Workers and Wage Slaves, Class Warfare; Politics, GOP, Civil Rights and Racism, Vote Machinations, Campaign Finance Deform; Banks and Wall Street, JPMorgan, Stock Market; Obamacare, Medicaid Expansion, Bill of Health, Anti-Vax; Heartbleed Bug

Workers and Wage Slaves

• Senate extends unemployment insurance. Why such a tough sell in the House?
• Getting Walmart Workers Off Food Stamps Would Cost Customers Barely Anything
• Reich: Why the Minimum Wage Should Really Be Raised to $15 an Hour
• SeaTac, Wash., fast becoming epicenter of 'livable wage' debate
• Work-life balance: what changes could help improve yours?—"New labour laws in France protect workers from responding to emails after 6pm, and a trial in Sweden is reducing work hours to just 30 hours a week. Do these initiatives sound like a good idea to you? Or what changes could help improve your work-life balance?"

Class Warfare

• How America is rigged for the rich—"Eric Liu says Paul Ryan gets it very wrong: The U.S.'s problem is not a culture of poverty, it is a culture of wealth destroying the value linking work to reward."
• Alabama Passes 4 Bills Restricting Welfare
• Why Is Georgia About to Pass a Law That Will Make It Easier to Send Poor People to Prison?—"After extensive lobbying, the private probation industry is poised to wield ever more power over Georgia's debtors."
• Drum: Nobody Cares What You Think Unless You're Rich
• Du Pont heir didn't go to court-ordered clinic—Send him to prison where he belongs.

Politics

• Obama blasts 'least productive Congress in modern history'
• Fed-Up Eric Holder Rips Congress: 'Unprecedented, Unwarranted, Ugly and Divisive'
• Sen. Charles Grassley plans new whistleblower-protection caucus WaPo
• Why people are not engaged in politics and policymaking – and how to fix it—"We asked former home secretary David Blunkett and other experts how to involve #peopleinpolitics. Here's what they said."
• CapitolBells.com—Leveraging social media to track bills
• How politics makes us stupid

GOP

• Busy Day For House GOP: Blocks Bills On Minimum Wage, Equal Pay, LGBT Rights, Mine Safety
• Darrell Issa Tries Tactic In IRS Probe Last Used In McCarthyism—More circus acts [WaPo] to come.
• Dems seek end to Benghazi probe; GOP presses ahead
• Poll: More than half of N.J. voters say Christie's 'Bridgegate' report was 'whitewash'
• Judge: Key BridgeGate Figures Don't Have To Give Documents To Lawmakers
• Huckabee: Men Hunt Together, Women Go To The Restroom Together—Misogynistic and homophobic Salon.

Civil Rights and Racism

• Many doubt 1964 Civil Rights Act could pass today
• GOP Senate Candidate: Obama Is Dodging Impeachment Because He Isn't White
• Study: When whites are told they're becoming a minority, they become more conservative
• Jimmy Carter: Southern White Men Turn To The GOP Because Of 'Race'

Vote Machinations

• The Supreme Court Gutted the Voting Rights Act. What Happened Next in These 8 States Will Not Shock You.
• We Should Be in a Rage—"When will we demand the country we deserve? If we don’t like the path we’re on, we can alter it." NYT
• How to reverse a supreme court attack on democracy: fight for voting rights—"John Roberts' wrecking ball got you mad as hell? Don't take his court's electoral destruction for granted anymore."
• Clinton: Voting limits derail civil rights—"President Bill Clinton ripped the Supreme Court's conservative justices and Republicans pushing voter identification laws on Wednesday, accusing them of undermining civil rights." He also urges adding photos to Social Security cards for voter identification WaPo
• Why voting rights is the Democrats' most important project in 2014 WaPo
• Could absentee ballot controversy lead to Ohio voting probe?—"Going after the personal finances of public officials for trying to promote voter participation is unprecedented."
• Voter laws: Imposter anxiety
• Senate sends governor bill banning United Nations election monitors from Tennessee—What a waste of time.
• Wisconsin Had Best-Run Elections in U.S., So Republicans Fixed 'Em
• Report: Florida Voting Wait Times In 2012 Were Worst In the Nation
• New Rule Prohibits Voters In Miami-Dade County From Using The Restroom, No Matter How Long The Line
• In the Exciting New World of Campaign Financing, Deceptive Fundraising Websites Are A-OK

Campaign Finance Deform

• Thought money could buy an American election? You ain't seen nothin' yet—"The supreme court's relaxing of donation rules just made US elections even more undemocratic and corruptible."
• Dionne: Supreme oligarchy—"Combine McCutcheon with the decision in the Citizens United case and you can see that the court is systematically transferring more power to a tiny, privileged sliver of our people." WaPo
• The war against American citizens—"The Supreme Court’s ‘McCutcheon’ decision exemplifies the struggles against average Americans." WaPo
• RNC Chair Complains That The Supreme Court Hasn’t Done Enough To Let Rich Donors Give The GOP Money
• Revealed: Rahm Emanuel's top donor bought stock in Marriott just before it was awarded huge Chicago contract

Banks and Wall Street

• Why Obama's Regulators Let Wall Street Bankers Off Easy—"Remember when the economy collapsed because some people were criminally negligent and nobody went to prison?"
• SEC Goldman Lawyer Says Agency Too Timid on Wall Street Misdeeds—"Kidney said his superiors were more focused on getting high-paying jobs after their government service than on bringing difficult cases. The agency's penalties, Kidney said, have become 'at most a tollbooth on the bankster turnpike.'"
• Wall Street's wily front group: Inside story of a rental scheme's secret facelift—"How profit-hungry Wall Street landlords are secretly trying to turn themselves into a modest, lovable trade group." Salon
• Banker Who Helped Crash Housing Market Helped Crafting Mortgage Reform
• Fannie, Freddie shareholders lobby against U.S. housing reform bill
• Bank of America to pay nearly $800 million for deceptive credit card practices WaPo
• Trial of Occupy activist struggles to find jurors impartial to protest movement—"Series of potential jurors voice opposition to protest movement in trial of Cecily McMillan, who faces seven years in prison for assault on police officer."

JPMorgan

• Office Of Outgoing JPMorgan Asia CEO Raided By Hong Kong's Commission Against Corruption
• J.P. Morgan Backs Off Russian Payment Halt
• JPMorgan fails to end lawsuit over London Whale losses

Stock Market

• U.S. stock markets are rigged, says author Michael Lewis
• Yes, the stock market is rigged
• The FBI Is Investigating High-Frequency Traders
• In Defense of "Flash Boys"—Felix Salmon: "[T]he big problem with high-frequency trading isn't that small investors get ripped off, it's that the system is so complex that literally no one really understands how it works or what kind of danger it poses."
• Katsuyama vs. O'Brien - who won the fight?
• The Wolf Hunters of Wall Street NYT

Obamacare

• Obamacare: It's Working!—"Once left for dead, the president's signature legislation is hitting its goals. And it's changing the political calculus for November."
• Obamacare Might Be Covering Way More People Than Previously Thought—Good news for those who weren't denied.
• GOP Grapples With The Unsettling Fear That Obamacare May Succeed
• Conservative Health Experts Wonder How To Coexist With Obamacare
• Gov. Rick Scott stands by two misleading campaign ads on Obamacare
• Many Obamacare Critics, Including Koch Brothers, Accepted Its Subsidies
• WSJ Editors To Conservatives: Stop Acting Crazy Over Obamacare
• The Right Searches for Obamacare Replacement, Finds Obamacare
• Forget Obamacare: Vermont wants to bring single payer to America
• This Generation of Med Students Wants a Truly Just Healthcare System for All
• Obamacare's Next Task: Break Our Dependence On The Emergency Room

Medicaid Expansion

• The perils of Florida's refusal to expand Medicaid—"Charlene Dill is one of an estimated 2,000 people who expected to face dire health issues due to lack of access to care."
• Maine's GOP Governor Vetoes Medicaid Expansion For Third Time
• Virginia's Medicaid expansion fight: More proof that the Commonwealth is broken
• Court Rejects Louisiana's Bid To Stop Anti-Jindal Pro-Obamacare Billboard
• Boehner Concedes on Sneaky GOP Voice Vote Expanding Obamacare: "It Was a Good Thing"

Bill of Health

• $1,000-a-day miracle drug shocks U.S. health care system
• Top Medicare Doctor Paid $21 Million in 2012, Data Shows
• Tamiflu: Millions wasted on flu drug, claims major report
• On Indiegogo, a miracle health device crowdfunds $730k. One problem: it might be total bullshit

Anti-Vax

• Anti-vaccine movement is giving diseases a 2nd life
• More measles outbreaks in Calif. as debate continues over vaccines
• Chili's cancels fundraiser with National Autism Association—They were planning on donating 10% of their profits to anti-vaccine truthers this month.
• Vaccinations fall, measles rise in Oregon
• Measles In Calgary: Unvaccinated Students Should Stay Home
• Australia: Court grants father right to vaccinate his children
• JHallComics: Vaccine
• Blast from the Past: Penn & Teller's Bullshit - Vaccinations

Heartbleed Bug

• My Heart Bleeds for OpenSSL
• Schneier on Heartbleed—"'Catastrophic' is the right word. On the scale of 1 to 10, this is an 11."
• The Real Threat From The Heartbleed Security Flaw Is The NSA
• How Companies Are Reacting to the Heartbleed Security Bug
• How to protect yourself from the 'Heartbleed' bug

St. Paddy's Not-so-Gay Day; NSA Spying, Surveillance State; Your Rights Online, UK Filters; SOPA, Copyfight; Mobile Phones, Broadband; Tesla; Unfriendly Skies; Trains-portation

St. Paddy's Not-so-Gay Day

• Boston mayor skips St. Patrick's parade over exclusion of gay group—Instead, there was a 'diversity float'.
• Guinness pulls out of NY's St. Patrick's parade over ban on gays
• Irish ask: What's the big deal about letting gays in St. Pat's parades?
• Fox News' Defense Of Anti-Gay Discrimination At NYC's St. Patrick's Day Parade
• PSA: Paddy Not Patty

NSA Spying

• Compare the NSA's Facebook Malware Denial to its Own Secret Documents
• Intel panel 'very close' on killing NSA phone programs Politico
• IBM denies links with NSA spying program

Surveillance State

• Lawmaker 'taken aback' by CIA's tough response to spying allegations
• U.S. intelligence officials to monitor federal employees with security clearances
• US defends surveillance before UN rights panel—How the mighty have fallen.

Your Rights Online

• The US is an 'enemy of the internet'
• U.S. to Cede Its Oversight of Addresses on Internet—"An international group, not yet determined, will take over the task of assigning names and numbers for Internet addresses." This may lead to more censorship pressure from governments cracking down on free speech. NYT
• EU: Data Protection, NSA Votes Won; Net Neutrality Next
• Russia: Vladimir Putin stamps on his citizens again, this time with Internet censorship
• Australia: Attorney General's new war on encrypted web services—They want everyone's web browsing history.
• Philippines: Block child porn websites, NTC orders Internet providers—Start of the slippery slope.

UK Filters

• No 10 aide arrested over child porn: Police quiz 62-year-old who advised Cameron on web filters and was tipped for peerage
• The Best Story Yet About The UK's Online Porn Filters
• Children can turn off net filters, report finds
• UK pornographers launch new site in response to 'overblocking' internet filters
• UK gov wants 'unsavoury' web content censored
• Turns Out UK Government Only Wishes It Had Special Powers To Censor YouTube

SOPA

• SOPA backers seek to restrict online rights again -- but this time outside the law
• The Rebranding Of SOPA: Now Called 'Notice And Staydown'
• Hollywood's Copyright Lobbyists Are Like Exes Who Won't Give Up

Copyfight

• Copyright Group: Chilling Effects DMCA Archive is "Repugnant"—"If it wasn't for the Chilling Effects DMCA clearing house the actions of those abusing the DMCA would go largely unreported. Still, the Copyright Alliance doesn't like the site, this week describing the information resource as "repugnant" to the DMCA. Unsurprisingly, Chilling Effects sees things differently."
• U.S. Court Orders Seizure of "DVD Ripping" Software Domains and Funds
• Popcorn Time Is Back

Mobile Phones

• Mobile phone 'bill shock' driving victims into debt, Citizens Advice warns—"Charity says 130,000 people contacted it last year for help with unexpected high bills, often caused by error or roaming charges."
• Legislation abolishing roaming charges goes through European parliament—"Mobile phone operators say that domestic charges may increase as a result of ban, which will come into force in December 2015."
• EU Parliament votes in favour of universal mobile phone charger—Applies to plugs, but manufacturers still want to lock in the connector.

Broadband

• Telecom Giants Drag Their Feet on Broadband for the Whole Country
• Nearly one in three American households have no choice when it comes to their internet
• Two simple maps show us how Comcast is about to take over the country
• $5 discount to give up unlimited data? Time Warner Cable customers say "no"
• If You Want To Fix U.S. Broadband Competition, Start By Killing State-Level Protectionist Laws Written By Duopolists
• Google's gigabit gambit isn't going away—"Opinion: Google Fiber appears to be gaining momentum."
• San Antonio City Council OKs Google Fiber contract

Tesla

• Tesla sales will be banned in New Jersey starting April 1st—So much for Christie and the 'free market'.
• Auto dealers push legislation to keep Tesla Motors out of Ohio
• Washington DC: Legislature acts to allow Tesla to sell cars directly—"Tesla can continue to sell cars directly to customers under amended bills passed in the state House and Senate, but it will be the only car manufacturer with that privilege."
• New Jersey Bans Tesla to Ensure Buying a Car Will Always Suck
• Tesla CEO Rips New Jersey Over 'Backroom Deal' Auto Sales Ban
• Car Dealers Are Terrified of Tesla's Plan to Eliminate Oil Changes
• Tesla's 'Gigafactory' sets off 4-state bidding war

Unfriendly Skies

• Asiana Airlines Penalized Over Crash—"In the first penalty of its kind, federal transportation officials on Tuesday docked Asiana Airlines $500,000 for failing to promptly contact passengers' families and keep them informed about their loved ones after a deadly crash last year at San Francisco International airport."
• Airline Pet Handlers Speak Out Against Alleged Animal Neglect—"Two whistleblowers describe chronic, dangerous neglect in United's PetSafe program."
• Louisiana man fined $600 after drunken fight with wife aboard flight
• Why 2,000 passengers just rioted at an airport in China
• Southwest passenger screams for booze, throws gang signs 'for Jesus,' forces PDX landing, court documents show

Trains-portation

• Barcelona-Paris high speed rail link launched
• Japan wants to sell its super-fast levitating trains to the US
• This Insane Chinese Concept Train Doesn't Need To Stop At Stations To Pick Up Passengers

Surveillance State; Climate Change; Environment, Pollution, North Carolina, Keystone XL, Fukushima, China Smog-åsbord, Unclean Energy, Fracking; Ecology, Agri-Torture

Surveillance State

• Sen. Wyden: CIA, NSA leadership have developed a pattern of false statements, misleading actions
• CIA Search of Congressional Computer Sparks Constitutional Crisis
• The C.I.A. Torture Cover-Up—"Sen. Feinstein today provided stark evidence that the C.I.A. may have committed crimes to prevent the exposure of brutal interrogation practices." NYT
• Did the CIA Chief Just Dare Obama to Fire Him?—"Under a sudden avalanche of criticism, CIA director John Brennan said President Obama can 'ask me to go.' Will he?" Wasn't he was already following the White House's directives?
• CIA feud with Senate panel puts lack of post-9/11 accountability in spotlight WaPo
• The Senate and the CIA at War—"Even Sen. Dianne Feinstein has lost faith in America’s intelligence community."
• The Senate Didn't Care Much About Surveillance Until the CIA Spied on It Too
• What Happens When the NSA Comes to Town—"The NSA set up a facility in Utah, promising jobs and industry along with it. None of that came. Now, one surveillance scandal later, residents can vote to render the facility useless in the simplest way possible. Is it worth it?"

Climate Change

• The Very, Very Thin Wedge of Denial—"To me, one of the most fascinating aspects of climate change denial is how deniers essentially never publish in legitimate journals, but instead rely on talk shows, grossly error-laden op-eds, and hugely out-of-date claims (that were never right to start with)."
• Wyoming Governor Takes Major Stand Against Modern Science—'Wyoming took an unprecedented step this week when the governor approved a budget that would prevent the state from reviewing or funding a new set of science standards that treat climate change as fact."
• GOP's "inane" war on science: Plasma physicist congressman takes on the denialists—'Retiring Rep. Rush Holt tells us why 'millions will die' due to climate change -- but why the solution is a bargain." Salon
• Climate buffoons' real motives: 5 reasons they still spout debunked garbage—"From greed to idiocy, here's the true agenda of deniers who still claim climate change isn't happening." Salon
• Climate change deniers have grasped that markets can't fix the climate—"The refusal to accept global warming is driven by corporate interests and the fear of what it will cost to try to stop it."
• Australia: Environment commissioner Kate Auty quits, drops bucket—"Victoria's environment commissioner has quit and hit out at the Napthine government's attitude on climate change, saying bureaucrats told her they were directed to refrain from even using the term."
• UN Officials Speak Out On Climate Change As Australian Drought Deepens
• Global Warming Slows Down Antarctica's Coldest Currents

Environment

• Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail Gets More Protection Than Mobile's Drinking Water Supply For 250,000
• Alaska mine could be blocked to save salmon fisheries
• SF becomes first major city to ban sale of plastic water bottles
• Congress Designates the First Wilderness Area in Five Years—"32,500 acres of lakeshore along Lake Michigan have been designated as wilderness by Congress."
• Mysterious new man-made gases pose threat to ozone layer

Pollution

• Chicagoans Want the Koch Brothers to Stop Polluting The City
• Pollution's price: Will a stiff fine change the ways of Alpha coal?—Coal Firm to Pay Record Fine for Water Pollution
• NY Judge Rules for Chevron in Ecuador Case—"A federal judge on Tuesday blocked U.S. courts from being used to collect a $9 billion Ecuadorean judgment against Chevron for rainforest damage, saying lawyers poisoned an honorable quest with their illegal and wrongful conduct."
• Oil From the Exxon Valdez Spill Lingers on Alaska Beaches—"Boulder-strewn beaches in the Gulf of Alaska still harbor oil from the Exxon Valdez spill."
• Industry Attempting to Defeat Pollution Standards Before They Emerge

North Carolina

• Duke CEO: Ratepayers will cover coal ash cleanup—Gov. McCrory still trying to wash his hands of this mess.
• Ash Spill Shows How Watchdog Was Defanged—"North Carolina regulators say that under Gov. Pat McCrory, a weakened Department of Environment and Natural Resources has abandoned its regulatory role." NYT
• Violations issued against Duke for coal ash spill
• NC cites 5 Duke Energy plants for lacking permits
• Judge rules Duke must halt groundwater pollution at coal ash sites

Keystone XL

• Dozens Arrested At Keystone Protest At White House
• Study Finds Keystone XL Would Have Much Larger Impact Than State Department Suggests
• Ed Schultz: "I was wrong" about Keystone—"The MSNBC host urges Obama to say no to the pipeline." Salon
• It's Not About the Pipe—"It's about what the pipe would carry."
• Keystone XL: Just the facts

Fukushima

• Prosecutors drop charges over Fukushima nuclear disaster—"No-one has been held accountable for the second-worst nuclear accident in history."
• Three years later, the lessons of Fukushima are uglier than ever
• Fukushima operator may have to dump contaminated water into Pacific—"As Japan marks the third anniversary of the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster, Tepco is struggling to find a solution for hundreds of thousands of tonnes of contaminated water."
• U.S. Nuclear Agency Hid Concerns, Hailed Safety Record as Fukushima Melted
• Fukushima Radiation To Reach West Coast In April, Experts Weigh In On How Dangerous It Is

China Smog-åsbord

• Nine Chinese cities suffered more days of severe smog than Beijing—"Pollution widespread and affected millions more than previously thought, 2013 data shows."
• Wealthy Residents Depart Chinese Mainland In Search Of Clean Air
• China's 'War on Pollution' Will Be Fought by Smog-Sucking Drones

Unclean Energy

• Coal Miners Say They Were Surveilled, Harassed After Making Safety Complaints
• Alberta doctor tells U.S.: Canada is 'lying' about tar sands' health effects—"American Senators told that oil sands are linked to a huge spike in cancer, despite Canadian government claims."
• BP Splitter Refinery Seen Skirting U.S. Oil Export Ban
• This Is What Happened When Scholastic Tried to Bring Pro-Coal Propaganda to School—"'The United States of Energy' was a colorful series of lessons on the advantages of coal, aimed at 4th-graders—and sponsored by Big Coal. Here’s how educators and activists worked together to get it out of."
• Chevron pizza 'scandal' isn't one in small town

Fracking

• Fracking could be allowed under homes without owners' permission—"Ministers admit they are looking at overhauling trespass laws to make it easier for energy companies to explore for shale gas."
• Fracking Waste is Being Dumped Into the Ocean Off California's Coast
• State Senators Mitchell and Leno introduce fracking moratorium bill
• Wastewater Injection Triggered Oklahoma's Earthquake Cascade—"One of Oklahoma's biggest man-made earthquakes, caused by fracking-linked wastewater injection, triggered an earthquake cascade that led to the damaging magnitude-5.7 Prague quake that struck on Nov. 6, 2011, a new study confirms."
• Court bars anti-fracking activist from more than 300 square miles of Pa.

Ecology

• Rhino with bullet in its brain and hacked off horn wanders for days before being put down
• Uganda president wants poachers 'shot on sight'
• Australia's Shark Cull Is Killing the Wrong Sharks
• Indonesian Muslim clerics issue fatwa protecting endangered animals
• Japan to halve bluefin tuna catch—"Japanese media say the nation's fisheries agency has decided to boost protection for juvenile bluefin tuna by halving Japan's northern Pacific catch. Studies show a dramatic decline in tuna prized by eaters of sushi."

Agri-Torture

• The wrongheaded law that's making your food less safe—"If the cows providing your milk were being drugged up and abused, you'd want to know, right?" The Idaho governor doesn't want anyone to know.
• Arizona House approves livestock cruelty bill—"House Bill 2587 would reduce first-offense felony charges to a misdemeanor for farmers and others accused of abusing livestock."
• Don’t buy the Chipotle hype: There’s no such thing as "humane" slaughter—"The chain has earned praise for promoting animal welfare — but there's no getting past the bloody truth." Salon

Iran; Filibusted, Politics, Vote Machinations; Press Freedom and Transparency; NSA Spying, Your Rights Online, Cybersecurity, Tech Tracking, Surveillance and Privacy

Iran

• Iran agrees to curb nuclear activity at Geneva talks
• We Have a Deal With Iran. A Good One.—"It's everything Obama hoped to achieve in Geneva."
• Republicans Attack Iran Deal Before It's Announced—"Texas Senator John Cornyn suggests the late-night announcement from Geneva is a Wag The Dog moment, aimed at saving the President from the messy Obamacare rollout."

Filibusted

• Don't Believe the Republican Cries of Vengeance—"They would have gotten rid of the filibuster at the first chance they got, regardless of what Democrats did today."
• Stop whining, centrists: Bipartisanship is a myth that's never existed—"While Beltway elite pine for the "good old days" and condemn filibuster reform, they're wrong on the history." Salon
• GOP: Ending Filibusters Is Unconstitutional and Un-American—and We'll Do it, Too
• Why The Filibuster Change Is Fantastic News For Obama—Will make him less of a lame duck [WaPo].
• Harry Reid and filibuster reform: The nuclear option is a huge victory for progressives

Politics

• Utah Attorney General Blames 'False Allegations' For Forcing Resignation
• Blow by Blow: 10 Politicians Linked to Cocaine—"Congressman Trey Radel isn't the first politician to make headlines from white lines."
• Drug testing is a great idea. Thanks, Rep. Radel.—"Rep. Trey Radel voted in favor of drug-testing the folks who get food stamps. In that case, why don’t we drug-test all people who get federal money? Let's start with members of Congress!" WaPo

Vote Machinations

• Bill to end gerrymander huge reform
• Georgia GOP dusts off Jim Crow tactic: Changing election date
• It's The Fundamentals, Stupid: Elections Aren't Determined By Short-Term 'Game Changes'

Press Freedom and Transparency

• White House blocks access to Obama events, news groups say
• Focal shift: Press photogs riled by White House social media—"Even if the Obama administration mollifies angry photojournalists, the news media now has to earn its place alongside direct communications through Twitter and Facebook."
• Muzzling the Freedom of Information Act—"Government to authors: We're not showing you public records because you're not journalists."

NSA Spying

• Government Claims Americans Have No Right To Challenge NSA Phone Surveillance
• N.S.A. Report Outlined Goals for More Power—"The top-secret document described strategies to keep pace with rapidly changing technology and stay ahead of adversaries in intelligence collection." NYT
• NSA and metadata: How the government can spy on your health, political beliefs, and religious practices
• NSA Mass Surveillance Has Already Been Used For Ordinary Police Work—"[O]nce mass surveillance of ordinary people is used for everyday police work, we are past the event horizon to a surveillance dystopia."
• NSA infected 50,000 computer networks with malicious software
• Report: NSA also had the green light to spy on UK residents—"NSA has unfettered access to metadata about UK residents' communications."
• House intel bill adds $75 million to NSA budget to stop future Snowdens—"Senate version also adds money to NSA's budget to stop 'insider threat.'"
• NSA bulk data collection violates constitutional rights, ACLU argues—"Civil liberties group tells New York court that program breaches first and fourth amendments and NSA is overreaching its powers."
• NSA deputy director skeptical on sharing data with FBI and others—"John Inglis appears at University of Pennsylvania to argue legality of bulk surveillance and indicates stance on Feinstein bill."
• Former Blackwater CEO: The NSA Is Turning America Into North Korea

Your Rights Online

• Tim Berners-Lee says 'surveillance threatens web'And it's worse than outright censorship.
• Internet co-creator: 'Privacy may be an anomaly'
• Lavabit Strikes Back at Feds in Key Internet Privacy Case
• Twitter upping security to thwart government hacking—"The microblogging site adds a new security measure designed to make it harder for organizations like the National Security Agency to uncover its data."
• Google Can Bring an End to Censorship in 10 Days. Here's how.

Cybersecurity

• Rockefeller attaches cybersecurity bill to NDAA 2014—CISPA returns.
• President's tech council plays sad trombone for federal cybersecurity—"Report finds that government 'rarely follows accepted best practices.'"
• Repeated attacks hijack huge chunks of Internet traffic, researchers warn—"Man-in-the-middle attacks divert data on scale never before seen in the wild."

Tech Tracking

• LG smart TVs send viewing habits, filenames back to manufacturer—"Businesses may want to think twice before plugging that USB device into the boardroom smart TV as a UK blogger has found that his TV has been sending back the names of files on his devices."
• Google pays $17m to settle Safari cookie privacy-bypass charge
• Microsoft video attacks Google's Chrome as surveillance technology

Surveillance and Privacy

• Meet the Spies Doing the NSA's Dirty Work—"This obscure FBI unit does the domestic surveillance that no other intelligence agency can touch."
• US Working Overtime Behind The Scenes To Kill UN Plan To Protect Online Privacy From Snooping
• The surveillance state: How Australia spies on its own
• Mexico Uses Deaf People to Monitor Surveillance Cameras
• A Vote for Privacy is a Vote for Security

Shutdown Aftermath, Obstructionism; Voter Suppression, Campaign Finance; Racism; Obamacare, Healthcare.gov; Surveillance and Privacy

Shutdown Aftermath

• Cruz: Shutdown was worth it
• Insight: As U.S. default threatened, banks took extraordinary steps
• Deal to avoid another government shutdown struggling in Senate
• How McConnell Is Bracing GOP For Next Shutdown Fight
• Another government shutdown unlikely, Obama tells CEOs—Another "promise"?

Obstructionism

• Warren: Republican Senators Are Trying to 'Nullify' the 2012 Election
• Obama Pick for Court Is 3rd in a Row Blocked by Republicans—"In blocking Judge Robert L. Wilkins's nomination, Senate Republicans on Monday denied President Obama his third pick in recent weeks to fill a vacancy on the nation's most powerful and prestigious appeals court." NYT
• Op/Ed: It's time to go nuclear in the Senate—"It's pretty simple to see what's happening in the Senate right now with judges. Republicans are blockading three seats on the DC Court of Appeals with no other real excuse than 'because we can.'" Personally, I think this will backfire badly. WaPo
• Boehner: We Have 'No Intention Of Ever' Taking Up Senate Immigration Bill
• The Party of Zilch—"With Democrats sagging, Republicans are missing an opportunity to fill the leadership void."

Voter Suppression

• Voter suppression the new GOP strategy WaPo
• Wisconsin Republicans move to cut early voting hours—According them, they're totally not doing that (even though they really are). WaPo
• Wisconsin GOP aims to scrap weekend voting—"Wisconsin Republicans are pushing a bill that would make it harder for people in the state's most populous areas to vote—and would hit blacks especially hard."
• Politifact: There were a few problems with voter ID law during early voting in Texas—Mostly false.
• If You're a Millennial, Black, or Latino, Good Luck Voting Quickly in 2016

Campaign Finance

• Reports shed light on how Koch brothers' money flows to campaigns
• Michigan GOP split over disclosing ad funding sources—"Hours after Michigan Secretary of State Ruth Johnson proposed requiring political parties and other interests to disclose individual donors who pay for certain election ads, the state Senate moved quickly to keep intact the existing rules so contributors stay anonymous."
• Stephen Colbert's Lawyer Explains Why All Hope Is Not Lost—"Some people think getting money out of politics is a hopeless cause given our current Supreme Court, but as Trevor Potter (of Colbert SuperPAC fame) explains, there are still plenty of things we can do to end corruption and get America back on the right track."

Racism

• Oprah Winfrey: The Butler, racism and Obama
• DHS Still Hasn't Fired Black Supremacist Who Called for Mass Murder of Whites—"Almost four months after he was unmasked as a militant black nationalist who called for murdering 'Uncle Tom race traitors,' Ayo Kimathi is still employed."
• University Of Texas Students Cancel 'Catch An Illegal Immigrant Game'
• White Supremacist Craig Cobb Targeted With Graffiti For African Descent
• America's angriest white men: Up close with racism, rage and Southern supremacy—"Up close with small-town white rage, with bitter, scary men who feel left behind by economic and cultural change." Salon

Obamacare

• Terrible Polls for Obamacare, But Some Good News on Policy
• Officials: Slower health spending growth may boost jobs—"Health care spending since the 2010 passage of the Affordable Care Act has risen by 1.3% a year, the lowest rate ever recorded."
• Obamacare and the Republican War on Competence—"The efficacy of government, now the lonely responsibility of Democrats, used to be the province of both parties."
• How Republicans Lost the Chance to Win Obamacare—"Conservatives had the chance to test their favorite health-care ideas in state-run exchanges. They decided bullying Obama was a better use of their time than ideological consistency instead."
• New anti-Obamacare ads are Classic Koch—"Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse talks with Rachel Maddow about the state level campaign by the billionaire Koch brothers to discourage sign-ups for health insurance."
• Koch Brothers Use Actress To Portray Disgruntled Voter In Mark Begich Attack Ad
• Obamacare Shows How Americans Are Becoming Jerks
• GOP Tweets Altered Image Of Grimes As 'Obama Girl'

Healthcare.gov

• Why Healthcare.gov Sucks? Because They Hired Political Cronies, Not Internet Native Companies To Build It—And they've got lots of catching up to do [NYT].
• HealthCare.gov Greets Sebelius With Error Message While Touting Law In Miami—Why aren't more heads rolling?
• Healthcare.gov and the Gulf Between Planning and Reality

Surveillance and Privacy

• Sobriety Checkpoints Paved Path to NSA Email Spying
• Bob Woodward Disappointed That Snowden Didn't Go To Him—Laughable.
• U.S. Army to Track Employees' Web Activity to Thwart Future Snowdens
• A Russian GPS Using U.S. Soil Stirs Spy Fears—"American spy agencies fear that allowing monitor stations in the United States for Russia's version of GPS could compromise American intelligence." NYT
• Surveillance is not about protecting us. It's about control.

Politics, Obstructionism, Benghazi, Church and State, Vote Machinations, Racism; Obamacare; NSA Spying, Surveillance and Privacy, Your Rights Online

Politics

• Government shutdown didn't save money. It cost $2 billion, report says.—"From a budgetary perspective, the government shutdown was a lose-lose scenario, with federal employees sitting at home getting no work done but then later getting paid for it."
• Obama Job Approval Sinks To Bush Levels In New Poll
• Poll: Can Congress go lower? Yes! Politico
• House Republicans Say: What GOP Crisis?
• Let's Face It, Bloomberg's Legacy Is Terrible
• Rand Paul-footnotes: Kentucky Republican's speech at The Citadel had 33 footnotes
• Which of the 11 American nations do you live in? WaPo

Obstructionism

• GOP Escalates Nuclear Showdown By Filibustering Another Top Obama Judge
• Patrick Leahy Slams GOP For Blocking Another Nominee, Demands Filibuster Reform
• Court nominees: Battleground for partisan politics

Benghazi

• A Bizarre and Telling Book Excerpt From 60 Minutes' Bogus Benghazi Source
• 7 Questions CBS Is Dodging on Its Bogus Benghazi Story
• '60 Minutes' and the Benghazi Scandal Trap—"There are two charges against CBS: that they were duped, and that the segment itself was an example of misinformation, confusion, and intense partisanship."
• How can CBS possibly not fire Lara Logan?—"This was a screw-up just as bad as 'Rathergate,' but the reporter responsible probably won't suffer the same fate.'" Salon
• Jon Stewart Lights Into '60 Minutes' For Their Benghazi Disaster

Church and State

• We Have a Dumb Religion Problem -- Not a Political Problem
• The Fall of the House of Moon—"Sex rituals, foreign spies, Biden offspring, and the Unification Church's war-torn first family."
• Pastor loses bus driving job for praying with students—'Captive audience', indeed.
• American Theocracy?: Lawsuit Alleges Utah and Ariz. Towns Enforce Religious Edicts As Law
• Fla. teacher suspended for forcing 4th-grader to participate in Pledge of Allegiance

Vote Machinations

• Republicans Just Changed The Rules AFTER A Virginia Election To Change The Outcome
• Virginia: Democrat Herring widens lead in AG race—Down to the wire.
• TX Republican Election Head Blames Wendy Davis for Voters Actually Voting
• NRO: One Of The Most Restrictive Voter ID Laws In The Country Is "A Good Thing"
• How Republicans Rig the Game—"Through gerrymandering, voter suppression and legislative tricks, the GOP has managed to hold on to power while more and more Americans reject their candidates and their ideas."

Racism

• Harry Belafonte Calls Koch Brothers 'Men Of Evil,' Compares Them To KKK
• Richard Cohen Defends Column: 'The Word Racist Is Truly Hurtful'—He says, "The column is about Tea Party extremism and I was not expressing my views, I was expressing the views of what I think some people in the Tea Party held." The view being: "People with conventional views must repress a gag reflex when considering the mayor-elect of New York — a white man married to a black woman and with two biracial children." Gag-worthy projection and scapegoating.
• The Right's Slavery Obsession—"'This isn't racist,' but the federal debt is as bad as slavery, says Alaska's ex-governor. Nothing about that statement is accurate—and it only minimizes real suffering."
• Colorado Lawmaker Jokes Obama Was Born In Kenya
• White supremacist Craig Cobb told he is 14% African in televised DNA test

Obamacare

• Clinton: Obama Should Let People Keep Their Health Plans—Democrats scrapped the federal public option and single-payer trying to appease Republicans, and now we have this fucked up "marketplace".
• Calif. Insurance Commissioner: More Than 1M Californians Having Insurance Cancelled Due To ACA
• It's Good That You Can't Keep Your Insurance Plan—"Obama was wrong to mislead people but right to scrap dysfunctional insurance products."
• Troubled Obamacare website enrolled fewer than 50,000 in Oct -WSJ
• Come back! HealthCare.gov invites 275,000 to try again
• The right's most outraged Twitter responses to a new, millennial-focused Obamacare ad—"The people who brought you "brosurance" are back and trolling the right all over again." Salon
• Sarah Palin Struggles To Explain Her Obamacare Alternative

NSA Spying

• The original NSA whistleblower: "Snowden is a patriot"—"You likely haven't heard of Perry Fellwock, the first whistle-blower to go to the press about NSA 30 years ago." Salon
• The edge of the abyss: exposing the NSA's all-seeing machine
• White House considers appointing civilian NSA chief amid calls for reform—"Administration also pondering plan to disaggregate embattled agency from new military command created around it."
• NSA leaks on Canadian surveillance coming, Greenwald says—"Reporter in Edward Snowden NSA leaks says there are many documents about Canada."
• ProPublica Motion Seeks Release of Court Rulings on NSA Spying
• EFF: NSA's Vast Surveillance Powers Extend Far Beyond Counterterrorism, Despite Misleading Government Claims
• Severing Ties with the NSA
• After the NSA revelations, who will listen to America on human rights?—"The US was once in a position to promote human rights abroad. That was undermined under Bush, and the damage continues."

Surveillance and Privacy

• Cost-benefit analysis and state secrecy: Foiled plots and bathtub falls
• Patriot Act Author Tells EU Parliament That U.S. Needs to Reform Surveillance
• ACLU to law enforcement: Tell us how you get users' search history, data—"More questions: Are warrants required? Can you intercept searches in real time?"
• UK spies continue "quantum insert" attack via LinkedIn, Slashdot pages—"Targets included engineers at Global Roaming Exchange providers and OPEC." GCHQ sez: Nothing to see here, jog on.
• Surveillance Leaves Writers War—"A survey by the writers' organization PEN American Center has found that a large majority of its members are deeply concerned about the extent of government surveillance of email and phone records." Chilling effect achievement unlocked. NYT

Your Rights Online

• Privacy Pretense: How Silicon Valley Helped the NSA
• In Lavabit Appeal, U.S. Doubles Down on Access to Web Crypto Keys—"A U.S. email provider can promise its users all the security and privacy it wants; it still has to do whatever it takes to give the government access. That';s the gist of the Justice Department's 60-page appellate brief in the Lavabit surveillance case, filed today in the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia."
• Op-ed: Lavabit's founder responds to cryptographer's criticism
• Hoping to avert "collision" with disaster, Microsoft retires SHA1—"After 2016, Microsoft will stop accepting the collision-prone crypto algorithm."
• Don't expect data on P2P networks to be private, judge rules—"Defendants claimed that searching for files on their computers violated Fourth Amendment rights."

Snowden, Surveillance and Privacy; Workers and Wage Slaves; Politics and Economy; Public-Private Partnerships, Uncharitable; Wall Street and Financial Institutions; Corporations; Monsanto; Plane Fare

Snowden

• NSA leaker Snowden on flight to 'third country' via Moscow with WikiLeaks help—So much for extraditing him from Hong Kong.
• Edward Snowden: Shooting the messenger?—"Mainstream media in the US seems to be more interested in the character of the leaker than in the content of the leak."
• Petition to pardon Edward Snowden passes 100,000 signatures, forcing White House response—Non-response more like it, but at this least this continues to keep up awareness.

Surveillance and Privacy

• US spies on Chinese mobile phone companies, steals SMS data: Edward Snowden—"The US government is stealing millions of text messages in their hacking attacks on major Chinese mobile phone companies, Edward Snowden has told the Post."
• Amid NSA spying scandal, the gloves are off for EU's justice chief—"No longer is the EU standing for U.S. lobbying and policy pushing. The EU's Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding is back in the trenches. The gloves are off, and she's fighting back."
• Bill Clinton on NSA: Americans need to be on guard for abuses of power by US—"Former president tells Scottish audience there needs to be accountability and transparency when surveillance is used."
• Pelosi booed at Netroots while defending espionage charges against Snowden
• Google handed over years of e-mails belonging to WikiLeaks chatroom admin—A secret warrant was used to get them.
• NSA surveillance: don't underestimate the extraordinary power of metadata—"President Obama has reassured US citizens that 'nobody is listening to your calls', but it's not the content of conversations that intelligence agencies crave."
• There's a New Fascism on the Rise, and the NSA Leaks Show Us What It Looks Like—"The power of truth-tellers like Edward Snowden is that they dispel a whole mythology carefully constructed by the corporate cinema, the corporate academy and the corporate media."
• Tradeoff—"The stupidest framing of the controversy over ubiquitous surveillance is that it reflects a trade-off between 'security' and 'privacy.' We are putting in jeopardy values much, much more important than 'privacy.'"

Workers and Wage Slaves

• Graphics worker: 'The shouting of the bankers resembled constant gunfire'—"A woman working night shifts in graphics for a major bank, talks of the systematic abuse and poor conditions she faced."
• Former intern: Don't step on us
• Disabled workers paid just pennies an hour – and it's legal
• How I Got Fired from the Job I Invented
• Round Lake village residents in uproar over library employee's firing—"The tiny village is in an uproar, Mayor Dixie Lee Sacks said, over the firing of a well-liked veteran library employee who closed the library 40 minutes early last week, without permission, because of the threat of tornados in the area."
• Firing of Five Walmart Strikers Condemned by Rep. Ellison: 'Completely Unjust and Illegal'
• Laws fail to protect pregnant women who need special accommodations on the job

Politics and Economy

• Poll: Congress' new level of awfulness—"Asked about a list of institutions in American society, only 10% of those questioned in a Gallup survey released Thursday say they have confidence in Congress. That's down three percentage points from last year, and according to their release, 'this is the lowest level of confidence Gallup has found, not only for Congress, but for any institution on record.'"
• Sanders: We must not accept this economic 'new normal'—"Yes, the economy is improving, but too many Americans are being left behind, while the rich keep getting richer."
• Big Lie: America Doesn't Have #1 Richest Middle-Class in the World...We're Ranked 27th!—"America is the richest country on Earth. We have the most millionaires, the most billionaires—and a increasingly poor 'middle class.'"
• Decline and fall: how American society unravelled—"Thirty years ago, the old deal that held US society together started to unwind, with social cohesion sacrificed to greed. Was it an inevitable process – or was it engineered by self-interested elites?"
• Rising US wealth doesn't generate spending surge

Public-Private Partnerships

• State legislators' ties to nonprofit groups prove fertile ground for corruption—"New York scandals reveal unsavory pattern of 'quid pro quo' links between lawmakers and 'charities.'"
• Leaker's Employer Is Paid to Maintain Government Secrets—"Booz Allen Hamilton has become one of the largest and most profitable firms in the United States almost exclusively by serving one client: the government." NYT
• The Great Farm-Bill Ripoff—"A confusing clutter of programs that pay farmers not to farm, reward them for undue risk, write checks to rock stars and Rockefellers, give special treatment to certain crops without rationale, and ladle out welfare to the wealthy while ignoring those on the margins." To everyone's surprise, the Farm Bill goes down in flames.
• Scott Walker Plans To Sell Off Many Of Wisconsin's University Buildings, Prisons
• How Tea Party Favorite Rick Scott Helped Cook Up a Sweetheart Deal for His Florida Friends
• Residents of Blue Mound, a small North Texas town, upset with water veto—"The town's water is provided by a private company...." and Gov. Perry's veto made sure it stayed that way despite the town having "considerably higher water rates than the town's neighbors"
• Flipside: Attempted Land Grab Ends With Voters Booting Entire City Council

Uncharitable

• America's 50 worst charities rake in nearly $1 billion for corporate fundraisers
• Why is Nancy Brinker still CEO of the Susan G. Komen foundation?
• Lax IRS Oversight Fostered Costly Charity Scams

Wall Street and Financial Institutions

• The Last Mystery of the Financial Crisis—"It's long been suspected that ratings agencies like Moody's and Standard & Poor's helped trigger the meltdown. A new trove of embarrassing documents shows how they did it."
• Obama Rewards Wall Street Again, Thwarts Reform By Sacking Gensler
• A Wall Street regulator’s race against time—"Can Gary Gensler finish the most important piece of financial reform before he’s out?"
• Wall Street is winning the long war against post-crash regulation—"Feeble as it was, Dodd-Frank was a high point of reining in abuses. Thanks to financial lobbying, it's business as usual."
• Credit Unions Fight Back against Big Banks—...and the lobbying efforts "that would strip them of their tax-exempt status."
• UK's Co-op Bank agrees to £1.5 billion 'bail-in' rescue plan
• 6 Unbelievable Ways the Big Banks Are Scamming You—"Five years since the crash, the big banks continue to screw over their customers.:
• Fox commentator paid $50,000 to tout stock
• Ex-Enron CEO Jeff Skilling to leave prison early—"In seeking to reduce the sentence, the government had emphasized that $40 million in restitution, currently held up as Skilling pursued appeals, would be released to victims."
• Depositing a Little Common Sense into the Law—"Did you know that small business owners can be prosecuted for making repeated cash deposits of under $10,000?"

Corporations

• Sen. Warren Blasts Pro-Corporate Trend of Federal Courts—"[Y]ou will end up with a Supreme Court that's a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Chamber of Commerce."
• In Major Blow To Consumers, Supreme Court Protects Mega-Corporations From Liability
• McConnell: 'Absurd' to ban corporations from having same rights as 'people'
• California To Wal-Mart: Enough! No More Taxpayer Subsidized Profits For You
• Criminal charges laid against Nestle Canada, other companies for chocolate price fixing
• Business Leaders Urge President to Allow G8 to Close Corporate Tax Loopholes
• Flipside: Marlins Park Is Satisfyingly Empty

Monsanto

• Appeals Court Makes Monsanto Promise Not To Sue Organic Farmers
• Monsanto Turns To Blackwater For Increased Security, Intelligence And 'Infiltrate Activist Groups'
• Monsanto snubs Puerto Rico Senate

Plane Fare

• Ryanair plans to put only one toilet on planes in latest scheme to slash fares
• Oof! Airline Fees Rise Yet Again: At Least $200 to Change a Flight
• Give them an inch and they take $773,074,040