04.18.13
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Republican Mike Rogers led CISPA bill, the Fourth Amendment, and you

Overshadowed by congressional action on guns and immigration is an Internet privacy bill that could affect most Americans, without them knowing it, on a daily basis.

computer servers

The final vote in the House was 248-168, as 42 Democrats voted for the bill, while 28 Republicans voted against it.

And like gun control, it’s far from a done deal after the House passes CISPA. It would need Senate approval, and President Barack Obama has indicated he’ll possibly veto CISPA if it comes to his desk.

Both sides of Congress would need to muster a two-thirds majority vote to override the president’s veto, which would seem unlikely in the current political atmosphere of Washington.

At the heart of CISPA is a Fourth Amendment issue.

The amendment reads:

“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

CISPA is designed to let the federal government work with private companies to fight hackers and cybercriminals in and outside of the United States. As part of the effort to detect cyber threats, private companies could voluntarily share with the government data about Internet users.

The sharing could be done in “real time” as the cybercops try to defeat and track down the evildoers. Companies could also share data among themselves as part of the effort.

There are major drawbacks about the legislation, say CISPA’s critics. The privacy provisions for consumers, they claim, are vague or nonexistent. The government and companies can’t look at your personal data, such as medical records and tax returns, if they are part of the “data dump” that is shared in real time. But the law doesn’t require that companies excise, or edit out, that information in the transfer process.

Another criticism is that a warrant isn’t needed for the government to obtain that information. And companies that share your information won’t be held legally liable for sharing that information, a practice that seemingly conflicts with privacy policies on existing websites.

CISPA’s biggest critic in Congress is a representative from Colorado, Jared Polis. The Democrat told the House on Wednesday, “This is the biggest government takeover of personal information that I’ve seen during my time here in Congress.”

Mike Rogers, a Republican representative from Michigan and the House Intelligence Committee chairman, is leading the CISPA effort, along with Dutch Ruppersberger, a Democrat from Maryland.

Rogers believes the measure is long needed. “People were stealing their identities, their accounts, their intellectual property, and subsequent to that, their jobs,” he recently said. “[Web users] began to question the value of getting on Internet and using [it] for commercial purposes. Their trust in the free and open Internet … was at risk.”

He has also stressed that participation in CISPA is voluntary for companies.

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What do you think about this clear violation of the fourth amendment?  Michigan residents living in the 8th US Congressional district can reach out to Mike Rogers to give their opinion of his bill:

Office Information
2112 Rayburn House Office Building Washington, D.C. 20515 Phone: (202) 225-4872 Fax: (202) 225-58201000 West St. Joseph Suite 300 Lansing, Michigan 48915 Phone: (517) 702-8000 Toll Free: 877-333-MIKE Fax: (517) 702-8642To Send an e-mail:http://mikerogers.house.gov/contact/

Click below for the full article.

http://news.yahoo.com/cispa-fourth-amendment-143420272.html

 

04.18.13
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Power of the People? Redditors May Have A Found A Hi-Res Image Of Boston Bombing ‘Suspect 2’

A photo  posted on Reddit may show a hi-res image of Suspect 2 from the  Boston bombings.

This image has not been confirmed.

The FBI released low-res  images and video from security cameras of two suspects to the public, asking  for help in identification.

Reddit, which has been studying every angle of this case from the beginning,  responded quickly.

Suspect 2 in the FBI release (see upper right) looks a lot like the man in a  backwards white baseball cap and grey hoodie in the photo posted on Reddit (see  below).

Redditors have also below  that the man in the hi-res photo appears not to be carrying a backpack,  suggesting that he may have put it down.

Commenters on the Reddit  thread seem confident that the image is not photoshopped, though this question  is still up in the air.

boston suspect 2 red

Click below for the full article.

http://www.businessinsider.com/reddit-finds-clear-picture-of-suspect-2-2013-4

04.18.13
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AP Poll: Trust in government, Obama approval slip

President Barack Obama’s re-election glow is gone. Congress’ reputation remains dismal. And only about one in five Americans say they trust the government to do what’s right most of the time, an Associated Press-GfK poll finds.

Most adults disapprove of Obama’s handling of the federal deficit, a festering national problem. But they also dislike key proposals to reduce deficit spending, including a slower growth in Social Security benefits and changes to Medicare.

Rounding out the portrait of a nation in a funk, the share of people saying the United States is heading in the wrong direction is at its highest since last August: 56 percent.

The government in Washington is “dealing with a lot of stuff that are non-issues,” said Jeremy Hammond, 33, of Queensbury, N.Y.

Hammond, a Web programmer and political independent, said Congress should focus on “the incredible debt and lack of spending control.” He said it’s absurd for Congress to force the Postal Service to continue Saturday mail delivery when the agency says “we can’t afford it.”

Hammond reflects the lukewarm feelings toward Obama found in the poll. Asked his opinion of the president, Hammond paused and said: “I don’t know. I voted for him in 2008, not in 2012.” When it comes to presidents, he said, “it’s one set of lawyers or the other.”

Click below for the full article.

http://news.yahoo.com/poll-trust-government-obama-approval-slip-164950163–politics.html

04.18.13
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Business Insider: Here’s What We Know About The Sad State Of Wall Street Now That Earnings Are All In

In the last week or so every Wall Street bank has reported its earnings, so now  it’s time for the takeaways.

As usual the headlines of the week didn’t tell the whole story.

A quick glance looks like this: JP  Morgan beat estimates with a 33%  jump in profits, Morgan  Stanley‘s profits dipped but the bank still  beat expectations, Goldman  Sachs is taking champagne  showers, Bank  of America is eeking  out some kind of improvement, and Citi  is finally coming into its own after shedding a load of toxic assets.

Now for the news you can read between the lines.

Sales and trading is on life support, especially if you trade fixed income,  currencies or commodities. The traders at Goldman Sachs did better than everyone  else, but as CNBC’s  John Carney pointed out, they were still down 7% for the quarter.

Bank of America’s S&T revenue fell 20% (run by Tom Montag, who still gets  paid more than BofA CEO Brian  Moynihan) and Morgan Stanley got killed, with its revenue falling 42%.

On the other hand, Wealth Management, once one of the most boring sectors on  The Street, is carrying banks. This is especially true at Morgan Stanley (where  the unit is up 48% from this time last year) and Bank of America, where  assets under management grew $67.7  billion year-over-year to $745.3 billion.

Another business where Wall Street is making some cash is in debt  underwriting. Thanks to our current low yield environment, companies that were  unable to issue bonds before can do so now. The demand to buy these bonds is  there from clients searching for yield any way they can get it. Wall Street is here to help.

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Click below for the full article.

http://www.businessinsider.com/wall-street-banks-q1-2013-earnings-2013-4

04.18.13
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Associated Press: UnitedHealth warns of Medicare profit squeeze

UnitedHealth Group, the largest provider of Medicare Advantage plans, warned Thursday that funding cuts for the privately-run versions of the federal Medicare program will force it to reconsider its expectations for earnings growth next year.

CEO Stephen Hemsley told analysts that the government-subsidized coverage for elderly and disabled people faces a reimbursement cut of about 4 percent next year. That’s on top of other possible federal funding reductions and an expected 3 percent rise in medical costs.

“We did not expect the fastest-growing, most popular and most effective of the Medicare benefit options serving America’s seniors would be underfunded to this extent in 2014,” Hemsley said.

More than 13 million people were enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans last year, or about 27 percent of the Medicare population, according to the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation.

Insurers offer hundreds of different Medicare Advantage plans around the country. The coverage typically provides extras such as dental and vision care, or rates that are lower than standard Medicare.

UnitedHealth, which is the nation’s largest health insurer, has nearly 2.9 million people enrolled, and the plans brought in about 20 percent of the insurer’s revenue last year.

Shares of UnitedHealth and other insurers that provide Medicare Advantage coverage slid in February after the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services released data that pointed to payment cuts as steep as 8 percent next year. The government then softened the blow to a reduction of about 4 percent.

But UnitedHealth said that cut, combined with the other reductions, will be tough to stomach. UnitedHealth said it may have to trim benefits, change provider networks or leave some markets to preserve Medicare Advantage profitability.

Hemsley, UnitedHealth’s CEO, called the reimbursement cut “a significantly greater rate setback than anyone could have expected.”

The company also said widespread government spending cuts that started earlier this year and hit Medicare will make it hard for the insurer to reach the top end of its forecast for 2013 earnings of $5.25 to $5.50 per share. Analysts expect earnings of $5.51 per share, according to FactSet, a research firm.

Analysts had labeled UnitedHealth’s 2013 earnings forecast conservative after it came out last fall, and the insurer normally raises it several times through the year. But so far, the company has just backed the initial projection.

Thursday’s outlook warning came as UnitedHealth reported that its first-quarter earnings sank 14 percent, largely due to a lower gain the company recorded due to leftover insurance claims.

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Click below for the full article.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/unitedhealth-warns-medicare-profit-squeeze-175814694–finance.html

 

04.18.13
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The Week: Does the gun bill’s failure prove the Senate is broken?

Background checks have overwhelming support from the American public: A Washington Post-ABC News poll last week found that 86 percent of people support a law “requiring background checks on people buying guns at gun shows or online.”

The Senate, ostensibly, represents those same people. Yet the Toomey-Manchin bill regulating that exact issue failed in the Senate on Wednesday by a vote of 54-46. (It needed 60 votes to pass.) What’s wrong with this picture?

The main problem is that small states are vastly overrepresented in the Senate. If you judge the vote by population, the Toomey-Manchin bill actually got a majority of the votes. Alec MacGillis of The New Republic breaks down the numbers and finds that “senators voting for the bill represented about 194 million people, while the senators voting against the bill represented about 118 million people,” which is “getting close to a two-thirds majority in favor of the measure.”

While the Constitution has always protected the interests of small states, the disparity has never been this big. Ezra Klein of The Washington Post points out just how much things have changed:

During the first Congress, Virginia, the largest state, was roughly 12 times the size of Delaware, which was, at the time, the smallest state. Today, California is 66 times the size of Wyoming. That makes the Senate five times less proportionate today than it was at the founding. [Washington Post]

Of course, the effects of the Great Compromise wouldn’t be so, well, great, if it weren’t so easy to filibuster bills. “Everything needs 60 votes today. This is supposed to be a majority body,” Sen. Dianne Feinstein complained after the bill failed, according to The Huffington Post.

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Click below for the full article.

http://theweek.com/article/index/242989/does-the-gun-bills-failure-mean-the-senate-is-broken

04.18.13
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The Blaze: MSNBC Publicly Shames Senators Who ‘Voted Against Common Sense,’ Warns Of Retribution In 2014

The air in the small town of West, Texas was still filled with the smell of smoke and ammonia as medical crews worked to help the hundreds who were injured while rescue workers struggled to locate and identify the dozens killed in yesterday’s fertilizer plant explosion, MSNBC was looking for revenge. Revenge for the death of the gun control bill in the U.S. Senate.

Following the Senate’s rejection of the gun control bill, MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” launched a campaign of public shaming of those who voted “no.” (And in some cases, they chose a few unflattering photos to display.)

MSNBC Publicly Shames Senators Who Voted No On Gun Bill

On Thursday morning, the majority of the first hour of “Morning Joe” was dedicated to the not-so-surprising results from yesterday’s defeat of the Senate’s gun bill. Co-host Mika Brzezinski talked about the “stinging loss for the president…and might I add to the script, the country.” Brzezinski went on to talk about those who voted against the bill, announcing that the show was going to put their names and pictures on the screen so all could see the 54 “Faces of Cowardice.”

Democrats who voted against the bill were featured individually as well as given their own special page at the end of the segment.

MSNBC Publicly Shames Senators Who Voted No On Gun Bill

Joe Scarborough also piled on, warning of consequences coming to anyone who voted against the “90 percent.” (Scarborough declared himself and anyone who supported the background checks in the now-dead bill, “We are the 90 percent!”)

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Click below for the full article and some other related articles.

MSNBC Publicly Shames Senators Who ‘Voted Against Common Sense,’ Warns Of Retribution In 2014

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/04/18/msnbc-publicly-shames-senators-who-voted-against-common-sense-warns-of-retribution-in-2014/

Is the liberal anti-gun push backfiring?
http://www.theblaze.com/blog/2013/04/18/is-the-liberal-anti-gun-push-backfiring/

MSNBC Host Blames NRA for ‘Slow’ Boston Investigation: ‘In the Business of Helping Bombers Get Away With Their Crimes’
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/04/18/msnbc-host-blames-nra-for-slow-boston-investigation-in-the-business-of-helping-bombers-get-away-with-their-crimes/

04.18.13
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Marketwatch: No decisions made on gun-control bill: Boehner

House committee chairmen are looking at gun violence proposals but no decisions
have been made about legislation, House Speaker John Boehner said Thursday.
“When we have a decision to announce, we’ll announce it,” Boehner told
reporters, a day after the Senate defeated an amendment that would have expanded
background checks for gun buyers.

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Do Republicans also need an education on the Second Amendment?  What do you think?  This is an interesting statement from the top GOP in the House.  Click below for the direct link.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/no-decisions-made-on-gun-control-bill-boehner-2013-04-18?siteid=yhoof2

04.18.13
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Motoramic: Why does the world’s largest automaker need $146.5 million from Kentucky?

On Friday, Toyota Chief Executive Akio Toyoda and Kentucky officials are expected to announce a $530 million expansion of Toyota’s sprawling Georgetown factory in the Bluegrass State so that it can build 50,000 Lexus ES sedans a year. In return for adding 570 permanent jobs, Kentucky will give Toyota a package of tax breaks and other incentives worth $146.5 million. Such deals are so common they rarely draw comment, but it’s worth asking: Why does the world’s largest automaker need a handout?

To get the incentives, Toyota promised to hire up to 570 new full-time workers at the Georgetown plant, along with 180 temporary workers. As the Louisville Courier-Journal reports, those permanent employees will be paid an average of $26 an hour in wages and benefits, a bit more than half of what long-time employees in Georgetown make.

It would be unfair to Toyota to single it out for taking a path trod so often by other automakers and corporations; in fact, it’s unheard of for an automaker from General Motors to Mitsubishi to expand a plant without some kind of government gift. Last December, The New York Times counted up 35 different grants to Ford from Kentucky alone between 2007 and 2010, totaling $307 million — which came even as the company cut jobs.

And those breaks pale to the deals automakers bargain for when they open new plants, with the current record held by Volkswagen, whose Tennessee factory came with incentives that total $577 million over several years. In return for those incentives, VW vowed to hire 2,000 full-time workers, for a cost of about $288,500 per job, a ratio that was the highest ever for a new auto assembly plant in the United States. When Kia opened its plant in Georgia in 2009, it did so only after driving a hard bargain for a $400 million incentive package, including everything from school property tax breaks to a free rail spur to ship cars from the factory.

State and local governments give automakers endless breaks for several reasons. A new auto plant often means additional jobs from parts suppliers on top of the add-on boost to the local economy. In tough times for American workers, automotive manufacturing jobs ofter stability and wages well above what’s available in most service industry careers. And many state officials fear being held to answer why a project was lost if the pot wasn’t sweet enough.

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How do you feel about this government intervention?  Click below for the full article.

http://autos.yahoo.com/blogs/motoramic/why-does-world-largest-automaker-146-million-kentucky-164424807.html

04.18.13
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New York Times: Mortgage Relief Checks Go Out, Only to Bounce

A $300 relief check that bounced. The name and other information was redacted by The New York Times for privacy reasons.

When the bank account is running dry and the mortgage payment is coming due, the phrase “insufficient funds” is the last thing you want to hear.

Now imagine hearing those two words when trying to cash a long-awaited check from the same bank that foreclosed on you.

Many struggling homeowners got exactly that this week when they lined up to take their cut of a $3.6 billion settlement with the nation’s largest banks — lenders accused of wrongful evictions and other abuses.

Ronnie Edward, whose home was sold in a foreclosure auction, waited three years for his $3,000 check. When it arrived on Tuesday, he raced to his local bank in Tennessee, only to learn that the funds “were not available.”

Mr. Edward, 38, was taken aback. “Is this for real?” he asked.

It is unclear how many of the 1.4 million homeowners who were mailed the first round of payments covered under the foreclosure settlement have had problems with their checks. But housing advocates from California to New York and even regulators say that in recent days frustrated homeowners have bombarded them with complaints and questions.

The mishap is just the latest setback to troubled homeowners. It took more than two years to resolve a federal investigation into the foreclosure abuses. Even after the settlement in January, the checks were delayed for weeks.

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The Too Big to Fail Banks certainly didn’t seem to have trouble getting their checks from Hank Paulson or Ben Bernanke but it looks like these folks weren’t so fortunate.  Click below for the full article.

http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2013/04/17/victims-of-foreclosure-abuses-face-another-woe-bounced-checks/