According to aides who were present when Trump discussed the issue, but who choose to remain anonymous for fear of retribution, Trump said he was sick of Vance and wanted to fire him. “I wanted him to be my attack dog,” said Trump, “but he appears foolish on television. He dropped the college football trophy. He met with Pope Francis and the next day the pope died. Vance is toxic, and I don’t want him to come near me. He just doesn’t look as good on television as I thought he would.”   read more

“By the end of December 2001, it became evident that the Americans were serious about getting rid of me,” he stated. “People were telling me, ‘They want your head.’” He said that Saddam Hussein’s government indicated two years before the U.S. invasion that Iraq was interested in joining the Chemical Weapons Convention, which OPCW oversees. That move would have required Iraq to allow inspectors to visit and verify that no such munitions existed.   read more

More than half of the families of fast-food workers “are enrolled in one or more public programs, compared to 25 percent of the workforce as a whole,” according to the academics’ report. It also noted that 26% of the workers are parents, and 42% are older than 18. McDonald’s employees, who number 700,000 in the U.S., collected $1.2 billion in public assistance, the most of any fast-food chain.   read more

The NSA pulls in about 500,000 buddy lists on live-chat services, as well as from the inbox displays of Web-based email accounts, which also provide the agency with the first few lines of a message. This data collection has not been authorized by the U.S. Congress or by the FISA Court that is supposed to oversee the NSA’s activities. Therefore, in order to maneuver around the law, the NSA intercepts the data from non-U.S. telecommunications companies and foreign intelligence services   read more

“NGI shall return the incorrect candidate a maximum of 20% of the time, as a result of facial recognition search in support of photo investigation services,” the FBI report said. NGI was a little more accurate when the search involved a “repository” of data, bumping the success rate up from 80% to 85%. The system’s iris-scan technology was found to be 98% accurate as long as the repository was in play, otherwise the rate dropped to 90%.   read more

In many cases, Jeong said, the videos and materials used during anti-bullying programs gave kids new ways of tormenting others, including the use of texting and social media. “The schools with interventions say, ‘You shouldn’t do this,’ or ‘you shouldn’t do that.’ But through the programs, the students become highly exposed to what a bully is and they know what to do or say when questioned by parents or teachers,” Jeong said.   read more

Something like brake pads may seem innocent enough, unless they wind up in Iran, whose air force is in need of parts for U.S.-made jets purchased before the Islamic revolution 34 ago. Three of the many companies that are likely to benefit from the administration’s decision are Lockheed Martin, which makes C-130 transport planes, Textron, builder of Kiowa Warrior helicopters, and Honeywell, which outfits military choppers.   read more

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) suggested earlier this year during the sequestration debate that Congress reduce the “bed mandate” after years of it being raised again and again. GOP lawmakers objected, however. They responded by setting the mandate at 34,000 detainees and ordered ICE to spend nearly $400 million more than the agency requested.   read more

Local officials and police in Oakland developed the Domain Awareness Center. The Center is planned as a high-tech operation, fully staffed 24 hours a day, which will display its streams of data on banks of giant wall monitors. Initially data collection will focus on the port, traffic camera coverage, license plate reading and 911 calls. Eventually, the system will add surveillance of schools, state highways and commuter rail.   read more

The U.S. Department of Justice prosecuted a 10-year-old boy as a sex offender two years ago, it now has been revealed, sparking a debate about trying juveniles using laws intended for adult pedophiles. In 2011, federal prosecutors won a delinquency finding against a boy accused of engaging in sex acts when he was 10 with five younger boys (ages 5-7) living at Fort Huachuca, an Army base in Arizona. The child was one of the youngest defendants ever pursued by the Justice Department.   read more

Winters have grown shorter, and in New Hampshire, that has exposed moose to more ticks. Some animals have been found carrying as many as 100,000 of the parasites. Milder winters are occurring more often now, which is bad for an animal made for cold weather. This development has led to heat stress, which can cause exhaustion and death for the moose.   read more

More than 40% said that the ACA provides subsidies to undocumented immigrants to buy health insurance, establishes something resembling a death panel, and reduces benefits for seniors currently enrolled in Medicare—none of which are true. In addition, a Public Policy Polling survey showed that 27% of Americans—including 47% of African-Americans–didn’t know that Obamacare and ACA are the same thing.   read more

All 2,400 prisoners at the North Fork Correctional Facility in Western Oklahoma are from California, which shipped them there in 2007 . The lawsuit alleges that CCA and its former warden, Fred Figueroa, didn’t train guards properly and left some positions understaffed, which led to the “severe and permanent physical and mental injuries” suffered by the four plaintiffs   read more

Segarra found out that during the $23 billion El Paso/Kinder Morgan merger in 2012, Goldman had a $4 billion stake in Kinder while also advising El Paso on the deal—a clear conflict of interest. Segarra thought that Silva would back her up, based on comments he had made the prior December that he was worried that if the extent of Goldman’s conflict management problems became public, clients might leave the firm and cause serious financial damage, according to Segarra’s notes.   read more

But Karzai insisted he could not unilaterally approve the deal with the immunity provision, saying tribal leaders would have to okay it. So the agreement must go before a Loya Jirga, which can include hundreds and as many as a thousand elders, leaders and other influential people. If the assembly does not approve the plan, the U.S. is unlikely to keep any forces in Afghanistan after 2014.   read more

Parents-to-be whose DNA has been tested for various traits would access a database of sperm and egg donors whose DNA has also been tested, allowing the former to select a donor based on the odds of particular characteristics being expressed in potential offspring. Nothing but higher odds is, or could be, promised.   read more

Threatening to upend a tradition of equality that dates back to the founding of the country, Republican political leaders in Kansas and Arizona are discussing plans to establish a multi-tier voting rights system for their states if they lose a voting rights case currently in federal court. The net effect would be to bar some U.S. citizens—mostly immigrants, racial minorities, the elderly, and the poor—from voting in state and local elections even as they cast ballots in federal contests.   read more