The United States has accused some of its leading European allies of endangering free trade agreements if they pursue the development of protected data networks to avoid American electronic spying operations. Government and corporate officials in Europe began discussing whether their nations should shield themselves from future NSA spying by keeping emails and other electronic information from passing through American-based networks.   read more

The illegal activities ranged from employees encouraging callers to vote for Obama to in-person conversations in which Republicans were disparaged. One IRS staffer allegedly encouraged taxpayers to reelect Obama by “repeatedly reciting a chant based on the spelling of [the president's] last name.” Workers at an IRS center in Dallas brought pro-Obama items to work, which violated workplace rules. More serious violations of this sort had occurred under President George W. Bush.   read more

Correctional facilities housed 356,268 inmates with severe mental illness as of 2012. Psychiatric hospitals, on the other hand, housed only 35,000 patients. Mentally ill Americans were routinely thrown together with prisoners until the mid-19th century, when reformer Dorothea Dix began a movement to create state hospitals for the mentally ill. The number of institutionalized mentally ill peaked at about 560,000 in the mid-1960s, but had dropped to 130,000 in 1980.   read more

Obama’s plan has resulted in thousands of military items being taken off the State Department’s export-control list. Tehran is trying to obtain U.S. military parts for use in F-5 fighter jets and China wants radiation-hardened U.S. microchips for missiles. They might now simply be able to legally purchase them under the Obama initiative. The purpose is to allow U.S. arms firms to compete with foreign weapons merchants. Yet the U.S. already controls 80% of world arms sales.   read more

Of the 64 teams that qualified for the NCAA (National Collegiate Athletic Association) tournament, UConn had the worst graduation rate. The NCAA reported last fall that only 8% of the UConn men’s team completed their programs and received their degrees within a six-year window. If Connecticut’s poor academic record had you rooting for Kentucky in the NCAA final, keep in mind that since 2006, Kentucky has fielded 13 different players who spent only one year at the school.   read more

Currently, the federally mandated minimum wage, set in 2009, is $7.25 an hour. The federal minimum wage was first created in 1938. If the level that existed in 1968 was merely adjusted for inflation, it would be higher today than the amount President Obama has proposed: $10.10 an hour.   read more

Sixty-seven percent of respondents to a national survey by the Pew Research Center said the government should focus less on prosecuting people who use illegal drugs (such as cocaine and heroin) and focus more on getting them into treatment. When asked which is more harmful to a person’s health, 69% chose alcohol, while only 15% selected marijuana. In terms of impact on society, 63% said alcohol had a more detrimental effect. Only 23% said marijuana had a more negative effect.   read more

Billionaires and multi-millionaires across the U.S. will have more opportunities to spend large sums of money on federal elections, thanks to the latest U.S. Supreme Court ruling to throw out established limits on campaign contributions. Dissenting, Justice Breyer said the ruling “undermines, perhaps devastates, what remains of campaign finance reform.” Watchdog groups are now expecting a big increase in wealthy donor spending on congressional candidates in this year’s midterm election.   read more

Clapper’s admission goes against President Barack Obama’s assurance last year that his administration was not prying into people’s communications. “When it comes to telephone calls, nobody is listening to your telephone calls. That’s not what this program’s about,” Obama said in June. “As was indicated, what the intelligence community is doing is looking at phone numbers and durations of calls. They are not looking at people’s names, and they’re not looking at content.”   read more

Each time objects spotted in the search for Flight 370 turn out to be trash, it shows how mankind has treated the ocean as a dumping ground. There are up to 10,000 shipping containers that fall off ships each year, With them go their contents, be it computers, toys, clothing, appliances and more. The 2011 Japan tsunami swept 10 million tons of debris—including homes, cars and trees—into the Pacific. “The ocean is like a toilet bowl that swirls but doesn’t flush,” said Charles Moore.   read more

Researchers in New York and California have concluded that wind-derived electrical power costs an average of 8.7 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh). That’s cheaper than nuclear power (10.8 cents) and coal (12.3 cents), as well as two alternative energy sources: solar (14.4 cents) and biomass (11.1 cents). Only natural gas is cheaper than wind, averaging 6.6 cents per kWh.   read more

The president says he wants Congress to adopt new legislation that would terminate the bulk collection of phone records and would institute other means for data to be collected. But if he really wanted this outcome, he could simply ask the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) to not renew the NSA’s authority to carry out this work. That authority was due to expire March 28. But Obama didn’t go this route.   read more

Grandy Lake applied for a permit to clear a 15-acre tract near the plateau’s edge. The proposal was rejected at first, but then DNR approved it after Grandy Lake agreed to harvest half as many trees as it originally intended. But the cutting, which concluded in 2005, wound up bordering the slope that collapsed, and even ventured into a “restricted” zone where no trees were to be removed because of the risk of groundwater eroding the slope. The following year, a large landslide occurred.   read more

House Bill 2, adopted last year during a special legislative session, requires abortion providers to have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the clinic where they work. Abortion rights advocates denounced the legislation, claiming the requirement was unnecessary and actually a veiled attempt to limit access to abortions. Since the law went into effect, 13 of the state’s 37 medical facilities offering abortion services have gone out of business.   read more

The FDA has decided to get into the counterterrorism game by proposing new rules to prevent the poisoning of the nation’s food supply. Food manufacturers would be required to secure products from “intentional adulteration.” Many food suppliers don’t use basic security such as surveillance cameras, locking up warehouses, and conducting background checks on temporary workers. So introducing a contaminant -- salmonella, botulism, mercury -- into the food chain would not be difficult.   read more

• About a third of respondents were unaware that they had to get health insurance this month or be penalized. • Nearly half were clueless about the health exchanges set up for people to purchase insurance through Healthcare.gov. • More than half didn’t know about the subsidies available to help low-income individuals afford coverage.   read more