Legal and health experts said they could not think of another modern example of a court ordering offenders to give blood in lieu of payment, or face jail time. “What happened is wrong in about 3,000 ways,” said professor Caplan. “You’re basically sentencing someone to an invasive procedure that doesn’t benefit them and isn’t protecting the public health.” The Southern Poverty Law Center filed an ethics complaint against the judge, saying he had committed “a violation of bodily integrity.”   read more

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) “quietly published” a list of titles of its restricted reports that have not been publicly released because they contain “classified information or controlled unclassified information.” GAO officials said the list was published in an effort to inform lawmakers, federal agencies and the public about those reports. The list goes back only as far as September 30, 2014, and it does “not cite titles that are themselves classified,” Steven Aftergood wrote.   read more

Gifford said coming out as a teenager was challenging, but that his life has changed completely since then. “I came out when I was 18... It was a huge struggle. I had no gay role models... I was riddled with self-hatred and self-doubt, and a lack of any understanding of what my life would be like in the future. There were many, many days when you didn’t want to wake up the next morning, but you can’t even imagine those days now—they seem like another lifetime.”   read more

The greater numbers of people now experiencing the effects of climate change have contributed to the switch. “The drought issue is affecting big regions of the country,” said Rabe. “Drought is not just a narrow, localized issue now.” Fifty-six percent of Republicans support the evidence behind global warming. That’s the highest that number has been since 2008, just as the GOP establishment began to attack President Barack Obama and his policies, including climate change mitigation.   read more

The announcement was made the month after Shell gave up on its exploration efforts in the Alaskan Arctic after spending seven years and $7 billion on the efforts. The decision also came as the price of oil stabilized around the $50-per-barrel mark with a glut of the product in the U.S. For now, it means an estimated 13% of the world’s unexplored oil reserves will remain in the ground, perhaps slowing the effects of climate change on the fragile Alaskan landscape.   read more

As of 2014, 248,608 federal employees were classified as disabled, including veterans with 30% or more disability. That’s 13.6% of the federal workforce, an increase of 0.8% over 2013’s numbers. It’s also the largest number and highest percentage of disabled federal employees since 1980. Obama signed an executive order in 2010 requiring the hiring of 100,000 disabled workers by the federal government within five years. OPM reports that agencies are “on track” to meet Obama’s requirement.   read more

Hurun claimed China’s billionaire population grew dramatically from 2014 to 2015 by 70%, adding 242. “Despite the slowdown in the economy, China’s richest have defied gravity, recording their best year ever, and creating more wealth than any country has ever done before in a year,” said Huran's Rupert Hoogewerf. If Hurun’s calculations are accurate, China’s billionaire club controlled $2.1 trillion. China’s richest man as of August was Wang Jianlin, chairman of Dalian Wanda, with $34.4 billion.   read more

Public power plants and hospitals were on average 9% more likely not to comply with the Clean Air Act and 20% more likely to have committed high-priority violations. Public water utilities had on average 14% more Safe Drinking Water Act violations and were 29% more likely to commit monitoring violations. Public power plants and hospitals that violated the Clean Air Act were 1% less likely than private-sector violators to receive a punitive sanction and 20% less likely to be fined.   read more

Christopher Ingraham at the Post pointed out the absurdity of students not being trusted to warm bagels safely, but given free rein to carry a deadly weapon. Students at the University of Texas are planning to protest the law by carrying sex toys, which are forbidden under a state law banning the display of obscene materials, around campus. “You would receive a citation for taking a DILDO to class before you would get in trouble for taking a gun to class.” according to the event’s Facebook page.   read more

Women may have moved beyond gender parity in undergraduate degrees because more of them value a college education than men. “A 2011 Pew study found that 50% of women who had graduated from a four-year college or university thought their education was a good investment, while only 37% of men thought so,” wrote Kate Groetzinger. More women have been attending college since the 1960s, gradually closing a higher education gender gap.   read more

The poll found 92% of Democrats, 90% of Republicans, and 79% of independents expressed support for politicians who know science. “We are living in a new age when science affects every aspect of public policy, and voters want candidates to give science issues like climate change, healthcare, GMO foods, and jobs in the new tech economy a higher priority," said Shawn Otto. “Evidence from science is the great equalizer in a democracy."   read more

“The underlying issue here is not that a college degree makes you a better driver. Rather, the least-educated tend to live with a lot of other conditions that can make getting around more dangerous. They own cars that are older and have lower crash-test ratings. Those with less education are also likely to earn less and to have the money for fancy safety features such as side airbags, automatic warnings and rear cameras,” wrote the Post reporters.   read more

Sales of full-calorie soda have dropped 25% in the past two decades after a sharp increase from the 1960s to the 1990s. Americans are increasingly turning to other beverages, such as water, to quench their thirst. The sales drop has been fueled by increased concern about obesity, particularly among children. “The drop in soda consumption represents the single largest change in the American diet in the last decade,” wrote the New York Times’ Margot Sanger-Katz.   read more

U.S. officials using the Global Forecast System (GFS) warned for two days that Joaquin would strike the East Coast around the Mid-Atlantic region. Instead, it remained out at sea—which is what the European Center for Medium-Range Forecasts forecast. “Eventually, the GFS model forecast shifted to the correct solution, but the European model had the correct forecast about 24 hours before the GFS, emerging victorious,” Jason Samenow wrote at The Washington Post.   read more

It’s no contest when comparing the grammar skills of Democrats and Republican. Republican supporters made more than twice as many mistakes as Democratic supporters. For every 100 words written, the average Democratic supporter made 4.2 mistakes, while the average Republican backer made 8.7 errors. Among the candidates, supporters of Democrat Lincoln Chafee had the lowest rate of mistakes (3.1 per 100 words), while those backing Donald Trump had the highest rate of mistakes (12.6).   read more

The newly formed German-based Intelexit has launched a PR campaign to lure employees of the NSA and the British GCHQ “in from the cold” and to stop spying. Intelexit has put up billboards outside offices run by both agencies to let their employees know they’re here to help. Intelexit has also handed out fliers outside the NSA’s Fort Meade, Maryland, headquarters. The information will tell employees where they can get support and counseling if they choose to leave the agency.   read more