Welcome! "The Evening Blues" is a casual community diary (published Monday - Friday, 8:00 PM Eastern) where we hang out, share and talk about news, music, photography and other things of interest to the community.
Just about anything goes, but attacks and pie fights are not welcome here. This is a community diary and a friendly, peaceful, supportive place for people to interact.
Everyone who wants to join in peaceful interaction is very welcome here.
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Hey! Good Evening!
This evening's music features blues and gospel songwriter, guitarist and singer Josh White. Enjoy!
Josh White - Freedom Road
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed -- and hence clamorous to be led to safety -- by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary."
-- H.L. Mencken
News and Opinion
Fearleader shakes his mighty pom-poms of doom!
Hear the Fearleader and tremble! Terror is on the phone lines dialing for death and destruction!
Give up your 4th amendment rights now while you still can!
Otherwise the terrorists will win?
NSA surveillance needed to prevent Isis attack, claims former intelligence chair
Mass surveillance should be retained because of the prospect of Islamic State attacks within the United States, a key Republican ally of the National Security Agency has claimed.
Mike Rogers, the former chairman of the House intelligence committee, said the NSA needed to preserve its wide powers in case Isis used its bases in Syria and Iraq to unleash atrocities on the US homeland. ...
Rogers gave the warning as negotiators in the House of Representatives wrangled over a revamp of the USA Freedom Act, a bill that aimed to stop the NSA from its daily collection of US phone records in bulk which failed in the Senate in 2014, and is now returning to Congress.
Congress cannot be taken seriously on cybersecurity
Members of Congress - most of whom can’t secure their own websites, and some of whom don’t even use email - are trying to force a dangerous “cybersecurity” bill down the public’s throat. Everyone’s privacy is in the hands of people who, by all indications, have no idea what they’re talking about. ...
Consider the qualifications of the members who are in charge of cybersecurity oversight and who are leading the push for these invasive new laws. The man in charge of the subcommittee on cybersecurity and the NSA in the House, Representative Lynn Westmoreland, has a background in construction and is best known for trying to pass a Ten Commandments law (while only being able to name three of them). His actual expertise in cybersecurity is anyone’s guess, besides having an NSA facility in his district.
It gets worse. The Congressman who oversees the appropriation of billions of dollars in cybersecurity funding for the Department of Homeland Security, Representative John Carter, said this about cybersecurity and encryption recently: “I don’t know anything about this stuff”. Yes, that is an exact quote.
Congress doesn’t have to be completely ignorant about technology issues. They used to have a whole office which would give them all the expert advice they asked for. It was called the Office of Technology Assessment and it gave Congress nonpartisan advice on technical matters. Newt Gingrich killed it when he became speaker of the House of Representatives in the mid-1990s. As Vox’s Timothy Lee explained, when Representative Rush Holt, a member of Congress who knew a thing or two (he was a nuclear physicist), tried to revive it, his plan was voted down almost 2-1.
So there you have it: Congress has intentionally chosen to stay ignorant of technical issues. When they try to reassure you about the bills that are coming up for vote not being about increasing surveillance, just remember: most of them have no idea what they’re talking about.
Watching the Watchers: Code Red plans 'to hold govts' feet to the fire'
Hmmm... wonder how that bug got in there...
Networking flaw opens millions of iOS app users to data theft
Around 1,000 iOS apps are affected by a weakness in their mobile security which makes it easy for attackers to access encrypted data like passwords, bank account numbers and home addresses as they are being sent over the airwaves, according to a report from security firm SourceDNA.
Companies including Microsoft, Uber and Yahoo all released apps affected by the flaw – they have now fixed them but many others still have not updated their apps to a new secure version.
The affected apps all share the same code, available for free to help developers incorporate encryption into their programmes. Called AFNetworking, the code library was revealed to have a flaw in its implementation of SSL, the web security technology that allows sensitive data to be exchanged over the net. It was introduced in January, and fixed in late March, but 1,000 or so apps are still running the vulnerable version. ...
Without SSL, or similar encryption, internet traffic can be intercepted through a “man-in-the-middle” attack, where an attacker routes traffic through their own computers to alter or steal it. A typical scenario for such an attack would be against a customer browsing free Wi-Fi in a coffee shop; but there’s little technical difference between that and the systematic surveillance practiced by Western intelligence agencies.
Amnesty International states the obvious.
Amnesty International condemns U.S. failure to act on torture report
Amnesty International on Tuesday accused President Barack Obama's administration of granting "de facto amnesty" to people rights group said that since the release in December of a Senatinvolved in a CIA program that detained and tortured militants captured after the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.
The human e report on the use of what the Central Intelligence Agency called "enhanced interrogation techniques," the administration had done nothing to end impunity for those who mistreated prisoners.
Amnesty researcher Naureen Shah said the administration was effectively granting immunity from prosecution by failing to thoroughly investigate conduct that came to light in the five-year investigation.
House Again Blocks Proposed Military Base Closures
In what is becoming a virtually annual event, the House Armed Services Committee has once again blocked a proposal in the 2016 military spending bill to begin preparing for a round of base closures in 2017.
The Pentagon has argued for years that multiple bases inside the United States are completely unnecessary, but the concern about losing a lucrative base in their own district has kept much of Congress averse to any talk of closures. The last such closures were in 2005.
Yemen crisis: air strike hits Aden after Saudi Arabia ends bombing campaign
Air strike targets tanks in southern port city on Wednesday, just hours after Riyadh had announced the end of nearly a month of attacks on Houthi rebels
Air strike targets tanks in southern port city on Wednesday, just hours after Riyadh had announced the end of nearly a month of attacks on Houthi rebels
The Saudi defence ministry on Tuesday night announced the end of nearly a month of attacks that saw Yemen’s domestic political chaos becoming enmeshed in regional rivalries. The US and Iran – which Saudi Arabia accuses of arming the rebels – both expressed the hope that the decision would open the way for a negotiated settlement of the conflict. Nearly 950 people have been killed in the past four weeks and a major humanitarian crisis has erupted. ...
Signs are that the US may have urged the Saudis to wind up military action and move on to a political track because of concerns in Washington that the crisis was proving a boon to al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, until recently the target of US drone strikes launched from Saudi Arabia. Ominously, Islamic State also made a debut appearance in Yemen last month with massive bombings in Sana’a.
Saudis Declare ‘Victory': Is Yemen War Ending or Just Being Rebranded?
Fresh off killing scores of civilians in an airstrike on the Yemeni capital city of Sanaa, Saudi Arabia has declared victory in their ongoing war against the Houthis, insisting the military objectives of “Operation Decisive Storm” have all been achieved. ...
The declaration of victory and an end to the war doesn’t appear to mean an actual end to the war, however, as officials are announcing “Operation Renewal of Hope,” which will begin immediately, and will include military components. They’re describing it as an anti-terror operation, though the indications are that it will continue to focus on the Shi’ites, and not al-Qaeda.
Warships to Yemen provide US with options, Pentagon says
The US government confirmed reports on Tuesday that the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt has been sent to the Gulf of Aden off the coast of Yemen.
But reasoning for the ship movement differed as provided by the Pentagon, the State Department and the White House, as US military officials acknowledged the movement of an Iranian armada toward the same coast at the same time. ...
At the State Department, acting spokeswoman Marie Harf rejected any connection between the US warship’s movement and Iran’s own activities as “blatantly untrue.”
“This discreet movement of US assets is for a discreet purpose,” Harf told reporters in a daily press briefing. “The purpose is not to do anything in terms of those Iranian ships.” ...
“I want to be very clear,” Harf repeated. “They are not there to intercept Iranian ships.”
Pentagon Doubts Latest Iraqi Claims ISIS Leader ‘Seriously Wounded’
Top Iraqi officials are claiming that ISIS leader Caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was “seriously wounded” in a US airstrike in March, and that he has not been the day-to-day leader of the caliphate since then. ...
While Iraqi officials are talking up Baghdadi’s injury, the Pentagon is downplaying the reports, saying they have no evidence that the man wounded in the airstrike in question was actually Baghdadi.
Syriza's Choice: Bail on the People or the Troika
Macedonian Government Accused of Faking Police Hostage Situation to Inflame Ethnic Tensions
Macedonian government officials have accused ethnic Albanian militants of taking several police officers hostage Tuesday near the country's northern border with Kosovo, though opposition leaders and an ethnic Albanian political group are claiming the incident was faked. ...
The gunmen reportedly tied up and beat three of the officers, and appeared on camera demanding "an Albanian state." According to Kotevski, the officers somehow escaped when the hostage who was not tied up freed the others. The video of the incident has not yet surfaced.
The ethnically charged incident comes after a string of attacks in Macedonia allegedly committed by Albanians. Macedonia is currently embroiled in political crisis that began in February when Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski was accused of illegally spying on more than 20,000 citizens, including journalists, religious figures, and rival politicians.
Several Balkan media outlets have suggested that the Macedonian government staged the kidnapping incident Tuesday to inflame ethnic tensions and draw attention away from the surveillance scandal.
Burundi’s Government Threatens to Unleash Army on Opposition Protesters
Senior ministers in Burundi warned Monday that the landlocked African nation's government would not shy away from mobilizing the army against demonstrators protesting President Pierre Nkurunziza's plans to seek a third term in an election scheduled for June.
Speaking at a press conference on Monday in Burundi's capital of Bujumbura, Defense Minister Pontien Gaciyubwenge warned that he was prepared "to accompany the other security actors in resisting the detractors of peace" at the request of the commander-in-chief.
Protests have escalated over the past few months ahead of the election. Many fear that incumbent Nkurunziza, who has been in power since 2005, is preparing to defy the two-term limit imposed by Burundi's constitution and remain in office.
"It Was Worth Risking My Life, My Freedom": Campaign Reform Activist on Flying Gyrocopter to Capitol
G.O.P.’s Israel Support Deepens as Political Contributions Shift
As the proposed agreement over Iran’s nuclear program is debated in coming weeks, President Obama will make his case to a Congress controlled by Republicans who are more fervently pro-Israel than ever, partly a result of ideology, but also a product of a surge in donations and campaign spending on their behalf by a small group of wealthy donors.
One of the surprisingly high-profile critics is Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas, who burst to prominence with a letter signed by 46 Republican colleagues to leaders of Iran warning against a deal. Mr. Cotton, echoing criticism by Israeli leaders, swiftly denounced the framework reached on Thursday as “a list of dangerous U.S. concessions that will put Iran on the path to nuclear weapons” — words, his colleagues say, that expressed his deep concern about Iran’s threat to Israel’s security.
But it is also true that Mr. Cotton and other Republicans benefited from millions in campaign spending in 2014 by several pro-Israel Republican billionaires and other influential American donors who helped them topple Democratic opponents.
Republicans currently in the Senate raised more money during the 2014 election cycle in direct, federally regulated campaign contributions from individuals and political action committees deemed pro-Israel than their Democratic counterparts, according to data compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics and analyzed for The New York Times by a second nonprofit, MapLight. The Republican advantage was the first in more than a decade.
Oh, such a choice our dark overlords have planned for our next big electoral moment of "change!"
Jeb Bush Praises Obama’s Expansion of NSA Surveillance
One of the most glaring myths propagated by Washington — especially the two parties’ media loyalists — is that bipartisanship is basically impossible, that the two parties agree on so little, that they are constantly at each other’s throats over everything. As is so often the case for Washington partisan propaganda, the reality is exactly the opposite: from trade deals to Wall Street bailouts to a massive National Security and Penal State, the two parties are in full agreement on the bulk of the most significant D.C. policies (which is why the leading candidates of the two parties (from America’s two ruling royal families) will have the same funding base). ...
Consider the comments today of leading GOP presidential candidate Jeb Bush:
Medved: If you were to look back at the last seven years, almost, what has been the best part of the Obama administration?
Jeb Bush: I would say the best part of the Obama administration would be his continuance of the protections of the homeland using the big metadata programs, the NSA being enhanced.
The FBI's 'mass disaster' of false conviction
In July 2013, the FBI admitted that the foundations of what it called “hair comparison evidence” – a technique that its agents had used in hundreds of criminal cases nationwide and spread through the training of state-based detectives potentially through tens of thousands of other cases – were scientifically invalid. ...
As the scientific basis of hair analysis has crumbled, the scale of the judicial catastrophe caused by the FBI’s enthusiastic use of it for decades until about 2000 has now begun to emerge more fully. On Monday, the FBI and the US Justice Department, together with the Innocence Project and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers,released the findings of the first stage of a joint investigation into these historic civil rights mistakes.
The results, first reported by the Washington Post, concluded that an astonishing 26 of the 28 FBI agents who had provided testimony as expert witnesses at trial based on microscopic hair analysis had made statements to juries that were known to be false. Their erroneous evidence was found in a full 90% of the trial transcripts the team has studied.
The government has identified almost 3,000 cases in which FBI agents may have given testimony involving the now-discredited technique. So far only about 500 of those cases have been been reviewed.
Some 268 of those involved FBI examiners providing expert evidence in court that pointed to the guilt of the defendant – of which 257, or 96%, included false testimony.
Most shockingly, at least 35 defendants received the death penalty, 33 of which were the subject of false FBI testimony. Nine of the prisoners were executed and five died from other causes on death row.
Baltimore officer suspended in Freddie Gray case accused of domestic violence
The Baltimore police officer who led the initial chase of Freddie Gray, the young man who died after being arrested and suffering a broken neck, has twice been accused of domestic violence and was temporarily ordered by a court to stay away from a second person.
Lieutenant Brian Rice faced actions in Maryland’s civil courts over alleged domestic violence in 2008 and 2013, according to public filings. In both cases, requests for protective orders were denied by the judge. For a week in 2013, Rice was also ordered not to abuse, contact, nor go to the home or workplace of a second person who took him to court.
Rice, 41, was one of six officers suspended over Gray’s death on Sunday. Gray, who was 25, was arrested a week earlier after being chased when he made eye contact with Rice and ran away, according to police chiefs. Gray’s neck was left “80% severed” by the breaking of three vertebrae and his voice box was almost crushed, according to his family’s attorney. ...
Police have not given further details of the roles each officer played in Gray’s detention. Rice was named by a spokesman on Tuesday along with sergeant Alicia White, 30, and police officers William Porter, 25, Garrett Miller, 26, Edward Nero, 29, and Caesar Goodson, 45. All are suspended on full pay pending the inquiries into what happened.
Rice and one other officer are said to have pursued Gray on their bicycles after he “fled unprovoked”. ... The US Department of Justice on Tuesday opened a civil rights inquiry into Gray’s death. A spokesperson said investigators were “gathering information to determine whether any prosecutable civil rights violation occurred”.
Democratic Trade War: Obama Says Warren 'Wrong' on TPP as Reid Says 'Hell No' to Fast Track
President Obama on Tuesday evening said that progressives like Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) who have called out the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement for being a corporate-power grab and have vowed to defeat legislation designed to ram it through Congress are simply "wrong" when it comes to the pending deal between the U.S. and 11 Asian and Pacific nations. ...
On Tuesday, Senator Harry Reid, the top-ranking Democrat in the Senate, voiced his strongest opposition yet to pending bills in Congress that would grant the Obama administration what is known as Trade Promotion Authority, or Fast Track, which would give the White House power to finalize the terms of the deal without oversight or input from lawmakers. If Fast Track is approved, the trade deal would receive only an up-or-down vote in Congress without the ability to make changes.
"You couldn’t find a person to ask this question who feels more negatively about it than I do," Reid told reporters after being asked whether he supports Fast Track for the TPP. "So the answer is not only no, but hell no."
Hellraiser Preview
Sherman, set the time machine for tomorrow's Hellraisers Journal which will feature news from the trial of John R Lawson: the prosecution has excused all potential jurors who expressed that they had "conscientious scruples against the death penalty."
Tune in at 2pm!
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I am a cook in the US Senate but I still need food stamps to feed my children
Every day, I serve food to some of the most powerful people on earth – including many of the senators who are running for president: I’m a cook for the federal contractor that runs the US Senate cafeteria. But today, they’ll have to get their meals from someone else’s hands, because I’m on strike.
I am walking off my job because I want the presidential hopefuls to know that I live in poverty. Many senators canvas the country giving speeches about creating “opportunity” for workers and helping our kids achieve the “American dream” – most don’t seem to notice or care that workers in their own building are struggling to survive.
I’m a single father and I only make $12 an hour; I had to take a second job at a grocery store to make ends meet. But even though I work seven days a week – putting in 70 hours between my two jobs – I can’t manage to pay the rent, buy school supplies for my kids or even put food on the table. I hate to admit it, but I have to use food stamps so that my kids don’t go to bed hungry.
I’ve done everything that politicians say you need to do to get ahead and stay ahead: I work hard and play by the rules; I even graduated from college and worked as a substitute teacher for 5 years. But I got laid-off and I now I’m stuck trying to make ends meet with dead-end service jobs.
American voters should ask themselves: if presidential candidates won’t help the workers who serve them every day, will they really help the millions of low-wage American workers who they don’t know or see?
The Evening Greens
Obama's political point-scoring Earth Day event turns into a pissing contest with a Rethug governor. See the guy with the disasterous climate record go toe to toe with the guy who banned the use of the term "climate change!"
Quite an impressive show to watch as the planet burns.
Obama in the Everglades to raise alarm on climate change
Barack Obama is expected on Wednesday to visit Everglades national park in southern Florida, where administration officials say concerns about changing temperatures and rising sea levels offer the perfect backdrop for the administration to raise an alarm about climate change on Earth Day 2015. ...
The sense of a building political skirmish was stoked by a pre-emptive attack against the president’s visit by Florida’s Republican governor, Rick Scott, himself a climate change skeptic. Scott released a statement on Tuesday criticizing Obama for failing to “live up to his commitment on the Everglades and find a way to fund the $58m in backlog funding Everglades national park hasn’t received from the federal government”.
White House spokesman Josh Earnest sharply objected to Scott’s attack in a conference call with reporters late Tuesday, noting repeatedly that Scott’s office had reportedly banned state employees from using the phrase “climate change” in educational material and other official documents.
UN Target of 2 Degree Limit for Temperature Rise 'Utterly Inadequate'
Petra Tschakert, Coordinating Lead Author of IPCC Climate Change Report, says the 2 degree limit will not prevent climate catastrophe
Imperative to Abandon Fossil Fuels Called Opportunity 'Too Good to Be Missed'
If dramatic action is not taken in Paris later this year, the planet faces a high risk of reaching a 6°C riseand potentially catastrophic climate scenarios
Calling 2015 a "critical year for humanity" and setting out what must be achieved at UN climate talks scheduled for Paris in December, a group of scientists and economists from some of the world's top research institutions is marking Earth Day by saying a commitment to "leaving at least three quarters of all known fossil fuel reserves in the ground" must be met in order to save the world from the most devastating impacts of climate change.
In a joint statement articulating eight essential elements that need to be included in the agreement that comes out of the next Convention of the Parties (COP21) summit, prominent members of the Earth Leaguesay that the planet's carbon budget is already overloaded and that world governments must take action if they intend to keep global temperatures from rising more than 2°C by the end of this century.
Under current global emission rates, the statement warns, the world is "currently on a path to around 4°C warming by 2100, which would create unmanageable environmental challenges." And if dramatic action is not taken, it continues, there exists a 10% chance of reaching a 6°C rise in which tipping points could hurl the planet towards catastrophic climate scenarios. ...
"Deep decarbonization, starting immediately and leading to a zero-carbon society by 2050 or shortly thereafter, is key to future prosperity," the statement asserts. "This long-term goal, paired with strong national commitments, including a price on carbon, and a possibility to ramp up ambition via regular reviews, are essential elements of the Paris agreement. Fossil fuel subsidies should be removed urgently, and investment should be redirected to spark a global renewable energy revolution, warranting energy access for all and particularly for those most in need."
How Many More? 116 Environmental Defenders Were Murdered Last Year, Mostly in Latin America
Someone Flew a Drone Carrying Radiation on to the Japanese Prime Minister’s Office
A drone carrying trace amounts of radiation landed on the roof of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's office on Wednesday. No one has yet claimed responsibility for the action, but it coincides with a key victory for Abe in his push to restart Japan's nuclear power program, which has remained dormant since the 2011 Fukushima disaster.
The drone was reportedly equipped with a camera, a radiation sign, and was carrying a water bottle. An official with the prime minister's office told local media that the radiation levels were low enough not to be a threat to humans. The area was covered in blue tarpaulin and the aircraft was carried away by police officers. ...
Wednesday also marked a decision in Kagoshima district court that is likely to have national ramifications. The court rejected an injunction by local residents opposed to the restart of the first two nuclear reactors which the Nuclear Regulation Authority, set up after Fukushima, has approved to restart operation. ...
The ruling opens the door to the resumption of a multi-billion dollar nuclear power industry, which has essentially been in a state of hibernation. All 48 of Japan's power plants were shutdown in the aftermath of the Fukushima disaster, with the last one being switched off in September 2013.
In Historic Ruling, Pair of Chimpanzees Recognized as 'Legal Persons'
For the first time in U.S. history, a judge has effectively recognized two chimpanzees as legal persons, in an order Monday which will allow a pair of research primates—Hercules and Leo—to seek relief from unlawful imprisonment.
Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Barbara Jaffe on Monday granted the chimps a writ of habeas corpus that will require Stony Brook University, where they are being kept for biomedical experiments, to appear in court and explain why the school has "unlawfully detained" Leo and Hercules. That hearing is set for May 6.
Jaffe's decision comes in response to a petition filed by the Nonhuman Rights Project (NhRP). Steven Wise, one of the lawyers on the case, told the Guardian after the ruling, "This is one step in a long, long struggle."
As NhRP stated in a press release Monday: "Under the law of New York State, only a 'legal person' may have an order to show cause and writ of habeas corpus issued in his or her behalf. The Court has therefore implicitly determined that Hercules and Leo are 'persons.'"
Blog Posts of Interest
Here are diaries and selected blog posts of interest on DailyKos and other blogs.
What's Happenin' Is On Hiatus
American Outcasts: US Prisons And Modern Day Banishment
A small country but a big nation: how genocide shaped the Armenia of today
Israel Deported Them. Then ISIS Cut Off Their Heads.
Survey Says: Visibility Matters
A Little Night Music
Josh White - St. James Infirmary
Josh White - Milk Cow Blues
Josh White - Jesus Gonna Make Up My Dying Bed
Josh White - Jelly Jelly
Josh White - One Meat Ball
Josh White - Black And Evil Blues
Josh White - There's A Man Goin' Around Taking Names
Josh White - Trouble
Josh White - Hard Times Blues
Josh White - Silicosis Is Killin' Me
Josh White - Defense Factory Blues
Josh White - I Got A Head Like A Rock
Josh White - Prodigal Son
Josh White - Baby Won't You Doodle-Doo-Doo
Josh White - Uncle Sam Says
Josh White - Pigmeat And Whiskey Blues
Leadbelly And Josh White - I've A Pretty Flowers
Josh White - Outskirts of Town
Josh White - Paul And Silas Bound In Jail
Josh White - I Got A Home In That Rock
Josh White - Free & Equal Blues Pt 1 & 2
It's National Pie Day!
The election is over, it's a new year and it's time to work on real change in new ways... and it's National Pie Day. This seemed like the perfect opportunity to tell you a little more about our new site and to start getting people signed up.
Come on over and sign up so that we can send you announcements about the site, the launch, and information about participating in our public beta testing.
Why is National Pie Day the perfect opportunity to tell you more about us? Well you'll see why very soon. So what are you waiting for?! Head on over now and be one of the first!
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