Breaking News Events

[Kobi]

Originally Posted by Andrea

S. 744
Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act
As reported by the Senate Committee on the Judiciary on May 28, 2013,
including the amendments made in the star print of June 6, 2013

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/s744.pdf

"The report estimates that in the first decade after the immigration bill is carried out, the net effect of adding millions of additional taxpayers would decrease the federal budget deficit by $197 billion. Over the next decade, the report found, the deficit reduction would be even greater -- an estimated $700 billion, from 2024 to 2033."

Bolding mine....

I always take these government projections with a grain of salt, seeing the figures are based on arbitrary and incalculable variables resulting in the "new math" of governmental illusionary thinking in an absolutely perfect world that doesn't exist.

Adding 10 million new people to the workforce would be terrific if there were jobs. According to Bureau of Labor Statistics there are already 11 million unemployed Americans as of May 2013. This doesn't include those who are no longer bothering to look for work.

So, if you have 11 million unemployed already, just how many of the new 10 million are likely to find gainful employment so they provide more disposable revenue for the government to misuse?

In the same vein, 10 million more people need to be added to an infrastructure that is not equipment to even handle the current loads. 10 million more accessing education, health care, housing, social security and other benefits. There is no reasonable way to calculate the cost of adding new numbers or of how the infrastructure, (federal, state and local) needs to expand to accommodate increased demand.

I'm not dissing the bill btw. I am dissing the way government tries to sell us an illusionary bill of goods and promises that defy basic logic and math.

[Greyson]

WEDNESDAY JUNE 19 2013

OP-ED: Murkowski Shares Thoughts on Marriage Equality with Alaskans
The Pursuit of Happiness – Without Government Interference

Not too long ago, I had the honor of nominating an Alaskan family as “Angels in Adoption,” a celebration of the selflessness shown by foster care families and those who adopt children. They arrived in Washington, DC, a military family who had opened their doors to not one child but four siblings to make sure that these sisters and brother had the simplest gift you can give a child: a home together. We had lunch together, and they shared their stories with me. All the while, the children politely ate lunch and giggled as content youngsters do. Given my daily hectic Senate schedule, it’s not often that I get to sit down with such a happy family during a workday – and I think of them often, as everything our nation should encourage.

I bring them up because the partners were two women who had first made the decision to open their home to provide foster care to the eldest child in 2007. Years later – and after a deployment abroad with the Alaska National Guard for one of them – they embraced the joy and sacrifice of four adopted children living under the same roof, with smiles, laughter, movie nights, parent-teacher conferences and runny noses.

Yet despite signing up and volunteering to give themselves fully to these four adorable children, our government does not meet this family halfway and allow them to be legally recognized as spouses. After their years of sleepless nights, after-school pickups and birthday cakes, if one of them gets sick or injured and needs critical care, the other would not be allowed to visit them in the emergency room – and the children could possibly be taken away from the healthy partner. They do not get considered for household health care benefit coverage like spouses nationwide. This first-class Alaskan family still lives a second-class existence.

The Supreme Court is set to make a pair of decisions on the topic of marriage equality shortly, and the national conversation on this issue is picking back up. This is a significant moment for our nation when it comes to rethinking our society’s priorities and the role of government in Americans’ private lives and decisions, so I want to be absolutely clear with Alaskans. I am a life-long Republican because I believe in promoting freedom and limiting the reach of government. When government does act, I believe it should encourage family values. I support the right of all Americans to marry the person they love and choose because I believe doing so promotes both values: it keeps politicians out of the most private and personal aspects of peoples’ lives – while also encouraging more families to form and more adults to make a lifetime commitment to one another. While my support for same sex civil marriage is something I believe in, I am equally committed to guaranteeing that religious freedoms remain inviolate, so that churches and other religious institutions can continue to determine and practice their own definition of marriage.

With the notion of marriage – an exclusive, emotional, binding ‘til death do you part’ tie – becoming more and more an exception to the rule given a rise in cohabitation and high rates of divorce, why should the federal government be telling adults who love one another that they cannot get married, simply because they happen to be gay? I believe when there are so many forces pulling our society apart, we need more commitment to marriage, not less.

This thinking is consistent with what I hear from more and more Alaskans especially our younger generations. Like the majority of Alaskans, I supported a constitutional amendment in 1998 defining marriage as only between a man and a woman, but my thinking has evolved as America has witnessed a clear cultural shift. Fifteen years after that vote, I find that when one looks closer at the issue, you quickly realize that same sex unions or civil marriages are consistent with the independent mindset of our state – and they deserve a hands-off approach from our federal policies.

First, this is a personal liberty issue and has to do with the most important personal decision that any human makes. I believe that, as Americans, our freedoms come from God and not government, and include the rights enumerated in the Declaration of Independence: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. What could be more important to the pursuit of happiness than the right to choose your spouse without asking a Washington politician for permission? If there is one belief that unifies most Alaskans – our true north – it is less government and more freedom. We don’t want the government in our pockets or our bedrooms; we certainly don’t need it in our families.

Secondly, civil marriage also touches the foundation of our national culture: safe, healthy families and robust community life. In so many ways, sound families are the foundation of our society. Any efforts or opportunity to expand the civil bonds and rights to anyone that wants to build a stable, happy household should be promoted.

Thirdly, by focusing on civil marriage -- but also reserving to religious institutions the right to define marriage as they see fit -- this approach respects religious liberty by stopping at the church door. As a Catholic, I see marriage as a valued sacrament that exists exclusively between a man and a woman. Other faiths and belief systems feel differently about this issue – and they have every right to. Churches must be allowed to define marriage and conduct ceremonies according to their rules, but the government should not tell people who they have a right to marry through a civil ceremony.

I recently read an interview where Ronald Reagan’s daughter said that she believes he would have supported same-sex marriage, that he would think “What difference does it make to anybody else’s life? I also think because he wanted government out of peoples’ lives, he would not understand the intrusion of government banning such a thing. This is not what he would have thought government should be doing.”

Like Reagan, Alaskans believe that government works best when it gets out of the way. Countless Alaskans and Americans want to give themselves to one another and create a home together. I support marriage equality and support the government getting out of the way to let that happen.

http://www.murkowski.senate.gov/publ...5-354b3aef41dc

[Greyson]

Secrets piling up faster than government can declassify some

By Anita Kumar
McClatchy Washington Bureau
Last Modified: Wednesday, Jun. 19, 2013 - 8:00 pm

COLLEGE PARK, Md. -- In the darkened stacks of a nondescript building in the suburbs outside Washington, dozens of federal employees wearing protective gloves spend day after day sifting through millions of pages of secret documents, some of them nearly a century old.

The 70 staffers of the National Declassification Center are charged with deciding – anonymously and quietly – which of the nation’s old secrets can be laid bare for the world to see.

“We’re treading water,” said Sheryl Shenberger, a former CIA officer who’s the center’s director.

She later added that there’s some confusion about the exact parameters of the president’s goal but that she thinks that examining all the documents once – but not necessarily releasing them – would meet the goal, though she knows other people do not.

Obama acted on several longtime recommendations when he created the declassification center in December 2009 to conduct “automatic” reviews while implementing revised rules for classifying and declassifying documents.
But an automatic review is anything but automatic.

http://www.sacbee.com/2013/06/19/550...ster-than.html

__________________________________________________ _____________

I encourage you to read the entire article. It gets "better" and more in depth.
I had never heard of the "National Declassification Center." In all fairness some of these recommendations were created before Obama was elected president. However, in my opinion Obama is tepid when it comes to transparency. FYI, I did vote for Obama, twice. My first choice was Hillary Clinton.

[*Anya*]

CLOSING TIME: "EX-GAY" GROUP REALIZES THEY'RE WRONG

Wednesday, June 19, 2013 - 11:55pm by Ross Murray, Director of News and Faith Initiatives at GLAAD

The leadership of Exodus International has announced that they are shutting their doors after 3 decades of practicing so-called ‘ex-gay’ ministry.

According to a statement on the group’s web site, the board of directors was finding ‘ex-gay’ work more and more difficult, given their anti-gay words and actions.

“Exodus is an institution in the conservative Christian world, but we’ve ceased to be a living, breathing organism,” said Alan Chambers, President of Exodus. “For quite some time we’ve been imprisoned in a worldview that’s neither honoring toward our fellow human beings, nor biblical.”

The president of Exodus, Alan Chambers, was a well-documented figure on GLAAD’s Commentator Accountability Project for previous anti-gay statements. However, his tone and words began shifting over the course of the past two years. Today, Chambers posted an apology on the Exodus web site for the harm that he had caused LGBT people and their families in his quest to make them match an anti-gay view of God.

"I am sorry for the pain and hurt that many of you have experienced. I am sorry some of you spent years working through the shame and guilt when your attractions didn’t change. I am sorry we promoted sexual orientation change efforts and reparative theories about sexual orientation that stigmatized parents.

I am sorry I didn’t stand up to people publicly ‘on my side’ who called you names like sodomite—or worse. I am sorry that I, knowing some of you so well, failed to share publicly that the gay and lesbian people I know were every bit as capable of being amazing parents as the straight people that I know. I am sorry that when I celebrated a person coming to Christ and surrendering their sexuality to Him, I callously celebrated the end of relationships that broke your heart. I am sorry I have communicated that you and your families are less than me and mine."

The timing comes as Exodus opened what is now to be their last conference. It also comes just one day before an episode of Our America with Lisa Ling, in which Chambers offers an apology (part of which is printed above) to a group of ex-gay survivors. This is a follow-up for Ling, who two years ago did an episode on so-called ‘ex-gay’ programs that featured Chambers and other ‘ex-gay’ practitioners.

"Alan Chambers, and the rest of the Exodus leadership, has fully and completely come to the realization that their so-called 'ministry' has done harm to thousands of people,” said Ross Murray, Director of News and Faith Initiatives. “They are coming to the right decision to end that harm now."

http://www.glaad.org/blog/closing-ti...s-theyre-wrong

[Gráinne]

http://www.thejimani.com/thehistoryo...irslounge.html *WARNING* Graphic pictures

I'd never heard of this tragedy before now. I was 10 when it happened, so this wasn't in some dim pages of history. It feels like a different world, though.

I know we have a lot farther to go and a lot of work to do yet, but how far we have come in 40 years since. The Supreme Court is deciding on a case about gay marriage, which will have the same ramifications as the Loving decision of 1967. And instead of a tiny club hidden upstairs and sneaking around in shame, over 100 of us are about to descend on a fancy hotel in the heart of a Deep South city and get our groove on (fairly) openly in that ballroom.

[Tommi]

BREAKING: Supreme Court strikes down federal provision requiring benefits to legally married gay couples.

Defense of Marriage Act struck down by Supreme Court OTUS
Breaking news

Updated: Wednesday, 26 Jun 2013, 10:05 AM EDT
Published : Wednesday, 26 Jun 2013, 7:11 AM EDT


WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court is meeting to deliver opinions in two cases that could dramatically alter the rights of gay people across the United States.

The justices are expected to decide their first-ever cases about gay marriage Wednesday in their last session before the court's summer break. Hours before the court was to issue its rulings, crowds began lining up outside the Supreme Court building in hopes of getting a seat inside the courtroom.

The issues before the court are California's constitutional ban on same-sex marriage and the federal Defense of Marriage Act, which denies legally married gay Americans a range of tax, health and pension benefits otherwise available to married couples.

The broadest possible ruling would give gay Americans the same constitutional right to marry as heterosexuals. But several narrower paths also are available, including technical legal outcomes in which the court could end up saying very little about same-sex marriage.

If the court overturns California's Proposition 8 or allows lower court rulings that struck down the ban to stand, it will take about a month for same-sex weddings to resume for the first time since 2008, San Francisco officials have said.

http://www.wwlp.com/dpps/news/politi...13-jos_6309251

[Tommi]

The U.S. Supreme Court decided Wednesday it will not take up a challenge to California's voter-approved Prop 8 -- a ban on same-sex marriage that landed before the Justices after years of legal battles.

The ruling states the people who brought this case had no legal standing to bring the case to the Supreme Court

[MsTinkerbelly]

Same-sex marriages resume in California after court gives go-ahead


By CNN Staff

updated 7:16 PM EDT, Fri June 28, 2013







California lifts same-sex marriage ban



STORY HIGHLIGHTS
A federal appeals court lifts an order banning same-sex marriages
It takes effect "immediately," according to the court order
The U.S. Supreme Court paved the way for the move with a ruling Wednesday

(CNN) -- The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Friday that same-sex marriages can resume in California, a move that the Supreme Court paved the way for on Wednesday.

Three judges on the appeals court made it possible for local governments to issue marriage certificates for gay and lesbian couples with a few words: "The stay in the above matter is dissolved effective immediately."

Very soon after, California Attorney General Kamala Harris was already at San Francisco's city hall marrying couples, according to her office.

"I am thrilled that the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals lifted its stay to allow same-sex couples to legally marry in California," Harris said in a statement. "Gay and lesbian couples have waited so long for this day and for their fundamental right to marry. Finally, their loving relationships are as legitimate and legal as any other."

California's Supreme Court struck down the state's ban on same-sex marriage in May 2008, ruling that the state's constitution gives "this basic civil right to (marry to) all Californians, whether gay or heterosexual, and to same-sex couples as well as to opposite-sex couples."

But months later, 52% of voters backed Proposition 8 to once again restrict marriages so that they can only be between a man and a woman.

The measure put gay and lesbian marriages on hold in the state, but a federal appeals court later rule Proposition 8 was unconstitutional.

In a 5-4 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed an appeal of that federal court ruling on jurisdictional grounds. That meant that Friday's news -- and the resumption of same-sex marriages in the Golden State -- was expected, even if the timing wasn't fully known

[Greyson]

Is the U.S. Turning Into a Nation of Temps? Depends on Where You Live

RICHARD FLORIDA

JUN 27, 2013

Our new dependence on temp jobs is much greater in some metro areas than others. The table below, based on EMSI data, shows the 10 large metros (those with more than one million people) where temp jobs have made up the largest share and smallest share of total employment growth since 2009.



Large Metros with Where Temp Jobs Make Up
the Largest and Smallest Shares of Job Gains, 2009-2013
Metros with the Largest Increases Percent of all job growth
(2009-2013)

Memphis, Tennessee-Mississippi-Arkansas* 116%
Birmingham-Hoover, Alabama 66%
Cincinnati-Middletown, Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana 65%
Hartford-West Hartford-East Hartford, Connecticut 58%
Milwaukee-Waukesha-West Allis, Wisconsin 51%
Kansas City, Missouri-Kansas 46%
Cleveland-Elyria-Mentor, Ohio 44%
Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, Pennsylvania-New Jersey-Delaware 41%
Chicago-Joliet-Naperville, Illinois-Indiana-Wisconsin 40%
Tucson, Arizona 37%

Metros with Smallest Increases Percent of all job growth
(2009-2013)

Washington, D.C. 2%
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma 3%
San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, California 4%
Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos, Texas 5%
Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, California 6%
Salt Lake City, Utah 6%
Buffalo-Niagara Falls, New York 6%
San Diego-Carlsbad-San Marcos, California 6%
San Antonio-New Braunfels, Texas 7%
Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, Washington 7%


Read More:
http://www.theatlanticcities.com/job...you-live/5997/

[Hollylane]

Originally Posted by Greyson

Is the U.S. Turning Into a Nation of Temps? Depends on Where You Live

RICHARD FLORIDA

JUN 27, 2013

Our new dependence on temp jobs is much greater in some metro areas than others. The table below, based on EMSI data, shows the 10 large metros (those with more than one million people) where temp jobs have made up the largest share and smallest share of total employment growth since 2009.



Large Metros with Where Temp Jobs Make Up
the Largest and Smallest Shares of Job Gains, 2009-2013
Metros with the Largest Increases Percent of all job growth
(2009-2013)

Memphis, Tennessee-Mississippi-Arkansas* 116%
Birmingham-Hoover, Alabama 66%
Cincinnati-Middletown, Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana 65%
Hartford-West Hartford-East Hartford, Connecticut 58%
Milwaukee-Waukesha-West Allis, Wisconsin 51%
Kansas City, Missouri-Kansas 46%
Cleveland-Elyria-Mentor, Ohio 44%
Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, Pennsylvania-New Jersey-Delaware 41%
Chicago-Joliet-Naperville, Illinois-Indiana-Wisconsin 40%
Tucson, Arizona 37%

Metros with Smallest Increases Percent of all job growth
(2009-2013)

Washington, D.C. 2%
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma 3%
San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, California 4%
Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos, Texas 5%
Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, California 6%
Salt Lake City, Utah 6%
Buffalo-Niagara Falls, New York 6%
San Diego-Carlsbad-San Marcos, California 6%
San Antonio-New Braunfels, Texas 7%
Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, Washington 7%


Read More:
http://www.theatlanticcities.com/job...you-live/5997/

I think and talk about this subject a lot. My theory about the main reason for our economy being in the toilet, is outsourcing to other countries, hiring workers from other countries to come work in the states when so many Americans are unemployed (I don't blame foreign workers, they are just taking advantage of a good opportunity, for themselves and their families), and temporary workers.

How can any American feel truly secure in investing in a home/vehicle or purchasing other high dollar items, when so very few people have a reliable source of income? It seems that very few jobs are safe from outsourcing or from layoffs. Laid off employees are replaced with temporary employees, and companies even find that giving a severance to an employee that is a long way from retirement, is cheaper than keeping them employed. The appeal of the temporary worker is that they have little to no expectation of monetary increases or advances in employment, and the young temp workers have few thoughts about pension or health benefits (unless they have small children). The thing that bothers me the most about the replacement of our aging workforce with younger employees, is that the age for retirement is going up and up, with no viable jobs to retire from.

I could go on and on...and it just keeps getting worse.

[*Anya*]

NY TIMES TODAY 7/1/13

By JULIA PRESTON
An American man in Florida and his husband, who is from Bulgaria, have become the first same-sex married couple to be approved for a permanent resident visa, an immigration milestone that comes after the Supreme Court struck down a federal law against same-sex marriage.

The notice of approval of a permanent visa, known as a green card, was issued by e-mail late Friday to Traian Popov, a Bulgarian immigrant who lives with his American spouse, Julian Marsh, in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. The approval was evidence that the Obama administration was acting swiftly to change its visa policies in the wake of the court’s decision on Wednesday invalidating the Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA.

The approval came so fast that it took the couple’s immigration lawyer, Lavi Soloway, by surprise. Mr. Soloway, who represents many same-sex couples, said he received the official message while he was attending the annual conference in San Francisco of the American Immigration Lawyers Association.

“I thought, ‘Am I reading this wrong?’ ” Mr. Soloway said in an interview on Saturday. Although it was a professional setting, he said, he began to weep with emotion when he realized the significance of the notice.

Speaking by telephone on Sunday from the couple’s home, Mr. Marsh said that he turned 55 on Friday and that he and Mr. Popov were celebrating with dinner at a Red Lobster restaurant when they received news of the unprecedented green card.
“It was just kind of a shock, like winning the lottery,” said Mr. Marsh, a music producer. “The amazing overwhelming fact is that the government said yes, and my husband and I can live in the country we chose and we love and want to stay in.”

Mr. Popov, 41, said he had been living legally in the United States for 15 years with a series of student visas. He has completed three master’s degrees, he said, and is working on a doctorate in social science at Nova Southeastern University in Florida. The couple married in New York last year, and they applied for a green card in February.

Immigration officials said the visa agency, United States Immigration and Citizenship Services, would announce new procedures early this week for same-sex binational couples seeking green cards. The first approval was also supposed to be issued this week, officials acknowledged, but eager officers at the agency pressed the button on the notice on Friday.

[LeftWriteFemme]

Employment Non-Discrimination Act Passes Senate Committee



http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...p_ref=politics

[Wolfsong]

Women pinned against a car, taunted and beaten by 10 men, for being gay in a westside Chicago neighborhood.


You know I feel pretty free walking around here. We have 1 large predominantly gay neighborhood with another growing (Boystown & Andersonville) quickly. We have a Pride that drew more than 1 million people this year. Andi and I live in the Bridgeport neighborhood. While I wouldn't term this as gay friendly nobody bothers us or treats us badly. We're just one of the neighbors.

Then something like this happens and it jerks me back into reality.

Funny, Illinois just passed concealed carry (it is lawful to carry a gun(s) in public on your person) this week. Andi and I talked about it a lot and pretty much had decided that we didn't need these permits. They are $150 each and really that's $300 that we didn't need to spend. I've lived here all my life and never needed to carry a gun around before so why would I now just because it's legal? I had just said last night that anything that might happen to cause us to need to carry a gun was pretty bad and if it got to that point nobody would be looking at permits anyway. Should we be re-thinking this? I've yapped long and hard about not buying a gun out of fear......and now I'm talking about carrying one for that very reason. It's just wrong.

This really isn't about carrying or not carrying guns anyway (although it would have likely changed the outcome of this interaction). This is about two of us that got beat up simply for existing. This is about the bravery of one woman stepping between real danger and her lover, this is about the anguish of not being able to protect your loved one, this is about hate and fear and frustration. We as a community ought to be able to do something about this. Many of us are much stronger than 2 alone on the street surrounded by angry men. Aren't we?

[Kobi]

LONDON (AP) — You can ditch your computer and leave your cellphone at home, but you can't escape your DNA.

It belongs uniquely to you — and, increasingly, to the authorities.

Countries around the world are collecting genetic material from millions of citizens in the name of fighting crime and terrorism — and, according to critics, heading into uncharted ethical terrain.

Leaders include the United States — where the Supreme Court recently backed the collection of DNA swabs from suspects on arrest — and Britain, where police held samples of almost 7 million people, more than 10 percent of the population, until a court-ordered about-face saw the incineration of a chunk of the database.

The expanding trove of DNA in official hands has alarmed privacy campaigners, and some scientists. Recent leaks about U.S. surveillance programs by former NSA systems analyst Edward Snowden have made people realize their online information and electronic communications may not be as secure as they thought. Could the same be true of the information we hold within our genes? DNA samples that can help solve robberies and murders could also, in theory, be used to track down our relatives, scan us for susceptibility to disease, or monitor our movements.

Earlier this year Yaniv Erlich, who runs a lab at MIT's Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, published a paper in the journal Science describing how he was able to identify individuals, and their families, from anonymous DNA data in a research project. All it took was a computer algorithm, a genetic genealogy website and searches of publicly available Internet records.

"It was a very weird feeling — a 'wow' feeling," Erlich told The Associated Press. "I had to take a walk outside just to think about this process."

Erlich says DNA databases have enormous positive power, both for fighting crime and in scientific research. But, he said, "our work shows there are privacy limitations."

Ethical qualms have done little to stop the growth of genetic databases around the world.

The international police agency Interpol listed 54 nations with national police DNA databases in 2009, including Australia, Canada, France, Germany and China. Brazil and India have since announced plans to join the club, and the United Arab Emirates intends to build the world's first database of an entire national population.

The biggest database is in the United States — the FBI's Combined DNA Index System, or CODIS, which holds information on more than 11 million people suspected of or convicted of crimes.

It is set to grow following a May Supreme Court ruling that upheld the right of police forces to take DNA swabs without a warrant from people who are arrested, not just those who are convicted. (Policies on DNA collection vary by state; more than half of the states and the federal government currently take DNA swabs after arrests.)

The court's justices were divided about implications for individuals' rights. Justice Anthony Kennedy, for the five-judge majority, called the taking of DNA a legitimate and reasonable police booking procedure akin to fingerprinting.

But dissenting Justice Antonin Scalia argued that it marked a major change in police powers. "Because of today's decision, your DNA can be taken and entered into a national database if you are ever arrested, rightly or wrongly, and for whatever reason," he said.

A similar note of caution has been struck by Alec Jeffreys, the British geneticist whose 1984 discovery of DNA fingerprinting revolutionized criminal investigations. He has warned that "mission creep" could see authorities use DNA to accumulate information on people's racial origins, medical history and psychological profile.

Erlich agreed that scenario was possible, if not likely.

"If it's not regulated and the police can do whatever they want ... they can use your DNA to infer things about your health, your ancestry, whether your kids are your kids," he said.

Police forces have already tracked down criminals through the DNA of their innocent relatives, a practice that is both a goldmine for investigators and, according to skeptics, an ethical minefield. Charles Tumosa, a clinical assistant professor in forensic studies at the University of Baltimore who is wary of the potential for genetic surveillance, says relatives of suspects could be identified through DNA and leaned on for information about their family members.

And yet familial DNA searches have helped solve terrible crimes. In Britain, a sex attacker known as the "shoe rapist" was caught after 20 years through DNA from his sister, who was in the database due to a drunken-driving arrest. In Kansas in 2005, police identified Dennis Rader as a serial killer known as "BTK" through his daughter's DNA obtained, without her knowledge, from a pap smear in her medical records.

"There's got to be a debate," said Tumosa. "Nobody has talked this out.

"At what point do you say, enough is enough? Do we want to have a society where 5 percent of the crime is unsolved, or do we want to have a society where 100 percent of the crime is solved" but privacy is compromised. "What's the trade-off?"

Both supporters and critics of DNA databases point to Britain, where until recently, police could take the DNA of anyone 10 or older arrested for even the most minor offense — and keep it forever, even if the suspect was later acquitted or released without charge.

Police say the database has helped solve thousands of crimes, including murders and rapes. On the other side of the coin are hundreds of thousands of innocent people, including children, who feel shamed and tainted by inclusion on a database of criminal suspects — a status some legal experts say undermines the presumption of innocence.

"A lot of British people were very shocked to find themselves or their children ending up on the database for minor alleged offenses such as throwing a snowball at a car," said Helen Wallace, director of the privacy group GeneWatch, which campaigns for restrictions on collection of DNA and other personal information.

After a long legal battle — waged in part by a youth who was arrested at 11 on suspicion of attempted robbery and had his DNA retained despite being acquitted — the European Court of Human Rights ruled in 2008 that Britain's "blanket and indiscriminate" storage of DNA violated the right to a private life.

The U.K. was forced to trim its huge database. Under a law passed last year known as the Protection of Freedoms Act, the government is destroying the DNA profiles — strings of numbers derived from DNA samples that are used to identify individuals — of a million people who were arrested for minor offenses but not convicted. People acquitted of serious crimes have their DNA profiles kept for up to five years.

Britain also has incinerated more than 6 million physical DNA samples — mostly swabs of saliva — taken from suspects. Samples, which could previously be kept indefinitely, must now be destroyed after six months.

Destroying the samples is seen as key to limiting DNA databases to crime-fighting rather than snooping, because it means stored DNA cannot be used to trace relatives or susceptibility to disease.

The U.K. government says the curbs have restored a sense of proportion to Britain's database, but some aspects of the country's genetic monitoring remain murky.

The U.K. DNA ethics watchdog has expressed concerns about a secret counterterrorism database, which, according to the Metropolitan Police Authority, contains "DNA obtained through searches, crime scenes and arrests in relation to counterterrorism" — including samples from people stopped and questioned at ports and borders, even if they are not arrested.

The Home Office, which oversees police and the DNA database, said there was a "robust regulatory framework" for the counterterrorism database. But it would not disclose how large it is, who has access to it or whether the information is shared with other countries.

Some authorities on DNA say fears of genetic intrusion are misplaced.

Chris Asplen, a former assistant U.S. attorney who now heads the Global Alliance for Rapid DNA Testing, argues that DNA is not dramatically different from other information the authorities already hold about millions of people, such as fingerprints, social security numbers or automobile registrations.

But he does see avenues for abuse.

"There is an argument to be made that because that biological sample exists, the government could go back and do other things with it that are not authorized by the law," he said. "It's a constant tension between government and people, particularly when technology is applied."

http://news.yahoo.com/spread-dna-dat...072535306.html

[Kobi]

WASHINGTON (AP) — Chances are, your local or state police departments have photographs of your car in their files, noting where you were driving on a particular day, even if you never did anything wrong.

Using automated scanners, law enforcement agencies across the country have amassed millions of digital records on the location and movement of every vehicle with a license plate, according to a study published Wednesday by the American Civil Liberties Union. Affixed to police cars, bridges or buildings, the scanners capture images of passing or parked vehicles and note their location, uploading that information into police databases. Departments keep the records for weeks or years, sometimes indefinitely.

As the technology becomes cheaper and more ubiquitous, and federal grants focus on aiding local terrorist detection, even small police agencies are able to deploy more sophisticated surveillance systems. While the Supreme Court ruled in 2012 that a judge's approval is needed to track a car with GPS, networks of plate scanners allow police effectively to track a driver's location, sometimes several times every day, with few legal restrictions. The ACLU says the scanners assemble what it calls a "single, high-resolution image of our lives."

"There's just a fundamental question of whether we're going to live in a society where these dragnet surveillance systems become routine," said Catherine Crump, a staff attorney with the ACLU. The civil rights group is proposing that police departments immediately delete any records of cars not linked to a crime.

Law enforcement officials said the scanners can be crucial to tracking suspicious cars, aiding drug busts and finding abducted children. License plate scanners also can be efficient. The state of Maryland told the ACLU that troopers could "maintain a normal patrol stance" while capturing up to 7,000 license plate images in a single eight hour shift.

"At a time of fiscal and budget constraints, we need better assistance for law enforcement," said Harvey Eisenberg, chief of the national security section and assistant U.S. attorney in Maryland.

Law enforcement officials also point out that the technology is legal in most cases, automating a practice that's been done for years. The ACLU found that only five states have laws governing license plate readers. New Hampshire, for example, bans the technology except in narrow circumstances, while Maine and Arkansas limit how long plate information can be stored.

"There's no expectation of privacy" for a vehicle driving on a public road or parked in a public place, said Lt. Bill Hedgpeth, a spokesman for the Mesquite Police Department in Texas, which has records stretching back to 2008, although the city plans next month to begin deleting files older than two years. "It's just a vehicle. It's just a license plate."

In Yonkers, N.Y., just north of the Bronx, police said retaining the information indefinitely helps detectives solve future crimes. In a statement, the department said it uses license plate readers as a "reactive investigative tool" that is only accessed if detectives are looking for a particular vehicle in connection to a crime.

"These plate readers are not intended nor used to follow the movements of members of the public," the department's statement said.

But even if law enforcement officials say they don't want a public location tracking system, the records add up quickly. In Jersey City, N.J., for example, the population is only 250,000 but the city collected more than 2 million plate images on file. Because the city keeps records for five years, the ACLU estimates that it has some 10 million on file, making it possible for police to plot the movements of most residents depending upon the number and location of the scanners, according to the ACLU.

The ACLU study, based on 26,000 pages of responses from 293 police departments and state agencies across the country, also found that license plate scanners produced a small fraction of "hits," or alerts to police that a suspicious vehicle has been found. In Maryland, for example, the state reported reading about 29 million plates between January and May of last year. Of that amount, about 60,000 — or roughly 1 in every 500 license plates — were suspicious. The No. 1 crime? A suspended or revoked registration, or a violation of the state's emissions inspection program accounted for 97 percent of all alerts.

Eisenberg, the assistant U.S. attorney, said the numbers "fail to show the real qualitative assistance to public safety and law enforcement." He points to the 132 wanted suspects the program helped track. They were a small fraction of the 29 million plates read, but he said tracking those suspects can be critical to keeping an area safe.

Also, he said, Maryland has rules in place restricting access for criminal investigations only. Most records are retained for one year in Maryland, and the state's privacy policies are reviewed by an independent board, Eisenberg noted.

At least in Maryland, "there are checks, and there are balances," he said.

http://news.yahoo.com/driving-somewh...140052644.html

http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2013/07/17...nd-is-now-law/


The equal marriage bill for England and Wales was today given Royal Assent, and is now officially law.

[*Anya*]

Groups Condemn Threats Against Haiti’s Gay Society

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: July 17, 2013 at 3:49 PM ET


PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Watchdog groups in Haiti on Wednesday condemned what they say has been a series of threats targeting the Caribbean nation's small gay community.

Attorney Mario Joseph and gay rights advocate Charlot Jeudy told a news conference that people who are gay or lesbian should be able to live freely without being harassed or attacked.

Jeudy, president of a gay rights group named Kouraj, Haitian Creole for courage, said he recently received several threats, including a call from someone who told him to shut his mouth, or have it shut for him. The same caller threatened to burn down his home and office.

The news conference came three weeks after several Protestant leaders from a group calling itself the Haitian Coalition of Religious and Moral Organizations said on national television that they disagreed with recent laws in other countries supporting gay marriage. The group announced it would hold an anti-gay demonstration in the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince on Friday, a gathering that worries rights leaders.

"Haitian society needs tolerance," said Joseph, the lawyer. "Whatever sexual orientation you are, you have rights."

Haiti's small gay and lesbian community has long remained largely underground because of a strong social stigma that sparks fears of physical violence and loss of employment.

Gay rights groups in Haiti say that members of the country's lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community often don't report rights violations to authorities out of fear of reprisal. Those people also have suffered overt discrimination from law enforcement and judicial authorities, particularly in Port-au-Prince, the U.S. State Department said in a 2012 report on human rights in Haiti.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2013...html?ref=world

[Kobi]

The presidents of 93 Catholic colleges and universities are calling on Catholic members of the House of Representatives to pass immigration reform that would put most of the 11 million unauthorized immigrants in the country on a path to citizenship.

“Catholic teaching values the human dignity and worth of all immigrants, regardless of legal status,” the Catholic leaders say in a letter sent to all 163 Catholic member of Congress, including Rep. Nancy Pelosi and House Speaker John Boehner. “We remind you that no human being made in the image of God is illegal.”

The Senate passed a comprehensive bill last month but, so far, the Republican-controlled House has not touched it.

The presidents represent 290,000 students at Catholic colleges and universities. They noted that 10 percent of House and Senate members graduated from Jesuit colleges.

“One thing immigrants do for the American Catholic Church is they enrich the church,” said John Garvey, president of the Catholic University of America. “They’re keeping the Catholic Church fresh and the churches full. More and more they're the backbone of parish life.”

“It would be a failure if we miss the opportunity to make the nation more welcoming,” said Father John Jenkins, president of the University of Notre Dame.

Garvey joked that the only way to influence members of Congress to vote for the legislation would be “revoking their degrees.” He said that “apart from that we don't have a lot of authority over them” and acknowledged that presidents' advocacy might not sway representatives opposed to the bill. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has also backed reform legislation.

Religious leaders from some evangelical churches — including conservatives such as Liberty University Law School Dean Mat Staver — have joined their Catholic colleagues in advocating for reform. Evangelical and Catholic churches are increasingly filled with immigrants and their children, and Christian doctrine commands followers to “welcome the stranger,” these leaders argue. It remains to be seen if they can mobilize their followers — about half of Americans self identify as Catholic or evangelical — to pressure lawmakers to pass reform.

Some lawmakers have objected to the Christian argument for reform. Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., has argued that the immigration reform boosters play “fast and loose” with Scripture, which frequently emphasizes the importance of following the law.

Garvey addressed these concerns on a conference call with reporters. He said that even though unauthorized immigrants have broken civil immigration laws, they do not deserve to be punished their whole lives.

“We don't pursue people for all of their lives for something they may have done to find a better life for their families,” Garvey said. “At some point we have to let those transgressions go in our search for working things out.”

http://news.yahoo.com/religious-coll...191440814.html

----------------------------------------------

Hey, church people, how about we apply those same rules and values to the queer community? Queers can fill your failing churches too.

SMH.

[Kobi]

Social Security and Medicare benefits — two cornerstones of retirement planning long enjoyed by most married Americans — will be a bonanza for couples in the 13 states that recognize gay marriage. Gay and lesbian couples will be eligible for valuable spousal and survivor benefits that could be worth tens, maybe hundreds, of thousands of dollars to each household.

President Barack Obama has promised that all relevant federal benefits and obligations will be implemented "swiftly and smoothly," including retirement and health benefits, according to the Social Security Administration.

Once they are, gay couples married in California, Connecticut, Delaware, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Vermont, Washington and Washington, D.C., will be able to incorporate Social Security and Medicare benefits into their post-career planning. Minnesota and Rhode Island join that roster Aug. 1.

Men (or women) married to each other, even if divorced, for example, will be able to collect up to half of each other's Social Security benefits if certain conditions are met. If one is widowed, even if divorced, he can receive up to 100% of the deceased spouse's benefit if it's less than his own benefit, and a spouse or divorced spouse may qualify for half of a worker's disability benefits. Medicare benefits also are available to spouses who haven't contributed.

For those living in states that accept only same-sex civil unions, the federal benefits will not be so generous. The Obama administration will not extend federal-worker benefits to domestic partners who are not legally married.

That applies to civil unions in Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois and New Jersey. Oregon, Nevada and Wisconsin have domestic-partnership laws on the books. Activists hope to eke out a legislative or court victory for gay-marriage laws in Illinois and New Jersey by the end of the year. Other pivotal states in the near term include Hawaii, Nevada, New Mexico and Oregon.

The first known legal test to overturn bans on gay marriage emerged last week when civil-rights lawyers, representing 23 men, women and children, challenged Pennsylvania's law.

The Supreme Court did not touch a DOMA provision that states need not recognize same-sex marriages performed by other states. Because the Social Security Act relies on where you were "domiciled when you filed for benefits," Congress will have to address changing the law to apply to couples who get married in states where gay marriages are legal but move to states where they're not. Thirty states outlaw same-sex unions.

"States have all kinds of rules about what is marriage, but at this point if your state of residence says you're not married, you're not married," says John Olivieri, a partner at White & Case law firm.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/sam...its-2013-07-18

[UofMfan]

Detroit Bankrupt: Kevyn Orr Asks Federal Judge To Place City Under Chapter 9 Bankruptcy Protection