Despite being decommissioned more than two years ago, the Defense Department’s Total Information Awareness program is still collecting data. According to a report in the National Journal, project names were changed to conceal their identities, but their funding remains intact, often under the same contracts. The projects that moved, their new code names, and the [...]
In an effort to contain deliberate misinformation campaigns perpetrated by diarists, the Homeland Security Department coordinated a week-long exercise to disrupt their would-be hacker adversaries. The test scenario, observed by more than 115 government agencies, companies and organizations, included such challenges as responding to “deliberate misinformation campaigns” by bloggers. Foresman likened his agency’s role during [...]
Frank Luntz, political consultant to the Republican Party, is the author of what amounts to the GOP “bible” on how to frame the debate in terms of the neocon agenda. Luntz states, “Those who define the issue will determine the outcome.” And, fortunately, we can now learn exactly how the conservatives plan to define the [...]
Bill Scannell has created UnrealID.com, a place for citizens to generate faxes to their senators regarding the Real ID Act. Note that the act is up for vote–tomorrow, Tuesday, May 10th. In a CNet article, Declan McCullagh writes: Starting three years from now, if you live or work in the United States, you’ll need a [...]
A bill now making its way through the Florida Senate would give students legal standing to sue professors and universities if they felt their beliefs were not being properly respected during class. The Academic Freedom Bill of Rights, similar to a bill being considered in Ohio, is said to be modeled after the “academic bill [...]
The Senate today voted to open the Alaska wildlife refuge to oil drilling, despite the fact that 95% of Alaska’s coastline was already open to oil exploration. The government’s Fish and Wildlife Service has this to say about it: Information gathered from the biological, seismic and geological studies was used to complete a Legislative Environmental [...]
Arguing that Democratic filibusters are “unprecedented,” Senate Republicans have been attacking their practice in order to clear the path for President Bush’s ultra-conservative judicial nominees. It should be noted that Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch is using the word “unprecedented” in an entirely new way–one curiously free of historic fact. Otherwise he might have to [...]
“We don’t want science, per se,” they said. “We want that thing where you tell people what we want them to hear. Is that still science?” More than 200 scientists employed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service say they have been directed to alter official findings to lessen protections for plants and animals, a [...]