Rick Santelli's Chicago Tea Party |
- Facial recognition technology poses privacy concerns
- Georgia ethanol plant sold, at taxpayers’ loss
- US Economic Forecast for 2012 and the Election Year Cycle
- Former SS Boss Proposes Global Email Fusion Center
- Wholesale Approval of Genetically Engineered Foods — Obama Administration Disappoints/Angers Public
- Google: Ron Paul, Kim Kardashian more popular in New Hampshire than Romney
- NH Tea Party leaders splitting on endorsements
| Facial recognition technology poses privacy concerns Posted: 05 Jan 2012 06:00 PM PST By Michael O’Connell, FederalNewsRadio.com Facial recognition is becoming a bigger part of law enforcement and homeland security. It’s also growing in the commercial sector, which has all kinds of privacy and ID misuse implications. That’s why the Federal Trade Commission recently held a workshop to explore the issues. Amanda Koulousias, a staff attorney in the Division of Privacy and Identity Protection at the FTC, spoke to The Federal Drive with Tom Temin Tuesday morning about the who, what and why of this gathering. “One of the things that we learned at the workshop … is what are the privacy concerns here and are the technologies currently being implemented in a way that raises additional privacy concerns or are they being implemented in a privacy-sensitive way,” said Koulousias. “And since we don’t fully know the answers to that, it’s very hard to predict where we’ll go.” Workshop participants included technologists, privacy and consumer advocates, academics and representatives of companies implementing facial recognition in their products. They discussed the privacy concerns relating to two separate technologies — facial detection and facial recognition. One way that companies are now using facial detection is in commercial signs. “It’s detecting the age range and the gender of the person who is looking at the sign,” Koulousias said. “It can then target an ad to that person based on the demographic characteristics.” Facial recognition, on the other hand, is being used in various photo-tagging applications. Representatives from both Google and Facebook were among those at the workshop discussing how their social networks were using the technology. To read more, visit: http://www.federalnewsradio.com/439/2691162/Facial-recognition-technology-poses-privacy-concerns |
| Georgia ethanol plant sold, at taxpayers’ loss Posted: 05 Jan 2012 05:58 PM PST By Dan Chapman, ajc.com The failed Range Fuels wood-to-ethanol factory in southeastern Georgia that sucked up $65 million in federal and state tax dollars was sold Tuesday for pennies on the dollar to another bio-fuel maker with equally grand plans to transform the alternative energy world. LanzaTech, a New Zealand-based biofuel company, paid $5.1 million for the plant in Soperton. Its main financial backer: Vinod Khosla, a California entrepreneur who also bankrolled Range Fuels, and helped secure its government loans, before Range went bust last year. LanzaTech hasn’t received the same type of loans, but the company has received $7 million from the U.S. departments of Energy and Transportation to assist in the development of alternative fuels. The Range fiasco harkens other, failed renewable energy companies that received major taxpayer funding. California solar panel maker Solyndra got $535 million in federal loan guarantees. Beacon Power of Massachusetts, which makes energy-storage equipment, took in $43 million in federal money. Both filed for bankruptcy last year. Range cost U.S. taxpayers $64 million and Georgia taxpayers another $6.2 million. Tuesday’s sale netted $5.1 million which will help offset losses suffered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Georgia’s money, which paid for some of the ethanol-making equipment, won’t be recouped outright, but state officials expect LanzaTech to use the machinery. Sam Shelton, director of research programs at Georgia Tech’s Strategic Energy Institute, was long skeptical of Range Fuels’ plans and technology. To read more, visit: http://www.ajc.com/business/georgia-ethanol-plant-sold-1289567.html |
| US Economic Forecast for 2012 and the Election Year Cycle Posted: 05 Jan 2012 05:55 PM PST By: James Hall, Infowars.com When it comes to business cycles, the former rules no longer seem to apply. The seminal events that changed the economic landscape after the 2008 financial crash still points to an uncertain future and marginal recovery. If you watch CNBC or Bloomberg business news, you hear that a modest recovery is in place. Accepting this kind of reporting may temporarily make you feel better, but in the real economy, the prospects for a rebound are mere fiction. Prosperity only exists for the chums of the insider financial system, who are immune from actual market conditions. Under the privileged and favoritism model, political subsidies and bailouts are more important than creative industry or innovative execution. The businesses that produce and service the everyday functions of society flounder in a sea of uncertainty and a desert of capital illiquidity. Within this context, the only realistic way to examine the prospects for 2012, must factor in the political component. Yet the promoters of the corporatist system build up false hope, while fudging the numbers. Analyze the valid question; Can We Trust The Moderate Growth Forecasts? “Another day, another economic forecast. The 35 economists polled for the latest Livingston Survey via the Philadelphia Fed project that real GDP for the U.S. will grow at an annualized 2.5% rate for the second half of 2011. That's down from June's 3.2% second-half 2011 forecast. Down, but still not out. Looking ahead to 2012, the Livingston survey forecasters “see the growth rate of economic output slowing to 2.1 percent (annual rate) in the first half of 2012, and they predict that it will then increase to 2.5 percent (annual rate) in the second half of the year.” The economists also expect “a slow recovery in the labor market, with the unemployment rate at 9.0 percent in December 2011 and at 8.9 percent in June 2012.” Lakshman Achuthan, chief operations officer of the Economic Cycle Research Institute, talks with Bloomberg about the next year in the U.S. Economic Outlook, Labor Market video. To read more, visit: http://www.infowars.com/us-economic-forecast-for-2012-and-the-election-year-cycle/ |
| Former SS Boss Proposes Global Email Fusion Center Posted: 05 Jan 2012 05:50 PM PST By: Kurt Nimmo, Infowars.com Ronald Noble – the former head of the Secret Service, the BATF, and secretary general of Interpol – wants to create a fusion center with the ability to track and trace your email. Noble says that although there is no known threat posed against the Olympics planned for 2012 in London, the state needs a fusion center to make sure. "A smart terrorist would know that if the world's attention is focused on something and they commit a terrorist act it will help them create the kind of fear that would make people want to leave London," Noble told The Independent before visiting Scotland Yard to discuss arrangements for the Games. "My concern is that the people planning that attack – that nuclear attack, that bio-terrorist attack, that attack that should concern us all as a world – would be able to plan it more effectively because we don't have a network in place for tracing the source of email messages on the internet," he said. Noble's proposed email fusion center will provide a place where "police around the world can go quickly and find out the source of any kind of message or communication that's come across the internet." In order to calm the fears of civil libertarians, Noble emphasized that the fusion center "will only target specific, suspicious emails" and will not have the capability to "track all the messages from billions of innocent people." To read more, visit: http://www.infowars.com/former-ss-boss-proposes-global-email-fusion-center/ |
| Wholesale Approval of Genetically Engineered Foods — Obama Administration Disappoints/Angers Public Posted: 05 Jan 2012 05:47 PM PST From: Cornucopia.org Cornucopia, WI – Over the holidays, the United States Department of Agriculture announced its approval of a novel strain of genetically engineered corn, developed by Monsanto, purportedly being "drought tolerant." Despite receiving nearly 45,000 public comments in opposition to this particular genetically engineered (GE) corn variety (and only 23 comments in favor), the Obama administration gave Monsanto the green light to release its newest GE corn variety freely into the environment and American food supply, without any governmental oversight or safety tracking. "President Obama and Secretary of Agriculture Vilsack just sent a clear message to the American public that they do not care about our concerns with genetically engineered food and their questionable safety, adverse environmental impacts, and detrimental effects on farmers, especially organic farmers," says Mark A. Kastel, Senior Farm Policy Analyst with The Cornucopia Institute. "This is just the latest in a string of approvals of genetically engineered crops, and it is clear that despite campaign promises of change from Obama, he has not had the courage to stand strong against the powerful agribusiness and biotechnology lobbies," Kastel added. In addition to its announcement approving Monsanto's newest GE corn variety, the USDA also opened a 60-day public comment period for two additional petitions – one for Monsanto's GE soybean containing higher levels of an omega-3 fatty acid, that does not naturally occur in soybeans, and the other from Dow AgroSciences for corn that has been genetically engineered to better resist the poisonous herbicide 2,4-D. To read more, visit: http://www.cornucopia.org/2012/01/wholesale-approval-of-genetically-engineered-foods-obama-administration-disappointsangers-public/ |
| Google: Ron Paul, Kim Kardashian more popular in New Hampshire than Romney Posted: 05 Jan 2012 05:43 PM PST By Josh Peterson, DailyCaller.com Polling data suggests that GOP presidential front-runner Mitt Romney is more popular in New Hampshire than the rest of the Republican field. But recent Google statistics indicate that Texas Rep. Ron Paul and even Kim Kardashian are piquing greater interest than Romney in the Granite State. A recent RealClearPolitics polling average from Dec. 27, 2011, to Jan. 3, 2012, showed Romney crushing Paul, his closest competitor in New Hampshire, by a whopping 21.3-point margin. Romney governed the neighboring state of Massachusetts between 2003 and 2007. But despite Romney's polling advantage, Internet interest in Paul among New Hampshire residents — gauged using search statistics from Google Insights for Search — steadily increased from the beginning of January 2011 to the beginning of January 2012, maintaining a lead in user interest over Romney since early June 2011. New Hampshire Internet users exhibited significantly more interest in Paul than Romney through December, with Paul-related search queries increasing exponentially throughout the month. The Google data "analyzes a portion of Google web searches to compute how many searches have been done for the terms you've entered, relative to the total number of searches done on Google over time," according to the company The search engine also eliminates "repeated queries from a single user over a short period of time, so that the level of interest isn't artificially impacted by these type of queries." To read more, visit: http://dailycaller.com/2012/01/05/google-ron-paul-kim-kardashian-more-popular-in-new-hampshire-than-romney/#ixzz1iaSQEnzJ |
| NH Tea Party leaders splitting on endorsements Posted: 05 Jan 2012 05:40 PM PST By JOHN DiSTASO, NewHampshire.com THURSDAY, JAN. 5, UPDATE: LUTHER FOR SANTORUM. State Sen. Jim Luther, R-Hollis, will endorse Rick Santorum for President tonight at an event at Windham High School, UnionLeader.com State House Reporter Garry Rayno reports. THURSDAY, JAN. 5, UPDATE: SPLIT LIBERTY MOVEMENT? In an example of how Mitt Romney could benefit in Tuesday’s primary by a continued split among New Hampshire conservatives, two key state Tea Party/liberty movement leaders today endorsed different candidates. Jerry DeLemus of Rochester, chairman of the Granite State Patriots Liberty PAC, today gave his personal endorsement to Rick Santorum. DeLemus had been one of the few New Hampshire backers of Michele Bachmann, who dropped out of the race on Wednesday following a poor showing in the Iowa caucuses . Jane Aitken of Bedford, co-founder of the New Hampshire Tea Party Coalition and a member of the board of the Coalition of New Hampshire Taxpayer, gave her personal endorsement to Ron Paul. Several weeks ago, another leading Tea Party activist, Jack Kimball, backed Newt Gingrich. Kimball founded the GSPL PAC and was DeLemus’s predecessor as chairman. To read more, visit: http://www.newhampshire.com/article/20120105/NEWS0605/110609989 |
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