Politics & Government

Reuters | The United States will run state-wide tests in Alaska on Wednesday of the country's Emergency Alert System, which uses television and radio to inform the public in the event of a national emergency.

Wired | The Air Force Research Laboratory set out in 2008 to build the ultimate assassination robot: a tiny, armed drone for U.S. special forces to employ in terminating “high-value targets.”

Scholastic.com | Maintenance of Authority. One of the principal functions of government is to remain in power. Governments do not relinquish their authority unless compelled to do so. Many of the actions of politicians and civil servants can be explained by the need to maintain and enhance their power.

Wired | Bloggers: If you suddenly find Air Force officers leaving barbed comments after one of your posts, don’t be surprised. They’re just following the service’s new "counter-blogging" flow chart

Business Insider | Shortly after the Christmas bomber tried to blow up a Delta flight into Detroit, the U.S. Transportation Security Administration (TSA) rolled out an emergency directive requiring airlines to implement draconian new security procedures.

Alternet | The Washington Post reports today, on page A7, that Michael Chertoff, the former DHS secretary, has been playing a little fast and loose with the public trust.

The Independent | Neodymium is one of 17 metals crucial to green technology. There’s only one snag – China produces 97% of the world’s supply. And they’re not selling

Truthout | The military's senior mentor programs are part of a high-level review ordered by Defense Secretary Robert Gates and the subject of a report in USA TODAY.  Earlier in December, Gates asked Deputy Secretary William Lynn to review whether mentors are overpaid and whether their work is a conflict of interest.

Money News | In its new "A Fistful of Dollars" report, the International Monetary Fund concludes that the riskiest mortgage lenders were also the most active lobbyists in Washington.

Yahoo News | A former US official has said that both the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) are extremely paranoid about the Israeli secret service Mossad and Jews, and adds that the charges of espionage against US Defense Department scientist Stewart Nozette reflect this fear and "extreme view".

Wired | The House of Representatives tabled on Wednesday legislation to reform U.S. surveillance law. The two-month delay puts off a collision with a competing Senate version.

Utah Alternative Conservative | I was recently lucky enough to stumble across a PDF copy of Carroll Quigley’s Tragedy and Hope.  While browsing through I came across an interesting statement:

Constitutionally | The United States has been in a declared state of emergency from September 2001, to the present.  On September 11, 2001, the government declared a state of emergency. That declared state of emergency was formally put in writing on 9/14/2001

Breit Bart | "The assessment of behavioral tendencies, that is not profiling, but it is the same misstep that we made in Fort Hood."

Judicial Watch | Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, today released its 2009 list of Washington’s “Ten Most Wanted Corrupt Politicians.”  The list, in alphabetical order, includes:

Tenth Amendment Center | The 10th is what’s known in the legal world as a “rule of construction.” In short, it’s what tells us how to view the entire Constitution: that “We the People” of the several states created the federal government to be OUR agent for certain, enumerated purposes – and nothing more.

Democracry Now | In December 2003, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge warned of “near-term attacks that could either rival or exceed what we experienced on September 11.” He claimed the information came from “credible sources.”

Alternet | Books by Chris Hedges, Thom Hartmann and Cass Sunstein suggest that we've nearly lost our sense of self-government. None show the way to get it back.

Daily Campaign for Liberty | Dr. Ron Paul is for legalizing medical marijuana , He introduced The Federal Medical Marijuana Bill - Representative Ron Paul (R-TX) introduced H.R. 5842, the “Medical Marijuana Patient Protection Act,” in April 2009. This bill would make federal authorities respect states' current laws on medicinal cannabis and end DEA raids on facilities distributing medical marijuana legally under state law.

Information Liberation | Michael J. Badnarik, the Libertarian Party nominee for President of the United States in the 2004 elections and a former software engineer and radio talk show host has suffered a heart attack. Badnarik is also the president of the 2009 Continental Congress.

Washington Post | Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates has proposed a major overhaul of the way the Pentagon and State Department do nation-building, seeking to end friction between the bureaucracies by putting them jointly in charge of three huge new funds aimed at stabilizing strife-ridden countries.

Think Progress | Obama came out today and said "I never campaigned on a public option!" Obama during the campaign in 2008: “My plan builds on and improves our current insurance system, which most Americans continue to rely upon, and creates a new public health plan for those currently without coverage.”

CNS News | According to a Zogby poll conducted last week, 83.5 percent of respondents agreed at least “somewhat” with the lengthy-bill premise, and 61.2 percent of Americans agreed strongly. Only 14.4 percent disagreed, and just 5.8 percent did so strongly.

Huffington Post |Everyone is crying for jobs, but no one seems to understand why there aren't any. And the reason for those opposing jobs is money.  Beginning in 1973, big banks made most of their profit outside of the United States. Industries off-shoring, investing, banks financing the investments, transfer fees, fees and interest on the loans made for bigger profits

Campaign for Liberty | In 2008, the Supreme Court of the United States decided Kennedy v. Louisiana. In that decision, the Court created a new categorical right to rape a child without receiving the death penalty.

Video | FOX News cover's this story of government big brother

Raw Story | Documents long classified but scheduled to be released at the end of 2009 will not see the light of day just yet thanks to the Obama administration, according to a published report.  Under pressure to grant an extension to intelligence agencies that have reviewed only a fraction of the "millions of pages," the administration is allowing an undetermined amount of time for additional consideration of the materials, a report in The Boston Globe notes.

Wired | An Israeli-American lawyer who worked as an FBI linguist pleaded guilty Thursday to providing an unidentified blogger with classified documents derived from U.S. communications intelligence.

World Socialist Web Site | Obama administration lawyers under the direction of Attorney General Eric Holder are once again supporting the dismissal of a civil case brought by a victim of illegal detention and torture during the Bush administration.

True Slant | The Supreme Court has refused to hear a suit seeking accountability for Guantanamo torture. (h/t Digby) SCOTUS received an assist from the Obama White House, which had asked the court not to hear the case.

Independent | Federal employees making salaries of $100,000 or more jumped from 14% to 19% of civil servants during the recession’s first 18 months—and that’s before overtime pay and bonuses are counted.

Seatlle Business Journal | The Puget Sound Business Journal for months has asked the Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS), the federal agency that regulated Washington Mutual, to release internal communications between WaMu's regulators.

Politico | Late last Friday, Baucus acknowledged his relationship with Melodee Hanes, whom he nominated for the job of U.S. attorney in Montana, after it was first reported on the website MainJustice.com. But he said that Hanes withdrew from consideration for the job when the relationship became more serious. The next day, he dismissed calls for an ethics investigation, saying, “I went out of my way to be up and up.”

New York Times | Private security guards from Blackwater Worldwide participated in some of the C.I.A.’s most sensitive activities — clandestine raids with agency officers against people suspected of being insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan and the transporting of detainees, according to former company employees and intelligence officials.

Video | This is part 1 of the video

BBC | Desmond Uttley was sentenced to six years in jail after he was found guilty of raping the 15-year-old girl in 2002.  However, after hearing new evidence, judges at the Court of Criminal Appeal overturned his conviction.

Alternet | Half-baked Homeland Security is spending millions to develop sensors capable of detecting a person's level of 'malintent' as a counterterrorism tool.

News Tribune | After getting a ticket for driving the wrong way on the freeway, Andy Magee figured it would be easy to explain that it was all a mistake.

Oregon Live | Capt. Michael D. Nguyen, a 28-year-old West Point graduate based out of Fort Lewis, Wash., acknowledged that he stole government property and illegally structured financial transactions.

Race Wire | Roughly 550 years later, Native peoples are still fighting to keep their own land because of broken treaties and erroneous information.

Times Online | Two children considered to be at risk of abuse because they are severely obese have been removed from the protection register after scientists discovered that they carry a newly identified genetic abnormality that explains their weight.

Seattle Times | Rachel Porcaro, now manager of a hair salon in Renton, cuts Rebecca Porcaro's hair. Rachel Porcaro, a 32-year-old single mom with two boys, worked at a different salon during the time covered by an IRS audit.

The Age | Under a deal struck by the State Government in a bid to ensure the project is finished before Melbourne runs out of water, Victoria Police has agreed to hand over photos, video recordings and other police records to the international consortium AquaSure to help it ''manage'' protests and potential security threats.

BBC | There are 4.2 million CCTV cameras in Britain watching our every move.  In London, there are more CCTV cameras than any other city in the world with one camera for every eight Londoners. But as victims of crime have found to their cost, catching criminals on camera is dependent on the equipment being both monitored and maintained.

KansasCity.com | The former president of Truman State University in Kirksville performed only one task but earned $215,000 in her year as its consultant.  Barbara Dixon wrote a report on ways the university could save money.  The disclosure was first reported Thursday by the Truman State Index newspaper. Dixon did not return several phone calls to The Associated Press seeking comment.

Politico | House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) spent $2,993 in taxpayer money on flowers between June and October. House Majority Whip James Clyburn has a thing for Chantilly Donuts, spending about $265 at the Virginia shop in the past quarter. And Rep. Tim Walz (D-Minn.), a fiscal conservative, decided to give about $2,000 in unused office funds back to the government to help reduce the deficit.

New York Times | What’s going to happen, economically and politically, over the next few years? Nobody knows, of course. But I have a vision — what I think is the most likely course of events. It’s fairly grim — but not in the approved way. This vision lies behind a lot of what I’ve been writing, so it might clarify things for regular readers if I laid it out explicitly.

WMR | WMR has obtained additional details on Business International Corporation (BIC), the CIA front company where President Obama spent a year working after graduating from Columbia University in 1983.  BIC used journalists as non-official cover (NOC) agents around the world. The firm published weekly and fortnightly newsletters for business executives, including Business International, Business Europe, Business Latin America, and Business Asia.

Associated Press | Saddam Hussein was telling the truth, this time. The United States just didn't believe him.  So it took the most powerful military in the world 18 years to find the remains of the only U.S. Navy pilot shot down in an aerial battle in the 1991 Gulf War.  Michael "Scott" Speicher's bones lay 18 inches deep in Iraqi sand, more or less right where a group of Iraqis had led an American search team in 1995.