The Republican-dominated state has adopted a new law which outlaws the collecting of ecological data on private and public lands. Violations can result in a year of prison time and fines of $5,000. It also makes any samples inadmissible as evidence in court, even if they show environmental hazards. The law prohibits photos and soil samples used for ecological purposes, even in state and national parks. Opponents say it is so broad, it would prevent taking photos at Yellowstone National Park.   read more

Iran has been a great bogeyman for American merchants of war by helping boost billions of dollars in military sales to oil-rich states in the Middle East. In the last five years, U.S. arms purchases by Gulf Arab countries have skyrocketed by 70%. Saudi Arabia alone has paid out $90 billion to American arms firms in that time. U.S. defense contractors have benefited by selling weapons systems and munitions to Persian Gulf countries that have worried about Iranian military plans in the region.   read more

One-third of the missiles controlled by Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota are in the Bakken oil field and the trains carrying much of that volatile output pass in close proximity to many missile sites, according to a report (video) on MSNBC’s “The Rachel Maddow Show.” Air Force documents obtained by the show highlight the Pentagon’s concern about the problem.   read more

The Department of Homeland Security, in 2003, issued an emergency alert to its air marshals of a possible hijacking on a commercial flight--“a more ambitious, broader-scale version of the 9/11 plot.” But within 48 hours, one of those marshals, Robert MacLean, received a text message from TSA cancelling overnight missions, in order to save money on hotel lodging. Outraged, MacLean reported it to TSA’s IG but it led nowhere. So he leaked the story to MSNBC and , in return, got fired by TSA.   read more

The PTC system could have saved the lives of the seven who have died so far as a result of the Philadelphia accident. Amtrak has gotten no help from Congress in making its lines safer. The morning after the crash, the Republican-controlled House Appropriations Committee actually voted along party lines to cut funding to the passenger rail line by about 20%. And a bill proposed in March by Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Missouri) would delay the PTC implementation deadline to 2020.   read more

To agents in the FBI's Houston office, the targeted demonstrators were environmental extremists. The spying began in early 2013. For as many as eight months, the FBI monitored members of the protest group Tar Sands Brigade. Brigade organizer Ron Seifert said dozens of campaigners were arrested in Texas for protest-related activity but none was accused of violent crime or property destruction. The FBI has said the investigation was an “administrative error.”   read more

The Obama administration has approved another request from Shell to drill for oil in the Arctic Ocean. Environmentalists object, saying an oil spill in the oft-frozen waters could result in an ecological tragedy that could exceed the 2010 disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. “Not only does it put the Arctic’s pristine landscapes at a huge risk for oil spills...but it’s utterly incompatible with President Obama’s rhetoric to address the climate crisis,” said the Center for Biological Diversity.   read more

Using a NASA radar detector known as FINDER, rescue workers were able to locate two survivors in a collapsed textile factory and two others in a building in Chautara. FINDER, which is about the size of a suitcase, detected the people’s heartbeats even though their bodies were buried under 10 feet of debris, including brick, mud and wood. JPL said tests of FINDER have shown it can identify breathing and heartbeats through 30 feet of rubble or 20 feet of solid concrete.   read more

The Second Circuit Court of Appeals ruled unanimously that the NSA’s bulk phone data program is illegal. The government has argued that Section 215 of the Patriot Act authorized the agency to gather and store for up to five years the phone call records of Americans. Judge Gerard E. Lynch wrote: “Such expansive development of government repositories of formerly private records would be an unprecedented contraction of the privacy expectations of all Americans."   read more

Agriculture accounts for 80% of California's water use. California is the sole producer (generating 99% or more) in the United States for the following: almonds, artichokes, dates, figs, raisins, kiwifruit, olives, Clingstone peaches (the kind preferred for salads or fresh snacks), pistachios, dried plums, pomegranates, sweet rice and walnuts. California also accounts for 94% of broccoli and fresh plums and it leads the nation in producing American Pima cotton, which is used in clothing.   read more

A federal appeals court has ruled that law enforcement agencies may access tracking information on cell phones without a warrant. In a 9-2 vote, the court said that mobile phone users should have no expectation of privacy. “Cell users know that they must transmit signals to cell towers within range..." Judge Frank Hull wrote.   read more

The closure of mental hospitals four decades ago was supposed to have been accompanied by increased funding for community-based care. Most of the money was never appropriated, leaving many of the mentally ill on the streets, where police deal with the symptoms of the problem without being able to provide a cure. Studies have shown that those with mental health issues can be kept out of jails if they’re monitored.   read more

The term “digital native” is somewhat vague, but means basically someone who has always lived in a world with the Internet. That would make digital natives no older than 30 or so. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has ruled against companies who advertise for “recent graduates” and “young blood.” Now the EEOC is faced with deciding whether a posting for a digital native similarly discriminates against that class.   read more

The findings showed that 32% of reports of sexual assault were submitted by civilian women, who were undercounted by the Pentagon. The report also says that 21% of reports were submitted by civilian military spouses, who also weren’t sufficiently counted. Gillibrand had trouble getting even those numbers from the Defense Department. She sought four years’ worth of data from the bases, the largest in each service. After nearly a year of stonewalling, the military provided redacted data from 2013.   read more

Many of the most U.S. powerful corporations and foundations contributed $1 million or more to the Clinton Foundation while also lobbying the State Department during Hillary Clinton’s tenure as secretary of state. The foundation also set up a charity that may have helped some of its donors hide their contributions to the Clinton Foundation.   read more

The bill doesn’t address data collection under Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act, which allows the collection of the actual content of some communications, including that of Americans, and the collection of information from overseas calls. “If this bill passes, the NSA will continue unaddressed surveillance programs and will secretly torture the English language to devise novel justifications for spying on Americans,” said David Segal, executive director of Demand Progress.   read more