Most of you have probably noticed that the quality of my monthly contributions to the GNR have declined in quality recently. Not the actual news, of course—that continues to be good, especially when compared to the dark days of the Trump regime when I started doing this.
But it can’t be denied that my ability to produce the content you deserve—and which the GNR mission demands—has become increasingly lessened as my health problems continue to increase. So, as much as I wish it weren’t so, this is going to have to be my last Roundup (so to speak).
Tweets of the Week, my weekly feature, will continue. That requires very little effort, so it’s right up my alley.
It has been a profound honor to be included in the group of dedicated and creative people who make this feature happen every day. And it has been a great privilege to have all of you read and interact with my poor efforts. Thank you all for being here, and for being part of the struggle for a better world.
And please forgive me if I don’t take part in the comments exchange today. GNR comments are the best anywhere, and are the very best part of my monthly efforts. However, a couple of doctors in Austin have requested my presence today, and I’d hate to deny them my company.
So I’ll just leave some good news and good music for you, and look forward to reading all your contributions when I get back home. And much more than that, I look forward to seeing the better country and better world we are all going to work to create.
So let’s get this party started with a little music.
Project Veritas announced on Monday that it was defrauded out of $165,000 after being targeted by hackers.
James O’Keefe, the group’s founder, said that scammers posing as the group’s attorneys were able to convince his team to transfer funds out of their bank account.
The hack appears to be what is known as a Business Email Compromise (BEC) or Email Account Compromise (EAC) attack. The FBI describes such attacks as sophisticated scams “targeting both businesses and individuals performing transfers of funds.”
“The scam is frequently carried out when a subject compromises legitimate business email accounts through social engineering or computer intrusion techniques to conduct unauthorized transfers of funds,” the FBI explained in a report last year.
The hactivist collective Anonymous says that it has gained access to a massive trove of data from Epik, the web host and domain registrar for a variety of right-wing sites. Epik’s client list has reportedly ranged from more mainstream conservative groups like the Texas Republican Party to Gab and other far-right sites on the fringes of the internet.
In a press release, Anonymous says that it has captured “a decade’s worth of data” from Epik. They say the data includes domain registrations, domain transfers, passwords, account credentials for all of Epik’s customers, logins, more than a half-million private keys, payment history, a “dump of an employee’s mailbox, just because we could,” and more. Of the private keys, they wrote, “What are they for? Who knows!”
“This dataset is all that’s needed to trace actual ownership and management of the fascist side of the Internet that has eluded researchers, activists, and, well, just about everybody,” they said.
Anyone interested in seeing the data in question can download it via bittorrent here, although at 35GB the file is too large for most bittorrent clients. A smaller version of the data file is due to be released soon
Many people have asked what is the Church’s stance on vaccinations and vaccination mandates.
Many have asked if we provide exemption letters.
I find it weird that religious exemptions are an accepted thing in general, seems like it would be best to leave public health policy to the most knowledgable, not religious leadership. But if Churches must take a position on the issue …
I am happy to announce that we are offering Official letters for those Pastafarians who would like to be exempt from working in proximity to the unvaxxed.
The unvaccinated may emit harmful virus particles which are forbidden to devout Pastafarians, therefore we expect all reasonable measures to be taken to help us avoid these virus particles. Please respect our religious liberty.
Create your letter here with this form I made. Enter your information to get an Official letter (PDF)
Here’s what your letter would look like
A song for the folks at Project Veritas, Epik, and all the antivaxxers? Yeah, I think I have one.
Just months after Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill into law designed to crack down on riots and protests, a federal judge has temporarily blocked the enforcement of the most key components of the law.
The judge cited violations of the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution in the ruling issued Thursday afternoon.
The plaintiff organizations released a joint statement, saying in part, “H.B.1 effectively criminalizes our constitutional right to peacefully protest and puts anyone -- particularly Black people demonstrating against police violence -- at risk of unlawful arrest, injury and even death.”
The future composition of the FTC became a bit clearer on Monday, as the White House announced that President Biden will nominate privacy expert and scholar Alvaro Bedoya as FTC commissioner. If confirmed, Bedoya would take the seat currently held by Commissioner Rohit Chopra, whose nomination as CFPB Director remains pending, and serve in a term that ends in September 2026.
Bedoya is currently a Visiting Professor of Law at Georgetown and is the Founding Director of Georgetown’s Center on Privacy & Technology (CPT). Before moving to Georgetown, Bedoya served as Chief Counsel of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law. Bedoya’s background as a privacy expert sends a supportive signal from the White House of broader privacy initiatives at the FTC and bolsters privacy expertise at the Commission level.
CPT under Bedoya’s watch has also studied privacy and data-related issues that fall outside the FTC’s ambit. For example, CPT scored law enforcement agencies’ use of face recognition technologies along civil rights and data protection dimensions and filed an amicus brief in federal district court arguing that aerial surveillance conducted by the Baltimore Police Department is unconstitutional. In writings published under his own name, Bedoya has criticized government agencies’ use of commercial technologies and data for law enforcement and immigration purposes. In a September 2020 op-ed, for example, Bedoya described a “panoply” of companies that provide data and software that support federal agencies’ immigration enforcement actions.
In addition to pursuing privacy and data security policy under the FTC Act, it’s also likely that Bedoya will examine how the FTC enforces specific privacy laws, such as the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), and related rules.
The good news here is they’re not letting him slide because the investigation is taking so long.
Trevor Bauer, the high-priced Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher, will miss the rest of the 2021 baseball season and postseason as law enforcement authorities continue investigating claims he sexually assaulted a woman.
Bauer, 30, was first placed on administrative leave on July 2 and has not pitched since June 28.
And here’s another little song, for no reason really except that the video is fun and I like the song. BTW, most music fans are unaware that the video was filmed entirely at RNC headquarters.
The Buffalo Soldiers ride again!
The US Military Academy unveiled a life-sized bronze statue of a Buffalo Soldier on Friday.
From 1907 to 1947, the all-black soldiers were assigned to the 9th and 10th Calvary Regiments at West Point to provide instruction in mounted drill and tactics to the Corp of Cadets.
They fought during the time of reconstruction in the mid-to late-1800s.
You can read more about the Buffalo Soldiers at Wikipedia.
RED hot off the press, a Stephen King exclusive short story: Red Screen.
We’ve teamed up with legendary author Stephen King for a once in a lifetime opportunity. Presenting, Red Screen, a never before published work, exclusively available through Humble Bundle. In this unsettling short story, a cop interrogates a deranged plumber who just murdered his wife, only to discover something far more insidious. Pay what you want, and support the ACLU.
“Pay what you want” means just that, and any payments of $5 or more will go entirely to the ACLU. Just click, tap, push, pull, dance the fandango, or whatever you do on the headline of this item to get the story and support civil rights.
And I think that’ll do it for today’s Roundup. (I know I didn’t mention the results of the California recall election, but I figured you’d probably already heard a thing or two about that.) I’ve had a lot of fun doing this for the last couple of years or so, and however much I may have encouraged you, you’ve encouraged me at least twice as much. We’ve come a long way since we climbed out from under the Trump regime—now let’s go the rest of the way together.
I guess what I’m trying to say is—if you still need more good news, go out and make some of your own.