From: EFF
… Not only does this briefing show that the Department of Justice continues to strongly protect the FBI’s NSL authority, it highlights a startlingly aggressive new tactic used by the Department of Justice: suing NSL recipients who challenge the FBI’s authority, arguing that court challenges to such authority themselves amount to breaking the law.
From: Threat Watch
The Department of Homeland Security has launched a research project to find ways to hack into gaming consoles to obtain sensitive information about gamers stored on the devices.
One of the first contracts for the project was awarded last week to Obscure Technologies, based in California, to devise a forensic tool that will siphon data from the Xbox 360, Wii, PlayStation 3 and other consoles.
LA is proposing the ban on racist and sexist comments on radio. I don’t agree with that type of speech, but I am not willing to sellout my freedom to ban it. California needs to come to terms with its self and secede. If they want a “utopia”, they can go ahead and try but not at the expense of these United States.
Gibson Guitars has been raided twice because the government claims Gibson bought wood that was illegally logged in India and Madagascar.
From: CNET
The White House raised concerns yesterday about controversial antipiracy bills being debated in Congress and one way to measure how furious some copyright owners are with the President Obama is to read the Twitter posts of Rupert Murdoch.
EFF urged a federal court to block Microsoft Corporation’s attempt to misuse copyright law to thwart a competitor offering memory cards for the Xbox gaming system. Microsoft claims that Xbox users violate U.S. federal law — the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) — if they use third-party cards memory cards, such as those produced by Datel Holdings. If Microsoft were to prevail on this point, it could give the software giant the ability to use the DMCA to prevent competitors from selling Xbox-compatible accessories, like memory cards, controllers, and headsets. Such a ruling would have wide-ranging ramifications for hundreds of other consumer products.
From Reason.com:
Last week the U.S. Supreme Court said the “exigent circumstances” that exist when someone might be flushing drugs down a toilet allow police to enter a home without a warrant, even if their own actions create those circumstances.
As stated in the lone dissenting opinion by Justice Ginsberg: ” The Court today arms the police with a way routinely to dishonor the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement in drug cases. In lieu of presenting their evidence to a neutral magistrate, police officers may now knock, listen, then break the door down, nevermind that they had ample time to obtain a warrant. I dissent from the Court’s reduction of the Fourth Amendment’s force.”
What are the people to do when the Supreme Court won’t uphold the Constitution?
The police in Indiana now have the ability to enter a person’s home for any reason, or no reason. Writing for the majority in this case Justice David said:
“We believe … a right to resist an unlawful police entry into a home is against public policy and is incompatible with modern Fourth Amendment jurisprudence,” David said. “We also find that allowing resistance unnecessarily escalates the level of violence and therefore the risk of injuries to all parties involved without preventing the arrest.”
The key word in the above quote is “modern”. The justices are of the mindset that even though the words in the Constitution haven’t changed, their meaning has changed as the world has changed.
The justices in this case have blatantly created a police state in Indiana. They have come to the conclusion that the people of Indiana must submit to any and all violations of the law by police and then use the legal system to rectify the injustice.
Posted by Gary in Law, News, Opinion, Threat Watch on 16/Apr/2011 12:44
It’s not often that the ACLU and I are on the same side of an issue.
From: ACLU
A 6-year old getting patted down at the airport — leaving her confused and in tears because she thought she did something wrong — is an example of the out-of-control searches and security measures in our airports.
Aviation security requires striking a delicate balance between the personal safety of passengers and their right to privacy. Unfortunately, TSA has developed increasingly invasive methods of searching passengers that are encroaching upon their rights. The TSA has subjected passengers to “enhanced†pat-downs, which have resulted in reports of people feeling humiliated and traumatized, and, in some cases, reports comparing their psychological impact to sexual assaults.
Tell Congress to support the bipartisan Aircraft Passenger Whole-Body Imaging Limitations Act of 2011. Read more.
via WarriorTimes
From: The Patriot Post
· Thursday, April 7, 2011
“To preserve independence…we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and Liberty, or profusion and servitude. … The fore horse of this frightful team is public debt. Taxation follow that, and in its turn wretchedness and oppression.” –Thomas Jefferson
In the news this week, Barack Hussein Obama announced his 2012 re-election bid.
Plus…
The Treasury Department quietly mentioned that last month the government spent 8.2 times its net revenue.
Plus…
The Continuing Resolution authorizing additional borrowing for federal spending, a source of much political pretentiousness, expires on Friday. If there is no renewed CR, the result will be a partial government shutdown (read: “debt accumulation slowdown”), with dire consequences such as the suspension of IRS audits. Of course, the shutdown showdown is just the opening salvo in a war over how to fund the remaining five months of FY2011, which ends on 30 September, and, moreover, government budgets for 2012 and beyond.
Plus…
The price of oil, amid the Middle East meltdown precipitated by Obama’s leadership vacuum, is on the fast track back to its record high of $147/barrel. Indeed, it may be headed to more than $2-300/barrel if the Saudi government is the next to fall. Despite what the Obama administration would have us believe, oil is the lifeblood of the U.S. and world economy, and we have a critical national interest in sustaining that supply. However, because of Leftist energy policies, we do not have energy hedges including domestic oil and nuclear power alternatives.
Plus…
Consequently, gold bullion — the world’s primary barometer of concern about inflation, national debt, securities and real estate price declines, fiat currency failures, and warfare and social unrest — hit a nominal record high of $1,457 per troy ounce.
However, the most significant news this week, in light of the aforementioned reports, is the big Beltway budget brawl between those who are advocating the right path to economic prosperity and Liberty, and those who would stay the course toward economic catastrophe and tyranny.
The raucous political rhetoric over the federal budget sounds much like the perennial hyperbole between Right and Left over the constitutional authority of the central government and its spending priorities. However, the outcome of the current debate is much more than a budget agreement for next year and the next decade: It will determine whether our nation will avert systemic economic collapse or collide with it head-on, plunging us into the most significant National Security Crisis since 1860, and condemning our posterity to the inevitable institution of socialism and the abject tyranny that accompanies it.
If a majority of our countrymen are not able to distinguish between the veracity of this grave assertion and political playbook hyperbole, the consequences for the next generation of Americans will be grim as the light of Liberty fades.
The danger of public debt was of great concern to our nation’s Founders.
As George Washington wrote, “No pecuniary consideration is more urgent, than the regular redemption and discharge of the public debt: on none can delay be more injurious, or an economy of time more valuable.” James Madison declared, “Having never been a proselyte to the doctrine, that public debts are public benefits … I consider them, on the contrary, as evils which ought to be removed as fast as honor and justice will permit.” Thomas Jefferson warned, “To preserve independence … we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and Liberty, or profusion and servitude. … The fore horse of this frightful team is public debt. Taxation follow that, and in its turn wretchedness and oppression.”
Regrettably, few today attach much reverence to the words of such men. Fewer still — especially those who lived through the last Great Depression — remain among us to attest in first person to its tragic consequences for our nation, for its people, and for our legacy of Liberty.
To paraphrase philosopher George Santayana, “Ignorance of historical tragedy begets its replication.”
Make no mistake: We are at a tipping point.
Tell Congress to Rein in PATRIOT and Restore JUSTICE!
Congress voted at the end of February to extend the expiring provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act, but only for three months — giving liberty-loving citizens a new opportunity to continue to protest this dangerous law and demand reforms before the end of May. A message from you, opposing PATRIOT extension and demanding that Congress pass the important reforms contained in the JUSTICE Act, could make a critical difference. Help EFF defend civil liberties and stop Congress from rubber-stamping the PATRIOT Act!
There’s new hope in the PATRIOT debate. Thanks to bipartisan opposition from Democratic leaders and an insurgent movement of conservative Republicans, PATRIOT provisions that were scheduled to expire at the end of February were only temporarily renewed for three months. That means we have three more months to fight against permanent renewal and demand meaningful reform to the government’s broad surveillance powers under that law. With debate over PATRIOT dominating Twitter and the blogosphere, and with both Democrats and Republicans demanding meaningful oversight and reform, this is our best chance in years to convince Congress to investigate how PATRIOT is being used and establish new checks and balances to protect against abuse.
That’s why Congress needs to hear from you now, as it begins the three-month process of conducting hearings and considering proposals for PATRIOT renewal and reform. Congress needs to know now that you oppose PATRIOT extension and support meaningful reforms, like the powerful new PATRIOT oversight and accountability measures found in the JUSTICE Act bills that were introduced in the House (H.R. 4005) and Senate (S.1686) in 2009 during the last PATRIOT reauthorization debate.
The JUSTICE Act not only contained critically important new checks and balances to prevent abuse of the three expiring PATRIOT provisions, but also proposed many meaningful reforms to a wide range of other, permanent PATRIOT powers. The JUSTICE Act also began to address some of the serious civil liberties problems with the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, which broadly enhanced the government’s authority to spy on your international phone calls and emails without warrants and may ultimately be more dangerous to civil liberties than anything in PATRIOT.
Congressional leaders have promised they won’t waste the next three months but instead will spend that time giving PATRIOT reform the attention it deserves. It’s our job to make sure they keep that promise, and to demand that Congress rein in PATRIOT and restore JUSTICE. So, please contact your Representative and Senators today!
From: Threat Level
A federal magistrate said Sony may subpoena the PayPal account of PlayStation 3 hacker George Hotz, as the gamemaker ratchets up its civil lawsuit against the man who released the first full-fledged PS3 jailbreak in the console’s four-year history.
Tuesday’s order came two weeks after Magistrate Joseph Spero in San Francisco granted Sony the right to acquire the internet IP addresses of anybody who had visited Hotz’s website from January of 2009 onward. Sony has also won subpoenas for data from YouTube and Google, as well as Twitter account data linked to Hotz, who goes by the handle GeoHot.