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Senator Merkley Says Obama Is Wrong Congress Did NOT Approve Spying On Americans In Bulk!
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  Sat, 08 Jun 2013 09:16
BBC News - Nelson Mandela admitted to hospital in 'serious condition'
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  Sat, 08 Jun 2013 08:34
  8 June 2013Last updated at08:02 ETFormer President Nelson Mandela has been admitted to hospital in South Africa with a lung infection.
  A presidential spokesman said he is in a "serious but stable condition", although he was able to breathe on his own - a "positive sign".
  Mr Mandela, 94, has been ill for some days but deteriorated overnight and was transferred to a hospital in Pretoria.
  He led the fight against apartheid and is regarded as the father of democratic South Africa.
  Continue reading the main story''Start QuoteAs long as he is still alive... we still have hope. South Africa is nothing without him''
  End QuoteMamoshomo TswaiTrader, PretoriaHe has recently suffered a series of health problems and this is his fifth visit to hospital in two years.
  In April he was released from hospital after a 10-day stay caused by pneumonia.
  His illness was described on Saturday as a recurrence of a lung infection, which has troubled him repeatedly.
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  The South African presidential spokesman Mac Maharaj gave an update on Mr Mandela's condition
  Mr Mandela was taken to hospital, from his home in a suburb of Johannesburg, at about 01:30 local time (23:30 GMT Friday).
  Mac Maharaj, South Africa's presidential spokesman, told the BBC he was receiving expert medical care.
  Doctors were doing everything possible to make him comfortable and better, he added.
  "What I am told by doctors is that he is breathing on his own and I think that is a positive sign," he said.
  Mr Maharaj said at least one close member of Mr Mandela's family was with him in hospital.
  "Naturally the immediate members of the family have access to him and it's always good for the patient that he has been accompanied by one or other of them, and that has happened," he said.
  Mr Mandela's wife, Graca Machel, has cancelled a scheduled appearance at a meeting in London on Saturday.
  'Symbol of hope'"President Jacob Zuma, on behalf of government and the nation, wishes Madiba a speedy recovery and requests the media and the public to respect the privacy of Madiba and his family," Mr Maharaj said in a statement, using the clan name by which Mr Mandela is often known.
  Continue reading the main storyNelson Mandela: Key dates1918 Born in the Eastern Cape1943 Joins African National Congress1956 Charged with high treason, but charges dropped1962 Arrested, convicted of sabotage, sentenced to five years in prison1964 Charged again, sentenced to life1990 Freed from prison1993 Wins Nobel Peace Prize1994 Elected first black president1999 Steps down as leader2004 Retires from public lifeOn the streets of Pretoria, people expressed their affection for their former president and their concern.
  Mamoshomo Tswai, a trader, said: "As long as Tata [father] is still alive then poor people like me, people who are down down, single mothers like me, we still have hope. South Africa is nothing without him."
  But another informal trader in Pretoria, who did not want give their name, said: "We must just accept that he is old. We love him, we all do, but we must start to accept that he is a very old man."
  Keith Khoza, a spokesman for the governing ANC, said Mr Mandela continued to be "a symbol of hope, to be a symbol of reconciliation" for South Africa.
  "We are certainly concerned about his health and we called on South Africans to pray for him and his family.
  "Even if you have an elderly person in the family who is sick and you expect something - once it happens the shock is still there."
  Damaged lungsMr Mandela served as president from 1994 to 1999.
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  South Africans offer best wishes to Nelson Mandela
  He was previously imprisoned for 27 years, and is believed to have suffered damaged lungs while working in a prison quarry.
  He contracted tuberculosis in the 1980s while being held in jail on the windswept Robben Island.
  He retired from public life in 2004 and has been rarely seen in public since.
  There was a row in April when South Africa's governing African National Congress (ANC) - Mr Mandela's party - filmed a visit to see him and broadcast the pictures of him with President Zuma and other party figures.
  Critics called it an invasion of his privacy.
  Mr Mandela was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993 jointly with former President FW de Klerk for ending apartheid and bringing democracy to South Africa.
Panetta Named in Bin Laden Raid Security Lapse
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  Sat, 08 Jun 2013 00:40
  WASHINGTON -- Several weeks after overseeing the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, then-CIA Director Leon Panetta revealed the name of the raid commander in a speech attended by the writer of the film "Zero Dark Thirty," according to a draft report by Pentagon investigators.
  Under security rules, the commander's name was not to be made public, but the draft report did not say whether Panetta knew a member of the public was in his audience at CIA headquarters. A former CIA official familiar with the event said Wednesday that Panetta did not know of the writer's presence; if the disclosure was inadvertent it would not constitute a violation of the rules by Panetta.
  The former official spoke on condition of anonymity because a security issue was involved.
  The unpublished draft report was first disclosed by the Project on Government Oversight and confirmed by Rep. Peter King, who asked for the investigation nearly two years ago. The draft report did not accuse Panetta of wrongdoing.
  King, R-N.Y., said he has not seen the draft report but was briefed on some of its contents. "It's been told to me what's in there," King said. He said it confirmed his suspicion that the Obama administration cut corners on security in its dealings with Hollywood executives eager to produce a film about the May 2, 2011, raid on bin Laden's compound in Pakistan.
  King said it would not surprise him if Panetta was unaware that the movie writer was in his audience.
  "Whatever he did was not done intentionally," King said, adding that he still questions why someone allowed a person without proper security clearances to attend.
  In the movie, which received a best picture Oscar nomination, Panetta's character was played by James Gandolfini.
  "CIA was very sloppy and the administration was very sloppy in enforcing security procedures when it came to Hollywood," King said in a telephone interview. "It almost seems as if they were star-struck."
  The episode is among many that have raised questions about leaks of classified information and the apparently selective enforcement of security rules by government officials.
  A Pentagon spokesman, Army Col. Steve Warren, said the Defense Department had no comment on the draft report by its inspector general.
  Bridget Serchak, a spokeswoman for the inspector general, said there is no projected date for finishing the report. She said that if it is unclassified when completed, it will be made public.
  The report cited two instances when administration officials divulged the names of individuals involved in the bin Laden operation -- in both cases to makers of "Zero Dark Thirty." The movie told the story of the decade-long hunt for the al-Qaida leader and the dark-of-night Navy SEALs raid in which he was killed.
  The first instance was a July 15, 2011, interview of the Pentagon's top intelligence official, Michael Vickers, by the film's director, Kathryn Bigelow, and screenwriter Mark Boal. In that session Vickers gave them the name of a special operations planner whose identity was supposed to be protected from public release, the report said.
  The second instance was a June 24, 2011, awards ceremony at CIA headquarters in which Panetta identified the ground commander of the SEALs raid, with Boal in attendance. The report did not say whether Panetta knew Boal was present. But the former agency official, who was present at the ceremony, said Wednesday that Panetta did not know Boal was in the audience and assumed that everyone in the audience of at least several hundred people had proper security clearances. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because a security matter was involved.
  The report said the ground commander's name was supposed to be protected from public release, under federal law. Although the name was mentioned in Boal's presence, Boal did not subsequently use the name in any public manner.
  The report also said without further explanation that Panetta "also provided (Defense Department) information identified by original classification authorities as top secret."
  The report did not address the question of possible penalties for Panetta's actions.
  Several days after the ceremony, Panetta became defense secretary. He held that post until February 2013, when he retired.
  A telephone call to his office in California on Wednesday was not immediately returned.
  "I think Secretary Panetta should explain what happened, why it happened," King said. "And that's all I'll say right now on it. It is a serious matter. I'm sure there was no malice at all by Panetta."
  The draft report said that although one or both of the movie executives were present at both the Vickers interview and the CIA awards ceremony, investigators concluded that no classified or sensitive information about Navy SEALs tactics, techniques or procedures were exposed.
  In his August 2011 request for an investigation by the Pentagon, King also asked the CIA's inspector general to look into the matter. He said Wednesday that the CIA is now in the second phase of its investigation.
  In the first phase of its probe, the CIA found that the agency's office of public affairs did not keep adequate records on its dealings with the entertainment industry, King said, and that "CIA employees did not always comply with agency regulations to prevent the release of classified information during their dealings with the entertainment industry."
  (C) Copyright 2013 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Tech Companies Concede to Surveillance Program - NYTimes.com
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  Sat, 08 Jun 2013 00:50
  SAN FRANCISCO '-- When government officials came to Silicon Valley to demand easier ways for the world's largest Internet companies to turn over user data as part of a secret surveillance program, the companies bristled. In the end, though, many cooperated at least a bit.
  Twitter declined to make it easier for the government. But other companies were more compliant, according to people briefed on the negotiations. They opened discussions with national security officials about developing technical methods to more efficiently and securely share the personal data of foreign users in response to lawful government requests. And in some cases, they changed their computer systems to do so.
  The negotiations shed a light on how Internet companies, increasingly at the center of people's personal lives, interact with the spy agencies that look to their vast trove of information '-- e-mails, videos, online chats, photos and search queries '-- for intelligence. They illustrate how intricately the government and tech companies work together, and the depth of their behind-the-scenes transactions.
  The companies that negotiated with the government include Google, which owns YouTube; Microsoft, which owns Hotmail and Skype; Yahoo; Facebook; AOL; Apple; and Paltalk, according to one of the people briefed on the discussions. The companies were legally required to share the data under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. People briefed on the discussions spoke on the condition of anonymity because they are prohibited by law from discussing the content of FISA requests or even acknowledging their existence.
  In at least two cases, at Google and Facebook, one of the plans discussed was to build separate, secure portals, like a digital version of the secure physical rooms that have long existed for classified information, in some instances on company servers. Through these online rooms, the government would request data, companies would deposit it and the government would retrieve it, people briefed on the discussions said.
  The negotiations have continued in recent months, as Martin E. Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, traveled to Silicon Valley to meet with executives including those at Facebook, Microsoft, Google and Intel. Though the official purpose of those meetings was to discuss the future of the Internet, the conversations also touched on how the companies would collaborate with the government in its intelligence-gathering efforts, said a person who attended.
  While handing over data in response to a legitimate FISA request is a legal requirement, making it easier for the government to get the information is not, which is why Twitter could decline to do so.
  Details on the discussions help explain the disparity between initial descriptions of the government program and the companies' responses.
  Each of the nine companies said it had no knowledge of a government program providing officials with access to its servers, and drew a bright line between giving the government wholesale access to its servers to collect user data and giving them specific data in response to individual court orders. Each said it did not provide the government with full, indiscriminate access to its servers.
  The companies said they do, however, comply with individual court orders, including under FISA. The negotiations, and the technical systems for sharing data with the government, fit in that category because they involve access to data under individual FISA requests. And in some cases, the data is transmitted to the government electronically, using a company's servers.
  ''The U.S. government does not have direct access or a 'back door' to the information stored in our data centers,'' Google's chief executive, Larry Page, and its chief legal officer, David Drummond, said in a statement on Friday. ''We provide user data to governments only in accordance with the law.''
  Statements from Microsoft, Yahoo, Facebook, Apple, AOL and Paltalk made the same distinction.
  But instead of adding a back door to their servers, the companies were essentially asked to erect a locked mailbox and give the government the key, people briefed on the negotiations said. Facebook, for instance, built such a system for requesting and sharing the information, they said.
  The data shared in these ways, the people said, is shared after company lawyers have reviewed the FISA request according to company practice. It is not sent automatically or in bulk, and the government does not have full access to company servers. Instead, they said, it is a more secure and efficient way to hand over the data.
  Tech companies might have also denied knowledge of the full scope of cooperation with national security officials because employees whose job it is to comply with FISA requests are not allowed to discuss the details even with others at the company, and in some cases have national security clearance, according to both a former senior government official and a lawyer representing a technology company.
  FISA orders can range from inquiries about specific people to a broad sweep for intelligence, like logs of certain search terms, lawyers who work with the orders said. There were 1,856 such requests last year, an increase of 6 percent from the year before.
  In one recent instance, the National Security Agency sent an agent to a tech company's headquarters to monitor a suspect in a cyberattack, a lawyer representing the company said. The agent installed government-developed software on the company's server and remained at the site for several weeks to download data to an agency laptop.
  In other instances, the lawyer said, the agency seeks real-time transmission of data, which companies send digitally.
  Twitter spokesmen did not respond to questions about the government requests, but said in general of the company's philosophy toward information requests: Users ''have a right to fight invalid government requests, and we stand with them in that fight.''
  Twitter, Google and other companies have typically fought aggressively against requests they believe reach too far. Google, Microsoft and Twitter publish transparency reports detailing government requests for information, but these reports do not include FISA requests because they are not allowed to acknowledge them.
  Yet since tech companies' cooperation with the government was revealed Thursday, tech executives have been performing a familiar dance, expressing outrage at the extent of the government's power to access personal data and calling for more transparency, while at the same time heaping praise upon the president as he visited Silicon Valley.
  Even as the White House scrambled to defend its online surveillance, President Obama was mingling with donors at the Silicon Valley home of Mike McCue, Flipboard's chief, eating dinner at the opulent home of Vinod Khosla, the venture capitalist, and cracking jokes about Mr. Khosla's big, shaggy dogs.
  On Friday, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook's chief executive, posted on Facebook a call for more government transparency. ''It's the only way to protect everyone's civil liberties and create the safe and free society we all want over the long term,'' he wrote.
  Reporting was contributed by Nick Bilton, Vindu Goel, Nicole Perlroth and Somini Sengupta in San Francisco; Edward Wyatt in Washington; Brian X. Chen and Leslie Kaufman in New York; and Nick Wingfield in Seattle.
NSA domestic surveillance: American voters trust the government to fight terrorism. - Slate Magazine
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  Sat, 08 Jun 2013 00:37
  U.S. President Barack Obama speaks about the National Security Agency's secret collection of telephone records from millions of Americans during a visit to San Jose, Calif., June 7, 2013.
  Photo by Kevin Lamarque/Reuters
  Cybersnooping was always scheduled to be an important topic during President Obama's meetings with Chinese President Xi Jinping. We just didn't know until recently that it might be a chance for the two men to exchange best practices. The Chinese government is accused of stealing U.S. military secrets and hacking into the computer networks of American companies. Recent reports suggest the U.S. government may be hacking into the servers of American companies as well.
  In processing news developments in Obama's second term, the most useful sorting technique for the last few weeks has been to ask: Is this a scandal, a controversy, or merely a flap? The substantive answer in this case is that these revelations about U.S. spy efforts deserve real attention. When officials in the executive branch are given this kind of power, they usually abuse it. That is our history. That's human nature. That is particularly true when there are weak or nonexistent mechanisms to restrain that abuse. The political answer about how important these revelations may be is different. We are simultaneously in the season of high scandal and high fake scandal, but at the moment the political risks seem slim for the president and anyone who supports the National Security Agency's snooping power. For that to change, voters would have to stop giving the executive branch a pass whenever a possible government overreach is done for the sake of fighting terrorism.
  Polls suggest that people often support measures to catch terrorists that infringe on civil liberties. In a New York Times/CBS poll taken after the Boston Marathon bombing, 78 percent of people said surveillance cameras were a good idea. A CNN poll taken a month later showed the same support for cameras, but that poll indicated that there were limits. People were asked if they would allow "expanded government monitoring of cell phones and email to intercept communications" to catch suspected terrorists. Fifty-nine percent said they would not be OK with that.
  The disclosure this week that the NSA was monitoring huge numbers of phone calls made in the Verizon network is operationally very similar to the disclosure in 2006 that it was doing the same thing. In 2006, people were mostly comfortable with the idea. A Fox News poll found a small majority, 52 percent, supported the collection of massive amounts of phone data, and 41 percent opposed it. CBS, ABC, and CNN polls at the same time also found majority support, but a Newsweek poll found that 53 percent said that monitoring metadata goes too far. (The fact that the Bush administration, unpopular at the time, had collected the phone information without court approval or without notifying Congress could have influenced these numbers; that's not the case here.)
  Polling suggests the distinction people draw is between the narrow targeting of suspects versus targeting the broader public. In 2006, when CBS asked people if they would be OK with phone surveillance if the government thought they had a suspect, 69 percent approved. If the surveillance was just a sweep of ordinary Americans? Sixty-eight percent opposed that. Five years later, CBS found roughly the same result. In 2011, 65 percent of those polled said they were willing to let government agencies monitor telephone calls and emails of suspicious people, but when asked about a broader phone snooping ''of ordinary Americans on a regular basis" 72 percent said they would disapprove of such surveillance.
  So support for the activities recently disclosed lies in whether people think they're a big fishing expedition or tied to specific work that has stopped terrorism.
  It's almost certain that we won't know for sure whether these ongoing surveillance efforts paid off in a way that connects them with specific terrorist suspects. Rep. Mike Rogers, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee says they did. (Reuters has reported the attack Rep. Rogers was referring to was aimed at the New York City subway.) Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, also said the surveillance had foiled several terrorist plots. Reports that the monitoring of computer systems has provided the bulk of the information in the president's daily intelligence briefing are likely to make people think that this is useful information worth gathering.
  Republican leaders who have jumped on each new development in the IRS or Benghazi scandals have been nearly mute in response to these latest disclosures. Republican Sen. Rand Paul spoke out against the program, but his colleague Sen. Marco Rubio defended it. Without a strong political force to keep pushing this story, it's unlikely to stay in the public consciousness in a way that will be politically damaging.
  If the public is not outraged, it may very well be because they trust these lawmakers when they say these measures are necessary to stop terrorism. That's an aberration from the normal public attitude where more than three-quarters of Americans tell pollsters they don't trust government. It's the exact opposite of what has happened in the IRS investigation. Any Democrat who suggests the extra IRS scrutiny of conservative groups was warranted will find himself sitting alone on the bench.
  These latest revelations do expose President Obama and Vice President Biden as having highly malleable views. As a candidate, Barack Obama was righteous in denouncing Bush-era policies, saying they jeopardized the rights and ideals of all Americans and that there was not sufficient congressional oversight. He criticized the president for monitoring Americans who did nothing wrong. Biden can be seen here in 2006 pounding on President Bush for collecting phone records indiscriminately. But if Americans believe these programs are part of a long-standing (successful) effort to thwart a major terrorist attack on American soil, it's unclear whether there will be any penalty to pay for the change of heart.
  The other controversies in Washington appear to have weakened the public's view of the president's honesty. That may be because his answers have been unsatisfying. He learned about the IRS mishap and Justice Department targeting journalists on the news. That may have been proper'--he has direct control over neither'--but polls show his disconnection has contributed to the view he's not being honest. In the aftermath of the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, administration answers have been fuzzy and evolving. In this case, though, the president supported the NSA activities as soon as the news broke. Since polls show the public trusts him on the issue of fighting terrorism above all other issues, his fast and forceful defense may cause people to give him the benefit of the doubt. In a perverse way it's even possible to imagine that the NSA revelations, by stealing a few news cycles from developments on the IRS investigation and allowing the president to present himself as protector of the American people, may wind up helping the president's standing with the American people. Not even the NSA saw that coming.
'How little rights you have:' Anonymous leaks more PRISM-related NSA docs | End the Lie '' Independent News
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  Sat, 08 Jun 2013 00:23
  AFP Photo / Gabriel Bouys
  Hackers affiliated with the Anonymous collective have leaked a US Department of Defense memo relating to the PRISM program, revealing that the National Security Agency has secretly gathered intelligence on millions of Americans for years.
  Editor's note: be sure toe check out the release from Anonymous and the documents themselves.
  The hacktivists, who have long sought complete transparency online and elsewhere, published a total of thirteen documents, one of which outlines the US government's ''NetOps Strategic Vision'' for monitoring the Internet.
  The documents are mostly pulled from 2008, just after when the government reportedly began using PRISM to mine servers at technology companies including Microsoft and Yahoo. An NSA slideshow published Thursday by the Guardian and the Washington Post reveals the intelligence community first gained access to Google in January of 2009 and Facebook in June of the same year.
  ''NetOps will transform along with the Global Information Grid to dynamically support new warfighting, intelligence, and business processes and enable users to access and share trusted information in a timely manner,'' one document states.
  ''The future Global Information Grid will result in a richer Net-Centric information environment comprised of shared services and capabilities based on advanced technologies.''
  ''It will be heavily reliant on end-to-end virtual networks to interconnect anyone, anywhere, at any time with any type of information through voice, video, images, or text. It will also be faced with greater security threats that NetOps must help address.''
  Much of the leak contains vague language that outlines the desired goals of the ''NetOps Vision,'' not details on how surveillance is conducted or the individuals or groups targeted by the NSA. At least a section of Friday's information dump was previously made available by the government, according to technology news site ZD Net, which found the data on Web.Archive.org.
  Anonymous, however, reminded readers to share the documents before the figurative ''they'' try to make them disappear.
  ''Anonymous has obtained some documents that 'they' do not want you to see, and much to 'their' chagrin, we have found them, and are giving them to you,'' the poster writes. ''This is happening in over 35 countries and done in cooperation with private businesses, and intelligence partners worldwide. We bring this to you so that you know just how little rights you have.''
  Source: RT
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Statement of Microsoft Corporation on Customer Privacy
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  Sat, 08 Jun 2013 00:09
  On June 6, media outlets including the Washington Post and Guardian began reporting allegations that the United States National Security Agency (NSA) is collecting customer communications data from major technology companies, including Microsoft. Microsoft issued the following statement about the company's alleged involvement in these activities:
  REDMOND, Wash., June 6, 2013 - We provide customer data only when we receive a legally binding order or subpoena to do so, and never on a voluntary basis. In addition we only ever comply with orders for requests about specific accounts or identifiers. If the government has a broader voluntary national security program to gather customer data we don't participate in it.
Department of Justice: drone strikes on American citizens are legal because Obama and Holder said so | End the Lie '' Independent News
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  Sat, 08 Jun 2013 00:01
  By Madison Ruppert
  Editor of End the Lie
  ''Where law ends tyranny begins,'' seen on the Justice Department building in Washington D.C. (Image credit: joewcampbell/Flickr)
  In a court filing this week, Justice Department lawyers claimed that the Obama administration's drone strikes that have admittedly killed four American citizens are constitutional in part simply because Eric Holder and Barack Obama said so.
  While this might seem absurd to the point that it seems like it should be published in the Onion, it is quite unfortunately true.
  ''The Attorney General's statement last month that the use of remotely piloted aircraft and the targeting of Anwar Al-Aulaqi were subject to 'exceptionally rigorous interagency legal review' and determined to be lawful '-- along with the President's statement that those actions were legal '-- only support the conclusion that those actions were lawful, and certainly were not clearly established to be unconstitutional in 2011,'' stated a court filing signed by Paul Warner, a trial lawyer in the Department of Justice's Criminal Division, according to Ryan J. Reilly of the Huffington Post.
  This came in response to a lawsuit, al-Aulaqi v. Panetta, filed by both the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) on behalf of the estates of three of the American citizens who have been killed in U.S. drone strikes.
  The lawsuit alleges that the U.S. government's killing of Anwar al-Awlaki (also spelled Aulaqi), his 16-year-old son Abdulrahman al-Awlaki and Samir Khan was unconstitutional because they were not given the due process demanded by the Constitution.
  Of course, in the past Attorney General Eric Holder has claimed that the Obama administration's secret reviews of classified evidence count as due process and they claim that the letter from Holder to members of Congress and Obama's speech on national security didn't change their legal position.
  However, that letter and the speech were the first time that the Obama administration ever formally acknowledged that they killed an American citizen.
  The government claims that they deserve qualified immunity because the plaintiffs ''failed to allege the violation of any clearly established constitutional rights.''
  The government claims that the statements from Obama and Holder are ''holly consistent with Defendants' showing that Anwar Al-Aulaqi's due process rights were not violated.''
  When the legal basis for the targeted killings was challenged in court previously, a federal judge ruled that the Obama administration could simply claim they had a legal basis while never explaining it.
  Furthermore, in the Justice Department's leaked whitepaper on the targeted killing of Americans, anything resembling due process was glaringly absent.
  Most astounding of all is that the Obama administration argued in their filing that the judicial branch ''is ill-suited'' to evaluate the many ''military, intelligence, and foreign policy considerations'' behind the choice to kill the American citizens.
  The government added that because 16-year-old Abdulrahman al-Awlaki and Khan were not specifically targeted by the government, as is their claim, the plaintiffs cannot claim that they were subjected to an unconstitutional process.
  The fact that the government is now claiming that the judicial branch simply can't evaluate the killing of Americans shouldn't be all that surprising given the aforementioned federal judge's decision. After all, that judge didn't even read the legal memo supposedly outlining the government's legal basis for killing Americans.
  I'd love to hear your opinion, take a look at your story tips and even your original writing if you would like to get it published. I am also available for interviews on radio, television or any other format. Please email me at [email protected]
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NYT Claims Tech Giants Gave NSA Access To Private Data, Just Not ''Direct Access'' | TechCrunch
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 23:57
  The fog of confusion is slowly lifting and the facts surrounding the NSA's PRISM surveillance program are becoming a little bit clearer. According to a new report by the New York Time's Claire Cain Miller, the tech companies that allegedly helped the government to spy on their people did indeed not provide a direct access back door to their servers.
  Instead, the New York Times report claims, they made it easier for the government and the companies, including Microsoft, AOL, Apple, Facebook, Yahoo and Paltalk, ''to more efficiently and securely share the personal data of foreign users in response to lawful government requests.''
  In some instances, the report says, the companies did change their computer systems to do so. Google and Facebook, for example, apparently discussed plans to build ''secure portals'' that would allow a government agency to request data, which the companies would then upload to these servers for the government to retrieve. That sounds a little bit like a dead drop from an espionage novel, but some variation of these rooms has long existed in telco switching centers in the physical world.
  The report also details one instance where an agent installed software on one of the company's servers (which one isn't clear) and used it to download data to a laptop for ''several weeks.''
  Just like the original report claims, real-time access is apparently also an option.
  All of this, of course, doesn't immediately jibe with the company's outright denials that they had any knowledge of this. The New York Times argues that the employees who were handling this information were likely not allowed to discuss their work '' though it's unclear how all of this would go unnoticed inside a company like Google or Facebook.
"The Data Are Just Phone Numbers! There's NO Content" Senator Feinstein
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 23:55
When We Have A Govt That Operates In The Dark You Get A Govt Full Of Fleischers Spewing Falsehoods
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 23:53
Influence of oral sex and oral cancer i - PubMed Mobile
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 23:52
  AbstractPublic health information and educational interventions regarding human papillomavirus (HPV) have focused on the link between vaginal sex and cervical cancer among women. Many people are unaware that HPV can be transmitted through oral sex or that HPV causes oral cancers. Given that HPV infections and unprotected oral sex are increasing, research on oral sex-related HPV risk is important. This study examined the effect of a brief informational intervention regarding HPV and oral sex on the sexual risk cognitions of young adults. College students (N = 238) read information on HPV, oral sex, and oral cancer or no information. Participants then completed measures of oral sex and HPV knowledge, oral sex willingness, HPV vaccination likelihood, and risk perceptions. Participants who read the information on HPV and oral sex and cancer (compared to those who did not) reported greater knowledge, perceived risk and concern, and lower willingness to engage in oral sex. These effects were only significant among women. However, men reported a higher likelihood of future HPV vaccination compared to women who had not yet received the vaccine. Focusing on oral sex and cancer, this study adds to research investigating ways to reduce HPV infections.
VIDEO-BBC News - Five dead in Santa Monica shooting
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 23:43
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VIDEO-Exclusive: Top NSA Whistleblower Spills the Beans on the Real Scope of the Spying Program | Washington's Blog
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 23:42
  Top NSA Official: Government Tapping CONTENT, Not Just Metadata '... Using Bogus ''Secret Interpretation'' of Patriot ActWe reported in 2008 that foreign companies have had key roles scooping up Americans' communications for the NSA:
  At least two foreign companies play key roles in processing the information.
  Specifically, an Israeli company called Narus processes all of the information tapped by AT &T (AT & T taps, and gives to the NSA, copies of all phone calls it processes), and an Israeli company called Verint processes information tapped by Verizon (Verizon also taps, and gives to the NSA, all of its calls).
  Business Insider notes today:
  The newest information regarding the NSA domestic spying scandal raises an important question: If America's tech giants didn't 'participate knowingly' in the dragnet of electronic communication, how does the NSA get all of their data?
  One theory: the NSA hired two secretive Israeli companies to wiretap the U.S. telecommunications network.
  In April 2012 Wired's James Bamford '-- author of the book ''The Shadow Factory: The NSA from 9/11 to the Eavesdropping on America'' '-- reported that two companies with extensive links to Israel's intelligence service provided hardware and software the U.S. telecommunications network for the National Security Agency (NSA).
  By doing so, this would imply, companies like Facebook and Google don't have to explicitly provide the NSA with access to their servers because major Internet Service Providers (ISPs) such as AT&T and Verizon already allows the U.S. signals intelligence agency to eavesdrop on all of their data anyway.
  From Bamford (emphasis ours):
  ''According to a former Verizon employee briefed on the program, Verint, owned by Comverse Technology, taps the communication lines at Verizon'...
  At AT&T the wiretapping rooms arepowered by software and hardware from Narus, now owned by Boeing, a discovery made by AT&T whistleblower Mark Klein in 2004.''
  Klein, an engineer, discovered the ''secret room'' at AT&T central office in San Francisco, through which the NSA actively ''vacuumed up Internet and phone-call data from ordinary Americans with the cooperation of AT&T'' through the wiretapping rooms, emphasizing that ''much of the data sent through AT&T to the NSA was purely domestic.''
  NSA whistleblower Thomas Drake corroborated Klein's assertions, testifying that while the NSA is using Israeli-made NARUS hardware to ''seize and save all personal electronic communications.''
  Both Verint and Narus were founded in Israel in the 1990s.
  ***
  ''Anything that comes through (an internet protocol network), we can record,'' Steve Bannerman, marketing vice president of Narus, a Mountain View, California company, said. ''We can reconstruct all of their e-mails along with attachments, see what web pages they clicked on, we can reconstruct their (voice over internet protocol) calls.''
  With a telecom wiretap the NSA only needs companies like Microsoft, Google, and Apple to passively participate while the agency to intercepts, stores, and analyzes their communication data. The indirect nature of the agreement would provide tech giants with plausible deniability.
  And having a foreign contractor bug the telecom grid would mean that the NSA gained access to most of the domestic traffic flowing through the U.S. without technically doing it themselves.
  This would provide the NSA, whose official mission is to spy on foreign communications, with plausible deniability regarding domestic snooping.
  The reason that Business Insider is speculating about the use of private Israeli companies to thwart the law is that 2 high-ranking members of the Senate Intelligence Committee '' Senators Wyden and Udall '' have long said that the government has adopted a secret interpretation of section 215 of the Patriot Act which would shock Americans, because it provided a breath-takingly wide program of spying.
  Last December, top NSA whistleblower William Binney '' a 32-year NSA veteran with the title of senior technical director, who headed the agency's global digital data gathering program (featured in a New York Times documentary, and the source for much of what we know about NSA spying) '' said that the government is using a secret interpretation of Section 215 of the Patriot Act which allows the government to obtain:
  any data in any third party, like any commercial data that's held about U.S. citizens '....
  (relevant quote starts at 4:19).
  I called Binney to find out what he meant.
  I began by asking Binney if Business Insider's speculation was correct. Specifically, I asked Binney if the government's secret interpretation of Section 215 of the Patriot Act was that a foreign company '' like Narus, for example '' could vacuum up information on Americans, and then the NSA would obtain that data under the excuse of spying on foreign entities '... i.e. an Israeli company.
  Binney replied no '... it was broader than that.
  Binney explained that the government is taking the position that it can gather and use any information about American citizens living on U.S. soil if it comes from:
  Any service provider '... any third party '... any commercial company '' like a telecom or internet service provider, libraries, medical companies '' holding data about anyone, any U.S. citizen or anyone else.
  I followed up to make sure I understood what Binney was saying, asking whether the government's secret interpretation of Section 215 of the Patriot Act was that the government could use any information as long as it came from a private company '... foreign or domestic. In other words, the government was using the antiquated, bogus legal argument that it was not acting ''color of law'' using governmental powers, and that it was private companies just doing their thing (which the government happened to order all of the private companies to collect and fork over).
  Binney confirmed that this was correct. This is what the phone company spying program and the Prism program '' the government spying on big Internet companies '' is based upon. Since all digital communications go through private company networks, websites or other systems, the government just demands that all of the companies turn all of them over.
  Let's use an analogy to understand how bogus this interpretation of the Patriot Act is. This would be analogous to a Congressman hiring a hit man to shoot someone asking too many questions, and loaning him his gun to carry out the deed '... and then later saying ''I didn't do it, it was that private citizen!'' That wouldn't pass the laugh test even at an unaccredited, web-based law school offered through a porn site.
  I then asked the NSA veteran if the government's claim that it is only spying on metadata '' and not content '' was correct. We have extensively documented that the government is likely recording the content as well. (And the government has previously admitted to ''accidentally'' collecting more information on Americans than was legal.)
  Binney said that was not true; the government is gathering everything, including content.
  Binney explained '' as he has many times before '' that the government is storing everything, and creating a searchable database '... to be used whenever it wants, for any purpose it wants when it wants to go after someone.
  Binney said that former FBI counter-terrorism agent Tim Clemente is correct when he said that no digital data is safe (Clemente says that all digital communications are being recorded). Binney gave me an idea of how powerful Narus recording systems are. There are probably 18 of them around the country, and they can each record 10 gigabytes of data '' the equivalent of a million and a quarter emails with 1,000 characters each '' per second.
  Binney next confirmed the statement of the author of the Patriot Act '' Congressman Jim Sensenbrenner '' that the NSA spying programs violate that Act. After all, the Patriot Act is focused on spying on external threats, not on Americans.
  Binney asked rhetorically: ''How can an American court [FISA or otherwise] tell telecom to cough up all domestic data?!''
  Update: Binney sent the following clarifying email about content collection:
  It's clear to me that they are collecting most e-mail in full plus other text type data on the web.
  As for phone calls, I don't think they would record/transcribe the approximately 3 billion US-to-US calls every day. It's more likely that they are recording and transcribing calls made by the 500,000 to 1,000,000 targets in the US and the world.
Justice Dept. Is Accused of Misleading Public on Patriot Act - NYTimes.com
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 23:41
  WASHINGTON '-- Two United States senators on Wednesday accused the Justice Department of making misleading statements about the legal justification of secret domestic surveillance activities that the government is apparently carrying out under the Patriot Act.
  Chip Somodevilla/Getty ImagesSenator Mark Udall of Colorado, above, and Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon asked the attorney general to ''correct the public record.''
  Joshua Roberts/Bloomberg NewsSenator Ron Wyden of Oregon, above, and Senator Mark Udall of Colorado, have questioned the Justice Department about surveillance activities.
  The lawmakers '-- Ron Wyden of Oregon and Mark Udall of Colorado, both of whom are Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee '-- sent a letter to Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. calling for him to ''correct the public record'' and to ensure that future department statements about the authority the government believes is conveyed by the surveillance law would not be misleading.
  ''We believe that the best way to avoid a negative public reaction and an erosion of confidence in U.S. intelligence agencies is to initiate an informed public debate about these authorities today,'' the two wrote. ''However, if the executive branch is unwilling to do that, then it is particularly important for government officials to avoid compounding that problem by making misleading statements.''
  The Justice Department denied being misleading about the Patriot Act, saying it has acknowledged that a secret, sensitive intelligence program is based on the law and that its statements about the matter have been accurate.
  Mr. Wyden and Mr. Udall have for months been raising concerns that the government has secretly interpreted a part of the Patriot Act in a way that they portray as twisted, allowing the Federal Bureau of Investigation to conduct some kind of unspecified domestic surveillance that they say does not dovetail with a plain reading of the statute.
  The dispute has focused on Section 215 of the Patriot Act. It allows a secret national security court to issue an order allowing the F.B.I. to obtain ''any tangible things'' in connection with a national security investigation. It is sometimes referred to as the ''business records'' section because public discussion around it has centered on using it to obtain customer information like hotel or credit card records.
  But in addition to that kind of collection, the senators contend that the government has also interpreted the provision, based on rulings by the secret national security court, as allowing some other kind of activity that allows the government to obtain private information about people who have no link to a terrorism or espionage case.
  Justice Department officials have sought to play down such concerns, saying that both the court and the intelligence committees know about the program. But the two lawmakers contended in their letter that officials have been misleading in their descriptions of the issue to the public.
  First, the senators noted that Justice Department officials, under both the Bush and Obama administrations, had described Section 215 orders as allowing the F.B.I. to obtain the same types of records for national security investigations that they could get using a grand jury subpoena for an ordinary criminal investigation. But the two senators said that analogy does not fit with the secret interpretation.
  The senators also criticized a recent statement by a department spokesman that ''Section 215 is not a secret law, nor has it been implemented under secret legal opinions by the Justice Department.'' This was ''extremely misleading,'' they said, because there are secret legal opinions controlling how Patriot Act is being interpreted '-- it's just that they were issued by the national security court.
  ''In our judgment, when the legal interpretations of public statutes that are kept secret from the American public, the government is effectively relying on secret law,'' they wrote.
  That part of the dispute appeared to turn on semantics. The department said that while the national security court's opinions interpreting the Patriot Act are classified, the law itself is public.
Manhunt over, Deval Patrick tied one on | Boston Herald
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 22:54
  Gov. Deval Patrick gave a candid, behind-the-scenes look at the horrific days after the Boston Marathon bombings, telling employees at a Cambridge marketing firm yesterday he got ''quite drunk'' the day after the intense manhunt finally ended.
  Patrick said the killing of bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev and the capture of his younger brother, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, on April 19 was a relief because people wouldn't be ''bitching and moaning'' about the unprecedented ''shelter in place'' order he gave that day, locking down Boston, Cambridge, Brookline, Newton, Waltham and Belmont for nearly 16 hours.
  Patrick shared his gripping memories during an hourlong question-and-answer session with HubSpot co-founder Brian Halligan, who invited the governor to riff on career advice. Instead, Patrick gave a raw oral history:
  ' On putting the FBI in charge of the case: ''I said we need one agency in charge. I said, 'I don't care who it is ... somebody's got to be in charge.' ... And they all nodded. Probably because of the practice of the (FBI-led) Joint Terrorism Task Force. And, two, because nobody knew if this thing was going to go south.''
  ' On the controversial Greater Boston lockdown: ''In the afternoon ... I went back to the offices in the State House ... and I took a nap. (Then) the phone rang. It was the president. ... And he said, ''Deval, I'm briefed. ... What are you going to do about the city? You can't keep it locked down indefinitely.'
  ''I said, 'Mr. President, I know that. ... I'm trying to sort that out now.' ... Basically the state police had said we should end this ... when we finish the door-to-door in Watertown. So if we haven't found him, we should say to people, 'Look, live your lives, but please be careful because he's still at large.'''
  ' On the capture of '¨accused terrorist Dzhokhar Tsarnaev: ''Look, the reason why it worked out in the end is because we found him. If we didn't find him then people would be bitching and moaning about how we kept them indoors all day.''
  ' On getting drunk: ''I got out to the Berkshires around supper time (Saturday, April 20). And I went for a quick swim, and I went to a local restaurant ... for supper by myself with a book. And I sat in the corner and Maggie, who runs the (restaurant), asked, 'Do you want to be near people or away from people?' I said, 'As far away as I can.' So she put in the corner, me and my book on my iPad, and she starts bringing me things. Some of them edible. In fact all the food was edible. She starts bringing me things to drink as a celebration. And by the end of the meal, I was actually quite drunk, by myself.''
  Maggie Merelle, co-owner of the West Stockbridge bistro Rouge, told the Herald yesterday she didn't sense the governor was '¨intoxicated.
  ''He wasn't tipsy. I never would have known,'' Merelle said, recalling Patrick had duck confit, french fries, soup, salad and a ''glass of chardonnay or two.''
  She said she was honored to have him, adding hosting him made her feel ''like an old Jewish mother feeding him. We just wanted to nourish him.''
  Patrick admitted he left that night without paying the bill.
  ''I realized I had no money with me. So I called her over, and I said to Maggie: 'I really appreciate it. I'm very relaxed.' And I also have no money. Can I bring it down tomorrow or something?''‰'' the governor said.
  Merelle, who remembered the night well, told the Herald the governor ''definitely'' squared his tab.
Leaked document shows Obama efforts to expand cyberwarfare preparation '' CNN Security Clearance - CNN.com Blogs
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 22:38
  By Barbara Starr
  President Barack Obama has directed senior national security leadership to prepare a list of targets for potential cyberattacks, according to a "Top Secret" document published Friday by the British newspaper The Guardian.
  The classified document marks the third time in three days that highly sensitive government information has been leaked to The Guardian.
  The latest document, called Presidential Policy Directive/PPD-20, is marked "TOP SECRET/NOFORN" which means it is not to be shared with foreign nationals. CNN could not independently verify the directive but it appears in the same format as other government directive documents. "Top Secret" material is highly sensitive but it is not the highest level of classification in the government.
  The presidential directive orders the federal government to "identify potential targets" for "offensive" cyberoperations - essentially cyberattacks.
  Under U.S. law, presidential approval is required for all cyberoperations. In the event an attack is ordered, the president would specifically approve that use of force and troops specializing in cyberoperation, a senior Pentagon official told CNN.
  The document spells out what has been known in far less detail until now - that the United States is increasingly developing cyberwarfare capability.
  The leaked directive follows other presidential orders dating back to 1990. It was the growing concern about cyber vulnerabilities and cyberattack that led the Pentagon several years ago to establish the U.S. Cyber Command, a military unit specifically devoted to both using the military to defend against cyberattacks on U.S. targets, and developing the capability to launch cyberattacks on targets. There is also extensive cooperation with industry because of the need to protect civilian infrastructure such as power grids, pipelines and transportation networks.
  The cyber realm remains one of the most sensitive areas for the U.S. military.
  "We have developed a full range of capabilities to operate in the cyber-domain," the senior Pentagon official said. "But we are not going to talk about it." He emphasized the "same rules of engagement" apply in cyberattacks as with other targets the U.S. military might strike.
  But in cyberattacks, there also is a unique need to assess the possibility of civilian damage because an attack to disable a computer network could have widespread, perhaps unintended, consequences beyond an initial military cybertarget.
  Details of the capabilities are closely held.
  The leak, though revealing, will likely not raise the alarm of Americans compared to the previous disclosure in The Guardian of a secret court order to Verizon to turn over its complete phone records for calls within the United States and overseas.
  Similarly, a top-secret document disclosed to The Guardian and the Washington Post on Thursday suggested the U.S. government was tapping directly into the servers of major U.S. Internet companies including Google and Facebook to intercept e-mails, videos, photos and other data flowing through the United States.
  Both newspapers wrote the program was done with the cooperation of nine companies, most of whom adamantly denied any knowledge of the secretive program. The Obama administration, including the president, insisted the program was legal, limited solely to hunting down information related to seeking out terrorists overseas, and was not seeking data on Americans.
  On Thursday, the director of national intelligence called the leaks "reprehensible" and said the situation "threatens potentially long-lasting and irreversible harm" to efforts to defend the country.
  The Washington Post described the source who provided the documents on the Internet surveillance program as "a career intelligence officer" who sought to "expose what he believes to be a gross intrusion on privacy."
Macaroni and cheese - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 22:09
  Macaroni and cheese, also called "mac and cheese" in American English, Canadian English, and Australian English; "macaroni pie" in Caribbean English;[1] and "macaroni cheese" in the United Kingdom,[2] and New Zealand;[3] is a dish consisting of cooked elbow macaroni, white sauce, and cheese.[4][5]
  Traditional macaroni and cheese is a casserole baked in the oven; however, it may be prepared in a sauce pan on the top of the stove from scratch[6] or using a packaged mix.[5]
  History[edit]Macaroni ("Î¼Î±ÎºÎ±Ï�ÏŽÎ½ÎµÎ¹Î±" in Greek where the word is derived from) is mentioned in various medieval Greek and Italian sources, though it is not always clear whether it is a pasta shape or a prepared dish.[7] Pasta and cheese casseroles have been recorded in cookbooks as early as the Liber de Coquina, one of the oldest medieval cookbooks. A cheese and pasta casserole known as makerouns was recorded in an English cookbook in the 14th century.[8] It was made with fresh, hand-cut pasta which was sandwiched between a mixture of melted butter and cheese. It was considered an upper class dish even in Italy until about the 18th century.[7]
  "Maccaroni" with various sauces was a fashionable food in late 18th century Paris. The future American president Thomas Jefferson encountered macaroni both in Paris and in northern Italy. He drew a sketch of the pasta and wrote detailed notes on the extrusion process. In 1793, he commissioned American ambassador to Paris William Short to purchase a machine for making it. Evidently, the machine was not suitable, as not Jefferson later imported both macaroni and Parmesan cheese for his use at Monticello.[9] In 1802, Jefferson served a "macaroni pie" at a state dinner.
  Recipe history[edit]Since that time, the dish has been associated with the United States.[citation needed] A recipe called "macaroni and cheese" appeared in the 1824 cookbook The Virginia Housewife written by Mary Randolph. Randolph's recipe had three ingredients: macaroni, cheese, and butter, layered together and baked in a 400 °F(204 °C) oven. The cookbook was the most influential cookbook of the 19th century, according to culinary historian Karen Hess[citation needed]. Similar recipes for macaroni and cheese occur in the 1852 Hand-book of Useful Arts, and the 1861 Godey's Lady's Book. By the mid-1880s, cookbooks as far west as Kansas included recipes for macaroni and cheese casseroles. Factory production of the main ingredients made the dish affordable, and recipes made it accessible, but not notably popular. As it became accessible to a broader section of society, macaroni and cheese lost its upper class appeal. Fashionable restaurants in New York ceased to serve it.[10]
  Macaroni and cheese recipes have been attested in Canada since at least Modern Practical Cookery in 1845, which suggests a puff pastry lining (suggesting upper-class refinement) and a sauce of cream, egg yolks, mace, and mustard, and grated Parmesan or Cheshire cheese on top. Canadian Cheddar cheese was also becoming popularized at this time and was likely also used during that era.[11]
  Contemporary versions[edit]Boston Market, a ready to eat take-out restaurant, and Michelina's and Stouffer's frozen food, are some of the more recognizable brands of macaroni and cheese available in the United States. The dish retains its Southern associations and is a common side at barbecue and soul food restaurants, but it has long held its place in higher end Southern establishments and working class cafeterias.[citation needed] One novelty presentation is deep-fried mac and cheese found at fairs and mobile vendors (food carts). A prepared version known as "macaroni and cheese loaf" can be found in some stores.[12]
  Since 2005 a number of restaurants operating on a fast-food model'--but serving only macaroni and cheese'--have opened in places such as New York City, Oakland, Portland, St. Louis, Manchester and Vancouver, Canada.
  It is possible to make "macaroni and cheese" with actual cheese rather than a cheese sauce.[4] It has been suggested that pasta rigati or some other small shell macaroni is an excellent choice for the pasta ingredient due to its "pocket" to hold cheese.[6]
  Regional variations[edit]A similar traditional dish in Switzerland is called lplermagronen (Alpine herder's macaroni), which is also available in boxed versions. lplermagronen are made of macaroni, cream, cheese, roasted onions, and potatoes. In the Canton of Uri, the potatoes are traditionally omitted, and in some regions, bacon or ham is added.
  Packaged mixes[edit]Packaged versions of the dish are available in frozen form or as a boxed convenience food, consisting of uncooked pasta and either a liquid cheese sauce or powdered ingredients to prepare it. The powdered cheese sauce is mixed with either milk or water, and margarine, butter, or olive oil. In preparing the dish, the macaroni is cooked and drained, then mixed with the cheese sauce. These products are prepared in a microwave, in a stove pot, or baked in an oven, often with any of the extra ingredients mentioned above.
  A number of different products on the market use this basic formulation with minor variations in ingredients.[13]
  A variety of packaged mixes which are prepared on the top of the stove in a sauce pan are available. They are usually modeled on Kraft Macaroni & Cheese (known as Kraft Dinner in Canada), which was introduced in 1937 with the slogan "make a meal for four in nine minutes." It was an immediate success in the US and Canada amidst the economic hardships of the Depression. During the Second World War, rationing led to increased popularity for the product which could be obtained two boxes for one food rationing stamp.[14] The 1953 Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook includes a recipe for the dish with Velveeta, which had been reformulated in that year.
  Often, packaged macaroni and cheese mixes contain ingredients that aren't certified kosher. This is because many cheese products include rennet, an extract containing the enzyme rennine. Rennet is often not kosher, because it contains an enzyme procured from a non-kosher animal. Therefore, when packaged macaroni and cheese became more popular, there was a need to create a kosher version. The two most popular brands are Wacky Mac and Fould's.
  Celebrations[edit]In the United States, July 14 has been branded as "National Macaroni and Cheese Day".[15]
  See also[edit]References[edit]^Staff writer (14 January 2007). "Macaroni Pie Recipe". Retrieved 19 June 2010 ^BBC, Recipes, Macaroni cheese^"Mama's Macaroni Cheese". Retrieved 24 October 2012. ^ abMoskin, Julia (4 January 2006). "Macaroni and Lots of Cheese". The New York Times. Retrieved 30 January 2009. ^ ab"Perfect Macaroni and Cheese". Martha Stewart Living66 (February 1999). Retrieved September 22, 2012. ^ ab"The Ultimate Macaroni and Cheese". MyPanera. Retrieved September 22, 2012. ^ ab"Did You Know: Food History - The History of Macaroni". Cliffordawright.com. Retrieved 2010-10-20. ^James L. Matterer. "Makerouns". Godecookery.com. Retrieved 2010-10-20. ^McLaughlin, Jack. Jefferson and Monticello: the Biography of a builder. p. 229. ^Kummer, Corby (July 1986). "Pasta". The Atlantic. Retrieved 21 November 2012. ^Chapman, Sasha (September 2012). "Manufacturing Taste". The Walrus. Retrieved September 1, 2012. ^Ellis-Christensen, Tricia. "What is Macaroni and Cheese Loaf?". wiseGEEK. Retrieved 15 August 2011. ^Guide to Macaroni and Cheese Spread of ratings for all 130 products in Macaroni and Cheese evaluated by GoodGuide.^"Kraft Macaroni & Cheese: A History". Chicago Tribune. August 14, 2010. Retrieved 21 November 2012. ^National Mac & Cheese DayWisconsin Cheese Talk July 14th, 2010External links[edit]
scott buscemi - "What the....?" is right - you are reading from a script!
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 21:40
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PRISM-Official Blog: What the ...?
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 21:35
  Dear Google users'--You may be aware of press reports alleging that Internet companies have joined a secret U.S. government program called PRISM to give the National Security Agency direct access to our servers. As Google's CEO and Chief Legal Officer, we wanted you to have the facts.
  First, we have not joined any program that would give the U.S. government'--or any other government'--direct access to our servers. Indeed, the U.S. government does not have direct access or a ''back door'' to the information stored in our data centers. We had not heard of a program called PRISM until yesterday.
  Second, we provide user data to governments only in accordance with the law. Our legal team reviews each and every request, and frequently pushes back when requests are overly broad or don't follow the correct process. Press reports that suggest that Google is providing open-ended access to our users' data are false, period. Until this week's reports, we had never heard of the broad type of order that Verizon received'--an order that appears to have required them to hand over millions of users' call records. We were very surprised to learn that such broad orders exist. Any suggestion that Google is disclosing information about our users' Internet activity on such a scale is completely false.
  Finally, this episode confirms what we have long believed'--there needs to be a more transparent approach. Google has worked hard, within the confines of the current laws, to be open about the data requests we receive. We post this information on our Transparency Report whenever possible. We were the first company to do this. And, of course, we understand that the U.S. and other governments need to take action to protect their citizens' safety'--including sometimes by using surveillance. But the level of secrecy around the current legal procedures undermines the freedoms we all cherish.
  Posted by Larry Page, CEO and David Drummond, Chief Legal Officer
TIA Lives On @ ShaneHarris.com
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 21:34
  A controversial counter-terrorism program, which lawmakers halted more than two years ago amid outcries from privacy advocates, was stopped in name only and has quietly continued within the intelligence agency now fending off charges that it has violated the privacy of U.S. citizens.Research under the Defense Department's Total Information Awareness program '-- which developed technologies to predict terrorist attacks by mining government databases and the personal records of people in the United States '-- was moved from the Pentagon's research-and-development agency to another group, which builds technologies primarily for the National Security Agency, according to documents obtained by National Journal and to intelligence sources familiar with the move. The names of key projects were changed, apparently to conceal their identities, but their funding remained intact, often under the same contracts.It is no secret that some parts of TIA lived on behind the veil of the classified intelligence budget. However, the projects that moved, their new code names, and the agencies that took them over haven't previously been disclosed. Sources aware of the transfers declined to speak on the record for this story because, they said, the identities of the specific programs are classified.Two of the most important components of the TIA program were moved to the Advanced Research and Development Activity, housed at NSA headquarters in Fort Meade, Md., documents and sources confirm. One piece was the Information Awareness Prototype System, the core architecture that tied together numerous information extraction, analysis, and dissemination tools developed under TIA. The prototype system included privacy-protection technologies that may have been discontinued or scaled back following the move to ARDA.A $19 million contract to build the prototype system was awarded in late 2002 to Hicks & Associates, a consulting firm in Arlington, Va., that is run by former Defense and military officials. Congress's decision to pull TIA's funding in late 2003 ''caused a significant amount of uncertainty for all of us about the future of our work,'' Hicks executive Brian Sharkey wrote in an e-mail to subcontractors at the time. ''Fortunately,'' Sharkey continued, ''a new sponsor has come forward that will enable us to continue much of our previous work.'' Sources confirm that this new sponsor was ARDA. Along with the new sponsor came a new name. ''We will be describing this new effort as 'Basketball,' '' Sharkey wrote, apparently giving no explanation of the name's significance. Another e-mail from a Hicks employee, Marc Swedenburg, reminded the company's staff that ''TIA has been terminated and should be referenced in that fashion.''Sharkey played a key role in TIA's birth, when he and a close friend, retired Navy Vice Adm. John Poindexter, President Reagan's national security adviser, brought the idea to Defense officials shortly after the 9/11 attacks. The men had teamed earlier on intelligence-technology programs for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which agreed to host TIA and hired Poindexter to run it in 2002. In August 2003, Poindexter was forced to resign as TIA chief amid howls that his central role in the Iran-Contra scandal of the mid-1980s made him unfit to run a sensitive intelligence program.It's unclear whether work on Basketball continues. Sharkey didn't respond to an interview request, and Poindexter said he had no comment about former TIA programs. But a publicly available Defense Department document, detailing various ''cooperative agreements and other transactions'' conducted in fiscal 2004, shows that Basketball was fully funded at least until the end of that year (September 2004). The document shows that the system was being tested at a research center jointly run by ARDA and SAIC Corp., a major defense and intelligence contractor that is the sole owner of Hicks & Associates. The document describes Basketball as a ''closed-loop, end-to-end prototype system for early warning and decision-making,'' exactly the same language used in contract documents for the TIA prototype system when it was awarded to Hicks in 2002. An SAIC spokesman declined to comment for this story.Another key TIA project that moved to ARDA was Genoa II, which focused on building information technologies to help analysts and policy makers anticipate and pre-empt terrorist attacks. Genoa II was renamed Topsail when it moved to ARDA, intelligence sources confirmed. (The name continues the program's nautical nomenclature; ''genoa'' is a synonym for the headsail of a ship.)As recently as October 2005, SAIC was awarded a $3.7 million contract under Topsail. According to a government-issued press release announcing the award, ''The objective of Topsail is to develop decision-support aids for teams of intelligence analysts and policy personnel to assist in anticipating and pre-empting terrorist threats to U.S. interests.'' That language repeats almost verbatim the boilerplate descriptions of Genoa II contained in contract documents, Pentagon budget sheets, and speeches by the Genoa II program's former managers.As early as February 2003, the Pentagon planned to use Genoa II technologies at the Army's Information Awareness Center at Fort Belvoir, Va., according to an unclassified Defense budget document. The awareness center was an early tester of various TIA tools, according to former employees. A 2003 Pentagon report to Congress shows that the Army center was part of an expansive network of intelligence agencies, including the NSA, that experimented with the tools. The center was also home to the Army's Able Danger program, which has come under scrutiny after some of its members said they used data-analysis tools to discover the name and photograph of 9/11 ringleader Mohamed Atta more than a year before the attacks.Devices developed under Genoa II's predecessor '-- which Sharkey also managed when he worked for the Defense Department '-- were used during the invasion of Afghanistan and as part of ''the continuing war on terrorism,'' according to an unclassified Defense budget document. Today, however, the future of Topsail is in question. A spokesman for the Air Force Research Laboratory in Rome, N.Y., which administers the program's contracts, said it's ''in the process of being canceled due to lack of funds.''It is unclear when funding for Topsail was terminated. But earlier this month, at a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing, one of TIA's strongest critics questioned whether intelligence officials knew that some of its programs had been moved to other agencies. Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., asked Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte and FBI Director Robert Mueller whether it was ''correct that when [TIA] was closed, that several '... projects were moved to various intelligence agencies'.... I and others on this panel led the effort to close [TIA]; we want to know if Mr. Poindexter's programs are going on somewhere else.''Negroponte and Mueller said they didn't know. But Negroponte's deputy, Gen. Michael V. Hayden, who until recently was director of the NSA, said, ''I'd like to answer in closed session.'' Asked for comment, Wyden's spokeswoman referred to his hearing statements.The NSA is now at the center of a political firestorm over President Bush's program to eavesdrop on the phone calls and e-mails of people in the United States who the agency believes are connected to terrorists abroad. While the documents on the TIA programs don't show that their tools are used in the domestic eavesdropping, and knowledgeable sources wouldn't discuss the matter, the TIA programs were designed specifically to develop the kind of ''early-warning system'' that the president said the NSA is running.Documents detailing TIA, Genoa II, Basketball, and Topsail use the phrase ''early-warning system'' repeatedly to describe the programs' ultimate aims. In speeches, Poindexter has described TIA as an early-warning and decision-making system. He conceived of TIA in part because of frustration over the lack of such tools when he was national security chief for Reagan.Tom Armour, the Genoa II program manager, declined to comment for this story. But in a previous interview, he said that ARDA '-- which absorbed the TIA programs '-- has pursued technologies that would be useful for analyzing large amounts of phone and e-mail traffic. ''That's, in fact, what the interest is,'' Armour said. When TIA was still funded, its program managers and researchers had ''good coordination'' with their counterparts at ARDA and discussed their projects on a regular basis, Armour said. The former No. 2 official in Poindexter's office, Robert Popp, averred that the NSA didn't use TIA tools in domestic eavesdropping as part of his research.But asked whether the agency could have used the tools apart from TIA, Popp replied, ''I can't speak to that.'' Asked to comment on TIA projects that moved to ARDA, Don Weber, an NSA spokesman said, ''As I'm sure you understand, we can neither confirm nor deny actual or alleged projects or operational capabilities; therefore, we have no information to provide.''ARDA now is undergoing some changes of its own. The outfit is being taken out of the NSA, placed under the control of Negroponte's office, and given a new name. It will be called the ''Disruptive Technology Office,'' a reference to a term of art describing any new invention that suddenly, and often dramatically, replaces established procedures. Officials with the intelligence director's office did not respond to multiple requests for comment on this story.
Parag Khanna maps the future of countries - YouTube
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  Archived Version
  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 21:26
Nikola Tesla Page, Tesla's power receiver
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  Archived Version
  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 20:45
  CONTENTSHOW DO ATOMS DO IT?I stumbled across the answer to my questions in a paper about VLF/ELF loop antennas. Apparently Quantum Mechanics does not supply the answer. Instead the question of small antenna behavior is resolved by a little-known section of classical electromagnetism. It involves resonance, but more importantly, it involves the magnetic and electric fields which surround any antenna. (I guess I should have expected this. After all, much of physics works fine with classical concepts, with photons and EM waves both explaining the same phenomena.)An "electrically small" antenna is one where the physical antenna size is far smaller than the EM wavelength being received. At first glance, electrically small antennas aren't all that strange. If we use them to transmit radio waves, they work just as you'd expect. In order to force a tiny antenna to send out a large amount of EM energy, we can simply give it a huge driving signal (high voltage on a tiny dipole, or high current on a tiny loop antenna.) If the EM fields are strong at a distance of 1-wavelength from the small antenna, then the total EM radiation sent out by the antenna will be significant. It's almost as if the EM fields themselves are acting as the antenna. Weak fields act "small," while intense fields behave as a "large" antenna. This explains how a tiny antenna can transmit lots of EM. But what about reception?
  It turns out that a similar idea works for reception; for "input" as opposed to "output." By manipulating the EM fields, we can force an electrically-small receiving antenna to behave as if it was very, VERY large. The secret is to intentionally impress an artificial AC field upon the receiving antenna. We'll transmit in order to receive, as it were. Conventional half-wave antennas already do exactly this because their electrons can slosh back and forth, generating their own EM fields. For example, the thin wires of a half-wave antenna are far too thin to block any incoming radio waves and absorb them. However, the current in such an antenna, as well as the voltage between the two wires, these send out large, wide, volume-filling EM fields which have a constant phase relative to the incoming waves. Because of the constant phase, these fields interact very strongly with those incoming waves. They create the lobes of an interference pattern, and this pattern has an odd characteristic: some of the incoming energy has apparently vanished. The fields produced by the antenna have cancelled out some of the energy of the impinging EM waves.
  TRANSMIT IN ORDER TO RECEIVE?!!!Rather than relying upon the wiggling electrons in the wires of the large half-wave antenna to generate EM fields... what if we used use a power supply instead? If an antenna is 1/10,000 wavelength across, we should be able to force it to behave as if it's huge; perhaps 1/3 wavelength across. We simply have to drive it hard with an RF source. We must drive it at the *same* frequency as the incoming waves, then adjust the phase and amplitude of the power supply to a special value. At one particular value, our transmissions will cause the antenna to be best at absorbing the incoming waves.Take a loop antenna as an example. If we want our little loop-antenna to receive far more radio energy than it normally would, then we need to produce a large AC current in the antenna coil, where the phase of this current is locked in synch with the waves we wish to receive, and is lagging by 90 degrees. The voltage across the antenna terminals stays about the same as when an undriven antenna receives those waves. However, since the current is much higher in the driven antenna, the energy received per second is much higher as well. This seems like engineering blasphemy, no? How can adding a larger current increase the RECEIVED power? And won't our receiving antenna start transmitting? Yet this actually does work. Power equals volts times amps. To increase the RF power received from distant sources, we increase the antenna's amperes intentionally.
  This sounds really silly. How can we improve the reception of an electrically small antenna by using it to *transmit*? The secret involves the cancellation of magnetic or electric fields in the near-field region of the antenna. The physics of the nearfield region of antennas has a kind of nonlinearity because conductors are present. In the electromagnetic nearfield region, it's possible to change the "E" of a wave without changing the "M" (change the antenna's voltage without changing the current), and vice versa. Superposition of EM traveling waves does not quite apply here because the ruling equations for energy propagation near conductors depends upon V^2 or I^2 separately. In addition, V is almost independent of I in the near-field region. If a very small loop antenna (a coil) should happen to receive a radio wave as a very small signal, we can increase the received *energy* by artificially increasing the current. Or if we're using a tiny dipole antenna (a capacitor,) we can increase the short dipole's received energy by applying a large AC voltage across the antenna terminals.
  NOT CRACKPOTTY AFTER ALLNote that this does not violate any rules of conventional physics. If we add stronger EM fields, they sum with the incoming EM plane waves and cause these radio waves to bend towards the tiny antenna, and the antenna absorbs them. This increases the antenna's EA (effective area, or effective aperture.) We can use this process to alter the coupling between the antenna and the surrounding space, but the total energy still follows the conservation law. The altered fields only change the "virtual size" or EA of the antenna.More importantly, the phenomenon is quite limited. We can only use it with electrically "small" antennas. We cannot increase the "virtual size" much beyond a quarter wavelength for the waves involved. If we already have a large 1/2-wave dipole, then no matter how large is our artificially-add AC voltage, we cannot make it absorb more incoming waves. However, if we have an extremely small antenna, say, a 10KHz loop antenna the size of a pie plate, we can make that antenna seem very, very large indeed. Think like this: how large is the diameter of the antenna's nearfield region at 10KHz? Around 10 kilometers? What if we could extract half of the incoming energy from that entire volume?!! In theory we can: half can be absorbed, and the other half scattered. In theory a tiny loop antenna sitting on your lab bench can intercept just as much energy as a longwire 1/2-wave antenna which is 10KM long. Bizarre, eh?
  Here's a way to look at the process. If I can create a field which CANCELS OUT some of the energy in an extended region surrounding a tiny antenna, this violates the law of Conservation of Energy. Field energy cannot just vanish! That's correct: if we cancel out the energy in the nearfield of an antenna, this is actually an absorption process, and the energy winds up inside the antenna circuitry. By emitting an EM field, a receiving antenna sucks EM energy into itself. If we ACTIVELY DRIVE an antenna with an "anti-wave", we will force the antenna to produce stronger fields which cancel the incoming waves, and simultaneously the antenna absorbs more energy from the EM fields in the surrounding region of space than it ordinarily would. It also emits some waves of its own. But in antenna theory these waves are identical to the received signals, and they are considered to be reflected or "scattered" from the antenna. It's a general law that we cannot receive EM waves without scattering half of the energy away again.
  Here's the interesting part. If we wish to receive power rather than signals, a critical issue arises.
  Driving a tiny antenna with a large signal will create large currents and heat the antenna. Small antennas are inefficient when compared to half-wave dipoles. If we wish to maximize the virtual aperature of a really tiny antenna (e.g. make our 10KHz pie-plate coil act 10KM across,) we'll quickly be frustrated by wire heating. All the extra received energy will go into warming the copper. Possible solutions: use superconductor loops, or at low frequencies use the nearest equivalent to an AC-driven superconductor: a rotating permanent magnet or rotating capacitor plates.
  BUT HOW DO ATOMS DO IT?OK, if this supposedly explains how tiny atoms can receive long light waves, how can we increase the voltage signal to a SINGLE ATOM?! Actually it's not difficult. No angstrom-sized radio transmitter is needed. The key is to use EM energy stored as oscillating fields; i.e. resonance.If an atom resonates electromagnetically at the same frequency as the incident light waves, then, from a Classical standpoint, that atom's internal resonator will store EM energy accumulated from the incoming waves. It will then behave as an oscillator, becoming surrounded by an increasingly strong AC electromagnetic field as time goes by. (Quantum Mechanics might say that the atom is surrounded by virtual photons at the resonant frequency.) If this alternating field is locked into the correct phase with the incoming light wave, then the atom's fields can interact with the light waves' fields and cancel out quite a bit of the light energy present in the nearfield region around the atom. The energy doesn't vanish, instead it ends up INSIDE the atom. Half of the energy goes into kicking an electron to a higher level, and the other half is re-emitted as "scattered" waves.
  By resonantly creating an "anti-wave", which superposes with incoming waves and bends them towards the atom, the tiny atom has "sucked energy" out of the enormously long light waves as they go by. And since the atom has no conventional copper coils inside it wasting energy, it can build up some really strong fields which allow it to behave extremely "large" when compared to it's physical diameter.
  Impossible? Please track down the C. Bohren paper in the references below. He analyzes the behavior of small metal particles and dielectric particles exposed to long-wave EM radiation, and rigorously shows with semi-Classical analysis that the presance of a resonator can cause dust motes to "act larger than they really are."
  How can this stuff be true?! After all, electric and magnetic fields cannot BEND other fields. They cannot affect each other directly. They work by superposition. For the same reason, a light wave cannot deflect another light wave. Ah, but as I said before, the mathematics of the fields around a coil or a capacitor are not the same as the mathematics of freely-propagating EM waves. If we add the field of a bar magnet to the field of a radio wave, and if the bar magnet is in the right place (at a spot where the phase of the b-field of the radio wave is reversing polarity,) then the radio wave becomes distorted in such a way that it momentarily bends towards the bar magnet. And then, as the EM wave progresses, we must flip the magnet over and over in order to keep the field pattern from bending away again during the following half-cycle. The energy flow continues to "funnel in" towards the rotating magnet. Now replace the bar magnet with an AC coil, and vary the coil current so the fields stay locked to the traveling radio wave in the same way. In that case the wave energy will ALWAYS bend towards the coil and be absorbed. Superposition still applies, but this is a COHERENT superposition, so it acts like a static field pattern: as if a permanent magnet can bend a radio wave inwards and absorb its energy rather than simply having the fields sum together without interesting results.
  Note that the coil will also emit its own EM ripple. This emission is well known: atoms ideally will scatter half the light they absorb, and dipole antennas behave similarly: they scatterer incoming EM waves as they absorb part of the energy. When all is said and done, our oscillating coil has absorbed half of the incoming EM energy and re-emitted (or "scattered") the rest. In a phase-locked system, we cannot tell the difference between reflection and transmission.
  A "HOLE" IN PHYSICSWhen viewed as a halfwave receiving antenna, a resonant atom acts as if it has expanded in size to fill its entire nearfield region. In terms of Quantum Mechanics, it does so by locally creating a large virtual-photon AC field which normally would not exist. Because of coherent superposition, in a sense this new field BECOMES THE ANTENNA. The significant part of this new field extends to (Pi*wavelength)/2 distance around the atom, and this distance can be thousands of times larger than the atom's radius. A 1-angstrom atom with a large AC field can behave as a 1/3-wave antenna at optical frequencies. Though tiny, the atom can absorb "longwave" radiation such as light. Our 1-angstrom atom becomes a black sphere 2000 angstroms across, and efficiently absorbs 6000-Angstrom light waves. Very strange, no? I've certainly never encountered such a thing during my physics training. Apparently the missing details of the absorption of light wave by atoms is a "hole" in physics education, and it has only been treated in a couple of contemporary physics papers in the 1980s. Here's another hole: when an atom absorbs waves, it has to scatter away half the energy. Does this mean that when an atom absorbs a photon, it must always interact with TWO photons, eating one and reflecting the other?!!!! I've never heard of such a requirement. It flys in the face of the usual description of atoms and photons. (Is it mentioned in Feynman's QED book?)Fig 1. Energy flux lines for the nearfield region ofa resonant absorber. The tiny absorber acts likea large disk.[from ref#4]
  This "energy suction" effect is not limited to atoms. We can easily build a device to demonstrate the phenomenon. Below is a simple physics analogy to show how tiny atoms can "suck energy" from long light waves. Suppose we transmit a VLF radio signal at 1KHZ frequency. Let's arbitrarily set the signal strength so it's about the same strength as the Earth's weak vertical e-field: 100 Volt/meter. If the transmitter's e-field is contained entirely below the conductive ionosphere, and if the bottom of the ionosphere is about 100Km high, then the Earth's entire vertical field is about 10 megavolts top to bottom. Our transmitter must produce such a field. These values aren't totally ridiculous. Large, well-designed Tesla coils commonly produce 10 megavolts. If such a coil was erected outdoors and connected to an insulated metal tower, it would fill the Earth's entire atmosphere with 1KHz radiation. The Earth's atmosphere would be like a microwave oven cavity. Such an AC voltage field would produce a feeble 100V/M field everywhere on the Earth's surface. This field would be detectable by instruments, but otherwise it would be too small for humans to notice, and we certainly would not expect to be able to get significant power out of it.
  CAPACITIVE-PLATE ANTENNAOK, we've got a feeble AC e-field in the outdoor environment. How will a simple antenna-plate perform as an energy receiver? See fig.2 below. If it's a large horizontal metal plate about one meter off the ground, it will give out a 100 volt signal at 1KHz, but this one hundred volt "power source" has an extremely large capacitive series impedance. Let's say that the plate/ground capacitance is 10pF. To draw energy with the maximum possible voltage, the load resistor should be approximately equal to the series impedance. This impedance is dominated by the 10pF capacitor value, so this gives 1/(2*PI*F*C) = 16 megohm load resistor, and it drags the antenna's voltage down from 100V to 70.7V. The received energy in the resistor is 300 microwatts, and the current in the resistor is in the microamp range. Just as we might expect, everything here is similar to a conventional radio antenna. The weak e-field from the incoming EM waves behaves only as a "signal", and it is not a source of significant power. It can't drive a motor or light an LED. __________ --> | 10 MVolt |_______ | @ 1KHz | | |__________| | | ___|___ Capacitance from ionosphere to plate _|_ ( very small, say 1/10,000 pF ) //// _______ | | |______________ | 10 MVolt |_______ | @ 1KHz | | |__________| | | ___|___ Capacitance from ionosphere to plate _|_ ( very small, say 1/10,000 pF ) //// _______ | | |_____________
Losing Their Religion
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  Archived Version
  Source: JustOneMinute
  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 17:25
  One of the things I find interesting is a push now to define broadcasting, computing, and publishing as all being the same business--media. So you end up with these tech companies and broadcasters and newspapers who think of bo as a partner in this new future they plan to impose for our benefit.
  I just finished listening to futurist Marina Gorbis being interviewed and saying we have been building this platform of tools now for 40 years. Now it is time for the tools to begin changing us.
  Really?
  And if reality doesn't fit the redesign or plans like Woolwich or the reality of a personally disengaged President, you simply ignore it?
  Until when? Do only the graphics of falling buildings and airliners count?
  Posted by: rse | June 07, 2013 at 07:05 AM
  So they were momentarily Apostates, but now they're back to being Prostrates.
  I wonder what's more difficult for former True Believers, renouncing Islam or renouncing Obama?
  G'nite.
  Posted by: daddy | June 07, 2013 at 07:32 AM
  Clarice, just put up a Ted Stevens update on the previous thread. G'nite for a 2nd time.
  Posted by: daddy | June 07, 2013 at 07:32 AM
  I just finished listening to futurist Marina Gorbis being interviewed and saying we have been building this platform of tools now for 40 years. Now it is time for the tools to begin changing us.
  Really?
  It's how they think. I've seen it from the inside.
  Posted by: Captain Hate | June 07, 2013 at 07:59 AM
  Saw that update, Daddy. It's not unusual for the govt to take the full amount of time allowed within which to appeal to actually file an appeal.
  Posted by: Clarice | June 07, 2013 at 08:01 AM
  This is the equivalent of, say, Vatican Radio reporting on how the Pope has lost all credibility by meeting with Ayatollah Khemeni and then revising it by noting he has only lost credibility with the Sunni's.
  Raining in Bald,mur. Cobblestone streets of Fells Point are wet and glistening. What a great job they have done around the Inner Harbor. Fun place to be. I remember years ago even Chuck Norris wouldn't walk these streets even in daytime.
  Posted by: 4Jack is Back!2 | June 07, 2013 at 08:07 AM
  JiB, Father Hate used to buy suits around there when, if you didn't know where you were going, you wouldn't even get out of the car. All cash transactions and he'd have to get them tailored elsewhere.
  How 'bout those Spurs?
  Posted by: Captain Hate | June 07, 2013 at 08:13 AM
  Last time I was in Fells Point I ran into Senator Mikulski and her then girlfriend. I like Fells Pt a lot, tpp, JiM
  Posted by: Clarice | June 07, 2013 at 08:13 AM
  I just read a post that indicated that Lois Lerner was aware of the IRS targeting a year before she admitted - July 2010. It seems to me the House should immediately write a bill abolishing the IRS and bring it up every day until it sticks. There has never been a better time. (And I want it passed before quarterlies are due.)
  Posted by: Jane | June 07, 2013 at 08:21 AM
  Yes, Jane, and that detail you pointed out with then official Werfel meeting with their IT expert, before the targeting happened, makes things more curious;
  Posted by: narciso | June 07, 2013 at 08:25 AM
  Forget Orwell. 93 years ago H. L. Menken had this to say:
  "As democracy is perfected, the office of the President represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day, the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last and the White House will be occupied by a downright fool and complete narcissistic moron.
  H.L. Mencken, The Baltimore Evening Sun,
  July 26, 1920"
  Well, I am in Bald,mur:)
  Posted by: 4Jack is Back!2 | June 07, 2013 at 08:30 AM
  I used to go to Fells Point when my brother was in med school, he could afford to go there back then (I usually paid). Now he takes me to Fells Point because he can afford to go there (he pays now). Parts of Baltimore are much improved, other parts are still Baltimore.
  Posted by: henry | June 07, 2013 at 08:30 AM
  Oh what a surprise, the Times backed off already:
  Dylan Byers gets a response from the New York Times explaining why they edited their editorial criticizing the Obama administration.
  ''The administration has now lost all credibility,'' the Times originally declared, sparking surprise from political figures and journalists.
  Later the line was changed to, ''The administration has now lost all credibility on this issue.''
  ''The change was for clarity's sake,'' editorial page editor Andrew Rosenthal explained. ''It was clear from the context of the editorial that the issue of credibility related to this subject and the final edit of the piece strengthened that point.''
  http://washingtonexaminer.com/new-york-times-secretly-edited-critical-obama-editorial-for-claritys-sake/article/2531382
  Tools.
  Posted by: Porchlight | June 07, 2013 at 08:32 AM
  We ate at a small Tapas bar last night and it was as good as any we have found in the US. Down the street was a Gelato place and it was superb. Off to breakfast and then the Aquarium. Would love to go out to Ft. McHenry but today is a day to stay inside.
  p.s. To show how much it has changed, I had to go find some throat lozenges for Mrs. JiB's summer cold and found the cleanest 711 store I have ever seen. And everyone there talked plain English:)
  Posted by: 4Jack is Back!2 | June 07, 2013 at 08:36 AM
  This column that Clarice linked awhile ago is very good -Coulter: Tips for Right-Wingers on the IRS Scandal
  http://www.humanevents.com/2013/06/05/coulter-tips-for-right-wingers-on-the-irs-scandal/
  "ACORN...Occupy Wall Street... Media Matters for America...Moveon.org...The Center for American Progress...The Tides Foundation...The Ford Foundation...
  These groups are regarded by the IRS as nonpartisan community groups, merely educational, while dozens of patriotic, constitutional, Christian or tea party groups are still waiting for their tax exemptions.
  That's to say nothing of Planned Parenthood, PBS and innumerable other Democratic front-groups that not only have tax exemptions, but get direct funding from the government."
  Posted by: Janet | June 07, 2013 at 08:52 AM
  Jane@8:21...hubby reminded me to pay the June quarterlies and I said,or I could "forget." : )Did everyone read matt's link last night? FLOTUS is snubbing the Chinese First Lady. Speaking of no credibility. Just as well,I guess.Jack,your dogs are having a great trip,staying at doggy spas!
  Posted by: Marlene | June 07, 2013 at 08:52 AM
  I just finished listening to futurist Marina Gorbis being interviewed and saying we have been building this platform of tools now for 40 years. Now it is time for the tools to begin changing us.
  A futurist: Someone so fixated on predictions that yesterday and today are ignored.
  Posted by: sbw | June 07, 2013 at 08:55 AM
  JournoList was supposedly shut down June 25, 2010 (according to wiki)....so all this is goin' on while patriotic, constitutional, Christian or tea party groups are still waiting for their tax exemptions.
  Posted by: Janet | June 07, 2013 at 08:58 AM
  Well Janet if it's the same players, pursuing the same agenda, then it's not really off, is it.
  Posted by: narciso | June 07, 2013 at 09:00 AM
  Is there any way to challenge the tax status of the groups Janet highlights? If they are approved while Tea Party groups are not, should they face a retroactive change of tax status due to criminal nature of the status they were given?
  Posted by: henry | June 07, 2013 at 09:02 AM
  Marlene-
  How often do you bring the spouse the first time the big boss comes to visit the plant?
  Posted by: Melinda Romanoff Just sayin' | June 07, 2013 at 09:05 AM
  McCarthy: "The problem here is not government power." Sorry. I disagree. For me, the problem is always government power. It is exacerbated by corrupt administration of the power.
  Coulter's ideas could be good, but for the fact that the GOP lacks the leadership will to deal with it. I prefer Trey Gowdy for Speaker of the House.
  Posted by: MarkO | June 07, 2013 at 09:13 AM
  JiB-- are you still in Fell's Point? If the tapas/Med restaurant you ate in last night is across from a public parking garage, about 100ft to the west on the corner is a Coffee Bar. Get Brunch THERE-- they sell the most unbelievable Mac/Cheese/Bacon bowl and dern good coffee.
  PS: The mencken quote is depressing.
  Posted by: NK | June 07, 2013 at 09:20 AM
  Yesterday's 64th Anniversary of Orwell Publishing '1984'-- Let's see: FISA Warrant revealed (check); PRISM revealed (check); More testimony about IRS coercing citizens about what they think and who they associate with (check)Some MSNBC schmuck leads a 30 second hate against Obama critics as using 'IRS' as "N&%^$r' (check); and the NYT memory holing their own editorial (check)-- Voila-- Orwell didn't write a cautionary tale, it was an instruction manual.
  Posted by: NK | June 07, 2013 at 09:26 AM
  Mel,I guess if the big boss has a glamorous and accomplished wife,then the plant manager's wife might suffer in comparison. We wouldn't want that to happen.
  Posted by: Marlene | June 07, 2013 at 09:26 AM
  It just seems like there should be a "big picture" reminder for Americans about what ALL was going on.I can hardly remember & I'm a news junkie.
  a bit of my rant on FB - At the Tea Party rallies I attended there were hundreds or thousands of Becky Gerritsons. Americans that had never been politically engaged came out to voice their concerns at an out-of-control federal government. And what happened?...I opened the paper & read about evil, racist, dangerous mobs. The coverage in the old media was such a lie. In fact...the people were so nice that by March 2010 a group of Representatives staged a "show" to provoke an incident, but still nothing happened. McClatchy News ran with the accusations anyway. Representatives Andre Carson, John Lewis, Emanuel Cleaver, & James Clyburn lied. They slandered honest concerned Americans. THAT should have been the news story.
  Around March 2010 was when the IRS targeting of conservative groups really took off too. The Dem/media world must have been scared that Americans were waking up....so they had to slander the movement. Who wants to go to a rally with "evil, racist, dangerous" mobs? Who wants to be audited by the IRS?...it is "safer" to just stay home & be quiet.
  JournoList was still running in March 2010.The Dem-"news"media-nonprofit inbreeding needs some serious exposing.
  Posted by: Janet | June 07, 2013 at 09:29 AM
  "In one instance, Spencer Ackerman of the Washington Independent urged his colleagues to deflect attention from Obama's relationship with Wright by changing the subject. Pick one of Obama's conservative critics, Ackerman wrote, ''Fred Barnes, Karl Rove, who cares '-- and call them racists.''" - from the 8:53 linked post
  Posted by: Janet | June 07, 2013 at 09:33 AM
  I don't think any of us here believed the journolisters would do anything other than stay in place and just do things slightly more surreptitiously. Lying dirtbags can't act otherwise.
  Posted by: Captain Hate | June 07, 2013 at 09:45 AM
  Waiting for a certain shop to open first before we go to see the fishies.
  NK, the Tapas place id Adela next to the Admiral Fell Inn. Had breakfast at Jimmy's but it was disappointing. Service without a smile and food without any distinction. Not like Sip 'N Soda:)
  Janet, like that guy in Network - we should all be yelling out our windows "I am not going to take it anymore". You're doing your part like every patriot before you and hopefully after you.
  But I am more sanguine than usual since at Jimmy's they had the TV set on and it was Maury Povich and his low life, lower intelligent guests. No wonder they were advertising "free tickets". That's all these people know is "free stuff". Pretty pathetic coming from the son of one of America's greatest sports writers, Shirley Povich.
  Marlene, I have a photo of one of the Beagles (Jazz) looking over my shoulder as we are driving up. Like a driving instructor but for some reason even resizing it - it won't post. I'll send it by email.
  Posted by: 4Jack is Back!2 | June 07, 2013 at 09:50 AM
  Janet,
  I swear the MSM functions soley to tell people who can't think for themselves what to think.
  Unfortunately too much of the country is made up of those people.
  Posted by: Jane | June 07, 2013 at 09:50 AM
  Woke up this morning to find that Oshyster and apparently Clinton as well will be shutting down a large part of West LA today, which is front page news.
  I guess the Emperor and the eminence grise really need the ego boost. Why don't I remember Bush having done this?
  Apparently Clapper was asked point blank by a Senate committee whether the government was spying on Americans a few weeks ago and denied it emphatically.
  When do we reach the tipping point? Intimidating the press. A corrupt and oppressive taxation agency? An Administration built on lies and corruption?
  Posted by: matt | June 07, 2013 at 10:18 AM
  Jane, I think that's exactly right.
  But they have a second function - to encourage people not to think, and, over time, to remove their ability to do so.
  Posted by: James D. | June 07, 2013 at 10:22 AM
  Joker comes back in the fourth and wins a tie break to go to a fifth against Nadal in the French semis.
  Posted by: MarkO | June 07, 2013 at 10:34 AM
  The San Onofre nuclear plant is going to be closed permanently. For those not familiar with that plant, it is a can't-miss landmark along I-5 and is affectionately known to millions as the Dolly Parton Memorial.
  Posted by: Danube at IMac | June 07, 2013 at 10:46 AM
  Indeed, MarkO.
  Is DOJ going to go after Glenn Greenwald? They could totally clear up that whole sock puppeting controversy.
  Posted by: Porchlight | June 07, 2013 at 10:48 AM
  For those not familiar with that plant, it is a can't-miss landmark along I-5 and is affectionately known to millions as the Dolly Parton Memorial.
  And featured prominently in this scene from Naked Gun.
  Posted by: Cecil Turner | June 07, 2013 at 11:01 AM
  Apparently Clapper was asked point blank by a Senate committee whether the government was spying on Americans a few weeks ago and denied it emphatically.
  IMNSHO he was asked a question he shouldn't have been asked, and responded fairly:
  "There are cases where they could inadvertently perhaps collect [intelligence on Americans], but not wittingly," the U.S. intelligence chief told Wyden and the rest of the committee.That said, "particularly in the case of NSA and CIA, there are structures against tracking American citizens in the United States for foreign intelligence purposes," Clapper added.
  Posted by: Cecil Turner | June 07, 2013 at 11:02 AM
  JiB:NK, the Tapas place id Adela next to the Admiral Fell Inn.
  Maybe you should try Duda's Tavern just down the street.
  I mean, it's Duda's!
  Posted by: hit and run | June 07, 2013 at 11:03 AM
  That's a reasonable way of describing the FISA minimization process (basically: sift through it all, collect on foreign intel). He is severely constrained in what he can say on the subject in open hearings.
  Clapper yesterday:
  Information collected under this program is among the most important and valuable foreign intelligence information we collect, and is used to protect our nation from a wide variety of threats.
  The unauthorized disclosure of information about this important and entirely legal program is reprehensible and risks important protections for the security of Americans.
  Posted by: Cecil Turner | June 07, 2013 at 11:08 AM
  This also strikes me as correct. FISA was renewed in December, with a strong bipartisan vote. Playing politics with this program is very easy, and very irresponsible.
  Posted by: Cecil Turner | June 07, 2013 at 11:09 AM
  In July of 2011 and again in May 2012, Wyden and Senator Mark Udall (D-Colo.) wrote a letter to James R. Clapper, Jr., the Director of National Intelligence, asking him a series of four questions regarding the activities of the NSA and other intelligence agencies regarding domestic surveillance.
  In one of the questions, Udall and Wyden asked Clapper if ''any apparently law-abiding Americans had their communications collected by the government pursuant to the FISA Amendments Act'' and if so, how many Americans were affected by this surveillance.
  In a letter dated June 15, 2012, I. Charles McCullough III informed the senators that calculating the number of Americans who've had their electronic communications ''collected or reviewed'' by the NSA was ''beyond the capacity of his office and dedicating sufficient additional resources would likely impede the NSA's mission."
  See? They're too busy collecting data on Americans to count how many Americans they're collecting data on.
  Posted by: Porchlight | June 07, 2013 at 11:13 AM
  Remember how the Russians sent us a warning about the Tsarnaev's but our people ignored it?
  Well, when they stop ignoring that kind of thing then maybe, just maybe, I'll think they're competent enough to deserve something like PRISM. At the moment, however, I can't shake the feeling that their real motive isn't foreign threats to the people, but the domestic threats to their power.
  Posted by: Rob Crawford | June 07, 2013 at 11:20 AM
  IMO the so called constitutional right to privacy is more placebo than real. OTOH if "the people" are going to elect and support bounders like Obama and the Clintons then seems perfectly okay to ram the damn placebo up sideways where there is no sunshine.
  Posted by: boris | June 07, 2013 at 11:24 AM
  DOT - It should be interesting how the San Onofre closing plays in my little coastal city. We've been having wars over an outdated electrical plant that sits right at the coastline a few blocks from my house. It is a truly ugly monstrosity and with awful zoning, but you know how many new power plants have been built in the last few decades in California. The environmental folks have been suing the city for years to get it shut down assuring everyone that wind, solar and San Onofre are sufficient for the power grid. AES, the owner, wants to rebuild a new plant up to new standards. Meanwhile, the taxpayers have been footing the bill for the lawyers, pro and con.
  Posted by: CR | June 07, 2013 at 11:26 AM
  FISA was renewed in December, with a strong bipartisan vote.
  Cecil,
  FISA is much, much smaller in scope than PRISM, as I understand it. Only wiretapping, and only conversations with foreign intelligence targets abroad.
  Also it was a known program! What sort of strong bipartisan support would there have been for PRISM if the public had had any idea what was going on? No one can say.
  Posted by: Porchlight | June 07, 2013 at 11:27 AM
  Cecil,
  I'm with you. The republicans that have known about it in congress don't seem to have their pants on fire. However Obama brought this on himself. No one trusts him or his henchmen.
  Posted by: Sue | June 07, 2013 at 11:28 AM
  How does someone "inadvertently" collect data on every citizen?
  People coding in SQL can probably answer this.
  Posted by: Captain Hate | June 07, 2013 at 11:30 AM
  More important is which other departments are they sharing the hoard with (constraints don't appear to apply in this administration)?
  Posted by: henry | June 07, 2013 at 11:31 AM
  With typepad erasing my comments, it's like having a conversation with my deaf mother in law.
  Posted by: peter | June 07, 2013 at 11:32 AM
  Jane-
  Someone set their Coke down on the keyboard by mistake. Happens all the time.
  Posted by: Melinda Romanoff Honest | June 07, 2013 at 11:33 AM
  JiB-- I checked my calendar from last summer, the places we ate in balt were on Aliceanna street, adjacent to Fell's point;Dinner at Pazo (1425) and brunch at Teavolve (1401). John's Hopkins B-School at the edge of inner harbor is pretty sweet.
  Hope you enjoyed the aquarium
  Posted by: NK | June 07, 2013 at 11:34 AM
  I'm torn between supporting Cecil's (and many others) hair-not-on-fire position and saying, screw reason and facts - just go full Alinsky on their ass*.
  Posted by: AliceH | June 07, 2013 at 11:35 AM
  FISA is much, much smaller in scope than PRISM, as I understand it.
  The sad truth about this sort of hypertechnical operation is that we don't understand it at all, and probably never will. Assuming it was properly briefed to the relevant intel committee folks, it's likely righteous. It's simply too easy to torpedo such a program with a leak for it to survive a bipartisan briefing, otherwise.
  Posted by: Cecil Turner | June 07, 2013 at 11:40 AM
  Just a query-anyone think processing and possessing all this info is in part what that facility in Utah was built to do?
  The spooking is not aimed at terrorist threats. Remember this is the Admin that wants to eliminate the distinction between public and private.
  sbw--I am very tired of listening to so-called experts speaking to conservative groups (there was a woman with her tea party badge proudly displayed yesterday) and taking in every word. I know that there is fibbing going on in their presentations and that what drives them is the vision of the altered future. They are not an expert on education. They are experts in using education to get to an altered future and convincing good people who believe in freedom and liberty to go along with practices that are actually designed to shut it down.
  Govt at every level in the 21st is a shakedown racket.
  Posted by: rse | June 07, 2013 at 11:40 AM
  More important is which other departments are they sharing the hoard with (constraints don't appear to apply in this administration)?
  Only the most important -- DNC, OFA, HRC, PETA, NRDC...
  Posted by: Rob Crawford | June 07, 2013 at 11:44 AM
  Govt at every level in the 21st is a shakedown racket.
  No need to put a time frame on that statement.
  Posted by: Ranger | June 07, 2013 at 11:45 AM
  Assuming it was properly briefed to the relevant intel committee folks, it's likely righteous. It's simply too easy to torpedo such a program with a leak for it to survive a bipartisan briefing, otherwise.
  No, from that we can only assume it didn't exist during the Bush administration. Democrats would have run screaming to the NYT with this if it was Bush's program.
  Posted by: Rob Crawford | June 07, 2013 at 11:46 AM
  "Someone set their Coke down on the keyboard by mistake. "
  Ahhh that explains it.
  Alice I'm ready to go all Alinsky.
  The spy in chief is about to address all our concerns. Talk about pants on fire.
  Posted by: Jane | June 07, 2013 at 11:49 AM
  " Playing politics with this program is very easy, and very irresponsible."
  The question is who's playing with fire? What is WaPo source? Same as Greenwald? This may be connected to the AP leak. Whoever is doing it deliberately endangered covert operations and people in NK.
  Posted by: Corn-fed conservative (southern strategy version) | June 07, 2013 at 11:49 AM
  It's simply too easy to torpedo such a program with a leak for it to survive a bipartisan briefing, otherwise.
  That's a good point. I'm so grateful for anyone in this administration willing to leak anything at all, I've probably lost perspective.
  I'm not entirely clear on how many people in Congress were told the full scope of PRISM, though, so the fact that the GOP folks were quiet about it isn't conclusive IMHO.
  Posted by: Porchlight | June 07, 2013 at 11:52 AM
  The question is who's playing with fire? What is WaPo source? Same as Greenwald?
  Allahpundit pointed out that there are cosmetic differences between the presentation slides provided to Greenwald and the ones provided to the Guardian. That may mean more than one source but who knows.
  It's cute that you're worried about covert operations and people in NK all of a sudden.
  Posted by: Porchlight | June 07, 2013 at 11:56 AM
  'It's simply too easy to torpedo such a program with a leak for it to survive a bipartisan briefing, otherwise."
  What would motivate them to amend/terminate; great public outrage?
  The public just wants to be safe. They don't care what you call the program. Anyway I suspect PRISM is software embedded in TELCOM which actually is designed to 'cull' data, sector it into files before sending to NSA. That would kill the 'datamining' issue, because they are selective. JMO.
  Posted by: Corn-fed conservative (southern strategy version) | June 07, 2013 at 11:56 AM
  I'm torn between supporting Cecil's (and many others) hair-not-on-fire position and saying, screw reason and facts - just go full Alinsky on their ass*.
  I'm all for the full Alinsky treatment. Obama specifically ran in 2008 as the candidate who would end these practices, not expand them. For him to now simply claim that they are just and necessary requires him to apologies to W at the least and also explain that his statement that the War on Terror is coming to an end was simply a lie.
  Instapundit links to this observation:
  How Stupid do you think we are? Paulie was right edition
  http://datechguyblog.com/2013/06/07/how-stupid-do-you-think-we-are-paulie-was-right-edition/
  Any group of people who will lie about the necessity of these types of programs, is more than willing to misuse them for their own political purposes.
  I don't have a basic problem with using the technology at our disposal to find the bad guys, but I want much stricter oversight than a quarterly blanket court authorization to harvest everyone phone records. And I find it hard to believe that there is any purpose behind cataloguing every credit card transaction that takes place in the US, except possibly a forensic one after a attack has happened (in which case you can go back and get the specific data you want with a court order anyway).
  Posted by: Ranger | June 07, 2013 at 11:56 AM
  between the presentation slides provided to Greenwald and the ones provided to the Guardian.
  Guardian s/b WaPo, sorry
  Posted by: Porchlight | June 07, 2013 at 11:57 AM
  I'm torn between supporting Cecil's (and many others) hair-not-on-fire position and saying, screw reason and facts - just go full Alinsky on their ass*.
  I'm with Alice, except for the fact that I'm not torn. I know what the left would do in this situation, and I'm against unilateral disarmament.
  Posted by: Extraneus | June 07, 2013 at 11:57 AM
  Cecil, given the behavior of this Administration, why in God's name should we assume that ANYTHING done by any arm of the Federal Government at this point is "righteous."
  I know there are a lot of good, dedicated people who are working to protect this country, and who are not tainted by Obama and the progs. But the work they do IS being warped and perverted by Obama and the progs. How can it not be?
  What possible reason is there to trust anything from the government at this point?
  Posted by: James D. | June 07, 2013 at 11:58 AM
  WaPo backtracks on claim that internet companies participated knowingly:
  The Post previously claimed that Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, PalTalk, YouTube, Skype, AOL and Apple ''participate knowingly''. The phrase that stood out in the report (it has been repurposed by numerous tech blogs and news sites across the Web) since it suggested that US firms willingly agreed to a process that '-- at best '-- could violate the rights of millions in the US if their data is accidentally monitored by the NSA.
  Hours after the news broke, and every company bar PalTalk and AOL denied any knowledge of the program and allegations of their involvement, the Post has changed its stance.
  http://thenextweb.com/us/2013/06/07/wapost-backtracks-on-claim-tech-companies-participate-knowingly-in-prism-data-collection/
  Posted by: Porchlight | June 07, 2013 at 12:01 PM
  The NYT changed its position to a more comfortable one. Instead of keeping their nose glued to Obama's right posterior muscle, they've moved their nose to his left posterior muscle. Nothing to see here. Move on. No credible newspaper is involved.
  Posted by: Comanche Voter | June 07, 2013 at 12:04 PM
  "It's cute that you're worried about covert operations and people in NK all of a sudden."
  There's leaks, and there are leaks. Ask yourself, if it is true that PRISM is a selective, non-drag-net program, who does it help the most to leak that fact?
  Posted by: Corn-fed conservative (southern strategy version) | June 07, 2013 at 12:05 PM
  Allahpundit pointed out that there are cosmetic differences between the presentation slides provided to Greenwald and the ones provided to the Guardian. That may mean more than one source but who knows.
  A smart reporter would have... tweaked... the slides in order to protect his source from a trap built around different details on the slides.
  Posted by: Rob Crawford | June 07, 2013 at 12:07 PM
  Ask yourself, if it is true that PRISM is a selective, non-drag-net program, who does it help the most to leak that fact?
  If it is true, then the Obama administration is most helped by the leaking of that fact.
  Posted by: Porchlight | June 07, 2013 at 12:08 PM
  The NYT changed its position to a more comfortable one. Instead of keeping their nose glued to Obama's right posterior muscle, they've moved their nose to his left posterior muscle.
  Their tongue, of course, remains in place.
  Posted by: Rob Crawford | June 07, 2013 at 12:09 PM
  A smart reporter would have... tweaked... the slides in order to protect his source from a trap built around different details on the slides.
  Definitely possible. Or a smart leaker would have tweaked them before sharing with multiple media outlets. Just don't know.
  Posted by: Porchlight | June 07, 2013 at 12:09 PM
VIDEO-Remarks Celebrating LGBT Pride Month
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 17:20
  Hello! I wanted to take a moment to join people around the world in celebrating Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Pride month. This month is about the assertion of equality and dignity. It is about the affirmation of fundamental freedoms and human rights. It is about people taking pride in who they are, no matter their sexual orientation or gender identity. Protecting universal human rights is at the very heart of our diplomacy, and we remain committed to advancing human rights for all, including LGBT individuals. We are committed to advancing these rights not just in the month of June, but year-round.
  As Secretary, I join with my colleagues at our embassies, consulates, and USAID missions around the world in saying, no matter where you are, and no matter who you love, we stand with you.
  Across the globe '' in Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Americas '' our diplomats are assisting local LGBT organizations and supporting local human rights advocates working to promote equality, create dialogue, and ensure protections for LGBT individuals.
  Through the Global Equality Fund, the State Department has already provided critical emergency and long-term assistance to promote and protect the human rights of LGBT persons in over twenty-five countries. And our support will continue to grow, in cooperation with other equality-minded governments, foundations and corporations.Forty-four years after Stonewall, we see incredible progress in the fight to advance the human rights and fundamental freedoms of LGBT people, both here in the United States and globally. Unfortunately, our work is not done. Recent events underscore that despite progress, we still have a long way to go. There are LGBT people of all ages, all races, and all faiths '' citizens of every country on Earth. And in too many places, LGBT people and their supporters are being attacked and harassed for simply being who they are and for standing up for their rights. The United States condemns all such violence, harassment, and discrimination. As President Obama said, ''the struggle to end discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender persons is a global challenge, and one that is central to the United States' commitment to promoting human rights.'' LGBT persons must be free to exercise their human rights '' including freedom of expression, freedom of religion, and freedom of assembly and association '' without fear of reprisal.
  It is my honor to reaffirm the State Department's commitment to promoting the human rights of LGBT persons, and indeed all human beings, worldwide.
  To those celebrating Pride in the United States and around the world, I wish you all a Happy Pride month.
Presidential Proclamation -- Flag Day and National Flag Week, 2013
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: White House.gov Press Office Feed
  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 17:19
  The White House
  Office of the Press Secretary
  For Immediate Release
  June 07, 2013
  FLAG DAY AND NATIONAL FLAG WEEK, 2013
  - - - - - - -
  BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
  A PROCLAMATION
  Each June, our Nation lifts its sights to the flag that has watched over us since the days of our founding. In those broad stripes and bright stars, we see the arc of the American story -- from a handful of colonies to 50 States, united and free.
  When proud patriots took up the fight for independence, they came together under a standard that showed their common cause. When the wounds of civil war were still fresh and our country walked the long road to reconstruction, our people found hope in a banner that testified to the strength of our Union. Wherever our American journey has taken us, whether on that unending path to the mountaintop or high above into the reaches of space, Old Glory has followed, reminding us of the rights and responsibilities we share as citizens.
  This week, we celebrate that legacy, and we honor the brave men and women who have secured it through centuries of service at home and abroad. Let us raise our flags high, from small-town storefronts to duty stations stretched around the globe, and let us look to them once more as we press on in the march toward a more perfect Union.
  To commemorate the adoption of our flag, the Congress, by joint resolution approved August 3, 1949, as amended (63 Stat. 492), designated June 14 of each year as "Flag Day" and requested that the President issue an annual proclamation calling for its observance and for the display of the flag of the United States on all Federal Government buildings. The Congress also requested, by joint resolution approved June 9, 1966, as amended (80 Stat. 194), that the President annually issue a proclamation designating the week in which June 14 occurs as "National Flag Week" and call upon citizens of the United States to display the flag during that week.
  NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim June 14, 2013, as Flag Day and the week beginning June 9, 2013, as National Flag Week. I direct the appropriate officials to display the flag on all Federal Government buildings during that week, and I urge all Americans to observe Flag Day and National Flag Week by displaying the flag. I also call upon the people of the United States to observe with pride and all due ceremony those days from Flag Day through Independence Day, also set aside by the Congress (89 Stat. 211), as a time to honor America, to celebrate our heritage in public gatherings and activities, and to publicly recite the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America.
  IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this seventh day of June, in the year of our Lord two thousand thirteen, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-seventh.
  BARACK OBAMA
Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 16:48
  The Fourth Amendment (Amendment IV) to the United States Constitution is the part of the Bill of Rights which guards against unreasonable searches and seizures, along with requiring any warrant to be judicially sanctioned and supported by probable cause. It was adopted as a response to the abuse of the writ of assistance, which is a type of general search warrant, in the American Revolution. Search and seizure (including arrest) should be limited in scope according to specific information supplied to the issuing court, usually by a law enforcement officer, who has sworn by it. The Fourth Amendment applies to the states by way of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
  The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.[1]History of adoption[edit]English law[edit]Like many other areas of American law, the Fourth Amendment finds its roots in English legal doctrine. Sir Edward Coke, in Semayne's case (1604), famously stated: "The house of every one is to him as his castle and fortress, as well for his defence against injury and violence as for his repose."[2]Semayne's Case acknowledged that the King did not have unbridled authority to intrude on his subjects' dwellings but recognized that government agents were permitted to conduct searches and seizures under certain conditions when their purpose was lawful and a warrant had been obtained.[3]
  The 1760s saw a growth in the intensity of litigation against state officers, who, using general warrants, conducted raids in search of materials relating to John Wilkes' publications attacking both government policies and the King himself. The most famous of these cases involved John Entick, whose home was forcibly entered by the King's Messenger Nathan Carrington, along with others, pursuant to a warrant issued by George Montagu-Dunk, 2nd Earl of Halifax authorizing them ''to make strict and diligent search for . . . the author, or one concerned in the writing of several weekly very seditious papers intitled, 'The Monitor or British Freeholder, No 257, 357, 358, 360, 373, 376, 378, and 380,''" and seized printed charts, pamphlets and other materials. In the resulting case, Entick v. Carrington (1765), Charles Pratt, 1st Earl Camden ruled that the search and seizure was unlawful as the warrant authorized the seizure of all of Entick's papers, not just the criminal ones and the warrant lacked probable cause to even justify the search. Entick established the English precedent that the executive is limited in intruding on private property by common law.[3]
  Colonial America[edit]In Colonial America, legislation was explicitly written to enforce British revenue gathering policies on customs.[3] Until 1750, all handbooks for justices of the peace, the issuers of warrants, contained or described only general warrants.[3] William Cuddihy, Ph.D. in his dissertation entitled The Fourth Amendment: Origins and Original Meaning,[4] claims there existed a "colonial epidemic of general searches." According to him, until the 1760s, a "man's house was even less of a legal castle in America than in England" as the authorities possessed almost unlimited power and little oversight.
  In 1756, the colony of Massachusetts enacted legislation that barred the use of general warrants. This represented the first law in American history curtailing the use of seizure power. Its creation largely stemmed from the great public outcry over the Excise Act of 1754, which gave tax collectors unlimited powers to interrogate colonists concerning their use of goods subject to customs and permitted the use of a general warrant known as a writ of assistance, allowing them to search the homes of colonists and seize ''prohibited and uncustomed'' goods.[5]
  A crisis erupted over the writs of assistance on December 27, 1760 when the news of King George II's death on October 23 arrived in Boston. All writs automatically expired six months after the death of the King and would have had to be re-issued by King George III, the new king, to remain valid.[6]
  In mid-January 1761, a group of over 50 merchants represented by James Otis, petitioned the court to have hearings on the issue. During the five hour hearing on February 23, 1761, Otis vehemently denounced British colonial policies, including their sanction of general warrants and writs of assistance.[7]John Adams, who was present in the courtroom when Otis spoke, viewed these events as "the spark in which originated the American Revolution.''[8] However, the court ruled against Otis.[9]
  Because of the name he had made for himself in attacking the writs, Otis was elected to the Massachusetts colonial legislature and helped pass legislation requiring that special writs of assistance be ''granted by any judge or justice of the peace upon information under oath by any officer of the customs'' and barring all other writs. The governor overturned the legislation, finding it contrary to English law and parliamentary sovereignty.[10]
  Seeing the danger general warrants presented, the Virginia Declaration of Rights (1776) explicitly forbade the use of general warrants. This prohibition became precedent for the Fourth Amendment:[11]
  That general warrants, whereby any officer or messenger may be commanded to search suspected places without evidence of a fact committed, or to seize any person or persons not named, or whose offense is not particularly described and supported by evidence, are grievous and oppressive and ought not to be granted.[12][13]Article XIV of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights, written by John Adams and enacted in 1780 as part of the Massachusetts Constitution, added the requirement that all searches must be ''reasonable'' and served as the basis for the language of the Fourth Amendment:[14]
  Every subject has a right to be secure from all unreasonable searches, and seizures of his person, his houses, his papers, and all his possessions. All warrants, therefore, are contrary to this right, if the cause or foundation of them be not previously supported by oath or affirmation; and if the order in the warrant to a civil officer, to make search in suspected places, or to arrest one or more suspected persons, or to seize their property, be not accompanied with a special designation of the persons or objects of search, arrest, or seizure: and no warrant ought to be issued but in cases, and with the formalities, prescribed by the laws.[15]Applicability[edit]The Fourth Amendment has been held to mean that generally a warrant must be judicially sanctioned for a search or an arrest. In order for such a warrant to be considered reasonable, it must be supported by probable cause and be limited in scope according to specific information supplied by a person (usually a law enforcement officer) who has sworn by it and is therefore accountable to the issuing court. However, a dissenting school of thought often found in the opinions of Justice Antonin Scalia is that searches must simply be "reasonable," and the warrant requirement has been overly emphasized.
  The Fourth Amendment applies to governmental searches and seizures, but not those done by private citizens or organizations who are not acting on behalf of a government.[16] The Bill of Rights originally only restricted the federal government. However, in Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S.643 (1961), the Supreme Court ruled that the Fourth Amendment applies to the states by way of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Moreover, all state constitutions contain an analogous provision.[17]
  Federal jurisdiction regarding criminal law was narrow, until the late 19th century when the Interstate Commerce Act and Sherman Antitrust Act were passed. As federal criminal jurisdiction expanded to include other areas, such as narcotics, more questions about the Fourth Amendment came to the Supreme Court.[18]
  The Supreme Court ruled that some searches and seizures may violate the reasonableness requirement under the Fourth Amendment, even if a warrant is supported by probable cause and is limited in scope.[19] Conversely, the Court has approved routine warrantless seizures, for example "where there is probable cause to believe that a criminal offense has been or is being committed."[20] Thus, the reasonableness requirement and the warrant requirement are somewhat different.
  The reasonableness requirement applies not just to a search in combination with a seizure, but also to a search without a seizure, as well as to a seizure without a search.[21]
  Definition of "search"[edit]A threshold question in Fourth Amendment jurisprudence is whether a search has occurred. If no search occurred, then the Fourth Amendment does not apply.
  In Katz v. United States, 389 U.S.347 (1967), the Supreme Court ruled that a search occurs when 1) a person expects privacy in the thing searched and 2) society believes that expectation is reasonable.
  In Katz, the Supreme Court ruled that a search had occurred when the government wiretapped a telephone booth.[22] The Court's reasoning was that 1) Charles Katz expected that his phonebooth conversation would not be broadcast to the wider world and 2) society believes that expectation is reasonable.
  In United States v. Jones, 565 U. S. ____ (2012), the Supreme Court ruled that, in addition to the Katz standard, a search occurs when law enforcement trespasses on the searched person's property. In Jones, law enforcement officers had attached a GPS device on a car's exterior without Antoine Jones's consent. The Court concluded that Jones was a bailee to the car, because the car's owner had regularly permitted him to use the car, and so had a property interest in the car.[23]
  Stop and frisk[edit]Under Terry v. Ohio 392 U.S.1 (1968), law enforcement officers are permitted to conduct a limited warrantless search on a level of suspicion less than probable cause under certain circumstances. In Terry, the Supreme Court ruled that when a police officer witnesses "unusual conduct" that leads that officer to reasonably believe "that criminal activity may be afoot", that the suspicious person has a weaponand that the person is presently dangerous to the officer or others, the officer may conduct a "pat-down search" (or "frisk") to determine whether the person is carrying a weapon. To conduct a frisk, officers must be able to point to specific and articulatory facts which, taken together with rational inferences from those facts, reasonably warrant their actions. A vague hunch will not do. Such a search must be temporary and questioning must be limited to the purpose of the stop (e.g., officers who stop a person because they have reasonable suspicion to believe that the person was driving a stolen car, cannot, after confirming that it is not stolen, compel the person to answer questions about anything else, such as the possession of contraband).[24]
  Seizure[edit]The Fourth Amendment proscribes unreasonable seizure of any person, person's home (including its curtilage) or personal property without a warrant. A seizure of property occurs when there is "some meaningful interference with an individual's possessory interests in that property",[25][26] such as when police officers take personal property away from an owner to use as evidence, or when they participate in an eviction.[27] The Amendment also protects against unreasonable seizure of their persons, including a brief detention.[28]
  A seizure does not occur just because the government questions an individual in a public place. The exclusionary rule would not bar voluntary answers to such questions from being offered into evidence in a subsequent criminal prosecution. The person is not being seized if his freedom of movement is not restrained.[29][30] The government may not detain an individual even momentarily without reasonable, objective grounds, with few exceptions. His refusal to listen or answer does not by itself furnish such grounds.[31]
  A person is seized within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment only when, by means of physical force or show of authority, his freedom of movement is restrained and, in the circumstances surrounding the incident, a reasonable person would believe that he was not free to leave.[31] As long as the police do not convey a message that compliance with their requests is required, the courts will usually consider the police contact to be a "citizen encounter" which falls outside the protections of the Fourth Amendment.[32] If a person remains free to disregard questioning by the government, there has been no intrusion upon the person's liberty or privacy under the Fourth Amendment '-- there has been no seizure.[31]
  Exceptions[edit]The government may not detain an individual even momentarily without reasonable and articulable suspicion, with a few exceptions. In Delaware v. Prouse, 440 U.S.648 (1979), the Supreme Court ruled that, absent articulable and reasonable suspicion that a motorist is unlicensed or that an automobile is not registered, or that either the vehicle or an occupant is otherwise subject to seizure for violation of law, stopping an automobile and detaining the driver in order to check his driver's license and the registration of the automobile are unreasonable.
  Where society's need is great and no other effective means of meeting the need is available, and intrusion on people's privacy is minimal, certain discretionless checkpoints toward that end may briefly detain motorists. In United States v. Martinez-Fuerte, 428 U.S.543 (1976), the Supreme Court allowed discretionless immigration checkpoints. In Michigan Dept. of State Police v. Sitz, 496 U.S.444 (1990), the Supreme Court allowed discretionless sobriety checkpoints. In Illinois v. Lidster, 540 U.S.419 (2004), the Supreme Court allowed focused informational checkpoints. However, in City of Indianapolis v. Edmond, 531 U.S.32 (2000), the Supreme Court ruled that discretionary checkpoints or general crime-fighting checkpoints are not allowed.
  Another exception is at borders and ports of entry.
  Roadblocks may be used to capture a particular fleeing criminal or locate a bomb.[33]
  Arrest[edit]When a person is arrested and taken into police custody, they have been seized (e.g., a reasonable person who is handcuffed and placed in the back of a police car would not think they were free to leave). A person subjected to a routine traffic stop on the other hand, has been seized, but is not "arrested" because traffic stops are a relatively brief encounter and are more analogous to a Terry stop than to a formal arrest.[34] A police officer does not have the authority to arrest someone for refusing to identify himself when he is not suspected of committing a crime, unless state law says otherwise.[35] A search incidental to an arrest that is not permissible under state law does not violate the Fourth Amendment, if the arresting officer has probable cause.[36][37]
  In Maryland v. King (2013), the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of police to swab for DNA upon arrests for serious crimes, along the same mentality that allows police to take fingerprints or photographs of those they arrest and detain.[38]
  Arrest by a citizen[edit]The Fourth Amendment does not apply to a seizure or an arrest by private citizens. However, many states have passed laws that regulate the specific circumstances in which a private citizen may arrest another. Typically, a private person can make an arrest when: (1) a misdemeanor amounting to a public nuisance is being committed; or (2) a felony has been committed, and the arresting citizen has reasonable cause to believe that the person arrested committed it.[39]
  Warrant[edit]Under the Fourth Amendment, law enforcement must receive written permission from a court of law, or otherwise qualified magistrate, to lawfully search and seize evidence while investigating criminal activity. A court grants permission by issuing a writ known as a warrant. A search or seizure is generally unreasonable and unconstitutional if conducted without a valid warrant[40] and the police must obtain a warrant whenever practicable.[41] Searches and seizures without a warrant are not considered unreasonable if one of the specifically-established and well-delineated exceptions to the warrant requirement applies.[42]
  Probable cause[edit]Main article: Probable causeWhen police conduct a search, the amendment requires that the warrant establishes probable cause to believe that the search will uncover criminal activity or contraband. They must have legally sufficient reasons to believe a search is necessary. In Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S.132 (1925), the Supreme Court stated that probable cause to search is a flexible, common-sense standard. To that end, the Court ruled in Dumbra v. United States, 268 U.S.435 (1925), that the term probable cause means "less than evidence that would justify condemnation," reiterating Carroll's assertion that it merely requires that the facts available to the officer would "warrant a man of reasonable caution" in the belief that specific items may be contraband or stolen property or useful as evidence of a crime.[43] It does not demand any showing that such a belief be correct or more likely true than false. A "practical, non-technical" probability that incriminating evidence is involved is all that is required.[44] In Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S.213 (1983), the Supreme Court ruled that the reliability of an informant is to be determined based on the "totality of the circumstances."
  At common law, a police officer could arrest an individual if that individual committed a misdemeanor in the officer's presence or if the officer had probable cause to believe that the individual committed a felony. For misdemeanors, probable cause to believe that a wrongdoer committed a misdemeanor is not sufficient for an arrest'--the police officer has to actually witness the misdemeanor.[34]
  The standards of probable cause differ for an arrest and a search. The government has a probable cause to make an arrest when "the facts and circumstances within their knowledge and of which they had reasonably trustworthy information" would lead a prudent person to believe that the arrested person had committed or was committing a crime.[45] Probable cause to arrest must exist before the arrest is made. Evidence obtained after the arrest may not apply retroactively to justify the arrest.[46]
  Exclusionary rule[edit]One way courts enforce the Fourth Amendment is through the use of the exclusionary rule. The rule provides that evidence obtained through a violation of the Fourth Amendment is generally not admissible by the prosecution during the defendant's criminal trial.
  The Court adopted the exclusionary rule in Weeks v. United States, 232 U.S.383 (1914), prior to which all evidence, no matter how seized, could be admitted in court. Additionally, in Silverthorne Lumber Co. v. United States, 251 U.S.385 (1920) and Nardone v. United States, 308 U.S.338 (1939), the Court ruled that tips resulting from illegally obtained evidence are also inadmissible in trials as "fruit of the poisonous tree". The rule serves primarily to deter police officers from willfully violating a suspect's Fourth Amendment rights. The rationale behind the exclusionary rule is that if the police know evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment cannot be used to convict someone of a crime, they will not violate it. In Wolf v. Colorado, 338 U.S.25 (1949), the Court rejected incorporation of the exclusionary rule by way of the Fourteenth Amendment. Later, in Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S.643 (1961), the Court explicitly overruled Wolf and made the Fourth Amendment (including the exclusionary rule) applicable in state proceedings as an essential part of criminal procedure.
  Limitations[edit]In United States v. Calandra, 414 U.S.338 (1974), the Supreme Court ruled that grand juries may use allegedly illegally obtained evidence in questioning witnesses because "the damage to that institution from the unprecedented extension of the exclusionary rule outweighs the benefit of any possible incremental deterrent effect."[47] The issue of illegality of search should be adjudged in a subsequent proceeding, after the defendant has been indicted. In United States v. Leon, 468 U.S.897 (1984), the Supreme Court, applying the "good faith" rule, ruled that evidence seized by officers relying in good faith on a warrant was still admissible, even though the warrant was later found to be defective. Evidence would be excluded, however, if an officer dishonestly or recklessly prepared an affidavit to seek a warrant, the issuing magistrate abandoned his neutrality, or the warrant lacked sufficient particularity.[48]
  The Leon case applies only to search warrants. The Supreme Court ruled in Arizona v. Evans, 514 U.S.1 (1995) and Herring v. United States (2009), that the exclusionary rule does not apply to evidence found due to negligence regarding a government database, as long as the arresting police officer relied on that database in "good faith" and that the negligence was not pervasive.[49][50][51] In Davis v. United States, 131 S.Ct. 2419 (2011), the Supreme Court ruled that the exclusionary rule does not apply to a Fourth Amendment violation resulting from a reasonable reliance on binding appellate precedent.[52] To what extent the "good faith" exception applies to warrantless seizures in other contexts remains unclear.
  The rule has been held not to apply in the following circumstances:
  probation or parole revocation hearings;[53] tax hearings;[54]deportation hearings;[55]military discharge proceedings;[56] child protective proceedings;[57]sentencing hearings;[citation needed]evidence seized from a common carrier;[58]evidence collected by U.S. Customs agents;[59]evidence seized by probation or parole officers;[60]evidence seized outside the United States;[citation needed]evidence illegally seized by a "private actor" (i.e., not a governmental employee);[61] andillegally seized evidence used to impeach the defendant's testimony.[citation needed]Under Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U.S.128 (1978), a defendant has standing to object to the admission of unconstitutionally seized evidence only if such seizure violated that defendant's Fourth Amendment rights. In other words, a defendant may not assert another person's rights.
  In Rakas, the Court ruled that a passenger in a car which he does not own has standing to contest the stop of the car and a search of *his* person, but he usually lacks standing to contest a search of the car. He would have standing to challenge the search of the car, if he is the owner of that car. However, that rule was modified by Brendlin v. California, 551 U.S.249 (2007), in which the Court ruled that all occupants of a car are "seized" for purposes of the Fourth Amendment during a traffic stop, not just the driver. Therefore, a passenger in a vehicle subject to a traffic stop is thereby "detained" for purposes of the Fourth Amendment, thus allowing the passenger to contest the legality of the traffic stop.
  In Segura v. United States, 468 U.S.796 (1984), the Supreme court ruled that evidence illegally found without a search warrant is admissible if the evidence is later found and legally seized based on information independent of the illegal search.
  In Nix v. Williams, 467 U.S.431 (1984), the Supreme Court ruled that evidence illegally seized without a search warrant is admissible if the prosecution can prove the evidence would have been found and seized by legal means not based on evidence or information illegally seized.
  Exceptions to the warrant requirement[edit]Courts have developed a number of exceptions to the warrant requirement:
  Consent[edit]Main article: Consent searchIf a party gives consent to a search, a warrant is not required, even if the party is unaware of their right to refuse to cooperate. There are exceptions and complications to the rule, including the scope of the consent given, whether the consent is voluntarily given, and whether an individual has the right to consent to a search of another's property.[62]
  Plain view[edit]If an officer is lawfully present, he may seize objects that are in "plain view". However, the officer must have had probable cause to believe that the objects are contraband.[63]
  Open fields[edit]Similarly, "open fields" such as pastures, open water, and woods may be searched without a warrant, on the ground that conduct occurring therein would have no reasonable expectation of privacy.
  The doctrine was first articulated by the Supreme Court in Hester v. United States, 265 U.S.57 (1924), which stated that ''the special protection accorded by the Fourth Amendment to the people in their 'persons, houses, papers, and effects,' is not extended to the open fields." The decision was rendered on the ground that "open fields are not a 'constitutionally protected area' because they cannot be construed as "persons, houses, papers, [or] effects.
  In Oliver v. United States, 466 U.S.170 (1984), the police ignored a "no trespassing" sign and a fence, trespassed onto the suspect's land without a warrant, followed a path for hundreds of feet, and discovered a field of marijuana. The Supreme Court ruled that no search had taken place, because there was no privacy expectation regarding an open field:
  open fields do not provide the setting for those intimate activities that the Amendment is intended to shelter from government interference or surveillance. There is no societal interest in protecting the privacy of those activities, such as the cultivation of crops, that occur in open fields.[64]Curtilage[edit]While open fields are not protected by the Fourth Amendment, the curtilage, or outdoor area immediately surrounding the home, is protected. Courts have treated this area as an extension of the house and as such subject to all the privacy protections afforded a person's home (unlike a person's open fields) under the Fourth Amendment. However, courts have held aerial surveillance of curtilage not to be included in the protections from unwarranted search so long as the airspace above the curtilage is generally accessible by the public.
  An area is curtilage if it "harbors the intimate activity associated with the sanctity of a man's home and the privacies of life."[65] Courts make this determination by examining "whether the area is included within an enclosure surrounding the home, the nature of the uses to which the area is put, and the steps taken by the resident to protect the area from observation by people passing by."[66] Theoretically, many structures might extend the curtilage protection to the areas immediately surrounding them. The courts have gone so far as to treat a tent as a home for Fourth Amendment purposes in the past.[67][68][69] It is possible that the area immediately surrounding a tent (or any structure used as a home) might be considered curtilage.
  Despite this broad interpretation, the courts seem willing to find areas to be outside of the curtilage if they are in any way separate from the home (by a fence, great distance, other structures, even certain plants).[70]
  Exigent circumstance[edit]There are also "exigent circumstances" exceptions to the warrant requirement. Exigent circumstances arise when the law enforcement officers have reasonable grounds to believe that there is an immediate need to protect their lives, the lives of others, their property, or that of others, the search is not motivated by an intent to arrest and seize evidence, and there is some reasonable basis, to associate an emergency with the area or place to be searched.[71]
  Motor vehicle[edit]The Supreme Court also held that individuals in automobiles have a reduced expectation of privacy, because vehicles generally do not serve as residences or repositories of personal effects. Vehicles may not be randomly stopped and searched; there must be probable cause or reasonable suspicion of criminal activity. Items in "plain view" may be seized; areas that could potentially hide weapons may also be searched. With probable cause, police officers may search any area in the vehicle. However, they may not extend the search to the vehicle's passengers without probable cause to search those passengers or consent from the passenger(s) to search their persons or effects.
  In Arizona v. Gant, 556 U.S. ___ (2009), the Supreme Court ruled that a law enforcement officer needs a warrant before searching a motor vehicle after an arrest of an occupant of that vehicle, unless at the time of the search the person being arrested is unsecured and within reaching distance of the passenger compartment of the vehicle or police officers have reason to believe that the evidence for the crime for which the person is being arrested will be found in the vehicle.[72]
  Searches incident to a lawful arrest[edit]Another common law rule'--that permitting searches incident to an arrest without warrant'--has been applied in American law. The rule permitting searches incident to a lawful arrest has a lengthy common law history.[73] The justification for such a search is to prevent the arrested individual from destroying evidence or using a weapon against the arresting officer. In Trupiano v. United States, 334 U.S.699 (1948), the Supreme Court held that "a search or seizure without a warrant as an incident to a lawful arrest has always been considered to be a strictly limited right. It grows out of the inherent necessities of the situation at the time of the arrest. But there must be something more in the way of necessity than merely a lawful arrest." In United States v. Rabinowitz, 339 U.S.56 (1950), the Court reversed its previous ruling, holding that the officers' opportunity to obtain a warrant was not germane to the reasonableness of a search incident to an arrest. The decision suggested that any area within the "immediate control" of the arrestee could be searched, but it did not define the term. In deciding Chimel v. California, 395 U.S.752 (1969), the Supreme Court elucidated its previous decisions. It held that when an arrest is made, it is reasonable for the officer to search the arrestee for weapons and evidence.
  Similarly, it was held that it is reasonable for the officer to search the area within the arrestee's immediate control, which is the area from which the defendant may gain access to a weapon or evidence. A warrentless search of the room in which the arrest is made is therefore permissible. However, other rooms may not be searched absent a search warrant or other exigent circumstances, as the arrestee would be unlikely to access weapons or evidence in those rooms at the time of arrest.
  Border search exception[edit]Searches conducted at the United States border or the equivalent of the border (such as an international airport) may be conducted without a warrant or probable cause subject to the "border-search" exception.[74] Most border searches may be conducted entirely at random, without any level of suspicion, pursuant to U.S. Customs and Border Protection plenary search authority. However, searches that intrude upon a traveler's personal dignity and privacy interests, such as strip and body cavity searches, must be supported by "reasonable suspicion."[75] The U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Fourth and Ninth circuits have ruled that information on a traveler's electronic materials, including personal files on a laptop computer, may be searched at random, without suspicion.[76]
  Other exceptions[edit]In New Jersey v. T. L. O., 469 U.S.325 (1985), the Supreme Court ruled that searches in public schools do not require warrants, as long as the searching officers have reasonable grounds for believing that the search will result in the finding of evidence of illegal activity. However, in Safford Unified School District v. Redding, 557 U.S. __ (2009), the Court ruled that school officials violated the Fourth Amendment when they strip searched a 13 year old girl based only on a student claiming to have received drugs from that student.[77][78]
  Similarly, in Samson v. California, 547 U.S.843 (2006), the Court ruled that government offices may be searched for evidence of work-related misconduct by government employees on similar grounds. Searches of prison cells are subject to no restraints relating to reasonableness or probable cause or searches undertaken as a condition of parole.
  In a memo dated March 14, 2003, an official in the Bush administration stated "... our Office recently concluded that the Fourth Amendment had no application to domestic military operations". The administration believed that any search or surveillance conducted by the National Security Agency of US citizens communicating with foreign nationals abroad was immune to a Fourth Amendment challenge.[79] To protect the telecommunication carriers cooperating with the US government from legal action, the Congress passed a bill updating the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 to permit this type of surveillance.[80]
  In August 2008, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review ruled that the President and the Congress had the authority to wiretap international phone calls and intercept e-mail messages without a specific court order.[81]
  The Supreme Court has not ruled on post-9/11 airport security procedures, but the Ninth Circuit ruled in United States. v. Aukai that "airport screening searches, like the one at issue here, are constitutionally reasonable administrative searches because they are conducted as part of a general regulatory scheme in furtherance of an administrative purpose, namely, to prevent the carrying of weapons or explosives aboard aircraft, and thereby to prevent hijackings."[82]
  Computers and privacy[edit]Over the last decade, courts adjudicated whether the government can access evidence of illegal activity stored on digital technology without violating the Fourth Amendment.
  Many cases discuss whether incriminating evidence stored by an employee in workplace computers is protected under the reasonable expectation of privacy. In a majority of cases, employees do not have a reasonable expectation of privacy for electronic communications at work.[83] However, one federal court held that employees can assert the attorney-client privilege with respect to certain communications on company laptops.[84]
  On January 30, 2007, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in United States v. Ziegler, 497 F.3d 890 reversed its earlier August 2006 decision upon a petition for rehearing. In contrast to the earlier decision, the Court acknowledged that an employee has a right to privacy in his workplace computer. The court also found that an employer can consent to searches and seizures that would otherwise be illegal.[85]
  In Ziegler, an employee had viewed at work websites of child pornography. His employer noticed the conduct, made copies of the hard drive, and gave the FBI the employee's computer. At his criminal trial, Ziegler filed a motion to suppress the evidence on the ground that the government violated the Fourth Amendment rights. The Ninth Circuit allowed the lower court to admit the evidence. After reviewing the relevant Supreme Court opinions on a reasonable expectation of privacy, the court acknowledged that Ziegler had a reasonable expectation of privacy at his office and on his computer. However, the court found that the employer could consent to a government search of the computer without infringing on the Ziegler's Fourth Amendment rights.
  On March 11, 2010, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit ruled, in Rehberg v. Paulk, 598 F.3d 1268, that a person does not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in an e-mail once any copy of the communication is delivered to a third party.[86]
  On December 14, 2010, in United States v. Warshak, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit ruled that a person has a reasonable expectation of privacy in his emails and that the government violated Warshak's Fourth Amendment rights by compelling his internet service provider to turn over his emails without first obtaining a warrant based upon probable cause.[87]
  On January 3, 2011, in The People v. Gregory Diaz, the Supreme Court of California ruled for allowing warrantless search by the police of suspects' cell phones at the time of the arrest, on the grounds of preventing destruction of evidence such as text messages:[88]
  the loss of privacy upon arrest extends beyond the arrestee's body to include ''personal property... immediately associated with the person of the arrestee'' at the time of arrest. [...] this loss of privacy entitles police not only to ''seize'' anything of importance they find on the arrestee's body [...], but also to open and examine what they find.
  Important cases[edit]Exclusionary rule[edit]Privacy[edit]Informants[edit]Search warrants[edit]Arrest and search of a person without a warrant[edit]Search of and seizure from a residence without a warrant[edit]Search and seizure of vehicles and containers without a warrant[edit]Plain-view & Plain-feel[edit]Stop and Frisk[edit]Border searches[edit]Deportation[edit]See also[edit]References[edit]^Official Bill of Rights in the National Archives^Coke's Rep. 91a, 77 Eng. Rep. 194 (K.B. 1604)^ abcd*Kilman, Johnny and George Costello (Eds) (2006). "The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation". GPO. pp. 1281''1282.^W. Cuddihy, The Fourth Amendment: Origins and Original Meaning (1990) (Ph.D. Dissertation at Claremont Graduate School)^Davies (1999)^Kinvin Wroth and Hiller B. Zobel, eds, Legal Papers of Adams II, p. 113, fn 22 (1965) ''The writs of assistance did not become an issue until news of King George II's death arrived in Boston December 27, 1760.''^Kinvin Wroth and Hiller B. Zobel, eds, Legal Papers of Adams II, p. 113, fn 23 (1965)^Adams, Charles Francis, and John Adams (1856). The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author. Volume: 1. Little, Brown. p. 59. ^Lasson (1937), pp. 57''61^Lasson (1937), p. 66^Levy (1995), p. 161^Article X of the Virginia Declaration of Rights, Levy (1995), p. 161^Levy (1995), pp. 162''164^Roots, Roger (January 13, 2010). "The Originalist Case for the Fourth Amendment Exclusionary Rule". Gonzaga Law Review. p. 20 (fn. 118). Retrieved 8 January 2012. ^Mass. Const. pt. 1, art. XIV.^United States v. Jacobsen, 466 U.S.109 (1984): "This Court has ... consistently construed this protection as proscribing only governmental action; it is wholly inapplicable to a search or seizure, even an unreasonable one, effected by a private individual not acting as an agent of the Government or with the participation or knowledge of any governmental official." (punctuation omitted).^For example, see Article 1, § 7 of the Tennessee Constitution.^Lasson (1937), p. 106^Warden v. Hayden, 387 U.S.294 (1967) (speculating that there may be "items of evidential value whose very nature precludes them from being the object of a reasonable search and seizure")^Devenpeck v. Alford, 543 U.S.146 (2004)^Tennessee v. Garner 471 U.S.1 (1985)^Katz v. United States, 389 U.S.347, 352 (1967). "No less than an individual in a business office, in a friend's apartment, or in a taxicab, a person in a telephone booth may rely upon the protection of the Fourth Amendment. One who occupies it, shuts the door behind him, and pays the toll that permits him to place a call is surely entitled to assume that the words he utters into the mouthpiece will not be broadcast to the world."^Denniston, Lyle (January 23, 2012). "Opinion recap: Tight limit on police GPS use". SCOTUSblog. Retrieved 23 January 2012. ^Florida v. Royer, 460 U.S. 491, 497''98, 103 S.Ct. 1319, 1324 (1983).^Soldal v. Cook County, 506 U.S.56, 61 (1992); 113 S.Ct. 538, 543 (1992)^Jacobsen, 466 U.S. at 113^Soldal, 506 U.S. at 69: "the right against unreasonable seizures would be no less transgressed if the seizure of the house was undertaken to collect evidence, verify compliance with a housing regulation, effect an eviction by the police, or on a whim, for no reason at all."^United States v. Mendenhall, 446 U.S. 544, 551, 64 L. Ed. 2d 497, 100 S. Ct. 1870 (1980)^Florida v. Royer, 460 U.S. 491, 497''98, 75 L. Ed. 2d 229, 103 S. Ct. 1319 (1983)^Dunaway v. New York, 442 U.S. 200, 210 n. 12, 99 S.Ct. 2248, 2255 n. 12, 60 L.Ed.2d 824 (1979)^ abcUnited States v. Mendenhall, 446 U.S. 544, 100 S.Ct. 1870 (1980).^Florida v. Bostick, 501 U.S. 429, 439, 115 L. Ed. 2d 389, 111 S. Ct. 2382 (1991)^e.g., Edmond and Palmer v. Indianapolis (7th Cir., 1999)^ abKnowles v. Iowa, 525 U.S. 113, 117, 119 S.Ct. 484, 488 (1998).^Moritz, Rob (April 5, 2008). "Fed appeals court says refusal to identify no cause for arrest". Arkansas News Bureau. Retrieved April 6, 2012. ^see Virginia v. Moore, 553 U.S. 164 (2008)^"Court allows search and seizure in Va. case". USA Today. April 23, 2008. Retrieved April 11, 2012. ^June, Daniel, "Supreme Court Approves Use of DNA Swabbing in Serious Arrests"^See, e.g., Tennessee Code Annotated § 40-7-109 (2003)^Maryland v. Dyson, 527 U.S.465 (1999)^Andrews v. Fuoss, 417 F.3d 813 (8th Cir. 2005).^Flippo v. West Virginia, 528 U.S.11 (1999); California v. Acevedo, 500 U.S.565 (1991)^Carroll at 162^Texas v. Brown, 460 U.S. 730, 742, 103 S.Ct. 1535, 1543 (1983)^Beck v. Ohio, 379 U.S. 89, 91, 85 S.Ct. 223, 225 (1964)^Johnson v. United States, 333 U.S. 10, 92 L.Ed 436, 68 S.Ct 367 (1948)^Calandra, at 354^Leon, at 926^Stinger, C. Maureen (February 13, 1996). "Arizona v. Evans: Adapting the Exclusionary Rule to Advancing Computer Technology". The Richmond Journal of Law and Technology. Retrieved January 16, 2009. ^"Court says evidence is valid despite police error". Retrieved January 14, 2009. ^Opinion of the Court and dissenting opinions in Herring v. United States^Denniston, Lyle (June 25, 2011). "Opinion analysis: The fading "exclusionary rule"". SCOTUSblog. Retrieved 25 November 2011. ^Pennsylvania Bd. of Probation and Parole v. Scott, 524 U.S.357 (1998)^United States v. Janis, 428 U.S.433 (1976)^INS v. Lopez-Mendoza, 468 U.S.1032 (1984)^Garrett v. Lehman, 751 F.2d 997 (9th. Cir. 1985)^State in re A.R. & C.P., 937 P.2d 1037, 1042, 1044 (Utah Ct. App. 1997); In re Antoine, 2007 Conn. Super. LEXIS 1688^United States v. Pryba, 163 U.S. App. D.C. 389, 397''398, 502 F.2d 391, 399''400 (1974)^United States v. Andreas, 463 U.S.765 (1983)^Griffin v. Wisconsin, 483 U.S.868 (1987);United States v. Knights, 534 U.S.112 (2001)^Burdeau v. McDowell, 256 U.S.465 (1921)^Holcomb, J. W. (March 2003). Obtaining Written Consent to Search. FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin^Requirements of the plain view doctrine^Oliver, 466 U.S. 170, 179 (1984)^United States v. Dunn, 480 U.S. 294, 300 (1987)^Dunn at 301^United States v. Gooch, 6 F.3d 673 (9th Cir. 1993)^LaDuke v. Nelson, 762 F.2d 1318 (9th Cir. 1985)^LaDuke v. Castillo, 455 F.Supp. (E.D. Wash. 1978)^United States v. Hatch, 931 F.2d 1478 (11th Cir.), cert. denied, 502 U.S. 883 (1991)^United States v. Smith, 797 F.2d 836, 840 (10th Cir.1986)^Moore, Kristina (April 21, 2009). "Limits on warrantless car searches, compensation to terrorism victims, veterans benefit disputes". SCOTUSblog. Retrieved April 22, 2009. ^Kerr, Orin (2010-12-14) The Origins of the ''Search Incident to Arrest'' Exception, The Volokh Conspiracy^See United States v. Flores-Montano, 541 U.S.149 (2004), United States v. Montoya de Hernandez, 473 U.S.531 (1985), and United States v. Ramsey, 431 U.S.606 (1977).^See Flores-Montano, 541 U.S. at 152''53^See United States v. Ickes, 393 F.3d 501 (4th Cir., 2005) and United States v. Arnold, (9th Cir., 2008)^"Top court rules strip search of teen was illegal". Associated Press. June 25, 2009. Retrieved June 25, 2009. ^Denniston, Lyle (June 25, 2009). "Analysis: Some expansion of student privacy". SCOTUSblog. Retrieved June 25, 2009. ^"Administration Asserts No Fourth Amendment for Domestic Military Operations". Retrieved April 3, 2008. ^"U.S. Spy Bill Protecting Telecoms Heads To President Bush". Retrieved July 14, 2008. ^Risen, James; Lichtblau, Eric (January 16, 2009). "Intelligence Court Rules Wiretapping Power Legal". The New York Times. Retrieved May 2, 2010. ^http://www.scribd.com/doc/44023522/United-States-of-America-v-Daniel-Kuualoha-Aukai^e.g., United States v. Simons, 206 F.3d 392, 398 (4th Cir., Feb. 28, 2000)^See Curto v. Medical World Comm., No. 03CV6327, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 29387 (E.D.N.Y. May 15, 2006)^See United States v. Ziegler, ___F.3d 1077 (9th Cir. Jan. 30, 2007, No. 05-30177) [1]Cf. United States v. Ziegler, 456 F.3d 1138 (9th Cir. 2006)^Opinion in Rehberg, p. 19-22^Opinion in Warshak, p. 2^Egelko, Bob (4 January 2011). "Court OKs searches of cell phones without warrant". San Francisco Chronicle. Archived from the original on 13 January 2011. Retrieved 13 January 2011. Further reading[edit]External links[edit]
VIDEO-President Obama on Health Care Law in San Jose, California - C-SPAN Video Library
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  President Obama spoke about implementation of the Affordable Care Act, calling for a concentrated, localized strategy to encourage young Americans to enroll in the new health care exchanges.*He also responded to a question about .. Read MorePresident Obama spoke about implementation of the Affordable Care Act, calling for a concentrated, localized strategy to encourage young Americans to enroll in the new health care exchanges.*He also responded to a question about his administration's mass collection of telephone and Internet records, saying it was thoroughly overseen by Congress and judges and struck the right balance between security and privacy.
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Obama defends digital spying: ''I think we've struck the right balance'' | Ars Technica
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  At a press conference in California on Friday, President Barack Obama took questions and gave a forceful defense of the PRISM program. PRISM was revealed yesterday by two newspapers who showed that several American tech companies have been complicit in providing the government with access to their systems. In addition, Obama also responded to the disclosure of a secret court order requiring Verizon to hand over metadata to the National Security Agency.
  ''When I came into this office, I made two commitments that are more important than any other,'' he said, according to The Guardian, one of the two news outlets that revealed the secret program.
  ''Number one, to keep the American people safe. And number two, to uphold the constitution and constitutional rights to privacy and to civil liberties. These programs are secret in the sense that they're classified. But they're not secret in the sense that'--when it comes to telephone calls, every member of Congress has been briefed."
  "I think it's important to recognize you can't have 100 percent security and also 100 percent privacy, and also zero inconvenience. We're going to have to make some choices as a society."
  Earlier this week, The Guardian detailed a court order requiring Verizon to hand over millions of phone records every day. However, the PRISM program appears to entail direct access to digital services by the FBI and the National Security Administration'--and not phone calls.
  ''When it comes to telephone calls: Nobody is listening to your telephone calls,'' the president continued. ''That's not what this program's about. What the intelligence community is doing is identifying, looking at phone numbers and durations of calls. They are not looking at people's names, and they're not looking at content. But by sifting through this so-called metadata, they may find potential leads with respect to folks who might engage in terrorism. If they want to actually listen to a phone call, they have to go back to a federal judge. I want to be very clear. Some of what we've been hearing the last day or so'--nobody's listening to the content of your phone calls. This program is overseen... not only by Congress but by a special [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] court.''
  ''They're professionals''According to The Washington Post, the other news outlet that broke the story, the commander-in-chief also reiterated what the director of national intelligence described late Thursday'--that the PRISM program is focused on foreigners and not citizens or residents.
  ''They make a difference in our capacity to anticipate and prevent possible terrorist activity,'' Obama said, adding that the programs are ''under very strict supervision by all three branches of government and they do not involve listening to people's phone calls, do not involve reading the e-mails of US citizens and US residents.''
  The Guardian also quoted Obama as essentially saying he trusts America's spy agencies, and we should too.
  ''I will leave this office at some point,'' he said. ''And after that I will be a private citizen. And I would expect that on the list of people who might be targeted so that somebody could read their e-mails'--I'd probably be pretty high on that list. But I know that the people who are involved in these programs... They're professionals.''
  ''In the abstract you can complain about Big Brother and how this is a program run amok, but when you actually look at the details, I think we've struck the right balance,'' Obama said.
  ''The program does not allow the government to listen in on anyone's phone calls''A second statement released by Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper on Thursday evening also provided several explanations to the disclosure of the Verizon-National Security Agency alliance from earlier this week.
  ''Although this program has been properly classified, the leak of one order, without any context, has created a misleading impression of how it operates,'' he wrote. ''Accordingly, we have determined to declassify certain limited information about this program.''
  He continued:
  The program does not allow the Government to listen in on anyone's phone calls. The information acquired does not include the content of any communications or the identity of any subscriber. The only type of information acquired under the Court's order is telephony metadata, such as telephone numbers dialed and length of calls.
  The collection is broad in scope because more narrow collection would limit our ability to screen for and identify terrorism-related communications. Acquiring this information allows us to make connections related to terrorist activities over time. The [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] Court specifically approved this method of collection as lawful, subject to stringent restrictions.
  . . .
  By order of the [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court], the Government is prohibited from indiscriminately sifting through the telephony metadata acquired under the program. All information that is acquired under this program is subject to strict, court-imposed restrictions on review and handling. The court only allows the data to be queried when there is a reasonable suspicion, based on specific facts, that the particular basis for the query is associated with a foreign terrorist organization. Only specially cleared counterterrorism personnel specifically trained in the Court-approved procedures may even access the records.
  . . .
  The Patriot Act was signed into law in October 2001 and included authority to compel production of business records and other tangible things relevant to an authorized national security investigation with the approval of the FISC. This provision has subsequently been reauthorized over the course of two Administrations'--in 2006 and in 2011. It has been an important investigative tool that has been used over the course of two Administrations, with the authorization and oversight of the FISC and the Congress.
Presidential Memorandum -- Transforming our Nation's Electric Grid Through Improved Siting, Permitting, and Review
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 13:09
  The White House
  Office of the Press Secretary
  For Immediate Release
  June 07, 2013
  MEMORANDUM FOR THE HEADS OF EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENTS AND AGENCIES
  SUBJECT: Transforming our Nation's Electric Grid Through Improved Siting, Permitting, and Review
  Our Nation's electric transmission grid is the backbone of our economy, a key factor in future economic growth, and a critical component of our energy security. Countries that harness the power of clean, renewable energy will be best positioned to thrive in the global economy while protecting the environment and increasing prosperity. In order to ensure the growth of America's clean energy economy and improve energy security, we must modernize and expand our electric transmission grid. Modernizing our grid will improve energy reliability and resiliency, allowing us to minimize power outages and manage cyber-security threats. By diversifying power sources and reducing congestion, a modernized grid will also create cost savings for consumers and spur economic growth.
  Modernizing our Nation's electric transmission grid requires improvements in how transmission lines are sited, permitted, and reviewed. As part of our efforts to improve the performance of Federal siting, permitting, and review processes for infrastructure development, my Administration created a Rapid Response Team for Transmission (RRTT), a collaborative effort involving nine different executive departments and agencies (agencies), which is working to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of transmission siting, permitting, and review, increase interagency coordination and transparency, and increase the predictability of the siting, permitting, and review processes. In furtherance of Executive Order 13604 of March 22, 2012 (Improving Performance of Federal Permitting and Review of Infrastructure Projects), this memorandum builds upon the work of the RRTT to improve the Federal siting, permitting, and review processes for transmission projects. Because a single project may cross multiple governmental jurisdictions over hundreds of miles, robust collaboration among Federal, State, local, and tribal governments must be a critical component of this effort.
  An important avenue to improve these processes is the designation of energy right-of-way corridors (energy corridors) on Federal lands. Section 368 of the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (the "Act") (42 U.S.C. 15926), requires the Secretaries of Agriculture, Commerce, Defense, Energy, and the Interior (Secretaries) to undertake a continued effort to identify and designate such energy corridors. Energy corridors include areas on Federal lands that are most suitable for siting transmission projects because the chosen areas minimize regulatory conflicts and impacts on environmental and cultural resources, and also address concerns of local communities. Designated energy corridors provide an opportunity to co-locate projects and share environmental and cultural resource impact data to reduce overall impacts on environmental and cultural resources and reduce the need for land use plan amendments in support of the authorization of transmission rights-of-way. The designation of energy corridors can help expedite the siting, permitting, and review processes for projects within such corridors, as well as improve the predictability and transparency of these processes. Pursuant to the Act, in 2009, the Secretaries of the Interior and Agriculture each designated energy corridors for the 11 contiguous Western States, as defined in section 368 of the Act. Energy corridors have not yet been designated in States other than those identified as Western States. It is important that agencies build on their existing efforts in a coordinated manner.
  By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, I hereby direct the following:
  Section1. Principles for Establishing Energy Corridors. (a) In carrying out the requirements of this memorandum regarding energy corridors, the Secretaries shall:
  (i) collaborate with Member Agencies of the Steering Committee on Federal Infrastructure Permitting and Review Process Improvement (Steering Committee), established by Executive Order 13604, which shall provide prompt and adequate information to ensure that additional corridor designations and revisions are consistent with the statutory responsibilities and activities of the Member Agencies and enable timely actions by the Secretaries;
  (ii) focus on facilitating renewable energy resources and improving grid resiliency and comply with the requirements in section 368 of the Act, by ensuring that energy corridors address the need for upgraded and new electric transmission and distribution facilities to improve reliability, relieve congestion, and enhance the capability of the national grid to deliver electricity;
  (iii) use integrated project planning and consult with other Federal agencies, State, local, and tribal governments, non-governmental organizations, and the public early in the process of designating the energy corridors, so as to avoid resource conflicts to the extent practicable and make strategic decisions to balance policy priorities;
  (iv) collaborate with State, local, and tribal governments to ensure, to the extent practicable, that energy corridors can connect effectively between Federal lands;
  (v) minimize the proliferation of dispersed and duplicative rights-of-way crossing Federal lands while acting consistent with subsection (a)(ii) of this section;
  (vi) design energy corridors to minimize impacts on environmental and cultural resources to the extent practicable, including impacts that may occur outside the boundaries of Federal lands, and minimize impacts on the Nation's aviation system and the mission of the Armed Forces; and
  (vii) develop interagency mitigation plans, where appropriate, for environmental and cultural resources potentially impacted by projects sited in the energy corridors to provide project developers predictability on how to seek first to avoid, then attempt to minimize any negative effects from, and lastly to mitigate such impacts, where otherwise unavoidable. Mitigation plans shall:
  (A) be developed at the landscape or watershed scale with interagency collaboration, be based on conservation and resource management plans and regional environmental and cultural resource analyses, and identify priority areas for compensatory mitigation where appropriate;
  (B) be developed in consultation with other Federal agencies, State, local, and tribal governments, non-governmental organizations, and the public;
  (C) include clear and measurable mitigation goals, apply adaptive management methods, and use performance measures to evaluate outcomes and ensure accountability and the long-term effectiveness of mitigation activities;
  (D) include useful mechanisms, such as mitigation banks and in lieu fee programs, where appropriate for achieving statutory and regulatory goals; and
  (E) be considered in the energy corridor designation process.
  (b) The Secretary of Energy shall assess and synthesize current research related to the requirements set forth in subsection (a)(ii) of this section, such as transmission planning authority studies, congestion studies, and renewable energy assessments. Based on that analysis, the Secretary of Energy shall provide to the Steering Committee a Transmission Corridor Assessment Report (Report) that provides recommendations on how to best achieve the requirements set forth in subsection (a)(ii) of this section. Where research is available, the Report shall include an assessment of whether investment in co-locating with or upgrading existing transmission facilities, distributed generation, improved energy efficiency, or demand response may play a role in meeting these requirements. In preparing the Report, the Secretary of Energy shall consult with Federal, State, local, and tribal governments, affected industries, environmental and community representatives, transmission planning authorities, and other interested parties. The Report shall be provided in two parts. The first part, which shall provide recommendations with respect to the Western States, shall be provided by December 1, 2013, and the second part, which shall provide recommendations with respect to States other than the Western States, shall be provided by April 1, 2014.
  Sec. 2. Energy Corridors for the Western States. (a) The Secretaries shall strongly encourage the use of designated energy corridors on Federal land in the Western States where the energy corridors are consistent with the requirements in this memorandum and other applicable requirements, unless it can be demonstrated that a project cannot be constructed within a designated corridor due to resource constraints on Federal lands. Additionally, the Secretaries, pursuant to section 368 of the Act, shall continue to evaluate designated energy corridors to determine the necessity for revisions, deletions, or additions to those energy corridors. Also, the Secretaries, coordinated by the Secretaries of the Interior and Agriculture, shall:
  (i) by July 12, 2013, provide to the Steering Committee a plan for producing the Western corridor study and regional corridor assessments (as specified in subsection (a)(ii) and (a)(iii) of this section), which shall include descriptions of timelines and milestones, existing resources to be utilized, plans for collaborating with Member Agencies, and plans for consulting with other Federal agencies, State, local, and tribal governments, affected industries, environmental and community representatives, and other interested parties;
  (ii) within 12 months of completion of the plan pursuant to subsection (a)(i) of this section, provide to the Steering Committee a Western corridor study, which shall assess the utility of the existing designated energy corridors;
  (iii) provide to the Steering Committee regional corridor assessments, which shall examine the need for additions, deletions, and revisions to the existing energy corridors for the Western States by region. The regional corridor assessments shall evaluate energy corridors based on the requirements set forth in subsection (a) of section 1, the Report issued pursuant to subsection (b) of section 1, and the Western corridor study. The regional corridor assessments shall be completed promptly, depending on resource availability, with at least the first assessment completed within 12 months of completion of the plan pursuant to subsection (a)(i) of this section;
  (iv) by November 12, 2014, provide to the Steering Committee and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) an implementation plan for achieving the requirements set forth in subsections (a)(v) and (a)(vi) of this section based on the regional corridor assessments. The implementation plan shall include timelines and milestones that prioritize coordinated agency actions and a detailed budget;
  (v) promptly after the completion of the regional corridor assessments and prioritized based on the availability of resources, undertake coordinated land use planning and environmental and cultural resource review processes to consider additions, deletions, or revisions to the current Western energy corridors, consistent with the requirements set forth in subsection (a) of section 1, the Report required issued pursuant to subsection (b) of section 1, and the Western corridor study; and
  (vi) as appropriate, after completing the required environmental and cultural resource analyses, promptly incorporate the designated Western corridor additions, deletions, or revisions and any mitigation plans developed pursuant to subsection (a)(vii) of section 1 into relevant agency land use and resource management plans or equivalent plans prioritized based on the availability of resources.
  (b) The Member Agencies, where authorized, shall complete any required land use planning, internal policy, and interagency agreements to formalize the designation of energy corridors implemented pursuant to subsection (a)(vi) of this section. The Secretaries and Member Agencies shall also develop and implement a process for expediting applications for applicants whose projects are sited primarily within the designated energy corridors in the Western States, and who have committed to implement the necessary mitigation activities, including those required by the interagency mitigation plans required by subsection (a)(vii) of section 1.
  Sec. 3. Energy Corridors for the Non-Western States. The Secretaries, in collaboration with the Member Agencies, shall continue to analyze where energy corridors on Federal land in States other than those identified as Western States may be necessary to address the recommendations in the Report issued pursuant to subsection (b) of section 1 and the requirements set forth in subsection (a) of section 1, and to expedite the siting, permitting, and review of electric transmission projects on Federal lands in those States. By September 1, 2014, the Secretaries shall provide the Steering Committee with updated recommendations regarding designating energy corridors in those States.
  Sec. 4. Improved Transmission Siting, Permitting, and Review Processes. (a) Member Agencies shall develop an integrated, interagency pre-application process for significant onshore electric transmission projects requiring Federal approval. The process shall be designed to: promote predictability in the Federal siting, permitting, and review processes; encourage early engagement, coordination, and collaboration of Federal, State, local, and tribal governments, non-governmental organizations, and the public; increase the use of integrated project planning early in the siting, permitting, and review processes; facilitate early identification of issues that could diminish the likelihood that projects will ultimately be permitted; promote early planning for integrated and strategic mitigation plans; expedite siting, permitting, and review processes through a mutual understanding of the needs of all affected Federal agencies and State, local, and tribal governments; and improve environmental and cultural outcomes.
  By September 30, 2013, Member Agencies shall provide to the Chief Performance Officer (CPO) and the Chair of the Council on Environmental Quality a plan, including timelines and milestones, for implementing this process.
  (b) In implementing Executive Order 13604, Member Agencies shall:
  (i) improve siting, permitting, and review processes for all electric transmission projects, both onshore and offshore, requiring Federal approval. Such improvements shall include: increasing efficiency and interagency coordination; increasing accountability; ensuring an efficient decision-making process within each agency; to the extent possible, unifying and harmonizing processes among agencies; improving consistency and transparency within each agency and among all agencies; improving environmental and cultural outcomes; providing mechanisms for early and frequent public and local community outreach; and enabling innovative mechanisms for mitigation and mitigation at the landscape or watershed scale; and
  (ii) facilitate coordination, integration, and harmonization of the siting, permitting, and review processes of Federal, State, local, and tribal governments for transmission projects to reduce the overall regulatory burden while improving environmental and cultural outcomes.
  Sec. 5. General Provisions. (a) The Secretaries and the Member Agencies shall coordinate the activities required by this memorandum with the Steering Committee and shall report to the Steering Committee their progress on meeting the milestones identified pursuant to this memorandum, consistent with the plans developed pursuant to sections 2 and 4 of this memorandum. The CPO shall report on the implementation of this memorandum in the report to the President submitted pursuant to section 2(e) of Executive Order 13604.
  (b) In carrying out their responsibilities under this memorandum, Member Agencies shall consult relevant independent agencies, including the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
  (c) This memorandum shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of appropriations.
  (d) This memorandum shall be implemented consistent with Executive Order 13175 of November 6, 2000 (Consultation and Coordination with Indian Tribal Governments) and my memorandum of November 5, 2009 (Tribal Consultation).
  (e) Nothing in this memorandum shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:
  (i) the authority granted by law to an executive department or agency, or the head thereof; or
  (ii) the functions of the Director of OMB relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.
  (f) This memorandum is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.
  (g) The Director of OMB is hereby authorized and directed to publish this memorandum in the Federal Register.
  BARACK OBAMA
VIDEO-Too Many Too Soon: The Anti-Vaccine Fallacy - Academic Earth
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 12:00
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  About the VideoThe specter of autism is scary for any new parent, especially given the most recent estimates. Whether or not we're looking at a true epidemic or can chalk the numbers up to more liberal diagnostics, an estimated 1 in 50 children has autism spectrum disorder, or ASD.1 Parents, doctors, and researchers are scrambling to pinpoint a cause, and hopefully, a cure or means of prevention. This desperate search has lead many well-meaning parents to scapegoat vaccines as the cause of their child's illness.
  In 1998, Andrew Wakefield, published a study claiming a causal link between the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine and autism. Parents of children with autism celebrated the research and began a wildly successful campaign against the widespread vaccination. In 2010, Wakefield's UK medical license was revoked after it was found that he engaged in unethical research practices and falsified his findings.2 Despite subsequent studies that find no link between autism and the MMR vaccine, the damage has been done. A large swath of desperate parents is convinced that vaccines are to blame.
  Early theories blamed autism rates on the vaccine preservative thimerosal, an organic mercury-containing compound.3 Parents were convinced that autism must be a result of mercury poisoning. When thimerosal was removed from vaccines and autism rates continued to rise, affected parents shifted the goal post and decided that the number of vaccines must be the culprit, or too many too soon.
  Mounting scientific evidence disproves any link between vaccines and autism. This is cold comfort to parents raising children with an ASD, but it is important that people understand this. These well-meaning parents, who desperately love their children, have consequently put all children at risk in their successful attempts to curb vaccinations. Vaccines are perhaps the greatest public health success in history. It would be devastating to turn back the clock.4
  2 ''Andrew Wakefield.'' Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., 29 Apr. 2013. Web. 01 May 2013.
  3 United States. U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research. ''Thimerosal in Vaccines.''Fda.gov. U.S. Food and Drug Administration, 20 June 2012. Web. 1 May 2013.
  4 United States. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Vaccines.gov. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, n.d. Web. 1 May 2013.
  Transcript''Too many, too soon!'' is the favored battle cry of the anti-vaccine crowd. Too many shots, too many antigens, too close together.
  By age 6, the recommended vaccination schedule exposes children to 5 live attenuated or altered organisms and 21 different antigens.1, 2 Is this a lot? Does this put an enormous burden on the immune system sending it spiraling out of control to damage our children? Let's find out.
  It has been estimated that humans can generate about 10 billion different antibodies, each capable of binding a distinct epitope of an antigen.3 Actual estimates of antibody specificities in an individual, due to exposure to various germs and other foreign materials, range between 1 million and 100 million.4
  We cannot say with absolute certainty how many antigens the average human is exposed to by age 18, but let's say, as an argument, that you've had most of your antigen exposure by that age. Assuming total exposure is around 1 million antigens, this equals 152 unique exposures per day. Under this conservative estimate, by age 6, the vaccine exposure would account for .006% of the total antigen exposure of the child.
  If a child is exposed to 100 million antigens by age 18, the rough maximum, we're looking at 15,520 unique exposures per day. By age 6 that would be nearly 34 million antigens, and the vaccine schedule would account for 0.00006% of exposure.
  No matter how you slice it, the vaccine schedule represents a miniscule exposure to antigens and organisms compared to what people encounter as part of life. Worrying about the exposure from the vaccine schedule is like worrying about a thimble of water getting you wet while swimming in an ocean.
  Share/EmbedShare VideoEmbedCreated by AcademicEarth.org
Our Team | Consumer Media Network
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  Consumer Media Network's commitment to quality starts at the top. Our eye for excellence can be seen in the web properties we build and the people we employ. Our management team is comprised of a diverse group of minds committed to one common mission: changing the consumer experience online.
  Our team's background in online marketing and publishing across many consumer verticals gives us a unique perspective, and it is one that we can't wait to share with you. We strive to create the best consumer-facing sites on the web because we know, quite simply, that consumers demand more.
  Patrick GavinCEOPatrick has 10+ years experience in Internet marketing. He started his first online marketing company in 2000 shortly after graduating from Xavier University. Patrick resides in Iowa with his wife and three children.
  Rafael JoseCOORafael has spent his career in online advertising and operations, with areas of focus in digital technologies, agencies and direct marketing for both large established companies and smaller start-ups. As a graduate of the University of California, Davis, he's spent time living on the coasts of San Francisco and New York. He and his wife call Seattle home now and enjoy the summers enough to endure the winters.
  Stephen AmanteCFOStephen has over 25 years experience helping technology firms grow. Prior to joining CMN, he was the CFO of NCR Entertainment/Blockbuster Express, eRealty.com (in which he was a co-founder) and Dealer Solutions and spent his early career with Arthur Andersen in Houston and Prague, Czech Republic. Stephen graduated from Santa Clara University and is married and has three children with whom he enjoys sports and traveling.
  Justin KlemmVice President, Product DevelopmentJustin oversees the development and hosting of CMN's web properties. He earned a degree in computer science from Virginia Tech before moving on to various internet marketing companies. Justin has several years of experience both developing and supporting large websites. He currently resides in New York City. A self-professed foodie, Justin enjoys trying new restaurants, traveling, and outdoor activities.
  Sagar SatapathyDIRECTOR OF PUBLISHER RELATIONSSagar has been associated with CMN since August 2005. He manages the promotion of CMN's properties and oversees its publisher relations strategy. He is leading a strong team, which is split into various divisions. Sagar has over 10 years of experience in various industries including Journalism, Writing, Social Media and Internet Marketing.
  Ashley MerusiEDITOR IN CHIEFAshley manages the content strategy for CMN's web properties. Since joining the company in 2007, she has directed the team of writers and overseen the growth of the content team. Prior to that, she gained editorial experience in book publishing at The National Archives and Houghton Mifflin Company. She is a graduate from the University of Notre Dame and currently resides in Boston, MA.
  Avishan HodjatSVP, Sales and Client ServicesAvi has been in the online advertising space since 1999 and has a record of executive success at performance marketing agencies. This success was created through client services, new sales achievements, and profitable revenue growth within the online media channels: paid/organic search, social media, eMail, affiliate network, display, data acquisition, CRM, mobile, and reputation management. She enjoys her morning runs, client visits, tennis, and cheering for the New York Yankees with her niece.
  Eric MullinsSENIOR DIRECTOR OF MARKETINGEric manages the monetization and affiliate network for CMN. He graduated from Texas A&M University before taking a job with an Internet marketing company. He optimizes program and content placement on CMN properties and works with potential affiliates to grow their portfolio through CMN. He is an active runner, and he likes being outdoors and finding new places to hangout.
  Michelle TozziVICE PRESIDENT, CLIENT SERVICESMichelle manages the Client Services department for the Online Education division of CMN. She is actively involved in building and maintaining client relationships and oversees the planning and management of all client campaigns. Michelle is also directly involved in developing new business to further the growth of the college and university portfolio. She resides in New Jersey where she enjoys playing softball, watching the New York Giants, and spending time with her Cavalier King Charles.
  Muhammad SaleemDIRECTOR OF SOCIAL MEDIAMuhammed is a consultant and expert on all things social media and online marketing. He regularly contributes to major industry publications and has been featured in Techcrunch, Mashable, Read/WriteWeb, Search Engine Land, ProBlogger, CopyBlogger and has spoken at many social media conferences. Most recently, Muhammad served as the Director of Social Media Strategy for the Chicago Tribune Media Group and has been listed as one of the world's most influential marketers in 2008 and 2009.
  Eric ClemmonsVice President, Software DevelopmentEric leads architecture and development of CMN's lead-generation platform. Additionally, he specializes in improving user-experience via design, interaction & multivariate testing. Eric has several years of experience developing with web technologies and contributes to several open-source projects. When not cooking or composing music, he contributes to these projects.
  Danny ZevallosDirector of DesignDanny oversees the design team at CMN. He has over 14 years of experience in print, web design and development. He has merged his print design background into web design implementation and is active within the design community. Prior to joining CMN, Danny was involved in economic development within the Houston business community, where his designs were utilized by Fortune 500 companies, elected officials, and local CEOs.
  David FranklinVice President, StrategyDavid oversees the Strategy and Business Analytics departments for CMN. Previously, he co-founded DCF Ventures and worked as a manager in the Strategy/Business Development group for DaVita, Inc. He holds an MBA from UCLA Anderson School of Management and engineering degrees from Duke University. David is a big fan of skiing, both on water and on snow, and is doing his best to reduce his golf score.
  Laura MilliganManaging EditorLaura helps manage the content creation and marketing plans for many of CMN's web properties. She has worked with the content team at CMN since 2007 in various roles and has demonstrated experience in public relations, blogging, and social media marketing strategy. Although an enthusiastic resident of her adopted Texas, Laura is always eager to jump on a plane and explore somewhere new.
About Academic Earth | Academic Earth
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 11:58
  Academic Earth believes that everyone has the right to a world-class education. Recognizing the existing barriers in academia, we continue our efforts to curate an unparalleled collection of free online courses from the world's top universities. Moving forward, we honor the egalitarian spirit of Academic Earth's founders as we develop a platform to facilitate the global sharing of ideas, both inside and outside the classroom.
  In addition to our comprehensive collection of open courseware, Academic Earth features an ongoing series of original videos. These videos tap into our belief that a great deal of learning happens outside the classroom in those unstructured moments when provocative questions are raised, debated, and sometimes answered. We embrace intellectual curiosity and encourage the Academic Earth community to share our videos to launch their own discussions. After all, only through questioning the world around us, can we come to better understand it.
  To help facilitate these discussions, Academic Earth welcomes a true advocate for lifelong learning, our expert blogger, Roger Harris, as he takes a critical look at academia and the ever-changing state of educational technology.
  HistoryIn 2008, Richard Ludlow, Chris Bruner, and Liam Pisano, founded Academic Earth with the mission of giving everyone on earth access to a world-class education. Backed by an angel investor group, including four Yale professors, Honest Tea founder Barry Nalebuff, and Pulitzer Prize winner Daniel Yergin, Academic Earth stood instrumental in the online learning revolution.
  Recognizing the critical roll of the Internet in supporting their mission, the founders set out to develop an interactive web-based platform for users to actively engage with free online education resources from the world's top universities. The site continues to evolve in response to rapidly changing educational technology.
  In 2012, Academic Earth was acquired by CMN.com, a leader in consumer driven-content strategy with a strong online presence in higher education. Under the new ownership, Academic Earth gains the expertise and resources invaluable to refining its learning platform while better connecting users with premier, web-based educational content.
  Academic Earth holds true to its original mission of giving everyone access to a world-class education.
  Academic Earth is headquartered in Seattle, WA.
  Meet our blogger, Roger HarrisBorn into a family of educators, Roger Harris has a natural affinity for learning, though his educational perspective might be described as atypical. From a Catholic convent school in Africa to a Quaker school in England, Roger's early educational experiences ran the gamut, culminating at the UK's Open University, a pioneer in distance learning. During his childhood in Africa, Roger developed a love of nature that inspired him to go on and earn a biology degree from the University of York in England.
  During his graduate studies at the University of Oregon, he became especially interested in teaching. He followed this passion, spending several years as a natural history and photography guide, leading numerous trips down the Amazon River. Inspired by this experience, he published his first book in 1997, a travel guide to the Amazon rainforest. Roger further honed his writing skills as a contributing editor for American Scientist, reaching a readership of 60,000 scientists and engineers.
  Finding that his interest in education meshes perfectly with his enthusiasm for emerging technologies, Roger's focus these days is in applying new technology to education as demonstrated through his work for Discovery Education, among others, for whom he has created online interactive lesson plans, widgets and videos. He has developed social media strategy for prestigious businesses and non-profits, as well as consulting on gamification, outreach, and educational strategies.
  In his ever-decreasing spare time, Roger inflicts his culinary skills on unsuspecting guests, weeds his beloved garden, and zooms around the back roads of North Carolina on his Italian motorcycle.
  Meet Our Editor-in-Chief, Stephanie SniderA bona fide information junkie, Stephanie knows a little about a lot and a lot about a little, but will never claim to know it all'...not usually. After all, her mom taught her, ''The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.'' (Thanks, Socrates) To this day, from politics to pop culture, she loves asking questions and looking for answers.
  Stephanie's passion for learning took her on a winding path that eventually led to Academic Earth. In 2000, she graduated from the University of Washington. With English degree in hand, she stepped into the insurance and investment world. Knowing her heart would never belong to Wall Street, she returned to the UW, earning a Masters in Architecture in 2009. But, with the ink still wet on her diploma, she found herself at the mercy of the financial crisis.
  Again, her mom's sage words came to mind, ''The difference between a crisis and an adventure is all in your attitude.'' She chose adventure. Skip ahead two years. Stephanie worked in design, became a mom, and started a small business. Today, she brings her tenacity and love of learning to Academic Earth, and is thrilled to help usher this online community into the future.
  In her ''free time,'' she and her husband chase after their toddler, who proves that perpetual motion is possible. And, on any given weekend, they can be found wandering the aisles of Seattle's record stores, introducing their little one to the finer points of vintage vinyl.
  InquiriesMembers of the media may direct inquiries to Academic Earth's site manager, Stephanie Snider.
  RecognitionIn the NewsAcademic Earth has cornered the market on free online education by making a smorgasbord of online course content '' from prestigious universities such as Stanford and Princeton '' accessible and free to anyone in the world.
  Forbes, December 2011These are not cut-up dumbed-down introductions made zippy for today's short attention spans, they are the full-length lectures that you would see if you were an undergraduate at Yale, Berkeley, Harvard, MIT, Princeton or Stanford.
  Telegraph.co.uk, March 2009It's been years since I was in school, and I've got few fond memories of going to class. But Academic Earth is unexpectedly irresistible. It's like Hulu, but for nerds.
  Slate, February 2009On the new site Academic Earth you can watch lectures on physics from M.I.T., or catch a Yale history course on the origins of World War I, or see a U.C. Berkeley professor cradle a brain while she talks about human anatomy.
  American Public Media, January 2009From the BlogsEven if you can't nail down an admission into one of the Ivy League institutions you can still take advantage of the intellectual and professional (and free!) resources that many of these have to offer on their respective websites'...
  All My FavsEven if you can't nail down an admission into one of the Ivy League institutions you can still take advantage of the intellectual and professional (and free!) resources that many of these have to offer on their respective websites'...
  Defending Chaos in OrderWhat you'll see here is an impressive early implementation of where Academic Earth plans to go. Take content-rich videos from universities, organize the videos well, make the visual experience attractive, add personal customization functionality and the ability to engage with the content, and you have a very useful service to bring to the world.
  Open CultureI'm optimistic that we will continue to realize the amazing potential of the Internet for doing good. What Academic Earth is trying to accomplish is one reason why I feel that way.
  TechCulturePartnering with usIf you are a professor, educator, or representative from an academic institution and would like to feature your content on Academic Earth, we want to hear from you.
  Please contact our site manager, Stephanie Snider, for more information on content partnership opportunities.
  We'd love to hear from youContact us for questions, feedback or just to say hi.
  Contact Us
BBC News - Queen officially opens BBC's new Broadcasting House building
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  Fri, 07 Jun 2013 08:33
  7 June 2013Last updated at09:05 ETPlease turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play.
  The Queen got a good view of the BBC News Channel studio
  The Queen has officially opened the BBC's rebuilt Broadcasting House, creating a memorable TV moment when she appeared behind the newsreaders on air.
  She had earlier made a live broadcast on BBC Radio 4, in which she said it was a "great pleasure" to see the BBC's new central London headquarters.
  During a tour of the building, she met many of the BBC's biggest names.
  The Duke of Edinburgh had also been expected to attend, but was admitted to hospital on Thursday for an operation.
  Crowds gathered outside the building, which flew the Royal Standard, to await the arrival of the Queen, who wore a powder blue coat and hat.
  BBC Trust chairman Lord Patten and BBC director general Tony Hall met the Queen and escorted her on the first part of her visit.
  She started the tour, her first visit to the corporation's recently expanded headquarters, by visiting BBC Radio 1 and meeting presenters including Nick Grimshaw, Trevor Nelson and Sara Cox.
  She then visited the station's famous Live Lounge to watch a live performance by The Script, whose lead singer is Danny O'Donoghue, also well-known as a judge on BBC One show The Voice.
  Her next destination was the building's third floor, where Fran Unsworth, the BBC's acting director of news, introduced her to several BBC Radio 4 staff, including Today presenter John Humphrys.
  Background appearanceShe then joined another Today presenter, James Naughtie, and Sian Williams live on Radio 4 where she gave a short address to declare the BBC's new home open.
  "It is a great pleasure to visit the BBC today, and to see it in its new home," she said.
  "I remember first coming to Broadcasting House with my father, the King, and my mother and sister shortly before the war.
  "I came again with the Duke of Edinburgh shortly before the coronation in 1953."
  She added: "I hope this new building will serve you well for the future and I am delighted to declare it open today."
  Afterwards, she met BBC newsreaders Huw Edwards and Sophie Raworth and weather presenter Carol Kirkwood at the start of a tour of the BBC newsroom.
  The guided tour took her to look through the glass during a News Channel broadcast. Staff laughed and broke into a round of applause as she appeared in the background of the studio shot, prompting newreaders Julian Worricker and Sophie Long to turn round.
  After leaving the basement-level newsroom, the Queen met stars including David Dimbleby and Strictly Come Dancing trio Sir Bruce Forsyth, Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman in the ground-floor reception.
  In the building's Media Cafe, which is normally open to the public but was closed for the duration of the visit, she was introduced to newsreader Fiona Bruce, Radio 1 DJ Greg James and actress Anne Reid.
  At the end of her visit, the Queen unveiled a plaque marking the occasion at a reception attended by BBC staff, presenters and trustees.
  Before the plaque was unveiled, Lord Patten wished the Duke of Edinburgh a quick recovery from his operation.
  He said it was a "particular privilege" to welcome the Queen to Broadcasting House.
  The Queen had previously visited Broadcasting House on five previous occasions but those were all before the BBC's extensive project to overhaul, modernise and expand the building to accommodate staff being moved from Television Centre, which closed in March.
  The building is now home to nine radio networks, three 24-hour TV news channels, all of the BBC's main news bulletins and is the workplace for 6,000 BBC staff from the BBC's television, radio, news and online services.
Glenn Greenwald Says Their Goal Is To End ALL Privacy!
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  Thu, 06 Jun 2013 23:12
QRP ARCI - Awards
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  Thu, 06 Jun 2013 23:03
  QRP ARCI congratulates the following new awardees -
  VA3JFF - Jeff Hetherington - for earning 7 Band KMPW Award # 1. Jeff distinguished himself by submitting applications for 1000 MPW contacts on 80, 40, 20, 17, 15, 12, and 10 meters, using CW, SSB, RTTY, and PSK31.
  KJ4EZX - Terry Smith - KMPW Award # 3264 - 20M 5W SSB QSO with SV3AQR for 1060 MPWKJ4EZX - Terry Smith - KMPW Award # 3265 - 15M 2.5W SSB QSO with LZ2HQ for 2106 MPW
  KB5JO - Curt Hulett - KMPW Award # 3266 - 10M 200mW CW QSO with KB7DY (2xQRP) for 9557 MPW
  VA3JFF - Jeff Hetherington - KMPW Award # 3267 -40M 1W CW QSO with KK7JS for 1138 MPW
  AF9W - Bob Stephens - KMPW Award # 3268 - 17M 5W CW QSO with F6HKA for 1113 MPW
  WB3AAL - Ron Polityka - KMPW Award # 3269 - 15M 100mW CW QSO with S50R for 43, 049 MPW
  OK1DMP - Milan Pracka - 5 Band QRP DX Award # 3 - for proof of working at least 100 countries on 40, 20, 17, 15, and 10 meters, using CW, SSB, RTTY, PSK, and JT65
  OK1DMP - Milan Pracka - 7 Band QRP All Continents Award # 2 - for poof of working all continents on 40. 30, 20, 17, 15, 12, and 10 meters - All CW
The Technium: The Unabomber Was Right
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  Thu, 06 Jun 2013 22:30
  Ted Kaczynski, the convicted bomber who blew up dozens of technophilic professionals, was right about one thing: technology has its own agenda. The technium is not, as most people think, a series of individual artifacts and gadgets for sale. Rather, Kaczynski, speaking as the Unabomber, argued that technology is a dynamic holistic system. It is not mere hardware; rather it is more akin to an organism. It is not inert, nor passive; rather the technium seeks and grabs resources for its own expansion. It is not merely the sum of human action, but in fact it transcends human actions and desires. I think Kaczynski was right about these claims. In his own words the Unabomber says: "The system does not and cannot exist to satisfy human needs. Instead, it is human behavior that has to be modified to fit the needs of the system. This has nothing to do with the political or social ideology that may pretend to guide the technological system. It is the fault of technology, because the system is guided not by ideology but by technical necessity.''
  I too argue that the technium is guided by ''technical necessity.'' That is, baked into the nature of this vast complex of technological systems are self-serving aspects '' technologies that enable more technology, and systems that preserve themselves -- and also inherent biases that lead the technium in certain directions, outside of human desire. Kaczynski writes ''modern technology is a unified system in which all parts are dependent on one another. You can't get rid of the 'bad' parts of technology and retain only the 'good' parts.''
  The truth of Kaczynski's observations does not absolve him of his murders, or justify his insane hatred. Kaczynski saw something in technology that caused him to lash out with violence, but despite his mental imbalance, he was able to articulate that view with surprising clarity his sprawling, infamous 35,000-word manifesto. Kaczynski murdered three people (and injured 23 more) in order to get this manifesto published. His despicable desperation and crimes hide a critique that has gained a minority following by other luddites. The center section of his argument is clear, remarkably so, given his cranky personal grievances against leftists that bookend his rant. Here, in meticulous, scholarly precision, Kaczynski makes his primary claim that ''freedom and technological progress are incompatible,'' and that therefore technological progress must be undone.
  As best I understand, the Unabomber's argument goes like this:
  Personal freedoms are constrained by society, as they must be.The stronger that technology makes society, the less freedoms.Technology destroys nature, which strengthens technology further.This ratchet of technological self-amplification is stronger than politics.Any attempt to use technology or politics to tame the system only strengthens it.Therefore technological civilization must be destroyed, rather than reformed.Since it cannot be destroyed by tech or politics, humans must push industrial society towards its inevitable end of self-collapse.Then pounce on it when it is down and kill it before it rises again.In short, Kaczynski claims that civilization is the disease and not the cure. He wasn't the first to make this claim. Rants against the machine of civilization go back as far as Freud and beyond. But the assaults against industrial society speed up as industry sped up. Edward Abbey, the legendary wilderness activist, considered industrial civilization to be a ''destroying juggernaut'' wrecking both the planet and humans. Abbey did all he could personally to stop the juggernaut with monkey wrenching maneuvers '' sabotaging logging equipment and so forth. Abbey was the iconic Earth Firster who inspired many fire throwing followers. The luddite theorist, Kirkpatrick Sale, who unlike Abbey, railed against the machine while living in a brownstone in Manhattan, refined the idea of ''civilization as disease.'' Kirk Sale and I had a public debate which led to public bet of $1,000 on whether civilization would collapse by 2020 (me nay, he yay). Recently the call to undo civilization and return to a purer, more humane primitive state has accelerated in pace with the supposed advent of the Singularity. In 2008 John Zerzan published an anthology of contemporary readings focused on the theme "Against Civilization". Derrick Jensen penned a 1,500 word treatise on how and why to topple technological civilization, with hands-on suggestions of the ideal places to start '' power and gas lines and the information infrastructure.
  Kaczynski had read earlier jeremiads against industrial society and arrived at his hatred of civilization in the same way many other nature lovers, mountain men, back-to-the-earthers have. He was driven there in a retreat from the rest of us. Kaczynski buckled under the many rules and expectations society put up for him. He said, ''Rules and regulations are by nature oppressive. Even 'good' rules are reductions in freedom.'' He was deeply frustrated at not being able to integrate into professional society, which he groomed himself for. His frustration is echoed in these words from his manifesto:
  Modern man is strapped down by a network of rules and regulations'... Most of these regulations cannot be disposed with, because they are necessary for the functioning of industrial society. When one does not have adequate opportunity to go throughout the power process the consequences are '...boredom, demoralization, low self-esteem, inferiority feelings, defeatism, depression, anxiety, guilt, frustration, hostility, spouse or child abuse, insatiable hedonism, abnormal sexual behavior, sleep disorders, eating disorders, etc. [The rules of industrial society] have made life unfulfilling, have subjected human beings to indignities, have led to widespread psychological suffering. By "feelings of inferiority" we mean not only inferiority feelings in the strictest sense but a whole spectrum of related traits: low self-esteem, feelings of powerlessness, depressive tendencies, defeatism, guilt, self-hatred, etc.
  Kaczynski suffered these indignities, which he blamed on society, and escaped to the hills where he perceived he could enjoy more freedoms. In Montana he built a cabin without running water or electricity. Here he lived a fairly self-sustained life '' away from the rules and the reach of technological civilization. (But just as Thoreau did at Walden, he came into town to restock his supplies.) However his escape from technology was disturbed around 1983. One of the wilderness oases Kaczynski loved to visit was a "plateau that dated from the Tertiary Age'' a two-day hike from his cabin. The spot was sort of a secret retreat for him. As Kaczynski remembers, ''It's kind of rolling country, not flat, and when you get to the edge of it you find these ravines that cut very steeply into cliff-like drop-offs. There was even a waterfall there.'' The area around his own cabin was getting too much traffic from hikers and hunters, so in the summer of 1983 he retreated to his secret spot on the plateau. As he tells an interviewer later in prison,
  ''When I got there I found they had put a road right through the middle of it" His voice trails off; he pauses, then continues, "You just can't imagine how upset I was. It was from that point on I decided that, rather than trying to acquire further wilderness skills, I would work on getting back at the system. Revenge. That wasn't the first time I ever did any monkey wrenching, but at that point, that sort of thing became a priority for me.''
  It is easy to sympathize with Kaczynski's plight. You politely try to escape the squeeze of technological civilization by retreating to its furthest reaches, where you establish a relatively techno-free lifestyle and then the beast of civilization/development/industrial technology stalks you and destroys your paradise. Is there no escape? The machine is ubiquitous! It is relentless! It must be stopped!
  The Unabomber cabin in lower left.
  Ted Kaczynski, of course, is not the only wilderness lover to suffer the encroachment of civilization. Entire tribes of indigenous Americans were driven to remote areas by the advance of European culture. They were not running from technology per se (they happily picked up the latest guns when they could), but the effect was the same '' to distance themselves from industrial society, to remove themselves from the advancing culture.
  Kaczynski argues that it is impossible to escape the ratcheting clutches of industrial technology for several reasons. One, because if you use any part of it, the system demands servitude; two, because technology does not ''reverse'' itself, never releasing what is in its hold; and three, because we don't have a choice of what technology to use in the long run. In his words, from the Manifesto:
  The system HAS TO regulate human behavior closely in order to function. At work, people have to do what they are told to do, otherwise production would be thrown into chaos. Bureaucracies HAVE TO be run according to rigid rules. To allow any substantial personal discretion to lower-level bureaucrats would disrupt the system and lead to charges of unfairness due to differences in the way individual bureaucrats exercised their discretion. It is true that some restrictions on our freedom could be eliminated, but GENERALLY SPEAKING the regulation of our lives by large organizations is necessary for the functioning of industrial-technological society. The result is a sense of powerlessness on the part of the average person.
  It is not possible to make a LASTING compromise between technology and freedom, because technology is by far the more powerful social force and continually encroaches on freedom through REPEATED compromises. Another reason why technology is such a powerful social force is that, within the context of a given society, technological progress marches in only one direction; it can never be reversed. Once a technical innovation has been introduced, people usually become dependent on it, unless it is replaced by some still more advanced innovation. Not only do people become dependent as individuals on a new item of technology, but, even more, the system as a whole becomes dependent on it.
  When a new item of technology is introduced as an option that an individual can accept or not as he chooses, it does not necessarily REMAIN optional. In many cases the new technology changes society in such a way that people eventually find themselves FORCED to use it.
  Kaczynski felt so strongly about the last point that he repeated it once more in a different section of his treatise. It is an important criticism. Once you accept that individuals surrender freedom and dignity to ''the machine'' and that they increasingly have no choice but to do so, then the rest of Kaczynski's argument flows fairly logically:
  But we are suggesting neither that the human race would voluntarily turn power over to the machines nor that the machines would willfully seize power. What we do suggest is that the human race might easily permit itself to drift into a position of such dependence on the machines that it would have no practical choice but to accept all of the machines decisions. As society and the problems that face it become more and more complex and machines become more and more intelligent, people will let machines make more of their decision for them, simply because machine-made decisions will bring better result than man-made ones. Eventually a stage may be reached at which the decisions necessary to keep the system running will be so complex that human beings will be incapable of making them intelligently. At that stage the machines will be in effective control. People won't be able to just turn the machines off, because they will be so dependent on them that turning them off would amount to suicide. .. Technology will eventually acquire something approaching complete control over human behavior.
  Will public resistance prevent the introduction of technological control of human behavior? It certainly would if an attempt were made to introduce such control all at once. But since technological control will be introduced through a long sequence of small advances, there will be no rational and effective public resistance.
  I find it hard to argue against this last section. It is true that as the complexity of our built world increases we will necessarily need to rely on mechanical (computerized) means to managing this complexity. We already do. Autopilots fly our very complex flying machines. Algorithms control our very complex communications and electrical grids. And for better or worse, computers control our very complex economy. Certainly as we construct yet more complex infrastructure (location-based mobile communications, genetic engineering, fusion generators, autopilot cars) we will rely further on machines to run them and make decisions. For those services, turning off the switch is not an option. In fact, if we wanted to turn off the internet right now, it would not be easy to do if others wanted to keep it on. In many ways the internet is designed to never turn off.
  Finally, if the triumph of a technological takeover is the disaster that Kaczynski outlines '' robbing souls of freedom, initiative, sanity, or the environment of its sustainability '' and if this prison is inescapable, then the system must be destroyed. Not reformed, because that will merely extend it, but eliminated. From his manifesto:
  Until the industrial system has been thoroughly wrecked, the destruction of that system must be the revolutionaries' ONLY goal. Other goals would distract attention and energy from the main goal. More importantly, if the revolutionaries permit themselves to have any other goal than the destruction of technology, they will be tempted to use technology as a tool for reaching that other goal. If they give in to that temptation, they will fall right back into the technological trap, because modern technology is a unified, tightly organized system, so that, in order to retain SOME technology, one finds oneself obliged to retain MOST technology, hence one ends up sacrificing only token amounts of technology.
  Success can be hoped for only by fighting the technological system as a whole; but that is revolution not reform. '...While the industrial system is sick we must destroy it. If we compromise with it and let it recover from its sickness, it will eventually wipe out all of our freedom.
  For these reasons Ted Kaczynski went to the mountains to escape the clutches of the civilization and then later to plot his destruction of it. He would make his own tools (anything he could hand fashion) while avoiding technology (stuff it takes a system to make). His small one-room shed was so well-constructed that the Feds later moved it off his property as a single intact Lego-like piece, and put it in storage (it now sits reconstructed in the Newseum in Washington, DC.) His place was way off the road; he used a mountain bike to get into town. He dried hunted meat in his tiny attic, and spent his evenings in the yellow light of a kerosene lamp crafting intricate bomb mechanisms. The bombs were strikes at the professionals running the civilization he hated. It was evident that while the bombs were deadly, they were ineffective in achieving his goal since no one knew what their purpose was. He needed a billboard to announce why civilization needed to be destroyed. He needed a manifesto published in the major papers and magazines of the world. Once they read it a special few would see how imprisoned they were and they would join his cause. Perhaps others would also start bombing the chokepoints in civilization. Then his Freedom Club (FC) would be a real club of more than himself.
  The attacks on civilization did not materialize in bulk. Occasionally an Earth Firster would burn a building in an encroaching development or pour sugar into a bulldozer's gas tank. During the otherwise peaceful protests against the G7, some anti-civilization anarchists (who call themselves anarcho-primitivists) broke fast-food store-front windows and smashed property. But the mass assault on civilization never happened.
  The problem is that Kaczynski's most basic premise, the first axiom in his argument, is not true. The Unabomber claims that technology robs people of freedom. But most people of the world find the opposite. They gravitate towards venues of increasing technology because they recognize they have more freedoms when they are empowered with it. They (that is we) realistically weigh the fact that yes, indeed, some options are closed off when adopting new technology, but many others are opened, so that the net gain is a plus of freedom, choices, and possibilities.
  The gray hoodie under the plastic bag appeared on his police sketches.
  Consider Kaczynski himself. For 25 years he lived in a type of self-enforced solitary confinement in a dirty (see the photos and video) smoky shack without electricity, running water, or a toilet '' he cut a hole in the floor for late night pissing. In terms of material standards the cell he now occupies in the Colorado Admax prison is a four-star upgrade: larger, cleaner, warmer, with the running water, electricity and the toilet he did not have, plus free food, and a much better library. In his Montana hermitage he was free to move about as much as the snow and weather permitted him. He could freely choose among a limited set of choices of what to do in the evenings. He may have personally been content with his limited world, but overall his choices were very constrained, although he had unshackled freedom within those limited choices. Sort of like, ''you are free to hoe the potatoes any hour of the day you want.'' Kaczynski confused great latitude within limited choices as superior over modest latitude in an expanding number of choices.
  His workbench where he made bombs.I can only compare his constraints to mine, or perhaps anyone else's reading this today. I am plugged into the belly of the machine. Yet, technology allows me to work at home, so I hike in the mountains, where cougar and coyote roam, most afternoons. I can hear a mathematician give a talk on the latest theory of numbers one day, and the next day be lost in the wilderness of Death Valley with as little survivor gear as possible. My choices in how I spend my day are vast. They are not infinite, and some options are not available, but in comparison to the degree of choices and freedoms available to Ted Kaczynski in his shack, my freedoms are overwhelmingly greater.
  This is the chief reason billions of people migrate from mountain shacks '' very much like Kaczynski's '' all around the world. A smart kid living in a smoky one-room shack in the hills of Laos, or Cameroon, or Bolivia will do all he/she can to make their way against all odds to the city where there are '' so obvious to them '' vastly more freedom and choices. They would find Kaczynski's argument that there is more freedom back in the stifling hut they just escaped from plain crazy.
  The young are not under some kind of technological spell that warps their mind into believing civilization is better. Sitting in the mountains they are under no spell but poverty's. They clearly know what they give up when they leave. They understand the comfort and support of family, the priceless value of community acquired in a small village, the blessings of clean air and the soothing wholeness of the natural world. They feel the loss of immediate access to these, but they come to the city anyway because in the end, the tally favors the freedoms created by civilization. They can (and will) return to the hills to be rejuvenated.
  My family doesn't have TV, and while we have a car, I have plenty of city friends who do not. Avoiding particular technologies is certainly possible. The Amish do it well. Many individuals do it well. However the Unabomber is right that choices which begin as optional can over time become less so. First, there are certain technologies (say sewage treatment, vaccinations, traffic lights) that were once matters of choice but that are now mandated and enforced by the system. Then, there are other systematic technologies, like automobiles, which are self-reinforcing. Thousands of other technologies are intertwined into these systemic ones, making it hard for a human to avoid. The more that participate, the more essential it becomes. Living without these embedded technologies requires more effort, or at least more deliberate alternatives. This web of self-reinforcing technologies would be a type of noose if the total gains in choices, possibilities and freedoms brought about by them did not exceed the losses. I argue that our continued embrace of more technology is further proof that we have made the calculation as we head for the greater good.
  Anti-civilizationists would argue that we embrace more because we are brainwashed by the system itself and we have no choice to but to say yes to more. We can't say no to more than a few individual pieces, so we are imprisoned in this elaborate artificial lie.
  It is possible that the technium has brainwashed us all, except for a few clear-eyed anarcho-primitivists who like to blow up stuff. I would be inclined to believe in the anarchy if the Unabomber's alternative to civilization was more clear. After we destroy civilization, then what?
  From Green Anarchy Primer
  I've been reading the literature of the anti-civilization collapsatarians to find out what they have in mind after the collapse. Anti-civilization dreamers spend a lot of time devising ways to bring down civilization (befriend hackers, unbolt power towers, blow up dams), but not so much on what replaces it. They do have a notion what the world looked like before civilization. According to them it looks like this (from the Green Anarchy Primer):
  Prior to civilization there generally existed ample leisure time, considerable gender autonomy and equality, a non-destructive approach to the natural world, the absence of organized violence, no mediating or formal institutions, and strong health and robusticity.
  Then came civilization and all the ills (literally) of the earth:
  Civilization inaugurated warfare, the subjugation of women, population growth, drudge work, concepts of property, entrenched hierarchies, and virtually every known disease, to name a few of its devastating derivatives.
  Among the green anarchists there's talk of recovering your soul, making fire by rubbing sticks, discussions of whether vegetarianism is a good idea for hunters, but there is no outline of how groups of people go beyond survival mode, or if they do. We are supposed to aim for ''re-wilding'' but the re-wilders are shy to describe what life is like in this re-wild state. One prolific green anarchy author, Derrick Jensen, dismisses the lack of alternatives to civilization and says simply, ''I do not provide alternatives because there is no need. The alternatives already exist, and they have existed '' and worked '' for thousands and tens of thousands of years.'' He means of course tribal life, but not modern tribal; he means tribal as in no agriculture, no anti-biotics, no nothing beyond wood, fur and stone.
  The great difficulty of the anti-civilizationists is that a sustainable desirable alternative to civilization is unimaginable. We cannot picture it. We cannot see how it would be a place we'd like to move to. We can't imagine how this primitive arrangement of stone and fur would satisfy each of our individual talents. And because we cannot imagine it, it will never happen, because nothing has ever been created without being imagined first.
  Despite their inability to image a desirable coherent alternative, the archo-primitivists all agree that some combo of being in tune with nature, eating low-calorie diets, owning very little and using only things you make yourself, will bring on a level of contentment, happiness and meaning we have not seen for 10,000 years (literally).
  But if this state of happy poverty is so desirable and good for the soul why do none of the anti-civilizationists live like this? As far as I can ell from my research all self-identifying anarcho-primitivists live in modernity. They compose their rants against the machine on very fast desktop machines. While they sip coffee. Their routines would be only marginally different than mine. They have not relinquished the conveniences of civilization for the better shores of nomadic hunter-gathering.
  Except one: The Unabomber. Kaczynski went further than other critics in living the story he believed in. At first glance his story seems promising, but on second look, it collapses into the familiar conclusion: he is living off the fat of civilization. The Unabomber's shack was crammed with stuff he purchased from the machine: snowshoes, boots, sweat shirts, food, explosives, mattresses, plastic jugs and buckets, etc. '' all things that he could have made himself, but did not. After 25 years on the job, why did he not make his own tools separate from the system? It looks like he shopped at Wal-mart. The food he scavenged from the wild was minimal. Instead he regularly rode his bike to town and there rented an old car to drive to the big city to restock his food and supplies from supermarkets. He was either incapable of supporting himself without civilization, or unwilling to.
  Unabomber shack attic.
  Besides lacking a desirable alternative, the final problem with destroying civilization as we know it is that the alternative, such as it has been imagined by the self-described ''haters of civilization'', would not support but a fraction of the people alive today. In other words, the collapse of civilization would kill billions. Ironically the poorest rural inhabitants would fare the best, as they could retreat to hunting gathering with the least hurdle, but billions of urbanites would die once food ran out and disease took over. The anarcho-primitives are rather sanguine about this catastrophe, arguing that accelerating the collapse early might save lives in total.
  Again the exception seems to be Ted Kaczynski, who reckons with the die-off in this post-arrest interview:
  For those who realize the need to do away with the techno-industrial system, if you work for its collapse, in effect you are killing a lot of people. If it collapses, there is going to be social disorder, there is going to be starvation, there aren't going to be any more spare parts or fuel for farm equipment, there won't be any more pesticide or fertilizer on which modern agriculture is dependent. So there isn't going to be enough food to go around, so then what happens? This is something that, as far as I've read, I haven't seen any radicals facing up to.
  Presumably Kaczynski personally ''faced up'' to the logical conclusion of taking down civilization; it would kill billions of people. He must have decided that murdering a few more people up front in the process would not matter. After all, the techno-industrial complex had snuffed out the humanity from him, so if he had to snuff out a few dozen humans on the way to snuff out the system that enslaves billions, that would be worth it. The death of billions would also be justified because all those unfortunate people under the grasp of technology were now soulless, like he was. Once civilization was gone, the next generation would be really free.
  The ultimate problem is that the paradise the Kaczynski is offering, the solution to civilization so to speak, is the tiny, smoky, dingy, smelly wooden prison cell that absolutely nobody else wants to dwell in. It is a paradise billions are fleeing from. Civilization has its problems but in almost every way it is better than the Unabomber's shack.
  The Unabomber is right that technology is a holistic, self-perpetuating machine. He is wrong to bomb it for many reasons, not the least is that the machine of civilization offers us more actual freedoms than the alternative. There is a cost to run this machine, a cost we are only beginning to reckon with, but so far the gains from this ever enlarging technium outweigh the alternative of no machine at all.
DNI Statement on Recent Unauthorized Disclosures of Classified Information
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  Archived Version
  Thu, 06 Jun 2013 22:26
  June 6, 2013DNI Statement on Recent Unauthorized Disclosures of Classified Information
  The highest priority of the Intelligence Community is to work within the constraints of law to collect, analyze and understand information related to potential threats to our national security.The unauthorized disclosure of a top secret U.S. court document threatens potentially long-lasting and irreversible harm to our ability to identify and respond to the many threats facing our nation.
  The article omits key information regarding how a classified intelligence collection program is used to prevent terrorist attacks and the numerous safeguards that protect privacy and civil liberties.
  I believe it is important for the American people to understand the limits of this targeted counterterrorism program and the principles that govern its use. In order to provide a more thorough understanding of the program, I have directed that certain information related to the ''business records'' provision of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act be declassified and immediately released to the public.
  The following important facts explain the purpose and limitations of the program:
  The judicial order that was disclosed in the press is used to support a sensitive intelligence collection operation, on which members of Congress have been fully and repeatedly briefed. The classified program has been authorized by all three branches of the Government.Although this program has been properly classified, the leak of one order, without any context, has created a misleading impression of how it operates. Accordingly, we have determined to declassify certain limited information about this program.The program does not allow the Government to listen in on anyone's phone calls. The information acquired does not include the content of any communications or the identity of any subscriber. The only type of information acquired under the Court's order is telephony metadata, such as telephone numbers dialed and length of calls.The collection is broad in scope because more narrow collection would limit our ability to screen for and identify terrorism -related communications. Acquiring this information allows us to make connections related to terrorist activities over time. The FISA Court specifically approved this method of collection as lawful, subject to stringent restrictions.The information acquired has been part of an overall strategy to protect the nation from terrorist threats to the United States, as it may assist counterterrorism personnel to discover whether known or suspected terrorists have been in contact with other persons who may be engaged in terrorist activities.There is a robust legal regime in place governing all activities conducted pursuant to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which ensures that those activities comply with the Constitution and laws and appropriately protect privacy and civil liberties. The program at issue here is conducted under authority granted by Congress and is authorized by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC). By statute, the Court is empowered to determine the legality of the program.By order of the FISC, the Government is prohibited from indiscriminately sifting through the telephony metadata acquired under the program. All information that is acquired under this program is subject to strict, court-imposed restrictions on review and handling. The court only allows the data to be queried when there is a reasonable suspicion, based on specific facts, that the particular basis for the query is associated with a foreign terrorist organization. Only specially cleared counterterrorism personnel specifically trained in the Court-approved procedures may even access the records.All information that is acquired under this order is subject to strict restrictions on handling and is overseen by the Department of Justice and the FISA Court. Only a very small fraction of the records are ever reviewed because the vast majority of the data is not responsive to any terrorism-related query.The Court reviews the program approximately every 90 days. DOJ conducts rigorous oversight of the handling of the data received to ensure the applicable restrictions are followed. In addition, DOJ and ODNI regularly review the program implementation to ensure it continues to comply with the law.The Patriot Act was signed into law in October 2001 and included authority to compel production of business records and other tangible things relevant to an authorized national security investigation with the approval of the FISC. This provision has subsequently been reauthorized over the course of two Administrations '' in 2006 and in 2011. It has been an important investigative tool that has been used over the course of two Administrations, with the authorization and oversight of the FISC and the Congress.Discussing programs like this publicly will have an impact on the behavior of our adversaries and make it more difficult for us to understand their intentions. Surveillance programs like this one are consistently subject to safeguards that are designed to strike the appropriate balance between national security interests and civil liberties and privacy concerns. I believe it is important to address the misleading impression left by the article and to reassure the American people that the Intelligence Community is committed to respecting the civil liberties and privacy of all American citizens.
  James R. Clapper, Director of National Intelligence
  ###
PRISM scandal: tech giants flatly deny allowing NSA direct access to servers | World news | guardian.co.uk
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Thu, 06 Jun 2013 19:38
  Executives at several of the tech firms said they had never heard of PRISM until they were contacted by the Guardian
  Two different versions of the PRISM scandal were emerging on Thursday with Silicon Valley executives denying all knowledge of the top secret program that gives the National Security Agency direct access to the internet giants' servers.
  The eavesdropping program is detailed in the form of PowerPoint slides in a leaked NSA document, seen and authenticated by the Guardian, which states that it is based on "legally-compelled collection" but operates with the "assistance of communications providers in the US."
  Each of the 41 slides in the document displays prominently the corporate logos of the tech companies claimed to be taking part in PRISM.
  However, senior executives from the internet companies expressed surprise and shock and insisted that no direct access to servers had been offered to any government agency.
  The top-secret NSA briefing presentation set out details of the PRISM program, which it said granted access to records such as emails, chat conversations, voice calls, documents and more. The presentation the listed dates when document collection began for each company, and said PRISM enabled "direct access from the servers of these US service providers: Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, Paltalk, AOL, Skype, YouTube, Apple".
  Senior officials with knowledge of the situation within the tech giants admitted to being confused by the NSA revelations, and said if such data collection was taking place, it was without companies' knowledge.
  An Apple spokesman said: "We have never heard of PRISM. We do not provide any government agency with direct access to our servers and any agency requesting customer data must get a court order," he said.
  Joe Sullivan, Facebook's chief security officer, said: "We do not provide any government organisation with direct access to Facebook servers. When Facebook is asked for data or information about specific individuals, we carefully scrutinise any such request for compliance with all applicable laws, and provide information only to the extent required by law."
  A Google spokesman said: "Google cares deeply about the security of our users' data. We disclose user data to government in accordance with the law, and we review all such requests carefully. From time to time, people allege that we have created a government 'backdoor' into our systems, but Google does not have a 'back door' for the government to access private user data."
  Within the tech companies, and talking on off the record, executives said they had never even heard of PRISM until contacted by the Guardian. Executives said that they were regularly contacted by law officials and responded to all subpoenas but they denied ever having heard of a scheme like PRISM, an information programme internal the documents state has been running since 2007.
  Executives said they were "confused" by the NSA claims. "We operate under what we are required to do by law," said one. "We receive requests for information all the time. Say about a potential terrorist threat or after the Boston bombing. But we have systems in place for that." The executive claimed, as did others, that the most senior figures in their organisation had never heard of PRISM or any scheme like it.
  The chief executive of transparency NGO Index on Censorship, Kirsty Hughes, remarked on Twitter that the contradiction seemed to leave two options: "Back door or front?" she posted.
NSA slides explain the PRISM data-collection program - The Washington Post
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  Archived Version
  Thu, 06 Jun 2013 19:38
  Through a top-secret program authorized by federal judges working under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), the U.S. intelligence community can gain access to the servers of nine Internet companies for a wide range of digital data. Documents describing the previously undisclosed program, obtained by The Washington Post, show the breadth of U.S. electronic surveillance capabilities in the wake of a widely publicized controversy over warrantless wiretapping of U.S. domestic telephone communications in 2005. These slides, annotated by The Washington Post, represent a selection from the overall document, and certain portions are redacted. Read related article.
  Introducing the programA slide briefing analysts at the National Security Agency about the program touts its effectiveness and features the logos of the companies involved.
  The program is called PRISM, after the prisms used to split light, which is used to carry information on fiber-optic cables.
  This note indicates that the program is the number one source of raw intelligence used for NSA analytic reports.
  The seal ofSpecial Source Operations, the NSA term for alliances with trusted U.S. companies.
  Monitoring a target's communicationThis diagram shows how the bulk of the world's electronic communications move through companies based in the United States.
  Providers and dataThe PRISM program collects a wide range of data from the nine companies, although the details vary by provider.
  Participating providersThis slide shows when each company joined the program, with Microsoft being the first, on Sept. 11, 2007, and Apple the most recent, in October 2012.
Evidence The Obama Administration Is Lying About Civilian Deaths Caused By Drone Strikes - YouTube
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  Archived Version
  Thu, 06 Jun 2013 09:20
Obama administration defends NSA collection of Verizon phone records
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: The Guardian World News
  Thu, 06 Jun 2013 08:59
  The White House has sought to justify its surveillance of millions of Americans' phone records as anger grows over revelations that a secret court order gives the National Security Agency blanket authority to collect call data from a major phone carrier.
  Politicians and civil liberties campaigners described the disclosures, revealed by the Guardian on Wednesday, as the most sweeping intrusion into private data they had ever seen by the US government.
  But the Obama administration, while declining to comment on the specific order, said the practice was "a critical tool in protecting the nation from terrorist threats to the United States".
  The secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (Fisa) granted the order to the FBI on April 25, giving the government unlimited authority to obtain the data for a specified three-month period ending on July 19.
  Under the terms of the blanket order, the numbers of both parties on a call are handed over, as is location data, call duration, unique identifiers, and the time and duration of all calls. The contents of the conversation itself are not covered.
  The disclosure has reignited longstanding debates in the US over the proper extent of the government's domestic spying powers.
  Under the Bush administration, officials in security agencies had disclosed to reporters the large-scale collection of call records data by the NSA, but this is the first time significant and top-secret documents have revealed the continuation of the practice under President Obama.
  The White House stressed that orders such as the one disclosed by the Guardian would only cover data about the calls rather than their content. A senior administration official said: "Information of the sort described in the Guardian article has been a critical tool in protecting the nation from terrorist threats to the United States, as it allows counter-terrorism personnel to discover whether known or suspected terrorists have been in contact with other persons who may be engaged in terrorist activities, particularly people located inside the United States.
  "As we have publicly stated before, all three branches of government are involved in reviewing and authorising intelligence collection under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Congress passed that act and is regularly and fully briefed on how it is used, and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court authorises such collection. There is a robust legal regime in place governing all activities conducted pursuant to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act."
  The administration stressed that the court order obtained by the Guardian relates to call data, and does not allow the government to listen in to anyone's calls.
  However, in 2013, such metadata can provide authorities with vast knowledge about a caller's identity. Particularly when crosschecked against other public records, the metadata can reveal someone's name, address, driver's licence, credit history, social security number and more. Government analysts would be able to work out whether the relationship between two people was ongoing, occasional or a one-off.
  "From a civil liberties perspective, the program could hardly be any more alarming. It's a program in which some untold number of innocent people have been put under the constant surveillance of government agents," said Jameel Jaffer, American Civil Liberties Union deputy legal director. "It is beyond Orwellian, and it provides further evidence of the extent to which basic democratic rights are being surrendered in secret to the demands of unaccountable intelligence agencies."
  The order names Verizon Business Services, a division of Verizon Communications. In its first-quarter earnings report, published in April, Verizon Communications listed about 10m commercial lines out of a total of 121m customers. The court order does not specify what type of lines are being tracked. It is not clear whether any additional orders exist to cover Verizon's wireless and residential customers, or those of other phone carriers.
  Fisa court orders typically direct the production of records pertaining to a specific named target who is suspected of being an agent of a terrorist group or foreign state, or a finite set of individually named targets. The unlimited nature of the records being handed over to the NSA is extremely unusual.
  The Verizon order expressly bars the company from disclosing to the public either the existence of the FBI's request for its customers' records, or the court order itself. "We decline comment," said Ed McFadden, a Washington-based Verizon spokesman said on Wednesday.
  News of the order brought swift condemnation from senior US politicians. Former vice-president Al Gore described the "secret blanket surveillance" as "obscenely outrageous". "In [the] digital era, privacy must be a priority," he said.
  The court order appears to explain the numerous cryptic public warnings by two US senators, Mark Udall and Ron Wyden, about the scope of the Obama administration's surveillance activities.
  For about two years, the two Democrats have been stridently advising the public that the US government is relying on "secret legal interpretations" to claim surveillance powers so broad that the American public would be "stunned" to learn of the kind of domestic spying being conducted.
  Udall, a member of the senate intelligence committee, said on Wednesday night: "While I cannot corroborate the details of this particular report, this sort of widescale surveillance should concern all of us and is the kind of government overreach I've said Americans would find shocking."
  The Center for Constitutional Rights said in a statement that the secret court order was unprecedented. "As far as we know this order from the Fisa court is the broadest surveillance order to ever have been issued: it requires no level of suspicion and applies to all Verizon [business services] subscribers anywhere in the US.
  "The Patriot Act's incredibly broad surveillance provision purportedly authorizes an order of this sort, though its constitutionality is in question and several senators have complained about it."
  Mark Rumold, a lawyer with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, said: "This is confirmation of what we've long feared, that the NSA has been tracking the calling patterns of the entire country. We hope more than anything else that the government will allow a judge to decide whether this is constitutional, and we can finally put an end to this practice."
  Howard Wolfson, a deputy mayor of New York, described the revelations as "a shocking report that really exploded overnight".
  "A lot of people are waking up now and I think they will be horrified," he said. "It is not just the civil libertarian wings of the Republican and Democratic parties; I think most Americans will be really surprised that their government is having access to all of the phone calls they make."
  "I don't think the administration's response [so far] is anywhere near adequate. I think you will see a lot of questions being asked in the coming days."
  Oregon senator Jeff Merkley said: "This type of secret bulk data collection is an outrageous breach of Americans' privacy. Can the FBI or the NSA really claim that they need data scooped up on tens of millions of Americans?"
Report: Leon Panetta revealed classified SEAL unit info
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  Archived Version
  Source: ccampeador
  Thu, 06 Jun 2013 08:58
  A source close to Panetta said Wednesday evening that he was unaware anyone without the proper security clearances was present at the event, which included both CIA and military personnel.
  ''He has no idea who all is in the audience. He was told everyone got the requisite clearances,'' said the source, who asked not to be named.
  Panetta's prepared speech was classified ''secret,'' according to the source. That may have led the CIA director to believe he could speak freely about the operation.
  The leaked version of the report does not address whether Panetta knew Boal was present at the ceremony, held under a tent at the CIA complex on June 24, 2011. ''Approximately 1,300'' people from the military and the intelligence community were on hand for the event, according to a CIA press release issued the following week.
  The disclosure of the IG report could undermine the Obama administration's claims that senior officials have not leaked classified information. Last spring, Republicans publicly attacked President Barack Obama and his top aides, alleging that the administration leaked national security secrets to burnish Obama's standing for his reelection bid.
  Word that Panetta, a key member of Obama's national security team, might have been responsible for improper disclosures without encountering any known repercussions comes as the administration faces questions over the fairness of the aggressive anti-leak investigations and prosecutions being mounted by the Justice Department.
  The release of the findings in the draft report may also raise questions about why the document has been under wraps for so long, and which of its conclusions were known to White House officials prior to last November's election.
  Asked Wednesday about the report, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said he was not familiar with it and would have to get back to reporters. No further response was forthcoming by late Wednesday afternoon.
  Panetta did not respond to interview requests Wednesday made through his non-profit public policy institute in Monterey, Calif. He was sworn in as defense secretary about a week after the 2011 ceremony. He left the Pentagon post in February of this year and returned to California.
  Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.), who requested the inspector general's review, said he was disturbed by the report's findings and by the delays in its official release.
  ''It does raise issues about a lack of security at the CIA and at DoD,'' King told POLITICO on Wednesday. ''The most important issue right now is why this report was held back for so long. Inspectors general are supposed to be independent. It's the integrity of the process. '... It's important to know where that pressure [to withhold it] was coming from.''
  The congressman said he also wants an apology from Carney for statements he made in August 2011, when the press secretary called King's claims about security breaches related to the film ''ridiculous'' and ''simply false.''
  ''I would hope as we face a continued threat from terrorism, the House Committee on Homeland Security would have more important topics to discuss than a movie,'' Carney said then.
  After reviewing the leaked draft, King said he was writing to Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and the inspector general's office to demand the immediate official release of the report.
  King said he still had no official notification about the report but heard that it had been completed some time ago. ''I've been hearing at least since January that this report was final and that it could affect some high-ranking people, some high-ranking officials,'' he said.
  Asked Wednesday about the reason for the delay, a spokeswoman for the IG did not respond directly.
  ''While we do not have a projected date of completion for the referenced report, we are working diligently to complete the project as quickly as possible,'' spokeswoman Bridget Serchak told POLITICO Wednesday. She indicated release of the report was not planned in the next 30 days.
  DoD has been without a confirmed inspector general since December 2011.
  A separate CIA Inspector General review concluded in January found breaches of security in how the agency dealt with the Zero Dark Thirty filmmakers, King said.
  ''They said then that CIA did not follow its own procedures regarding security of both information and individuals,'' King said. He said he was describing the unclassified findings of the report. No portion of the CIA report has been publicly released.
  ''The CIA continues to look at our processes to address the concerns Representative King raised,'' CIA spokesman Ned Price said Wednesday.
  A CIA spokesman said the agency couldn't comment on IG reviews. The inspector general's office also declined to comment.
  It's unclear who authored or approved the contents of the version of the DOD IG report obtained by POGO. The document says it reflects the results of ''an initial review,'' and notes that review did not include an interview with Panetta.
  The draft report indicates that no measures were taken at the June 2011 ceremony to disguise the identities of the commandos who carried out the raid. ''The special operators were all in uniform with name tapes and directed to reserved seats in the front row,'' the report says.
  With the unit in full view and identified by name, Panetta and other speakers at the event may have had no reason to think they needed to be discreet.
  King said the bigger concern was not Panetta's remarks, but the wisdom of inviting a filmmaker to such an event. ''I'm not saying Panetta did anything intentional, but the whole operation was set in place here to be a deliberate security breach,'' the lawmaker said. ''Boal wasn't there at the spur of the moment'...You shouldn't have people like that there.''
  A prominent expert on classification policy said Wednesday that he can't conceive of Panetta facing any charges in connection with the episode.
  ''There's zero chance of him being prosecuted,'' said Steven Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists. ''It's not clear that [Panetta] was aware there were any uncleared people in the audience. It would not be easy for such a person to gain access'...You would not expect CIA headquarters to be vulnerable to a party crasher.''
  Aftergood noted that if Panetta disclosed the identities of people involved in the operation, so too did the SEAL team members who walked around with their names plastered on their chests and their faces undisguised. ''Did they also violate the rules?'' he said. ''To take it off the end that way, lies absurdity.''
  Aftergood said the incident should provide another reason for the administration to reconsider how aggressively it pursues some classified leaks. ''It illustrates the different standards in effect for senior officials and low-level officials. That's just a fact of life,'' he said.
  ''This episode ought to imbue everyone with a degree of humility about the working of the classification system. If someone of undoubted patriotism can violate the Espionage Act, then the legal regime is clearly out of whack,'' Aftergood added.
  King echoed the point. ''The administration has been subpoenaing reporters' records and prosecuting people for leaks'....but to then have its own people, for Hollywood purposes breaking security regulations seems to me totally wrong and indefensible.''
  The report, building on documents released last year under the Freedom of Information Act, describes a broad effort by the White House, the Pentagon and the CIA to support the movie project headed by Boal and colleague Kathryn Bigelow. However, the report is less clear about how Boal ended up at the award ceremony.
  A Pentagon public affairs officer told investigators that a CIA public affairs representative said that Panetta's chief of staff, Jeremy Bash, directed that Boal be admitted. However, Bash told investigators that CIA's public affairs shop made any such arrangements, and he was not involved in extending the invitation.
  It's unclear what Boal did, if anything, with the information he heard at the ceremony. The commander recognized by Panetta does not appear to be identified in the film.
  ''Boal was invited by [CIA] Public Affairs to absorb the emotion of the event,'' the source close to Panetta said.
  A source told POLITICO last July that the DoD IG review was essentially complete and that that the findings could be politically significant, though an IG spokeswoman said at the time that ''no release date has yet been determined.''
  In December, the spokeswoman told POLITICO: ''The assessment report our staff is preparing in response to the congressional request from Rep. King has not yet been completed, so there is no update at this time.''
  Link'...