated occupation whatsoever. Much of after-school was spare time too. I read, I wrote, I hung out with Jean and Shirley and Joyce, I moseyed around having thoughts and feelings, oh lord, deep thoughts, deep feelings… I hope some kids still have time like that. The ones I know seem to be on a treadmill of programming, rushing on without pause to the next event on their schedule, the soccer practice the playdate the whatever. I hope they find interstices and wriggle into them. Sometimes I notice that a teenager in the family group is present in body — smiling, polite, apparently attentive — but absent. I think, I hope she has found an interstice, made herself some spare time, wriggled into it, and is alone there, deep down there, thinking, feeling.

openhouseforbutterflies18.jpg?w=680&ssl=Illustration by Maurice Sendak from Open House for Butterflies by Ruth Krauss.

Two millennia after Seneca placed the heart of life in learning to live wide rather than long and a century after Hermann Hesse contemplated how busyness drains life of its little, enormous joys, Le Guin examines the vital difference between being busy with doing and being occupied with living:

The opposite of spare time is, I guess, occupied time. In my case I still don’t know what spare time is because all my time is occupied. It always has been and it is now. It’s occupied by living.

An increasing part of living, at my age, is mere bodily maintenance, which is tiresome. But I cannot find anywhere in my life a time, or a kind of time, that is unoccupied. I am free, but my time is not. My time is fully and vitally occupied with sleep, with daydreaming, with doing business and writing friends and family on email, with reading, with writing poetry, with writing prose, with thinking, with forgetting, with embroidering, with cooking and eating a meal and cleaning up the kitchen, with construing Virgil, with meeting friends, with talking with my husband, with going out to shop for groceries, with walking if I can walk and traveling if we are traveling, with sitting Vipassana sometimes, with watching a movie sometimes, with doing the Eight Precious Chinese exercises when I can, with lying down for an afternoon rest with a volume of Krazy Kat to read and my own slightly crazy cat occupying the region between my upper thighs and mid-calves, where he arranges himself and goes instantly and deeply to sleep. None of this is spare time. I can’t spare it. What is Harvard thinking of? I am going to be eighty-one next week. I have no time to spare.

No Time to Spare: Thinking About What Matters is a wonderful read in its totality, replete with Le Guin’s warm wisdom on art and life. Complement this particular portion with German philosopher Josef Pieper on why unoccupied time is the basis of culture, English psychoanalyst Adam Phillips on why a capacity for “fertile solitude” is the basis of contentment, and two hundred years of great thinkers on the creative purpose of boredom, then revisit what I continue to consider Le Guin’s greatest nonfiction masterpiece: her brilliant essay on “being a man.”


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