The majority of voters did not vote for Donald Trump for president; the majority of voters did not vote for Republican candidates for the Senate; and fewer than 51% of voters cast their ballots for Republican candidates for the House of Representatives. The Republican Party now controls the White House, both houses of Congress and the Supreme Court, no matter how that came to be. I believe it is worth bearing in mind that a majority of U.S. citizens did not support the Republican winners.   read more

Clinton Cook Sr. tells Anchorage television KTUU he was on a boat that found one of the heavy, hard plastic containers. They were going to pass it, but noticed the unusual shape, about 8-feet by 2-feet. Troopers say an explosives ordinance team helped determine the boxes were "void of their original contents."   read more

He often brags that he is paying for his campaign, saying, “I don’t need anybody’s money.” But Donald Trump’s disregard for fundraising by email, building lists of small donors and assembling a digital operation could hamstring him as a general-election candidate and do lasting damage to the Republican Party, strategists say. Trump has emailed no mass requests for contributions. Rather, he has passively harvested the contact information of his website visitors and merchandise customers.   read more

Weeks after a prison inspector privately told a state Senate committee about cover-up and abuse at the prison agency, he was hit with six internal investigations in a single day, all aimed at discrediting him or forcing him out. Doug Glisson was then moved from his office into a former broom closet. When Glisson protested to his supervisors, he was subjected to a verbal tirade from Inspector Falstrom so loud and filled with invective that it scared the other office staff who overhead it all.   read more

De Sousa has exhausted her appeals in the Italian judicial system. It is not clear whether, upon her return to Italy, she would immediately begin serving her prison term, which would last a minimum of four years. Portuguese courts have stated that De Sousa, once sent to Italy, should have the right to a new trial, or at least the opportunity to present new evidence and witnesses in an appeal. But one of the Italian prosecutors said she would be sent straight to prison, “and that’s that."   read more

Fusion centers have been criticized by both the political left and right. A 2014 report found they had been used to track and monitor Occupy Wall Street protesters. The Cato Institute alleged center employees conducted surveillance of Tea Party groups and Second Amendment rallies. One center allegedly targeted supporters of congressman Ron Paul while he was running for U.S. president. Homeland Security itself identified privacy risks at centers, including data mining and excessive secrecy.   read more

Amid intensifying national attention over harsh sentencing policies that have disproportionately affected African-Americans, governors and legislatures around the nation have been debating — and often fighting over — moves to restore voting rights for convicted felons. Virginia imposes especially harsh restrictions, barring felons from voting for life. “There’s no question that we’ve had a horrible history in voting rights as relates to African-Americans — we should remedy it,” said McAuliffe.   read more

A large body of research shows that the rich live longer — and that the life span gap between rich and poor is growing. And that means that the progressive ideal built into the design of Social Security is, gradually, being thwarted. In some circumstances, the program can actually be regressive, offering richer benefits to those who are already affluent. For anyone who believes that it’s important for the Social Security program to remain progressive, the life-span shifts have big implications.   read more

The cases were brought by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which represented two service providers. EFF attorney Andrew Crocker said they are "extremely disappointed that the superficial changes in the NSL statutes were determined to be good enough to meet the requirements of the First Amendment. NSL recipients can still be gagged at the FBI's say-so, without any procedural protections, time limits or judicial oversight. This is a prior restraint on free speech, and it's unconstitutional."   read more

The increase was substantial among middle-aged Americans, sending a signal of deep anguish from a group whose suicide rates had been stable or falling since the 1950s. The rise was particularly steep for women, including an alarming increase among girls 10 to 14, whose suicide rate, while still very low, had tripled. The data analysis also provided fresh evidence of suffering among white Americans, showing surges in deaths from drug overdoses, suicides, liver disease and alcohol poisoning.   read more

The Navy is following the lead of the General Services Administration, which last year became the first federal agency to require its vendors to report carbon emission and set lower targets. The U.S. military is also broadening its use of solar and other renewable energy, seeking to lessen its dependence on supply chains and on oil, a commodity vulnerable to global tensions. The Navy is responsible for about one-third of the Pentagon's use of fossil fuel, Mabus said   read more

The FBI took the unusual step of deeming part of that case a “bad shoot” in agents’ parlance. But the two agents who killed Harrison were not faulted. Instead, only the agent who shot the tire was blamed, recommending that the agent be suspended for a day without pay. The reason was that lethal force force policy forbids firing a gun to disable a vehicle. But the same policy permits firing a gun to protect people from danger, which they applied to Harrison's killing.   read more

A top-secret federal court has called the NSA and FBI's retention of personal information "disturbing and disappointing," and ordered them to reveal how they will destroy such information going forward. The court said the NSA may have broken the law by failing to redact information collected about its targets online. Judge Hogan also singled out the FBI, ordering it to submit a report containing each instance in which it places Americans under surveillance to "extract foreign intelligence."   read more

Saleh sought to turn the focus away from his own case to the experience of millions of Syrians who find the world’s borders closed to them. “In any airport, the treatment we get as Syrians is different,” he said. “The way they look at us, we are suspected.” Said USAID's Gayle Smith: "Raed and his colleagues don’t run away. They run toward the bombs, protected only by their white helmets and driven by a simple belief inspired by the Quran — to save one life is to save humanity.”   read more

Isabella Baumfree, a slave born in 1797, changed her name to Sojourner Truth after she walked off an upstate farm in 1826 with her infant daughter. She became a Christian preacher and grew increasingly political in pressing for abolition, women’s suffrage and prison reform. She delivered her most famous address, “Ain’t I a Woman,” in 1851 in Ohio, where she said: “I could work as much and eat as much as a man — when I could get it — and bear the lash as well. And ain’t I a woman?”   read more

State attorneys general said ACICS had “ruined the lives of hundreds of thousands of vulnerable students whom it was charged to protect.” Sen. Elizabeth Warren slammed Gray for propping up Corinthian Colleges amid allegations of fraud. “How many federal and state agencies need to file lawsuits against one of your colleges before your organization takes a second look at whether that school should be eligible for accreditation, and most importantly, federal money?” she demanded.   read more

Cornucopia, which takes its name from the city in Wisconsin where it is based, accuses the defendants of "appointing unqualified individuals to the National Organic Standards Board," a 15-member committee that advises the USDA on how to implement the 1990 Organic Foods Production Act. "The American people have a right to trust that food certified as organic is free of inappropriate or inadequately reviewed synthetic substances that do not comport with the OFPA," the complaint states.   read more