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Ariz. Governor Brewer offers a softer approach to illegal immigration
Arizona governor Jan Brewer has made a name for herself for always taken a her hard line stance on the subject of illegal immigration, but recently she has begun to soften her tone on the issue. While Brewer’s position has not changed — she prefers border security over immigration reform — her tone has, as the State of the State address last week suggests.
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More states move to restrict access to personal information of gun holders
Currently, thirty-five states do not provide access to information on people who have gun licenses, except to law enforcement. Some of the states where access to such information is permitted, are now moving toward restricting such access.
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Thwarting facial-recognition, photo-tagging software
Information about when and where photographed subjects were when their pictures were taken is readily disclosed through photos taken, and the information is disclosed and distributed without their permission. The problem has become even worse due to the popularization of portable terminals with built-in cameras and developments in SNS and image search technologies. Japanese researchers offer a solution: goggles or glasses which, when equipped with near-infrared LED emitter. :
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Thorium holds promise of safer, cleaner nuclear power
Thorium as nuclear fuels has drawbacks, but its main advantage includes generating far less toxic residue. The majority of the mineral is used during the fission process, and it can burn existing stockpiles of plutonium and hazardous waste, saving the need to transport it and bury the waste in concrete. If thorium becomes available as a source of energy in the future, the world will rely less on coal and gas, and wind turbines will become a thing of the past. The risk of a global energy crunch will decrease considerably.
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Algerian hostage drama over; 48 hostages, 32 terrorists dead
Algerian forces have taken control of the gas drilling site near the Algeria-Libya border, and the authorities are trying to determine the human toll of the 4-day drama. Initial estimates indicate that forty-eight hostages and thirty-two terrorists have died in the fire exchanges between the hostage takers and the Algerian military. The Algerian government says that five of the Islamist terrorists were captured alive. The forty Islamist hostage-takers came from six different countries, and trained for the operation in a base in Islamist-controlled north Mali.
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French defense minister: campaign goal is “total reconquest” of Mali
French fighter planes continued their attacks on training bases, weapon storage sites, and Islamist troop concentrations in north Mali, paying special attention the Islamists presence in and around the major cities of Gao and Timbuktu.
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Many hostages dead in clumsy Algerian raid on gas drilling site
Sketchy news from the Sahara desert gas field site indicates that up to thirty hostages may have been killed by their Islamic captors as Algerian special forces attacked the site. Algerian officials said that the thirty dead included eight Algerians, two Britons, two Japanese, and one French national. The nationality of the other seventeen hostages killed at the site had not been established. The British government more openly, and the French and U.S. governments more elliptically, raised questions about the tactics used by the Algerian military: Algerian helicopter gunships strafed the living quarters at the site when both hostages and terrorists were inside; helicopters also destroyed four jeeps carrying both jihadists and hostages. It appears that most of the hostages were killed by Algerian fire, not by the terrorists.
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Metamaterial sensor improves security, collision avoidance
Engineers have developed a novel sensor which is more efficient, versatile, and cheaper for potential use in such applications as airport security scanners and collision avoidance systems for aircraft, cars, or maritime vessels.
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Personal genetic information vulnerable to hacking
Using only a computer, an Internet connection, and publicly accessible online resources, a team of researchers has been able to identify nearly fifty individuals who had submitted personal genetic material as participants in genomic studies.
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Minnesota counties police make big money from drug seizures
In 2011, law enforcement in southern Minnesota made a significant profit off crime busts. State Auditor Rebecca Otto released the Criminal Forfeitures Report last month, which offers information on the amount of cash and property seized by Minnesota law enforcement agencies.
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Police officers in Louisiana do not have to look for a ride home
Tighter budgets have had an effect on police departments everywhere. In Indianapolis, Indiana, and many other cities, police departments now charge officers a fee to take home their squad cars. Police departments in central Louisiana resist this trend. “This [taking home a squad car] is not a privilege,” says the director of the National Fraternal Order of Police. “It really is about maximizing response times and the ability of officers to be where they need to be.”
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Privately run detention center locks up immigrants for months
Hundreds of immigrants who have committed minor offenses have been locked up for weeks or months at a time in a Broward County, Florida facility run by a private company. The majority of the immigrants have been accused of entering the country illegally or staying longer than were allowed to.
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Obama unveils comprehensive proposal to curb gun violence
President Obama earlier today proposed the most comprehensive gun-control policies in a generation. He also initiated twenty-three separate executive actions aiming to curb what he called “the epidemic of gun violence in this country.” In addition to executive measures, the president called on Congress to pass legislation to ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines for civilian use, and to require universal background checks for all gun buyers.
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House approves $50.7 billion Sandy relief bill
The House Tuesday night approved, by a vote of 241 to 180, the $50.7 billion in a Sandy relief package, the second installment of a $60.4 billion package requested by the White House and approved by the Senate (last week the House approved the $9.7 million flood-insurance part of the package). Effort by conservative members of the House to offset a part of the bill’s cost with across-the-board federal budget cuts failed on a 258-162 vote.
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New York State votes for strict gun law
New York governor Andrew Cuomo yesterday signed into law a sweeping gun-control bill. The bill expands a ban on assault weapons, limits the size of magazines, includes measures to keep guns away from the mentally ill, and make penalties stiffer for using a gun in the commission of a crime. Cuomo signed the bill shortly after the State Assembly approved it by a 104-43 vote on the second day of the 2013 legislative session.
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More headlines
The long view
Preventing Another 'Jan. 6' Starts by Changing How Elections Are Certified, Experts Say
The 2024 presidential election may be a rematch between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, but preventing a repeat of Jan. 6, 2021 — when false claims of a stolen election promoted by Donald Trump and his allies led to an insurrection at the U.S. Capitol —will be top of mind this election year. Research finds broad support among public for nonpartisan certification commissions.
States Rush to Combat AI Threat to Elections
This year’s presidential election will be the first since generative AI became widely available. That’s raising fears that millions of voters could be deceived by a barrage of political deepfakes. Congress has done little to address the issue, but states are moving aggressively to respond — though questions remain about how effective any new measures to combat AI-created disinformation will be.
Chinese Government Hackers Targeted Critics of China, U.S. Businesses and Politicians
An indictment was unsealed Monday charging seven nationals of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) with conspiracy to commit computer intrusions and conspiracy to commit wire fraud for their involvement in a PRC-based hacking group that spent approximately 14 years targeting U.S. and foreign critics, businesses, and political officials in furtherance of the PRC’s economic espionage and foreign intelligence objectives.
European Arms Imports Nearly Double, U.S. and French Exports Rise, and Russian Exports Fall Sharply
States in Europe almost doubled their imports of major arms (+94 per cent) between 2014–18 and 2019–23. The United States increased its arms exports by 17 per cent between 2014–18 and 2019–23, while Russia’s arms exports halved. Russia was for the first time the third largest arms exporter, falling just behind France.
LNG Exports Have Had No Impact on Domestic Energy Costs: Analysis
U.S. liquified natural gas (LNG) exports have not had any sustained and significant direct impact on U.S. natural gas prices and have, in fact, spurred production and productivity gains, which contribute to downward pressure on domestic prices.
Don’t Buy Moscow’s Shameless Campaign Tying Biden to Its Terrorist Attack
Russia has offered many different explanations to the ISIS-K’s 22 March 2024 terrorist attack at the Crocus City Hall in Moscow, but the most recent explanation offered by Russia is the most audacious yet: Russia now charges that the Ukrainian energy company Burisma financed the attack. Burisma is at the center of an effort by a congressional committee to impeach President Biden, but the case has all but collapsed. Hunter Stoll writes that Russia’s disinformation and propaganda apparatus appears to be searching for ways to keep Burisma in the news ahead of the U.S. presidential election.