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

PEER says the draft omits mention of potentially dangerous concentrations of radioactive contaminants that would be allowed in water deemed safe to drink. PEER believes the undisclosed concentrations far exceed what is known to be safe. PEER says the EPA is stonewalling on producing the requested documents, frustrating its efforts to educate the public about the proposed policy changes in an "arbitrary and capricious" violation of federal law.   read more

New privacy rules may make it easier to escape at least some online tracking. Several consumer-advocacy groups hailed the action, while saying it should go further. "I think the new FCC rules are a step in the right direction," said Mark Bartholomew, a law professor at the University of Buffalo who studies advertises law and privacy. "But ultimately I think people will go ahead and let themselves be tracked."   read more

A recent study of a half-million driver trips found that when traffic slows due to congestion, many drivers pick up their smartphones to text or use apps. "You look at urban areas where the traffic slows way down and the first thing that half the drivers do, or more than half, is pull out their iPhones and their iPads," Gordon said. "You start talking to your friends, you check your email, maybe you send a text and that's a huge problem." Traffic deaths spiked 10.4% this year.   read more

Young came home in 2003 to serve as senior watch officer in the State Department Operations Center. The following year, he began a stint as foreign policy adviser to Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Connecticut). In 2005, he was made desk officer for Italy and San Marino in the State Department’s Bureau of European Affairs, then in 2007 was sent to Paris as political counselor in the embassy there.   read more

Of the economic divide, the report says that "at the current rate of change, and given the widening economic gender gap since last year, it will not be closed for another 170 years." The widest gap between the sexes, according to the survey, is in political empowerment. No country has fully closed its overall gender gap, but those in the top five, which includes Rwanda, have closed more than 80% of theirs. The U.S. placed 45th in the index, down from 28th in 2015. Yemen comes in last.   read more

The amendment goes into effect on Dec. 1 unless Congress steps in to stop it. Google and civil liberties groups have argued that it grants the government overly broad powers to hack into computers across the country, with potentially unintended consequences. Civil liberties advocates said the change would magnify the Justice Dept's investigatory powers because of the interconnected nature of the internet and increasingly large number of internet-connected devices.   read more

The Dept. of Energy wants to clear away two football fields of desert in New Mexico to store containers of radioactive waste coming from around the country. Designed to withstand the force of tornadoes and seismic events, they would store packaged waste on an open concrete pad covering more than 2 acres. Despite assurances of the robustness of the concrete containers, critics of the plan said Thursday they are asking for the department's request to be withdrawn or rejected by state regulators.   read more

Fully 57% of all Americans, and nearly two-thirds of independents, agreed that “politics and elections are controlled by people with money and by big corporations,” so it does not matter if they vote. At 66%, young people are among the most likely to feel pessimistic about the worth of their vote. “This goes along with a lot of what we know about millennials, that they distrust institutions in general,” Jones said. “But it doesn’t bode well for civic participation going forward.”   read more

Science teacher Susan German says she engages her class with hands-on projects. In one, her students had to build a water treatment facility. They tested their designs and made adjustments for any leaks, but German says it's not just the science she's trying to teach. "While they're acting like scientists and engineers, it's the bigger, broader thinking skills that I'm after, because regardless of what you want to do in this world, critical thinking skills are important," she said.   read more

In an election year when turnout could be crucial, many factors — foot-dragging by states, confusion among voters, the inability of judges to roll back bias — are blunting the effect of court rulings against the laws. The courts’ effort “in practice so far has not fixed problems for voters facing special burdens to produce identification,” said Prof. Hasen. Some courts said laws were biased against minorities, but ordered state officials to modify the laws instead of striking them down.   read more

Potential whistleblowers throughout DCAA have been intimidated into silence because they can’t afford to risk being transferred across the country, demoted, or fired. McGill claims he was subjected to retaliation for blowing the whistle that included workplace harassment, a negative performance evaluation, removal of duties, an involuntary transfer, and a five-day unpaid suspension. Under increasing pressure and mounting stress, McGill resigned.   read more

Almost unnoticed outside defense circles, the Pentagon has put artificial intelligence at the center of its strategy to maintain the U.S.’ position as the world’s dominant military power. It is spending billions of dollars to develop autonomous and semiautonomous weapons and to build an arsenal stocked with the kind of weaponry that until now has existed only in Hollywood movies and science fiction, raising alarm among scientists and activists concerned by the implications of a robot arms race.   read more

Schneiderman celebrated the court's order and vowed to move "full-steam ahead with our fraud investigation of Exxon. I hope that today's order serves as a wakeup call..." The requested files could shine a light on the Exxon's "representations about the impact of climate change on its business." Schneiderman said his investigation could uncover a "massive securities fraud" if he proves that ExxonMobil knew that climate change would force the company to leave vast reserves of oil in the ground.   read more

Utah schools unconstitutionally subject homosexual students to harassment and bullying, censor their speech, violate their right to association and won't even let them mention gay issues in a positive way, parents claim in Federal Court. They accuse the state of "facially targeting lesbian, gay, and bisexual persons for disparate treatment" and, in at least one case, the parents say, the state schools "refused to protect a gender nonconforming student from bullying and harassment."   read more

Rigged elections. Vigilante observers. The fear is that the ugly rhetoric could escalate into violence, endangering students. Anxieties have been stoked by Trump's repeated claims that the election is rigged and his call for supporters to stand guard at the polls. Some are worried about clashes between the self-appointed observers and voters. "If anybody can sit there and say they don't think this is a contentious election, then they aren't paying much attention," said police chief Ed Tolan.   read more

Several news outlets have reported on the extensive surveillance on those demonstrations. "Just like in decades past, fatal police shootings of black people continue with alarming frequency, as does the unlawful government surveillance of those who speak out against it and protest," Farah said. "The public has the right to know how and why the federal government is surveilling constitutionally protected activity in response to police violence."   read more