Posts - Americans

Does The FBI Actually Need To Hire Another 700 Special Agents?

News

The FBI is looking to hire 700 special agents throughout the country, to work across the agency’s 56 field offices.

But is this hiring actually needed? More agents means a larger police force, at a time when both the number of special police forces and number of members in each force is at all-time highs. Money for the FBI doesn’t come from the clouds – it comes from the taxpayers in our country. Every new agent means taxpayer dollars going to expensive hires, thanks to generous benefits and pension packages.

The latest focus for the FBI is on bringing in a variety of diverse recruits that include those who speak Spanish, which is useful when working near the border, as well as recruits with experience in information technology.

And while the agency may have need for different skills, there is no talk about it replacing workers – it seems to just be hiring and getting bigger rather than maintaining a fixed size and becoming more efficient.

While the agency is also targeting women, which will no doubt be good to the culture of the organization, there still needs to be questions asked.

How big should the FBI be? How many police forces should we have in operation?

The Obama administration seems to be slowly looking at this issue, as just last week it banned the sale of certain military items to police forces because of the expense and perception that police forces are turning into armies.

Charter To Buy Time Warner Cable In Effort To Fight Net Neutrality

News

Cable companies are becoming increasingly vocal about losing some of their monopoly powers and the latest deal between Charter Communications Inc. and Time Warner shows the corporate giants will do anything in their power to maintain their position of dominance over American families.

The two mega cable companies are rumored to be in a $55.1 billion cash and stock tie up, according to people in the know.

Charter will pay approximately $195 a share, $100 in cash and the rest in its own stock, said the sources, who asked not to be identified because the talks are confidential.

The deal could be announced as soon as tomorrow.

The merger will also see Bright House Networks, a small cable company that Charter is trying to buy, be merged into the combined entity as well.

Charter is the fourth-biggest U.S. cable company and looking to take on both larger providers and also increase its leverage with customers in the face of tough new measures by the FCC to prevent large cable monopolies from abusing their position.

Cable and wireless monopolies increasingly are looking to extort internet companies, such as Google, Netflix or Facebook, for delivery of their content to users, who already pay for such delivery.

The industry faces increased competition from these companies where traditionally they have enjoyed stable monopolies. To fight back, the cable companies are looking to abuse their dominant position rather than adapting to the new market realities.

Consumers, if the cable companies got their way, would be left footing the bill and also with a fundamentally broken internet.

The tactics have been loudly opposed by rights activists, consumer groups, competition officials and politicians. The White House has pushed the FCC hard to enact tough measures that protect American consumers and preserve the fundamentally open nature of the internet.

The FCC has obliged and concocted some of the best consumer protections seen in recent American history.

Montreal To Become North America’s First Smart City

Entertainment News

The Canadian city of Montreal, best known for its old-world French atmosphere, great food and vibrant nightlife is beginning 70 projects that will turn Montreal into North America’s first “smart city.”

A total of $23 million will be spent, broken down into 6 sections. The project will be completed by the end of 2017.

The plan takes a multi-faceted appraoch, from ensuring a fast fiber network, “unleashing municipal data,” and the rollout of “intelligent transport systems” that will bring real-time info on subway/bus/car services and deploying free WiFi.

According to the press release, Montreal will be deploying wireless access points in 750 locations to facilitate the free public WiFi to “enhance the experience of citizens, boost tourism and accelerate economic development of Montreal.”

Denis Coderre, Mayor of Montreal, said, “Montreal, smart city, it is now practical projects that will significantly improve the quality of life of all Montrealers. The Action Plan, Montreal, intelligent and digital means to deploy public Wi-Fi and high-speed network; accelerate the development of smart city economic niche; to optimize travel time, improve access in democratic life and to offer digital public services.”

Montreal is looking to compete against larger world cities such as New York and London, for both business and tourism dollars. The move will put pressure on U.S. east coast cities to adopt similar policies and initiatives or risk falling by the wayside. Midwest cities may also increase the pressure, looking to smart city initiatives to remain competitive and get ahead of larger east coast rivals.

According to the plan, the six sections will be composed of the following:

1. Wi-Fi public: Deploy APs to extend coverage in the area, creating a harmonized experience and provide uniform performance across the network to enhance the experience of citizens, boost tourism and accelerate the economic development of Montreal.
2. Very high speed network, multiservice: Adopt a telecommunications policy, create one-stop telecommunications and urban integrate the telecommunications component in the charter of all major urban projects, so that all players in the Montreal community have access a fiber network at high speed and multi-service, that meets their current and future needs.
3. Economic Niche smart city: Create an environment facilitating the emergence of companies in the smart city economic niche, multiply the sources of innovation for solving urban problems and simplify doing business with the City, so that Montreal becoming a leader in innovation as smart city and accelerate economic development.
4. Intelligent Mobility: Make available all data on mobility in real time, implement intelligent transport systems, intermodal and integrated deployment and support solutions designed to inform users to optimize mobility users in real time on the entire territory.
5. Participatory democracy: Unleashing municipal data, information management and governance and adapt the means of citizen participation to make them accessible online, to improve access to the democratic process and consolidate the culture of transparency and accountability.
6. Digital Public Services: Making a maximum of services available on a multitude of digital channels, involve citizens in the development of services and create opportunities for all, to become familiar with their use, to provide access to municipal services 24/7, across multiple platforms.

Facebook Owned Instagram To Start Spamming Users Who Don’t Use It Enough

Finance

In Facebook-speak spam emails are called “newsletters” and spamming is called “trying a new engagement tactic,” the company announced over the weekend.

In an effort to drive engagement (and one that shows attention paid to social networks in in decline), Instagram announced it will start sending a Twitter-like email digest of what you’ve “missed”.

Instagram’s newsletter will attempt to highlight posts a user might have missed while they were away from the app. The company recently began testing the email with select users with an eye to rolling it out to everyone in the near future.

The proposition is simple: spam people with photos they’ve been missing and they’ll open the app more often. This will in turn help Instagram’s bottom line since more people will see the ads that populate the social network.

In typical screw-the-users Facebook fashion, there’s currently no way to unsubscribe from the emails; hitting the unsubscribe button currently leads to a web page that’s ‘under construction’.

While Instagram has approximately 300 million monthly active users, many of those users only check their Instagram feed once in a while, which is likely why the company felt the need to start spamming them.

Mercedes Benz Teams Up With Chinese Search Giant Baidu To Take On Google Cars

Finance

In perhaps the most interesting technology alliance in recent memory, German carmaker Daimler is making software from Chinese search company Baidu available in its Chinese Mercedes-Benz cars, in a show of deepening ties between carmakers and consumer tech companies.

Most immediately car manufacturers are seeking to extend information and entertainment services available in vehicles and ensuring smartphone compatibility, in an era of increasingly connected cars.

But longer term the deal could lay the groundwork for using Baidu services in Daimler cars rather than Google.

Recently Uber, along with Baidu, were bidding on map data firm HERE, in an effort to combat Google’s rising dominance of mapping data, seen as essential to both location based services and self driving cars.

That battle has become a three-way race between German carmakers Daimler, BMW and Volkswagen’s Audi on the one hand, competing with a consortium including Uber and Baidu, and a third group including China’s Tencent and Navinfo.

The latest move by Mercedes could be a hedge against losing the bid to better funded tech companies who are flush with cash.

Daimler and Chinese tech giant Baidu announced their tie-up on Monday at consumer electronics show CES, which is taking place in Shanghai.

The new Mercedes-Benz cars will feature Baidu software that allows users to access content from their smartphones via their dashboards, such as music and Chinese Internet services.

The companies did not say when the first cars would be produced.

Everyday Hillary Requires Large Private Jet, $250k Cash And Lots of Extras To Speak

News

Former First Lady and failed Secretary Of State Hillary Clinton is running a stealth, ‘grassroots’ campaign aimed to make sure regular Americans know she is in touch with them and the issues that matter to their families.

But how in touch in Ms. Clinton, really, with everyday Americans? After all, she claimed to be “dead broke” just a year ago.

Judging by her list of requirements for a speaking engagement, she could only be said to be in touch with the top 1%.

So what does it take to get Hillary Clinton to speak at your event?

$250,000 cold hard cash

Round trip private jet (must be Gulfstream 450 or larger)

First class hotel for Clinton and all her handlers

1 round trip first class ticket for her travel manager

2 round trip business class tickets for more of her aides

Cover all meals, ground transportation and incidentals for Clinton and her large entourage for a whole week

The total works out to over half a million dollars for a thirty minute speech. It also doesn’t include the tab picked up for her security by the U.S. taxpayers.

In short, Ms. Clinton travels more like corporate bankers at Goldman Sachs (who have committed a long list of crimes againt Americans, stayed out of jail and paid Ms. Clinton $200,000 to come speak to them) than average Americans.

While Ms Clinton may well be qualified for the job of President let’s be clear: It has been decades since Hillary Clinton was or can actually relate to being an average American.

Microsoft Looking For More Acquisitions, Eyes Struggling Blackberry

Finance

Struggling smartphone maker Blackberry may be on the auction block again, as software giant Microsoft eyes a bid for the Canadian company. Microsoft recently lost a bid for rival software giant Salesforce and the latest move shows the company is seeking a growth by acqusition strategy to expand outside its core Operating System and Office markets.

Sources are claiming, however, that Microsoft is not alone in pursuing the enterprise communications leader, with upstart mobile rivals like Xiaomi, Lenovo and Huawei also interested in acquiring BlackBerry.

Microsoft has reportedly hired bankers to assess their chances of taking over BlackBerry, looking push hard into the mobile business solution segment and take advantage of Blackberry’s deep patent portfolio in the Internet of Vehicles (IoV), as well as mobile platform and communications segments.

While Microsoft eyes a full acquisition, Chinese smartphone manufacturers are mainly interested in investing in BlackBerry to improve their brand visibility across the U.S. and European markets.

The move comes just after BlackBerry declared that it will lay off hundreds of employees across the globe and will merge its device software, hardware and applications business.

Greece Doesn’t Have Enough Money To Make June IMF Loan Repayment, Faces Default

Entertainment News

Greece’s interior minister said on Sunday that the struggling European country cannot make debt repayments to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) next month unless it achieves a deal with creditors. The comments are the more clear remarks yet from Athens that default may occur.

With poor credit and a new government shutting the country out of bond markets and with bailout aid locked, the cash-strapped state has been scraping the coffers to meet debt obligations and to pay wages and pensions.

It has already started seizing cash in an effort to stay solvent.

After four months of talks with its euro zone partners and the IMF, the anti-establishment Syriza government is still looking for a deal in order to release up to $7.9 billion in remaining aid, in order to avert bankruptcy.

“The four installments for the IMF in June are 1.6 billion euros. This money will not be given and is not there to be given,” Interior Minister Nikos Voutsis told Greece’s Mega TV.

Voutsis was asked about his fear of a ‘credit event’, a term covering scenarios like bankruptcy or default, should Athens misses a payment.

“We are not seeking this, we don’t want it, it is not our strategy,” he said.

“We are discussing, based on our contained optimism, that there will be a strong agreement (with lenders) so that the country will be able to breathe. This is the bet,” Voutsis said.

He went on to say that the last four months Athens has managed to pay public sector salaries, pensions and dues to the IMF by taking 14 percent of national output, doing “remarkably well” for an economy that doesn’t have access to money markets.

“At some point we will not be able to do it and at some point we are going obviously to have to make this choice that no minister of finance should ever have to make,” Varoufakis said.

A Greek default would likely lead to its withdrawal from the European Union and could hasten the exit of other Eurozone members such as the United Kingdom.

ISIS Massacred Hundreds Of Civilians After It Took Over Palmyra

Entertainment News

ISIS has reportedly slaughtered hundreds of civilians after seizing control of the ancient town of Palmyra last week.

Syrian state TV reported that over 400 civilians had been massacred by the group since Wednesday of last week, while an additional 300 of President Bashar al-Assad’s troops and loyalists, were hunted down and executed after the fighting died down.

“Shabiha [a term used to describe pro-regime militias and supporters], including men and women, were the ones targeted and killed,” said Nasser, of the Palmyra Media Centre

Nasser also confirmed that besieged Palmyra, now under ISIS control, is not allowing civilians to leave or enter it, and that basic services have been cut off in the town.

“Water, electricity and phone landlines have been cut off there,” he added.

Meanwhile, the Syrian military was deploying troops near Palmyra, in preparation for a counterattack to retake it.

Local activists reported that government fighter jets carried out more than 10 attacks on the city on Monday morning.

Talal Barazi, the governor of the central province of Homs, which includes Palmyra, told the Associated Press news agency on Sunday that there were plans from the government forces to launch a counterattack against ISIS fighters in Palmyra.

“There are plans, but we don’t know when the zero hour for a military act in Palmyra [will be],” Barazi said.

The capture of Palmyra raised the prospect of ISIS destroying one of the world’s most spectacular archaeological sites – a well-preserved, 2,000-year-old Roman city on the town’s edge – just as they destroyed others in Syria and Iraq.

EU Drops Plans For Safer Pesticides Because Of Secret U.S. Trade Agreement

Health & Wellness

There’s good reason why the Obama administration and members of congress want trade agreements to remain under tight secrecy: they’re probably bad for you.

Take the case of the EU, who had plans to regulate hormone-damaging chemicals found in pesticides. Yet thanks to secret new trade deals these public safety plans have been dropped because of threats from the U.S.

According to sources such new laws, designed to protect the public from harmful chemicals, would have meant no Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) trade agreement.

The EU regulations would have banned 31 pesticides containing endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) that have been linked to testicular cancer and male infertility.

The insistence on dropping the regulations are part of the powerful U.S. chemical lobby, principally Monsanto and Dow Chemical, who have long cared little for public health if it means profits.

According to sources after the launch of the TTIP negotiations on June 13th 2013, a U.S. business delegation visited EU officials to demand that the proposed regulations governing EDCs should be thrown out.

That about-face comes despite repeated promises from the European Commission that TTIP would not jeopardize EU health and safety standards. A Commission factsheet on Pesticides in TTIP from February 2015 states: “TTIP will not lower the food safety standards for pesticides.”

The revelations show clearly that when trade deals remain secret they are bad for citizens. When your elected officials tell you they know best and not to worry, its probably time to ask lots of questions.

China Caught In Massive Illegal Fishing Operation Off Coast Of West Africa

Culture

China is known to have little regard for the environment and its neighbors in the international community while publicly stating the polar opposite. Yet new reports from Greenpeace show just how willing China is to abuse the environment and cheat its trading partners.

According to a new study, Greenpeace found that Chinese companies have been fishing illegally off the coast of West Africa in a large scale, sophisticated operation that has the full backing of the Chinese government. Greenpeace caught large Chinese commercial fishing vessels off the coast of West Africa sending incorrect location data suggesting they are as far away as Mexico or even on land.

The practice is illegal under maritime law yet Chinese flagged vessels are permitted to operate illegally by the Chinese government.

The report demonstrates how Chinese fishing vessels took advantage of the chaos caused by the 2014 Ebola outbreak, which hit Liberia, Guinea, Sierra Leone and several other West African countries, to conduct illicit fishing trips.

As China’s trading partners suffered, the communist state was busy stealing from their poor people.

“Not only are they exporting the destructive fishing model that destroyed China’s own fisheries, but some irresponsible Chinese companies were stealing fish from African countries affected by Ebola outbreak as its government was conducting one of the biggest aid programmes to support these African countries to confront a major local public health crisis,” the report states.

China has been forced to move to international waters as it destroyed most of its own fish stocks by allowing environmentally irresponsible fishing methods that pushed populations to extinction.

The number of Chinese-flagged or Chinese-owned fishing boats operating in Africa has risen sharply in recent decades, from just 13 in 1985 to 462 in 2013, Greenpeace said.

Greenpeace found 114 cases of illegal fishing by such vessels in periods totaling eight years in the waters off Gambia, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Mauritania, Senegal and Sierra Leone. The boats were operating without licenses or in prohibited areas.

60 cases involved ships of the China National Fisheries Corporation (CNFC), a state-owned company charged with “developing” fishing in distant seas. The flagrant violations attributed to the fleet show that from the top down in China, everyone is on board with stealing from neighbors and destroying the environment.

“While the Chinese government is starting to eliminate some of the most destructive fishing practices in its own waters, the loopholes in existing policies lead to a double standard in Africa,” Ahmed Diame, a Greenpeace Africa ocean campaigner, said in a statement.

Iran Slams U.S. For Not Doing Anything To Stop ISIS

Entertainment News

The general in charge of Iran’s special forces in the Middle East said the United States and other global superpowers were not doing enough to stop Islamic State, and only Iran was committed to the task, a news agency in the country reported on Monday.

The comments were made by Major General Qassem Soleimani, commander of the elite Quds Force, which is responsible for protecting Iran’s interests abroad. General Soleimani is a familiar face on the battlefields of Iraq, where he frequently outranks local commanders.

“Today, in the fight against this dangerous phenomenon, nobody is present except Iran,” the Tasnim news agency quoted Soleimani as saying on Sunday in reference to Islamic State.

Iran will do what it can to help those oppressed by the Islamic State, said Soleimani, whose force is part of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), state-controlled Iranian news network Mehr reported.

ISIS, composed mainly of Sunni militants, has easily taken key cities in Iraq and Syria in the past week. The victories are attributed both to the size of the force as well as little will by Iraqi fighters to do battle.

“Obama has not done a damn thing so far to confront Daesh [ISIS]: doesn’t that show that there is no will in America to confront it?” Mehr quoted Soleimani as saying. Daesh is a derogatory Arabic term for Islamic State.

“How is it that America claims to be protecting the Iraqi government, when a few kilometres away in Ramadi killings and war crimes are taking place and they are doing nothing?”

ISIS poses an interesting problem for Washington. On one hand they create a problem for Iran, who must deal directly with ISIS because they operate in its back yard. This help U.S. interests.

On the other, ISIS is becoming large, powerful and increasingly wishes to do battle with the United States directly, via suicide attacks.

“We should immunise our borders against this great evil and we should help those countries that are suffering under Daesh,” Soleimani said in a speech to former and serving members of the IRGC in Kerman city.

85,000 Antelope Dead In 3 Days After Mysterious Infection

Culture

Kazakhstan authorities have confirmed around one-third of the endangered saiga antelope population has mysteriously died off in the last few days.

Kazakhstan’s agriculture ministry confirmed Friday that the number of saiga that have died may have reached 85,000.

Government officials suspect the animals, which are known for their distinctive humped snout, may have been struck by pasteurellosis caused by a bacterial infection. International veterinarian experts have been flown to Kazakhstan to study other possible causes for the catastrophic die-off.

The number of saiga rapidly declined in the 1990s due to poaching. At the latest Kazakh government count in 2014, the saiga population stood at only 257,000.

While saiga are also found in Russia, they are in very small numbers.

America’s ‘Toughest Sheriff’ Wants You To Pay For His Crimes

News

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio isn’t known for his strict regard for the law. The loudmouth sheriff’s flagrant disregard for the law is finally catching up to him, but he now feels that the public should pick up the tab for his misdeeds.

Arpaio calimed in a letter to supporters that he “doesn’t have the money to continue paying for attorneys out of his own pocket” adding that he feels “targeted” by the immigration rights groups suing him over his racist policies targeting Latinos.

“In some instances I have to personally pay for attorneys to represent me in these cases,” Arpaio wrote in an email. “I do not have the personal wealth or the wherewithal to keep up with the costly demands of paying for attorneys to defend me.”

Yet the case has nothing to do with being targeted or, directly, his discriminatory policies. Instead, the issue is whether he disregarded a direct court order to refrain from bias against minorities.

The trial shows just how corrupt Arpaio’s police force has become as on Friday, he asked for Judge Snow to be taken off the case. The reason? Arpaio’s former lawyer authorized a secret investigation of Snow’s wife.

Snow had ruled in 2013 that the sheriff’s department had systematically racially profiled Latinos in virtually all aspects of its policing. The entire office was basically being operated to harass minorities.

“I want to apologize to the judge,” Arpaio said last month. “I should have known more about these court orders that slipped through the cracks.”

This isn’t Arpaio’s first time getting a judge moved off one of his cases and shows he is a savvy operator in the backwater Arizona legal system. In 2009, he had District Judge Mary Murguia taken off the profiling case because her sister was a prominent leader of a national Latino advocacy organization.

Arpaio has another, more serious challenge on his hands, thanks to federal judge David G. Campbell, who in January ordered an immediate halt to the state’s enforcement of identity theft laws which penalize immigrants in the country for seeking employment. The enforcement program was ruled to be blatantly illegal.

Police Detonate Pressure Cooker Found Near Capitol

News

A single male is in custody Sunday evening after a bomb squad detonated a pressure cooker that was found in a car near the U.S. Capitol building.

U.S. Capitol Police spokeswoman Lt. Kimberly Schneider said that Israel Shimeles of Alexandria, Va. was charged with “operating after revocation”, a seemingly minor motor vehicle offense for people caught driving while their license has been suspended.

The pressure cooker was spotted around 5 pm local time, when officers on patrol noticed a vehicle they deemed “suspicious” on a street that intersected the National Mall, west of the Capitol between Constitution and Independence Avenues.

In addition to the pressure cooker the vehicle also smelled like gasoline.

A bomb squad was called in and, after streets were closed off, the device was detonated at approximately 7:45 pm.

Security officials believe, after examining the car after the explosion, that it was in fact a food service item connected to a propane tank.

“[The owners’] story checked out,” said one source. “But we wanted to neutralize it.”

The Capitol is on high alert as thousands of people were arriving at the West Front of the Capitol for the annual Memorial Day concert.

The nationally televised concert featured appearances by singer Gloria Estefan, Gen. Colin Powell, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin Demspey.

The scare had no impact on the show, which went off on time and ran smoothly.

The Summer Set To See Cheapest Gasoline In Five Years

Finance

While the price of unleaded gasoline has been steadily climbing, drivers could soon begin to see some relief at the pump, just in time for the summer driving season.

“Everything points to the notion that we are very close to a peak price of 2015,” said Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst for the Oil Price Information Service, a well regarded price tracker.

The national average price for a gallon of regular gas stood at $2.74 heading into the weekend, which is the highest so far this year. That’s over 25 cents a gallon greater than last month, yet still about 90 cents a gallon cheaper than a year ago.

The recent increase in prices is just due to seasonal shutdowns of refineries as they stop producing winter blend gasoline and start making the more expensive summer gasoline blend required to reduce smog and air pollution.

But now that the changeover is complete, supplies of gasoline should start to build.

“Prices have been strong enough that most of the refineries are hurrying to restart,” Kloza said.

The analyst sees summer gas prices falling to near $2.50 a gallon by July or August, and prices could fall sharply at the end of the year as cheaper winter blends start to hit the market.

“Post-Labor Day, a lot of places are going to see gasoline for $2, 2.25 a gallon,” he said.

Wall Street agrees.

“We believe that the recent price rally is premature,” wrote Goldman Sachs oil analysts Damien Courvalin and Jeffrey Currie in a report. They’re forecasting oil prices to revisit the October lows by later this summer.

ISIS Claims Forced Sex With Yazidi Girls Is Never Rape Because Koran Condones It

Entertainment News

In the latest issue of Isis propaganda magazine Dabiq, under the headline: “Slave-girls or prostitutes?”, the author writes that it is never rape to rape a slave because it is an Islamic practice inspired by the Prophet himself.

The article is written by “Umm Sumayyah al-Muhajirah”, a jihadi bride whose husband took a Yazidi girl as a slave.

The delusional writer claims that taking slaves, such as captured Yazidi women and girls, through war (“saby”) is a “great prophetic Sunnah [teachings of Mohamed] containing many divine wisdoms and religious benefits”.

Praising Isis’ slave markets, where girls as young as eight are sold into sex slavery, she attempts to insult First Lady Michelle Obama by claiming that no one would pay a “third of a dinar” for her.

Umm Sumayyah, in classic victim blaming fashion, puts reports of horrific abuse at the hands of ISIS fighters down to “devious and wicked slave girls” who “made up lies and wrote false stories”.

A United Nations envoy who interviewed dozens of sexual abuse victims in the region reported that ISIS is using mass-scale and systematic sexual violence as a “terrorist” tactic to spread fear.

Big Wireless Companies Think It’s Their First Amendment Right To Mess With Your Internet

News

AT&T and the other Internet delivery monopolies that are suing the FCC have resurrected the argument, used unsuccessfully by Verizon in 2012, that net neutrality rules violate its First and Fifth Amendment rights.

The move marks the all out offensive the giant internet service providers are launching against the FCC’s new net neutrality rules, which prevent internet access companies from charging tolls to websites you access most often.

AT&T said last week that it plans on challenging whether the FCC’s net neutrality order “violates the terms of the Communications Act of 1934, as amended, and the First and Fifth Amendments to the US Constitution.”

Showing just how it is grasping at straws and trying every dirty trick in the book to undo the consumer-friendly legislation, the First and Fifth Amendments will be used to attack the FCC’s decision to reclassify both fixed and mobile broadband as common carrier services, as well as the FCC’s authority over how ISPs interconnect with other networks.

While the internet monopolists didn’t provide the full reasoning in their filings, Verizon claimed in 2012 that net neutrality “violates the First Amendment by stripping [ISPs] of control over the transmission of speech on their networks. And it takes network owners’ property without compensation by mandating that they turn over those networks for the occupation and use of others at a regulated rate of zero, undermining owners’ multi-billion dollar-backed expectations that they would be able to decide how best to employ their networks to serve consumers and deterring network investment.”

While the First Amendment protects freedom of speech, the Fifth says that “[n]o person shall be… deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.”

Given record profits by the giant ISPs, who enjoy lack of competition due to cozy relationships with regulators, it is clear that they are obviously being deprived of life, liberty and property.

Russian Rocket Launch Failures Lead India To Cancel Joint MIssion

Entertainment News

As a result of recent Russian rocket launch failures the Indian government has lost interest in a joint project with Russia for soil sample taking at the south pole of the Moon, the Space Council of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) reported late last week.

“Taking into account the RAS Space Research Institute information about the Indian specialists loss of interest in the Luna-27 project, Roscosmos [Russia’s Federal Space Agency] is advised to agree with the Indian side on the issue of exclusion of the Indian ‘mini rover’ from the payload of Luna-Resurs-1 project [new project name – Luna-27],” says the Council’s decision.

Head of the space gamma-ray spectroscopy laboratory of the RAS Space Research Institute Igor Mitrofanov told Russian state news agency TASS that the “RAS Space Council has turned to the Federal Space Agency with this proposal. Roscosmos is currently considering it.”

A space industry source told TASS that India was not satisfied with the constant postponement of the Russian lunar missions and a high accident rate.

“As a result, the parties have preliminarily agreed to exchange data on the national lunar programmes and coordinate efforts in the Moon study and went, as they say, their separate ways,” the source said.

India is currently planning to land its own probe on the Moon’s south pole in 2016-2017, becoming the first country to implement such a project. The launch of the cancelled Russian probe, according to the draft of the Federal Space Programme for 2016-2025, is scheduled for 2022.

Telecom Giant Vodaphone Pulls Out Of Facebook’s Insidious Internet.org Scheme

Entertainment News

Facebook’s plan to monopolize the internet of developing countries suffered a blow this weekend as Vodafone India, the country’s second-biggest mobile operator, announced it would hold off offering free internet or ‘zero rated’ services amid a fierce political debate about the practice.

Free internet services are offered to customers when an online service provider, such as Facebook, Spotify or, in India Flipkart, does a deal with the telco provider to pay for the services wholesale and then pass them along to customers for free.

Opposition to the practice say it favors big players, forcing smaller organisations or start-ups out of the market. There is also the more dangerous issue of companies like Facebook violating net neutrality principles and favoring their own content.

Facebook’s Internet.org scheme does not allow arch-rival Google to give access to its Youtube property and all sites wanting access must be hand filtered by Facebook.

Several European countries have outlawed zero rated service, namely The Netherlands and Slovenia, because of the dramatic effect it has on consumption patterns.

Lawmakers have gone so far as to say it removes real choice from users.

The uproar over Internet.org service from Bharti Airtel and Flipkart in India was so great that the plan has been abandoned.

While Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg lies and says this is just a philanthropic effort to get more underprivileged communities online the privacy invading social network pays RCom, an Indian telecom provider, so users receive AccuWeather, Dictionary.com and, of course, Facebook for free.

India’s telecom regulator Trai and the Department of Telecom (DoT) have set up an inquest to examine the ramifications of zero rating and the country may outlaw the practice.

Salesforce Snubs Microsoft’s $55 Billion Bid

Finance

The mystery bidder for Salesforce has been confirmed as Microsoft, according to sources close to the deal. The software giant wanted to buy the cloud giant for $55 billion but the bid was rejected by Salesforce.

According to CNBC, Salesforce boss Marc Benioff wanted $70 billion, a stunning price tag that ultimately sunk the deal. Salesforce’s current market cap is about $48.48 billion. .

The talks reportedly ended in early May, but both Salesforce and Microsoft have refused to discuss them publicly.

The bid wasn’t just talk – the offer was serious enough to prompt Salesforce to hire financial advisers to handle the negotiations.

Many had speculated Microsoft was the buyer, although SAP was also named as an interested party. Oracle was another potential acquirer, although co-CEO Safra Katz quickly shot down any talk of a merger between Benioff and his former boss Larry Ellison.

Salesforce reported revenues of $1.51 billion for the last fiscal quarter, up 27 per cent over the previous year’s quarter.

Benioff has publicly stated his goal is to get to $10bn in annual revenues.

The large bid shows just how under-pressure Microsoft is to come up with a new hit product, as its dominance of computer operating systems fades and marketshare of its popular Office suite is slowly eaten away but rivals such as Evernote, Google and Apple.

More Job Cuts Loom For Troubled Blackberry

Finance

Once ubiquitous Blackberry is laying off more workers across its money losing hardware division, the struggling Canadian smartphone maker has confirmed.

While the company was briefly profitable during Q4 of fiscal ’15, this short run of fortune couldn’t hide the wider challenges in the business and yet another year of losses.

CEO John Chen wants to achieve sustainable profitability by the end of the current fiscal year and is looking to achieve it with another round of cost cutting.

Blackberry would not confirm the number of people to be let go but given the small sales of its once large hardware division the firings could be considerable.

“Our intention is to reallocate resources in ways that will best enable us to capitalize on growth opportunities while driving toward sustainable profitability across all facets of our business

As a result, we have made the decision to consolidate our device, software, hardware and applications business, impacting a number of employees around the world,” said BlackBerry.

The company employed just 6,225 full-time employees globally as of February, way down on the 16,000 workforce in 2012 before it began to slash costs in the wake of a string of disappointing hardware devices.

In BlackBerry’s last full financial year it had revenues of $3.34 billion, down 51 per cent year-on-year, good for a loss of $304 million. While a terrible result it was better than than the loss of $5.9 billion in fiscal ’14.

The company reiterated that it sees a future built on software and services rather than hardware:

“One of our priorities is making our device business profitable. At the same time, we must grow software and licensing revenues. You will see in the coming months a significant ramping in our customers facing activities in sales and marketing.”

The “path to growth” for the company will achieved by investments in software, enterprise security and exploiting the coming Internet of Things, according to the company report.

Blackberry faces a tough challenge as Android has become the ubiquitous operating system of smartphones, televisions and will likely extend that success to connected appliances. As a large number of people have not used a Blackberry, instead preferring iPhones and Androids, the company faces an uphill battle teaching users how to use its devices and making them connect with other, more dominant, operating systems.

Drought Stricken California Sees Vandals Dump 50 Million Gallons Of Fresh Water Into San Francisco Bay

News

Vandals attacked an inflatable dam on Alameda Creek, California, resulting in the loss of nearly 50 million gallons of water.

The timing could not have been worse as California struggles through the worst drought on record.

Police believe he vandals entered a restricted area sometime on Thursday morning and intentionally damaged the dam, causing it to spill the precious water.

“The dam, which is instrumental to the Alameda County Water District’s water supply operations, suffered irreversible damage,” police said.

More than 150 acre-feet of water, approximately 49 million gallons, washed past the destroyed dam and into the San Francisco Bay.

The wasted water was to have been percolated into the Niles Cone Groundwater Basin for use by residents and businesses in Fremont, Newark, and Union City.

“This amount of water is enough to supply the needs of approximately 500 homes for one year,” police said.

District staff acted quickly to open upstream diversions, which saved some of the water from being wasted yet the damage done was immense.

“This is a very significant loss of water under any circumstances, and more so in the drought conditions we are experiencing,” said ACWD General Manager Robert Shaver. “It is an utterly senseless, destructive, and wasteful thing to do.”

The inflatable dams are large, heavy-duty devices, which can be inflated to impound water or deflated to allow water to flow through the creek in storm conditions.

The timing of the vandalism is interesting as it could be a move by activists to draw attention to California’s absurd water usage. While residents struggle with water bans, celebrities continue to waste water while farmers use water-intense practices that are not possibly sustainable in the dry California climate.

Tens Of Thousands Join March Against Chemical Giant Monsanto

Health & Wellness

Thousands of people took to the streets Saturday to protest American biotechnology giant Monsanto and its portfolio of evil products which include genetically modified crops and cancer causing pesticides.

The third annual March Against Monsanto saw rallies in over 400 cities in more than 40 countries around the world.

2,500 people staged anti-Monsanto protests in the Swiss cities of Basel and Morgues, where the company’s Europe, Africa and the Middle East headquarters is situated.

In Paris, Monsanto’s market-leading herbicide Roundup was the main target of protesters’ anger with over 3,000 protesters rallied by environmental organisations including Greenpeace and anti-capitalist group Stop Tafta taking part.

Roundup’s main ingredient was recently classified as “probably carcinogenic to humans” by the World Health Organization and have been banned in many countries. “Looking for mass suicide? Go for Roundup,” read one protest sign at another French protest in the western city of Rennes.

In Burkina Faso, Halfway around the planet, around 500 marched against the chemical giant’s introduction of genetically modified cotton into the west African country in 2003.

Demonstrators demanded a 10-year moratorium on the planting of Monsanto seeds so “independent research can be conducted” into the effects of the technology.

Outside the European Parliament in Strasbourg, over 1,000 anti-Monsanto activists gathered as the sun was setting for a minute’s silence “in homage to the existing and future victims poisoned by pesticides”, according to the organizers.

The worldwide March Against Monsanto was started in 2013 by the Occupy movement. Its growth since then illustrates the wide range of criminal and dangerous acts committed by the company.

The United States Has An Income Inequality Problem

Finance

The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development confirmed this week that the gap between the rich and poor in most of the world’s advanced economies is at record levels.

In most of the 34 countries that make up the OECD, the income gap is at its highest level in over three decades, with the richest 10 percent of the population earning 9.6 times the income of the poorest 10 percent.

In the late 1980s this stood at 7 to 1, the OECD said in a report.

The wealth gap is even greater, with the top 1 percent owning 18 percent and the 40 percent only 3 percent of household wealth as of 2012. This trend has likely gotten worse over the past three years but will not be available until the next report is published.

“We have reached a tipping point. Inequality in OECD countries is at its highest since records began,” said OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurria.

A more troubling fact, which is exposed by this inequality, is control of assets. The study shows that basically all the world’s assets are exclusively controlled by the top 10%. As for the bottom 10%, 50% and even 90%? They have now assets at all and instead “liabilities.”

The report draws parallels to medieval serfdom, where rich landowners controlled the entire asset base while the majority of the population was forced to work the land for meager wages.

Russia Bans “Undesirable” NGOs, Including Human Rights Watch

Entertainment News

Non-governmental organizations in Russia were effectively banned on Sunday after Russian dictator Vladimir Putin passed a law that allows the government to prosecute them on the grounds they are ‘undesirable.’

Workers of those organizations can now be sentenced to six harsh years in Russian prison, which can easily amount to a death sentence given the appalling conditions.

The new measure provoked an international outcry.

The U.S. State Department said it was “deeply troubled” while Amnesty International said the law threatened “fundamental freedoms.” Human Rights Watch condemned it as a “piece of repressive legislation.”

In a largely symbolic move the law was passed through both houses of the Russian parliament. The exact wording states that a foreign non-governmental organization can be recognized as undesirable if it poses a threat to the constitutional order of the Russian Federation or to the country’s defense and security.

The law is incredibly broad, targeting Russian citizens or groups that have any “involvement” with undesirable NGOs.

It is the latest step in a series of measures aimed at suppressing opposition and restricting freedom within the country.

Tanya Lokshina, of Human Rights Watch, said the new law would “severely damage our work in Russia,” and that it was a cause for grave concern for all international groups operating in Russia.

An interesting point Ms. Lokshina raised is that she did not believe the law was aimed at international organizations like hers but instead at Russians who might cooperate with, or support, international organizations.

“The bill does not specify what ‘involvement’ might include,” Lokshina wrote in a statement. “So anything goes. Distributing — including by posting online — the statements, reports, or other materials of an ‘undesirable,'”.

Put more bluntly, in Russia, even retweeting something from an undesirable NGO could land a Russian citizen in jail for up to six years.

Google Caught Helping Copyright Trolls Extort Money From Google Fiber Users

Finance

It’s no secret Google is aggressively looking to cozy up with Hollywood to help its struggling Youtube website. In the latest sign that the search monopolist is getting into bed with Big Copyright and their legal extortionists, Google Fiber, the high-speed broadband service offering broadband speeds up to 100 times faster than the national average, is forwarding nasty extortion letters to users who have allegedly downloaded copyright movies and TV shows.

Copyright extortion firms such as CEG-TEK and Rightscorp blast thousands of settlement notices every month, demanding $20 to several hundred dollars for alleged infringements. The notices are legally suspect, with the industry previously trying to extort $15,000 to $25,000 per letter. After a legal smackdown the shady industry has adjusted its ask – just $20 to $500 – in order to stay under the radar.

While many ISPs refuse to forward the blatant extortion attempts, Google is keen to get into bed with Hollywood and so is passing along the notices to customers in hopes they will pay.

Yet other big ISPs including Comcast, Verizon and AT&T have chosen not to forward settlement demands directly to subscribers to protect their interests, in recognition that letters are nothing more than extortion attempts by big corporations against main street Americans.

Website Zdnet published one of the threatening extortion letters which reads:

BMG will pursue every available remedy including injunctions and recovery of attorney’s fees, costs and any and all other damages which are incurred by BMG as a result of any action that is commenced against you.
While BMG is entitled to monetary damages from the infringing party […] The BMG believes that it may be expeditious to settle this manner without the need of costly and time-consuming litigation. In order to help you avoid further legal action from BMG, we have been authorized to offer a settlement solution that we believe is reasonable for everyone.

According to Mitch Stoltz, staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), ISPs are not legally bound to send such notices to subscribers and that such notices terrorize users, hoping to extract money from them regardless of legal culpability.

“In the U.S., ISPs don’t have any legal obligation to forward infringement notices in their entirety. An ISP that cares about protecting its customers from abuse should strip out demands for money before forwarding infringement notices. Many do this. ”

The latest move by Google shows how it wants to cuddle up to the big Copyright Lobby in order to promote its Youtube property, seen as key to it staying relevant over the next ten years as its search monopoly fades into oblivion.

It also highlights how Google views users as expendable and an asset that needs to be monetized – regardless of the implications of peoples’ lives.

Google, predictably, declined to comment of the latest revelations.

The FBI Doesn’t Want You To Know That Patriot Act Snooping Didn’t Catch A Single Terrorist

News

Despite pleas by law enforcement for increased illegal spying and surveillance powers, the FBI can’t point to any major terrorism cases cracked because of the unconstitutional snooping powers granted under the Patriot Act, the Justice Department’s inspector general said in a report Thursday.

Inspector General Michael E. Horowitz’s report found that between 2004 and 2009, the FBI tripled its use of bulk data collection under Section 215 of the Patriot Act, increasingly scooping up records of Americans who had no ties to official terrorism investigations.

Yet despite this increased invasion of privacy, which directly contravenes the constitution, the FBI came up with no leads.

“The agents we interviewed did not identify any major case developments that resulted from use of the records obtained in response to Section 215 orders,” the inspector general concluded.

The shocking contrast between privacy invasion and lack of effectiveness highlights a general trend in law enforcement towards lazy policing. Police routinely circumvent the constitution instead of doing manual police work, arguing that the increased invasion is needed to catch bad guys. Yet no bad guys are actually caught by the constitutional intrusion and instead our police forces get lazy and weak.

The FBI declined to comment on the latest revelations.

Japanese Fisheries Minister Thinks Endangered Dolphins Should Be Hunted To Extinction

Culture

Out of touch Japanese fisheries minister Yoshimasa Hayashi expressed ‘hope’ that the controversial dolphin slaughter known as Taiji will continue despite Japanese aquariums’ yielding to international pressure and stopping the procurement of the marine mammals caught by fishermen in Taiji town where the hunt is located.

Hayashi, the minister of agriculture, forestry and fisheries, told reporters that “I’d like to see to it that (the method) be implemented as it has been.” Yet the world roundly condemns the hunt, which leaves waters in the cove blood red.

The Japanese Association of Zoos and Aquariums said Wednesday it will acquiesce to international demands and ban members from getting dolphins from Taiji after they faced expulsion from the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums because the slaughter is deemed cruel and inhumane.

Japan is the largest killer of marine mammals, routinely slaughtering rare whales, dolphins and porpoises for food while calling the killings ‘research.’

While Feds Ready Criminal Charges Against GM Engineers, Wall Street Walks Free

Finance

Proving that Wall Street is always above the law, federal prosecutors are said to be filing criminal charges against General Motors Co. over a faulty ignition switch linked to more than 100 deaths. The charges are said to be against both the company and individual engineers.

The situation is reminiscent of the numerous recent Wall Street crimes, in which large, too big to fail banks, conspire to commit criminal acts and yet when caught, face only financial penalties amounting to far less than the ill gotten gains. In all cases on Wall Street no individuals have been charged and nobody has gone to jail.

In a move showing just how deeply Wall Street has corrupted our judiciary, a New York court thinks GM and its employees ought to be prosecuted while Wall Street has never had an individual charged with anything and escaped with paltry civil penalties.

The Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office, notoriously cozy with Wall Street, has apparently determined GM broke the law by making misstatements about the ignition-switch glitch in older Chevrolet Cobalts and other vehicles it manufactured. The allegations date back more than a decade and will result in a fine exceeding $1 billion from the company. GM will either plead guilty or enter a so-called deferred-prosecution agreement, the preferred settlement of Wall Street banks, according to sources familiar with the matter.

Preet Bharara, who is in charge of the Wall Street friendly Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office, has made cases like GM and Toyota a priority while letting large criminal bank syndicates off the hook with relatively minor penalties.

Penalties to banks have affected shareholders, who are usually average Americans, while leaving bonuses of the actual offenders fully intact. In short, the office has decided that America should pick up the tab for Wall Street’s wrongdoing and that criminal bankers should be free to do as they please.

Mr. Bharara’s office has stated that, unlike Wall Street criminal banks, individual GM engineers will face personal criminal charges.

It is unclear, at the time of writing, why Wall Street gets a pass while GM, composed mostly of middle class citizens, faces extra punishment.