Morning Media Summary
Tech:
“Fabric” To Weave Security Into Code:
“As we become increasingly dependent on computers to manage our lives and businesses, our money and privacy become less and less secure. But now, Cornell researchers offer a way to build security into computer systems from the start, by incorporating security in the language used to write the programs.”
Wi-Fi Direct provides P2P wireless sans hot spots:
“Wi-Fi Direct officially became a concrete technology today with several new laptop components certified by the Wi-Fi Alliance. That threshold was reached even before most people even understand what Wi-Fi Direct is.”
Does Facebook leak what profiles:
“It turns out Google’s Street View cars found out more about Internet users than previously acknowledged. Last Friday, the company said the cars, which roam the world taking pictures for its location-based applications, scarfed up e-mail addresses, URLs and passwords from residential Wi-Fi networks they passed by in dozens of countries.”
Local newspaper boasts ultimate passive-aggressive paywall policy:
“The North County Gazette, a regional paper covering upstate New York, offers its articles online with a sort of an honor system instead of a standard paywall. OK, but instead of a straight-up honor system or “tip jar” (you read stuff, then drop a micropayment in the bucket), they are totally aggro and threatening about it..
Global Warming / Environment / Energy:
Storm To Be Among Worst In 70 Years:
“A combination of strong thunderstorms, followed by violent and destructive winds, will make for one of the Midwest’s most dangerous storms in 70 years.”
Insurance / Gambling:
UK Changes Rules about Gambling Online from Abroad:
“the UK’s National Lottery will no longer pay winners who purchased their lottery tickets over the internet from abroad. The current rules allow for players to buy tickets while overseas using their internet accounts at the National Lottery’s website, but this will all change in a couple of months.”
Health / Safety:
Nurse caught on CCTV turning off paralyzed patient’s life support machine:
“Violeta Aylward, an agency nurse working for the NHS, was caught on camera turning off the ventilator keeping quadriplegic Jamie Merrett alive.”
Economics:
Pelosi: Things were going great for us until these outside groups started spending money:
“Serious question: Is this just desperate eleventh-hour excuse-making or … is she actually starting to believe it?”
Texas Sends Amazon a $269 Million Sales Tax Bill:
“As states grapple with increasingly squeezed budgets, one simmering battle — trying to collect sales taxes from retailing behemoth Amazon (AMZN) — has heated up considerably over the past year. The jury’s still out on how much money states like Rhode Island and North Carolina (which is thick in litigation with Amazon over this very issue) will get from online sales-tax initiatives. But Texas has issued its own bill to Amazon — to the tune of $269 million.”
Gas prices rise, breaking pre-election pattern:
“Gasoline prices haven’t gotten much attention amid all the other bad economic news for Democrats heading into a final week of campaigning, but the price per gallon has climbed nearly 15 cents since Labor Day – a surprising jump, given that prices usually plummet before an election.”
Cuba self-employed to pay taxes up to 50 percent:
“Cuba has set income tax rates at 25 to 50 percent for its soon to be expanded private sector, with the biggest earners paying the most taxes, according to official decrees published on Monday.”
Bernanke Asset Purchase Risk Unleashing 1970s Inflation Genie:
“For the second time since he became chairman in 2006, Ben S. Bernanke is leading the Federal Reserve into uncharted monetary territory.”
FDIC Head Sounds Alarm on Foreclosure Litigation:
“Federal Deposit Insurance Corp Chairman Sheila Bair said she did not believe legislation would be needed to address concerns over whether the paperwork was properly done so long as investigations show the issue was mostly “procedural.”
Greece Likely to Default By 2013 as Debts Remain, El-Erian Says:
“Greece is likely to default over the next three years because budget-cutting won’t be enough to reduce the nation’s debt burden, Pacific Investment Management Co. Chief Executive Officer Mohamed A. El-Erian said.”
U.S. slips to historic low in global corruption index:
“Somalia was judged the most corrupt country, followed by Myanmar and Afghanistan at joint second-worst and then by Iraq, in the Berlin-based watchdog TI’s annual corruption perceptions index (CPI).”
The Mortgage Morass:
“The mortgage mess just keeps getting messier. Last week, Bank of America announced that it had performed a “thorough review” of its processes, found nothing amiss and would soon restart 102,000 pending foreclosures. On Sunday, the bank acknowledged that it had in fact found errors in its filings, and would resume foreclosures only in a deliberate manner as new and corrected paperwork was submitted to the courts.”
Legal:
Dem congressman: Hey, let’s impeach John Roberts:
“Via the Blaze, the logical conclusion to weeks of Democratic demagoguery aimed at the Supremes’ decision in the Citizens United case, which of course made it safe for swarthy foreigners to buy the election this year by donating to the Chamber of Commerce or something. This is almost too stupid to dignify with a response, but content is content.”
TRENDING: Aide fired over Florida debate foul:
“Alex Sink’s campaign violated rules Monday evening at the CNN/St. Petersburg Times Florida gubernatorial debate when her make-up artist delivered a message during a television break.”
NPR Affiliate Managers Voice Discontent with Firing of Juan Williams:
“Executives at NPR affiliate stations across the United States have begun publicly voicing discontent in the aftermath of the network’s dismissal of news analyst Juan Williams, with several station managers openly questioning the actions and judgment of NPR President and CEO Vivian Schiller.”
More Democracy, More Incarceration:
“The numbers are staggering. In 1970 one in 400 American adults was behind bars or on parole. As of 2008, the number was one in 100. Add in probation, and it’s one in 31. The number of people behind bars for drug crimes has soared from 40,000 in 1980 to about half a million today. States today spend one of every 15 general fund dollars on maintaining their prisons. According to the King’s College World Prison Population List (PDF), the U.S. is home to 5 percent of the world’s population but nearly a fourth of its prisoners. Judging by these official numbers, America’s incarceration rate leads the developed world by a large margin, although it’s doubtful that authoritarian regimes such as China’s are providing accurate data, especially about political prisoners. But among liberal democracies, the competition isn’t even close: As of 2008, the U.S. incarceration rate was 756 per 100,000 people, compared to 288 for Latvia, 153 for England and Wales, 96 for France, and 63 for Denmark.”
Treasury hiring FOIA officers ‘to withhold information from release to public’:
“Officials at the Treasury Department’s Office of Financial Stability contracted with a small consulting firm that has given nearly $25,000 to Democratic candidates since 2005 (and no money to Republicans) to hire “Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) Analysts to support the Disclosure Services, Privacy and Treasury Records.” The firm is currently advertising a job opening for a FOIA analyst with experience in the “Use of FOIA/PA exemptions to withhold information from release to the public” (emphasis mine, and if that link goes down, The Examiner has kept a copy for its records).”
Obama’s turnout pitch to Latinos: Get out there and punish your “enemies”:
“I wonder how this rhetoric squares with his standard condescending line about Republican-leaning voters not thinking clearly because their minds are clouded by economic anxiety. Does economic anxiety also explain why Latino turnout isn’t quite where the Democrats need it to be (although, per this new Politico poll, it’s getting there)? Or is this the first, last, and only case this year of The One admitting that his own failures — specifically, the failure to pass amnesty — might be even partly responsible for the Democrats’ predicament? And what about those supposed “enemies” that Latinos should be turning out to punish? Are they actual enemies like those shadowy bastards donating to the Chamber of Commerce or, as Obama himself once famously suggested, are they merely bitterly clinging to xenophobia to soothe their own economic frustrations?”
Labor:
New Jersey Governor Chris Christie responds to O’Keefe video:
“New Jersey Republican Governor Chris Christie’s spokesperson responded to videos conservative activist James O’Keefe released Monday apparently showing unionized educators at a New Jersey Education Association conference attacking the governor and his policies in crude language.”
Transportation/ Land Use:
Virginia gets $45 million for high-speed rail:
“The state has been awarded $45.4 million in federal transportation grants toward the development of a high-speed passenger rail service between Richmond and Petersburg and Washington.”