Things really heated up in 2012 in the United States—last year was the hottest one on record in the contiguous U.S., with the average temperature measuring 55.3 degrees Fahrenheit, a full degree higher than the previous record set in 1998, a significant jump.   read more

Disney World will offer MyMagic+, a special rubber bracelet encoded with customers’ credit card information, enabling visitors to enter the park and purchase food or souvenirs without using credit cards or cash, while their actions, behaviors, and whereabouts are tracked within the park.   read more

A third provision in the measure would mandate that mobile services reveal the names of the advertising networks or other third parties with which they share consumers’ locations. Franken says his privacy bill is needed to prevent companies from creating a precise profile of consumers’ family connections and professional associations, as well as political and religious beliefs and even health status.   read more

The mandate in the Obamacare law says insurance companies must provide details in no more than four pages that utilize plain English, and include easy-to understand formats. Wendell Potter lauded the change in law because he felt the industry had “profited for years by using legalese and gobbledygook in describing their policies, and also by purposely withholding information we really need to make informed coverage decisions.”   read more

Nearly 85 percent of the weapons, or about 1,260, were loaded—which is illegal. Under TSA rules, passengers with proper permits may fly with unloaded guns stored in hard-sided checked baggage, but not in carry-on items or on a passenger. If one accounts for airport size by measuring gun confiscations per passenger enplaned, the list leader is Provo, Utah, Municipal Airport, with its rate of 134.6 guns per million.   read more

The California Court of Appeal for the Second District ruled that sex-by-impersonation is only rape when the impersonator is pretending to be a spouse. The three-judge panel voted unanimously to order a retrial of Julio Morales with instructions that the lower court, essentially, ignore his trickery. However, the court also urged the California legislature to change the outdated 1872 law to expand the definition of rape to include impersonating a boyfriend or significant other.   read more

The problem with the loan-a-drone program, according to critics, is that it is being operated on an ad-hoc basis with no established regulations for how and when to use them, or how to protect Americans’ privacy, or how to make sure taxpayers are reimbursed for the loaners. After all, CPB’s drones can cost between $15 million and $34 million each to purchase, not to mention their hourly operational costs.   read more

According to the plaintiff, the products include GMO corn and corn derivatives, making any “all natural” claim out to be “false, misleading and likely to deceive reasonable consumers.” The lawsuit notes that “Genetically modified corn products contain genes and/or DNA that would not normally be in them, and are thus not natural, thereby causing the Product to fail to be ‘All Natural.’”   read more

From 2001 to 2010, the murder total dropped in the U.S., including a 16.7% decline in the largest cities. Unfortunately, homicides increased by almost the same percentage, 16.9%, in suburban communities during the same period. Public officials theorize that criminals have found a lower law enforcement presence in the suburbs than in the big cities, and have therefore re-targeted their efforts to the areas of least resistance.   read more

According to election officials, the reasons for the long lines—some of which stretched for blocks—included lengthy ballots, heavy voter turnout, and reduced early voting days. Theodore Allen, a professor from Ohio State University, estimated that as many as 49,000 Floridians were discouraged from voting because of the long waits.   read more

Perdue decided to issue a full “pardon of innocence’ after the state chapter of the NAACP and other advocates presented her with new information that revealed the prosecutor, Assistant New Hanover County District Attorney James “Jay” Stroud Jr., wrote glowingly of white jurors believed to be Ku Klux Klan members while labeling one black juror as an “Uncle Tom type.” For some members of the Wilmington Ten, the pardons came far too late. Four have died, and several others are in poor health.   read more

Included in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (pdf) is a section mandating most businesses to offer employees insurance coverage for contraceptive drugs and devices and other birth control methods. More than 40 lawsuits have been filed by opponents of the requirement, including one from the construction firm Korte & Luitjohan Contractors, whose owners, Cyril and Jane Korte, objected to the rule based on their Catholic beliefs.   read more

Buried within the tome that is the federal healthcare reform law is a provision, only recently noticed and now much debated, that restricts doctors from gathering data about their patients’ gun habits. The clause, which falls under the heading “Protection of Second Amendment Gun Rights,” was added to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act at the insistence of the National Rifle Association (NRA).   read more

The rightward drift of the Republicans can be partially attributed to the remapping of House districts into increasingly partisan populations in which one party overwhelmingly dominates. From the Republican perspective this means that primary elections are more important than general elections, and incumbents are more worried about defending themselves against primary opponents from the Right than they are about the Democrats they face in November contests.   read more

Every year, a group of conspiracy theorists gathers on November 22 at Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas, to commemorate the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. But the group has been denied a permit for 2013 because the city plans to observe the 50th anniversary of the tragic event, and it doesn’t want alternative theories over who was behind the killing to be a distraction.   read more

“Why should churches be exempt from basic financial reporting requirements? Equally important, why would churches not wish to be accountable?” Annie Laurie Gaylor, FFRF co-president, said in a press release. “Having tax-exempt status is a great privilege, and in exchange for that privilege, all other groups must file a detailed report annually to the IRS and the public on how we spend donations.”   read more