Monthly Archives: May 2014

FBI ‘Grappling’ With Hiring Policy Because Top Hackers Smoke Pot

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“FBI Director James B. Comey said Monday that if the FBI hopes to continue to keep pace with cyber criminals, the organization may have to loosen up its no-tolerance policy for hiring those who like to smoke marijuana.  Congress has authorized the FBI to add 2,000 personnel to its rolls this year, and many of those new recruits will be assigned to tackle cyber crimes, a growing priority for the agency. And that’s a problem, Mr. Comey told the White Collar Crime Institute, an annual conference held at the New York City Bar Association in Manhattan. A lot of the nation’s top computer programmers and hacking gurus are also fond of marijuana.”

http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2014/05/20/director-comey-fbi-grappling-with-hiring-policy-concerning-marijuana/

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How Snowden’s Revelations Have Strengthened the NSA

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portallogo3

“A year has gone by, and nothing has changed. This is a grant of legitimacy to the NSA that it did not have before Snowden’s revelations. Before, the NSA worked in secrecy from the public. Now the NSA knows that the worst possible light can be thrown on the NSA’s activities, and nothing is done to roll back the NSA. It has survived Snowden’s revelations, and now it can continue without any major threat to its operations.  I’m glad that Snowden did what he did, because I wanted to hear evidence that backed up what James Bamford wrote about the NSA over two decades ago. But nobody cared about Bamford’s book, and nobody really cares about Snowden’s revelations.”

http://www.garynorth.com/public/12446.cfm

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House Votes to Make It Easier to Fire VA Officials Involved in Scandal

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“The House voted overwhelmingly on Wednesday to make it easier to fire senior Veterans Affairs officials involved in the healthcare scandal, just hours after President Barack Obama delivered a speech that failed to satisfy those looking to take quick action against the VA. Members passed the VA Management Accountability Act in an easy 390-33 vote — the only ‘no’ votes came from Democrats.  Passage of the bill is the latest domino to fall in the expanding healthcare scandal.  The VA recently admitted that long wait-times for health clinics contributed to the death of more than 40 veterans, and it later came out that the VA had known about these problems for years, but tried to cover up the problem.”

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/05/21/house-votes-to-make-it-easier-to-fire-va-officials-involved-in-ongoing-scandal/

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Phoenix VA Director Given $8,500 Bonus, Rescinded After Complaints

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“Sharon Helman, the director of the Phoenix Veterans Affairs Health Care System, ‘got an $8,500 bonus last month while there was an open [inspector general] investigation into Phoenix,’ Chairman Miller told CNN’s Jake Tapper.  It had been previously reported that Helman receivedmore than $9,000 in bonus pay in 2013 on top of her annual salary of $169,900. The VA office of inspector general began investigating the Phoenix VA for wrongdoing in December 2013, months before Helman received the additional $8,500 bonus.  Chairman Jeff Miller said that VA officials told him that the Helman’s new bonus was the result of ‘an administrative error’ made by a ‘low-level person’ in the department.”

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/director-phoenix-va-hospital-where-vets-died-received-8500-bonus-april_793434.html

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The Veterans Administration: News Cycle vs. Spin Cycle

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portallogo3

“In 2003, we had Abu Ghraib. It became a scandal only because one sergeant put his career on the line and leaked the photos. Another sergeant blew the whistle. Without these two men, the scandal would never have surfaced. One of them took the hit.  Bad news does not easily travel up bureaucracies. Bad news is usually stifled before it gets very far up the chain of command. The guys at the very top really are uninformed. General Shinseki probably had no clue as to what was happening. He was paid his fat salary, he got his perks, and he figured he was doing a great job. The system won’t let bad news go up the chain of command. But this time it escaped.”

http://www.garynorth.com/public/12478.cfm

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Kentucky Gains Federal Permit For Its Hemp Seeds

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“Federal drug officials approved a permit Thursday ending a standoff that had imperiled the state’s experimental plantings this spring, agriculture officials said.  Kentucky’s Agriculture Department expects to receive delivery of the shipment of seeds from Italy on Friday, state Agriculture Commissioner James Comer said. Kentucky’s eight pilot hemp projects for research were put on hold after the seed shipment was stopped by U.S. customs officials in Louisville earlier this month. The state’s Agriculture Department then sued the federal government in hopes of freeing the seeds.  Growing hemp without a federal permit was banned in 1970 due to its classification as a controlled substance.”

http://www.lex18.com/news/kentucky-gains-federal-permit-for-its-hemp-seeds

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Fed ‘Biosurveillance’ Plan Seeks Direct Access to Private Health Records

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“The federal government is piecing together a sweeping national ‘biosurveillance’ system that will give bureaucrats near real-time access to Americans’ private medical information in the name of national security, according to Twila Brase.  Brase warns that the NHSS proposal would allow the federal government to monitor an individual’s behavior before, during and after any government-defined health ‘incident’ – which could be anything from a local outbreak of the flu to a terrorist anthrax attack.  One of the dangers, Brase pointed out, is that this vast amount of medical data warehoused in a giant electronic database will only be available to government-approved researchers.”

http://cnsnews.com/news/article/barbara-hollingsworth/federal-biosurveillance-plan-seeking-direct-access-americans

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State Law Hides Investigations of Police Misconduct from Public Scrutiny

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“When compared to other states, Police Departments in California are among the least transparent in the country. When citizens complain about the conduct of sworn police officers, those complaints might go away and are never heard of again. In the last five years alone, the Investigative Unit discovered 17.916 citizen’s complaints filed against the four major law enforcement agencies in the Bay Area, in addition to California’s Highway Patrol.  Yet, a state law called the Police Officer’s Bill of Rights protects police from those who allege misconduct.”

http://www.nbcbayarea.com/investigations/State-Law-Hides-Investigations-of-Police-Misconduct-from-Public-Scrutiny-257080571.html

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Why the IRS Can Now “Ground” You

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“If you’re a US citizen and believe you have an unfettered right to leave your country – and come back – think again.  Since the events of 9/11, your government has imposed draconian restrictions on international travel:  Initiatives like the ‘Automated Targeting System’ and ‘Secure Flight’ require airlines to turn over passenger data to the government.  ‘No-fly lists’ keep hundreds of citizens trapped in other countries, unable to return to their US homes.  Hundreds of thousands of US citizens can’t leave the US because they’re ineligible for a US passport, many because they’re behind in child support payments.  And we can now add ‘tax’ to the list of reasons.”

http://www.nestmann.com/why-the-irs-can-now-ground-you

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Wendy McElroy: America’s Electronic Police State

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“The fusion centers share many characteristics of a surveillance state with the NSA. These characteristics include a disregard for civil rights, secret records, the use of informants, little to no transparency, the targeting of political opponents, and an ever-expanding mission.  Since Snowden’s revelations, the NSA has been under a spotlight that reduces its ability to hide activities such as the warrantless recording of emails and phone calls. NSA is subjected to public controversy, with civil liberty groups pushing to rein in its power. By contrast, the fusion centers are comparatively invisible, which allows them to operate covertly in a manner more typical of a surveillance state.”

http://www.fee.org/the_freeman/detail/americas-electronic-police-state

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