Tuesday, January 10, 2017

10 January - Netvibes - oldephartteintraining

The Atlantic Wire

Trump’s Senior Adviser-in-Law - Jared Kushner is a man who has been in the right place—or more precisely, the right families—at the right time, and been willing and able to bend the rules to move forward. In the latest instance of that pattern, President-elect Donald Trump will reportedly name Kushner a senior White House adviser, CNN and The New York Times report, placing his son-in-law in a top post but setting up a potential showdown over the reach of federal nepotism laws. That would end weeks of speculation that Kushner would receive a top job at the White House, and it would represent a continuation of his role on the Trump presidential campaign, where Kushner gradually grew in influence, ultimately becoming one of his father-in-law’s closest aides. As soon as rumors of a Kushner appointment bubbled up, ethics experts objected, saying his playing a role in the White House would fall afoul of rules instituted in 1967, partly in response to John F. Kennedy naming his brother, Robert F. Kennedy, as attorney general. But there are ways around the law. The statute specifies: A public official may not appoint, employ, promote, advance, or advocate for appointment, employment, promotion, or advancement, in or to a civilian position in the agency in which he is serving or over which he exercises jurisdiction or control any individual who is a relative of the public official. The law defines agency as “an Executive agency,” “an office, agency, or other establishment in the legislative branch,” “an office, agency, or other establishment in the judicial branch,” or “the government of the District of Columbia,” and it’s the meaning of those definitions on which Kushner’s eligibility for his new job hinges. Ironically, it’s Hillary Clinton who might bail Trump out here. When Bill Clinton named the first lady to lead a health-care task force in 1993, the appointment was challenged in court as a violation of the act. But the court concluded that the White House and Executive Office of the President didn’t fall under the statutory definition. Will that work for Kushner? Opinions diverge, even between Norm Eisen and Richard Painter, who have emerged as the most consistent voices assailing Trump’s ethical practices. “We’re not talking about Kushner running a side task force here,” Eisen, who was Obama’s chief ethics lawyer, told Politico in November. “We’re talking about a regular staff job. This falls right in the bull’s eye of the statute. I think it’s illegal.” But Richard Painter, who held the same position for George W. Bush, told ABC News that same month that while a Kushner job “clearly violates the intent of the law,” there are also “arguments that could be used to try and wiggle around it if you were making an appointment in the White House.” The likely ascent to a job at the president’s right hand represents the latest piece of good luck and good timing for Kushner, a spree that began with his birth as the scion of a prominent New York area real-estate family—a parallel between Kushner and Donald Trump that has not been overlook. Kushner was also lucky in marriage, with his union with Ivanka Trump bringing him into another prominent New York real-estate empire. The attempt to circumvent nepotism statutes points to another characteristic of Kushner’s career: He’s been willing and able to have rules bent on his behalf. In a 2006 book on how colleges court wealthy donors, Pulitzer Prize winning reporter Daniel Golden reported that Jared Kushner was likely admitted to Harvard on the basis of a lavish gift that his father Charles made to the Ivy League college. Golden recapped his reporting in a recent ProPublica piece: “There was no way anybody in the administrative office of the school thought he would on the merits get into Harvard,” a former official at The Frisch School in Paramus, New Jersey, told me. “His GPA did not warrant it, his SAT scores did not warrant it. We thought for sure, there was no way this was going to happen. Then, lo and behold, Jared was accepted. It was a little bit disappointing because there were at the time other kids we thought should really get in on the merits, and they did not.” During the course of the campaign, Kushner gradually came to be seen as a more and more powerful figure. He helped shape Trump’s Middle East policy and his March 2016 speech to AIPAC, an outing that was seen as surprisingly sober and prepared for a candidate mostly characterized by chaos and disorder. He was said to have a role in the June firing of Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, who, according to some reports, had sought to plant negative stories about Kushner. But although Kushner is an observant orthodox Jew, he emerged as a major backer of Steve Bannon, the emissary of the “alt-right” who became Trump’s final campaign chairman and is headed to the White House as its top strategist. Kushner’s hand is said to be at work in the falling fortunes of Chris Christie, the New Jersey governor who was an early backer of Trump. Christie, then a U.S. attorney, sent Jared Kushner’s father Charles to jail for two years in a rococo case, in which Charles hired a prostitute to solicit his sister’s husband, then taped the encounter and sent a recording to the sister. Christie was dethroned as head of the transition shortly after Trump’s election, and has thus far been shut out of a post in the Trump administration. Although Kushner has little experience in politics or government—he is the owner of the New York Observer, a weekly newspaper that has historically focused on media, real estate, and the doings of New York City’s chattering classes—he is well connected in business circles. Kushner was reportedly a major advocate for Gary Cohn, the president of Goldman Sachs who has been appointed as the head of Trump’s National Economic Council. Kushner has already been sitting in on meetings with foreign leaders like Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. As Andrew Rice reports in a new profile in New York, the parallels between Donald Trump and Jared Kushner do not end with their backgrounds as the sons of major Gotham developers. Trump was for many years a Democrat and espoused standard liberal positions before taking his hard-right turn ahead of his presidential campaign. Kushner, like Ivanka Trump, seems to have been a fairly typical pro-business Democrat until recently—indeed, when his father was sentenced to jail, the New York Times headline identified him first and foremost as a “Democrat Donor.” More recently, associates told Rice that Kushner had taken a hard turn right. Even if nepotism laws can be overcome, Kushner risks running afoul of other White House rules. Because of his role running his family’s real-estate company, Kushner is deeply enmeshed with a variety of business interests that could conflict with his role in policymaking. A deeply reported Times story on Sunday looked at the Kushner companies and how they intersect with, among other things, Chinese national interests. Despite Trump’s belligerent words about China, a joint Trump-Kushner venture in New Jersey was financed in part with a maneuver that allows major overseas investors, in this case many of them Chinese, to get U.S. visas. These connections could cause problems for Kushner. Or he could take the approach that Donald Trump has taken as president-elect, and simply refuse to acknowledge the deep conflicts of interest or do anything about them. If Kushner did that, it would be yet another case of like father, like son-in-law. 9 Jan
Mixed Martial Arts Is Full of ‘Outsiders and Foreigners’—and Artists - On the way to denouncing Donald Trump during her Golden Globes speech Sunday, Meryl Streep ended up miffing some sports fans. “Hollywood is crawling with outsiders and foreigners,” she said, “and if we kick them all out you’ll have nothing to watch but football and mixed martial arts—which are not the arts.” Just as Trump would soon shoot back at Streep, the mixed martial arts community soon took issue with her comment. Scott Coker, president of Bellator MMA, wrote her an open letter inviting her to attend a fight so she could see that “mixed martial arts celebrates male and female athletes from all over the world who work tirelessly honing their craft and—yes—art.” The complaints from fans were not simply that she’d seemed to condescend to the sport but that she’d, in fact, misrepresented it. “MMA is as international as Hollywood,” the author Kerry Howley said on Twitter, adding, “Meryl Streep: America’s white working class invented Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.” Howley’s semi-fictional 2014 book Thrown is based on her real experience spending three years getting to know MMA fighters. Deadspin called it “The Only MMA Book Anyone Ever Needs To Write.” Looking for some perspective about mixed martial arts’s multiculturalism and claim to the status of art, I spoke with Howley, an assistant professor at the University of Iowa, on the phone this morning. This conversation has been edited. Spencer Kornhaber: What was your reaction when Meryl Streep mentioned MMA? Kerry Howley: I just thought it was odd. She couldn’t have chosen a worse sport to represent American provincialism. The implication was that you could expel foreigners from the country and you wouldn’t have Hollywood but you’d have MMA. Of course, if you expelled foreigners from the country you would destroy MMA, which is as Brazilian as it American—and Irish and Japanese and Russian and Korean and Belgian. I think her implication was bigger: It was that MMA fans are inward-looking, provincial people who are offended and confused by the cosmopolitanism of Hollywood. And that’s a more disturbing kind of ignorance, right? The ignorance of the dynamics of a particular sport. I’m not sure how much you know about MMA… Kornhaber: I really don’t know anything! Howley: Originally, MMA was brought to this country, in the early ’90s, by a Brazilian family who had studied a Japanese art form. The sport has never lost its international flavor. Fighters and fans are completely aware that this is a cosmopolitan sport. Just list the martial arts you need to be successful in mixed martial arts: Muay Thai, Judo, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, Taekwondo. Do those sound American? If you’re a Brazilian fighter, you might come to the U.S. to study boxing and American wrestling. But otherwise you’ll be seeking wisdom from other cultures. Fighters are constantly going back and forth to training camps in Brazil. Many of them study Portuguese so they can more effectively understand their instructors. And it bleeds into a real interest in the culture. Let’s just look at the very last UFC fight. That was Ronda Rousey versus a [Brazilian] woman named Amanda Nunes, who beat her. We all listened to Nunes talk about her win through a translator. That’s MMA. You couldn’t turn it into the kind of inward-looking white American phenomenon that Meryl Streep seems to think it is. If Americans wanted to not have to hear people speak through a translator, not have to deal with other cultures, they could go watch American wrestling or do something else. Kornhaber: What about the implication that the fandom, at least, is a lot of people who supported Trump? Howley: I can’t comment on the mass of fans. But the fighters I write about in Thrown and all the fighters in this one fight camp I spent years with—which is in Iowa, it’s not in New York City—are searchers. They’re nonconformists. They’re artists who absolutely embrace the cosmopolitan aspects of the sport. They think it’s bigger than this country, and they’re completely dismissive of the provincial attitudes that Meryl Streep was complaining about. “Whatever part of [fans] is interested in MMA is not the part of them that celebrates white supremacy.”I mean, think about it: If you were a strong natural athlete and also a conformist who was uncomfortable with difference and with change, what would you do? You would try football, or basketball. You wouldn’t choose the stigmatized, relatively un-renumerative sport. You wouldn’t learn Portuguese so you could learn under Brazilians. I don’t know if most MMA fans are Trump supporters. I have no idea. But whatever part of them is interested in MMA is not the part of them that celebrates white supremacy or inward-looking provincialism. We know that [Ultimate Fighting Championship president] Dana White is friendly to Trump, but Dana White is not the mass of MMA fans. Kornhaber: What did you make of the comment that Mixed Marital Arts are not art? Howley: The fighters that I know self-identify as artists. They’re people who are seeking out a life that is very likely not going to make them wealthy, that is very difficult, and that is openly stigmatized, as we just saw. And they’re doing it because there’s something beautiful and strange about the experience of opening yourself up to this kind of violence. It was very easy for me to spend three years with these men because they shared a lot of the values of the artist community that I have here in Iowa City. Of course if you’re not inside the world, you only see Ronda Rousey and you might say, “Oh, she’s after fame and B-movie parts.” But, of course, most fighters are never going to be Ronda Rousey and are well aware of that. There are fights in high-school gyms every weekend. There are fights at state fairgrounds. These are people who love what they’re doing and are trying to refine a number of distinct arts that have been brought here from other cultures. Kornhaber: Streep also mentioned the NFL, another sport associated, to many people, with contact and violence. Do you think it makes sense to group those sports together? Howley: I am deeply ignorant about football—to be honest, I share Meryl Streep’s assumptions about football. And so when she makes these deeply incorrect assumptions about MMA, it makes me stop and think about the breadth of what I don’t know about lives that I haven’t bothered to understand. So right now the comparison [with the NFL] makes no sense to me because I can see that MMA is so international and football doesn’t seem to be like that. But I don’t know—maybe if I wrote about football I would discover a world of broadminded people. Kornhaber: Scott Coker, an MMA promoter, wrote Streep a letter inviting her to a match. What do you think she’d make of it if she went? Howley: I don’t think she’ll respond. But if she went, she could very likely end up at a fight card that isn’t even majority American. And that might be surprising to her. 9 Jan
What Sets the Smart Heroines of Hidden Figures Apart - When it comes to historical movies about brilliant minds, especially in the realms of math or the sciences, audiences can all but expect a tale of ego. Films such as A Beautiful Mind, The Theory of Everything, and The Imitation Game all lean in some way on the idea of the inaccessible genius—a mathematician, computer scientist, and theoretical physicist all somehow removed from the world. Hidden Figures is not that kind of film: It’s a story of brilliance, but not of ego. It’s a story of struggle and willpower, but not of individual glory. Set in 1960s Virginia, the film centers on three pioneering African American women whose calculations for NASA were integral to several historic space missions, including John Glenn’s successful orbit of the Earth. These women—Katherine Johnson, Mary Jackson, and Dorothy Vaughan—were superlative mathematicians and engineers despite starting their careers in segregation-era America and facing discrimination at home, at school, and at work. And yet Hidden Figures pays tribute to its subjects by doing the opposite of what many biopics have done in the past—it looks closely at the remarkable person in the context of a community. Directed by Theodore Melfi (St. Vincent) and based on the nonfiction book of the same title by Margot Lee Shetterly, the film celebrates individual mettle, but also the way its characters consistently try to lift others up.  They’re phenomenal at what they do, but they’re also generous with their time, their energy, and their patience in a way that feels humane, not saintly. By refracting the overlooked lives and accomplishments of Johnson, Vaughan, and Jackson through this lens, Hidden Figures manages to be more than an inspiring history lesson with wonderful performances. From the start, Hidden Figures makes clear that it is about a trio, not a lone heroine. Katherine (played by a radiant Taraji P. Henson) is the film’s ostensible protagonist and gets the most screen time. But her story is woven tightly with those of Mary (Janelle Monáe) and Dorothy (Octavia Spencer); the former became NASA’s first black female engineer, the latter was a mathematician who became NASA’s first African American manager. (It’s worth noting that, as a dramatization, the film makes tweaks to the timeline, characters, and events of the books.) Hidden Figures begins in earnest in 1961. Katherine, Mary, and Dorothy are part of NASA’s pool of human “computers”—employees, usually women, charged with doing calculations before the use of digital computers. Due to Virginia’s segregation laws, African American female computers have to work in a separate “colored” building at the Langley Research Center. But the U.S. is so desperate to beat the Soviet Union into space that NASA becomes a reluctant meritocracy: Because of her expertise in analytic geometry, Katherine is assigned to a special task group trying to get Glenn into orbit. She arrives at her new job to find she’s the sole brown face in the room. Katherine is closest to the excitement, but Hidden Figures widens its scope beyond her. Mary must navigate layers of racist bureaucratic hurdles in her quest to become an engineer. Dorothy is fighting for a long overdue promotion, while the arrival of an IBM machine threatens to put her team of computers out of work. The women consistently out-think their higher-ranked (usually white, male) colleagues, whether by learning a new programming language, solving problems in wind-tunnel experiments, or calculating narrow launch windows for space missions. Each is uniquely aware of the broader stakes of her success—for other women, for black people, for black women, and for America at large—and this knowledge is as much an inspiration as it is a heavy weight. Early on, Dorothy shares her ambivalence about Katherine’s prestigious new assignment. “Any upward movement is movement for us all. It’s just not movement for me,” she says, disappointed after a setback at work. It’s a subtle, but loaded point, and one of the most thought-provoking lines in the film. Of course she’s proud of Katherine, and of course Katherine is paving the way for others. But individual victories are often simply that—Katherine knocking down one pillar of discrimination doesn’t mean countless more don’t remain. Still, Dorothy’s frustration with her stagnation at work doesn’t translate to defeatism or selfishness. She spends much of the film maneuvering to protect her team’s jobs, even if it means risking her own status and security. Their intellect may not be broadly relatable, but their sense of rootedness is.Their intellect may not be broadly relatable (again, they’re exceptional for a reason), but their sense of rootedness is. Though most of their time and energy go to their careers, the women of Hidden Figures don’t take their relationships with each other and with their friends and families for granted. If one gets held up at work for hours, the other two wait in the parking lot until they can all drive home. On the weekends, they go to church and neighborhood barbecues and spend time with their children. They don’t “have it all,” but they do strive for balance and connection. (Another “feel-good film” from 2016, Queen of Katwe, also used the concept of community and interdependence to undermine the built-up notion of isolated talent.) Despite the racism and sexism Katherine, Dorothy, and Mary face, Hidden Figures is a decidedly un-somber affair. The breezy script by Melfi and Allison Schroeder opts not to dwell much on the particulars of aeronautical science; instead, it revels in the intelligence and warmth of its subjects, in their successes both in and out of the office, and it wants viewers to do so too. Hidden Figures doesn’t hide its efforts to be a crowdpleaser—depending on audience size, you can expect clapping and cheering after moments of victory, and loud groans whenever egregious acts of racism take place (there are many). A buoyant soundtrack by Pharrell Williams, Hans Zimmer, and Benjamin Wallfisch and regular doses of comic relief help keep the tone light and optimistic despite the serious issues at hand. Rounding out Hidden Figures’ all-star cast are Kevin Costner, as Katherine’s boss and eventual ally; an appropriately un-funny Jim Parsons as a new colleague of Katherine’s who can barely tolerate her presence; Kirsten Dunst as Dorothy’s manager and the epitome of the racist-who-thinks-she’s-not type; Glen Powell as an affable John Glenn; and Mahershala Ali as Katherine’s kindly love interest, Jim Johnson. Because of the engaging performances that Henson, Monáe, and Spencer give, each main character is fascinating to watch in her own right. But it’s their dynamic that makes it a joy to see them onscreen together. Hidden Figures doesn’t try to push many artistic boundaries, but it tells its story so well that it doesn’t really have to. The film also avoids the most glaring missteps of historical movies that deal with race: At no point does it try to give viewers the impression that racism has been “solved,” and its white characters exist on a constantly shifting spectrum of racial enlightenment. What’s more, the film’s straightforward presentation belies its fairly radical subject matter. As K. Austin Collins notes at The Ringer, Hidden Figures “might be one of the few Hollywood movies about the civil rights era to imagine that black lives in the ’60s, particularly black women’s lives, were affected not only by racism but also by the space race and the Cold War.” The Hidden Figures author, Shetterly, has discussed how the film only portrays a fraction of the individuals who worked on the space program—and how the movie was meant to speak to the experiences of the many African American women working at NASA at the time.  Watching this particular story unfurl on the big screen, it’s hard not to think of how many more movies and books could be made about women like Katherine Johnson—talented women shut out of promotions and meetings and elite programs and institutions and, thus history, because they weren’t white. Even today, barriers remain. A 2015 study found 100 percent of women of color in STEM fields report experiencing gender bias at work, an effect often influenced by their race. Black and Latina women, for example, reported being mistaken for janitors (a scene that, fittingly, takes place in Hidden Figures). With the complex social forces that shaped its characters’ lives still so relevant today, Hidden Figures is powerful precisely because it’s not a solo portrait or a close character study. Certainly, Hollywood will be a better industry when there are more films about the egos and personal demons and grand triumphs of black women who helped to change the world. But Hidden Figures shines with respect for sisterhood and the communistic spirit, and in casting its spotlight wide, the film imparts a profound appreciation for what was achieved in history’s shadows. 9 Jan
The Introverted Politics of the 2017 Golden Globes - Meryl Streep, honored on Sunday with the Hollywood Foreign Press Association’s Cecil B. deMille award for lifetime achievement, used her acceptance speech to make an extremely bold claim. “You and all of us in this room really belong to the most vilified segments in American society right now,” Streep told her fellow actors and creators. “Think about it: Hollywood, foreigners, and the press.” The crowd laughed. They might have laughed louder, though, had Streep’s dark joke not already been used, almost word for word, earlier in the evening—by Hugh Laurie. Accepting his Best Supporting Actor award for his work in The Night Manager, the Brit suggested that the incoming presidential administration might somehow bring an end to the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (and, with it, the Golden Globe awards that body gives out each year). The mechanism for the dissolution? Unclear. The reason for the dissolution? The association, Laurie said, “has the words ‘Hollywood,’ ‘foreign,’ and ‘press’ in the title.” The actors’ comments were, on the one hand, extremely typical of awards shows, whose rituals tend to merge Hollywood’s sense of its own cultural significance with a passing awareness of the struggles of the world beyond Wilshire Boulevard. Talk of politics—Sean Penn on Proposition 8, Jared Leto on Ukraine, Patricia Arquette on equal pay—is extremely common on the stages of those shows, as celebrities use their cultural influence to effect political change. The 74th incarnation of the Globes, though, saw advocacy of a different strain. Streep and her fellow celebrities used their time on the stage of the Beverly Hilton not just to speak up for others, but also to speak up for … themselves. Hollywood, according to Hollywood, is at risk. Its denizens are, or at least very soon will be, oppressed. ‘Hollywood is crawling with outsiders and foreigners. And if we kick them all out, you’ll have nothing to watch but football and mixed martial arts.’Laurie suggested that Sunday’s show would be the “last ever Golden Globes,” punctuating the claim by remarking, “I also think that, to some Republicans, even the word ‘association’ is slightly sketchy.” Streep noted that “Hollywood is crawling with outsiders and foreigners. And if we kick them all out you’ll have nothing to watch but football and mixed martial arts, which are not the arts.” If we kick them all out. We’ll have nothing to watch. That Streep would make such observations on the Globes stage was, as the Los Angeles Times’s Steven Zeitchik put it, “a powerful act of political defiance.” The observations themselves, however, were also the kind of claims that might be dubbed, in other quarters, truthful hyperbole. Here was Streep, the consummate Hollywood partisan, making the consummate “you’ll miss us when we’re gone” argument. (Mixed martial arts!) Here was the decorated actor suggesting that the culture wars have become so asymmetrical that they could reasonably end with an annihilation of Hollywood itself. Streep also used her speech to make another, related argument: that she and her fellow actors and creators, far from being members of the global elite, are in fact Just Like Us—and thus just as vulnerable as the rest of us are to the forces of political oppression. “I was born and raised and educated in the public schools of New Jersey,” Streep noted. “Viola [Davis, who introduced Streep] was born in a sharecropper’s cabin in South Carolina, came up in Central Falls, Rhode Island,” Streep informed the Globes auditorium. “Sarah Paulson was born in Florida, raised by a single mom in Brooklyn. Sarah Jessica Parker was one of seven or eight kids in Ohio.” Related Story The Golden Globes Anoint La La Land and Moonlight So the culture wars, whatever some of the warriors might have to say about it, cannot simply be a matter of elite-versus-regular-people—because even the elite, under Streep’s logic, are regular people. And even the elite, as such—even the wealthy and powerful denizens of Hollywood—can be victimized. The Just Like Us posture was reflected by the producers of the Globes themselves. After Streep concluded her speech, the NBC telecast aired a pre-recorded segment featuring actors who were up for awards during the evening sharing the jobs they did before Hollywood anointed them as celebrities. Casey Affleck shoveled snow. Viola Davis flipped bingo cards. Robert DeNiro worked as “a golf boy.” The segment was meant to be a spoof on the Screen Actors Guild Awards’s “How I got my SAG card” montage; it was also, though, a frame-by-frame insistence on the everypersonhood of Hollywood’s demigods. Stars are people, too. They shovel snow, too. They, too, are part of an interconnected political system in which all of us are under existential threat. The ostensible source of that threat, Donald Trump, was a spectral presence during the evening’s proceedings. Laurie merely alluded to him, the actor’s warnings playing out as predicates whose subject was merely implied. Streep invoked him—she remarked on Trump’s mockery of a disabled reporter, and on “this instinct to humiliate”—without ever mentioning the president-elect by name. So, perhaps, did La La Land ’s producer, Marc Platt, when he observed in his Best Comedy acceptance speech that films can help us not just to dream, but “to dream more urgently.” What does it mean, to dream urgently? And how will films continue to help people to do it? The Globes ceremony was, in the end, revealing not just about Hollywood’s love for itself—La La Land, the consummate film about filmmaking, emerged with the most Globe awards ever granted in one evening—but also about its sense of its own moral purpose. The telecast presented itself, for all its wacky antics, as an epic battle: kindness versus cruelty, good versus its absence, a Hollywood that emphasizes inclusion and understanding—“we have to remind each other of the privilege and the responsibility of the act of empathy,” Streep put it—pitted against a Washington that so often fails to see beyond the self. Here were some of the most wealthy and powerful people in the world, claiming their averageness by way of their empathy. But here, too, was Meryl Streep, the master of American drama, acknowledging—warning—that empathy, far too often, is not enough. 9 Jan
What's Behind the New Wave of Transgender 'Bathroom Bills' - In North Carolina, the lessons of H.B. 2, last year’s controversial transgender “bathroom bill,” seem clear. The law states, among other things, that transgender people must use bathrooms corresponding to the biological sex on their birth certificates when using public accommodations. The law inspired huge boycotts, cost the state an estimated hundreds of millions of dollars in lost economic growth, drew a lawsuit from the Department of Justice, and was a central cause of Republican ex-Governor Pat McCrory’s defeat in his reelection bid. In late December, an attempt to repeal the law failed amid partisan acrimony—but over how to repeal the bill, not whether to repeal it. But in several states, legislators have taken a different lesson: They’ve seen what happened in North Carolina and decided that their states need something like it. Lawmakers in Texas, Virginia, and Kentucky have all filed similar bills, reflecting an alternative political calculus on transgender rights. While the language is slightly different across the bills, they share several essential characteristics: They define biological sex based on an individual’s birth certificate, and then say that people must use public accommodations—especially in public schools—corresponding to that sex. Related Story How Did North Carolina's Deal to Repeal H.B. 2 Fall Apart? The legislation comes at a dramatic political moment, when the future of transgender law is in flux. The Obama administration reacted fiercely to North Carolina’s law, filing suit against the state and then issuing guidance saying that all schools should allow students to use bathrooms corresponding to the gender with which they identify, saying Title IX mandated it. But a federal judge blocked that law in August. Backlash to the administration’s order, combined with the expectation that a Trump Justice Department will take a far different tack on transgender issues and interpretation of Title IX, seem to have inspired legislators to push their own legislation, even at the risk of incurring the harsh business backlash that accompanied H.B. 2. In fact, part of the strategy behind the new wave of bills is a calculation that while boycotts may be effective on a state-by-state scale, they will fall apart if many states enact such legislation. The Texas bill, styled S.B. 6, is perhaps the most viable of the bills proposed so far, given GOP majorities in the legislature and Governor Greg Abbott’s previous positive statements about bathroom bills. It covers school districts, open-enrollment charter schools, state agencies, and some other districts. Like North Carolina’s H.B. 2, the bill is designed to preempt local governments from passing their own ordinances governing transgender restrooms, and like that law, it does not affect private businesses. The bill was filed by Senator Lois Kolkhorst of Brenham, but its big booster is Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick. (Kolkhorst’s staff declined to make her available to speak on it.) “We know it’s going to be a tough fight,” Patrick said at a news conference in Austin on Thursday. “The forces of fear and misinformation will pull out all the stops, both in Texas and nationally. But we know we’re on the right side of the issue, and we’re on the right side of history.” “You can’t boycott half the country.”It’s difficult to forecast the fate of proposals like these. A bathroom bill in South Dakota last year appeared to be on a fast-track to enactment before Governor Dennis Daugaard, a Republican, surprised some observers by vetoing the bill after meeting with transgender people. Still, the other two bills proposed this year seem to face serious hurdles. Kentucky’s bill is similar to Texas’s. The bill in sponsored by Representative Rick Nelson, a Democrat from Southeastern Kentucky. Nelson did not respond to a request for comment, but he told the Louisville Courier-Journal, “I just want to make sure those bills are out there in case the other side decides not to do them. I support them and think they're pretty good.” He appeared to be alluding to the dearth of support among Bluegrass State Republican leaders for such a bill. Although Governor Matt Bevin joined states that sued over the Obama administration rule on transgender restrooms, he mocked the idea of a bathroom bill in his own state during a December press conference. “Is it an issue? Is there anyone you know in Kentucky who has trouble going to the bathroom? Seriously?" the Republican said. “The last thing we need is more government rules. I’m cutting red tape, not creating it. Making government rules for things that don’t even need government rules would be silly.” Virginia’s bill is sponsored by Bob Marshall, a GOP delegate who has, as Slate chronicles, a colorful record of legislation to his name. (The Republican speaker of the House of Delegates dismissed Marshall’s latest bill to the Richmond Times-Dispatch as “Bob being Bob.”) The proposal uses slightly different language, though it achieves the same goal. The unusual element of the Virginia bill is one of the final clauses, which would force school authorities to out any students who came out as transgender at school to their parents. Principals would be required to notify parents without 24 hours of any request to be “recognized or treated as the opposite sex, to use a name or pronouns inconsistent with the child's sex, or to use a restroom or changing facility designated for the opposite sex.” Virginia’s bill also faces strong headwinds. The state’s governor, Terry McAuliffe, is a Democrat, and last year, a similar bill died last year in the GOP-controlled House of Delegates, with Republicans citing pending federal legislation.  The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in April that a school district in Virginia should allow Gavin Grimm, a transgender teenager, to use the men’s bathroom. That case is now headed to the Supreme Court. But pending court decisions have not discouraged conservatives from continuing to propose the laws. Richard Mast, senior litigation attorney with Liberty Counsel, a social-conservative legal nonprofit, said the Obama administration guidance, which said that schools risked federal funds if they did not follow the federal interpretation of “sex discrimination” to include gender identity, had produced a backlash. “It was heavy-handed, in that they were threatening and bullying school districts into loss of funds,” Mast said. “It’s going to cost us money and it’s going to make us look like bigots.”Mast said Liberty Counsel had been providing model language for legislation to lawmakers, among other efforts to lobby for such laws. He said Texas’s bill was “very similar language to what we have provided” to legislators, school boards, and others around the country. “People want to maintain privacy,” he said. “They want to be assured that their safety, particularly of children is maintained in restrooms like this.” Mast said Liberty Counsel recommended providing single-stall restrooms to students with gender dysphoria. If these bills are born out of a frustration with rapidly changing norms, the ones on the table now also appear to be driven by the chance to make a political splash, from Marshall’s attempt to resurrect last year’s failed bill to Nelson’s bid to bring up a proposal that Kentucky’s Republican leadership has already rejected. Dan Patrick is seen as a politician with designs on higher office, and even a failed S.B. 6 could help raise his profile and solidify his conservative bona fides. Chase Strangio, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union who works on LGBT issues, says the lawmakers introducing bills now were “people who are committed to targeting the trans community.” “We saw last session bills across the country attempting to do the same thing,” Strangio said. “We were overwhelmingly successful in stopping them, and we’re incredibly optimistic that we’ll be able to stop the majority of them this session.” But the advent of a Trump administration should be favorable for bathroom-bill advocates. The president-elect himself offered vague and contradictory statements about North Carolina’s law during the campaign, but a Department of Justice headed by Senator Jeff Sessions, his nominee for attorney general, is expected to be much less friendly to expansions of LBGT rights. Any state attempting to institute a bathroom law still faces headwinds. For one, a Supreme Court ruling could resolve the issue and obviate state laws. Another challenge is enforcement. “We can only have the bright-line test of biological sex,” Mast said, though he acknowledged that such bills rely heavily on self-regulation. A viral tweet from a transgender man named James Sheffield, sent during the H.B. 2 debate, highlighted the challenge: Though Sheffield says his birth certificate indicates he is a woman, he suggested that his beard would probably cause a ruckus in a women’s room. But the economic danger of such laws remains perhaps the most potent discouragement, even for policymakers who might sympathize with the goals of a bathroom bill. It’s one likely reason that governors like Bevin are not eager to take up fights on the matter. North Carolina lost hundreds of jobs in intended expansions, various conferences, and multiple sporting contests, including the 2017 NBA All-Star Game and multiple NCAA and ACC college-sports events. Texas stands to lose in many of the same ways. The Texas Association of Business, a generally conservative organization, warned in December that a bathroom bill could cost the Lone Star State as much as $8.5 billion and 100,000 jobs. Richard Mast argued that such boycotts will become unworkable as more states pass bathroom laws. “You can’t boycott half the country,” he said. But not everyone is so sure. Texas State Representative Eric Johnson, a Democrat from Dallas, said S.B. 6 was a misguided bill that capitalized on lack of understanding about transgender people, and he predicted that Democrats and Republicans would come together to keep the bill from going anywhere. If that didn’t happen, though, his political case against it was concise. “It’s going to cost us money and it’s going to make us look like bigots,” he said. 9 Jan
The Mystery of Sherlock's New Antagonist - This article contains spoilers through the most recent episode of Sherlock, “The Lying Detective.” Last week, writing about the first episode of the fourth season of Sherlock, “The Six Thatchers,” I complained about the treatment of women in Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss’s BBC show, and bemoaned how the loss of Mary (Amanda Abbington) meant there were no complex female characters left. I was dismissive of the depths of Mrs. Hudson (Una Stubbs), characterizing her as a former stripper and cartel moll. And I suggested that one fix for the show might be if John’s mysterious “E” turned out to be Sherlock Holmes’s sister, but then assumed Moffat wouldn’t be forward-thinking enough to write that storyline. After watching “The Lying Detective,” I feel compelled to wholeheartedly apologize: to Sherlock, to Moffat, and, most grovelingly, to Mrs. Hudson. “The Lying Detective” was publicized as a story about Culverton Smith (Toby Jones) a brash businessman and television personality whom Sherlock had reason to believe was also “the most dangerous, despicable human being I’ve ever encountered,” and who turned out to be a serial killer hiding in plain sight. But there was another, more intriguing antagonist also hiding in plain sight throughout the episode, revealed to be Eurus (Sian Brooke), who’d masqueraded first as John’s paramour on the bus in “The Six Thatchers,” then as his new therapist, and then finally as Culverton Smith’s daughter. “Amazing the times a man doesn’t really look at your face,” she told John. “Did you ever stop to think that Sherlock’s secret brother might be Sherlock’s secret sister?” The existence of Eurus has been alluded to in a few past episodes, with Mycroft seemingly hinting at another Holmes sibling. “I’m not given to outbursts of brotherly compassion: You know what happened to the other one,” he said at the end of “His Last Vow.” In the same episode, Sherlock told John that Mycroft used to scare him with stories about the “east wind, this terrifying force that lays waste to all in its path. Seeks out the unworthy and plucks them from the earth.” Eurus told John that her parents named her after the east wind, implying Mycroft has long been aware of her (potentially destructive) existence, even if Sherlock hasn’t. It’s a fascinating twist for the show, setting up Eurus as the potential big bad of the fourth season, just as Moriarty loomed over the first two, and Mary ended up being the secret antagonist of the third. Eurus, like Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes, is clearly a master of disguise, transforming herself into different women so efficiently that even John can’t recognize her (in Conan Doyle’s stories, Watson was forever having encounters with strangers who ultimately turned out to be Holmes). She’s possibly homicidal, threatening to “put a hole” in John’s face before pulling out a gun. And she’s also possibly working for (the deceased) Moriarty, leaving a secret “Miss Me?” message on the note she left behind (while pretending to be Smith’s daughter) at Sherlock’s apartment. “The Lying Detective” was really an example of Sherlock at its best, interweaving a case-of-the-week storyline with subplots about John’s grief and Sherlock’s relapse into addiction, all while setting up Eurus as a larger presence in the next episode. But one of the other highlights was Mrs. Hudson, given her own James Bond-esque car-chase sequence in an Aston Martin after kidnapping Sherlock and throwing him in the trunk. To John’s obvious astonishment, she screeched, “I’m the widow of a drug dealer, I own property in central London, and for the last time, John, I’m not your bloody housekeeper!” The episode also hinted at the return of Irene Adler, whose text wishing Sherlock a happy birthday revealed that the two are still occasionally in contact. John’s frustration at Sherlock’s refusal to consider a normal human relationship (albeit one with a sociopath and criminal) was strengthened by his recent loss of Mary, who appeared in ghost-like form as John’s conscience throughout the episode. With its nod to “the woman,” as John referred to Adler, the show continues its efforts to humanize Sherlock, making him less of an automaton and more of a recognizably decent and vulnerable person. It’s another departure from the Sherlock Holmes of Conan Doyle’s stories, who wasn’t ever as devoted to anyone as Sherlock’s protagonist was with John and Mary, and it portends a fascinating clash with Eurus in the last episode of the season, “The Final Problem.” Regardless, the episode’s subtext revolved almost entirely around the women of the show, making as efficient a rebuttal to my argument last week that anyone could ask for. 9 Jan
La La Land’s Double-Edged Nostalgia - This post contains spoilers for the entirety of La La Land. Midway through La La Land, an aspiring actress named Mia (Emma Stone) performs her one-woman show for her love interest, Sebastian (Ryan Gosling). It remains, perhaps mercifully, unseen by the audience. “It feels really nostalgic to me,” she says, fretting about staging it in public. “That’s the point!” he assures her. “Are people going to like it?” she asks. Sebastian shrugs. “Fuck ‘em!” In the end, Sebastian is right to encourage her; Mia’s play strikes a chord with a casting agent, which is enough to set her on the path to celebrity. But for all its colorful musical numbers and starry-eyed Hollywood mythmaking, La La Land has an uncomfortable relationship with nostalgia. Sebastian might encourage Mia’s backward gaze, but the writer and director Damien Chazelle has made a film that understands the limits of worshipping art at its most ossified. La La Land delights in its throwbacks, referencing some of musical history’s greatest cinematic moments, but clinging to the past isn’t an approach that ends entirely well for its characters. Mia’s embrace of nostalgia shines through the most in her climactic audition scene, in which she sings a song memorializing her aunt (a failed actress herself) and the other “fools who dream.” It’s a wistful, optimistic number, a resolute and soaring ballad about the value of never giving up on your art, a sentiment that feels right out of the Golden Age Hollywood musicals that Chazelle grew up loving. But at this point in the film, Mia knows how ridiculous her aspirations are—she’s crashed out of the industry and moved back home to Nevada, and only at Sebastian’s insistence does she appear before a pair of casting executives for one last shot. The song is a hit, and Mia is catapulted to stardom. When we next see her, she’s an A-list actress who’s happily married (not to Sebastian) and has a child. It’s a classic Hollywood rags-to-riches story, a miracle accomplished through the power of song alone, and it echoes the kind of magical unreality of the early movie musicals that Chazelle said inspired him in making La La Land. When accepting the film’s award for Best Film at the New York Film Critics Circle on January 3, Chazelle referenced 7th Heaven, Frank Borzage’s 1927 silent film starring Janet Gaynor, as a prime influence. In 7th Heaven, Gaynor’s Diane falls in love with Charles Farrell’s Chico, who then dies on a World War I battlefield. At the end of the film, he’s somehow returned to her, telling her, “They thought I was dead, but I’ll never die!” It’s a happy ending that feels both oddly tacked-on and strangely melancholy. Chazelle said the wild ambiguity of the ending struck him as archetypal of the genre. Is Diane being given a studio-enforced happy ending, to satisfy some mandate that these films should end on an emotional upswing? Has she finally lost her mind, and in doing so hallucinated a vision of her dead lover? To Chazelle, it could work both ways: “He died, but he is alive, because of how deeply she loved him,” he said in his speech. “It’s an idea that speaks to only what movies can do—that emotion can override everything, override the reality reflected onscreen.” In La La Land, Mia gets her happy ending—but it’s without Sebastian, whom she leaves behind on her way to the top, after they mutually decide they can’t pursue their goals while trying to provide a life for each other. In the film’s climax, however, they’re magically reunited when Mia visits Sebastian’s jazz club by chance. As he plays a mournful tune on the piano, time rewinds and the two enter a fantasy dream ballet, dancing through the life they could have had together. Visually, it recalls sequences like the painterly Parisian tableaus of Vincente Minnelli’s An American in Paris or the surreal, stripped-down sets of his The Band Wagon. But emotionally, this epilogue touches on that deeper ambiguity in 7th Heaven that so struck Chazelle; he’s letting audiences see the fantasy and the reality, and take their pick. Of course, Mia does eventually snap back to the present, and she leaves the club with her husband, sharing one last glance with Sebastian. La La Land’s darker note is more pronounced by the end. Sebastian, who spends the entire movie preaching the purity of jazz as an art form, has achieved his goal of erecting a temple to it, but he has seemingly little else going on. After the film’s jump forward, Chazelle only shows Sebastian inside the club, whereas he shows Mia’s life outside of work. While Mia has both a family and fame, Sebastian is stuck behind a piano. From everything we see of his club, “Seb’s,” he’s presenting his art form as he prefers it: beautiful, but trapped in amber. Nostalgia has propelled Mia to stardom; it’s given Sebastian his artistic integrity, but little else.Sebastian’s worshipful relationship with jazz has been much remarked upon since the film opened. Writing for MTV News, Ira Madison III noted its “white jazz narrative,” in which Sebastian is “convinced that the genre is on its last legs and it’s his sole purpose in life to restore it to glory,” rather than participate in its reinvention. Chazelle clearly sees much of himself in Sebastian—he played jazz drums while growing up and has frequently spoken of his affection for the genre, which was central to his previous film Whiplash. At the beginning of La La Land, Sebastian’s fanaticism is resolute, but once he meets and falls for Mia, he begins to compromise, taking a job touring with an old jazz acquaintance, Keith (John Legend), whose band has a synth-focused poppy sound. To Keith, the best way to save the genre they both care about is to let it better reflect the changing world. “How are you gonna be a revolutionary if you’re such a traditionalist? You hold onto the past, but jazz is about the future,” he lectures Sebastian. But in the end, Sebastian gets what he wants, and La La Land communicates the drawbacks of his obsession quite powerfully—the apex of his achievement is dwelling in a basement club where jazz can be preserved, at the cost of seemingly everything else (including the woman he loves). Perhaps others don’t see the ending that darkly, but it arguably underscores the ambiguity of the genre Chazelle spoke so fondly of. It recalls the final scene of La La Land’s most obvious influence, Jacques Demy’s French musical The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, a sung-through tale of young lovers Geneviève and Guy (played by Catherine Deneuve and Nico Castelnuovo) who are, much as in 7th Heaven, separated by military service. Demy’s film is sharp and colorful, even as its story is told in a minor key. After a first act that shows the couple in love, circumstance directs them toward other partners, and when they briefly reunite years later, Guy can barely hold a conversation with her, not wanting to reopen old wounds.   Far earlier in the film, as Sebastian and Mia begin to fall for each other, they walk around the studio lot she works on, admiring the pieces of Hollywood marginalia around them. Below the “window from Casablanca,” as my colleague Christopher Orr hinted, is an umbrella shop very similar-looking to the titular setting of Cherbourg (an earlier dance sequence set amid an L.A. traffic jam recalls another of Demy’s films, The Young Girls of Rochefort). Mia and Sebastian are trapped in amber, too, but for Mia, there’s an escape—the curious magic of the musical, which turns her inner creativity into visual splendor. Getting ready for a party turns into a song-and-dance number with her roommates called “Someone in the Crowd,” which resembles “I Feel Pretty” from West Side Story. Later, a first date with Sebastian sees them dancing among the stars at the Griffith Observatory. When Sebastian and Mia reunite at the end of La La Land, they don’t speak. The moment isn’t quite as painful as the end of The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, because of their shared fantasy, which we witness as a dream ballet. But the reality seems crueler. Nostalgia has propelled Mia to stardom; it’s given Sebastian his artistic integrity, but little else. Chazelle hands his audiences a surprisingly bitter pill, made that much stranger for how smoothly it goes down. Viewers can still easily imagine an ending where Mia and Sebastian reunite, even as they’re parting. To paraphrase Chazelle, it’s something only the movies can do: create a world where feeling alone can override every sad truth. 9 Jan
The Golden Globes Anoint La La Land and Moonlight - The Hollywood Foreign Press lavished attention on Hollywood-set musical La La Land, which won a record seven Golden Globes at the ceremony that kicks off the final stretch of the Oscar campaign every year. La La Land exited the night with trophies for its stars Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling, as well as two for its writer-director Damien Chazelle, though its clean sweep was slightly overshadowed by the triumph of Moonlight, a small-budget independent film about the adolescence of an African-American boy in Miami, which took Best Picture (Drama) as the last award of the night. La La Land and Moonlight have been tipped as the two contenders to beat at the Academy Awards, which will announce its nominations later this month, but it was clear who the 90-member Hollywood Foreign Press Association preferred. La La Land took Best Director and Best Screenplay along with Best Original Score, Best Song (“City of Stars”), Best Actor and Actress, and Best Picture (Comedy or Musical). Moonlight was otherwise shut out, including an especially surprising loss for its supporting actor Mahershala Ali—that award, the first of the night, went to Aaron Taylor-Johnson for Nocturnal Animals. On the TV side, acclaimed new shows Atlanta and The Crown were the biggest winners; the often Euro-centric Globes also gave four awards to BBC miniseries The Night Manager and named French legend Isabelle Huppert Best Actress in a Drama for Paul Verhoeven’s controversial film Elle. In general, the Globes were true to form—slightly ramshackle but high-energy (it helps that the audience gets to drink), with some standout speeches (including Meryl Streep’s lifetime achievement award and Viola Davis’s trophy for Best Supporting Actress in Fences) and some slightly more head-scratching moments. While last year’s master of ceremonies, Ricky Gervais, was intent on attacking the egos of the gathered showbiz elite, this year NBC brought on Tonight Show host Jimmy Fallon, a much gentler comic who began the show with an elaborate musical spoof of La La Land and otherwise largely stayed out of sight. As the film awards rolled on, the ubiquity of La La Land began to overwhelm. Its wins for its music were hardly surprising, and nor was the anointing of Stone and Gosling (both of whom competed in the less crowded Comedy/Musical category). But Chazelle’s triumphs in both Best Director and Best Screenplay were unexpected, especially the latter—a category that would be an obvious place to recognize more dialogue-heavy films like Manchester by the Sea or Moonlight. As La La Land’s victors continued to ascend the stage, they repeatedly spoke on how “daring” the film’s production was, since studios don’t make many original musicals anymore, touting it as a celebration of “dreamers” everywhere. The optics were slightly awkward. Though the musical has become a rarer genre for Hollywood, La La Land is still a showbiz-focused film about creativity in L.A. featuring two hugely recognizable stars, while the triumph of a smaller-scale independent work like Moonlight is a genuinely rare phenomenon come awards season, especially as it focuses on themes of black and queer identity. Still, the balance was somewhat redressed as Moonlight won Best Picture (Drama), with writer/director Barry Jenkins shouting out the word-of-mouth campaign that has helped make the film an unlikely box office success. On the TV side, the Globes largely spread the love between various new shows of 2016. The Crown won Best Drama Series and Best Actress for its star Claire Foy, who plays Queen Elizabeth II at the time of her coronation; Best Actor in a Drama went to Billy Bob Thornton, who plays a lawyer in the Amazon series Goliath. The comedy awards went to FX’s acclaimed Atlanta, which took Best Comedy Series and Best Actor in a Comedy for Donald Glover, and ABC’s sitcom Black-ish, whose star Tracee Ellis Ross took Best Actress. John Le Carre adaptation The Night Manager largely swept the miniseries category, with cast members Tom Hiddleton, Hugh Laurie, and Olivia Colman all taking trophies for the serious-minded spy thriller. The other major winners of the night were Davis, who is a near-lock to repeat as Best Supporting Actress at the Oscars for Fences; the darkly satirical French film Elle, which won Best Foreign Film and Best Actress; and Taylor-Johnson, easily the most surprising winner of the night. Perhaps the most memorable speech, however, was delivered by Meryl Streep, who in accepting the Cecil B. DeMille Award turned her attention to the president-elect. She recalled her horror at Donald Trump’s much-discussed mockery of a disabled reporter during his campaign, comparing it to some of the other “performances” of the year. “This instinct to humiliate, when it’s modeled by someone in the public platform, by someone powerful, it filters down into everybody’s life, because it kinda gives permission for other people to do the same thing,” Streep said. “Disrespect invites disrespect, violence incites violence. And when the powerful use their position to bully others we all lose … we have to remind each other of the privilege and the responsibility of the act of empathy.” It was the most remarked-on moment in a ceremony that saw many stars, obliquely or otherwise, speaking on the current political climate, even as most of the awards went to La La Land, a deeply nostalgic, old-fashioned bit of Hollywood movie magic. It’s a dichotomy that will likely continue in the weeks to come, as award show after award show provides the opportunity for actors and creators to pontificate in front of a global audience, but the trophies keep going to a more apolitical work of throwback filmmaking. As the Golden Globes demonstrated, it’s going to be La La Land’s world for the next two months—a sunnier world of “dreamers” that many awards voters clearly wish they could return to. 8 Jan
Rafsanjani's Impact - Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the former Iranian president who died Sunday at the age of 82, was viewed as a consummate political insider and reformer in a country where conservatives have held sway since the 1979 Islamic revolution. Although he was a longtime ally of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic republic, Rafsanjani came to prominence as speaker of Iran’s parliament in the 1980s. He was appointed commander-in-chief of the country’s military in the last days of the Iran-Iraq war and was seen as instrumental in accepting the United Nations Security Council resolution that ended the 1980-88 conflict. Two events that occurred after Khomeini’s death in 1989 have shaped modern Iran: Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, then a Rafsanjani ally, was named supreme leader. Rafsanjani was elected president the same year. These two men influenced Iranian politics—sometimes working together, sometimes as bitter enemies—over the next three decades. Khamenei sought to maintain Iran as an anti-Western bastion in the Middle East while Rafsanjani supported change. As president, Rafsanjani opened up the country’s moribund economy, encouraged family planning by promoting contraceptive use, and placed women in prominent positions—all the while facing opposition from the country’s hard-liners. But he also amassed a great deal of personal wealth. He was believed to be one of the richest men in the country and was placed by Forbes on its list of “Millionaire Mullahs.” Under Rafsanjani, Iran was by no means a Western-style democracy. Human rights were still suppressed and dissent crushed. As recently as 2015, Rafsanjani said Israel will be “wiped off the map.” He served two terms as president—and was constitutionally forbidden from seeking a third term.      Rafsanjani remained active in politics after he left the presidency. In 2002, he was named head of the Expediency Council, the body that settles disputes between the Majlis, Iran’s parliament, and the Guardian Council, the body that vets legislation and supervises elections. Three years later, he sought the presidency again, but lost to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the populist mayor of Tehran, whose policies Rafsanjani publicly criticized. In 2006, he was named head of the Assembly of Experts, which appoints Iran’s supreme leader. It was in that position that he supported Mir Hossein Mousavi, the reformist leader who sought the presidency and ultimately lost to Ahmadinejad in the contentious 2009 election. That election caused a major rift between Rafsanjani and Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader. Ahmadinejad accused Mousavi of being backed by corrupt individuals, but he did not name Rafsanjani. Rafsanjani, in an open letter, appeared to accused the supreme leader of remaining silent in light of the accusations. Rafsanjani and his family fell out of political favor after that. An attempt to seek the presidency in 2013 was blocked by the Guardian Council, stunning Iranians. At the time of his death Sunday, Rafsanjani remained a member of the Assembly of Experts, but his influence on Iranian politics had waned. 8 Jan
In 1987, Arnold Schwarzenegger Helped to Predict 2017 - Here are some of the things that The Running Man, the 1987 film starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, features in its dystopian vision of the America of 2017: voice-controlled electronics an internet known as the “infonet” jetpacks a cultural obsession with cheekily choreographed aerobics numbers a short supply of food, oil, and other natural resources a totalitarian police state where rioters and rebels are either killed or taken away to labor camps a state-controlled media apparatus that revolves around propaganda a spate of reality TV shows that come courtesy of that media apparatus The Running Man, one such show, which pits criminals and political prisoners against weapon-wielding mercenaries—an urban version of The Hunger Games’s course that almost always ends with the violent and live-televised deaths of its contestants As is often the case with films that predict a dystopian future, The Running Man—based loosely on the book of the same name by Richard Bachman, better known as Stephen King—gets a little bit right, and a very lot wrong, about the United States of 2017. Most obviously: No jetpacks yet, sigh. But also: No totalitarian police state. No immediate shortage of food or water or oil. No federalized infotainment system. No gladiatorial reality show that televises the grisly deaths of criminals to the delight of bloodthirsty masses. And yet, for all those errors in imagination, The Running Man was prescient in one particular way: It has insights to share about the cultural consequences of life under a totalitarian regime. Everything, here, from food to fun, falls under the control of the state. And that means that, in this dystopian universe, news and entertainment are blurred—intentionally, by a savvy and sadistic political regime—to such an extent that it’s impossible to tell where the one ends and the other begins. The Running Man explores, in its campy way, how easily propaganda can be empowered, and how effectively a world that blends information and entertainment can destabilize the very notion of facts themselves. “The truth hasn’t been very popular lately,” one political prisoner tells another, at the outset of The Running Man’s action, and the rest of the movie goes about proving that. Schwarzenegger plays Ben Richards, a former policeman who is imprisoned for rebelling against the state and then—’80s-era Arnold Schwarzenegger being what he is—forced to compete in The Running Man’s contest of wit and brute strength. Richards finds himself in that predicament in the first place because, as a policeman patrolling his district, he refused to open fire on a group of unarmed civilians who were protesting the district’s lack of food. When he is introduced to viewers in his episode of The Running Man, the show’s producers use edited footage to claim that he had gone crazy and, himself, fired on those civilians—including “innocent women and children.” Richards is branded “The Butcher of Bakersfield.” When he appears on the reality show that will depict him fighting for his life—and, presumably, dying a violent death at the hands of The Running Man’s appointed Stalkers—the crowds watching it jeer at him. And then they cheer his impending (and, the doctored footage suggests, well-deserved) demise. The Running Man, to be clear, is not a good movie. Its acting is stilted. The world the film builds is not terribly consistent, in its aesthetics or its politics. (One of the films this totalitarian America has produced is titled, oh-so-onthenose-ily, The Hate Boat.) And, perhaps most predictably, The Running Man falls victim to the trap that so many movies about the future, whatever the decade that created them, have fallen into: It fails to stretch its imagination beyond the aesthetics and the assumptions of its own time. The clothing of 2017, per The Running Man of 1987, features the angular cuts and fluorescent colors of the American ’80s (only, because The Future, with more metallics thrown into the mix). The tech of 2017 revolves around cassette tapes and analog phones. Computers are clunky desktops. Apple may have claimed the year 1984; this 1987 film, though, offers little evidence of the changes that would result from that. The entertainment of 2017, too, is narrow-minded in the film’s vision. The intro to The Running Man, the TV show, features the same choreographed aerobics numbers—complete with high-cut leotards and sheer pantyhose—that were popular in the ’80s and the ’80s alone. (Those numbers were choreographed, though, by someone who would have staying power far beyond the age of hairspray and tube socks: Paula Abdul.) For all this, though, The Running Man offers insights that are much more subtle than its seeking-freedom-within-oppression framing would suggest. This is a film that arose during the early days of CNN and 24-hour news, during a time when fashionable intellectuals were looking to the television as a source both of narcissism and nihilism. It’s a movie that is keenly aware of the pitfalls of infotainment, and—in the manner of Trow and Postman and Minow—acutely suspicious of what can happen when people, indeed, amuse themselves to death. As David Bishop, writing for The Conversation, put it, “Welcome to a world where fake news stories are used to manipulate public opinion. Dissent is no longer tolerated and all your communications are monitored; the economy is not functioning and reality TV is used to distract you from harsher realities.” Related Story Future Schlock: What Back to the Future II Got Right About 2015 It’s not quite 2017, but it’s disturbingly 2017-adjacent. In The Running Man’s dystopian world, people are willing accomplices to their own subservience: They trade political freedom for the conveniences of conformity and easy distraction. In the film’s version of 2017, the nation’s means of understanding itself—journalism, arts, escapist cultural products—originate from one central body: the Justice Department, in the guise of a conglomerate called ICS. At the outset of the film, streaming on a JumboTron in the middle of the “Wilshire” militarized zone, an anchorwoman announces to the zone’s “Cadre Kids” (an apparent and unsubtle play on the Hitler Youth of the previous century) that “October is bonus recruitment month”: Children, she shares, will earn “double bonus for reporting a family member.” The anchorwoman concludes her announcement with a chipper addendum: “ICS, your entertainment and information network, reminds you: Seeing Is Believing.” Seeing is believing is a theme that runs through the film. Here, mistruths aggregate and accrete to become, for the compliant American citizens who are at once the lies’ producers and their consumers, a series of convenient “truths.” “America’s favorite game show” is, in the film, not simply an anticipation of “reality TV,” but a tool of violent propaganda. (Even the contestants presented, for drama’s sake, as having escaped the game’s Stalkers are executed as soon as the cameras turn off.) Nobody much cares, though: The show satisfies people’s cravings for drama and spectacle. It’s a futuristic version of the Roman circus, with all its ritualized bloodlust. And, run as it is under the auspices of the Justice Department, the show doesn’t offer violence for its own sake; it also promises a kind of lower-j administration of justice. The Running Man will, as the show’s wacky and sadistic host, Damon Killian (Richard Dawson), puts it, “give criminals, rapers, and enemies of the state exactly what they deserve.” Even if those enemies—especially if those enemies—must be manufactured. The Running Man didn’t predict the truths of 2017—far from it. What it did do, though, is anticipate the fact that truth itself might be a matter of political controversy in the United States. The film understood the ways that celebrity and politics would mingle and muddle this year, in ways both harmlessly entertaining and potentially dangerous for democracy. In 1987’s version of 2017, the president has a theatrical agent, and the state exerts control with the help of a reality show. In the actual 2017, the president-elect is someone who solidified his fame with, yes, the help of a reality show. And that reality show is now being hosted, of course, by the star of the film whose fictional version of this year warned against the dangers of celebritized politics. On the new version of The Celebrity Apprentice, which is set, like the running man, in 2017, Arnold Schwarzenegger doesn’t have the brash presence that Donald Trump once effected on the show. Still, though, the actor-turned-politician insists that the celebrities whose fate he determines on the show refer to him, at least so long as the cameras are rolling, as “Governor.” 8 Jan

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Southern Metropolis Daily Reveals Prevalence of Data Black Markets - In a recent article for SupChina, China Media Project’s David Bandurski translated and commented on an investigative exposé in which two Chinese journalists demonstrated the ease with which personal data can be purchased on the black market. With permission from their colleagues, Southern Metropolis Daily reporters Rao Lidong (饶丽冬) and Li Ling (李玲) visited data procurement services and provided false pretenses for requiring access to these colleagues’ data: For a modest fee of 700 yuan, or about 100 dollars, the reporters were able to obtain an astonishing array of information based on one colleague’s personal ID number, including a full history of hotel rooms checked into, airline flights taken, internet cafes visited, border entries and exits, apartment rentals, real estate holdings — even deposit records from the country’s four major banks. But that wasn’t all. The reporters were also able to purchase live location data on another colleague’s mobile phone, pinpointing their position with disturbing accuracy. Hundreds of tracking services are advertised on internet-based platforms in China, offering clients the power to unlock, with as little as a phone number or ID, the personal data of just about any Chinese citizen. You can find them on Tencent’s WeChat and QQ services, on the Taobao online marketplace and on Weibo. And while some of these services are unreliable or outright fraudulent, others are able to deliver accurate information from what must be national police and government databases, as well as from banks and mobile carriers. […] Obtaining permission and an ID number from a second colleague, the reporters purchased the so-called “ID super-tracking service,” a comprehensive search across information categories, negotiating the price down to 700 yuan. Twenty-four hours later, they received two Excel files that included ID super-tracking of this colleague across nine categories  —  including hotel stays, visits to internet bars, places of both permanent and temporary residence, bank accounts, driving records (including infractions), motor vehicle registration, airline flights and train journeys. […] [Source] The Washington Post’s Simon Denyyer cited the data-purchasing services as further evidence that “living in China feels like dystopia has already arrived,” pointing to the new social credit system as an additional indication of how little privacy technology users in China have. Although both Bandurski and Denyer present the Chinese data market issue as a sign that privacy is undervalued in China, the Southern Metropolis Daily followed up their investigative report by interviewing the head of a Chinese cybersecurity firm, reflecting the paper’s interest in informing citizens of risks to their personal data. In the December 24 article “Anheng CEO Fan Yuan: Leaked Personal Data Channels and Espionage Are Comparable to Hackers,” Fan stressed that “insider” (nèi guǐ 内鬼) theft of personal data poses just as severe a risk as hacking. He emphasized that these “insiders” are not merely limited to those working within an organization, but can also include third-party software and maintenance or security staff. While Fan identified recent Chinese data protection regulations and the new national cybersecurity law as steps in a positive direction, his outlook on overall data security in China remains wary at best: Statistics show that for every hundred people, no fewer than 50% experience data leaks. […T]here are still many systems that have issues, and the situation is indeed not an optimistic one. Protection of personal information still has a long way to go. […] Construction of a big data center is a future trend. But from a hacker’s perspective, that would make the objective even more clear-cut. “Where there is data, there is a target.” Therefore when designing platforms one needs to consider strengthening protection of security. [Chinese] © anminda for China Digital Times (CDT), get_post_time('Y'). | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: cybersecurity, data security, Internet surveillance, personal data protectionDownload Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall 9 Jan
Most Popular Essays of 2016 on CDT Chinese - Below is a list of the most popular essays archived by CDT Chinese in 2016. Many of the most popular Chinese-language posts also provided the source material that become some of our most widely viewed CDT English posts last year. Speaking on the relevance of the most popular CDT Chinese posts of 2016, CDT Founder and Editor-in-Chief Xiao Qiang says, “These most-visited pages on CDT’s Chinese site are not only a perfect showcase of the censored content most desirable to internet users able to circumvent the Great Firewall, but also a powerful indicator of what Chinese authorities are most afraid of allowing citizens to see and openly express inside China.” Open Letter: Loyal Party Members Call for Xi Jinping’s Resignation (忠诚党员促习近平辞职的公开信) On the eve of the National People’s Congress in March, this open letter urged President and CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping to step down in order to preserve China’s stability and his own “personal safety and that of [his] family.” Wujie News (无界新闻), the Xinjiang-based outlet that originally published the letter, was soon after taken offline, and several staff writers were detained (they were reportedly released in August).  CDT English translated the letter in full, and that post similarly became the most read CDT English post in 2016. Du Chen: How Did the “Panama Papers” Shock the World? (Du Chen：震惊世界的巴拿马文件事件到底是怎么一回事) PingWest writer Du Chen reviews the scale and import of the 11.5 million leaked documents on offshore holdings.  Also see all CDT English coverage of the Panama Papers.  Vanke vs. Baoneng: Barbarians at the Gate, Zhao Family at the Rear (万科宝能之争：门口的野蛮人，背后的赵家人) This anonymous article on shareholder Baoneng Group’s attempt to take over real estate company Vanke popularized the epithet “Zhao family member” for those connected to the political elite. Why Do People Cherish The Elder? The Systemic Problems Behind His’ Internet Fame ( 为什么人们怀念长者？长者风靡网络背后的制度难题) Netizens call former president Jiang Zemin the “Elder” or the “Toad” in adoring reference to his appearance and earthy manner. But was he really China’s “best leader” since 1949? President Xi’s Diary: Xi Apologies to the Whole Nation for His “Loose Clothing” Slip (【习总日记】习总为宽衣事件向全国人民道歉) Xi Jinping’s satirical “diarist” imagines how the president may have felt about his gaffe at the G20 summit in Hangzhou. Vox: The Panama Papers Leak, Explained With an Adorable Comic About Piggy Banks (一组漫画看懂巴拿马文件泄露事件) Chinese translation of an English-language Vox story explaining the Panama Papers revelations with a cartoon. 171 Party Members: Immediately Relieve Comrade Xi Jinping of All Posts (171名中国共产党员：就立即罢免习近平同志党内外一切职务告全党、全军、全国人民书) Coming on the heels of the first open letter asking Xi to resign, this second letter briefly appeared on the U.S.-based site Minjing News. Xie Bin: Panama Papers Make the CCP Blush With Shame (解滨：巴拿马文件让中共汗颜) “This international scandal could cast a pall over Xi Jinping and make his fans lose faith,” claims this article on the Panama Papers, published on the overseas website creaders.net. Netizen Voices: “Brother-in-Law” Added to Banned Words List (【网络民议】看敏感词库 已到姐夫) When Xi Jinping’s brother-in-law appeared among the Panama Papers, “brother-in-law” briefly trended on Weibo before the term was blocked. CDT Chinese editors compiled Weibo reactions. See also resident cartoonist Badiucao’s illustrated take on the censorship of the term.  Badiucao: Facilitate Commerce and Loosen Clothing (巴丢草 | 通商宽衣) CDT resident cartoonist Badiucao takes Xi Jinping’s G20 gaffe literally. Anne Henochowicz helped summarize the Chinese-language posts listed above. © josh rudolph for China Digital Times (CDT), get_post_time('Y'). | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: badiucao, CDT Chinese Highlights, Panama Papers, Xi JinpingDownload Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall 9 Jan
Photo: Beijing Forbidden City, by NViktor - Beijing Forbidden City © josh rudolph for China Digital Times (CDT), get_post_time('Y'). | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: NViktorDownload Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall 9 Jan
Photo: Beijing, Liang Ma He, by michel_china - Beijing, Liang Ma He © Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), get_post_time('Y'). | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: michel_chinaDownload Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall 8 Jan
Documents Reveal U.K. Warned About June 4 Killings - Documents recently unclassified by the U.K.’s National Archives reveal that the British embassy in Beijing was warned that Deng Xiaoping had claimed, in the days before the June 4, 1989 crackdown on pro-democracy protesters, that, “Two hundred dead could bring 20 years of peace to China.” Zheping Huang and Ilaria Maria Sala report for Quartz: The UK’s National Archives released on Dec. 30 a huge number of previously secret government files from 1989 and 1990. Over two dozen documents (pdf) dated between May 20 and July 21 in 1989 revealed the Margaret Thatcher administration’s understanding of the political climate in China in the lead-up to the crackdown. A major reveal: The UK embassy in Beijing knew two weeks before June 4 that the People’s Liberation Army was preparing to kill hundreds, if not thousands, of student protesters who had been gathering at Beijing’s main square for weeks. On May 20, 1989, a month after students started occupying Tiananmen Square calling for democratic reform in the Communist Party, Deng declared martial law and deployed 300,000 troops to Beijing. On the same day, Sir Alan Ewen Donald, Britain’s ambassador to China, sent Downing Street a telegram about his lunch with American sinologist Stuart Schram. “Professor Stuart Schram confided to me that one of his Chinese contacts had told him that in recent days Deng Xiaoping commented that ‘two hundred dead could bring 20 years of peace to China’,” Donald wrote. “The implication clearly was that the sacrifice of a number of demonstrators lives now would stabilize the present situation and buy the time needed to complete the reform of China.” Donald went on to say that he learned from the Pentagon on the same night that the Chinese authorities had decided “there is no way to avoid bloodshed,” so they recalled state hospital staffers to their workplaces and instructed the troops to “do what is necessary to put down the situation.” [Source] In 2015, Library and Archives Canada released thousands of cables sent by their embassy in Beijing in the days surrounding the June 4 crackdown, describing the situation as, “grim at best and potentially disastrous.” A new book, “Tiananmen Redux,” by Johan Lagerkvist, gives the author’s analysis of the impact of Deng’s decision to send troops in to quell the pro-democracy protests in Tiananmen Square. Richard Bernstein reviews the book for The Wall Street Journal: The day of the crackdown, June 4, 1989, in this sense marked a decisive moment in China’s long history. But the Swedish Sinologist Johan Lagerkvist goes further in “Tiananmen Redux: The Hard Truth about the Expanded Neoliberal World Order.” For Mr. Lagerkvist, Tiananmen was not just a watershed in Chinese history but a watershed for the world, more important in its permanent impact than such near contemporaneous occurrences as the fall of the Berlin Wall and the disintegration of the Soviet Union. His argument is essentially this: The violent denouement of the Tiananmen demonstrations brought about something more than the definitive eradication of any opposition to the authority of the one-party state. It also released paramount leader Deng Xiaoping to accelerate China’s transformation from a poverty-stricken Maoist country to a rich and powerful capitalist one. What is most important in Mr. Lagerkvist’s scheme is that Tiananmen allowed the 84-year-old Deng to press on his reluctant co-elders in the party a neoliberal economic agenda, by which he means a kind of savage capitalism, with low wages, reduced social welfare benefits and yawning gaps between the rich and the poor. All the well-publicized ills of globalization thus originate in China’s decision to go for rapid economic growth no matter the costs. [Source] Hong Kong Free Press has published a series of photos taken on June 4 in and around Tiananmen Square. © Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), get_post_time('Y'). | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: 1989 protests, dang xiaoping, diplomacy, June 4th, United KingdomDownload Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall 6 Jan
China to Spend Over $360 Billion on Renewable Energy - With China looking to see what options might open up in global climate leadership ahead of the inauguration of a U.S. president known to be skeptical of climate change, and as Beijing battles yet another dangerous pollution season, the National Energy Administration has reported its intent to invest over $360 billion on renewable energy sources by 2020. From Meng Meng and Josephine Mason at Reuters: The investment will create over 13 million jobs in the sector, the National Energy Administration (NEA) said in a blueprint document that lays out its plan to develop the nation’s energy sector during the five-year 2016 to 2020 period. The NEA said installed renewable power capacity including wind, hydro, solar and nuclear power will contribute to about half of new electricity generation by 2020. […] Last month, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the country’s economic planner, said in its own five-year plan, that solar power will receive 1 trillion yuan of spending, as the country seeks to boost capacity by five times. That’s equivalent to about 1,000 major solar power plants, according to experts’ estimates. […] Concerns about the social and economic costs of China’s air pollution have increased as the northern parts of the country, including the capital Beijing, have battled a weeks-long bout of hazardous smog. [Source] The announcement from the NEA comes less than two months after the agency released a five-year plan with goals to increase the nation’s coal power capacity 20% by 2020 while lowering solar and wind goals, suggesting that this year’s ongoing period of toxic air pollution may have  prompted a priority adjustment. A video report from The New York Times’ Needi Upadhye describes how public anger over smog and new opportunities in the renewable energy market are together prompting Beijing to move away from coal: Elsewhere at The New York Times, Michael Forsythe puts this development into the context of climate concerns following the recent election of Donald J. Trump as U.S. president, explaining how the combination of planned Chinese investments and expected climate denialism inside the upcoming Trump administration could send once-potential U.S. jobs to China: The country’s National Energy Administration laid out a plan to dominate one of the world’s fastest-growing industries, just at a time when the United States is set to take the opposite tack as Donald J. Trump, a climate-change doubter, prepares to assume the presidency. [..] Mr. Trump has in the past called the theory of human-cased global warming a hoax and picked a fierce opponent of President Obama’s rules to reduce carbon emissions, Scott Pruitt, the Oklahoma attorney general, to lead the Environmental Protection Agency. The investment commitment made by the Chinese, combined with Mr. Trump’s moves, means jobs that would have been created in the United States may instead go to Chinese workers. [Source] At The Guardian, Michael Slezak reports that as China prepares to ramp up its domestic investment on renewables, it is also increasing foreign investments into renewable energy technology, setting itself up to dominate the global industry: A report by the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (Ieefa) found China’s dominance in renewables is rapidly spreading overseas, with the country accelerating its foreign investment in renewable energy and supporting technologies. Analysing Chinese foreign investments over US$1bn, Ieefa found 13 in 2016, worth a combined $32bn. That represented a 60% jump over similar investments in 2015. China was already widely recognised as the largest investor in domestic renewable energy, investing $102bn in 2015, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance – more than twice that invested domestically by the US and about five times that of the UK. […] Tim Buckley, director of Ieefa and author of the report, said the election of Donald Trump in the US and lack of supportive policy in Australia left those countries at risk of missing a huge opportunity. [Source] © josh rudolph for China Digital Times (CDT), get_post_time('Y'). | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: air pollution, coal, donald Trump, foreign investments, renewable energy, smog, solar power, wind powerDownload Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall 6 Jan
Photo: Untitled, by Felix Nagel - Untitled © josh rudolph for China Digital Times (CDT), get_post_time('Y'). | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: Felix NagelDownload Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall 6 Jan
Phrase of the Week: Ulterior Motives - The Word of the Week comes from the Grass-Mud Horse Lexicon, a glossary of terms created by Chinese netizens and encountered in online political discussions. These are the words of China’s online “resistance discourse,” used to mock and subvert the official language around censorship and political correctness. biéyǒuyòngxīn 别有用心  Former Foreign Ministry Spokesman Qin Gang: “Those who claim that the Chinese government supports hackers have ulterior motives.” (Tencent) A phrase often used by the official media to blame foreign forces and domestic dissidents for social unrest and criticism of the Chinese government. Netizens sometimes twist this phrase to mock the government. Example: Wengtao2015 (@翁涛2015): If you yell on the street, “Diaoyu Islands belong to China!” you are a patriot. If you instead yell, “Outer Mongolia and Vladivostok belong to China!” you may be arrested as a mad person or someone who has ulterior motives! Why is that? (February 14, 2015) 如果你站在街上喊：”钓鱼岛是中国的!” 你就是爱国者；你若喊：”外蒙、海参崴是中国的!”，你就是有可能被当作疯子或者别有用心抓起来！这是为什么？ [Chinese] In August of 2016, “ foreign hostile forces” with “ulterior motives” made multiple appearances in the apparently scripted confessions of the first round of trials for rights lawyers and activists detained in the 2015 “Black Friday” crackdown. The language being used in the courtroom confessions and echoed by state media coverage was suspiciously similar to that being used in a parallel propaganda campaign warning against foreign attempts to foment a “color revolution” in China. See also foreign (hostile) forces. Can’t get enough of subversive Chinese netspeak? Check out our latest ebook, “Decoding the Chinese Internet: A Glossary of Political Slang.” Includes dozens of new terms and classic catchphrases, presented in a new, image-rich format. Available for pay-what-you-want (including nothing). All proceeds support CDT. © josh rudolph for China Digital Times (CDT), get_post_time('Y'). | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, propaganda, state media, ulterior motives, word of the weekDownload Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall 6 Jan
Photo: Untitled, by Mi..chael - Untitled © Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), get_post_time('Y'). | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall 5 Jan
Xinjiang Party Officials Probed After Karakax Attack - Reuters’ Christian Shepherd reports that two CCP officials in Xinjiang have been placed under investigation for “serious disciplinary breaches” days after a deadly attack occurred at a government building under their jurisdiction: The Xinjiang Discipline Inspection Commission announced the investigation into Hu Jun, 49, party secretary of Karakax county in south Xinjiang, and Zhang Jinbiao, 53, party secretary of Hotan, the prefecture where Karakax is located. Both officials are also being investigated for dereliction of duty, the commission said in online statements. The commission did not give details of either official’s suspected wrongdoing. They could not be reached for comment. […] The pair are just the latest in a long line of party officials to be investigated for graft since President Xi Jinping waged war on corruption in the party after assuming power four years ago. The cases are publicised on state media on an almost daily basis. Resource-rich Xinjiang has been home to waves of violence in recent years, with hundreds of people killed in incidents often sparked by tensions between the Muslim Uighur people who call the region home and the ethnic majority Han. [Source] On December 28, Reuters covered the deadly attack on a government building in Karakax County, Hotan Prefecture. Reuters’ Ben Blanchard, relying on information from official Chinese media, reported: Attackers drove a vehicle into a government building in China’s unruly far western region of Xinjiang, setting off an explosive device and using knives to kill two people before all three of the assailants were shot dead, state media said on Thursday. […] The Xinjiang government said in a short statement on its main news website the incident occurred just before 5 p.m. (0900 GMT) on Wednesday in Karakax county, deep in southern Xinjiang’s Uighur heartland. It said “thugs” drove a vehicle into a yard at the county Communist Party offices and detonated an “explosive device”. The official Xinhua news agency, citing the Ministry of Public Security, later said all three of the attackers were shot dead, but not before they killed a security guard and a government official and wounded three others. Xinhua described the incident as a “terrorist attack”, and said the attackers also used knives. [Source] Coverage of the disciplinary inspection into Zhuang and Hu from the South China Morning Post notes that the two are likely to be sacked following attacks in their jurisdiction, citing precedent in the region since the installation of Chen Quanguo as Party chief of Xinjiang: Official reports had earlier said that both Pishan county’s party boss and county chief were replaced in September. The reshuffle came immediately after an attack in the county, according to two sources familiar with the matter. Pishan county is also part of Hotan prefecture, one of the districts in the region that have experienced the most attacks. The practice of sacking officials immediately after attacks had been adopted by the region’s new party chief since August, Chen Quanguo, the sources said. […] “Chen is looking to enter the Politburo [during the 2017 leadership transition] and had told cadres that no accidents were allowed,” a source close to Xinjiang authorities said. “But he had never visited southern Xinjiang himself.” [Source] In May 2014, authorities launched a nationwide crackdown on terrorism in response to an increase in violent incidents in Xinjiang and elsewhere in China. The campaign, focused mostly in the Xinjiang region, has steadily escalated over the past two years, and has included controversial policies targeting the rights of the predominantly Muslim Uyghur minority that have been criticized by international rights advocates for exacerbating ethnic tensions. Amid the campaign, Chinese authorities have expressed concerns that some Uyghurs are traveling to the Middle East for jihad training, and have controversially attempted to restrict mobility of Xinjiang residents with passport recalls across the region. Chinese authorities have long attempted to tie domestic attacks to the global jihad movement, and a report from a U.S.-based think tank last July claimed that over 100 Uyghurs had joined the Islamic State between 2013 and 2014. Last August, a Uyghur militant detonated an explosive device at the Chinese Embassy in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, leading a Uyghur ethnic rights group to express fear of increased persecution of Uyghurs living in China. Following the deadly New Year’s Day attack on a nightclub in Istanbul, Turkey, a senior Turkish official said that he suspected the gunman was Uyghur, and the state-run Anadolu News Agency reported that several detained suspects are Uyghur. At The Guardian, Jason Burke describes evidence suggesting that the Istanbul attacker may have been a Uyghur; meanwhile, following erroneous claims that the Istanbul attacker was Kyrgyz, Catherine Putz at The Diplomat warns against jumping to conclusions. © josh rudolph for China Digital Times (CDT), get_post_time('Y'). | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: corruption, terrorism, turkey, Uyghurs, Xi anti-corruption campaign, Xinjiang, Xinjiang violenceDownload Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall 5 Jan

The Eyeopener from CBC Radio Calgary (Highlights)

Eyeopener Podcast for Jan. 9, 2017 - Today's podcast: Two business owners comment on the economic climate in Calgary; Alzheimer's Awareness Month in Canada; we announce the final tally from our Food Bank Drive; looking back at last night's Golden Globes. 8 Jan
Eyeopener Podcast for Jan. 6, 2017 - Today's podcast: We introduce our new Eyeopener theme; Devonian Gardens remain closed for repairs; contemporary Canadian dance icon Louise Lecavalier. 5 Jan
Eyeopener Podcast for Jan. 5, 2017 - Today's podcast: New Leaf cancels routes after WestJet moves in; Bishop William McGrattan; Saying farewell to Urban Behaviours, the Eyeopener theme. 4 Jan
Eyeopener Podcast for Jan. 4, 2017 - Today's podcast: Energy Efficiency Alberta board chair; Banff fire chief on Mount Royal Hotel fire; Pilot accused of passing out in cockpit of passenger plane. 3 Jan
Eyeopener Podcast for Jan. 3, 2017 - Today's podcast: Peter Tertzakian's predictions for the oil and gas industry; Dr. Raj Bhardwaj explains strange medical maladies; Julie Van Rosendaal's 2017 food resolutions. 2 Jan
Eyeopener podcast for December 30 - On today's podcast: is it time to legalising all drugs to solve the phentanyl crisis; Emma Hunter tees up tonight's AirFarce TV special; John Gilchrist's top 12 best new restaurants in Calgary.29 Dec 16
Eyeopener Podcast for Dec. 29, 2016 - Today's podcast: Calgary Marathon introduces 150-km ultramarathon; political watchers talk about the top stories of 2016; man punches cougar in Tim Horton's drive-thru.28 Dec 16
Eyeopener Podcast for Dec. 28, 2016 - Today's podcast: Looking back at Calgary business news in 2016; changes in store for Calgary's skyline; Unconventional Panel offers their picks for TV and movie watching over the holidays.27 Dec 16
The Eyeopener podcast for Thursday December 22 - On today's podcast: Westjet woes at the new YYC terminal,a personal story of weight loss, Canada Post delivers a record number of parcels this year, books for holiday reading.21 Dec 16
The Eyeopener podcast for Wednesday December 21 - On today's podcast: A look back at 2016 with Mayor Nenshi; signs of optimism in Calgary's job market; Deborah Yedlin on why she thinks the new international terminal at YYC is a bust; our Unconventional panel on gifts and gift cards.20 Dec 16

di

Daily Kos
Senate Democrats head into five hours of Obamacare talkathon - Here's a few of the Democratic Senators who stood up for Obamacare—and the people it's saved—on Facebook and on the Senate floor Monday night. x.@SenateDems protest repeal of Affordable Care Act #ACA - LIVE on C-SPAN2 https://t.co/1RW9wG6O1v pic.twitter.com/N7RkD0Votm— CSPAN (@cspan) January 10, 2017 The message these Democrats are sending is that Democrats are united in fighting, while, as leader Chuck Schumer says, Republicans are "flummoxed […]  We are seeing Republicans get cold feet." Democrats will continue to press this advantage, and Republicans will continue to flail. For the list of speakers and videos of some of their statements, head below the fold. 9 Jan
Open thread or night owls: State legislators seek to block militaristic appointees - Dierdre Fulton at Common Dreams writes—State Lawmakers Urge Rejection of Militaristic, Conflict-Ridden Nominees: A coalition of progressive state lawmakers from around the country on Monday sent a letter to Sens. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), demanding the U.S. Senate only confirm cabinet nominees "who have an established record of respecting the importance of diplomacy and other tools of statecraft over the unnecessary use of force, respecting civil liberties, placing American interests over personal interests, and upholding our sacred tradition of a civilian-led government." owls The letter was organized by the legislative arm of Women's Action for New Directions (WAND), a Cambridge-based grassroots advocacy organization dedicated to amplifying women's voices in national security, disarmament, and anti-militarization campaigns. Signed by 125 female and male state legislators, the letter has the backing of groups including the Arms Control Association, Global Zero, National Priorities Project, Peace Action, and Win Without War. It calls for nominees to be "evaluated around five principles core to maintaining American strength abroad and at home": Diplomacy Over Military Intervention. We urge you to oppose nominees who see war and conflict as the best or only means to defend America's interests. Arms Control. We urge you to oppose nominees who seek to maintain or increase the number of nuclear weapons in the world, rather than support policies of nonproliferation, reduction, and eventual elimination. Civil Liberties. We urge you to oppose nominees who would undermine the civil liberties of the American people enshrined in the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution. Conflicts of Interest. We urge you to oppose nominees whose personal or professional interests might conflict, or have the perception of conflict, with the interests of the public they serve. Civilian Leadership. While we strongly respect the experience and credentials of our military's active and retired generals, we urge you to oppose nominees who would undermine the core American philosophy of civilian leadership.[...] Legislators signing this letter hail from Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia, Vermont, Washington, Wisconsin, and West Virginia. Their perspective is unique, they write, because "U.S. national security policy has implications in our home states. From crumbling bridges and inadequate road maintenance to the opioid crisis and a lack of support for our veterans, the last 15 years of war and nation-building endeavors have taken an enormous toll on our communities and our ability as state lawmakers to provide critical services to our constituents." TOP COMMENTS  TWEET OF THE DAY xNEW, from @thamburger: Trump AG nominee Sessions failed to disclose oil interests as required, ethics experts say  https://t.co/H1ojgiwhrf— Rebecca Sinderbrand (@sinderbrand) January 10, 2017  BLAST FROM THE PAST At Daily Kos on this date in 2004—Bush sweats "insider" books: The Bush White House is nervous about two forthcoming books by former insiders. Ex-Bush Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill assails the president for a lack of interest in substantive policy in a book written by journalist Ron Suskind that will be trotted out with great fanfare on CBS's "60 Minutes" this weekend. One Bush insider, however, ventures that no one really cares what a former Treasury secretary says. But, a book due out later by Richard Clarke, the White House's top terror expert under both President Clinton and President Bush, is another matter. Mr. Clarke is known to feel the Bush administration largely ignored the threat of terrorism and Osama bin Laden before 9-11, even after al Qaeda in June 2001 claimed responsibility for the bombing of the USS Cole, which killed 17 American soldiers. On today’s Kagro in the Morning show, Greg Dworkin reminds us of the perils facing Obamacare. Trump reminds us he’s outraged by TV, while his son-in-law assures friends that he really isn’t. Mexico, by which we mean you & your taxes, will pay for the wall. And the alt-right is still a sex cult. x Embedded Content  YouTube | iTunes | LibSyn | Support the show via Patreon 9 Jan
Kellyanne Conway assails media for listening to what Trump says - Kellyanne Conway sure is a good fit with Donald Trump. How many other people out there can hope to match his shamelessness and disregard for the truth? Yet somehow, Conway manages it, day in, day out. Challenged by CNN’s Chris Cuomo on Trump’s 2015 mockery of a disabled New York Times reporter, Conway repeated Trump’s denials that he was doing what we all saw him on video doing, and asked “Why can’t you give him the benefit of the doubt?” Cuomo was not interested in the benefit of the doubt, so Conway went all in. “Why is everything taken at face value?” she asked. “You can’t give him the benefit of the doubt on this and he’s telling you what was in his heart, you always want to go with what’s come out of his mouth rather than look at what’s in his heart.” First of all, what comes out of the mouths of world-leaders-to-be is … kind of important. At a certain point—I’d argue it’s a point that comes in the teen years, at the latest, but definitely before one becomes a major presidential candidate—you have to accept that people are going to listen to the things you say and that you should speak accordingly and take a modicum of responsibility for your own words. Being a grown-ass man, a 70-year-old man in actual fact, one about to be inaugurated president, and sending your minions out to insist that what you say publicly in front of an audience should not be taken seriously? That’s one of the many things that would be pathetic if Trump’s upcoming inauguration didn’t make it flat-out terrifying. But even if the world at large could adhere to a standard of not actually listening to what Donald Trump said, there’s still a problem. Namely, all efforts to look at what’s in Trump’s heart have led to the conclusion that it’s just as ugly as what comes out of his mouth. 9 Jan
Sen. Tom Udall: 'Repeal and replace is not a sound public policy, only a sound bite' - Sen. Tom Udall (D-NM), like many of his colleagues, spent his time on the Senate floor Monday night defending Obamacare in the most essential of terms: how it has saved the lives of many of his constituents. "Save my daughter." That was the heartbreaking plea that came to me from one of my constituents. Kevin from Albuquerque. Kevin's 33-year-old daughter amber has multiple sclerosis, a tough disease. To treat her M.S., Amber must follow an exact an rigorous drug regimen combined with visits to our neurologist and annual MRIs. The retail cost of her drugs is $60,000 her year. Her doctor visits and MRIs would run into the thousands of dollars. Amber works—in fact she has a good-paying job. But her employer does not provide health insurance. Amber purchases health insurance through the individual open market, without Affordable Care Act subsidies. Amber is able to work because she gets the medical care she needs through insurance. But Kevin fears his daughter will lose the right to health insurance if the Affordable Care Act is repealed. […] I'm the father of a daughter, and I'm angry that this father has to worry about whether his daughter will get the medical care she needs to live a healthy and productive life. Mr. President, let me tell you about Pam and Mike. They are a husband and wife from Placitas. They own a small business. They signed up for an insurance plan under the affordable care act as soon as they could because premiums before the ACA were too expensive and Pam had a preexisting condition. Using their new preventive care, they found out that Mike had an aggressive form of cancer. But, thankfully, doctors caught the cancer at an early stage, Mike was treated at the university of New Mexico cancer center and is now cured. And Pam says there is no question that the ACA saved her husband's life. […] But what would president-elect trump and Republicans do to make sure Pam and Mike and millions of others can keep getting cancer screenings? Nothing. They have no plan. They talk but no plan. […] Mr. President, there are tens of thousands of stories in New Mexico like those of Kevin, Pam, Mike […] . Over 36,000 new Mexicans gained health care since the A.C.A. Was passed and over 21 million Americans have health insurance because of Obamacare. I have heard from new Mexicans who are terrified because there is no plan to replace the ACA's protections, benefits and rights. Republicans have recalled—have called to repeal and replace the ACA. For years. They have had years to figure out how to replace it, and they have not. They have no plan. Repeal and replace is not a sound public policy, only a sound bite. You can watch his full statement below the fold. These stories are making a profound difference. It's the reason why the Republican resolve to repeal the law is breaking. Just tonight, five Republicans have offered an amendment to delay the repeal by a few months. And now someone critical to the repeal, Sen. Lamar Alexander who is Chairman of the Health committee that would be tasked with a replacement plan says slow down. "We have to take each part of it and consider what it would take to create a new and better alternative and then begin to create that alternative and once it's available to the American people, then we can finally repeal Obamacare," Alexander said. Real people will be hurt. Terribly. That's all of a sudden dawning on some Republicans, it would seem. That's just one of the reasons that this commitment by Democrats to fight back—and to rebuff the pleas of Republicans to bail them out—is going to win the day. 9 Jan
Now Trump's lying about dress shops, because there's nothing he doesn't lie about - Donald Trump is a compulsive liar. It's pathological. “We are going to have an unbelievable, perhaps record-setting turnout for the inauguration, and there will be plenty of movie and entertainment stars,” Mr. Trump said. “All the dress shops are sold out in Washington. It’s hard to find a great dress for this inauguration.” This is a damn strange thing to lie about, and by strange we mean stupid, and by lie we mean Jeebus Crisp, how would you even invent such a thing? Your greatness is so vast the nation's collected fashion industries are incapable of even finding clothes for your too-many admirers? So Racked had to fact-check this, because this is our lives now, and it is indeed a load of hot flaming garbage pulled from the Dumpster fire that Donald Trump calls his ego. An employee at the Neiman Marcus at the Mazza Gallerie told Racked, when asked whether it had evening gowns available, “Absolutely. A lot of them!” A staff member at Saks Fifth Avenue at Mazza Gallerie informed us that it does indeed have evening collections in stock at the moment. An employee at Gucci City Center said that clients can shop its ready-to-wear by appointment, and that offering “absolutely” includes evening dresses. A local Lord & Taylor has “a lot of eveningwear dresses,” according to an employee, and they’re 15 percent off with a Lord & Taylor Card! Betsy Fisher is “definitely not sold out,” [...] And so on and so on and so forth. All right, so what brought on this latest compulsive lie from the compulsive liar to whom we're giving the nuclear codes? 9 Jan
A letter calling on committee senators to reject Labor secretary-designate Andrew Puzder - This past Friday, Daily Kos joined other progressive organizations calling on senators who will be questioning Andrew Puzder to cast their committee votes against him for secretary of Labor. Here is our official letter of opposition: US Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor & Pensions 428 Senate Dirksen Office BuildingWashington, DC 20510 January 6, 2017 Dear Members of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions: On behalf of Daily Kos, the nation's largest progressive political blog, I am writing to urge committee members to oppose confirmation of Andrew Puzder as secretary of Labor. Like other pending appointees of President-Elect Donald Trump, Mr. Puzder expresses outright opposition to the founding objectives of the very department he has been chosen to lead. He gripes frequently about companies being over-regulated and workers being overprotected.  As you committee members all know, ever since it became a cabinet-level department 104 years ago, the Department of Labor's mission has been "to foster, promote, and develop the welfare of the wage earners, job seekers, and retirees of the United States; improve working conditions; advance opportunities for profitable employment; and assure work-related benefits and rights." Mr. Puzder, on the other hand, has a history of hostility to workers, much of it documented in his own words. That he has been selected to fill the Labor post clearly shows how quickly President-Elect Trump is willing to forget his campaign promises to improve the economic life of working-class Americans.  Puzder will certainly not be an advocate for such improvement. Indeed, as CEO of CKE Holdings, the parent company of Hardee's and Carl's Jr. fast-food restaurants, he demonstrated that he has no interest in workers’ well-being. The department he has been chosen to steer has repeatedly brought complaints against his company during the 16 years he has been at its helm. For instance, CKE restaurants and franchises were found in violation of wage and hour laws in 60 percent of DOL investigations of the company since 2009.  Puzder, who makes nearly 300 times what the average worker earning minimum wage takes home in a year, is vituperative in his opposition to increasing that minimum. He wrote two years ago: "The feds can mandate a higher wage, but some jobs don’t produce enough economic value to bear the increase." Higher minimum wages, he says, means people who would have been hired won't be.  9 Jan
Elizabeth Warren on Republicans and Obamacare: 'Repeal and run is for cowards' - Senate Democrats are still on the Senate floor, detailing the great good that Obamacare has achieved, and calling out Republicans for their abject failure in coming up with a replacement. No on is better at that then Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA). "Democrats and nonpartisan government officials have worked for years here in Washington to make the health system work. We have made progress.  And now, Republicans in Congress are ready to throw away these years and years of progress.  They are ready to threaten the collapse of our insurance markets.  They are ready to threaten the health and safety of millions of Americans, simply to make a political point.  They are ready to repeal and run," Senator Warren said. She continued, "if Republicans want to destroy health care in America, I will fight them every step of the way. The stakes are too high for the millions of Americans whose futures are about to be sacrificed so that one party can make a political point. Let's stay here and do the work that needs to be done to make sure every American gets access to high quality, affordable health care. Repeal and run is for cowards." Watch a clip of her statement below. 9 Jan
Office of Government Ethics 'lost contact' with Trump team after election, even as conflicts mounted - If you missed it this weekend, the least surprising news of the Trump transition continues to be the Office of Government Ethics' struggles to convince anyone on Donald Trump's team to give a damn about ethics. Office of Government Ethics Director Walter Shaub emailed Trump aides in November to lament that despite his office's repeated outreach, "we seem to have lost contact with the Trump-Pence transition since the election." As the office attempted to explain to Trump's staff, giving a damn about Ethics, the office, is important because they're the ones who will be vetting Trump picks to ensure there are no financial improprieties or conflicts of interest—presuming anybody in Senate leadership still cares about such things, of course. And because so many of Trump's nominees have no prior government experience, those nominees stand a very good chance of ending up in jail for breaking laws that they didn't even know existed. The perils for White House staff were even more severe, Shaub argued, because they might begin their jobs without crucial ethics guidance, raising a risk of inadvertently breaking federal rules. "They run the risk of having inadvertently violated the criminal conflicts of interest restriction at 18 USC 208," Shaub wrote, citing a federal conflicts law in an email to Trump Transition aide Sean Doocey. There's no word that any of this has been resolved since November. 9 Jan
Conservative groups plan to spend $10 million on bullying Democrats to vote for Trump SCOTUS pick - Groups like the Judicial Crisis Network have already invested something like $7 million into securing the Supreme Court, but that was just a downpayment. The plan now is to spend at least $10 million to target Senate Democrats who are up in 2018, hoping to sway them to vote for whatever popular vote loser Donald Trump gives them. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) vowed this month that his caucus will oppose high-court nominees that are not “mainstream”—adding that he would “absolutely” try and keep the seat vacant. Republicans hold 52 seats in the Senate and will need at least eight Democrats to break a filibuster on a Supreme Court nominee. […] But JCN believes it can go around Schumer by concentrating its fire on his members who must win over Trump voters in 2018. Ten Senate Democrats are up for reelection in Trump states. "We are preparing to launch the most robust campaign for a Supreme Court nominee in history and we will force vulnerable Senators up for re-election in 2018 like Joe Donnelly and Claire McCaskill to decide between keeping their Senate seats or following Chuck Schumer's liberal, obstructionist agenda,” said JCN’s chief counsel Carrie Severino. JCN is just one player in a larger, multi-faceted effort outside the halls of the Capitol to confirm a new conservative justice, sources planning the strategy said. The push will also include paid advertising, earned media, research and grassroots outreach from JCN and several other prominent conservative groups. JCN’s paid advertising will likely concentrate on Democrats like Donnelly of Indiana, McCaskill of Missouri and Sens. Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and Jon Tester of Montana, who all hail from states that Trump won overwhelmingly. Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), sure they can probably get him. In fact, they aren't even going to run ads against him. But picking up eight more? To rubber stamp Trump and wreck the Supreme Court for who knows how long? That's going to be an awfully heavy lift. Particularly since they'd be abandoned by all of the left—the grassroots, donors, interest groups—if they give in. 9 Jan
Senate Democrats take to Facebook and the floor in a talkathon against Obamacare repeal - Senate Democrats are into their first hours of an Obamacare talkathon, taking turns on Facebook Live to talk about the criticality of the program. Here's the first two hours, featuring Sens. Bernie Sanders, Catherine Cortez-Masto, Debbie Stabenow, and Chuck Schumer, with others, along with a group of medical students. x Embedded Content Democratic leader Schumer reiterated that “we are a united Democratic caucus—everyone of us has voted against Obamacare repeal. Our Republican friends are tied in a knot,” he said. “They say repeal, then they know there are so many good things as part of ACA. [...] Our colleagues on the other side of the aisle have no idea how to keep them and repeal ACA at the same time.” You can follow them on Facebook Live and on C-SPAN2. It’s true. In fact, just today five Republican Senators introduced an amendment to extend the repeal deadline until March, in hopes that maybe somehow they can come up with a replacement idea by then. 9 Jan

Democracy Now!

Repeal & Run? Republicans Move to Axe Obamacare, But What Will Replacement Look Like? - Republicans in the newly sworn-in 115th Congress are moving swiftly to repeal the Affordable Care Act, President Obama’s signature healthcare law. By a vote of 51 to 48 last week, the Senate approved a procedural measure clearing a way for a budget resolution that could repeal major sections of the law. The charge was led by Vice President-elect Mike Pence, who admitted his party has not yet decided how to replace the Affordable Care Act. "The Republicans’ rebranded version of the Affordable Care Act will be much meaner and skimpier," says Dr. Steffie Woolhandler, a primary care physician. She is a lecturer at Harvard Medical School. "It will have much more in the way of copayments and deductibles, particularly for poor people who are unable to afford it." Woolhandler is a professor at CUNY-Hunter College and the co-founder of Physicians for a National Health Program. 9 Jan
Protests Erupt in Kentucky After GOP Supermajority Passes Extreme Anti-Choice, Anti-Union Bills - In Kentucky, hundreds of demonstrators packed into the Capitol building Saturday to protest the state Legislature’s passage of a slew of controversial bills, including an anti-union "right-to-work" law and extreme anti-choice legislation that bans abortions after 20 weeks and requires a woman to have an ultrasound before having an abortion. The surprise emergency legislative session Saturday came after Republicans seized a supermajority in the House of Representatives, giving the Republicans control of the House, the Senate and the governorship for the first time in Kentucky state history. On Saturday, the Legislature also repealed a law that had guaranteed higher wages for workers on publicly financed construction projects. We go to Louisville, Kentucky, for an update from Richard Becker, a union organizer with Service Employees International Union, and we speak with Lisa Abbott, a community organizer with Kentuckians for the Commonwealth. 9 Jan
Senate to Begin Confirmation Hearings for Wealthiest Cabinet in U.S. History Despite Lack of Vetting - A barrage of Senate confirmation hearings is set to begin Tuesday for what could be the wealthiest Cabinet in modern American history. This comes despite concerns that ethics clearances and background checks are incomplete for several of President-elect Donald Trump’s Cabinet picks. "Each one of these people, by themselves, would be an outrage in any other administration. But the totality of what we’re seeing from the Trump administration has no precedent in American history," says Robert Weissman, president of Public Citizen, which has just launched the CorporateCabinet.org website to track the corporate connections and conflicts of interest of Trump Cabinet appointees. We also speak with Richard Painter, professor of corporate law at the University of Minnesota. He was the chief White House ethics lawyer for President George W. Bush from February 2005 to July 2007. 9 Jan
Headlines for January 9, 2017 - Confirmation Hearings to Begin Before Trump Nominees Finish Ethics ClearancesFort Lauderdale Alleged Shooter is Iraq War Vet with History of Domestic ViolenceAfter Briefing, Trump Denies Russian Hacking Affected 2016 ElectionU.S. Tanks & Troops Head to Eastern Europe Amid Tensions Between U.S. and RussiaHundreds Protest as KY Legislature Passes Anti-Union, Anti-Choice BillsIraq: At Least 20 Killed in 2 Suicide Bomb Attacks in BaghdadSyria: Dozens Killed in Fuel Truck Explosion; Airstrikes Near Damascus & in NorthIsrael: 4 IDF Soldiers Killed in Palestinian Truck AttackBrazil: Dozens Killed in 2 More Prison UprisingsMexico: Massive Nationwide Demonstrations Protest Fuel HikesTexas: 2 Arrested Locked to Machinery to Delay Trans-Pecos Pipeline ConstructionFlorida: 7 from Food Not Bombs Arrested Feeding People in City ParkNew York: Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant to Shut Down by 2021South Dakota: Residents Hold Vigil for Murdered Trans Woman Jamie Lee Wounded ArrowFormer Iranian President Hashemi Rafsanjani Dies at 82Meryl Streep Rails Against Trump in Golden Globes Achievement Award Speech 9 Jan
"This is Not a Coup, But It's Not Normal": Trump Picks 3 Generals for Top Foreign Policy Posts - As President-elect Donald Trump’s key nominees for Cabinet and Cabinet-level positions include three generals, we get response from Gordon Adams, professor emeritus at American University’s School of International Service, who recently wrote in The New York Times about "Donald Trump’s Military Government." Confirmation hearings begin Monday, including for retired Marine General John Kelly as homeland security secretary, retired General James "Mad Dog" Mattis as defense secretary and retired Army Lieutenant General Michael Flynn as national security adviser. 6 Jan
Glenn Greenwald: U.S. Intel Chiefs Alleging Russian Threat Have History of Deceiving the Public - Journalist Glenn Greenwald examines the track record of intelligence chiefs, including CIA Director John Brennan, FBI Director James Comey and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, who are meeting today with President-elect Donald Trump to give him a classified briefing on alleged Russian cyberthreats. 6 Jan
What Impact Will Trump Presidency Have on Freedom of Edward Snowden & Julian Assange? - In our extended conversation, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Glenn Greenwald responds to claims NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden’s revelations helped Russia, and examines what actions the Trump administration may take against him and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. "Exactly the same playbook was used against [Daniel] Ellsberg that is now being used against Snowden, which is to say, ’Don’t listen to these disclosures. Don’t regard this person as a hero for exposing our corruption and lawbreaking. Focus instead on the fact that these are traitors working with our enemies,’" says Greenwald. "And just as it was completely false in the case of Ellsberg, so too is it completely false in the case of Snowden." 6 Jan
Glenn Greenwald: Democrats Eager to Blame "Everybody But Themselves" for Collapse of Their Party - As Director of National Intelligence James Clapper testifies at a Senate hearing on Russian cyberthreats ahead of a highly classified briefing today with President-elect Donald Trump, we speak with Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Glenn Greenwald, who has faced an onslaught of criticism for questioning the premise of Russian hacking of the U.S. election. "Because Democrats are so desperate to put the blame on everybody but themselves for the complete collapse of their party, they’re particularly furious at anybody who vocally challenges this narrative," Greenwald says. "And since I’ve been one of the people most vocally doing so, the smear campaign has been like none that I have ever encountered. I have been accused of being a member of the alt-right, of being an admirer of Breitbart, of being supportive of Donald Trump, of helping him get elected and, of course, of being a Kremlin operative." 6 Jan
Headlines for January 6, 2017 - GOP Lawmakers Planning to End Federal Funds to Planned ParenthoodSix Confirmation Hearings, Trump News Conference Scheduled on One DayTrump Taps Former Sen. Dan Coats as Director of National IntelligenceIntelligence Chiefs Testify That Russia Meddled in U.S. ElectionTrump to Seek Funds for Border Wall from Congress, Not MexicoHouse Votes to Condemn U.N. over Resolution on Israeli SettlementsIsraelis Threaten Judges over Manslaughter Conviction of IDF SoldierChicago: Hate Crimes Charges for Teens in Torture VideoTexas: Lawmakers Propose Anti-Transgender "Bathroom Bill"Mississippi: Mesha Caldwell Killed in First Trans Murder of 2017North Dakota: Water Protector Opposing Pipeline Resists Grand JuryTurkey: Suicide Car Bomb in Izmir Blamed on Kurdish MilitantsTurkish Officials Release Photo of New Year's Massacre SuspectSyria: Car Bombing in Jableh Kills 11, Shakes CeasefireProtesters Fight Trump Inauguration Committee for Permits 6 Jan
Glenn Greenwald: Mainstream U.S. Media is Culpable for Disseminating Fake & Deceitful News on Russia - We are joined by Glenn Greenwald, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and one of the founding editors of The Intercept. His latest article is headlined "WashPost Is Richly Rewarded for False News About Russia Threat While Public Is Deceived." In it, he writes, "Any story that bolsters the prevailing D.C. orthodoxy on the Russia Threat, no matter how dubious, is spread far and wide. And then, as has happened so often, when the story turns out to be false or misleading, little or nothing is done to correct the deceitful effects." 5 Jan

John Perkins

What Will 2017 Bring? - It’s a question on many minds as we begin this new year. It is perhaps asked more now than ever before in my life-time – and that spans 7 decades. All we can say for sure is that we are in for big changes . . . on many fronts. Each of us is faced with the decision: Will we sit back and accept changes imposed by Washington, Moscow, Beijing, and Big Business? Or will we take actions that guide humanity to a saner world? I’ve had the opportunity to travel across this magnificent planet, speaking at a wide variety of events and talking with individuals from a multitude of jobs and lifestyles. Everywhere, I encounter more and more people who are committed to taking actions that will change consciousness. They realize that consciousness change is the key to altering what we call objective reality. They know that the big events in this world are molded by the ways we perceive ourselves and our relationship to all that is around us. By changing perceptions, we change the world. In a few days, I leave for a two-month journey that will take me to venues in the United States, Guatemala, Costa Rica, the Bahamas, and Ecuador. I will be speaking at the Conscious Life Expo, the Heartbeat Summit, and many other places. Every one of these is oriented toward using changes in our perceived reality to influence the way human beings impact each other and the world. What will 2017 bring? That depends on you. I encourage each and every one of you to make a New Year’s resolution right now that will commit you to taking the path that leads to action. The events of this past year, including those in the Middle East, Europe, Latin America, and the US serve as wakeup calls. One of the facts we awaken to is that business is the driving force behind politics and governments. Whether a leader’s name is Trump or Putin, Merkel or Xi Jinping, he or she serves at the pleasure of banks and other global corporations. And those banks and corporations depend on us – you and me – to buy their goods and services, work for, manage, and invest in them. Without us, they go the way of Woolworth’s, Polaroid, Pan Am, Bethlehem Steel, and so many others that have become corporate dinosaurs. However you feel about the new Oval Office occupant, know that his power base is the business community. However you feel about climate change, pipelines, vanishing forests, urban violence, wars, and just about every other issue, know that the twists and turns of that issue are shaped by business. However you feel about Monsanto, Exxon, Nike or any other business know that that business depends on its customers, workers, managers, and investors – us. Consumer movements work. They ended apartheid, installed seat belts, cleaned up polluted rivers, labelled fats, sugars, calories, and proteins in our foods, opened corporate doors wider to women and minorities, and so much more. In each of these areas we need to go further and we also need to expend these movements. We must insist that every company we support in any way be committed to serving us, the public, the world, future generations – not simply the bottom line. We must change the perception of what it means to be successful. That is our job and our pleasure. You have the power. Social networking makes it easier – and more fun – than ever to launch campaigns that will change the perception of what it means to be “successful.” It’s time for you and me to use all the tools at our disposal to show those who would drive us down a path of distraction, lethargy, depression, and mayhem that we simply will not stand for it. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for and we are here now. 2017 is our year! It will bring what we demand. Best wishes, John The Love Summit organized by the nonprofit Dream Change that John founded nearly 30 years ago is a powerful example of a movement that is going global to change businesses. 1 Jan
Message from the Legendary Elder Siblings - I write this in-flight, returning from a magical trip to the Kogi of Colombia. I write this having seen and heard the airport TV reports of the trauma that continues to dominate US politics, as well as those in many other countries. Last year my Ecuadorian partner, Daniel Koupermann, and I took a group to the amazing lands of the Kogi – people who have a message for us all. They came down from their mountain hideaways to meet us and to spread their message of the need for change. They were so impressed by the deep spirituality and commitment of that 2015 group that they invited us to bring another similar group – and this time to be the first ever to live among them, to sleep in their community, and to sit in their sacred ceremonial lodges. For the 19 of us it was a life-changing trip. We were surrounded by breathtaking scenes: the emerald Caribbean and palm-fringed beaches, the Sierra Nevada mountains that rise 18,000 feet up from the ocean to glacier-covered peaks, the rain forests, and the sparkling rivers that cascade from the glaciers into the Caribbean. But most of all it was the Kogi who impressed us! I have to admit that I was shocked – ecstatically – by the extent to which the Kogi invited us to share their lives and ceremonies. These up-til-now illusive people totally opened the doors to their homes and hearts to us. They invited us to come and learn from their Mamos (wise elders/teachers/shamans/spiritual leaders), to answer a call that dates back to a time when their forefathers retreated from the onslaught of Spanish conquistadors and the destructive nature of European cultures. Their Mamos told us of how their ancestors had fled up the valleys of the glacial rivers into the mountains. Choosing to remain isolated for centuries, they developed a new dream of the Earth, a revelation that balances the brilliant potential of the human mind, heart and spirit with all the forces of nature. To this day they remain true to their ancient laws and traditions—the moral, ecological, and spiritual dictates of a force they identify as “the Mother”—and are still led by sacred rituals. In the late 1900s, their Mamos understood that they are the Elder Siblings and that they had to come down and share that powerful message with the modern world, the people they call the Younger Siblings – us. They have shared their history with others. What was unique this time was their enthusiasm for embracing this group on very personal levels. I write this while flying home and it is all too close to me to be able to express in detail at this moment (a book to come, I think!) but I will say that the bonding we all felt is symbolized by a ceremony when a Mamo and his wife in whose community we had spent the night invited us to witness their 5-year-old son training to become a Mamo. We traveled many miles down from their community and stood with them on the bank of a glacial river where it meets the Caribbean while the young man gently offered the river the commitments we had all made and blown into tiny pieces of cotton from a local plant. The Kogi message, although similar to the one I received more than 40 years ago when I was a Peace Corps volunteer living with the Shuar in the Amazon and then again 20 years later from the Achuar, is more urgent now than ever. It is the message that birthed nonprofits, including Dream Change and the Pachamama Alliance. It is the message of the North American indigenous people and all those who join them at Standing Rock. It is a message that now has issued forth from indigenous cultures and organizations around the world. It is a message of hope, one that says we can transformer ourselves from societies that adhere to systems that threaten to destroy us to ones that will sustain us and future generations. I’ve written many times about the necessity to move from a Death Economy, based on warfare and ravaging the very resources upon which it depends, to a Life Economy, based on cleaning up pollution, regenerating destroyed environments, and developing new technologies that recycle and life-styles that give back more than they take from our Living Earth. Now, flying back from the Kogi, I feel rejuvenated and recommitted to spreading the message that is the underlying principle behind that economic shapeshift that needs to happen. We know we are facing severe crises. We know the climate is changing and that we humans are devastating the air, water, and land that support all life on this planet. We know that our government is incapable or unwilling to turn things around. It is easy to be discouraged. EXCEPT we also now know what our Elder Siblings understood long ago, that We the People must transform ourselves and our institutions. That is the message of the Kogi. It is the message of the Shuar, the Achuar, the people at Standing Rock and all our brothers and sisters around the globe. It is the message of the rising oceans, flooding rivers, melting glaciers, the hurricanes, the political traumas, and all the other crises. We are blessed to be hearing this message, to be inhabitants of this incredible organism that is our Living Earth and to be able to understand that the crises are themselves the message that it is time for us to come out of our isolation and create the change we want and know in our hearts, minds, and souls is necessary.13 Dec 16
JFK’s Advice for this Hour of Change and Challenge - As I travel around the world speaking at venues that range from corporate summits to rock festivals and from consumer groups to universities, I hear deep dissatisfaction with the current global political/economic system. This is reflected in Brexit, and in movements sweeping Iceland, Italy, Greece, and so many other countries. And it was reflected, perhaps most strongly, in the US elections. People everywhere understand that although the system that’s been in place for roughly a century has created amazing science, technology, medicine, and arts, it has run its course. It is not serving We the People. Not on any continent. It is broken. And it can’t be fixed with old tools. Perhaps more than any other message to take away from the 2016 US presidential election – as well as movements around the globe – is that people are discouraged and are demanding something different. Those on the right look for a conservative, authoritarian government while those on the left favor a progressive, socialistic one. Bernie’s popularity and Trump’s victory symbolize these two opposite ends of the spectrum. Hillary stood in the middle and symbolized the status quo. When I finish giving speeches, during the question-and-answer period, people often ask if I don’t think things have to fall apart before we can move into a new phase. I believe we would be wise to accept the recent events as symbols that things have fallen apart. People are waking up to the fact that our space station is headed for disaster and we must change course. Those who feel discouraged by the results of the recent election and those who are euphoric share a motivation to change our space station’s navigational system. This new administration and Congress will have impacts. The Supreme Court, health care, regulations governing Wall Street, energy, transportation, education, and the environment, as well as international relations: all of these will change. But let us understand that these are symptoms. The illness is much bigger. It is a systemic disease. And we must heal it. We must ask: how do we pull back from the brink of disaster? How do we maneuver human societies in ways that will direct us away from systems that are obviously failing, to ones that are themselves renewable resources? Since the illness is the political/economic system itself, we must change it. Regardless of policies implemented by national governments, we all need to dedicate ourselves to converting a Death Economy, based on militarism and excessive consumption, into a Life Economy, based on cleaning up pollution, regenerating environments, and developing sustainable non-extractive technologies. When the US felt threatened by the Soviet domination of space, President John Kennedy in September 1962 said, “We meet in an hour of change and challenge, in a decade of hope and fear, in an age of both knowledge and ignorance.” He then announced his intention to beat the Soviets by being the first nation to send men to the moon. “And,” he added with an optimistic statement that seemed almost beyond possibility, “it will be done before the end of this decade.” Although he did not live to see it, the President’s promise was fulfilled; Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the moon in July 1969. We are at such a time now. This hour of change and challenge, hope and fear, knowledge and ignorance, demands our involvement. It is imperative for each of us to be creative, to take actions, to understand that democracy truly is based on all of us participating in the great adventure that is the next ten years. John Kennedy’s promise is a promise for each of us to make now: It will be done before the end of the decade.10 Nov 16

Channel NewsAsia Singapore News

More stringent criteria set for pulp, paper firms under enhanced Green Label Scheme - Among the enhanced criteria, companies have to undertake a comprehensive range of fire prevention measures to quickly detect and suppress fires before they get out of control, as well as take steps to protect biodiversity in peatlands.48 min
'Significant risk' Linggiu Reservoir may dry out this year: Vivian Balakrishnan - The Foreign Affairs Minister said in a written parliamentary reply that Singapore is watching the falling levels at the Johor reservoir closely. 58 min
'Significant risk' Linggiu Reservoir will dry out this year: Vivian Balakrishnan - The Foreign Affairs Minister said in a written parliamentary reply that Singapore is watching the falling levels at the Johor reservoir closely. 00:20
New management model for hawker centres will derive economies of scale: Amy Khor - The new management model will allow operators to have greater flexibility and space to experiment with new ideas and processes which will benefit both hawkers and patrons, says Senior Minister of State for Environment and Water Resources Amy Khor. 9 Jan
Ng Eng Hen conveys condolences to Thai defence chief over deadly floods - The Singapore Defence Minister was speaking to Thailand's Chief of Defence Forces of the Royal Thai Armed Forces General Surapong Suwana-adth during the latter's introductory visit to Singapore on Tuesday (Jan 10).  9 Jan
Price display requirement for wet market stalls may be revised: Amy Khor - With daily fluctuations in the prices of market produce, many wet market stalls may face difficulty in displaying their prices and so the Government is looking into revising the requirement, says Senior Minister of State for Environment and Water Resources Amy Khor. 9 Jan
Proposed changes to Presidential Elections Act introduced in Parliament - These changes are intended to effect the amendments to the Constitution which were passed in Parliament last year, and to improve the processes and procedures of the upcoming Presidential Election.  9 Jan
Electrolux extends recall to another 2 glass cooker hobs - The appliance maker has extended its recall to include two FLEXI glass gas hobs that run on town gas – EGT9038CKP and EGT8028CKP – as a “precautionary measure”. 9 Jan
Government looking to revise price display requirement for wet market stalls: Amy Khor - With daily fluctuations in the prices of market produce, many wet market stalls may face difficulty in displaying their prices and so the Government is looking into revising the requirement, says Senior Minister of State for Environment and Water Resources Amy Khor. 9 Jan
Grab imposes S$2 fee on users who cancel rides 'excessively' - The fee will be levied on passengers who cancel more than 10 rides in a week, the ride-hailing company says.  9 Jan

Channel NewsAsia Front Page News

Thai king's office seeks changes to draft constitution - PM - Thai King Maha Vajiralongkorn's office has requested changes to a draft constitution regarding royal powers, the prime minister said on Tuesday.26 min
25 dead, over one million affected by southern Thai floods - Large parts of southern Thailand remain under floodwaters after more than a week of heavy monsoon rain as the government scrambled more emergency aid to over a million affected residents.30 min
More stringent criteria set for pulp, paper firms under enhanced Green Label Scheme - As part of the enhanced criteria, companies have to undertake a comprehensive range of fire prevention measures to quickly detect and suppress fires before they get out of control, as well as take steps to protect biodiversity in peatlands.36 min
More stringent criteria set for pulp, paper firms under enhanced Green Label Scheme - Among the enhanced criteria, companies have to undertake a comprehensive range of fire prevention measures to quickly detect and suppress fires before they get out of control, as well as take steps to protect biodiversity in peatlands.40 min
Policeman wounded in gun attack outside Greek socialist party office - Attackers shot at riot police guarding the offices of Greece's socialist Democratic Alliance party in central Athens early on Tuesday, slightly wounding one officer, Greek police said.41 min
Raised for meat in South Korea, dogs head for new homes in U.S - "You're OK, you're OK," Lola Webber, a campaign manager with the Humane Society International (HSI), whispers to a lab-mix puppy, cradling her in a jacket as dozens of dogs bark in nearby cages.41 min
L'Oreal to buy three skincare brands from Valeant for US$1.3 billion - French cosmetics group L'Oreal said on Tuesday it was buying three skincare brands - CeraVe, AcneFree and Ambi - from Valeant for US$1.3 billion, in a cash deal which L'Oreal said would boost its U.S. revenues.46 min
'Experience - running nation': Spotify offers Obama job - The world's leading streaming service on Monday (Jan 9) advertised an opening for "President of Playlists" - and said it was looking for someone with "at least eight years experience running a highly regarded nation."50 min
Guardiola pleased with City's approach at the back - Manager Pep Guardiola is pleased with the recent improvement in Manchester City defence but believes there is plenty of work to be done in the second half of the season.51 min
'Significant risk' Linggiu Reservoir may dry out this year: Vivian Balakrishnan - The Foreign Affairs Minister said in a written parliamentary reply that Singapore is watching the falling levels at the Johor reservoir closely. 58 min

Channel NewsAsia World News

Policeman wounded in gun attack outside Greek socialist party office - Attackers shot at riot police guarding the offices of Greece's socialist Democratic Alliance party in central Athens early on Tuesday, slightly wounding one officer, Greek police said.41 min
'Experience - running nation': Spotify offers Obama job - The world's leading streaming service on Monday (Jan 9) advertised an opening for "President of Playlists" - and said it was looking for someone with "at least eight years experience running a highly regarded nation."50 min
US citizens targeted after extradition of Haiti ex-coup leader - Haitian police have evacuated some 50 U.S. citizens to safety after attempted attacks by supporters of Haitian Senator-elect Guy Philippe, who was arrested and extradited to the United States last week, a police official said on Monday. 9 Jan
Norway seeks to overturn ruling it violated killer Breivik's rights - Norway will appeal on Tuesday against a court ruling that it violated the human rights of mass killer Anders Behring Breivik by keeping him too isolated in jail after he massacred 77 people in 2011. 9 Jan
Trump's son-in-law Kushner to become senior White House adviser - U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, will become a senior White House adviser working on trade and the Middle East, transition officials said on Monday, in a rare case of a close presidential family member taking a major job. 9 Jan
Trump, China's Ma hold 'great' meeting on jobs - President-elect Donald Trump and China's billionaire founder of e-commerce giant Alibaba held "great" talks in New York on Monday focused on creating US jobs and enabling trade with Asia. 9 Jan
Trump's son-in-law Kushner to become senior White House adviser - U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, will become a senior White House adviser working on trade and the Middle East, transition officials said on Monday, in a rare case of a close presidential family member taking a major job. 9 Jan
Trump names son-in-law senior White House advisor - The baby-faced real estate developer and magazine publisher who turns 36 on Tuesday, will be the youngest top member of the administration, working closely with chief of staff Reince Priebus and chief strategist Steve Bannon. 9 Jan
Barack Obama's speeches, from Cairo to Charleston - The speech in Chicago will bookend the political career of a charismatic statesman known for his powerful oratory, with several memorable addresses marking milestones in his White House tenure.   9 Jan
New UN chief to make first address to Security Council - UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday will deliver his first address to the Security Council since taking office, making the case for a new, more assertive diplomacy backed by world powers. 9 Jan

Channel NewsAsia Asia Pacific News

'Significant risk' Linggiu Reservoir will dry out this year: Vivian Balakrishnan - The Foreign Affairs Minister said in a written parliamentary reply that Singapore is watching the falling levels at the Johor reservoir closely. 00:20
21 farmers in court in Myanmar army land-grabbing case - Twenty-one farmers appeared Tuesday (Jan 10) in a Myanmar court to seek bail after being arrested over a land-grab dispute with the military that has highlighted acute challenges faced by the rural poor.00:20
Pirates attack fishing boat in Philippine south, 8 killed: Coast Guard - Armed men killed eight fishermen in what appeared to be an attack by pirates in dangerous waters in the southern Philippines, a coast guard spokesman said on Tuesday.00:06
Undersea earthquake of 6.9 magnitude hits southeast of Philippines: USGS - A major undersea earthquake with a magnitude of 7.3 struck southeast of the Philippines on Tuesday, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) said. 9 Jan
Pirates attack fishing boat in Philippine south, eight killed - coast guard - Armed men killed eight fishermen in what appeared to be an attack by pirates in dangerous waters in the southern Philippines, a coast guard spokesman said on Tuesday. 9 Jan
Pirates attack fishing boat in Philippine south, 8 killed - coast guard - Armed men killed eight fishermen in what appeared to be an attack by pirates in dangerous waters in the southern Philippines, a coast guard spokesman said on Tuesday. 9 Jan
China graft drive has punished 1.2 million - Nearly 1.2 million people have been punished in China's ongoing anti-graft campaign, a senior official has said, promising that the government will double-down on the drive that some say is a political purge. 9 Jan
Australian police say they are helping with 1MDB investigations - The Australian Federal Police have said they are working with international law enforcement agencies to investigate companies associated with the 1MDB scandal.  9 Jan
South Korea prosecutor says undecided on whether to seek arrests of Samsung executives - South Korea's special prosecution office said on Tuesday it had not yet decided whether to seek arrest warrants for two Samsung Group executives as part of a widening investigation into the political scandal threatening President Park Geun-hye. 9 Jan
Japan says always gathering information on North Korea's nuclear missiles - Japan is always gathering and analysing information on North Korea's nuclear missile situation with great interest, its top government spokesman said on Tuesday. 9 Jan

Media Monarchy

#GoodNewsNextWeek: Building a Better YouTube With BitChute (Video) - This week on #GoodNewsNextWeek: 2017 starts out with a whole new year's worth of ways we're winning w/space not spikes, free hot soup, p2p video and much more. 9 Jan
#PumpUpThaVolume: January 9, 2017 - Media Monarchy plays Two Moons, Swet Shop Boys, Yellow Bentines and more on #PumpUpThaVolume for January 9, 2017. ♬ 9 Jan
#MorningMonarchy: January 9, 2017 - Atlantic Resolve, Designated Successor and the Black Spider Memos + this day in history w/"A Gift of Song" and our song of the day by Nahko & Medicine for the People w/Joseph on your Morning Monarchy for January 9, 2017. 9 Jan
#PumpUpThaVolume: January 6, 2017 - Media Monarchy plays Darkbird, Bonobo, Son Volt and more on #PumpUpThaVolume for January 6, 2017. ♬ 6 Jan
#MorningMonarchy: January 6, 2017 - Sing for peace, spin the black circle and open the BitChute + this day in history w/the telegraph system and our song of the day by Elbow on your Morning Monarchy for January 6, 2017. 6 Jan
The Death of Celebrity w/Thomas Sheridan (Video) - Can we draw a connection between America's post-election riots - and the spate of celebrity deaths? Thomas Sheridan joins Media Monarchy for the first time to talk about 2017, the defunct dodos and why we may get a few years of tranquility. 5 Jan
A Few Years of Tranquility w/Thomas Sheridan (Audio) - Can we draw a connection between America's post-election riots - and the spate of celebrity deaths? Thomas Sheridan joins Media Monarchy for the first time to talk about 2017, the defunct dodos and why we may get a few years of tranquility. 5 Jan
#PumpUpThaVolume: January 5, 2017 - Media Monarchy plays Luscious Jackson, Marilyn Manson, Kitty Kallen and more on #PumpUpThaVolume for January 5, 2017. ♬ 5 Jan
#MorningMonarchy: January 5, 2017 - Manson's alive, 'The Queen Is Dead' and 'Star Wars' blaster fire + this day in history w/Dreyfus Affair and our song of the day by Gringo Star on your Morning Monarchy for January 5, 2017. 5 Jan
#PumpUpThaVolume: January 4, 2017 - Media Monarchy plays Whiskey Shivers, Cate Le Bon, Floating Room and more on #PumpUpThaVolume for January 4, 2017. ♬ 4 Jan

NATO Latest News

NCI Agency Industry Conference and AFCEA TechNet International (NITEC17) - Bringing together more than 800 high-level defence experts from across NATO, the Allied militaries, Industry and academia, NITEC17 will offer a unique opportunity to act on NATO's innovation agenda through strategic dialogue with partners. 4 Jan
Holiday greetings to the troops - In his end of the year message to the forces working under NATO command, Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg thanks the troops for their hard work in dangerous and demanding places, such as training recruits in Afghanistan, patrolling the Baltic airspace and the Mediterranean Sea, and keeping the peace in Kosovo.21 Dec 16
KFOR CIMIC donation in Zubin Potok - Zubin Potok, December 20th , 2016. This afternoon, the Joint Regional Detachment - North (JRD-N) conducted a donation of professional boots, helmets and gloves in favour of the Firefighters Station of Zubin Potok.21 Dec 16
Statement19 Dec 16
Mongolia achieves major milestone in its partnership with NATO - Mongolia graduated its second Staff Officers Course class and declared a new capacity for the faculty of the Mongolian National Defence University at a ceremony held on 13 December 2016 at the Ministry of Defence in Ulaanbaatar.19 Dec 16
Emerging security risks for energy flows across South Caucasus - Energy security is high on the political agendas of both NATO member states and partner countries. At the NATO Summit in Warsaw in July 2016, Allied leaders highlighted that energy developments can have significant political and security implications. Stable and reliable energy supplies, the diversification of import routes, suppliers and energy resources, and the interconnectivity of energy networks are of critical importance and increase resilience against political and economic pressure.15 Dec 16
Secretary General stresses importance of NATO-EU cooperation - NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg met with EU leaders on Thursday (15 December 2016) for talks on European defence and closer NATO-EU cooperation. Mr. Stoltenberg stressed that closer cooperation between NATO and the EU is important today because of new security threats, efforts to strengthen European defence and to build the partnership between Europe and North America.15 Dec 16
NATO Allies and Partners condemn North Korea’s nuclear programme - The North Atlantic Council on Thursday (15 December 2016) strongly condemned North Korea's continued development of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles and its inflammatory rhetoric, saying North Korea’s actions are breaching relevant UN Security Council resolutions and posing an increasing threat to international peace and security. NATO Allies were joined in session by the Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Korea, Mr. AHN Chong-ghee, and by representatives from Australia, Japan, and New Zealand.15 Dec 16
Chairman of the NATO Military Committee thanks Germany for its leading role in international security and stability - The Chairman of the NATO Military Committee General Petr Pavel visited Germany on 8-9 December 2016, where he met with Chief of Defence, General Volker Wieker, the Ministry of Defence Director-General for Strategy and Operation, Lieutenant General Dieter Warnecke and other high level political and military officials.15 Dec 16
Group of Allies sign off on initial multinational Precision Guided Munitions order - Today (15 December 2016) the NATO Support and Procurement Agency signed an agreement with the United States to acquire Precision Guided Munitions (PGMs) on behalf of a multinational cooperation framework that brings together eight NATO Allies - Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Greece, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, and Spain.15 Dec 16

National Post

Greg Palast

I get the Blues too… - A note to all who’ve made a donation to our Investigative Fund You are not only keeping us alive financially, but emotionally. Eventually, our stories make national news, but, in those months while the mainstream resists, your encouragement really means a lot. People ask me how I keep my sense of humor when I see all these horrors, from lost votes to lost lives. The truth is, I get the blues too. Support, good wishes, and remembering the tough world I came from are what gets me back on track. And here’s something they can’t steal from us:  a Happy New Year, from my family to yours. Thank you, Greg Palast, reporting Make a tax-deductible donation to our Stolen Election Investigation *  *  *  *  * Greg Palast (Rolling Stone, Guardian, BBC) is the author of The New York Times bestsellers, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy and Billionaires & Ballot Bandits, now out as major motion non-fiction movie.Rent or buy the film from Amazon or Vimeo. Support The Palast Investigative Fund and keep our work alive. Or support us by shopping with Amazon Smile.AmazonSmile will donate 0.5% of your purchases to the Sustainable Markets Foundation for the benefit of The Palast Investigative Fund and you get a tax-deduction! More info.   The post I get the Blues too… appeared first on Greg Palast.30 Dec 16
A note in the snow - Last week, I flew to Detroit with my team at the request of a major west coast publication. When I landed, they got cold feet; assignment cancelled. Without funding to continue, I should have headed home. But I was getting tips of nasty doings with the ballots in Motown. I could get the evidence that Trump’s victory was as real as his tan. So I tucked my long-johns under my suit, put on my fedora, and headed out to meet the witnesses, see the evidence and film an investigative report on the Theft of Michigan. With almost no sleep (and no pay), my producer David Ambrose and I put together an investigative film—and donated it, no charge, to Democracy Now! and several other outlets. As to the airfares, hotels, cars, camera batteries, sound equipment, local assistants and the rest, the bills have piled high as the snow and uncounted ballots. So, here I was, literally out in the cold, hoping you'd see the value of top-flight investigative reporting. So, buddy, can you spare a dime? Or $100 or so? For that, I’ll send you my new film, the one that, back in September, told you exactly how Trump would steal it. Or a signed copy of the book that goes with it: The Best Democracy Money Can Buy, a tale of billionaires and ballot bandits. I want to thank all of you who donated to get me to Washington DC to testify at the ad hoc Congressional hearing and to speak with the Justice Department about the suppression of minority votes. (On Monday, I was joined at the Washington Press Club by the nation’s top voting rights attorney, Barbara Arnwine; civil rights legend Ruby Sales; Muslim activist Sameera Khan. They announced plans to take legal and political action against Crosscheck, the Trumpistas’ latest Jim Crow tactic, the one our team uncovered for Rolling Stone. Khan joined me at Justice to present them 50,000 signatures (we unloaded reams of paper on them) gathered by 18 Million Rising, the Asian American advocacy group, to light a fire under Justice. On Tuesday, I joined the presidents of the NAACP chapters of Michigan and Wisconsin and other front-line voting rights leaders, to plan next steps for this week, for this year, for this decade. My presentation to Justice, to Congressmen and rights advocates, to the press, was so much more powerful because I arrived in DC with the goods, the evidence, the film, the facts from Michigan, from the scene of the electoral crime. So, in the end, my assignment wasn’t cancelled: I went to work for YOU. Because I have faith that my readers agree that this work is important, that I’m not on some fool’s errand. The US media doesn’t want to cover the vote theft—because, hey, the count is over—and we should get over it. I am not over it. I am standing my ground. Let me know if you think I’ve made the right decision. Feed the team. I have nothing to offer you in return except some signed discs and books (or the Combo)— and the facts. Continue Supporting the 2016 Stolen Election Investigation because it ain’t over and we’re not done. – Greg Palast   * * * * * Greg Palast (Rolling Stone, Guardian, BBC) is the author of The New York Times bestsellers, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy and Billionaires & Ballot Bandits, now out as major motion non-fiction movie. Rent or buy the film from Amazon or Vimeo. Visit the Palast Investigative Fund store or simply make a tax-deductible contribution to keep our work alive!  Or support the The Palast Investigative Fund (a project of The Sustainable Markets Foundation) by shopping with Amazon Smile. AmazonSmile will donate 0.5% of your purchases to the Palast Fund and you get a tax-deduction! More info. GregPalast.com   The post A note in the snow appeared first on Greg Palast.18 Dec 16
The Republican Sabotage of the Vote Recounts in Michigan and Wisconsin - By Greg Palast for Truthout Photo of Michigan ballot with bubble. (Image courtesy of Palast Investigative Fund, 2016)Michigan officials declared in late November that Trump won the state's count by 10,704 votes. But hold on – a record 75,355 ballots were not counted. The uncounted ballots came mostly from Detroit and Flint, majority-Black cities that vote Democratic. According to the machines that read their ballots, these voters waited in line, sometimes for hours, yet did not choose a president. Really? This week, I drove through a snowstorm to Lansing to hear the official explanation from Ruth Johnson, the Republican secretary of state. I was directed to official flack-catcher Fred Woodhams who told me, "You know, I think when you look at the unfavorability ratings that were reported for both major-party candidates, it's probably not that surprising." Sleuthing about in Detroit, I found another explanation: bubbles. Bubbles? Michigan votes on paper ballots. If you don't fill the bubble completely, the machine records that you didn't vote for president. Susan, a systems analyst who took part in the hand recount initiated by Jill Stein, told me, "I saw a lot of red ink. I saw a lot of checkmarks. We saw a lot of ballots that weren't originally counted, because those don't scan into the machine." (I can only use her first name because she's terrified of retribution from Trump followers in the white suburb where she lives.) Other ballots were not counted because the machines thought the voter chose two presidential candidates. How come more ballots were uncounted in Detroit and Flint than in the white 'burbs and rural counties? Are the machines themselves racist? No, but they are old, and in some cases, busted. An astonishing 87 machines broke down in Detroit, responsible for counting tens of thousands of ballots. Many more were simply faulty and uncalibrated. I met with Carlos Garcia, University of Michigan multimedia specialist, who, on Election Day, joined a crowd waiting over two hours for the busted machine to be fixed. Some voters left; others filled out ballots that were chucked, uncounted, into the bottom of machine. When the machine was fixed, Carlos explained, "Any new scanned ballots were falling in on top of the old ones." It would not be possible to recount those dumped ballots. This is not an unheard of phenomenon: I know two voters who lost their vote in another state (California) because they didn't fill in the bubble – my parents! Meet mom and dad in my film, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy: How did Detroit end up with the crap machines? Detroit is bankrupt, so every expenditure must be approved by "emergency" overlords appointed by the Republican governor. The GOP operatives refused the city's pre-election pleas to fix and replace the busted machines. "We had the rollout [of new machines] in our budget," Detroit City Clerk Janice Winfrey said. "No money was appropriated by the state." Same in Flint. GOP state officials cut the budget for water service there, resulting in the contamination of the city's water supply with lead. The budget cuts also poisoned the presidential race. The Human Eye Count There is, however, an extraordinary machine that can read the ballots, whether the bubbles are filled or checked, whether in black ink or red, to determine the voters' intent: the human eye. That's why Dr. Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate, paid millions of dollars for a human eyeball count of the uncounted votes. While labeled a "recount," its real purpose is to count the 75,355 votes never counted in the first place. Count those ballots, mostly in Detroit and Flint, and Trump's victory could vanish. Adding to the pile of uncounted ballots are the large numbers of invalidated straight-ticket votes in Detroit. In Michigan, you can choose to make one mark that casts your vote for every Democrat (or Republican) for every office. Voters know that they can vote the Democratic ballot but write in a protest name – popular were "Bernie Sanders" and "Mickey Mouse" – but their ballot, they knew, would count for Clinton. However, the Detroit machines simply invalidated the ballots with protest write-ins because the old Opti-Scans wrongly tallied these as "over-votes" (i.e., voting for two candidates). The human eye would catch this mistake. But Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette stymied Stein's human eye count. The Republican pol issued an order saying that no one could look at the ballots cast in precincts where the number of votes and voters did not match – exactly the places where you'd want to look for the missing votes. He also ordered a ban on counting ballots from precincts where the seals on the machines had been broken – in other words, where there is evidence of tampering. Again, those are the machines that most need investigating. The result: The recount crews were denied access to more than half of all Detroit precincts (59 percent). I met with Stein, who told me she was stunned by this overt sabotage of the recount. "It's shocking to think that the discounting of these votes may be making the critical difference in the outcome of the election," she said. This story was repeated in Wisconsin, which uses the same Opti-Scan system as Michigan. There, the uncounted votes, sometimes called "spoiled" or "invalidated" ballots, were concentrated in Black-majority Milwaukee. Stein put up over $3 million of donated funds for the human eye review in Wisconsin, but GOP state officials authorized Milwaukee County to recount simply by running the ballots through the same blind machines. Not surprisingly, this instant replay produced the same questionable result. Adding Un-Votes to the Uncounted Stein was also disturbed by the number of voters who never got to cast ballots. "Whether it's because of the chaos [because] some polling centers are closed, and then some are moved, and there's all kinds of mix-ups," she said. "So, a lot of people are filling out provisional ballots, or they were being tossed off the voter rolls by Interstate Crosscheck." Interstate Crosscheck is a list that was created by Donald Trump supporter and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach to hunt down and imprison voters who illegally voted or registered in two states in one election. An eye-popping 449,092 Michiganders are on the Crosscheck suspect list. The list, which my team uncovered in an investigation for Rolling Stone, cost at least 50,000 of the state's voters their registrations. Disproportionately, the purged voters were Blacks, Latinos and that other solid Democratic demographic, Muslim Americans. (Dearborn, Michigan, has the highest concentration of Arab Americans in the US.) The Michigan Secretary of State's spokesman Woodhams told me the purpose of the mass purge was, "to clean our voter lists and ensure that there's no vulnerability for fraud. We've been very aggressive in closing vulnerabilities and loopholes to fraud." While Woodhams did not know of a single conviction for double-voting in Michigan, the "aggression" in purging the lists was clear. I showed him part of the Michigan purge list that he thought was confidential. The "double voters" are found by simply matching first and last names. Michael Bernard Brown is supposed to be the same voter as Michael Anthony Brown. Michael Timothy Brown is supposed to be the same voter as Michael Johnnie Brown. Woodhams assured me the GOP used the Trump-Kobach list with care, more or less. He said, "I'm sure that there are some false positives. But we go through it thoroughly, and we're not just canceling people." As to the racial profiling inherent in the list? Did he agree with our experts that by tagging thousands of voters named Jose Garcia and Michael Brown there would be a bias in his purge list? The GOP spokesman replied, "I've known a lot of white Browns." Jill Stein didn't buy it. Responding to both Michigan's and Trump's claim that voter rolls are loaded with fraudulent double voters, Stein said, "It's the opposite of what he is saying: not people who are voting fraudulently and illegally, but actually legitimate voters who have had their right to vote taken away from them by Kris Kobach and by Donald Trump." Crosscheck likely cost tens of thousands their vote in Pennsylvania as well. "It is a Jim Crow system, and it all needs to be fixed," Stein concluded. "It's not rocket science. This is just plain, basic democracy." * * * * * Greg Palast (Rolling Stone, Guardian, BBC) is the author of The New York Times bestsellers, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy and Billionaires & Ballot Bandits, now out as major motion non-fiction movie. Support the 2016 Stolen Election Investigation After investigating the REAL story of the recount, we stopped by the Department of Justice and handed them our Crosscheck petition, signed by 50,000 people. We have a lot more work to do and thankfully, our efforts are starting to get notice. We're not done... Join us bySupporting the Stolen Election Investigation Rent or buy the film from Amazon or Vimeo. Visit the Palast Investigative Fund store or simply make a tax-deductible contribution to keep our work alive!  Or support the The Palast Investigative Fund (a project of The Sustainable Markets Foundation) by shopping with Amazon Smile. AmazonSmile will donate 0.5% of your purchases to the Palast Fund and you get a tax-deduction! More info. GregPalast.com   The post The Republican Sabotage of the Vote Recounts in Michigan and Wisconsin appeared first on Greg Palast.18 Dec 16
Palast Report for Democracy Now!:By Rejecting Recount, Is Michigan Covering up 75,000 Ballots Never Counted? - Investigative reporter Greg Palast has just returned from Michigan, where he went to probe the state’s closely contested election. Trump won Michigan by fewer than 11,000 votes out of nearly 4.8 million votes cast. Green Party presidential contender Dr. Jill Stein attempted to force Michigan to hold a recount, but a federal judge ordered Michigan’s Board of Elections to stop the state’s electoral recount. One big question remains: Why did 75,335 ballots go uncounted? Support the 2016 Stolen Election Investigation My team and I just returned from Michigan to report the REAL story of the recount. I’ve also been responding to urgent requests in the recount states for our technical files and analysis. We're in Washington and stopped by the Department of Justice yesterday and handed them our Crosscheck petition, signed by 50,000 people. Join us by Supporting the Stolen Election Investigation Last stop for Democracy • PLEASE, say, "Count me in to count the votes" by supporting the 2016 Stolen Election Investigation for a donation of any size no matter how small or large • Stay informed and get a signed DVD of my film The Best Democracy Money Can Buy, a signed copy of the book with the same title or better still - get the Book & DVD combo  • Be listed as a producer ($1,000) or co-producer ($500) in the credits of the broadcast version of the updated, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy:  THE THEFT OF 2016. * * * * * Greg Palast (Rolling Stone, Guardian, BBC) is the author of The New York Times bestsellers, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy and Billionaires & Ballot Bandits, now out as major motion non-fiction movie. Donate to the Palast Investigative Fund and get the signed DVD. Download the FREE Movie Comic Book. Rent or buy the film from Amazon or Vimeo. Visit the Palast Investigative Fund store or simply make a tax-deductible contribution to keep our work alive!  Or support the The Palast Investigative Fund (a project of The Sustainable Markets Foundation) by shopping with Amazon Smile. AmazonSmile will donate 0.5% of your purchases to the Palast Fund and you get a tax-deduction! More info. GregPalast.com   The post Palast Report for Democracy Now!:By Rejecting Recount, Is Michigan Covering up 75,000 Ballots Never Counted? appeared first on Greg Palast.13 Dec 16
Crosscheck Is Not Just Crooked, It’s Criminal - After reading my report on the Kobach/Koch/Trump operation, which has removed tens of thousands of minority voters from the rolls in the swing states that surprisingly shifted to Trump, former federal judge (and now Congressman) Alcee Hastings told me Crosscheck is a criminal violation of federal law. Hastings has called for criminal indictments and written an official Congressional member letter to ask for investigation. hastings-crosscheck-letter-to-ag-lynch Hastings’ demand for justice is backed by a petition to expose and end Crosscheck’s racist attacks on voting rights. So far it's been signed by 50,000 people, including 29,507 members of 18 Million Rising, the Asian-American rights group. The group is joined by co-signers Rep. Keith Ellison, Bill Gallegos of Climate Justice, Martin Luther King III and others. On Tuesday, December 13 I will join the leaders of 18 Million rising in Washington, D.C. to present the petition to Attorney General Loretta Lynch. Stopping Crosscheck is the Standing Rock of racist vote suppression.  If we don’t open the investigations now, by January 21, Kris Kobach will be Homeland Security chief and Jeff Sessions Attorney General. Demand an investigation into Crosscheck, sign our petition — and then share it! For the full story, see the film, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy, the story of my investigation of Crosscheck. * * * * * Greg Palast (Rolling Stone, Guardian, BBC) is the author of The New York Times bestsellers, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy and Billionaires & Ballot Bandits, now out as major motion non-fiction movie. Donate to the Palast Investigative Fund and get the signed DVD. Download the FREE Movie Comic Book. Rent or buy the film from Amazon or Vimeo. Visit the Palast Investigative Fund store or simply make a tax-deductible contribution to keep our work alive!  Or support the The Palast Investigative Fund (a project of The Sustainable Markets Foundation) by shopping with Amazon Smile. AmazonSmile will donate 0.5% of your purchases to the Palast Fund and you get a tax-deduction! More info. The post Crosscheck Is Not Just Crooked, It’s Criminal appeared first on Greg Palast. 5 Dec 16
The No-BS Inside Guide to the Presidential RecountSorry, no Russian hacker hunt - by Greg Palast for Truthout There's been so much complete nonsense since I first broke the news that the Green Party would file for a recount of the presidential vote, I am compelled to write a short guide to flush out the BS and get to just the facts, ma'am. Nope, they’re not hunting for Russian hackers To begin with, the main work of the recount hasn't a damn thing to do with finding out if the software programs for the voting machines have been hacked, whether by Putin’s agents or some guy in a cave flipping your vote from Hillary to The Donald. The Green team does not yet even have the right to get into the codes. But that's just not the core of the work. The ballots in the electoral “dumpster” The nasty little secret of US elections, is that we don't count all the votes. In Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania—and all over America—there were a massive number of votes that were simply rejected, invalidated, and spoiled. They were simply, not counted.  Officially, in a typical presidential election, at least three million votes end up rejected, often for picayune, absurd reasons. The rejects fall into three big categories:  provisional ballots rejected, absentee and mail-in ballots invalidated and in-precinct votes “spoiled,” spit out by a machine or thrown out by a human reader as unreadable or mis-marked. So, as Robert Fitrakis, lead lawyer for the recount tells me, their first job is to pull the votes out of the electoral dumpster—and, one by one, make the case for counting a rejected provisional, absentee or “spoiled” ballot. Spoiled:  over-votes and under-votes How does a vote spoil? Most fall in the categories of “over-votes” and “under-votes.” In Michigan, the Green team has found a whole lot of people who voted for TWO candidates for President.  These are the “over-vote”—votes that will count for neither candidate. How odd.  While the schools in Detroit are not stellar, its graduates do know that they can only have one president. Then, some folks didn’t vote at all.  They are the “under-voter.” But, Fitrakis and team suspect, many of these under- and over-voters meant to vote for a candidate but the robot reader couldn’t understand their choice. Here’s how it happens.  Voters in Michigan and Wisconsin fill in bubbles next to their choice.  The cards, filled up with darkened bubbles for each race, are gathered and fed through an “optical scanner.” These robotic eyeballs mess up all the time. This is what Fitrakis, an old hand at vote-machine failures (both deliberate and benign), calls “the calibration problem.” Are machines calibrated with a Republican or Democratic bias? No, that's not how it works. But just as poor areas get the worst schools and hospitals, they also get the worst voting machines. The key is an ugly statistic not taught in third grade civics class:  According to the US Civil Rights Commission, the chance your vote will be disqualified as “spoiled” is 900% more likely if you’re Black than if you’re white. So the Green Party intends to review every single one of the six million bubble-filled cards. They’ll use the one instrument that can easily tell one bubble from two, or one bubble from none: the human eye. As you can imagine, This will require several thousand eyes.  The good news is, Fitrakis reports, that well over a thousand volunteers have already signed up.  Training by Skype begins Tuesday morning. Support the 2016 Stolen Election Investigation The team and I are off to Ground Zero:  Michigan. Wisconsin. Pennsylvania. To report the REAL story of the recount. I’m also responding to urgent requests in the recount states for our technical files and analysis. And then it’s on to Washington—to the Department of Justice—while there’s a bit of Justice left. Join us by Supporting the Stolen Election Investigation Last stop for Democracy Provisional or “placebo” ballots According to the US Elections Assistance Commission (EAC), Americans cast 2.7 million provisional ballots in the last presidential election.  About a million were simply discarded.  What?! Yes.  Discarded, not counted.  You show up at your normal polling station and they can’t find your name, or they don’t like your ID, or you’re supposed to vote in another precinct.  Instead of letting you vote on a regular ballot, you fill out a “provisional” ballot and place it in an envelope, sign your name, and under penalty of jail time for lying, affirm you’re a properly registered voter. The polls close—then the magic begins.  It’s up to highly partisan election officials to decide if your vote counts.  Hillary Clinton only won one swing state, Virginia, notably, the only one where the vote count was controlled by Democrats.  She lost all swing states—Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Arizona, North Carolina and Florida—where the GOP set the rules for counting these ballots and their hacks acted as the judge and jury on whether a ballot should be counted. Wisconsin generally rejects votes cast in the wrong precinct, even if they’re legal voters—and, says Fitrakis, “even if their official precinct was just another table in the same high school gym—and they were mis-directed by poll workers.” (That’s why I sometimes call “provisional” ballots “placebo” ballots.  They let you feel you’ve voted, even if you haven’t.) In Wisconsin, provisional ballots were handed to voters—mostly, it appears, students—who didn’t have the form of ID required under new Wisconsin law. These ballots were disqualified despite zero evidence even one voter was an identity thief. Fitrakis says the Stein campaign will fight for each of these provisional votes where this is clearly no evidence the vote is fraudulent. Mail-in, Early and Absentee Ballots go Absent If you’ve gone postal in this election, good luck!  According to EAC data, at least half a million absentee ballots go absent, that is, just don’t get counted.  The cause: everything from postage due to “suspect signature.” Fitrakis told me that in his home state of Ohio, you need to put your driver’s license number on the envelope, “and if you don’t have a driver’s license and leave the line blank—instead of writing ‘no driver’s license’—they toss your ballot. From Palast's book The Best Democracy Money Can Buy: A Tale of Billionaires & Ballot Bandits by Ted Rall It’s a “gotcha!” system meant to knock out the ballots the officials don’t want to count.  (Remember, your mail-in ballot is anything but secret.)  Team Green will try to fight for each absentee ballot rejected for cockamamie reasons. If the recount doesn’t change the outcome, can we feel assured the election was honest? Sadly, no.  As Fitrakis says, “If a student is given a provisional ballot because they didn’t have the right ID, or the state simply lost their registration, we can fight for the ballot to be counted.  But most students who voted off campus didn’t know their right to get a provisional ballot and most probably didn’t get offered one. Students and others were discouraged from voting because they lacked the proper ID (300,000 by the estimate of the experts with the ACLU—that’s thirty times Trump’s plurality).  But if you didn’t cast any ballot, provisional or otherwise, no one can fight for it. And final decisions may come down to the vote of the Wisconsin Elections Commission, God forbid.  As Norman Stockwell, the editor of Madison-based The Progressive explained to me, formerly, elections law adjudications were made by a panel of non-partisan judges.  These were replaced by this new commission of partisan shills appointed by GOP Governor Scott Walker. Trump says millions voted illegally. Is he crazy? Crazy like a fox.  There’s a method in his madness that affects the recount. While the media dismisses Trump’s claim that there are "millions of people that voted illegally," they have not paid attention to the details of his claim.  Trump explains that millions of people are “voting many, many times,” that is, voting in two states in the same election. Trump’s claim is based on a list of “potential duplicate voters” created by his operative, Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach.  Kobach (a top dog in Trump’s transition team)  directs a program for hunting down fraudulent voters using a computer system called, “Crosscheck.” It’s quite a computer:  Crosscheck identified a breathtaking 449,922 Michiganders who are suspected of voting or registering in a second state, a felony crime, as are 371,923 in Pennsylvania. I spent two years investigating the Trump/Kobach claim for Rolling Stone.  We obtained the “confidential” suspect list of several million citizens accused of voting twice.  In fact, it was no more than a list of common names—Maria Hernandez, James Brown, David Lee—that is, common to voters of color.  Read: Democrats.  A true and typical example: Michael James Brown of Michigan is supposed to be the same voter as Michael Kendrick Brown of Georgia. Page from The Best Democracy Money Can Buy (FREE) Comic book penned by Keith Tucker About 54,000 voters in Michigan, five times Trump’s plurality, lost their right to vote based on this nutty double-voter accusation.  In Pennsylvania, about 45,000 were purged. The problem for Fitrakis:  While he eventually plans to file suit against Crosscheck purges, in the meantime, it’s not clear he can challenge someone whose lost their vote because of a false accusation of double voting.  And those who found their names missing and didn’t demand a provisional ballot—there’s no hope at all of recovering their vote. Is Jill Stein going to get rich? Fitrakis laughs at this one.  “The FEC [Federal Elections Commission] has very strict rules on recounts. The donations for the recount are sequestered in a specially designated account and all spending is restricted to the recount.” The big problem is that the cost is somewhat out of Stein’s control.  Each state will bill the campaign for the “pro-rated salaries and benefits” of its county and state officials working on the recount. To add to the cost and just plain drive the Green team crazy, the Wisconsin Election Board announced on Monday that each separate county elections clerk will decide if they’ll even let the Green volunteers directly view the ballots.  Fitrakis and partners will have to get a court order to get into each county.  How does one recount ballots without seeing them?  (Hmm, is the Wisconsin board, stooges appointed by the GOP Governor, fearful that the viewing the ballots will expose the game?) Hillary joins the fray What will the Clinton camp add to the recount? “Lawyers,” said Fitrakis, though he’s yet to see them.  The Clinton campaign is apparently helping find one voter in each Pennsylvania county, as one is required in each jurisdiction to file for a recount of that state. And what about that hack job? While Fitrakis is not looking for Russkies in the computer code, he says, “We’re more concerned with the private companies that control the keys to the kingdom—to match what’s on paper to the official count.”  The “keys” are the little machines, memory cards and other electronic gewgaws that are used to suck the data from the voting machine—which are carried off to another state for tabulation by a private contractor.  Will these tabulations at each step match what the volunteers find in the on-the-ground recount? One problem is that the tabulation software is “proprietary.”  A private company owns the code to the count—and the privateers will fight fiercely, with GOP help, to keep the ballot counting code their commercial secret. Push and Pray Pennsylvania In the end, the single biggest impediment to a full and fair recount is that 70 percent of Pennsylvania voters used what are called, “Push and Pray” voting machines—Direct Recording Electronic touch-screens.  Push the screen next to your choice and pray it gets recorded. Pennsylvania is one of the only states that has yet to require some form of VVPAT (“vee-pat”) or voter-verified paper audit trail that creates an ATM-style receipt. Therefore, the Keystone State recount will have to rely on hopes of access to the code, statistical comparisons to counties that used paper ballots—and prayer. Maybe it IS the Russians The possibility that a Putin pal hacked the machines was championed by University of Michigan computer sciences professor J. Alex Halderman who proposed, “The attackers would probe election offices well in advance in order to find ways to break into their computers…and spread malware into voting machines.” I imagine some squat, middle-pay-scale civil servant in chinos and a pocket protector who works in the Michigan Secretary of State’s office approached, one late overtime night, by some FSB agent in high heels and a slinky dress split halfway up her thigh. The svelte spy would lean against the bureaucrat provocatively and whisper, “My handsome dahling, would you mind sticking this little thumb drive into that big old computer of yours?” Professor Halderman, if you want to help the recount, put down the James Bond novels and pick up some Opti-Scan ballots.  We’ve got a lot of bubbles to read.  End PLEASE, say, "Count me in to count the votes" by supporting the 2016 Stolen Election Investigation for a donation of any size no matter how small or large Stay informed and get a signed DVD of my film The Best Democracy Money Can Buy, a signed copy of the book with the same title or better still - get the Book & DVD combo Be listed as a producer ($1,000) or co-producer ($500) in the credits of the broadcast version of the updated, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy:  THE THEFT OF 2016. * * * * * Greg Palast (Rolling Stone, Guardian, BBC) is the author of The New York Times bestsellers, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy and Billionaires & Ballot Bandits, now out as major motion non-fiction movie. Donate to the Palast Investigative Fund and get the signed DVD. Download the FREE Movie Comic Book. Rent or buy the film from Amazon or Vimeo. Visit the Palast Investigative Fund store or simply make a tax-deductible contribution to keep our work alive!  Or support the The Palast Investigative Fund (a project of The Sustainable Markets Foundation) by shopping with Amazon Smile. AmazonSmile will donate 0.5% of your purchases to the Palast Fund and you get a tax-deduction! More info. GregPalast.com   The post The No-BS Inside Guide to the Presidential RecountSorry, no Russian hacker hunt appeared first on Greg Palast.30 Nov 16
Exclusive: Jill Stein just called, Green Party filing for recount in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania - by Greg Palast Jill Stein just called to say that I am the first one to be informed that the Green Party is formally petitioning for a recount in 3 states, Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. Trump’s margin is less than 11,600 in Michigan, 27,200 in Wisconsin and 68,000 in Pennsylvania. If just a few thousand votes are found in Wisconsin and Michigan, Hillary Clinton becomes president by 276 electoral votes verses 264 for Trump. Support the 2016 Stolen Election Investigation Stein told me “We’re filing in Wisconsin Friday because the votes were cast on proven hack-prone machines. This has been a hack-ridden election.” She said that it will be most difficult to recount the machines in Pennsylvania. When asked why the democrats are not bringing this action, Stein told this reporter that “Democrats do not act to protect the vote even when there is dramatic evidence” of tampering. The Green Party told us that Stein will be represented by experienced voting rights attorney’s John Bonifaz, Boston, MA and Robert Fitrakis, Columbus, OH. Stein said, “our voting system is on life support.” The presidential candidate also said, “The Green Party will continue to be the go to advocate for voting rights. That includes fighting vote suppression tactics such as the Interstate Crosscheck system.” Interstate Crosscheck is the program which wrongly purged hundreds of thousand of minority voters in this election, according to the investigation this reporter fro Rolling Stone Magazine. Stein received 50,700 votes in Michigan, five times Trump’s winning plurality, and 30,980 in Wisconsin, more than Trump’s margin. When asked the "Nader" question, "Isn’t it true that your votes in Wisconsin and Michigan, if they went to Clinton, would have blocked Trump?", Stein answered, "Not at all. Our polls showed that 61% of our voters would have simply sat out the election, and one-third of the remaining voters would have voted Trump." The candidate insisted, "We are the ‘un-spoilers.’" Stein said she acted when Clinton turned silent because, "Only candidates may formally demand a re-count and we have standing." * * * * * Greg Palast (Rolling Stone, Guardian, BBC) is the author of The New York Times bestsellers, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy and Billionaires & Ballot Bandits, now out as major motion non-fiction movie. Donate to the Palast Investigative Fund and get the signed DVD. Download the FREE Movie Comic Book. Rent or buy the film from Amazon or Vimeo. Visit the Palast Investigative Fund store or simply make a tax-deductible contribution to keep our work alive!  Or support the The Palast Investigative Fund (a project of The Sustainable Markets Foundation) by shopping with Amazon Smile. AmazonSmile will donate 0.5% of your purchases to the Palast Fund and you get a tax-deduction! More info. GregPalast.com   The post Exclusive: Jill Stein just called, Green Party filing for recount in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania appeared first on Greg Palast.23 Nov 16
Here’s what we do now A personal note by Greg Palast - Being right never felt so horrid. “This is the story of the theft of the 2016 election. It’s a crime still in progress.” So opens my film, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy. And on Election night I waited for the returns to make a fool of me. Instead, the returns made the fool a President. And so, my vacation’s cancelled. My life’s cancelled; that is, a life of anything but sleuthing and exposing the details of the heist of our democracy. What’s at stake? No way around it, this is one frightening moment. Decades of progress created with sweat and determination face destruction.  Within the next six months, we may see the Voting Rights Act repealed—and civil rights set back 50 years; the entirety of our environmental protection laws burnt in a coal pit; police cruelty made our urban policy; the Education Department closed to give billionaires a tax holiday; and a howling anti-Semite as White House Senior Counselor. But the horror we face is countered by this one hard and hopeful fact:  Donald Trump did NOT win this election. Trump not only lost the popular vote by millions — he did not legitimately win the swing states of the Electoral College. Michigan, Florida, North Carolina, Arizona, Ohio:  every one was stolen through sophisticated, and sickeningly racist vote suppression tactics. If you saw my report for Democracy Now! on election morning, it revealed that Ohio GOP officials turned off anti-hacking software on voting machines, forced Black voters to wait hours in line (while whites had no wait). And, crucially, I confirmed that purged tens of thousands of minority voters on fake accusations they’d voted twice.  I first exposed this bogus double-voter blacklist called Crosscheck, in Rolling Stone. It’s the sick excrescence crafted by Kris Kobach, the Trump transition team's maven who also created the Muslim-tracker software he’s bringing to the Trump administration. What can we do now? I have been INUNDATED with requests for my factual reports and findings by media and, most important, the front-line activist groups preparing for the fierce fight to protect our votes. Some examples: Rev. William Barber of the NAACP filed a suit based in North Carolina,  hoping to overturn the Trump "victory" — and protect the tiny margin of the Democrat’s win of the Governor’s mansion.  The NAACP cites my discovery of "Crosscheck" — in which North Carolina removed upwards of 190,000 voters on false charges they voted twice. They now need my facts. Congressmen Keith Ellison and Alcee Hastings of the Congressional Black Caucus, personally presented Attorney General Loretta Lynch with my investigative reports and demanded investigation — "and indictments."  That investigation must kick off immediately. They now need my facts. The Asian-American civil rights group 18 Million Rising has gathered 50,000 signatures to push the Justice Department to investigate my evidence of a massive attack on the Asian-American vote. They now need my facts. In Michigan, the ACLU is ready to take action on the purge scheme I uncovered, "Crosscheck," that wrongly gave the state to Trump. In Ohio, voting rights attorney Robert Fitrakis is going into court with evidence, much that I uncovered, of racist voting games — from 5-hour-long lines in Black precincts to shutting off ballot security measures on the voting machines. The team need my facts. I expect to be in Washington at the Justice Dept and meeting with civil rights groups in December before the Electoral College meets. Information—plus film, video, investigative reports And beyond the voluminous files and confidential documents my team has uncovered that is sought by activists, we are deluged with requests for our film, videos, writings and more. And now we have US networks, even major comedy shows, asking for our material and, of course, new investigative findings. Information and facts make a difference With our investigative reports, with our hard and unassailable evidence, we can challenge the legitimacy of the Trump "election."  Most important, we must begin the difficult but necessary work of protecting and restoring voting rights.  The 2018 Election — and the threat of more stolen elections — is upon us. What we need to keep going...  Your extraordinary support and faith in our work funded my film The Best Democracy Money Can Buy, which is now more relevant than ever and being seen by ever more audiences. Now we need your financial support again to keep this fight going. We just did not budget for the GOP's in-your-face steal of the Congress and White House.  All our resources went into raising the alarm before the election. So, now, I have to re-hire the staff, hit the road again. Ohio, North Carolina, Washington DC and who knows where, retain attorneys—and retain our team of technicians from cameramen to outreach organizers. Can this new work be done? Is there any choice? Honestly and personally, I was hoping for some rest and time off. But a lifetime of your work and mine is now in the balance. ● PLEASE, say, "Count me in to count the votes" by supporting the 2016 Stolen Election Investigation for a donation of any size no matter how small or large ● Be listed as a producer ($1,000) or co-producer ($500) in the credits of the broadcast version of my film The Best Democracy Money Can Buy ● Stay informed and get a signed DVD of my film The Best Democracy Money Can Buy, a signed copy of the book with the same title or better still - get the Book & DVD combo. And does an angel have the $8K needed for our Washington work and filming?  If so, flap your wings. I can't thank you enough for all the years of support. Alas... our work is not done. Greg Palast and the Palast Investigations Team * * * * * Greg Palast (Rolling Stone, Guardian, BBC) is the author of The New York Times bestsellers, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy and Billionaires & Ballot Bandits, now out as major motion non-fiction movie. Donate to the Palast Investigative Fund and get the signed DVD. Download the FREE Movie Comic Book. Rent or buy the film from Amazon or Vimeo. Visit the Palast Investigative Fund store or simply make a tax-deductible contribution to keep our work alive!  Or support the The Palast Investigative Fund (a project of The Sustainable Markets Foundation) by shopping with Amazon Smile. AmazonSmile will donate 0.5% of your purchases to the Palast Fund and you get a tax-deduction! More info. GregPalast.com   The post Here’s what we do now A personal note by Greg Palast appeared first on Greg Palast.20 Nov 16
Ethnic Votes Stolen in Crucial States Help Fix US Election For Trump Reveals Greg Palast - By Ben Gelblum | The London Economic Throughout the US election campaign one of The Donald’s main refrains was “this election is rigged.” Turns out this particular Trump election rallying cry wasn’t a lie… Well, not entirely. Veteran election investigator Greg Palast has uncovered the sickening truth. I spoke to Palast about evidence of widespread systemic election rigging, robbing black, hispanic and asian American voters of their right to vote in crucial states. – Enough votes to swing the election away from the Hillary Clinton victory predicted in polls – explaining suspicious exit polls inconsistencies – and towards a shock result for Trump and Republican victory in the Senate. “Before a single vote was even cast, the election was already fixed by Trump operatives,” explains Palast. “This country is violently divided. There simply aren’t enough white guys to elect Trump nor a Republican Senate. The only way they could win was to eliminate the votes of non-white guys—and they did so by tossing black provisional ballots into the dumpster, new strict voter ID laws that saw students and low income voters turned away—the list goes on.” Palast has spent the past decade and a half investigating and identifying several techniques used to suppress ethnic minority and young votes – the voters that statistically vote Democrat. And this is surely the biggest and most unreported scandal of the most bizarre election any of us can recall. According to The Guardian, Palast is the “most important investigative reporter of our time – up there with Woodward and Bernstein.” The fast-talking fedora-topped reporter has investigated election irregularities for publications such as The Guardian, Rolling Stone, and BBC’s Newsnight, ever since the controversial Bush v Gore election in 2000. The 2000 election was too close to call without Florida, where votes were counted and recounted for weeks before George W Bush won the state by a margin of just 537 votes out of almost 6 million, and as a result the presidency. Palast uncovered the purge of 56,000 black voters in Florida – wrongly deleted from voter rolls as ex-felons. Now Palast’s investigative team are certain that vote suppression techniques were instrumental in last week’s Republican presidential and Senate victory. “For years I have been following the American election process which is nothing like in England,” says Palast. “Election manipulation is a very big factor in US elections. I found we had a massive problem in Florida in 2000, similarly in 2004 in Ohio with tens of thousands of invalidated votes. And now we are back at it again.” So why were Trump and his acolytes constantly drawing attention to vote rigging during the campaign? Trump was constantly banging on about debunked claims of large scale voter fraud, urging supporters to volunteer to monitor the polls, and creating an atmosphere where hysteria and conspiracy theories abounded. Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, talked about busloads of people voting numerous times in some big cities. He also quipped that “dead people generally vote for Democrats, rather than Republicans.” Yet truly, you are more likely to be struck by lightning in the next year (a one in 1,042,000 chance, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) than to find a case of voter fraud by impersonation (31 in over a billion ballots cast from 2000 to 2014, according to Loyola law school’s research). Trump allies often cited the fact that Mitt Romney failed to win a single vote in 59 out of 1,687 Philadelphia precincts that happened to be almost entirely black. But with their demographic make up it’s no surprise why and investigations by Philadelphia’s Republican Party and the Philadelphia Inquirer found nothing untoward. Nationwide, 93% of black voters voted for Barack Obama that year. In 2012, an Arizona State University study concluded: “while fraud has occurred, the rate is infinitesimal, and in-person voter impersonation on Election Day, which prompted 37 state legislatures to enact or consider tough voter ID laws, is virtually non-existent.” Yet despite the lack of evidence or convictions for the crime of multiple voting, certain Republican figures devised draconian systems to prevent it, which have also served to deny electorally significant sections of the population of their right to vote. – Disproportionately ethnic votes, which are way more likely to be Democrats. And now the election is over, according to Palast, Trump’s increasing hysteria about vote rigging served as the ultimate smokescreen for a systematic denial of hundreds of thousands of crucial votes in the name of preventing fraud. – A ‘bigly’ enough scam to win Trump the Whitehouse. Palast started investigating Donald Trump’s increasingly hysterical claims that the election was rigged by people voting many times for Rolling Stone Magazine, and made some shocking discoveries in his report last August: The GOP’s Stealth War Against Voters. As a response to constant paranoia about voter fraud, 30 mainly Republican states have adopted a system called the Interstate Voter Registration Crosscheck Program (Crosscheck), according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. This system was devised in 2005 by Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, better known as the anti-immigration fanatic responsible for Trump’s idea of building a wall on the US / Mexico border and getting Mexico to pay for it. Kobach, like Trump, has given lip service to conspiracy theories, especially ones that bolster fears of the growing influence of racial and ethnic minorities in the U.S. And now, interestingly he has been rewarded by Trump with a job on his Transition Team as adviser on immigration. Kobach convinced other states, including crucial swing states such as Michigan and North Carolina, to share their voter lists to look for the same name potentially registered to vote in more than one state. Crosscheck supposedly matches first, middle and last name, plus birth date, and provides the last four digits of a Social Security number for additional verification. Seems like a sensible method to stop people voting more than once in separate states. Only it soon became clear that Crosschecking was neither accurate nor fair and was not being used as it should. Some states including Florida dropped out of the program due to doubts about the reliability of its data — though others joined despite them. Palast’s team discovered Crosscheck had amassed a list of 7.2 million voters accused of being potential double voters.  Yet despite such an enormous list of suspects, there has only been four arrests. “It is a crime to deliberately register to vote twice,” says Palast. “You go to jail for five years. And to organise double voting on a significant scale is practically impossible. They are basically arresting no one – about four arrests out of a list which identified around seven million potential double voters, and I doubt these arrests are even due to the list.” Palast’s team managed (legally) to get hold of over 2 million names identified as potential double voters and soon began to spot obvious mistakes. The failsafes of National Insurance number and date of birth meant to make the system foolproof were not attached and appeared to have been ignored. “The most common name in the world is Mohamed Mohamed,” explains Palast, scanning through the list of names, “so for example under this Trump hit list, Mohamed Said Mohamed is supposed to be the same voter as Mohamed Osman Mohamed – in fact about one out of four middle names don’t match and Jr and Sr don’t match – so for example with James Brown a very common black name – they are matching James Brown Sr to James Brown Jr and saying it’s the same voter and then the middle names don’t even match.” U.S. Census data shows that minorities are overrepresented in 85 of 100 of the most common last names. “If your name is Washington, there’s an 89 percent chance you’re African-American,” says Palast. “If your last name is Hernandez, there’s a 94 percent chance you’re Hispanic.” This inherent bias results in an astonishing one in six Hispanics, one in seven Asian-Americans and one in nine African-Americans in Crosscheck states landing on what Palast dubs “Trump’s hit list.”  Potential double registrants were sent a postcard and asked to verify their address by mailing it back. “The junk mail experts we spoke to said this postcard is meant not to be returned. It’s inscrutable small print, doesn’t mean anything. It doesn’t even say you’re accused of voting twice. It just says, please confirm your voting address,” explains Palast, “and most people of colour, poor voters don’t respond to this sort of mailing and they know that.” According to the Census Bureau, white voters are 21 percent more likely than blacks or Hispanics to respond to official requests; homeowners are 32 percent more likely to respond than renters; and the young are 74 percent less likely than the old to respond. Those on the move – students and the poor, who often shift apartments while hunting for work – might not get the mail in the first place. So if a few older white people, more likely to vote Republican were caught up in the mainly ethnic hit list, they were more likely to return the card and retain their right to vote. If you do not reply to the missive, state officials have discretion over what to do next, and the process varies from state to state. What Palast’s investigation made clear is ethnic voters were disproportionately likely to be targeted and purged from voter lists. All this despite other states choosing a more reliable system to prevent double voting: the Electronic Registration Information Center, (ERIC) – adopted by 20 member states plus the District of Columbia, according to its website. A 2013 report found ERIC actually boosted voter registration and turnout and eliminated errors in voter files. Palast’s investigators calculated 1.1 million people, many spread over crucial swing states were deprived of their right to vote last Tuesday.  According to the exit polls last Tuesday, 88% of black voters voted for Hillary Clinton, as well as  65% of hispanic and asian American voters. “The list is loaded overwhelmingly with voters of colour and the poor,” says Palast. “Many didn’t discover that their vote was stolen until they turned up last Tuesday and found their name missing. In the US they are given something called a provisional ballot, but if your name is not on the voter roll, you can fill out all the provisional votes you like they’re not going to count your vote. – They can’t even if you’re wrongly removed. “Trump’s victory margin in Michigan was 13,107 and the Michigan Crosscheck purge list was 449,922. Trump’s victory margin in Arizona- 85,257, Arizona Crosscheck purge list- 270,824;. Trump’s victory margin in North Carolina was 177,008 and the North Carolina Crosscheck purge list had 589,393 people on it.” Crosscheck was by no means the only method that came to light to disenfranchise voters more likely to vote Democrat. Palast also cites statistics on vote spoilage – “In the UK, glitches, spoiled or empty ballots are random,  but here, the US Civil Rights Commission found in Florida you are 900% more likely to lose your vote to spoilage if you are black than if you are white.” Statistician Philip Clinker author of the study, has said that this is typical nationwide, and according to Palast, if anything, the situation has got worse since the 2000 study. In 2013, the Supreme Court overturned part of the Voting Rights Act enacted in 1965 at the heart of the Civil Right Movement to prohibit racial discrimination in voting. This allowed all kinds of shenanigans in the lead up to last week that previously could have been challenged by the Department of Justice. In North Carolina, for example, Republicans even bragged: “African American Early Voting is Down.” – This after a federal court federal court found their voting restrictions “target African-Americans with almost surgical precision.” States, particularly those controlled by Republicans, made several changes this year, such as stricter voter ID laws and restricting polling booths, to make voting harder in a way that targeted generally Democrat-voting ethnic minority voters. There were reports of ridiculously long queues. As this is not the first election this has happened in, it appears to be a deliberate tactic. Harvard’s Stephen Pettigrew who studies polling lines found that ethnic minority voters were six times more likely to have to stand in line for over an hour. And losing out on work from disproportionately long queues costs people in ethnic minority areas proportionately more in lost income, which also puts them off voting next time. Pettigrew estimated that 200,000 people did not vote in 2014 because of queues encountered in 2012. “Election day was marred by long lines due to cuts in early voting and 868 fewer polling places,” adds Palast, “to say nothing of the untold millions who were unable to vote due to restrictive voter ID and felon disenfranchisement laws.” During the election last week, Palast also made a shocking discovery about voting machines in Ohio – one of the states in which he found many black voters were disenfranchised by a mixture of the Crosscheck and other systems, and exit polls differed markedly from the counted votes. “In the state of Ohio they have fancy new machines which can record an image of your vote and an anti-hacking function. They were turned off,” explains Palast. “I went to court with Bob Fitrakis a law professor in Ohio to have this overturned. I went into the judge’s chamber, and there the Republicans did not deny that it was turned off but they said to turn it back on would create havoc. – This after the FBI had issued a warning that they feared the machines would be hacked. “If you get such a warning, why would you turn off the anti-hacking mechanism? All this means we will never know if the machines were hacked and how many votes were lost if there was a challenge as there was no image of the vote recorded.” Greg Palast’s documentary and book The Best Democracy Money Can Buy  further details his warnings about voter suppression techniques we haven’t even mentioned in this article. “I stuck my neck out last year, saying they would steal this election, and I really hoped I would be left looking like an idiot.  “Turns out I was right though,” he adds. “The problem with the electoral college is a few thousand votes in tiny states can flip an election.” – An election President Elect Donald J Trump won despite still trailing nationwide in the popular vote. – A problem Donald Trump railed about too in the past, calling it “a disaster for democracy.” Civil rights organisation NAACP, which nine times managed to see off voter suppression of hundreds of thousands of votes in the federal courts over the past few months, is now mounting a legal battle to reinstate fully the Voter Registration Act. Palast and his team are certain that the chicanery they and others uncovered more than explains the difference between the outcome polls predicted and the result of the presidential and senate elections – especially when it comes to the exit polls taken as people had just voted. “Crosscheck does not account for all the shoplifting, but if you put it together with the other nine methods to steal votes that I identified, there’s little question that the exit polls were correct and Hillary Clinton won, or at least more voters voted for her in the swing states. Obviously she won the popular vote, but we have an electoral college system. If they counted all the votes in all the swing states the traditionally highly accurate exit polls would have been accurate,” adds Palast. Electoral Integrity blogger Theodore de Macedo Soares drew attention to the bizarre discrepancy between computer counted official vote counts and exit polls last week, writing: “According to the exit polls conducted by Edison Research, Clinton won four key battleground states (NC, PA, WI, and FL) in the 2016 Presidential Election that she went on to lose in the computerized vote counts.  With these states Clinton wins the Electoral College with a count of 302 versus 205 for Trump.  Clinton also won the national exit poll by 3.2% and holds a narrow lead in the national vote count still in progress. Exit polls were conducted in 28 states. In 23 states the discrepancies between the exit polls and the vote count favored Trump. In 13 of these states the discrepancies favoring Trump exceeded the margin of error of the state.” Palast believes such discrepancies, some far greater than any acceptable margin of error are indicative of systematic electoral rigging to steal Democrat votes: “The bane of pre-election polling is that pollsters must adjust for the likelihood of a person voting.  Exit polls solve the problem. The US State Department uses exit polling to determine whether you accept the outcome of a foreign election. The Brexit exit polls were extremely accurate. Yet in the Ukraine the US does not accept the result of the 2004 election because of the exit poll mismatch with the final official count. “And here for example in North Carolina we have the exit poll raw data at 2.1% favouring victory by Clinton, yet she loses by 3.8% in the final count. In Pennsylvania 4.4% victory suddenly became a 1.2 % loss; Wisconsin: 3.9% victory becomes a 1% loss; Florida: 1.1% victory becomes a 1% loss. “In the swing States we have this massive red shift because when people come out of the votes, exit pollsters can only ask, “How did you vote?” What they don’t ask, and can’t, is, “Was your vote counted?”” Kris Kobach did not give us a comment, but a statement from Kris Kobach’s office on the Crosscheck program said the Crosscheck program had been used for over a decade, and insisted “merely appearing as a potential match does not subject a voter to removal from a participating states’ voter registration roll/record.  Ineligible and/or unqualified persons who are registered voters are only removed from a states’ voter registration roll/record if the person is subject to removal pursuant to applicable state and federal elections provisions.”           The post Ethnic Votes Stolen in Crucial States Help Fix US Election For Trump Reveals Greg Palast appeared first on Greg Palast.15 Nov 16
The Election was Stolen – Here’s How… - Before a single vote was cast, the election was fixed by GOP and Trump operatives. Starting in 2013 – just as the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act – a coterie of Trump operatives, under the direction of Kris Kobach, Kansas Secretary of State, created a system to purge 1.1 million Americans of color from the voter rolls of GOP–controlled states. The system, called Crosscheck, is detailed in my Rolling Stone report, “The GOP’s Stealth War on Voters,” 8/24/2016. Crosscheck in action:   Trump victory margin in Michigan:                    13,107 Michigan Crosscheck purge list:                       449,922 Trump victory margin in Arizona:                       85,257 Arizona Crosscheck purge list:                           270,824 Trump victory margin in North Carolina:        177,008 North Carolina Crosscheck purge list:              589,393 On Tuesday, we saw Crosscheck elect a Republican Senate and as President, Donald Trump.  The electoral putsch was aided by nine other methods of attacking the right to vote of Black, Latino and Asian-American voters, methods detailed in my book and film, including “Caging,” “purging,” blocking legitimate registrations, and wrongly shunting millions to “provisional” ballots that will never be counted. Trump signaled the use of “Crosscheck” when he claimed the election is “rigged” because “people are voting many, many times.”  His operative Kobach, who also advised Trump on building a wall on the southern border, devised a list of 7.2 million “potential” double voters—1.1 million of which were removed from the voter rolls by Tuesday. The list is loaded overwhelmingly with voters of color and the poor. Here's a sample of the listThose accused of criminal double voting include, for example, Donald Alexander Webster Jr. of Ohio who is accused of voting a second time in Virginia as Donald EUGENE Webster SR. Note: Watch the four-minute video summary of Crosscheck. The investigation and explanation of these methods of fixing the vote can be found in my book and film, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy: a Tale of Billionaires & Ballot Bandits (2016). No, not everyone on the list loses their vote.  But this was not the only racially poisonous tactic that accounted for this purloined victory by Trump and GOP candidates. For example, in the swing state of North Carolina, it was reported that 6,700 Black folk lost their registrations because their registrations had been challenged by a group called Voter Integrity Project (VIP). VIP sent letters to households in Black communities “do not forward.”  If the voter had moved within the same building, or somehow did not get their mail (e.g. if their name was not on a mail box), they were challenged as “ghost” voters.  GOP voting officials happily complied with VIP with instant cancellation of registrations. The 6,700 identified in two counties were returned to the rolls through a lawsuit.  However, there was not one mention in the press that VIP was also behind Crosscheck in North Carolina; nor that its leader, Col. Jay Delancy, whom I’ve tracked for years has previously used this vote thievery, known as “caging,” for years.  Doubtless the caging game was wider and deeper than reported.  And by the way, caging, as my Rolling Stone co-author, attorney Robert F. Kennedy Jr., tells me, is “a felony, it’s illegal, and punishable by high fines and even jail time.” There is still much investigation to do.  For example, there are millions of “provisional” ballots, “spoiled” (invalidated) ballots and ballots rejected from the approximately 30 million mailed in.  Unlike reporting in Britain, US media does not report the ballots that are rejected and tossed out—because, after all, as Joe Biden says, “Our elections are the envy of the world.”  Only in Kazakhstan, Joe. While there is a great deal of work to do, much documentation still to analyze, we’ll have to pry it from partisan voting chiefs who stamp the scrub lists, Crosscheck lists and ballot records, “confidential.” But, the evidence already in our hands makes me sadly confident in saying, Jim Crow, not the voters, elected Mr. Trump. What about those exit polls? Exit polls are the standard by which the US State Department measures the honesty of foreign elections.  Exit polling is, historically, deadly accurate. The bane of pre-election polling is that pollsters must adjust for the likelihood of a person voting.  Exit polls solve the problem. But three times in US history, pollsters have had to publicly flagellate themselves for their “errors.”  In 2000, exit polls gave Al Gore the win in Florida; in 2004, exit polls gave Kerry the win in Ohio, and now, in swing states, exit polls gave the presidency to Hillary Clinton. So how could these multi-million-dollar Ph.d-directed statisticians with decades of experience get exit polls so wrong? Answer:  they didn’t.  The polls in Florida in 2000 were accurate.  That’s because exit pollsters can only ask, “How did you vote?”  What they don’t ask, and can’t, is, “Was your vote counted.” In 2000, in Florida, GOP Secretary of State Katherine Harris officially rejected 181,173 ballots, as “spoiled” because their chads were hung and other nonsense excuses.  Those ballots overwhelmingly were marked for Al Gore.  The exit polls included those 181,173 people who thought they had voted – but their vote didn’t count.  In other words, the exit polls accurately reflected whom the voters chose, not what Katherine Harris chose. In 2004, a similar number of votes were invalidated (including an enormous pile of “provisional” ballots) by Ohio’s GOP Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell.  Again, the polls reflected that Kerry was the choice of 51% of the voters.  But the exit polls were “wrong” because they didn’t reflect the ballots invalidated by Blackwell. Notably, two weeks after the 2004 US election, the US State Department refused the recognize the Ukraine election results because the official polls contradicted the exit polls. And here we go again. 2016: Hillary wins among those queried as they exit the polling station—yet Trump is declared winner in GOP-controlled swings states. And, once again, the expert pollsters are forced to apologize—when they should be screaming, “Fraud!  Here’s the evidence the vote was fixed!” Now there’s a new trope to explain away the exit polls that gave Clinton the win.  Supposedly, Trump voters were ashamed to say they voted for Trump.  Really?  ON WHAT PLANET?  For Democracy Now! and Rolling Stone I was out in several swing states.  In Ohio, yes, a Black voter may have been reluctant to state support for Trump. But a white voter in the exurbs of Dayton, where the Trump signs grew on lawns like weeds, and the pews of the evangelical mega churches were slathered with Trump and GOP brochures, risked getting spat on if they even whispered, “Hillary.” This country is violently divided, but in the end, there simply aren’t enough white guys to elect Trump nor a Republican Senate.  The only way they could win was to eliminate the votes of non-white guys—and they did so by tossing Black provisional ballots into the dumpster, ID laws that turn away students—the list goes on.  It’s a web of complex obstacles to voting by citizens of color topped by that lying spider, Crosscheck. ***** Rent it or buy Greg Palast's movie from Amazon or Vimeo. Greg Palast (Rolling Stone, Guardian, BBC) is the author of The New York Times bestsellers, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy and Billionaires & Ballot Bandits, now out as major motion non-fiction movie. Donate to the Palast Investigative Fund and get the signed DVD. Download the FREE Movie Comic Book. Rent or buy the film from Amazon or Vimeo. Visit the Palast Investigative Fund store or simply make a tax-deductible contribution to keep our work alive!  Or support the The Palast Investigative Fund (a project of The Sustainable Markets Foundation) by shopping with Amazon Smile. AmazonSmile will donate 0.5% of your purchases to the Palast Fund and you get a tax-deduction! More info. GregPalast.com   The post The Election was Stolen – Here’s How… appeared first on Greg Palast.11 Nov 16

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(U//FOUO) U.K. Ministry of Defence Guide: Understanding the Arab People - The Arab World is a vast area which is home to people from diverse cultures. The way in which people behave and interact with you will therefore vary greatly across the region. This guide discusses aspects of Arab culture that you might experience in Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Oman, the Palestinian Territories, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Yemen. Further reading on individual countries is recommended before you deploy. Most Arabs are Sunni Muslims who speak Arabic. However, there are many different religions, ethnic and social groups in the Arab world, among them Christians, Jews, Shi’a and Sunni Muslims, Kurds, Turks and Berbers. Some of these groups have suffered oppression in their countries, but many live happily as Arabs and as part of Arab society. While some Arab countries are very conservative and have strict rules about the role of women, others are more permissive in their approach to issues like alcohol, religion and education. The familiar stereotype of the Bedouin Arab with his camel, tent, robes and blood feuds is only a small part of Arab identity and history. In fact, this traditional way of life has died out in many parts of the Arab world, and is not significant today in areas like North Africa. With the improvement in technology and social media in recent years, people across the Arab World have been exposed to other cultures to a much greater degree than previous generations. Approximately 70% of the Arab World are under the age of 30 and so the entire region is undergoing a transformation as people try to find ways to integrate their traditional cultures into the modern world. … Religious Practice. Islam affects almost every aspect of life as a Muslim Arab. People use Islamic symbols to decorate their homes and cars, carry miniature Qur’ans with them, and go on pilgrimage to various holy shrines around the Arab world. Most Arabs follow a pattern of daily prayer, celebrate Islamic festivals and holidays, and adhere to the rules of Islam. Verses from the Qur’an are memorised. In most Arab countries, Islam also affects politics and law, influencing marriage, inheritance and divorce law, as well as many aspects of business and banking. It is common to see a copy of the qu’ran on car dashboards in Muslim countries. Sharia. Sharia is the law as revealed by God and based on the philosophy laid out in the Qur’an and Hadith (the sayings of the Prophet Muhammed). It provides the legal basis for all public rituals but also guides an individual in their personal life, such as how to wash and how to behave in relationships. Sharia is interpreted for the people by religious scholars (collectively known as an Ulema). In Saudi Arabia and Sudan, sharia is interpreted very strictly and encompasses all aspects of domestic and civil law. In other countries it is integrated with other influences. For example, Tunisia is a former French colony and during that period French civil law applied. Since gaining independence the law has developed and evolved to incorporate sharia into the existing framework, resulting in a more liberal interpretation. Christians. There are an estimated 12-16 million Christians in the Arab world, representing 5-7% of the total population. Larger communities are located in Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, Sudan, Jordan and Iraq. The Coptic church is the most important Christian denomination in the Middle East, and suffers from discrimination in Egypt and elsewhere. A significant minority of these Christians do not consider themselves Arabs. … 8 Jan
(U//LES) ATF Chemical Analysis of Exploding Targets - Over the past few months, ATF Agents have contacted the Forensic Lab to inquire about the chemical components of various exploding targets. To assist Agents with their inquiry, exploding targets were purchased (September 2012 to October 2012) from numerous distributors and chemically analyzed. All exploding targets contain an oxidizer and a fuel (catalyst). When these two components are properly mixed, the resulting mixture becomes a shock sensitive explosive. The exploding target oxidizers and fuels were analyzed using Infrared Spectroscopy, Scanning Electron Microscope / Electron Dispersive Spectroscopy (SEM/EDS), and X-Ray Diffraction. All analysis was supervised by Forensic Chemist John Jermain. For additional questions and information, contact John at 925.280.3607. Additional studies dealing with exploding targets will be conducted by Forensic Chemist Brittany Crane and will be published at a later date. … 7 Jan
Office of the Director of National Intelligence Background Report: Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent US Elections - “Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent US Elections” is a declassified version of a highly classified assessment that has been provided to the President and to recipients approved by the President. The Intelligence Community rarely can publicly reveal the full extent of its knowledge or the precise bases for its assessments, as the release of such information would reveal sensitive sources or methods and imperil the ability to collect critical foreign intelligence in the future. Thus, while the conclusions in the report are all reflected in the classified assessment, the declassified report does not and cannot include the full supporting information, including specific intelligence and sources and methods. The Analytic Process The mission of the Intelligence Community is to seek to reduce the uncertainty surrounding foreign activities, capabilities, or leaders’ intentions. This objective is difficult to achieve when seeking to understand complex issues on which foreign actors go to extraordinary lengths to hide or obfuscate their activities. On these issues of great importance to US national security, the goal of intelligence analysis is to provide assessments to decisionmakers that are intellectually rigorous, objective, timely, and useful, and that adhere to tradecraft standards. The tradecraft standards for analytic products have been refined over the past ten years. These standards include describing sources (including their reliability and access to the information they provide), clearly expressing uncertainty, distinguishing between underlying information and analysts’ judgments and assumptions, exploring alternatives, demonstrating relevance to the customer, using strong and transparent logic, and explaining change or consistency in judgments over time. Applying these standards helps ensure that the Intelligence Community provides US policymakers, warfighters, and operators with the best and most accurate insight, warning, and context, as well as potential opportunities to advance US national security. Intelligence Community analysts integrate information from a wide range of sources, including human sources, technical collection, and open source information, and apply specialized skills and structured analytic tools to draw inferences informed by the data available, relevant past activity, and logic and reasoning to provide insight into what is happening and the prospects for the future. A critical part of the analyst’s task is to explain uncertainties associated with major judgments based on the quantity and quality of the source material, information gaps, and the complexity of the issue. When Intelligence Community analysts use words such as “we assess” or “we judge,” they are conveying an analytic assessment or judgment. Some analytic judgments are based directly on collected information; others rest on previous judgments, which serve as building blocks in rigorous analysis. In either type of judgment, the tradecraft standards outlined above ensure that analysts have an appropriate basis for the judgment. Intelligence Community judgments often include two important elements: judgments of how likely it is that something has happened or will happen (using terms such as “likely” or “unlikely”) and confidence levels in those judgments (low, moderate, and high) that refer to the evidentiary basis, logic and reasoning, and precedents that underpin the judgments. Determining Attribution in Cyber Incidents The nature of cyberspace makes attribution of cyber operations difficult but not impossible. Every kind of cyber operation—malicious or not—leaves a trail. US Intelligence Community analysts use this information, their constantly growing knowledge base of previous events and known malicious actors, and their knowledge of how these malicious actors work and the tools that they use, to attempt to trace these operations back to their source. In every case, they apply the same tradecraft standards described in the Analytic Process above. Analysts consider a series of questions to assess how the information compares with existing knowledge and adjust their confidence in their judgments as appropriate to account for any alternative hypotheses and ambiguities. An assessment of attribution usually is not a simple statement of who conducted an operation, but rather a series of judgments that describe whether it was an isolated incident, who was the likely perpetrator, that perpetrator’s possible motivations, and whether a foreign government had a role in ordering or leading the operation. … 6 Jan
U.S. National Electric Grid Security and Resilience Action Plan - The Joint United States-Canada Electric Grid Security and Resilience Strategy (Strategy) is a collaborative effort between the Federal Governments of the United States and Canada and is intended to strengthen the security and resilience of the U.S. and Canadian electric grid from all adversarial, technological, and natural hazards and threats. The Strategy, released concurrently with this National Electric Grid Security and Resilience Action Plan (Action Plan), details bilateral goals to address the vulnerabilities of the respective and shared electric grid infrastructure of the United States and Canada, not only as an energy security concern, but for reasons of national security. The implementation of the Strategy requires continued action of a nationwide network of governments, departments and agencies (agencies), and private sector partners. This Action Plan details the activities, deliverables, and timelines that will be undertaken primarily by U.S. Federal agencies for the United States to make progress toward the Strategy’s goals. The security and resilience of the integrated U.S. and Canadian electric grid is dynamic. New threats, hazards, and vulnerabilities emerge even as the two countries work to prevent, protect against, and mitigate their potential consequences and to improve their ability to respond to, and recover from, disruptive incidents. Secure and reliable electricity is essential for safe and continued operation of infrastructure owned by businesses, governments, schools, hospitals, and other organizations. Structure of the Action Plan The Strategy defines three strategic goals to reduce the systemic risk to the electric grid through combined and aligned organizational, technical, and policy efforts across the public and private sectors. This Action Plan is organized around the same three strategic goals: 1. Protect Today’s Electric Grid and Enhance Preparedness 2. Manage Contingencies and Enhance Response and Recovery Efforts 3. Build a More Secure and Resilient Future Electric Grid Implementation of the Strategy and Action Plan The Secretaries of Energy and Homeland Security, in coordination with other agencies and stakeholders, will lead the implementation of the Strategy and Action Plan. The Secretaries of Energy and Homeland Security will report annually to the Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism and the Assistant to the President for Science and Technology on progress made in implementing the Strategy and Action Plan in coordination with other agencies. Agencies are also expected to take steps to increase the security and resilience of the electric grid that are not explicitly included in either the Strategy or Action Plan. These efforts will also be included in the progress report to the President. This Action Plan is not intended to, nor does it, create any binding obligations under international law. The Action Plan focuses on U.S. Federal actions that may be taken within current statutory authorities and resources. Implementation of these actions will occur in consultation with State and provincial governments, regulators, and utilities, where applicable, and will require the sustained, coordinated, and complementary efforts of individuals and groups from both the United States and Canada, including many who contributed to the development of the Strategy, such as private sector partners, policy makers, and the public. Agencies will engage with private sector partners to the extent permitted by and consistent with applicable law and policy, including, but not limited to, the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), 5 U.S.C. App. 2. Iterations and future developments of this effort will be guided by each country’s Action Plan to pursue the goals of the Strategy. The Strategy sets the groundwork upon which to build future activity, just as multiple prior executive branch efforts informed the Strategy: •• Presidential Policy Directive (PPD) 8, “National Preparedness” (2011), PPD 21, “Critical Infrastructure Security and Resilience” (2013), and PPD 41, “United States Cyber Incident Coordination” (2016); •• Executive Order 13636, “Improving Critical Infrastructure Cybersecurity,” Executive Order 13653, “Preparing the United States for the Impacts of Climate Change” (2013), and Executive Order 13744, “Coordinating Efforts to Prepare the Nation for Space Weather Events” (2016); •• Presidential Memorandum, “Climate Change and National Security” (2016); •• National Space Weather Strategy and National Space Weather Action Plan (2015). 2 Jan
Joint United States-Canada Electric Grid Security and Resilience Strategy - This Joint United States-Canada Electric Grid Security and Resilience Strategy (Strategy) is a collaborative effort between the Federal Governments of the United States and Canada and is intended to strengthen the security and resilience of the U.S. and Canadian electric grid from all adversarial, technological, and natural hazards and threats. The Strategy addresses the vulnerabilities of the two countries’ respective and shared electric grid infrastructure, not only as an energy security concern, but for reasons of national security. This joint Strategy relies on the existing strong bilateral collaboration between the United States and Canada, and reflects a joint commitment to enhance a shared approach to risk management for the electric grid. It also articulates a common vision of the future electric grid that depends on effective and expanded collaboration among those who own, operate, protect, and rely on the electric grid. Because the electric grid is complex, vital to the functioning of modern society, and dependent on other infrastructure for its function, the United States and Canada developed the Strategy under the shared principle that security and resilience require increasingly collaborative efforts and shared approaches to risk management. The Strategy envisions a secure and resilient electric grid that is able to withstand hazards and recover efficiently from disruptions. In pursuit of this goal, the Strategy organizes joint approaches to protect today’s electric grid, manage contingencies by enhancing response and recovery capabilities, and cultivate a more secure and resilient future electric grid. As an expression of shared intent and approach, the Strategy organizes joint efforts to manage current and future security challenges. Three strategic goals underpin the effort to strengthen the security and resilience of the electric grid: •• Protect Today’s Electric Grid and Enhance Preparedness: A secure and resilient electric grid that protects system assets and critical functions and is able to withstand and recover rapidly from disruptions is a priority for the governments of both the United States and Canada. •• Manage Contingencies and Enhance Response and Recovery Efforts: The Strategy sets out a shared approach for enhancing continuity and response capabilities, supporting mutual aid arrangements such as cyber mutual assistance across a diverse set of stakeholders, understanding interdependencies, and expanding available tools for recovery and rebuilding. •• Build a More Secure and Resilient Future Electric Grid: The United States and Canada are working to build a more secure and resilient electric grid that is responsive to a variety of threats, hazards, and vulnerabilities. To achieve this, the electric grid will need to be more flexible and agile, with an architecture into which new technologies may be readily incorporated. The Strategy will be implemented in accordance with forthcoming U.S. and Canadian Action Plans, which will each detail specific steps and milestones for achieving the Strategy’s goals within their respective countries. These documents are intended to guide future activity within areas of Federal jurisdiction, with full respect for the different jurisdictional authorities in both countries. The Strategy is not intended to, nor does it, create any binding obligations under international law. Implementation will occur in consultation with state and provincial governments, regulators, and utilities, where applicable, and will require the sustained, coordinated, and complementary efforts of individuals and groups from both countries, including many who contributed to the development of the Strategy, such as private sector partners, policy makers, and the public. The two countries’ common effort to strengthen the security and resilience of the electric grid is imperative for both governments and all who depend on this critical asset. 2 Jan
DHS-FBI Joint Analysis Report on GRIZZLY STEPPE Russian Malicious Cyber Activity - This Joint Analysis Report (JAR) is the result of analytic efforts between the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). This document provides technical details regarding the tools and infrastructure used by the Russian civilian and military intelligence Services (RIS) to compromise and exploit networks and endpoints associated with the U.S. election, as well as a range of U.S. Government, political, and private sector entities. The U.S. Government is referring to this malicious cyber activity by RIS as GRIZZLY STEPPE. Previous JARs have not attributed malicious cyber activity to specific countries or threat actors. However, public attribution of these activities to RIS is supported by technical indicators from the U.S. Intelligence Community, DHS, FBI, the private sector, and other entities. This determination expands upon the Joint Statement released October 7, 2016, from the Department of Homeland Security and the Director of National Intelligence on Election Security. This activity by RIS is part of an ongoing campaign of cyber-enabled operations directed at the U.S. government and its citizens. These cyber operations have included spearphishing campaigns targeting government organizations, critical infrastructure entities, think tanks, universities, political organizations, and corporations leading to the theft of information. In foreign countries, RIS actors conducted damaging and/or disruptive cyber-attacks, including attacks on critical infrastructure networks. In some cases, RIS actors masqueraded as third parties, hiding behind false online personas designed to cause the victim to misattribute the source of the attack. This JAR provides technical indicators related to many of these operations, recommended mitigations, suggested actions to take in response to the indicators provided, and information on how to report such incidents to the U.S. Government. … Description The U.S. Government confirms that two different RIS actors participated in the intrusion into a U.S. political party. The first actor group, known as Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) 29, entered into the party’s systems in summer 2015, while the second, known as APT28, entered in spring 2016. Both groups have historically targeted government organizations, think tanks, universities, and corporations around the world. APT29 has been observed crafting targeted spearphishing campaigns leveraging web links to a malicious dropper; once executed, the code delivers Remote Access Tools (RATs) and evades detection using a range of techniques. APT28 is known for leveraging domains that closely mimic those of targeted organizations and tricking potential victims into entering legitimate credentials. APT28 actors relied heavily on shortened URLs in their spearphishing email campaigns. Once APT28 and APT29 have access to victims, both groups exfiltrate and analyze information to gain intelligence value. These groups use this information to craft highly targeted spearphishing campaigns. These actors set up operational infrastructure to obfuscate their source infrastructure, host domains and malware for targeting organizations, establish command and control nodes, and harvest credentials and other valuable information from their targets. In summer 2015, an APT29 spearphishing campaign directed emails containing a malicious link to over 1,000 recipients, including multiple U.S. Government victims. APT29 used legitimate domains, to include domains associated with U.S. organizations and educational institutions, to host malware and send spearphishing emails. In the course of that campaign, APT29 successfully compromised a U.S. political party. At least one targeted individual activated links to malware hosted on operational infrastructure of opened attachments containing malware. APT29 delivered malware to the political party’s systems, established persistence, escalated privileges, enumerated active directory accounts, and exfiltrated email from several accounts through encrypted connections back through operational infrastructure. In spring 2016, APT28 compromised the same political party, again via targeted spearphishing. This time, the spearphishing email tricked recipients into changing their passwords through a fake webmail domain hosted on APT28 operational infrastructure. Using the harvested credentials, APT28 was able to gain access and steal content, likely leading to the exfiltration of information from multiple senior party members. The U.S. Government assesses that information was leaked to the press and publicly disclosed. … Reported Russian Military and Civilian Intelligence Services (RIS) Alternate Names APT28 APT29 Agent.btz BlackEnergy V3 BlackEnergy2 APT CakeDuke Carberp CHOPSTICK CloudDuke CORESHELL CosmicDuke COZYBEAR COZYCAR COZYDUKE CrouchingYeti DIONIS Dragonfly Energetic Bear EVILTOSS Fancy Bear GeminiDuke GREY CLOUD HammerDuke HAMMERTOSS Havex MiniDionis MiniDuke OLDBAIT OnionDuke Operation Pawn Storm PinchDuke Powershell backdoor Quedagh Sandworm SEADADDY Seaduke SEDKIT SEDNIT Skipper Sofacy SOURFACE SYNful Knock Tiny Baron Tsar Team twain_64.dll (64-bit X-Agent implant) VmUpgradeHelper.exe (X-Tunnel implant) Waterbug X-Agent29 Dec 16
(U//FOUO) DHS Cyber Threats to the Homeland Presentation - 28 Dec 16
U.S. House Encryption Working Group Year-End Report 2016 - On February 16, 2016, a federal magistrate judge in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California issued an order requiring Apple, Inc. to assist the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in obtaining encrypted data off of an iPhone related to a 2015 shooting in San Bernardino, California. Apple resisted the order. This particular case was resolved when the FBI pursued a different method to access the data stored on the device. But the case, and the heated rhetoric exchanged by parties on all sides, reignited a decades-old debate about government access to encrypted data. The law enforcement community often refers to their challenge in this context as “going dark.” In essence, “going dark” refers to advancements in technology that leave law enforcement and the national security community unable to obtain certain forms of evidence. In recent years, it has become synonymous with the growing use of strong default encryption available to consumers that makes it increasingly difficult for law enforcement agencies to access both real-time communications and stored information. The FBI has been a leading critic of this trend, arguing that law enforcement may no longer be able “to access the evidence we need to prosecute crime and prevent terrorism, even with lawful authority.” As a result, the law enforcement community has historically advocated for legislation to “ensure that we can continue to obtain electronic information and evidence pursuant to the legal authority that Congress has provided to keep America safe.” Technology companies, civil society advocates, a number of federal agencies, and some members of the academic community argue that encryption protects hundreds of millions of people against theft, fraud, and other criminal acts. Cryptography experts and information security professionals believe that it is exceedingly difficult and impractical, if not impossible, to devise and implement a system that gives law enforcement exceptional access to encrypted data without also compromising security against hackers, industrial spies, and other malicious actors. Further, requiring exceptional access to encrypted data would, by definition, prohibit some encryption design best practices, such as “forward secrecy,” from being implemented. These two outlooks are not mutually exclusive. The widespread adoption of encryption poses a real challenge to the law enforcement community and strong encryption is essential to both individual privacy and national security. A narrative that sets government agencies against private industry, or security interests against individual privacy, does not accurately reflect the complexity of the issue. … Compelled Disclosure by Individuals Although much of the debate has focused on requiring third party companies to decrypt information for the government, an alternative approach might involve compelling decryption by the individual consumers of these products. On a case-by-case basis, with proper court process, requiring an individual to provide a passcode or thumbprint to unlock a device could assist law enforcement in obtaining critical evidence without undermining the security or privacy of the broader population. Given evolving technologies and the trend towards using biometrics—like a fingerprint or facial recognition software—to decrypt data, Congress might consider the following questions: § Can the government compel an individual to unlock his phone without violating the protection against self-incrimination guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution? § With respect to the Fifth Amendment, is there a substantive or legal difference between unlocking a device with a passcode and unlocking the device with a biometric identifier? Is entering a passcode a “testimonial act,” as some courts have held? Is a fingerprint different in any way? § What is the proper legal standard for compelling an individual to unlock a device? § Are there other circumstances that would enable the government to compel production of a passcode without undermining the Fifth Amendment?24 Dec 16
U.S. House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Declassified Report on Snowden Disclosures - In June 2013, former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden perpetrated the largest and most damaging public release of classified information in U.S. intelligence history. In August 2014, the Chairman and Ranking Member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) directed Committee staff to carry out a comprehensive review of the unauthorized disclosures. The aim of the review was to allow the Committee to explain to other Members of Congress–and, where possible, the American people–how this breach occurred, what the U.S. Government knows about the man who committed it, and whether the security shortfalls it highlighted had been remedied. Over the next two years, Committee staff requested hundreds of documents from the Intelligence Community (IC), participated in dozens of briefings and meetings with IC personnel, conducted several interviews with key individuals with knowledge of Snowden’s background and actions, and traveled to NSA Hawaii to visit Snowden’s last two work locations. The review focused on Snowden’s background, how he was able to remove more than 1.5 million classified documents from secure NSA networks, what the 1.5 million documents contained, and the damage their removal caused to national security. The Committee’s review was careful not to disturb any criminal investigation or future prosecution of Snowden, who has remained in Russia since he fled there on June 23, 2013. Accordingly) the Committee did not interview individuals whom the Department of Justice identified as possible witnesses at Snowden’s trial, including Snowden himself, nor did the Committee request any matters that may have occurred before a grand jury. Instead, the IC provided the Committee with access to other individuals who possessed substantively similar knowledge as the possible witnesses. Similarly, rather than interview Snowden’s NSA coworkers and supervisors directly, Committee staff interviewed IC personnel who had reviewed reports of interviews with Snowden’s co-workers and supervisors. The Committee remains hopeful that Snowden will return to the United States to face justice. The bulk of the Committee’s 36-page review, which includes 230 footnotes, must remain classified to avoid causing further harm to national security; however, the Committee has made a number of unclassified findings. These findings demonstrate that the public narrative popularized by Snowden and his allies is rife with falsehoods, exaggerations, and crucial omissions, a pattern that began before he stole 1.5 million sensitive documents. First, Snowden caused tremendous damage to national security, and the vast majority of the documents he stole have nothing to do with programs impacting individual privacy interests-they instead pertain to military, defense? and intelligence programs of great interest to America,s adversaries. A review of the materials Snowden compromised makes clear that he handed over secrets that protect American troops overseas and secrets that provide vital defenses against terrorists and nation-states. Some of Snowden’s disclosures exacerbated and accelerated existing trends that diminished the IC’s capabilities to collect against legitimate foreign intelligence targets, while others resulted in the loss of intelligence streams that had saved American lives. Snowden insists he has not shared the full cache of 1.5 million classified documents with anyone; however, in June 2016, the deputy chairman of the Russian parliaments defense and security committee publicly conceded that “Snowden did share intelligence” with his government. Additionally, although Snowden’s professed objective may have been to inform the general public, the information he released is also available to Russian, Chinese, Iranian, and North Korean govemment intelligence services; any terrorist with Internet access; and many others who wish to do harm to the United States.23 Dec 16
House Oversight Committee Report on Law Enforcement Use of Cell-Site Simulation Technologies - Advances in emerging surveillance technologies like cell-site simulators – devices which transform a cell phone into a real-time tracking device – require careful evaluation to ensure their use is consistent with the protections afforded under the First and Fourth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. The United States’ military and intelligence agencies have developed robust and sophisticated surveillance technologies for deployment in defense against threats from foreign actors. These technologies are essential to keeping America safe. Increasingly though, domestic law enforcement at the federal, state, and local levels are using surveillance technologies in their every-day crime-fighting activities. In the case of cell-site simulators, this technology is being used to investigate a wide range of criminal activity, from human trafficking to narcotics trafficking, as well as kidnapping, and to assist in the apprehension of dangerous and violent fugitives. Law enforcement officers at all levels perform an incredibly difficult and important job and deserve our thanks and appreciation. While law enforcement agencies should be able to utilize technology as a tool to help officers be safe and accomplish their missions, absent proper oversight and safeguards, the domestic use of cell-site simulators may well infringe upon the constitutional rights of citizens to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures, as well as the right to free association. Transparency and accountability are therefore critical to ensuring that when domestic law enforcement decide to use these devices on American citizens, the devices are used in a manner that meets the requirements and protections of the Constitution. After press reports alleged wide-spread use of cell-site simulation devices by federal, state, and local law enforcement, the Committee initiated a bipartisan investigation in April 2015. At the outset of the investigation, the use of these devices by federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies was not well known, and in many instances, appeared to be shrouded in secrecy. This is partly due to the use of the technology by military and intelligence agencies and the need for sensitivity in national security matters. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), for example, avoided disclosing not only its own use of the devices, but also its role in assisting state and local law enforcement agencies in obtaining and deploying these devices. Indeed, the Committee’s investigation revealed that as part of the conditions for being able to sell cell-site simulators to state and local law enforcement, the manufacturers of these devices must first notify the FBI, and those agencies in turn must sign a non-disclosure agreement with the FBI that expressly prohibits them from publicly disclosing their use of this technology, even in prosecutions where the use of the technology was at issue. … FINDINGS The Department of Justice has 310 cell-site simulation devices and spent more than $71 million in fiscal years 2010-14 on cell-site simulation technology. The Department of Homeland Security has 124 cell-site simulation devices and spent more than $24 million in fiscal years 2010-14 on cell-site simulation technology. DHS allows state and local law enforcement to purchase cell-site simulation technology using grants from the Preparedness Grant Program administered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), including the State Homeland Security Program, Law Enforcement Terrorism Prevention Program, Citizen Corps Program, Urban Areas Security Initiative, Emergency Management Performance Grants, Buffer Zone Protection Program, Transit Security Program, and the Intercity Passenger Rail Program. DHS was able to identify more than $1.8 million in grant money to state and local law enforcement to purchase cell-site simulation technology, however DHS does not maintain a separate accounting of grant funds used to purchase cell site-simulators and the total amount may be higher. Before DOJ and DHS issued their new and enhanced policies for the use of cell-site simulators—which now require a warrant supported by probable cause—federal law enforcement agencies had varying policies and most relied on a lower-than-probable cause standard for use of these devices in most, but not all, situations. State laws continue to vary as to what court authorization is required before law enforcement can deploy cell-site simulators. Several states, including California, Washington, Virginia, Utah, and Illinois have passed laws requiring law enforcement agencies to obtain a warrant or order based on probable cause before deploying cell-site simulators, with varying exceptions. In many cases, state and local law enforcement continue to rely on the state equivalent of a pen register/trap and trace order, which only requires law enforcement to meet a “relevance based standard” to use cell-site simulation devices, a standard lower than probable cause. Costs of individual cell-site simulator devices ranged from $41,500 to as high as $500,000. 19 Dec 16

Sunlight Foundation Blog

Federal agencies subject to CFO Act near full compliance with Open Government Directive - Almost 8 years ago, President Obama’s commitment to transparent and open government on first day in office led to the Open Government Directive (OGD) of December 2009, directing agencies to publish plans about improving transparency, accountability and participation. The same model was expanded to the Open Government Partnership, where nations publish action plans. Examining its progress, success and failures is an important part of understanding President Obama’s legacy – and the prognosis for similar efforts around the world. Last September, Sunlight found that half of U.S. Cabinet agencies had not complied with President Barack Obama’s Open Government Directive by publishing a 2016 Open Government plan, as directed by the White House. By the end of 2016, 13 of the 15 cabinet agencies had published plans, with the Department of Veterans Affairs promising to publish one and Interior referring our inquiry onwards without outcome to date. At the beginning of 2017, Sunlight completed a second audit of federal agencies, starting with the 44 on the White House’s list of senior accountable officials for the Open Government Directive and adding the Federal Communications Commission and Federal Trade Commission. We’ve asked agencies when they will comply with the president’s executive orders using the opengov emails they’ve published and will update this spreadsheet and post if and when that occurs. Our audit, which is a living document that we update over time, is embedded below. What we found on January 4, 2017 was relatively good news: along with the 13 cabinet agencies that we’d previously audited, all 9 of the CFO Act agencies had 2016 open government plans. That’s a 92% compliance rate. Of the 23 non-CFO Act agencies we audited, however, 17 did not have a 2016 plan. As we said in July 2016, “if the result of the self-evaluation are weak or incomplete plans that highlight how agencies have fallen short in achieving their goals, that will be a useful outcome for building upon those lessons. If the results show meaningful progress, it will be a useful indicator of whether this approach to making government more transparent and accountable is worth preserving, extending and strengthening. If agencies do not provide any plan at all, that will serve as its own answer for the priority the Open Government Directive has occupied in their governance.” Our most recent findings, however, must be contextualized: according to White House counsels that briefed Sunlight in 2009, federal agencies subject to the Chief Financial Officers Act are mandated to comply with the executive order. Federal agencies that are not subject to the Act were encouraged but not required to comply. While the public can and should question the quality and frequency of open government commitments or achievements, the basic requirements of the OGD were for agencies to set up a /open webpage, put three “high value data sets” online, and publish a plan. Where agencies were not required to comply with the OGD, those requirements were often not met. Other agencies published a plan in 2010 and never returned. Other asked for feedback promised a plan but never published one. A few don’t even have a /open page. The National Archives and Records Administration, however, produced an impressive open government plan that reflects commitments to transparency, accountability, participation and collaboration that the public can and should expect of federal agencies in the United States of America. By way of contrast, unfortunately, the White House’s own Office of National Drug Control Policy has failed to publish a new plan since 2010, during the expansion of the opioid epidemic in the USA. Despite the importance of their roles as regulators and disclosure agencies, the Federal Communications Commission, Securities and Exchange Commission, and Federal Election Commission never published an Open Government Plan during the Obama administration at all. It’s not that the FCC or FEC haven’t made progress using technology to govern better — just look at Open.FEC.gov — or honored sunshine laws, but the absence of a plan at these agencies means there is no progress report, self-assessment nor activities to use as a baselines the next administration comes into power. That’s a poor foundation for open government in a Trump administration and another data point for President Obama’s mixed record. We hope that the transition team will use all of the 2016 plans as a baseline for open government in the Trump administration, extending and improving the progress that has been made since 2009 towards making our agencies more transparent, accountable, and responsive to the public. 4 Jan
When the public speaks, Congress still listens - Today was a good day for open government in the United States. This morning, the U.S. House of Representatives was set to vote on rules for the 115th Congress that would have undermined the independence of the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE), the ethics watchdog created in 2009 in the wake of scandals. On Monday, Rep. Robert Goodlatte added an amendment to the rules package with no advance notice nor opportunity for debate. The House Republican Conference then voted for the amendment in secret, 119-74, with no advance public notice nor disclosure of the amendment for debate. Despite the opposition of Sunlight and our allies, it appeared that one of the first actions of the 115th Congress was going to be to weaken independent oversight at a time when it’s more important than ever. The public knows about Members of Congress taking secret trips overseas funded by foreign governments because of OCE. When we asked you to pick up the phone and call your Representative in Congress to ask about his or her vote on this issue, you did, filling out a “public whip count” to provide some accountability for who voted to weaken Congress’ ethics watchdog. Picking up the phone, however, led to something unexpected: after a public outcry, House Republicans backed down on gutting the independent ethics office. The public’s role is not the full story, however: House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy was involved in calling an emergency meeting this morning, which led both to removing the amendment by Rep. Goodlatte from the rules package and introducing a measure suggesting draft changes to OCE that would be delivered by the August recess that was accepted by acclamation. Thank you to each and every one of you who spoke up and called Congress today. Journalist Robert Costa reported that most Members told him a blizzard of angry constituent calls was the most important factor in getting the House to sideline the amendment. As New America fellow Lee Drutman (and former Sunlighter) highlighted, the preservation of OCE is a promising sign. Effective reporting that reminds politicians that the public still cares about ethics standards and credible institutions is a wonderful start to 2017. Special thanks go to Daniel Schuman, policy director at Demand Progress (and former Sunlighter) who raised alarm bells about the efforts to weaken OCE last night, the subsequent secret vote on the rules, and worked with Fordham law professor Zephyr Teachout to build the public whip count. While it’s important to celebrate a victory today, however, it does not mean that anyone should rest on these laurels. Keep in mind that the President-Elect and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy objected only to the timing of this effort to weaken what Trump termed an “unfair” institution, not its intent. Today’s outcome is likely to be followed with another “reform” effort that could reduce the independence or authority of OCE later this year, perhaps as early as April. While OCE has been preserved for now, we’re continuing our Public Whip Count on whether Members of Congress voted to weaken OCE. Your voice in Washington mattered today, however, demonstrating that the public does care about ethics in Congress if watchdogs and media can work together to inform and activate people to be civically involved.  Please stay engaged. 3 Jan
OpenGov Voices: Telling open data stories about military history with data.mil - Earlier this month, the Department of Defense launched a new open government data platform, data.mil. Above, you can see a visualization of some of the data on the site that tells one aspect of the history of the Vietnam war : the number of aerial bombardments conducted by military forces from 1965-1975. To learn more about the thinking behind the website and how this experiment in open data differs from previous efforts, Sunlight interviewed data.mil’s co-creators, Mary Lazzeri, at U.S. Digital Services, and Maj. Aaron Capizzi, program manager at United States Air Force. Our discussion follows, including a postscript regarding what open data may tell us about newly discovered blockbuster bomb in Germany. How long has data.mil been online? Where did the idea come from and how has it evolved? Mary: The site launched on December 15th. Major Aaron Capizzi, USAF had the idea to use open data principles to solve Department of Defense (DoD) problems after attending a panel discussion at the Harvard Kennedy School sponsored by former Deputy CTO, Nick Sinai. In addition, I had been looking to seed an open data effort at DoD. Aaron’s idea, coupled with the opportunity to present the Theater History of Operations (THOR) bombing data in a new and interesting way, provided a perfect opportunity to put energy behind the effort. We’re looking to use this pilot to jumpstart a larger open data effort at DoD. The beta site is a working proof-of-concept. The next step is to show the larger DoD community that open data merits investment. How does the approach to this site differ from previous attempts, in terms of use, re-use or presentation? Aaron: Our approach is unique in two ways.  First, Data.mil will test various ways of sharing defense-related information, gauging public interest and potential value, while protecting security and privacy. We will quickly iterate and improve the data offerings on data.mil, using public feedback and internal department discussions to best unlock the value of defense data. Our goal is to provide all data with enough context that users, both the public and defense employees, can understand the potential value and get started using data quickly. Second, Data.mil will prioritize opening data using a demand-driven model, focusing on quality rather than standard quantity metrics.  The Department of Defense regularly reports on the significant challenges we face in defending the nation, which range from attracting talented recruits to developing game-changing technology within constrained budgets.  Most of these aspects of defense business generate large amounts of unclassified data which, if released, can encourage collaboration and innovation with public and private sector partners. What tech is data.mil built on? How is it different than other sites? Mary: The site is built using an open data storytelling platform, LiveStories. Rather than simply posting a list of datasets, the goal of Data.mil is to tell stories with data. The site provides narratives to complement the data so users can more quickly understand and begin using it. LiveStories was selected for its visualization and data analysis features allowing us to present an engaging site for its users. In addition, it’s easy to use. Non-technical staff can use the platform to share their data and tell their stories. We want to compel collaboration from military components, industry partners and the public. The partnership with data.world enables that collaboration providing the social media tools to support exploration and a community discussion of the data. How much data is on data.mil now? How much is new? How much should we expect to be there by the end of 2017? Aaron: The site’s first offering, Theater History of Operations (THOR), is a painstakingly cultivated database of historic aerial bombings from World War I through Vietnam. THOR has already proven useful in finding unexploded ordinance in Southeast Asia and improving Air Force combat tactics. This is the first time that the THOR WWI, WWII, and Vietnam datasets have been released as flat tabular data files that can be easily analyzed and visualized with the accompanying data dictionary. Additionally, the site published the Korean War data for the first time ever on December 18th. We hope to feature data from the Gulf War in the near future. The next featured dataset will be military casualty data, set to be released in February 2017. The working target is to release a compelling data story each month. The story may have one or multiple datasets. What is the most important data set on the site? What are the most important insights? Aaron and Mary: The THOR data on the site can be used for a variety of purposes. The public can look up a relative’s call-sign and see what missions he flew. The data has been useful in uncovering unexploded ordinance in Southeast Asia. It’s also been used in air power history and strategy classes at Air Force professional education schools. Its value to historians is immense. The data provides bomb damage assessments in the pilot’s own words dating back as far as 1918. Of course, we plan to expand the data offering in the coming weeks and months by targeting and releasing data that can help solve defense problems and increase the public’s understanding of their military. Open government data about the military carries obvious security concerns. How did the DoD approach decided what to disclose and how? Aaron & Mary: All datasets are thoroughly vetted using the military’s well-established public release processes. While protecting national security and privacy remains the top priority of all defense employees, many aspects of the military’s daily business and operations are unclassified. By following best practices, information ranging from personnel diversity to contracting opportunities and open source software can be shared broadly without posing risk to national security objectives or operations security. In this initial experimental stage, we are targeting public release of information with low sensitivity and risk for security implications.  As the Defense Department gains more experience in providing open data sources to target specific problems, from logistics costs to scientific innovation, we will refine our understanding of where the balance between value and security lies. What’s the most significant impact that could come out of this site? What could prevent it from happening? Mary: Data.mil was launched for less than $10,000 and as a 20% project for Mary and Aaron in partnership with LiveStories and data.world. We want to collect feedback from the public and use that feedback to chart the site’s expansion. Data.mil is a working proof-of-concept and seeks to make the case that open data is a low-risk investment for DoD with immense potential value. Eventually, we hope to make a significant impact on looming defense issues, some of which are summarized in the Department’s 2015 Performance Report.  But to be successful, we need participation both from our public and private industry partners, and internal defense data owners. To expand, we need partners throughout the military who are looking to share their data. Potential partners and anyone with feedback on the pilot should reach out to data@dds.mil. POSTSCRIPT Ian Greenleigh, a digital strategist currently working as the head of brand at data.world, emailed Sunlight to share a discovery in the data. I came across this story the other day, about an unexploded Royal Air Force “blockbuster” bomb they just found at a worksite in Augsburg, Germany. I found a few things to cross-reference in other articles, then asked my colleague to query the dataset to find the mission responsible for the bomb. I think we found it. I’ve attached a CSV with what the query returns, and a screenshot of the query results on data.world. It’s a new sort of experience, for me at least, to learn of a story and then find it within a dataset. I think we’ll be seeing a lot of this in the future. If you find more stories at data.mil or have other feedback, please share in the comments!29 Dec 16
A “release to one, release to all” policy for FOIA will serve the public interest - Today, the Sunlight Foundation commented on a “release to one, release to all” policy for the Freedom of Information Act proposed by the Department of Justice’s Office of Information Policy promulgated in a Request for Comments, including an description of the “release to all presumption” and a draft memorandum for federal agencies. Our comment, which will be available to the public at Regulations.gov, follows. Dear Director Pustay, We welcome the opportunity to comment upon the Department’s proposed “release-to-one, release-to-all” policy for fulfilling requests made under the Freedom of Information Act. The Sunlight Foundation strongly supports the proposal overall, with some specific concerns regarding individual components in the draft regarding overly broad exemptions and exceptions. As a decade-old nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to using journalism, advocacy and technology to improving the transparency and accountability of our politics and government, we see great potential for this approach to improve public knowledge of the operations of government, reduce the costs of administering one of the core sunshine laws of the nation, and reduce asynchronies in the disclosure of government data that are providing an unintended subsidy to industry. As we have argued in the past, this policy represents a significant change in the nation’s information disclosure policies that would not only complement recent updates to how the federal government protects, structures and publishes public records but could, in the long run, increase public knowledge of what is being done in our name. Governments everywhere should use the demand signal of FOIA requests to prioritize proactive disclosures online. Structuring and publishing the datasets that commercial interests repeatedly, frequently request should increase the capacity of FOIA officers to respond to more complex public interest requests. We hope that agency CIOs will work directly with the nation’s FOIA officers to apply Project Open Data’s resources to proactive disclosure of records online in machine-readable format. Should the proactive disclosure of records as open government data be directly tied to the demand expressed by inbound FOIA requests in 2017, we expect to see significant improvements in government transparency and accountability to not only occur in the U.S. federal government but secondary effects in other states and countries that learn from our example. On Exceptions and Exemptions While we acknowledge that combining open government data sets and analyzing them can lead to insight that may implicate the privacy of individuals or security of states, we are concerned about OIP embracing “mosaic theory” in its guidance to agencies on FOIA. The “foreseeable harm standard” in the statute is sufficient for officers to consider. In 2017, we expect the potential impact of OPEN Government Data Act on the default disclosure approach of the nation to be significant. As it currently stands, mosaic theory is functioning as an abstract risk, rather than a strategy for weighing potential risks. The Department of Justice should help agencies weigh risks and public benefits. Invoking the mosaic theory often serves as an abstract gesture toward complex risk, rather than an empirical assessment of public harm. We also are concerned about the “Good Cause” language in the draft OIP guidance. The FOIA statute provides ample leeway for officers to redact or withhold responsive documents. OIP should avoid adding justifications for no disclosure where existing justifications are already sufficient. On a Delay in Release As the White House Office of Management and Budget moves forward on a building new FOIA.gov next year, we hope to see the “release-to-one, release-to-all policy” explicitly connect the data and demand collected from the nation’s revamped FOIA request portal to the disclosures flowing through Data.gov. We anticipate that proactive, periodic disclosure of structured open data that’s subject to frequent FOIA requests will, in fact, reduce costs and the backlog caseload at many agencies, freeing up FOIA processors to work on the more complicated public interest requests submitted by journalists that contribute to the accountability the public deserves. Over the decades since FOIA was passed, the question of whether the public receives public records provided to publishers has been a longstanding question of significant public interest. Historically, publishers have not always published records that they receive. Over the past two decades, more journalists and editors have adopted the laudable practice of publishing source documents and data online that underpins the reporting stories rely upon. New storytelling formats, like the news apps, visualizations and open source tools that the Sunlight Foundation has supported and contributed to have demonstrated how powerful sharing the original documents can be informing the public and connecting them to their elected representatives. As we wrote in July, we understand the concerns that investigative journalists have about how a “release to one, release to all policy“ could affect their work. The feedback from the initial pilots suggests that many journalists want government transparency and accountability, but fear that a policy that mandates immediate release of responsive documents to all could harm their journalism. Moreover, the surveys conducted by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press confirm that only a small minority of journalists support immediate release of records due to concerns about the impact on their investigations. In considering the two options for disclosure that OIP laid out — immediate or a five day delay, Sunlight is mindful for the Hippocratic Oath that doctors observe: first, do no harm. We do not want to see the Department of Justice create a disincentive for journalists to make FOIA requests or for publishers to allot budget and spend money to file lawsuits for records under the statute. Public records frequently provide a backbone for crucial public interest reporting that holds agencies accountable for fraud, waste, abuse or other forms of corruption. On the other hand, we are also mindful of the concerns regarding the state of compliance with the FOIA in the United States. To delay the release of documents or databases to the general public after release to an individual requester gives us pause. As OIP highlights, the FOIA statute includes a limited exemption for fee waivers in situations in which a given requester can demonstrate that “disclosing the requested information is in the public interest because it is likely to contribute significantly to public understanding of the operations and activities of the government and is not primarily in the commercial interest of the requester.” This is an important signal from Congress that agencies should not create monetary disincentives for journalists and citizens. Congress has not formally weighed in, however, on whether such a public interest exception should be considered in how records are disclosed. Effectively creating a separate class of requesters who receive documents and data under an embargo public interest exception without clear guidance from lawmakers is not ideal. We therefore recommend that there be no delay in releasing documents or databases to all online in an open, machine-readable format. We also recommend that agencies formally ask for feedback from the original requesters regarding the impact of such disclosure on their investigations. This feedback should be cataloged and published in a report by OIP next December and used to revisit whether the policy is having any demonstrated harm upon investigative journalism or the public interest. Creating and formalized an ongoing feedback loop with the requester community regarding the quality, frequency and outcomes of disclosures is in of itself a desirable dynamic, and we hope that the Department of Justice works with the Office of Government Information Services at the National Archives in developing improvements in this area. As a practical matter, we anticipate that agencies may not publish all responsive documents online immediately upon disclosure to an individual. As IT modernization improves the capacity of agencies to manage their information as an asset, however, we see a future where agencies responding to FOIA requests for data, documents and software code will be able to conduct searches, redact the results and disclose them online much more quickly. If news organizations show that this policy has caused issues for investigations, OIP should reform it. We look forward to participating in that conversation. Respectfully, The Sunlight Foundation23 Dec 16
Today in OpenGov: How you can help preserve open government data in 2017 - ARCHIVE ALL THE THINGS. Over the last month, many of you have asked what will happen with open government data under a Trump administration or with government transparency writ large. The honest answer is that we don’t know, but there’s sufficient reason for concern and cause for action now, as FreeGovInfo explains: Here at FGI, we’ve been tracking the disappearance of government information for quite some time (and librarians have been doing it for longer than we have; see ALA’s long running series published from 1981 until 1998 called “Less Access to Less Information By and About the U.S. Government.”). We’ve recently written about the targeting of NASA’s climate research site and the Department of Energy’s carbon dioxide analysis center for closure. But ever since the NY Times last week wrote a story “Harvesting Government History, One Web Page at a Time”, there has been renewed worry and interest from the library- and scientific communities as well as the public in archiving government information. And there’s been increased interest in the End of Term (EOT) crawl project — though there’s increased worry about the loss of government information with the incoming Trump administration, it’s important to note that the End of Term crawl has been going on since 2008, with both Republican and Democratic administrations, and will go on past 2016. EOT is working to capture as much of the .gov/.mil domains as we can, and we’re also casting our ‘net to harvest social media content and government information hosted on non-.gov domains (e.g., the St Louis Federal Reserve Bank at www.stlouisfed.org). We’re running several big crawls right now (you can see all of the seeds we have here as well as all of the seeds that have been nominated so far) and will continue to run crawls up to and after the Inauguration as well. We strongly encourage the public to nominate seeds of government sites so that we can be as thorough in our crawling as possible. Scientists and researchers around the United States and beyond are now crawling and archiving data. For more information about this effort, and ways you can help, read FreeGovInfo and participate in the End of Term Crawl. [READ MORE] GOOD NEWS: New Jersey passed what looks to us like a landmark open data law. If you agree or disagree, please let us know. SPRECHEN SIE DEUTSCH? Germany has published a draft of a proposed open data law. Keep an eye on this one. TO WATCH: A privatized security force employed directly by a President would be a threat to public accountability, as John Wonderlich warns: “Is Trump’s security team going to be paid through a government contract? Or is this a private arrangement that contradicts Secret Service roles? Trump’s security team is presumably paid through one of Trump’s corporate vehicles, not his personal account, no? Privatized POTUS security is Presidential security that lives further from public protections, FOIA, and the rule of law. Trump’s failure to divest is also an assertion that he can act unilaterally outside the law. Like with a private security force.” WEIGH IN: As we highlighted in August, the Office of Information Policy asked for feedback on a proposed “release to one, release to all” policy for the Freedom of Information Act. This month, the Justice Department published an official Request for Comments on the draft, including an description of the “release to all presumption” and a draft memorandum for federal agencies. The Project on Government Oversight supports the proposed “release-to-one, release-to-all” policy for the Freedom of Information Act, with caveats. So do we, as you’ll read tomorrow. We encourage you to comment — but don’t wait: the deadline is tomorrow. [Federal Register] EDITOR’S NOTE: This will be the last Today in OpenGov of 2016, as Sunlight staff takes time off to rest, travel and spend time with family over the holiday break. As the year comes to a close, we are also saddened about remarkable colleagues are moving on after making extraordinary contributions to Sunlight and to open government in the United States. We are deeply grateful to them and you, our community. Thank you for reading, commenting, corresponding and holding us accountable, too. We hope you will consider making a tax-deductible donation as part of your year-end giving. We will see you in the new year. –Alex TRANSITION 2017 Christmas @ Mar-a-Lago: @realDonaldTrump, relaxed and chatty, hosts press for drinks — off-record but pics OK @axios pic.twitter.com/lysW7FHzIl — Mike Allen (@mikeallen) December 19, 2016 148 days. The last press conference President-elect Donald J. Trump held was on July 27. He has held none since Election Day. News organizations are starting to respond appropriately by highlighting the violation of this fundamental democratic norm but are still not adjusting, as Poynter’s report that White House correspondents are fretting over their dinner suggests. The deeper problem is what the White House Correspondents Association (WHCA) dinner — aka “nerd prom” — “looks like” now, and has for years: journalists too cozy with power and worried about losing access. A majority of the public doesn’t trust the press. Reporters should worry about Trump’s lack of press conferences. “Engaging with the press” is not a sufficient commitment by the President-elect or his team. Our suggestion to media organizations and the WHCA: suspend the dinner until Trump holds press conference and commits to the holding them in office. Billionaire investor Peter Thiel is involved in filling health, technology and science appointments in the transition, including roles that would have conflicts of interest with some of his investments. [Stat News] Activist investor Carl Icahn is to play a role in choosing new SEC chairman, who oversees regulation of investors. [New York Times] Vetting billionaires nominated for public service takes time. Process shouldn’t be rushed, nor disclosure diminished. [New York Times] The National Archives and Records Administration proactive published the transition materials it prepared for the transition team. This is a commendable open government bar for all federal agencies! Looking back through the history of the United States, former Sunlighter Zephyr Teachout, a law professor ran for governor and Congress in New York, concludes that Trump could be the “most corruptible President ever.”   [Politico Mag] The Trumps are taking steps to address conflicts of interest. [New York Times] The President-elect is going to have to decide whether he will put the people’s business or his business interests first. [Diane Rehm Show] A piecemeal approach to resolving conflicts of interest journalists report won’t work. A “discretionary blind trust” won’t work. A President of the United States should disclose his tax returns, divest from his businesses, invest the proceeds into a blind trust, and hold a press conference to discuss it all. NATIONAL The Obama administration is “dismantling a dormant national registry program for visitors from countries with active terrorist groups — a program that President-elect Donald J. Trump has suggested he is considering resurrecting.” Read the Federal Register. [New York Times] In a new report, the House Judiciary Committee concluded that “Any measure that weakens encryption works against the national interest.” Notable conclusion, that. In a historic moment of progress for Americans with disabilities, The FCC voted 5-0 to require US wireless carriers & device manufacturers to support RTT: real-time text messaging. [Motherboard] The White House announced iOS and Android apps for regulatory information. While we’re glad to see improvements in making the regulatory process more easy to understand to smartphone-toting nation, should government agencies focus on shiny apps or making .gov websites mobile-friendly and responsive first? [WhiteHouse.gov] Separately, the White House shared an update on “We the People,” its e-petition platform. As U.S. chief digital officer Jason Goldman notes, “While we’ve taken every step possible to make it easy for future administrations to carry on this tradition, it’s ultimately up to the incoming team.” Please let Sunlight know if you think this is a platform worth defending. [Medium] Oh yeah! Cornell Law School’s Legal Information Institute is officially the co-owner of oyez.org, the wonderful website that publishes audio and context for oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court. [InfoDocket] Despite data problems and oversight, the IT Dashboard continues to give us some sense of how long federal IT projects take and how much they cost. A new analysis by Federal News Radio digs into that data to come up with some averages across agencies, documenting continued challenges in delivery. [FedNewsRadio] Price transparency will bring down health care costs if and when the data finds the public through tools and platforms when and where they make decisions. Today, far too many people don’t know where to go to compare or find data. [New York Times] Speaking of transparency, the Department of Veterans Affairs is now releasing health care quality data. [USA Today] STATE AND LOCAL A federal monitor found multiple problems with the Cleveland Police Department’s bodycam program. [Cleveland.com] As the City of Chicago settles a public records lawsuit, Mayor Rahm Emanuel acknowledged that he hid city business using personal email accounts. [Chicago Tribune] Civic Hall will be the anchor tenant of a new $250 million “innovation hub” in New York City’s Union Square, set to break ground in 2018. Congratulations to former Sunlight advisors Micah Sifry and Andrew Rasiej on this further validation of their vision. [Fast Company] INTERNATIONAL The United States reached the biggest settlement ever – by far – under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, penalizing two Brazilian companies. “On December 21st America’s Department of Justice (DoJ) reached a $3.5bn settlement with Odebrecht, Brazil’s biggest builder, and with Braskem, a petrochemical joint venture between that firm and Petrobras. The DoJ alleges that since 2001 Odebrecht and Braskem paid $788m in bribes to officials and political parties in Brazil and in 11 other countries. Most of these are in Latin America. They include Venezuela, Mexico, Argentina and the Dominican Republic (see chart). Two Portuguese-speaking African countries—Angola and Mozambique—are also on the list.” [The Economist] Researcher Jonathan Gray published a new paper on “datafication” and democracy. [IPPR] The World Bank published a new post on their work to determine the cost of open government reforms: “Once finished, the costing framework will be made freely available for governments and other interested parties to cost out specific open government reforms under consideration. It will also position this framework as an accessible, “do-it-yourself” (DIY) tool that can be utilized by generalists — including officials in low and middle-income country governments — seeking to understand the full costs of starting and sustaining open government reforms over time.” [World Bank] The lingering feeling from the Anti-Corruption Summit and Open Government Partnership Summit was that “the usual responses are inadequate,” writes Tom King. [GIJN] 22 Dec 16
Today in OpenGov: The Sunlight Foundation will endure - SUNLIGHT WILL ENDURE. No need to bury the lede today, as you should have heard this in a separate email from us: The Sunlight Foundation will be an independent, nonpartisan advocate for open government in 2017 under the leadership of Executive Director John Wonderlich. Your correspondent is stepping up to be the new Deputy Director. We’ll have more to share in the weeks and months ahead about what’s next, but the work continues. We hope that the second decade of our work will honor the contributions of the hundreds of our alumni and the tens of thousands of members of our communities. We trust that you will continue to support Sunlight through donations of your time, funds, attention and goodwill.  Thank you all for your messages of support and encouragement. [READ MORE] 141 days. President Barack Obama held what is likely to be his last press conference of 2016 today. The last press conference President-elect Donald J. Trump held was on July 27. He has held none since Election Day. Why does it matter? Tamara Keith is spot on: “Unlike other ways of getting messages out, press conferences hold public officials more accountable to the American people because they have to answer questions in an uncontrolled environment.” [NPR] News organizations are starting to respond appropriately by highlighting the violation of this fundamental democratic norm. (And yes, maintaining democratic norms really matters.) The “number of days since” should start to lead the morning shows and evening news. TRANSITION 2017 In a letter responding to Senator Tom Carper, the U.S. Office of Government Ethics recommended that President-elect Trump divest from his businesses, stating that  transferring a business to your children isn’t a blind trust nor removes conflicts of interest. [NPR] Divestiture addresses conflicts of interest in a way that transferring control does not. [GovExec] Every day, more conflicts of interest emerge and are catalogued by the media. [The Atlantic] According to The Wall Street Journal, however, Trump is not going to divest from his businesses to address the conflicts, unlike Presidents have over the past 4 decades, just as he did not disclose his tax returns. This decision is one that members of the Electoral College will have to weigh.  [Quartz] The Washington Post has launched a genuinely innovative approach to covering the President-elect’s post-factual tweets: a Chrome Web browser plug-in that adds much-needed fact-checking and context to @RealDonaldTrump on Twitter.com.  [Washington Post] Every nominee to lead a federal agency receives serous scrutiny in a Senate hearing — and in focusing on assembling a cabinet quickly, as compared to past years, the transition team may have set itself up for major headaches in 2017. The Wall Street Journal reports that “picks have been named without extensive reviews of their background and financial records, people familiar with the process say.” Stay tuned. [WSJ] NATIONAL The inspector general of the National Security Agency received a termination notice for retaliation against a whistleblower. The Project on Government Oversight reported the outcome, including something important: it’s the result of reform. “It was reached by following new whistleblower protections set forth by President Obama in an executive order, Presidential Policy Directive 19. (A President Trump could, in theory, eliminate the order.) Following PPD-19 procedures, a first-ever External Review Panel (ERP) composed of three of the most experienced watchdogs in the US government was convened to examine the issue. The trio — IG’s of the Justice Department, Treasury, and CIA – overturned an earlier finding of the Department of Defense IG, which investigated Ellard but was unable to substantiate his alleged retaliation. “The finding against Ellard is extraordinary and unprecedented,” notes Stephen Aftergood, Director of the Secrecy Program at the Federation of American Scientists. “This is the first real test drive for a new process of protecting intelligence whistleblowers. Until now, they’ve been at the mercy of their own agencies, and dependent on the whims of their superiors. This process is supposed to provide them security and a procedural foothold.” [POGO] Related: Congress passed legislation that will empower inspectors general. [Daily Caller] Surveillance reform include the need for Congress to affirm that there’s no place for secret law in our democracy. [Access Now] The Department of Defense has launched a new open data platform, data.mil. [Meritalk] Speaking of open data, fears are rising that a Trump administration would remove data from federal websites, or, worse yet, delete it altogether. [Politico] The ways that Trump administration handles open government data, however, may be more subtle than that, as we and others told 538. “What does have observers worried are two things in particular: budget cuts that could significantly impact data collection and quality, particularly within the government’s statistical agencies — those that produce key economic indicators like the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Bureau of Economic Analysis; and the willful miscommunication of scientific research that proves politically inconvenient to the White House.” [FiveThirtyEight] We’ll see. In the meantime, the SEC may issue a rule on open data before the next administration comes into power. [FCW] STATE AND LOCAL Want to get an amazing download of insight about how open data can help cities and communities around the United States? Watch the video embedded above, in which Sunlight’s Stephen Larrick and Kate Rabinowitz of DataLensDC talk with Michael A. Shea from Arlington Independent Media. Lawmakers in New Jersey are considering a bill that would change a “state law that requires governments, businesses, and individuals to publish legal notices in printed newspapers.” Moving all government notices completely online would leave seniors and poor in data poverty. Every state must get everyone online before leaving print entirely. [NJ.com] Civic technology and engagement can and should reach into county-level government. [TechCrunch] INTERNATIONAL Mor Rubenstein reflected on the good, bad and ugly from the Open Government Partnership Summit. [OKFN] We were glad to see press freedom on the agenda at OGP16, given the rise of authoritarianism around the world. [CPJ] 16 Dec 16
Sunlight will endure - Today, we can announce that Sunlight will continue its role as an nonpartisan advocate for open government under the leadership of Executive Director John Wonderlich. John has been a strong steward of the organization’s principles and mission during this period of transition, and over the last decade. Alex Howard will be the new Deputy Director, helping to lead Sunlight into the next stage of its evolution. Over the past two months, we have heard from people around the United States, indeed around the world, of their regard for the role the Sunlight Foundation has played in the global transparency movement.  Developments over the past two months have made it clear how important Sunlight’s continued work in the public interest is and can be, as an independent institution. Unfortunately, several staff will be departing as part of this transition. Over the next year, Sunlight will retain and expand our capacity to preserve and defend an open government by, for and of the people in the United States and our work to strengthen democratic norms and institutions across the country and the globe. Our federal and international work will continue with our allies to defend and enhance hard-won progress in transparency laws and accountability initiatives. Our state and local programs will continue to work with cities and statehouses to improve open data policies and implementation. Sunlight will continue to confront key challenges facing democracy, including conflicts of interest and other forms of corruption, and other threats to open government, press freedom, undisclosed influencers and regressive legislation and regulation. We are grateful to our friends and allies in the nonprofit world who stepped up to preserve tools for transparency following our September decision to transfer databases and apps to stable, motivated successors and to close Sunlight Labs as a separate development team. The updates we have heard post-adoption confirm that we made good choices and have honored the legacy of our colleagues. These steps appropriately reflect a robust community dedicated to demonstrating that civic technology can and does continuously contribute to meaningful transparency and accountability in our government and politics, at all levels. We are immensely proud of our contributions to democracy and grateful to everyone who will carries the results of these efforts forward, in and outside of government. We expect that the expertise and reputation the Sunlight Foundation has developed as a nonpartisan advocate over the past decade will play an important role in the movement to make governments everywhere, at all levels, more transparent and accountable. We trust that you will continue to support Sunlight through donations of your time, funds, attention and goodwill. We hope that the second decade of our work will honor the contributions of the hundreds of our alumni and the tens of thousands of members of our communities. Thank you all for your messages of support and encouragement. 16 Dec 16
Today in OpenGov: Senate passes historic endorsement of open government data - GOOD NEWS: On Dec. 10, 2016, S.2852, the Open, Public, Electronic, and Necessary (OPEN) Government Data Act, passed the Senate with an amendment by unanimous consent. The OPEN Government Data Act has been a core priority of the Sunlight Foundation in Washington in 2016. Amidst unanswered questions about the future of open government in the United States, the Senate has provided a unanimous endorsement of a set of enduring principles that the Sunlight Foundation has advanced and defended for a decade: that data created using the funds of the people should be available to the people in open formats online, without cost or restriction. We hope that the U.S. House will quickly move to re-introduce the bill in the 115th Congress and work across the aisle to enact it within the first week of public business. We expect the members of Congress who stood up for open government data this fall to continue do so in 2017. MORE DIVERSION, NOT DIVESTMENT: On Friday, Sunlight joined dozens of ethics experts and good government advocates on a second letter addressed to President-elect Donald Trump to address his conflicts of interest by disclosing and divesting from his businesses. Last night, Trump postponed a December 15th press conference on the future of his businesses that he had announced in the end of November on Twitter. A spokesman told the Washington Post the delay was so that Trump could focus on building a cabinet. Later in the evening, Trump sent three tweets, stating that: “Even though I am not mandated by law to do so, I will be leaving my busineses [sic] before January 20th so that I can focus full time on the Presidency. Two of my children, Don and Eric, plus executives, will manage them. No new deals will be done during my term(s) in office. I will hold a press conference in the near future to discuss the business, Cabinet picks and all other topics of interest. Busy times!” “Not signing new deals” is neither divesting nor disclosing, as every President of the United States has done for decades has done prior to taking an oath to support and defend the Constitution. Today, Newsweek published a new investigation of Trump’s international business ties. Trump has set no date for that press conference nor disclosure of his tax returns, which would add much-needed sunlight into his foreign entanglements, including his huge debts. 138 days: Trump last held a press conference on July 27. He has held none post-election, which is unprecedented for a President-elect in the modern era. The primary didn’t enforce a norm for tax disclosure. Congress still hasn’t. It’s now up to press and the public to apply pressure to hold Trump accountable. TRANSITION 2017 The Presidential Transition relaunched GreatAgain.gov on Medium. The new site details how to connect to the Transition using social media and mail and information on the Presidential Transition Act. Along with glossy biographies of nominees, the transition has also published a list of agency landing teams and landing team members, including a funding source for each: volunteer, private, and transition entity. The site has a news section with updates about nominations. While the transition is still falling short on financial disclosures and responsiveness to inquiries about staffing, adherence to or even existence of an ethics pledge, the expanded site does fulfill some of the open government principles we laid out in November. The Energy Department has refused the transition request to name staff who worked on climate change policy. [The Hill] Scientists and researchers are organizing to preserve government data on climate and environment to mitigate the risk of potential deletions by a Trump administration. [Vice] NATIONAL The New York Times published a notable new feature on the information warfare campaign the Russians conducted to disrupt the 2016 U.S. presidential election. [New York Times] In a letter, the White House council informed Congress that the Senate report on CIA torture would be preserved as a government record in President Obama’s presidential papers — but would not be declassified for 12 years. Score this one as a victory for history but not for transparency or accountability anytime soon. [LA Times] Katherine Hawkins offered thanks that at least one copy of the report will be preserved but is concerned about the future of other copies — and dismayed that the report will not be publicly released. [Just Security] A federal judge issued an order for White House Office of Science and Technology Director John Holdren to preserve all email from his private account during a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit regarding the messages goes forward. Josh Gerstein: “The case involving Holdren was brought by the Competitive Enterprise Institute in 2014, after the group learned that he was conducting some official business on his Woods Hole account. Kessler tossed out the case the following year, ruling that his office had no duty to search a non-government email account.However, earlier this year the D.C. Circuit reversed that decision on appeal, holding that the mere fact that records are stored outside of government servers does not automatically put them beyond the reach of FOIA.” [Politico] The Senate unanimously approved S.579, the Inspector General Empowerment Act, which the House passed earlier this fall. Under the legislation, which President Obama is expected to sign into law, federal agency inspectors general will gain faster, complete access to records, although it stops short of providing subpoena powers. “Passage  of  the  IG  Empowerment  Act  enhances the  IGs’  ability  to  fight  waste, fraud, abuse, and misconduct, protects whistleblowers who share information with IGs,  increases  government  transparency,  and bolsters  the  public’s  confidence  in the independence of IGs.  For these reasons, the Act is an important milestone for good  government,” said Justice Department IG Michael Horowitz. “The  Inspector  General  community is grateful to the sponsors and co-sponsors of this Act and all those who  stood up for independent oversight.” [Federal News Radio] STATE AND LOCAL Emily Shaw shares some changes for the better in state-level campaign finance disclosures: “…in our review of the past year’s changes to state laws on campaign finance disclosure, we’ve seen legal improvements across the country that should improve the accuracy and timeliness of publicly available campaign finance information. The results are mixed, but overall states made real progress in 2016, with California, Maryland and South Dakota taking positive strides. However, some states, like Arizona and Wisconsin, took steps backward in terms of allowing more money and less disclosure into their local elections.” [READ MORE] Sunlight’s Steven Larrick and Greg Jordan-Dettamore launched OpenDataPolicies.org, a website that collects open data policies from around the USA. [StateScoop] The Constitution Project’s Committee on Policing Reforms released a new report recommending guidelines for the use of body-worn cameras by law enforcement officials, including important transparency and accountability elements. [Constitution Project] INTERNATIONAL Daniel Dietrich writes in to share a new report and scoping studies on 15 countries that evaluated the ability of governments and civil society organizations to publish and use open contracting data. He explains: “The scoping studies, conducted under supervision of the Open Contracting Partnership, point out opportunities and challenges regarding making public contracting more efficient and transparent, and identify needs and capacities of civil society to help translate available contracting data into actionable information. The countries covered are Bangladesh, Ghana, Guatemala, Honduras, Indonesia, Kenya, Malawi, Myanmar, Nepal, Nigeria, Peru, the Philippines, Senegal, Tanzania, and Uganda.” The report finds that to ensure efficient and transparent public spending through its contracts, governments need to make strong commitments to open contracting, draft legislation that guarantees public access to information on public contracts, disclose contracting data and documents using the Open Contracting Data Standard and provide feedback channels to foster strong engagement of citizens, civil society organizations and the private sector. Documents obtained by BuzzFeed Brasil implicate Brazilian President Michel Temer in a money laundering scheme. Severino Motta and Alexandre Aragão: “A former VP at one of Brazil’s largest construction companies told prosecutors the firm gave the president $3.3 million in “undeclared” funds.”  [BuzzFeed News] State security agents have been spying on journalists at South Africa’s public broadcaster. [Quartz] A coalition of French civil liberties and open government advocates has called out the Government of France for openwashing. [Republique Citoyenne] EVENTS What events will YOU be attending over the next six months? Write to ahoward@sunlightfoundation.com. 13 Dec 16
Senate passes historic endorsement of open government data - Amidst unanswered questions about the future of open government in the United States, the Senate has provided a unanimous endorsement of a set of enduring principles that the Sunlight Foundation has advanced and defended for a decade: that data created using the funds of the people should be available to the people in open formats online, without cost or restriction. On Dec. 10, 2016, S.2852, the Open, Public, Electronic, and Necessary (OPEN) Government Data Act, passed the Senate with an amendment by unanimous consent. The OPEN Government Data Act has been a core priority of the Sunlight Foundation in Washington in 2016. We are thrilled that the Senate has acted to move it and grateful to the bill’s co-sponsors for their support for open government. “I’m proud to work across the aisle with Senator Schatz to bring a 21st century solution to this city’s antiquated, 20th century approach to data,” said Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., in a statement. “Because transparency keeps Washington accountable to the people, government data should be made public unless an administration makes a compelling reason not to. After passing the Senate with bipartisan support, we have momentum to carry this important work into the new year.” Proud to work with @SenBrianSchatz to bring a 21st century solution to this city's 20th century approach to data.​ https://t.co/EwmxPekwWJ pic.twitter.com/h9i5QCUC8f — Senator Ben Sasse (@SenSasse) December 12, 2016 “Public information belongs to the public, and it’s the government’s job to make sure that data is available and easily accessible in today’s ever-changing digital world,” said Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, in a statement, “I thank Senator Sasse for working with me to get this through the Senate, and I look forward to continuing our work in the next Congress.” The bill requires government data assets to be published as machine-readable data in an open format that does not limit reuse and imposes a condition that no costs will be imposed. In keeping with Sunlight’s years of advocacy, the bill requires the White House Office of Management and Budget to oversee the completeness and availability of an enterprise data inventory for every agency. That work is ongoing today, as everyone in the public can see at the Project Open Data Dashboard. The OPEN Government Data Act will ensure that the work continues. This approach to transparency and accountability will not only inform and enhance public knowledge and apply data to improve society. It will improve the ability of agencies to understand and use the information assets they hold. The data breaches and compromises of the past decade show how important it is for agencies to understand what data they hold and its sensitivity. That’s why the OPEN Government Data Act’s requirement for the Chief Information Officers Council to work with the newly strengthened Office of Government Information Services and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy to “promote data operability and comparability of data assets across the government” is welcome and essential. So to is the act’s requirement for the White House Office of Management and Budget to continue to “assess the extent of each federal agencies use of data assets to support decision-making cost savings and performance.” If enacted and signed into law, these measures would be directly relevant and useful to advancing the goals of the Evidence-Based Policy Commission in 2017. We hope that Speaker of the House Paul Ryan sees and values this connection swiftly to institutionalize this sensible, bipartisan approach to improving government and governance. Given the Congressional Budget Office’s assessment of no cost to taxpayers from the OPEN Government Act, there is strong rationale to get this one. Given the demand from commercial requesters using the freedom information act to search for data, we hope and expect that open data from a new FOIA.gov will be used to prioritize the structuring and disclosure of open data using the vehicle that the OPEN Government Data Act mandates: Data.gov. The act would also preserve Data.gov as a public interface for the nation’s open data, which is in of itself a valuable mandate, particularly given the site’s improvements and approach to federation. The OPEN Government Data Act is an essential complement to the Freedom of Information Act reform that passed this summer. Together, the legislation would provide statutory structure and mandatory requirements for open and transparent government in the 21st century. If passed and implemented, the two laws put in place a series of provisions and structures that will enable Congress, journalists, nonprofits, academics, private-sector companies and the public to hold future administrations accountable. We and our allies know that executive orders and memorandums can be undone with the stroke of a pen. Sunshine laws cannot be so easily untangled nor dismissed. For this reason, we both celebrate the Senate’s unanimous endorsement of the law and hope that the U.S. House will quickly move to re-introduce the bill in the 115th Congress and work across the aisle to enact it within the first week of public business. We will hold Schatz and Sasse to their word and expect the members of Congress who stood up for open government data this fall to continue do so. Sunlight stands ready with our allies to hail congressional support for open government in the 21st century, and to hold our legislators and official accountable for following through on this mandate.12 Dec 16
Change for the better in state-level campaign finance disclosure - (Photo credit: Ervins Strauhmanis/Flickr)With recent Supreme Court rulings leading to an increase in the amount of money eligible to legally affect elections, it becomes even more important to have adequate transparency in campaign finance. Happily, in our review of the past year’s changes to state laws on campaign finance disclosure, we’ve seen legal improvements across the country that should improve the accuracy and timeliness of publicly available campaign finance information. The results are mixed, but overall states made real progress in 2016, with California, Maryland and South Dakota taking positive strides. However, some states, like Arizona and Wisconsin, took steps backward in terms of allowing more money and less disclosure into their local elections. Although Supreme Court decisions like Citizens United have restricted states’ ability to limit political donations, our right to require campaign finance disclosure has remained fundamentally intact. The Supreme Court recognizes that “‘provid[ing] the electorate with information’ about the sources of election-related spending … would help citizens ‘‘make informed choices in the political marketplace.’” We need to be able to see who is giving what to which candidates to evaluate whether new officials are favoring campaign donors — with contracts, state support or other favorable outcomes. Transparency in government means that the government provides information that allows the public to see critical decisions and transactions. Understanding both the processes and outcomes of government action lets us know whether we have the right policies, and right political leaders, in place. In the interest of seeing how states continue to work to meet this challenge, we are providing a one-year update on changes to state campaign finance law and practice occurring since the 2015 State Integrity Investigation (SII). Last November, Global Integrity and the Center for Public Integrity released the second round of the SII, an in-depth research project that evaluated how the 50 states each performed on 245 indicators of transparency and accountability. The study covered 13 institutional categories, ranging from access to information to state pension fund management. The Sunlight Foundation, with support from Global Integrity, decided to take a closer look at how campaign finance laws and practices have changed (or not) since the mid-2015 end of the SII data collection period. In previous posts, we noted that the last year has seen a number of substantial changes across the country in the areas of campaign finance limits and campaign finance oversight. We also found substantial changes in laws affecting campaign finance disclosure. Over the last year, 16 states passed law in this area. Changes in the laws of 12 states represented improvements, creating stronger campaign finance disclosure. Changes to law in three states weakened campaign finance disclosure. One state passed a law on campaign finance disclosure which didn’t appear to represent a significant change in either direction. To view the spreadsheet in a new window, click here.Of the states which saw improvements in disclosure between June 2015 and June 2016, improvements generally fell into the following categories: Electronic report submission: The electronic submission of campaign finance reports significantly improves their quality and the speed with which they can be made available to the public. It’s therefore somewhat incredible that, as of 2015, 18 states still permitted campaigns to file on paper, despite the fact that paper submissions have created significant additional costs in terms of data-entry labor and data quality. (Only one state, Mississippi, does not support the electronic submission of campaign finance reports.) Happily, the country is continuing to move in the direction of requiring the electronic submission of campaign finance reports. New laws in West Virginia and Missouri require electronic filing of campaign reports. In West Virginia, advocates noted that this would finally make it possible to create searchable online disclosure that was “much more meaningful and user friendly for the public than viewing scanned documents that aren’t searchable and are sometimes illegible.” Meanwhile, new laws in New Hampshire, New Mexico and Connecticut enable more electronic filing of campaign finance reports, moving those states toward the goal of a fully searchable and updated online disclosure database. New requirements for disclosure — type of elections/candidates: New laws in Colorado, New Hampshire and South Dakota require campaign finance reports to be filed by candidates not previously required (in Colorado, this includes candidates running for school board) and for new stages of the campaign (New Hampshire’s new requirement that governors disclose the source of contributions to inauguration events), and also reduce exemptions from campaign finance disclosure requirements (as in South Dakota, which now requires primary-period disclosure from candidates running unopposed, among other closed loopholes.) Where laws expand the period of activity and entities covered, people can feel confident that they are seeing the full picture of donations to current and future officials. Lower reporting thresholds: New laws in Maine and Connecticut lower the amount of money that a campaign must spend before it is required to file campaign finance reports. In Connecticut’s case, the threshold for mandatory reporting dropped from $250,000 to $1,000, representing a substantial change that should add all state races to the disclosure list. To give a sense of the significance of this change, in 2010 the national average for contributions raised in state legislative races was $79,142 — and the national median was just $24,404. Other improvements: More improvements to campaign finance disclosure systems include faster and more frequent disclosure requirements, like SB 248 in Illinois, a bill that generally speeds up reporting for independent expenditures by PACS and expands the length of the faster pre-election reporting period. The Hawaiian public also gains greater clarity on the actual source of campaign donations through HB 1491, which requires super PACs to help administrators tease through the layers of identity-shielding legal shells to identify the original source of their contributions. Weaknesses: While the overwhelming majority of changes represented improvements, three states did pass laws which are likely to reduce the effectiveness of their disclosure regimes. Arizona and Michigan both passed laws which reduce the number of entities that are required to file a campaign finance disclosure: in Arizona, HB 5612 raised the minimum amount at which a committee must file from $500 to $1000, while in Michigan HB 4596/4597 excuses incumbent judges from needing to file at all. Virginia passed a weakening of its disclosure law with H1387 that moved pre-election filing deadlines from 5:00 pm to 11:50 pm, a change which may affect the speed with which those reports can be publicly reported. Despite these few steps back, state-level legislative action over the past year mainly improved the public’s ability to find out who’s funding the campaigns in our states. For many states over the past year, while the progress has been incremental, it is nonetheless in the right direction. As long as states continue to improve their disclosure regimes, hope remains that we’ll eventually all be able to access the data we need in time to make informed choices during elections.   This is the fourth of a series of four posts tracking state-level developments in campaign finance; find the others here. The contents of this blog and the underlying research are the result of a partnership between Global Integrity and the Sunlight Foundation in relation to the State Integrity Investigation. 9 Dec 16
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