Imagine that China’s dictator, Xi Jinping, sends one million Chinese troops to invade the United States. Fighting breaks out all over the U.S. as U.S. troops and civilians battle against the Chinese invaders. Hundreds of thousands, if not millions, are killed. Meanwhile, China has taken over Florida and declared it an overseas province of China, with Chinese nationals taking over control of the Florida government.   read more

Local police sent two surveillance robots inside the home to find Blevins. Upon seeing the larger of the two robots, Blevins opened fire and damaged the roving technology. He now faces two felony counts of unlawful possession of a dangerous ordnance and vandalism of government property, among other charges.   read more

This argument has provoked derisive responses from some observers who find it appalling the FBI could blame draconian budget cuts that have yet to really kick in for the agency’s failure to indict Wall Street leaders. Former Congressman Brad Miller (D-North Carolina) told the Huffington Post, “Are they worried that because of sequestration the FBI will interview critical witnesses three years after the statute of limitations has expired instead of just one year?"   read more

TSA officials said they made the switch in order to bring U.S. rules impacting carry-on items in line with those of international carriers. They also said it will allow passengers to move through screening lines more quickly, since it reduces the number of prohibited items that TSA screeners have to deal with.   read more

The committee found a “correlation between the absence of a permanent inspector general and a high volume of open and unimplemented recommendations,” according to its report. Currently, eight of the 73 IG positions are vacant. In fact, the State Department has not had an inspector general for more than five years and the Department of the Interior for more than four years, while the Labor Department had been IG-less for a mere three and a half years.   read more

India has decided that a domestic company can sell a generic—and much cheaper—version of a cancer drug manufactured by Germany’s Bayer AG, despite its patent protecting exclusivity and higher prices for the medication. Last year, the Indian patents office authorized Natco Pharma to sell generic Nexavar at 8,800 rupees ($160) for a month’s dose. Bayer had been charging 280,000 rupees ($5,120) for Nexavar.   read more

The Michigan Department of Community Health (MDCH) has, since 2003, compiled names, birth dates, risk categories, and other demographic information of people submitting for confidential HIV testing into a huge database. Those identified as sexual and needle-sharing partners of persons living with HIV have been coded in the database.   read more

Information on the CIA kidnapping program was collected by a Senate select committee on intelligence. But those findings—collated in a 6,000-page report— were never released to the public, and Emmerson wants that report turned over. Emmerson has urged the British government to make similar disclosures pertaining to its role in the program.   read more

Steven Alan Levin sued his eye surgeon after an operation at the U.S. Naval Hospital in Guam to remove a cataract in his right eye left him with diminished eyesight, discomfort and other problems. Levin claimed he twice withdrew his consent to the operation based on his concerns over the equipment. But the Navy surgeon proceeded anyway, resulting in the plaintiff developing severe corneal edema.   read more

After reviewing their files as part of a billion-dollar settlement with the federal government, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo each uncovered about 200 military members whose homes were wrongfully taken away in 2009 and 2010. A fourth bank, Citigroup, had at least 100 such foreclosures. The foreclosures violated the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act, which requires financial institutions to obtain court orders before foreclosing on active-duty members.   read more

Joseph Torsella, deputy U.S. ambassador to the UN for management and reform, asked the budget committee if “negotiating rooms should in future be an inebriation-free zone." One diplomat, requesting anonymity, told Agence France-Presse that it wasn’t just his fellow diplomats who caused problems. “On one occasion the note-taker who was meant to be recording the talks was so intoxicated he had to be replaced.”   read more

A new poll from the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press found that 62% of respondents believe the Republican Party is out of touch with the rest of the country. Furthermore, 36% of Republicans feel the same way about their party. The survey also revealed that a majority of Americans (56%) think the GOP is not open to change, and 52% say the party is too extreme.   read more

As of the third quarter of 2012, corporate profits as a percentage of national income rose to 14.2%, representing the largest share at any time since 1950, according to The New York Times. However the percentage of corporate income that went to employees, 61.7%, is close to the lowest it’s been since 1966. The boom in corporate profits has not been accompanied by an increase in jobs in the United States and overall personal income has only risen 1.4% per year over the same period.   read more

If successful, this new system could raise “some thorny legal and social questions about privacy,” wrote Robert Beckhusen at Wired. One example cited by Lease involves “respecting the privacy rights of multiple people involved,” and how to gain permission of everyone talking before capturing and storing a conversation. In the hands of spy agencies, this is not expected to be an issue.   read more

Other suggested savings include limiting military bands ($2 billion), delaying the rebuilding of Abrams tanks that the Army doesn’t want ($3 billion), reducing the number of deployed nuclear weapons ($28 billion), withdrawing 40,000 troops from Europe ($32 billion) and downsizing military headquarters ($40 billion).   read more

By then the cost of the purchase had risen by $72 million, and the first planes won’t be delivered until at least April 2015 instead of the original target date of April 2014. The problem with that is that the U.S. is scheduled to withdraw most military personnel from Afghanistan by the end of 2014. That means there might not be any American trainers in the country to show the Afghans how to fly the Super Tucanos.   read more

Orcutt wrote: “If I am not mistaken, a cyclists [sic] has an increased heart rate and respiration. That means that the act of riding a bike results in greater emissions of carbon dioxide from the rider. Since CO2 is deemed to be a greenhouse gas and a pollutant, bicyclists are actually polluting when they ride.”   read more