The Breakfast Club June 26, 2014

Welcome to The Breakfast Club! We’re a disorganized group of rebel lefties who hang out and chat if and when we’re not too hungover  we’ve been bailed out we’re not too exhausted from last night’s (CENSORED) the caffeine kicks in. Join us every weekday morning at 9am (ET) and weekend morning at 10:30am (ET) to talk about current news and our boring lives and to make fun of LaEscapee! If we are ever running late, it’s PhilJD’s fault.

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I can see the appeals coming from this.

Massachusetts high court says accused criminal must decrypt computers for police by Elizabeth Barber, Reuters

Police can order an accused criminal to decrypt his computer without violating his constitutional right against self-incrimination, Massachusetts’ top court said on Wednesday.

In the latest U.S. ruling on the contentious issue, the 5-2 ruling by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court reverses a lower court’s finding that police could not force Leon Gelfgatt, charged with mortgage fraud, to decrypt four computers seized in an investigation, since doing so would violate his Fifth Amendment right.

The court found that since Gelfgatt had told investigators that the computer belonged to him and that he had the encryption key, police could compel him to decrypt his files. [..]

In February 2012, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta ruled that a defendant did not have to decrypt his hard drive, since doing so would violate his Fifth Amendment rights. But a federal judge in Wisconsin last spring ordered a Missouri man to decrypt his files, after he admitted that he owned the computer and had the key.

Any bets the rest of the US MSM is silent about this?

Judge upholds order demanding release of CIA torture accounts by Spencer Ackerman, The Guardian

US government loses attempt to keep accounts of torture of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri secret

A military judge has rejected the US government’s attempts to keep accounts of the CIA’s torture of a detainee secret, setting up a fateful choice for the Obama administration in staunching the fallout from its predecessor’s brutal interrogations.A military judge has rejected the US government’s attempts to keep accounts of the CIA’s torture of a detainee secret, setting up a fateful choice for the Obama administration in staunching the fallout from its predecessor’s brutal interrogations. [..]

Among those details are the locations of the “black site” secret prisons in which Nashiri was held until his September 2006 transfer to Guantánamo; the names and communications of CIA personnel there; training and other procedures for guards and interrogators; and discussions of the application of so-called “enhanced interrogation techniques”.

The government has charged Nashiri in connection to the deaths of 17 sailors in the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole. After his 2002 capture, Nashiri’s interrogators revved a power drill near his head, threatened him with a gun and waterboarded him, producing a sensation akin to drowning.

Pohl’s orders represent a watershed in disclosure for the commissions. Lawyers for Guantánamo detainees charged with war crimes have long criticised their lack of access to CIA detentions files, which they say prevents them from fully defending their clients, several of whom are known to have been abused in custody.

Kamala Harris for US Attorney General.

California clamps down on federal immigration detention requests by Steve Gorman, Reuters

California’s attorney general warned police departments statewide on Wednesday that it is generally illegal for them to honor immigration detention requests from the federal government unless the detainee has a criminal history of serious or violent offenses.

The directive by Attorney General Kamala Harris cited the recent enactment of a state law dubbed the Trust Act in outlining new limits on California’s compliance with a federal program that has helped deport hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants.

She also cited a federal court case in Oregon as leaving local police agencies vulnerable to civil rights lawsuits for detaining individuals solely on the basis of a request from the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, or ICE.

The directive is aimed at the federal government’s Secure Communities program, which was launched in 2008 in partnership with the FBI and local law enforcement to deport unauthorized immigrants who are arrested by police for other offenses.

Privacy for EU citizens but not for American communications with them>

US to extend privacy protection rights to EU citizens by Ewan Mac Askill, The Guardian

EU and human rights and privacy groups welcome pledge, which follows pressure in wake of Snowden revelations

The Obama administration has caved in to pressure from the European Union in the wake of Edward Snowden’s revelations on surveillance by promising to pass legislation granting European citizens many of the privacy protection rights enjoyed by US citizens.

The proposed law would apply to data on European citizens being transferred to the US for what Washington says is law enforcement purposes.

After the first Snowden revelations appeared in June last year, the Obama administration irritated many by insisting that while US citizens were protected by law from snooping by US spy agencies, this did not apply to non-Americans.

On Wednesday the US attorney general, Eric Holder, promised at a US-EU meeting of home affairs and justice ministers in Athens that legislation would be sent to Congress to extend the US Privacy Act to EU citizens.

Another one bites the dust.

Utah gay marriage ban declared unconstitutional by appeals court BY Karen McVeigh, The Guardian

Judges uphold lower court ruling that struck down the ban, saying ‘plaintiffs have a fundamental right to marry’

A federal appeals court issued a historic ruling on Wednesday, finding for the first time that same-sex marriage is constitutionally protected in a decision that is expected to bring the issue closer to the US supreme court.

The 2-1 ruling, by the 10th circuit court of appeals, upheld a lower court ruling that struck down Utah’s gay marriage ban and gives a boost to a growing momentum of legal victories by advocates for same-sex marriage.

The Utah attorney general’s office said it will appeal the decision to the US supreme court.

Some 16 federal judges have issued rulings in favour of gay marriage. But Wednesday’s ruling represents the first time a federal appeal court has ruled on the issue since last summer’s landmark ruling against the Defense of Marriage Act (Doma) and California’s same-sex marriage ban.

This puts Obama and Syrian president Assad on the same side of this conflict. What will McCain and Graham say now?

Syrian airstrikes on ISIS mark new strategy in civil war By Mousab Alhamadee and Jonathan S. Landay, McClatchey

After taking a hands-off approach toward the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria for several months, the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad has reversed course and launched air attacks against the Sunni Muslim extremist group inside both Syria and Iraq.

The policy shift complicates an already tangled situation for the Obama administration by effectively aligning Assad, whose ouster Washington is demanding, with the United States in the fight against ISIS, which was once part of al Qaida.

The attacks by Syrian jet aircraft are occurring as Iraq’s air space appears to be growing crowded. The Pentagon this week confirmed that U.S. aircraft and unmanned drones are flying dozens of daily sorties over Iraq, collecting intelligence to share with the government of beleaguered Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki. Moreover, news reports said that Iran, which backs both Maliki and Assad, also is flying drone missions over Iraq.

Seriously? Don’t defecate in the hallways?

EPA Memo To Employees: Please Stop Pooping In The Hallway by Caitlan MacNeil, Talking Points Memo

An administrator at a regional Environmental Protection Agency office in Denver, Colo. had to educate employees about bathroom etiquette.

Deputy Regional Administrator Howard Cantor wrote an email to staff earlier this year lecturing them about bathroom behavior and telling them not to defecate in the hallways, Government Executive reported.

Cantor told employees about multiple inappropriate incidents, including “an individual placing feces in the hallway” near a restroom and someone clogging the toilets with paper towels, according to Government Executive.

Must Read Blog Posts

Federal Judge Rules US Citizens Placed on No-Fly List Had Their Due Process Rights Violated by Kevin Gosztola, FireDogLake

Enough Secret Law: Newly Released DOJ Drone Killing Justification Memo… Points To Another Secret Drone Memo by Mike Masnick, Techdirt

Dear Internet, by Peter van Buren, MyFDL

Alan Grayson: Is Keith Alexander Selling Classified Information to the Banks? by Marcy Wheeler, emptywheel

Wells Smacked Down Over Bad Faith Arguments in Foreclosure Case by Yves Smith, naked capitalism

The Daily Wiki

Relative Humidity

Relative humidity is the ratio of the partial pressure of water vapor in an air-water mixture to the saturated vapor pressure of water at a prescribed temperature. The relative humidity of air depends on temperature and the pressure of the system of interest.[..]

Comfort

Humans are sensitive to humidity because the human body uses evaporative cooling, enabled by perspiration, as the primary mechanism to rid itself of waste heat. Perspiration evaporates from the skin more slowly under humid conditions than under arid conditions. Because humans perceive a low rate of heat transfer from the body to be equivalent to a higher air temperature, the body experiences greater distress of waste heat burden at a lower temperature with high humidity than at a higher temperature at lower humidity.

For example, if the air temperature is 24 °C (75 °F) and the relative humidity is zero percent, then the air temperature feels like 21 °C (69 °F). If the relative humidity is 100 percent at the same air temperature, then it feels like 27 °C (80 °F). In other words, if the air is 24 °C (75 °F) and contains saturated water vapor, then the human body cools itself at the same rate as it would if it were 27 °C (80 °F) and dry. The heat index and the humidex are indices that reflect the combined effect of temperature and humidity on the cooling effect of the atmosphere on the human body.

Humans can be comfortable within a wide range of humidities depending on the temperature – from thirty to seventy percent – but ideally between 50%[5] and 60%.[

Something to Think about over Coffee Prozac

Evolution is among the most well-established theories in the scientific community. To doubt it sounds to biologists as absurd as denying relativity does to physicists.

Leonard Mlodinow

Tweet of the Day

Yeah, I know DH.

Liz Cheney couldn’t get elected in Wyoming, but w 10th Circuit decision, now Mary Cheney can get married there

— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) June 25, 2014

Stupid Shit by LaEscapee

Just a Few Simple Thoughts

Cross posted at Docudharma and Voices on the Square