we all know you and i are being spied upon

i hope THEY (the they being those in government. YES OUR GOVERNMENT) know THEY are being spied upon too. do they think they're beyond the scopes of king george and his court? well i hope they think again. it's all ok when we, the little ones are having our rights and liberties tossed. i wonder when they'll figure out THEIR rights and liberties are being trounced on as well
king george is NOT exempting anyone. not me. not you or you OR YOU

FBI Data Transfers Via Telecoms Questioned

By Ellen NakashimaWashington Post Staff Writer
When FBI investigators probing New York prostitution rings, Boston organized crime or potential terrorist plots anywhere want access to a suspect's telephone contacts, technicians at a telecommunications carrier served with a government order can, with the click of a mouse, instantly transfer key data along a computer circuit to an FBI technology office in Quantico.
The circuits -- little-known electronic connections between telecom firms and FBI monitoring personnel around the country -- are used to tell the government who is calling whom, along with the time and duration of a conversation and even the locations of those involved.
Recently, three Democrats on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, including Chairman John D. Dingell (Mich.), sent a letter to colleagues citing privacy concerns over one of the Quantico circuits and demanding more information about it. Anxieties about whether such electronic links are too intrusive form a backdrop to the continuing congressional debate over modifications to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which governs federal surveillance.
Since a 1994 law required telecoms to build electronic interception capabilities into their systems, the FBI has created a network of links between the nation's largest telephone and Internet firms and about 40 FBI offices and Quantico, according to interviews and documents describing the agency's Digital Collection System. The documents were obtained under the Freedom of Information Act by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit advocacy group in San Francisco that specializes in digital-rights issues. .........

thursday humor

well not exactly funny in a ha ha way, but sure as shite funny in the OTHER way. again, it's not so much that this happened (and IS happening as i write this), what gets me the maddest is, NOW WE ALL KNOW this is happening
1) are we going to fire these epa scientists with DIRECT TIES to big bid-nez/chemical companies
2) are we going to allow this to CONTINUE
3) are we going to hold someone's hand to the flame on this?

no
no
no
most likely

Lawmakers Probe EPA Conflicts
By H. JOSEF HEBERT –
WASHINGTON (AP) — A House committee opened an investigation Monday into potential conflicts of interest in scientific panels that advise the Environmental Protection Agency.
The House Energy and Commerce Committee cited the case of eight scientists who were consultants or members of EPA science advisory panels assessing the human health effects of toxic chemicals while getting research support from the chemical industry on the same chemicals they were examining.
In two cases, EPA advisers were employed by companies that made or worked with manufacturers of the chemicals being evaluated. the committee said.
Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., the committee's chairman, said such conflicts appear to be in stark contrast to EPA's decision last summer to remove a public health scientist and expert in toxicology, from a panel examining the health impacts of a flame retardant because of critical comments she made about the chemical.
The American Chemistry Council, the industry trade group, had called for the removal of Deborah Rice, a toxicologist from Maine, as chairman of an independent EPA panel assessing the health risks from "deca", a flame retardant in electronic equipment, after she urged the Maine state legislature to ban the chemical.
"The routine use of chemical industry employees and representatives in EPA's scientific review process, together with EPA's dismissal of Dr. Rice raises serious questions with regard to EPA's conflict of interest rules and their application," said Dingell in a letter Monday to EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson.
Rice, an employee of Maine's Department of Health and Human Services, was never alleged to have any monetary interest associated with deca and her dismissal "seems to argue that scientific expertise ... is a basis for disqualification," the letter continued.
"We will be reviewing the letter and we will respond appropriately," said EPA spokesman Timothy Lyons.......

...........Among the appointments questioned:
_ An employee of Exxon Mobil Corp., who served on an expert panel assessing the cancer-causing potential of ethylene oxide, a chemical also made by Exxon Mobil.
_ A participant in a panel examining the risk to humans from a widely used octane enhancer in gasoline, who was employed by an engineering company working with makers of the chemical and major oil and chemical companies.
_ A scientist who served on a panel examining the health impacts of ethylene oxide, a component in various industrial chemicals, who received research support from Dow Agro, one of the chemicals' manufacturers........

what's wrong with

THIS picture?

people are afraid to air 'howl' by allen ginsberg on the radio waves. but we can be illegally spied upon and the fcc does NADA?

Public radio station in NYC won't air "Howl" for fear of the FCC
Posted by Cory Doctorow
The FCC's war on dirty words is having a chilling effect -- even WBAI Pacifica, the radical radio station in NYC, is scared of airing Allen Ginsberg's magnificent poem, Howl. "Why, 50 years later after a judge ruled that children could read this poem, people are afraid the courts will say that their ears shouldn't hear it," said Ron Collins, a constitutional law instructor and First Amendment advocate who is leading a small group of authors, broadcasters and free-speech advocates pushing to broadcast the poem eventually. "Yet they can go on the Internet and see far, far worse things."
Another irony: WBAI, the Pacifica Foundation station in New York that plans to post "Howl" online, is the same station that took on the FCC more than 30 years ago over the right to air George Carlin's comedy routine featuring the "seven dirty words." The challenge led to a 1978 Supreme Court decision governing what naughty words can be broadcast and when. ........

FCC refuses to probe telecoms over giving customer data to NSA
As Reuters reports, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin has declined to look into allegations that telecommunications companies colluded with the NSA to collect information on American citizens in conjunction with warrantless wiretapping.
Martin cites "national security concerns."
EXCERPTS:
#
The reports have prompted scrutiny by the House Energy and Commerce Committee. Democratic Rep. Edward Markey, the chairman of a key Energy and Commerce subcommittee, asked Martin to investigate.
In his response, Martin included Tuesday's letter from McConnell. A spokesman for the FCC declined further comment..........