Welcome! "The Evening Blues" is a casual community diary (published Monday - Friday, 8:00 PM Eastern) where we hang out, share and talk about news, music, photography and other things of interest to the community.
Just about anything goes, but attacks and pie fights are not welcome here. This is a community diary and a friendly, peaceful, supportive place for people to interact.
Everyone who wants to join in peaceful interaction is very welcome here.
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Hey! Good Evening!
This evening's music features R&B and blues singer and guitarist Tarheel Slim. Enjoy!
Tarheel Slim - Number 9 Train
“Hope
Smiles from the threshold of the year to come,
Whispering 'it will be happier'...”
-- Alfred Tennyson
News and Opinion
#Why2013matters: 13 scandals & breakthroughs that changed the world
Apple insists it did not work with NSA to create iPhone backdoor program
Apple has denied any knowledge of a National Security Agency tool to hack into iPhones after newly-released documents showed the tech giant’s bestselling phone was targeted by the spying agency.
Documents released Monday showed the NSA had worked on software that would allow it to remotely retrieve virtually all the information on an iPhone including text messages, photos, contacts, location, voice mail and live calls.
The software, DropoutJeep, was first disclosed by Der Spiegel and security researcher Jacob Appelbaum. The NSA slides are dated 2008, a year after the first iPhone was launched.
In a statement, Apple said: “Apple has never worked with the NSA to create a back door in any of our products, including iPhone. Additionally, we have been unaware of this alleged NSA program targeting our products. We care deeply about our customers’ privacy and security. Our team is continuously working to make our products even more secure, and we make it easy for customers to keep their software up to date with the latest advancements.
“Whenever we hear about attempts to undermine Apple’s industry-leading security, we thoroughly investigate and take appropriate steps to protect our customers. We will continue to use our resources to stay ahead of malicious hackers and defend our customers from security attacks, regardless of who’s behind them.”
President Obama claims the NSA has never abused its authority. That's false.
The facts that we know so far – from Fisa court documents to LOVEINT – show that the NSA has overstepped its powers
Time and again since the world learned the extent of what the NSA was doing, government officials have defended the controversial mass surveillance programs by falling back on one talking point: the NSA programs may be all-powerful, but they have never been abused.
President Obama continually evokes the phase when defending the NSA in public. In his end-of-year press conference, he reiterated, "There continues not to be evidence that the [metadata surveillance] program had been abused". ... There's only one problem: it's not true.
We don't have to look further than the Fisa court opinions that have been released in the past few months (thanks to Freedom of Information Act lawsuits by Electronic Frontier Foundation and American Civil Liberties Union). ... For years, as new data came into the NSA's database containing virtually every phone call record in the United States, analysts would search over 17,000 phone numbers in it every day. It turns out only about 1,800 of those numbers – 11% – met the legal requirement that the NSA have "reasonable articulable suspicion" that the number was involved in terrorism.
What were the other 89% of the numbers being searched for? We're not exactly sure. But we do know that five years after the metadata program was brought under a legal framework, the Fisa court concluded it had been "so frequently and systematically violated that it can fairly be said that this critical element of the overall … regime has never functioned effectively".
In another recently-released Fisa court opinion (pdf) about the NSA collection of American internet metadata, the court accused the NSA of engaging in "systemic overcollection" for years, and that "'virtually every [metadata] record' generated by this program included some data that had not been authorized for collection". The judge listed the government's "frequent failures to comply with the [surveillance program's] terms", excoriated them for their "apparent widespread disregard of [Fisa court imposed] restrictions", and accused the NSA of committing "longstanding and pervasive violations of the prior orders in this matter".
Does that sound like an agency that has never abused its powers?
Former NSA Chief: Obama Should Keep Spying, Ignore Panel Recommendations
Torture- and warrantless spying-defender Gen. Michael Hayden says Snowden's leaks showed no wrongdoing by agency, which needs 'power and secrecy' to do its job
General Michael Hayden, former head of the CIA and the former NSA chief who launched illegal, warrantless domestic spying programs, said in an interview that none of the NSA's dragnet surveillance revealed by Edward Snowden was wrong, and that the keys to the agency's effectiveness are power and secrecy.
Speaking to USA Today's Susan Page, Hayden rejected a recommendation by the White House-appointed NSA review panel that the NSA should obtain individual court orders to search the data held by the NSA, saying it didn't make sense in "a post-9/11 world," and that the system orchestrated under Bush was "far more agile."
Hayden said that "since there have been no abuses" of the NSA's surveillance "and almost all the court decisions on this program have held that it's constitutional, I really don't know what problem we're trying to solve by changing how we do this."
It's only under discussion now, Hayden said, because "somebody stirred up the crowd," referring to the NSA whistleblower.
Not Socially Acceptable: NSA boss video ‘most hated’ on YouTube in 2013?
A YouTube video in which NSA boss Keith Alexander tries “to set the record straight” on the agency’s spying antics has nosedived. The half-hour interview triggered a wave of criticism from users, branding it the “most hated” video on YouTube. ...
However, the video had far from the desired effect and has been branded as one of the “most hated” videos of the year. Out of the 187,833 people who have viewed the video up until now 16,407 have hit the dislike button, compared to a mere 300 who “liked” the video.
Thousands of commentators also laid into the video, accusing the NSA of brazen propaganda.
“This NSA interview is the most-hated thing on YouTube right now,” said Google+ user Andy Sweet.
“How fearful are the NSA that they're resorting to releasing propaganda on YouTube. I'm sure all of the upvotes are bots or shills,” wrote Kevin Willock in the comments section.
Another Federal Judge fails the American people:
Judge OKs Border Search of Private Electronics
ACLU calls decision total defeat for personal privacy of innocent people crossing border
In a decision the ACLU says has "no silver lining," a federal judge ruled on Tuesday that the U.S. government has the right to search the private electronic devices of individuals crossing its international border—even those of U.S. citizens—calling the possibility of having ones computer or phone taken and searched by authorities "simply among the many inconveniences associated with international travel.”
Though the judge who made the ruling, Edward R. Korman of the Federal District Court for the Eastern District of New York, contended such searches are rare. He also indicated that traveling abroad with electronically strored data was not necessary and that ways to "mitigate" the possibility of a search were possible.
“While it is true that laptops may make overseas work more convenient,” he wrote, “the precautions plaintiffs may choose to take to ‘mitigate’ the alleged harm associated with the remote possibility of a border search are simply among the many inconveniences associated with international travel.”
According to the ACLU, however, the government itself has records showing that thousands of innocent American citizens have been searched as they return from trips abroad.
Cases of ethnic minorities, political activists, and working journalists being specifically targeted are also well-documented in the post-9/11 era.
17% of Americans Support Afghanistan War
A CNN/ ORC International poll has found that only 17% of Americans support the war in Afghanistan. That is down from 52% in 2008.
82% of Americans are against the war.
Other recent polls found that 57% of Americans think the US was wrong to go into Afghanistan in the first place, and two-thirds said that they didn’t think the war had not been worth fighting.
Utah asks Supreme Court to stay same-sex marriage ruling
Utah went to the Supreme Court on New Year's Eve, asking justices to block for now a trial judge's ruling striking down the state's ban on same-sex marriage.
In a legal package that, with appendices, spanned 101 pages, Utah asserted that there is "a certainty of irreparable harm" if the high court doesn't put a stay on the earlier ruling by U.S. District Judge Robert J. Shelby. ...
"Numerous same-sex marriages are now occurring every day in Utah," the state's newly filed brief states. "And each one is an affront...to the interests of the state and its citizens in being able to define marriage through ordinary democratic channels."
Utah's newly sworn-in Attorney General Sean D. Reyes, who only took office Dec. 30, is now leading the state's effort. The 10th Circuit Court of Appeals, though it agreed to expedite its consideration of the state's appeal, declined to put a stay on Shelby's decision.
All world currencies are in trouble
Wall Street Sings While Americans Sob: Happy New Year One and All
Wall Street posts record gains as millions of Americans face a year of more cuts
Bankers on Wall Street rang in the final hours of 2013 with gains unseen in almost twenty years. However, for roughly half of America, these stock market highs mean nothing as they face a new year with little work and even less of a safety net. ...
"There's a stat that Obama's bull market just beat Ronald Reagan's. I dare say, if you canvass the man on the street, no one would guess that we beat the decade of decadence already. You're certainly not feeling it out there," he continued.
At the end of the day Tuesday, the Standard & Poor index closed with a nearly 30 percent gain, its best since 1997. The Dow Jones Industrial Average also closed at a record high, reaching 16,576.73, up 26.5 percent on the year—marking the largest annual jump since 1996.
And, according to the Wall Street Journal, when dividends are taken into account, stocks posted their best returns since 1995.
However, for the half of Americans who avoid or cannot afford to dally in the stock market, these gains are inconsequential. With the unemployment rate currently near 7 percent, it's clear that many of these corporate gains have not had any positive impact on working people.
Eurozone crisis far from over amid ravaging austerity & debts
Social Security: The Social Contract's Comeback Year?
What a difference a year makes. Last year at this time, a president and a party who had just won an election with progressive rhetoric were quickly pivoting toward a "Grand Bargain" which would cut Social Security and Medicare. ... Today the forces of corporate consensus are on the defensive. It's considered politically reckless to get too far out front on the subject of benefit cuts. Some of the think tanks who advocated Austerity Lite one year ago are focused now on inequality. And, as the leaders of Third Way learned recently, the same rhetoric which earned nods of approval all across Washington this time last year can get you slapped down today.
Social Security is a vital program, but the implications of this shifting debate run even deeper, to the future of the social contract itself. ...
The social contract is an ancient concept, which arguably began with Plato. Worrying about its well-being can seem absurd, like worrying about the fate of entropy or the planetary crust. It seems unassailable, indestructible. But either we're a society or we're not. An attack on any aspect of the social contract, especially programs like Social Security, are an attack on the entire fabric of an indivisible whole.
It's been more than three hundred years since John Locke published his Two Treatises on Government. The social contract has continued to evolve since then. It was essential to the formation of this country, and to our best modern moments of prosperity. But today it's threatened by the forces of globalized wealth.
That's why the good news of the past year is more than just a glimmer of hope. It's been asymmetrical warfare between the highly-financed advocates for the 1 Percent and the outgunned, underfunded fighters for the majority. The shifting debate about Social Security is one sign that the balance of power may be shifting.
Marijuana stores ready to serve up legal highs as Colorado makes history
Colorado voted to allow recreational pot sales in a ballot initiative in the November 2012 general election, as did voters in Washington state. Uruguay also recently decided to legalise. As the first to put the law into practice the Rocky Mountain state is a laboratory commanding global attention. After Washington, activists in Alaska, Oregon and Nevada hope they will be next.
“This is a very momentous occasion. A huge milestone in the movement to end marijuana prohibition,” said Mason Tvert, communications director for the Marijuana Policy Project. In the Netherlands pot is tolerated, but not legal, a crucial distinction, he said. However many show up on Wednesday to buy recreational cannabis – estimates vary from dozens to thousands – they will be “part of history”, said Tvert. He praised state authorities for efficiently converting the voters' verdict into nuts-and-bolt reality. ...
Much hinges on the ability of Colorado's dispensaries to adapt. From serving a relatively stable pool of 110,000 patients with medicinal red cards those with recreational licences must now serve a much bigger, fluid market while jumping through myriad new regulatory hoops intended to track every marijuana plant from seed to sale.
Each plant clipping must be tagged with a unique serial number as it flowers and is harvested, weighed, dried, trimmed, packaged and transported. Stores must record each sale and have a set number of cameras with certain pixelation, among other security requirements.
It is a formidable list but the industry, eager for mainstream acceptance, has assented.
The Final Word: A Holly Jolly White House Message
The Evening Greens
Controversial Idaho hunting contest ends with no wolves killed
A controversial hunting contest in Idaho targeting wolves and coyotes has ended with nearly two dozen coyotes killed but no wolves shot, though rancor over the event remains undiminished.
The coyote and wolf derby was promoted by ranchers and hunting enthusiasts as a form of family recreation aimed at reducing the number of predators threatening livestock and big-game animals like elk prized by hunters. It was condemned by conservationists as cruel and unsportsmanlike. ...
On Friday, a U.S. judge rejected a request by conservation groups to block the Idaho hunt, which was staged on a national forest near where federal wildlife managers reintroduced wolves to the Rocky Mountain West in the mid-1990s.
WildEarth Guardians and others had argued that the U.S. Forest Service did not issue proper permits for the event, but the judge said the contest was similar to activities like picnicking that do not require such special permits.
Bethany Cotton, wildlife program manager for WildEarth Guardians, said the legal battle will go on.
"A killing contest has no place on public lands," she said.
Questions Remain After Massive Oil Train Explosion Forces Town to Evacuate
The collision involved a 106-car BNSF Railway Co oil train, which slammed into a derailed grain train on Monday afternoon, setting off large-scale explosions and a plume of toxic smoke that could be seen for 25 miles near the small town of Casselton.
As of Tuesday afternoon, all of the fires had not yet been put out and the majority of residents closest to the accident were told to stay away from their homes.
Contrary to the Sheriff's advice, Dr. Alan Nye, a toxicologist hired by the BNSF Railway Co to monitor the crash, told Reuters that the air quality was fine and particulate levels were falling, with tests showing a "good range."
Safety questions after ND oil train derailment
CASSELTON, N.D. (AP) — A fiery oil train derailment's near-miss of a small North Dakota town had its mayor angrily calling for federal officials to do more to guarantee the safety of the nation's growing shipment of oil by rail.
Government regulators defended their record on moving hazardous materials by rail, noting that 2012 was the safest year in the industry's history. But oil trains have bucked that trend, thanks in part to the massive amount of oil being moved out of western North Dakota, where the industry's rapid growth is far outpacing pipeline development.
No one was hurt when the mile-long BNSF Railway train derailed Monday afternoon near the eastern North Dakota town of Casselton, but the overturned tankers — exploding and engulfed in plumes of flames and black smoke for more than 24 hours — burned so hot that emergency crews didn't even attempt to put out the blaze. Most of Casselton's roughly 2,400 residents agreed to temporarily evacuate due to concerns about unsafe air. ...
Through early November, the most recent data available, crude releases have been reported from 137 rail cars in 2013, according to an Associated Press analysis of federal accident records. By comparison, only one release was reported in 2009, before the boom got well underway.
The rail tracks in eastern North Dakota run through the middle of Casselton, about 25 miles west of Fargo. McConnell estimated that dozens of people could have been killed if the derailments had happened within the town. ...
"There have been numerous derailments in this area," [the mayor] told the AP. "It's almost gotten to the point that it looks like not if we're going to have an accident, it's when."
Blog Posts of Interest
Here are diaries and selected blog posts of interest on DailyKos and other blogs.
What's Happenin' Is On Hiatus
Swartz, Fracking, Manning, GMO: 13 most underreported news stories of 2013
Selling Pot To Holder -- CO Begins Today
Ruth Marcus on Edward Snowden: point by point
President Obama: Grant Snowden Immunity Now - ACLU Petition
A Little Night Music
Tarheel Slim & Little Ann - It's Too Late
Tarheel Slim - Wildcat tamer
Tarheel Slim & Little Ann - Can't Stay Away
Tarheel Slim & Little Ann - Much Too Late
Tarheel Slim & Little Ann - Bless You My Darling
Tarheel Slim - You're A Little Too Slow
Tarheel Slim and Little Ann - Two Time Loser
Tarheel Slim & Little Ann - Lock Me in Your Heart
Tarheel Slim & Little Ann - Security
Tarheel Slim & Ann - You Make Me Feel So Good
Tarheel Slim - Somebody Changed The Lock On My Door
The Larks - Eyesight To The Blind
The Larks - Little Side Car (Too Many Drivers)
The Larks - Rockin' In The Rocket Room
The Larks - Forget It
Tarheel Slim - Superstitious
Tarheel Slim - Some cold, rainy day
It's National Pie Day!
The election is over, it's a new year and it's time to work on real change in new ways... and it's National Pie Day. This seemed like the perfect opportunity to tell you a little more about our new site and to start getting people signed up.
Come on over and sign up so that we can send you announcements about the site, the launch, and information about participating in our public beta testing.
Why is National Pie Day the perfect opportunity to tell you more about us? Well you'll see why very soon. So what are you waiting for?! Head on over now and be one of the first!
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