What Adam Curry is reading

Australia planning to block 10,000 websites | Global Research
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  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 15:23
  Australia is preparing to block public access to 10,000 websites deemed to carry ''unwanted content''.
  By Bonnie Malkin in Sydney
  The websites will be blocked as part of a government-sponsored trial of its filter technology that will start before Christmas and last six weeks.
  The government has already identified 1300 websites that it wants to black list as part of the clean feeds scheme.
  Communications Minister Stephen Conroy said the sites mostly contained child pornography and other unwatned content, including images and videos.
  ''While the ACMA blacklist is currently around 1300 URLs, the pilot will test against this list '' as well as filtering for a range of URLs to around 10,000 '' so that the impacts on network performance of a larger blacklist can be examined,'' se said.
  The government is calling for ISP providers to express interest in taking part in the trial. Just one ISP has volunteered so far.
  A spokesman for Mr Conroy said: ''The pilot will provide an invaluable opportunity for ISPs to inform the Government's approach.
  ''The live pilot will provide valuable real-world evidence of the potential impact on internet speeds and costs to industry and will help ensure we implement a filtering solution that is efficient, effective and easy for Australian families to use.''
  A trial of web-filtering technology earler this year found it could slow internet access by as much as 87 per cent and by at least 2 per cent. Australia's internet service is already notoriously sluggish.
  The proposed filter is highly unpopular with civil liberty groups and the internet service industry.
  Colin Jacobs, board member of Electronic Frontiers Australia said he was concerned at what would be deemed ''unwanted content''.
  ''It is unclear how ACMA will scale up their blacklist to 10,000 websites and what will go on the list,'' he told the Melbourne Herald-Sun.
  ''Conroy said the list would contain illegal and unwanted content but we still have to see what would end up on that list.
  ''Under the current mandate that includes adult material, which would mean most material that could be rated R and, in some circumstances, material rated MA15+.''
Global-warming 'proof' is evaporating | New York Post
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  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 15:18
  The 2013 hurricane season just ended as one of the five quietest years since 1960. But don't expect anyone who pointed to last year's hurricanes as ''proof'' of the need to act against global warming to apologize; the warmists don't work that way.
  Warmist claims of a severe increase in hurricane activity go back to 2005 and Hurricane Katrina. The cover of Al Gore's 2009 book, ''Our Choice: A Plan to Solve the Climate Crisis,'' even features a satellite image of the globe with four major hurricanes superimposed.
  Yet the evidence to the contrary was there all along. Back in 2005 I and others reviewed the entire hurricane record, which goes back over a century, and found no increase of any kind. Yes, we sometimes get bad storms '-- but no more frequently now than in the past. The advocates simply ignored that evidence '-- then repeated their false claims after Hurricane Sandy last year.
  And the media play along. For example, it somehow wasn't front-page news that committed believers in man-made global warming recently admitted there's been no surface global warming for well over a decade and maybe none for decades more. Nor did we see warmists conceding that their explanation is essentially a confession that the previous warming may not have been man-made at all.
  That admission came in a new paper by prominent warmists in the peer-reviewed journal Climate Dynamics. They not only conceded that average global surface temperatures stopped warming a full 15 years ago, but that this ''pause'' could extend into the 2030s.
  Mind you, the term ''pause'' is misleading in the extreme: Unless and until it resumes again, it's just a ''stop.'' You don't say a bullet-ridden body ''paused'' breathing.
  Remarkably, that stoppage has practically been a state secret. Just five years ago, the head of the International Panel on Climate Change, the group most associated with ''proving'' that global warming is man-made and has horrific potential consequences, told Congress that Earth is running a ''fever'' that's ''apt to get much worse.'' Yet he and IPCC knew the warming had stopped a decade earlier.
  Those who pointed this out, including yours truly, were labeled ''denialists.'' Yet the IPCC itself finally admitted the ''pause'' in its latest report.
  The single most damning aspect of the ''pause'' is that, because it has occurred when ''greenhouse gases'' have been pouring into the atmosphere at record levels, it shows at the very least that something natural is at play here. The warmists suggest that natural factors have ''suppressed'' the warming temporarily, but that's just a guess: The fact is, they have nothing like the understanding of the climate that they claimed (and their many models that all showed future warming mean nothing, since they all used essentially the same false information).
  If Ma Nature caused the ''pause,'' can't this same lady be responsible for the warming observed earlier? You bet! Fact is, the earth was cooling and warming long before so-called GHGs could have been a factor. A warm spell ushered in the Viking Age, and many scientists believe recent warming was merely a recovery from what's called ''the Little Ice Age'' that began around 1300.
  Yet none of this unsettles the rush to kill debate. The Los Angeles Times has even announced that it will no longer print letters to the editor questioning man-made global warming. Had the Times been printing before Columbus, perhaps it would have banned letters saying the Earth was round.
  Meanwhile, the Obama administration continues to push to reduce supposed global-warming emissions. Last month, the president even signed an executive order establishing a Council on Climate Preparedness and Resilience that could dramatically expand government bureaucrats' ability to restrict Americans' use of their property, water and energy to reduce so-called ''greenhouse gas emissions.''
  Such attempted reductions in other countries have proved incredibly expensive, while barely reducing emissions. But damn the stubbornly weak economy, says President Obama, full speed ahead!
  This, even as new data show that last year the US median wage hit its lowest level since 1998 and long-term unemployment is almost the highest ever.
  People have a right to religious and cult beliefs within reason. But the warmists have been proved wrong time and again, each time reacting with little more than pictures of forlorn polar bears on ice floes and trying to shut down the opposition. (More bad timing: Arctic ice increased by almost a third this past year, while that at the South Pole was thicker and wider than it's been in 35 years.)
  In war and in science, the bloodiest conflicts always seem to be the religious ones. Time for the American public to say it's no longer going to play the victim in this one.
  Michael Fumento is a journalist and attorney based in Colombia.
hillary 2016
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  Source: BadChad's ThoughtPile
  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 14:56
  Rumors had been circling that Zack Snyder's follow-up to Man of Steel wouldn't just feature a new Batman but another classic DC character as well. Now it's official: Deadline reports that Gal Gadot will play Wonder Woman in Batman vs. Superman. Perhaps best known for her role in the recent Fast & Furious films, she will join Henry Cavill as Superman, and the hotly contested Ben Affleck as Batman.
  "Wonder Woman is arguably one of the most powerful female characters of all time and a fan favorite in the DC Universe," Snyder said in a statement. "Not only is Gal an amazing actress, but she also has that magical quality that makes her perfect for the role. We look forward to audiences discovering Gal in the first feature-film incarnation of this beloved character." This will be the second attempt to rethink Wonder Woman for modern audiences in the past few years. In 2011, Friday Night Lights star Adrianne Palicki starred as the title character in a TV pilot written by none other than David E. Kelley, though the show never went to series.
  According to earlier reports, Gadot had been one of a trio of front-runners for the role, including Elodie Yung of GI Joe: Retaliation and Olga Kurylenko from Quantum of Solace. With Variety reporting that Flash will also make a cameo, Batman vs. Superman is looking increasingly like DC and Warner Bros.' attempt to jumpstart an Avengers-style phenomenon, packing as many DC characters into the film as possible. Girls' Adam Driver had been rumored for the role of Nightwing as well, though the actor has since denied such reports. How Snyder plans to reimagine so many well-known characters all at once still remains to be seen, but audiences will have plenty of time to mull over the possibilities; the film isn't scheduled to open until 2015.
Message Sent
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  Source: Lame Cherry
  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 14:54
  This stolen shipment of radioactive material was not an accident and meant to send a message.
  This was the Islamocommunists of Persia and the intent was to frame the Mexicans for further actions.
  Yes there is more to come in this, and that means America.
  Upon inquiry it is pointed at New Jersey in the Donut Cream realm.
  This is not a dirty bomb, and one is in the loop. It is currently in Mexico and is an atomic cobalt bomb.
  If you want more that is what someone has to pay for in the big 350,000 for what is up with this blog.
  Schedule is to come across the border in January for a March deadline in the Garden State. The cobalt already came out of Mexico, was made into bomb making material in Iran and is in country.
  Upon inquiry this device is active.
  I would that I was done with all of this in the Lame Cherry exclusives in matter and anti matter as I have had it with being the only adult in the room listening to the children be lewd opening the windows and flashing, and when it all melts down I am the one who is supposed to fix things and make it all right.
  agtG
Official Letters from Santa
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  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 14:33
  Hurry! FREE Shipping Ends in
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  Copyright 2013 (C) officiallettersfromsanta2013.com - All rights reserved.
Paul Walker 'was in a STREET RACE when he died in fireball crash' | Mail Online
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  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 06:12
  Police are now probing whether the supercar was racing at the time of fatal crashThe driver of the vehicle was former race car driver Roger Rodas, Paul Walker's friend and financial adviserFather Paul Walker Snr has paid tribute to his son: 'His heart was so big. I was proud of him every day of his life.'The 40-year-old starred in five of the six Fast & Furious films about illegal street racing and heistsA teaser leaked online for the franchise's latest DVD chillingly includes Walker's co-star Tyrese Gibson saying the line: 'Promise me, no more funerals', before Walker replies: 'Just one more.'Walker leaves behind daughter, Meadow, 15, and long-term girlfriend Jasmine Pilchard-Gosnell, 23Officials confirm speed WAS a factor in the crash as sources say a steering-fluid leak may have also caused the driver to lose steeringBy Alex Greig, Tara Brady and David Mccormack
  PUBLISHED: 10:16 EST, 1 December 2013 | UPDATED: 03:12 EST, 3 December 2013
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  The supercar that actor Paul Walker was in when he died was racing another vehicle at speeds of more than 100mph when the fatal crash occurred, witnesses claim.
  Police are investigating tip-offs from possible witnesses that the Porsche's owner Roger Rodas, who also perished in the crash, was in the middle of a street race at the time, TMZ reports.
  Other reports today claim the former Pirelli World Challenge race car driver was going 100mph just moments before the crash despite traveling through a 45mph zone.
  'Though the investigation is in its early stages, investigators from the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department believe the Porsche was going over 100 mph,' a source close to the investigation told Radar.
  Detectives are now appealing for anyone who may have video of the car to come forward.
  Scroll down for videos
  Fans gather and place flowers on Sunday at the scene of a fiery crash that killed Fast & Furious star Paul Walker in the Santa Clarita area of Los Angeles
  Horror crash: First responders gather evidence near the wreckage of a Porsche sports car that crashed into a light pole on Hercules Street near Kelly Johnson Parkway in Valencia on Saturday, November 30, killing actor Paul Walker
  In this photograph actor Paul Walker, best known for his role in the Fast & Furious action movies, is seen stepping into his friend Roger Rodas' Porsche GT just moments before the horrendous crash in which the pair lost their lives
  Paul Walker's father pays tribute to film star son
  It is understood the fatal incident took place in an area popular with street racers.
  The new twist in the case comes as Paul Walker Snr, the Fast & Furious film actor's father, paid an emotional tribute to his son, saying: 'His heart was so big. I was proud of him every day of his life.'
  Choking on his tears, Mr Walker told website JustJared: 'I'm just glad, that every time I saw him, I told him I loved him. And he would say the same thing to me.'
  Describing how friends and relatives had rallied around to support the family in their time of grief, he added: 'You can't beat friends at a time like this. His brothers are all taking it pretty hard.'
  Mr Walker also told how his son had been determined to cut back on filming commitments to spend more time with his daughter just before he died.
  He said: 'He told me "I want to take a hiatus", his daughter Meadow is just 15 and "I don't have much more time to be with her" and then boom, he got another movie. He would say, "I don't know what to do."
  Paul Walker crash scene moments after fatal accident
  No survivors: The remains of the Porsche Carrera GT lie where the vehicle came to rest. The steering wheel shows the driver's position, meaning that Walker would have been sitting at the point where the vehicle struck the trees
  Heartbroken: Paul Walker's father, Paul Walker Senior paid tribute to his son today as family members joined fans to mourn at the makeshift memorial at the crash site
  Today co-star Tyrese Gibson wept as he visited the crash site to lay flowers. Hundreds of fans have turned the site into a makeshift shrine.
  Meanwhile, a haunting clip of tragic actor Paul Walker promising there would be 'just one more' funeral in the next Fast & Furious film was leaked online just three days before he died in the smash.
  In the teaser scene, from Fast & Furious 7 but released as an extra on the DVD and Blu-ray versions of Fast & Furious 6, Walker's character, Brian O'Conner, makes the remark to co-star Tyrese Gibson's character, Roman Pierce, at the funeral of Han and Gisele.
  Standing in the graveyard, Gibson turns to Walker and says: 'Promise me Brian, no more funerals.'
  'Just one more,' responds Walker, a reference to Jason Statham's villainous character Ian Shaw.
  The clip was leaked on film website Movies.com on November 27. Fast & Furious 6 is to be released on DVD and Blu-ray on December 10 in the U.S.
  Tragic Fast & Furious actor predicts a 'funeral' in movie trailer
  Foreboding: In the teaser scene, from Fast & Furious 7 but released as an extra on the DVD and Blu-ray versions of Fast & Furious 6, Walker's character Brian O'Conner (left) makes the remark to co-star Tyrese Gibson's character, Roman Pierce (right), at the funeral of Han and Gisele
  Disbelief: Damian Diaz writes on a Racer's Prayer board as people gather around a make-shift memorial site at the spot
  Tyrese Gibson breaks down in tears at Paul Walker crash site
  Sheriff's deputy Peter Gomez said investigators are continuing to work to determine how fast the car was traveling and what caused it to lose control, Fox News reported. They will be investigating whether the driver was distracted or if he swerved to avoid something in the road.
  It comes amid claims the crash may have been caused by a steering malfunction in the high-performance sports car.
  Sources linked to Always Evolving - the shop co-owned by Walker and the Porsche driver Roger Rodas - told TMZ they saw evidence of a fluid burst and subsequent fluid trail before the skid marks at the accident site.
  They said the noticeable lack of skid marks until just before the crash site suggest the driver may have lost control of the steering. On top of that, they appear in a straight line, not in a swerve pattern as normally occurs when a driver loses control of a car.
  The sources also told the website that the flames spread so quickly to the front of the car reinforces their theory of a steering fluid leak. The engine of a Porsche Carrera is at the back of the vehicle.
  It was also revealed today that the eight-year-old son of Rodas was one of the first to the site of the horrific car crash.
  Before the flames had even died down, Rodas's son heroically came rushing to try and pull his dad from the inferno.
  'His son had jumped the fence and gone over, he was trying to get his dad out,' said witness Jim Torp.
  The tragic detail emerged after footage surfaced of the Fast & Furious actor stepping into his friend's ill-fated sports car just 30 minutes before the horrendous crash in which the pair lost their lives.
  According to Radar Online, the crash happened so close to the charity event Walker was attending that Rodas's son was on the scene in mere seconds.
  'There was nothing he could do,' Torp said.
  TMZ reports that the crash occurred as the friends were on their way back from a 20-minute drive.
  Prior to that drive, Rodas had personally taken the wheel of the vehicle after one of the former race car driver's employees at the upscale auto shop he owned was having issues backing the car up into the garage. The vehicle reportedly kept stalling for the employee.
  As Rodas took control, Walker hopped in because he hadn't yet had a chance to take a spin in the impressive sports car.
  The crash occurred just yards away from the auto shop as the friends returned.
  The county coroner has revealed that the bodies of Walker and Rodas were so badly burned that they are currently unidentifiable.
  'There was a post-collision fire and bodies are not visually identifiable,' said LA County deputy coroner Dana Bee.
  Tragic loss: Paul Walker, 40, leaves behind a 15-year-old daughter, Meadow, pictured with him above left, who had recently moved to California from Hawaii to be closer to him. Walker was killed in the crash along with his friend and business partner Roger Rodas, pictured with Walker above right
  The LA County Coroner's office has requested dental records for both victims before they can identify the bodies. Autopsies on both bodies have been delayed until later this week, reports TMZ.
  Walker, who appeared in six of the seven films about illegal street racing and heists, had been at an event for his charity Reach Out Worldwide before deciding to take the car, a cherry-red Porsche, out for a drive with his friend.
  Walker was a self-confessed adrenaline junkie who enjoyed fast cars, surfing and outdoor pursuits. On his official Twitter account, he described himself as 'outdoorsman, ocean addict, adrenaline junkie... and I do some acting on the side.'
  The wreck took place about 3.30pm, about 300 yards from the office park where the event was held - and where the speed limit is 45mph.
  Guests rushed to put out the flames with fire extinguishers but the fireball had already engulfed the car.
  By Saturday evening, all that remained was the burnt mangled metal of the red car and a light pole that had been knocked down.
  Better days: Here, Walker is pictured with his 15-year-old daughter Meadow (far right) as he takes a break from filming in Montreal back in June
  Woman he left behind: Walker had been dating Jasmine Pilchard-Gosnell, 23, for the past seven years, relatives have said she is 'broken up' over his loss and that she was quickly becoming a stepmother to Meadow
  Fans write remembrances, left, while leaving flowers, candles and even DVDs, right, at the scene of the crash that killed Paul Walker and his friend Roger Rodas in the Santa Clarita area of Los Angeles on Saturday
  TMZ also reports that Walker's childhood friend Nute was one of the first to reach the scene with a fire extinguisher and tried desperately to put out the flames despite seeing quite clearly that the crash was not survivable.
  Nute then took a swing at responding officers, who initially placed him under arrest but let him go once the circumstances became clear.
  Antonio Holmes told the Santa Clarita Signal: 'We all ran around and jumped in cars and grabbed fire extinguishers and immediately went to the vehicle. It was engulfed in flames. There was nothing.
  'They were trapped. Employees, friends of the shop. We tried. We tried.'
  Holmes added: 'Him and his buddy, his brother in arms at heart just decided to joyride, take a spin. Something we all do. We're all car enthusiasts...
  'We're all here driving, enjoying each other, and God must've needed help.
  Rapper Tyrese Gibson was overcome with emotion when he visited the crash scene where his friend Paul Walker died in Santa Clarita
  Devastated: Tyrese Gibson took a piece of the crash scene which he said he would keep to hold on to Walker's energy forever
  'When we saw Paul and Roger leave, Paul was the passenger in the vehicle. They both were experienced drivers.'
  Fellow co-star and rapper Tyrese Gibson broke down when he attended the crash scene last night, less than 24 hours after Walker was killed. Standing amid the notes, candles and flowers dedicated fans have put together for the star, he burst into tears.
  Everyone around him fell silent as the rapper laid two flowers where his friend died.
  Tyrese also took a piece of the wreckage home and posted a photo of it online. He wrote: 'I will keep your energy with me forever #AshesOfAnAngel fast family around the world, we live you and we love you. Paul is the heartbeat of this franchise and we're gonna see it that his energy presence lives on forever #myhearthurtssobad'
  He later tweeted: 'At least I got to say I love you #OurLastExchange but our laughs and moments will live forever.'
  Walker leaves behind a 15-year-old daughter, Meadow, who had recently moved to California from Hawaii to be closer to him.
  The actor was also dating Jasmine Pilchard-Gosnell, 23, who is said to be 'broken up' over his loss, relatives have revealed.
  Almost nothing left of Porsche that actor Paul Walker died in
  Across social media sites, fans have been posting a quote - 'If one day the speed kills me, do not cry because I was smiling' - attributed to Walker
  A memorial for Paul Walker: Fans have been paying their respects to the Fast & Furious actor at the scene of the crash, he died on Saturday afternoon along with his friend Roger Rodas
  'Hurting so bad': Co-stars and fans were both shaken by the news of the actor's death. Fast & Furious co-star Tyrese took to Twitter, writing: 'My heart is hurting so bad.' Tyrese was seen at the crash site visibly emotional as he mourned his friend's death
  'Race in paradise': The memorial near the site of the Santa Clarita gained more visitors, mementos, flowers and messages of remembrance on Sunday
  'Unbelievable': Visitors to the memorable found the scene difficult to see following the crash that left a charred Porsche wrapped around a tree. Even after authorities picked over the scene, it remained difficult for some to see. 'It was just unbelievable,' said Sandra Caipo, who visited the scene
  Removing the wreck: The remains of the Porsche are taken away. The L.A. County Coroner has requested dental records for both victims before they can identify the bodies
  Her uncle Barton Bruner said that she is being comforted by her mother Julie as she struggled to cope with the 'horrible' news.
  Bruner said: 'Paul was a really good guy and Jasmine is broken up by this. I went to Thanksgiving with him, played golf with him.
  'They had their ups and downs but they were together and looking to spend a bright future together.
  'This is horrible news and unexpected. Her mother is with her and she is comforting her'.
  THE OTHER VICTIM: WALKER'S FRIEND AND BUSINESS ASSOCIATEThe driver of the car in which Paul Walker died has been identified as former race car driver Roger Rodas, 38, who was also Walker's financial adviser.
  The pair were friends and had been racing for several years before they began collaborating on Walker's finances.
  Rodas had helped Walker establish his Reach Out Worldwide charity, after creating his own foundation to support widows and orphans in his native El Salvador.
  Rodas was also the CEO of Always Evolving, the car customization shop where Saturday's charity event had been taking place. Walker was an investor in the business.
  It is believed the pair were leaving the event when the crash occurred.
  Walker reportedly started dating Pilchard-Gosnell when she was just 16, meaning he would have been 33, an age gap of 17 years.
  She was supposedly beginning to become the step-mother to Walker's daughter, even though she is only 10 years older.
  The actor's official Facebook page told fans of his death: 'It is with a truly heavy heart that we must confirm that Paul Walker passed away today in a tragic car accident while attending a charity event for his organization Reach Out Worldwide.
  'He was a passenger in a friend's car, in which both lost their lives.
  'We appreciate your patience as we too are stunned and saddened beyond belief by this news.
  'Thank you for keeping his family and friends in your prayers during this very difficult time. We will do our best to keep you apprised on where to send condolences. - #TeamPW.'
  Since the crash, fans and people wishing to pay their respects have left messages of condolence as well as candles and flowers at the site of the crash.
  Across social media sites, fans have been posting a quote - 'If one day the speed kills me, do not cry because I was smiling' - that is attributed to Walker.
  In the 'Fast & Furious', the blond-haired, blue-eyed actor played Brian O'Conner, a law enforcement official and starred in all but one of the six action blockbusters which began in 2001.
  He was born in Los Angeles and brought Californian surfer good-looks and an easy, warm charm to the popular street-racing series.
  'All of us at Universal are heartbroken,' Universal Pictures said in a statement.
  'Paul was truly one of the most beloved and respected members of our studio family for 14 years, and this loss is devastating to us, to everyone involved with the Fast and Furious films, and to countless fans.'
  His 'Fast & Furious' co-star Vin Diesel posted a photograph of him and Walker arm-in-arm on Instagram with the message: 'Brother I will miss you very much. I am absolutely speechless.'
  Another co-star, Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson, also took to social media to convey his condolences. Johnson also posted an old photo of him and the late Walker.
  The son of a fashion model and a sewer contractor, Walker grew up in a working class, Mormon Los Angeles household.
  The oldest of five siblings, Walker's mother began taking him to auditions as a toddler.
  He was a child model from the age of two and starred in a Pampers commercial when he was a toddler.
  Walker was born in Glendale, California, and raised in the San Fernando Valley area with his four siblings.
  He previously said the early induction to show business wasn't to kick start his career but a way to help provide for the family.
  After a string of TV roles as a child in the 1980s, Walker made his feature film debut in the 1998 comedy Meet the Deedles.
  Tragic: One witness, Jim Tort, said that one of those people on the scene who witnessed the crash and attempted to help the men was Roger Rodas' eight-year-old son
  Aftermath: Firefighters attend the scene where Paul Walker died when the car he was a passenger in crashed into a pole and a tree
  Engulfed: This witness photo shows the Porsche completely engulfed by flames after the driver lost control, hitting a pole and killing himself and Paul Walker
  Desperate: Bystanders desperately tried to put out the flames with fire extinguishers but the fire was too strong
  On the scene: Fast & Furious actor dies in fiery car wreck
  WALKER WAS DUE ON SET NEXT WEEK: WHAT NEXT FOR THE FAST & FURIOUS FRANCHISE?Following the tragic death of Paul Walker, the future of the latest Fast & Furious film is in doubt.
  A meeting was held on Monday between director James Wan and Universal executives, and filming is unlikely to resume, according to Digital Spy.
  A large part of the film has already been shot, although Walker and the rest of the cast were scheduled to travel to Abu Dhabi to film additional scenes in January.
  Walker had been scheduled to fly to Atlanta this week to resume filming, with TMZ reporting that he was supposed to be filming some 'key scenes' for the latest film in the highly successful franchise.
  Filming will now grind to a halt following the untimely death of Walker, who played lead character Brian O'Conner in six of seven film instalments.
  Universal - the studio behind the movie - doesn't know when, or if, they will start shooting again although if it does go ahead the script will require a significant rewrite to explain the loss of such an integral character.
  The last film, released in May, was the most lucrative of them all, grossing more than $788 million worldwide.The one sequel that Walker didn't appear in The Fast And The Furious: Tokyo Drift (2006) was the least successful.
  The seventh instalment of the street racing series, also due to star Jordana Brewester, Vin Diesel, Michele Rodriguez and Dwayne Johnson, was scheduled for a July 2014 release.
  Director James Wan tweeted that he was 'beyond heartbroken' and was unable to 'process anything' in the hours following the 40-year-old star's death.
  The last post to Walker's Twitter profile before his accident on Saturday was dated Nov. 29, and included a still from what appeared to be the set of Fast & Furious 7 and a message that read 'The boys are back. Will you be ready?'
  Walker had recently joked that he would continue working on the long-running film franchise until 'Fast & Furious 66'.
  Archive: Paul Walker dies in fiery car crash aged 40
  Heartthrob: Walker was a child model and the face of Davidoff Cool Water, appearing in print commercials for the brand
  Supporting roles in films Pleasantville, Varsity Blues and She's All That followed.
  His performance in the 2000 thriller The Skulls caught the eye of producer Neal H. Moritz, who cast him in the Fast & Furious as undercover police officer Brian O'Conner.
  Adapted from a Vibe magazine article about underground street races, the film became an unexpected hit.
  In the sequel, 2 Fast 2 Furious, Walker moved to centre stage with his co-star Vin Diesel momentarily dropping out.
  Walker, a self-described 'gearhead,' kept his character's sports car from the film.
  Other roles include Brokedown Palace, Flags of Our Fathers and the Hurricane Katrina drama Hours, which is set to be released in December.
  Although his stardom didn't make as much of an impact outside the Fast & Furious series, Walker continually drew praise from his co-stars and directors as a kind-hearted and eager collaborator.
  Death crash actor Paul Walker recently spoke about his future
  Too soon: Paul Walker with co-star Vin Diesel (right) in the 2001 film The Fast & the Furious and with Ludacris (left) in the sequel, 2 Fast 2 Furious
  Tragic ending: Walker starred in Fast & Furious, the fourth installment of the franchise in 2009 (left) and the next one, Fast Five (right) in 2011
  Early days: Walker as a young child (left) and pictured in Village Christian High School yearbook in 1991, the year he was voted 'Best Hair'
  Jesse Brisendine, an internationally recognized life coach, wrote on Facebook: '3 years ago Paul Walker and I were sitting around talking about goals and dreams.
  'I asked him what he would want written on his tombstone and his response was ''He was a good guy and a kind person.''
  'Having known Paul and being privileged to call him a best friend and brother, having traveled the world together, having shared 1000's of laughs and tears together, I can honestly say that Paul was more than a good guy and a kind person,' he wrote.
  The post continued: 'He is one of the kindest, caring, compassionate people I have ever met. He always wanted to learn, he always wanted to grow, he always wanted to be the best person he can be.
  'I know he would want the same for all those who know him and know of him: to do your best to be the best person you can be.'
  Hollywood stars have paid tribute to the actor, including rapper and actor Ludacris, who tweeted his shock and sadness at his Fast & Furious co-star's untimely death.
  Alongside a touching picture of the film's cast holding hands, he wrote: 'Your humble spirit was felt from the start, wherever you blessed your presence you always left a mark.
  'We were like brothers & our birthdays are only 1 day apart, now You will forever hold a place in all of our hearts @paulwalker legacy will live on forever. R.I.P.'
  'Effortlessly golden': Outside of the Fast & Furious franchise, Walker's movies included Varsity Blues with James Van Der Beek, left, (1999) and Into The Blue (2005) with Jessica Alba. On Saturday, Van Der Beek tweeted, 'I just remember him being so effortlessly golden.'
  Animal lover: Walker at the premiere of his film Eight Below (left) said the best thing about the film was the dogs. The star had two dogs, including a Chesapeake Bay retrieve called Boone
  'No, @RealPaulWalker. No. No. No,' tweeted actress Alyssa Milano. Walker guest-starred with her in the 80s comedy, Who's The Boss? 'Rest with the angels. You. Sweet boy. #beauty #love #RIP.'
  Actress Goldie Hawn said: 'Our family mourns the loss of Paul. A very special Human being. Our prayers go his beloved family.'
  Bring It On star Gabrielle Union said: 'This is awful. Awful. #RIPPaulWalker pls pray for his family, friends & fans. We've lost a great, laid back, sweet, cool man & father.'
  The Wire actor Michael B Jordan said: 'Man life is so short. People you care about can be here one min and gone the next Don't take life for granted RIP Paul Walker.'
  TV host Vanessa Lachey said: 'I just heard and am in shock. Prayers to Paul Walker's family. Life is precious, never take a day for granted. #RIPPaulWalker'
  James Franco said: 'Much love to paul walker. So sad. He gave a lot of joy.'
  Mario Lopez, Jenna Dewan-Tatum, Jack Osborne and DMX also tweeted about the death.
  Walker's death came just days after he was the victim of an online death hoax.
  The actor will star in the upcoming Hurricane Katrina drama, Hours, which Lionsgate's Pantelion Films is to release December 13.
  He also stars in Brick Mansions, a remake of the French action film District B13 in post-production that Relativity plans to release next year.
  Relativity President Tucker Tooley said in a statement: 'Paul was an incredibly talent artist, devoted philanthropist and friend,'
  Walker formed Reach Out Worldwide in 2010 to aid people struck by natural disasters.
  Bill Townsend, a friend of Walker's who attended the fundraiser, said: 'He was very happy. He was smiling at everybody, just tickled that all these people came out to support this charity. He was doing what he loved. He was surrounded by friends, surrounded by cars.'
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Religio-Political Talk (RPT) Some Final Thoughts on the Walker/Rodas Tragedy
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  See my previous post on the Paul Walker/Roger Rodas wreck.
  Heard through the grapevine (Fire Dept. in our Valley) that the estimated speed Roger was driving was 100-to-120 mph. Mechanical failure coupled with driving city streets at that speed equals opportunity for a very bad ending. Sad for the families impacted by this, but people make choices, and sometimes other people have to live with them in ways the person making the choice do not. In this case, literally. I am sure Roger '-- being a financial adviser (one of Merrill Lynch's top guys) as well as being involved in a dangerous sport '-- had a good life-insurance policy for his family. Here Roger gives some tips for adding cars to an investment portfolio:
  The following comes from Investment News:
  Mr. Rodas, 38, was a nearly-two-decade Bank of America Corp. employee who had become one of Merrill Lynch's most successful brokers in Southern California. The automobile aficionado and exotic-car shop owner also headed a team of advisers in Glendale, Calif.
  Mr. Walker met Mr. Rodas at a race club, and the two talked about one of Mr. Rodas' Porsches. The two raced cars together even before Mr. Rodas developed Mr. Walker as a formal client in 2007, according to an article published two years ago by Merrill Lynch.
  The article said that Mr. Rodas reorganized Mr. Walker's portfolio, ''a hodgepodge of personal investments,'' meeting with the actor to readjust financial strategies after each movie he made, suggesting he incorporate his race shop to make his hobby financially self-sustaining and working with an accountant to set up the actor's foundation, Reach Out Worldwide.
  [....]
  The relationship between Mr. Walker and Mr. Rodas was unusual, said Jeffrey B. Wheeler, a Westlake Village, Calif.-based adviser who has celebrity clients.
  Advisers who manage money for the tabloid set more commonly deal with handlers and gatekeepers, such as business managers, than their clients, he said.
  ''People who are as successful as Paul Walker are very busy people,'' said Mr. Wheeler, whose firm is called Wealth Collaborative Inc. and manages about $350 million. ''This appears to be a very deep relationship that is difficult to achieve.''
  Mr. Rodas' circle of friends also included ''Happy Days'' actor Scott Baio.
  ''Roger Rodas was my dear friend & a good human being,'' Mr. Baio wrote on Twitter. ''I will miss him.''
  Read more: http://www.investmentnews.com/article/20131202/FREE/131209991
  And then The Blaze has this awesome story of one of Paul Walker's secret act of kindness:
  Tags: Merrill Lynch, Paul Walker, Roger Rodas
VIDEO-Obama: Income Inequality 'a Defining Challenge of our Time' | MRCTV
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  MRC TV is an online platform for people to share and view videos, articles and opinions on topics that are important to them '-- from news to political issues and rip-roaring humor.
  MRC TV is brought to you by the Media Research Center, a 501(c) 3 nonprofit research and education organization. The MRC is located at: 1900 Campus Commons Drive, Reston, VA 20194. For information about the MRC, please visit www.MRC.org.
  Copyright (C) 2013, Media Research Center. All Rights Reserved.
VIDEO- "THE OOGA BOOGER MAN IS REAL!" Insist Top Terror WAR PROFITEERS - YouTube
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VIDEO- China's New Lunar Rover To Search Moon For Natural Resources - YouTube
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VIDEO- "There Are NEW Bombs! Very BIG Bombs! There Are Bombs That Go Through Magnetometers!" OH MY! - YouTube
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VIDEO- Hong Kong Reporting First Case Of H7N9 Bird Flu In A Human - YouTube
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Text - H.R.3626 - 113th Congress (2013-2014): To extend the Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988 for 10 years. | Congress.gov | Library of Congress
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  There is one version of the bill.
  Shown Here:Introduced in House (12/02/2013)[Congressional Bills 113th Congress][From the U.S. Government Printing Office][H.R. 3626 Introduced in House (IH)]113th CONGRESS 1st Session H. R. 3626 To extend the Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988 for 10 years._______________________________________________________________________ IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES December 2, 2013 Mr. Coble (for himself and Mr. Israel) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary_______________________________________________________________________ A BILL To extend the Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988 for 10 years. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,SECTION 1. EXTENSION OF UNDETECTABLE FIREARMS ACT OF 1988 FOR 10 YEARS. Section 2(f)(2) of the Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988 (18 U.S.C. 922 note) is amended by striking ``25'' and inserting ``35''.
VIDEO- "We Don't Feel That The 911 Calls Should Have Been Released" Sandy Hook Mom Nicole Hockley - YouTube
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VIDEO- Maddow Continues To Insist No One Needs To Hear 911 Calls From Sandy Hook Massacre - YouTube
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VIDEO-NORAD Tracks Santa Command Video 2013 - YouTube
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VIDEO-PENTAGON MAKES SANTA PART OF THEIR BLOODTHIRSTY KILLING MACHINE - YouTube
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VIDEO- "Congressman The Evidence That WTC Building-7 Was Brought Down With Explosives Is Real And Proven!" - YouTube
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VIDEO- Congressman Duncan Hunter Jr Says All Middle Easterners Are LIARS "It's Part Of Their Culture" - YouTube
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VIDEO- Al Jazeera Will NOT Air Sandy Hook 911 Calls - YouTube
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VIDEO- "We Must Unflinchingly Look At These Things! If It Means Listening To These Tapes We Should!" - YouTube
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VIDEO- Pretend Journalist Pretend To Have Scruples As An Excuse For Not Publishing Sandy Hook 911 Calls - YouTube
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VIDEO- BREAKING! Radioactive Material Stolen In Mexico FOUND - YouTube
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Gal Gadot to Play Wonder Woman in 'Batman vs. Superman' | Variety
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  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 03:30
  Gal Gadot will play Wonder Woman in the untitled ''Batman vs. Superman'' movie.
  Henry Cavill and Ben Affleck are set to star with Zack Snyder directing.
  ''Wonder Woman is arguably one of the most powerful female characters of all time and a fan favorite in the DC Universe. Not only is Gal an amazing actress, but she also has that magical quality that makes her perfect for the role. We look forward to audiences discovering Gal in the first feature film incarnation of this beloved character,'' Snyder said.
  PHOTOS: Hollywood's Super Women
  Variety first reported that Gadot, ''G.I. Joe: Retaliation'' thesp Elodie Yung and Olga Kurylenko had tested for the part that was believed to be Wonder Woman.
  The Wonder Woman rumor has been kicking around for some time, and insiders believe the plan is to have not just Batman and Superman in the film but several members of the Justice League as well. It's unclear which members, but Wonder Woman (Diana Prince) and the Flash are said to be locks to make an appearance in some fashion, whether that's a significant role or a cameo.
  Warners will also look to now cast the villain with ''Zero Dark Thirty'' and ''300: Rise of the Empire'' star Callan Mulvey someone Warner Bros. is eyeing to play the role.
  Pic will bow July 17, 2015. Gadot was last seen in ''The Fast and Furious 6'" and is repped by ICM Partners.
  She tweeted the following after Variety's story hit on Wednesday.
George Clooney says anyone famous on Twitter is a 'moron' | Mail Online
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  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 03:28
  Hollywood star George Clooney thinks Twitter is 'just stupid'Actor says stars like Clark Gable would not have coped with the pressuresDespite rise to superstardom the actor says being famous is 'restrictive'By Tara Brady
  PUBLISHED: 06:25 EST, 4 December 2013 | UPDATED: 08:41 EST, 4 December 2013
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  The urge to join Twitter is tempting when everyone from the Prime Minister to the Pope is posting messages about their daily lives.
  But actor George Clooney says anyone who is rich and famous and on the social media site is a 'moron'.
  Speaking in an interview with Esquire magazine, the Hollywood star also says the pressures of the 21st Century would have been too much for the stars from the 'golden age' of cinema.
  Actor George Clooney says anyone who is rich and famous and on the social media site is a 'moron'
  'Not that I'm comparing myself to Clark Gable, whoever, but they couldn't survive in this environment', the 52-year-old said.
  'They'd punch the s**t out of some people. It requires a Zen quality.'
  Twitter addict and columnist Caitlin Moran responded: 'If I were friends with Sandra Bullock in real life, I probably wouldn't be on Twitter either, to be honest.'
  Despite the actor's rise to global superstardom, he says being famous is restrictive.
  The Hollywood star says the pressures of the 21st Century would have been too much for the stars from the 'golden age' of cinema
  In 15 years Clooney has not gone for a walk in New York's Central Park, despite wanting to, and is still surprised by his success.
  'There's a funny thing about fame. The truth is you run as fast as you can towards it because it iseverything you want. You get there and it's shocking how immediately you become enveloped in thisworld that is incredibly restricting.'
  Clooney, who has won two Academy Awards and four Golden Globes, is not the first to criticise the use of Twitter. However, some have had to give in to social media network.
  David Cameron said in 2009 that 'the trouble with Twitter, the instantness of it (is) too many tweets might make a t**t'.
  But that didn't stop him setting up an account just before the Tory party conference in 2012 andnow he has more than 500,000 followers.
  Hugh Laurie in House (left) succumbed to joining Twitter this year while actor George Clooney said stars from the golden age of cinema such as Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable would not survive in today's environment
  Four years ago Hugh Laurie declared: 'As I look around my friends' tweets, I see banality on all sides.'
  He now has more than 230,000 followers since he set up his Twitter account declaring in under 140 characters: 'Having damned this technology as the seed of Satan, I finally succumb'.
  Actor Steven Berkoff described Twitter as a 'river of filth'.
  David Cameron tweeted this photo of himself with Chinese entrepreneur Jack Ma yesterday. He originally was against the idea of joining Twitter
  George Clooney's latest project sees him team up with Ocean's Eleven co-start Matt Damon once again as they battle to rescue art stolen by Nazis during the Second World War in new movie The Monuments Men.
  Clooney plays George Stout, who is real life was a conservationist at Harvard University's Fogg Museum when the war began. Stout led the team who braved battle to save Europe's artistic legacy.
  The January issue of Esquire is out tomorrow and is also available online.
  Check out the full George Clooney interview in the Esquire January issue - on sale Thursday 5 December. Also available as a digital edition.
  Click here to see more exclusive photos on Esquire.co.uk
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FASCIA: The NSA's huge trove of location records - The Washington Post
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  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 02:02
  FASCIA is the National Security Agency's enormous database containing trillions of device-location records that are collected from a variety of sources. This document shows the volume and types of device-location data collected by the agency.
  >> NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show
  Click to see the related section of the document.
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  ]]> GRAPHIC: Ashkan Soltani and Matt DeLong - The Washington Post. Published Dec. 4, 2013.
VIDEO-NSA tracking cellphone locations worldwide, Snowden documents show - The Washington Post
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  The National Security Agency is gathering nearly 5 billion records a day on the whereabouts of cellphones around the world, according to top-secret documents and interviews with U.S. intelligence officials, enabling the agency to track the movements of individuals '-- and map their relationships '-- in ways that would have been previously unimaginable.
  The records feed a vast database that stores information about the locations of at least hundreds of millions of devices, according to the officials and the documents, which were provided by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. New projects created to analyze that data have provided the intelligence community with what amounts to a mass surveillance tool.
  (Video: How the NSA uses cellphone tracking to find and 'develop' targets)
  The NSA does not target Americans' location data by design, but the agency acquires a substantial amount of information on the whereabouts of domestic cellphones ''incidentally,'' a legal term that connotes a foreseeable but not deliberate result.
  One senior collection manager, speaking on the condition of anonymity but with permission from the NSA, said ''we are getting vast volumes'' of location data from around the world by tapping into the cables that connect mobile networks globally and that serve U.S. cellphones as well as foreign ones. Additionally, data are often collected from the tens of millions of Americans who travel abroad with their cellphones every year.
  In scale, scope and potential impact on privacy, the efforts to collect and analyze location data may be unsurpassed among the NSA surveillance programs that have been disclosed since June. Analysts can find cellphones anywhere in the world, retrace their movements and expose hidden relationships among the people using them.
  (Graphic: How the NSA is tracking people right now)
  U.S. officials said the programs that collect and analyze location data are lawful and intended strictly to develop intelligence about foreign targets.
  Robert Litt, general counsel for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which oversees the NSA, said ''there is no element of the intelligence community that under any authority is intentionally collecting bulk cellphone location information about cellphones in the United States.''
  The NSA has no reason to suspect that the movements of the overwhelming majority of cellphone users would be relevant to national security. Rather, it collects locations in bulk because its most powerful analytic tools '-- known collectively as CO-TRAVELER '-- allow it to look for unknown associates of known intelligence targets by tracking people whose movements intersect.
  Still, location data, especially when aggregated over time, is widely regarded among privacy advocates as uniquely sensitive. Sophisticated mathematical tech­niques enable NSA analysts to map cellphone owners' relationships by correlating their patterns of movement over time with thousands or millions of other phone users who cross their paths. Cellphones broadcast their locations even when they are not being used to place a call or send a text message.
Report: Climate change tipping points coming - POLITICO.com
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  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 01:57
  The report adds to the scientific research warning of dramatic fallout from climate change. | Reuters
  CloseClimate change isn't just a problem facing future generations, a new scientific report warns, saying the planet could suffer serious and abrupt climate threats in the next few years or decades '-- leaving nations with a narrow window to adapt.
  The National Research Council report, released Tuesday, says even gradual climate changes that have unfolded over centuries will reach so-called tipping points that could result in abrupt impacts on everything from sea ice to ecosystems. The report calls for an ''early warning system'' aimed at better predicting when those impacts will occur.
  Continue Reading
  ''Right now we don't know what many of these thresholds are,'' James White, professor of geological sciences at the University of Colorado at Boulder and chairman of the committee that wrote the report, said in a statement. ''But with better information, we will be able to anticipate some major changes before they occur and help reduce the potential consequences.''
  (Also on POLITICO: EPA head bets on China for climate change support)
  The report adds to the growing body of scientific research warning of dramatic fallout from unabated climate change. Notably, it also echoes longtime warnings by activists and scientists that it is imperative to act quickly.
  But many activists say domestic and international efforts to address the issue aren't moving fast enough. The U.S. and other nations are struggling to come to a global climate change agreement in 2015, having been unable to reach major agreements at an interim meeting in Poland last month. And while the Obama administration is moving forward with greenhouse gas regulations for power plants, experts say rules reining in emissions from other sectors must follow.
  ''Although many projections of future climatic conditions have predicted steadily changing conditions giving the impression that communities have time to gradually adapt '... the scientific community has been paying increasing attention to the possibility that at least some changes will be abrupt, perhaps crossing a threshold or 'tipping point' to change so quickly that there will be little time to react,'' the report says.
  (Also on POLITICO: A green movement of all stripes)
  Some of these abrupt changes, including melting late-summer Arctic sea ice and species extinctions, are already occurring. But scientists are watching for others, including gradual rises in sea level that suddenly reach the point of flooding low-lying cities.
  The report calls for the development of an ''Abrupt Change Early Warning System'' that would ''(1) identify and quantify social and natural vulnerabilities and ensure long-term, stable observations of key environmental and economic parameters through enhanced and targeted monitoring; (2) integrate new knowledge into numerical models for enhanced understanding and predictive capability; and (3) synthesize new learning and advance the understanding of the Earth system, taking advantage of collaborations and new analysis tools.''
  The report, called ''Abrupt Impacts of Climate Change: Anticipating Surprises,'' was sponsored by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the National Science Foundation, the U.S. intelligence community and the National Academies.
  (Sign up for POLITICO's Morning Energy tip sheet)
  The report was issued on the same day the International Energy Agency warned that global greenhouse gas emissions will continue to surge in the coming years, a move that puts the planet on a path toward blowing past a temperature increase target that scientists consider low enough to avoid serious harm.
  Carbon dioxide emissions from the energy sector will rise 20 percent by 2035 despite moves in the U.S., Europe, China, Japan and elsewhere to reduce emissions, according to the IEA's 2013 World Energy Outlook.
  ''This leaves the world on a trajectory consistent with a long-term average temperature increase of 3.6 C, far above the internationally agreed 2 C target,'' the outlook said.
BBC News - Is it ethical to block adverts online?
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  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 01:54
  4 December 2013Last updated at 19:21 ET By Dave LeeTechnology reporter, BBC NewsBlinking, beeping, auto-playing. Popping up, over, under. Tracking, intruding, unsettling. If the internet was a pretty face, advertising would be its wart.
  Thankfully, if getting "a great six pack in weeks!" isn't your thing, you can simply flick a switch and use an adblocker - software that banishes the sight and hushes the din of irritating advertising all over the web.
  The appeal is obvious, and millions have done it, but should you?
  According to one count, 84% of the top 100 websites in the world rely on advertising to generate revenue, utilising the now long-established trade-off: use our website for free, but you need to look at some ads while you do it.
  Continue reading the main storyOne site fights back...The above image was displayed to visitors to online dating site OkCupid who had an adblocking program switched on.
  On traditional mediums such as TV and radio, advertising has over time developed into a form of entertainment itself - just ask the millions who tune in to the Superbowl without any interest in football.
  But online, evidence suggests we're far less forgiving. Adblock Plus, the most popular adblocking program on the market, has been downloaded 250 million times, and has around 60 million active users.
  "I guess everyone agrees that online ads are just plain annoying," says Till Faida, co-founder of Eyeo, the firm that owns and maintains Adblock Plus.
  "They don't work for most people, and most consumers have turned their back on them."
  Mainstream adoptionWhat's more, as firms scramble to monetise however they can, it's arguably getting worse.
  "Advertising has become even more aggressive," says Sean Blanchfield, chief executive of Pagefair, a firm that monitors how often advertising is blocked on websites.
  "Most people are installing adblocks because of video advertising. That's where the mainstream adoption is coming from."
  Adblock Plus sees its "mission" as being to encourage advertisers, and the websites that carry their material, to rethink how those ads work - minimising discomfort for internet users.
  "Right now we block all video ads," says Ben Williams, Adblock Plus's director of operations. "It isn't inconceivable that in the future there will be a better format, but don't see that coming right now, personally."
  Mr Faida adds: "We want to move away from the same old blinking banners, and encourage the industry to develop better advertising formats that actually work with the consumers instead of trying to force something upon them."
  Yet an increasing number of people are questioning whether Adblock Plus's software is unfairly using its powerful position not just to encourage better ads, but also to build a quite considerable revenue stream of its own.
  'Like the mafia'It's no spoiler to share that most publishers or advertisers have little time for Adblock Plus - and recently that annoyance has stepped up a notch.
  Descriptions like "extortion", "protection racket" and "like the mafia" are all terms being voiced to describe the operation, says Mr Blanchfield.
  "I can definitely confirm that that's what most publishers call it," he tells the BBC. "And I can see it from their point of view."
  Continue reading the main story''Start QuoteThere could potentially be an issue of a conflict of interest''
  End QuoteTill FaidaEyeo, owner of Adblock PlusThe row centres around a more recent addition to Adblock Plus's business, first trialled in 2011 but now gathering pace now it is out of its beta phase.
  Where initially Adblock Plus would block all advertising, it now operates using a whitelist - a collection of, so far, around 150 sites and services whose ads are allowed through the filter.
  To get on this whitelist, the advertising has to meet several fairly strict criteria: no animations, don't get in the way of reading text, and don't take up more than a third of a page's width, plus various other things.
  Sensible parameters on the face of it, but here's the bone of contention: for "big" companies that want to be on the whitelist, Adblock Plus demands they pay a fee.
  "Large companies that significantly increase their profits," explains Mr Faida, "In return support us to make the initiative sustainable."
  If that fee isn't paid, advertising is blocked, even if it fits the "acceptable" criteria.
  Pay up, in other words, or Adblock Plus will knock-out some of your revenue.
  'Stirring up controversy'Such descriptions of Adblock Plus are unfair, argues Mr Williams.
  "To describe it as extortion is absolutely imprecise and wrong," he says.
  "I think that people call it that all the time in the hopes of stirring up a bit of controversy here and there.
  Continue reading the main story'Acceptable ads'The principles of "acceptable" advertising, as defined by Adblock Plus and its volunteer community:
  Acceptable Ads are not annoying. Acceptable Ads do not disrupt or distort page content. Acceptable Ads are transparent with us about being an ad. Acceptable Ads are effective without shouting at us. Acceptable Ads are appropriate to the site or tweet that we are on. But Mr Faida says he can understand why some people may be concerned at that set-up.
  "There could potentially be an issue of a conflict of interest," he concedes. "We're trying to counter that with maximum transparency."
  But both men argue that far from working against advertisers, they are instead playing the role of the much needed intermediary, working with advertisers in a way that keeps internet users happy.
  Around 10% of the companies on the whitelist pay for the privilege, Mr Williams says, and he lists Google, Amazon, Yahoo and Reddit as some of the company's "strategic partners".
  They would not not be drawn on how much they charge, nor do they give up any details on which companies had refused to play ball.
  "There are of course cases where people are looking at it from a simplistic point of view," Mr Faida says of those firms distancing themselves.
  £44-a-monthThe Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB), a UK-based trade association for online and mobile advertisers, released a report earlier this year that hypothesised what it thought an advertising-free internet might look like.
  The report argued that if some of the web's most popular services - excluding shopping - did not carry advertising, users would each need to pay around £44-a-month, on top of existing fees, to make up the revenue needed to keep those sites alive.
  While the trade association has an obvious motivation behind stressing the importance of advertising, the report does at least highlight how integral that revenue stream is.
  "As a trade body we support innovation in advertising technology," says Nick Stringer, director of operations at the IAB.
  "But we don't support the blocking of ads per se, because it denies publishers the revenues they need."
  Although often descending into a bitter war of words, both sides of the adblocking debate at least agree on one core issue.
  "The advertising industry just wants advertising to be relevant," says Mr Stringer. "The more relevant it is to the consumer the more attractive it is to the advertiser, and it's more valuable to the web publisher."
  But targeted advertising requires sophisticated techniques to track users and their browsing habits - a highly-contentious issue, to put it mildly.
  Follow Dave Lee on Twitter @DaveLeeBBC
Cyber experts uncover 2 million stolen passwords to global Web accounts
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  Source: Reuters: Technology News
  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 01:53
  BOSTONWed Dec 4, 2013 7:11pm EST
  TweetShare thisEmailPrintThe Facebook logo is pictured at the Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park, California January 29, 2013.
  Credit: Reuters/Robert Galbraith
  BOSTON (Reuters) - Security experts have uncovered a trove of some 2 million stolen passwords to websites including Facebook, Google, Twitter and Yahoo from Internet users across the globe.
  Researchers with Trustwave's SpiderLabs said they discovered the credentials while investigating a server in the Netherlands that cyber criminals use to control a massive network of compromised computers known as the "Pony botnet."
  The company told Reuters on Wednesday that it has reported its findings to the largest of more than 90,000 websites and Internet service providers whose customers' credentials it had found on the server.
  The data includes more than 326,000 Facebook Inc accounts, some 60,000 Google Inc accounts, more than 59,000 Yahoo Inc accounts and nearly 22,000 Twitter Inc accounts, according to SpiderLabs. Victims' were from the United States, Germany, Singapore and Thailand, among other countries.
  Representatives for Facebook and Twitter said the companies have reset the passwords of affected users. A Google spokeswoman declined comment. Yahoo representatives could not be reached.
  SpiderLabs said it has contacted authorities in the Netherlands and asked them to take down the Pony botnet server.
  An analysis posted on the SpiderLabs blog showed that the most-common password in the set was "123456," which was used in nearly 16,000 accounts. Other commonly used credentials included "password," "admin," "123" and "1." (bit.ly/1g6hfJZ)
  Graham Cluley, an independent security expert, said it is extremely common for people to use such simple passwords and also re-use them on multiple accounts, even though they are extremely easy to crack.
  "People are using very dumb passwords. They are totally useless," he said.
  (Reporting by Jim Finkle; Editing by Ken Wills)
  Tweet thisLink thisShare thisDigg thisEmailPrintReprintsComments (1)
  The good news is that easy to discover passwords, like ''123456'" protect worthless information. No harm no foul.
Radioactive material container from hijacked truck found empty in Mexico
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  Source: WTF RLY REPORT
  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 01:50
  Photo from cnsns.gob.mx
  RT.com
  Mexican police located a stolen truck which contained dangerous radioactive material the UN warned could be used to construct a ''dirty bomb.'' The safety container holding that cargo was found empty, with the material abandoned nearby.
  The vehicle was found close to where it was stolen outside of Mexico City as it was transporting Cobalt-60 from a hospital in Tijuana to a radioactive waste storage center. Mexico's nuclear safety director Juan Eibenschutz said radioactivity had been detected about a half mile (1 kilometer) from where the truck and container were located.
  Mexico's national nuclear safety commission CNSNS has said that the thieves, thought to be unaware of the contents which have now been located, removed it from its protective container and were exposed to dangerous levels of radiation.
  ''This is a radioactive source that is very strong,''Eibenschutz told the AP, saying that exposure could cause death almost immediately if in close proximity.
  Read more
Avian influenza '' why it's not going away
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  Archived Version
  Source: The Conversation
  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 01:48
  Where doe outbreaks of avian influenza come from? Flickr/cskkWhile Hong Kong has just reported its first case of the deadly H7N9 bird flu indicating that the virus may be spreading across China, Australia is reporting an egg shortage over Christmas as a result of the recent H7N2 cases in NSW. So how does the virus keep reinventing itself to cause issues across the world?
  As over 70 per cent of emerging infectious diseases in people originate in animals, whenever we hear of a new virus outbreak we jump to find the source.
  That's not to vilify the animal species responsible, but to enable scientists to characterise the virus, track its path, assess its level of virulence and its potential impact on animal and human populations. While some recent viruses such as SARS and MERS have been tracked to bats, in the case of avian influenza in people, the source is birds.
  Finding the source of influenzaAs well as ''bird flu'' in the past there have also been reports of ''swine flu''. In fact both these flu viruses belong to a group known as influenza A, and all influenza A viruses originally come from wild water fowl.
  These complex viruses have evolved over time to become infectious to domestic birds such as farmed and back-yard poultry, pigs, horses, other domestic and wild animals and of course people. Cross-species transmissions can occur from time to time.
  Viruses that infect more than one species frequently have natural hosts in which they replicate but do not cause obvious disease. The pathogen and host exist in harmony with each other and examples include Hendra, Nipah and SARS viruses in bats, Hanta viruses in rodents and influenza viruses in wild water birds.
  On the whole, naturally occurring avian influenza (AI) viruses do not cause disease in wild bird populations. However, if wild water fowl are shedding virus and come in contact with domestic poultry, their food or water, either directly or via their excretions, AI can enter a poultry farm.
  Once on a farm, the virus can be transmitted and maintained in the poultry in low pathogenic form, or certain strains can mutate to become highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) in the new host with a high fatality rate.
  In the case of farmed chickens, the close contact between these birds can lead to rapid transmission and in some countries infection has jumped from the poultry to other species such as pigs and humans.
  Influenza virus evolutionThere are a range of different influenza virus subtypes differentiated by the external proteins of the virus: haemagglutinin (H) and neuraminidase (N). It is generally recognised there are 16 different H types and 9 different N types.
  Only some viruses of the H7 and H5 subtypes progress to be highly pathogenic in poultry through the process of mutation. Other H types may cause low-level disease but do not show the highly pathogenic mutations that can occur with H7 and H5 strains.
  Avian influenza is an RNA virus with eight segments to its genome which makes it prone to re-assortment. When two or more influenza strains infect a host the genetic material can mix thereby producing a new strain or genotype. These genotypes can be tracked over time and the lineage identified for each of the genomic segments.
  The major H7 virus lineages can be traced to either one of Europe and Asia (Eurasia), Australia, or Nth American origins. On this basis, gene sequencing of virus from an influenza outbreak can be used to determine whether it is likely to be an exotic strain newly introduced from another region, or derived from viruses already circulating in the local environment.
  The Avian Influenza situation in AustraliaWhile Australian water fowl remain predominantly local to our continent, there are many wild migratory birds such as shore birds and waders that travel across the world to share Australia's waterways. A few of these migratory birds could potentially infect local wild water fowl.
  The devastating H5N1 highly pathogenic avian influenza strain has not ever been detected in either Australian wild or domesticated birds. All previous highly pathogenic avian influenza outbreaks in Australian poultry have been caused by H7 viruses.
  Low pathogenic viruses with an H7 haemagglutinin similar to that found in the current H7N2 outbreak and the earlier H7N7 outbreak in NSW have been detected in past unrelated samples from Australian wild water fowl.
  Genetic tracking gives support to the belief that outbreaks such as the October 2013 H7N2 are the result of transmission of a low pathogenic virus from a wild bird reservoir to the poultry farm, where it then turned highly pathogenic as it spread among the farmed chickens.
  Both the 2012 H7N7 and 2013 H7N2 are of Australian H7 lineage which has been circulating naturally here for many years.
  Predictive genetic analysisGenetic markers have been identified on H5 and H7 viruses that are associated with their potential to cause disease in people. The H7N9 virus in China in February 2013, though a low pathogenic avian virus, has certain genetic markers that are believed to be associated with its being more transmissible to and pathogenic in mammalian hosts.
  Unlike the Chinese H7N9, the Australian H7N2 and H7N7 strains are more typical avian influenza A viruses that do not contain the same genetic markers that are a concern for disease in people.
  The importance of biosecurityAvian influenza will remain prevalent around the world so long as there are migratory birds. Biosecurity measures can mitigate the risk but whilst poultry, their food or water remain in potential contact with wild birds there remains a low possibility of the poultry becoming infected.
  Biosecurity at the farm level is therefore vitally important to mitigate the risk of AI infection and biosecurity precautions to prevent disease outbreaks should be an everyday practice for all bird owners, whether large scale or back-yard poultry farmers.
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Is Britney Spears OK? Disturbing Secret Text Messages To A Former Friend Claim 'I'm Sad '... & Lost' | Radar Online
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  Archived Version
  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 01:47
  Britney Spears looked radiant as she celebrated the debut of her new album, ''Britney Jean,'' and the upcoming launch of her Vegas show at the Planet Hollywood casino on Tuesday night. But is it all an act? Spears' former confidante, Sam Lutfi, has released a series of disturbing text messages that he claims are from the pop star, and which contain several shocking allegations about her parents and her life under the conservatorship.
  Lutfi was prompted to post the texts '-- which are undated and may or may not be from Spears '-- just past midnight on Tuesday after a fan tweeted him asking ''when will her greedy father [Jamie] release her from this conservatorship?!!''
  He answered, ''Hmm good question, here's an old text from her you be the judge''
  TEXTS: Read The Texts Lutfi Claims Are From Spears
  ''A father has a daughter,'' the disjointed text reads. ''But why bother watch somthin about mary [sic] he calls me every name in the vocabulary and I'm a f***in noone[sic] so where's my son '...''
  Eight minutes later, Lutfi posted without comment another equally illegible text that reads, ''now cuz my dad will send me away again he's soo mean I can't believe they hurt me like this I seriously don't believe in anything but I do know my heart feels better when I talk to u my dads reading everything right now that I text and everybody's really scares me I miss my babies and I'm really still scared I'm never gonna see my babies again''
  Fans immediately struck back, asking Lutfi, who was hit with a restraining order from Spears' camp in 2008, when he will stop talking about Spears. ''Not till the truth is out, so I can have my life back as well,'' he wrote in response, soon releasing one long text split into two tweets.
  PHOTOS: Compare Britney Before & After Digital Touch-Up
  ''My mom and dad are soo mean,'' the text reads. ''They don't care about me, they just want my money and my babies. They stole my voice and scarred me for life. I will never forgive them they tapped my phone so we are goin to get in trouble I hate my life ivr become a nobody '...''
  ''All they care about is $$$$,'' the text continues. ''They make up lies about you to all these f*****g shady lawyers.''
  Seemingly mentioning Spears' ex-fianc(C), Jason Trawick, the text goes on, ''Jasons [sic] the only person I can talk to but he likes me and I don't feel the same but he's good with my babies. I'm sad So sad Lost very lost''
  Commenters pointed out that this text, in green, looked like an outgoing text from an iPhone. However, Lutfi insisted, ''Don't be ignorant. These are forensic and they know they're real. Wake up already. So sad to see so much ignorance.''
  PHOTOS: Britney Back In Shape, Shows Off Bikini Bod
  One fan then brought up Lynne Spears' gripping 2008 legal declaration against Lutfi, in which she claimed the shady svengali had practically imprisoned an emotionally fragile Britney, Lutfi answered, ''What's sad is it was all a lie. After this much time, I've realized Lynne may have felt cornered and had to say those things '... at the time, I really like Lynne and did everything I could to reunite them. I hope to gain the courage to forgive one day.''
  Lutfi was Spears' right-hand man during her much-publicized breakdown in 2008, but was edged out by her parents amid claims of wrongdoing when the pop star was placed under a conservatorship. He maintains that he did nothing wrong during the course of their friendship.
  When approached by Radar for comment, a rep for Spears said that the leaked messages are a legal matter, and deferred us to a legal representative, who had yet to comment at the time of publication.
How the RelayRides car sharing marketplace works
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  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 01:43
  List your carCreate a new listing in minutes. Tell us about your car, add a few photos, and you're in the marketplace.
  Before your first rental, get your car ready for renters. Put your RelayRides insurance card in the glovebox, double-check that you're up-to-date on maintainance, and tidy up the interior.
  Respond to requestsWe'll notify you when somebody wants to rent your car. Check out their profile and ratings, and decide whether the trip works for you.
  You're always in charge who can drive your car.
  Meet the renterOn the day of the rental, meet the renter. Check their license, show them around the car, check the mileage and fuel level, and hand over the keys.
  Relax and count your earningsSit back! RelayRides is keeping your car safe with our insurance and roadside support.
  Collect your keysThe renter will return your car at the end of the trip. Talk to them about the vehicle condition, and make sure everythings in order.
  Make sure to rate your renter, so other owners can stay informed.
In search of perfection, young adults turn to Adderall at work | Al Jazeera America
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  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 01:39
  The use of Adderall and other stimulants started for many with all-nighters in college and is making its way to the workplace. Getty Images
  Ella Benson was a junior in college the first time she took it. With a class assignment due, she was offered the drug as a means to stay up all night and crank out something respectable by morning.
  It worked, and Benson now says it was the first time she ''really connected'' with something she was working on.
  ''It was the first paper I wrote where I felt like I came up with an idea that was meaningful and important,'' she said. ''I got an A on it.''
  An A for Adderall.
  Now, at 26, Benson is a professional writer who reports for a major news publication and has had her byline in The New York Times. She keeps an ''emergency stash'' of Adderall nearby for when she's working on a big story and has to stay awake all night.
  Benson (whose name, like all the people in this story who discuss their ADHD drug use, has been changed to protect her identity) is typical of a growing population of young adults who went to college in the 2000s. As they age out into the workplace, they're taking with them the ADHD med habits they developed in college '-- and finding the drugs still work.
  When I take Adderall, I think, 'This must be how really successful, smart people are all the time.'
  While it is tempting to chalk up the rising use of ADHD drugs among young adults to a generational trend of lax morals and blind eyes towards addiction and other health risks, a more complete explanation suggests an environment that encourages stimulant use. A hugely popular New York Times op-ed written by Tim Kreider pointed out what is fast becoming the modern condition: guilt and anxiety over any minute not spent working or promoting that work.
  In this culture of perfection, in which the worst thing someone could be is not busy, many young adults have latched onto a drug that makes them go faster, harder and stronger at work.
  ''When I take Adderall, I think, 'This must be how really successful, smart people are all the time,''' said Jonathan Collier, 27, who works in a senior position at a New York production house. ''I wish so badly I was one of those people.''
  In his 2008 book, ''Outliers,'' Malcolm Gladwell theorized that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to master a skill and share the kind of success enjoyed by ''those people'' '-- the Bill Gateses and Paul Allens of the world. His theory may serve as both an explanation and a product of the current culture. Gladwell, after all, came to the conclusion that the way to succeed is to put the blinders on: to ignore all the distractions inherent in contemporary society and to single-mindedly and doggedly pursue a goal.
  Dr. Henry Abraham, a psychiatrist who has treated doctors, lawyers and other high achievers, said stimulants now are used often in a way that is closer to sports medicine than it is to psychiatry: to enhance performance. That's because the working world '-- like college before it, and, for some, prep school before that '-- is a competition, and people are looking to get an edge. Everyone wants to get those 10,000 hours, but not everyone is wired to do it naturally. So, many turn to Adderall and other ADHD drugs.
  The modern brain
  It's unclear how many adults take ADHD drugs, but it is evident that use is skyrocketing. According to IMS Health, in 2007, 5.6 million monthly prescriptions for ADHD medications were written for people ages 20 to 39. By 2011, that number had jumped to 14 million, a staggering 150 percent increase. Anecdotal evidence also shows a large number of people illegally taking ADHD drugs without a prescription.
  ''I think part of the increase in the rate of (ADHD drug) prescriptions,'' said Dr. David Meyer, a professor of psychology, cognition and perception at the University of Michigan, ''is that people both younger and older are coming to feel totally overloaded with bunches of information and are trying to cope with the increasing demands as best they can.''
  Our brains have mechanisms of executive function, similar to a computer operating system, he said. These mechanisms keep people's situational awareness up to speed and coordinate progress on various real-world tasks. But these executive functions are under constant attack in the modern world.
  ''Even a 10- (or) 20-second interruption can make you lose your situational awareness entirely,'' Meyer said.
  I feel uncomfortable using it to write. It would mean that what I consider my greatest skill is a lie.
  In many of the information-based jobs available to young professionals, those interruptions are not just unavoidable collateral damage; they are baked into the job itself.
  ''I'm expected to consume so much media and data every day on top of what I'm already supposed to do,'' said Cristina Long, a 24-year-old public-relations professional. ''I need to stay ahead of the trends.''
  Long was hired to click everywhere and look at everything, all the while creating cohesive results.
  The active ingredients in Adderall target the parts of the brain responsible for executive function. In other words, Adderall solves the very problems the modern world creates. Long now uses the drug daily, as do the many adults who don't have ADHD but are seeking an edge in the workplace.
  'Cosmetic neurology'
  The drugs are so popular because they work.
  ''Adderall opens up time for you,'' Collier said, emphasizing that using it enables him to get all his work done and still have time to work on other projects.
  Long said the stimulant clears her thoughts and helps her produce better work.
  For Benson, taking Adderall is like playing a video game and getting an extra life. She said she gets more done and is a better writer.
  All three said using the drug made their lives better.
  At the same time, Benson admitted she struggles with her use.
  ''I feel uncomfortable using it to write,'' she said. ''It would mean that what I consider my greatest skill is a lie.''
  So she now stays up all night writing, then, if necessary, takes Adderall the next morning to get through the workday.
  Benson's complex relationship with the drug illustrates problems Dr. Anjan Chatterjee, a professor of neurology at the University of Pennsylvania, has highlighted in connection to what he refers to as ''cosmetic neurology'' '-- the use of drugs like Adderall for performance enhancement.
  Essentially, Chatterjee argues that the advances in cognitive neuroscience and neuropharmacology mean the question of to what extent we want to create and live in a drug-enhanced society may no longer be relevant. That way of life is already here, and society must now account for the moral implications it brings.
  Like cosmetic surgery, cosmetic neurology will likely be available only to those with the disposable income to afford elective medicine, expanding the already wide gap between the haves and have-nots. Drugs like Adderall already tend to circulate among the wealthy '-- those who come from competitive universities and have access to health care that covers expensive prescriptions.
  An added concern is that the growing use of stimulants in the workplace will produce a new work environment in which use of neurological enhancement through pharmaceuticals is just one more thing expected of the perfect worker.
  Benson said using the drugs doesn't make her feel guilty. Collier agreed, saying, ''It's more about being honest with yourself '-- if it's something you're comfortable with.''
  But not everyone feels comfortable with it, yet they might feel compelled to use such drugs because of the pressure to keep up.
  ''Everyone is in an arms race of accomplishment,'' Chatterjee said.
  How can society account for the coercive nature of a culture of perfection?
  Dr. Todd Essig, a psychologist in New York, said medical professionals must address neurological performance enhancement openly and facilitate safer use and better oversight of such drugs rather than sweep it under the rug.
  ''Adderall is just the tip of the iceberg,'' Essig said. ''There are lots more drugs coming down the pike. The way we set up our cultural model for dealing with psychologically performance-enhancing drugs is a real serious question.''
The Common Core Agenda '' Part 2A: Architects and Profiteers | Tavern Keepers
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  Archived Version
  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 01:27
  As I mentioned in The Common Core Agenda '' Part 1, we all know the American education system is failing, and because of this many well meaning though naive people jumped on the Common Core bandwagon without having any idea of what they were supporting.
  On it's face Common Core sounds fine. There is absolutely nothing wrong with having baseline standards in education, agreed upon by the several states and applied on a strictly voluntary basis. In fact, in some ways it makes a lot of sense; but that is not the reality of Common Core. This is something that good, smart people like Carol Burris, principal of South Side High School in New York, who in 2010 was named New York State Outstanding Educator by the School Administrators Association of New York State, are now starting to realize.
  Back when Common Core standards were first presented to the states and educators they were still in the theoretical stage. As I wrote in Part 1, the states were coerced into adopting the new standards before they were even written, if they wanted to receive federal money. It was during this period that Mrs. Burris co-authored a book, ''Opening the Common Core,'' which according to a an op-ed she recently wrote, sang the praises of a ''rich curriculum and equitable teaching practices, not about testing and sanctions. We wrote it because we thought that the Common Core would be a student-centered reform based on principles of equity.'' Now that it's here however, Mrs. Burris has had a change of heart.
  ''Opening the Common Core'' co-authored by Carol Burris
  Admitting that she was na¯ve she says, ''The promise of the Common Core is dying and teaching and learning are being distorted. The well that should sustain the Core has been poisoned.'' She sites the constant testing of students, that does nothing to enhance the learning experience but is instead another aspect of the never ending data collection that is so much a part of Common Core. She rightfully questions the new business model as well and asks why companies like Pearson which receives ''multi-million dollar contract to create tests for the state should also be able to profit from producing test prep materials.''
  So you see, what Mrs. Burris and others failed to understand is that from the get go Common Core has never been about providing a better education for our kids. It has in fact always been about propelling a larger initiative and ideological warfare. It is about stripping the states of their Constitutional right to create school curriculum at the local level, and replacing it with lessons of secular ideology, environmental extremism, American apology, and global citizenry. And perhaps most importantly, it's about control.
  This is a long standing goal that can be traced back to 1984 and beyond, visa vie the United Nations educational arm known as UNESCO. According to Article I of the UNESCO Constitution,
  The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO.)was established in 1946 to "contribute to peace and security by promoting collaboration among nations through education, science and culture in order to further universal respect for justice, for the rule of law and for the human rights and fundamental freedoms which are affirmed for the peoples of the world, without distinction of race, sex, language or religion, by the Charter of the United Nations''.
  Anyone familiar with the UN's Agenda 21 initiative will recognize the roots of the UNESCO's Common Core in their 1984 ''Methodology Guide'' in which the group explicitly defines their Marxist agenda, written by the grandfather of Common Core, Robert Muller, Former UN Assistant Secretary General, Chancellor of the University for Peace, who said, '''...at the request of educators I wrote the World Core Curriculum, the product of the United Nations, the meta-organism of human and planetary evolution'....'' As blogger Cherilyn Eagar appropriately summarized on her site, the goals were then as they are now, absolutely in keeping with the goals of Agenda 21:
  The curriculum must be strictly secular and equitable in its teaching of the nations and the world. Redistribution of the wealth is the standard because there is no private property, only collective ownership of the planet. Therefore, the common core curriculum must take a pantheistic approach and while excluding one form of extremism (e.g. radical Islam) it embraces another: extremist environmental policy.
  In his, ''A Letter to All Educators in the World,'' Muller recalls that after he wrote his World Core Curriculum,
  I sent it at the time to a famous committee appointed by the president of the United States, the Paediaea Committee, headed by the great American philosopher, Mortimer Adler. Only one of its member wrote me back saying: "Mr. Muller, you are a nice fellow, but I can tell you that there will never be a school on Earth that will teach your curriculum in our lifetime."
  Oh how I miss the Reagan years. Not only did the committee that he appointed reject the UNESCO Common Core curriculum (as it is literally called in their ''Methodology Guide'' ), in that same year his administration withdrew from UNESCO entirely. As the Heritage Foundation reported back in 1995:
  The Reagan Administration withdrew from UNESCO in 1984 largely because the agency had become highly politicized. When the U.S. left, many UNESCO programs and debates focused on disarmament, "collective rights," and other themes which Washington believed were departures from UNESCO's original mandate. Moreover, these activities, driven by East Bloc and Third World countries, were hostile to free markets and a free press. UNESCO became a hotbed of agitation for the so-called New World Information and Communications Order (NWICO), which would have sanctioned government licensing of reporters.
  The Reagan Administration also criticized UNESCO for its top-heavy, over- centralized bureaucracy. The lavish lifestyle which UNESCO afforded Director General Amadou-Mahtar M'Bow throughout the 1970s and early 1980s, including his opulent penthouse above UNESCO headquarters, also aggravated U.S. officials. Moreover, during these years UNESCO had the most unrestrained budgetary expansion in the U.N. system.
  So what happened? In October 2003 under George W. Bush, yet another thing we can thank him for, the United States rejoined UNESCO. At the time President Bush had this to say:
  ''As a symbol of our commitment to human dignity, the United States will return to UNESCO. This organization has been reformed and America will participate fully in its mission to advance human rights and tolerance and learning.''
  Is it any wonder that Jeb Bush is such a big supporter of the Common Core Standards? In fact Jeb loves this top down, unconstitutional approach so much he founded the Foundation for Educational Excellence (FEE), an organization whose soul purpose is to support the implementation of the Common Core Standards. They recently embarked on an email campaign to encourage OK legislators to use the FEE to help write their Common Core reforms, ''Debunking Common Core State Standards Myths'':
  There is a lot of misinformation flying around about Common Core State Standards. Below is around up of recent articles, opinion pieces and posts by policy advisors, debunking Common Core myths and highlighting voices in the transition to these new standards. You'll also find quotes from teachers weighing in on Common Core and see how state and business leaders are supporting the higher standards.
  So both Bushes have opened the gateway for global education standards, that are clearly at odds with the United States Constitution which stipulates that all public school education decisions are to be directed and funded by the states'... suddenly No Child Left Behind makes more sense to me.
  It should also be noted that the Foundation for Excellence in Education is funded in part by a generous donation from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
  Now'... enter the progressives, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. As I wrote in The Common Core Agenda '' Part 1, before the Common Core Standards were commandeered by the Obama administration's Rise to the Top program, they ''were the brain-child of an organization known as Achieve in a partnership with the National Governors Association, and with funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. In 2010 that partnership introduced a set of math and English guidelines that could be adopted by the individual states on a voluntary basis.'' That of course went by the wayside with the insertion of federal dollars, and the bizarre competition that school were asked to engage in as a means of funding their own public schools. I say it was bizarre because, it's our money, not the federal government's and states should not be required to compete for the money they paid out in the first place. Here's an idea, how about the states keep their own money, we do away with the Department of Education and we put the focus back on our children'... but I digress'....
  Bill and Melinda Gates
  As I have shown, in addition to federal funding, Common Core has been propelled with large grants for the Gates Foundation, which sets a very dangerous precedent for the public school system. By utilizing these revenue streams, the power over our children's education is circumvented by corporate and ideological interests. In effect the voices of the voting public/tax payers have been silenced, and the authority of local school boards have been nullified. In other words, an unelected philanthropist has been permitted to direct public policy and the voting public gets cut out of the process. As Sarah Reckhow, a political science professor at Michigan State University rightly observes, the philanthropists not only cut out school boards and parents, the teachers unions are also removed from the equation:
  ''Philanthropists, unlike teachers unions, they don't have an obvious constituency,'' she said. ''Teachers unions represent teachers. Who does the Gates Foundation represent?
  Shudder!
  Common Core for Bill Gates is a capitalist endeavor as well as an ideological one. As the website, Common Core '' Education Without Representation reports:
  Microsoft has signed a cooperative agreement with the United Nations' education branch, UNESCO. In it, Gates said, ''Microsoft supports the objectives of UNESCO as stipulated in UNESCO's constitution and intends to contribute to UNESCO's programme priorities.'' UNESCO's ''Education For All'' key document is called ''The Dakar Framework for Action: Education For All: Meeting Our Collective Commitments.''
  So Gates partners with the U.N.'s educational and other goals via UNESCO's ''Education for All'' which seeks to teach the same standards to all children (and adults) on a global scale. Why is this a problem? It supercedes local control over what is taught to students, and dismisses the validity of the U.S. Constitution, all in the name of inclusivity and education and tolerance for all nations.
  I should mention that the Microsoft/UNESCO agreement was signed in November of 2004, just a year after President Bush reinserted the United States into the organization. I think it's safe to assume that the agreement had been in the works from at least that moment. Common Core '' Education Without Representation goes on to address how Microsoft and UNESCO will help to further the Agenda 21 goals.
  At this link, you can learn about how Education For All works: ''Prior to the reform of the global EFA coordination architecture in 2011-2012, the Education for All High-Level Group brought together high-level representatives from national governments, development agencies, UN agencies, civil society and the private sector. Its role was to generate political momentum and mobilize financial, technical and political support towards the achievement of the EFA goals and the education-related Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). From 2001-2011 the High-Level Group met annually.''
  The six goals of ''Education For All'' are claimed to be internationally agreed-upon. On the linked Education and Awareness page of the U.N. website, we learn:
  Did you get that? Education is indispensable for the U.N. to get its agenda pushed onto every citizen worldwide. They just admitted it out loud. They want a strong hand in determining what is taught worldwide.
  For those that are unaware, ideologically, Gates is globalist who believes that climate change is man made. He believes that there are too many people on the planet, and that all environmental woes can eliminated if we simply reduce the human population. He proposes doing this by offering better vaccinations and health care and increased ''reproductive health services'' [abortions and birth control. Thank goodness we have Obamacare to pay for that], as he explained at 2010 TED Conference:
  ''Let's take a look. First we got population. The world today has 6.8 billion people. That's headed up to about 9 billion. Now if we do a really great job on new vaccines, health care, reproductive health services, we could lower that by perhaps 10 or 15 percent''
  In addition, he is a backer of big government initiatives and supports the idea of having more power afforded to the Executive Branch. In essence, while he clearly believes in what he is saying, and is probably very well meaning, Mr. Gates and his wife Melinda are the very definition of the Progressive Elitist.
  College Board President David Coleman poses for a portrait in New York. '--Michael Nagle/College Board
  So now, with the funding in place, Common Core needed an ''architect''; enter David Coleman. Where the UN's Robert Muller was the grandfather of Common Core, David Coleman is surely it's daddy. As Dean Kalahar of the American Thinker wrote:
  David Coleman, says he believes in the value of a liberal-arts education. The problem is nobody asked what a liberal-arts education means to Mr. Coleman. Reading his background puts new meaning to the word "liberal" in liberal arts.
  David Coleman lives in trendy Greenwich Village, has never been a classroom teacher and wants to replace traditional subjects with broad learning. He believes there is "a massive social injustice in this country" and that education is "the engine of social justice." Coleman's leadership is questionable as he uses profanity ("s''t, f''k, bulls-t, a'') in speeches regarding Common Core. He graduated from liberal Yale, Oxford, and Cambridge universities and is a founding partner of Student Achievement Partners, and the Grow Network, acquired by textbook publisher McGraw-Hill. He is on the board of directors of The Equity Project Charter School, a middle school in New York City that paid $125,000 salaries to teachers yet had a 31.3% passing rate in English in 2010-11. His alliance with unions includes praise for "organizations like the UFT in New York City and the AFT statewide."
  Coleman's worldviews and education influences began at home with his mother, renowned (liberal) Bennington College President and social justice advocate, Elizabeth Coleman:
  His mother and greatest influence, Elizabeth Coleman, president of Bennington College in Vermont, does not like the idea of "expertise" or "neutrality (as) a condition of academic integrity" and "wants to "make the political-social challenges themselves the organizers of the curriculum." She emphasizes an "action-oriented curriculum" where "students continuously move outside the classroom to engage the world directly." In short: indoctrination through propaganda in education as the vehicle for social transformation.
  Mrs. Coleman founded a social justice initiative: the Center for the Advancement of Public Action (she called it a "secular church") "which invites students to put the world's most pressing problems at the center of their education." She was a professor of humanities at the far left New School for Social Research, which was begun by progressives in 1932 and modeled itself after the neo-Marxist social theory of the Frankfurt School. She fights for "social values," and a "secular democracy," saying "fundamentalist '...values (are) the absolutes of a theocracy."
  Today, David Coleman is the president of the College Board, the organization that owns and publishes the SAT's, the nation's most widely used college admission exam. He has proclaimed his eagerness to implement the Common Core Standards into the SAT's and has no problem insulting those that disagree with him. This can be a problem on many levels. For public school kids, it means a forced one size fits all national testing system for anyone who wants to get into collage. For homeschool and private school kids, it means that in order to pass the SAT's with satisfactory results, you must learn the Common Core Standards.
  Unfortunately, I haven't even begun to address all of the players behind Common Core '' usually for profit, but sometimes for ideology. Next time I will get into Pearson, the American Legislative Exchange Council, and more.
  Until then, please educate yourself on your child's new education. You're going to need all the ammo you can get!
  Read more here:
  On the Gates Foundation and Common Core: http://news.heartland.org/newspaper-article/2013/02/11/education-policies-led-gates-not-states?nocache=1
  Common Core Standards '' English Language Arts, Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science and Technical Subjects: http://www.corestandards.org/assets/Appendix_B.pdf
  Elizabeth Coleman speaks the the 2009 TED's conference: http://www.ted.com/talks/liz_coleman_s_call_to_reinvent_liberal_arts_education.html
  More on David and Elizabeth Coleman: http://cherilyneagar.com/2013/04/early-roots-common-core-education-policy/#more-2084
  David Coleman's Campaign to Bring Common Core to VA: http://smartregion.org/2011/10/u-s-educations-core-standards-fewer-clearer-higher/
  Tags:Agenda 21, EFA, featured, Robert Muller, United Nations
  Category: Special Reports, US
'Science' says 'selfie' isn't Word of the Year | The Verge
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  Archived Version
  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 01:25
  While Oxford Dictionary's Word of the Year choices often appear to be intentionally buzzy '-- be it "podcast," the verb "GIF," or this year's selection of "selfie" '-- Merriam-Webster has turned to statistics to determine its Word of the Year, removing an editorial hand from the selection. That process makes 2013's Word of the Year a fairly fitting winner: science. The selection was based on the word with the greatest increase in lookups over the past year. "Science" may seem like an odd candidate, but Webster's editor-at-large, Peter Sokolowski, suggests in a statement that it was relevant to this year's news, "A wide variety of discussions centered on science this year, from climate change to educational policy."
  "Science" saw a dramatic 176 percent increase in lookups this year. Webster also revealed the nine words that followed it, in order: cognitive,rapport,communication,niche,ethic,paradox,visceral,integrity, andmetaphor. It's an eclectic list to be certain, but Webster tries to explain how a few of them got there, tying "communication" and "rapport" to the NSA leaks, "cognitive" to NFL concussion issues, and "niche" to people just being confused about how to pronounce it. Basing the Word of the Year in actual stats certainly makes it more interesting, but it's worth noting that science's win isn't completely untouched by Webster's editors '-- Webster has been basing its Word of the Year on statistics for several years now, but what stat it's based on has changed more than a few times.
Former MTV VJ Kennedy to Host Fox Business Network Show
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  Archived Version
  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 01:24
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  Lisa Kennedy Montgomery
  In a move that's bound to make many a Gen-X-er feel a little old, Fox Business Network announced Tuesday that '90s MTV VJ Kennedy has just been tapped to host a primetime series about economics.
  Lisa Kennedy Montgomery, who first joined FBN in 2012 as a Stossel contributor, will topline The Independents -- a new program that intends to direct the financial network's lens at the protection of economic and civil liberties.
  PHOTOS: The Most Talked-About Faces of TV News
  Kennedy will serve as a co-host alongside Reason magazine's Matt Welch, America's Future Foundation's Kmele Foster and a rotating panel of money experts. The program premieres Dec. 9 and will run four times weekly -- Mondays through Wednesdays and again on Fridays -- at 9 p.m. ET. (Stossel will continue to air in the time slot on Thursdays.)
  The new hour marks another programming expansion for FBN, which currently airs an encore of Gerri Willis' Willis Report in the hour. FBN recently made headlines when it wooed financial news heavyweight Maria Bartiromo away from competitor CNBC. News of The Independents was announced by network executive vp Kevin Magee.
  Kennedy, who is repped by N.S. Bienstock, recently published her second book: The Kennedy Chronicles: The Golden Age of MTV Through Rose-Colored Glasses. She also hosts Music in the Morning on Los Angeles' 98.7 FM.
VIDEO-NJ law would ban snacking, putting on make-up while driving | 6abc.com
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  Archived Version
  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 01:12
  TRENTON, N.J. - November 26, 2013 (WPVI) -- Drivers in New Jersey could possibly be pulled over for snacking, smoking or putting on make-up behind the wheel under a bill that has been advanced in the Assembly.
  The proposed law would fine drivers found to "engage in any activity unrelated to the operation of a motor vehicle in a manner that interferes with the safe operation of the vehicle."
  The bill advanced by a 12-0 vote Monday in the Assembly's transportation committee.
  It does not spell out which activities would and would not be considered distracted driving, instead leaving that determination up to police.New Jersey National Motorists Association representative Steve Carrellas tells The Star-Ledger that the proposal is too vague.
  The bill has not been introduced in the state Senate.
  (Copyright (C)2013 WPVI-TV/DT. All Rights Reserved.)
  Get more Local/State >>
  Tags:
  new jersey news, driving, local/state
Emergency Alert Sounds on Phones Across SoCal | KTLA 5
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  Archived Version
  Thu, 05 Dec 2013 00:54
  An emergency alert that sounded on cellphones across the Southland midday Wednesday came from the Monterey Park Fire Department, which apologized for the notification.
  An emergency alert that sounded on phones across Southern California on Wednesday was sent by the Los Angeles County Emergency Operations Center, authorities said. (Credit: KTLA)
  The alert, which read ''THIS IS ONLY A TEST,'' was sent at 2:13 p.m. It appeared to have come from the Monterey Park Emergency Operations Center.
  A police official with the Monterey Park Police Department and a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department said the city's Fire Department had sent the alert.
  ''It wasn't something sent out by police; it was sent out by fire,'' police clerk Margaret Mkrtichian said.
  Monterey Park Fire Department personnel were unaware of any plans to send the alert, the dispatcher initially told KTLA.
  Later, the department apologized for the notification on Twitter.
  A spokesman for the Sheriff's Department, which has its headquarters in an unincorporated area next to Monterey Park, was initially unclear on where the message originated. The Sheriff's Department operates the county's Emergency Operations Bureau in its headquarters.
  ''It wasn't us. I don't know who sent it,'' Sgt. Richard Pena said. ''It might have been our guys, but we're still looking into it.''
  Later, Deputy Tony Moore said the Sheriff's Department had indeed determined that the Monterey Park Fire Department send the alert.
  ''We were able to track it down,'' Moore said. ''They're working on trying to find out why the test was done.''
  It was unclear how many people were reached by the alert.
  In the KTLA newsroom, dozens of phones went off at the same time, all together sounding an alarming high-pitched tone.
  Questions have been raised about the reach of the high-pitched emergency alert system after an early morning Amber Alert notification woke many California residents last August.
  Wireless Emergency Alerts are part of a system developed by the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Emergency Management Agency to let local, state and federal agencies target users of some cellphone models by sending alerts through geographically specific cell towers, according to the FCC website.
  KTLA's Melissa Pamer contributed to this report.
VIDEO-Greenspan on Bitcoin: I Guess It's a Bubble: Video - Bloomberg
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 23:51
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  Click to email this video:Dec. 4 (Bloomberg) -- Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan comments on Bitcoin. He spoke during an interview with Trish Regan on Bloomberg Television's "Street Smart." (Source: Bloomberg)
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Greenspan Says Bitcoin a Bubble Without Intrinsic Currency Value - Bloomberg
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 23:50
  Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said Bitcoin prices are unsustainably high after surging 89-fold in a year and that the virtual money isn't currency.
  ''It's a bubble,'' Greenspan, 87, said today in a Bloomberg Television interview from Washington. ''It has to have intrinsic value. You have to really stretch your imagination to infer what the intrinsic value of Bitcoin is. I haven't been able to do it. Maybe somebody else can.''
  Bitcoins, which exist as software and aren't regulated by any country or banking authority, surged to a record $1,124.76 on Nov. 30. The currency has rallied on growing interest from investors, while merchants are starting to accept Bitcoins and U.S. officials have told lawmakers such payments could be a legitimate means of exchange.
  ''I do not understand where the backing of Bitcoin is coming from,'' the former Fed chief said. ''There is no fundamental issue of capabilities of repaying it in anything which is universally acceptable, which is either intrinsic value of the currency or the credit or trust of the individual who is issuing the money, whether it's a government or an individual.''
  There are about 12 million Bitcoins in circulation, according to Bitcoincharts, a website that tracks activity across various exchanges. Bitcoin was introduced in 2008 by a programmer or group of programmers going under the name of Satoshi Nakamoto.
  A Justice Department official said Nov. 18 Bitcoins can be ''legal means of exchange'' at a U.S. Senate committee hearing, boosting prospects for wider acceptance of the virtual currency.
  ''We all recognize that virtual currencies, in and of themselves, are not illegal,'' Mythili Raman, acting assistant attorney general at the department's criminal division, told the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.
  Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke told the Senate committee the U.S. central bank has no plans to regulate the currency.
  ''Although the Federal Reserve generally monitors developments in virtual currencies and other payments system innovations, it does not necessarily have authority to directly supervise or regulate these innovations or the entities that provide them to the market,'' Bernanke wrote to lawmakers.
  To contact the reporter on this story: Jeff Kearns in Washington at jkearns3@bloomberg.net
  To contact the editor responsible for this story: Chris Wellisz at cwellisz@bloomberg.net
  Enlarge imageBitcoin Virtual CurrencyTomohiro Ohsumi/Bloomberg
  There are about 12 million Bitcoins in circulation, according to Bitcoincharts, a website that tracks activity across various exchanges.
  There are about 12 million Bitcoins in circulation, according to Bitcoincharts, a website that tracks activity across various exchanges. Photographer: Tomohiro Ohsumi/Bloomberg
Fact Families | What are Fact Families | Math@TutorVista.com
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 23:24
  In algebra, a fundamental arithmetic number of fact (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division) is general used in day-to-day life. Addition (+) defined as adding the two numbers. Subtraction (-) defined as the inverse of addition. Multiplication (x) defined as the product of numbers. Division (·) is a result of dividing two rational numbers when a divisor is not a zero.
  Math facts consist of indeterminate expressions. In math, there is a particular facts in which we are not capable to modify those facts. Example for division ''Positive · Negative = Negative''. It is a procedure of interactive teaching about the practice math facts.In these articles, we are going to see about number fact families.
  A fact family is a group of four statements each of which represent the same meaning. All the four statements have the same meanings. Fact families contain 3 numbers and 2 types of operations. There are 2 types of fact families: addition and subtraction fact families; multiplication and division fact families.
  To see the fact families we need to understand the meaning of following words:
  Addends: The numbers being added in an addiotion operation. Like 2 and 3 in 2 + 3 = 5
  Multiplicands: The numbers being multiplied in a multiplication operation. Like 4 and 5 in 4 x 5 = 20
  Inverse operation: Reverse of an operation like inverse operation of addition is subtraction and inverse of multiplication is division.
  Here you could see addition fact families and subtraction fact families that discussed below.
  Below are the addition and subtraction rules and examples for number fact families-
  Addition rules
  Positive + Positive = Positive10 + 8 = 18
  Negative + Negative = Negative(- 10) + (- 5) = - 15
  Addition of a negative and a positive integer: Use the sign of the larger number and subtract, examples,(- 12) + 6 = -6
  10 + (-8) = 2
  Practice problems:1. (-10) + 7 = ?
  Answer: (-3)
  2. 14 + (-10) = ?
  Answer: 4
  Negative rules
  Negative - Positive = Negative(- 16) - 13 = -16 + (-13) = (-29)
  Positive - Negative = Positive + Positive = Positive16 - (-14) = 16 + 14 = 30
  Negative - Negative = Negative + Positive = Use the sign of the larger number and subtract (Change double negatives to a non negative)(-17) - (-12) = (-17) + 12 = -5
  (-12) - (-15) = (-12) + 15 = -3
  Practice problems:1. (-18) '' 20 = ?
  Answer: (-38)
  2. 15 - (-13) = ?
  Answer: 28
  Here you could see multiplication fact families and division fact families that discussed below.
  Below are the multiplication and division rules and examples for number fact familiesMultiplication rulesRule1: Multiplication of two integers by the linked signs resolve be positive sign
  a) Positive x positive = positive
  b) Negative x negative = positive
  Rule2: Multiplication of two integers by the different signs will be negative
  a) Positive x negative = negative
  b) Negative x positive = negative
  Example problems:
  1. Positive x positive = positive
  Example: 13 — 12 = 156
  2. Negative x negative = positive
  Example: (-15) — (-11) = (165)
  3. Positive x negative = negative
  Example: 11 — (-12) = (-132)
  4. Negative x positive = negative
  Example: (-4) — 16 = (-64)
  Practice problems:
  1. (-16) — 10 = ?
  Answer: (-160)
  2. (-5) — (-60) = ?
  Answer: 300
  Division rulesRule 1: Division of two integers by the linked signs resolve be positive sign
  a) Positive · positive = positive
  b) Negative · negative = positive
  Rule 2: Division of two integers by the different signs will be negative
  a) Positive · negative = negative
  b) Negative · positive = negative
  Example problems:
  1. Positive · positive = positive
  Example: 100 · 50 = 2
  2. Negative · negative = positive
  Example: (-80) · (-10) = 8
  3. Positive · negative = negative
  Example: 120 · (-10) = (-12)
  4. Negative · positive = negative
  Example: (-90) · (10) = (-9)
  Practice problems:
  1. (-15) · 15 = ?
  Answer: (-1)
  2. 65 · (-5) = ?
  Answer: (-13)
Abe seeks help to end Fukushima water crisis | The Japan Times
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 23:19
  KYOTO '' Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Sunday requested more foreign assistance in cleaning up the Fukushima No. 1 power plant, where work has been plagued by the radioactive water crisis.
  ''Our country needs your knowledge and expertise'' in coping with the aftermath of the triple meltdown triggered by the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami, Abe said in a speech in English at an international science conference hosted by the city and Kyoto Prefecture.
  ''We are wide open to receive the most advanced knowledge from overseas to contain the problem,'' he said.
  Abe also said his government, which is taking over the cleanup, plans to host a separate annual forum on technologies for reducing greenhouse gas emissions next year. The first one will be held in Tokyo on Oct. 7 and 8.
  Despite Abe's reassurances to the International Olympic Committee last month that the leaks were ''under control,'' many Japanese believe he just swept the plant's problems under the rug. One Diet lawmaker said he lied.
  Ground water tainted by radioactive water exiting the plant's cracked foundations has been entering the Pacific since soon after the March 2011 meltdowns. Its leaking storage tanks are compounding public concerns.
  Tepco split under studyJIJI
  The Liberal Democratic Party is studying a plan to split Tokyo Electric Power Co. into two entities to accelerate the decommissioning of the stricken Fukushima No. 1 plant and contain its radioactive water, a senior LDP official said Sunday.
  ''We are discussing the idea of splitting Tepco into an entity in charge of all work related to the Fukushima No. 1 plant and another handling the rest of the firm's operations,'' Yasuhisa Shiozaki, acting chairman of the party's Policy Research Council, said on a TV program.
  The entity responsible for the crippled nuclear plant should assemble expertise from around the world, Shiozaki said, adding that the government should invest heavily in the entity to control it.
  Otherwise, new problems could occur at the stricken facility, which was hit by three meltdowns during the March 2011 quake and tsunami, he said.
Bought 2 Polymer 80% AR-15 lower receivers today! [Archive] - Calguns.net
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 22:53
  View Full Version : Bought 2 Polymer 80% AR-15 lower receivers today!
  FireArms101
  01-06-2013, 10:45 PM
  Bought two polymer "paperweights" today at gun show in Ontario... that's right POLYMER not aluminum. Came with few bucks to spend everything I was looking for was sold out decided I fork over $150 for two pieces of plastic :facepalm: Last summer I successfully turned 80% aluminum lower receiver into a 100% using my drill press and cant wait to start on this polymer one. Posted this to see if anyone here has ever had any experience with building, drilling or milling a polymer 80% lower receiver for AR-15? I did a Google search on the internet and couldn't find much info. Of course due to the high demand of paperweights the companys website down due to heavy traffic. I'm thinking once I finish this 80 percent lower I'm probably going to make it into dedicated .22, it being "plastic" aka "polymer" and all. Anyhow glad I bought two just in case I screw up on the first one. But come to think of it any screw ups could probably be fix with a little epoxy.Looking forward to any pics, tricks or experiences shared. Thanks in advance.
  el tardo
  01-06-2013, 10:57 PM
  only tip i can give you is when milling it out take time and be careful as plastic melts where the aluminum cuts away into shavings. plastic doesnt do that so dont let it get to hot when doing this.i hope it makes sense on what im trying to tell you.
  Faded
  01-06-2013, 11:03 PM
  Keep us posted on the progress.
  bigcalidave
  01-07-2013, 8:32 AM
  Who made it and who was selling it! Plastic 80s would be great, even now the production should be fast and the normal cost should be around $20. Are there markings on it?
  ptoguy2002
  01-07-2013, 9:00 AM
  Make sure they have some metal in them....I don't know what falls under the undetectable firearms laws, but you'd best know.IMHO, plastic lowers are going to be in the same history chapter as aluminum wiring.
  Insight.556
  01-07-2013, 9:31 AM
  80% Poly lowers.... Hhhmmm, sounds interesting. Please post pics/new thread to keep us in the loop. :popcorn:
  Tripper
  01-07-2013, 9:44 AM
  what company makes it
  uxo2
  01-07-2013, 11:08 AM
  pics please.....
  FireArms101
  01-07-2013, 3:54 PM
  I'm working all day till around midnight and honestly I cant stop thinking about getting started :D I'll take pictures and post them as soon as I can. As for who makes these polymer lowers I have no clue, I think theyre made by guy/company I bought them from but there was no info on the 80% lower its self. I picked up the business card at the booth but didn't bring it to work with me so I don't have the contact info. Once I get home I'll provide as much info as I can.I'd love to hear about past experiences with polymer 80% lowers so I don't end screwing something up. I searched the internet like crazy last night and couldn't find anything. Perhaps its something new?
  Make sure they have some metal in them....I don't know what falls under the undetectable firearms laws, but you'd best know.IMHO, plastic lowers are going to be in the same history chapter as aluminum wiring.WUT?
  Ibgreezy
  01-07-2013, 4:34 PM
  I want to buy a couple to mess with!!!!
  Jason_2111
  01-07-2013, 4:49 PM
  I'm always extremely leery of anything bought "at a gun show"... home of the chinese knock-off 80%s and other such not-sellable on the open internet things.I'd really like to see pictures of these polymer's, and find out where they came from.Cutting them shouldn't be any more difficult than an aluminum 80%... the question is whether they'll last for more the 10 shots.
  darksands
  01-07-2013, 4:55 PM
  I would be VERY weary of polymer lowers and it does smell of someone taking advantage of the situation. I am not saying it will not work but you are the first I have heard of poly 80%. Please let us know on your progress and thank you for taking the first steps and sharing with us.
  Kingofthehill
  01-07-2013, 5:37 PM
  I have a Plum Crazy lower but never seen or heard of anyone doing a polymer 80% lower. Thats interesting.My Plum crazy (a gift from an Ex) has held up just fine but hasn't seen a hard life.
  JOe
  Tripper
  01-07-2013, 5:42 PM
  I'm working all day till around midnight and honestly I cant stop thinking about getting started :D I'll take pictures and post them as soon as I can. As for who makes these polymer lowers I have no clue, I think theyre made by guy/company I bought them from but there was no info on the 80% lower its self. I picked up the business card at the booth but didn't bring it to work with me so I don't have the contact info. Once I get home I'll provide as much info as I can.I'd love to hear about past experiences with polymer 80% lowers so I don't end screwing something up. I searched the internet like crazy last night and couldn't find anything. Perhaps its something new?
  nobody has any past experience, thats why you cant find anything, and thats why we 'really' want to know where you got them
  SJgunguy24
  01-07-2013, 7:06 PM
  Make sure they have some metal in them....I don't know what falls under the undetectable firearms laws, but you'd best know.IMHO, plastic lowers are going to be in the same history chapter as aluminum wiring.Does the lower parts kit and that magazine full with ammo count? Those New Frontier and,plum crazy AR lowers are out there and I haven't heard of any horror stories about those yet.
  uxo2
  01-07-2013, 10:08 PM
  the issues with polymer that i have heard ofcome from people cranking down on the buffer tube/ castle nutand breaking the rear.
  readysetgo
  01-07-2013, 11:58 PM
  nobody has any past experience, thats why you cant find anything, and thats why we 'really' want to know where you got them^^^ This!
  He thinks he's joining a well versed trend.Little does he know, he's the trend setter! :eek:
  tatso7
  01-08-2013, 6:00 AM
  Is receiver made from a 3d printer or injection molded?
  ptoguy2002
  01-08-2013, 9:21 AM
  Does the lower parts kit and that magazine full with ammo count? Those New Frontier and,plum crazy AR lowers are out there and I haven't heard of any horror stories about those yet.I don't know. Even if everything else was plastic, you'd still have enough metal in the barrel alone to not be considered undetectable. But if the regs, however they are written, will apply to a frame or receiver by itself, that might be an issue ???I don't know how the law or the regs are written, so I don't know. I don't know about those lowers specifically, but other polymer lowers I've seen have metal plates in them where the serial number is.....just pointing out that it is something that should be looked into....
  Joewy
  01-08-2013, 9:37 AM
  I saw some of these at a gun show in South Dakota a month ago.
  I don't know. Even if everything else was plastic, you'd still have enough metal in the barrel alone to not be considered undetectable. But if the regs, however they are written, will apply to a frame or receiver by itself, that might be an issue ???I don't know how the law or the regs are written, so I don't know. I don't know about those lowers specifically, but other polymer lowers I've seen have metal plates in them where the serial number is.....just pointing out that it is something that should be looked into....lol...soo you don't know?
  This thread is about 80% not complete lowers.
  bigcalidave
  01-08-2013, 9:57 AM
  Just so you know, those plastics are NOT undetectable. They show up easily on the current scanners, although the current law stated:"Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988 - Amends the Federal criminal code to make it unlawful to manufacture, import, sell, ship, deliver, possess, transfer, or receive any firearm: (1) which is not as detectable as the Security Exemplar (after the removal of grips, stocks, and magazines) by walk-through metal detectors calibrated and operated to detect the Exemplar; or (2) of which any major component, when subjected to inspection by x-ray machines commonly used at airports, does not generate an image that accurately depicts the shape of the component.
  Defines the term "Security Exemplar" to mean an object that is suitable for testing and calibrating metal detectors and is, during the 12-month period beginning on the date of enactment of this Act, constructed of 3.7 ounces of stainless steel in a shape resembling a handgun. Directs the Secretary of the Treasury, at the close of such 12-month period and at appropriate times thereafter, to promulgate regulations to permit the manufacture, importation, sale, shipment, delivery, possession, transfer, or receipt of firearms that are as detectable as a security exemplar which contains 3.7 ounces of stainless steel or such lesser amount as is detectable in view of advances in state-of-the-art developments in weapons detection technology."
  So its a complete gun, of which 3.7 oz of metal which can be sensed by a metal detector needs to be there. Not a stripped receiver. If you made one, with the plastic LPK, carbon stock, plastic upper, carbon tensioned barrel, you still have to deal with a bolt carrier. If someone makes a .22 bolt carrier out of plastic, then you may be under that 3.7 oz
  readysetgo
  01-08-2013, 11:58 AM
  lol...soo you don't know?This thread is about 80% not complete lowers.
  Where can I find 99% incomplete threads and who makes them? Are they legal?
  ptoguy2002
  01-08-2013, 1:06 PM
  lol...soo you don't know?This thread is about 80% not complete lowers.
  Reading comprehension time. I said in my first post that I didn't know, but that the op had best know.
  :useless::useless::useless::useless::useless:
  FireArms101
  01-09-2013, 9:47 PM
  :uselessI hope these pics make this thread a lot uselessSold one of the two I bought to a friend. Been busy working so I haven't had time to start on mine or take pics so I asked my bud to txt me some pics of his and here they are.http://i1338.photobucket.com/albums/o699/areyray/photo_zpse79645d8.jpg
  http://i1338.photobucket.com/albums/o699/areyray/photo2_zpsd2f258e1.jpg
  http://i1338.photobucket.com/albums/o699/areyray/photo3_zps2ca229b2.jpg
  http://i1338.photobucket.com/albums/o699/areyray/photo5_zpsc2e0b36b.jpg
  http://i1338.photobucket.com/albums/o699/areyray/photo6_zpsdd57b0b2.jpg
  http://i1338.photobucket.com/albums/o699/areyray/photo7_zps541bc4db.jpg
  Tripper
  01-09-2013, 9:53 PM
  umm
  croc4
  01-09-2013, 9:54 PM
  wow...., best of luckcroc4
  wdsonny
  01-09-2013, 10:17 PM
  Looks airsoft-y.
  Colt562
  01-09-2013, 10:27 PM
  Looks like a last resort to me.
  wingnut232
  01-10-2013, 12:07 AM
  Ummm. Wow that looks odd, looks like the FCG pocket is filled in with different material. Who's the manufacturer? Thing looks very rough. Best of luck!!!:confused:
  wingnut232
  01-10-2013, 12:07 AM
  Ummm. Wow that looks odd, looks like the FCG pocket is filled in with different material. Who's the manufacturer? Thing looks very rough. Best of luck!!!:confused:
  dchang0
  01-10-2013, 12:29 AM
  It looks like someone took a COMPLETE polymer lower and just filled up the fire control pocket with epoxy... But that wouldn't explain the plastic flash on the magwell. What are those shiny stickers covering the maker's markings? I'm guessing your friend put those on there, but if they came like that when you bought them, I wonder what's underneath...Ah well, nothing to do but finish them up and go see how well they hold up.
  BigfootHunter
  01-10-2013, 12:33 AM
  Tagged, that looks WEIRD.
  dchang0
  01-10-2013, 12:39 AM
  I'll bet they were originally mfg as complete polymer lowers but didn't make it past inspection. Somebody bought them in bulk for cheap, filled in the FCG pockets to make them 80% lowers, then hoped to cash in on the fact that 80% lowers were going for MORE than complete lowers were for several months now.This does raise an interesting proposition for you. Perhaps it is possible to DISSOLVE whatever gunk was used to fill up the pocket, rather than mill/drill it out. I don't know what solvents would work without also damaging the polymer, but it is still a real possibility, especially if that's epoxy.
  dredgeman
  01-10-2013, 8:35 AM
  Ten Percent out of Kern county has one in a raffle on gunbroker.com I saw them when I read the front page of their website and followed the gun broker link.There is a company and write up
  dredgeman
  01-10-2013, 8:36 AM
  Complete not 80 percent
  Jason_2111
  01-10-2013, 9:32 AM
  I don't know what the heck those are... but I wouldn't let my ex-wife fire one.Unless I was really far away.
  I wouldn't touch one of these with a 10 foot pole.
  PolishMike
  01-10-2013, 9:36 AM
  Yah... uhh that looks absolutely terrible. Is someone buying $25 airsoft guns and filling the FCG and calling it a polymer 80%?
  Jason_2111
  01-10-2013, 9:45 AM
  With all of the garbage that floods the market as prices get rediculous, it wouldn't surprise me in the least to see someone taking crappy chinese airsoft receivers, filling them with epoxy, and trying to unload them on GB or at a gun show.You guys wouldn't believe some of the garbage we've seen come through our build party, and it's always the same story... "Got this at a gun show..."
  Iskra
  01-10-2013, 11:44 AM
  Yah... uhh that looks absolutely terrible. Is someone buying $25 airsoft guns and filling the FCG and calling it a polymer 80%?That's exactly what it looks like to me too
  Jeepers
  01-10-2013, 11:59 AM
  That's exactly what it looks like to me tooyup must be a airsoft otherwise it would not be legal even if its a reject it was never "demilled" and was complete at one time .....
  FireArms101
  01-10-2013, 12:15 PM
  The one I sold him is not as pretty as the one I kept, but he liked the black one. The one I kept has a smooth top and is made from a white polymer. The white polymer one felt a lot stronger and tougher (it passed the jumped on it/hit it with a mallet test). I sold him the "ugly" since he offered to pay half of what I spent. I'm Hoping to get off early today to take much better pics of mine and post as soon as I can. It feels pretty strong but even then I'm thinking of using it with magazine well "grip" installed like one of the one below...I've seen these polymer lowers break in the front area of the magazine well before:http://images2.opticsplanet.com/365-240-ffffff/opplanet-mako-group-magazine-well-grip-mwg-03.jpghttp://cdn.ammoland.com/files/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/sixell-innovations-never-quit-grip.jpg
  Cary1911
  01-10-2013, 12:54 PM
  that looks like an unfinished toy. i wouldnt fire it. but then again im the kind of guy who doesnt want shrapnel flying towards my face/body...
  Colt562
  01-10-2013, 12:59 PM
  I dont know if I would try and build with that. Seems to sloppy to me. Best of luck with it though.
  TheExiled
  01-10-2013, 2:17 PM
  :eek::eek: Good luck OP, I want to see where this goes..Off topic: Tokyo Marui lower FS..
  Well...The pics made me SPEECHLESS.....
  bigcalidave
  01-10-2013, 7:21 PM
  Where are the pictures!!! I wanted to see !
  Jason_2111
  01-12-2013, 10:25 AM
  I hope these pics make this thread a lot uselessSold one of the two I bought to a friend. Been busy working so I haven't had time to start on mine or take pics so I asked my bud to txt me some pics of his and here they are.
  Expect your friend to kick your butt. ;)
  Oceanbob
  01-12-2013, 10:58 AM
  Good luck and be careful.:D
  FireArms101
  01-13-2013, 4:06 PM
  Finally a day off and the time to upload some pics and start drilling my Polymer AR-15 80% lower!http://i1338.photobucket.com/albums/o699/areyray/arpoly_zpsee604f7b.jpghttp://i1338.photobucket.com/albums/o699/areyray/arpoly2_zps15da824b.jpg
  FireArms101
  01-13-2013, 4:08 PM
  I just noticed that the front of my magazine well is thicker on this lower than a regular AR-15. Maybe because a regular lowers magazine well is too thin and fragile for a plastic lower?
  Plastics do not melt if you machine it properly. Which you can't really do on a drill press.
  TheExiled
  01-13-2013, 6:33 PM
  How about a pic of the fcg pocket on that one? That one looks better than the other one for sure
  johnyreb
  01-15-2013, 8:57 PM
  Almost looks like resin for model making.
  RomanDad
  01-15-2013, 9:00 PM
  Looks like white chocolate.
  bohoki
  01-15-2013, 9:20 PM
  cool can you mill it out with a soldering ironi wonder if that plastic they use for billiard balls and white dominos would work
  johnyreb
  01-15-2013, 11:12 PM
  Looking at the flash over the front pivot pin hole. Looks just like 2 part resin, and looks nice and greasy from release agent. Look for pin holes on it or near complex areas dead give away if it was cast.
  wingnut232
  01-17-2013, 2:51 PM
  Keep us posted on this one. I want to see how this pans out as I've seen a post about a guy using a 3D printer for lowers.
  Eric B
  01-18-2013, 6:25 PM
  Tagging in to follow this. My curiosity has been piqued.
  vliberatore
  01-18-2013, 9:54 PM
  Tagging in to follow this. My curiosity has been piqued.^This
  Google it Research
  04-09-2013, 11:51 PM
  What became of this project?
  readysetgo
  04-10-2013, 10:42 AM
  What became of this project?Shamed into obscurity?
  BMartin1776
  04-10-2013, 12:33 PM
  DefCon guys had to make areas reinforced to be printed around buffer tube You should post close up pics of them Im curious to see how yours compare to printed ones.
  Freemanrebel
  05-23-2013, 9:55 AM
  Who made them? I know of a few companies that are just getting started making polymer 80%'s. Check out eplowers.com or polymer80. polymer80 are just taking pre-orders and they arent available but eplowers has photos of their polymer 80%'s on their website. They are available. I am curious if there is another company I don't know about that is making them.
  phantomfinisher
  05-23-2013, 11:12 AM
  Who made them? I know of a few companies that are just getting started making polymer 80%'s. Check out eplowers.com or polymer80. polymer80 are just taking pre-orders and they arent available but eplowers has photos of their polymer 80%'s on their website. They are available. I am curious if there is another company I don't know about that is making them.Thanks for the plug.. we actually also have prototype images up so you can see what itcwill look like...
  Curious.. have you fired this bad boy yet?
  Cheung415
  05-29-2013, 4:20 PM
  Thanks for the plug.. we actually also have prototype images up so you can see what itcwill look like...Curious.. have you fired this bad boy yet?
  He might be a goner. Last login 4-15-2013. I was very curious of this as well.
  wpage
  05-30-2013, 4:23 PM
  The suspense is killing me...
  EPLOWERS
  07-09-2013, 3:15 PM
  I never did see any of the pictures of this 80% poly lower. Does anybody have a link or a way to find out what they were? Thanks
  FireArms101
  10-08-2013, 12:34 AM
  Saw that EP Lowers is claiming to be the original 80% Polymer JIG-LESS lower and thats not true at all unless this company is also know as DIYLOWER. The lowers I purchased last winter and posted on here had two different colors letting you know what to remove out of the FCG. EP lowers is claiming something I can vouch is not true. Maybe you guys are the same company in that case my bad. As for the lowers... well I screwed up due to being too excited to get it done and the other one that went to a friend is his boys dedicated .22. I'll probably get another one from DIYLOWER or EP Lowers once I get some free time so I can take slower this time around.I never did see any of the pictures of this 80% poly lower. Does anybody have a link or a way to find out what they were? Thanks
  sharxbyte
  10-09-2013, 5:11 PM
  tagged for progress.. I ordered one from polymer80, and saw an ad on craigslist for 66 something rather... But I'm still slightly skeptical. I'll make it into a .223 pistol for my wife, or register it as an AW and let her have an SBR. something fun like that. My next aluminium 80 will replace the current one I have, and my current one will become a dedicated bolt lower.
  FireArms101
  10-09-2013, 6:34 PM
  So do these polymer 80% sellers like DIYLOWER, Polymer80 and EP Lowers actually have them in stock or are they made to order?tagged for progress.. I ordered one from polymer80, and saw an ad on craigslist for 66 something rather... But I'm still slightly skeptical. I'll make it into a .223 pistol for my wife, or register it as an AW and let her have an SBR. something fun like that. My next aluminium 80 will replace the current one I have, and my current one will become a dedicated bolt lower.
  67goat
  10-09-2013, 7:14 PM
  Ep lowers has them is stock. Polymer80 does not (and still hasn't satisfied pre orders). DIY I don't know, as I couldn't find a site for them.And FYI, the lowers you bought do not appear to be jigless. The FCP may have been a different color, but I see no markings, guides, or color differentiation for the selector hole or either of the pin holes. That means you would have to jig up, use a pattern, or measure before drilling those holes. The ep lowers have guide posts with divots at the end to make it truly jigless.
  FireArms101
  10-09-2013, 7:25 PM
  Awesome. Thanks for the info I can't wait to order one from each and compare them.Ep lowers has them is stock. Polymer80 does not (and still hasn't satisfied pre orders). DIY I don't know, as I couldn't find a site for them.
  And FYI, the lowers you bought do not appear to be jigless. The FCP may have been a different color, but I see no markings, guides, or color differentiation for the selector hole or either of the pin holes. That means you would have to jig up, use a pattern, or measure before drilling those holes. The ep lowers have guide posts with divots at the end to make it truly jigless.
  tal3nt
  10-09-2013, 8:20 PM
  Pics arent showing up for me. Are they these?http://www.calguns.net/calgunforum/showthread.php?t=788458
  67goat
  10-10-2013, 9:29 AM
  Pics on the first page aren't showing, but you should see two pictures on the second. I don't think OP got EP lowers because they have a fixed trigger guard. His have the standard open guards, plus no fire rate markings or guide pins/divots (from what I read, early ep prototypes had starter holes, then they moved to posts to ensure 80% status).
  FireArms101
  10-16-2013, 12:55 AM
  I got in touch with DIYLower.com (http://www.diylower.com) over the phone about getting another polymer 80% and they said they've put a pause on orders for now because they are "working on something much bigger that will change the entire gun industry". Got kinda excited and I asked for more info and was denied. So it looks like I'll have to order some from either EPLowers.com (http://www.EPLowers.com), Polymer80.com (http://www.Polymer80.com) and or this new place I found called Poly80.com (http://www.Poly80.com) I'll probably get one from each vendor to compare them and post my pictures and findings.
  anthonywwalker
  10-17-2013, 10:24 PM
  Got these in the mail today from EP Lowers. They were discounted to $35 each as blems but damned if I can see anything wrong with them, other than the ghastly zombie green color.
  Rock6.3
  10-18-2013, 8:44 AM
  Got these in the mail today from EP Lowers. They were discounted to $35 each as blems but damned if I can see anything wrong with them, other than the ghastly zombie green color.See if the takedown pins are properly placed by attaching an upper.
  fotoman
  10-19-2013, 3:36 PM
  Polymer lowers aren't bad at all.I picked up this Bushmaster Carbon a few years ago at Turner's in Chino Hills. Looking at the lower and bolt carrier, I was a little concerned but the sales guy assured me it was as durable as aluminum.Since then my sons an I fired hundreds and hundreds of rounds without any problems at all. What I really like is the finish, it doesn't get shiny with the normal scratches and scuffs.http://i586.photobucket.com/albums/ss301/mario_fotos/photo_zps91a9fb27.jpg
  TopGun3
  11-03-2013, 8:16 AM
  Actually ares armor is manufacturing these and selling them. They have put 10,000+ rounds thru it without any issues. Go to aresarmor.com
  gsc3zny
  11-03-2013, 10:38 PM
  I drilled out the selector pin holes stepping up the drill bits to 3/8 and now when I put in the selector lever, it is off set and not flush. I have attached pics. Anyone else run across this?
  Actually ares armor is manufacturing these and selling them. They have put 10,000+ rounds thru it without any issues. Go to aresarmor.comThey are just reselling them, not making them.
  kris smith
  11-11-2013, 7:11 AM
  I just bought one if these on a whim any one having any real issues with them ? And what size are the holes that have to be drilled ?
  pdsmith505
  11-11-2013, 7:27 AM
  I drilled out the selector pin holes stepping up the drill bits to 3/8 and now when I put in the selector lever, it is off set and not flush. I have attached pics. Anyone else run across this?Looks like you didn't drill the hole perpendicular to the receiver.
  fonzy
  11-11-2013, 3:38 PM
  I have the same problem. Never had any issues with my aluminum 80s I have done. Don't rely on their markings they were wrong on mine.Perpendicular nothing. I know it was done correctly I used the drill press and the mill and have done others. Just make sure you measure correctly.
  vBulletin® v3.8.7, Copyright (C)2000-2013, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.
Undetectable Firearms Modernization Act (H.R. 1474) - GovTrack.us
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 22:42
  GovTrack's Bill SummaryWe don't have a summary available yet.
  Library of Congress SummaryThe summary below was written by the Congressional Research Service, which is a nonpartisan division of the Library of Congress.
  4/10/2013--Introduced.
  Undetectable Firearms Modernization Act - Amends the Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988 to:
  (1) delay the repeal date for 10 years; and
  (2) extend coverage of, and exemptions under, the Act to undetectable firearm receivers and ammunition magazines.
  Prohibits the manufacture, importation, sale, shipment, delivery, possession, transfer, or receipt of any receiver for a rifle or handgun, or of any ammunition magazine, that:
  (1) is manufactured by a person who is not a licensed manufacturer;
  (2) is not as detectable as the Receiver Security Exemplar or the Magazine Security Exemplar by walk-through metal detectors; or
  (3) does not generate an image that accurately depicts the shape of a receiver or a magazine when subjected to inspection by airport x-ray machines.
  Allows barium sulfate or other compounds to be used in the fabrication of a firearm receiver.
  Defines a "Receiver Security Exemplar" and a "Magazine Security Exemplar" as objects fabricated at the direction of the Attorney General that are:
  (1) constructed, respectively, of 3.7 ounces of material type 17-4 PH stainless steel in a shape resembling the lower receiver for a rifle or handgun or of 1 ounce of material type 17-4 PH stainless steel in a shape resembling an ammunition magazine; and
  (2) suitable for testing and calibrating metal detectors.
  Directs the Attorney General to promulgate regulations to permit receivers or magazines that were previously prohibited but that become as detectable as the respective Exemplar in view of advances in weapons detection technology.
  House Republican Conference SummaryThe summary below was written by the House Republican Conference, which is the caucus of Republicans in the House of Representatives.
  No summary available.
  House Democratic Caucus SummaryThe House Democratic Caucus does not provide summaries of bills.
  So, yes, we display the House Republican Conference's summaries when available even if we do not have a Democratic summary available. That's because we feel it is better to give you as much information as possible, even if we cannot provide every viewpoint.
  We'll be looking for a source of summaries from the other side in the meanwhile.
House Approves 10-Year Extension on Plastic Gun Ban | Video | TheBlaze.com
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 22:36
  The House of Representatives voted Tuesday in favor of a 10-year extension for the Undetectable Firearms Act.Some Democrats were more in favor of a shorter extension to give lawmakers more time to tighten restrictions on plastic guns and the machines '-- 3-D printers '-- that can make them instead. Currently, those making 3-D printed guns must included a metal component that can be detected. The Senate returns from break next week, just one day before the original ban under the Undetectable Firearms Act expires. Cody Wilson firing the ''Liberator,'' Defense Distributed's first fully function, 100 percent 3D-printed gun. (Image source: YouTube)
  WASHINGTON (TheBlaze/AP) '-- Congress voted to extend the 25-year-old prohibition against firearms that can evade metal detectors and X-ray machines, just days before the ban would have expired. Spurred on by the recent advances in 3-D printing techniques, some Democrats, gun control advocates and law enforcement officials believe the restrictions must also be tightened.
  The Republican-led House approved the 10-year extension of the ban on Tuesday. Democrats' preference would have been to also require permanent metal components that would make plastic firearms more detectable.
  ''We can't let a minute or hour or day go by without having a renewal'' of the ban, said Brian Malte, a director of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence.
  The Democratic-run Senate returns from a two-week Thanksgiving break next Monday, the day before the ban expires. Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said he will seek fast approval of a measure renewing the ban and tightening the restrictions.
  But many believe the Senate will then accept the House bill, thanks to the imminent deadline and the eagerness of Democratic senators seeking re-election next year in GOP-leaning states to avoid difficult votes in a fresh battle over gun control.
  The measure is being debated in the shadow of the first anniversary of the massacre last Dec. 14 of 20 first-graders and six staffers at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn. Those shootings prompted a drive by President Barack Obama and his gun control allies to expand background checks for firearms buyers and other restrictions, which Senate Republicans squelched last April.
  The National Rifle Association, which helped defeat last spring's background check measure, has said nothing publicly about whether it supports extending the ban on undetectable firearms.
  But congressional aides and lobbyists say the group supports the renewal but opposes efforts to tighten the curbs. A longer renewal would limit Democrats' opportunities to use bills extending the ban to include other gun restrictions.
  NRA officials did not answer repeated efforts to reach them.
  In a letter to lawmakers last month, the smaller National Shooting Sports Foundation '-- representing the nation's gun-makers and retailers '-- said it backs the extension but opposes added restrictions on undetectable guns.
  ''We are always concerned that laws and regulations do not hamper the ability of our members to take advantage of technological advancements,'' the group wrote.
  The conservative Gun Owners of America opposes the extension, saying such laws wouldn't stop criminals intent on printing weapons.
  ''They've just spent all year trying to effectively destroy the gun lobby,'' Mike Hammond, legislative counsel of the small group, said of Democrats. ''So why in heaven's name, given this intransigence, should we give them this Christmas present?''
  The ban was first enacted in 1988 under President Ronald Reagan, when today's computer and weapons technologies were in their early stages. It was renewed in 1998 and 2003.
  Fast forward to 2013, a world where 3-D printers can spray repeated, thin layers of plastic or other materials to create objects from toys to automobile parts to medical devices. They are being used increasingly by companies, researchers and hobbyists, and the technology is constantly improving.
  The use of 3-D printers to make guns received heightened attention in May when Cody Wilson, then a University of Texas law student, posted blueprints online for using the printers to make the Liberator pistol, which he says he designed.
  3-D-printed components of the Liberator. (Image source: WikiWep DevBlog)
  Wilson included a metal piece in the gun to make it detectable, per the law.
  Watch the Liberator in action:
  Wilson, founder of Defense Distributed, a nonprofit that advocates the free distribution of information on 3-D printed weapons, was ordered by the State Department to take down the instructions after two days because of allegedly violating arms export controls, he said.
  At that point, the plans had already been downloaded more than 100,000 times and they remain available on file-sharing websites, he said.
  ''If you want to do this, it's plainly obvious there's no one standing between you, your computer and your 3-D printer. Anyone can make this gun,'' Wilson said Monday.
  Here's more of Defense Distributed's opinion blogged on its WikiWep DevBlog ahead of the vote:
  Sections 4 and 5 of the proposed House bill directly criminalize 3D printed receivers and magazines, and mandate an arbitrary amount of metal be part of their fabrication. Beyond suffering from fatal Due Process and GCA problems, the bill's prohibitions are not extended to manufacturers because (hint) there isn't actually a security issue at stake. The bad faith and fraud required to hide this from the current public discussion is of course par for the course. The media organs have dutifully repeated the official account.
  The NRA used to say ''no inroads.'' You can make gun parts on 3D printers now, just like you can and have been able to mill them for about the last few hundred years. Guns aren't allowed on airplanes and in courthouses. Now that it has reached a new level of visibility and popularity, the usual suspects would like to suppress the adoption of the digital manufacture of firearms. The goal of a new Undetectable Firearms Act is to make development and experimentation with these computer-aided devices fraught with danger and difficulty for the common man; to raise again the lowered barrier to entry to DIY gunsmithing, and to enable a means for arbitrary and capricious enforcement- like any good police state should.
  The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives said 3-D printers can cost from $1,000 to $500,000 but can also be leased.
  ''There are people who will go to any expense, there are groups who will go to any expense if the result is an undetectable firearm,'' said James Pasco, executive director of the Washington office of the Fraternal Order of Police, representing law enforcement officers.
  Earlier this year, ATF tested two guns made from different plastics using Wilson's Liberator design. While one exploded when fired, the other shot eight rounds before ATF halted the test. Watch the demo of the version that exploded:
  ''The undetectable firearm threat has become real,'' agency spokesman Timothy Graden said in an emailed statement.
  The expiring law forbids firearms that aren't spotted by airport X-ray screening machines or metal detectors. To meet that requirement, today's plastic guns often come with a metal part that can be detached and isn't necessary for the weapon to function.
  The GOP-written House measure extends that language for another decade.
  A bill by Rep. Steve Israel, D-N.Y., would require that such weapons have permanently attached working parts, such as the cylinder, containing at least 3.7 ounces of metal. Schumer, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., are working on similar legislation.
  ''The House bill is better than nothing, but it's not good enough,'' Schumer said Monday.
  On Nov. 21, Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., blocked a Schumer request for immediate, unanimous Senate approval of a one-year extension of the ban. Tensions were high because earlier that day, Democrats had muscled through changes making it harder for Republicans to block Obama nominations.
  Later, Iowa Sen. Charles Grassley '-- top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee '-- characterized Schumer's abrupt request as ''playing politics with public safety.'' He said Republicans preferred a longer renewal.
  ''
Kal Penn - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 22:15
  Kal Penn (born Kalpen Suresh Modi; April 23, 1977) is an American actor, producer, and civil servant.
  As an actor, he is known for his role portraying Dr. Lawrence Kutner on the television program House, as well as the character Kumar Patel in the Harold and Kumar film series. He is also recognized for his performance in the critically acclaimed film, The Namesake. Additionally, Penn has taught at the University of Pennsylvania in the Cinema Studies Program as a visiting lecturer.
  On April 8, 2009, it was announced that Penn would join the Obama administration as an Associate Director in the White House Office of Public Engagement.[1] This necessitated that his character, Lawrence Kutner, be written out of the TV series House.[1][2] Penn resigned his post as Barack Obama's Associate Director of Public Engagement on June 1, 2010, for a brief return to his acting career.[3] He filmed the third installment of the Harold and Kumar series, A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas, and subsequently returned to the White House Office of Public Engagement as an Associate Director.[4] In July 2011, he again left the White House to accept a role in How I Met Your Mother.[5] He has since returned to his role with the White House.
  Early childhood and personal life[edit]Penn was born Kalpen Suresh Modi in Montclair, New Jersey, to a HinduIndian family. His mother, Asmita, is a fragrance evaluator for a perfume company, and his father, Suresh Modi, is an engineer.[6][7] Both of his parents are Gujarati immigrants from India.[8] He has stated that stories of his grandparents marching with Mahatma Gandhi for Indian independence were a significant influence on his interest in politics.[9]
  He attended Marlboro Middle School in Marlboro Township, New Jersey and played baritone saxophone in the jazz band there. Penn attended The Fine and Performing Arts Academy (a magnet program) at Howell High School for freshman, sophomore, and junior years; he transferred to Freehold Township High School for senior year; both schools are part of the Freehold Regional High School District. He was active in the schools' theater productions and competed on the Freehold Township forensics team. He attended UCLA, where he double majored in film and sociology.[10] Penn is vegetarian and ate veggie sliders during the filming of Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle.[11]
  Acting career[edit]Penn's feature film debut came in 1998 in Express: Aisle to Glory. He has since appeared in American Desi, National Lampoon's Van Wilder, the final episode of The Lonely Island, Malibu's Most Wanted, A Lot Like Love, Dude, Where's the Party?, Love Don't Cost a Thing, Superman Returns, National Lampoon's Van Wilder: The Rise of Taj, Epic Movie, The Namesake, the Harold and Kumar series, and an uncredited appearance in Deck the Halls.
  Penn says that he derived his acting name, Kal Penn, as a lark: "Almost as a joke to prove friends wrong, and half as an attempt to see if what I was told would work (that anglicized names appeal more to a white-dominated industry), I put 'Kal Penn' on my resume and photos." His audition callbacks rose by 50 percent. He has stated that he prefers his birth name and uses "Kal Penn" only for professional purposes.
  In January 2007, Penn appeared in the first four episodes of the sixth season of 24 as Ahmed Amar, a teenage terrorist. Penn says he nearly turned down the role due to personal ethics, stating: "I have a huge political problem with the role. It was essentially accepting a form of racial profiling. I think it's repulsive. But it was the first time I had a chance to blow stuff up and take a family hostage. As an actor, why shouldn't I have that opportunity? Because I'm brown and I should be scared about the connection between media images and people's thought processes?"[12]
  Also in January 2007, he appeared in the spoof comedy Epic Movie as well as the television show Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. In May 2007, Penn received the Asian Excellence Award for Outstanding Actor for his performance in The Namesake.[13]
  In fall 2007, Penn joined the cast of the Fox medical drama House as a fellowship applicant.[14]E! reported that Penn had signed on as a regular on the show along with Olivia Wilde and Peter Jacobson and this was confirmed in the plot of the episode "Games". Penn continued with the series through to the episode "Simple Explanation", which aired April 6, 2009. He made an additional appearance as Lawrence Kutner on the fifth season finale, "Both Sides Now", that aired on May 11, 2009. However, due to his new job at the White House, Penn could not be present for the filming of this episode. The clip of him saying "Too bad it isn't true" was taken from a previous filming. Penn returned to the show for the series finale.[15]
  Beside his role on the TV series House, he is best known from his role in Harold & Kumar, as Kumar Patel, a cannabis smoker who goes with Harold Lee (John Cho) to White Castle for a hamburger. Unlike his character, he does not smoke marijuana, claiming it is not for him,[16] nor does he eat meat.
  Penn was recurring on How I Met Your Mother for the seventh season of the show,[17] in which he played Kevin, a therapist and later boyfriend of Robin Scherbatsky. Starting May 1, 2013, Penn hosts Big Brain Theory: Pure Genius on the Discovery Channel.[18] On May 10, 2013, it was announced that Penn would join the cast of We Are Men.[19]
  Political interests[edit]Penn was an advocate for Barack Obama's presidential campaign in 2007 and 2008 and a member of Obama's National Arts Policy Committee.[20] He appears in the Barack Obama-supporting video "S­ Se Puede Cambiar" by Andres Useche[21] and appeared with comedian George Lopez on January 18, 2009, at "We Are One: The Obama Inaugural Celebration at the Lincoln Memorial".
  In early 2009, Penn was offered the position of Associate Director of the White House Office of Public Engagement in the Obama administration, which he accepted. This necessitated his character Lawrence Kutner being written out of the TV series House.[1][22][23] In his new role with the Obama administration, Modi served as a liaison with the Asian-American and Pacific Islander communities.[24] He had gone back to using his birth name, Kalpen Modi.[25]
  Having made a commitment before his employment at the White House, Penn amicably left his post as Barack Obama's associate director of public engagement on June 1, 2010 to return to his acting career.[3] He returned to office on November 15, 2010, following completion of A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas.[26]
  In February 2012, it was announced that Penn would be a co-chair for the re-election campaign of President Barack Obama.[27] On September 3, 2012, Obama for America released a video featuring President Obama and Penn which announced that Penn would host the September 6 coverage of the 2012 Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina.[28] Penn's speech at the convention encouraged young people to register to vote and defended Obama's record.[29][30]
  Other activities[edit]In 2008, Penn served as a visiting lecturer in Asian American Studies at the University of Pennsylvania.[10][31] His course was titled "Images of Asian Americans in the Media."[32] In 2010, Penn wrote an article in the Huffington Post, responding to a Time Magazine article, which he said had contained racist comments against Indian immigrants in New Jersey.[33] Penn is currently working on a graduate certificate in international security from Stanford University.[1][10]
  Filmography[edit]Film[edit]Television[edit]See also[edit]References[edit]^ abcdAusiello, Michael (April 7, 2009). "'House' exclusive: The shocking story behind last night's big death". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved 2009-04-07.^"It'll be the White House for Kal Penn now". Rediff.com, April 7, 2009. Retrieved 2009-04-07.^ abRoberts, Roxanne; Argetsinger, Amy (June 22, 2010). "Kalpen Modi, aka Kal Penn, aka Kumar, leaves the White House, returns to showbiz". WashingtonPost.com (The Washington Post). Retrieved June 23, 2010. ^"Kalpen Modi Returns To White House Job After Leaving To Film 'Harold & Kumar' Sequel". The Note blog. ABC News. November 15, 2010. Retrieved 2010-11-17. ^"Kal Penn to leave White House again". Click blog. Politico.com. July 14, 2011. Retrieved 2013-06-14. ^Chivukula, Som (April 12, 2002). "Article: Kal Penn's do's and don'ts". India Abroad. Retrieved 2010-04-02 '' via HighBeam. ^Yuan-Kwan Chan (October 16, 2007). "Happy Birthday, Asian American Arts Alliance". Meniscuszine.com. Retrieved 2011-02-28. ^Chhabra, Aseem (April 22, 2005). Kal Penn: Hollywood's Desi No1!. Rediff.com. Retrieved 2009-04-07.^"Kumar Goes to the White House (airdate April 10, 2009)" (Flash video). The Rachel Maddow Show. MSNBC. Retrieved 2011-02-28. ^ abcActor Kal Penn to Teach at the University of Pennsylvania. University of Pennsylvania Office of University Communications, 2007-03-26. Retrieved 2009-04-07.^"10 Things You Didn't Know About Kal Penn". USnews.com. April 8, 2009. Retrieved 2013-04-19. ^Yuan, Jada (2007-03-04). "The White-Castle Ceiling". New York magazine. Retrieved 2009-04-07.^"Asian Excellence Awards '' Winners (archive)". azntv.com. May 2007. Archived from the original on 2008-02-13. Retrieved 2011-02-28. ^"'House' gets a new group of trainees". CNN. Archived from the original on 2007-08-16. Retrieved July 18, 2007. ^Hibberd, James (March 22, 2012). "'House' finale scoop: Kal Penn in talks to return". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved March 22, 2012. ^"Kal Penn Does Not Smoke Marijuana". The Insider. showbiznews.info. April 26, 2008. Archived from the original on 2008-07-14. Retrieved 2010-05-04. ^"THIS JUST IN: Kal Penn joining How I Met Your Mother". How I Met Your Mother. CBS official Facebook page. July 13, 2011. Retrieved 2011-07-14. ^"Kal Penn, host of the Discovery Channel's The Big Brain Theory : Discovery Channel". Discovery.com. March 13, 2013. Retrieved 2013-05-06. ^Ausiello, Michael (May 10, 2013). "Fall TV Scoop: CBS Picks Up 8 Series, Including Sarah Michelle Gellar's Crazy Comedy, Josh Holloway's Intelligence and Chuck Lorre's Mom". Fall TV Scoop. TVline.com. Retrieved 2013-06-07. ^Penn, Kal. "Open Letter to Two Undeclared College Superdelegates". The Huffington Post, May 11, 2008. Retrieved 2009-04-07.^Joshi, Monika (February 4, 2008). "Actor Kal Penn roots for Obama". Rediff.com. Retrieved 2009-04-07.^"It'll be the White House for Kal Penn now". Rediff.com. April 7, 2009. Retrieved 2009-04-07.^"Kal Penn Leaves House for the White House". Tvguide.com. April 7, 2009. Retrieved 2011-02-28. ^"'House' actor Kal Penn joins White House team". news.yahoo.com. AP. April 7, 2009. Retrieved 2013-06-14. ^Choudhury, Uttara (July 8, 2009). "You can call me Kalpen Modi". DNA (Daily News & Analysis). Retrieved 2009-08-18.^"Kalpen Modi Returns To White House Job After Leaving To Film 'Harold & Kumar' Sequel". Blogs.abcnews.com. November 15, 2010. Retrieved 2011-02-28. ^"Obama campaign announces co-chairs". Politico.Com. February 22, 2012. Retrieved 2013-05-06. ^"Watch the 2012 Democratic National Convention Live on BarackObama.com". BarackObama.com YouTube channel. 2012-09-03. Retrieved 2013-05-06. ^Wing, Nick (2012-09-04). "Kal Penn Speech At Democratic Convention: My Four-Letter Word Is 'Vote'". huffingtonpost.com. Retrieved 2012-09-08. ^"Kal Penn's DNC Speech". The Daily Conversation's YouTube Channel. 2012-09-04. Retrieved 2013-05-06. ^Schwedel, Heather (2007-03-26)."Kal Penn to teach at Penn". The Daily Pennsylvanian. Retrieved 2009-04-07.^"Asian American Studies Program at University of Pennsylvania". Asam.sas.upenn.edu. Retrieved 2011-02-28. ^Penn, Kal (July 2, 2010). "The 'Hilarious' Xenophobia of Time's Joel Stein". Huffington Post.External links[edit]PersondataNameModi, KalpenAlternative namesShort descriptionIndian actorDate of birthApril 23, 1977Place of birthMontclair, New JerseyDate of deathPlace of death
VIDEO- Calling All Young People: White House Youth Summit Preview - YouTube
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 22:06
Can This Video Save Obamacare? - WellBeeFile
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 22:04
  Erin McDonald '' the winner of Young Invincibles' Healthy Young American video contest '' knows from personal experience how important it is to be covered.
  As someone with type I diabetes, without the Affordable Care Act, Erin might currently be in a very bad spot.
  The law school grad has type I diabetes, and at 26, was recently dropped from her parent's insurance plan.
  Like many millennials, Erin has found it difficult to find work in the present economy. Despite her law degree, she had to move back with her parents in Chicago while she continues her job search.
  Yet while she can live under her parents' roof, Erin has exceeded the age at which she can remained covered under their insurance. Nor does her part time work in environmental law for the City of Chicago provide her with healthcare coverage.
  As someone with a medical condition, without the Affordable Care Act, Erin might currently be in a very bad spot. Without health insurance, her medical expenses could be through the roof. She's at risk of being hospitalized and she has the ongoing expenses of medications, an insulin pump, and regular doctor visits.
  So in the months leading up to her 26th birthday, she and her parents searched desperately for a private plan that would cover her, but she was consistently rejected because of her preexisting condition.
  As the day she would be kicked off the plan loomed, the family began to stockpile insulin and insulin pump supplies. ''We had no idea how I was going to get health care coverage,'' Erin says.
  But then her mother received an email about County Care, a Medicaid program being implemented under the Affordable Care Act to insure uninsured adults in Cook County, Illinois. And as part of the Affordable Care Act's mandate, diabetes could not disqualify Erin from coverage under County Care. ''It covers everything I need,'' she says. ''I cannot express in words how relieved I was.''
  As the day she would be kicked off her plan loomed, the family began to stockpile insulin and insulin pump supplies.
  It was in the process of looking for health insurance that Erin stumbled upon the young invincibles's video contest, which asked young people to submit videos explaining why it's important to get covered. Erin decided to create a video because she knows it's easy not to be worried about health insurance when you are young and feel invincible. As she put it:
  ''I think it's difficult for young people to understand how important coverage is when they haven't been sick '... There's a mentality that nothing is ever going to happen to you, and I think it's difficult to understand that something can happen to you, that you're taking a risk every day.''
  A talented singer, Erin chose to try to spread this message through an adaptation of Jessie J's song ''Price Tag.''
  ''I wanted to make a parody of an upbeat song so that people realized that the ACA is positively affecting many lives '' including mine,'' she says. Here's a sample:
  You're young and wild and free, but you need to stay healthy. There's no excuse to be uninsured. Just stop for a minute and think. You're not immune to all disease.
  Don't need a lot of money, money, money to stay young and healthy, healthy, healthy.
  We just want to make it more fair with affordable health care.
  Erin wrote the lyrics in a couple of days, and then used her webcam to record herself singing.
  In contrast to some of the other videos '' like this one, which has the host being hit by a car '' Erin's does not take a ''scare tactic'' approach. Rather, she chose to focus on the accessibility of health insurance under Obamacare.
  Erin's video doesn't use special effects or computer graphics, but the simple sincerity of her message shines through. It is clear just from watching her video how significant the issue is to Erin.
  ''I'm very excited to have won, and I hope that my song spreads a little bit of positive light on the Affordable Care Act, amongst all the negativity and misinformation that's out there. That's what I was basically trying to do with my song.''
  The winner was announced last night during a Google+ Hangout for the White House Youth Summit.
  You can watch Erin's and all the videos in the competition here. ''Jake Bleiberg
Announcing the Winners of the Healthy Young America Video Contest | The White House
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 21:49
  Back in August 2013, Young Invincibles, in partnership with the Department of Health and Human Services, launched the Healthy Young America Video Contest, an effort to mobilize young people to help educate and inform one another about the Affordable Care Act. Participants submitted their videos, the public weighed in, and a finalist was selected in each of three categories: "You Are Not Invincible," original song performance, and animation.
  Erin McDonald was announced as the overall Grand Prize winner with her video "Forget about the Price Tag" in a Google+ Hangout featuring Kal Penn and White House Health Care policy expert Christen Linke Young on December 2.
  During the Hangout, Christen and Kal also helped preview the White House Youth Summit coming up on December 4 and took questions about what the Affordable Care Act means for young people. You can tune into the Youth Summit starting at 2:00 pm ET on whitehouse.gov/live.
  Watch Erin's video below, and also check out videos from finalists in the other two categories.
  Grand Prize & Perform a Song Winner:Forget About the Price Tag: Erin McDonald
  You Are Not Invincible Category WinnerNobody's Invincible: Travis Grenier
  Animation Category WinnerGetting the Big Picture on Affordable Health Care: Maggie Ditre
There's a £60m Bitcoin heist going down right now, and you can watch in real-time
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 20:56
  Sheep Marketplace closed down over the weekend after someone got away with 96,000 bitcoins - and angry users are chasing him around the internet.
  Some fan-made physical bitcoins. (Photo: antanacoins/Flickr)
  One of the largest heists in bitcoin history is happening right now. 96,000 bitcoins - that's roughly £60m as of the time of writing - was taken from the accounts of customers, vendors and administrators of the Sheep Marketplace over the weekend.
  Sheep was one of the main sites that came to replace the Silk Road when it closed in October, but it too has now closed as a result of this theft. It's a little hard to work out exactly what's happened, but Sheep customers have been piecing it together on reddit's r/sheepmarketplace.
  Here's what happened: someone (or some group) managed to fake the balances in peoples' accounts on the site, showing that they had their bitcoins in their wallets when they'd actually been transferred out. Over the course of a week the whole site was drained, until the weekend when the site's administrators realised what was happening and shut everything down.
  Originally it was thought that only 5,200BTC - or £3m - was taken, with a message posted on Sheep's homepage blaming a vendor called "EBOOK101" for finding and exploiting a bug. However, over the weekend it became clear that the amount stolen was much, much larger.
  In a normal robbery that money would be gone by now, but it isn't. Bitcoin is pseudonymous, not anonymous, and bitcoins can't just disappear. It works because each and every transaction is public and visible to each and every other person using the Bitcoin network, and a person is only as anonymous as their link to their wallet.
  A couple of reddit users realised that the sheer size of the heist makes ''tumbling'' the coins - the normal method of laundering bitcoins - impossible, as long as they kept on their toes. Someone with bitcoin can send some to a tumbler like bitcoinfog, where it will be split into smaller subdivisions and mixed with other bitcoins from other places, recombining and splitting again several times over until the whole amount eventually comes out the other end, theoretically in such a way that it's impossible to track. Silk Road's in-built tumbler successfully foiled the FBI, allegedly.
  However, reddit user TheNodManOut managed to track where the first bunch of transfers out of Sheep went, and from there and silkroadreloaded2 worked out which tumbler that the thief was using. Here's how silkroadreloaded2 describes what's happened since (''Tomas'' is the alleged owner of Sheep, and one of the suspects for many users):
  All day, we've been chasing the scoundrel with our stolen bitcoins through the blockchain. Around lunchtime (UK), I was chasing him across the roof of a moving train, (metaphorically). I was less than 20 minutes, or 2 blockchain confirmations, behind "Tomas".
  He was desperately creating new wallet addresses and moving his 49 retirement wallets through them, but having to wait for 3 or 4 confirmations each time before moving them again. Each time I caught up, I "666"ed him - sent 0.00666 bitcoins to mess up his lovely round numbers like 4,000. Then,all of a sudden, decimal places started appearing, and fractions of bitcoins were jumping from wallet to wallet like grasshoppers on a hotplate without stopping for confirmations.
  Shit!
  He was tumbling our stolen bitcoins a second time, and a tumbler is unbeatable....
  Unless you guess which one it is, nearly all the coins belong to the person you're tracking, jump in with him, and get jumbled up through the same wallets using the same algorithm. I was hopping from foot to foot shouting "come on!" at my laptop, waiting an age for 6 blockchain confirmations to get 0.5 btc into "bitcoin fog". My half a bitcoin got sliced and diced through loads of wallets and I followed the biggest chunk with blockchain.info - along with 96,000 stolen ones!
  Or, in other words:
  He gathered 96,000 in one pot, then split it into about 50 smaller ones. then he saw me 666ing them all. Imagine a sports stadium with 96,000 people in it, each with $1000.
  He sent them all via different routes all over the world, but the same 96,000 people then arrived at a different stadium and he went to bed.
  Now there are 96,001, and I just phoned you on my mobile to tell you where the stadium is.
  A major problem with tumblers is that they only work with lots of bitcoins coming and going from a lot of different sources - if a tumbler is taking in 96,000 bitcoins, those will massively outnumber all other bitcoins being tumbled and it'll be easy to spot them coming out the other end. Mix in a little of your own with all those other ones and you'll find out the wallet addresses that the tumbler uses, and it should be easy to spot large transactions splitting off from there.
  The fascinating consequence of this is that you can see the stolen bitcoins on the public blockchain, and as long as there are people keeping tabs on it there's going to be no way for the thief to cash in on their haul. Considering how people rely on tumblers to maintain anonymity when buying illegal stuff online, this unusual loophole is something of a revelation.
  Right now, as you're reading this, you can watch as the the thief starts trying to move their bitcoins on again - it's currently down to 92,000 bitcoins and dropping as smaller chunks begin going out. Selling those bitcoins and turning them into cash is going to be extremely difficult, as the major Bitcoin exchanges all demand proof of identity (specifically to avoid charges that they're involved in money laundering), and if they're broken down into smaller quantities to sell via a site like localbitcoins.com a paper trail will still be generated. As soon as it's possible to link one real-life bank account or identity to any bitcoins from that stash, it will be possible to work out their real-life identity.
  This counts as one of the largest robberies in history at Bitcoin's current market value, ranking in the same company as real-life thefts like the $108m diamond theft at the Harry Winston store in Paris in 2008. 96,000 bitcoins also places the thief as one of the wealthiest Bitcoin millionaires on the current rich list (but bear in mind that few serious Bitcoin players keep their currency in just one wallet) - and all without having to go to the trouble of wearing balaclavas or threatening someone with a gun.
  Let's watch and see what happens next.
Tell Us More About The Sandy Hook Custodian '' The Real One | We Want Truth Now
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  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 20:16
  CUSTODIAN '' WHO ACTUALLY WAS RUNNING DOWN THE HALLS?
  School nurse Sally Cox,[36] 60, hid under a desk in her office and described the door opening and seeing Lanza's boots and legs facing her desk from approximately 20 feet (6.1 m) away. He remained standing for a few seconds before turning around and leaving. She and school secretary Barbara Halstead then hid in a first-aid supply closet for up to four hours, after calling 9-1-1.[37] Custodian Rick Thorne ran through hallways, alerting classrooms.[38]
  WIKIPEDIA
  Jan 12, 2013 '' Bottom of article says updated Jan 12, 2013
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_Hook_Elementary_School_shooting#cite_note-abclocal-38
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_Hook_Elementary_School_shooting
  ^ Christoffersen, John (December 14, 2012). ''20 children, 6 adults killed at Connecticut school''. Associated Press. ABC News. Retrieved December 15, 2012.
  http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/national_world&id=8920117
  NOT A SINGLE MENTION OF ANY CUSTODIAN IN THIS ARTICLE. Where did the name come from?
  https://www.google.com/search?q=Custodian+Rick+Thorne&oq=Custodian+Rick+Thorne&aqs=chrome.0.57&sugexp=chrome,mod=3&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#hl=en&safe=off&tbo=d&sclient=psy-ab&q=Custodian+Rick+Thorne&oq=Custodian+Rick+Thorne&gs_l=serp.12'...0.0.1.22651.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0..0.0.les%3B..0.0'...1c.Ob-FQqoboz0&psj=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.r_qf.&bvm=bv.1357700187,d.dmQ&fp=70f902665fe3d8c&biw=1152&bih=518
  Google search
  Sandy Hook School Custodian Kevin J. Anzellotti
  getthetruthout.icyboards.net/showthread.php?mode'...tid'...Jan 5, 2013 '' Why hasn't custodian Rick Thorne been interviewed by any '... But according to wikipedia it was custodian Rick Thorne running thru the halls '...
  A Faustian Bargain for State Pension Plans '' Businessweek
  http://www.businessweek.com/'.../a-faustian-bargain-for-state-pensio'...Nov 29, 2012 '' Rick Thorne worked as a school custodian in Chelmsford, Mass., for more than two decades, earning $20 an hour cleaning floors, cutting grass, '...
  Rick Thorne
  http://www.sports-books.com/'.../article-popup.php?'...Rick%20Thor'...Rick Thorne worked as a custodian in Chelmsford, Mass., schools for 22 years, earning $20 an hour cleaning floors, cutting grass and setting up for assemblies '...
  A Faustian Bargain? Or Not? ~ gad-fly
  herdgadfly.blogspot.com/2012/'.../a-faustian-bargain-or-not.ht'...Dec 2, 2012 '' Rick Thorne worked as a custodian in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, schools for 22 years, earning $20 an hour cleaning floors, cutting grass and '...
  Rick Thorne '' Silobreaker
  silobreaker.com/rick-thorne-11_15107985Rick Thorne worked as a custodian in Chelmsford, Mass., schools for 22 years, earning $20 an hour cleaning floors, cutting grass and setting up for assemblies '...
  Pension Fund's Gains Mean Worker Pain as Aramark Slashes Pay
  washpost.bloomberg.com/Story?docId=1376'...Nov 20, 2012 '' 20 (Bloomberg) '-- Rick Thorne worked as a custodian in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, schools for 22 years, earning $20 an hour cleaning floors, '...
  Middlesex University, London latest news
  interceder.net/latest_news/Middlesex-University,-LondonRick Thorne worked as a custodian in Chelmsford, Mass., schools for 22 years, earning $20 an hour cleaning floors, cutting grass and setting up for assemblies '...
  Twitter Trackbacks for Pension Fund's Gains Mean Worker Pain as '...
  topsy.com/'.../Pension-Fund-s-Gains-Mean-Worker-Pain-as-40'...Rick Thorne worked as a custodian in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, schools for 22 years, earning $20 an hour cleaning floors, cutting grass and setting up for '...
  Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting '' Wikipedia, the free '...
  en.wikipedia.org/'.../Sandy_Hook_Elementary_School_shootin'...Custodian Rick Thorne ran through hallways, alerting classrooms. First grade teacher Kaitlin Roig, age 29, hid 14 students in a bathroom and barricaded the '...
  Public pension funds in conflict '' jgmobile.net '' Business | The '...
  http://www.jgmobile.net/article/'.../BIZ/'.../BIZ&template=mobileartShareDec 2, 2012 '' Rick Thorne worked as a custodian in Chelmsford, Mass., schools for 22 years, earning $20 an hour cleaning floors, cutting grass and setting '...
  ONE ARTICLE:
  http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-11-29/a-faustian-bargain-for-state-pension-plans
  Sandy Hook School Custodian Kevin J. Anzellotti
  FACEBOOK was on vacation never confirmed
  Did they just have to come up with someone a custodian to fill in the blanks? He was unemployed and on his pension would he hire out to Sandy Hook???? Making $1500 a month and then what as of NOV 29 still on pension.
  Jump for joy for a Sandy Hook Elementary janitor named Rick Thorne who did a Paul Revere run through the hallways after spotting the gunman, shouting, ''A gunman is coming! A gunman is coming!'' He checked to make sure the classroom doors were locked.
  http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/ssssssssss-article-1.1230029
  Like this:LikeLoading...
VIDEO-What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook Elementary
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 20:15
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  ThePaulstalServiceOffer UpgradeUser ID: 2536940 United States02/06/2013 01:02 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationWhat Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook Elementary100 Rounds AR-15 fire confused with "pots and pans falling" "the janitor setting up tables and rafters in the gym" and "someone kicking the door."
  Not one bloody shoe, or any bloody footprints leaving the school, and no reports of anyone kicking or stepping on any empty bullets shells as they exit.
  Where is Rick Thorne- the supposed hero janitor who told Adam Lanza to put his gun down?
  It appears as though Rick Thorne didn't even work at Sandy Hook- there is no video evidence of him, and the news has never tried to interview him.
  [link to www.youtube.com]
  ThePaulstalService
  Anonymous CowardUser ID: 5469786 United States02/06/2013 01:23 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryThe girl in the beginning just blows the whole timeline out.
  DiamondGalUser ID: 5598080 United States02/06/2013 01:58 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryThe reporter "Chris Cuomo" is the little brother of Andrew Cuomo, Governor of NYS who passed a gun control law very shortly after this event in CT.
  Anonymous CowardUser ID: 33001296 United States02/06/2013 02:13 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryKevin Anzellotti is supposedly the janitor... only saw Rick Thorne mentioned in that NYDN piece...[link to aangirfan.blogspot.com]
  BittercritterUser ID: 26255514 United States02/06/2013 04:09 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryNobody heard rifle shots because it was a shotgun that was the murder weapon. NOBODY except police have stated they heards "rifle" shots specifically.Every child describes the noise as janitors moving tables, thuds,booms, someone kicking a door, etc. Loud but dull noises very unlike high velocity bullets would make.I even found a shotgun shell in the parking lot. There's a picture of a cop with 2 women and child running from the front of the school.Look on the right behind the row of cars. Photo here: [link to www.pennlive.com]Ever wonder how the glass near the door had such a large hole blown in it? Wonder why the kids weren't shown to the parents post-mortem? Why Carver said "the long weapon was used"? Why the children were so disfigured that they had closed casket ceremonies? If you are shot in the face with a .223 it leaves a hole in the front. The back of the head might is where the real damage is. Morticians can easily plug holes in a body but can't reconstruct a face hit by a shotgun blast.
  Why seal the case for 90 days if it was a cut and dry murder/suicide mission by Adam Lanza? Why all the confusion over what weapons were found and where?
  Wonder why each victims was reported hit so many times? Buckshot was used which would be far more efficient for that type of mass slaughter. Same deal happened at Aurora - many victims but most only had a couple pellets of #4 shot.It also explains why they reported long rifles and shotguns on the police scanner less than 10 minutes after police arrived.
  Keep this in mind when you find more details. I'm 90% positive this is the case.
  HooleyDooleyUser ID: 1366524 Australia02/06/2013 07:49 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryI wish you had added in what was NOT heard, namely sirens.I made a youtube video but I'm crap at it so I am hoping someone will make a better vid incorperating the info.
  [link to www.youtube.com]
  Previous thread:
  Thread: Evidence showing sandy hook was a drill that didn't go live until 20min AFTER shooting.
  I would like someone to make a video showing that what people heard is more likely just simulated noise and unrealistic of over a hundred rounds of gunfire, coupled with nobody hearing sirens, meaning the police were already on site when the fake noises were first played over the speaker system (or arrived quietly without sirens).
  This combination makes a very strong case it was just a preplanned drill.
  I will watch the OP youtube vid later, I think the most damning testimony is Kaitlin Roig's, she was in the immediate area yet doesn't report loud noises, was able to talk to her kids in a loving and caring way while hundreds of shots and screaming going off right nest door... riiiight.
  One of her kids says he knows karate and he'll lead them out, this shows that even in the classes right next door to where the shooting supposedly occurred the noise was kept at a level that was not traumatic for the kids.
  I will watch it later when I'm at a better computer.
  Last Edited by HooleyDooley on 02/06/2013 07:59 PM
  Anonymous CowardUser ID: 23200542 United States02/06/2013 08:16 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryHere's the only mention of seeing blood that I have run across so far.Anonymous CowardUser ID: 33695605 United States02/06/2013 08:27 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook Elementary100 Rounds AR-15 fire confused with "pots and pans falling" "the janitor setting up tables and rafters in the gym" and "someone kicking the door."
  Not one bloody shoe, or any bloody footprints leaving the school, and no reports of anyone kicking or stepping on any empty bullets shells as they exit.
  Where is Rick Thorne- the supposed hero janitor who told Adam Lanza to put his gun down?
  It appears as though Rick Thorne didn't even work at Sandy Hook- there is no video evidence of him, and the news has never tried to interview him.
  [link to www.youtube.com]
  Quoting: ThePaulstalServiceDid they check your I'd?
  Remember one thing about SANDY HOOKvISITORS are welcomeForget. Teaching just hang out a visitors are welcome signNow that is VERY WiERd
  Anonymous CowardUser ID: 33695605 United States02/06/2013 08:31 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryThere were at least six suspects according to the police radio watch the sandy hook documentaryIt has the best factual informationApart from it missing the nun outfits by the carThat are not t shirts neither are they jackets
  Anonymous CowardUser ID: 33695605 United States02/06/2013 08:33 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryThe sandy hook documentary has the best compilation of the actual factsIt even rationally discusses the online reported actual real eyewitness of the shooters entry into the school
  Anonymous CowardUser ID: 33695605 United States02/06/2013 08:36 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryThere is only one living eye witness to the shooter entering the schoolAnd that witness describes the fact he was let in because he was thoughts to be a catholic priest.There are no other living eyewitnessesThis person has been censored by injuctionxBat WingUser ID: 33796495 Canada02/06/2013 08:48 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryI think there were more than one shooter. All the doors on the Honda were open. Looks to me like a car load of people arrived and went round back of the school threw a window. Remember the guy in camo pants and black shirt. Then there was the bomb threat at the church where the morners went the next day. The caller said he was a friend of Adam. That was reported on Yahoo news. What about the Van? We know there was a purple van with windows shot out of it, so why are they not saying anything about it. One think for sure , lots of loose ends
  HooleyDooleyUser ID: 2316948 Australia02/06/2013 09:09 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryI think there were more than one shooter.
  Quoting: Bat Wing 33796495I think there was less than one shooter and that is why the eyewitnesses describe sounds that are consistent with a poorly simulated, rather than actual, shooting.
  Anonymous CowardUser ID: 25999930 United States02/06/2013 09:15 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryOperation Canned Goods....Know it?And yet, with all we know, the Communist New Networkcontinues to function as the enemy with in whileour childern die in far away land, presumably to bringliberty to ignorant savages.
  Zuzu's PetalsUser ID: 31989439 Canada02/06/2013 09:17 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryNobody heard rifle shots because it was a shotgun that was the murder weapon. NOBODY except police have stated they heards "rifle" shots specifically.Every child describes the noise as janitors moving tables, thuds,booms, someone kicking a door, etc. Loud but dull noises very unlike high velocity bullets would make.I even found a shotgun shell in the parking lot. There's a picture of a cop with 2 women and child running from the front of the school.Look on the right behind the row of cars. Photo here: [link to www.pennlive.com]Ever wonder how the glass near the door had such a large hole blown in it? Wonder why the kids weren't shown to the parents post-mortem? Why Carver said "the long weapon was used"? Why the children were so disfigured that they had closed casket ceremonies? If you are shot in the face with a .223 it leaves a hole in the front. The back of the head might is where the real damage is. Morticians can easily plug holes in a body but can't reconstruct a face hit by a shotgun blast.
  Why seal the case for 90 days if it was a cut and dry murder/suicide mission by Adam Lanza? Why all the confusion over what weapons were found and where?
  Wonder why each victims was reported hit so many times? Buckshot was used which would be far more efficient for that type of mass slaughter. Same deal happened at Aurora - many victims but most only had a couple pellets of #4 shot.It also explains why they reported long rifles and shotguns on the police scanner less than 10 minutes after police arrived.
  Keep this in mind when you find more details. I'm 90% positive this is the case.
  Quoting: Bittercritter 26255514I wonder how Noah Pozner was shot 11 times, more than any other victim, and still had an open casket...with much of his face showing (just a cloth covering the lower part of it).
  StickywicketUser ID: 2455163402/06/2013 10:04 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryThe reporter "Chris Cuomo" is the little brother of Andrew Cuomo, Governor of NYS who passed a gun control law very shortly after this event in CT.
  Quoting: DiamondGal 5598080Interesting.....
  New Age MessiahUser ID: 9993365 United States02/06/2013 10:35 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook Elementary"It Took Me A While To Realise, But N.A.M. Is The Greatest Poster On This, Or Any Other Forum."
  StickywicketUser ID: 2455163402/06/2013 10:44 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryI see that Chris Cuomo went to Yale. I wonder if he's a Bonesman.....
  RintyUser ID: 18164113 United States02/06/2013 11:02 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryAnonymous CowardUser ID: 33842893 United States02/06/2013 11:04 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook Elementary Quoting: Anonymous Coward 33001296Yes, Kevin Anzellotti... Media said he was a hero, locking doors and screaming for gunman to put gun down.
  Same guy who's friend on facebook outed him saying how he was on VACATION !!
  Some hero!!
  [link to krystle-ann.blogspot.com]
  Anonymous CowardUser ID: 33842893 United States02/06/2013 11:07 PMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook Elementary Quoting: Anonymous Coward 33001296Yes, Kevin Anzellotti... Media said he was a hero, locking doors and screaming for gunman to put gun down.
  Same guy who's friend on facebook outed him saying how he was on VACATION !!
  Some hero!!
  [link to krystle-ann.blogspot.com]
  Quoting: Anonymous Coward 33842893Also, being as he supposedly told the gunman (or men) to put the gun down, he then should've had a good view of the suspect....Making him a witness.
  And... when I think of the thread title (seen and heard)I think of the inconsistency with media saying the gunman said no words as he killed, then the teacher saying he was pounding door yelling "let me in"....Said it before and I'll say it again, why would he bother yelling that when he can just shoot his way in? Makes no sense.
  Anonymous CowardUser ID: 33833662 United States02/07/2013 12:24 AMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook Elementary"""""""I wonder how Noah Pozner was shot 11 times, more than any other victim, and still had an open casket...with much of his face showing (just a cloth covering the lower part of it)."""""""~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Yeah, according to the Naomi Zeveloff reported in the Jewish Daily Forward.
  No disrespect intended to the Pozner family, or the Jewish Daily Forward.
  I looked for the alleged photograph of the Pozner victim.
  FOUND NOTHING...
  Seeing is believing.
  Sorry Folks...Zero Credibility...
  xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
  Here we have the Pozner family making the Governor look at the victim....
  Heart rendering?...or perhaps a melodramatic agenda driven Psy-Op?
  The photo of V. Pozner looks more like anger than anguish?XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
  Veronique Pozner, whose six-year-old son Noah was killed at Sandy Hook
  She testified, with a few others, at last week's gun control hearings.
  After the shootings, she insisted on seeing Noah's body, not a photograph of it.
  she insisted on an open casket at his funeral.
  She also purposefully brought the governor to look at it because, "If there is ever a piece of legislation that comes across his desk, I needed it to be real for him.'' It was real.
  Noah took 11 bullets. His mouth and jaw were blown away;
  A cloth covered that part of his face. Most of his left hand was gone.
  The governor wept. Maybe he'll remember.
  Anonymous CowardUser ID: 26255514 United States02/07/2013 12:27 AMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook Elementaryte/index.ssf/2013/01/sandy_hook_1.htmlI wonder how Noah Pozner was shot 11 times, more than any other victim, and still had an open casket...with much of his face showing (just a cloth covering the lower part of it).
  Quoting: Zuzu's PetalsHe could have been hit with 11 pieces of shot rather than bullets if it was a shotgun that was used.
  Anonymous CowardUser ID: 33854288 United States02/07/2013 12:51 AMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryCould Rick Thorne potentially be one of the wounded survivors, the unidentified adult, taken to the hospital?
  Anonymous CowardUser ID: 33856734 United States02/07/2013 02:28 AMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryCould Rick Thorne potentially be one of the wounded survivors, the unidentified adult, taken to the hospital?
  Quoting: Anonymous Coward 33854288the first injured victim was natalie hammond in her foot and the second should be the woman (forgot who) who got shot while trying to keep the door closed (in her arm and foot)
  Anonymous CowardUser ID: 2918478202/07/2013 02:31 AMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook Elementary Quoting: Anonymous Coward 33001296Yes, Kevin Anzellotti... Media said he was a hero, locking doors and screaming for gunman to put gun down.
  Same guy who's friend on facebook outed him saying how he was on VACATION !!
  Some hero!!
  [link to krystle-ann.blogspot.com]
  Quoting: Anonymous Coward 33842893Also, being as he supposedly told the gunman (or men) to put the gun down, he then should've had a good view of the suspect....Making him a witness.
  And... when I think of the thread title (seen and heard)I think of the inconsistency with media saying the gunman said no words as he killed, then the teacher saying he was pounding door yelling "let me in"....Said it before and I'll say it again, why would he bother yelling that when he can just shoot his way in? Makes no sense.
  Quoting: Anonymous Coward 33842893Sounds like he realized he had been set up and the drill was live.
  It's odd that it was claimed they let him because they thought he was a priest. Was he in priest costume, & not dressed for war?
  swansongUser ID: 9183741 Canada02/07/2013 02:58 AMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryHere's the only mention of seeing blood that I have run across so far. Quoting: Anonymous Coward 23200542Interesting vid. Saw it before but didn't pay much attention. Vollmer is a kindergarten teacher, according to SHE's website. The kindergarten classes are allnear the front door by the office.
  How could she have left after the shooting and not seen 2 dead bodies near the office/front door?
  Just a lil blood? Just a lot of odd.
  Zuzu's PetalsUser ID: 31989439 Canada02/07/2013 06:15 AMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook Elementaryte/index.ssf/2013/01/sandy_hook_1.htmlI wonder how Noah Pozner was shot 11 times, more than any other victim, and still had an open casket...with much of his face showing (just a cloth covering the lower part of it).
  Quoting: Zuzu's PetalsHe could have been hit with 11 pieces of shot rather than bullets if it was a shotgun that was used.
  Quoting: Anonymous Coward 26255514I know nothing about guns. I would think that should be something they'd clarify for those of us who have no clue about guns. When someone says he was "shot" 11 times - I think shot with bullets. If that's not the case, then they need to clarify that.
  Zuzu's PetalsUser ID: 31989439 Canada02/07/2013 06:18 AMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryThis mother heard absolute silence. She arrived after the glass was already broken. No mention of seeing dead bodies near the entrance of the school, either.[link to video.katiecouric.com]
  BittercritterUser ID: 26255514 United States02/07/2013 09:50 AMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryI know nothing about guns. I would think that should be something they'd clarify for those of us who have no clue about guns. When someone says he was "shot" 11 times - I think shot with bullets. If that's not the case, then they need to clarify that.
  Quoting: Zuzu's PetalsIf you look at the Aurora shooting you had like 50 injured people - most of them only had a few pieces of shot in them.This gives the police and media the ability to say that dozens were wounded though very few were seriously hurt or killed at the theater.
  Mind you shot comes in different sizes - from smaller than a BB to what is known as Double OO buckshot which is around 1/3" in diameter and each shell holds 8 or 9 pieces that size.A shotgun spreads the pattern out so that a distance of 20 ft the pellets or shot will spread out over an area of 1 ft or so allowing someone to hit multiple targets with a single shot. This is why shotguns would disfigure the victims so badly which is one reason I believe it was the primary weapon used.
  Rifles and handguns on the other hand only shoot a single projectile so aim must be precise. Given what I have said which would you choose as a weapon to shoot multiple targets?
  Anonymous CowardUser ID: 18417244 United States04/27/2013 03:24 AMReport Abusive PostReport Copyright ViolationRe: What Was Actually Seen and Heard at Sandy Hook ElementaryPrevious Page
VIDEO-Obama calls on bartenders to host happy hours for Obamacare - YouTube
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 19:57
Bubonic Plague-Tulip mania - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 18:57
  Tulip mania or tulipomania (Dutch names include: tulpenmanie, tulpomanie, tulpenwoede, tulpengekte and bollengekte) was a period in the Dutch Golden Age during which contract prices for bulbs of the recently introduced tulip reached extraordinarily high levels and then suddenly collapsed.[2]
  At the peak of tulip mania, in March 1637, some single tulip bulbs sold for more than 10 times the annual income of a skilled craftsman. It is generally considered the first recorded speculative bubble (or economic bubble),[3] although some researchers have noted that the Kipper- und Wipperzeit episode in 1619''22, a Europe-wide chain of debasement of the metal content of coins to fund warfare, featured mania-like similarities to a bubble.[4] The term "tulip mania" is now often used metaphorically to refer to any large economic bubble (when asset prices deviate from intrinsic values).[5]
  The 1637 event was popularized in 1841 by the book Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, written by British journalist Charles Mackay. According to Mackay, at one point 12 acres (5 ha) of land were offered for a Semper Augustus bulb.[6] Mackay claims that many such investors were ruined by the fall in prices, and Dutch commerce suffered a severe shock. Although Mackay's book is a classic that is widely reprinted today, his account is contested. Many modern scholars feel that the mania was not as extraordinary as Mackay described and argue that not enough price data are available to prove that a tulip bulb bubble actually occurred.[7][8]
  Research on the tulip mania is difficult because of the limited economic data from the 1630s'--much of which comes from biased and anti-speculative sources.[9][10] Some modern economists[who?] have proposed rational explanations, rather than a speculative mania, for the rise and fall in prices. For example, other flowers, such as the hyacinth, also had high initial prices at the time of their introduction, which immediately fell. The high asset prices may also have been driven by expectations of a parliamentary decree that contracts could be voided for a small cost'--thus lowering the risk to buyers.
  History[edit]The introduction of the tulip to Europe is usually attributed to Ogier de Busbecq, the ambassador of Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor to the Sultan of Turkey, who sent the first tulip bulbs and seeds to Vienna in 1554 from the Ottoman Empire. Tulip bulbs were soon distributed from Vienna to Augsburg, Antwerp and Amsterdam.[11] Its popularity and cultivation in the United Provinces (now the Netherlands)[12] is generally thought to have started in earnest around 1593 after the Flemish botanist Carolus Clusius had taken up a post at the University of Leiden and established the hortus academicus.[13] He planted his collection of tulip bulbs and found they were able to tolerate the harsher conditions of the Low Countries;[14] shortly thereafter the tulip began to grow in popularity.[15]
  The tulip was different from every other flower known to Europe at that time, with a saturated intense petal color that no other plant had. The appearance of the non pareil tulip as a status symbol at this time coincides with the rise of newly independent Holland's trade fortunes. No longer the Spanish Netherlands, its economic resources could now be channeled into commerce and the country embarked on its Golden Age. Amsterdam merchants were at the center of the lucrative East Indies trade, where one voyage could yield profits of 400%.[16] The new merchant class displayed and validated its success, primarily by setting up grand estates surrounded by flower gardens, and the plant that had pride of place was the sensational tulip.
  As a result, tulips rapidly became a coveted luxury item, and a profusion of varieties followed. They were classified in groups: the single-hued tulips of red, yellow, or white were known as Couleren; the multicolored Rosen (white streaks on a red or pink streaks background), Violetten (white streaks on a purple or lilac background), and the rarest of all, the Bizarden (Bizarres), (yellow or white streaks on a red, brown or purple background).[17] The multicolor effects of intricate lines and flame-like streaks on the petals were vivid and spectacular and made the bulbs that produced these even more exotic-looking plants highly sought-after. It is now known that this effect is due to the bulbs being infected with a type of tulip-specific mosaic virus, known as the "Tulip breaking virus", so called because it "breaks" the one petal color into two or more.[18][19]
  The tulip was itself a conspirator in the supply-squeeze that fueled the speculation, in that it is grown from a bulb that cannot be produced quickly. Normally it takes 7''12 years to grow a flowering bulb from seed; bulbs can produce both seeds and two or three bud clones, or offsets, annually, but the "mother bulb" lasts only a few years. Properly cultivated, the "daughter offsets" will become flowering bulbs after one to three years. Before the demand for the "broken" tulips, virus-free bulbs producing ordinary single-color varieties were sold by the pound. Once affected by the virus, the "broken" exotics were an extremely limited commodity because the sought-after "breaking pattern" can only be reproduced through offsets, not seeds, as only the bulb is affected by the mosaic virus. Unfortunately, the virus that produced the sought-after effects also acted adversely on the bulb, weakening it and retarding propagation of offsets, so cultivating the most appealing varieties now took even longer. Taking this into account, quite probably from the time the speculation started until its collapse, the number of rare bulbs that changed hands so feverishly never increased beyond the original number.
  The beautiful effects of the virus made the flamboyant and extravagant plants highly coveted, and because they were rare and desirable, they were expensive. Given that, it is not surprising growers named their new varieties with exalted titles. Many early forms were prefixed Admirael ("admiral"), often combined with the growers' names: Admirael van der Eijck for example, was perhaps the most highly regarded of about fifty so named. Generael ("general") was another prefix that found its way into the names of around thirty varieties. Later varieties were given even more superb and high-flown names, derived from Alexander the Great or Scipio, or even "Admiral of Admirals" and "General of Generals". However, naming could be haphazard and varieties highly variable in quality.[20] Most of these varieties have now died out,[21] though virus-free variegated-bred tulips continue in the trade.
  Tulips bloom in April and May for only about a week. During the plant's dormant phase from June to September, bulbs can be uprooted and moved about, so actual purchases (in the spot market) occurred during these months.[22] During the rest of the year, florists, or tulip traders, signed contracts before a notary to buy tulips at the end of the season (effectively futures contracts).[22] Thus the Dutch, who developed many of the techniques of modern finance, created a market for tulip bulbs, which were durable goods.[12]Short selling was banned by an edict of 1610, which was reiterated or strengthened in 1621 and 1630, and again in 1636. Short sellers were not prosecuted under these edicts, but their contracts were deemed unenforceable.[23]
  As the flowers grew in popularity, professional growers paid higher and higher prices for bulbs with the virus, and prices rose steadily. By 1634, in part as a result of demand from the French, speculators began to enter the market.[25] The contract price of rare bulbs continued to rise throughout 1636, but by November, the price of common, "unbroken" bulbs also began to increase, so that soon any tulip bulb could soon fetch hundreds of guilders. That year the Dutch created a type of formal futures markets where contracts to buy bulbs at the end of the season were bought and sold. Traders met in "colleges" at taverns and buyers were required to pay a 2.5% "wine money" fee, up to a maximum of three guilders per trade. Neither party paid an initial margin nor a mark-to-market margin, and all contracts were with the individual counter-parties rather than with the Exchange. The Dutch derogatorily described tulip contract trading as windhandel (literally "wind trade"), because no bulbs were actually changing hands. The entire business was accomplished on the margins of Dutch economic life, not in the Exchange itself.[26]
  By 1636 the tulip bulb became the fourth leading export product of the Netherlands, after gin, herring and cheese. The price of tulips skyrocketed because of speculation in tulip futures among people who never saw the bulbs. Many men made and lost fortunes overnight.[27]
  Tulip mania reached its peak during the winter of 1636''37, when some bulbs were reportedly changing hands ten times in a day. No deliveries were ever made to fulfil any of these contracts, because in February 1637, tulip bulb contract prices collapsed abruptly and the trade of tulips ground to a halt.[28] The collapse began in Haarlem, when, for the first time, buyers apparently refused to show up at a routine bulb auction. This may have been because Haarlem was then at the height of an outbreak of bubonic plague. While the existence of the plague may have helped create a culture of fatalistic risk-taking that allowed the speculation to skyrocket in the first place, this outbreak might also have helped to burst the bubble.[29]
  Available price data[edit]The lack of consistently recorded price data from the 1630s makes the extent of the tulip mania difficult to estimate. The bulk of available data comes from anti-speculative pamphlets by "Gaergoedt and Warmondt" (GW) written just after the bubble. Economist Peter Garber collected data on the sales of 161 bulbs of 39 varieties between 1633 and 1637, with 53 being recorded by GW. Ninety-eight sales were recorded for the last date of the bubble, 5 February 1637, at wildly varying prices. The sales were made using several market mechanisms: futures trading at the colleges, spot sales by growers, notarized futures sales by growers, and estate sales. "To a great extent, the available price data are a blend of apples and oranges", according to Garber.[30]
  Mackay's Madness of Crowds[edit]Goods allegedly exchanged for a single bulb of the Viceroy[31]Two lasts of wheat448Æ'Four lasts of rye558Æ'Four fat oxen480Æ'Eight fat swine240Æ'Twelve fat sheep120Æ'Two hogsheads of wine70Æ'Four tuns of beer32Æ'Two tons of butter192Æ'1,000 lb. of cheese120Æ'A complete bed100Æ'A suit of clothes80Æ'A silver drinking cup60Æ'Total2500Æ'The modern discussion of tulip mania began with the book Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, published in 1841 by the Scottish journalist Charles Mackay; he proposed that crowds of people often behave irrationally, and tulip mania was, along with the South Sea Bubble and the Mississippi Company scheme, one of his primary examples. His account was largely sourced to a 1797 work by Johann Beckmann titled A History of Inventions, Discoveries, and Origins. In fact, Beckmann's account, and thus Mackay's by association, was primarily sourced to three anonymous pamphlets published in 1637 with an anti-speculative agenda.[32] Mackay's vivid book was popular among generations of economists and stock market participants. His popular but flawed description of tulip mania as a speculative bubble remains prominent, even though since the 1980s economists have debunked many aspects of his account.[32]
  According to Mackay, the growing popularity of tulips in the early 17th century caught the attention of the entire nation; "the population, even to its lowest dregs, embarked in the tulip trade".[6] By 1635, a sale of 40 bulbs for 100,000 florins (also known as Dutch guilders) was recorded. By way of comparison, a ton of butter cost around 100 florins, a skilled laborer might earn 150 florins a year, and "eight fat swine" cost 240 florins.[6] (According to the International Institute of Social History, one florin had the purchasing power of '‚¬10.28 in 2002.[33])
  By 1636 tulips were traded on the exchanges of numerous Dutch towns and cities. This encouraged trading in tulips by all members of society; Mackay recounted people selling or trading their other possessions in order to speculate in the tulip market, such as an offer of 12 acres (49,000 m2) of land for one of two existing Semper Augustus bulbs, or a single bulb of the Viceroy that was purchased for a basket of goods (shown at right) worth 2,500 florins.[31]
  Many individuals grew suddenly rich. A golden bait hung temptingly out before the people, and, one after the other, they rushed to the tulip marts, like flies around a honey-pot. Every one imagined that the passion for tulips would last for ever, and that the wealthy from every part of the world would send to Holland, and pay whatever prices were asked for them. The riches of Europe would be concentrated on the shores of the Zuyder Zee, and poverty banished from the favoured clime of Holland. Nobles, citizens, farmers, mechanics, seamen, footmen, maidservants, even chimney sweeps and old clotheswomen, dabbled in tulips.[6]
  The increasing mania contributed several amusing, but unlikely, anecdotes that Mackay recounted, such as a sailor who mistook the valuable tulip bulb of a merchant for an onion and grabbed it to eat. The merchant and his family chased the sailor to find him "eating a breakfast whose cost might have regaled a whole ship's crew for a twelvemonth". The sailor was jailed for eating the bulb.[6] Tulips are poisonous if prepared incorrectly, taste bad, and are considered to be only marginally edible even during famines.[34]
  People were purchasing bulbs at higher and higher prices, intending to re-sell them for a profit. However, such a scheme could not last unless someone was ultimately willing to pay such high prices and take possession of the bulbs. In February 1637, tulip traders could no longer find new buyers willing to pay increasingly inflated prices for their bulbs. As this realization set in, the demand for tulips collapsed, and prices plummeted'--the speculative bubble burst. Some were left holding contracts to purchase tulips at prices now ten times greater than those on the open market, while others found themselves in possession of bulbs now worth a fraction of the price they had paid. Mackay claims the Dutch devolved into distressed accusations and recriminations against others in the trade.[6]
  In Mackay's account, the panicked tulip speculators sought help from the government of the Netherlands, which responded by declaring that anyone who had bought contracts to purchase bulbs in the future could void their contract by payment of a 10 percent fee. Attempts were made to resolve the situation to the satisfaction of all parties, but these were unsuccessful. The mania finally ended, Mackay says, with individuals stuck with the bulbs they held at the end of the crash'--no court would enforce payment of a contract, since judges regarded the debts as contracted through gambling, and thus not enforceable by law.[6]
  According to Mackay, lesser tulip manias also occurred in other parts of Europe, although matters never reached the state they had in the Netherlands. He also claimed that the aftermath of the tulip price deflation led to a widespread economic chill throughout the Netherlands for many years afterwards.[6]
  Modern views[edit]Mackay's account of inexplicable mania was unchallenged, and mostly unexamined, until the 1980s.[35] However, research into tulip mania since then, especially by proponents of the efficient market hypothesis,[8] who are more skeptical of speculative bubbles in general, suggests that his story was incomplete and inaccurate. In her 2007 scholarly analysis Tulipmania, Anne Goldgar states that the phenomenon was limited to "a fairly small group", and that most accounts from the period "are based on one or two contemporary pieces of propaganda and a prodigious amount of plagiarism".[9] Peter Garber argues that the bubble "was no more than a meaningless winter drinking game, played by a plague-ridden population that made use of the vibrant tulip market."[36]
  While Mackay's account held that a wide array of society was involved in the tulip trade, Goldgar's study of archived contracts found that even at its peak the trade in tulips was conducted almost exclusively by merchants and skilled craftsmen who were wealthy, but not members of the nobility.[37] Any economic fallout from the bubble was very limited. Goldgar, who identified many prominent buyers and sellers in the market, found fewer than half a dozen who experienced financial troubles in the time period, and even of these cases it is not clear that tulips were to blame.[38] This is not altogether surprising. Although prices had risen, money had not exchanged hands between buyers and sellers. Thus profits were never realized for sellers; unless sellers had made other purchases on credit in expectation of the profits, the collapse in prices did not cause anyone to lose money.[39]
  Rational explanations[edit]There is no dispute that prices for tulip bulb contracts rose and then fell in 1636''37, but even a dramatic rise and fall in prices does not necessarily mean that an economic or speculative bubble developed and then burst. For tulip mania to have qualified as an economic bubble, the price of tulip bulbs would need to have become unhinged from the intrinsic value of the bulbs. Modern economists have advanced several possible reasons for why the rise and fall in prices may not have constituted a bubble.[40]
  The increases of the 1630s corresponded with a lull in the Thirty Years' War.[41] Hence market prices (at least initially) were responding rationally to a rise in demand. However, the fall in prices was faster and more dramatic than the rise. Data on sales largely disappeared after the February 1637 collapse in prices, but a few other data points on bulb prices after tulip mania show that bulbs continued to lose value for decades thereafter.
  Volatility in flower prices[edit]Garber compared the available price data on tulips to hyacinth prices at the beginning of the 19th century'--when the hyacinth replaced the tulip as the fashionable flower'--and found a similar pattern. When hyacinths were introduced florists strove with one another to grow beautiful hyacinth flowers, as demand was strong. However, as people became more accustomed to hyacinths the prices began to fall. The most expensive bulbs fell to 1 to 2 percent of their peak value within 30 years.[42] Garber also notes that, "a small quantity of prototype lily bulbs recently was sold for 1 million guilders ($US480,000 at 1987 exchange rates)", demonstrating that even today flowers can command extremely high prices.[43] Additionally, because the rise in prices occurred after bulbs were planted for the year, growers would not have had an opportunity to increase production in response to price.[44]
  Legal changes[edit]UCLA economics professor Earl A. Thompson argues in a 2007 paper that Garber's explanation cannot account for the extremely swift drop in tulip bulb contract prices. The annualized rate of price decline was 99.999%, instead of the average 40% for other flowers.[40] He provides another explanation for Dutch tulip mania. The Dutch parliament was considering a decree (originally sponsored by Dutch tulip investors who had lost money because of a German setback in the Thirty Years' War[45]) that changed the way tulip contracts functioned:
  On February 24, 1637, the self-regulating guild of Dutch florists, in a decision that was later ratified by the Dutch Parliament, announced that all futures contracts written after November 30, 1636 and before the re-opening of the cash market in the early Spring, were to be interpreted as option contracts. They did this by simply relieving the futures buyers of the obligation to buy the future tulips, forcing them merely to compensate the sellers with a small fixed percentage of the contract price.[46]
  Before this parliamentary decree, the purchaser of a tulip contract'--known in modern finance as a futures contract'--was legally obliged to buy the bulbs. The decree changed the nature of these contracts, so that if the current market price fell, the purchaser could opt to pay a penalty and forgo receipt of the bulb, rather than pay the full contracted price. This change in law meant that, in modern terminology, the futures contracts had been transformed into options contracts. This proposal began to be debated in the fall of 1636, and if it became clear to investors that the decree was likely to be enacted, prices probably would have risen.[46]
  This decree allowed someone who purchased a contract to void the contract with a payment of only 3.5 percent of the contract price (or about 1/30th the contract).[46] Thus, investors bought increasingly expensive contracts. A speculator could sign a contract to purchase a tulip for 100 guilders. If the price rose above 100 guilders, the speculator would pocket the difference as profit. If the price remained low, the speculator could void the contract for only 3½ guilders. Thus, a contract nominally for 100 guilders, would actually cost an investor no more than 3½ guilders. In early February, as contract prices reached a peak, Dutch authorities stepped in and halted the trading of these contracts.[46]
  Thompson states that actual sales of tulip bulbs remained at ordinary levels throughout the period. Thus, Thompson concludes that the "mania" was a rational response to changes in contractual obligations.[47] Using data about the specific payoffs present in the futures and option contracts, Thompson argues that tulip bulb contract prices hewed closely to what a rational economic model would dictate, "Tulip contract prices before, during, and after the 'tulipmania' appear to provide a remarkable illustration of 'market efficiency'."[48]
  Critiques[edit]Other economists believe that these elements cannot completely explain the dramatic rise and fall in tulip prices.[49] Garber's theory has also been challenged for failing to explain a similar dramatic rise and fall in prices for regular tulip bulb contracts.[5] Some economists also point to other factors associated with speculative bubbles, such as a growth in the supply of money, demonstrated by an increase in deposits at the Bank of Amsterdam during that period.[50]
  Social mania and legacy[edit]The popularity of Mackay's tale has continued to this day, with new editions of Extraordinary Popular Delusions appearing regularly, with introductions by writers such as financier Bernard Baruch (1932), financial writers Andrew Tobias (1980),[51] psychologist David J. Schneider (1993), and Michael Lewis (2008). At least six editions are currently in print.
  Goldgar argues that although tulip mania may not have constituted an economic or speculative bubble, it was nonetheless traumatic to the Dutch for other reasons. "Even though the financial crisis affected very few, the shock of tulipmania was considerable. A whole network of values was thrown into doubt."[52] In the 17th century, it was unimaginable to most people that something as common as a flower could be worth so much more money than most people earned in a year. The idea that the prices of flowers that grow only in the summer could fluctuate so wildly in the winter, threw into chaos the very understanding of "value".[53]
  Many of the sources telling of the woes of tulip mania, such as the anti-speculative pamphlets that were later reported by Beckmann and Mackay, have been cited as evidence of the extent of the economic damage. These pamphlets, however, were not written by victims of a bubble, but were primarily religiously motivated. The upheaval was viewed as a perversion of the moral order'--proof that "concentration on the earthly, rather than the heavenly flower could have dire consequences".[54] Thus, it is possible that a relatively minor economic event took on a life of its own as a morality tale.
  Nearly a century later, during the crash of the Mississippi Company and the South Sea Company in about 1720, tulip mania appeared in satires of these manias.[55] When Johann Beckmann first described tulip mania in the 1780s, he compared it to the failing lotteries of the time.[56] In Goldgar's view, even many modern popular works about financial markets, such as Burton Malkiel's A Random Walk Down Wall Street (1973) and John Kenneth Galbraith's A Short History of Financial Euphoria (1990; written soon after the crash of 1987), used the tulip mania as a lesson in morality.[57][58][59] Tulip mania again became a popular reference during the dot-com bubble of 1995''2001.[57]
  In this century, journalists have compared it to failure of the speculative dot-com bubble in 2000[60] and the most recently, to the subprime mortgage crisis.[61][62] Despite the mania's enduring popularity, Daniel Gross of Slate has said of economists offering efficient market explanations for the mania, that "If they're correct ... then business writers will have to delete Tulipmania from their handy-pack of bubble analogies."[63]
  In popular culture[edit]The following novels incorporate tulip mania:[64]
  The following films reference tulip mania:
  See also[edit]^Nusteling, H. (1985) Welvaart en Werkgelegenheid in Amsterdam 1540''1860, pp. 114, 252, 254, 258.^Tulipomania: The Story of the World's Most Coveted Flower & the Extraordinary Passions It Aroused. Mike Dash (2001).^Shiller 2005, p. 85 More extensive discussion of status as the earliest bubble on pp. 247''48.^Kindleberger, Charles P. and Aliber, Robert (2005 [1978]), Manias, Panics and Crashes. A History of Financial Crises, New York, ISBN 0-465-04380-1, p. 16.^ abFrench 2006, p. 3^ abcdefgh"The Tulipomania", Chapter 3, in Mackay 1841.^Thompson 2007, p. 99^ abKindleberger 2005, p. 115^ abKuper, Simon "Petal Power" (Review of Goldgar 2007), Financial Times, May 12, 2007. Retrieved on July 1, 2008.^A pamphlet about the Dutch tulipomania Wageningen Digital Library, July 14, 2006. Retrieved on August 13, 2008.^Brunt, Alan; Walsh, John, "'Broken' tulips and Tulip breaking virus", Microbiology Today, May, 2005, p. 68.^ abGarber 1989, p. 537^Dash 1999, pp. 59''60^Goldgar 2007, p. 32^Goldgar 2007, p. 33^Ricklefs, M. C. (1991). A History of Modern Indonesia Since c.1300, 2nd Edition. London: MacMillan. pp. 27^Dash 1999, p. 66^Phillips, S. "Tulip breaking potyvirus", in Brunt, A. A., Crabtree, K., Dallwitz, M. J., Gibbs, A. J., Watson, L. and Zurcher, E. J. (eds.) (1996 onwards). Plant Viruses Online: Descriptions and Lists from the VIDE Database. Version: August 20, 1996. Retrieved on August 15, 2008.^Garber 1989, p. 542^Dash 1999, pp. 106''07^Garber 2000, p. 41^ abGarber 1989, pp. 541''42^Garber 2000, pp. 33''36^Thompson 2007, pp. 101, 109''11^Garber 1989, p. 543^Goldgar 2007, p. 322^Simon Schama, The Embarrassment of Riches: An Interpretation of Dutch Culture in the Golden Age (1997) pp 350''66 esp p. 362^Garber 1989, pp. 543''44^Garber 2000, pp. 37''38, 44''47^Garber 2000, pp. 49''59, 138''144^ abThis basket of goods was actually exchanged for a bulb according to Chapter 3 of Mackay 1841 and also Schama 1987, but Krelage (1942) and Garber 2000, pp. 81''83 dispute this interpretation of the original source, an anonymous pamphlet, saying that the commodity bundle was clearly given only to demonstrate the value of the florin at the time.^ abGarber 1990, p. 37^Goldgar 2007, p. 323^Deane, Green. "Tulips". Eat the Weeds. Retrieved December 4, 2013. ^Garber 1989, p. 535^Garber 2000, p. 81^Goldgar 2007, p. 141^Goldgar 2007, pp. 247''48^Goldgar 2007, p. 233^ abThompson 2007, p. 100^Thompson 2007, p. 103^Garber 1989, pp. 553''54^Garber 1989, p. 555^Garber 1989, pp. 555''56^Thompson 2007, pp. 103''04^ abcdThompson 2007, p. 101^Thompson 2007, p. 111^Thompson 2007, p. 109^Kindleberger & Aliber 2005, pp. 115''16^French 2006, pp. 11''12^Introduction by Andrew Tobias to "Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds" (New York: Harmony Press, 1980) available on-line at Andrew Tobias, Money and Other Subjects. Retrieved on August 12, 2008^Goldgar 2007, p. 18^Goldgar 2007, pp. 276''77^Goldgar 2007, pp. 260''61^Goldgar 2007, pp. 307''09^Goldgar 2007, p. 313^ abGoldgar 2007, p. 314^Galbraith 1990, p. 34^Malkiel 2007, pp. 35''38^Frankel, Mark, "When the Tulip Bubble Burst",Business Week, April 4, 2000.^"Bubble and Bust; As the subprime mortgage market tanks, policymakers must keep their nerve", The Washington Post, August 11, 2007. Retrieved on July 17, 2008.^Horton, Scott. "The Bubble Bursts", Harper's, January 27, 2008. Retrieved on July 17, 2008. Archived June 16, 2008 at the Wayback Machine^Gross, Daniel. "Bulb Bubble Trouble; That Dutch tulip bubble wasn't so crazy after all", Slate, July 16, 2004. Retrieved on November 4, 2011.^Goldgar (2007), p. 329.References[edit](Dutch) P. Cos (1637) '' Verzameling van een meenigte tulipaanen, naar het leven geteekend met hunne naamen, en swaarte der bollen, zoo als die publicq verkogt zijn, te Haarlem in den jaare A. 1637, door P. Cos, bloemist te Haarlem. '' Haarlem : [s.n.], 1637. '' 75 pl. available online at Wageningen Tulip Portal. Retrieved on August 11, 2008.Dash, Mike (1999), Tulipomania: The Story of the World's Most Coveted Flower and the Extraordinary Passions It Aroused, London: Gollancz, ISBN 0-575-06723-3 French, Doug (2006), "The Dutch monetary environment during tulipomania" (PDF), The Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics9 (1): 3''14, doi:10.1007/s12113-006-1000-6 . Retrieved on June 24, 2008.Galbraith, J. K. (1990), A Short History of Financial Euphoria, New York: Penguin Books, ISBN 0-670-85028-4 Garber, Peter M. (1989), "Tulipmania", Journal of Political Economy97 (3): 535''560, doi:10.1086/261615 Garber, Peter M. (1990), "Famous First Bubbles", The Journal of Economic Perspectives (The Journal of Economic Perspectives, Vol. 4, No. 2) 4 (2): 35''54, doi:10.1257/jep.4.2.35, JSTOR 1942889. (subscription required)Garber, Peter M. (2000), Famous First Bubbles: The Fundamentals of Early Manias, Cambridge: MIT Press, ISBN 0-262-07204-1 Goldgar, Anne (2007), Tulipmania: Money, Honor, and Knowledge in the Dutch Golden Age, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, ISBN 978-0-226-30125-9 Hooper, William R. (April 1876), "The Tulip Mania", Harper's New Monthly Magazine52 (340): 743''746 Krelage, E. H. (1942), Bloemenspeculatie in Nederland, Amsterdam: P. N. van Kampen & Zoon Kindleberger, Charles P.; Aliber, Robert (2005), Manias, Panics, and Crashes: A History of Financial Crises (5th ed.), Hoboken: Wiley, ISBN 0-471-46714-6 Mackay, Charles (1841), Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, London: Richard Bentley, archived from the original on March 31, 2008, retrieved 2008-08-15 Malkiel, Burton G. (2007), A Random Walk Down Wall Street (9th ed.), New York: W. W. Norton, ISBN 0-393-06245-7 Pavord, Anna (2007), The Tulip, London: Bloomsbury, ISBN 0-7475-7190-2 Pollan, Michael (2002), The Botany of Desire, New York: Random House, ISBN 0-375-76039-3 Schama, Simon (1987), The Embarrassment of Riches: An Interpretation of Dutch Culture in the Golden Age, New York: Alfred Knopf, ISBN 0-394-51075-5 Shiller, Robert J. (2005), Irrational Exuberance (2nd ed.), Princeton: Princeton University Press, ISBN 0-691-12335-7 Steimetz, Seiji S. C. (2008), "Bubbles", in David R. Henderson (ed.), Concise Encyclopedia of Economics (2nd ed.) (Indianapolis: Library of Economics and Liberty), ISBN 978-0865976658, OCLC 237794267 Thompson, Earl (2007), "The tulipmania: Fact or artifact?" (PDF), Public Choice130 (1''2): 99''114, doi:10.1007/s11127-006-9074-4, retrieved 2008-08-15 External links[edit]
Bitcoin hype worse than 'tulip mania', says Dutch central banker | Technology | theguardian.com
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 18:56
  The former president of the Dutch Central Bank, Nout Wellink, has told students at the University of Amsterdam that the hype around bitcoin is worse than his country's Tulip mania in the 17th century.
  "Sooner or later the facade will fall", Wellink said, calling bitcoin "pure speculation" and "hype" according to comments reported in the Dutch press.
  "This is worse than the tulip mania," he continued. "At least then you got a tulip [at the end], now you get nothing."
  Wellink's comments follow a warning from the Dutch Central Bank about the risks of virtual currencies like bitcoin, which fall outside Dutch financial supervision laws.
  ''The exchange rate is volatile and there is no central issuer which may be held liable,'' the bank warned. It also cautioned that the country's deposit guarantee scheme "does not apply.''
  Tulip mania was one of the first recorded speculative bubbles. Over the course of four years in Holland, the price of tulips increased 200 times; at the peak of the bubble, a single bulb could sell for ten times a worker's annual wage.
  Then, in just one month, the bubble burst, and the price dropped to nearly nothing.
  ' Somewhere in a landfill in Newport is a hard drive containing £4.5m in bitcoin
Short-term fix eyed for another problem with U.S. healthcare website | Reuters
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  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 18:38
  By Roberta Rampton and Caroline Humer
  WASHINGTONWed Dec 4, 2013 6:13am IST
  WASHINGTON Dec 3 (Reuters) - President Barack Obama's administration has found a short-term fix to pay insurance companies for plans selected on HealthCare.gov, the not-yet-complete government website used to shop for insurance required under Obama's healthcare program.
  The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has not yet finished building the part of the website that would transfer billions of dollars in subsidies for plan premiums and cost-sharing payments to insurance companies.
  It is part of a long technical to-do list that has so far focused on fixing the errors and lag times in the part of the website used by consumers.
  The administration recently overhauled HealthCare.gov after its botched launch two months ago. The fixes are now expected to allow millions of Americans to shop for insurance.
  The heathcare program faces a critical test to enroll hundreds of thousands of people by Dec. 23, the deadline for people who need insurance coverage starting on Jan. 1, 2014.
  Julie Bataille, a spokeswoman for CMS, said the government will make the payments to insurers for premium tax credits and cost sharing on time.
  "We are committed to making sure they get paid in January and we will continue to work with them on that process," she told reporters.
  The administration is planning a "workaround" for payments, said Daniel Durham, vice president for policy and regulatory affairs at America's Health Insurance Plans.
  Health plans will estimate how much they are owed, and submit that estimate to the government. Once the system is built, the government and insurers can reconcile the payments made with the plan data to "true up" payments, he said.
  "The intent is to make sure plans get paid on time, which is a good thing," Durham told Reuters.
  The fix puts an additional "burden" on insurance companies, already taxed by having to double-check faulty enrollment data from the HealthCare.gov system.
  Now, companies need to quickly put together financial management systems to make the payment estimates, so they can be paid beginning in January, he said.
  "They have to recognize that plans are already quite stressed and introducing this at the last minute just adds substantial burden for plans to deal with," Durham said.
  Paying insurers on time and accurately is critical for the long-term competitiveness of Obamacare marketplaces, said Kevin Lucia, senior research fellow at Georgetown University's Health Policy Institute.
  "I'm pretty deeply concerned about this," Lucia said at a forum organized by the university and law firm Arent Fox.
  Some large insurance carriers could "cushion" delayed payments for a short period of time, said Lucia, a former CMS official. But that's not the case for a group of co-ops and smaller insurance providers.
  About two-dozen co-ops will start up with their first customers on Jan. 1 and have said they are concerned about how enrollment delays are affecting their finances during the first quarter.
  Small insurers also have a lot at stake as these new anticipated members are expected to make up a bigger portion of their total revenue. The individual business is only a small part of revenues at large insurers, which focus on employer-based coverage and private Medicare.
  "They cannot survive if they don't get paid. And even the larger carriers, it can only go on for so long," Lucia said. "The last thing we need is for a carrier, especially a large carrier, to walk away from this." (Editing by Christopher Wilson)
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Japan's ruling coalition pushes heavy-handed state secrets bill through lower house '-- RT News
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 18:30
  Published time: November 26, 2013 19:43Edited time: November 26, 2013 21:46Fukushiro Nukaga (top R), chairman of the lower house special committee, is surrounded by opposition lawmakers during a vote on a state secrets act at the parliament in Tokyo November 26, 2013. (Reuters/Toru Hanai)
  Japan's lower house has passed a heavy-handed state secrets act despite fears that it will have severe repercussions for state freedoms. Officials will now face a maximum punishment of ten years in prison if they are found to have leaked to the press.
  Japan's Diet (parliament) passed the bill, which is aimed at expanding the definition of a state secret and place increasing penalties upon anyone deemed a leaker. The move will apparently prevent media accessing information on four sensitive areas: defense, diplomacy, counter-terrorism and counter-espionage.
  The information will be further divided into 23 types. Top officials from all departments would have the power to declare issues 'secret'. The 'secrets' could then be kept classified for up to 60 years.
  Journalists and other private sector parties could also receive up to five years imprisonment if they are found to be using 'grossly inappropriate' means to acquire information.
  Such restrictions could spill over into the nuclear industry. The topic is particularly sensitive in the face of March 2011's Fukushima nuclear disaster, which drove over 160,000 residents from their homes.
  ''Information on the vulnerability of nuclear power plants could be classified as special secrets, along with plans on how to guard the plants,'' Yutaka Saito, a lawyer and a member of the Japan Federation of Bar Associations' task force on the bill, told Reuters.
  ''If so, anyone who has blown the whistle from the inside to warn of the danger of nuclear power plants will be punished,'' Saito said.
  The bill was adopted through majority vote by the ruling coalition after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), New Komeito, and the Opposition Your Party all agreed to revisions last week to gain the votes of small conservative opposition parties.
  The move comes despite overwhelming public opposition, and after members of opposition parties - including the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), the Japan Restoration Party, the Japanese Communist Party and the People's Life Party '' said that insufficient debate had been conducted prior to the vote. Critics allege that changes to the bill were merely cosmetic, and requested that it not be brought to vote. Regardless, the legislation was approved after only a few hours worth of delay.
  Nearly 63 percent of respondents to a Kyodo news agency survey expressed concerns about the bill last week, and its discussion triggered protests by hundreds of people outside of parliament on Tuesday. Thousands gathered in a Tokyo park the previous week to rally against the bill.
  ''We revised the proposal as much as possible to address the concerns held by the public,'' Gen Nakatani, an LDP director, said following the vote, while Atsushi Oshima, a DPJ director declared that it had been a ''defeat for the legislative branch.''
  The bill has now been sent to the Diet's Upper House for consideration, where it will likely pass without any difficulty. The LDP and its junior partner hold a solid majority in both houses.''Clearly, there will be a chilling effect on access to a wide range of information,'' said Meiji University law professor, Lawrence Repeta, said. ''It is clearly aimed at news media to block reporting in a way that may be critical of the government on a wide range of sensitive issues,'' he added.
  Abe has stated that the law is vital in the development of a US-style National Security Council to coordinate foreign policy and security while negotiating with allies such as the US over the possible sharing of information.
  ''My biggest concern is that it would be more difficult for the people to see the government's decision-making process,'' said Kyouji Yanagisawa, a former defense official who was in charge of national security in the Prime Minister's Office in 2004-2009. ''That means we can't check how or where the government made mistakes, or help the government make a wise decision.''
A Few Thoughts on Cryptographic Engineering: How does the NSA break SSL?
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  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 18:07
  A few weeks ago I wrote a long post about the NSA's 'BULLRUN' project to subvert modern encryption standards. I had intended to come back to this at some point, since I didn't have time to discuss the issues in detail. But then things got in the way. A lot of things, actually. Some of which I hope to write about in the near future.But before I get there, and at the risk of boring you all to tears, I wanted to come back to this subject at least one more time, if only to pontificate a bit about a question that's been bugging me.
  You see, the NSA BULLRUN briefing sheet mentions that NSA has been breaking quite a few encryption technologies, some of which are more interesting than others. One of those technologies is particularly surprising to me, since I just can't figure how NSA might be doing it. In this extremely long post I'm going to try to dig a bit deeper into the most important question facing the Internet today.
  Specifically: how the hell is NSA breaking SSL?
  To keep things on target I'm going to make a few basic ground rules.First, I'm well aware that NSA can install malware on your computer and pwn any cryptography you choose. That doesn't interest me at all, for the simple reason that it doesn't scale well. NSA can do this to you, but they can't do it for an entire population. And that's really what concerns me about the recent leaks: the possibility that NSA is breaking encryption for the purposes of mass surveillance.
  For the same reason, we're not going to worry about man-in-the-middle (MITM) attacks. While we know that NSA does run these, they're also a very targeted attack. Not only are MITMs detectable if you do them at large scale, they don't comport with what we know about how NSA does large-scale interception -- mostly via beam splitters and taps. In other words: we're really concerned about passive surveillance.
  The rules above aren't absolute, of course. We will consider limited targeted attacks on servers, provided they later permit passive decryption of large amounts of traffic; e.g., decryption of traffic to major websites. We will also consider arbitrary modifications to software and hardware -- something we know NSA is already doing.
  One last point: to keep things from going off the rails, I've helpfully divided this post into two sections. The first will cover attacks that use only known techniques. Everything in this section can be implemented by a TAO employee with enough gumption and access to software. The second section, which I've titled the 'Tinfoil Hat Spectrum' covers the fun and speculative stuff -- ranging from new side channel attacks all the way to that huge quantum computer the NSA keeps next to BWI.
  We'll start with the 'practical'.
  Attacks that use Known Techniques
  Theft of RSA keys. The most obvious way to 'crack' SSL doesn't really involve cracking anything. Why waste time and money on cryptanalysis when you can just steal the keys? This issue is of particular concern in servers configured for the TLS RSA handshake, where a single 128-byte server key is all you need to decrypt every past and future connection made from the device.
  In fact, this technique is so obvious that it's hard to imagine NSA spending a lot of resources on sophisticated cryptanalytic attacks. We know that GCHQ and NSA are perfectly comfortable suborning even US providers overseas. And inside our borders, they've demonstrated a willingness to obtain TLS/SSL keys using subpoena powers and gag orders. If you're using an RSA connection to a major website, it may be sensible to assume the key is already known.
  Of course, even where NSA doesn't resort to direct measures, there's always the possibility of obtaining keys via a remote software exploit. The beauty is that these attacks don't even require remote code execution. Given the right vulnerability, it may simply require a handful of malformed SSL requests to map the full contents of the OpenSSL/SChannel heap.
  Suborning hardware encryption chips. A significant fraction of SSL traffic on the Internet is produced by hardware devices such as SSL terminators and VPN-enabled routers. Fortunately we don't have tospeculate about the security of these devices -- we already know NSA/GCHQ have been collaborating with hardware manufacturers to 'enable' decryption on several major VPN encryption chips.The NSA documents aren't clear on how this capability works, or if it even involves SSL. If it does, the obvious guess is that each chip encrypts and exflitrates bits of the session key via 'random' fields such as IVs and handshake nonces. Indeed, this is relatively easy to implement on an opaque hardware device. The interesting question is how one ensures these backdoors can only be exploited by NSA -- and not by rival intelligence agencies. (Some thoughts on that here.)
  Side channel attacks. Traditionally when we analyze cryptographic algorithms we concern ourselves with the expected inputs and outputs of the system. But real systems leak all kinds of extra information. These 'side channels' -- which include operation time, resource consumption, cache timing, and RF emissions -- can often be used to extract secret key material.
  The good news is that most of these channels are only exploitable when the attacker is in physical proximity to a TLS server. The bad news is that there are conditions in which the attacker can get close. The most obvious example involves virtualized TLS servers in the cloud setting, where a clever attacker may share physical resources with the target device.
  A second class of attack uses remote timing information to slowly recover an RSA key. These attacks can be disabled via countermeasures such as RSA blinding, though amusingly, some 'secure' hardware co-processors may actually turn these countermeasures off by default! At very least, this makes the hardware vulnerable to attacks by a local user, and could even facilitate remote recovery of RSA keys.
  Weak random number generators. Even if you're using strong Perfect Forward Secrecy ciphersuites, the security of TLS depends fundamentally on the availability of unpredictable random numbers. Not coincidentally, tampering with random number generator standards appears to have been a particular focus of NSA's efforts.
  Random numbers are critical to a number of elements in TLS, but they're particularly important in three places:
  On the client side, during the RSA handshake. The RNG is used to generate the RSA pre-master secret and encryption padding. If the attacker can predict the output of this generator, she can subsequently decrypt the entire session. Ironically, a failure of the server RNG is much less devastating to the RSA handshake.*On the client or server side, during the Diffie-Hellman handshake(s). Since Diffie-Hellman requires a contribution from each side of the connection, a predictable RNG on either side renders the session completely transparent.During long-term key generation, particularly of RSA keys. If this happens, you're screwed.And you just don't need to be that sophisticated to weaken a random number generator. These generators are already surprisingly fragile, and it's awfully difficult to detect when one is broken. Debian's maintainers made this point beautifully back in 2008 when an errant code cleanup reduced the effective entropy of OpenSSL to just 16 bits. In fact, RNGs are so vulnerable that the challenge here is not weakening the RNG -- any idiot with a keyboard can do that -- it's doing so without making the implementation trivially vulnerable to everyone else. The good news is that it's relatively easy to tamper with an SSL implementation to make it encrypt and exfiltrate the current RNG seed. This still requires someone to physically alter the library, or install a persistent exploit, but it can be done cleverly without even adding much new code to the existing OpenSSL code. (OpenSSL's love of function pointers makes it particularly easy to tamper with this stuff.)If tampering isn't your style, why not put the backdoor in plain sight? That's the approach NSA took with the Dual_EC RNG, standardized by NIST in Special Publication 800-90. There's compelling evidence that NSA deliberately engineered this generator with a backdoor -- one that allows them to break any TLS/SSL connection made using it. Since the generator is (was) the default in RSA's BSAFE library, you should expect every TLS connection made using that software to be potentially compromised.Esoteric Weaknesses in PFS systems. Many web servers, including Google and Facebook, now use Perfect Forward Secrecy ciphersuites like ephemeral Diffie-Hellman (DHE and ECDHE). In theory these ciphersuites provide the best of all possible worlds: keys persist for one session and then disappear once the connection is over. While this doesn't save you from RNG issues, it does make key theft a whole lot more difficult.PFS ciphersuites are a good thing, but a variety of subtle issues can cramp their style. For one thing, the session resumption mechanism can be finicky: session keys must either be stored locally, or encrypted and given out to users in the form of session tickets. Unfortunately, the use of session tickets somewhat diminishes the 'perfectness' of PFS systems, since the keys used for encrypting the tickets now represent a major weakness in the system. Moreover, you can't even keep them internal to one server, since they have to be shared among all of a site's front-end servers! In short, they seem like kind of a nightmare.
  A final area of concern is the validation of Diffie-Hellman parameters. The current SSL design assumes that DH groups are always honestly generated by the server. But a malicious implementation can violate this assumption and use bad parameters, which enable third party eavesdropping. This seems like a pretty unlikely avenue for enabling surveillance, but it goes to show how delicate these systems are.
  The Tinfoil Hat Spectrum
  I'm going to refer to the next batch of attacks as 'tinfoil hat' vulnerabilities. Where the previous issues all leverage well known techniques, each of the following proposals require totally new cryptanalytic techniques. All of which is a way of saying that the following section is pure speculation. It's fun to speculate, of course. But it requires us to assume facts not in evidence. Moreover, we have to be a bit careful about where we stop.
  So from here on out we are essentially conducting a thought-experiment. Let's imagine the NSA has a passive SSL-breaking capability; and furthermore, that it doesn't rely on the tricks of the previous section. What's left?
  The following list begins with the most 'likely' theories and works towards the truly insane.
  Breaking RSA keys. There's a persistent rumor in our field that NSA is cracking 1024-bit RSA keys. It's doubtful this rumor stems from any real knowledge of NSA operations. More likely it's driven by the fact that cracking 1024-bit keys is highly feasible for an organization with NSA's resources.
  How feasible? Several credible researchers have attempted to answer this question, and it turns out that the cost is lower than you think. Way back in 2003, Shamir and Tromer estimated $10 million for a purpose-built machine that could factor one 1024-bit key per year. In 2013, Tromer reduced those numbers to about $1 million, factoring in hardware advances. And it could be significantly lower. This is pocket change for NSA.
  Along similar lines, Bernstein, Heninger and Lange examined at the feasibility of cracking RSA using distributed networks of standard PCs. Their results are pretty disturbing: in principal, a cluster about the size of the real-life Conficker botnet could do serious violence to 1024-bit keys.
  Given all this, you might ask why this possibility is even in the 'tinfoil hat' category. The simple answer is: because nobody's actually done it. That means it's at least conceivable that the estimates above are dramatically too high -- or even too low. Moreover, RSA-1024 keys are being rapidly being phased out. Cracking 2048 bit keys would require significant mathematical advances, taking us much deeper into the tinfoil hat.**
  Cracking RC4. On paper, TLS supports a variety of strong encryption algorithms. In practice, about half of all TLS traffic is secured with the creaky old RC4 cipher. And this should worry you -- because RC4 is starting to show its age. In fact, as used in TLS it's already vulnerable to (borderline) practical attacks. Thus it seems like a nice candidate for a true cryptanalytic advance on NSA's part.
  Unfortunately the problem with this theory is that we simply don't know of any attack that would allow the NSA to usefully crack RC4! The known techniques require an attacker to collect thousands or millions of ciphertexts that are either (a) encrypted with related keys (as in WEP) or (b) contain the same plaintext. The best known attack against TLS takes the latter form -- it requires the victim to establish billions of sessions, and even then it only recovers fixed plaintext elements like cookies or passwords.
  The counterargument is that the public research community hasn't been thinking very hard about RC4 for the past decade -- in part because we thought it was so broken people had stopped using it (oops!) If we'd been focusing all our attention on it (or better, the NSA's attention), who knows what we'd have today.
  If you told me the NSA had one truly new cryptanalytic capability, I'd agree with Jake and point the finger at RC4. Mostly because the alternatives are far scarier.
  New side-channel attacks. For the most part, remote timing attacks appear to have been killed off by the implementation of countermeasures such as RSA blinding, which confound timing by multiplying a random blinding factor into each ciphertext prior to decryption. In theory this should make timing information essentially worthless. In practice, many TLS implementations implement compromises in the blinding code that might resurrect these attacks, things like squaring a blinding factor between decryption operations, rather than generating a new one each time. It's quite unlikely there are attacks here, but who knows.
  Goofy stuff. Maybe NSA does have something truly amazing up its sleeve. The problem with opening this Pandora's box is that it's really hard to get it closed again. Did Jerry Solinas really cook the NIST P-curves to support some amazing new attack (which NSA knew about way back in the late 1990s, but we have not yet discovered)? Does the NSA have a giant supercomputer named TRANSLTR that can brute-force any cryptosystem? Is there a giant quantum computer at the BWI Friendship annex? For answers to these questions you may as well just shake the Magic 8-Ball, cause I don't have a clue.
  Conclusion
  We don't know and can't know the answer to these things, and honestly it'll make you crazy if you start thinking about it. All we can really do is take NSA/GCHQ at their word when they tell us that these capabilities are 'extremely fragile'. That should at least give us hope.
  The question now is if we can guess well enough to turn that fragility from a warning into a promise.Notes:
  * A failure of the server RNG could result in some predictable values like the ServerRandom and session IDs. An attacker who can predict these values may be able to run active attacks against the protocol, but -- in the RSA ciphersuite, at least -- they don't admit passive compromise.
  ** Even though 1024-bit RSA keys are being eliminated, many servers still use 1024-bit for Diffie-Hellman (mostly for efficiency reasons). The attacks on these keys are similar to the ones used against RSA -- however, the major difference is that fresh Diffie-Hellman 'ephemeral' keys are generated for each new connection. Breaking large amounts of traffic seems quite costly.
Joachim Stroink, Nova Scotia MLA, Criticized For Blackface Photo
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 18:06
  A Nova Scotia MLA is in hot water after posing with a man wearing blackface makeup and posting the image to Twitter.
  Joachim Stroink, a Liberal who represents Halifax Chebucto, participated in a Dutch Christmas event in Halifax on Sunday featuring "Sinterklass" and "Zwarte Piet" '-- or Black Pete '-- who is described in the Netherlands as Santa's helper or servant.
  Stroink got emotional at a news conference on Monday as he discussed the photo showing him sitting on the lap of the Black Pete character.
  "I do acknowledge that that whole blackface culture, there is no place for that in Nova Scotia, nor in our (Dutch) culture as well,'' he said.
  "There was no malicious intent whatsoever. This is a Dutch tradition that I grew up with and never ever in my deepest heart, ever thought that this would be portrayed in this manner."
  Stroink fought back tears as he discussed how difficult it has been to deal with the reaction to the photo and why he got into politics.
  "It's been incredibly hard," he said. "I didn't sign up for this. I did this because I wanted to better Nova Scotia."
  Stroink deleted the photo Sunday, but not before many Twitter users expressed outrage.
  Stroink, who was first elected in October, retweeted a post from a friend defending the MLA against charges of racism.
  Stroink also addressed the controversy in a message posted to his Facebook page Monday morning, saying he did not mean to offend anyone by celebrating an aspect of his culture.
  Christmas in my culture is a tradition focused on Sinterklaas and Zwarte Pete has always been his side kick, much like Santa's elves. While the history of Zwarte Pete and the blackface have contributed to perpetuating negative stereotypes, to ignore or to disavow Zwarte Pete would be to ignore that history within the Dutch community. In recent years issues have been raised in some communities, but to my knowledge never in Halifax or NS, with this cultural celebration.
  As a child growing up and celebrating the Sinterklaas and Zwarte Pete tradition, the blackface did not lead me to think less of my African NS neighbours and friends, and as such I was not sensitive to the potential to offend through my participation, with my family, at Sunday's 2013 Sinterklaas event held in Halifax.
  While it is certainly uncomfortable to be in the lime light for what was intended to be a fun community event for the family kicking off the Christmas season, the resulting conversation, highlighting the underlying issues with black face and how it has played a role in suppressing people of African heritage, is a worthy and necessary one. It is important we embrace discussions like this as a broader community.
  The Black Pete tradition has stirred heated debate in the Netherlands for years and recently drew criticism from the U.N. Human Rights Commissioner.
  Some believe the custom dates back to the 17th century, when wealthy Amsterdam families would often keep a black house slave.
  But while the custom has brought forth charges of racism, a poll from October showed 91 percent of Dutch people believe the tradition should not be changed.
  With files from The Canadian Press
  Also on HuffPost:
VIDEO-RAW: Joachim Stroink apologizes - News - CBC Player
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 18:05
  Dec 4, 2013|0:38CBC News: Winnipeg at 6:00RAW: Winter wind, snow batters Manitoba roadwaysVideoCBC News: Winnipeg at 6:00RAW: Winter wind, snow batters Manitoba roadwaysDec 4, 2013|0:38Southern Manitoba was under a snowfall warning on Wednesday, and blowing snow made driving on roadways difficult.
  Dec 4, 2013|0:32NewsRAW: Power pole fireVideoNewsRAW: Power pole fireDec 4, 2013|0:32Much of Dartmouth is in darkness. Power pole is on fire on Brule Street. Crews on scene.
  Dec 3, 2013|2:25NewsRAW: STARS chopper lands at RGHVideoNewsRAW: STARS chopper lands at RGHDec 3, 2013|2:25Watch in real time as a STARS emergency helicopter does a demonstration arrival at its new heliport on the Regina General Hospital.
  Dec 3, 2013|2:19NewsRAW Wynne gas plant committeeVideoNewsRAW Wynne gas plant committeeDec 3, 2013|2:19Ontario premier Kathleen Wynne appears before the inquiry into the province's canceled power plants.
  Dec 3, 2013|3:05CBC News Vancouver at 6RAW: Lawyer on horse-kicking caseVideoCBC News Vancouver at 6RAW: Lawyer on horse-kicking caseDec 3, 2013|3:05Robyn Wishart says Yuen Yen Wong remains in intensive care
  Dec 3, 2013|1:33NewsRAW VID: Trailer park's feral catsVideoNewsRAW VID: Trailer park's feral catsDec 3, 2013|1:33More than 30 feral cats from a Lower Sackville trailer park are set to get spayed or neutered in an attempt to get the booming population under control.
  Dec 3, 2013|1:18NewsRAW: The power of songVideoNewsRAW: The power of songDec 3, 2013|1:18Members of the Project PAL choir perform for CBC Montreal.
  Dec 3, 2013|3:31CBC News Vancouver at 6RAW: Tentative 5-year labour dealVideoCBC News Vancouver at 6RAW: Tentative 5-year labour dealDec 3, 2013|3:31B.C. Minister Mike de Jong calls deal 'relatively unprecedented'
  Dec 3, 2013|1:12CBC News: Winnipeg at 6:00RAW: Danny McManus on coming to WinnipegVideoCBC News: Winnipeg at 6:00RAW: Danny McManus on coming to WinnipegDec 3, 2013|1:12Danny McManus talks to reporters about joining the Blue Bombers coaching staff
  Dec 3, 2013|1:48CBC News: Winnipeg at 6:00RAW: James Allum reacts to math skills reportVideoCBC News: Winnipeg at 6:00RAW: James Allum reacts to math skills reportDec 3, 2013|1:48Education Minister James Allum talks to reporters about Manitoba's poor showing in math skills report
  Dec 3, 2013|1:52CBC News Vancouver at 6RAW: Pests in green binsVideoCBC News Vancouver at 6RAW: Pests in green binsDec 3, 2013|1:52Kitsilano resident Hal Kalman says he saw more rats, skunks and raccoons in green bins
  Dec 3, 2013|1:20CBC News Vancouver at 6RAW: Councillor defends green binsVideoCBC News Vancouver at 6RAW: Councillor defends green binsDec 3, 2013|1:20Coun. Andrea Reimer defends Vancouver's food scraps program
  Dec 3, 2013|0:26CBC News CalgaryRAW: Whiteout highway conditionsVideoCBC News CalgaryRAW: Whiteout highway conditionsDec 3, 2013|0:26Watch how bad the highway conditions are on Highway 567 west of Irricana, Alta. The video was submitted by Patrick Jessup who was trying to venture to the local grocery store.
  Dec 2, 2013|2:58CBC News: Winnipeg at 6:00RAW: Pallister explains 'infidel atheists' remarkVideoCBC News: Winnipeg at 6:00RAW: Pallister explains 'infidel atheists' remarkDec 2, 2013|2:58Manitoba Tory leader Brian Pallister said he was genuine when he was wishing "infidel atheists" the best for the holiday season.
  Dec 2, 2013|5:32NewsRAW: Joachim Stroink apologizesVideoNewsRAW: Joachim Stroink apologizesDec 2, 2013|5:32An emotional Stroink fought back tears as he apologized for a photo he posted of himself posing with the controversial blackface Dutch character Zwarte Piet.
EmacsWiki: Mutt In Emacs
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 17:44
  Emacs as your external editor for MuttAdd the following to your ~/.emacs in order to have all files whose name contains ''/mutt'' to be in mail-mode.
  (server-start) (add-to-list 'auto-mode-alist '("/mutt" . mail-mode))Change ~/.muttrc:
  set editor=emacsclient set pager=emacsclientYou can also use GnuClient instead of EmacsClient, if you installed it.
  XEmacs as your external editor for MuttUse the same as above, but change your ~/.muttrc to read as follows:
  set editor=gnuclient set pager=gnuclientYou need that because XEmacs uses GnuClient instead of EmacsClient.
  Run Mutt within Emacs or XEmacsYou can run mutt within an AnsiTerm: M-x ansi-term.
  Note that ansi-term remaps your default C-x key to C-c.
  Further ConfigurationSince your Mutt mails are now in mail-mode, you can use mail-mode-hook for further configurations. Here is an example to add AutoFillMode:
  (add-hook 'mail-mode-hook 'turn-on-auto-fill)Replacing C-x # with C-x kThis turns on auto-fill-mode, abbrev-mode and sets C-x k to server-edit so that you don't have to change from using C-x k to C-x # depending on the buffer
  (defun my-mail-mode-hook () (auto-fill-mode 1) (abbrev-mode 1) (local-set-key "\C-Xk" 'server-edit)) (add-hook 'mail-mode-hook 'my-mail-mode-hook)Replacing C-x # with C-c C-cHere's another way which binds C-c C-c and doesn't prompt whether you want to save the buffer first:
  ;; Yes, you can do this same trick with the cool "It's All Text" firefox add-on :-) (add-to-list 'auto-mode-alist '("/mutt-\\|itsalltext.*mail\\.google" . mail-mode)) (add-hook 'mail-mode-hook 'turn-on-auto-fill) (add-hook 'mail-mode-hook (lambda () (define-key mail-mode-map [(control c) (control c)] (lambda () (interactive) (save-buffer) (server-edit)))))Using Message mode for MuttFollowing snippet opens any file having name ''mutt'' in it in message mode, sets mail-header-separator to '''' for M-q and auto-fill to work correctly, sets auto-fill-mode default for message-mode and assigns C-c C-c in message mode to close the server buffer and exit quickly.
  (add-to-list 'auto-mode-alist '(".*mutt.*" . message-mode)) (setq mail-header-separator "") (add-hook 'message-mode-hook 'auto-fill-mode) (define-key message-mode-map (kbd "C-c C-c") '(lambda () "save and exit quickly" (interactive) (save-buffer) (server-edit))) Usage report: Tried code above on debian using emacs 23 but the keybinding doesn't work. Error is 'Symbol's value as variable is void: message-mode-map'. Unfortunately I hardly know any elisp so could anyone please correct it (if it is easily correctable)?
  Response: I haven't tested the below extensively, but I believe it solves your problem (which was mine as well).
  (add-to-list 'auto-mode-alist '(".*mutt.*" . message-mode)) (setq mail-header-separator "") (add-hook 'message-mode-hook 'auto-fill-mode) (defvar message-mode-map (let ((map (make-sparse-keymap))) (define-key map (kbd "C-c C-c") '(lambda () "save and exit quickly" (interactive) (save-buffer) (server-edit))) map) "Add Mutt C-c C-c command to message-mode keymap (creating it if needed)" )Update: Thank you very much, above code works but you completely replace message-mode's keymap so all other message-mode-bindings (for adding headers, jumping to body etc.) are gone. I finally managed to correct the first solution by wrapping the keybinding in a hook (problem seemed to be, that the 'message-mode-map'-variable is only available when in message mode). The complete snippet now reads:
  (add-to-list 'auto-mode-alist '(".*mutt.*" . message-mode)) (setq mail-header-separator "") (add-hook 'message-mode-hook 'turn-on-auto-fill (function (lambda () (progn (local-unset-key "\C-c\C-c") (define-key message-mode-map "\C-c\C-c" '(lambda () "save and exit quickly" (interactive) (save-buffer) (server-edit)))))))I'm sure this can be written more concisely but as I said, I hardly know anything about elisp and don't want to fiddle any furher'... At least everything works as it should now
  Switching window focus between mutt and emacs when using emacsclientSee the "Automatically managing window manager focus" section of EmacsClient.
  CategoryMailCategoryExternalUtilities
Nigella Lawson admits taking cocaine
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: BBC News - Home
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:47
  4 December 2013Last updated at 11:08 ET TV cook Nigella Lawson has admitted taking cocaine, but denies having a drug problem or being an addict.
  She said she had taken the drug twice, first with her late husband John Diamond when he was terminally ill.
  The second time was in July 2010 when, she said, she was being "subjected to intimate terrorism" by her ex-husband, Charles Saatchi.
  She made the admission at the trial at Isleworth Crown Court of her former assistants, who deny fraud.
  Francesca and Elisabetta Grillos' defence claims they were allowed to spend on credit cards by Ms Lawson in return for covering up her drug use.
  Ms Lawson, 53, explained that she took cocaine with Mr Diamond on six occasions, after he found out his cancer was terminal.
  "It gave him some escape," she said.
  She said she had responsibility for looking after him and the family and earning a living - and that she had spoken to a doctor at the time.
  She went on: "There was another time I took cocaine. In July 2010 I was having a very very difficult time.
  "I felt subjected to intimate terrorism by Mr Saatchi," adding that she felt "isolated and in fear of... just unhappy".
  "A friend of mine offered me some cocaine, I took it," she said.
  Ms Lawson said it "completely spooked" her.
  She said: "The idea that I am a drug addict, or habitual user of cocaine is absolutely ridiculous."
  Ms Lawson said Mr Saatchi "told everyone" he was taking cocaine out of her nose after he was photographed holding her neck at Scotts restaurant.
  She claimed the incident was actually sparked when she commented on a person walking by with a baby.
  "I said 'I'm so looking forward to having grandchildren'," Ms Lawson told the court.
  "He grabbed me by the throat and said 'I'm the only person you should be concerned with'."
  The case continues.
Newtown 911 calls to be released
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: BBC News - Home
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:46
  4 December 2013Last updated at 10:21 ET Authorities will later release emergency dispatch recordings of last year's school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, which left 26 people dead.
  The tapes reportedly contain nearly half an hour of 911 calls made from inside Sandy Hook Elementary School amid the attack on 14 December 2012.
  Residents have been advised to prepare themselves emotionally for the release of the seven landline calls.
  Attacker Adam Lanza killed 20 children and six adults at the primary school.
  Gunfire is said to be audible in the background of the recordings being released on Wednesday afternoon.
  'Emotional trigger'Newtown School Superintendent John Reed reportedly contacted parents on Tuesday to alert them to the impending distribution of the recordings, warning them the tapes could act as an "emotional trigger".
  The emergency recordings are being made public just days after a state judge ruled the tapes should be unsealed.
  State's Attorney Stephen Sedensky, the prosecutor overseeing the shooting investigation, and town officials had argued the tapes' release could hamper the inquiry and violate victims' rights.
  But Mr Sedensky said he would not pursue the effort further following the court ruling.
  The first call to emergency services came at 09:35 and the last shot, believed to be Lanza firing a handgun at himself, came at 09:40. Most of the deceased were killed in two classrooms.
  A report into the investigation was released last week, in which police determined that Lanza, 20, acted alone.
  Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play.
  A mother of a victim of the Sandy Hook shooting pleads for new gun control laws in April
  They have not determined a motive for the massacre, which began with Lanza killing his own mother.
  The report stated: "He had a familiarity with and access to firearms and ammunition and an obsession with mass murders, in particular the April 1999 shootings at Columbine High School in Colorado."
  The Newtown shooting prompted a renewed US campaign for stricter firearms controls.
  While no legislation was passed at a national level, some states - including Connecticut and Colorado - imposed tougher gun laws; other states loosened such restrictions.
VIDEO: How not to break law on social media
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  Archived Version
  Source: BBC News - Home
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:46
  This page is best viewed in an up-to-date web browser with style sheets (CSS) enabled. While you will be able to view the content of this page in your current browser, you will not be able to get the full visual experience. Please consider upgrading your browser software or enabling style sheets (CSS) if you are able to do so.
TSA Pre'''TM
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Federal Register Latest Entries
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:20
  This notice is effective December 4, 2013.
  Hao-y Froemling, Program Management Division, Office of Intelligence and Analysis (OIA), TSA-10, Transportation Security Administration, 601 South 12th Street, Arlington, VA 20598-0610; facsimile (703) 603-0409; or email at TSAPrecheckEnrollment@tsa.dhs.gov.
  (1) Searching the electronic Federal Docket Management System (FDMS) Web page at http://www.regulations.gov;
  (2) Accessing the Government Printing Office's Web page at http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/browse/collection.action?collectionCode=FR to view the daily published Federal Register edition; or accessing the ''Search the Federal Register by Citation'' in the ''Related Resources'' column on the left, if you need to do a Simple or Advanced search for information, such as a type of document that crosses multiple agencies or dates; or
  (3) Visiting TSA's Security Regulations Web page at http://www.tsa.gov and accessing the link for ''Stakeholders'' at the top of the page, then the link ''Research Center'' in the left column.
  In addition, copies are available by writing or calling the individual in the FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT section.
  TSA Pre'''TM is a passenger prescreening initiative for low risk passengers who are eligible to receive expedited screening at participating U.S. airport security checkpoints. [1] Currently, travelers eligible for TSA Pre'''TM screening include members of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) trusted traveler programs, as well as other groups (such as elite frequent flyers) who are invited to apply directly to TSA Pre'''TM.
  As part of DHS efforts to implement trusted traveler programs, and to expand the population of travelers eligible for TSA Pre'''TM screening, TSA is developing a trusted traveler program (to be called ''TSA Pre'''TM Application Program'') for air travel originating at U.S. airports. The public is invited to apply directly to TSA for enrollment through the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program. Travelers who are enrolled through the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program are eligible to receive TSA Pre'''TM screening at participating airports. Travelers interested in enrolling in the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program will provide the necessary biographic and biometric information [2] and pay a non-refundable fee of $85.00 for TSA to conduct security threat assessments. The results will be used by TSA to decide if an individual poses a low risk to transportation or national security. TSA will provide applicants who meet the standards of the security threat assessment a Known Traveler Number (KTN). [3] The security threat assessments and KTNs are valid for five years. It is expected that after five years, participants may renew their KTN by successfully undergoing another security threat assessment and paying the applicable fee through the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program.
  TSA Pre'''TM Application Program participants who provide their KTNs to airlines when they make their flight reservations may be eligible for expedited screening in the TSA Pre'''TM lane at participating airports. Enrollment into the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program, and use of the associated KTN, does not guarantee that an individual will receive expedited screening at airport security checkpoints. TSA retains a component of randomness to maintain the element of unpredictability for security purposes, and travelers with valid KTNs may be selected for standard physical screening on occasion. In addition, although the number of TSA Pre'''TM lanes at U.S. airports is increasing, TSA Pre'''TM is not yet available for all airports, all airlines, or all flights.
  TSA is required to provide for the screening of all passengers and property in air transportation. [4] TSA screens every passenger and all accessible property before the passenger may enter the sterile area of the airport and board a flight. TSA screens more than 1.7 million passengers each day at more than 450 airports nationwide. TSA employs risk-based procedures to screen all individuals who pass through the TSA security checkpoints.
  TSA is undertaking efforts to focus its resources and improve the passenger experience at security checkpoints by applying new intelligence-driven, risk-based screening procedures and enhancing its use of technology. This approach is based on, among other things, the following premises:
  The majority of airline passengers are low risk.By having passengers voluntarily provide more information about themselves, TSA can better segment the population in terms of risk.TSA can better increase security by focusing on unknowns; and expediting known and trusted travelers.TSA has taken a number of actions to implement its intelligence-driven, risk-based approach to aviation security. These actions include expedited screening for passengers 12-years old or younger or 75-years old or older and for U.S. military personnel. These steps enhance aviation security by permitting TSA to focus its limited security resources on passengers who are more likely to pose a threat to civil aviation, while also facilitating and improving the commercial aviation travel experience for the public.
  TSA Pre'''TM expedited screening for commercial airline passengers is a key component of this intelligence-driven, risk-based approach to aviation security. Persons generally eligible for TSA Pre'''TM include those who are elite members of participating airlines' frequent flyer programs or who participate in trusted traveler programs recognized by the U.S. Government. These trusted traveler programs include the CBP trusted traveler programs [5] such as Global Entry, NEXUS, and Secure Electronic Network for Travelers Rapid Inspection (SENTRI). [6] Under such programs, following a background investigation, eligible individuals receive an identifying number from the respective program. An airline passenger may provide that identifying number in the KTN field when making a flight reservation. Airlines provide the KTN, along with other Secure Flight Passenger Data (SFPD), to TSA through the Secure Flight program. [7] TSA then compares the submitted information against a list of trusted traveler program participants received from the program sponsor. If the passenger's identifying information matches the entry on the list of trusted travelers, the passenger is eligible for TSA Pre'''TM expedited screening.
  The CBP trusted traveler programs have been successful in serving international travelers seeking expedited customs and immigration clearance at ports of entry into the United States and at border crossings into Canada or Mexico. The eligibility of these trusted traveler program members for TSA Pre'''TM expedited screening for flights departing from participating U.S. airports also has been beneficial to both these travelers and the TSA. Consistent with DHS efforts to provide trusted traveler programs, TSA is seeking to expand access to TSA Pre'''TM expedited screening to additional trusted travelers who may not want or need expedited customs and immigration clearance at the border, may not have a passport, or may not live in locations convenient to a CBP enrollment site. Thus, TSA is establishing the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program to provide travelers another avenue to obtain KTNs that will make them eligible for TSA Pre'''TM.
  Members of CBP trusted traveler programs who are U.S. or Canadian citizens will continue to be eligible for TSA Pre'''TM expedited screening. However, those who enroll in the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program will not be able to use Global Entry, NEXUS, or SENTRI for expedited immigration and customs clearance when traveling to or from the United States unless they are already members of these programs.
  A. OverviewTSA is implementing the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program pursuant to its authority under sec. 109(a)(3) of the Aviation and Transportation Security Act (ATSA), Public Law 107-71 (115 Stat. 597, 613, Nov. 19, 2001, codified at 49 U.S.C. 114 note). That section authorizes TSA to ''[e]stablish requirements to implement trusted passenger programs and use available technologies to expedite security screening of passengers who participate in such programs, thereby allowing security screening personnel to focus on those passengers who should be subject to more extensive screening.'' Under this program, travelers may be eligible for expedited security screening for air travel through TSA Pre'''TM lanes if they: (1) Voluntarily submit requested biometric and biographic information to TSA; (2) pay the non-refundable program fee that covers TSA's costs for conducting the security threat assessment and adjudicating the application; and (3) meet the standards of the security threat assessment to confirm that they do not pose a threat to transportation or national security.
  The security threat assessment includes criminal, immigration, terrorist, and regulatory violation checks. TSA plans to use the criminal disqualifiers listed in statute [8] and rulemaking [9] for certain transportation workers as a basis for the criminal portion of the check. This includes, but is not limited to, indictments and convictions for crimes such as treason, air piracy, murder, assault with intent to kill, kidnapping, arson, fraud, bomb threats, RICO violations, smuggling, robbery, bribery, distribution of controlled substances, and unlawful use or possession of weapons or explosive devices. For the immigration portion of the check, TSA will verify that the applicant is a U.S. national (which includes U.S. citizens) or legal permanent resident. TSA will review government and international databases to determine whether the applicant has a connection or ties to terrorism, or that indicate he or she poses a threat to transportation or national security. TSA also will review records of regulatory violations to determine whether the applicant has violated regulations related to transportation security, such as interference with screening personnel or flight crew, or unlawfully attempting to carry or carrying a weapon or explosive on board an aircraft.
  Eligibility for the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program is within the sole discretion of TSA. TSA will provide individuals who pose a low risk to security with a KTN, which program members may use when making travel reservations. An individual is ineligible for the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program, if TSA at its sole discretion, determines that the individual presents a potential risk for terrorism, has committed certain criminal acts, or is otherwise not a low-risk traveler. Individuals who TSA determines are ineligible for the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program will be notified of their ineligibility in writing and continue to be screened at airport security checkpoints according to TSA standard screening protocols.
  Initially, TSA anticipates opening a limited number of enrollment sites at airports and at off-airport locations. TSA will also explore temporary mobile enrollment at corporate offices, conferences, and other venues that choose to provide this service to their personnel or participants. TSA expects to implement the program nationwide.
  Those seeking to enroll in the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program will have two options. One option is to begin the application process online by submitting biographic information and then completing the application process by visiting an enrollment center to provide biometric information. A second option is that an individual may complete the entire application process by visiting an enrollment center and providing both the required biographic and biometric information at that time. In both instances the applicant will be required to remit the published fees. TSA will conduct vetting of the applicants in a manner similar to how it vets applicants for a Hazardous Materials Endorsement (HME) and Transportation Worker Identification Credential (TWIC). See49 CFR parts 1570 and 1572. The required biographic information is similar to that collected for HME and TWIC applicants, which is described in 49 CFR 1572.9 and 1572.17, and includes name, date of birth, gender, height, weight, eye and hair color, address, citizenship/immigration status, and place of birth. Applicants will be required to submit fingerprints in-person at an enrollment center or during a mobile enrollment event. Submission of this biographic and biometric information enables TSA to complete checks on an applicant's criminal history, ties to terrorism and citizenship. TSA will notify the public of the locations of applicable enrollment sites as the program is implemented.
  B. Security Threat AssessmentOnce an applicant has submitted the required biographical and biometric information and paid the non-refunable fee, TSA will use its existing systems and processes to conduct the security threat assessment. The security threat assessment consists of a criminal history records check (CHRC) and analysis of other government databases, including terrorist watchlists and records of violations of regulatory requirements relating to transportation security. Those persons who have committed security-related regulatory offenses at an airport, airport checkpoint, airport checked baggage area, other airport area, on board an aircraft, or in connection with air cargo will not be eligible. TSA will also conduct an immigration check to confirm eligibility.
  Eligibility for the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program is within the sole discretion of TSA, which will notify applicants who are denied eligibility in writing by mail of the reasons for the denial. If initially deemed ineligible, applicants will have an opportunity to correct cases of misidentification or inaccurate criminal or immigration records. Consistent with 28 CFR 50.12 in cases involving criminal records, and before making a final eligibility decision, TSA will advise the applicant that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) criminal record discloses information that would disqualify him or her from the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program.
  Within 30 days after being advised that the criminal record received from the FBI discloses a criminal offense, the applicant must notify TSA in writing of his or her intent to correct any information he or she believes to be inaccurate. If the applicant fails to notify TSA of the intent to correct records, the applicant will likely not be eligible for the program and TSA will send a letter to the applicant explaining this. To successfully correct an inaccurate record, the applicant must provide a certified revised record, or the appropriate court must forward a certified true copy of the information, prior to TSA approving eligibility of the applicant for the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program.
  With respect to immigration records, within 30 days after being advised that the immigration records indicate that the applicant is ineligible for the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program, the applicant must notify TSA in writing of his or her intent to correct any information believed to be inaccurate. TSA will review any information submitted and make a final decision. If neither notification nor a corrected record is received by TSA, TSA may make a final determination to deny eligibility. Individuals whom TSA determines are ineligible for the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program will continue to be screened at airport security checkpoints according to TSA standard screening protocols.
  As part of the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program, TSA will conduct security threat assessments on applicants to determine whether they pose a low risk to transportation or national security. TSA will also charge a non-refundable fee to apply for the program. TSA is establishing the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program fee under sec. 540 of the DHS Appropriations Act, 2006, Public Law 109-90 (119 Stat. 2064, 2088-89, Oct. 18, 2005), which states:
  A. Fee Standards and GuidelinesThe program fee structure described in this notice is designed to fully recover TSA's anticipated costs of the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program. Such a structure will ensure that the costs to administer this program will be recovered from its applicants, in the same way TSA operates other vetting programs. When setting fees for services, TSA adheres to Federal policy, including policy outlined in the Office of Management and Budget Circular A-25 regarding user charges. In summary, the circular provides information regarding the basis upon which user charges are to be established and the implementation of such fees.
  B. Fee ComponentsThe fee is comprised of two components, discussed further below: (1) ''TSA Fee''; and (2) ''FBI Fee.'' TSA has identified various activities that will be funded through fees, including: Establishment and operation of a web-based platform for applicants to complete the submission of biographic information; establishment and operation of physical locations for applicants to complete the in-person portion of the enrollment process; construction, maintenance, and operation of the information technology platforms that are used to conduct a security threat assessment; verification of identity and U.S. citizenship or other permissible immigration status; adjudication of the results of the various checks conducted during the vetting process; a CHRC, conducted through the FBI; issuance of a KTN; and overall management and oversight of the program.
  To calculate the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program fee with full recovery TSA's anticipated costs of the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program, TSA developed population and cost figures for a five-year period. The five-year period also matches the lifecycle of the program for members, i.e., program members would be eligible for expedited screening for five years, after which they could apply to renew their membership in the program.
  Because this program is voluntary and establishes a new security service, TSA could not utilize historical enrollment data or data on a defined industry population to develop estimates. TSA developed an alternative method to estimate the population using three factors based on CBP Global Entry enrollments and usage, as well as the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program rollout strategy. First, CBP records show that of the approximately one million annual Global Entry program applicants who join the program approximately 40 percent (or 400,000) of those program participants have not used the expedited customs and immigration clearance process of Global Entry. One conclusion that may be drawn from this analysis is that some travelers that enroll in Global Entry may be doing so to gain TSA Pre'''TM expedited screening. Second, monthly Global Entry enrollments spiked by an average of 35,000 (or 420,000 annually) once reciprocity was provided between Global Entry and TSA Pre'''TM in October 2011, and this number continues to grow. Third, the initial rollout of the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program will be limited to a few locations with expansion to additional enrollment sites in later months. This rollout will affect the number of travelers who will be able to enroll in the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program during the first year. Considering these three factors, TSA has estimated that the annual average number of applicants who will apply to the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program in the first five years of the program will be 390,000.
  The cost estimates used to determine the fee have been developed in accordance with the applicable statutory language, section 540 of the DHS Appropriations Act, 2006, and Office of Management and Budget Circular A-25. Further cost information is provided in the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program Fee Development Report at www.tsa.gov.
  TSA will charge a total fee of $85.00 per person to recover fully the cost of this security service.
  1. TSA Fee. This fee component is established to fully recover the estimated costs TSA will incur to enroll applicants, process applications including any necessary redress, communicate results, monitor participants, and provide overall program management and oversight. Such activities include costs for personnel, modifications to information technology systems, system redundancy, system integration, helpdesk services, mailings, and general program office management. This fee component is $70.50 and will ensure that each program participant is charged an equitable portion of the cost necessary to operate this program.
  2. FBI Fee. This fee component is established to fully recover the cost that the FBI imposes on TSA to conduct a CHRC. As part of the security threat assessment, TSA submits fingerprints to the FBI to obtain any criminal history records that correspond to the fingerprints. The FBI is authorized to establish and collect fees to process fingerprint identification records. See28 U.S.C. 534 note. This fee is currently set at $14.50. See Notice, FBI Criminal Justice Information Services Division; Revised User Fee Schedule, 76 FR 78950 (Dec. 20, 2011). If the FBI increases or decreases its charge to complete the CHRC, the increase or decrease will apply to this program fee component and the total TSA Pre'''TM Application Program fee on the date that the new FBI fee becomes effective.
  TSA will collect the total non-refundable fee of $85.00 per person at the time of application to the program in accordance with TSA-approved payment methods. TSA will not issue fee refunds once vetting services have commenced. Further, TSA will not refund the fee, in whole or in part, to individuals who are not approved for participation in the program based upon the results of TSA's assessment. The TSA Pre'''TM Application Program KTN, and the underlying security threat assessment, are valid for a maximum of five years or until a disqualification occurs. Travelers have the option to renew their enrollment through the TSA Pre'''TM Application Program at the end of the five years by submitting an application and paying the fee.
  Dated: November 19, 2013.
  John S. Pistole,
  Administrator.
  [FR Doc. 2013-29007 Filed 12-3-13; 8:45 am]
  BILLING CODE 9110-05-P
Deutsche Bank gets '‚¬725 million Libor fine
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: The Local
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:43
  Photo: DPA
  Published: 04 Dec 2013 16:27 GMT+01:00Updated: 04 Dec 2013 16:27 GMT+01:00
  Germany's biggest bank has been fined a record '‚¬725 million for rigging interest rates. It was one of several banks fined a total of '‚¬1.7 billion by the European Union Commission on Wednesday.
  Deutsche Bank was fined the largest amount by the commission which handed down a decision in the Euribor and Libor interest rigging scandal, involving the Royal Bank of Scotland, Citi Group, Soci(C)t(C) G(C)n(C)rale and JPMorgan
  Barclays and UBS were spared fines after alerting authorities to the scandal which saw the banks act as a cartel to rig the interest rate benchmarks, Euribor and Libor..
  The German banks fine was broken down into one of '‚¬465m for taking part in euro market rigging and another '‚¬260 million for that of the Japanese Yen, the S¼ddeutsche Zeitung reported.
  The money will come out of the '‚¬4 billion Deutsche Bank has set aside for paying fines.
  ''The decision today is a clear signal that the commission is resolute in its fight against cartels in the finance sector,'' said EU commissioner responsible for competition Joachin Almunia.
  As well as Deutsche Bank, France's Soci(C)t(C) G(C)n(C)rale must pay '‚¬466 million and the Royal Bank of Scotland '‚¬391 million.
  READ MORE: Deutsche Bank profits collapse by 94 percent
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There are an usually large number of entries regarding this subject today: List of Bulk Drug Substances That May Be Used in Pharmacy Compounding
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Federal Register Latest Entries
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:42
  Withdrawal Of Proposed Rule; Request For Nominations.
  The Food and Drug Administration (FDA or Agency) is withdrawing the proposed rule to list bulk drug substances used in pharmacy compounding and preparing to develop a list of bulk drug substances (bulk drugs) that may be used to compound drug products, although they are neither the subject of a United States Pharmacopeia (USP) or National Formulary (NF) monograph nor components of FDA-approved drugs. To identify candidates for this bulk drugs list, interested groups and individuals may nominate specific bulk drug substances, and FDA is describing the information that should be provided to the Agency in support of each nomination.
  FDA is withdrawing the proposed rule published January 7, 1999 (64 FR 996), as of December 4, 2013.
  Submit written or electronic nominations for the bulk drug substances list by March 4, 2014.
  You may submit nominations, identified by Docket No. FDA-2013-N-1525, by any of the following methods.
  Submit electronic nominations in the following way:
  Submit written nominations in the following ways:
  Mail/Hand delivery/Courier (for paper submissions): Division of Dockets Management (HFA-305), Food and Drug Administration, 5630 Fishers Lane, rm. 1061, Rockville, MD 20852.Instructions: All submissions received must include the Agency name and docket number FDA-2013-N-1525 for this request for nominations. All nominations received may be posted without change to http://www.regulations.gov, including any personal information provided. For additional information on submitting nominations, see the ''Request for Nominations'' heading of the SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section of this document.
  Docket: For access to the docket to read background documents or nominations received, go to http://www.regulations.gov and insert the docket number, found in brackets in the heading of this document, into the ''Search'' box and follow the prompts and/or go to the Division of Dockets Management, 5630 Fishers Lane, rm. 1061, Rockville, MD 20852.
  Marissa Chaet Brykman, Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, Food and Drug Administration, 10903 New Hampshire Ave., Bldg. 51, suite 5100, Silver Spring, MD 20993-0002, 301-796-3110.
  Section 503A of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD Act) (21 U.S.C. 353a) describes the conditions under which a human drug product compounded for an identified individual patient based on a prescription is entitled to an exemption from three sections of the FD Act: (1) section 501(a)(2)(B) (21 U.S.C. 351(a)(2)(B)) (concerning current good manufacturing practice (CGMP) for drugs); (2) section 502(f)(1) (21 U.S.C. 352(f)(1)) (concerning the labeling of drugs with adequate directions for use); and (3) section 505 (21 U.S.C. 355) (concerning the approval of human drug products under new drug applications (NDAs) or abbreviated new drug applications (ANDAs)).
  One of the conditions for such an exemption is that a drug product may be compounded if the licensed pharmacist or licensed physician compounds the drug product using bulk drug substances that: ''(I) comply with the standards of an applicable United States Pharmacopoeia or National Formulary monograph, if a monograph exists, and the United States Pharmacopoeia chapter on pharmacy compounding; (II) if such a monograph does not exist, are drug substances that are components of drugs approved by the Secretary; or (III) if such a monograph does not exist and the drug substance is not a component of a drug approved by the Secretary, that appear on a list developed by the Secretary through regulations issued by the Secretary under subsection (d) [of Section 503A]'' (section 503A(b)(1)(A)(i) of the FD&C Act).
  Section 503A refers to the definition of ''bulk drug substance'' in FDA regulations at 21 CFR 207.3(a)(4): ''any substance that is represented for use in a drug and that, when used in the manufacturing, processing, or packaging of a drug, becomes an active ingredient or a finished dosage form of the drug, but the term does not include intermediates used in the synthesis of such substances.'' See section 503A(b)(1)(A) of the FD Act.
  Section 503A(d)(1) of the FD&C Act requires that, before issuing regulations to implement section 503A(b)(1)(A)(i)(III) of the FD&C Act, an advisory committee on compounding be convened and consulted ''unless the Secretary determines that the issuance of such regulations before consultation is necessary to protect the public health'' (section 503A(d)(1) of the FD&C Act).
  As described in more detail below, in 1998, FDA began to develop a list of bulk drug substances that may be used in compounding, but before a final rule was published, the constitutionality of section 503A was challenged in court because it included restrictions on the advertising or promotion of the compounding of any particular drug, class of drug, or type of drug and the solicitation of prescriptions for compounded drugs. These provisions were held unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2002. [1] After the court decision, FDA suspended its efforts to develop the list of bulk drug substances that could be used in compounding.
  The Drug Quality and Security Act (DQSA) removes from section 503A of the FD&C Act the provisions that had been held unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2002. [2] By removing these provisions, the new law removes uncertainty regarding the validity of section 503A, clarifying that it applies nationwide. Therefore, FDA is reinitiating its efforts to develop a list of bulk drug substances that may be used in compounding under section 503A.
  In the Federal Register of April 7, 1998 (63 FR 17011), FDA invited all interested persons to nominate bulk drug substances for inclusion on the list of bulk drug substances that may be used in compounding under section 503A. In total, FDA received nominations for 41 different drug substances. After evaluating the nominated drugs and consulting with the Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee as required by section 503A, FDA published a proposed rule proposing to list 20 drugs on the section 503A bulk drugs list in January 1999 (64 FR 996, January 7, 1999). The proposed rule also discussed 10 nominated drug substances that were still under consideration for the bulk drugs list. The Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee reconvened in May 1999 to discuss drugs included in the proposed rule, in addition to other bulk drug substances (see 64 FR 19791 (April 22, 1999)). However, as explained previously (see the ''Background'' section), after the 2002 U.S. Supreme Court decision, the Agency suspended its efforts to develop the bulk drugs list under section 503A.
  FDA intends to reconsider the bulk drug substances that were proposed for inclusion on the list and that neither have an applicable USP or NF monograph nor are components of an FDA-approved drug due to the time lapse since the last proposal. Therefore, the Agency withdraws the proposed rule, ''List of Bulk Drug Substances That May Be Used in Pharmacy Compounding,'' published in the Federal Register of January 7, 1999 (64 FR 996).
  To identify candidates for this list, FDA is seeking public input in the form of specific bulk drug nominations. All interested groups and individuals may nominate specific bulk drug substances for inclusion on the list. After evaluating the nominations and, as required by section 503A, consulting with the USP and the Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee, FDA will issue the list as a regulation under notice-and-comment rulemaking procedures.
  Nominations should include the following information about the bulk drug substance being nominated and the product(s) that will be compounded using such substance, and any other relevant information available. If the information requested is unknown or unavailable, that fact should be noted accordingly.
  Bulk Drug SubstanceIngredient name;Chemical name;Common name(s);Chemical grade or description of the strength, quality, and purity of the ingredient;Information about how the ingredient is supplied (e.g., powder, liquid);Information about recognition of the substance in foreign pharmacopeias and the status of its registration(s) in other countries, including whether information has been submitted to USP for consideration of monograph development; andA bibliography of available safety and efficacy data, [3] including any relevant peer-reviewed medical literature.Compounded ProductInformation about the dosage form(s) into which the drug substance will be compounded (including formulations);Information about the strength(s) of the compounded product(s);Information about the anticipated route(s) of administration of the compounded product(s);Information about the past and proposed use(s) of the compounded product(s), including the rationale for its use or why the compounded product(s), as opposed to an FDA-approved product, is necessary; andAvailable stability data for the compounded product(s).FDA cannot guarantee that all drugs nominated during the nomination period will be considered for inclusion on the next published bulk drugs list. Nominations received during the nomination period that are supported by the most complete and relevant information will likely be evaluated first. Nominations that are not evaluated during this first phase will receive consideration for list amendments, as the development of this list will be an ongoing process. Individuals and organizations also will be able to petition FDA to make additional list amendments after the list is published.
  Interested persons may submit either electronic nominations to http://www.regulations.gov or written nominations to the Division of Dockets Management (see ADDRESSES). It is only necessary to send one set of nominations. Identify nominations with the docket number found in the brackets in the heading of this document. Received nominations may be seen in the Division of Dockets Management between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m., Monday through Friday, and will be posted to the docket at http://www.regulations.gov.
  Dated: November 27, 2013.
  Leslie Kux,
  Assistant Commissioner for Policy.
  [FR Doc. 2013-28979 Filed 12-2-13; 11:15 am]
  BILLING CODE 4160-01-P
Drug Products That Present Demonstrable Difficulties for Compounding Under Sections 503A and 503B of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act; Request for Nominations
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Federal Register Latest Entries
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:15
  Notification; Request For Nominations.
  The Food and Drug Administration (FDA or Agency) is preparing to develop a list of drug products that present demonstrable difficulties for compounding (difficult-to-compound list). To identify candidates for this list, FDA is encouraging interested groups and individuals to nominate specific drug products or categories of drug products and is describing the information that should be provided to the Agency in support of each nomination.
  Submit written or electronic comments by March 4, 2014.
  You may submit comments, identified by Docket No. FDA-2013-N-1523, by any of the following methods.
  Submit electronic comments in the following way:
  Submit written submissions in the following ways:
  Mail/Hand delivery/Courier [for paper submissions]: Division of Dockets Management (HFA-305), Food and Drug Administration, 5630 Fishers Lane, rm. 1061, Rockville, MD 20852.Instructions: All submissions received must include the Agency name and Docket No. FDA-2013-N-1523 for this request for nominations. All comments received may be posted without change to http://www.regulations.gov, including any personal information provided. For additional information on submitting comments, see the ''Request for Nominations'' heading of the SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section of this document.
  Docket: For access to the docket to read background documents or comments received, go to http://www.regulations.gov and insert the docket number, found in brackets in the heading of this document, into the ''Search'' box and follow the prompts and/or go to the Division of Dockets Management, 5630 Fishers Lane, rm. 1061, Rockville, MD 20852.
  Marissa Chaet Brykman, Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, Food and Drug Administration, 10903 New Hampshire Ave., Bldg. 51, suite 5100, Silver Spring, MD 20993-0002, 301-796-3110.
  Section 503A of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD Act) (21 U.S.C. 353a) describes the conditions under which a human drug product compounded for an identified individual patient based on a prescription is entitled to an exemption from three sections of the FD Act: (1) Section 501(a)(2)(B) (21 U.S.C. 351(a)(2)(B)) (concerning current good manufacturing practice for drugs); (2) section 502(f)(1) (21 U.S.C. 352(f)(1)) (concerning the labeling of drugs with adequate directions for use); and (3) section 505 (21 U.S.C. 355) (concerning the approval of human drug products under new drug applications (NDAs) or abbreviated new drug applications (ANDAs)).
  One of the conditions for such an exemption is that the compounded drug product is not a ''drug product identified by the Secretary by regulation as a drug product that presents demonstrable difficulties for compounding that reasonably demonstrate an adverse effect on the safety or effectiveness of that drug product'' (section 503A(b)(3)(A) of the FD&C Act).
  Section 503A(d)(1) of the FD&C Act requires that before issuing regulations to implement section 503A(b)(3)(A) of the FD&C Act, an advisory committee on compounding be convened and consulted ''unless the Secretary determines that the issuance of such regulations before consultation is necessary to protect the public health'' (section 503A(d)(1) of the FD&C Act).
  At a meeting on July 13 and 14, 2000, the Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee discussed and provided FDA with advice about the Agency's efforts to develop a list of drugs that present demonstrable difficulties for compounding. FDA had published a notice of that meeting in the Federal Register of June 29, 2000 (65 FR 40104). However, before a list could be developed, the constitutionality of section 503A was challenged in court because it included restrictions on the advertising or promotion of the compounding of any particular drug, class of drug, or type of drug and the solicitation of prescriptions for compounded drugs. These provisions were held unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2002. [1] After the court decision, FDA suspended its efforts to develop the difficult-to-compound list.
  The Drug Quality and Security Act (DQSA) removes from section 503A of the FD&C Act the provisions that had been held unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2002. By removing these provisions, the new law removes uncertainty regarding the validity of section 503A, clarifying that it applies nationwide. Therefore, FDA is reinitiating its efforts to develop a list of drug products that present demonstrable difficulties for compounding that reasonably demonstrate an adverse effect on the safety or effectiveness of that drug product.
  In addition, the DQSA adds a new section 503B to the FD Act (21 U.S.C. 353b) that creates a new category of ''outsourcing facilities.'' Outsourcing facilities, as defined in section 503B, are facilities that meet certain conditions described in section 503B, including registering with FDA as an outsourcing facility. If these conditions are satisfied, a drug compounded by or under the direct supervision of a licensed pharmacist in an outsourcing facility is exempt from two sections of the FD Act: (1) Section 502(f)(1) and (2) section 505; but not section 501(a)(2)(B).
  One of the conditions in section 503B that must be satisfied to qualify for the exemptions is that an outsourcing facility does not compound a drug identified (directly or as part of a category of drugs) on a list published by the Secretary of drugs or categories of drugs that present demonstrable difficulties for compounding that are reasonably likely to lead to an adverse effect on the safety or effectiveness of the drug or category of drugs, taking into account the risks and benefits to patients, or the drug is compounded in accordance with all applicable conditions that are necessary to prevent the drug or category of drugs from presenting such demonstrable difficulties (see section 503B(a)(6)(A) and (a)(6)(B) of the FD&C Act). Section 503B(c)(2) of the FD&C Act requires that before issuing regulations to implement section 503B(a)(6) of the FD&C Act, an advisory committee on compounding be convened and consulted.
  FDA intends to develop and publish a single list of drug products and categories of drug products that cannot be compounded and still qualify for any of the exemptions set forth in sections 503A and 503B because they present demonstrable difficulties for compounding.
  To identify candidates for the difficult-to-compound list, FDA is seeking public input in the form of specific drug products or categories of drug products that are difficult to compound. Interested groups and individuals may nominate drug products or categories of drug products that are difficult to compound for inclusion on the list. After evaluating the nominations and, as required by Congress, consulting with the Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee (see sections 503A(d)(1) and 503B(c)(2) of the FD&C Act), FDA will issue the list as a regulation under notice-and-comment rulemaking procedures.
  Nominations should include the following for each drug product or drug product category nominated, and any other relevant additional information available:
  Name of drug product or drug product category;Reason why the drug product or drug product category should be included on the list, taking into account the risks and benefits to patients.Reasons may include but are not limited to:
  '—‹ The potential effect of compounding on the potency, purity, and quality of a drug product, which could affect the safety and effectiveness of the drug product. Factors that may be relevant to this determination include:
  1. Drug Delivery SystemIs a sophisticated drug delivery system required to ensure dosing accuracy and/or reproducibility?Is the safety or efficacy of the product a concern if there is product-to-product variability?2. Drug Formulation and ConsistencyIs a sophisticated formulation of the drug product required to ensure dosing accuracy and/or reproducibility?Because of the sophisticated formulation, is product-to-product uniformity of the drug product often difficult to achieve?Is the safety or efficacy of the product a concern if there is product-to-product variability?3. BioavailabilityIs it difficult to achieve and maintain a uniformly bioavailable dosage form?Is the safety or effectiveness of the product a concern if the bioavailability varies?4. Complexity of CompoundingIs the compounding of the drug product complex?Are there multiple, complicated, or interrelated steps?Is there a significant potential for error in one or more of the steps that could affect drug safety or effectiveness?5. Facilities and EquipmentAre sophisticated facilities and/or equipment required to ensure proper compounding of the drug product?Is there a significant potential for error in the use of the facilities or equipment that could affect drug safety or effectiveness?6. TrainingIs specialized, highly technical training essential to ensure proper compounding of the drug product?7. Testing and Quality AssuranceIs sophisticated, difficult-to-perform testing of the compounded drug product required to ensure potency, purity, performance characteristics, or other important characteristics prior to dispensing?Is there a significant potential for harm if the product is compounded without proper quality assurance procedures and end-product testing?'—‹ Adverse effects that could result when the drug product or drug product category is not made according to appropriate conditions.
  FDA cannot guarantee that all drug products or drug product categories nominated during the nomination period will be considered for inclusion on the next published difficult to compound list. Nominations received during the comment period that are supported by the most complete and relevant information will likely be evaluated first. Nominations that are not evaluated during this first phase will receive consideration for list amendments, because the development of this list will be an ongoing process. Individuals and organizations also will be able to petition FDA to make additional list amendments after the list is published.
  Interested persons may submit either electronic comments regarding this document to http://www.regulations.gov or written comments to the Division of Dockets Management (see ADDRESSES). It is only necessary to send one set comments. Identify comments with the docket number found in the brackets in the heading of this document. Received comments may be seen in the Division of Dockets Management between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m., Monday through Friday, and will be posted to the docket at http://www.regulations.gov.
  Dated: November 27, 2013.
  Leslie Kux,
  Assistant Commissioner for Policy.
  [FR Doc. 2013-28980 Filed 12-2-13; 11:15 am]
  BILLING CODE 4160-01-P
  1. See Thompson v. Western States Med. Ctr., 535 U.S. 357 (2002).
  Back to Context
BN'ers reageren op vreemdganger Onno Hoes
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: GeenStijl
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:28
  Het nieuws dat de relatie van Albert Verlinde en Onno Hoes op klappen staat, is hard aangekomen in de BN'erwereld. Ook in de politiek, maar de dag dat de politiek serieus gaat debatteren over de relatie van Albert Verlinde is de dag dat de politiek sterft, dus dat negeren we maar gewoon. Men raakt er maar niet over uitgepraat. Helemaal niet nu ook de spraakmakende kopkluiffoto's online zijn gekomen. We zijn heel erg benieuwd hoe RTL Boulevard dit nieuws gaat brengen vanavond. En wij niet alleen. Dat moet haast wel een kijkcijferrecord worden. Zoals het TMG betaamt hebben wij even alle geschokte reacties van BN'ers op Twitter over dit nieuws verzameld.
  Zelf ook BN'erophef maken? Dat kan hierrr en/of hierrr. Niet vergeten te delen!
  Johnny Quid | 04-12-13 | 14:25 | Link | Reageer ookJe bent ingelogd als: (Uitloggen)
  Probeer trouwens eens de totaal officieuze niet-ondersteunde third-party GeenStijl extension die compleet niet door ons ondersteund wordt en volledig op eigen risico is.
  Je bent niet ingelogd, klik hier om dat wel te doen: login of doe een CookieSync.
Zuckerberg, Gates lead funding round for education not-for-profit
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: CNET News
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:26
  The organization, EducationSuperHighway, steers schools toward speedier, more secure broadband connections.
  Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates have dropped cash into a not-for-profit through their respective foundations.
  EducationSuperHighway raised $9 million in a recently closed funding round, which was led by Zuckerberg's Startup:Education fund and included participation from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, EducationSuperHighway told TechCrunch on Wednesday. According to TechCrunch, the nonprofit will use the funds for everything from lobbying government to expanding its broadband-speed testing initiative.
  EducationSuperHighway's Web site claims that 80 percent of public schools in the US "lack fast enough Internet speeds to prepare our students for increasingly digital education." The not-for-profit offers a school speedtest on its site and aims to help those schools with slow broadband speeds to improve them. The organization achieves that goal by helping them weave through high-speed Internet "roadblocks."
Linux Commands Examples
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Hacker News
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:25
  22to3-3.22to3-3.3
  77zr
  4411toppm
  aa2dismoda2dissitea2enmoda2ensitea2paa-statusababc2lyacceptaccessdbaconnectacpidacpi_availableacpi_fakekeyacpi_listenadd-apt-repositoryadd-shelladdftinfoaddgroupaddpartaddr2lineadduserafm2plafm2tfmafmtoditagettyairbase-ngaircrack-ngairdecap-ngairdecloak-ngairdriver-ngaireplay-ngairmon-ngairodump-ngairodump-ng-oui-updateairolib-ngairserv-ngairtun-ngaleph
  aliasallcmallecallneededalsaalsactlalsaloopalsamixeralsaucmalsa_inalsa_outamarokamarokcollectionscanneramarokmp3tunesharmonydaemonamarokpkgamarok_afttaggeramidiamixeramuFormat.shamzdownloaderanacronanimateanimate.im6anytopnmapache2apache2ctlapachectlapgapgbfmaplayaplaymidiapm_availableapparmor_parserapparmor_statusappletviewerapport-bugapport-cliapport-collectapport-unpack
  appresaproposapt-add-repositoryapt-cacheapt-cdromapt-configapt-extracttemplatesapt-ftparchiveapt-getapt-keyapt-markapt-sortpkgsaptdaptdconapturlapturl-gtkararcharecordarecordmidiarm2hpdlarparpdarpingasasciitopgmaseqdumpaseqnetaspellaspell-autobuildhashaspell-importassistantasunderatatdatktopbmatobmatqatrm
  audacityavahi-autoipdavahi-browseavahi-browse-domainsavahi-daemonavahi-publishavahi-publish-addressavahi-publish-serviceavahi-resolveavahi-resolve-addressavahi-resolve-host-nameavahi-set-host-nameavconvavg_audioplayeravg_checktouchavg_checkvsyncavg_chromakeyavg_showcameraavg_showfileavg_showfontavg_showsvgavg_videoinfoavg_videoplayeravifixaviindexavimergeavisplitavisyncavivotoolavplayavprobeavserverawkaxi-cache
  bbadblocksbaobabbase64basenamebashbashbugbatchbcbccmdbdftopcfbdftruncatebibtexbibtex.originalbibtex8bibtexubioradtopgmbiosdecodebitmapblkidblobbyblockdevbluetooth-agentbluetooth-appletbluetooth-sendtobluetooth-wizardbluetoothdbluez-simple-agentbluez-simple-servicebluez-test-adapterbluez-test-audiobluez-test-devicebluez-test-discoverybluez-test-inputbluez-test-managerbluez-test-networkbluez-test-serialbluez-test-servicebluez-test-telephonybmp2tiff
  bmptopnmbmptoppmbmtoaboot-repairbootlogdbraserobridgebrlttybrltty-ctbbrltty-setupbrltty-trtxtbrltty-ttbbrushtopbmbsd-frombsd-writebtcflashbubbrosbubbros-clientbubbros-serverbuddy-ngbunzip2burgerspaceburgerspace-serverbusyboxbzcatbzcmpbzdiffbzegrepbzexebzfgrepbzgrepbzip2bzip2recoverbzlessbzmore
  cc++c++filtc2phc89c89-gccc99c99-gcccabextractcalcalendarcalibrate_ppacanberra-gtk-playcancelcapshcaptoinfocatcatchsegvcatmancautious-launchercccd-create-profilecd-fix-profilecdparanoiacdrdaocdrecordcdxa2mpegcfdiskchaclchagechardetcharmapchatchattrchconcheck-language-supportcheckbox-qtcheckcitescheckgidcheck_forensic
  chemchfnchgpasswdchgrpchildsplaychkdupexechmodchownchpasswdchromium-browserchrootchrtchshchvtciptoolcjpegck-historyck-launch-sessionck-list-sessionsck-log-system-restartck-log-system-startck-log-system-stopckbcompcksumclambcclamscanclamtkclearclear_consoleclipitcmpcmuwmtopbmcodepagecolcolcrtcolormgrcolrmcolumncombinediff
  commcommand2foo2lava-pjlcomparecompare.im6compizcompiz-decoratorcomposecompositecomposite.im6config_dataconjureconjure.im6console-kit-daemonconvertconvert-lyconvert.im6corelistcpcpancpan2distcpanpcpanp-run-perlcpgrcpiocppcpp-4.7cppwcracklib-checkcracklib-formatcracklib-packercracklib-unpackercrc32crdacreate-cracklib-dictcredentials-preferencescroncrontabcryptsetupcsplit
  ctanglectiectrlaltdelctstatcups-browsedcups-calibratecups-genppdupdatecupsacceptcupsaddsmbcupsctlcupsdcupsdisablecupsenablecupsfiltercupsrejectcupstestdsccupstestppdcutcvlccvtcweavecytunec_rehash
  ddashdatedbilogstripdbiprofdbiproxydbmmanagedbus-cleanup-socketsdbus-daemondbus-launchdbus-monitordbus-senddbus-uuidgendcdconfdconf-editorddddatedeallocvtdebconfdebconf-apt-progressdebconf-communicatedebconf-copydbdebconf-escapedebconf-gettextizedebconf-set-selectionsdebconf-showdebconf-updatepodebugfsdehtmldiffdeja-dupdeja-dup-preferencesdelgroupdelpartdeluserdepmoddesignerdesktop-file-editdesktop-file-installdesktop-file-validate
  detexdevdumpdevnagdfdfutooldgawkdhdhclientdhclient-scriptdh_apparmordh_auto_builddh_auto_cleandh_auto_configuredh_auto_installdh_auto_testdh_bash-completiondh_bugfilesdh_builddebdh_cleandh_compressdh_desktopdh_dkmsdh_fixpermsdh_gconfdh_gencontroldh_iconsdh_installdh_installcatalogsdh_installchangelogsdh_installcrondh_installdebdh_installdebconfdh_installdirsdh_installdocsdh_installemacsendh_installexamplesdh_installgsettingsdh_installifupdowndh_installinfo
  dh_installinitdh_installlogcheckdh_installlogrotatedh_installmandh_installmanpagesdh_installmenudh_installmimedh_installmodulesdh_installpamdh_installpppdh_installtexdh_installudevdh_installwmdh_installxfontsdh_installxmlcatalogsdh_linkdh_lintiandh_listpackagesdh_makeshlibsdh_md5sumsdh_movefilesdh_numpydh_perldh_perl_dbidh_prepdh_pysupportdh_pythondh_python2dh_python3dh_scrollkeeperdh_shlibdepsdh_stripdh_suidregisterdh_testdirdh_testrootdh_ucfdh_undocumenteddh_usrlocaldia
  dia-gnomedia-gnome-integrateddialogdiffdiff3diffstatdigdirdircolorsdirectomaticdirnamedirsplitdisdvidisplaydisplay.im6djpegdkmsdm-tooldmesgdmidecodedmsetupdnsdomainnamednsmasqdo-release-upgradedomainnamedosfsckdosfslabeldotlockfiledpkgdpkg-architecturedpkg-buildflagsdpkg-buildpackagedpkg-checkbuilddepsdpkg-debdpkg-distaddfiledpkg-divertdpkg-genchangesdpkg-gencontroldpkg-gensymbols
  dpkg-log-summarydpkg-maintscript-helperdpkg-mergechangelogsdpkg-namedpkg-parsechangelogdpkg-preconfiguredpkg-querydpkg-reconfiguredpkg-scanpackagesdpkg-scansourcesdpkg-shlibdepsdpkg-sourcedpkg-splitdpkg-statoverridedpkg-triggerdpkg-vendordprofppdt2dvdudumpe2fsdumpkeysduplicitydv2dtdvd+rw-booktypedvd+rw-formatdvd+rw-mediainfodvd-ram-controldvdripdvdrip-execdvdrip-masterdvdrip-multiteedvdrip-progressdvdrip-replexdvdrip-splashdvdrip-splitpipedvdrip-subpngdvdrip-thumbdvdxchapdvi2fax
  dvi2ttydvibookdviconcatdvicopydvihpdviljdvilj2pdvilj4dvilj4ldvilj6dvilualatexdviluatexdvipdfdvipdfmdvipdfmxdvipdftdviposdvipsdvireddviselectdvisvgmdvitodvidvitompdvitype
  ee2freefrage2fscke2imagee2labele2undoe4defrageasside-ngebbechoedediteditdiffeditoreditresegrepejectelfeditEmmaempathyempathy-accountsempathy-debuggerenc2xsenchantenchant-lsmodenvenvsubsteogephy-profile-migratorepiphanyepiphany-browsereps2epsepsffiteptexeqneqn2grapherberb1.8esc-mespdiff
  etexetf2lyeuptexeviewevimevinceevince-previewerevince-thumbnailerexexecflowexifautotranexpandexpiryexprextcheckextractbbextractresextressoeyuvtoppm
  ff2pyf2py2.7factorfaillogfaked-sysvfaked-tcpfakerootfakeroot-sysvfakeroot-tcpfallocatefalsefax2psfax2tifffc-cachefc-catfc-listfc-matchfc-patternfc-queryfc-scanfdformatfdiskffado-debugffmpegffplayffprobeffserverfgconsolefgrepfiascotopnmfig2devfig2mpdffig2ps2texfilefile-rollerfilefragfilezillafilterdifffind
  find2perlfindfsfindmntfindsmbfirefoxfitstopnmfix-qdffixcvsdifffixdlsrpsfixfmpsfixpsditpsfixpsppsfixscribepsfixtppsfixwfwpsfixwppsfixwwpsflacflipdiffflockfmtfmtutilfmtutil-sysfoldfont-managerfont-samplerfont2cfontinstfonttosfntfoo2hbpl2foo2hbpl2-wrapperfoo2hipercfoo2hiperc-wrapperfoo2hpfoo2hp2600-wrapperfoo2lavafoo2lava-wrapperfoo2oakfoo2oak-wrapper
  foo2qpdlfoo2qpdl-wrapperfoo2slxfoo2slx-wrapperfoo2xqxfoo2xqx-wrapperfoo2zjsfoo2zjs-icc2psfoo2zjs-pstopsfoo2zjs-wrapperfoomatic-addpjloptionsfoomatic-cleanupdriversfoomatic-combo-xmlfoomatic-compiledbfoomatic-configurefoomatic-datafilefoomatic-extract-textfoomatic-fix-xmlfoomatic-getpjloptionsfoomatic-kitloadfoomatic-nonumericalidsfoomatic-perl-datafoomatic-ppd-optionsfoomatic-ppd-to-xmlfoomatic-ppdfilefoomatic-preferred-driverfoomatic-printermap-to-gutenprint-xmlfoomatic-printjobfoomatic-replaceoldprinteridsfoomatic-ripfoomatic-searchprinterfortunefpingfping6freefreshclamfriends-dispatcherfriends-servicefrom
  fsckfsck.cramfsfsck.ext2fsck.ext3fsck.ext4fsck.ext4devfsck.minixfsck.msdosfsck.nfsfsck.vfatfsfreezefslsfontsfstab-decodefstobdffstopgmfstrimftpfunction_grep.plfunzipfuserfusermountfzputtygenfzsftp
  gg++g++-4.7g3topbmgamma4scanimagegatttoolgawkgcalccmdgccgcc-4.7gcc-ar-4.7gcc-nm-4.7gcc-ranlib-4.7gcomprisgconf-merge-treegconf-schemasgconftoolgconftool-2gcoregcovgcov-4.7gcr-viewergdbgdbusgdialoggdiffmkgdmflexiservergeditgemtopbmgemtopnmgencatgenisoimagegenresscriptgeqnGETgetafmgetcapgetconfgeteltoritogetent
  getfaclgethostipgetkeycodesgetoptgetpcapsgettextgettext.shgettextizegettygetwebgftodvigftopkgftypeghostscriptgif2tiffgiftopnmgimpgimp-2.8gimp-consolegimp-console-2.8ginstall-infogio-querymodulesgipddecodegitgit-receive-packgit-shellgit-upload-archivegit-upload-packgkbd-keyboard-displaygksugksu-propertiesgksudoglade2scriptglavglib-compile-resourcesglib-compile-schemasgltrongnome-calculatorgnome-character-map
  gnome-contactsgnome-control-centergnome-disk-image-mountergnome-disksgnome-file-share-propertiesgnome-font-viewergnome-helpgnome-keyringgnome-keyring-3gnome-keyring-daemongnome-language-selectorgnome-menus-blacklistgnome-minesgnome-opengnome-power-statisticsgnome-screensavergnome-screensaver-commandgnome-screenshotgnome-sessiongnome-session-propertiesgnome-session-quitgnome-settings-daemongnome-sound-appletgnome-sound-recordergnome-sudokugnome-system-loggnome-system-monitorgnome-terminalgnome-terminal.wrappergnome-text-editorgnome-thumbnail-fontgnome-www-browsergocrgoldgooboxgouldtoppmgpasswdgpggpg-zip
  gpgsplitgpgvgpicgpickgprofgrap2graphgrepgrepdiffgresourcegrngrodvigroffgroffergroggrolbpgrolj4gropdfgropsgrottygroupaddgroupdelgroupmodgroupsgrowisofsgrpckgrpconvgrpunconvgrub-bios-setupgrub-editenvgrub-fstestgrub-installgrub-kbdcompgrub-menulst2cfggrub-mkconfiggrub-mkdevicemapgrub-mkfontgrub-mkimagegrub-mklayoutgrub-mknetdir
  grub-mkpasswd-pbkdf2grub-mkrelpathgrub-mkrescuegrub-mkstandalonegrub-mountgrub-ntldr-imggrub-probegrub-rebootgrub-script-checkgrub-set-defaultgsgsbjgsdjgsdj500gsettingsgsettings-data-convertgsettings-schema-convertgsftopkgsljgslpgsndgst-discoverer-0.10gst-discoverer-1.0gst-feedback-0.10gst-inspect-0.10gst-inspect-1.0gst-installgst-launch-0.10gst-launch-1.0gst-typefind-0.10gst-typefind-1.0gst-visualise-0.10gst-xmlinspect-0.10gst-xmllaunch-0.10gstreamer-codec-installgstreamer-propertiesgtblgtfgtk-launch
  gtk-update-icon-cachegtk-update-icon-cache-3.0gtk-window-decoratorgucharmapguest-accountguileguile-1.8gunzipguvcviewgvfs-catgvfs-copygvfs-infogvfs-lessgvfs-lsgvfs-mimegvfs-mkdirgvfs-monitor-dirgvfs-monitor-filegvfs-mountgvfs-movegvfs-opengvfs-renamegvfs-rmgvfs-savegvfs-set-attributegvfs-trashgvfs-treegviewgvimgvimdiffgvimtutorgxditviewgzexegzip
  hh2phh2xshalthardening-checkhbpldecodehciattachhciconfighciemuhcitoolhdhdparmheadhedgewarshelpztagshexdumphipercdecodehipstopgmhosthostidhostnamehostnamectlhp-alignhp-checkhp-cleanhp-colorcalhp-config_usb_printerhp-doctorhp-firmwarehp-hpdiohp-infohp-levelshp-logcapturehp-makeurihp-mkurihp-pkservicehp-pluginhp-plugin-ubuntuhp-probehp-query
  hp-scanhp-setuphp-testpagehp-timedatehp-unloadhp-upgradehpftodithpijshplj1000hplj1005hplj1018hplj1020hpljP1005hpljP1006hpljP1007hpljP1008hpljP1505hpssdhtcachecleanhtdbmhtdigesthtml2texthtpasswdhttxt2dbmhwclockhybrid-detect
  ii386ibus-daemonibus-setupibus-table-createdbiceauthicoicontopbmiconviconvconfigicotoolididentifyidentify.im6idljiecsetifconfigifdownifqueryifupigawkijs_pxljrilbmtoppmim-configim-launchimgtoppmimportimport.im6includeresindxbibinfoinfobrowserinfocmpinfokeyinfotocapinifileinimfinitinit-checkconfinitctl
  initctl2dotinitexinnochecksuminnotopinputattachinsmodinstallinstall-docsinstall-infoinstall-printerdriverinstall-sgmlcataloginstalldbgsymbols.shinstallkernelinstmodshintel_audio_dumpintel_backlightintel_bios_dumperintel_bios_readerintel_disable_clock_gatingintel_dpio_readintel_dpio_writeintel_error_decodeintel_forcewakedintel_gpu_abrtintel_gpu_timeintel_gpu_topintel_gttintel_l3_parityintel_reg_checkerintel_reg_dumperintel_reg_readintel_reg_snapshotintel_reg_writeintel_sprite_onintel_steppingintel_upload_blit_largeintel_upload_blit_large_gttintel_upload_blit_large_mapintel_upload_blit_small
  interdiffinvoke-rc.dioniceipip6tablesip6tables-applyip6tables-restoreip6tables-saveipcmkipcrmipcsipmaddripod-read-sysinfo-extendedipod-time-syncipptooliproxyiptablesiptables-applyiptables-restoreiptables-saveiptables-xmliptunnelirbirb1.8irqbalanceischrootisdv4-serial-debuggerisodumpisohybridisohybrid.plisoinfoisosizeisovfyispell-autobuildhashispell-wrapperisqlisql-vtisqlw-vtitweb-settings
  iusqlivstoolsiwiwconfigiweventiwgetidiwlistiwpriviwspy
  jjackdjackdbusjack_aliasjack_bufsizejack_connectjack_controljack_cpujack_cpu_loadjack_disconnectjack_evmonjack_freewheeljack_iodelayjack_latent_clientjack_loadjack_lspjack_metrojack_midiseqjack_midisinejack_midi_dumpjack_midi_latency_testjack_monitor_clientjack_multiple_metrojack_netsourcejack_net_masterjack_net_slavejack_recjack_sampleratejack_server_controljack_session_notifyjack_showtimejack_simple_clientjack_simple_session_clientjack_testjack_thrujack_transportjack_unloadjack_waitjack_zombiejar
  jarsignerjavajavacjavadocjavahjavamorphjavapjavawsjconsolejdbjexecjhatjinfojmapjoinjpeg2yuvjpegexiforientjpegtopnmjpegtranjpsjrunscriptjsadebugdjson_ppjstackjstatjstatd
  kkactivitymanagerdkamosokatekbdinfokbdratekbd_modekbuildsycoca4kcmshell4kcolorchooserkcookiejar4kde-cpkde-mvkde-openkde4kde4-configkde4-menukdebugdialogkded4kdeinit4kdeinit4_shutdownkdeinit4_wrapperkDepIDBkDepObjkDepPrekdiff3keditfiletypekerneloopskerneloops-submitkeytoolkfile4kfilemetadatareaderkglobalaccelkhotnewstuff-uploadkhotnewstuff4kiconfinderkillkillallkillall5kioclient
  kismetkismet_capturekismet_clientkismet_dronekismet_serverkitenkitengenkitenkanjibrowserkitenradselectkjskjscmdkmailservicekmimetypefinderkmkkmk_appendkmk_ashkmk_catkmk_chmodkmk_cmpkmk_cpkmk_echokmk_exprkmk_gmakekmk_installkmk_lnkmk_md5sumkmk_mkdirkmk_mvkmk_printfkmk_redirectkmk_rmkmk_rmdirkmk_sedkmk_sleepkmk_testkmk_timekmodknotify4kObjCache
  koi8rxtermkpseaccesskpsepathkpsereadlinkkpsestatkpsetoolkpsewherekpsewhichkpsexpandkquitappkreadconfigkrosskshell4kstartkstatsksvgtopngktelnetservicektraderclientktrashktuberlingkubuntu-debug-installerkuiserverkwalletdkwrapper4kwriteconfig
  ll2pingl2testlamelandscape-client-ui-installlaptop-detectlastlastblastloglatexlav2mpeglav2wavlav2yuvlavaddwavlavadecodelavinfolavpipelavplaylavtranslcflconvertldld.bfdld.goldldattachldconfigldconfig.reallddleaftoppmlesslessecholessfilelesskeylesspipelexgroglibnetcfglibreofficelightdmlightdm-guest-session-wrapperlightdm-session
  lilymidililypondlilypond-booklilypond-invoke-editorlilysonglinelinguistlinklintianlintian-infolinux-boot-proberlinux32linux64lispmtopgmlistreslkbiblletterslnlnstatloadkeysloadunimaplocalclocalelocale-genlocalectllocaledeflocatelockfile-checklockfile-createlockfile-removelockfile-touchlodrawlofficelofromtemplateloggerloginloginctllognamelogresolve
  logrotatelogsaveloimpresslomathlooklookbiblorderlosetuploweblowntfs-3glowriterlplpadminlpclpdomaticlpinfolpmovelpoptionslppasswdlpqlprlprmlpstatlreleaselslsattrlsblklsb_releaselscpulsdifflsdvdlshwlsinitramfslsmodlsoflspcilspcmcialspgpotlss16toppm
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Evading Airport Security
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Hacker News
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:23
  A blog covering security and security technology.
  Keeping Track of All the Snowden Documents | Main
  December 4, 2013
  Thenewsisreporting about Evan Booth, who builds weaponry out of items you can buy after airport security. It's clever stuff.
  It's not new, though. People have been explaining how to evade airport security for years.
  Back in 2006, I -- and others -- explained how to print your own boarding pass and evade the photo-ID check, a trick that still seems to work. In 2008, I demonstrated carrying two large bottles of liquid through airport security. Here's a paper about stabbing people with stuff you can take through airport security. And here's a German video of someone building a bomb out of components he snuck through a full-body scanner. There's lots more if you start poking around the Internet.
  So, what's the moral here? It's not like the terrorists don't know about these tricks. They're no surprise to the TSA, either. If airport security is so porous, why aren't there more terrorist attacks? Why aren't the terrorists using these, and other, techniques to attack planes every month?
  I think the answer is simple: airplane terrorism isn't a big risk. There are very few actual terrorists, and plots are much more difficult to execute than the tactics of the attack itself. It's the same reason why I don't care very much about the various TSA mistakes that are regularly reported.
  Tags: air travel, DHS, homeland security, security theater, terrorism, TSA
  Posted on December 4, 2013 at 6:28 AM ' 12 Comments
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  I had a job that took me flying about 1 to 3 times a week when all this enhanced security began. As a result of an airline's Ÿ0mŸ sniffer detecting an alarm clock I was carrying to be a Ÿ0mŸ (it had a phosphorus dial), I was put on an internal watch list. I couldn't fly that airline without going through 3 to 4 searches. I quit that job and haven't flown since. Won't be flying ever again in the states.
  Wonder where he got lithium at the airport.Batteries are not so easy to get pure lithium from, and there's the problem of Li reacting with O.Granted that you can have near-pure Li, make a simil-handgun would be reduntant because you can use the reactivity of Li and water for a (not so) small bomb.
  @Luigi Rosa - Lithium is trivial enough to extract from camera batteries, the non-rechargeable ones contain a fair amount of it in reasonably pure form.
  A good writeup on extracting it is here
  Honestly though, most of the chap doing those airport-weapon demos are hilariously contrived.
  The incendiary bag one made me giggle a bit, as unattended luggage tends to spark an immediate security response.
  My guess is that the TSA only really cares about threats that can take down an entire plane. None of these weapons seem capable of doing that. While they go to great lengths to detect explosives, they seem unprepared for chemical or biological weapons.
  @Darren Martyn granted that you can easily (with tools that you cannot smuggle past the security checks) disassemble batteries you muste face other problems.The first is a place where do that without rising attention. Could be a toilet, but there is so much water and you risk to trigger Li reaction if you drop a piece of Li.Once you have the Li, you must store it. The link talks about kerosene (forget it, and JET-A1 is not an option...), you could buy olive oil to put Li into.I think that is not as easy as it seems.
  In 2004 while working for an airline a janitor discovered that somebody had dumped a ton of ammunition in the bathroom that was in the departure lounge so post clearance. It was obviously some hunter who forgot he had it and dumped it before getting on the plane but surprising you could get a garbage bag full of ammo past security undeclared.
  They freaked and shut down the airport for about an hour then lied about it to the media claiming just regular delays.
  Just to make two points explicit (I realize that they're obvious, but think they should be stated):
  1 - the risk isn't simply that of an airplane crash, but also of all the follow-on effects from such an incident. Depending on the nature of the cause, those effects can range from military action to loss of confidence in air travel. In fact follow-on effects from attacks are an integral part of the strategy being followed by AQAP and others.
  It may well be that the follow-on effects aren't entirely rational. But if we only planned for rational responses, the world would be a much more dangerous place.
  2 - this point can be slightly misleading, but it's important: what type of attacker is most likely to make it to a TSA checkpoint, and be categorized for regular screening, without previous identification by intelligence and law enforcement agencies? Is it (a) the well supported, well trained attacker, (b) the well supported, poorly trained attacker, (c) the unsupported, untrained attacker?
  The very next time I read a blog, Hopefully it doesn't disappoint me just as much as this particular one. After all, I know it was my choice to read through, but I really thought you would probably have something helpful to talk about. All I hear is a bunch of whining about something that you can fix if you weren't too busy searching for attention.
  Surely the whole point here is that there in no longer any need for the 'bad guys' to actually do anything. A simple threat is enough to give the authorities the 'heebie jeebies' and throw another layer of 'security' over whatever is perceived to be at risk.Last month 11 cyclists were killed in London by vehicles, in the whole of this year we have had no 'real' terrorist deaths (there have been a couple of murders 'in the name of Islam', but I don't consider that to be terrorism, just plain murder). Just imagine the safety improvements that would be possible if the anti-terror budget was transferred to building safe cycle ways.
  Just a heads-up. The comment by "home", starting "The very next time I read a blog, Hopefully it" is in fact spam. The same comment appears to have been posted on a good many other blogs and sites.
  On topic, I agree with Dave about spending money in a better fashion. If more 'anti-terrorism' money was spent on bicycle safety (perhaps educating drivers, or putting in clearly delineated bike lanes), then more lives could be saved. Similarly, lives could be saved by simply donating money to the poorest people on the planet (see givewell.org for their suggestion).
  If terrorism actually was a problem, we would be seeing bombs go off in malls, buses, and the security lines at airports. If there were people willing to die for the cause, why aren't there more mass shootings by "terrorists" in the USA (where getting your hands on a gun isn't exactly difficult I understand)?
  But, the 'anti-terrorism' crap isn't about terrorism at all. As our host repeatedly says, terrorism is rare. And as I keep saying, terrorism is a meaningless term. It is an essentially politicised term, which means "an act that the speaker (normally a government official), says is bad". Fuck the newspeak.
  Murder is murder. Simple. But then "terrorism" is also used to mean bombing a pipeline, cutting a telecommunications line, and various other lesser forms of property damage (source, Australian federal law).
  http://tsaoutofourpants.wordpress.com/
  Bottom line, DHS and the TSA has to go. They are worthless organization and are a detriment to airport security. Don't think about it too much. Get rid of them. Put airport security firmly on the shoulders of the airlines and airports and hold them civilly and criminally responsibility for breaches in security and attacks. You put a executives asses on the line and see how motivated they can be.
  Of course our 6% approval rated congress with F@#$ up everything.
  Added layers of complexity are more likely to cause problems which in turns causes people to find ways around it. I think you wrote about people disabling stuff thereby defeating the whole purpose. And then if the original problem materializes the people who added the layers of complexity for a reason just reinforce the whole thing by saying "oh see, the problem is those stupid people disabled it and that's why this happened."
  MS just pushed out IE10 and suddenly I couldn't enter passwords, anywhere, my email clients, anything. It is apparently caused by Kaspersky and the Safe Money feature. It's there with the best of intentions, to protect me and anyone else that uses the machine. And it worked fine before. Think MS is going to fix it? No, I had to disable Safe Money and finally quit using IE10. But it's not just an MS problem. I have had similar breaks with Firefox.
  This is exactly like the TSA and airport security, exactly. What if TSA mindlessness ultimately creates a bigger uglier problem than first existed? Bureaucrats will only care about having someone else to blame "see, this happened because people kept going around the system. " Booth will be the scapegoat.
  Schneier.com is a personal website. Opinions expressed are not necessarily those of BT.
ADP Soars To 215K Smashing Expectations, Prior Months Revised Higher Reviving Tapering Fears
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Zero Hedge
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:20
  Judging by massive revision in the October print, from 130K to 184K, or nearly a 50% error, one would think that instead of actually tabulating specific private jobs as it by definition does, using the data entering the ADP private payrolls system, the ADP makes its estimate of jobs based on high inaccurate surveys just like the BLS. Either that, or it was desperate to catch up on the upside to the BLS' own propaganda numbers, which are just as "realistic." That said, the November ADP print soared from 130K to an upward revised 184K in October blowing through expectations of 170K and printing at a whopping 215K. And so the Taper dance is back on as everyone will now expected Friday's NFP to come in scorching hot, and force the Fed to cut its monthly flow by a whopping $10 billion to $75 billion.
  The punchline from the report:
  Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody's Analytics, said, "The job market remained surprisingly resilient to the government shutdown and brinkmanship over the treasury debt limit. Employers across all industries and company sizes looked through the political battle in Washington. If anything, job growth appears to be picking up.''
  But... but... all the fearmongering.
  This is what the current and revised data looked like:
  The main driver for today's major revision and beat: the ADP's desire to mimic the NFP numbers. Which makes one wonder: what's the point of having an ADP number if it has an error range of +/- 50%?
  Total Nonfarm Private Employment by Company Size (in thousands):
  Change in Total Nonfarm Private Employment by Selected Industry
  A more detailed breakdown:
  Of course, since ADP is a joke, the greatest utility from this irrelevant service is that it is now social-media friendly and provides a ready to go infographic:
  Average:Your rating: NoneAverage: 5(1 vote)
What are the monkeys up to now?
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: the tap
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:19
  Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Two Bombs Went Off Within Comet ISON":Hi Tap, According to Dahb007, NASA have fabricated pictures of ISON going into the SUN.For some reason they did not want us to know the Sun did not eat ISON.The comet did loose some of its tail, yet carried on its journey.They posted the same image with the clock still ticking.What are the Elite upto ???
  Posted by Anonymous to the tap at 9:47 pm
Two arrested, bitcoins seized in German fraud probe
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Phys.org - latest science and technology news stories
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 16:17
  Two arrested, bitcoins seized in German fraud probe1 hour agoGerman police say they have arrested two people and seized illegally generated bitcoins worth more than 700,000 euros ($950,000) in an investigation of computer fraud.
  The Federal Criminal Police Office said Wednesday it staged searches earlier this week in an investigation of three people suspected of manipulating existing malware and spreading it over the Internet, creating a remotely controlled network of compromised computer systems.
  Police say the perpetrators used the processing power of the hacked computers to generate bitcoins, a cryptography-based digital currency. They also are investigating further suspected fraud, violations of copyright law and offenses related to the distribution of pornography.
  They gave no details on the two people who were arrested Monday, one in the southern state of Bavaria and the other in Lower Saxony, a northern region.
  Explore further:UK police arrest 6 people in phone hacking probe
  (C) 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
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NASA iPad app shows startling environmental changes
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Phys.org - latest science and technology news stories
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 15:41
  NASA iPad app shows startling environmental changes1 hour agoThe retreat of Pedersen Glacier, Alaska. Left: summer 1917. Right: summer 2005. Credit: NASA/JPL
  Human activities, a changing climate and natural disasters are rapidly altering the face of our planet. Now, with NASA's Images of Change iPad application, users can get an interactive before-and-after view of these changes.
  The app presents pairs or sets of images of places around the world that have changed dramatically. Some of these locations have suffered a disaster, such as a fire or tsunami, or illustrate the effects of human activities, such as dam building or urban growth. Others document impacts of climate change such as persistent drought and rapidly receding glaciers.
  "Images of Change gives users an astronaut's or Earth explorer's view of the changes occurring on our planet and demonstrates the important role NASA plays in contributing to the long-term understanding of Earth," said John Grunsfeld, NASA's associate administrator for science in Washington. "By utilizing ground-based and space-based observation systems, we are able to better understand how humans are contributing to a changing world."
  Images of Change makes NASA climate change resources, images and interactive tools more accessible to citizens and decision makers, a key aspect of President Obama's Climate Action Plan. The image pairs are part of the larger Images of Change gallery on NASA's Webby-award-winning Global Climate Change website. The gallery includes satellite views as well as photos taken at ground level.
  Viewers can look at the images side-by-side or overlay them using a slider bar to travel from past to present. Each image set includes background information on what the viewer is seeing and its location on a map.
  "The Images of Change gallery is one of the more popular parts of the Global Climate Change website," said Amber Jenkins, editor of the website at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "The gallery project, which began in 2009, helps people see just how our planet is changing over days, months, years and centuries. Seeing is believing, and the perspective we get from space helps us step back and see Earth as a whole."
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  NASA iPad app shows startling environmental changes1 hour agoThe retreat of Pedersen Glacier, Alaska. Left: summer 1917. Right: summer 2005. Credit: NASA/JPL
  Human activities, a changing climate and natural disasters are rapidly altering the face of our planet. Now, with NASA's Images of Change iPad application, users can get an interactive before-and-after view of these changes.
  The app presents pairs or sets of images of places around the world that have changed dramatically. Some of these locations have suffered a disaster, such as a fire or tsunami, or illustrate the effects of human activities, such as dam building or urban growth. Others document impacts of climate change such as persistent drought and rapidly receding glaciers.
  "Images of Change gives users an astronaut's or Earth explorer's view of the changes occurring on our planet and demonstrates the important role NASA plays in contributing to the long-term understanding of Earth," said John Grunsfeld, NASA's associate administrator for science in Washington. "By utilizing ground-based and space-based observation systems, we are able to better understand how humans are contributing to a changing world."
  Images of Change makes NASA climate change resources, images and interactive tools more accessible to citizens and decision makers, a key aspect of President Obama's Climate Action Plan. The image pairs are part of the larger Images of Change gallery on NASA's Webby-award-winning Global Climate Change website. The gallery includes satellite views as well as photos taken at ground level.
  Viewers can look at the images side-by-side or overlay them using a slider bar to travel from past to present. Each image set includes background information on what the viewer is seeing and its location on a map.
  "The Images of Change gallery is one of the more popular parts of the Global Climate Change website," said Amber Jenkins, editor of the website at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "The gallery project, which began in 2009, helps people see just how our planet is changing over days, months, years and centuries. Seeing is believing, and the perspective we get from space helps us step back and see Earth as a whole."
  Explore further:Earth month: NASA launches new interactive image gallery
  More information: The Images of Change iPad app is available as a free download at: http://go.nasa.gov/1bE3osn.
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  A free, new iPhone app from NASA literally puts the whole world in the palm of your hands. "Earth Now" immerses cyber explorers in dazzling visualizations of near-real-time global climate data from NASA's ...
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Wellink: 'Bitcoin is erger dan Tulpenmanie'
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: VK: Home
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 15:39
  Bewerkt door: redactie '' 04/12/13, 15:19
  (C) anp. Grachtenpanden uit bloembollen op de Keukenhof.
  De virtuele munt Bitcoin is een bouwwerk dat vroeg of laat instort. Dat zei voormalig president van De Nederlandsche Bank Nout Wellink vandaag tijdens een bijeenkomst met studenten van de Universiteit van Amsterdam.
  Het succes van de Bitcoin is volgens Wellink gebaseerd op een hype die erger is dan de Tulpenmanie uit de 17de eeuw. 'Toen kreeg je tenminste nog een tulp, nu krijg je niks.' Wellink deed zijn uitspraken tijdens de discussiebijeenkomst Room for Discussion.
  Eerder al waarschuwden De Nederlandsche Bank en minister van financin Jeroen Dijsselbloem voor virtuele valuta als de bitcoin. De koers van de virtuele munt is erg wisselvallig. Sterke pieken worden gevolgd door diepe dalen, vaak zonder dat daarvoor een duidelijk aanwijsbare reden is.
  Tijdens de Nederlandse Tulpenmanie, zo rond 1636-1637, was de tulpenbol enorm waardevol. Na een plotselinge prijsdaling raakten veel tulpenhandelaren aan de grond. Economen zien het als de eerste goed beschreven economische bubbel in de geschiedenis.
Verbod op homopropoganda niet in strijd met Russische grondwet
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: VK: Home
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 15:38
  04/12/13, 15:15 '' bron: ANP
  (C) anp. Protestbijeenkomst in Amsterdam tegen anti-homowet van Putin in april.
  Het Russische verbod op 'homoseksuele propaganda' is niet in strijd met de grondwet. Dat heeft het Grondwettelijk Hof in Sint-Petersburg woensdag besloten, meldde het Russische persbureau RIA Novosti.
  Homorechtenactivist Nikolai Alexejev had de zaak aangespannen nadat hij een boete had gekregen voor dergelijke homopropaganda. Zijn vergrijp bestond eruit dat hij een bord omhoog hield met een citaat van een actrice uit de Sovjettijd: 'Homoseksualiteit is niet pervers, in tegenstelling tot hockey en ijsballet.'
  Dat was volgens de politie in strijd met de 'wet tegen het bevorderen van niet-traditionele seksuele relaties ten overstaan van minderjarigen', zoals de wet officieel heet. Een lagere rechter had Alexejev al eerder in het ongelijk gesteld.
  Het Grondwettelijk Hof bevestigt nu dat de wetgeving in lijn is met de grondwet, omdat die de staat verplicht 'tot het beschermen van moeders, kinderen en families.'
  KritiekWesterse regeringen en mensenrechtenorganisaties hebben de regels fel bekritiseerd. Sommige activisten riepen zelfs op tot een boycot van de Olympische Winterspelen, die in februari in het Russische Sotsji worden gehouden.
  Om de onrust te temperen maakte president Vladimir Poetin duidelijk dat ook homoseksuelen van harte welkom zijn in Sotsji. De omstreden wet is volgens het Kremlin bedoeld 'om kinderen te beschermen' en niet om volwassenen in hun vrijheid te beperken. Rusland hoort overigens niet bij de 76 landen in de wereld waar homoseksualiteit als zodanig strafbaar is.
Is Washington joining 'bidding war' with Moscow over Eastern Europe?
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: CNN Security Clearance
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 15:37
  By Elise Labott
  The protests in Ukraine against President Viktor Yanukovich's last-minute decision not to sign a political and trade agreement with the European Union are the biggest in the country since the 2004 Orange Revolution that booted Yanukovich, then Prime Minister, from office.
  And U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry was tough Tuesday in his criticism of the government's use of force against the peaceful demonstrators, saying "violence has no place in a modern European state."
  But his decision to skip a visit to Kiev and attend a meeting of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe wasn't necessarily a response to the political upheaval and a voice of support for the protesters, nor was it an indictment of the government's heavy-handed methods to combat it.
  The snub was, in effect, a U.S. protest of the government's moves to align its trade interests with Moscow by deciding not to join the EU agreement. The so-called Eastern Partnership is designed to forge closer EU ties to Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, Azerbaijan and Georgia.Kerry said Ukraine should be free to choose its own path dictated by the will of the people. Yanukovich, he said, has made a "personal decision" that the Ukrainian people do not support.
  "Europe and Europe's friends all declined to engage in a rather overt and, we think, inappropriate bidding war with respect to the choice that might or might not be made," he said.
  But he added that the U.S. wanted to help "get the Ukraine back on the road to European integration and to economic health."
  While not mentioning Russia by name, Kerry's veiled references were at jab at Moscow's own strong-arm tactics to persuade the former Soviet republics to abandon the EU in favor of its own economic network of former territories, with Moscow as the driving force. The West sees the decision by Ukraine, the largest of the former republics, not to partner with the EU as a bow to Russian pressure. When asked Wednesday about the situation in Ukraine, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called the situation a "domestic issue" and said it's the prerogative of the government to decide whether to sign the agreement.
  A senior State Department official traveling with Kerry said Washington had made clear to Russian leaders that "we think that kind of play is self-defeating" and urged Moscow to further integrate with Europe by increasing free trade by removing barriers and tariffs.
  "If Russia's neighbors become richer and more prosperous as a result of having visa liberalization to the European Union and increased trade, they are more able to buy more things from Russia as well, and they are more stable on Russia's periphery," the official told reporters. "Our message has been to take off the zero-sum glasses; all boats can rise here."
  Instead of visiting Ukraine, Kerry will travel to the EU-friendly nation of Moldova, the poorest country in the region, which did sign the agreement in the face of Russian retaliation.
  Moscow recently banned imports of Moldovan wine, one of the tiny nation's largest and most profitable sectors, and has threatened to cut back on its deliveries of natural gas. Pointedly, Kerry will attend a trade and investment event at the Cricova Winery in Moldova's "wine city," whose wine cellars are a popular tourist attraction.
  "We wanted to send a very strong signal of support for those countries that had moved forward with the EU because of what it means in terms of their commitment to reform," a senior State Department official traveling with Kerry told reporters. "Had that been the case with Ukraine, it would have been a tougher decision whether to go to the OSCE, but since that didn't happen, we're going where the European decisions were made."
  By supporting nations that choose Europe over Russia, is the U.S. is joining the bidding war that Kerry rejects? Given that the America has only given about $1.1 billion in assistance since 1991 when the former republic gained independence, Washington, along with its European allies, will have to up its bid to continue to win the economic battle with Moscow.
TSA Travel Tips Tuesday: New Application Process and Enrollment Centers for TSA Pre''''
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: The TSA Blog
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 15:35
  Here's your travel tip for this week: Enjoying the benefits of TSA Pre'''' just got a little easier with the rollout of the new application process.Starting tomorrow (Dec. 4), interested travelers may enroll directly into TSA Pre'''' for expedited screening benefits. Travelersmay visit an application center to provide biographic information (name, date of birth, address, etc.), fingerprints and valid required identity and citizenship/immigration documentation. Applicants also have the option to apply online to provide basic information and make an appointment before visiting an enrollment center.Applicants will be able to check their status online within five days and written responses will take approximately two-three weeks.TSA's first enrollment center is located on the public side of the Indianapolis International Airport (IND).TSA plans to open additional enrollment centers in the New York City area, Washington, D.C. metro area and Los Angeles area by the end of the year. By spring of 2014, TSA plans to open more than 300 enrollment centers.Eligible participants use dedicated TSA Pre'''' lanes at participating airports for screening benefits which could include no longer removing the following items:Shoes3-1-1 compliant bag from carry-onLaptop from bagLight outerwear/jacketBelt The $85 fee covers a five-year period.A U.S. passport is not required to enroll, only proof of U.S. is citizenship needed.Children 12 and under can travel with you through the TSA Pre'''' lane.Please visit TSA.gov to make an appointment at an enrollment center and to start the ''pre-enrollment'' process.See you next Tuesday with more travel tips.If you have a travel related issue or question that needs an immediate answer, you can contact us byclicking here.
Rusbridger admits shipping agents' names '' what now?
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Unfashionista
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 15:25
  MPs today got Alan Rusbridger to admit a number of things he, and his paper had previously denied.
  Firstly, that he shipped the names of GCHQ agents abroad to newspapers and bloggers. Mr. Rusbridger was reminded that this was a criminal offence, and said he had a public interest defence. He also, however, kept arguing that he hadn't published any names, which rather blows up his public interest defence '' it's self-evident that you don't need the names of intelligence agents to report on GCHQ spying, so why not redact them?
  The fact is, Rusbridger did acknowledge that it put GCHQ agents at risk when he first shipped files to ProPublica. He redacted the names of GCHQ agents from those files, and he promised the government he had done so, so when he claims nobody from the government asked him about shipping names, it's possibly because they made the mistake of believing him.
  Rusbridger replied that the files contained information that citizens in a democracy deserved to know, and he assured Heywood that he had scrubbed the documents so that no undercover officials were identified or put at risk.
  If British papers had the guts to question members of their own club, they would ask Rusbridger why he scrubbed these documents '' his answers to Parliament have said that only publication would be risky '' and why he admitted to Heywood that undercover officials would be put at risk if he identified them.
  In Parliament today when asked why he didn't redact the names he said there were 58,000 documents '' essentially, he could be bothered to go through the
Grand Theft Autonomy
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: a.nolen
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 15:21
  The face that launched a thousand careers.
  When I was a young analyst, nearly a decade ago now, I sat next to a really smart kid at work. We shared open cubicles and I had a good view of his screen from my desk. One day I saw he was playing a video game.
  ''Whatcha doing?'' I asked. I wanted to play too.
  ''This is a beta version of a game I've been asked to try out.''
  ''At work?''
  ''Yeah, (his boss) gave it to me.''
  ''Cool. What type is it?''
  ''A training game.''
  The premise of the game was to engineer a coup d'etat using 'soft power' techniques: recruiting radicals, disseminating propaganda, courting media. You could engineer your own 'color revolution' from a digital console. I couldn't play long, because George Soros was giving a talk downstairs that afternoon and somebody had to set out the coffee cups.
  The game didn't made it into production, possibly because of the inflammatory nature of the premise. You don't have to be a genius to know that there's a fine line between virtual training and cynical mockery. The game never had a name, but I'll call it Grand Theft Autonomy.
  Memories of Grand Theft Autonomy came flooding back to me today when I read about the incredible Srdja Popovic, well known for his Washington-approved political activism during the War in Yugoslavia. (The war that launched Jeremy Scahill's career.) Here's the article from Occupy.com:
  Serbia's Srdja Popovic is known by many as a leading architect of regime changes in Eastern Europe and elsewhere since the late-1990s, and as one of the co-founders of Otpor!, the U.S.-funded Serbian activist group which overthrew Slobodan MiloÅeviÄ‡ in 2000.
  Srdja used his cache as a 'respected' political activist to get in touch with other activists around the world, then sell their information to Stratfor. (Good business, if you can get it!)
  Using his celebrated activist status, Popovic opened many doors for Stratfor to meet with activists globally. In turn, the information Stratfor intended to gain from Popovic's contacts would serve as ''actionable intelligence'''--the firm billed itself as a ''Shadow CIA'''--for its corporate clients.
  Popovic passed information to Stratfor about on-the-ground activist events in countries around the world, ranging from the Philippines,Libya, Tunisia, Vietnam, Iran, Azerbaijan, Egypt, Tibet, Zimbabwe, Poland and Belarus, Georgia, Bahrain, Venezuela and Malaysia. Often, the emails reveal, Popovic passed on the information to Stratfor without the consent of the activists and likely without the activists ever knowing that their emails were being shuttled to the private security firm.
  And'...
  Stratfor saw Popovic's main value not only as a source for intelligence on global revolutionary and activist movements, but also as someone who, if needed, could help overthrow leaders of countries hostile to U.S. geopolitical and financial interests. So useful was Popovic to Stratfor that the firm gave him a free subscription, dubbed ''legit sources we use all the time as a company'' by Papic.
  In a June 2011 email, Papic referred to Popovic as a ''great friend'' of his and described him as a ''Serb activist who travels the world fomenting revolution.''
  ''They'...basically go around the world trying to topple dictators and autocratic governments (ones that U.S. does not like ;),'' Papic says in one email. Replying to a follow up to that email, he states, ''They just go and set up shop in a country and try to bring the government down. When used properly, more powerful than an aircraft carrier battle group.''
  And'...
  ''In fact between 1997 and 2000 the National Endowment for Democracy and US government may have accomplished what NATO's 37,000 bombing sorties had been unable to do: oust Milosevic, replace him with their favoured candidate Vojislav Kostunica and promote a neoliberal vision for Serbia,'' independent scholar Michael Barker wrote for Z Magazine. ''In much the same way as corporate front groups and astroturf groups recruit genuinely committed supporters, strategically useful social movements can potentially dominate civil society when provided with the right resources (massive financial and professional backing).''
  ''We trained them in how to set up an organization, how to open local chapters, how to create a 'brand,' how to create a logo, symbols, and key messages,'' an Otpor! activist told U.S.-funded media outlet Radio Free Europe-Radio Liberty. ''We trained them in how to identify the key weaknesses in society and what people's most pressing problems were'--what might be a motivating factor for people, and above all young people, to go to the ballot box and in this way shape their own destiny.''
  Read the whole article here, plenty of juicy details and well worth your time. (Thank you Carl Gibson and Steve Horn.) As you can see, even a decade ago, these 'revolutions' were pretty formulaic. In fact, they aren't really 'revolutions' at all, but as the article states, ''intra-elite power transfers''.
  So, what most people have suspected all along is true. US Government agents infiltrate and manipulate civil unrest around the world to their own ends. Leveraging technology is a big part of this effort, which puts Jesselyn Radack's tweet this afternoon in a whole new light:
  For those of you who don't know, @ioerror is Jacob Appelbaum, and today the UK parliament grilled Alan Rusbridger, the editor-in-chief of The Guardian, about publishing Snowden's leaks. I guess that the MP knows something about The Tor Project that the rest of us don't?! #footinmouth
  Take home: we can all look forward to Srdja Popovic's regular contributions to Pierre Omidyar's news network.Like this:LikeLoading...
It is game over for 23andMe, and rightly so | PandoDaily
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 15:14
  By Cecile JanssensOn November 27, 2013
  The market for personal genome services is facing a reality check. While the most prominent and innovative company 23andMe has flourished so far, in the past few years many of its competitors have gone out of business. Now, with the latest warning from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the rest of the genome testing industry may be counting its days too. 23andMe has failed to provide scientific evidence for their genetic tests and the FDA has urged them in a public letter to halt the marketing of their services until further notice.
  The FDA treats genetic testing as a ''medical device'', and it wants all such devices to meet high quality standards. In this the FDA is right. 23andMe provides information that may lead its users to self-medicate, which, if based on faulty information can lead to serious adverse effects. The FDA does not mind if people would like to know what their DNA sequence is, but it is concerned about the interpretation of that data by 23andMe.
  The FDA's letter is unlikely to have surprised the people at 23andMe. They acknowledge similar concerns in their Terms of Service. They are also aware of the limited predictive ability of their tests for common diseases. 23andMe follows scientific progress in genetic risk prediction research closely, and by now they must have realised that the promise of personal genome services has faded.
  In 2009, when the company first filed for marketing authorisation of their service, the future of genetic prediction looked very bright. The discovery of genetic markers for common diseases had just started to take off. Each issue of Nature Genetics, the top journal for scientific discoveries in genetics and genomics, reported new markers for different diseases. It seemed global collaborations would soon rapidly unravel the genetic origins of disease.
  But the reality appeared more complex.
  Genomics researchers caught the bigger fish first, as new markers had increasingly smaller effects on disease risk. By now, only four years later, many scientific studies have investigated the predictive ability of risk models similar to those on which 23andMe's tests are based. Their results have been mostly discouraging, even though researchers have never used that word. Genetic markers are generally unable to predict risk of common diseases, and adding more markers to risk models does not improve their predictive ability that much.
  The results of these studies are no surprise: most of them have investigated risk predictions that are based on relatively few genetic markers. For instance, 23andMe uses only 15 markers to predict the risk of coronary heart disease, 11 for type-2 diabetes, two for melanoma and obesity, and one for esophageal and stomach cancer. These numbers are much lower than the dozens that have already been discovered. Predictive ability can be good only if markers have a lot of impact on disease risk, such as in age-related macular degeneration and several autoimmune diseases.
  Champions of the genetic medicine revolution could have been warned by looking at the degree of ''heritability'' of diseases. The lower this percentage, the less predictive the test can become. 23andMe discloses these estimates:
  Heritability of melanoma is estimated at around 20%; type-2 diabetes at 26%; colorectal, esophageal and stomach cancer all around 30%; coronary heart disease between 39% and 56%; and type-1 diabetes between 72% and 88%.
  But what does this mean? The high heritability of type-1 diabetes means that genes play a dominant role in causing the disease. If scientists manage to unravel all genetic markers for type-1 diabetes, a genetic test will be able to predict with high accuracy if a person will get diabetes.
  Unfortunately, due to all the complex interactions between the markers, this full unravelling is impossible. The number of interactions is probably so high that every patient will have his or her own unique complex cause of disease. And what has never happened cannot be identified or predicted by big data.
  Advances in genome science will improve what tests offer, but these improvements will be small. While the hope is based on big data, the reality is that most diseases are simply not genetic enough. Other risk factors such as diet, body weight, smoking, exercise and stress are too important. And big data cannot change the biology of diseases '' it will not make them more genetic.
  That is why genetic testing for common diseases will never become as predictive as champions of genetic testing hope.
  A Cecile JW Janssens does not work for, consult to, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has no relevant affiliations.
  [This article was originally published at The Conversation. Read the original article.]
Class Action Lawsuit Calls 23andMe Misleading, False, and Unscientific
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Valleywag
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 15:12
  It's hard out there for a rule-flouting, heavily financed disruptor. If it's not government regulators, then it's "frivolous lawsuits," amirite? This time, it's a class action lawsuit filed in California accusing 23andMe of "falsely and misleadingly" advertising their $99 genetic tests. The complaint, which asks for at least $5 million, also says the tests are "not supported by any scientific evidence."
  The timing of the complaint will no doubt spawn more outrage about silly government safety precautions.
  The lawsuit was filed days after the FDA issued a warning letter to 23andMe for not finishing studies of its Saliva Collection Kit and Personal Genome Service five years after the company began marketing. In the letter, the FDA said "we still do not have any assurance that the firm has analytically or clinically validated the PGS for its intended uses, which have expanded..."
  The agency's concern was that the tests and television ads would lead users to self-medicate based on unverified data. As epidemiologist and professor Cecile Janssens put it: "The FDA does not mind if people would like to know what their DNA sequence is, but it is concerned about the interpretation of that data by 23andMe."
  That expansive marketing sans regulation is also noted in the suit:
  2. In addition, Defendant uses the information it collects from the DNA tests consumers pay to take to generate databases and statistical information that it then markets to other sources and the scientific community in general, even though the results are meaningless.
  3. Despite Defendant's failure to receive marketing authorization or approval from the Food and Drug Administration ("FDA"), Defendant has slowly increased its list of indicators for the PGS, and initiated new marketing campaigns, including television advertisements in violation of the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act ("FDA Act").
  In a letter to customers, 23andMe CEO Anne Wojcicki, the wife (as far as we know) of Google cofounder Segrey Brin, called the FDA "an important partner."
  The company, which is backed by both Google Ventures and Brin personally, has stopped radio, TV, and online ads for 23andMe, but "has continued to sell its at-home testing kits," reports CNET.
  Casey v 23andMe by jeff_roberts881
Presidential Proclamation -- International Day of Persons With Disabilities, 2013
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: White House.gov Press Office Feed
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 15:12
  The White House
  Office of the Press Secretary
  For Immediate Release
  December 02, 2013
  INTERNATIONAL DAY OF PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES, 2013
  - - - - - - -
  BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
  A PROCLAMATION
  Nearly a quarter century has gone by since our Nation passed the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), a landmark civil rights bill that enshrined the principles of inclusion, access, and equal opportunity into law. The ADA was born out of a movement sparked by those who understood their disabilities should not be an obstacle to success and took up the mission of tearing down physical and social barriers that stood in their way. On this International Day of Persons with Disabilities, we celebrate the enormous progress made at home and abroad and we strengthen our resolve to realize a world free of prejudice.
  Every child deserves a decent education, every adult deserves equal access to the workplace, and every nation that allows injustice to stand denies itself the full talents and contributions of individuals with disabilities. I was proud that under my Administration the United States signed the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, an international convention based on the principles of the ADA, and I urge the Senate to provide its advice and consent to ratification. By joining the 138 parties to this convention, the United States would carry forward its legacy of global leadership on disability rights, enhance our ability to bring other countries up to our own high standards of access and inclusion, and expand opportunities for Americans with disabilities -- including our 5.5 million disabled veterans -- to work, study, and travel abroad.
  My Administration remains committed to leading by example. This year, as we celebrated the 40th anniversary of the Rehabilitation Act, we updated rules to improve hiring of veterans and people with disabilities, especially among Federal contractors and subcontractors. Thanks to the Affordable Care Act, insurers can no longer put lifetime dollar limits on essential health benefits for Americans with disabilities. And in January, it will be illegal to deny coverage because of pre-existing conditions.
  The changes achieved in the last two decades speak to what people can accomplish when they refuse to accept the world as it is. Today let us once again reach for the world that should be -- one where all people, regardless of country or disability, enjoy equal access, equal opportunity, and the freedom to realize their limitless potential.
  NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim December 3, 2013, as International Day of Persons with Disabilities. I call on all Americans to observe this day with appropriate ceremonies, activities, and programs.
  IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this second day of December, in the year of our Lord two thousand thirteen, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-eighth.
  BARACK OBAMA
The Birther Obama Chin First Wife
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Lame Cherry
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 15:08
  As another Lame Cherry exclusive in matter anti matter..........With the Globe or something in the tabloid section of the checkout showing that Birther Hussein Obama Chin had a gold band on his finger in Africa Kenya before he wed the lovely and vulvalous Muchelle, something must be posted to explain this.
  If you recall, as a reader my children of exclusives here, that Birther Hussein was cuddling with Pakistani rich boys in college and went on a partridge hunt.........That is not all that was bagged there but in this Lame Cherry exclusive only here in matter anti matter the following is revealed.
  Birther Hussein was not just comparing recipes with the old women while the men folk shot partridge, but an arranged marriage was conducted out in the Pakistani hinterlands with a well to do family.This was before Birther Hussein wed the lovely Muchelle with vulvalous appendages as Jesse Jackson's daughter would have nothing to do with Birther Obama.
  So Obama gets hisself wed to a Pakistani woman. She was 20 years old and not..........well let us say she had more clothes sizes than a regular woman and was the veil was an asset.
  Obama consummated the marriage, and there were not children as Obama pumps dust.
  So Obama Chin heads back to America and weds the lovely and vulvalous Muchelle and she has no idea she has Barack the Jack like his namesake in wives around the globe.
  With Obama globetrotting on Muchelle, the first wife starts getting the attention of another warlord, younger than her, and things start happening. Upon inquiry, Obama Chin shows up as the marriage lasts 7 years, and he casts the first stone........yeah they stone the wife for adultery and they bury her and Barack becomes a widower.This all took place around 1987.
  The Pakistani turban heads had no idea it was Birther Hussein and still do not. They just thought they were getting wed to an Indonesian, as that is what Obama was.
  Obama apparently had her buried and he knows where the grave is.
  This is the saga of the first wife of Birther Hussein Obama Chin. She was a remote woman of conveniences for weapons trade into Afghanistan. Ah so you keep track of the white hats in this, Obama Chin wed the large asset to keep track of the American arms shipments into Afghanistan for the Soviet Russians.Yeah it sounds like it does because that is what it was.
  That should be enough startling exclusives as I would not want people choking on their ......big biscuits in knowing there was an original Mrs. Chin of Pakistan who got stoned the real way and not on the hashish.
  Probably should be more said on this, but then there is that regime selling green cards with the MUTARD Dennis Daugaard of South Dakota that should put the Fang Jinn and the Mutant into the Vaseline hotel for an extended period of sentence.
  nuff said
  You really want a great deal out of me your rich folks in your not donating.......here you are with another Lame Cherry exclusive and you are stealing it. 350,000 dollars for the Widder Chin story.
  agtG 254
New York should revoke Dolan's license
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Scripting News
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 15:06
  I know the Dolan family owns the Knicks, but they don't own New York.
  They can keep playing here if they want, but if they want to call the team the New York Knicks, they have to sell the team to someone who will build something New York-like, something that works, and isn't built around one very inadequate person's ego.
  If anything about New York has been constant for all its history is scale, longevity, audacity, philosophy and sheer excellence when compared to the rest of the country. The Knicks make more sense in a city that's famous for humiliating itself. I'll leave that to your imagination. But they've had their chance. It's time for the Dolans and New York to take leave of each other.
  Maybe Staten Island wants them?
Why did Capitol cops cut down 'innocent' woman?
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 14:46
  WASHINGTON '-- A woman shot and killed by police on Capitol Hill supposedly was a threat to public safety, but a review of the known facts shows it was the police who may have posed the greater threat to public safety.
  It appears Miriam Carey never violated any law until police began pursuing her car. Officers, on the other hand, fired numerous shots at her in a crowded public space near the Capitol, as the video below shows.
  Seeing the news reports of the Oct. 3 shooting, many Americans came away with the impression that a mentally unstable and dangerous woman rammed a gate at the White House, sped away and was eventually shot by police because she could have posed a security threat to the nation's capital.
  Read the official police affidavit for the Miriam Carey case, Page 1 and Page 2.
  Miriam Carey
  But the official record raises numerous questions about that account, and the mainstream media have asked very few questions about the shooting death of Miriam Carey by police:
  Did she really ram a White House gate?Did she do anything illegal until police began pursuing her?Why didn't police try to Taser her instead of shooting her?Why didn't police shoot her tires instead of shooting into the car?If police feared she had an explosive device, why would they shoot at her?Was she really mentally unhinged, as claimed by some?Why did police shoot her at all?'Why are you firing?'
  The indisputable facts are that police shot and killed 34-year-old Miriam Carey after a car chase, and that her infant daughter, Erica, was in her vehicle.
  Carey family attorney Eric Sanders has requested the Department of Justice launch a federal investigation into what happened and how the dental hygienist ended up dead.
  WND spoke with Sanders and with Miriam's sister, Valerie Carey. Both she and Sanders are former officers with the New York City Police Department.
  The big question, of course, is why police shot Miriam.
  Drawing upon her professional experience, Valerie made perhaps the key point, that despite whatever questions have arisen about training, protocol and public safety, the officers at the scene ultimately had to decide for themselves how to best act responsibly.
  ''As an officer, you have to ask yourself, 'What is going on here?' No one is firing a weapon at you, so why are you firing?''
  But, Valerie said Americans should know this case presents even bigger questions.
  'We can't allow our civil liberties to be stripped'
  ''Everyone should realize we can't allow our civil liberties to be stripped in front of us. If my sister was traveling and came across a roadblock '' we're not even sure it was a checkpoint, there was some training going on in the area '' she should not have to be in fear of those sworn to protect us. And neither should we.''
  Sanders echoed those sentiments, saying, ''The bottom line is that there's a potential civil-rights claim here. Because, how do you visit Washington, D.C., as a U.S. citizen and end up getting killed?''
  ''It's important for people to understand that just because a car, even it were driven recklessly '... you don't lose your rights in this country because people are fearful. You don't lose your rights because the police are apprehensive. If we start going down that road, we have a big problem,'' added the attorney.
  Sanders said the fear of terrorism cannot be used to justify any and every action by law enforcement.
  ''Everything is terrorism, terrorism, terrorism '.... and that's the answer for everything. That's not the answer for everything. You don't lose your rights because of terrorism. We still have a Constitution. If we don't start enforcing it we're all in trouble.''
  A soft-spoken Valerie was still clearly in mourning for her sister, but she also spoke as a patriot who feared for her country.
  ''The news cycle sort of died down once it became clear she was not a terrorist threat. The media should have reported an innocent and unarmed woman was killed by police,'' she said. ''That's unacceptable. They cannot justify their actions. It was wrong, and America needs to know that.''
  Mishandled by the media
  Sanders said the media mishandled the story from the start by getting the most basic facts wrong.
  The headline on the ABC website read ''Attempt to Ram White House Gate Ends With Conn. Woman Dead.''
  ''The incident began at approximately 2:12 p.m. when a black Infiniti rammed a barrier outside the White House at 15th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue NW,'' read the article.
  NBC Washington's website reported, ''Law enforcement authorities still don't know why a Connecticut woman tried to breach a barrier at the White House.''
  ''The chase began at 2:12 p.m. when Ms. Carey, who was driving a black two-door Infiniti with Connecticut plates, tried to ram through a White House checkpoint at 15th and E Streets Northwest,'' reported the New York Times.
  However, contrary to those reports, she never tried to ram a White House gate or a barrier, according to the affidavit filed by the Washington, D.C., Metropolitan Police Department.
  ''She didn't ram the gate. She didn't run anybody over. The affidavit doesn't say she ran anyone over. It doesn't say she tried to ram a gate. All that is nonsense that has been reported by the media. It's about time for people to really start doing their homework. Their (Metro Police) own affidavit says all this,'' pointed out Sanders.
  And, in fact, the police report did not mention a White House gate, a barrier or any attempt to ram anything.
  It described the location as ''a vehicle checkpoint to the White House'' and said the driver ''refused to stop at the vehicle checkpoint and made a U-turn and began to flee.''
  The affidavit did say a Secret Service officer ''attempted to block the vehicle with a bicycle rack, however, the vehicle pushed over the bicycle rack, knocking the officer to the ground.''
  ''Making a U-turn is not illegal, not wanting go through a checkpoint is not illegal. Then the question is, why did a Secret Service person throw a bicycle rack at her car? That makes no sense,'' wondered Sanders.
  ''She didn't do anything but turn away from a checkpoint, which people all over the U.S. have a legal right to do. They don't have to go through a police checkpoint; they can turn around,'' he said.
  Killed for a panic attack?
  Some have speculated that Miriam simply came upon an unexpected police stop and panicked when quickly surrounded by heavily armed officers.
  National Review's Mark Steyn wrote, ''Ms. Carey does not appear to be guilty of any act other than a panic attack when the heavy-handed and heavier-armed palace guard began yelling at her.''
  For whatever reason, Miriam did not want to stop, and police decided to chase her car.
  Valerie has previously said, ''Deadly force was not necessary,'' and that ''They could have rammed the car or disabled the car.''
  WND asked, given her experience as an NYPD sergeant, how did she think it all went so wrong?
  She said her information is limited by not being able to see the dash-cam video, but based on what she's learned so far, ''I believe the authorities allowed the situation to get out of control, and it could have been handled a lot differently.''
  ''Possibly, there was a lack of communication from the first officer Miriam encountered all the way to those who fired upon her. Training and protocol seemed to have gone out the window.''
  Valerie Carey
  'Very, very poor judgment'
  So, WND asked, who should be held accountable: Those who pulled the triggers or those who trained them?
  Valerie said there didn't seem to be any reason the officers actually had to pull out their firearms.
  ''Sometimes you must, but once drawn, you'd better be ready to use your firearm. But in this incident, they used very, very poor judgment. And this is something those officers will have to live with.''
  One recent report suggested a radio problem may have left Secret Service officers unable to communicate with Capitol Police, a factor that may have contributed to the chaos.
  Valerie said, more likely, inexperience could have been an issue. She was concerned officers may have panicked, and she suggested they might not have ever been in such a situation.
  ''The more experienced an officer is, the better equipped that officer is to address the situation, even if there had been a problem with radio contact. If someone can't decide when to take someone's life, they should not be put in that position. ''
  'You can't shoot at a fleeing car'
  WND asked Sanders, with his experience as a police officer, if he believed police should have shot out the tires on Miriam's car.
  ''No, there should be no shooting at all,'' he said. ''They had no basis to shoot. You can't shoot at a fleeing car.''
  Sanders grew even more adamant, ''There's no protocol allowing them to shoot at a moving car. It makes no legal sense or philosophical sense. There's a whole host of safety reasons. That's why you don't shoot at cars.''
  He said that's a violation of police protocols in most every big city in the country, and the New York Times reported, ''Many police departments, including Washington's, prohibit officers from firing at moving cars, even when the car is being used in a threatening manner.''
  The paper continued, ''The Metropolitan Police rules say that no officer shall discharge a firearm 'at or from a moving vehicle unless deadly force is being used against the officer or another person.'''
  Miriam was not armed and never fired shots at anyone that fateful day.
  Was her car a deadly weapon?
  But, was she using her car as a deadly weapon? That's the impression media were getting from authorities, as the Times reported, ''A woman with a young child was shot to death after turning her vehicle into a weapon on Thursday afternoon, ramming her way through barriers outside the White House and on Capitol Hill.''
  Sanders disagreed.
  ''She had a car. A car is not a deadly weapon. I don't care what these people keep saying, I've been in law enforcement a long time, training with all these different agencies. We all know law enforcement training is cars are not weapons.''
  And the Metropolitan Police, which is conducting the official investigation into the incident, appears to agree with Sanders, as the Times notes the Metropolitan Police rules state, ''[A] moving vehicle is not considered deadly force.' It is not clear whether the Secret Service or the Capitol Police have a similar policy.''
  Lawmakers on Capitol Hill congratulated police for shooting the unarmed mother with a 30-second standing ovation.
  No choice but to shoot?
  Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., defended the officers in a speech on the Senate floor, calling the decision to shoot the woman ''understandable'' because the Capitol and the White House are often targets of attacks.
  Terrance Gainer, the Senate sergeant-at-arms and former chief of the Capitol Police, told the Times the officer did the right thing,'' because, ''It's not our typical car chase that starts out with some traffic stop.'' He told the Washington Post in 2005 that Capitol officers were trained to shoot a suspected bomber who refused to stop and be searched.
  Many in the media echoed that line, with CNN law enforcement analyst Mike Brooks insisting police had no choice but to shoot.
  ''You don't know if she has a bomb,'' he said. ''You don't know if it's a terrorist attack. The officers just don't know.''
  Sanders found all of those arguments illogical.
  ''How do you shoot at a person who is unarmed? Sitting in a car? 'Oh, there could've been a bomb in the car.' That's more nonsense. Because if there is a bomb in the car and you are shooting in the car, you are endangering everybody! C'mon.''
  The attorney said they overreacted to something that is ''handled by police everyday, all over the world.''
  ''Washington, D.C., is no different than any other city. 'Oh, we have high-value targets.' Oh, nonsense,'' he said. ''There are high-value targets in New York and many other cities. That doesn't mean the Constitution gets thrown out the window.''
  He again insisted there had been an overreaction to the threat of terrorism.
  ''We are under a siege mentality. For some reason, in this world, we believe that everybody is out to get us. It's like there's a big boogey man. And the police are responding the same way.''
  Killed for postpartum depression?
  Once it became clear that Miriam had not been a terrorist, the media's search for a motive centered on her mental health.
  ABC News reported, ''Authorities said she had a history of mental health issues, and her mother told ABC News she suffered from postpartum depression.''
  Time Magazine didn't mince words with a headline that blared, ''Capitol Car Chase Suspect Believed to Be Delusional, Emotionally Disturbed.''
  As evidence of this, Time cited an unidentified third-hand source, reporting that Carey ''was said to be delusional and believed the president was communicating with her, according to an anonymous federal law enforcement official with knowledge of the investigation who spoke to the Associated Press.''
  However, Time also reported, ''Carey's sisters said that she was being tapered off her medications under the supervision of her doctor, and that she was feeling fine.''
  National Review's Mark Steyn wrote, ''[W]e are told Ms. Carey was 'mentally ill,' although she had no medications in her vehicle and those at her home back in Connecticut are sufficiently routine as to put millions of other Americans in the category of legitimate target.''
  Valerie also took exception to the depiction of her sister.
  ''The media tried to depict my sister as some kind of mentally ill person,'' she said. ''For some reason, that makes people think it was sort of OK that she was shot. She was not mentally ill. She had postpartum depression. If that's a reason to kill a person, that's a very sad lesson.''
  If Valerie was saddened by the description, her attorney was enraged when asked if Miriam suffered from postpartum depression or some other mental illness.
  ''It's irrelevant! That has nothing to do with the police discharging their weapons,'' he said. ''The inquiry is not looking into what she was suffering; the inquiry is looking into, why did the police pull the trigger? That's the subject of any such inquiry. It amazes me, and it's kind of frustrating in a lot of ways, because it's so easy for people to get fooled by a red herring.''
  The more he thought about it, the more upset he got.
  ''I don't care if she suffered from 15 mental conditions!'' he declared. ''And, by the way, police are trained to deal with those types of situations, too. So you can disregard that. We don't know. The only thing we know is that the police pulled the trigger.''
  And that's what really matters, said Sanders.
  ''They have to answer to why they pulled the trigger,'' he said. ''That's what the Constitution says. That's what the law says. That's what they case law says.''
  WND CEO Joesph Farah looks into all the still-unanswered questions in the strange case of Miriam Carey
  Lingering questions
  Something else he found beside the point: Why did Miriam go to the White House?
  ''We don't know, but it's irrelevant,'' he said. ''She's a U.S. citizen. She was there legally and, quite frankly, it doesn't matter. Unless something comes out that we don't know about, it really doesn't matter because she had a legal right to be there.''
  As to why police did not Taser Miriam instead of shooting and killing her, police are not answering questions until the investigation is completed.
  When WND did ask D.C. police questions about the shooting, Metropolitan Police Department Communications Director Gwendolyn Crump replied:
  ''This case remains under investigation by the Metropolitan Police Department. The Internal Affairs Division is investigating this death. It should be noted that law enforcement agencies have different guidelines depending on their mission. Ultimately, the U.S. Attorney's Office will make the final determination.''
  It's also still unclear whether Miriam was shot inside her car or whether she exited the vehicle before police killed her.
  The day after the shooting, the New York Times reported, ''Ms. Carey managed to get out of the car, and was shot by several officers. According to a law enforcement official, she was not armed, and it was not known whether she presented an immediate danger.''
  That account seemed to be supported by eyewitness Patty Bills, who told CNN, ''As soon as the child was pulled from the car is when the gunfire really let loose,'' and ''I heard the gunshots, I saw the policemen shooting. It appeared someone got out and it looked like a rush of people running, so at that particular time you didn't know if there were more suspects involved.''
  However, Bills has now told WND that she, in fact, did not see Miriam exit her car.
  Bills said everything was such a blur on the day it happened, she actually has a better recollection of the event now.
  Although she did not remember saying, ''It appeared someone got out,'' she is now certain she did not see a woman get out of the car.
  Attorney arrested
  The day after Sanders held a press conference announcing he was calling for the Justice Department to look into the death of Miriam Carey, the attorney was arrested.
  The New York Post reported Sanders was arrested after a judge had decided the attorney had missed too many payments owed to a former employee. A state Division of Human Rights panel found Sanders and a partner wrongfully discriminated against Mary Rocco.
  The panel awarded her $175,000 in 2010 after deciding Sanders fired her because she was pregnant.
  When WND asked Sanders if he felt his arrest was an attempt to either silence or intimidate him, the attorney laughed loud and long.
  ''Of course I think it was! I can't prove it,'' he said. ''I loved the timing of it '' the day after our press conference. Exactly one day after I said don't trust the government.''
  Sanders insisted he has no debts and declared bankruptcy solely to fight this judgment.
  ''I am clean. That's the way I was as a cop, that's the way I am as an attorney,'' he said. ''I was a police officer in New York. I've never bee arrested in my life. The questions is, why was I picked up?''
  'We're serious people'
  While Sanders finds his arrest fishy, he gives no credence to a wild report claiming President Obama ordered the killing of Miriam because he had fathered her child.
  Sanders said it was not true that Valerie had asked for a paternity test.
  ''Absolutely not. I've asked for a retraction, and so far they haven't gotten back to me. I'm pretty annoyed about that,'' he said. ''That's not what we said. We are not game-players. We're serious people. We don't do those kinds of things.''
  But, he said his experience as a police officer had led him to understand that sometimes even those dedicated to serve and to protect do things that are hard to understand, or even believe.
  ''The bottom line is, cops do a lot of outrageous things. They really do. The public really has no clue as to what is really going on. You really have to be from that (police) culture to really understand what they are doing.''
  And that's why, he says, you can't believe everything you see in the news.
  ''Quite frankly, they are underreporting a lot of things. It's not as isolated as people think it is; it's a really big problem. It's just that cops won't speak up about it. Let me tell you, the blue wall of silence is serious '' hurting other cops and other outrageous things '' that really does happen.''
  WND has filed a Freedom of Information Act request for the forensics report that has yielded no results.
  A WND reporter on the scene immediately after the shooting found answers hard to come by and now finds little has changed, two months later.
  Follow Garth Kant on Twitter @DCGarth
Sources: AR-15 found in UNH student's car - WFSB 3 Connecticut
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 14:40
  WEST HAVEN, CT (WFSB) -The lockdown at University of New Haven was lifted Tuesday evening after a commuter student was spotted on West Haven campus with loaded firearms and an AR-15 along with loaded clips were found in his vehicle.
  The incident started just after 1 p.m. when someone told police they spotted a man with a weapon exiting his vehicle in the 1100 block of Campbell Avenue and headed toward UNH campus.
  Emergency alerts were sent out by university officials, notifying people on campus to shelter in place while police investigated the incident and searched the campus. Shelter in place means students needs to stay inside and away from windows and doors.
  Minutes later, the suspect, who police have identified as 21-year-old William Dong, of Fairfield, was found in possession of two loaded handguns on the UNH campus. Dong was quickly taken into custody by police without incident.
  Both weapons were registered to Dong, with one being on his person and the other in his bag, sources said.
  Police said Dong was initially spotted with a rifle, however, that weapon was found in his motor vehicle hours later.
  Sources told Eyewitness News an AR-15 and loaded magazines were found in Dong's vehicle, which is believed to be a Toyota Rav 4, and it was towed from the scene to be processed.
  Sources told Eyewitness News that Dong was putting the gun into the backseat of his vehicle and was moving to better hide it.
  Investigators said there is no indication that Dong was going to hurt anyone.
  "We have no idea," said West Haven police Sgt. David Tammaro on the suspect's motive.
  No shots were fired. There are no reports of any injuries to students, staff or police, investigators said.
  Sources told Eyewitness News there is no clear evidence of any criminal intent.
  However, any student found on UNH campus will face "disciplinary sanctions," according to the university handbook.
  The following items are considered weapons, according to the UNH handbook:
  All firearmsFacsimile firearmsPaintball gunsAir gunsSwitchblade knivesKnives with blades four or more inches in length,Dangerous materials and chemicals such as "mace" or teargasAfter the suspect was placed in custody, police conducted a "methodical search" to make sure the campus was secure. However, there is no indication of any other suspects.
  The Federal Bureau of Investigation and SWAT teams were called to the campus along with various police departments from surrounding towns.
  At this time, there is no immediate threat to the public, police said.
  Police focus on suspect's Fairfield home
  Police traced the registration in Dong's vehicle to his home in the 1300 block of Stratfield Road in Fairfield.
  Ammunition and pellet guns were found in the home, police said. However, police said nothing "alarming" has been located in the residence.
  Investigators secured the home where Dong lived with his parents and commuted to UNH. Police were waiting for a search warrant as of Tuesday evening.
  Dong recently received a valid pistol permit and has two registered handguns. The recent permit indicates that he does not have a criminal background. There were no reports of problems with police previously at the suspect's home.
  Police said a family member was at Dong's home all day. That family member does not speak good English, so they brought in a translator as they start asking more questions.
  West Haven schools shelter in place, Classes canceled
  All afternoon drivers and students trying to get on the UNH campus were turned away by police.
  For hours, police went dorm by dorm, sweeping the campus, making sure it was safe.
  The lockdown was lifted at the north and south campuses for UNH around 3:40 p.m. The main campus remained in lockdown until just before 5:30 p.m. The lockdown at UNH was lifted after six hours.
  UNH student Mike Lanzetta said once students heard the news, they gathered together.
  "School officials were telling us to go into the rooms, get away from the windows and the doors," Lanzetta said. "And that's what we did."
  UNH officials said afternoon and evening classes were canceled because of "ongoing police activity."
  Forest Elementary School and Carrigan Intermediate School were also given the shelter in place order, but that was lifted just after 1:30 p.m. Notre Dame High School was locked down while police investigated, and officials there said students were dismissed at 2:25 p.m.
  Notre Dame President Br. James Branigan said officers were stationed at the school during the entire lockdown, and students were never in any danger.
  "While we certainly had a stressful afternoon due to an unforeseen incident that took place that caused us to go into lockdown, I want to stress to our families that we have a lockdown procedure in place just in case it is needed to be put into operation," Branigan said in a statement Tuesday.
  Students applauded the university's quick response.
  "By the time we got the email and realized what was going on, there was already Milford Orange, the state police was here with K-9s," Lanzetta said.
  Several parents including Sandra Taylor rushed to campus to check on their children.
  "She actually said I don't feel safe here anymore," Taylor said.
  Recent lockdowns at colleges in Connecticut
  Tuesday's incident is the third such incident reported at a Connecticut school in a month. Central Connecticut State University was locked down for several hours on Nov. 4 after people reported seeing a man dressed in black with a face mask and possibly a sword or gun, getting off a bus and walking into a dorm.
  The student, David Kyem, said he was wearing a Halloween costume and didn't mean to scare anyone.
  Last week, Yale University was locked down for hours after police said someone was going to the campus to open fire. That, police said, appeared to be a hoax.
  Copyright 2013 WFSB (Meredith Corporation). All rights reserved.
Internet Press Vulnerable After WikiLeaks
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 14:12
  Some things truly haven't been seen before. WikiLeaks might be one of them.
  It's hard to believe that the founding fathers could have ever imagined the possibilities of the Internet or a journalist like Julian Assange when they crafted the First Amendment.
  If they were with us today they might well say they knew publishers they despised as much as some of our leaders today apparently do the editor-in-chief of the notorious website.
  Yet the angry words of government officials and the swirling storm over whether Assange's brand of journalism can be justified are overshadowing a potentially far more disturbing aspect of this story -- the new power governments have to punish publishers.
  It used to be that a publisher owned his own presses and while even the angriest of politicians might want to stop him from running them, there was essentially nothing they could do.
  With the Internet, many of us believed that the power of the publisher had spread to everyone, that we lived in a time of press freedom that would have been unimaginable just a few decades ago.
  But the WikiLeaks case exposes the vulnerability of any publisher on the Internet. What's happened to Assange and his website has deeply troubling implications for our society. And, no, we're not talking about the damage some believe he's doing to our national security by publishing classified records.
  We're talking about how democracy can be diminished when government uses its power to silence a voice it disagrees with. Even more worrisome is how this case has exposed how foreign governments may be able to use their own criminal investigations to hurt and potentially silence journalists beyond their own borders.
  Today, it appears, notification of a criminal investigation is enough to force businesses whose cause is not the First Amendment to cut off a publisher the way Amazon, PayPal, Visa and Mastercard each have done WikiLeaks. (Disclosure: Civil Beat Publisher Pierre Omidyar is chairman of eBay, which owns PayPal.) Unlike the press barons of old, the executives of these businesses cannot tell their shareholders that it will hurt their company more to cave on a matter of principle than to drop a customer. It is their right and common practice to shut a customer down when they receive complaints from criminal investigators, even without a court order. This even though the existence of a criminal investigation is no indication of guilt.
  The executives have a fiduciary duty to do what's best for their shareholders. And if they didn't respond to government warnings, they very well could risk their own business being shut down. The end result, we're learning: A website can be cut off and cut down, even by a foreign government. The existence of a criminal investigation in a foreign country with values different from our own may be enough cause for these companies to shut off a customer.
  Alas, the Internet is not free. Nor is it a place of unlimited freedom. We knew that about places like China. But until it became abundantly clear in the WikiLeaks case, not the U.S.A. Sure, it'll be impossible for the government to ever remove what Assange has published from the Internet. This is a case where the cat is definitely out of the bag. But by taking the steps they have to shut down WikiLeaks, governments create a chilling effect on other publishers, making it less likely that information that sheds light on government policy and actions that citizens should know about becomes public.
  Consider what the WikiLeaks case might mean for a local publisher. Even a news organization as young as Civil Beat has already received leaked documents from would-be whistleblowers. We've published articles based on those documents and could very well feel it's the right thing to do to post them on the Internet, as is our practice with many stories.
  What would happen if a prosecutor or government official went to the service that was hosting our news service and said we were the subject of a criminal investigation? Civil Beat, like other publishers, relies on payment services provided by a third party, be it PayPal or Visa and MasterCard. Without them, we don't receive revenue. We also depend on third parties to host our website. Yet we've seen in the past week that those ties can easily be severed just by raising the specter of an investigation.
  These threats are new tools to hurt publishers, not all of whom have the resources or resourcefulness of WikiLeaks but many of whom may have government secrets to share even more valuable, and potentially disturbing, to anybody in power.
  It's important that we not let anger against someone we may disagree with, even revile, blind us to how the very democracy we treasure can be diminished more by the actions of aroused government officials than by a news service that many believe is irresponsible.
  Victory in punishing WikiLeaks could be hollow at best. A critical lesson we should take from what has happened is that the Internet is vulnerable to abuse by governments who want to silence those who expose them.
  This post originally appeared at Civil Beat.
WikiLeaks, Press Freedom and Free Expression in the Digital Age
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 14:09
  This week, fourteen people charged by the Department of Justice in connection with a coordinated denial of service attack on PayPal's services in 2010 will appear in Federal Court. The "PayPal 14," as they have been dubbed, are charged with participating in an attack orchestrated by Anonymous to retaliate against PayPal's suspension of its relationship with WikiLeaks. Their case as well as PayPal's actions in 2010 raise important questions about press freedoms and the nature of online protests.
  As Chairman of eBay Inc., PayPal's parent company, and as a philanthropist and soon-to-be publisher deeply committed to government transparency, press freedoms and free expression, these issues hit close to home. (Since eBay is a public company, it's important for me to stress that the views in this article are my own and don't represent the views of the company.)
  The story started in December, 2010, when PayPal suspended its relationship with WikiLeaks and the foundation accepting donations on their behalf for a period of several months. Today, PayPal can be found as one of several payment options available to support WikiLeaks' work.
  When I learned of PayPal's decision, I immediately expressed my concerns to company management. A few days later, I contributed to an editorial by the Honolulu Civil Beat Editorial Board drawing attention to the important press freedom concerns raised by the actions of PayPal and other companies as a result of government pressure.
  In the editorial, we affirmed that Julian Assange is a publisher and that the U.S. government used its power to attempt to silence him:
  It used to be that a publisher owned his own presses and while even the angriest of politicians might want to stop him from running them, there was essentially nothing they could do.
  With the Internet, many of us believed that the power of the publisher had spread to everyone, that we lived in a time of press freedom that would have been unimaginable just a few decades ago.
  But the WikiLeaks case exposes the vulnerability of any publisher on the Internet. What's happened to Assange and his website has deeply troubling implications for our society. And, no, we're not talking about the damage some believe he's doing to our national security by publishing classified records.
  We're talking about how democracy can be diminished when government uses its power to silence a voice it disagrees with. Even more worrisome is how this case has exposed how foreign governments may be able to use their own criminal investigations to hurt and potentially silence journalists beyond their own borders.
  We also noted that the commercial nature of the Internet posed new threats to press freedoms by virtue of the fact that these companies generally don't have the First Amendment rights of its customers in mind when the government starts howling about one of them.
  Today, it appears, notification of a criminal investigation is enough to force businesses whose cause is not the First Amendment to cut off a publisher the way Amazon, PayPal, Visa and MasterCard each have done WikiLeaks...
  Unlike the press barons of old, the executives of these businesses cannot tell their shareholders that it will hurt their company more to cave on a matter of principle than to drop a customer.
  In contrast, our new media organization will have the First Amendment at its core, and will make very different decisions if faced with government pressure not to publish or retaliation after the fact.
  Three years later, the vulnerability of Internet publishers is not much different, though according to recent reports the Justice Department has realized it has a "New York Times problem" if it wants to criminalize WikiLeaks' publication. It may have taken nearly three years for the Justice Department to realize something that seems evident to press freedom advocates, but it's still progress.
  There is, however, still skepticism and uncertainty about whether or not WikiLeaks or Assange will be charged. While it's impossible to know what specific acts law enforcement officials are investigating, it's a sad state of affairs that the legality of what from the outside appears to be legitimate news-gathering operations are being questioned.
  Today it's not just the process of news-gathering that's being questioned, but the nature of online protest. Is a distributed denial of service attack a legitimate form of protest?
  Back in 2010, members of Anonymous retaliated against PayPal by launching exactly this type of attack. We don't know how many people participated in the attack but just fourteen were arrested and charged by the government.
  A denial of service attack is damaging and costly. Many of PayPal's customers rely on PayPal for their livelihood. An interruption in service can have serious consequences: those customers may lose income that may cause them to become late on rent payments, medical expenses, etc. These are serious impacts that must not be ignored. An attack on PayPal's servers hurts these vulnerable people far more than it hurts a multinational company.
  People at PayPal -- as in most companies -- take their responsibility to protect their customers very seriously. They sleep with pagers next to them so they can be woken in the middle of the night when something goes wrong. They put in extra hours on short notice at the expense of spending time with their families. They put their customers ahead of their own interests time and time again.
  But on the other side, I can understand that the protesters were upset by PayPal's actions and felt that they were simply participating in an online demonstration of their frustration. That is their right, and I support freedom of expression, even when it's my own company that is the target.
  The problem in this case however is that the tools being distributed by Anonymous are extremely powerful. They turn over control of a protester's computer to a central controller which can order it to make many hundreds of web page requests per second to a target website. The combined impact of just a few (say, one thousand) of these computers can overwhelm most websites. One thousand computers each initiating just 100 requests per second means that every minute, six million page requests are being made.
  If we want to make parallels between real-world protests and online protests, that means that one thousand people can have the effect of six million people demonstrating in front of your office. That seems like an excessive impact in the hands of each person. It's like each protester can bring along 6,000 phantom friends without going to the trouble of convincing each of them to take an afternoon off and join the protest in the street.
  That's why I've concluded that the use of these attack tools is vastly different than other forms of protest.
  That said, from a justice point of view, I think prosecutors need to look at the actual damage caused by each defendant. First, it would be unjust to hold fourteen people accountable for the actions of a thousand (or however many other people were part of the same attack). Each person should be accountable for the damage they personally caused.
  Second, the law allows prosecutors to calculate damage in a way that seems overstated. An appropriate damage estimate includes the pay and overtime pay required for employees to respond to the attack. But the damage estimate apparently being used by prosecutors in this case includes the cost of upgrading equipment to better defend against similar future attacks.
  To me, that doesn't make sense. It's akin to charging a protester who illegally and ill-advisedly throws a rock through a window with the cost of replacing the window with much more expensive rock-proof glass. Yes, it's true the business wouldn't have thought to protect itself against rocks if it hadn't been for the protester's actions, but to me it's not fair to compel the protester to pay for the upgrade.
  Prosecutors should also look at the circumstances of each defendant, and examine whether or not they were aware of the excessive impact their actions might have. They may have believed they were participating in a legitimate online protest and not aware of the multiplicative effect of the tools they were installing. Many people are not technically aware of the power of these tools and may have felt they were lending a single voice to the chorus of protest, rather than simulating thousands of voices. In those cases, I believe justice requires leniency. In my view, they should be facing misdemeanor charges and the possibility of a fine, rather than felony charges and jail time.
  As a society, our notions of free speech and protest must evolve since much of the public sphere is now online. Online protest is a new form of expression and probably feels natural to people who have grown up participating in online communities. The principles of the First Amendment require that we create space for free speech and association, unencumbered by government intrusion, and that those spaces exist online as well as offline. But in creating those spaces, we must also be cognizant that a much smaller number of protesters can now significantly disrupt the activities of millions of their fellow citizens who have an equal right to go about their lives without undue disruption.
  If the great civil rights March on Washington can now be simulated online by a few dozen people using purpose-built tools, simple parallels with offline protests aren't sufficient to give us guidance on the role of free expression online.
  The government's actions against WikiLeaks in 2010 and companies' reactions to that pressure, as well as the prosecution of the PayPal 14 raise critical questions about the nature of the First Amendment in the digital age. The First Amendment is primarily a restraint on government intrusion and a bedrock principle of our society. How do commercial interests interact with those protections? How does government ensure space for free expression online when there are no public sidewalks or street corners? How can unpopular dissent resist government pressure when that dissent depends on commercial Internet providers to reach its audience?
  These are vital questions in today's society. The First Amendment is one of the most important rights we have. How will our understanding of the First Amendment adapt as society and technology changes? Time will tell, but our freedoms depend on a vigorous engagement on these questions by all of us.
  Follow Pierre Omidyar on Twitter: www.twitter.com/pierre
Plea Deal For Alleged 'Paypal 14' Hackers Could Come Soon
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 14:08
  WASHINGTON -- Eleven of the 14 people allegedly affiliated with the hacker group Anonymous who were arrested in 2011 for launching a cyberattack against PayPal are prepared to plead guilty in California on Thursday as part of an agreement reached with federal prosecutors. The question is whether the Justice Department will approve the deal.
  Lawyers for several of the defendants revealed in court filings this week that 11 members of the "PayPal 14" are prepared to accept the agreement.
  But language in the plea agreement offered by federal prosecutors says the deal is only good if 13 of the defendants take it, and as of Wednesday there were two holdouts. (Any final agreement would not include PayPal 14 member Dennis Collins, since he was indicted earlier this month on separate charges alleging he helped Anonymous carry out attacks against credit card companies and recording industry groups.)
  It's not clear whether the deal would involve jail time. Several lawyers involved in the case declined to give details of the plea offer, citing the confidentiality of the negotiations. One lawyer called the deal "exceptionally good, but very fragile," and declined to say whether it involved jail time.
  As of Wednesday evening, attorneys for Jeffrey Puglisi, Tracy Ann Valenzuela and Christopher Quang Vo all indicated their clients were willing to take the deal.
  Plea negotiations have been going on for several months, and the case has put the lives of the defendants involved on hold for more than two years. Several of the defendants spoke of the financial and emotional burdens of the case in interviews with The Huffington Post earlier this year.
  The defendants have been charged under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, which has come under increased scrutiny for the stiff penalties it imposes for minor computer crimes. Some Internet activists say so-called distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, which involve overwhelming websites with data until they crash, amount to nothing more than protests and should be protected First Amendment speech.
  Most of the defendants in the Paypal 14 case are due in federal court in San Jose, Calif., on Thursday morning.
  Also on HuffPost:
Analysis Finds Cost of Obamacare Website Is Way More Than Anyone Predicted | TheBlaze.com
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 13:56
  The to-date cost of the glitchy Obamacare website has topped $1 billion, easily surpassing the $394 million originally estimated by the Government Accountability Office, according to a Bloomberg Government analysis.
  HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius (Getty Images)
  Perhaps more shocking than the site's likely price tag is the fact that roughly one-third of that amount was spent on contracts awarded during the six months leading up to the site's disastrous Oct. 1 launch '-- when those at the top were reportedly aware of the site's many problems.
  It's important to note that the Bloomberg analysis covers up until Sept. 30, just before the 16-day partial government shutdown. So the final amount awarded to contractors since the launch of healthcare.gov may be more than $1 billion.
  ''The torrent of late spending '-- almost $352 million of $1 billion in awards to the top 10 contractors '-- indicates the magnitude of the work still to be done as opening day approached,'' Bloomberg's Peter Gosselin reported, ''and helps explain the information technology problems that have dogged the exchange system since its launch.''
  The Bloomberg figure may come as a shock to many Americans. Indeed, despite the GAO stating earlier that its data was incomplete, the $394 million estimate has been widely reported as the final cost for the launch of the Affordable Care Act.
  But based on Obamacare-related payments to at least 10 firms involved in building the federal online health insurance marketplace, the GAO's figure may be way off, according to Bloomberg.
  ''In aggregate, the 10 firms won a third of their health law-related contract dollars in the six months ended Sept. 30,'' Gosselin wrote.
  ''Besides showing the rush to issue contract awards in the months leading up to the opening of exchanges, the (Bloomberg Government) analysis also revealed that the implementation of the health law is costing substantially more than generally is portrayed,'' he added.
  Image source: Bloomberg Government
  As of this writing, the $1 billion-plus website was still not functioning as designed.
  (H/T: Zero Hedge)
  ''
  Follow Becket Adams (@BecketAdams) on Twitter
q Construct
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 06:10
  The "q-construct" is implemented on APRS-IS to add the following capabilities to the Internet APRS transport mechanism.
  APRS-IS Entry IdentificationSupport for a Future Authorization AlgorithmSupport for Loop DetectionSupport for Automatic Loop ProtectionCompatibility with Existing IGate and Client SoftwareOnly Server Support Needed for ImplementationThe currently defined q constructs are:
  Server Generated:
  qAC - Packet was received from the client directly via a verified connection (FROMCALL=login). The callSSID following the qAC is the server's callsign-SSID.qAX - Packet was received from the client directly via a unverified connection (FROMCALL=login). The callSSID following the qAX is the server's callsign-SSID. This construct is in addition to the TCPIP*/TCPXX* construct currently in place. TCPXX and qAX have been depricated.qAU - Packet was received from the client directly via a UDP connection. The callSSID following the qAU is the server's callsign-SSID.qAo - (letter O) Packet was received via a client-only port, the FROMCALL does not match the login, and the packet contains either a ,I or qAR construct where the indicated IGate matches the login.qAO - (letter O) Packet was received via a client-only port and the FROMCALL does not match the login.qAS - Packet was received from another server or generated by this server. The latter case would be for a beacon generated by the server. Due to the virtual nature of APRS-IS, use of beacon packets by servers is strongly discouraged. The callSSID following the qAS is the login or IP address of the first identifiable server (see algorithm).qAr - Packet was received indirectly (via an intermediate server) from an IGate using the ,I construct. The callSSID following the qAr it the callSSID of the IGate.qAR - Packet was received directly (via a verified connection) from an IGate using the ,I construct. The callSSID following the qAR it the callSSID of the IGate.Client Generated:
  qAR - Packet is placed on APRS-IS by an IGate from RF. The callSSID following the qAR it the callSSID of the IGate.qAZ - Packet is generated by the server/client/IGate and should not be propagated. The callSSID following the qAZ is the callSSID of the server/client/IGate. This is normally used for connection messages such as messages to USERLIST.qAI - Trace packet. This packet tells each server to add login identification to the packet. This packet starts with the callSSID of the originating station following the qAI. See algorithm for more details.Client generated q constructs will be verified if a new authorization algorithm is created.
  Servers MUST have unique logins from any other server/IGate/client that insert data onto APRS-IS. This is to prevent packets from being erroneously detected as looping. For instance, if my server's login is AE5PL and my weather client is AE5PL, my server will see ,qAC,AE5PL and consider this packet a looped packet. As logins can be any combination of 9 alphanumeric characters, this should not pose a problem.
  IGates which append IGATECALL,I to the end of packets and which are directly connected to a server which supports the q construct will have the IGATECALL,I converted to qAR,IGATECALL, qAr,IGATECALL, or qAo,IGATECALL to support the extended capabilities of the q construct.
  Servers will have the ability to selectively enable tracing on all packets through server configuration. This must be used judiciously and only when a loop condition is suspected due to the increased bandwidth demands that tracing creates.
  q constructs will only appear on APRS-IS and are not to be used elsewhere due to bandwidth considerations.
  For example, this is what happens to a packet without a q construct which enters the system via a verified connection:
  Original packet:AE5PL>APRS,TCPIP*:payload
  Packet leaving the server if trace is off:AE5PL>APRS,TCPIP*,qAC,AE5PL-JS:payload
  or, if trace is on:AE5PL>APRS,TCPIP*,qAI,AE5PL,AE5PL-JS:payload
  Here is a similar example where the packet is gated to APRS-IS from RF:
  Original packet:AE5PL>APRS,WIDE1*:payload
  Packet leaving the server if trace is off:AE5PL>APRS,WIDE1*,qAR,AE5PL-10:payload
  or, if trace is on:AE5PL>APRS,WIDE1*,qAI,AE5PL-10,AE5PL-JS:payload
  Logins used on APRS-IS must not consist of exactly 8 characters from 0 to 9 or A to F as this would indicate a server generated IP address for the q construct.
Life of a Call Girl: Fantasy vs. Reality | Jon Millward - Blog
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 05:37
  In the final weeks of 2011, I delved once more into the secretive world of the UK sex industry.This time my focus wasn't on men who pay for sex, but the women who supply it. So I reached out to hundreds of British escorts with one request: tell me about your life. And'--on the condition that their words remain anonymous'--they did.
  In October of last year, I launched this blog with Dirty Words: A Probing Analysis of 5000 Call Girl Reviews. The meat of the article came from a textual analysis I carried out on over a million words, which were extracted from masses of 'field reports''--reviews of female escorts, written by the men who pay to have sex with them. My intention was to find out something about the mind of the average punter by pouring over the words he unconsciously chose to use in his recounting of paid-for sexual experiences. It turned out that while his individual word choices were interesting (slim, nice and blonde were most popular for describing the girls), they were nothing compared to the reviews as a whole. The punters' field reports were amazingly detailed, often bizarre, never degrading, and'--at times'--surprisingly funny.
  The response to Dirty Words and the infographic that accompanied it was great. A lot of people seemed to enjoy the excerpts from field reports that I included in the article, while others said they appreciated the fact that I didn't overtly judge the punters for their actions. Of course, I was curious to find out how the piece would be received by the punters themselves, the men who had unwittingly supplied the words that formed the heart of the study. So I used Google Analytics to check the traffic sources for the article. About five separate discussions had started on punters' forums'--so naturally I signed up for them to take a look. One forum contained a particularly lively debate on the article, with several people impressed and complimentary about what I'd done and said:
  But I got the impression from other comments that a few punters and girls weren't such big fans.
  Anyway, most people seemed to like the piece and I think it provided a small glimpse into the sex industry from a punter's perspective. It wasn't long after I posted the first article, however, that I was again thinking about the controversial world of the call girl, except this time it was the call girls' point of view I wondered about, instead of the punters'. I'd seen how the men describe the women in their reviews, but, if asked, how would the average escort describe her paying customers?
  A hundred questions about the escort way of life sprang to mind. How did they get into the business? Which are their favourite sex acts? Do they lie about their age, or to their friends and family about what they do? What is the craziest thing a client has requested? I wanted to strip fantasy from reality and find out what it's really like to be a courtesan, an escort, a working girl, a prostitute'...
  There are roughly three kinds of 'working girl' in the UK. The first can be found on the street. She is the classic prostitute: a night-worker, selling sex to men who pass in cars and on foot. She has low prices and high risks. The next works in a parlour or brothel alongside other women and she does 'incalls''--men visit her place of work and she provides them with a massage and a happy ending of one flavour or another. The last is the escort. She mostly does incalls but in her case the men flock to her apartment to indulge in pre-booked sessions of varying durations. The escort will either belong to an agency, which advertises her services, sends clients her way, and takes a cut of the money, or she'll run everything herself'--as an independent.
  It was the independent UK escorts I decided I'd contact, for two reasons. My hunch was that I wouldn't have much luck asking agencies to pass on my request to their catalogue of courtesans. I thought it would be better to bypass the middleman and reach out directly to the women I wanted to contact. The other reason was one of convenience. I knew that only a certain percentage of women I contacted would end up contributing to my research, so it was vital I get in touch with as many as possible'--hundreds, in fact. I found three massive directories of independent UK escorts and set about harvesting their contact details. This is a good way of acquiring email addresses, but it isn't strictly legal or respectable. In fact it's tantamount to spamming, but I couldn't think of any other option. I'd be as polite as possible in my email, make it clear that my intentions were strictly honourable, and hope for the best.
  It was while collecting the details of thousands of women listed in the online directories that another idea occurred to me. Every one of these escorts had written a 100-word description of herself and her services for potential clients to peruse. There were 1,207 women. That equalled over 120,000 words I could analyze in the same way as the million I'd used in my first study, Dirty Words. I could therefore compare the words escorts use to describe themselves to the words punters use to describe them in their reviews, which I'd already discovered through my first investigation. Would the women emphasize the same traits men so often mention, like being slim and blonde? Would the women's most mentioned height, bra size and dress size match the men's? I decided I couldn't pass up the chance to find out. I'd analyze the 1,207 self-written escort adverts while waiting for the responses to my spam email'--I mean, my polite request for the ladies' valuable input.
  The email I sent out explained and linked to my original piece on the punters and outlined what I hoped to achieve with the follow-up. At the end I gave a link to the survey, which I hosted on my site and protected with a password, which was also supplied in the email (it was fidelio). The last thing I wanted was for the survey to be completed by anyone other than the escorts.
  I spent a long time putting together the survey's questions. I wanted to make sure I didn't guide the respondents into answering in ways that might be pre-empted by my expectations or prejudices. To get around this, lots of totally open-ended questions were included. Others were multiple choice, but I think the most important ones provided a blank slate for the women's answers. Here are the questions I asked.
  And here's what happened with the email and survey over the next couple of weeks.
  While less than 5% of the women I emailed ended up completing the survey, the thirty who did do it gave more detailed, frank answers than I could ever have hoped for. Honesty was flooding into my inbox and it was illuminating.
  I started by building up a basic profile of the women who responded.
  While the responses trickled in, I'd also entered into email conversations with a few of the women. A couple wanted to know how much they would be paid for completing the survey (and promptly bid me farewell when I told them nothing), and one'--the first woman to email me back, in fact'--had a complaint to make about my use of the word girl in the survey's questions.
  '''...using terms that individuals or groups use to self-describe when you do not belong to those groups is generally viewed as less than desirable behaviour ('queer' and 'nigger' being good examples). I suppose if many of us weren't old enough to be your mother it would maybe be less jarring too'...''Indeed, several of the women who responded to the survey were old enough to be my mother, but there was also a small handful who could be my little sister'--the youngest was 20, a student, and had only been in the business for 3 months. This was the first sign of many that amongst the escort population there is huge variation to be found, not just in age, but in every aspect of their lives, life stories and opinions.
  My job as a writer is to find an interesting thread and tease is out. Uncover the 'story' and focus a light on it so that readers know what they're looking at and maybe even what they should think. Admittedly some of the survey's questions were included on the off chance that they'd produce such a juicy morsel for readers to chew on. For instance, the question of how old the respondent was when she lost her virginity. The average could go either way. If it came out as shockingly young, then perhaps women who are sexualised early in life are more likely to become call girls. If it was surprisingly old, maybe women who start their sex lives later feel more inclined to be sexually adventurous. The actual average from the survey results? 16.5 years old'--just 6 months under the national average for women. A negligible difference. That became the running theme when I continued to sort through the responses. Where I expected to find controversy, there was none (29 of the 30 women entered into the job by choice), and where I anticipated a mundane answer I got shocked practically into silence (just wait until you see the list of 'most bizarre sex acts requested').
  A full list of averages taken from the survey, as well as many of the women's open-ended answers, can be seen in the (huge) infographic at the end of this article. Here, though, is a brief overview of what the women had to say on all of the most pertinent topics raised in the survey. I'll also include some of the results from the analysis I ran on the escorts' 1,207 adverts.
  In Dirty Words, I found out that the average escort, according the things the punters most frequently made reference to in their field reports, was a size 8, 5'6'', blonde, with 34D breasts. The survey, however, changed the shape of that average a little'--the average dress size given by the women was 12. Also, the majority had a variation of brown hair, not blonde. The height remained the same at 5'6'' and the bra size was only one cup size smaller than 'advertised', at 34C. What's quite interesting is that in their adverts, the average bra size mentioned is identical to what most men give in their reviews'--both 34D. It seems like this might be a sort of ideal, in both the escorts' minds and the men's.
  The majority (23/30) don't use their real first names when they work, or advertise themselves using their actual ages'--they shave off 3 years on average. 3.5 years was the average time a respondent has been in the business, while most plan to leave it in 2.5 years' time.
  Below is an image that shows the words the women used most often to describe themselves in their adverts alongside the words used by men to describe the escorts in their reviews.
  As you can see, the average escort as described by punters is a slim, nice blonde. The average escort as described by the average escort is a sexy, sensual lady. The men mentioned the women's hair, breasts and eyes the most, whereas the women mentioned their eyes, hair and smile. One difference in word rank that I think is especially interesting is that the guys' number one word, slim, ranks way down at number 11 on the escorts' list. The women's list also contains many more adjectives relating to personality and intellect, like genuine and intelligent. And unlike the men, they don't use the word nice to describe their attributes, preferring perfect and great instead.
  On the days she works, the average escort sees two clients, for two hours and makes £290. She works a 10-hour week, which puts her yearly salary at about £50,000 (which I'm happy to say matches the prediction I made in Dirty Words). The question of how the women first entered the industry produced some very interesting answers. Quite a few responded to an advert put out by an agency after mulling over the idea for a while. One woman started after being offered (and accepting) £1,500 for a night of sex by a guy in a bar. A couple of the woman had more depressing reasons, like needing to support a child during hard times, and being forced into prostitution whilst homeless as a kid. Billie Piper's TV portrayal of 'Belle de Jour', the high-class escort-turned-author, was also mentioned as a direct inspiration for getting into the business. However, at least five of the women said in other answers that Piper's depiction of life as an escort was wildly inaccurate.
  ''Some people seem to think it's something out of ''Pretty Woman'', others expect us to have pimps and/or be coerced in some way. The complete clowns think we do it because we love sex.''When asked if there is an average 'type' of client, certain trends emerged from the women's answers (the men tend be white and in their mid 40s), whereas other common factors were downplayed. Instead, many of the women said the same thing: point to the guy in the street you'd least expect to be a punter'--he probably punts.
  ''They seem to come from all walks of life and are all ages. My youngest regular is 18 and the oldest is 78.''In fact the 'point out a punter' game was something the second youngest respondent told me about by email. She said she sometimes plays it with her boyfriend. They point out guys in turn and guess if they pay for sex. When I read that she had a boyfriend, I immediately wondered how he felt about her job, so I sent her a list of questions about it. It turned out she couldn't answer most of them, because he doesn't know. She keeps it a secret from him.
  The women described the average client's attitude towards sex as primarily being respectful, nervous and eager. I got the impression from the way the escorts spoke about their clients that they do respect the men who pay them for sex, but it's mostly a professional type of respect, much like the kind any seller would have for a buyer. This sentiment shone through in the women's answers to two questions in particular: would you consider being friends with a client? Most would, but only select clients. And would you ever consider dating a client? 77% said no, they wouldn't. Only 4 of the 30 had dated a punter. Whether this is because escorts tend to see their clients as being undesirable in some way is anyone's guess. It could just be that, like in the rest of life, you don't mix business with pleasure. Clients are clients.
  When I asked why they think the men choose to pay to have sex with them, their responses were mixed but did contain one theme in particular: the men don't get the sex and intimacy they desire elsewhere, or simply prefer it without the other 'baggage' of a relationship.
  ''Who was it who said 'they pay us to go away'? We're their parallel universe, providing a bit of escapism.''One respondent had an exceptionally succinct summary of her clients' motivations for using her services.
  ''Because they require an uncomplicated emotionally detached sexual service as opposed to an affair. This allows them to cognitively justify the act of adultery and therefore alleviates feelings of guilt and betrayal.''When analyzing the 5000 field reports for Dirty Words it became obvious that there are three main things a punter considers when deciding whether or not an escort is worth recommending and returning to: her looks, her sexual skills, and her attitude. The last of those three, her attitude, is the rope that binds the other two together. The more enthusiastic and 'into it' the woman appears to be, the better. This makes complete sense when you consider that the most popular type of sex men buy from escorts is the 'girlfriend experience', which includes a sense of sexual closeness and intimacy you'd more expect from a girlfriend than a pornstar or hooker. So, in reality, how do the women really feel about the act that defines their jobs? Is their enthusiasm a charade? Are their orgasms faked? And do their favourite sex acts match their clients'?
  The answer to that last question is 'sort of, but not entirely'. The majority of the escorts like vaginal sex and fellatio without a condom, which match the clients' top two favourite sex acts. The clients' 8th favourite act out of 16 was anal sex, which ranked as the escorts' number one least favourite. I asked the women what factors they consider when certain sex acts, like anal sex and 'cum on face' are listed on their sites as being at their 'discretion'. The main response was the clients' hygiene, followed by how turned on they feel at the time.
  I was really interested to see what the responses would be for 'How often do you genuinely feel turned on?' and 'How often do you fake orgasm?', but they turned out to be anything but clear cut. 13 of the 30 women 'sometimes' genuinely climax and a similar number reported 'sometimes' feeling turned on. The rest of the women's answers were spread across the other options pretty equally. It seems, as in standard sexual relationships, variation abounds.
  Another pair of questions I relished the chance to hear answered was:
  - What is the most unusual sex act a client has requested that you've performed?- What is the most unusual requested sex act that you've declined?
  Billie Piper's portrayal of Belle de Jour in Secret Diary of a Call Girl shows her indulging a host of bizarre and baffling sexual fetishes on behalf of her paying clients, but some of the things the escorts listed in their answers to the above two questions blew the script writers' ideas out of the water. I won't spoil the surprise by telling you all of the most shocking (check the infographic for those), but here are a few of the more 'colourful' ones.
  ''Squashing his unsuspecting wife.'' ''– Declined.
  ''A client wanted me to lick his nipples for an hour.'' ''-- Accepted.
  ''Put live frogs in my underwear and squash them.'' ''– Declined.
  ''Anal fisting.'' ''Ball bashing.'' ''Licking a guy's anus.'' ''-- All Accepted.
  ''Babysitting him while he pretended to be my child.'' ''– Declined.
  ''I had a client that used to hire a ballet studio, bring his own tutu, ballet shoes etc and I was the ballet mistress putting him through his positions and paces to the 'Flight of the bumble bee'.'' ''-- Accepted.
  The survey contained a lot of 'how' questions: How much? How many? How often? But it's the 'why' questions that arguably stir up the most discussion. Why do some men pay for sex and why do some women sell it to them? In Dirty Words I made a summary of the male motivation for punting that, after speaking to the escorts, turned out to be too reductive. I presumed punters just want to indulge the most clich(C)d of all male driving forces: the whims of their dicks. As Sebastian Horsley (a man who slept with over a thousand escorts in his time) put it, they want 'the sensation of sex without the boredom of its conveyance' and while this is surely true to a very large extent, it still fails to account for the full range of reasons a man might pay for sex. There's a world of difference between, say, a disabled man hiring an escort because it's his only chance of sexual intimacy, and a businessman arranging an incall out of sexual boredom in between corporate functions. The only constant is the courtesan; the woman who supplies the valued service (or acts as the disposable product).
  When I asked the 30 escorts what the benefits of the job are, the main one (27 mentions) was money, followed by being their own boss (22) and the working hours (20). The sex ranked dead last with only 8 women including it as a positive. Of course, there's no reason that should come as a shock to anyone. How many people, after all, could say that they do their job first and foremost because of what it is and not what it pays? A minority, I think. 4 out of the 30 women said that their dream job'--the profession they'd most like to work in if they could do it with no chance of failure'--was that of an escort. The others listed jobs that anyone, of either gender and any background, might choose: writer, teacher, DJ, chef, vet, midwife, wife a billionaire.
  The last question I asked the women was if they had any closing remarks about themselves or the industry. One escort said she hates everything about the job and fears that her stalker, who is blackmailing her, will tell her teenage kids about what she does. Most others, though, summed up their jobs as being wholly positive, if not as mundane as any other. They stressed the benefits of being paid so highly for doing so few hours of work, but also expressed a wish that their industry could be legalized and regulated like any other, or at the very least freed from the shackles of societal prejudice that seem to have surrounded it since the first time sex was offered for cash.
  I've tried to summarize as much of what the women had to say about their lives and jobs as possible, whilst also including some of the results from my analysis of their adverts. However, practically every answer and average is included in the infographic I've created to accompany this article. The full version is massive, but worth reading through if you want more of the results than the above article provided. There are also a couple of versions showing just the illustration.
  Please give the images a few seconds to load.
  ' Or SUPERSIZE full version (recommended for big monitors)' Or SUPERSIZE illustration with text (recommended for big monitors)' Or SUPERSIZE illustration WITHOUT text (recommended for big monitors)
  Thank you to all of the women who kindly spent an average of 52 minutes of their time completing the survey (and apologies to the several hundred others who got the email but weren't interested).
  ***
  Like this article? Please leave a comment or, better yet, subscribe to my RSS feed to be kept informed of my newest articles and projects. Cheers!***
Google Gave Money to Group That Helped Force Government Shutdown
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Valleywag
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 05:34
  S
  Silicon Valley's anti-government fervor hasn't spread to the main-est of the mainstream so far: no calls for secession from Zuck or Dorsey. But that doesn't mean big tech money isn't reaching radical elements. The Washington Post reports that Google's given money to the people grinding federal politics to a halt.
  Citing a new report by PR Watch, the Post says Google "gave money in the past year to Heritage Action, the upstart conservative advocacy group that helped set in motion this fall's government shutdown." Indeed, the Tea Party-friendly group is cited on Google's transparency page as having received "substantial" contributions from Google's U.S. Federal Public Policy and Government Affairs team'--though "substantial" is left undefined.
  Google and Heritage Action are both completely mum on the details of their relationship. But with others in tech buttering both sides of the toast, it'd be naive to expect Google to abstain from playing dirty DC politics, too.
  Photo: Getty
Chart Of The Day: The Fed Now Owns One Third Of The Entire US Bond Market
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Zero Hedge
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 05:32
  The most important chart that nobody at the Fed seems to pay any attention to, and certainly none of the economists who urge the Fed to accelerate its monetization of Treasury paper, is shown below: it shows the Fed's total holdings of the entire bond market expressed in 10 Year equivalents (because as a reminder to the Krugmans and Bullards of the world a 3 Year is not the same as a 30 Year). As we, and the TBAC, have been pounding the table over the past year (here, here and here as a sample), the amount of securities that the Fed can absorb without crushing the liquidity in the "deepest" bond market in the world is rapidly declining, and specifically now that the Fed has refused to taper, it is absorbing over 0.3% of all Ten Year Equivalents, also known as "High Quality Collateral", from the private sector every week. The total number as per the most recent weekly update is now a whopping 33.18%, up from 32.85% the week before. Or, said otherwise, the Fed now owns a third of the entire US bond market.
  At this pace, assuming Janet Yellen keeps delaying the taper again and again over fears of how "tighter" financial conditions would get, even as gross US bond issuance declines in line with the decline in deficit funding needs, the Fed will own just shy of half the entire bond market on December 31, 2014... and all of it some time in 2018.
  Source: Stone McCarthy
  Average:Your rating: NoneAverage: 4.9(20 votes)
Liquified Petroleum Gas Explosion '' Milford, Texas
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Atomic Insights
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 05:29
  On November 14, 2013, a Chevron maintenance crew compromised a 10 inch pipe carrying liquified petroleum gas. The resulting explosion and hours long fire resulted in a precautionary evacuation of the nearby town that lasted about a day. No one was reported to have been injured during the event. The fire stopped burning once all of the LPG in the pipe had been consumed.
  From a photogenic point of view, the continuing flames and dense plume of smoke from this event are at least as dramatic as the short burst of exploding hydrogen gas captured at Fukushima and endlessly repeated on the web, in major newspapers and on network newscasts all over the world.
Yale Lecture: Media and the Fertility Transition in Developing Countries -- Guest lecturer William Ryerson is President of the Population Media Center which produces radio and TV serial dramas in developing countries t
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: UN Agenda 21
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 05:29
  Exposing the comprehensive UN plan to bring about an authoritarian world government via international regulations and treaties under the guise of environmentalism and social equity.
  Remember, a lot of this is heavy doublespeak. I.E. "Commuter Friendly" = Commuter hell, at the mercy of public transportation, unfriendly-to-cars, no leaving the area etc., "Walkable" = car unfriendly, literally poverty infrastructure
  New UrbanismTriple Bottom LineSustainability/Sustainable DevelopmentSocial EquityEconomic EmpowermentSocial Responsibility"Smart" i.e. Smart GrowthEconomic/Environmental JusticeCorporate Social Responsibility(CSR)Liveable/WalkableNew NormalComplete StreetsMixed-Use (property)"Green"Commuter Friendly"Well-Being"Community ActionResilience/Resilient CommunitiesTransition TownNext/New EconomySECTION I. SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC DIMENSIONS: Chapter 2.1.
  In order to meet the challenges of environment and development, States have decided to establish a new global partnership. This partnership commits all States to engage in a continuous and constructive dialogue, inspired by the need to achieve a more efficient and equitable world economy, keeping in view the increasing interdependence of the community of nations and that sustainable development should become a priority item on the agenda of the international community. It is recognized that, for the success of this new partnership, it is important to overcome confrontation and to foster a climate of genuine cooperation and solidarity. It is equally important to strengthen national and international policies and multinational cooperation to adapt to the new realities.
  No Racism
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  Any posts that attack the sub, the users or the mods can be removed. Breaking this rule more than once can earn a ban.
  We are all different here, and you may find that have different beliefs, but please be respectful of each other.
The secret society of warmists - Telegraph
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 05:28
  In this week's Spectator Diary, Lord (Nigel) Lawson, chairman of the Global Warming Policy Foundation, partly lifts the veil on a curious ''secret meeting'' held at the House of Lords between a team from his GWPF and six scientists from the Royal Society. This arose from a bizarre personal attack made on Lord Lawson as a ''climate denier'' at an Australian university, by the Royal Society's president, Sir Paul Nurse '' a geneticist who has publicly shown that he knows little about climate science, but who believes that rising CO2 is disastrously causing the world to warm. After Lawson pointed out to Nurse that his attack was factually inaccurate, Nurse offered to send some of his ''experts'' to put the GWPF straight on science.
  The society insisted that the meeting be shrouded in secrecy; not even the names of those present were to be revealed. What might have surprised it was the calibre of the scientific team the GWPF was able to muster, including three fellows of the Royal Society itself, and Dr Richard Lindzen, the world's most distinguished atmospheric physicist. Although the GWPF has in general scrupulously observed the ''Chatham House rule'' that the society imposed on the meeting, we can piece together something of how it went.
  Nurse's team, led by Sir Brian Hoskins of the Grantham Institute, who also sits on the climate change committee advising the Government on policy, trotted out all the familiar arguments for the orthodoxy, including several ''hockey stick'' graphs to show global temperatures now soaring to levels unknown for thousands of years. They threw in some of the scare stories warmists have come up with to counter evidence that for 15 years temperatures have failed to rise as their computer models predicted, such as that ''the oceans are acidifying'' and that there has been a dramatic increase in ''extreme weather events'' (neither claim is true).
  As one present put it, ''it was like talking to members of a cult''. What particularly struck the GWPF team was their opposite numbers' refusal to discuss the policy implications of their beliefs, even though Hoskins is a leading member of the ''independent'' committee which advises the Government on its increasingly disastrous and futile ''low carbon'' energy policy. In short, the meeting seemed perfectly to exemplify the real mess we are in, where the officially approved scientists who advise our politicians are so sure they are right that it is impossible to have any serious dialogue with them.
  Iran's 'reforming' Rouhani has fooled the West once again
  One of the more dangerous fairy stories of our time, popular with politicians and journalists, is that Iran's new president, Dr Hassan Rouhani, is somehow a ''reforming moderate'' we can do business with '' as in that deal last week whereby Iran supposedly agreed not to continue developing nuclear weapons in return for a reduction in the UN sanctions that are damaging its economy.
  What those who fall for this overlook is that the Rouhani regime is imposing as ruthless a reign of terror on its unhappy people as ever: nearly 400 hangings since he was elected; teenagers publicly having their eyes gouged out; Tehran's Revolutionary Guards still spreading terror across the Middle East, playing a crucial part in helping Syria's President Assad to wage war on his people. And that vaunted nuclear deal is no more worth the paper it was written on than a similar deal in 2004, when Rouhani was Iran's chief negotiator, later boasting how he had fooled the West while Iran secretly carried on developing a nuclear bomb.
  As a puppet of Iran's real ''Supreme Leader'', the Ayatollah Khamenei, Rouhani may rejoice at having once again deceived the West. But the partial lifting of sanctions has bought Tehran a little more time to prop up a faltering dictatorship which Rouhani has no more intention of ''reforming'' than had any of his predecessors.
Bombshell Study Finds 44% Increased Breast Cancer Risk for Women Having Abortions | LifeNews.com
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  by Joel Brind, Ph.D. | Washington, DC | LifeNews.com | 12/2/13 10:04 AM
  A new systematic review and meta-analysis of abortion and breast cancer (ABC link) in China was just published four days ago in the prestigious, peer-reviewed international cancer journal, Cancer Causes and Control.
  In this meta-analysis (a study of studies, in which results from many studies are pooled), Dr. Yubei Huang et al. reported that, combining all 36 studies on the ABC link in China that have been published through 2012, the overall risk of developing breast cancer among women who had at least one induced abortion was significantly increased by 44%.
  These results, said the authors, ''were consistent with a previously published systematic review''. That review was the one I published in the British Medical Association's epidemiology journal with colleagues from Penn State Medical Center in 1996, which study reported an overall significant 30% increased risk of breast cancer in worldwide studies.
  Since the our study came out in 1996, the ''mainstream'' abortion advocates entrenched in universities, medical societies, breast cancer charities, journals, and especially, government agencies like the National Cancer Institute (In reality, the NCI is just another corrupt federal agency like the IRS and the NSA) have relentlessly targeted the ABC link with fraudulent studies and other attacks, culminating in a 2003 international phony ''workshop'' by the NCI, which officially declared the ABC link non-existent.
  Since 2003, armed with this new official ''truth'', NARAL and their ilk have viciously been attacking pro-life pregnancy resource centers (PRCs) for ''lying'' to women by telling them about the ABC link as a reality. In places like Maryland and New York City, they even went so far as to enact laws to muzzle the PRCs. Thankfully, the courts have struck down such laws as violations of free speech rights''so far.
  But the new Chinese meta-analysis is a real game changer. Not only does it validate the earlier findings from 1996, but its findings are even stronger, for several reasons:
  1. The link is a slightly stronger one, i.e., 44% v. 30% risk increase with abortion;
  2. It shows what is called a ''dose effect'', i.e., two abortions increase the risk more than one abortion (76% risk increase with two or more abortions), and three abortions increase the risk even more (89% risk increase with three or more abortions). Risk factors that show such a dose effect have more credibility in terms of actually causing the disease.
  3. Huang et al. state: ''The lack of a social stigma associated with induced abortion in China may limit the amount of underreporting''. Putative underreporting of abortions by healthy women has been routinely invoked to discredit the ABC link''the lack of credible evidence notwithstanding. This line of attack'--variously called the ''response bias'' or ''recall bias'' or ''reporting bias'' argument, has now been neutralized.
  4. Huang et al. explain why two earlier high-profile studies in Shanghai did not find the link, essentially by citing and extending arguments I had articulated in the British Journal of Cancer in 2004. In that published letter, I explained that the Shanghai population was unsuitable for studying the ABC link in the usual manner, because the prevalence of induced abortion was so high (greater than 50%) in the general population. Huang et al. provided strong evidence for that explanation, by performing what is called a meta-regression analysis of all the Chinese studies, which meta-regression showed that the more prevalent abortion was in the study population, the lower risk increase associated with abortion.
  5. The Huang study follows right on the heels of two new studies this year from India and Bangladesh, studies which reported breast cancer risk increases of unprecedented magnitude: over 600% and over 2,000%, respectively, among women who had any induced abortions.
  CLICK LIKE IF YOU'RE PRO-LIFE!
  Finally, the new Chinese meta-analysis follows on the heels of the recent decisions of the US 10th Circuit Court of Appeals which upheld the religious freedom rights of companies wanting to opt out of Obamacare, since Obamacare insurance funds contraceptive steroids and abortions. The Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer and the Breast Cancer Prevention Institute filed amicus curiae briefs for these cases, briefs which were specifically cited in the 10th Circuit's decision with respect to the cancer-causing effects of these steroid drugs (innocuously referred to as ''the pill'', in common parlance). At least two of these cases have just been accepted by the US Supreme Court for review in their next session.
  LifeNews Note: Dr. Joel Brind is a Professor of Biology and Endocrinology at Baruch College, City University of New York. He is the Science Adviser for the Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer and the co-founder of the Breast Cancer Prevention Institute.
It's My Life (Bon Jovi song) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 05:21
  "It's My Life" is Bon Jovi's first single from the album Crush. It was released on May 23, 2000. It was written by Jon Bon Jovi, Richie Sambora, and Max Martin. The song was hit #1 across several countries (although it only reached #33 in the US).[2] However, it has the distinction of making Bon Jovi the only band once classified as 1980s hair metal to reach the top 40 in the 21st century, a testament to how the song managed to introduce the band to a new, younger fanbase. The song is arguably their most well known post-1980s hit single and it has been performed live at almost all shows since its release.
  BackgroundEditThe song has many classic Bon Jovi features, such as Sambora's use of the talk box, and a line in the second verse "For Tommy and Gina, who never backed down" refers to Tommy and Gina, a fictional working class couple that Bon Jovi and Sambora first wrote about in their 1986 hit "Livin' on a Prayer".
  "It's My Life" is also notable for its line referencing fellow New Jerseyan Frank Sinatra: "My heart is like an open highway / Like Frankie said / I did it 'My Way'." Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora apparently had a disagreement over those lines, with Bon Jovi recalling:[3]
  I had just come home from making U-571 and I said "Sinatra made 16 movies and toured 'til he was 80. This is my role model". He [Sambora] said, "You can't write that damn lyric. Nobody cares about Frank Sinatra but you." And I wrote it anyway.
  Response from fansEditThe song became an anthem that appealed to many fans. As Jon Bon Jovi later stated:[4]
  When I was writing "It's My Life", I thought I was writing very self-indulgently about my own life and where I was in it. I didn't realize that the phrase "It's My Life" would be taken as being about everyone--by teenagers, by older guys, mechanics, whatever. "It's my life, and I'm taking control". Everyone kind of feels that way from time to time.
  Music videoEditThe music video was directed by Wayne Isham. Will Estes (as Tommy) and Shiri Appleby (as Gina) are the two main characters (as it says in the lyrics "for Tommy and Gina, who never back down"). At the beginning, Tommy is watching a video of a Bon Jovi concert on his computer when Tommy's mother ordered him to take out the trash and suddenly Gina calls, and during the whole video, Tommy starts running down to his apartment and obediently takes out the trash and starts runs through the streets of Los Angeles up to the concert, getting chased by dogs, running a marathon, posing for pictures, and jackknifing a truck. The video was inspired by the movie Run Lola Run.[5] Jon Bon Jovi met Will Estes on the set of U-571 and chose him to be in the video. The music video features the 2nd Street Tunnel as one of the main settings.
  Track listings and versionsEditMajor formats released for "It's My Life":
  German CD Single Pt. 1 (562754)(Released: May 23, 2000)
  "It's My Life" (Main version) '-- 3:46"Hush" (Demo version) '-- 3:48"You Can't Lose at Love" (Demo version) '-- 4:44"Someday I'll Be Saturday Night" (Enhanced Video Clip)Recorded live at the Sanctuary II, New Jersey Web Concert on February 10, 1999. Directed by Tony Bongiovi.UK CD Single Pt. 1 (562752)(Released: 2000)
  "It's My Life" (Main version) '-- 3:46"Hush" (Demo version) '-- 3:48"You Can't Lose at Love" (Demo version) '-- 4:44Includes Poster.Australian CD Single (562756)(Released: May 23, 2000)
  "It's My Life" (Main version) '-- 3:46"Hush" (Demo version) '-- 3:48"You Can't Lose at Love" (Demo version) '-- 4:44"I Don't Want to Live Forever" (Demo version) '-- 4:27"Someday I'll Be Saturday Night" (Enhanced Video Clip)Recorded live at the Sanctuary II, New Jersey Web Concert on February 10, 2000. Directed by Tony Bongiovi.German CD Single Pt. 2 (562755)(Released: May 23, 2000)
  "It's My Life" (Dave Bascombe Mix) '-- 3:44"Temptation" (Demo version) '-- 3:48"I Don't Want to Live Forever" (Demo version) '-- 4:27"Livin' on a Prayer" (Enhanced Video Clip)Recorded live at the Sanctuary II, New Jersey Web Concert on February 10, 2000.UK CD Single Pt. 2 (562768)(Released: 2000)
  "It's My Life" (Dave Bascombe Mix) '-- 3:44"Temptation" (Demo version) '-- 3:48"I Don't Want to Live Forever" (Demo version) '-- 4:27"It's My Life" (Enhanced Video Clip)Dutch CD Single (9815274)(Released: January 26, 2004)
  "It's My Life" (Acoustic version) '-- 3:41"Wanted Dead or Alive" (Demo version) '-- 3:42"Joey" (Live version) '-- 5:03Recorded live on January 19, 2003 in Yokohama Arena, Japan.4. "Wanted Dead or Alive" (Enhanced Video Clip)Official versions and remixesEditThe following versions and remixes were commercially released.
  Main version '-- 3:46Acoustic version '-- 3:41Dave Bascombe Mix '-- 3:44Acoustic versionEditA much slower, acousticballad version of the song is featured on Bon Jovi's 2003 album This Left Feels Right, a collection of their greatest hits that were readapted into new formats. This version was also released as a single.
  Won:
  "Video Of The Year" at the VH1 My Music Awards[6]Chosen as one of the greatest songs of the year at the ASCAP Pop Music AwardsNominated:
  Charts and certificationsEditCover versionsEditReferencesEdit^S. T. Erlewine, "Bon Jovi", Allmusic. Retrieved 16 July 2012.^"Allmusic (Bon Jovi charts & awards) Billboard singles". ^"Jon Bon Jovi recalls "It's My Life"". The Rock Radio. October 21, 2005. Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^"Bon Jovi Popularity Soars in Germany". Deutsche Welle. October 12, 2005. Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^Alex Gernandt: Bon Jovi, 2. edition, Goldmann, M¼nchen 2001, ISBN 3-442-42851-3, p 261^"Creed, Hill Lead My VH1 Awards". Billboard. Retrieved 2010-10-10. ^"Australian-charts.com '' Bon Jovi '' It's My Life". ARIA Top 50 Singles. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Bon Jovi '' It's My Life '' Austriancharts.at" (in German). –3 Austria Top 40. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Ultratop.be '' Bon Jovi '' It's My Life" (in Dutch). Ultratop 50. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Ultratop.be '' Bon Jovi '' It's My Life" (in French). Ultratop 50. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^Billboard magazine (2000). "Billboard charts". All Music Guide. Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^Sexton, Paul (July 10, 2000). "Corrs Bump Eminem From Top Of U.K. Chart". Billboard. Retrieved November 3, 2012. ^"Bon Jovi: It's My Life" (in Finnish). Musiikkituottajat '' IFPI Finland. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Lescharts.com '' Bon Jovi '' It's My Life" (in French). Les classement single. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Bon Jovi - It's My Life". Charts.de. Media Control. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Arch­vum '' Slgerlistk '' MAHASZ '' Magyar Hanglemezkiad"k Sz¶vets(C)ge" (in Hungarian). Single (track) Top 10 lista. Magyar Hanglemezkiad"k Sz¶vets(C)ge. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Chart Track". Irish Singles Chart. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Italiancharts.com '' Bon Jovi '' It's My Life". Top Digital Download. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Dutchcharts.nl '' Bon Jovi '' It's My Life" (in Dutch). Mega Single Top 100. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Norwegiancharts.com '' Bon Jovi '' It's My Life". VG-lista. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Hits of the World - Spain". Billboard: 67. July 15, 2000. Retrieved November 3, 2012. ^"Swedishcharts.com '' Bon Jovi '' It's My Life". Singles Top 60. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Bon Jovi '' It's My Life '' swisscharts.com". Swiss Singles Chart. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Archive Chart"UK Singles Chart. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Bon Jovi Album & Song Chart History"BillboardHot 100 for Bon Jovi. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Bon Jovi Album & Song Chart History"BillboardAdult Pop Songs for Bon Jovi. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Album & Song Chart History"BillboardLatin Pop Songs for Bon Jovi. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Bon Jovi Album & Song Chart History"BillboardPop Songs for Bon Jovi. Retrieved November 3, 2012.^"Australian year-end chart". ARIA. 2000. Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^ abcdefgHit Parade (2000). "International charts". Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^Austrian Charts (2000). "Austrian Annual Chart". Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^Ultra Top (2000). "Flemish Annual Chart". Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^Ultra Top (2000). "Walloon Annual Chart". Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^Syndicat national de l'(C)dition phonographique (2000). "French Annual Chart". Disque En France. Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^Universit¤t W¼rzburg (2000). "German Annual Chart". ki.informatik.uni-wuerzburg.de. Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^Mariah-Charts (2000). "Weekly Charts". Retrieved 2009-01-10. ^ abSverigetopplistan (2000). "Swedish charts". Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^Hit Parade (2000). "Swiss Annual Chart". Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^"Die ultimative Chart Show | Hits des neuen Jahrtausends | Download". RTL.de. Retrieved 2011-10-15. ^Austrian Recording Industry Association (2000). "Australian Certification". Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^Australian Recording Industry Association. "Criteria". Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^International Federation of the Phonographic Industry '-- Austria (August 2, 2000). "Austrian Certification (searchable database)". ifpi.at. Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^ abcRecording Industry Association of Japan (2005). "Standard for Certifying Awards of Countries" (PDF). riaj.or.jp. Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^"Awards 2000". Ultratop. 2000. Retrieved May 14, 2012. ^ abSyndicat national de l'(C)dition phonographique (2000). "French Certification". Charts In France. Retrieved 2009-01-26. [dead link]^"Gold-/Platin-Datenbank (Bon Jovi; 'It%27s+My+Life')" (in German). Bundesverband Musikindustrie. Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (2000). "Criteria" (PDF). musikindustrie.de. Retrieved 2009-01-26. [dead link]^NVPI (2000). "Dutch Certification (searchable database)". Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^ abHit Parade (2000). "Uk Certification". Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^ abHit Parade (2000). "Swiss Certification". Retrieved 2009-01-26. ^YouTube Ð"ÑÑƒÐÐÐ° "ÐÐµÐ>>Ð¾ Ð¸ Ð›ÑŽÐ´Ð¸" Ð". Ð¥Ð°ÑÑŒÐºÐ¾Ð²^[1]The Washington Post.External linksEditPreceded by"Oops!... I Did It Again" by Britney Spears"Vamos a Bailar (Esta Vida Nueva)" by Paola & ChiaraItalian FIMI Singles Chartnumber-one singleMay 18, 2000 - June 15, 2000June 22, 2000 - July 6, 2000Succeeded by"Vamos a Bailar (Esta Vida Nueva)" by Paola & ChiaraPreceded by"Oops!... I Did It Again" by Britney SpearsDutch Singles Chart number-one singleMay 20, 2000 - June 10, 2000Succeeded by"Jij bent de zon" by JopSwiss Singles Chartnumber-one singleMay 28, 2000 - June 4, 2000Succeeded by"Freestyler" by Bomfunk MC'sPreceded by"Ich vermiss' dich... (wie die H¶lle)" by ZlatkoAustrian Singles Chart number-one singleJune 4, 2000 - June 18, 2000Preceded by"Oops!... I Did It Again" by Britney SpearsEurochart Hot 100 Singlesnumber-one singleJune 24, 2000 - July 22, 2000Succeeded by"The Real Slim Shady" by EminemPreceded by"Freestyler" by Bomfunk MC'sBelgium (Flemish) Singles Chart number-one singleJune 24, 2000 - July 22, 2000Succeeded by"They Stood Up for Love" by Live
  Last modified on 19 November 2013, at 09:09
A meta-analysis of the association between induced abortion and breast cancer risk among Chinese females - Online First - Springer
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 05:20
  Yubei Huang,Xiaoliang Zhang,Weiqin Li,Fengju Song,Hongji Dai,Jing Wang,Ying Gao,Xueou Liu,Chuan Chen,Ye Yan,Yaogang Wang,Kexin Chen'...show all 12hide368Downloads200Citations
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  Get AccessObjectiveTo evaluate the association between induced abortion (IA) and breast cancer risk among Chinese females.
  MethodsWe searched three English databases (PubMed, ScienceDirect, and Wiley) and three Chinese databases (CNKI, WanFang, and VIP) for studies up to December 2012, supplemented by manual searches. Two reviewers independently conducted the literature searching, study selection, and data extraction and quality assessment of included studies. Random effects models were used to estimate the summary odds ratios (ORs) and the 95 % confidence intervals (CIs).
  ResultsA total of 36 articles (two cohort studies and 34 case''control studies) covering 14 provinces in China were included in this review. Compared to people without any history of IA, an increased risk of breast cancer was observed among females who had at least one IA (OR = 1.44, 95 % CI 1.29''1.59, I2 = 82.6 %, p
Four GCC countries to announce common currency by end-December | GulfNews.com
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 04:12
  Dubai: Four Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries will announce the introduction of a common currency by the end of December, a Bahraini daily reported on Sunday.
  The common currency to be announced by Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and Saudi Arabia will be pegged to the dollar, a source told Akhbar Al Khaleej.
  ''The decision to peg the Gulf currency to the dollar is political and is not related to the economy,'' the source said.
  ''From an economic point of view, it would have been better to peg the new currency to a basket of currencies because the volume of trade of the Gulf states with the countries of the European Union is much larger than that of their commerce with the United States. Gulf exports of oil to the European Union are estimated to constitute about 70 per cent of European imports,'' the source said.
  The daily did not identify the sources, but said it was close to Gulf decision-making circles.
  Oman and the UAE, the other two members of the six-country Gulf council set up in 1981, are not likely to join the common currency in the near future, the source added, without divulging the reasons for the same.
  ''I do not see any need for a common Gulf currency if it is not sovereign. Even though the GCC states have huge financial reserves, their currencies are not listed on the world's reserve currency list because they are not producing states,'' the source said.
  The GCC countries have been discussing a currency union similar to the Eurozone for more than 15 years.
  Several economists in the Gulf have been calling for dropping the GCC countries' long-entrenched peg to the dollar and consider moving to a more flexible exchange rate that will help them better face highly possible inflation risks and economic crises.
  In September, an official of the European Central Bank (ECB) said that the GCC should not introduce a common currency before its members have a clear common objective.
  Yves Mersch, an executive board member of the ECB, reportedly said at a global financial summit that no union of states would be ready for a common currency if there was no political consensus.
Joachim Stroink's Zwarte Piet problem | Reality Bites | Halifax, Nova Scotia | THE COAST
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 03:57
  The photo above was tweeted approvingly last night by Halifax Chebucto MLA Joachim Stroink. "Giving some love to Zwarte Piet and Sinterklass thank you to the Dutch Community for putting this event on," wrote Stroink.
  Within minutes, Allison Sparling, who was voted "Best Twitterer" in The Coast's Best of Halifax poll, tweeted her objections, and posted a lengthy blog post, laying out her argument.
  Today, the story has gone national, and "blackface" is trending in the part of the Twitterverse Halifax occupies as the town discusses the photo and its implications.
  Stroink himself has offered the following explanation:
  Yesterday, my family and I participated in a Dutch cultural event that marks the unofficial start of our Christmas season - this event has been taking place in Halifax for a number of years now. Families from all over Nova Scotia and New Brunswick attend each year.
  Christmas in my culture is a tradition focused on Sinterklaas and Zwarte Pete has always been his side kick, much like Santa's elves. While the history of Zwarte Pete and the blackface have contributed to perpetuating negative stereotypes, to ignore or to disavow Zwarte Pete would be to ignore that history within the Dutch community. In recent years issues have been raised in some communities, but to my knowledge never in Halifax or NS, with this cultural celebration.
  As a child growing up and celebrating the Sinterklaas and Zwarte Pete tradition, the blackface did not lead me to think less of my African NS neighbours and friends, and as such I was not sensitive to the potential to offend through my participation, with my family, at Sunday's 2013 Sinterklaas event held in Halifax.
  While it is certainly uncomfortable to be in the lime light for what was intended to be a fun community event for the family kicking off the Christmas season, the resulting conversation, highlighting the underlying issues with black face and how it has played a role in suppressing people of African heritage, is a worthy and necessary one. It is important we embrace discussions like this as a broader community.
  Given the controversial nature of my tweet, I will be removing the image from my profile.
  Thank you for your collective passion and opinions.
  Joachim.
  In 2011, blogger Flavia Dzodan, who describes herself as "half Hispanic, half Eastern European," and who lives in Amsterdam, wrote a long piece detailing the racist origins of Zwarte Piet, and its continued racist connotations. Here's part of it:The above, for those not familiar with our local ''traditions'', are popularly known as ''Black Pete'', or ''Zwarte Piet'' in Dutch. These ''colorful'' characters are the helpers of Sinterklaas, or more formally Sint Nicolaas/ Sint Nikolaas or Saint Nicolas in French. Sinterklaas is a children's Winter holiday celebrated every year in The Netherlands, Belgium and some cities in the North of France. According to tradition, the Saint arrives to The Netherlands a few weeks prior to the celebration, in a boat, carrying the gifts he will deliver to children. The ''Black Petes'' are his helpers and they carry candy and control children's behavior (children who misbehave supposedly get no presents from the Saint). Again, according to ''tradition'', these helpers are Moors, or North African slaves. This ''tradition'' has evolved throughout the years, partially due to increasing protests from groups that find these depictions offensive. Nowadays, it is claimed that the Black face is due to the fact that the helpers have gone through chimneys and as a result, their faces are covered in soot. What again, nobody can clearly explain, is what kind of soot leaves such a uniform and evenly spread residue. Or worse, why these ''chimney dwellers'' speak in a fake accent that parodies the Black population of the Dutch former colony of Suriname.
  I know Stroink, and have interviewed him. He's a good guy. Helps kids, donates to charities. On a personal level, I haven't witnessed any overt racism on Stroink's part, and I doubt I ever will. Stroink himself assures us that he his not racist, by re-tweeting his former roommate's defence of Stroink:But the issue is not how Stroink treats this or that black person, or what's in his heart and head. That's almost immaterial to this discussion. Racism is much, much deeper than a black guy and a white guy being good friends, and so that's the end of it. No, racism is NOT about how this or that white person treats this or that black person, or vice-versa. Rather, racism is a societal disease, a pervasive beast that pops up again and again, in governmental policies, in how companies do or do not police their workforce, in segregated schools, in housing discrimination and more.
  I was born and raised in the American south. Just five years before I was born, the powers-that-be in my hometown of Norfolk, Virginia shut down the schools rather than desegregate them. As I was growing up, segregated water fountains were still being removed.
  I won't bore you with the overt racism I saw growing up. Frankly, it embarrasses me, and doubly so because I benefitted from it.
  But I was a first-hand observer of southern racism until I moved to California (where I found a different kind of racism) when I was 23, and then again when I took a one-year stint as a daily newspaper reporter in Arkansas, before moving to Halifax in 2004. I can tell you this: a unifying theme of it is the Confederate flag.
  There are a lot of, well, straight-up racist assholes flying the Confederate flag, but I've met plenty of southerners who are nice people, refined, educated, contribute to charity, etc, who also fly the Confederate flag. This latter group assure us they're not racist, and it's just part of their "heritage" and "tradition."
  Like these nice southerners flying the Confederate flag, Stroink doesn't intend to cause offense with the Zwarte Piet. It's just tradition, something he grew up with and un-thinkingly reenacts each year. But it's precisely this cluelessness, this unexamined playing out of "tradition" and "heritage" that is the problem. It lays out there in the world, part of the day-to-day symbolism that black people in our society have to put up with: "Hey, it's just tradition! You know, that tradition where we enslaved people that looked like you. Don't take it personally!"
  Undoubtedly, many black people would be perfectly fine with Zwarte Piet if in return they got equal employment opportunities, the end of profiling while in stores and driving and so forth. Alas, that deal won't be in the works. That's because one is connected to the other: the symbolism and cultural representation of black faces is inexorably linked to the societal racism against black people.
  All of which is to say, I don't think Stroink is a bad guy, but I urge him to think this through. He's right to say the discussion his tweet has generated is worthy. I just hope he listens to it.
Joachim Stroink apologizes for Zwarte Piet blackface photo - Nova Scotia - CBC News
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 03:56
  An emotional Joachim Stroink fought back tears Monday afternoon as he apologized for a photo he posted of himself posing with the controversial blackface Dutch character Zwarte Piet.
  "I do acknowledge that the whole blackface culture, there is no place for that in Nova Scotia, nor in our culture. There was no malicious intent. This is a Dutch tradition I grew up with and never in my deepest heart thought that this would be portrayed in this manner," said the Halifax MLA.
  "Looking back, I guess I can see how the blackface prospect is unacceptable in today's culture and society."
  Joachim Stroink, far right, poses with Zwarte Piet at a Sinterklaas event in Halifax on Sunday night. (Twitter)
  In the Netherlands, Zwarte Piet, or Black Pete, is Santa Claus's helper. Stroink tweeted a photo of himself with a person in blackface portraying Black Pete at an event Sunday.
  Stroink swiftly deleted the photo, but it had already spread on social media.
  "This wasn't an intentional attack on the black [culture] of Nova Scotia, it was celebrating a Dutch tradition. I completely offended an African culture. I get that and I apologize for that," he said.
  He said the tradition "can't continue as it is."
  'I didn't sign up for this'Stroink, who is a first-term Liberal member of the legislative assembly in Nova Scotia, said the backlash stunned him.
  "It's been incredibly hard. I didn't sign up for this. I did this because I wanted a better Nova Scotia," he said about entering politics. "Finding the balance between an MLA and being Joachim Stroink, I feel that that's gone."
  He met with Tony Ince, the minister for African Nova Scotian affairs, said he understands why the photo upset people. He hopes it can become an educational moment about bridging the two cultures, he added.
  "I want to be able to celebrate this tradition and maybe Zwarte Piet is no longer part of this tradition. That's a discussion the Dutch community has to derive on their own, hopefully with the help of myself and Minister Ince."
  Stroink had earlier posted an apology on Facebook.
  Stroink stressed that Dutch culture has long emphasized a black elf-like character as part of its Sinterklaas celebrations.
  'For many people at least in Amsterdam, it's not acceptable anymore. [Black Pete] is seen as a slave.'- Jessica Silversmith
  "As a child growing up and celebrating the Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet tradition, the blackface did not lead me to think less of my African Nova Scotian neighbours and friends, and as such I was not sensitive to the potential to offend," he wrote.
  A traditional song refers to the character as a "servant" to St. Nicholas, but in recent years, those references have largely been replaced with the notion that he is black from chimney soot as he delivers toys for children.
  "While the history of Zwarte Piet and the blackface have contributed to perpetuating negative stereotypes, to ignore or to disavow Zwarte Piet would be to ignore that history within the Dutch community," Stroink wrote.
  Nova Scotia New Democrat MP Peter Stoffer, who was born in the Netherlands, said the tweet was taken out of context.
  "Zwarte Piet has been a Dutch tradition for many, many, many years," said Stoffer.
  "If the tradition is to change then that would be up to the Dutch government and the Dutch people to do that in that regard. In 16½ years, no one has ever come to me either in writing, email, fax, personal visit or phone across the country to raise this issue with me."
  Tradition 'not acceptable anymore'But Jessica Silversmith, director of the Anti-Discrimination Bureau for Amsterdam, said it's time for the Netherlands to move on from the tradition.
  "For many people at least in Amsterdam it's not acceptable anymore," she said. "He's seen as a slave '... his role is also a problem."
  Silversmith told CBC's Maritime Noon that her group heard 240 complaints about Zwarte Piet in 2012.
  "It's so strange to see a Dutch immigrant living in Canada and he's introducing Black Pete while in his former home country we don't like Black Pete. It's remarkable," she said.
  "Traditions are most of the time never innocent. You have to look behind the tradition."
  Members of the Twitter community took the newly elected politician to task.
  "I'm Dutch too. I love Sinterklaas, but we've got to let Zwaarte Piet go. Surely you can see how this could offend," tweeted Ben Diepeven.
  "Traditions are also a great way to spread racist sentiment," wrote Matt Neville.
  "You can't delete the photo from my hard drive," tweeted user @musekaltweet.
VIDEO-VERY BIG BOMBS-Intelligence Chairs Warn of 'New Bombs, Very Big Bombs' | CNS News
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  Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif) (AP File Photo)
  (CNSNews.com) - Are Americans safer now than they were a year or two ago? No, said the chairs of the House and Senate intelligence committees on Sunday.
  "I don't think so," Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) told CNN's "State of the Union" with Candy Crowley.
  "I think terror is up worldwide. The statistics indicate that -- the fatalities are way up. The numbers are way up. There are new bombs, very big bombs, trucks being reinforced for those bombs. There are bombs that go through magnatometers. The bomb maker is still alive. There are more groups than ever, and there's huge malevolence out there."
  Feinstein later added that people "can get on aircraft with those bombs. They have tried to send four into this country..."
  Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.), chair of the House Intelligence Committee, had a similar response:
  "Oh, I absolutely agree that we're not safer today for the same very reasons," he told Crowley. "So the pressure on our intelligence services to get it right to prevent an attack are enormous. And it's getting more difficult because we see the al Qaeda as we knew it before is metastasizing to something different, more affiliates than we've ever had before, meaning more groups that operated independently of al Qaeda have now joined al Qaeda around the world -- all of them have at least some aspiration to commit an act of violence in the United States or against western targets all around the world.
  "They've now switched to this notion that maybe smaller events are okay. So if you have more smaller events than bigger events, they think that might still lead to their objectives and their goals. That makes it exponentially harder for our intelligence services to stop an event like that," Rogers said.
  Feinstein told CNN that the main problem is "displaced aggression in this very fundamentalist, jihadist, Islamic community," which blames the Western world for everything that goes wrong and believes that the only solution is "Islamic sharia law and the concept of the caliphate."
  "And I see more groups, more fundamentalists, more jihadists more determined to kill to get to where they want to get. So, it's not an isolated phenomenon. You see these groups spread a web of connections. And this includes North Africa, it includes the Middle East, it includes other areas as well," Feinstein added.
  Rogers expressed particular concern about nations like Syria, where al Qaeda and its affiliates are attracting Westerners to their cause. The "scary part" is that many people with Western passports are now returning home, fully trained and radicalized:
  "A percentage of them have already gone home, including the United States, by the way, is included in that western number. We are very, very concerned that these folks who have western paper (passports) have gone there, participated in combat events, are trained, are further radicalized, now have the ability to go back in western countries.
  And now they have a connection, a direct connection to al Qaeda affiliates operating in a place where most people would say, well, we have no interest in Syria. Well, clearly we do. And clearly, that's just one place. And it's starting to spread...Iraq is having its problems now. It's spreading into Lebanon, Jordan has issues, Turkey along the border has issues. This is very, very, very concerning."
  Aside from the diversity of threats, Rogers pointed to the challenge of detecting them before something happens: "We have now three al Qaeda affiliate groups have changed the way they communicate, meaning it's less likely that we're going to be able to detect something prior to an event that goes operational, meaning that they've already started the final planning stages to blow something up or shoot someone.
  And so we're fighting amongst ourselves here in this country about the role of our intelligence community -- that is having an impact on our ability to stop what is a growing number of threats. And so we've got to shake ourselves out of this pretty soon and understand that our intelligence services are not the bad guys. The bad guys, the al Qaeda affiliates, Russian intelligence services, Chinese intelligence services, the Quds force that operates terrorism events all around the world, those are the folks we need to focus our attention and our energy on in order to keep America safe."
VIDEO- 2013: CNN's Worst Year Ever - YouTube
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WASHINGTON: Obama spends $600 million on rail projects that benefit private companies | Economy | McClatchy DC
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 03:51
  WASHINGTON '-- The railroad industry brags in its national publicity campaign that it spends billions of dollars improving its infrastructure ''so taxpayers don't have to.''
  But the ads don't tell everything. The nation's freight rail network has been the quiet recipient of more than $600 million in federal investment during the Obama administration.
  According to Federal Railroad Administration numbers, at least half that amount has gone to projects that benefit the nation's four largest railroads, the same companies at the heart of the industry's ubiquitous ''Freight Rail Works'' campaign.
  That doesn't even include tens of millions more that states have contributed for additional investment in ports and high-speed passenger trains that's boosted the nation's freight railroads.
  The public dollars have built new overpasses to separate trains from one another, as well as cars and trucks. They've replaced aging bridges, laid new track and upgraded signal systems. They've paid to enlarge tunnels and raise bridges so that shipping containers may be double-stacked. They've built new facilities where cargo containers can be transferred from trucks to trains, or vice versa.
  Supporters say these public investments, combined with private capital, are model infrastructure partnerships that will help take trucks off crowded highways, reduce pollution and improve the flow of goods to and from the nation's seaports.
  ''The majority of dollars that benefit freight rail are well spent,'' said Chuck Clowdis, the managing director of North American markets at economic forecaster IHS Global Insight.
  But others wonder whether an industry that boasts about how little it depends on taxpayers really needs the extra help.
  ''We don't run (ad) campaigns like that, and we move 70 percent of all the tonnage in America at some point every day,'' said Bill Graves, the president and CEO of the American Trucking Associations and a former Republican governor of Kansas.
  The trucking industry isn't bashful about pressing for more highway funding, Graves said, while railroads ''probably overstate their independence from public investment.''
  The Obama administration's high-speed passenger rail initiatives have overshadowed its freight push.
  While its passenger rail improvements have been mired in controversy and delays, many of the freight rail investments begun under the economic stimulus of 2009 are at or near completion. The White House is eager to show the results.
  ''This is the inland version of the widening of the Panama Canal,'' Vice President Joe Biden said last month, not at a seaport but at a CSX freight terminal in the middle of a cornfield in North Baltimore, Ohio.
  North Baltimore anchors the National Gateway, a project partially funded with a $98 million grant from the Department of Transportation. CSX paid for the Ohio facility, while the federal money helped raise overhead clearances on its route to East Coast ports, to allow double-stacked container trains.
  Last week in Missouri, Federal Railroad Administrator Joseph Szabo cut the ribbon on a new bridge that added a second track over the Osage River, eliminating a bottleneck between St. Louis and Kansas City. Though the Obama administration paid for $22 million of the $28 million project through its High Speed Intercity Passenger Rail Program, the bridge will benefit the nation's largest freight railroad, Union Pacific, which operates as many as 60 trains a day on the line.
  In November, the Port of Miami restored its rail connection, which Hurricane Wilma had severed in 2005. A DOT grant paid for $22 million of the $49 million project. Port Director Bill Johnson said the grant was essential and that the project wouldn't have happened without it. The Miami port is undertaking a massive expansion to accommodate bigger ships. It's scheduled to be ready when a widened Panama Canal opens in 2015.
  ''We need a rail system to serve Florida and also the heartland of America,'' Johnson said. ''It's all about connecting.''
  In Charlotte, N.C., $129 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act money will separate the Norfolk Southern and CSX mainlines where they cross in the city. The grant is part of $520 million in stimulus funds awarded to North Carolina to improve passenger and freight service in the corridor from Raleigh to Charlotte.
  For all the public money that freight railroads have received, they haven't talked much about it. The industry spent years trying to free itself from government regulation, and it doesn't want federal money with too many strings attached.
  ''I think the industry is concerned about maintaining its independence,'' said David Clarke, the director of the Center for Transportation Research at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville.
  The worst recession since the Great Depression offered an opportunity few railroads could refuse. The Obama stimulus gave birth to a discretionary program called TIGER, for Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery.
  The competitive program has proved popular with governors and mayors because it's helped them start, and in some cases finish, infrastructure projects they'd long desired. Many of them involved freight railroads.
  TIGER helped pay for two projects that involve the heavily congested intersections of two of the nation's largest railroads, Union Pacific and BNSF Railway.
  Until August, Colton Crossing in Southern California was a chokepoint for cargo moving out of the ports at Los Angeles and Long Beach. A $34 million TIGER grant helped build an overpass. The California Department of Transportation contributed another $41 million, while the railroads paid for the balance of the $91 million project.
  A similar number of trains compete for a green signal at Tower 55 near downtown Fort Worth, Texas. A $34 million TIGER grant will cover about a third of the cost of fixing the junction, with the railroads sharing most of the rest. The work should be finished next year.
  Freight rail investment might relieve congested roads, as well.
  When it comes to moving smaller quantities of consumer goods faster over shorter distances, trucks have the advantage. But railroads excel at moving large quantities of freight over long distances at a lower cost.
  ''Our growth is driven by taking trucks off the highways,'' said Jeff Heller, the vice president for intermodal at Norfolk Southern.
  Norfolk Southern would like to skim some new business from one of the country's busiest trucking lanes with what it calls its Crescent Corridor, stretching from the Northeast to the Mississippi River and the Gulf Coast.
  In a $2.5 billion partnership that involves the railroad, DOT and several states, Norfolk Southern has upgraded track and signals and has opened several new intermodal facilities, where trailers and containers can be loaded on trains. The latest such facility will open in Charlotte early this month.
  The railroad hopes to divert 1.3 million trucks a year, while the federal and state transportation departments hope to improve traffic congestion and safety on interstate highways.
  Chicago hopes that a state, federal and local partnership will relieve congestion at the nation's busiest rail hub.
  A $2 billion, decade-long project is building lots of new overpasses to ease the delays caused when more than 1,300 passenger and freight trains converge on Chicago every day, creating headaches for shippers and commuters. Some trains arrive from the East Coast in a day only to get stuck in the city for two days.
  But the success of both projects might be limited by decisions made in the 19th century that would take billions of dollars more to fix.
  Chicago's congestion stems from the fact that major railroads built into the city without making efficient connections. They still don't connect seamlessly, and there are few options to bypass Chicago.
  Portions of the Crescent Corridor were laid out before the Civil War, with an abundance of hills and curves that slow the trains. That makes it hard for the railroad to be an effective competitor with trucks on parallel interstate highways.
  ''The railroads are still hamstrung to a certain extent by how their routes run,'' said Clowdis of IHS Global Insight.
  Email: ctate@mcclatchydc.com; Twitter: @tatecurtis
Son Fights Father Over Mac And Cheese: Alex Rossi Allegedly Punched Dad, Brian Rossi, Who Accused Him Of Using All The Cheese Packets [PHOTO]
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  A South Carolina man was arrested Sunday on assault and battery charges after he allegedly beat his father when his dad complained about him using all the cheese packets from a box of macaroni and cheese.
  Alex Rossi, 20, of Spartanburg, S.C., allegedly punched his father, 54-year-old Brian Rossi, in the face and head after his dad confronted him about the missing cheese packets, according to a report from the Spartanburg County Sheriff's Office obtained Monday by the Smoking Gun.
  Although his father told him to stop, Alex continued the assault, eventually tackling his father to the ground and hitting him, according to the report. The father was able to get up and put his son in a headlock, ending the fight.
  A Spartanburg County sheriff's deputy who responded to the scene said they noticed the father had ''a fresh laceration beneath his eye with bruising and swelling.'' The dad denied medical attention, but gave a statement about the incident, according to the report.
  Both father and son told authorities that their fight was over macaroni and cheese. Brian Rossi said he tried to make some mac and cheese on Sunday, but he discovered that there was only pasta in the box and no cheese packets. He went to the garage to throw out the box, where he saw his son. After telling his son to stop using all of the cheese packets, ''they exchanged a few words,'' according to the report.
  Alex Rossi said he and his father then started shoving each other. While he allegedly admitted to punching his dad in the face, he also told authorities that his father punched him in the face as well. He said he then walked out of the garage. Although he claimed to have a ''shiner,'' authorities found no evidence of facial or head injuries to the 20-year-old.
  Brian Rossi told sheriff's deputies that he wanted to press charges against his son, who he said ''does not contribute to the household.'' Alex Rossi was then taken to the Spartanburg County Detention Facility on charges of assault and battery.
-animals as property-Lawsuits Could Turn Chimpanzees Into Legal Persons | Science/AAAS | News
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  (C) Martin Harvey/Corbis
  Property or person? A series of lawsuits could free U.S. chimpanzees from captivity.
  This morning, an animal rights group known as the Nonhuman Rights Project (NhRP) filed a lawsuit in a New York Supreme Court in an attempt to get a judge to declare that chimpanzees are legal persons and should be freed from captivity. The suit is the first of three to be filed in three New York counties this week. They target two research chimps at Stony Brook University and two chimps on private property, and are the opening salvo in a coordinated effort to grant ''legal personhood'' to a variety of animals across the United States.
  If NhRP is successful in New York, it could be a significant step toward upending millennia of law defining animals as property and could set off a ''chain reaction'' that could bleed over to other jurisdictions, says Richard Cupp, a law professor at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California, and a proponent of focusing on animal welfare rather than animal rights. ''But if they lose it could be a significant step backward for the movement. They're playing with fire.''
  The litigation has been in the works since 2007, when animal rights attorney Steven Wise founded NhRP, an association of about 60 lawyers, scientists, and policy experts. The group argues that cognitively advanced animals like chimpanzees and dolphins are so self-aware that keeping them in captivity'--whether a zoo or research laboratory'--is tantamount to slavery. ''It's a terrible torture we inflict on them, and it has to stop,'' Wise says. ''And all of human law says the way things stop is when courts and legislatures recognize that the being imprisoned is a legal person.''
  NhRP spent 5 years researching the best legal strategy'--and best jurisdiction'--for its first cases. The upshot: a total of three lawsuits to be filed in three New York trial courts this week on behalf of four resident chimpanzees. One, named Tommy, lives in Gloversville in a ''used trailer lot '... isolated in a cage in a dark shed,'' according to an NhRP press release. Another, Kiko, resides in a cage on private property in Niagara Falls, the group says. The final two, Hercules and Leo, are research chimps at Stony Brook University. Wise says that 11 scientists have filed affidavits in support of the group's claims; most of them, including Jane Goodall, have worked with nonhuman primates.
  In each case, NhRP is petitioning judges with a writ of habeas corpus, which allows a person being held captive to have a say in court. In a famous 1772 case, an English judge allowed such a writ for a black slave named James Somerset, tacitly acknowledging that he was a person'--not a piece of property'--and subsequently freed him. The case helped spark the eventual abolition of slavery in England and the United States. Wise is hoping for something similar for the captive chimps. If his group wins any of the current cases, it will ask that the animals be transferred to a chimpanzee sanctuary in Florida. Any loss, he says, will immediately be appealed.
  Regardless of what happens, NhRP is already preparing litigation for other states, and not all of it involves chimpanzees. ''Gorillas, orangutans, elephants, whales, dolphins'--any animal that has these sorts of cognitive capabilities, we would be comfortable bringing suit on behalf of,'' Wise says. Some would be research animals; others would be creatures that simply live in confined spaces, such as zoos and aquariums. ''No matter how these first cases turn out, we're going to move onto other cases, other states, other species of animals,'' he says. ''We're going to file as many lawsuits as we can over the next 10 or 20 years.''
  Frankie Trull, the president of the National Association for Biomedical Research in Washington, D.C., says her organization will fight any attempts at personhood in the courts. Chimpanzees, she notes, are important models for behavioral research, as well as for developing vaccines against viruses like hepatitis C. ''Assigning rights to animals akin to what humans have would be chaotic for the research community.''
  Anatomist Susan Larson, who studies the Stony Brook chimpanzees to shed light on the origin of bipedalism in humans, says she is "very shocked and upset" by the lawsuit. She says the chimps live in an indoor enclosure comprised of three rooms'--''about the size of an average bedroom'''--plus another room where they can climb, hang, and jump from ladders and tree trunks. ''Everything I do with these animals I've done on myself,'' she says. ''I understand that animal rights activists don't want these animals mistreated, but they're hampering our ability to study them before they become extinct.''
  The more immediate threat to Larson's research isn't NhRP, however'--it is the National Institutes of Health (NIH). In June, NIH announced plans to retire all but 50 of its 360 research chimpanzees and phase out much of the chimp research it supports. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, meanwhile, has recommended that captive chimps be listed as endangered, which would limit any research that isn't in their best interest. ''Soon, the type of work I do will no longer be possible,'' Larson says. ''They have effectively ended my research program.''
  Stephen Ross, the director of the Lester E. Fisher Center for the Study and Conservation of Apes at the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago, Illinois, wonders if there's a compromise. Ross, who has studied chimpanzees for more than 20 years and played a role in crafting NIH's new policy, advocates ending private ownership of chimps and invasive research. All other chimpanzees, he says, whether located at zoos or universities, should live in large enclosures, with access to the outside, and in group sizes of at least seven individuals. ''You don't need personhood to do that,'' he says. ''I think we share a common philosophy,'' he says of NhRP. ''We want to make things better for chimps. We just disagree on how to get there.''
  To participate in a live video chat on this topic, check out this week's ScienceLIVE: Should Animals be Granted Legal Rights?
  A more detailed version of this story will appear in the 6 December issue of Science.
  *Clarification, 2 December, 4 p.m.: This item has been updated to reflect Richard Cupp's position on animal rights.
VIDEO-Opinion: Better health not about Obamacare, it's about you - CNN.com
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 03:28
  STORY HIGHLIGHTS
  Sanjay Gupta: Moral hazard causes some to neglect health when they get health insuranceHe says Obamacare alone won't guarantee good health; personal habits must do thatHe says research shows 30 minutes of daily exercise cuts heart attack, stroke risk by a thirdGupta: It's time to stop playing defense on your health; instead, start optimizing it yourselfEditor's note: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, a practicing neurosurgeon, is the multiple Emmy®-award winning chief medical correspondent for CNN. Tune in to CNN this afternoon to hear him discuss what he thinks is the real issue with Obamacare.
  (CNN) -- I have an uncle who has always been a robust and healthy guy. He drank a glass of skim milk every day, bragged about how many pull-ups he was doing and fit into pants he was wearing 20 years before. He didn't take a single medication and retired early.
  Given that he had no medical problems and ran his own business, he opted to go several years without health insurance. Eventually, when he turned 65, he picked up Medicare.
  What happened next was a little strange. He fell off the wagon. He exercised only sporadically, and paid hardly any attention to what he was eating. One day, I saw him eat an entire bag of potato chips. He bemoaned the fact that he was forced to buy new, bigger pants, and he stopped drinking his milk. For him, becoming newly insured had nearly the opposite effect on him of what we doctors hope to achieve. He'd become unhealthier.
  In many ways, my uncle was demonstrating a concept known as the moral hazard. Two economists wrote about this exact scenario in 2006
  They found that many men, at the time they obtained Medicare, started behaving badly. Moral, or morale, hazard is a term largely used by economists to describe the actions of people more willing to take risks because they are insulated from the cost of their actions, in this case because of their recently obtained health insurance.
  In the case of these men, when they got Medicare, they took worse care of themselves; they actually exercised less. Among those who didn't visit the doctor after getting insurance, the effect was dramatic: Their overall physical activity dropped by 40%; they were 16% more likely to smoke cigarettes and 32% more likely to drink alcohol.
  Even if that seems extreme, it's still worth asking: Does health insurance make us healthier?
  The past five years have seen a tumultuous battle over Obamacare, or the Affordable Care Act, culminating in the bitter recriminations this fall over lost policies and the disastrous launch of the HealthCare.gov website. When I interviewed Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius at the end of October, she downplayed the concerns and seemed certain the site would be up and running by the end of November.
  The website may be working better now, but to me that's not the most important issue. In my mind, the real suspense comes from whether Obamacare will really make us a healthier America, even if it succeeds in its ambitions to dramatically expand coverage.
  A healthier America: That is the goal we should share as Americans, but access alone won't get us anywhere close.
  This past spring, the New England Journal of Medicine followed up on an important experiment in Oregon.
  The state created a remarkable strategy to do a minimal expansion of Medicaid. It decided to conduct random lottery drawings to allocate the limited spots.
  While it was controversial in its implementation, the situation was a goldmine for researchers. It offered something very rare in these types of studies: a unique opportunity for researchers to compare the newly insured to their highly similar counterparts, who remained uninsured. The results were surprising, and mostly disappointing.
  The newly insured Medicaid population did go to the doctor more often, used more preventive health services and received more medications. Problem was, in nearly every area, they weren't any healthier. The scientists sat down with more than 12,000 people and compared some of the most important health indicators. They found having insurance did not improve measures of blood pressure, cholesterol or how well diabetics controlled their blood sugar. Furthermore, the 10-year risk of having a heart attack didn't change in those who had Medicaid. It wasn't at all what the proponents of universal access to health insurance hoped they would see.
  The results remind me of a column I wrote a few years ago, shortly after my own marriage. It seemed like a good time to explore the question of whether marriage was in fact good for one's health. I spent a fair amount of time researching the topic and one of the experts I interviewed gave me an answer I have never forgotten: Marriage is good for your health (long pause) ... as long as it's a good marriage.
  It was a terrific answer, and a metaphor for so many aspects of our lives.
  As you might imagine, I had quite a bit of fun with that article on marriage, but it taught an important lesson. There is almost always a second beat to any story. Being married all by itself isn't necessarily good or bad for your health. It was the effort required to make it a good or bad marriage that made up the entire difference.
  The same can be said about health insurance. In this case, I don't mean that "good" or "bad" insurance is the critical factor, but that health insurance alone doesn't lead to better health. None of this works unless we all take personal responsibility, and hold ourselves accountable.
  To be clear, there will always be some baseline benefit to being insured versus not being insured, even if you account for the moral hazard. A major Institute of Medicine report in 2009 found that uninsured adults are more likely to be diagnosed at an advanced stage of cancer, more likely to die from a heart attack and less likely to recover from a serious injury.
  Even in Oregon, the newly insured enjoyed some benefits. For example, they were nearly a third less likely to suffer from depression, perhaps because they had more peace of mind from being insured. And there were significant benefits in nonmedical areas: Whereas more than 5% of the uninsured faced "catastrophic" medical expenses in a year -- defined as greater than 30% of their income -- those catastrophic expenses were virtually eliminated in the group on Medicaid.
  But strictly in terms of health, insurance, like marriage, doesn't guarantee good health. After all, I am sure you can think of people right now who have terrific health insurance and terrible health. It seems the benefits pale in comparison to what we can gain with a few simple personal decisions about our health.
  A good example comes from a study in the journal Circulation. Researchers estimated that if all Americans exercised 30 minutes a day, we would reduce the number of cardiovascular events -- heart attacks and strokes -- by a third. A third! Just 30 minutes a day, and suddenly we are starting to get serious about a more healthy America.
  You can break up the exercise into 10-minute chunks, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and you don't even have to knock yourself out. Just go hard enough that your breathing is slightly labored, enough that it would keep you from singing if you suddenly got the urge.
  Problem is that as things stand now, only half of us, at most, exercise that much.
  While we are fond of comparing ourselves to France, a place that was ranked as having the best overall health care system in 2000, according to the World Health Organization, there's a huge difference between the United States and France that has little to do with the health care safety net.
  We Americans are three times as likely to be obese as the average French person -- and obesity is related to just about every chronic disease imaginable.
  I think about this all the time, and here is what I tell my own patients. It is time to stop merely playing defense when it comes to your health, and time to start optimizing yourself.
  Yes, of course we are desperate to stamp out disease when it occurs, but we are more desperate for those diseases to never occur in the first place. I say that as a neurosurgeon, someone who is often called in to extinguish the brightest of fires. I also say this, however, as a 44-year-old dad who wants to be around for a long time.
  I have been fortunate to have always had health insurance, but a few years ago, I decided to strive for something more. I wanted to optimize myself. I wanted to be the best that I could possibly be, instead of waiting around for the seemingly inevitable diagnosis of heart disease or diabetes. I found that it wasn't that hard. I became diligent about breaking a sweat every day. I made it as important as a meeting with my boss or a dinner date with my wife.
  Also, as a student of neuroscience, I know the brain isn't particularly good at distinguishing thirst and hunger; so most people eat when they should drink. As a result we walk around overstuffed and dehydrated. Drinking fluids all day long has cut my calorie consumption by a third.
  Studies of the mind-body connection also remind us that it takes about 15-20 minutes for the brain to know the stomach is full. Stop eating when you are 80% full, and you will likely take in the right number of calories. The Japanese call it hara hachi bu. To help, we use smaller plates in our home to trick the brain into believing we are eating more.
  We eat meat occasionally, but no longer serve it in our home. I eat seven different colored foods a day, and try to buy locally grown vegetables whenever I can.
  These are simple strategies that have made me biologically younger than I was nearly five years ago. At 44, I have the biological age of someone in his mid-30s.
  It is true that the American Medical Association supports the aspects of Obamacare that expand insurance coverage, as do many others in the medical community, even if they aren't convinced that it will reliably lead to better health. It appeals to a sense of justice, and a desire to prevent the awful situation of people being turned away when they need help the most.
  But, as we follow the story of Obamacare over the coming years, it's important to understand and agree on the true measure of success. As a doctor, I think a healthier America is the rallying cry we can all get behind. We have had a rocky, yet still vitally important start, but the point is that access to health care insurance is not nearly enough.
  If we are serious about a more healthy America, the real change starts in each and every one of us, and it's not that hard to do.
  Follow us on Twitter @CNNOpinion.
  Join us onFacebook/CNNOpinion.
  The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Sanjay Gupta.
33 WOW-Ian Parker: The Search for a Blockbuster Insomnia Drug : The New Yorker
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  Wed, 04 Dec 2013 03:19
  One evening in late May, four senior employees of Merck, the pharmaceutical company, sat in the bar of a Hilton Hotel in Rockville, Maryland, wearing metal lapel pins stamped with the word ''TEAM.'' They were in a state of exhausted overpreparedness. The next morning, they were to drive a few miles to the headquarters of the Food and Drug Administration and attend a meeting that would decide the future of suvorexant, a new sleeping pill that the company had been developing for a decade. Merck's team hoped to persuade a committee of seventeen, composed largely of neurologists, that suvorexant was safe and effective. The committee, which would also hear the views of F.D.A. scientists, would deliver a recommendation to the agency. If the government approved suvorexant'--whose mechanism, inspired partly by research into narcoleptic dogs, is unlike anything on the market'--it would be launched within a year. Some industry analysts had described it as a possible blockbuster, a term usually reserved for drugs with annual earnings of a billion dollars. Merck had not created a blockbuster since 2007, when it launched Januvia, a diabetes drug. The company was impatient. A factory in Las Piedras, Puerto Rico, was ready to start production.
  David Michelson, who runs Merck's clinical research in neuroscience, said of suvorexant, ''It's huge. It's a major product.'' He was sitting perfectly still in his chair; his hair flopped a little over his forehead. He looked as if he were waiting in an airport for a very late flight.
  For months, in rooms across Merck's archipelago of mismatched buildings north of Philadelphia, Michelson had taken part in role-playing rehearsals for the F.D.A. meeting. The focus had been on readying Joe Herring, another Merck neuroscientist; he would be the primary speaker, having run the later clinical trials of suvorexant. Herring, a straight-backed, athletic-looking man in his fifties, had just gone up to his room, for an early night. ''Joe had to find a way to be authentic,'' Michelson recalled. ''He had to find a way to engage with the audience without becoming too informal.'' During the meeting, Herring would have access to a library of twenty-one hundred and seventy PowerPoint slides.
  The Merck team was frustrated. The F.D.A. had just shown them the draft of a presentation, titled ''Suvorexant Safety,'' that would be delivered by Ronald Farkas, an F.D.A. neuroscientist who had reviewed thousands of pages of Merck data. In a relentless PowerPoint sequence, Farkas made suvorexant sound disquieting, almost gothic. He noted suicidal thoughts among trial participants, and the risk of next-day sleepiness. He quoted from Merck's patient notes: ''Shortly after sleep onset, the patient had a dream that something dark approached her. The patient woke up several times and felt unable to move her arms and legs and unable to speak. Several hours later, she found herself standing at the window without knowing how she got there.'' A woman of sixty-eight lay down to sleep ''and had a feeling as if shocked, then felt paralyzed and heard vivid sounds of people coming up the stairs, with a sense of violent intent.'' A middle-aged man had a ''feeling of shadow falling over his body, hunted by enemies, hearing extremely loud screams.''
  An F.D.A. presentation that focusses on individual ''adverse events'''--and draws attention to patients feeling ''hunted by enemies'''--is discouraging to a drug's sponsor. Michelson called the presentation ''somewhat unusual,'' and emitted a dry laugh.
  Darryle Schoepp, the head of Merck's neuroscience division, was at the other end of the table. During the human trials of suvorexant, he noted, it had been taken two hundred and seventy thousand times, and ''every time you take a drug it's an opportunity for something to happen that the user can report.'' He added, ''Go back to the early days of Ambien. I wonder how many patient days of data they had with Ambien.''
  Ambien, which is now available generically as zolpidem, is one of America's most popular drugs, and it played a role'--silent or spoken'--in many conversations that I had heard on visits to the Merck offices. Zolpidem was the cheap drug that suvorexant had to take on, if not unseat, in order to succeed in the sleep-medication market. In addition, rising public worry about risks associated with taking Ambien'--ranging from amnesiac devouring of Pop-Tarts to premature death'--had reduced the F.D.A.'s tolerance for side effects in sleep medications.
  John Renger was also at the bar. A forty-four-year-old neuroscientist, he has a round face, cropped hair, and a neat goatee. He helped lead the company to the suvorexant molecule, and ran the first tests on rats, mice, dogs, and rhesus monkeys. He, too, was politely indignant about the F.D.A. ''They've taken the emphasis off efficacy,'' he said, adding, ''They're saying any residual effects are bad. But they're not looking at the balance'--'What is the improvement in this mechanism?' ''
  The central nervous system is in an ever-adjusting balance between inhibition and excitation. Ambien, like alcohol or an anesthetic, triggers the brain's main inhibitory system, which depends on binding between GABA'--gamma-aminobutyric acid, a neurotransmitter'--and gaba receptors on the surface of billions of neurons. gaba receptors can be found throughout the brain, and when they're activated the brain slows. Ambien encourages the process by sticking to the receptors, holding open the door to the neurotransmitter. Suvorexant, which Merck describes as ''rationally designed'''--rather than stumbled upon, like most drugs'--influences a more precise set of neurotransmitters and receptors. Orexin neurotransmitters, first identified fifteen years ago, promote wakefulness. When suvorexant is in the brain, orexin is less likely to reach orexin receptors. Instead of promoting general, stupefying brain inactivity, suvorexant aims at standing in the way of a keep-awake signal. This difference may or may not come to mean a lot to insomniacs, but Merck's marketing is likely to encourage the perception that suvorexant ends the dance by turning off the music, whereas a drug like Ambien knocks the dancer senseless.
  If the Merck scientists succeeded at the F.D.A., they would be the first to bring an orexin-related drug to market. ''It's an amazing achievement,'' Richard Hargreaves, the fourth colleague at the Hilton, said. ''Everyone should be really proud.'' But, he added, ''my worry is that a new mechanism is being evaluated on the science of an old mechanism.''
  ''With Ambien, you've got a drug that's got basically only onset,'' Renger said, dismissively. That is, it sends you to sleep but might not keep you asleep. ''Suvorexant has the onset, but it has the great maintenance, especially in the last third of the night, where other drugs fail.'' And even though suvorexant keeps working longer than Ambien, suvorexant patients don't feel groggier afterward, as you might expect. Impassioned, Renger imagined himself addressing the F.D.A.: ''Why aren't you giving this a chance?''
  ''Drugs usually have some side effects,'' Schoepp said. ''It's all benefit-risk.'' He added, ''There is some dose where suvorexant will be ultimately safe'--because nothing will happen. If you go low enough, it becomes homeopathic.''
  They stood to go to their rooms. Schoepp murmured, ''I'd love to take it right now.''
  Jean-Pierre Kaplan lives in a southern suburb of Paris. When I visited him this summer, he tricked his elderly dog into thinking there was a cat in the front yard that needed chasing, and then we sat down to lunch with Marie-Louise Pelus-Kaplan, his wife. Kaplan is seventy-four, and when he retired, in 2000, he was a patent lawyer. Before that, he was a chemist in the pharmaceutical industry, a career that ended unhappily. In the late seventies, while working in a laboratory a few miles from where we were eating, he co-invented the drug that became known as Ambien. Kaplan's name is one of two on the French and American patents.
  In 2006, Ambien's manufacturer estimated that it had been taken twelve billion times worldwide. The drug was worth two billion dollars a year in American sales. (Ambien, which was patented in the U.S. in 1981, went generic in 2007.) Last year, there were sixty million prescriptions for sleeping pills in the U.S., and forty-three million of them were for some form of zolpidem, including Ambien C.R., a deftly repatented controlled-release pill. Over lunch, I asked Kaplan, who has not previously given interviews, if he'd ever taken Ambien. ''Never,'' he said, in accented English. ''I sleep very well.''
  Pelus-Kaplan, a retired professor of early-modern history, teasingly explained that her husband almost never takes medication. He allows his doctor to write prescriptions, and he even picks up the pills at the pharmacy, ''but he never eats one. He says, 'Too dangerous.' ''
  ''If I need a drug, I would take it, but I don't need it!'' Kaplan said. ''When I get flu, I stay in bed. Drugs are very important when you don't want to lose time, but when you have plenty of time you stay in bed.'' His annual drug intake, he estimated, was no more than ten over-the-counter painkillers.
  Zolpidem is part of a third generation of synthetic compounds that treat insomnia by attaching to GABA receptors. Such drugs were first introduced a century ago, long before the gaba system was identified. The first generation, barbiturates, effectively induce sleep, but can be addictive, and it's easy to overdose on them (Marilyn Monroe, Judy Garland, Jimi Hendrix, Jean Seberg). In the second, safer generation are benzodiazepines, a class that has some mixture of sedative, muscle-relaxant, anticonvulsant, anti-anxiety, and amnesiac effects. These were invented in the fifties by Leo Sternbach, a chemist at Hoffmann-La Roche in New Jersey. He synthesized Librium and then Valium, which, between 1968 and 1981, was the most frequently prescribed drug in the Western world. Valium was marketed as a treatment for anxiety, but insomniacs also used it. The first benzodiazepine explicitly approved by the F.D.A. as a sleep medicine was Dalmane, launched by Hoffmann-La Roche in 1970. Halcion, a benzodiazepine from Upjohn, became the world's best-selling sleep aid after its launch, in 1982.
  In the early seventies, Sternbach visited the offices of Hoffmann-La Roche in Basel, Switzerland, and ran into Jean-Pierre Kaplan, who then worked there. Sternbach shook Kaplan's hand, and wished him well. Kaplan, who had grown up in Paris, was then a few years out of college. A mountain climber, he was long-haired and instinctively unaccommodating. ''I felt very free,'' he said. ''I had a very different comportment from the Swiss researchers. I did not fear anybody.'' (He was once told that he was the first Jewish scientist to be employed at the site. He is not Jewish.)
  In 1973, Kaplan took a new job, at Synth(C)labo, in Bagneux, near Paris. L'Or(C)al had just bought a majority stake in the firm, and wanted to turn it into a major pharmaceutical force. After he identified some compounds with anticonvulsive properties, he felt that one of them was being improperly accelerated toward commercial development. He considered the drug ineffective at safe doses'--''a big waste of money for the company.'' (The drug, progabide, was eventually approved as an epilepsy treatment in France, but not elsewhere.) Kaplan says that this disagreement, along with his activities in a trade union, had already begun souring his relations with the company when, in 1978, a colleague made a passing suggestion: why not try to build something ''a little like zopiclone''?
  Zopiclone, a compound that had been created several years earlier by a rival company, was an interesting oddity. Although its chemical structure was quite unlike that of a benzodiazepine, it acted just like one. It eventually beat zolpidem to market, as the first in a new category of sleep medication: ''z-drugs,'' or non-benzodiazepines. (Lunesta, approved by the F.D.A. in 2004, is a close variant of zopiclone.) Kaplan recalled, ''I thought, O.K., if zopiclone and benzodiazepines act on the same brain receptor, why don't I try to make another drug'--a hybrid? That was the gist of the invention.''
  The molecule, when finished, had another important characteristic. At the lunch table, Kaplan began sketching in my notebook the chemical structure of LSD. He drew hexagons attached to other hexagons. One of them had a tail of nitrogen, oxygen, and carbon. This tail helps to make LSD unusually effective at reaching the brain from the bloodstream. He said of LSD, ''I knew that this kind of structure was very active in the brain.'' A similar tail was incorporated into zolpidem. ''This was important, to have activity in the brain. Maybe it increases the activity one hundred or one thousand times.'' (I asked Kaplan if he had taken LSD. ''Never!'')
  He and Pascal George'--a younger colleague whom Kaplan described as ''sympathetic and brilliant'''--started by building wooden models, including ones for Valium, Halcion, and zopiclone. Colored one-inch spheres, representing atoms, were connected by thin rods, creating models the size of a shoebox. This was a more empirical, architectural approach than is typical in a lot of pharmaceutical chemistry. Kaplan and George tried to identify what these molecules had in common, structurally, that allowed them to affect the brain in the same way. Kaplan told me that their thinking wasn't wildly creative, but it was agile: ''You know, at that time it was maybe clever, because you have no computer. Now it's routine work.''
  George wrote a report describing a few possible types of new chemical compounds. Working separately, they built molecules of the first two types: about ten of one, five of the other. These were unpromising. A third series, made by George, looked better. When it was tested on animals, Kaplan said, ''it was clear that it would be a great success. After the very first compound, I knew.'' But in 1980, while this work was still under way, Kaplan was taken off the project. In his account, Synth(C)labo, eager to get rid of him, ''didn't want to give me the merit of the invention.'' From then on, George ran the research. Kaplan heard only rumors about how the compounds were testing.
  That fall, Synth(C)labo applied for a French patent on a series of seventy-seven compounds. The company knew that one of the compounds had far more pharmaceutical promise than the others, but did not need to disclose this to industry competitors. So the star molecule was also hidden from Kaplan, even though his name was at the top of the document. He showed me the patent. ''I was named the first inventor, but did not have the results of the compound I proposed!'' he said. He looked down a list of seventy-seven chemical formulas, and pointed to the seventy-fifth: this was Ambien.
  Although Kaplan felt increasingly unwelcome at Synth(C)labo, he would not resign. The company eventually moved him to an office in central Paris, to a phantom job in an empty room. He left Synth(C)labo in 1984, and never worked as a scientist again, considering himself blacklisted. ''He was furious,'' Marie-Louise Pelus-Kaplan said. ''He went biking in the woods to think. . . . And then he decided to study law.''
  In a friendly tone, Pascal George told me, ''Jean-Pierre was very intelligent, but very suspicious. I would say paranoiac. Since he was paranoiac, he was very happy to be frustrated'--it was a part of his happiness.'' (There is no evidence of ill will between him and Kaplan.) After the patent filing, it took some years before zolpidem reached the market. George recalled that ''the internal resistance'' at Synth(C)labo was ''rather strong.'' Among other things, zolpidem had been conceived by chemists, not biologists, which was unusual. He said that drug development accelerated in 1985, when a company pharmacist, preparing a batch of syrup for the first human trial, accidentally swallowed a teaspoonful of the drug. He immediately fell asleep.
  Synth(C)labo also established that zolpidem was ''selective'' in its influence on the GABA system. Zolpidem had more impact on sleep than on amnesia, muscle relaxation, and the other effects associated with drugs that bind to gaba receptors. In theory, at least, this selectivity meant that the drug would have fewer undesirable outcomes.
  Zolpidem was launched in France in 1988. Five years later, it was brought to America, with the name Ambien, in a joint venture between Synth(C)labo and Searle. George became the drug's acknowledged inventor, and Kaplan was sometimes left out of official accounts'--''like in the former Soviet Union,'' he said. Pelus-Kaplan once attended a conference, incognito, to confirm that her husband was being overlooked. It was George who built the molecule, but Kaplan argues that the initial collaboration created the blueprint for all that followed. George agrees.
  Ambien had the good fortune to reach the market just as the reputation of Halcion, which had been promoted as safer than barbiturates, collapsed. The public was concerned about Halcion's perceived side effects'--including amnesia and panic'--and about reports that Upjohn had suppressed unfavorable data from its trials. William Styron, in his 1990 memoir, ''Darkness Visible,'' blamed Halcion for amplifying his suicidal thoughts. Philip Roth, in ''Operation Shylock,'' drew on his own reaction to Halcion, describing a ''mental coming apart'' that was ''as distinctly physical a reality as a tooth being pulled.'' In 1991, Upjohn settled a suit brought by a woman who had shot and killed her eighty-two-year-old mother after taking Halcion, and Time ran a story on ''The Dark Side of Halcion.'' That year, the drug was banned in Britain. (It remains available in the U.S., but it is no longer a best-seller.)
  Searle and Synth(C)labo presented Ambien as a safe alternative to Halcion. Jed Black, a sleep specialist at Stanford's medical school who has worked in the pharmaceutical industry, recently recalled being visited by Ambien salespeople: ''They would say to me, with a very straight face'--and I think they believed it completely'--'This is not a benzodiazepine, and therefore it's safer.' '' Ambien did send people to sleep quickly, and the human body broke it down after a few hours, so there was a limited hangover effect. And a fatal overdose would be very hard, if not impossible, to engineer. (Ruth Madoff told ''60 Minutes'' that she and Bernie Madoff failed to commit suicide with Ambien: ''We took pills and woke up the next day.'') But, like benzodiazepines, Ambien sometimes caused amnesia and confusion. According to Black's reading of published data, the drug was selective'--focussed on sleep'--in its action on GABA receptors, but only in doses that were too low to induce sleep. At useful doses, it ''became indistinguishable'' from a benzodiazepine. Nevertheless, Ambien was accepted as a better drug. ''Everyone bought into it,'' Black said. The situation hasn't changed. He noted that, when he lectures to physicians at Stanford, ''I'll say, 'Who here would be equally happy to prescribe Halcion and Ambien?' And none of them raise their hand. Then I show them the data.''
  Ambien quickly became the national best-seller in its category. As Black recalled, ''Everybody switched allegiance'--most physicians did'--and then nothing came along that was any better.'' Customers were satisfied, because the drug reliably induced sleep, and, as Black noted, sleep drugs that target GABA receptors ''impart a sense of feeling a little less stressed, like you've had a drink or two.'' And Ambien, in common with many other drugs, can be tricky for some patients to give up. Those who stop abruptly may experience ''rebound'' insomnia that is worse than when they started. Black said, ''And they inaccurately assume, 'Oh, my insomnia's really bad still.' '' He laughed. ''It's actually a nice feature for a drug to have, from a pharmaceutical perspective.''
  By the turn of the century, there were more U.S. prescriptions for Ambien than for all benzodiazepines combined, and Ambien's benign reputation seemed to help normalize the idea of medical assistance for insomnia. (In 1998, Kathy Giusti, at the time a Searle executive, explained to an interviewer, ''We had to change consumer perception about the sleep category in general, to eliminate the stigma.'') Between 1993 and 2006, the number of times a year that a U.S. doctor gave a diagnosis of insomnia rose from fewer than a million to more than five million.
  In 1995, Kaplan negotiated a payment'--about thirty thousand dollars'--from his former employers. George, who stayed at the company, happily, until his retirement, in 2010, received a little less. After Kaplan retired from his career in law, he formed an organization that lobbies on behalf of people who invent things while working as a salaried employee.
  Kaplan described zolpidem as a ''professional disaster.'' He added, ''It's not lifesaving, it does not treat cancer, it does not treat malaria, it does not treat Alzheimer's'--the most difficult illnesses to treat. Therefore, I call it a comfort drug.''
  A woman recently posted online a description of her Ambien experiences:
  Ordered 3 pairs of saddle shoes from eBaySexted my best male friend who is married. I have a BF as wellOrdered $35.00 stylus off of amazon, I must have thought it said $3.00 or somethingPlayed draw something w/my friend and drew penises and rainbows for every wordTried to legally change my name on the computer
  Ambien can be disinhibiting and depersonalizing. Or, to quote from the label of a bottle of sleep medication used by Tina Fey's character, Liz Lemon, on ''30 Rock'': ''May cause dizziness, sexual nightmares, and sleep crime.'' Zolpidem enters the gut, passes into the bloodstream, squeezes through the liver, and then crosses the blood-brain barrier, to make GABA receptors more receptive to gaba. When the neurotransmitter sticks to its target, negatively charged chloride ions flow into cells, making the inside of the cells more negative, and less likely to fire. Traffic is interrupted, signals don't reach their destinations, and the brain starts to quiet. Many people experience this as a contented swoon that silences inner chatter while giving a half glimpse of childhood; they are overtaken by sleep, like a three-year-old in a car seat.
  But others resist sleep and embrace the woozy, out-of-body license. To some, this is an opportunity to take part in what Rachel Uchitel, a former girlfriend of Tiger Woods, has reportedly described as ''crazy Ambien sex.'' At the London Olympics, some Australian swimmers took Ambien to build team spirit. After taking the drug, they larked around and knocked on the doors of other athletes. As one of them later put it, they allowed themselves ''to be normal for one night.'' Because the drug had been banned by the Australian Olympic Committee, and because the team failed to win medals that it was expected to win, this became a national scandal.
  But for many Ambien users, like the eBay shopper, their activities on the border of wakefulness and sleep are less purposeful. Drew Fairweather, an online cartoonist, has described the phenomenon in a popular series of panels in which a walrus addresses a human companion with such suggestions as ''Take some more Ambien and cut off all your hair, man. Let's do this.'' In 2006, Patrick Kennedy, then a congressman, crashed his Mustang into a barrier near Capitol Hill, in the middle of the night; he told police, inaccurately, that he was late for a vote. He had Ambien and an anti-nausea medication in his body. By the following spring, the F.D.A. had heard enough about Ambien-related sleep-driving, sleep-eating, and sleep-walking'--accompanied by amnesia'--to require new warnings. The drug's label now refers to the risk of ''preparing and eating food, making phone calls, or having sex.''
  This kind of behavior can occur during dreamless, slow-wave sleep'--the state of an unmedicated sleepwalker'--or, more commonly, Jed Black suspects, while someone is awake but disinhibited, by Ambien alone or by Ambien and alcohol. Black noted that this altered state can be mischaracterized as sleep by people who have forgotten their adventures. A recent study, described in European Neuropsychopharmacology, suggests that these phenomena affect five per cent of users. (Other studies have reported lower numbers.) Zolpidem's reputation for outlandish side effects may be inflated by gossip'--by the interaction of medication and the Internet. Thomas Roth, the director of the sleep center at Henry Ford Hospital, in Detroit, who has consulted for Merck and other pharmaceutical companies, told me he has not yet seen persuasive evidence that there is more of this behavior among Ambien users than among the rest of the population (which includes drinkers). The F.D.A.'s 2007 warnings were prompted by doctors' reports, not by peer-reviewed data. But amnesiac confusion certainly occurs, and zolpidem's popularity makes misadventures commonplace, to the point that it's hard to use Ambien in a criminal defense. Defendants must argue that they were involuntarily intoxicated'--that they couldn't have foreseen the possible consequences of taking Ambien, alone or with drinks'--despite the warnings delivered both by their doctor and by Charlie Sheen, who called the drug ''the devil's aspirin'' after an incident, in 2010, involving a porn star and a damaged chandelier, in the Eloise Suite of the Plaza Hotel.
  There may be other risks associated with zolpidem. In a recent paper in the online edition of the British Medical Journal, Daniel Kripke, a professor emeritus at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine, examined five years of electronic medical records collected by a health system in Pennsylvania. He compared more than ten thousand patients who had been prescribed a sleep medicine'--most commonly Ambien'--and more than twenty thousand patients who had not. After adjusting for age, gender, smoking habits, obesity, ethnicity, alcohol use, and a history of cancer, and after controlling, as much as possible, for other diseases and disorders, Kripke found that people who had taken sleeping pills were more than three times as likely to have died during the study period as those who had not. Those on higher doses of the drugs were more than five times as likely to have died.
  ''My best estimate is that drugs like zolpidem are killing as many people as cigarettes,'' Kripke told me recently. That is, more than four hundred thousand Americans a year. ''And suppose they're only killing a tenth as many people'--you still wouldn't want them on the market.'' Echoing Ambien's co-inventor, Kripke called the risks unnecessary. ''Nobody dies because they didn't take a sleeping pill,'' he said.
  Kripke acknowledges that his study did not identify the cause of any death; ill people take more sleeping pills than others, and some users might have had illnesses that were undiagnosed, and therefore not controlled for in the study. And insomnia itself could present a significant health risk, although Kripke resists that idea. Jed Black finds the data interesting but too inconclusive. A representative of Sanofi'--the company that Synth(C)labo became part of, after various mergers'--told me that Sanofi stood behind its Ambien safety data, which had satisfied the F.D.A.
  Other research has linked zolpidem and similar drugs to depression, suicide, and car accidents; there are also data connecting zolpidem to cancer. (Such numbers do not establish causation.) The U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration recently reported that E.R. cases involving zolpidem had risen from six thousand, in 2005, to nineteen thousand, in 2010.
  If the public has largely overlooked such data, even as it pays attention to Patrick Kennedy'--or to his cousin Kerry Kennedy, who was arrested last year with zolpidem in her body, having driven for several miles on a shredded tire after colliding with a tractor-trailer'--it may be because Ambien deaths are disguised by circumstances. ''The people who die after taking sleeping pills tend to be older and obese, and to have multiple illnesses,'' Kripke said. ''So if they happen to die in the middle of the night nobody supposes that it's from the sleeping pill. And there's no way of proving that it was.''
  John Renger, the Merck neuroscientist, has a homemade, mocked-up advertisement for suvorexant pinned to the wall outside his ground-floor office, on a Merck campus in West Point, Pennsylvania. A woman in a darkened room looks unhappily at an alarm clock. It's 4 A.M. The ad reads, ''Restoring Balance.''
  The shelves of Renger's office are filled with small glass trophies. At Merck, these are handed out when chemicals in drug development hit various points on the path to market: they're celebrations in the face of likely failure. Renger showed me one. Engraved ''MK-4305 PCC 2006,'' it commemorated the day, seven years ago, when a promising compound was honored with an MK code; it had been cleared for testing on humans. Two years later, MK-4305 became suvorexant. If suvorexant reaches pharmacies, it will have been renamed again'--perhaps with three soothing syllables (Valium, Halcion, Ambien).
  ''We fail so often, even the milestones count for us,'' Renger said, laughing. ''Think of the number of people who work in the industry. How many get to develop a drug that goes all the way? Probably fewer than ten per cent.''
  In 1998, when Renger was in Japan, finishing his postdoctoral work, two groups of scientists announced almost simultaneously that they had identified, in rodents, a previously unknown neurotransmitter. One group, in San Diego, called it hypocretin, after the hypothalamus, the area of the brain where it is produced. The other team, in Dallas, called it orexin, as in ''orexigenic,'' which means ''appetite-stimulating.'' Its primary function was thought to be the regulation of food intake. Orexin-abundant mice gained more weight than others on the same diet. (The naming question has still not been settled, although ''orexin'' is more widely used in nonacademic circles, including pharmaceutical companies. Renger referred to hypocretin partisans, affectionately, as ''a stubborn group.'')
  The orexin papers were widely noticed, in part because of the connection to feeding. Several pharmaceutical companies, including Merck, began investigating possible obesity treatments. A year later, a remarkable paper from Stanford sent everyone in another direction.
  Since the seventies, Stanford sleep scientists, led first by William Dement, had bred narcoleptic dogs. This was an achievement in itself. The animals suffered from extreme daytime sleepiness and had a propensity for mid-coital collapse: at moments of high emotion, the dogs, like narcoleptic humans, experienced sudden muscle weakness, or cataplexy. The first Stanford dog was a poodle named Monique. Later, there were other breeds; the Stanford colony, mostly Dobermans, had eighty dogs at its peak. Narcoleptic dogs gave birth to narcoleptic puppies; the disorder in canines has a single genetic cause. In 1999, after a decade-long search, a team led by Emmanuel Mignot, a researcher at Stanford, located the damaged gene, and reported that it encoded a receptor: the same one that had just been identified by the work done in California and Texas. Narcoleptic dogs lacked orexin receptors.
  Mignot recently recalled a videoconference that he had with Merck scientists in 1999, a day or two before he published a paper on narcoleptic dogs. (He has never worked for Merck, but at that point he was contemplating a commercial partnership.) When he shared his results, it created an instant commotion, as if he'd ''put a foot into an ants' nest.'' Not long afterward, Mignot and his team reported that narcoleptic humans lacked not orexin receptors, like dogs, but orexin itself. In narcoleptic humans, the cells that produce orexin have been destroyed, probably because of an autoimmune response.
  Orexin seemed to be essential for fending off sleep, and this changed how one might think of sleep. We know why we eat, drink, and breathe'--to keep the internal state of the body adjusted. But sleep is a scientific puzzle. It may enable next-day activity, but that doesn't explain why rats deprived of sleep don't just tire; they die, within a couple of weeks. Orexin seemed to turn notions of sleep and arousal upside down. If orexin turns on a light in the brain, then perhaps one could think of dark as the brain's natural state. ''What is sleep?'' might be a less profitable question than ''What is awake?''
  Mignot had done something very unusual: he had discovered the genetic cause of a condition, helped to reframe thinking about a fundamental human behavior, and revealed clear pharmaceutical opportunities. An orexin receptor is the kind of place that many existing drugs are designed to reach. As Mignot put it, ''This was druggable.'' (That is often not the case: researchers know the genetic cause of Huntington's disease but have nothing to target.) A drug that activated orexin receptors might help treat narcoleptics, and a drug that blocked orexin receptors, if introduced to a brain producing orexin at unwelcome times, might help insomniacs, perhaps without intoxicating them. Pharmaceutical companies were reluctant to give up their obesity-drug ambitions, but it seemed that the orexin mice described in 1998 were fat because they stayed up late and had more time to eat.
  Research at Merck had long focussed on eleven diseases, including Alzheimer's and diabetes. Insomnia was not one of them. Renger, who joined the company in 2001, recalled, ''The perception at that time was, You have a lot of medications available'--should we be working on this?'' How large was the population of insomniacs poorly served by Ambien? Should Merck invest in a market dominated by a drug that, within a few years, would become a cheap generic? The need for an ''orexin-antagonist'' sleep aid was neither commercially overwhelming nor clinically pressing. (Indeed, one detects a little professional defensiveness from the suvorexant team. Renger can sound effortful when describing the distress of insomniacs: ''We've got to think of the patients! That's why we make medicines.'')
  But orexin-related work promised pharmaceutical novelty, which is extraordinarily uncommon. Most new drugs are remixes of old drugs'--clever circumventions of patent protections. The last truly original medicines in neuroscience were triptans, for the treatment of migraines, introduced in the early nineteen-nineties. ''The science is really what drove us,'' Renger said. ''To have a new target'--to know the genetics of the brain's control system and to be able to focus on that specifically to control sleep'--is a pretty rare event. It's like the thing people keep promising: you know, the 'cancer gene.' This was the first time there was the 'sleep gene.' ''
  The work was also feasible. It's easier to observe sleep than, say, a reduction in anxiety or depression. Renger, upon his arrival at Merck, had set up a sleep laboratory that could make very fast, semiautomated measurements of the sleep patterns of rodents and monkeys. The lab was designed to identify sleep-related side effects of Merck compounds, but was well suited for testing insomnia treatments. ''With sleep, you can do an EEG study in a few days, and it'll tell you whether or not we're having an impact. I could do these studies'''--he snapped his fingers'--''and get an answer.''
  Merck has a library of three million compounds'--a collection of plausible chemical starting points, many of them the by-products of past drug developments. I saw a copy of this library, kept in a room with a heavy door. Rectangular plastic plates, five inches long and three inches wide, were indented with hundreds of miniature test tubes, or wells, in a grid. Each well contained a splash of chemical, and each plate had fifteen hundred and thirty-six wells. There were twenty-four hundred plates; stacked on shelves, they occupied no more space than a filing cabinet.
  In 2003, Merck conducted a computerized, robotized examination of almost every compound in the library. At this stage, the scientists were working not with Renger's animals but with a cellular soup derived from human cells and modified to act as a surrogate of the brain. Plate by plate, each of the three million chemicals in the library was introduced into this soup, along with an agent that would cause the mixture to glow a little if orexin receptors were activated. Finally, orexin was added, and a camera recorded the result. Renger and his colleagues, hoping to find a chemical that sabotaged the orexin system, were looking for the absence of a glow.
  I visited the room in which this work had been done. Yellow robotic arms, on the same scale as car-assembly robots, were moving the trays from here to there, making bursts of sound like a nut being loosened in a tire shop. ''Summertime'' played on a radio. A computer monitor showed enhanced images of reactions on the plates: a fuzzy grid of light and dark dots, like a blurry telescope image of distant stars.
  The robots ran through Merck's collection in about three weeks. ''If something's interesting, you grab that by the neck,'' Renger said. The molecules that best blocked orexin receptors were re-screened, in various ways. Chemists then modified the most promising candidates, much in the way that the Synth(C)labo chemists had worked twenty-five years earlier: they induced chemical change by heating and mixing, to build families of drug-like compounds. These were then tested on human liver cells, in vitro, and on animals in Renger's sleep lab.
  Renger took me to see the rats and monkeys. The lab has soundproofed walls built out of the kind of air-infused blocks used in bomb shelters. The rats were transmitting live EEG data, wirelessly, from brain implants. So were the monkeys; they also had touch-responsive screens in their cages, on which they sometimes played games, for rewards of juice. A red square might appear on the screen and then disappear; after a pause, a red square might appear alongside a yellow square, and the monkey would be rewarded for touching the red one. (''It's like drinking soda and playing a little bit of Assassin's Creed,'' Renger explained.) With these games, Renger could simultaneously measure wakefulness and cognition. During the orexin research, when it was necessary to intrude on the monkeys' sleep, he played the amplified sound of a tiger's growl.
  The work went back and forth between the chemists and the biologists: compounds were improved and tested. In December, 2006, Renger put on a good suit and drove with his team to Merck's offices in Branchburg, New Jersey. At the monthly meeting of the pre-clinical-development review committee, they pitched their best bet to the company. ''We had what we thought was a fantastic molecule,'' Renger recalled. ''It had all the properties we thought we would need, and it was going to look like a drug.'' It seemed likely that suvorexant would have a far longer half-life than Ambien, which implied a risk of next-day effects. But Renger wanted the drug to extend sleep. ''We wanted to have something that covers this system for the entire night,'' he said.
  Merck approved the compound. ''At that point, the might of the corporation swings in behind the science,'' Richard Hargreaves, who helped run the meeting, told me. The company was now likely to fund at least a year or two of work. To bring a drug to market now costs an average of about two billion dollars, Hargreaves said. Renger and his team celebrated with drinks at the Cock 'n' Bull, in Lahaska, Pennsylvania.
  Despite years of sleep problems, Samar Chatterjee, a seventy-year-old environmental engineer, had until recently never taken a sleep aid. Chatterjee, who lives in Washington, D.C., told me that he had feared ''getting hooked on the drugs, and getting dozy and dopey.'' He referred to the extreme example of Michael Jackson, who, at the time of his death, in 2009, was taking a general anesthetic, apparently as a remedy for insomnia. But, in 2010, Chatterjee saw an advertisement for a sleep-medication trial, at the Center for Sleep & Wake Disorders, in Chevy Chase, Maryland, and he applied. He thought that the study might benefit society, and he hoped to learn if he had sleep apnea: people with the condition would not be allowed to participate. After being monitored over two nights of imperfect sleep, at the Chevy Chase center, Chatterjee learned that he did not have sleep apnea, or other complicating conditions, and that he was sufficiently insomniac to join the trial. (The center, one of many contracted by Merck, heard from five hundred applicants, but found only seventeen who met all the criteria.) He took a tablet every night for three months; he was usually at home, but sometimes in a bed in Chevy Chase, where EEG readings, and other measurements, recorded ''sleep efficiency'' (percentage of time in bed spent asleep); L.P.S. (Latency to Persistent Sleep: the speed with which a person falls asleep); and WASO (Wake After Sleep Onset: the time spent awake in bed after initially falling asleep). When Chatterjee slept at home, he delivered an account of his night to the center, through an automated telephone questionnaire. He suspected, correctly, that he was taking a drug rather than a placebo. He fell asleep faster than usual, and stayed asleep. This seems to have pleased him, but left him ambivalent about insomnia medication. I asked him about side effects. ''Nothing major,'' he said. ''Some constipation. Maybe some dizziness or pain. Headache, that type of thing.'' He also experienced some sleepiness in the afternoons.
  Drug trials usually have three phases, and Chatterjee had taken part in the final phase of the suvorexant trials. The Phase I trials, begun in 2007, tested for safety. Non-insomniac volunteers'--the researchers called them ''healthies'''--took the drug at high or low doses, or with other drugs, or the night before a supervised, hour-long highway drive in which they were told not to drift out of their lane.
  These trials had barely begun when, in February, 2007, Nature Medicine published a paper, ''Promotion of Sleep by Targeting the Orexin System in Rats, Dogs and Humans,'' written by scientists at Actelion, the Swiss pharmaceutical company. Merck knew that other firms had built orexin antagonists, but Actelion's paper showed that it was clearly ahead of Merck, perhaps by a year or two.
  ''We thought, O.K., great,'' Renger recalled, with a sigh. But the news also galvanized the Merck team: ''We were already highly motivated, but seeing someone jump in front gives you that extra kick in the ass.''
  In 2008, results from Phase I studies of suvorexant showed that it was safe enough to go forward. The data also provided enough indications of efficacy'--by sending ''healthies'' to sleep'--to allow Merck to accelerate its process, and skip a formal proof-of-concept stage. In late 2008, suvorexant began a Phase II trial, involving two hundred and fifty-four insomniacs in the U.S. and Japan. The results would establish the doses for much larger, and more expensive, Phase III trials, whose results are at the center of any submission to the F.D.A. In Phase II, Merck tested the drug at ten, twenty, forty, and eighty milligrams. Sleep measurements were taken by observing patients in the lab, and by collecting sleep diaries.
  Daniel Kripke, of U.C. San Diego, argues that the effectiveness of insomnia treatments should be judged by patients' ability to function the next day. But the pharmaceutical companies, and the F.D.A., judge a sleep drug by its impact on sleeplessness. That impact is assessed objectively, with electronic monitoring, and subjectively, using patient reports. Objective data show that insomnia medications, on average, provide a gain of only ten or twenty minutes in total sleep time. But a patient's perception of improved sleep is also a recognized part of the clinical data. In this framework, insomnia is a condition not just of losing sleep but of being disturbed by sleeplessness. Indeed, most people with prescriptions for insomnia never visit a sleep lab, trusting their own assessment of a sleep deficit. This emphasis on the subjective also makes the amnesiac effect of sleep drugs oddly advantageous to those who manufacture them: the drugs inhibit people from creating memories of waking during the night.
  The Phase II results were strong: suvorexant worked on insomniacs. Renger recalled that the team was ebullient: ''A novel mechanism in neuroscience'--whatever happens from there on, you've done something in your career.'' They took a day trip, with families, to an aquarium in Camden, New Jersey.
  By then, the company had begun considering which of the four doses of suvorexant it should take into Phase III. The placebo effect of sleep drugs is powerful. A recent paper in the British Medical Journal suggested that it accounts for half the effect of z-drugs. So insomnia medications need to be quite potent to distinguish themselves from a placebo in clinical trials. The Phase II results showed that, at ten milligrams, suvorexant had an effect that could be measured in a sleep lab, but the dose had no advantage over a placebo in the subjective measures'--patients' estimations of their own speed in falling asleep, subsequent wakefulness in bed, and total sleep time.
  Merck then made an important decision. For Phase III, starting in late 2009, it would drop ten and eighty milligrams in favor of twenty and forty milligrams, with forty regarded as the likely standard dose. In Phase III, Merck would also test fifteen- and thirty-milligram doses on patients sixty-five and older, who were more sensitive to the drug. The Chevy Chase sleep center, along with more than a hundred other facilities around the world, was contracted to test the four doses. Eighteen hundred patients participated in the trial.
  At the time, Jed Black, the Stanford sleep specialist, was on a two-year leave of absence, working full time on almorexant, the rival drug made by Actelion. Phase III trials of the drug were under way. This work has not been published, and Black cannot discuss it, although he recently described almorexant as having ''an absolutely remarkable profile'' that was likely to outperform zolpidem in sleep maintenance.
  But, in early 2011, Actelion announced that it was halting the drug's development, because of an undisclosed possible safety issue. Merck's scientists speculated about the nature of the concerns, and feared for the future of suvorexant. Black said that the problem was ''straightforward,'' but that Actelion had decided to pause and take its time. ''I don't think almorexant needs re-tinkering at the molecular level,'' he said, implying a problem of drug delivery. Black, who is back at Stanford, suspects that almorexant will be launched, and is certain that such drugs will eventually become dominant. (GlaxoSmithKline recently published results, from Phase II studies, of its own orexin antagonist.)
  Actelion's Phase III trials had included a comparison of its drug's performance with zolpidem's. Merck used zolpidem in two tiny studies, but not in larger ones. This omission might seem surprising. If suvorexant really was a possible Ambien killer, then couldn't its superiority have been demonstrated in comparative studies? Merck scientists sometimes seemed evasive in their responses to this question, but an answer eventually came into focus. On the core issues that interest the F.D.A.'--efficacy and safety'--a de-facto head-to-head would become available; anyone could compare published data about the two drugs. But it was risky to go beyond those requirements, even if such trials might have demonstrated other possible strengths of suvorexant: a lower chance of nighttime confusion, perhaps. The trials would have slowed suvorexant's sprint to market, and they would have been very hard to engineer: Merck would have had to use safe, low doses of the two drugs, and the differences between them might have been subtle, if they existed at all. Suvorexant might even have lost the contest, and Merck would have been obliged to include that information in its filing with the F.D.A. ''We were in competition, and we were behind,'' Joe Herring said to me. ''We wanted to get across the line with a lean program.''
  The real-world test'--a double dose, three glasses of wine, and a laptop'--would take place after F.D.A. approval. In the meantime, Merck scientists who spoke publicly about suvorexant had to restrict themselves to the data from F.D.A.-sanctioned trials; they could not discuss strengths that the drug seemed only likely to have. They had an impressive narrative about the creation of a rational, novel, and ''beautiful'' molecule. But they couldn't display a chart showing that suvorexant was, say, less likely than Ambien to lead to such episodes as ''cooking yourself breakfast and forgetting the next day,'' as Renger put it.
  One possibly significant difference between suvorexant and Ambien may be indicated, informally, by Merck's Phase III trials, though it wasn't part of the official results. There were no reports of euphoria'--a word that is on Ambien's label. Thomas Roth, of Henry Ford Hospital, said of suvorexant, ''I would not expect any kind of high before sleep.'' Most people would regard clear-headedness as a pharmacological virtue, but to some the Ambien buzz is a pleasure enhanced by the comforting promise of imminent sleep.
  Merck's decision to forgo more comparative data was ''quite bullish,'' Black said, but not unreasonable. ''They thought that they had a good safety profile, and that there would be no problems at the F.D.A.'' But, as he noted, ''the F.D.A., particularly under the direction of Ron Farkas, seems to be raising the bar a bit on safety.'' This year, the agency lowered the recommended dose of zolpidem for women from ten milligrams to five.
  If there are Merck employees who regret the decision, I didn't hear them say it. But a recently published paper, written by Renger and others at Merck, offered hints about how suvorexant might have performed in a comparative study. The paper described an experiment involving rodents and monkeys dosed with Ambien, Valium, Lunesta, and a Merck compound called DORA-22'--another orexin antagonist that Merck made alongside suvorexant. The dora-22 study first established the amount of each drug necessary to send the animals to sleep, and then'--using cognitive tests like the red-square game'--measured the extent to which the drugs, soon after ingestion, affected memory and attention span. Renger was ''elated'' by the results. dora-22 performed far better than its rivals. In one test, monkeys administered thirty times the sleep dose of dora-22 showed no impairment after being woken and given an attention test. The Ambien monkeys were dozily incompetent even at doses too low to have initiated sleep.
  The unspoken promise of orexin antagonists, then, is sleep without stupidity. The DORA-22 experiment measured mid-dose confusion. In effect, it was the Patrick Kennedy test. ''You can publish this kind of data and get people to think about it,'' Renger said, though he emphasized that the animal study had its limits. ''You don't know if it translates,'' he said. ''Maybe this is a monkey thing.''
  Colorcon, the world's leading supplier of tablet coatings, provides its clients with a pill-color chart. Dots of various hues are arranged in a circle and divided into pizza slices of pinks, blues, and greens, which darken toward the edge. The chart can be overlaid with plastic sheets that are opaque but dotted with clear circles, allowing you to see some of the colors beneath. One sheet reveals the acceptable colors for pills in the E.U. and North America; another'--showing intolerance for dark grays, dark greens, and the brightest pinks'--also covers Japan.
  Rick Derrickson, Merck's director of project leadership, recently showed me this chart, and recalled meetings, early in 2011, with the company's experts on drug stability, marketing, and supply chains. As Derrickson remembered it, the issue was: ''Do I want to look like something on the market, or do I want to be totally different? Do I want to convey strength or emotion?'' He explained, ''Reds are culturally not acceptable in some places. It has to do with death. And some colors are viewed as candy. And you don't see black, either.''
  He showed me the finished suvorexant tablets. The forty-milligram version was a pale-green oval. Thirty milligrams was yellow and round. Twenty milligrams was white and oval, fifteen milligrams white and round. ''We were looking for non-offensive,'' he said. ''Hopefully, we won't run into a country that says, 'There's no way we'll take green.' ''
  At this time, suvorexant had already been ''on a tablet path'' for two years. ''Everyone in the industry tries to gravitate toward a tablet,'' Derrickson explained. ''It's tried-and-true technology. When you get into some of the exotics'--like putting something under your tongue'--people aren't always comfortable.'' In its purest form, suvorexant is a fine crystal, with a texture somewhere between sugar and flour. Merck synthesizes it in Ireland, and ships it across the Atlantic in hundred-and-twenty-litre drums. (Derrickson expected Merck to need ''several metric tons'' a year.) That active chemical is mixed with a polymer that helps the drug's absorption by the body. The mixture is heated and then extruded from a machine, like pasta, and flattened between rollers. It cools and flakes, and those flakes are ground very finely, added to filler, and pressed into tablets.
  ''The U.S. prefers everything in a thirty-count bottle,'' Derrickson said. ''The rest of the world prefers blisters'''--that is, blister packs made of plastic and foil. In 2011, he asked for thousands of suvorexant tablets, in the various doses, to be packaged both ways and placed in several climate-controlled rooms, including one set at 86°F. and seventy-five-per-cent humidity. This was the start of a trial assessing the tablets' perishability. The F.D.A. asks for at least a yearlong trial, and Merck planned to run the study for three years. In addition to the main batch, some bottled suvorexant tablets were held in other rooms, for an ''in use'' study, where bottles were opened and closed, manually, on different schedules, as they might be by an occasional user of the drug.
  The unopened bottles protected suvorexant well. But some of the ''in use'' bottles did not: the tablets absorbed moisture, their coating cracked, and they started to crumble. The advantages of an orange plastic bottle over blister packs were so evident to Derrickson'--''Cheaper, and more friendly,'' as he put it'--that he was slow to accept the results. Laura Jacobus, who was in charge of that process, recalled, ''He was saying, 'Are you sure? Check one more time.' ''
  When Merck made its formal submission to the F.D.A., in August of last year'--with forty-one gigabytes of material'--it proposed selling suvorexant at fifteen, twenty, thirty, and forty milligrams, in blister packs of ten, in a child-resistant plastic case.
  People attending the F.D.A. committee meeting on suvorexant passed, in a lobby, a display case of pharmaceutical shame. On shelves, behind glass, were samples of a century's worth of toxic drugs, including a pack of thalidomide'--the sedative and antiemetic, launched in Europe in the nineteen-fifties, that caused thousands of birth defects before it was withdrawn, in 1961. The F.D.A. is proud that thalidomide was never approved for sale in America; in 1962, Frances Oldham Kelsey, the agency reviewer who blocked it, received a President's Award for Distinguished Federal Civilian Service.
  A red rope bisected a large hall. To the left, rows of seats reserved for the public went largely unused. To the right, there was a crush of dark suits: committee members sat at a U-shaped desk, and were flanked, in a kind of parliamentary arrangement, by Merck employees on one side and F.D.A. employees on the other.
  Opening remarks were delivered by Russell Katz, the director of neurology products at the F.D.A. He affably described suvorexant as ''an exciting compound,'' but almost immediately spoke of an emerging F.D.A. preference for drug doses that are as low as one can ''get away with.'' Without naming zolpidem, he referred to the drug's recently reduced dosage for women, saying, ''We believe this is the right way to go.'' He noted that suvorexant was shown to impair next-day driving at a twenty-milligram dose, and perhaps at fifteen milligrams.
  Katz also observed that Merck's Phase II investigation of ten milligrams had shown that it outperformed a placebo in sleep efficiency and Wake After Sleep Onset, although not in the time taken to fall asleep. ''These data, in our view, taken together, argue for recommending doses as low as ten milligrams, or even perhaps lower than ten milligrams,'' he said.
  It was 8:30 A.M. The men and women on Merck's benches looked grimly composed, like C.E.O.s being scolded at a Senate hearing. For a few days, they had known that the committee was likely to discuss a dose of suvorexant that Merck had examined, and then rejected, four years earlier, at the end of Phase II trials. If this idea was pursued by the F.D.A., then there was the odd possibility that a drug could go to market at a starting dose that Merck had studied only long enough to conclude that it didn't work. A drug sold at an underperforming starting dose would, of course, be at a disadvantage.
  Joe Herring, Merck's main speaker, was next. Company leaders were watching a live video feed on the F.D.A. Web site, as were pharma investors, and pharma analysts ready to tweet. Herring didn't need to make the case already made by his Phase III data: suvorexant was effective, particularly in maintaining sleep. His primary task, whose strangeness colored the rest of the day, was to talk down the effectiveness of suvorexant at the ten-milligram dose. He agreed with Katz that the objective Phase II results for ten milligrams were ''substantial and encouraging.'' But the subjective, patient-reported results were no stronger than those for a placebo, and insomnia ''involves patient perception of sleep disturbance and clinically significant distress.'' He noted that the F.D.A. had expected Merck to find subjectively significant doses to take into Phase III.
  Herring then gave reassuring accounts of the side-effect data connected to the higher doses, and disputed the idea that any reported reactions to suvorexant could be thought of as ''narcolepsy-like.'' (Herring knew that Ronald Farkas's unfriendly PowerPoint presentation would make the suggestion.) The direct link between narcolepsy and orexin made such suspicions natural, but Merck, assisted by an external committee, had looked for cataplexy in the data and had not found it. A few episodes of excessive daytime sleepiness, at high doses of suvorexant, and of sleep paralysis, could be explained without reference to narcolepsy. Thomas Scammell, a narcolepsy specialist at Harvard who has published widely on orexin, was sitting on Merck's benches, as a consultant, and he later spoke to the committee in support of the company's position. (Emmanuel Mignot, the researcher at Stanford, recently told me that suvorexant seems to produce a rather normal experience of sleep, except that patients are hurried into the REM phase, which is also the experience, in a more extreme way, of narcoleptics. Suvorexant might not be the best drug for people prone to nightmares, he said.)
  After Herring finished, David Michelson'--the executive who had said that suvorexant was a ''huge'' product for Merck'--spoke. A committee member asked him if suvorexant had been compared to zolpidem in a head-to-head study. No, he acknowledged.
  Farkas then gave his PowerPoint presentation. Phrases like ''violent intent'' appeared in large type. He recommended a ten-milligram dose, and said, ''It really does come down . . . to what dose would you want used for your mother?'' He seemed to enjoy his role: slightly ill-mannered, and happy to open the door to doubt. He began one sentence, in an innocent tone, ''I think we don't want to raise concerns that suvorexant causes narcolepsy by causing an autoimmune death of cells that produce orexins.'' He also took a moment to undermine the importance of subjective results, saying, ''Everybody knows that sleep interferes with your ability to know how much time you've slept.'' John Carroll, an industry analyst, tweeted that the meeting was a ''disaster'' for Merck.
  During a lunch break, Renger ate Doritos and groused: ''Ten years of work, all this innovation'--novel science'--and we're talking about dose and driving studies!'' In the afternoon, Merck continued its effort to undermine the ten-milligram plan: Julie Stone, an expert in statistical modelling at Merck, delivered an elaborate analysis and said, flatly, ''We don't believe that ten milligrams would be an effective dose.'' Herring, speaking to the committee again, said, ''Ten milligrams is ineffective from a patient perspective.''
  In the midafternoon, committee members began to answer a series of questions asked by their F.D.A. hosts. They started with: Was suvorexant effective at the doses suggested by Merck? In two votes, the committee members agreed that it was.
  The F.D.A.'s next question began, ''The applicant has submitted data supporting the conclusion that ten milligrams is an effective dose.''
  This was peculiar. Robert Clancy, a professor of neurology and pediatrics at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, pointed out that it wasn't true.
  Katz agreed: the F.D.A., not Merck, was arguing for the efficacy of ten milligrams. He said, ''We shouldn't couch it in terms of 'Has the applicant done it?' Have we done it?''
  The committee's opinion was mixed. Jason Todd, a neurologist from North Carolina, said, ''Honestly, it looks like the best treatment, in terms of balancing effectiveness and side effects, is placebo.'' Ronald Farkas wondered if ten milligrams would have performed better in a larger study. ''A small, underpowered, negative study does not mean the drug does not work,'' he said.
  The committee was asked to vote on the question: Would a ten-milligram dose require additional studies before it could be approved by the F.D.A.? It voted no. Paul Rosenberg, a psychiatrist at Johns Hopkins, said, ''I'm convinced that it maybe works.'' Clancy said, ''I feel like I'm stuck in an old episode of 'The Twilight Zone.' The company's arguing their drug doesn't work, and the F.D.A. is arguing, 'Yes, it does.' '' He said that he needed a sleeping pill.
  By the end of the session, the committee had recommended to the F.D.A. that thirty and forty milligrams should not be approved, for safety reasons. Doses of fifteen and twenty milligrams should be approved, but the F.D.A. should consider instructing Merck to make ten milligrams the drug's starting dose.
  David Michelson sank slowly into a chair in the lobby. ''I'm exhausted,'' he said. ''Just emotionally. You're up and down, and you don't know where it's going to go. You're forced to sit there and watch it. You're thinking, This is going south!'''--that the committee would vote suvorexant out of existence. ''And then it wasn't going south.'' He added, ''It's certainly unusual that they'd be willing to consider approving a dose that had not been extensively studied.''
  Jed Black followed the day's events from afar, and was at this moment wondering if Merck ''might just say, 'Screw this,' and proceed with another molecule.'' I asked Michelson if Merck would pursue ten milligrams, if necessary, despite the company's public disparagement of the dose. He foresaw discussions. He and his colleagues then walked to their bus, pulling wheeled luggage, in a tight, flight-attendant formation.
  A few weeks later, the F.D.A. wrote to Merck. The letter encouraged the company to revise its application, making ten milligrams the drug's starting dose. Merck could also include doses of fifteen and twenty milligrams, for people who tried the starting dose and found it unhelpful. This summer, Rick Derrickson designed a ten-milligram tablet: small, round, and green. Several hundred of these tablets now sit on shelves, in rooms set at various temperatures and humidity levels; the tablets are regularly inspected for signs of disintegration.
  The F.D.A.'s decision left Merck facing an unusual challenge. In the Phase II trial, this dose of suvorexant had helped to turn off the orexin system in the brains of insomniacs, and it had extended sleep, but its impact didn't register with users. It worked, but who would notice? Still, suvorexant had a good story'--the brain was being targeted in a genuinely innovative way'--and pharmaceutical companies are very skilled at selling stories.
  Merck has told investors that it intends to seek approval for the new doses next year. I recently asked John Renger how everyday insomniacs would respond to ten milligrams of suvorexant. He responded, ''This is a great question.'' After the approval process is finished, the marketing division of Merck'--a company whose worldwide sales last year totalled forty-seven billion dollars'--will conduct a different kind of public trial. The study will address this question: How successfully can a pharmaceutical giant'--through advertising and sales visits to doctors' offices'--sell a drug at a dose that has been repeatedly described as ineffective by the scientists who developed it? '...
VIDEO-Paul Walker Crash -- The Moment Of Impact & Massive Inferno | Celebrity Videos | TMZ.com
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Gemeentelijke administratieve sanctie - Wikipedia
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  Een gemeentelijke administratieve sanctie (GAS) is in Belgi een straf, meestal een boete, die een gemeente kan opleggen voor inbreuken op zijn gemeentereglement. Het is op die manier een instrument om op lokaal niveau een antwoord te bieden aan de problematiek van openbare overlast.
  Ontstaan[bewerken]Het systeem van gemeentelijke administratieve sancties wordt mogelijk gemaakt door de wet van 13 mei 1999.[1] Deze wet werd in minder dan twee maanden ingediend, besproken en goedgekeurd door het Parlement.[2] Met dit instrument is het de bedoeling dat de gemeenten de problematiek op een administratieve manier kunnen aanpakken.
  Het doel van de wet bestond er in het gevoel van straffeloosheid tegen te gaan voor bepaalde inbreuken en weinig ernstige gedragingen (die t"ch als overlast worden ervaren) niet langer strafrechtelijk te laten afhandelen, maar eerder door een administratieve sanctie.
  De wet heeft de Nieuwe Gemeentewet op drie onderdelen gewijzigd:
  Uitbreiding van de gemeentelijke bevoegdheden: waar er vroeger discussie was over het al dan niet bevoegd zijn van gemeenten op het vlak van openbare orde, wordt er nu formeel de bevoegdheid gegeven aan de gemeenten om op te treden in het kader van openbare overlast.Uitbreiding bevoegdheden van de burgemeester: in hoogdringende gevallen kan de burgemeester instellingen sluiten of hun vergunning schorsen. Bovendien kan hij een voor het publiek toegankelijke inrichting gedurende drie maanden sluiten wanneer de openbare orde rond deze inrichting verstoord wordt.Administratieve afhandeling: er werd een nieuw artikel 119bis toegevoegd dat de gemeenteraad toelaat om administratieve sancties (zie verder) te bepalen voor de inbreuken in zijn gemeentereglementen.Pas in 2001 verscheen er een omzendbrief[3] die enkele praktische zaken van de wet regelde. Mede hierdoor bleef de wet een dode letter.
  Hervormingen[bewerken]Deze wet werd in de loop van de jaren verscheidene malen gewijzigd.[4] In 2004 werden heel wat strafrechtelijke overtredingen gedepenaliseerd, waardoor de gemeenten de mogelijkheid kregen om deze overtredingen op te nemen in hun politiereglement en al dan niet te bestraffen met administratieve sancties. Bovendien werd er een aantal inbreuken geselecteerd die weliswaar strafbaar blijven, maar die ook in het gemeentereglement kunnen opgenomen worden. Het werd ook mogelijk om jongeren tussen 16 en 18 jaar te sanctioneren. Een andere wijziging introduceert de bemiddelingsprocedure: deze is verplicht voor de minderjarigen.
  In 2005 werd een reparatiewet gestemd en goedgekeurd die enkele hiaten en procedureproblemen moest oplossen. Later volgde nog een nieuwe verklarende omzendbrief.
  In het najaar van 2012 werd door de federale ministerraad, op aangeven van de Minister van Binnenlandse Zaken Jolle Milquet[5], beslist om de reglementering rond de gemeentelijke administratieve sancties te verstrengen: o.a. de minimumleeftijd zou verlaagd worden naar veertien jaar, de boetes zouden hoger zijn en meer ambtenaren zouden bevoegd worden.[6][7] Op 30 mei 2013 keurde de Kamer van Volksvertegenwoordigers het wetsontwerp ter verstrenging van de wet op de gemeentelijke administratieve sancties (GAS-wet) goed.[8][9] Daarin werden alle voornoemde maatregelen opgenomen.[10]
  De gemeenteraad kan een administratieve sanctie voorzien bij een inbreuk van haar gemeentelijk reglement.
  Bovendien laat de wet toe volgende misdrijven administratiefrechtelijk te sanctioneren:
  Inbreuk van eerste soortDeze inbreuken zijn uit het strafrecht gelicht;Kunnen vastgesteld worden door politieambtenaren en -agenten, bepaalde gemeentelijke ambtenaren en gemeenschapswachten, bepaalde ambtenaren van de vervoersmaatschappijen en bewakingsagenten (deze hebben enkel 'aangifte'-bevoegdheid).Gemengde inbreuken - Inbreuk van tweede (lichte) en derde soort (zware)Blijven wel ingeschreven in het Strafwetboek en blijven prioritair voor strafrechtelijke afhandeling, maar het parket kan deze dossiers doorspelen aan de gemeenteKunnen enkel vastgesteld worden door politieambtenaar of -agent.De gemeenteraad kan de volgende administratieve sancties bepalen:
  de administratieve geldboete, met een maximum van 250 EUR;de administratieve schorsing van een door de gemeente afgegeven toestemming of vergunning;de administratieve intrekking van een door de gemeente afgegeven toestemming of vergunning;de tijdelijke of definitieve administratieve sluiting van een inrichting.De boete waarvan sprake in 1° wordt opgelegd door de sanctionerende ambtenaar van de gemeente. Indien de overtreder (en in uitzonderlijke gevallen de sanctionerende ambtenaar) niet akkoord is, is beroep mogelijk bij de politierechtbank.Voor 2°, 3° en 4° is het College van Burgemeester en Schepenen die de beslissing nemen. Beroep tegen deze beslissing is enkel mogelijk bij de Raad van State.
  Ook minderjarigen vanaf 16 jaar kunnen een geldboete opgelegd krijgen. Voor hen is het bedrag echter beperkt tot maximaal 125 euro en er dient steeds een bemiddelingspoging aan vooraf te gaan. De jeugdrechtbank is in dit geval de bevoegde beroepsinstantie.
  Tegen de beslissing van de politie- of jeugdrechtbank is enkel nog cassatieberoep mogelijk.
  De gemeenten moeten een register bijhouden van de GAS-boetes die zij hebben opgelegd. Meerdere gemeenten kunnen dat samen doen. De gegevens mogen vijf jaar lang bewaard worden vanaf het moment van de sanctie.[11]
  Enkele voorbeelden van inbreuken die door GAS-boetes bestraft kunnen worden:
  Gemeentereglement[bewerken]Deze reglementen verschillen van gemeente tot gemeente.
  Reglementering betreffende openbare rust (grasmaaien, ijsventer, vuur maken,...) openbare veiligheid (honden aan leiband, werken die hinder veroorzaken,...) en openbare gezondheid (sluikstorten, wildplassen, voetpad sneeuwvrij houden,...)
  Strafrechtelijke inbreuken[bewerken]het spuiten van graffiti (artikel 534bis Sw)nachtlawaai (artikel 561/1 Sw)vandalisme (artikel 534ter Sw)lichte beledigingen of gewelddaden: vechtpartijtjes zonder gewonden, taartgooien,... (artikel 563/2 en 3 Sw)dragen van kleding die het gezicht bedekt (zoals boerka of nikab) (artikel 563bis Sw)Het systeem van de GAS-boetes heeft zijn voor- en tegenstanders. Het systeem laat toe kleine, lokale problemen kort op de bal aan te pakken.[12] Critici beweren dat er zo een wildgroei ontstaat van boetes, waarbij vooral bepaalde (jongeren)groepen zouden geviseerd worden. Het systeem leidt ook tot een versnippering aangezien elke gemeente het begrip 'overlast' anders invult. Een coherent strafbeleid voeren is op die manier niet mogelijk.[13]
  Fel bekritiseerd zijn bijvoorbeeld de boetes voor:
  heimelijk of zonder noodzaak kloppen of bellen aan de deuren of vensters van woningen (belletje trekken)het beoefenen van waarzeggerij[14]op de rug- en zijleuning van de openbare banken zittenin een openbaar zwembad met meer dan (C)(C)n van een waterglijbaan glijden of het glijden op de waterglijbaan onderbrekenhet maken van een open vuur in de woningVele jeugdorganisaties en jeugdraden zien dit als een bedreiging en komen hier tegen in het verweer. Ook Humo deed mee en lanceerde een terugbetaling van de absurdste GAS-boete. [15]Bronnen, noten en/of referenties'†‘Wet van 13 mei 1999 tot invoering van gemeentelijke administratieve sancties. Moet samengelezen worden met omzendbrief OOP 30 van 02 mei 2001 en OOP 30bis van 3 januari 2005'†‘Zie hiervoor de fiche op www.dekamer.be'†‘Ministerile omzendbrief OOP30 van 2 mei 2001 aangaande de uitvoering van de wet van 13 mei 1999 betreffende de invoering van de gemeentelijke administratieve sancties'†‘Wet van 7 mei en van 17 juni 2004 tot wijziging van de nieuwe gemeentewetWet van 20 juli 2005 houdende diverse bepalingenWet van 25 januari 2007 tot bestraffing van graffiti en van beschadiging van onroerende eigendommen en tot wijziging van de nieuwe gemeentewet.Wet van 15 mei 2007 tot instelling van de functie van gemeenschapswacht, tot instelling van de dienst gemeenschapswachten en tot wijziging van artikel 119bis van de nieuwe gemeentewet.Wet van 1 juni 2011 tot instelling van een verbod op het dragen van kleding die het gezicht volledig dan wel grotendeels verbergt.'†‘GAS-boetes fors uitgebreid'†‘Pascal Smet (2012): De beste GAS-boete is een vermeden GAS-boete'†‘Ministerraad keurt forse uitbreiding GAS-reglementering goed, Polinfo.be'†‘Kamer keurt verstrenging GAS-wet goed, De Standaard, 30 mei 2013.'†‘Kamer keurt strengere GAS-boetes goed: vanaf 14 jaar en tot 350 euro, knack.be, 6 juni 2013.'†‘Zie hiervoor de fiche op www.dekamer.be'†‘De GAS-wet van Milquet, Gazet van Antwerpen, 30 mei 2013'†‘Overlastboetes zijn geen pestboetes VVSG, 21 mei 2012'†‘'Gemeenten moeten niet voor rechter gaan spelen', Het Nieuwsblad, 26 mei 2012'†‘Waarzegger riskeert GAS-boete De Standaard, 22 november 2012'†‘Humo betaalt jouw gas-boete terug
Pandora Stops Internet Radio Fairness Act Legislation Efforts, To Focus on CRB (From the Magazine) | Billboard
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  Archived Version
  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 23:13
  Pandora has given up its efforts to seek legislation that would help reduce the royalties paid to rights holders, a source knowledgeable with the decision tells Billboard.
  Instead of pursuing legislation, Pandora will focus its efforts on lobby­ing the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB), the three-judge panel that sets statutory rates for webcasters like Pandora. The current rates run through 2015.
  Pandora didn't comment on the company's specific strategy for addressing royalties. ''Pandora will focus on other paths to resolution,'' a representative says. One path could be direct deals with labels, which Apple has secured for iTunes Radio. ''Direct deals are not something that we're allergic to,'' Pandora founder/chief strategy officer Tim Westergren told investors in September.
  Legislation to change webcasting royalties is dead without ­Pandora's support. Other companies and trade groups also backed the legislation, but Pandora was the primary force behind the Internet Radio Fairness Act. It hired a Washington, D.C., lobbying firm, and Westergren visited Capitol Hill to plead his case. At conferences, in the press and on its blog, Pandora was on the front lines of the public opinion battle. No one else is going to pick up where Pandora left off.
  IRFA opponents hail Pandora's decision. RIAA chairman/CEO Cary Sherman calls the demise of IRFA ''a historic moment'' for the music industry. A coalition of labels, managers, artists, unions and trade groups like SoundExchange and the RIAA fought vociferously against the legislation. The op-ed articles, public statements, advertisements, email blasts and social media efforts ''clearly moved the needle,'' Sherman says.
  Rights owners and artists were battling Pandora-supported legislation that would have ultimately lowered the statutory royalty rate for webcasters. The IRFA sought to change the standard by which the CRB sets statutory royalties for webcasters. Royalties for satellite and cable radio companies are established using what's called the 801(b) standard. Webcasters' rates are set using a ''willing buyer, willing seller'' standard that attempts to approximate an open-market negotiation between digital service and rights holder.
  Giving the 801(b) standard to webcasters was likely to have lowered Internet radio's statutory royalties. Royalties for satellite radio companies are currently 9% of royalties, and will rise by a half percentage point every year through 2017. Cable radio services' rate is 8% of gross revenue, and will increase to 8.5% from 2014 through 2017. Webcasters pay fixed, per-stream royalties. The current rate set by the CRB is 0.23 cents. The Webcaster Settlement Act of 2009 allows independent, pure-play webcasters like Pandora to pay 0.12 cents. (Pandora pays 0.22 cents for streams originating from subscribers to its subscription service, Pandora One.)
  There were signs earlier this year that Pandora had abandoned IRFA. In August, the musicFIRST coalition noticed the website for the pro-IRFA Internet Radio Fairness Coalition, an advocacy group launched in October 2012 by several Internet and broadcast companies, had been taken down. In addition, a source says Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), an IRFA co-sponsor, had clearly lost enthusiasm about the issue. And Pandora had been silent on the issue. When talking with investors about its royalties, the company referred only to the upcoming CRB rate proceedings.
  IRFA expired in January at the end of the 112th Congress, and some people believed Pandora would reintroduce the legislation with different language and a different title. The particular legislation introduced last year effectively died in November after a congressional hearing on Internet radio royalties turned into an assault on radio broadcasters over the lack of a performance royalty. ''It went so badly for them last time there was no smart way to reignite the war they lost,'' one insider says. ''[Pandora] went from having a halo to having horns.''
  The effort against IRFA may pay even more dividends. The broadcast radio performance right is still an important issue -- Rep. Mel Watt (D-N.C.) introduced legislation in September that would establish that right -- and could help Pandora regain favor within the artistic community.
  Additional reporting by Alex Pham.
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'GAS-boetes kunnen helpen bij beheer sociale netwerken' - De Standaard
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  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 23:08
  Enkele mensen die op een krantenwebsite commentaar hadden achtergelaten over de politie riskeren een GAS-boete van 250 euro. 'Die sociale netwerken moeten beter beheerd worden en GAS-boetes kunnen daarbij helpen', reageert de sanctionerende ambtenaar van de stad Verviers, Pierre Demolin, in DS Avond.
  De commentaren werden eind oktober op de site gezet, nadat tijdens een achtervolging in Verviers twee politievoertuigen in het decor waren beland. De brommer die ze achtervolgden, kon ontsnappen.
  'Het is toch gemakkelijker versperringen op te trekken, pv's uit te schrijven voor stommiteiten en vooral zich Lucky Luke te wanen door de slimmerik uit te hangen tegenover eerlijke burgers', schreef Zouber Bouasaam op de website van de krant La Meuse.
  Samen met vijf andere commentatoren kreeg hij een aangetekende brief van de sanctionerende ambtenaar van Verviers Pierre Demolin. Ze krijgen wellicht een GAS-boete van 205 euro. In DS Avond verdedigt Demolin zijn beslissing.
  'Ze hebben de politie beledigd en dat is strafbaar in Verviers', zegt hij. 'Ik heb het pv niet opgemaakt, dat doet de politie. Ik moet de feiten beoordelen en de straf bepalen.'
  Volgens de sanctionerende ambtenaar 'is een sociaal netwerk een openbare ruimte die is onderworpen aan het politiereglement' en overschreden de commentatoren een grens met 'beledigingen en oproepen tot haat'.
  Eerder had Demolin al aangegeven dat hij de boete kan verlagen op basis van aanvaarding van de fout of berouw.
VIDEO-'Information vampires' hoping to charge press outlets for publishing Snowden leaks '-- RT Op-Edge
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  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 18:07
  Beginning his working life in the aviation industry and trained by the BBC, Tony Gosling is a British land rights activist, historian & investigative radio journalist.
  Published time: December 03, 2013 04:19Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger (Reuters / Andrew Winning)
  Rather than working to correct the growing surveillance state lawmakers on both sides of the Atlantic are dragging their feet and exploring methods to crack down on the press, The Guardian in particular, journalist Tony Gosling told RT.
  Officials from the UK intelligence agency GCHQ raided the Guardian newspaper's London officers back in August in search of hardrives containing data leaked by former CIA employee Edward Snowden. Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger said the officials wanted the Guardian to destroy all the information from Snowden despite the fact the data had already been disseminated to different news organizations around the world.
  Rusbringer is set to give evidence to an MP committee investigating counter-terrorism activities on Tuesday. The Guardian's editor has criticized the UK government for its intimidation tactics and said the US and UK are making work increasingly difficult for journalists.
  RT:Authorities are convinced that The Guardian is damaging British national security, should they be allowed to get away with it just because they're journalists?
  Tony Gosling: Well they're not getting away with anything. What they're doing is informing the public on criminal activity done by our own intelligence services, GCHQ particularly, because other newspapers and people including the BBC in particular haven't been doing it over the past few years. They've come up with some fantastic quotes in the Guardian over the last couple of days to describe for example how the GCHQ and the NSA have risen without trace. What's happened is this massive security state has been created in this country without any approval by Parliament and by no approval even by MPs. What we've seen is a massive organization now being put together. What we've got now is a very strange situation isn't it? Intelligence services, even though they completely failed us on Iraq and in other ways, have risen in power. Their budgets after the Cold War are doubling and yet our own armed forces are being pared down. The danger of all this of course is that you've got information overload. They've got information on everybody, including our own military. So if someone opposes them from within Parliament or even senior officers within our own military they are able to character assassinate these people and take them down. They are becoming an extremely dangerous organization.
  RT:What about the newspaper itself The Guardian? It's still printing whatever it wants '' is it really being influenced in any way? Is it being scared off by what's happening?
  TG: Well, what we've had is legal threats. This is actually what is very chilling, at least it certainly can be on newspapers and it is. If lawyers are worried that newspapers will be given massive fines for telling the truth about these matters then this really ties up the paper and they will actually avoid doing those stories. The interest here is making sure the public realize just what an enormous intelligence gathering operation is being created here. Let's remember what they're doing. They're collecting our passwords for example, our bank passwords, and what I'd like to see in front of this committee is the people from GCHQ, the nameless anonymous spooks who have actually been breaking the law by hacking into our personal lives. I'd like to see them in front of the committee today.
  RT:Well you are raising all of these concerns which of course we know about being released to British newspapers, of course The Guardian, and yet Scotland Yard has said its looking into whether the newspaper has broken British law. If the paper refuses to yield just how far do you think the government could go? Would it attempt to close them down perhaps?
  TG: Well of course this accusation that they've broken the law is being thrown around willy-nilly over the last few months, ever since Edward Snowden came out with these revelations. This is absolute rubbish I'm afraid when in front of the Intelligence and Security Committee the bosses of MI5, MI6, and GCHQ were giving their evidence, we were asking them for any kind of evidence that there's been any kind of threat to national security and do you know what they said, 'Oh we can't tell you it's secret.' This is no real evidence they don't have any real evidence. They've been caught out acting criminally and they've got no proper oversight whatsoever of our intelligence services right now. We've got this chap Malcolm Rifkind who is supposedly looking into all of this but then he gives the intelligence services the questions he is going to ask them beforehand. I wonder is he giving Alan Rusbridger a full list of questions before he brings him out to ask him beforehand? I don't think he's playing fair this Rifkind and he's simply got to go. That's the only way we're going to get some oversight on the massive '' what I call information vampires '' at the heart of the British intelligence service and let's not forget they have grown massively since the Cold War. They've given us bogus information on Iraq etc. and we've got to have some proper oversight otherwise we're going down the George Orwell, Big Brother route.
  RT:Just how much is the British government being influenced by Washington?
  TG: Massively. We're getting massive payments as well from Washington. The National Security Agency and the GCHQ have also been caught putting spyware on half a million people's computers. This again is criminal illegal behavior and what they're doing rather than addressing this is actually digging in. They're saying 'no it's not happening' and they're massively in denial. What about some answers from the intelligence services about the death of the cryptographer, and there are other cryptographers that have died as well, Gareth Williams. They're trying to tell us that there was nothing to see there, this guy killed himself. He clearly didn't, he was the victim of a professional heist. These are the kind of answers we've got to see from these intelligence chiefs and its absolutely ridiculous to see the parliamentarians starting to interview the messenger. Shooting the messenger is what they're trying to do today and they're not going to succeed.
  RT:Just finally, concerning the messenger, couldn't the government going after the messenger '' in this case The Guardian '' actually be a good thing and bring attention to the struggles of people like you, journalists trying to do their job?
  TG: Well I think The Guardian has risen to the fight wonderfully. They've produced a massive supplement including quotes by the inventor of the internet Tim Berners-Lee where he says, 'get your hands off my baby.' What he's doing of course is drawing attention to the fact that much of what GCHQ and the NSA have been doing - after we've seen these Snowden revelations which many of us suspected beforehand but now we've got concrete proof '' is they're actually making the internet very difficult for people to use in any kind of confidential or private manner. That is extremely dangerous, that needs to be rolled back and the Parliament and British government have got to be doing that over the next few weeks otherwise there will be no privacy in this country. All the MPs and other people, police and et cetera, all their passwords will be hackable. That I am not prepared to accept and I don't think anyone here in Britain is prepared to accept us going down that route.
  The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
VIDEO- CBC spy spin | Lilley's Pad
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  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 18:06
  BRIAN LILLEY | QMI AGENCY
  OTTAWA '-- CBC's bombshell claim that the National Security Agency (NSA) spied on Canadian soil with the support of the Harper government was blown to bits Monday after the state broadcaster released its source documents.Last Wednesday, CBC's The National trumpeted a story of American spies targeting foreign leaders.
  ''Stephen Harper's government allowed the largest American spy agency to conduct widespread surveillance in Canada during the 2010 G8 and G20 summits,'' the headline on CBC's website read.
  The documents, released online Monday, don't support that claim and read more like a standard security briefing ahead of an international summit.
  Wesley Wark , a visiting professor at the University of Ottawa, said the claims made by the story and the words in the documents don't match.
  ''There was no support in the document for the claim originally made by the CBC that CSEC (the Communications Security Establishment Canada would lend its technical expertise to the NSA effort,'' Wark said.
  Security analyst David Harris of Insignis Strategic Research agreed with Wark that the documents don't support the claims CBC made in its original story.
  ''As smoking guns go this is the ultimate smokeless gun, there's no compelling evidence of any kind of CSEC collaboration with any imagined NSA plot to penetrate private discussions of visiting government leaders,'' Harris told QMI Agency.
  That's a far cry from the way CBC anchor Peter Mansbridge and reporter Greg Weston played the story last Wednesday evening on The National.
  ''The U.S. was monitoring the communications of world leaders while they were all in Toronto for the G20 summit and Canadian officials approved it,'' Mansbridge said as he introduced the story.
  Weston claimed on air that the spying operation was done, ''all with the blessing of the Canadian government.''
  ''Beyond the indication about 'co-ordination' with the Canadian partner there are no details about what CSEC or the Canadian government felt about this U.S. operation,'' Wark said.
  CBC obtained the documents from Glenn Greenwald the journalist, lawyer and former porn promoter who has been working with NSA leaker Edward Snowden. CBC paid Greenwald for access to the documents, a fact omitted from the broadcast of their original story.
  Harris called it strange that CBC partnered with someone like Greenwald, a person who calls for more open government, but initially refused to release the documents.
  ''For people pushing governments to be more honest and transparent, it certainly took a lot to get the documents out of them,'' Harris said.
  Categories: Politics
  Tags: Canada, CBC, nsa, spies
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White House Twitter Account Attempts to Enlist Help of '#WHYouth,' Intense Mockery Ensues | TheBlaze.com
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  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 17:48
  The Obama administration announced Monday that it would hold a special ''youth summit social'' on Dec. 4 for the ''people who engage'' the White House on social media.
  The White House also requested that participants ''spread the word'' by using the Twitter hashtag ''#WHYouth,'' prompting intense mockery and snickering from certain corners of the Internet.
  Apparently, some social media users felt that the White House's ''youth'' tag was just a tad '' creepy:
  We begin today's meeting of the #WHYouth by singing the "Chad Henderson Lied."#WHYouth. Because you want the State to have a direct influence on your children. Don't you?Perhaps #WHYouth should use as its slogan "Forward!" No other nefarious youth organization has ever used that slogan. Oh, wait.Dear @, please at least read Wikipedia history before you have ideas. So is the #WHYouth slogan "Arbeitslosigkeit macht frei" ?#WHYouth Not even this White House could be THAT dumb. They are probably trying to distract us from something else.The summit aims to educate young voters on the supposed benefits of enrolling in the Affordable Care Act.
  ''White House Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Google+ followers ages 18-35 are eligible to apply to attend this White House event on December 4,'' the White House said in a blog post. ''After you sign up, spread the word! Let your followers know that you applied to attend the #WHYouth social.''
  If they don't stop immediately, I'm going to have to report some of those mocking #WHYouth to both AttackWatch and TruthTeam.I love this idea that there's nothing inherently funny about #WHYouth or holiday healthcare talks, and only a ''hack'' would think there is.They didn't seriously call it #WHYouth did they? Is this some perverted form of Godwin's law where they do it for us?Between people mocking the ''#WHYouth'' hashtag and the intense criticism the GOP Twitter account received for praising Rosa Parks Sunday for ''ending racism,'' it looks like social media strategists on both sides of the aisle should take a break.
  ''
  Follow Becket Adams (@BecketAdams) on Twitter
  Featured image via whitehouse.gov
NYers charge guests to attend birthday bashes | New York Post
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  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 17:47
  When Natalia Kossman walked into EVR nightclub around 10 on a Friday night last month for a friend's 30th birthday bash, she was expecting a bouncer '-- but not one who shills for a charity.
  ''That will be $20, please,'' says James Lukban, 24, guarding a lockbox stuffed with $20 bills and a string of orange admission bracelets.
  Lukban was hired to collect cash at the door for the Lollipop Theater Network, which screens current movies to hospitalized children.
  Kossman, 30, forked over $80 total for four friends before going inside for film producer Jonathan Shukat's birthday party-cum-fund-raiser.
  Olya Volk hands a twenty to James Lukban to attend Jonathan Shukat's charity birthday bash. The evening included a vodka open bar for a portion of the evening. But not everyone is a fan of the growing trend of paying to party, which can lead to awkward social situations.Photo: Rahav Segev
  ''I know it helps kids,'' she says, with a shrug.
  Her Russian friend Olya Volk is bewildered. ''We don't pay for birthday parties in Russia,'' she says.
  With a free open vodka bar for a portion of the night courtesy of EVR, and friend DJ Phresh spinning pro bono, Shukat still netted $1,500 for Lolliop '-- after spending a few hundred dollars for out-of-pocket incidentals from the evening's proceeds.
  Inside, Shukat addresses his friends and supporters from a podium. He thanks the crowd for their support '-- but not before reminding them about the raffle: ''It's only $2 a ticket, guys, for all this swag!'' he says.
  ''Keep it up and give a lot of money,'' adds his mom Evelyn from the DJ booth.
  ''Tonight is Jonathan's 30th birthday!''
  Forget party hats and a glass of champagne '-- more altruistic New Yorkers are insisting on throwing birthday bashes with mandatory charity donations.
  Last month at his 39th birthday bash, actor Leonardo DiCaprio raised a cool $3 million for his namesake charity, the Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation, which supports environmental causes, including saving the sharks. In October, ''Wolverine'' star Hugh Jackman netted $1.85 million for the Motion Picture & Television Fund for his 45th birthday at Hollywood's Dolby Theatre. And designer Rachel Roy cashed in on the birthday charity bandwagon, raising north of $20,000 for Charity Water for her 39th birthday earlier this year.
  But the trend isn't limited to celebrities, socialites and their deep-pocketed friends. Workaday New Yorkers are now expected to shell out to celebrate '-- or risk being branded a Scrooge.
  Last year, Kossman's boyfriend Daniel Green held his 34th birthday party at Bryant Park Hotel, also raising money for Lollipop.
  A typical birthday party invite now asks guests to pay for food and drink '-- and donate to charity.
  Were there any complaints?
  ''There will always be cheapskates,'' concedes Green, who notes that some of his guests balked at shelling out $20 bucks to attend his birthday fund-raiser.
  ''If they don't cough up the money, it's more about them. When you're talking about terminally ill children, it says more about your character.''
  Not so, insist some put-upon party guests.
  ''I've probably been invited to five birthday party fund-raisers in the last six months,'' says Josh, a 30-year-old entrepreneur from Murray Hill, who asked that his last name not be used for fear of looking stingy.
  ''One was for cancer because his grandpa died of cancer. You can't say no to that! It was $75. It's the obligation: 'You're not my friend unless you do this.''‰''
  When a longtime friend held her philanthropic fªte this summer to save the puppies '-- with a hundred dollar mandatory donation '-- he griped, but still gave: ''The societal pressure forces you to get on board because it's considered a good cause. It would be such a faux pas to say no to it '-- you don't want to be the one guy who doesn't save the puppies. I know everyone thinks it, but no one wants to be perceived as cheap.''
  Etiquette experts say the arrangement, however well-intentioned, can be fraught with peril.
  ''I don't think you should hitch your birthday to your charitable cause,'' says author Henry Alford. ''It seems a little crass to me, regardless of that charitable aspect. Your birthday and your cause should be honored separately: What if your friends don't share your interest in anti-fracking measures or transgendered rights? Do you really want to test your friendship's parameters like that?
  Leonardo DiCaprio's 39th birthday last month also doubled as a fundraiser for his charity.
  Rachel Roy collected funds for clean water in lieu of dinner and gifts.
  Adds Daniel Post Senning, great-great-grandson of Emily Post and spokesperson at the Emily Post Institute: ''You have to be understanding of people who don't want to come and be accepting if they don't want to spend the money or back a particular charity. As a guest, you don't have to feel bad about not attending '-- if you can't afford it, it's a reasonable decision to make.''
  But despite the potential for awkwardness, the trend is growing.
  ''Everyone now has that party-for-a-purpose mentality. Third-party fund-raising is huge,'' says Carli Roth, co-founder of Host Committee, who just celebrated her own 28th birthday bash by raising $2,500 for the Building Blocks charity last weekend in the Meatpacking District.
  Roth estimates that 25 percent of Host Committee's business '-- a 2012 startup that acts as a third-party fund-raiser and party-planning service '-- are charity birthdays. The first $20 of each ticket goes back to Host Committee for the cost of the event, with a guaranteed open bar for the first hour of the party.
  ''People can raise between $2,000 and $5,000 at their birthday party '-- it's a big feeling of achievement,'' says Roth.
  And while some put no limits on the amount they'll try to raise for a favorite charity, other hosts try to keep people's bank accounts in mind.
  ''I'm sensitive to people's financial situation '-- that's why we had a $20 flash sale that I sent out to all my girlfriends,'' says real estate sales executive Katie Thiele of her 30th birthday blowout, which raised money for prostate cancer. ''All I'm asking is for people to donate to my charity '-- this is all the present this 30-year-old needs.''
  Mandatory tickets to her birthday bash last month at 55 Gansevoort cost $45 at the door.
  Birthday boy Jonathan Shukat raised $1,500 for charity at his 30th birthday party last month at EVR nightclub.Photo: Rahav Segev
  So do friends mind paying to party with the birthday girl?
  ''They're in the giving mindset,'' she insists.
  ''It's just a part of living in New York '-- to spend a little money to gain the best experiences out there. New York is such a monster '-- it loves fund-raisers and parties, and this is my way of doing what I can to raise awareness.''
  But it was Alana Tendler who really cleaned up this year for her 26th birthday last month at a Highline Ballroom bash, replete with a Billy Joel tribute band and kosher Korean barbecue.
  ''I raised $5,000 for my birthday,'' says Tendler, who is supporting JICNY, which fosters Jewish identity among young internationals. She recently became the organization's executive director.
  Her e-mail to 100 friends was simple, but direct: ''I said, 'I have every single thing I need '-- I don't want dinners or presents. All I want is for you to support JICNY, which is to support me.''‰''
  Even with the steep $150 ticket price for JICNY's annual gala, Tendler's friends who couldn't attend came through with donations for as little as $10.
  ''I didn't expect everyone to come '-- it's expensive and that's not how everyone wants to spend their time and money. I had a certain goal '-- and we doubled that.''
  But even the broke friends can still win brownie points: ''One friend was having a financial struggle, and she said, 'I love you and support you in every way. I'm in no position to donate to the cause right now.' But she was so supportive in terms of emotional support,'' says Tendler.
  Too bad emotional support doesn't get you past the velvet rope.
Zucker plans massive change at CNN | Capital New York
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 17:47
  After almost a year of tinkering, CNN Worldwide President Jeff Zucker has concluded that a news channel cannot subsist on news alone.
  So he is planning much broader changes for the network'--including a prime-time shakeup that's likely to make CNN traditionalists cringe.
  Once, CNN's vanilla coverage was a point of pride. Now, the boss boasts about the ratings for his unscripted series, and documentaries like the Sea World-slamming film Blackfish. Zucker, in his first one-on-one interview since taking control of CNN last January, told Capital he wants news coverage ''that is just not being so obvious.''
  Instead, he wants more of ''an attitude and a take'':
  MORE ON CAPITALADVERTISEMENT''We're all regurgitating the same information. I want people to say, 'You know what? That was interesting. I hadn't thought of that,''' Zucker said. ''The goal for the next six months, is that we need more shows and less newscasts.''
  Zucker'--''rhymes with hooker,'' he likes to say'--also expanded on comments he has made about breaking CNN out of a mindset created by historic rivalries with MSNBC and Fox. He wants the network to attract ''viewers who are watching places like Discovery and History and Nat Geo and A&E.''
  ''People who traditionally just watch the cable news networks [are] a great audience,'' he said. ''I'm not trying to alienate that audience. But the overall cable news audience has not grown in the last 12 years, OK? So, all we're doing is trading [audience] share. '... We also want to broaden what people can expect from CNN.''
  The 48-year-old Zucker initially faced internal resistance to his experiments beyond the realm of hard news, but he now has an irrefutable retort: The No. 1 show on CNN is now ''Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown,'' a travel-adventure show featuring the bad-boy celebrity chef. Zucker said that inside CNN, his formula has finally been accepted ''because people have seen the results.''
  Zucker is ramping up changes across the massive organization, some subtle and some extreme.
  More series and films untethered to the news and produced by outside production companies will get runs in primetime: ''Yes, there will be more and, yes, they will not just be on Sundays'...," he said. "I think it will expand past just the weekends, and so there's a little piece of news for you'... This is a primetime play. It's too expensive to confine it to weekends.''
  Among the prime-time possibilities he is considering at CNN: half-hour shows, perhaps including one for Bill Weir, recently hired from ABC.
  ''Honestly, there is not a piece of paper that has the lineup on it right now,'' he said.
  HLN''the former Headline News''will be ''rethought, reimagined, and rebranded'' to get away from the wall-to-wall courthouse coverage that earned HLN massive viewership during big events like the Jodi Arias and George Zimmerman trials. HLN ''really just had a great year from an audience standpoint,'' he said, but: "it's not as strong a business proposition, and it's not really what advertisers are looking for. If we wanted to be in the court business, Time Warner would have kept Court TV.''
  He tapped veteran TV executive Albie Hecht to lead the changes at HLN.
  ''His mandate is to figure out the white space for yet another cable news network in a world where headlines are ubiquitous on whatever mobile device you choose to use,'' Zucker said.
  Zucker said he is in the middle of ''reinvigorating'' CNN International with more news and more news programs, to replace sponsored content.
  Zucker leads each day's 9 a.m. editorial call '' a duty his predecessor, Jim Walton, delegated. After an embarrassing on-air mistake the day of the Boston Marathon bombing, Zucker has made a point of preaching caution over speed in the channel's breaking-news reporting.
  WITH A SMALL OFFICE IN CNN'S FIFTH-FLOOR newsroom, Zucker is far removed from the executive suites on the upper levels of the Time Warner Center. The room is small and sparse for an office of someone at his level. Except for a ''CNN Miami'' hat'--a token from his childhood in South Florida'--and some stacks of papers, a few trinkets and a gift bag filled with CNN swag, the room is mostly empty.
  But there are 11 TV screens lining the walls of his office. One of them used to be tuned to CNBC but has since gotten the boot, replaced by CNN.com. It's a small sign of his increasing mandate to focus on digital news.
  For months, he has been working on combining ''our legacy television newsroom and our digital newsroom.''
  ''This weekend, we had more people learn about [Fast & Furious actor] Paul Walker's death from our mobile products than from our desktop products, which was the first time that something like that had happened,'' Zucker said.
  For now, the cable channel brings in the money. But increasing resources and mindshare are going to other platforms.
  ''Television is still our bread and butter today, but digital will continue to be more important every day going forward,'' he said. ''The majority of our time is still spent on television, but much more'--an increasing amount every day'--is spent on digital.''
  To that end, Zucker said, CNN is developing ''a suite of new products'' that will provide dual-screen experiences for cable subscribers.
  ''There's a reorientation of the organization that we're in the process of: understanding the importance going forward of digital and, in particular, mobile and video,'' he said. ''Are the revenues there, the way we want them today to be? No. But are they growing? Yes.''
  New hires'--including Brian Stelter from The New York Times, hired last month to cover media and host CNN's weekly ''Reliable Sources'''--are being brought in for roles that ''are as much digital as they are television,'' Zucker said.
  ''We're in the video game already,'' he said. ''So shifting video to a different screen is much easier for us than an organization that is a legacy print organization.''
  ''In five years,'' Zucker continued, ''mobile video consumption with three little red letters called CNN is what the future looks like. I think that there are three incredible brands in the news and information space. I think ESPN owns sports, I think the Weather Channel owns weather, and I want CNN to own news and information in the global digital video space."
  MORE:Author: Mike Allen and Alex Weprinfollow this reporter
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VIDEO-Americans Want Congress Members To Pee In Cups To Prove They're Not On Drugs
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 17:40
  WASHINGTON -- While most Americans like the idea of drug testing for welfare recipients, they LOVE the idea of drug testing for members of Congress.
  According to a new HuffPost/YouGov poll, 64 percent of Americans favor requiring welfare recipients to submit to random drug testing -- a measure pushed by Republican lawmakers in recent years -- while 18 percent oppose it. But an even stronger majority said they're in favor of random drug testing for members of Congress, by a 78 percent to 7 percent margin. Sixty-two percent said they "strongly" favor drug testing for congressional lawmakers, compared to only 51 percent who said the same of welfare recipients.
  The House of Representatives passed legislation this year that would allow states to require food stamp recipients to pee in cups to prove they're not on drugs. In 2012, Republicans pushed for drug testing of people seeking unemployment insurance benefits when they lose their jobs. At the state level, GOP lawmakers across the country have sought drug testing for an array of safety net programs. (Politicians sometimes refer to means-tested government benefits in general as "welfare," although the term is more commonly a nickname for the relatively small Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program.)
  Democrats have frequently suggested that if drug tests are good for people getting a hand from the government, then they're good for people running the government, too. Republicans usually don't go along with that idea -- the Kansas state legislature is one recent exception -- but voters heartily approve.
  While drug testing for both welfare recipients and lawmakers received support across party lines in the new poll, the congressional proposal was the one more likely to bring Americans together. Eighty-six percent of Republicans, 77 percent of Democrats and 75 percent of independents said they want drug testing for members of Congress.
  Republicans felt especially strongly about drug testing of welfare recipients, with 87 percent favoring it and only 9 percent opposed. Among Democrats, 50 percent favored and 28 percent opposed drug testing of welfare recipients, while independents were in favor by a 64 percent to 16 percent margin.
  If a member of Congress is caught using illegal drugs, as Rep. Trey Radel (R-Fla.) was in late October, Americans expressed little inclination to show mercy. Sixty-six percent said that a member of Congress convicted of possessing a small amount of cocaine should be forced to resign, while only 14 percent favored allowing the convicted member to serve out the remainder of his or her term.
  Americans consider drug testing to be a no-brainer under a variety of circumstances, according to the survey. Seventy-two percent said they support random drug testing for members of the military, and 87 percent supported it for airline pilots. Seventy-one percent said they support random drug testing for professional athletes.
  The HuffPost/YouGov poll was conducted Nov. 25-27 among 1,000 U.S. adults using a sample selected from YouGov's opt-in online panel to match the demographics and other characteristics of the adult U.S. population. Factors considered include age, race, gender, education, employment, income, marital status, number of children, voter registration, time and location of Internet access, interest in politics, religion and church attendance.
  The Huffington Post has teamed up with YouGov to conduct daily opinion polls. You can learn more about this project and take part in YouGov's nationally representative opinion polling.
  Also on HuffPost:
Spartanburg Co. Man Charged After Mac & Cheese Fight With Dad - WSPA
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 17:39
  Woman robbed, kidnapped after Black Friday shopping at SC Wal MartWoman robbed, kidnapped after Black Friday shopping at SC Wal MartUpdated:Monday, December 2 2013 2:20 PM EST2013-12-02 19:20:09 GMT
  SUMMERVILLE, SC - Shortly before 10 PM Friday, North Charleston Police responded to a Walmart parking lot at 9880 Dorchester Rd. According to police, the victim stated that she was getting inside her
  SUMMERVILLE, SC - Shortly before 10 PM Friday, North Charleston Police responded to a Walmart parking lot at 9880 Dorchester Rd. According to police, the victim stated that she was getting inside her
  Elf On The Shelf: Show Us Your Elf's Hiding Place Each DayElf On The Shelf: Show Us Your Elf's Hiding Place Each DayEvery December, more and more families are participating in Elf on the Shelf, a hide-and-seek game where kids wake up each morning and the elf is in a different spot.
  Every December, more and more families are participating in Elf on the Shelf, a hide-and-seek game where kids wake up each morning and the elf is in a different spot.
  Spartanburg Co. Man Charged After Mac & Cheese Fight With DadSpartanburg Co. Man Charged After Mac & Cheese Fight With DadUpdated:Monday, December 2 2013 12:20 PM EST2013-12-02 17:20:39 GMT
  Spartanburg County Deputies say a fight over macaroni and cheese landed a man in jail, charged with assault.
  Spartanburg County Deputies say a fight over macaroni and cheese landed a man in jail, charged with assault.
  North Carolina Man Crashes Car Into Ice Skating RinkNorth Carolina Man Crashes Car Into Ice Skating RinkUpdated:Monday, December 2 2013 8:53 PM EST2013-12-03 01:53:55 GMT
  Police have arrested a North Carolina man following a chase that ended when he crashed his car into a skating rink Sunday evening. Benjamin Tanner Watts is charged with fleeing to elude arrest with a motor vehicle, driving while impaired, reckless driving, resisting a public officer and injury to real property.
  Police have arrested a North Carolina man following a chase that ended when he crashed his car into a skating rink Sunday evening. Benjamin Tanner Watts is charged with fleeing to elude arrest with a motor vehicle, driving while impaired, reckless driving, resisting a public officer and injury to real property.
  Amazon Packages Could Be Delivered By Drones In The UpstateAmazon Packages Could Be Delivered By Drones In The UpstateUpdated:Monday, December 2 2013 5:22 PM EST2013-12-02 22:22:21 GMT
  Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos announced on Sunday that his company is testing an idea to deliver packages using a drone, an option that could be available to consumers in the Upstate.
  Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos announced on Sunday that his company is testing an idea to deliver packages using a drone, an option that could be available to consumers in the Upstate.
  Seneca Teen Dies After Chase, Crash On Highway 24Seneca Teen Dies After Chase, Crash On Highway 24Updated:Saturday, November 30 2013 4:13 PM EST2013-11-30 21:13:56 GMT
  Jesse Logan Hannah, 14, was pronounced dead a little over an hour after the accident on Highway 24 early Friday morning. Troopers say he was driving a car that didn't stop for a police officer. Two other teenagers were injured in the crash.
  Jesse Logan Hannah, 14, was pronounced dead a little over an hour after the accident on Highway 24 early Friday morning. Troopers say he was driving a car that didn't stop for a police officer. Two other teenagers were injured in the crash.
Kurds' Oil Deals With Turkey Raise Fears of Fissures in Iraq - NYTimes.com
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 17:37
  ISTANBUL '-- The sharp, dry mountains that run between Turkey and Iraq have long marked a front line in the battle between the Turkish government and Kurdish separatists where cross-border attacks took many lives on both sides.
  Though a rapprochement has calmed the border, the United States fears stability may now be in even greater danger. The problem is not war '-- but commerce. Iraqi Kurds are selling oil and natural gas directly to Turkey, infuriating Washington and the central government in Baghdad, which fear that oil independence could lead Kurds to declare a broad independence and the fracturing of the nation.
  Even as sectarian killing is again spiking across Iraq, and the Syrian civil war destabilizes the region, American officials in Baghdad say the flow of oil to Turkey may be the greatest potential risk to Iraq's cohesion.
  But a year-and-a-half-long diplomatic drive by the United States to stop the flow has so far failed, reflecting Washington's diminished influence in the region, even with its two longtime allies. Not only will trucks continue to travel daily from the Kurdish region to two Turkish cities on the Mediterranean coast, and not only will the Kurds continue to deliver oil via a pipeline to Turkey, but the parties plan to build a second pipeline, whose details have been kept secret.
  The Iraqi Kurds run their own relatively prosperous region.
  The New York Times
  ''The Kurdistan deal with Turkey is a huge violation against the Iraqi Constitution because they didn't make the deal with the coordination of the central government,'' said Ali Dhari, the deputy chairman of the Iraqi Parliament's oil and gas committee. ''This means the stealing of the Iraqi wealth, and we will not allow it.''
  The oil accords with Turkey, potentially worth billions of dollars, are part of a broader effort by Iraqi Kurds in recent years to cut their own energy deals '-- including exploration agreements with foreign companies like Exxon Mobil, Chevron and Gazprom '-- that sidelined the central government. The Kurds, and the Turks, say they will pay Baghdad its fair share. But officials in the capital have long claimed such arrangements are illegal.
  The controversy is in part the unfinished business of the American occupation of Iraq. The failure of the Iraqi government to pass a national oil law, one of the benchmarks set by President George W. Bush when he announced the United States troop ''surge'' in 2007, has left Baghdad and Erbil, the Kurdish capital, in a perpetual feud over how to divide profits and who has the authority to make agreements with international oil companies.
  Qasim Mishkhati, a Kurdish member of Parliament's oil and gas committee, insisted that the wealth from the deals would be shared with the rest of Iraq, and that it was the responsibility of the regional government in the north to find international markets for its oil resources. ''Kurdistan is working to increase the national income so that all Iraqis can enjoy better services and more wealth,'' he said.
  Oil tankers in Erbil. Iraqi Kurds are selling oil and natural gas directly to Turkey, angering Washington and Baghdad
  Khaled Hasan for The New York Times
  Although the mechanism for such payments has not been worked out, the Turks and the Kurds have indicated that they would adhere to the existing proportions for the division of national revenue, meaning Baghdad would receive 83 percent of the net profit and the Kurds would keep 17 percent.
  But the alarm in Baghdad and Washington has grown with these oil deals, which appear to be part of a slow, long-term strategy by the Iraqi Kurds to pursue a path of increasing autonomy that experts say has one endgame: an independent Kurdish state.
  Tens of millions of Kurds live in Iraq, Syria, Turkey and Iran, and they have long held ambitions for independence that for decades were thwarted. Now, amid the turmoil of the Middle East, Kurdish leaders are taking decisive steps to advance that dream, not just in Iraq, but also in Syria, where Kurdish factions recently declared an autonomous administration in the northeast.
  The Iraqi Kurds run their own autonomous and relatively prosperous region in northern Iraq, control their own ports of entry, field their own army and intelligence service and conduct their own foreign policy. The Kurdish region also has separate visa rules, so an American, for instance, might wait weeks or months to secure a visa to Baghdad, but could buy one at the airport in Erbil. The region has also served as a safe haven for Sunni officials looking to escape the reach of the Shiite-led government, including former Vice President Tariq al-Hashimi, accused in 2011 of terrorism.
  But the oil deals also highlight the drastic reshaping of regional alliances in the past few years. In 2003 Turkey, worried that the American invasion of Iraq would promote Kurdish independence, forbade American troops to use its territory to enter Iraq.
  But now Turkey is in the process of making peace with its own Kurds, who have waged a three-decade insurgency against the Turkish state with bases in Iraq. In a region where Turkey has few allies these days, the Iraqi Kurds have become close partners.
  For Turkey, though, the energy deals with Iraqi Kurdistan, which include oil and natural gas, underscore a persistent national challenge to secure reliable supplies of energy for its economy. Turkey boasts the Middle East's largest economy but has few domestic energy sources. It has historically relied on two countries for the bulk of its energy '-- Russia and Iran '-- and a national priority for Turkey has been to diversify its sources of oil and gas.
  The only place in the world where demand for energy is growing faster than Turkey is in China, and the only people who pay more for gasoline at the pump than Turks are Norwegians. In Turkey it can cost more than $120 to fill the tank of a compact car because of high taxes the government has levied in an effort to keep demand down
  While Turkey and the Iraqi Kurdish regional government have slowly expanded their relationship in the past few years, they have recently agreed to something ambitious and broader: a multibillion-dollar pact that includes the building of the second pipeline, according to press reports and oil executives involved in the negotiations.
  That deal comes as Turkish and Iraqi government officials have recently sought to mend ties that had soured in recent years, an effort that included a visit to Baghdad on Sunday by Turkey's energy minister, who indicated Turkey would try to win Baghdad's support for the deals with the Kurds. Turkey had supported the Sunni Muslim opposition in Iraq, angering the Shiite leadership that dominates the government in Baghdad.
  ''There has been a rapprochement between Ankara and Baghdad, but what I see in the energy policy of Turkey relating to Kurdistan still seems to be a fly in the ointment for the Ministry of Oil in Baghdad,'' said Badr H. Jafar, the chairman of the Pearl Petroleum consortium, the largest private oil and gas investor in Iraqi Kurdistan.
  The recent steps taken to improve the relationship between Turkey and Iraq '-- a reconciliation pushed by the Americans '-- now seem to be the best bet, analysts said, to achieve an agreement on an elusive national oil law to divide the country's vast petroleum profits.
  The Iraqi Kurdish leadership ''is positioning itself for greater autonomy in negotiations with Baghdad, but as relations between Ankara and Baghdad continue to warm it is inconceivable that the K.R.G. will be allowed to export to Turkey without Baghdad's consent,'' said David L. Goldwyn, the State Department's coordinator for international energy affairs during the first term of the Obama administration, referring to the initials for the Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq.
  Turkey, though, has said it will ensure that the government in Baghdad will be paid for any oil it imports from Kurdistan in accordance with Iraq's revenue-sharing arrangement.
  ''If done correctly, these deals have the potential to generate huge revenues for Iraq, distributed by the Iraqi government in accordance with the Iraqi Constitution and for the ultimate benefit of the Iraqi people, including of course, the Kurdish region,'' Mr. Jafar said.
  Tim Arango reported from Istanbul, and Clifford Krauss from Houston. Duraid Adnan contributed reporting from Baghdad, and Sebnem Arsu from Istanbul.
  Correction: December 3, 2013
  An earlier version of the caption with the photograph of the oil well in Kirkuk misstated the city's location. It is in a contested area of northern Iraq, not inside Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region.
VIDEO-BBC News - RF Safe-Stop shuts down car engines with radio pulse
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  Archived Version
  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 17:33
  3 December 2013Last updated at 08:11 ET By Chris VallanceBBC Radio 4, PM Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play.
  Andy Bennett, of E2V, shows how the device works at Throckmorton Airfield, in Worcestershire
  A British company has demonstrated a prototype device capable of stopping cars and other vehicles using a blast of electromagnetic waves.
  The RF Safe-Stop uses radio frequency pulses to "confuse" a vehicle's electronic systems, cutting its engine.
  E2V is one of several companies trying to bring such a product to market.
  It said it believed the primary use would be as a non-lethal weapon for the military to defend sensitive locations from vehicles refusing to stop.
  There has also been police interest.
  The BBC was given a demonstration of the device at Throckmorton Airfield, in Worcestershire.
  Deputy Chief Constable Andy Holt, of the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo), who has evaluated the tech, said the machine had "potential, but it's very early days yet".
  Radio pulseAt one end of a disused runway, E2V assembled a varied collection of second-hand cars and motorbikes in order to test the prototype against a range of vehicles.
  In demonstrations seen by the BBC a car drove towards the device at about 15mph (24km/h).
  As the vehicle entered the range of the RF Safe-stop, its dashboard warning lights and dials behaved erratically, the engine stopped and the car rolled gently to a halt. Digital audio and video recording devices in the vehicle were also affected.
  "It's a small radar transmitter," said Andy Wood, product manager for the machine.
  "The RF [radio frequency] is pulsed from the unit just as it would be in radar, it couples into the wiring in the car and that disrupts and confuses the electronics in the car causing the engine to stall."
  He did not provide other specifics. However, the Engineer magazine has reported the device uses L- and S-band radio frequencies, and works at a range of up to 50m (164ft).
  Some experts the BBC has spoken with suggested that turning off the engine in this manner would not stop vehicles rapidly enough. Others worried about what effect it might have on a car's electronic brake and steering systems.
  But E2V said the risks were lower than with alternative systems.
  Acpo suggested the machine's ability to stop motorbikes "safely" could prove particularly useful.
  Mr Holt noted that the tyre deflation devices used by some police forces posed the risk of causing "serious injury" if used against two-wheelers.
  E2V added that its device could also be effective against other types of vehicles, including boats.
  But because the device works on electronic systems, he acknowledged that it would not work on all older vehicles.
  "Certainly if you took a 1960s Land Rover, there's a good chance you're not going to stop it," Mr Wood said.
  The firm added that it did not believe the RF Safe-Stop posed any risk to people using a pacemaker.
  Listeners in the UK can hear more about the device on BBC Radio 4's PM programme between 17:00 and 18:00 on Tuesday.
Porsche Carrera GT: 5 reasons the car Paul Walker died in is different - CNN.com
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 17:32
  By Holly Yan and Martin Savidge, CNN
  updated 9:59 AM EST, Tue December 3, 2013
  STORY HIGHLIGHTS
  The 2005 Porsche Carrera GT goes up to 208 mph and has more than 600 horsepower"It was beyond a super car. It is what we call a hyper car," a Car and Driver editor saysThe car costs $450,000 new, and an oil change alone costs $900(CNN) -- It has three times the horsepower of the average car. It's notoriously difficult to handle, even for professional drivers. And now, it's known as the car actor Paul Walker was riding in when he died.
  Both Walker and his driving team partner, who was behind the wheel, died after the 2005 Porsche Carrera GT they were in slammed into a pole and burst into flames. Los Angeles County authorities say speed was a factor in the crash and are investigating how fast the exotic car was going.
  So why is the 2005 Porsche Carrera GT so different from other street cars? Here are five reasons:
  1)It flies on the road
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  HIDE CAPTION
  The sports car has a top speed of 208 mph, a very high-revving V10 engine and more than 600 horsepower, said Eddie Alterman, editor-in-chief of Car and Driver magazine.
  Police rule out 2nd vehicle in Walker crash
  "This was not a car for novices," Alterman said. "Actually, the Carrera GT program began as a racing program."
  Todd Trimble, an exotic car mechanic in Las Vegas, said the Carrera GT is a "very hard car to drive."
  "It's (a) pure racer's car. You really need to know what you're doing when you drive them. And a lot of people are learning the hard way."
  5 things to know about Roger Rodas, who died with Paul Walker
  2)It's incredibly expensive
  Brand new, the car costs $450,000.
  An oil change alone costs $900, Trimble said.
  3)The engine is in the middle
  Having the engine in the middle of the car means it's more agile and turns more quickly than a car with the engine in the front or in the rear.
  The Carrera GT is able to change direction "very quickly, very much like a race car," Alterman said.
  "It was beyond a super car. It is what we call a hyper car."
  4)It has no stability control
  The Carrera GT is also unusual because it has no electronic stability control. That means it's unforgiving with mistakes.
  "Stability control is really good at correcting slides, keeping the car from getting out of shape," race car driver Randy Pobst said.
  Pobst coached the actors in the second "Fast & Furious" movie -- including Paul Walker.
  "Paul was by far the best driver -- a natural car guy," he said.
  Alterman said learning to drive a car like a Carrera GT can be extremely tricky.
  "Every car is sort of different. And this one, especially since it had such a hair-trigger throttle, because it changed directions so quickly, there is a lot to learn."
  5) There are only 1,300 of them
  Porsche made only about 1,300 Carreras GTs -- and they're disappearing fast.
  "They're getting rarer and rarer," Trimble said. "Most of the time, when they do get wrecked, there's not much left of them."
  Walker and other stars who died during production
  CNN's Sarah Aarthun contributed to this report.
When Algorithms Grow Accustomed to Your Face - NYTimes.com
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 17:27
  People often reveal their private emotions in tiny, fleeting facial expressions, visible only to a best friend '-- or to a skilled poker player. Now, computer software is using frame-by-frame video analysis to read subtle muscular changes that flash across our faces in milliseconds, signaling emotions like happiness, sadness and disgust.
  With face-reading software, a computer's webcam might spot the confused expression of an online student and provide extra tutoring. Or computer-based games with built-in cameras could register how people are reacting to each move in the game and ramp up the pace if they seem bored.
  But the rapidly developing technology is far from infallible, and it raises many questions about privacy and surveillance.
  Ever since Darwin, scientists have systematically analyzed facial expressions, finding that many of them are universal. Humans are remarkably consistent in the way their noses wrinkle, say, or their eyebrows move as they experience certain emotions. People can be trained to note tiny changes in facial muscles, learning to distinguish common expressions by studying photographs and video. Now computers can be programmed to make those distinctions, too.
  Companies in this field include Affectiva, based in Waltham, Mass., and Emotient, based in San Diego. Affectiva used webcams over two and a half years to accumulate and classify about 1.5 billion emotional reactions from people who gave permission to be recorded as they watched streaming video, said Rana el-Kaliouby, the company's co-founder and chief science officer. These recordings served as a database to create the company's face-reading software, which it will offer to mobile software developers starting in mid-January.
  The company strongly believes that people should give their consent to be filmed, and it will approve and control all of the apps that emerge from its algorithms, Dr. Kaliouby said.
  Face-reading technology may one day be paired with programs that have complementary ways of recognizing emotion, such as software that analyzes people's voices, said Paul Saffo, a technology forecaster. If computers reach the point where they can combine facial coding, voice sensing, gesture tracking and gaze tracking, he said, a less stilted way of interacting with machines will ensue.
  For some, this type of technology raises an Orwellian specter. And Affectiva is aware that its face-reading software could stir privacy concerns. But Dr. Kaliouby said that none of the coming apps using its software could record video of people's faces.
  ''The software uses its algorithms to read your expressions,'' she said, ''but it doesn't store the frames.''
  So far, the company's algorithms have been used mainly to monitor people's expressions as a way to test ads, movie trailers and television shows in advance. (It is much cheaper to use a program to analyze faces than to hire people who have been trained in face-reading.)
  Affectiva's clients include Unilever, Mars and Coca-Cola. The advertising research agency Millward Brown says it has used Affectiva's technology to test about 3,000 ads for clients.
  Face-reading software is unlikely to infer precise emotions 100 percent of the time, said Tadas Baltrusaitis, a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Cambridge who has written papers on the automatic analysis of facial expressions. The algorithms have improved, but ''they are not perfect, and probably never will be,'' he said.
  Apps that can respond to facial cues may find wide use in education, gaming, medicine and advertising, said Winslow Burleson, an assistant professor of human-computer interaction at Arizona State University. ''Once we can package this facial analysis in small devices and connect to the cloud,'' he said, ''we can provide just-in-time information that will help individuals, moment to moment throughout their lives.''
  People with autism, who can have a hard time reading facial expressions, may be among the beneficiaries, Dr. Burleson said. By wearing Google Glass or other Internet-connected goggles with cameras, they could get clues to the reactions of the people with whom they were talking '-- clues that could come via an earpiece as the program translates facial expressions.
  But facial-coding technology raises privacy concerns as more and more of society's interactions are videotaped, said Ginger McCall, a lawyer and privacy advocate in Washington.
  ''The unguarded expressions that flit across our faces aren't always the ones we want other people to readily identify,'' Ms. McCall said '-- for example, during a job interview. ''We rely to some extent on the transience of those facial expressions.''
  She added: ''Private companies are developing this technology now. But you can be sure government agencies, especially in security, are taking an interest, too.''
  Ms. McCall cited several government reports, including a National Defense Research Institute report this year that discusses the technology and its possible applications in airport security screening.
  She said the programs could be acceptable for some uses, such as dating services, as long as people agreed in advance to have webcams watch and analyze the emotions reflected in their faces. ''But without consent,'' Ms. McCall said, ''they are problematic '-- and this is a technology that could easily be implemented without a person's knowledge.''
  EMAIL: novelties@nytimes.com.
Feds' 3 tentacles in the Common Core
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 14:27
  (Editor's note: This is Part 4 in a series on the Common Core State Standards Initiative. Read Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3.)
  In Part 1 of my series on the Common Core State Standards being infused into 45 state public school systems, I revealed how the feds spent $350 million of taxpayers' money, funding and giving grants and waivers to muscle states and local school districts to accept CCSS. And that was after 2009, when feds awarded or bribed ''governors approximately $48.6 billion '... in exchange for a commitment to advance essential education reforms '... including: college- and career-ready standards [aka CCSS] '...''
  In Part 2, I showed how the feds are injecting their progressive agenda into curricula taught to U.S. kids in elementary, middle and high schools via their educative minions posted in academic arenas and among CCSS curricula creators.
  In Part 3, I began to give you the third evidence for the feds' collaborations and entanglements within CCSS: namely, that they are creating and expanding a national database to store and access your kids' private information obtained through a technological project within CCSS '' an informational mega-overreach and push within their 2009 $48.6 billion bribe to governors.
  PolitiFact, a left-leaning so called fact-discerning website, accused executive board member of Georgia's Fayette County Republican Party, Angela Bean, of exaggeration when she told the Newnan Times-Herald that informational wings within CCSS were ''designed to collect up to 400 data points on each child, which can include personally identifiable data, she said. The data will be collected by a company called inBloom, created by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.''
  PolitiFact further accused Bean of confusing the facts and separation between the longitudinal data systems, or LDS, and the CCSS. And they also cited CCSS organization officials, who affirmed that ''there are no data collection requirements with Common Core.'' (Can you imagine ''no data collection'' requirements in the most overreaching national academic system and standards to date? If it sounds too good to be true, you can bet it is. Read on.)
  But then PolitiFact explained that many Georgia schools are in fact using inBloom and cited Robert Swiggum, Georgia state department's chief information officer, who confessed that the longitudinal data systems ''collects data points in about 10 categories '... [which] include: a student's name, grade, gender, ethnicity, birth date, attendance, enrollment history, test scores, courses taken and grade received, and any subgroup (example: English language learner, retained, economically disadvantaged).''
  And each of those categories has sublevels of students' personal information, too. PolitiFact itself elaborated, ''Each of the categories has dozens of data points that can vary depending on how many tests each student takes, those test scores, the number of courses taken and the length of time a student has been in school.''
  So let me get this straight: Beginning in 2009, the Obama administration began a massive overreach, push and expansion of an informational and technological student tracking system called LDS that stores a wide range of academic and personal information of every student in the U.S. from preschool through college and into the workforce.
  At the same time, the administration begins a massive overreach, push and expansion of new national academic standard system called Common Core State Standards that will cover every core classroom subject from kindergarten through high school and be the basis of 85 percent of all curricula and progress assessments.
  Yet, we're supposed to believe naively that the CCSS, its curricula, its assessments for teachers and students, and its plethora of personal student information will not intersect, intertwine, be combined with or use the technological communication system (LDS), through which all student data and progress in public schools is recorded and transmitted?
  The LDS and CCSS were developed and enlarged side by side during the same time and same presidential administration, but the CCSS testing and performance will not be recorded and monitored via the LDS?
  Is it merely coincidental that the feds spent billions expanding both systems simultaneously over the past few years and yet there is no congruency or intended purpose between the ginormous national construction of CCSS and its expanding LDS informational pipeline?
  Hogwash! Who's kidding who??
  To not recognize how LDS will clearly serve the information gathered under CCSS is to overlook any connection between a hot dog and a hot dog bun. In fact, if you believe LDS and CCSS are solo and separate academic coincidences in an ever-expanding federal government that has been funding and promoting both, I have a London Bridge to sell you in Lake Havasu City, Ariz.!
  CCSS and its bedfellow LDS are partners in crime. It will literally be impossible for one to operate without the other, based upon the very reason they were created to complement each other. They are destined to be married and become one, just as they have already been living together in secret in the minds of bureaucrats and educrats. LDS will serve under CCSS, plain and simple, inasmuch as teachers and curricula will conform to its mandates, too.
  And the primary problem remains that both CCSS and LDS are two of the greatest overreaches by the federal government '' in cahoots with state educrats '' and encroachments on student privacy and parental rights under the banner of the new ''Common Core'' education.
  And if you think I'm just connecting conspiratorial dots, then let me remove all doubt by citing a document anyone can read on the website for the National Center for Education Statistics, or NCES, which is the primary federal entity for collecting and analyzing data related to education in the U.S. and other nations and is located within the U.S. Department of Education and the Institute of Education Sciences.
  The NCES produced four books on building longitudinal data systems. Book one is titled, ''Traveling through Time: The Forum Guide to Longitudinal Data System,'' which also gives a glimpse into its informational future.
  In Chapter 5 of book one, ''LDS Benefits: Why Should We Build These Systems,'' the NCES clearly explains for all to read: ''Longitudinal data system (LDS) is not just a compliance system that will feed the state and federal governments more data. An LDS has the potential to make high quality, timely data available to all stakeholders to help them '... leverage significant educational change.''
  Any questions?
  Again, welcome to the future of Fed Ed and your family's personal information floating across the Internet for ''key stakeholders'' from your house and the local school house to the state houses and the White House.
  It's time to ship Fed Ed to some remote deserted island! And we can start by stopping Common Core!
  (Next week in Part 5, I will answer the question: ''Is Common Core really good for children?'')
Public-private partnerships feature in latest UN climate talks | GreenBiz.com
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 14:24
  Green Business News
  How 'being-centered' leadership can drive capitalism
  In a recent GreenBiz article, Rick Ridgeway, Patagonia's head of environmental affairs and creator of the ''Responsible Economy'' campaign, asked a fundamental question: ''If [economic] growth is the elephant in the room, and if over...
  BMW's solar partnership helps give EV industry a jolt
  BMW has put in place another part of the jigsaw for the imminent launch of its BMW i range of electric cars, announcing a partnership with U.S. solar specialist SolarCity to allow American drivers to power their electric BMWs using solar power. The two co...
  Refrigerant phase-outs put the chill on climate change
  Back in the 1980s, an international alarm was sounded when a growing hole in the Earth's ozone layer was discovered over the Antarctic. This phenomenon was caused, scientists said, by the presence of Ozone Depleting Substances (ODS) such as the gases...
  UN calls on private sector to protect vulnerable communities
  "But let us again be clear that we are witnessing ever more frequent, extreme weather events, and the poor and vulnerable are already paying the price." Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change,...
  More...
Teacher slams scripted Common Core lessons that must be taught 'word for word' - The Washington Post
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 14:23
  By Valerie Strauss, Published: NOVEMBER 30, 11:00 AM ET Aa (By Charles Rex Arbogast/ AP)
  A public school teacher in Delaware wrote the following moving piece but asked not to be identified out of fear of retaliation. It explains what is happening to many teachers who are being given scripted lessons aligned to the Common Core State Standards by their principals and district superintendents. Note that this teacher is not opposed to standards. It's an important point, as critics of the Common Core's implementation in many school districts have been accused of being opposed to standards and wanting to keep the ''status quo.''
  Here is the teacher's piece:
  Teaching used to be a fun job that I was deeply passionate about. I used my own creativity mixed with a healthy dose of perseverance, dedication and cheerleading to encourage my students, most labeled "special needs," to believe in their own abilities and self worth. I believed in their greatness and I helped them to believe it, too. In my nearly 25 years of teaching children I have seen learning disabled, non-readers become college graduates; non-writers grow to be valedictorians; reluctant readers become bookworms. I've encouraged students to write, to risk, to think, and to try again all of my adult life. In fact, one performance evaluation stated that I was "a naturally gifted teacher with the unique ability to inspire greatness in my students."
  I was taught in teacher's college that each student had an individual learning style, and that my job as a teacher was to discover each child's pathway to learning and help them to embark on that path. My calling was to meet the needs of the child.
  Some years I witnessed the growth in the year I actually taught the student. Many times I simply planted the seed that another teacher watered and yet another reaped the harvest. Teaching, for me, has always been about the children. Their learning. Their growth. Their future.
  I used to do many fun, innovative projects with my students. My students have owned and managed their own businesses, written children's books and read them to younger students, done year-long literature studies on specialized topics, hosted project fairs, and an array of other student-created, choice- driven projects. They have designed, researched, written and read beyond their peers. My high school students were required to read 25 novels per year...yes, even the ones with learning disabilities could meet this goal with the help of assistive technology. Meeting and exceeding standards has always been my goal.
  Last year, however, my performance appraisal listed me as "satisfactory." What has changed? I'm still me. I still bring the passion, dedication, and years of experience to the classroom that I always have.
  What has changed is Common Core State Standards. I was given a curriculum and told by my administration to teach it "word-for-word." In a meeting with my administration, I was reprimanded with "Don't forget, standards drive our instruction."
  Standards drive instruction. Data determines effectiveness. Positive outcomes for students requires proof.
  If I don't supply that proof, I'm not an effective teacher. Period. And my administration has warned me that my job depends on this proof.
  I can't do projects with my students anymore because I have to teach the curriculum word-for word, and I am only allowed to use standards-based assessments (which I must create myself). It doesn't matter how my students learn best. It doesn't matter that the Common Core State Standards assume a steady progression of skills that my students have not been formerly taught. It doesn't matter that my students arrive at my door with a host of factors that I cannot control...their home situations, their former schooling, their attitudes toward school and learning and themselves, the neighborhood they live in, whether they are English Language Learners or have special needs, or whether they have just broken up with their girlfriend in the cafeteria. All those factors also affect student performance, but none of that matters. What matters is how my students perform on the state test. (And I must STOP teaching for 6 weeks in the spring to make sure our students pass that test.)
  I'm not opposed to standards, it's the standards BASED part that I have issue with.
  My students like to tell me that I'm old school. They are right. I'm from the school of teaching CHILDREN, not standards. I'm from the school of student needs, not student data. I'm from the school of thinking and discovery and choice; not canned, watered-down, one-size-fits-all, global curricula.
  Like so many experienced, good teachers, I don't want to be a teacher anymore. But where do I go? I need to make a living, but who wants a "satisfactory" former teacher with no advanced degree? I've dedicated my life to teaching children, but with CCSS, teaching children is no longer the point.
  Standards-BASED education gets it all wrong. They assume the best teaching and the best learning can be quantified with tests and data. Yet I've never once had a student compliment me on my academic knowledge or my data collection skills. I've never had a student thank me for writing insightful test questions or for staying up late to write a stunning lesson plan. But students HAVE thanked me for being there, for listening to them, for encouraging them, for believing in them even before they could believe in themselves. Meeting our student's academic needs begins with seeing them as human beings with worth and capability and gifting, not as research subjects.
  Chicken Soup for the Teacher's Soul is full of stories of teachers who made a difference in student's lives through their care, their courage, and their dedication...not their student's test scores. Judging the effectiveness of a teacher on only quantifiable data reduces the art of teaching children to a mathematical algorithm can that be performed more effectively by a hologram projected on the Smart board than by an old-fashioned, caring, humanly flawed teacher.
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Enabling postfix (sendmail) on Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard '' Subtle Coolness
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 12:16
  Enabling postfix (sendmail) on Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard '' Subtle Coolness
  June 21, 2009 ' 'ž
  I recently migrated off a web server running Ubuntu onto a server running Mac OS X 10.5 (client, not server). Everything has been working except sending email. On Ubuntu, when someone left a comment on my blog, the web server sent me an email. I hadn't received any email from the server since I moved to OS X. Today I found out why.
  Mac OS X 10.5 comes with a mail-sending program called postfix, but it is not turned on by default. Today, while diagnosing the problem, I found an excellent article explaining how to enable postfix on OS X.
  If you just want to send all of your outgoing mail to some relay server, like the SMTP server of your Internet service provider, you usually need to have a host name for the computer that is sending the mail. This configuration is for a server that is not being used to receive mail.
  Open Terminal and enter the following commands, each on a single line. After the first command you will be prompted for your password. (Oh, you need to be logged on as a user with administrative privileges.)
  First, you want to set postfix to run when your computer tries to send mail:
  % sudo launchctl unload /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/org.postfix.master.plist% sudo defaults write /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/org.postfix.master OnDemand -bool true% sudo launchctl load /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/org.postfix.master.plistNext, you want to tell postfix what the host name of the computer is:
  % sudo postconf -e myhostname=Next, tell postfix what SMTP server to use to send email:
  % sudo postconf -e relayhost= : >> /etc/postfix/sasl_passwd% sudo postconf -e smtp_sasl_auth_enable=yes% sudo postconf -e smtp_sasl_password_maps=hash:/etc/postfix/sasl_passwdAt this point, if postfix tries to send email to someone@, the email will be delivered locally. If your email for this host name is handled by some other server, tell postfix that this is not the final destination for email sent to that host name:
  % sudo postconf -e mydestination=localhostI used the following specifically for my environment:
  % sudo postconf -e myhostname=subtlecoolness.com% sudo postconf -e relayhost=smtp-server.austin.rr.comThere! You should now be running postfix and your web server will send emails (again)!
  RSS feed. Twitter.
  Enabling postfix (sendmail) on Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard '' Subtle Coolness
  June 21, 2009 ' 'ž
  I recently migrated off a web server running Ubuntu onto a server running Mac OS X 10.5 (client, not server). Everything has been working except sending email. On Ubuntu, when someone left a comment on my blog, the web server sent me an email. I hadn't received any email from the server since I moved to OS X. Today I found out why.
  Mac OS X 10.5 comes with a mail-sending program called postfix, but it is not turned on by default. Today, while diagnosing the problem, I found an excellent article explaining how to enable postfix on OS X.
  If you just want to send all of your outgoing mail to some relay server, like the SMTP server of your Internet service provider, you usually need to have a host name for the computer that is sending the mail. This configuration is for a server that is not being used to receive mail.
  Open Terminal and enter the following commands, each on a single line. After the first command you will be prompted for your password. (Oh, you need to be logged on as a user with administrative privileges.)
  First, you want to set postfix to run when your computer tries to send mail:
  % sudo launchctl unload /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/org.postfix.master.plist% sudo defaults write /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/org.postfix.master OnDemand -bool true% sudo launchctl load /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/org.postfix.master.plistNext, you want to tell postfix what the host name of the computer is:
  % sudo postconf -e myhostname=Next, tell postfix what SMTP server to use to send email:
  % sudo postconf -e relayhost= : >> /etc/postfix/sasl_passwd% sudo postconf -e smtp_sasl_auth_enable=yes% sudo postconf -e smtp_sasl_password_maps=hash:/etc/postfix/sasl_passwdAt this point, if postfix tries to send email to someone@, the email will be delivered locally. If your email for this host name is handled by some other server, tell postfix that this is not the final destination for email sent to that host name:
  % sudo postconf -e mydestination=localhostI used the following specifically for my environment:
  % sudo postconf -e myhostname=subtlecoolness.com% sudo postconf -e relayhost=smtp-server.austin.rr.comThere! You should now be running postfix and your web server will send emails (again)!
  RSS feed. Twitter.
First Victim of Amazon Drones: The Credibility of CBS and 60 Minutes
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Tue, 03 Dec 2013 11:54
  Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos runs one of the world's most notoriously secretive organizations. Yet last night he went on national TV and showed off a bunch of dazzling delivery drones that he says won't realistically arrive in the real world for another four or five years, which in realspeak means they're a decade or more away.
  Why is this incredibly tight-lipped company suddenly showing off prototypes? The answer is that these drones were not designed to carry packages, but to give a lift to Amazon's image.
  For one thing, today is Cyber Monday, the day when everyone goes shopping online. Amazon somehow got CBS and 60 Minutes to create a 14-minute free ad spot for Amazon on the eve of this huge shopping day.
  Did Amazon control the timing of the story and insist that the piece must run on the night before Cyber Monday? Was this a condition of the deal in exchange for getting access to Bezos? I think you'd be naive to believe otherwise, but who knows? Maybe it was just a lucky coincidence.
  But there's another factor at work here. Bezos and Amazon are still reeling from the recent publication of a not entirely flattering book by Businessweek reporter Brad Stone. The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon portrays Bezos as a ruthless tyrant and a "penny-pinching ballbuster," as Gawker put it.
  As soon as the book came out, Amazon swung into action trying to discredit Stone. Jeff Bezos's wife MacKenzie Bezos published a scathing negative review of the book (on Amazon, of course) in which she claims the work contains "numerous factual inaccuracies." Craig Berman, VP of Global Communications at Amazon, issued his own statement blasting the book and criticizing Stone for not making an effort to get his facts right.
  This is a very big deal. Amazon PR typically doesn't say anything to anyone. They're the most tight-lipped bunch in the business, right up there with Apple. Suddenly they were all over the place.
  Worse, the spin campaign didn't work. Stone's book became a best-seller, and even won the prestigious Financial Times and Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year award.
  Now, suddenly, for no apparent reason, this company that never tells anybody anything about any future products, ever, is showing off prototype drones that are years away. This is like Apple inviting Charlie Rose in to show off that 60-inch TV that it may or may not ever actually manufacture and sell to the public.
  Why the change in policy?
  This is about shifting the narrative. The first spin campaign didn't work, so now you do what PR people call "closing one door and opening another." You deflect and distract.
  You line up Charlie Rose to do one of his famous softball-tossing puff pieces, and while he's there you trot out some amazingly impossibly cool new technology to dazzle the folks in the cheap seats.
  You let Jeff Bezos appear on camera being all goofy and happy and looking like the world's friendliest little nerd, talking to Uncle Charlie about how much he and his band of happy elves at Amazon just love exploring and tinkering and innovating. Let Bezos do his weird laugh, which you can catch in the final minute of this video:
Europe must prepare for extreme weather events - News in Brief - The Ecologist
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  Archived Version
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 16:47
  The Ecologist
  2nd December 2013
  Given the tragic events this year in the rest of the world and the recent IPCC report, we feel obliged to draw attention to the growing impact of extreme weather in Europe
  Grave economic and social consequences will follow if European policy makers do not use the latest estimates of future droughts, floods and storms in their planning, warns a report published today by EASAC, representing the national science academies of EU Member States. Europe also must invest in adapting to global warming and to the wider climate disruption the warming will cause.
  The report, Extreme Weather Events in Europe, advises that Europe has already experienced a 60% rise over the last 30 years in the costs of damage from extreme weather events. "Given the tragic events this year in the rest of the world and the recent IPCC report, we feel obliged to draw attention to the growing impact of extreme weather in Europe", said EASAC President Sir Brian Heap, launching the document.
  "From the major loss of lives in heat waves to the economic and human costs of floods and storms, the implications are worrying. They present the European Union and its Member States with significant challenges in preparing Europe for a future with greater frequency of extreme weather.
  "In planning to adapt to such a future, it is critical to use the latest scientific knowledge on how different types of extreme events are expected to develop. This depends not only on the type of event but also where in Europe is being considered since the EU's 28 countries and over 500 million population live in very different climate zones, from the Mediterranean sub-tropical to the Arctic."
  Five specific areas requiring immediate action driven at the EU level: heat-waves; flood defence and early warning; agriculture; climate research; and adaptation plans. Joint EU action is "essential because these events do not respect national barriers".
  Sir Brian also emphasised the need to improve and refine climate models. "Global climate model outputs have proved of immense value in providing the basis for understanding climate and its future. However, there is an urgent need to improve regional climate models to reduce uncertainties and improve projections, for example extreme precipitations or hail storms and other local climatic phenomena such as tornadoes remain imperfectly understood.
  "The EU has a critical role in strengthening European climate-research communities and building networks across borders and disciplines to provide the data required for informed future policy-making."
  The full report can be downloaded from the EASAC website http://www.easac.eu from 2 December 2013.
  EASAC, the European Academies Science Advisory Council, is formed by the national science academies of the EU Member States, to collaborate in giving advice to European policy-makers. EASAC provides a means for the collective voice of European Science to be heard. Through EASAC, the academies work together to provide independent expert, evidence-based advice about the scientific aspects of European policies to those who make or influence policy within the European institutions.
BBC News - French court orders search firms to block pirate sites
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 16:36
  2 December 2013Last updated at 07:10 ET A court in France has ordered Google, Microsoft and Yahoo to block 16 video-streaming sites from their search results.
  The case was brought by five groups representing film companies, distributors and producers.
  The High Court in Paris ruled the websites were dedicated to the "distribution of works without consent of their creators".
  Several internet service providers were also ordered to block the sites.
  The two-year legal battle involved the streaming of copyrighted content on sites including allostreaming, Fifostream and dpstream.
  The court said the sites broke French intellectual property laws and were "almost entirely dedicated" to streaming content without the owners' permission.
  Google, Microsoft and Yahoo must now take measures to ensure the blocked pages cannot be found in a list of search results.
  ISPs, including Orange and Bouygues Telecom, will also have to prevent users from being able to access the sites.
  Legitimising theftIn a statement, the groups representing the rights holders said the ruling "recognised the merits of the approach [of] forcing ISPs and search engines to cooperate with right holders in the protection of the law of literary and artistic property on the internet".
  Some of the companies involved in the case told the court blocking the streaming websites was unworkable as users just created new sites under a different name and used forums to tell each other where pirated content could be found.
  Google said it was disappointed with the court's verdict.
  "We are committed to helping content owners fight piracy across Google's tools, and we will continue to work with them so that they can make the best use of our state of the art copyright protection tools," the company said in a statement.
  The Motion Picture Association (MPA), which represents six major Hollywood studios, said it welcomed the outcome of the court case and that search engines had a responsibility to help users get a "high-quality viewing experience".
  "Search engines are incredibly skilful, yet they are still leading consumers to illegal money-making sites even when the searcher is seeking legal content online," said Chris Marcich, president of MPA in Europe, Middle East and Africa.
  "The present situation is confusing for consumers, damaging the legal download market and legitimising copyright theft. The decision in France clearly is a step in this direction."
  The search companies and ISPs have two weeks to implement blocking procedures.
  In a separate case in Ireland the Irish subsidiaries of Sony Music, Universal Music and Warner Music will appear at the High Court on Monday.
  They will ask the court to order five of the country's largest ISPs to block access to the file sharing site Kickass Torrents.
Four GCC countries to announce common currency by end-December | GulfNews.com
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 09:40
  Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and Saudi Arabia to decide to peg currency to the dollar
  Staff ReportDecember 1, 2013
  Dubai: Four Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries will announce the introduction of a common currency by the end of December, a Bahraini daily reported on Sunday.
  The common currency to be announced by Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and Saudi Arabia will be pegged to the dollar, a source told Akhbar Al Khaleej.
  ''The decision to peg the Gulf currency to the dollar is political and is not related to the economy,'' the source said.
  ''From an economic point of view, it would have been better to peg the new currency to a basket of currencies because the volume of trade of the Gulf states with the countries of the European Union is much larger than that of their commerce with the United States. Gulf exports of oil to the European Union are estimated to constitute about 70 per cent of European imports,'' the source said.
  Related StoriesThe daily did not identify the sources, but said it was close to Gulf decision-making circles.
  Oman and the UAE, the other two members of the six-country Gulf council set up in 1981, are not likely to join the common currency in the near future, the source added, without divulging the reasons for the same.
  ''I do not see any need for a common Gulf currency if it is not sovereign. Even though the GCC states have huge financial reserves, their currencies are not listed on the world's reserve currency list because they are not producing states,'' the source said.
  Flexible exchange
  The GCC countries have been discussing a currency union similar to the Eurozone for more than 15 years.
  Several economists in the Gulf have been calling for dropping the GCC countries' long-entrenched peg to the dollar and consider moving to a more flexible exchange rate that will help them better face highly possible inflation risks and economic crises.
  In September, an official of the European Central Bank (ECB) said that the GCC should not introduce a common currency before its members have a clear common objective.
  Yves Mersch, an executive board member of the ECB, reportedly said at a global financial summit that no union of states would be ready for a common currency if there was no political consensus.
  Most Popular in BusinessGCC common currency in 4 countries soonLamborghini unveils Dh16.5m car in Abu DhabiEtihad crowned world's leading airlineAbu Dhabi 'fastest growing emirate in UAE'UAE flag carriers soar higher in 2013New Stories in BusinessAviation (3)ConstructionMarkets (6)Oil & Gas (2)PropertyTechnologyTourism (1)Your Money
VIDEO-'We Don't Know the Source': Mystery Illness in Las Vegas Hospitalizes At Least 60 | TheBlaze.com
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 09:38
  A mystery illness in Las Vegas has hospitalized at least 60 adults and children in town this weekend for the National Youth Football Championships.
  ''We don't know the source,'' Clark County Fire Department Captain John Steinbeck, said.
  The mystery illness includes flu-like symptoms, such as nausea and vomiting, according to ABC News.
  ''It felt like we were in an outbreak movie,'' Annalisa Johnson, a parent of the one of the players, said.
  ABC News reported that at one hotel sick individuals climbed aboard a shuttle and were then offloaded at a hospital.
  ''I was very scared because I really didn't know what was going on,'' Alastair Jones, coach of a sick 7-year-old, told KTNV.
  ''I was very scared because I really didn't know what was going on''Authorities say it is unlikely the individuals were food poisoned, since they weren't all eating at the same place. Further, many are staying in separate hotels.
  Dr. Richard Besser, chief health and medical editor for ABC News, says a Norovirus may be the culprit.
  ''It's one of the nastiest germs around. It spreads through person to person contact, it spreads through food and also from contaminated surfaces,'' Besser said. ''It's one of the most contagious ones we see.''
  Regardless, parents and organizers say the football tournament will go on.
  ''None of our kids want to cancel the tournament,'' Johnson said. ''We fundraise for this, we earn this, and all of our kids want to play.''
  ''
  Follow Oliver Darcy (@oliverdarcy) on Twitter
Paul Walker Death Hoax was Swirling on Internet on Eve of Actual Car Crash - IBTimes UK
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 09:29
  Death hoax of Fast & Furious star Paul Walker was doing rounds in internet before his actual demise in car crash - (Reuters file photo)
  A death hoax involving Fast & Furious star Paul Walker was swirling around cyberspace on the eve of hisactual demise in a car crash in Los Angeles.
  The hoax is believed to have emerged from a parody news site, MediaMass.net.
  The website had carried an article stating that the 40-year-old actor had died and quoted one of Walker's representatives as denying the report.
  Responding to the hoax, Walker's representative said: "He joins the long list of celebrities who have been victimised by this hoax. He's still alive and well, stop believing what you see on the internet."
  Although many users recognised it as a hoax, some are said to have actually believed it.
  Following the article, a user posted a message on an online forum: "So I work in Santa Clarita at an automotive performance shop and a good customer just came from Paul's shop AE (Always Evolving) where they were having a car now. It seems Paul went for a ride in a guys Porsche and they ended up around a phone pole, the car burst onto flames and rumour has it Paul is dead. I hope he got it wrong but he insists it was Paul. I'm reluctant to post this being just hearsay, but the guy who informed us is a wealthy car enthusiast that just pulled up in his Maserati and nothing to gain from a lie, and has video on his phone of the burning car. It it does turn out to be true, damn... RIP Paul."
  However, hours after the hoax, the news of the actual death emerged.
  Despite official confirmation of his death, internet rumours are rife that the fatal car crash itself is a fake.
  READ MORE
  Paul Walker death: Eye witness accounts and photos of crash scene
  Paul Walker death: Celebrities pay tribute
  Paul Walker obituary
  Fast and Furious star Paul Walker dies in car crash
  To report problems or to leave feedback about this article, e-mail: To contact the editor, e-mail:
  This article is copyrighted by IBTimes.co.uk, the business news leader
Is bitcoin mining itself compromising the security of SHA256 - Bitcoin Stack Exchange
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 09:27
  Theoretical answer: yes and no.
  Practical answer: not at all.
  SHA-2, or specifically SHA-256, is a good hashing algorithm as far as we know. It has all the properties desired and there are no real attacks on it. It has already been battle-tested a lot in the past years. That Bitcoin uses SHA-256 makes it an even more interesting algorithm to try to crack (there is 'money' behind it now), and with all the ASIC producers popping up it becomes less work to also create ASICs that try to crack passwords hashed with this.
  So with all the extra attention SHA-256 gets, it is now more likely that flaws are found rather sooner than later. However, SHA-2 is a very widely used algorithm as it is, regardless of its use in Bitcoin. If there were any great and obvious flaws, they would have been found already.
  It can be compared with RSA, which now powers many of today's financial transactions and encrypted connections. That too draws a lot of attention to it, but good algorithms don't become bad just because they are in the picture.
  So while all the extra ASIC production for Bitcoin mining may also provide for better password cracking tools and brings more people to look at the algorithm, this is no practical problem. Also, you should not use SHA-2 directly as a password hashing mechanism anyway. For that, see this question: http://security.stackexchange.com/q/211/10863
  Edit: Read your question more thoroughly now instead of responding to the title.
  Is bitcoin mining with its daily 4000+ TH/s power, funded and manned entirely by users of the hardware hoping to gain Bitcoins (and hoping they are worth some real $$) really performing a service for the NSA (or someone) and effectively "hiding in plain sight"?
  No. That's just tinfoil hattery and not even worth the "thought experiment" (nice try, conspiracy theorist) since it can readily be disproved. See other answers about what we're hashing (hint: we're not finding hashes for actual passwords or other purposes).
Newsstand Shotgun Hack Poised to Further Ruin Air Travel
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Hack a Day
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 09:21
  The people who go nuts over 3D printed guns are going to have a field day with this one. It's a shotgun and ammo built entirely from items you can purchase after passing through airport security. Now look, obviously the type of folks who read Hackaday understand that security in any form is something of an illusion. House keys don't keep people from breaking into your home. Encryption doesn't keep the government from looking over your shoulder. And no level of security screening can eliminate every possible hazard. So let's just enjoy this one for the fine act of hacking that it is.
  [Evan Booth] put his mind to work on the items you can buy at the stores inside of an airport terminal. Above you can see the diagram of all the parts. The break action accepts a Red Bull can that acts as the cartridge for the shotgun (our calculations put this at just under 0.25 Gauge). The bottom of the can contains water separated from Lithium metal (from cellular phone accessories?) by a condom. When the nonet of 9V batteries are connected to the heating element from the hair dryer it melts a hole in the prophylactic, mixing the water with the metal causing a reaction that propels pocket change as the projectile. The video after the break shows that this does take a while'... perhaps 10 seconds from the time the trigger is pulled. Oh, and you might not want to be holding the thing when it goes off. We'd say the firearm can barely contain the explosion.
  If you like this (or were horrified by it) [Evan's] got a whole collection of weapons built inside the airport terminal. For those that care, here's a link to the most recent of 3D printed gun posts which we referenced earlier.
  [Lukas]
Dennis Michael Lynch
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: from GitmoTex
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 09:20
  At the bottom of this post is a video of Paul Ryan playing politics with immigration reform and buttering up to Congressman Luis Gutierrez of Illinois (D). Gutierrez is a fighter for the Hispanic community, which is cool, but elected officials are supposed to represent everyone. Luis is an uno demographic guy. (I suggest you visit his website and browse the press releases.)
  Ryan panders to the crowd with 5-key elements to immigration reform. My alarm goes off when he goes gimmicky by suggesting the government will collect fines and back taxes. And then he gets super gimmicky, "The illegal immigrants have to go to the back of the line."
  In Houston, the fine for parking in a handicap parking space without a permit is $500. So the soccer mom parks illegally for 3-minutes to drop off dry cleaning and BANG -- $500 fine. I bet she won't make that mistake again. Compare that to the fine proposed in the immigration reform BILL. A person crosses our border illegally. They live and work here for years, in some cases, decades. Their kids go to our schools free of charge. They drive without a license or insurance so they can get to a job that should go to an American. The punishment for such behavior is $2,000 and a path to citizenship.
  The idea of collecting back taxes is ridiculous. How many illegals are going to turn over a stolen SS card? How many will claim years of collecting cash and wiring funds out of the country? Fact is, it takes a few seconds to rubber stamp a person versus days to investigate the truth. The government is going to fast-track the entire process and collect peanuts. Every immigration lawyer in America knows this to be true and will advise their clients to play dumb.
  As for illegals going to the back of the line? I ask, "What line?" The illegal is already here. The day the BILL is signed the illegal is legal. Welcome to the new America where we reward the law breaker and punish the law abider. Paul Ryan, good luck outdoing Rubio for the Latino vote in 2016.
Geheime dienst werft student als informant over protesten
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  Archived Version
  Source: VK: Home
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 09:19
  Bewerkt door: redactie '' 02/12/13, 07:13 '' bron: ANP/BuzzT
  (C) anp. Studenten in de bibliotheek van de Erasmus Universiteit in Rotterdam. (Archieffoto)
  Studenten worden door de de Nederlandse inlichtingendienst AIVD vaak benaderd om informant te worden. Zij worden onder meer geworven om inlichtingen over studentenprotesten in Nederland of het buitenland te geven. Dat schrijft het AD op basis van eigen onderzoek.
  (C) ANP.
  Uit een rondgang langs meerdere Nederlandse studenten die het afgelopen jaar zijn benaderd, blijkt dat de meesten zich hierdoor overrompeld en ge¯ntimideerd voelden. Allen bleken in eerste instantie benaderd te zijn door mensen die zich voorstelden als een ambtenaar van Binnenlandse Zaken. De inlichtingendienst vroeg hen onder meer naar informatie over China, Egypte, demonstraties en krakersbijeenkomsten.
  'Het gaat om een kwetsbare groep'De AIVD mag iedereen rekruteren omdat het om de staatsveiligheid gaat, hoewel niemand mag worden gedwongen. SP-Kamerlid Ronald van Raak vindt echter dat studenten niet als informant moeten optreden. 'Het gaat om een kwetsbare groep.'
  'Dat de AIVD studenten benadert, verbaast mij niet. Het valt onder human intelligence', aldus Beatrice de Graaf, hoogleraar Conflict en Veiligheid aan de Universiteit Leiden. 'Als er signalen zijn dat een groep zal radicaliseren, moet de AIVD dat in een voorstadium opmerken.'
  Studenten zelf twijfelen of de AIVD wel goede redenen heeft. Zo werden enkelen ook benaderd tijdens de geweldloze demonstraties tegen de onderwijsbezuinigingen in 2011.
  De geheime dienst kreeg in 1981 ook al kritiek op het ronselen van studenten. Toenmalig minister Ed van Thijn (Binnenlandse Zaken) moest zich verantwoorden toen een student was gevraagd om te infiltreren in een vredesbeweging.
The pre-history of the US dollar
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  Archived Version
  Source: BBC News - Home
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 09:13
  1 December 2013Last updated at 20:55 ET By Graham InghamBBC Radio 4 Later this month, the Federal Reserve marks its centenary. One of its most important tasks is managing the dollar, the official US currency for more than 200 years. But what did settlers in the New World use instead of money before either the Fed or the dollar came into existence?
  In 1620, the Mayflower set sail from Rotherhithe in East London bound for the New World, carrying religious dissenters in search of a new life overseas. Those first settlers took with them gold and English coins. But they weren't wealthy and they soon ran out of hard money, leaving them without means of buying food, animal skins and other necessities from the indigenous people of the American continent.
  Jason Goodwin, author of Greenback: the Almighty Dollar and the Invention of America sums up the difficulty: "They simply didn't have any cash. They weren't very loaded when they came over in the first place. And it became quite awkward for the colonists to do exchanges between themselves'... it was all very well to barter one thing for another, but of course quite soon you get into quite complex exchanges, and that's where money is so incredibly useful."
  Continue reading the main storyFind out moreListen to the first of five episodes of Greenback: How the dollar came to rule the world at 13:45 GMT, on BBC Radio 4 on Monday 2 December.
  Soon after their arrival, the settlers discovered that certain kinds of shell - known as wampum - had great symbolic significance for many native Americans and as such could be exchanged by the English colonists for the things they needed, such as food. In fact, the wampum became so important in the early days of trading in what is now the Eastern seaboard of the US that in 1637 the Massachusetts Bay Colony declared them to be legal tender.
  As trade among the settlers themselves became increasingly important, they started to use other goods for bartering. In the northern colonies they used corn and cod, for example, and in the more southerly colonies they also favoured tobacco. Many of these goods were declared legal tender at one time or another, although not all proved successful.
  Jason Goodwin says that the value of tobacco tended to fluctuate depending on the success or otherwise of the crop. But there was, he says, another problem with tobacco: "The leaves were put in store and then circulated, but of course they became very crumbly and dry and people always tried to pay people off with all the crumbliest and driest of their tobacco leaves. And it caused a lot of confusion, because if your currency is actually deteriorating as well as losing value as you use it, it is not much good."
  Continue reading the main story''Start QuoteIt was easier to get hold of Spanish reals than British sovereigns''
  End QuoteGoodwin also points out that when the settlers tried using nails some were tempted to burn down wooden barns in order to extract the nails, which had a value similar to money.
  The price of goods tended to be different if you were paying in hard money - gold or silver or coins of one kind or another - rather than one of the forms of legal tender such as wampum. This was because hard money was more widely accepted and therefore more useful. As Madame Knight, a Boston schoolmistress observed in 1704 -with something of an understatement - it was a "very intricate way of trade".
  Those early colonists, though, had few options other than this relatively sophisticated form of bartering because the British authorities refused to permit the export of gold and silver coins - and also refused to allow the colonists to mint their own coins. It was easier to get hold of Spanish coins such as the real, and these were still circulating in the US in the early 19th Century.
  Eventually, the intransigent attitude of the British authorities, coupled with the burden of taxes levied on the settlers by the British government, led to a complete break with Britain. The colonists issued their famous Declaration of Independence in 1776 and after the prolonged and bitter War of Independence succeeded in defeating the British forces in 1783.
  The Revolutionary War, as it is also known, left the 13 states of the Union in financial chaos.
  The war was longer than anticipated and very expensive for the colonists. So, as Benjamin Franklin, one of the founding fathers of the Revolution explained: "Congress... issued an immense quantity of paper bills to pay, clothe, arm and feed their troops, and fit out our ships; and with this paper, without taxes for the first three years, they fought and buffeted one of the most powerful nations of Europe."
  Continue reading the main story''Start QuoteIt wasn't until 1792 that a mint was established in America''
  End QuoteThese paper bills - IOUs really - were known as Continentals, named after the Continental Congress which had been responsible for the Declaration of Independence and which managed the war against Britain. But by the end of the war, these Continentals were worthless - hence the saying "not worth a Continental" - and the new republic needed to establish economic and financial order as a matter of urgency.
  In 1785, the Continental Congress met in New York and on 6 July the dollar was established as the official currency of the new United States of America.
  The Congress decided it would be a decimal system with 100 cents to a dollar. But disagreements among the members of Congress - which even then was divided about the extent to which the federal government should dictate to the individual states - meant that it wasn't until 1792 that a mint was established in America.
  And it was another 70 years - 1862, in the middle of the Civil War - before the US Treasury was able to print dollar bills - black on the front, green on the back, so coloured because of the chemicals used to prevent counterfeiting. And so the dollar (or greenback) as we know it today came into being.
  Listen to the first of five episodes of Greenback: How the dollar came to rule the world at 13:45 GMT, on Monday 2 December.
  Follow @BBCNewsMagazine on Twitter and on Facebook
Law Ending Gazprom's Gas Export Monopoly Enters Into Force
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: RIA Novosti
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 09:11
  MOSCOW, December 2 (RIA Novosti) '' Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a landmark law breaking state-owned Gazprom's monopoly on gas exports, according to a document published on a government site Monday.
  Gazprom will keep its export monopoly on gas carried through pipelines, but the new law will allow Russian producers to export liquefied natural gas, the super-cooled fuel increasingly in demand on international markets.
  Domestic gas producers have been posing a growing threat to Gazprom's traditional dominance in recent years as they expand their operations inside Russia and push ahead with LNG export plans.
  The legislation was passed by the upper house of parliament last week and has now been signed by Putin, according to a copy of the document published on government site pravo.ru. The primary beneficiaries are expected to be independent gas producer Novatek and state-owned oil giant Rosneft, both of which have plans to develop LNG facilities that are likely to be oriented toward serving the growing Asian energy market.
  Novatek, controlled by billionaires Gennady Timchenko and Leonid Mikhelson, is partnered with China's CNPC and France's Total in a $20 billion LNG project in the Arctic Yamal peninsula. Rosneft has plans to build an LNG terminal in Russia's Far East.
  The only working LNG plant in Russia is located on Sakhalin, an island off the eastern coast, and is owned by a Gazprom-led consortium that also includes Anglo-Dutch major Shell.
Paul Walker Death Hoax was Swirling on Internet on Eve of Actual Car Crash
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: WTF RLY REPORT
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 09:09
  IB Times
  A death hoax involving Fast & Furious star Paul Walker was swirling around cyberspace on the eve of his actual demise in a car crash in Los Angeles.
  The hoax is believed to have emerged from a parody news site, MediaMass.net.
  The website had carried an article stating that the 40-year-old actor had died and quoted one of Walker's representatives as denying the report.
  Responding to the hoax, Walker's representative said: ''He joins the long list of celebrities who have been victimised by this hoax. He's still alive and well, stop believing what you see on the internet.''
  Although many users recognised it as a hoax, some are said to have actually believed it.
  Following the article, a user posted a message on an online forum: ''So I work in Santa Clarita at an automotive performance shop and a good customer just came from Paul's shop AE (Always Evolving) where they were having a car now. It seems Paul went for a ride in a guys Porsche and they ended up around a phone pole, the car burst onto flames and rumour has it Paul is dead. I hope he got it wrong but he insists it was Paul. I'm reluctant to post this being just hearsay, but the guy who informed us is a wealthy car enthusiast that just pulled up in his Maserati and nothing to gain from a lie, and has video on his phone of the burning car. It it does turn out to be true, damn'... RIP Paul.''
  However, hours after the hoax, the news of the actual death emerged.
  Despite official confirmation of his death, internet rumours are rife that the fatal car crash itself is a fake.
  IB Times
SPD: half of our ministers will be women
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: The Local
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 09:08
  Gabriel with Hannelore Kraft, state premier of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most senior female SPD figure. Photo: DPA
  Published: 02 Dec 2013 08:30 GMT+01:00Updated: 02 Dec 2013 08:30 GMT+01:00
  The leader of the Social Democrats pledged a 50-50 male-female split of the party's cabinet posts in a planned new 'grand coalition' with Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives, according to a newspaper interview.
  Social Democrat leader Sigmar Gabriel last week sealed a deal with Merkel to form a left-right coalition government after five weeks of political wrangling following September's elections.
  But the accord must still be endorsed by his party's membership who vote on December 14th. A poll in the Sunday's Welt am Sonntag newspaper suggested 78 percent of party members were intending to back the deal.
  At the Social Democratic Party's (SPD) instigation, possible portfolios have so far not been announced to allow the more than 470,000-strong rank-and-file, who will begin voting this week, to focus on policy.
  But when asked in an interview with the Bild am Sonntag whether he could promise that half of the ministries would go to women, Gabriel, who is expected to become Merkel's vice-chancellor, replied: "Yes."
  He added that the SPD needed to become more female although the 150-year-old party had already taken strides in that direction.
  "We have now for the first time in the history of the SPD more women than men in the top party leadership," he said, adding however: "The SPD must become still more female."
  The SPD is expected to get six ministries in the new government.
  The party pushed through several of its key demands in the coalition deal, including the creation of a minimum wage and a women's quota for the supervisory boards of listed companies.
  Nevertheless the outcome of the SPD members' vote, expected to be known on December 14th or 15th, is far from certain because many members reject the notion of their traditionally blue-collar party again governing in the shadow of Merkel, as it last did in 2005-2009.
  After that uneasy political marriage, the SPD suffered two humiliating electoral defeats in a row, winning less than 26 percent against the conservatives' nearly 42 percent in the election on September 22nd.
  SPD general secretary Andrea Nahles told the Welt am Sonntag newspaper that she was "optimistic" the party base would approve the coalition and had "a good feeling" it would win clear majority backing.
  But she acknowledged scepticism remained among some members.
  Gabriel, who may also head a ministry, told the Bild newspaper he planned to continue picking up his two-year-old daughter from nursery, saying he believed it had to be possible as a politician to also have a family.
  "Since I will frequently be away at the weekend I will also still fetch my daughter regularly from nursery when my wife is working," he said.
  READ MORE: SPD's Gabriel turns defeat into victory
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  Gabriel with Hannelore Kraft, state premier of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most senior female SPD figure. Photo: DPA
  The leader of the Social Democrats pledged a 50-50 male-female split of the party's cabinet posts in a planned new 'grand coalition' with Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives, according to a newspaper interview. READ () >>
  Photo: DPA
  The difference in attitudes towards the European Union between Britain and its continental partners is widening on both sides, a poll of people in four countries, including Germany, showed on Saturday. READ () >>
  Photo: DPA
  Bayern Munich extended their unbeatenBundesliga record to 39 games with a workmanlike 2-0 home win over bottom side Eintracht Braunschweig on Saturday with Arjen Robben scoring both goals. READ () >>
  Photo: DPA
  Bayern Munich coach Pep Guardiola admitted Friday to having concerns about his team's mounting injury problems. READ () >>
  Tascha looking after Dylan, 10. Photo: Erna-Graff-Stiftung
  A boy who has been in a coma since birth could lose his best friend, an American Staffordshire Terrier, after authorities said she was dangerous. But more than 100,000 people have joined a campaign to keep the dog at his side. READ () >>
  Photo: DPA
  UPDATE: A policeman has been arrested on suspicion of murder after allegedly chopping up a man he met on a cannibal website and burying parts of the body in his garden. READ () >>
  Photo: DPA
  Poland believes German-made submarines are not up to the job of defending Polish shores, but sources have told The Local that on the back of a landmark naval deal between the two countries, Poland is likely to lease two subs anyway. READ () >>
Reader Post: A Great Miracle Happened
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Israellycool
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 09:07
  Every year as a child when Chanukah was approaching, my teachers brought out the Chanukah materials so that we could learn about the resistance and the triumph of the Maccabees. Trying to explain to children that one small vial of oil lasted 8 glorious days instead of just 1, seemed a miracle in itself!
  But as kids, we just looked forward to the dreidel game that somehow, always had me landing on the Shin.× (Nun) '' Take Nothing×' (Gimel) '' Take All×-- (Hey) '' Take Half×(C) (Shin) '' Add 1 to the pot
  When I complained to my mother about the Shin, my mother always responded with optimism. ''Look at the greater picture. You could have landed on the Nun.''
  A few years later, I learned the important and historical meaning of these letters and the phrase:Nes Gadol Haya Sham, A Great Miracle Happened There.
  There, of course was the Land of Israel, the land of Yehuda HaMakabi, 'Judah the Hammer', the homeland of the Jewish people, my people, the land of miracles.
  My teacher then explained that kids in Israel also play with dreidels ( in Hebrew Sivivon, ××‘××‘×•×Ÿ). Only, their dreidels do not have a Shin (×(C)), but a Peh (×¤).
  Instead of what we know in the Diaspora, that 'A Great Miracle Happened There '' Nes Gadol Haya Sham', in Israel the phrase is, 'A Great Miracle Happened Here '' Nes Gadol Haya Poh'.
  Many years later after making Aliyah, I was ecstatic to throw my first Chanukah party as an Israeli citizen. In keeping with the Chanukah spirit, my friend brought Chanukah gelt, latkes and of course a dreidel.
  We were just about to start spinning the dreidel so I could feel like a kid again and win some of the delicious chocolate gelt, when I looked down at the dreidel and I saw the Hebrew letter Peh (×¤).
  The difference of one letter, one word '' it strengthened the entire meaning of Chanukah for me. It was something so small, but so very meaningful.
  I, Miriam, was finally living HERE in the Land of Israel, the land of Yehuda HaMakabi, 'Judah the Hammer', the homeland of the Jewish people, my people, the land of miracles. I have always felt connected, but this was something different.Something powerful. Something beautiful.
  I continuously think about our 2,000 year old history with the many challenges and triumphs. This is yet another triumph that we honor every year.
  It has become almost too easy to forget that the place where this 'Great Miracle Happened' still exists.
  It is and should be a part of every candle that we light, and the message we teach to our children, both Here and There.
  Happy Chanukah and Chag Sameach!
A MAtter of Expectations // Morse Code, QRP and Communication
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: Radio Preppers
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 09:05
  In a world with cheap, global and easy to use communication via a smartphone in our shirt pocket, to many people, all this business of ham radio and Morse Code is just over-the-top "stupid". I mean, why would a person want all hat hassle when cellphones are so reliable - right?Well, that fact of the matter is that cell phones ARE amazingly reliable, versitile and handy - until one moment they stop. It's rare when it does - but I've been through it more than a few times. There is also the aspect that there ARE places in the US where the is simply no coverage - not a few low spots, but entire regions of the West have no coverage and likely never will - because the population destiny is too low to make a profit. Remember the silicon valley guy who died after taking a wrong turn in a winter storm in Nevada? No cell coverage, but a sub $100 QRP rig would have been excellent.
  There is also the question of what it means to 'communicate'. Yes - there are some who just get ont he radio and talk about absolutely nothing for hours - maybe all night, like a teenaged girl on the phone. Listen to 80 meter SSB at night. Some of it would make a maggot gag. Back to topic though, for a prepper, communication is usually more like texting, rather than the endless discussion of little or nothing. Communication for content is like texting. A message like :
  AM AT BILLS PLACE. IS IT SAFE AT THE FARM?
  Could be the most important message in your life, determining your travel/relocation plans. orYOU ENTIRE FAMILY SAFE AND STAYING AT 1ST BAPTIST CHURCH OF BURGESS, VA. UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE.
  ... or even just a SITREP from camp - which we've doune among ourselves on more than one occasion.
  There is the level of comms to discuss local and world events and their possible impact, and even full conversations about everything from politics to - yes - radios. We DO build radios to talk about radios we would like to build. ha ha
  In short - real communication, without dependence upon commercial infrastructure can be accomplished with amazingly portable rigs , available for less than the cost of a monthly cell phone bill - per month. It's not as easy, nor as flexible, but it's something to think about. (or to talk about on the radio...)
  Your thoughts?
  >RadioRay ..._ ._
Thousands protest US drone strikes in Pakistan
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Source: RT - News
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 09:04
  Published time: December 02, 2013 02:17Pakistani supporters of the Defence of Pakistan coalition shout slogans and carry placards at an anti-US rally in Lahore on December 1, 2013 (AFP Photo / Arif Ali)
  Thousands of people took to the streets in Pakistan's eastern city of Lahore to protest against ongoing US drone strikes, amid a rise in local protests against US tactics.
  Around 5,000 demonstrators called on the US to immediately stop the drone assaults on the country. The event was organized by the Defence of Pakistan Council, which is comprised of 40 religious and political groups, AFP reported.
  Protesters chanted slogans to block NATO supplies being transported to Afghanistan through Pakistan.
  Recently, local residents have become more vocal against the US tactics, organizing increasing numbers of rallies. Just over one week ago, thousands of demonstrators protesting US drone strikes in Pakistan blocked a main road in the northern Peshawar province, used to transport NATO supplies to and from Afghanistan.
  Pakistan's government often speaks out against US drone strikes, heavily criticizing the tactic and calling it a violation of Pakistan's sovereignty but critics accuse the government of not actively doing enough to stop the strikes.
  The US has also faced significant international pressures on account of its attacks. Amnesty International released a report in October, arguing that the US officials, who are responsible for carrying out the drone strikes, may have to stand trial for war crimes. It also listed extensive civilian casualties in Pakistan. Human Rights Watch has issued a similar report on Yemen.
  Despite criticism, the US has carried out hundreds of drone strikes since 2004. In October, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Counterterrorism, Ben Emmerson, said that US drone strikes have killed 2,200 in the past decade, 400 of whom were civilians.
  Pakistan confirmed that ''at least 400 civilians had died as a result of remotely piloted aircraft strikes and a further 200 individuals were regarded as probable non-combatants,'' Emmerson said in an interim report to the UN General Assembly.
  Within the last week, one of Pakistan's major political parties published the name of what it believed to be the CIA's chief operative in Islamabad, after a US drone strike killed five people the previous week. The group was demanding that the spy chief face murder charges.
UT Documents: Questions/responses for journalists linking to the Pando post - and other matters
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 08:50
  The other day I referred to those who "evince zero interest in the substance of the revelations about NSA and GCHQ spying which we're reporting on around the world", but "are instead obsessed with spending their time personally attacking the journalists, whistleblowers and other messengers who enable the world to know about what is being done." There are dozens of examples, one of whom is the author of a post this week at Pando.com which accuses me and Laura Poitras of having "promptly sold [the Snowden] secrets to a billionaire", Pierre Omidyar, and claims we made "a decision to privatize the NSA cache" by joining Omidyar's new media organization and vesting it with a "monopoly" over those documents.I've steadfastly ignored the multiple attacks from this particular writer over the years because his recklessness with the facts is so well-known (ask others about whom he's written), and because his fixation is quite personal: it began with and still is fueled by an incident where The Nation retracted and apologized for an error-strewn hit piece he wrote which I had criticized (see here and here).But now, this week's attack has been seized on by various national security establishment functionaries and DC journalists to impugn our NSA reporting and, in some cases, to argue that this "privatizing" theory should be used as a basis to prosecute me for the journalism I'm doing. Amazingly, it's being cited by all sorts of DC journalists and think tank advocates whose own work is paid for by billionaires and other assorted plutocrats: such as Josh Marshall, whose TPM journalism has been "privatized" and funded by the Romney-supporting Silicon Valley oligarch Marc Andreesen, and former Bush Homeland Security Adviser and current CNN analyst Fran Townsend ("profiteering!", exclaims the Time Warner Corp. employee and advocate of the American plundering of Iraq).Indeed, Pando.com itself is partially funded by libertarian billionaire Peter Thiel, the co-founder of Paypal and CIA-serving Palantir Technologies. The very same author of this week's Pando post had previously described Thiel (before he was funded by him) as "an enemy of democracy" and the head of a firm "which last year was caught organizing an illegal spy ring targeting American political opponents of the US Chamber of Commerce, including journalists, progressive activists and union leaders" (one of whom happened to be me, targeted with threatened career destruction for the crime of advocating for WikiLeaks)).Moreover, the rhetorical innuendo in the Pando post tracks perfectly with that used by NSA chief Keith Alexander a few weeks ago when he called on the US government to somehow put a stop to the NSA reporting: "I think it's wrong that newspaper reporters have all these documents, the 50,000-- whatever they are, and are selling them and giving them out as if these-- you know, it just doesn't make sense," decreed the NSA chief. This attack is also the same one that was quickly embraced by the Canadian right to try to malign the reporting we're now doing with the CBC on joint US/Canada surveillance programs.I would think journalists would want to be very careful about embracing this pernicious theory of "privatizing" journalism given how virtually all of you are not only are paid for the journalism you do, but also have your own journalism funded by all sorts of extremely rich people and other corporate interests.Obviously, the rancid accusation that paid investigative journalism is tantamount to the buying and selling of government secrets is being made quite deliberately by the US government and its apologists with the knowledge that this is what sends people to prison. That language didn't fall out of Keith Alexander's mouth by accident. This Pando post is not only reckless with the facts but espouses a theory very few of the journalists cheering for it could or would apply to themselves. Standing alone, I'd simply ignore it.But any theory that is being simultaneously embraced by Gen. Keith Alexander, foreign governments on whom we're reporting, and DC functionaries to insinuate that there is something untoward or even criminal about our journalism is one I'm going to answer.So let's get to that. Here are a few questions about this theory, along with some facts. Moreover, in the spirit of what the Washington Post's Erik Wemple has noted is the extreme and very unusual transparency I've offered from the beginning on how this reporting is being done, I'll also address here once and for all a few other claims made and questions asked periodically about our methods of reporting:1) How is our reporting arrangement any different than the standard means used to report classified information? Bart Gellman has thousands of top secret documents from Snowden. He's repeatedly reported on them and published them in the Washington Post. He's not on the paper's staff, but is paid for the articles he writes for the Post. Shortly after he published his first article on the NSA documents at the Post (for pay!), it was announced that Gellman is writing a book about US surveillance.Does this mean that Gellman has "privatized" the NSA documents, is "profiteering" off of them, and that he sold US secrets to the Washington Post?Last month, it was announced that Jeff Bezos purchased the Washington Post for $250 million. Are any of you intrepid DC journalists citing this Pando post going to accuse Gellman of selling US secrets to his publisher and profiteering off of them, or Bezos of having bought secrets? Speak up, bold and principled Josh Marshall and Fran Townsend.Or let's take the revered-in-DC Bob Woodward, who has become America's richest journalist by writing book after book over the last decade that has spilled many of America's most sensitive secrets fed to him by top US government officials. In fact, his books are so filled with vital and sensitive secrets that Osama bin Laden personally recommended that they be read. Shall we accuse Woodward of selling US secrets to his publisher and profiteering off of them, and suggest he be prosecuted?Or let's take the New York Times. They reported that they received 50,000 classified Snowden documents fromthe Guardian. Rather than simultaneously publish them all on the internet, they've been reporting on selective documents while keeping the rest for themselves. They have published very well-linked articles by reporters such as Scott Shane, who are paid money to read through these documents and then write about them. Are the New York Times and Scott Shane also now guilty of "privatizing" the nation's secrets?Or how about Jim Risen, who in 2004 learned about one of the nation's most sensitive secrets: the NSA's top secret warrantless eavesdropping program. He wrote a best-selling book (for which he was paid!) in which he reported on that top secret program and others, and was also paid to write an article about it for the New York Times. Are Risen, his publisher, and the NYT now also guilty of "privatizing" secrets and "profiteering" off them? Should they be prosecuted for it?Since the NSA story began, Laura Poitras has reported on these documents in a freelance capacity with the New York Times (multiple times with Jim Risen), the Washington Post (bylined with Gellman), the Guardian (bylined with me and others), and der Spiegel (with that paper's staff reporters). Are these four newspapers, all of whom paid Poitras and her fellow reporters for this reporting, guilty of buying US secrets?Over the last three decades, Seymour Hersh has received all sorts of classified information from his sources. So has Jane Mayer. They do not dump it publicly on the internet. They keep it inside the New Yorker or their publishing company - where they vet it, understand it, verify it, and then report on it: all for pay! Let's hear all of you step up and accuse Mayer and Hersh of criminally "privatizing" and selling the nation's secrets and the New Yorker and their publishing companies of purchasing them.Daniel Ellsberg gave the Pentagon Papers to the New York Times. The reporter with whom he worked was paid to write about those documents, and the NYT itself sold lots of papers by virtue of having that story. Was the NYT guilty of "privatizing" the Pentagon Papers, and Neil Sheehan guilty of selling them by being paid to write about them?Every worthwhile investigative journalist - by definition - at some point receives, and then publishes, classified information. They are virtually always paid for their work in exposing that information, because that's how professional journalists earn a living. It's also a necessary arrangement for journalists to report on these matters with legal protections (see below). And rather than mail the material they get from their sources around to other media organizations, they keep it themselves, work on reporting it, and then write about it in their own media outlets.If you are so infuriated by this NSA reporting that you short-sightedly embrace theories that suggest there's something untoward or criminal about this process, then you're essentially criminalizing all professional investigative journalism. Do you not see where this idiocy takes you?2) What better alternatives exist for our reporting on these documents? The strategy Laura Poitras and I used to report these documents is clear: I reported on most of them under a freelance contract with the Guardian, and she has reported on most under similar contracts with the NYT, the Washington Post, the Guardian and especially der Spiegel. But we also have partnered with multiple media outlets around the world - in Germany, Brazil, Canada, France, India, Spain, Holland, Mexico, and Norway, with more shortly to come - to ensure that the documents are reported on in those places where the interest level is highest and are closest to those individuals whose privacy has been invaded.Feel free to criticize that method all you want. I'm extremely proud of the model we've created, one that borrows heavily from the WikiLeaks model of worldwide media partnerships, as it's ensured that no one media outlet has monopolized these documents. Instead, all the stories are reported with the benefit of journalists most familiar with the climate and landscape in the affected countries. That has made the story international in scope, and has made the reporting far better than if it had all been centralized in one place.The result has been - in just six months - the publication of more classified documents and revelations about the NSA than have appeared in the entire history of the organization before that. Six months is hardly a long time: WikiLeaks did not publish their first war log until five months after they received them from Manning, and did not publish their first diplomatic cable until nine months after they first received them. That's because these documents are complex, take time to understand, vet, and process. We have published a huge number in countries around the world in a short period of time, and there are still many, many more stories and documents to be reported in countries all over the world.But those that want to criticize that method are compelled to identify one that is superior. Let's examine those alternatives:Dump all the documents at once on the internet. As one of the most vocal and long-time supporters of WikiLeaks, this is a model that I endorse in some cases (though WikiLeaks also redacted documents it published and still withholds others it possesses for very justifiable reasons; they also only publish documents once they've vetted, authenticated and understood them). I completely empathize with those arguing this: as I've said many times, the complaint that we've published too little is infinitely more valid than the complaint that we've published too much. But there are so many reasons why this dump-it-all approach makes no sense in this particular case.To begin with, doing this would violently breach the agreement we made with our source. Edward Snowden knows how the internet works. If he had wanted all the documents uploaded onto the internet, he could have - and would have - done that himself. Or he could have told us to do it, or given it to a group with instructions to do that. Quite obviously, he did none none of that.He did the opposite: he came to journalists he personally selected, and asked that we only publish with media organizations. He also asked that we very carefully vet the material he gave us and only publish that which would be recognized as in the public interest but not anything which could be said to endanger the lives of innocent people. His primary concern has always been that the focus be on the substance of what the NSA is doing, and knew that mass, indiscriminate publication would drown meaningful discussions with accusations of how we recklessly helped The Terrorists', the Chinese, and every other World Villain.I'm absolutely convinced that the agreement we made with our source for how these documents were to be reported was the right one. Had we just published them all without any context, discrimination or reporting, the impact - for so many reasons - would have been far, far less than the slow, incremental and careful reporting we've done.But at this point, that debate doesn't matter: those demanding that we just publish all of the documents without regard to their consequences or content are demanding that we ignore and violate our agreement with our source, and we're never going to do that no matter who doesn't like it. And as our source has repeatedly proven: if he's unhappy about how matters are proceeding or has something to say, he's more than willing and able to speak out. He hasn't done so about this because the way we've reported these documents is completely consistent with the agreement and methodology he insisted upon.Moreover, those demanding that all of these documents be published indiscriminately are completely ignoring the very real legal risks for everyone involved in this process, beginning with Snowden, who already faces 30 years in prison and is currently protected only by 9 more months of temporary asylum in Russia. Everyone involved in the publication of these materials has already undertaken substantial legal risk.Just like it's cheap and easy for war advocates to demand that others go and risk their lives to fight the wars they cheer, it's very cheap and easy to demand that others (including Snowden) undertake even more legal risk by publishing all of these documents. Everyone has the right to decide for themselves what risks they're willing to endure, and if you aren't taking any yourselves for the cause you claim to support, then perhaps it's worth considering whether others are entitled to the same consideration you give yourself.I'd also like to test whether those who argue this are being genuine. Should we really publish everything we have without redactions or regard to their consequences? Speaking purely hypothetically:if we know the names of people the NSA is accusing of engaging in "online promiscuity" on the internet, or the names of those the NSA believes are terrorists, should we publish that, thereby invading their privacy and destroying their reputations?
  if we have the raw chats, internet activity, and telephone calls of people on whom the NSA has spied, should we just publish those?
  if we have documents that would help other states spy more effectively on their own citizens' internet activities, should we publish those, thereby subjecting hundreds of millions of people to heightened state surveillance?
  if we have documents containing the names of innocent people whose reputations or lives would be endangered if they were exposed, should we just ignore their plight and publish those?
  if we have documents that are so complex that we don't yet understand the potential consequences for other people from publishing them, should we just throw caution to the wind and publish them anyway, and learn later what happens?
  The minute any of you say "no" to any of those questions, then you are asking us to do exactly that which we've been doing: take the time to go through the documents carefully, consult with experts, understand them, and then only publish those documents or parts of documents which do not cause any of these harms.All of the foregoing is addressed to the people who are asking in good faith why we aren't publishing more documents more quickly. I respect that critique. If I were watching someone else reporting on these documents, I'd likely be asking those same questions. That's why I've spent so much time and energy engaging those who raise these questions.By contrast, I have nothing but contempt for the DC functionaries who are cynically embracing that Pando post that holds out the WikiLeaks dump-it-all model as the ideal - the Josh Marshalls and Fran Townsends of the world - as though they would prefer we did that instead. Those are the very same people who hate WikiLeaks, and would be first in line to accuse us of recklessness and likely demand our prosecution if we followed that model (here, for instance, is a CNN debate I did in 2010 with the very same Fran Townsend when I defended Julian Assange after he signed a $1.2 million book deal). As one Twitter commentator put it regarding the DC WikiLeaks-haters heralding this Pando post:@ggreenwald "You didn't dump all the documents in public domain like Wikileaks did!" Sincerely, Those Who Attacked Wikileaks For Doing That'-- Mr. LV426 (@mrlv426) December 1, 2013
  The DC functionaries citing that Pando post don't want a different model of reporting. They are just National Security State loyalists and/or Democratic partisans who don't want any NSA reporting being done at all. And that Pando post is just a convenient weapon to impugn the reporting we're doing even though its cited rationale is one that, in every other case, they vehemently reject.Hand out large amounts of documents to other news organizations.Another possible alternative to the reporting approach we've chosen is to distribute thousands of documents to multiple news outlets around the world, so that the reporting can be done more quickly. But this ignores the legal constraints we face.Even using the more limited approach we've undertaken, we've already been accused of possible criminality and/or had our prosecution advocated by the likes of Alan Dershowitz, Peter King, David Gregory, Dianne Feinstein, Marc Thiessen, Andrew Ross Sorkin (who later apologized), and many others. The UK government is formally equating our journalism with "terrorism" and "espionage" and has said there are criminal investigations pending. Eric Holder's recent statements about whether I'd be prosecuted if I tried to enter the US was so riddled with caveats and uncertainties that it raised more questions than it answered.One of the few protections you have when you're reporting on classified materials is that you're doing it as a journalist. It's therefore vital that we never act as a source or distributor of the materials, which is what the DOJ would eagerly claim if - as individuals - we just started handing out massive amounts of documents to media organizations around the world, rather than doing what we've been doing: reporting on them on a story-by-story basis with those outlets.I realize that it's very easy to be dismissive and blithe about those risks if they're not yours to take. But especially since I think the approach we've been using is the most effective, and since I know that even the more limited approach is risky, I'm not going to hand prosecution advocates inside the US government a gift by becoming a source or distributor of the documents. That's why I've been reporting on these documents in partnership with media outlets on a story-by-story basis and will continue to do so. It is true, as the Pando post points out, that WikiLeaks did do exactly this: they shared thousands of classified documents with media outlets around the world. But it's also true - as outrageous as it is - that WikiLeaks for years has been and still is the target of a US criminal grand jury investigation, and Julian Assange fears - justifiably so - that the US intends to prosecute him for Espionage Act violations. The fear that the US intends do so was the basis cited by the Ecuadorian government for granting him asylum.So again, it's very easy to demand that others follow the WikiLeaks model: if it's not your indictment and Espionage Act prosecution, then there's no need to be concerned. But I'm very content with the number of revelations we've enabled (and will continue to enable) and the massive impact our reporting has had around the world. And I make no apology whatsoever about incorporating legal constraints and considerations of legal risks - for both our source and ourselves - into our approach.Finally, the very same DC functionaries now heralding this Pando post would be the very first people in line accusing us of being "sources" and "distributors of documents" - rather than journalists - if we followed this model. Their interest is in stifling the reporting in order to protect the President, his Party, and the NSA - not critiquing how it's being done.3) How can anyone reconcile the "monopoly" accusation with the most basic facts?The accusation that we sold, and Omidyar purchased, NSA secrets, and the related claim that he now has a "monopoly" on the NSA documents, is without question the single dumbest accusation I've heard since we began reporting on these documents. And that's saying something. So many obvious, glaring facts makes clear how absurd that is:First, how is this different from virtually every other big journalistic story involving top secret matters? Did the Washington Post privatize and have a monopoly when Dana Priest learned and then informed the world in that paper about the CIA black sites? Did the New York Times have a "monopoly" on the Pentagon Papers once Daniel Ellsberg gave it to them? Did the Guardian have a "monopoly" on the NSA story before I left?It's almost always the case that the journalists and media outlets that get information from a source are the ones who keep it, work on it, and report it. That's how the source wants it, which is why the source came to those journalists. Since when is this called "privatizing" material or having a "monopoly"?Second, everyone already knows that tens of thousands of these documents are in the possession of the New York Times, the Guardian, ProPublica, and Bart Gellman/the Washington Post - entities that obviously are not controlled by me, Poitras, or the new venture with which we're working. Does that sound remotely like a "monopoly"? It's true that only Laura and I have possession of the full set, but such vast numbers of these documents are spread around to so many different media organizations, which continue to report on them, that the claim that Laura and I possess sole control over them is ludicrous.Third, the suggestion that the creation of NewCo has anything to do with acquiring a "monopoly" over NSA documents is nothing short of laughable. We are building a large, general-interest, sustained news organization that has almost nothing to do with the NSA story. Indeed, even among the first set of hires that have been announced, none of the journalists and editors other than me and Laura have had anything to do with the NSA story. Moreover, given that we have not even announced a launch date yet, it's far from clear how much NSA reporting will be left to do at this new organization.Fourth, just use basic common sense - and obvious public facts - when assessing this accusation. Since our new media venture was announced, Laura and I have both reported on and published these documents around the world. Laura has published multiple big NSA stories at der Spiegel and the New York Times, while I've done the same in Norway, Holland, and Canada. Moreover, we just published one of the biggest NSA stories yet - about the agency's exploitation of internet porn activities to destroy the reputation of "radicals" - atthe Huffington Post. I'm also currently working with a separate large US media outlet on very big NSA/GCQH stories to be reported shortly.Does that sound like a "monopoly" to anyone who understands the word? If we wanted a monopoly at our new media venture, why are we not sitting on these big NSA stories until we launch so we can publish them there? A "monopoly" is the exact opposite of what we want and what we've been doing, as conclusively demonstrated by the continuous, ongoing reporting we're doing around the world even after our new media venture was announced.Fifth, and finally, those making this accusation are revealing more about themselves than about us. As I said when I moved from my own blog to Salon, and then again when I moved to the Guardian, editorial independence is central to everything I do. The same is true of Laura Poitras, Jeremy Scahill and others we've already announced, let alone those who are coming. The idea that any of us would allow meaningful reporting or our commentary to be restricted for commercial or ideological reasons by anyone (to say nothing of the claim that this is the intention of Omidyar given who he has pursued) would trigger a laughing fit on the part of anyone with whom we've worked or is familiar with our work. The only people who would say this or believe this are those who themselves succumb to those sorts of pressures.4) On the allegation of "profiteering"The one thing I never thought I'd be accused of is lacking sincere passion and conviction about the dangers of surveillance. Laura and I have been working on surveillance issues for many, many years - when few people were paying attention and there were zero rewards from doing so. I spent almost every day for two straight years - in 2006 and 2007 - writing about little other than the Bush-era NSA scandal. Indeed, the very first New York Times article about my work on the Snowden story tried to suggest that my interest in this topic was virtually freakish, saying that I have been "writing intensely, even obssesively, for years about government surveillance." Laura was working on a documentary about NSA surveillance long before either of us ever heard the name "Edward Snowden."It is simply an unavoidable reality that if you want to do effective investigative journalism aimed at the US government, the National Security State, and the world's most powerful corporate factions, then you need resources to do that. You need editors, fellow experienced reporters, lawyers, researchers, technologies, the ability to travel, the knowledge that you can defend yourself from legal attacks, and a whole variety of other means of support. That's why the oh-so-pure Pando writers ran into the arms of Silicon Valley libertarian oligarchs after their prior NSFW model failed and after they spent years maligning others for taking exactly that sort of funding, and then justified it by saying: "We now have millions of dollars to do investigative reporting." It is absolutely the case that I consider the opportunity to help build this new media venture to be a once-in-a-career dream opportunity. That's because the organization is being built from the start to support, sustain and encourage truly independent, adversarial journalism. It has the backing and is being built by someone whom I am absolutely convinced is dedicated to this model of independent, adversarial journalism. It has the real potential to enable innovative and fearless journalism.The same is true of the book I'm writing. Somewhere along the way, certain factions on the left began embracing a supremely anti-intellectual view of books as something to be suspicious of rather than a vital instrument for spreading ideas. Books can be uniquely valuable in making the case for a set of political ideas - which is presumably why people like Noam Chomsky have spent their lives writing dozens of them. And the same is true of films: they can reach audiences who otherwise are unreachable when it comes to political questions, and shape how they think about such matters like nothing else can. After all these years of toiling on these issues, I'm thrilled to have a loud platform to warn of the dangers of state surveillance, US militarism, and government secrecy, and to herald the importance of individual privacy, internet freedom, and transparency for the world's most powerful factions. Refusing to do what one can to have the greatest impact in defense of one's political values is just self-indulgent.Being skeptical and asking questions about any new media organization is completely appropriate. I'm sure I'd be doing the same thing of other new organizations. But we haven't even begun yet. When I moved to Salon and then to the Guardian, I heard all sorts of claims about how I'd have to moderate or dilute my work to accommodate those environments and the interests and views of those who own and run them. I don't think anyone can reasonably claim that happened. And I am quite certain that the same will be true here. The people we have hired and will continue to hire - and, ultimately, the journalism we produce - will speak volumes about exactly the reasons we're doing this and why I'm so excited about it.
The $70 Egg Tray and the Last Inch of Convenience
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  Archived Version
  Source: HomeFree America
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 08:45
  We're on the brink of an explosion in home automation. All of the technologies that make it possible are moving forward at light speed now.
  The only question is: how will it arrive?
  The work we've been doing here on the future of the American Dream provides us with some insight into what the answer won't be.
  It won't be: automation that solves the last inch of convenience. For example, here's a smart egg tray built by the company Quirky.
  This egg tray actively measures the weight of each egg it holds, to find rotten eggs.
  When it finds a rotten egg, it sends an alert to your iPhone.
  Wait for it. Here's the price.
  Ouch. No sale.
  The problem with this product isn't only the price. I'd expect nearly any new form of home automation to be expensive during the early phases of this technological roll-out.
  The big problem with this is conceptual. It's a product that automates convenience. The problem is that we are already very comfortable and the extra inch of convenience it offers the buyer is so small, it's not worth even a dollar or two more than a standard egg tray. Quirky isn't alone in that. The same conceptual problem is true with nearly every other form of home automation I've reviewed recently.
  We don't have a problem with convenience.
  Our problem is achieving the American Dream and these products won't help us do it.
  JR
  01. December 2013 by John RobbCategories: Food, HomeFree, Interior | 2 comments
Shaking the Water
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  Archived Version
  Source: Lame Cherry
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 08:44
  Just a quick note, for the 9.0 and 7.0 earthquake which are supposed to hit the American West Coast and off Japan, what the construct is they have been injecting metal energy rods into the ley lines to bleed off energy. The construct is still there for the earthquakes but it has been delayed for at least three years. However the delay will make the earthquake greater in magnitude when it does hit. The area I was looking at was the North Pacific and the West Coast.
  I have not Inquired about any of the earthquakes in the structure after the tampering but this is the up to date information as of today.
  Upon Inquiry what is trending now is the next major earthquake feature of 7.0+ is in the African area, Indian Ocean side. That is all I know.
  God's Blessings Kim to you and yours for the Christmas holidays and beyond.
  agtG
Google, the NSA, and the need for locking down datacenter traffic | ZDNet
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 08:20
  Summary: With the NSA seemingly listening in to Google's datacenter traffic, Google, Yahoo, and other companies' need for datacenter-to-datacenter encryption has never been greater.
  UPDATED, the evening of Oct. 30 with Google's Response. Not that this is going to come as any real surprise to anyone who's been following the Snowden NSA revelations but it appears that the NSA's newly revealed MUSCULAR project has been listening in to Google and Yahoo's datacenter-to-datacenter communications.
  It may look like a post-it note, but this leaked NSA slide had Google engineers swearing. (Credit: The Washington Post)The NSA has denied that they're doing this. Politico reported that a NSA representative said, "The assertion that we collect vast quantities of U.S. persons' data from this type of collection is also not true."
  But, what is the NSA doing, if anything, anyway? Good question. The NSA PowerPoint post-it note of a slide on Google Cloud Exploitation simply shows a sketch where the Public Internet meets the internal Google Cloud at a Google Front-End (GFE) server. This is not exactly a detailed technical document.
  More on the NSA surveillance revelationsHere's are some of the ways this could work. First, you should know that Google, Yahoo, and other major multinational Internet traffic companies store multiple copies of data across datacenters. That way when you do a search, read a Facebook post, what-have you, when your Web request goes to the closest possible datacenter it will get the fastest possible results.
  Six ways to protect yourself from the NSA and other eavesdroppersTo make that happen, and to ensure that you have the freshest information, the big boys use either their own or privately leased fiber-optic connections. These use networking technologies such as OC-768 and 100Gigabit Ethernet for data transmission rates of up to 100 Gigabits per second to hook up datacenters.
  This traffic, over these network connections, is not being encrypted at this time. The companies seem to have thought that since encryption does take up some time, and the traffic goes over a private connection, this was safe enough. They were wrong.
  After the news about NSA snooping first broke over the summer, Google decided it was time to start encrypting its datacenter-to-datacenter communications. Google also started automatically encrypting Google Cloud Storage data with 128-bit Advanced Encryption Standard (AES-128) before it's written to disk. Yahoo, for its part, is finally turning Secure-Socket Layer (SSL) on as its default Yahoo Mail setting for improved end-user security.
  Will these methods solve the major Internet players' privacy problem? Probably not.
  For starters, it's not at all clear from The Washington Post report how the NSA is listening in. Is the NSA is squatting in international telecommunications centers snooping on clear-text traffic between datacenters, or is the NSA actually breaking SSL, Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), and Transport Layer Security (TLS) traffic as it moves from Google's datacenters to the Internet? We don't know. For that matter, the Post story also implies that the GFE servers themselves may have been compromised.
  If SSL and its related security protocols have indeed been compromised there are ways they could be toughened. One such possible fix is Perfect Forward Secrecy (PFS).
  With PFS encrypted Web connections, when a secure connection is made between a browser and a server, a temporary secure session key is generated using Diffie-Hellman (DHE) or Elliptic Curve cryptography (ECDHE). As you continue to interact with a site new secure keys are generated.
  The good news is that this makes it much harder to break such secure connections. Instead of having to break one key, a would-be snooper must break multiple ones. The bad news is that both algorithms can slow down connections and they're not universally supported by Web servers and browsers.
  Of course, it's a cryptography truism that it's easier to get around cryptography than it to break it. So if the NSA, or one of its partners such as the UK's Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) could tap into Google's and Yahoo's private networks, that would be their method of choice.
  David Drummond, Google's Chief Legal Officer, said, "We have long been concerned about the possibility of this kind of snooping, which is why we have continued to extend encryption across more and more Google services and links, especially the links in the slide. We do not provide any government, including the U.S. government, with access to our systems. We are outraged at the lengths to which the government seems to have gone to intercept data from our private fiber networks, and it underscores the need for urgent reform."
  ZDNet has asked Yahoo for their take on the matter, but Yahoo hasn't responded yet. When they do, we'll update this story.
  For now, we just don't know, which, if not all three, methods the NSA used and what the companies will be doing in reaction to this. What we do know, and we should have known all along, is that privacy really doesn't exist on today's Internet.
  The moral of the story, for anyone, who runs datacenters in more than one country, is that it's well past time to start using as secure connections as you can find for your datacenter-to-datacenter communications. Simply having a "private" line doesn't mean that you're not actually on a party line with the NSA.
  Related Stories:
''Fast and Furious'' Star Paul Walker Assassinated by Obama Drone Strike? | Truther.org
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Mon, 02 Dec 2013 08:14
  RIP Paul Walker
  David Chase TaylorDecember 1, 2013Truther.org
  SWITZERLAND, Zurich '-- Based on evidence acquired to date, it appears that Fast and the Furious star Paul Walker was assassinated in a drone strike while riding in a car in Los Angeles, California on November 30, 2013. While initial reports state that the car split in two after striking a tree at a high rate of speed, one look at the crash scene (see photo below) and it's evident that the tree (no more than 6 inches in diameter) was not solely responsible for cutting in half, exploding and completely destroying the 2005 Porsche Carrera GT. A few inches of wood are obviously no match for thousands of pounds of forged steel allegedly traveling at an extremely high-rate of speed.. In other words, what is being alleged as the cause of death by authorities is scientifically impossible. The Walker crash scene is eerily similar to what is known to be a missile strike on a civilian vehicle and almost identical to that of fiery crash witnessed when Rolling Stone reporter Michael Hastings was assassinated on June 18, 2013, in Los Angeles, California. As evidenced in a video taken by witnesses who arrived at the crash scene only moments after the explosion, pieces of Walker's Carrera GT can be seen strewn across the street in every direction, characteristic of a high-impact missile strike.
  It's no secret that drones are operating in American airspace, the only question is whether or not they are now openly assassinating U.S. citizens, something President Obama has already admitted doing. Roughly 4 months ago on July 26, 2013, the FBI informed U.S. Senator Rand Paul in an unclassified letter they have flown drones over U.S. airspace a total of 10 times in the past 7 years, a statistic which is likely much higher. Aside from the deaths of Walker and Hastings, other suspected drone strikes include the West Texas Fertilizer Company explosion on April 17, 2013, in which a missile can be seen striking the building just prior to the explosion, as well as the explosion which killed the 19 elite firefighters near Yarnell Hill, Arizona, on June 30, 2013. Curiously, the autopsies and photos of the 19 firefighters are being withheld from the victims families because they are most likely not consistent with the now retracted preliminary autopsy report which stated that burns and smoke inhalation were the cause of death in all 19 fatalities. Considering that the firefighters suffered a radio blackout just prior to the explosion (i.e., electronic blackouts generally precede black operations) and that drones are admittedly being used fight forest fires (or start them), the likelihood of foul play in the tragedy is exponentially higher. Although the FBI's drone missions are still classified, they're evidently comprised of assassinations which are intended to look like ''accidents''.
  About the AuthorDavid Chase Taylor is an American journalist and the editor-in-chief of Truther.org. Taylor currently lives in Z¼rich, Switzerland where he has applied for political asylum after the release of The Nuclear Bible, a book credited with foiling a state-sponsored nuclear terror attack upon Super Bowl XLV in Dallas, Texas on February 6, 2011. Taylor has also authored The Bio-Terror Bible, a book and website exposing the 2013 global bio-terror pandemic. To date, Truther.org has identified and exposed over 50 Obama sanctioned terror plots, as well as the Alex Jones' links to STRATFOR.
  Truther.org Legal DisclaimerTruther.org's stated purpose is to prevent terror attacks by drawing unwanted global attention to these terror plots prior to their fruition. State-Sponsored Terror Threat Assessments (SSTTA), assertions, and forecasts made by Truther.org DO NOT necessarily imply that these terror events will transpire in reality but rather that there is a distinct possibility they could theoretically occur based on the cited data. Historically speaking, once a major false-flag is exposed (e.g., the Super Bowl XLV Nuclear Terror Plot), the terror plot is immediately canceled or postponed. State-sponsored acts of terror must have a prior paper trail in order to set-up patsies, prime scapegoats, create plausible deniability, as well as mislead the public from the true perpetrators of terror. By first identifying and then connecting the dots of said terror paper trail, Truther.org has successfully blown the whistle on numerous terror related plots. Please spread the word and help make terrorism a thing of the past. Blessed are the Peacemakers. Namaste
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23andStupid: Is 23andMe Self-Destructing? - Forbes
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  Archived Version
  Sun, 01 Dec 2013 22:48
  Log in with your social account:Or, you can log in or sign up using Forbes.New Posts+1 posts this hourMost PopularBlack Friday Survival GuideListsThe Business Of HockeyVideoOne World Trade Center3 Days Left: Register for the Forbes iConferenceHelp|Connect
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23andMe Is Terrifying, But Not for the Reasons the FDA Thinks: Scientific American
  Link to Article
  Archived Version
  Sun, 01 Dec 2013 22:11
  The genetic-testing company's real goal is to hoard your personal data
  By Charles Seife
  We've heard that one before. Back when Google was first launched, the founders insisted that the company would never sell you out to advertisers. The company admitted that it would share aggregate information about users' behavior with anyone who ponied up enough money, but the company's privacy policy promised that ''[i]ndividually identifiable information about you is not willfully disclosed to any third party without first receiving your permission.'' A decade and a half later, after countless minuscule frog-in-boiling-water changes, Google's privacy policy is craftily worded, diluting the word ''consent'' so that it's implicit in most cases. (There are a few exceptions; the company has graciously agreed not to reveal that you are a homosexual or that you have heart disease unless you explicitly opt in. But in matters not related to your medical conditions, race, ethnicity, sexuality, or your political or religious beliefs, there is no such guarantee.) Not that your consent really matters, implicit or explicit. Google has repeatedly proven that it is more than willing to break its promises and ignore its own privacy rules when it suits.
  Why should we believe that 23andMe's promises are any more binding? Early signs certainly aren't encouraging. Even though 23andMe currently asks permission to use your genetic information for scientific research, the company has explicitly stated that its database-sifting scientific work ''does not constitute research on human subjects,'' meaning that it is not subject to the rules and regulations that are supposed to protect experimental subjects' privacy and welfare.
  Those of us who have not volunteered to be a part of the grand experiment have even less protection. Even if 23andMe keeps your genome confidential against hackers, corporate takeovers, and the temptations of filthy lucre forever and ever, there is plenty of evidence that there is no such thing as an ''anonymous'' genome anymore. It is possible to use the internet to identify the owner of a snippet of genetic information and it is getting easier day by day.
  This becomes a particularly acute problem once you realize that every one of your relatives who spits in a 23andMe vial is giving the company a not-inconsiderable bit of your own genetic information to the company along with their own. If you have several close relatives who are already in 23andMe's database, the company already essentially has all that it needs to know about you. It is doubtful that 23andMe would be able to protect that information even if it were so inclined.
  While the FDA concentrates on the question of whether 23andMe's kit is a safe and effective medical device, it is failing to address the real issue: what 23andMe should be allowed to do with the data it collects. For 23andMe's Personal Genome Service is much more than a medical device; it is a one-way portal into a world where corporations have access to the innermost contents of your cells and where insurers and pharmaceutical firms and marketers might know more about your body than you know yourself. And as 23andMe warns on its website, ''Genetic Information that you share with others could be used against your interests. You should be careful about sharing your Genetic Information with others.''
  Present company excepted, of course.
Rename "master/slave" terminology to "client/server" [#343414] | Drupal.org
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  Archived Version
  Sun, 01 Dec 2013 14:36
  Welcome to the 1990s. ;) It's generally frowned upon to continue using potentially offensive terminology when there are vastly better alternatives available. Reading stuff like "here are the steps I had to take to get my slave running" makes my skin curl. I doubt I'm the only one.
  What's wrong with calling the coordinating machine the "testing server", and the various machines that help run tests "testing clients"?
'Humans evolved after a female chimpanzee mated with a pig': Extraordinary claim made by American geneticist.
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  Archived Version
  Source: bertb news feed
  Sun, 01 Dec 2013 14:27
  Dr Eugene McCarthy points to features that distinguish us from primatesHe says that the only animals which also have these features are pigsControversial hypothesis has been met by significant oppositionBy Damien Gayle
  PUBLISHED: 04:45 EST, 30 November 2013 | UPDATED: 05:49 EST, 30 November 2013
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  The human species began as the hybrid offspring of a male pig and a female chimpanzee, a leading geneticist has suggested.
  The startling claim has been made by Eugene McCarthy, of the University of Georgia, who is also one of the worlds leading authorities on hybridisation in animals.
  He points out that while humans have many features in common with chimps, we also have a large number of distinguishing characteristics not found in any other primates.
  The origin of the species? A remarkable new theory advanced by a leading geneticist suggests that human beings may have originally emerged as the hybrid offspring of a male pig and a female chimpanzee
  Dr McCarthy says these divergent characteristics are most likely the result of a hybrid origin at some point far back in human evolutionary history.
  What's more, he suggests, there is one animal that has all of the traits which distinguish humans from our primate cousins in the animal kingdom.
  'What is this other animal that has all these traits?' he asks rhetorically. 'The answer is Sus scrofa, the ordinary pig.'
  Dr McCarthy elaborates his astonishing hypothesis in an article on Macroevolution.net, a website he curates. He is at pains to point out that that it is merely a hypothesis, but he presents compelling evidence to support it.
  Scientists currently suppose that chimpanzees are humans' closest living evolutionary relatives, a theory amply backed by genetic evidence.
  However, as Dr McCarthy points out, despite this genetic similarity, there are a massive number of divergent anatomical characteristics distinguishing the two species.
  These distinguishing characteristics, including hairless skin, a thick layer of subcutaneous fat, light-coloured eyes, protruding noses and heavy eyelashes, to name but a few, are unmistakeably porcine, he suggests.
  There are also a number of less obvious but equally inexplicable similarities between humans and pigs in the structure of the skin and organs.
  Indeed, pig skin tissues and heart valves can be used in medicine because of their similarity and compatibility with the human body.
  Similarities: Dr Eugene McCarthy suggests that humans' hairless skin and subcutaneous fat could be explained by porcine ancestry
  Dr McCarthy says that the original pig-chimp hook up was probably followed by several generations of 'backcrossing', where the offspring of that pairing lived among chimps and mated with them - becoming more like chimps and less like pigs with every new generation.
  This also helps to explain the problem of relative infertility in hybrids. Dr McCarthy points out that the belief that all hybrids are sterile is in fact false, and in many cases hybrid animals are able to breed with mates of the same species of either parent.
  After several generations the hybrid strain would have become fertile enough to breed amongst themselves, Dr McCarthy says.
  Unsurprisingly, Dr McCarthy's hypothesis has come in for substantial criticism from orthodox evolutionary biologists and their Creationist opponents alike.
  One important criticism, which dubs his theory the 'Monkey-F******-A-Pig hypothesis', is that there is little chance that pigs and chimps could be interfertile. The two orders of creatures, according to evolutionary theory, diverged roughly 80million years ago, a ScienceBlogs post points out.
  '[J]ust the gradual accumulation of molecular differences in sperm and egg recognition proteins would mean that pig sperm wouldn't recognize a chimpanzee egg as a reasonable target for fusion,' PZ Myers writes.
  Furthermore, the blogger explains, while chimps have 48 chromosomes, pigs have just 38.
  He adds: 'Hybridizing a pig and a chimp is like taking half the dancers from a performance of Swan Lake and the other half from a performance of Giselle and throwing them together on stage to assemble something. It's going to be a catastrophe.'
  Finally, he suggests rather impudently that Dr McCarthy do the experimental work himself and try mating with a pig to see how far he gets.
  But Dr McCarthy believes that, in the case of humans and other creatures, his hybrid modification to evolutionary theory can account for a range of phenomena that Darwinian evolution alone has difficulty explaining.
  Despite the opinions of some peer reviewers that Dr McCarthy's work presents a potentially paradigm-shifting new take on conventional views of the origins of new life forms, he has had difficulty finding a publisher, so he has chosen to publish a book-length manuscript outlining his ideas on his website.
  In its conclusion he writes: 'I must admit that I initially felt a certain amount of repugnance at the idea of being a hybrid. The image of a pig mating with an ape is not a pretty one, nor is that of a horde of monstrous half-humans breeding in a hybrid swarm.
  'But the way we came to be is not so important as the fact that we now exist. As every Machiavellian knows, good things can emerge from ugly processes, and I think the human race is a very good thing. Moreover, there is something to be said for the idea of having the pig as a relative.
  'My opinion of this animal has much improved during the course of my research. Where once I thought of filth and greed, I now think of intelligence, affection, loyalty, and adaptability, with an added touch of joyous sensuality '-- qualities without which humans would not be human.'
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