PNN - Let Freedom Ring

PNN - Let Freedom Ring
Guests
Florida Senate Candidate for District 17 Amy Tidd, and Dr. Wendy Lynne Lee will discuss our country's birthday and what Freedom means today.

Segment Two:
 Brook Hines our Senior Political Consultant and I will lead a select group of Progressive Journalists in a discussion of News Stories from Florida and around the GLOBE.

The Progressive Journalists on our panel: Gwendolyn Holden Barry, Brian Stetten, Ruthan Amarteifio, and Dr. Wendy Lynne Lee
 
TUNE IN - Live Sunday 7/3/16 - 7pm - or AnyTime -
All Programs are available for later Listening
Solidarity & Peace
Rick Spisak

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/newmercurymedia/2016/07/03/pnn--let-freedom-ring

PNN 7/3/16

1. MORE WAR AHEAD 
[David Swanson on the DNC Platform]

The Democratic War Platform

Written by davidswanson Tag: Elections, Peace and War

The Democratic Party's draft platform takes a government that spends over half of discretionary spending on militarism, as much as the rest of the world combined, with troops in most countries and seven wars underway, and says: Keep it going, only more so!

The Platform begins with support-the-troops propaganda, demanding military spending for the sake of the people recruited into the military, many of them of course for lack of the free college that the Democrats have left out of their platform.

"Support Our Troops and Keep Faith with Our Veterans," is the opening headline on foreign policy.

The words under that headline have nothing to do with what it suggests:

    "Democrats believe America must continue to have the strongest military in the world."

You'd have to eliminate the vast majority of it for that not to be so.

    "We support a smart, predictable defense budget that meets the strategic challenges we face, not the arbitrary cuts that the Republican Congress enacted as part of sequestration."

They don't mean "defense" of course, which would also require cutting the vast majority of the U.S. military which serves only offensive purposes, in every sense of the word.

They do mean: Vote for us for more militarism than the Republicans offer.

    "... As we look beyond the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the conclusion of long-term nation-building with large military footprints ...."

Call me crazy, but don't you have to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in order to look beyond them? Wouldn't a platform be the place in which to take a position on continuing or ending the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Somalia, Pakistan, Syria, and Yemen? The Platform simply accepts wars, makes a nod to being aware of their existence, and moves along.

The Platform does make this promise, which I would believe about as far as I could throw Dick Cheney:

"... we will audit the Pentagon, launch a high-level commission to review the role of defense contractors, and take greater action against those who have been involved in fraud."

Greater than nothing isn't much, of course, but at least that's a useful promise if anyone were to ever try to hold them to it. The point of it, however, is not to reduce warmaking -- rather to make it more efficient.

So we'd need to hold them to it and then insist that wasted dollars be cut rather than spent on machinery that kills more economically and effectively.

The Platform contains the usual weak economic promises, with no universal education or healthcare or significant family or vacation leave. It chooses instead to propose decent policies only for veterans, as part of the war promotion it includes just before delving into anything related to foreign policy.

    "... We are outraged by the systemic problems plaguing the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and will fight for every veteran to have access to timely, high-quality health care. The delays in processing claims and appeals are unacceptable."

Whoever has been running this government in recent years sure has a lot to answer for.

When turning to foreign policy, the Democrats speak not of aid or diplomacy or disarmament, but of the need to "Confront Global Threats."

The failed, counterproductive war on terrorism would roll on: "We must defeat ISIS, Al Qaeda, and their affiliates, and prevent other groups from emerging in their place." The Democrats will pursue more of what doesn't work, but also urge other nations to do more of the same, not cease providing weapons and support but engage in more bombing:

    "First, Democrats will continue to lead a broad coalition of allies and partners to destroy ISIS’ stronghold in Iraq and Syria. We will press those in the region, especially the Gulf countries and local forces on the ground, to carry their weight in prosecuting this fight."

Also on Syria, where Hillary Clinton has long proposed wider war, the Platform says,

"Donald Trump would inflame the conflict by alienating our allies, inexplicably allowing ISIS to expand in Syria, and potentially starting a wider war. This is a reckless approach. Democrats will instead root out ISIS and bring together the Syrian opposition, international community, and our regional allies to reach a negotiated political transition that ends Assad’s rule."

So the contrast is between wider war through allowing ISIS to expand, and "rooting out ISIS" through something other than wider war but clearly amounting to nothing other than wider war -- just what has allowed ISIS to expand.

On Afghanistan, one of those wars the Platform looks beyond, the Platform proposes to continue the war:

"In Afghanistan, we will work with the NATO-led coalition of partners .... We support President Obama’s decision to maintain a limited troop presence in Afghanistan ...."


The same week that President Obama admitted to killing large numbers of civilians with drones, the Platform writes:

"We reject Donald Trump’s suggestion that our military should engage in war crimes, like murdering civilians."

The Platform repeats several times that it opposes using large numbers of U.S. ground troops, even at one point admitting that war on ISIS is counterproductive, at least when it uses this tactic which the Platform opposes for political reasons:

"We also firmly reject Donald Trump’s willingness to mire tens of thousands of our combat troops in a misguided ground war in the Middle East. It would embolden ISIS, and there is nothing smart or strong about such an approach."

The same of course applies to a misguided air war on ISIS, but Democrats believe nobody will protest them if they do that.

The Platform then turns immediately to falsely demonizing a nation with which the Pentagon has long dreamed of launching a big ground war: "Iran is the leading state sponsor of terrorism. It violates the human rights of its population, denies the Holocaust, vows to eliminate Israel, and has its fingerprints on almost every conflict in the Middle East." The first and last bits of this are U.S. projection, and Iran does not "vow to eliminate Israel."

Next in the Democrats' sights? North Korea and Russia!

    "North Korea is perhaps the most repressive regime on the planet, run by a sadistic dictator.... Yet Donald Trump praises North Korea’s dictator .... Russia is engaging in destabilizing actions along its borders, violating Ukraine’s sovereignty and attempting to recreate spheres of influence that undermine American interests. It is also propping up the Assad regime in Syria, which is brutally attacking its own citizens."

This while in fact the United States has backed a coup in Ukraine, put a missile base in Romania, begun building another in Poland, expanded NATO to Russia's border, and is currently engaged in major war "exercises" near Russia's border. Also, notice the new clue regarding the Platform's vague position on Syria. Russia's sins include "propping up" a government marked for overthrow.
The Platform culminates in a declaration of intent to dominate the globe:

"It would be a dangerous mistake for America to abandon our responsibilities. We cannot, as Donald Trump suggests, cede the mantle of leadership for global peace and security to others who will not have our best interests in mind. American leadership is essential to keeping us safe and our economy growing in the years ahead."

This includes viewing as Chinese aggression toward the United States its use of the South China Sea:

    "We will work with our allies and partners to fortify regional institutions and norms as well as protect freedom of the seas in the South China Sea. We will push back against North Korean aggression and press China to play by the rules. We will stand up to Beijing ...."

It also includes more hinting at overthrowing the Syrian government:

    "In the Middle East, Democrats will push for a more inclusive governance in Iraq and Syria that respects the equal rights of all citizens ...."

It also includes whatever the Israeli government may want in the way of free weapons or suppression of free speech in the United States:

    "... we will always support Israel’s right to defend itself, including by retaining its qualitative military edge, and oppose any effort to delegitimize Israel, including at the United Nations or through the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions Movement."

   "... While Jerusalem is a matter for final status negotiations, it should remain the capital of Israel ...."

How can something remain something it isn't?

    "... And in Venezuela, we will push the government to respect human rights and respond to the will of its people."

Oh good. Sort of like in Honduras?

    "... We will also work to end the reign of terror promulgated by Boko Haram, Al-Shabaab, AQIM, and ISIS."

So, good times ahead!

2. EPA Forced to Study Syngenta’s Atrazine and Monsanto’s Glyphosate’s Effects on Endangered Species

More than 1500 endangered plants and animals in the US are under attack by two of the most widely used pesticides known – Atrazine and Glyphosate. Now, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will be forced to research why this is happening as part of a settlement reached with the Center for Biological Diversity.

In addition to these two pesticides, the EPA will also analyze the impacts of propazine and simazine, two Big Ag pesticides that are very similar to Syngenta’s widely used Atrazine. The EPA is required to finish the assessments of all these chemicals by June 2020.

This is a considerable settlement, though it seems like a drop in the bucket considering that over 80 million pounds of Atrazine are used in the US annually, alone. The pesticide is second only to the use of Monsanto’s glyphosate, which was sprayed to the tune of 280 million pounds on crops in 2012, according to U.S. Geological Survey data.

Endangered species policy director at the Center for Biological Diversity, Brett Hartl states:
    “‘This settlement is the first step to reining in the widespread use of dangerous pesticides that are harming both wildlife and people. . .Atrazine, for instance, chemically castrates frogs even in tiny doses, is an endocrine disruptor, and likely causes birth defects in people. The EPA should have banned this years ago.
    This settlement will finally force the EPA to consider the impacts of glyphosate — widely known as Roundup — which is the most commonly used pesticide in the United States, on endangered species nationwide. With more than 300 million pounds of this stuff being dumped on our landscape each year, it’s hard to even fathom the damage it’s doing.’”
The harmful effects of glyphosate are becoming common knowledge, especially since the WHO’s declaration of the chemical as probably carcinogenic. Ever since that declaration, communities and even entire nations have at least put restrictions on glyphosate use, putting Monsanto in a financial hole. What’s more, Monsanto is being hit with lawsuit after lawsuit for the general act of polluting the world – and knowing about this toxic pollution for years.

As for Syngenta, well, that biotech company has gone to great lengths to cover up just how dangerous Atrazine can be. But nothing can stay secret forever.
3. Paul Ryan, the peoples house (the dem sit in)
Dear Speaker Ryan:
I was just gobsmacked when I heard you use the phrase "The People's House" in your scolding of the Democrats after their gun control sit-in. Although, I took it as a minor miracle you didn't immediately choke on your words or that lightning didn't strike any where near you. Granted, I didn't check the D.C weather reports for that day, so it's possible the latter happened.
How, I wondered, were you able to utter the phrase, "The People's House," especially after criticizing Democrats for doing a sit-in because they wanted to debate what were, after all, fairly mild gun safety regulations with which the majority of Americans agree.
According to a CBS News poll taken after Orlando, 57% of Americans now support a ban on assault weapons, a much more substantive proposal than anything the House Democrats were putting forth. One bill the Democrats wanted to debate was universal background checks, which a super majority of 89% of Americans support, including substantial majorities of Democrats and Republicans.
How can you call it "The People's House" when no debate is allowed over what the vast majority of people want? To call the present Republican House "The People's House" makes a mockery of the term. As Sean Illing pointed out in Salon in 2015, " the GOP's control of Congress is . . . a scandal." Obama beat Republican candidates twice "with more than 50 percent of the popular vote." Also, "Democratic congressional candidates received 1.4 million more votes than their Republican opponents in 2012. And yet Republicans lost only eight seats that year. In a remotely representative system, such results would not be possible."
So what has happened in the world's last best hope? Your party, fueled by dark money, was extraordinarily successful at rigging the system in its favor by gerrymandering at the state level.
As Illing explained, "Something like 55 percent of America's congressional districts have been redrawn to favor the GOP, while a paltry 10 percent have been redrawn to favor Democrats. It's difficult to overstate how anti-Democratic that is. Republicans have essentially short-circuited the Democratic process."

And how did your party do that? "They've used advanced technology and algorithms based on the most recent census data to redraw borders and create the safest districts possible." So because of your party's rigging of the system, its influence in Congress is much greater than its support among the actual people of America.

Another more interesting way to say it is that all of us have collectively been ratf**ked as Salon editor-in-chief David Daley puts it in his provocatively titled new book, RatF**ked: The True Story Behind The Secret Plan To Steal America's Democracy. Daley points out that because of your party's successful effort to subvert our democracy, blue states like Ohio and Pennsylvania that voted for Obama end up sending super majorities of Republicans to Congress, all because of gerrymandering. In Ohio's case, Republicans have a 12-4 advantage and Pennsylvania's delegation is 13-5 Republican.
Of course, your party was only able to pull off this little coup because of dark money. In fact, if it weren't for a handful of right-wing billionaires, the Kochs, the Scaifes, the DeVoses, and a few others, your party's hard right turn over the past few years would never have been possible. They bought off media and universities. They established think tanks and a 24-7 365-days-a-year campaign mode that has transformed our nation for the worse.

As described by Jane Mayer in her well-researched Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right , the present-Majority Leader Mitch McConnell once explained to a college class that there are only three ingredients to building a political party: money, money, and money. So according to your counterpart in the Senate, such quaint notions as the people's will or the common good are not ingredients in building a political party. Good to know.
After years and years of your party filling its coffers with dark money, while doing nothing, being the Party of No, you have the gall to lecture those who want to do the people's business. And to add insult to injury, you call your bought-and-paid-for House, "The People's House."

Given all the above, I don't know whether to call your utterance of the phrase "The People's House" chutzpah, delusional thinking, the meaningless mouthing of political platitudes, or just politics as usual as practiced in the second decade of the 21st century? Yet no matter what I call it, the people, whose well-being should be the primary objective of "The People's House," will continue to be the losers.

4. FRACKING DOESN"T JUST POISON GROUND WATER
Many of the toxic chemicals escaping from fracking and natural gas processing sites and storage facilities may be present in much higher concentrations in the bodies of people living or working near such sites, new research has shown.

In a first-of-its-kind study combining air-monitoring methods with new biomonitoring techniques, researchers detected volatile organic compounds (VOCs) released from natural gas operations in Pavillion, Wyoming in the bodies of nearby residents at levels that were as much as 10 times that of the national averages.

Some of these VOCs such as benzene and toluene are linked to chronic diseases like cancer and reproductive and developmental disorders. Others are associated with respiratory problems, headaches, nosebleeds, and skin rashes.

“Many of those chemicals were present in the participants’ bodies at concentrations far exceeding background averages in the US population,” notes the study, titled “When the Wind Blows: Tracking Toxic Chemicals in Gas Fields and Impacted Communities,” which was released last week.

Some residents of Pavillion have for years been concerned about the rise in health issues that they suspected were connected to emissions from the gas production activities. This tiny town of less than 250 people has been at the center of the growing debate on fracking since 2008 when locals began complaining that their drinking water had acquired a foul taste and odor back in 2008.

In 2014, air monitoring data showed some toxic chemical emissions at oil and gas sites in Wyoming were up to 7,000 times the “safe” levels set by US federal environmental and health agencies. In March of this year, Stanford University researchers found evidence that fracking operations near Pavillion were contaminating the local groundwater.

Now this new study, conducted by researchers with the national environmental health organization Coming Clean, establishes clearly that at least some of these harmful chemicals are making their way into the bodies of nearby residents.

The study focused on measuring ambient levels of a specific family of VOCs named BTEX chemicals — which include benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylenes — because these chemicals are known to be hazardous to human health even at low levels. Researchers then used new biomonitoring methods to detect these chemicals in 11 local residents who volunteered to participate in the study by wearing air quality monitors and providing blood and urine samples, and found evidence of eight hazardous chemicals emitted from Pavillion gas infrastructure in the urine of study participants.

“The biomonitoring confirmed what we knew,” Wilma Subra, an award-winning biochemist and one of the scientists involved in the project, told Earth Island Journal. “This clearly indicates that there is a need of control mechanisms to curb the emissions in order to reduce exposure of those living near these operations.”

The study leaders, however, also note that because VOCs are so ubiquitous in products and in our homes, it is possible that some of the VOCs detected in participants' bodies came from multiple sources. They are calling for further biomonitoring testing of people living or working near oil and gas sites to better understand how these chemicals travel through the environment and to prevent our exposure to them.

“If your drinking water is contaminated with toxic chemicals you might be able to make do with another source, but if your air is toxic you can't choose to breathe somewhere else,” Deb Thomas, the director of ShaleTest and one the study leaders, said in a statement.

Addendum: In related news, last week, Earthworks, FracTracker Alliance and Clean Air Task Force released OilAndGasThreatMap.com, a new tool that maps the locations of the 92,759 active oil and gas wells, compressors and processors operating in California, and the populations, schools and hospitals within a half mile radius of those facilities.

Based on peer-reviewed science and publicly-available data, map shows that 1.3 million Californians live within half-a-mile of an active oil and gas facility. These areas also include 365 schools and 74 medical facilities.

The Threat Map allows anyone to search their address to find if they live within the half-mile threat radius.

5. lock down you comm

There are dozens of messaging apps for iPhone and Android, but one in particular continues to stand out in the crowd. Signal is easy to use, works on both iOS and Android, and encrypts communications so that only the sender and recipient can decipher them.
It also has open source code, meaning it can be inspected to verify security. You can download Signal from the Android Play Store and the iPhone App Store.
Although Signal is well-designed, there are extra steps you must take if you want to maximize the security for your most sensitive conversations — the ones that could be misinterpreted by an employer, client, or airport security screener; might be of interest to a snooping government, whether at home or abroad; or could allow a thief or hacker to blackmail you or steal your identity.
I discuss these steps at length below, in order of importance. If you wish to jump ahead to a specific section, you can click the appropriate link:
Signal uses strong end-to-end encryption, which, when properly used, ensures that no one involved in facilitating your conversation can see what you’re saying — not the makers of Signal, not your cellphone or broadband provider, and not the NSA or another spy agency that collects internet traffic in bulk.
But Signal’s encryption scheme can’t stop someone from picking up your phone and opening the app to read through your conversations. You have to take additional precautions.
If you’re using Android:
    Set up screen lock, which requires you to draw a pattern, type a numeric PIN, or type a password to unlock your phone. You can do this from the Settings app under Security > “Screen lock.” Try to make it random, and avoid using anything obvious such as birthdates. Don’t tell anyone how to unlock your phone unless you’re OK with them reading all of your encrypted messages.
    Encrypt your phone’s storage. A screen lock is not much use if a thief can copy your phone’s data to a different device. Encrypting the flash memory on your phone blocks such an attack by scrambling your data so that it can only be unlocked using the same pattern, PIN, or password used to unlock your phone. You can do this from the Settings app under Security > “Encrypt phone.” Note that you need to have a full battery before Android lets you encrypt your phone, and you may have to wait up to an hour while your phone is encrypting.
    Install all updates promptly. Updates fix security bugs, so every day you haven’t installed them is a day you’re vulnerable to attack. You can check for Android updates by opening the Settings app, and under System tap “About phone” > “System updates.” You should also update all of your apps from the Play Store promptly.
If you’re using an iPhone:
    Set a strong passcode. iPhones automatically have encrypted storage, but this encryption only protects your data if you lock your device with a passcode. Everyone should use at least a six-digit passcode, and you should up that to 11 digits if you’re concerned that your phone might fall into the hands of a powerful attacker like a government. Avoid using anything obvious such as birthdates. I wrote about this in detail in February — skip to the bottom of that article for instructions on changing your passcode, and for considerations about using Touch ID.
    Install updates promptly. Updates fix security bugs, so every day you haven’t installed them is a day you’re vulnerable to attack. You can check for iPhone updates in the Settings app under General > Software Update. You should also update all of your apps in the App Store app under the Updates tab.
Hide Signal Messages on Your Lock Screen
Signal’s powerful encryption won’t necessarily help you if other people can see incoming Signal messages displayed on your lock screen. Displaying messages on the lock screen is Signal’s default behavior, but you should change this if your phone is frequently in physical proximity to people who shouldn’t see your Signal messages — roommates, coworkers, or airport screeners, for example.
Here’s how to lock down your Signal notifications.
If you’re using Android:
    Open the Settings app, and under “Device” > “Sound & notification” select “When device is locked.”
    The options are “Show all notification content,” “Hide sensitive notification content,” or “Don’t show notifications at all.” I recommend you choose “Hide sensitive information content” — this way you’ll still be notified when you get a Signal message, but you’ll have to unlock your phone to see who it’s from and what it says.
If you’re using an iPhone:
    Open the Signal app and click the gear icon in the top-left to get to Signal’s settings. Under “Notifications” > “Background Notifications,” tap “Show.”
    The options are “Sender name & message,” “Sender name only,” or “No name or message.” I recommend you choose “No name or message” — this way you’ll still be notified when you get a Signal message, but you’ll have to unlock your phone to see who it’s from and what it says.
    To completely remove Signal notifications from your iPhone’s lock screen, open the Settings app, tap “Notifications,” scroll down to the list of apps, and tap Signal. From here you can turn off “Show on Lock Screen.”
Verify That You’re Talking to the Right Person
I said earlier that Signal ensures your communications stay private when it is properly used. Using Signal properly involves verifying that your communications are not subject to a “man-in-the-middle attack.”
A man-in-the-middle attack is where two parties (Romeo and Juliet, for example) think they’re speaking directly to each other, but instead, Romeo is speaking to an attacker, Juliet is speaking to the same attacker, and the attacker is connecting the two, spying on everything along the way. In order to fully safeguard your communications, you have to take extra steps to verify that you’re encrypting directly to your friends and not to impostors.
Most messaging apps don’t provide any way to do this sort of verification. Signal provides two: one for verifying voice calls and one for verifying text conversations.
Verify Your Phone Contacts
It’s easy to verify the security of phone calls on Signal, but you have to verify every call.
For each call, the Signal app displays two words on the callers’ phone screens. In the screen shot below, for example, each screen shows the words “shamrock paragon.” Juliet and Romeo read these words to one another; if the words are the same, and they recognize one another’s voices, the call is secure. If the words are different, someone is attacking the encryption in the call and you should hang up and try calling again, but this time from a different internet connection.
It’s not required, but a popular convention is for the receiver to answer the phone by reading the first word, as in, “Shamrock?” And the caller to respond with the second word, as in, “Paragon.”
I admit that this sounds like magic, but I assure you that it’s only mathematics. Here’s how it works: When Juliet calls Romeo using Signal, her app communicates with his app and comes up with a shared secret that no one else can possibly learn, even if they’re spying on this exchange — watch this five-minute video if you want to get some information about how this works. The Signal app on each phone takes this shared secret and converts it into the two-word authentication string. As long as the shared secret is exactly the same, the authentication string will be exactly the same as well.
Verify Your Text Contacts
It’s more complicated to verify the security of Signal text chats, but once you’ve verified a text chat correspondent, you won’t have to re-verify them again until they get a new phone or re-install Signal.
Each person you text with in Signal has something called an identity key. When Juliet sends Romeo a message for the first time, her Signal app downloads a copy of his identity key and stores it on her phone and visa versa. So long as these identity keys are valid — the key that Juliet has stored for Romeo is actually Romeo’s real key and not some attacker’s key — then the messages they send to each other are secure.
Because it’s unlikely that anyone is trying to attack your encrypted messages the very first time you send a contact a message, Signal automatically trusts the identity key that it downloads. This makes Signal easy to use: All you need to do to have an encrypted conversation is send someone a message, and that’s it. But if you discuss anything sensitive, you still might want to confirm.
To verify the identity key, you first navigate to the verification screen.
If you’re using Android:
    Open the Signal app and tap on a conversation to open it
    Tap the contact’s name and phone number at the top of the screen
    Tap “Verify identity”
If you’re using an iPhone:
    Open the Signal app and tap on a conversation to open it
    Long-press the contact’s name at the top of the screen until the verification screen appears
Next, you want to confirm you have the correct identity key for your contact. You can do this either by scanning “QR codes,” which work similarly to the bar codes used to ring up groceries, or by comparing “fingerprints,” which are 66-character blocks of text.
Verifying a Text Contact in Person
If you’re able to meet up in person, here’s how you verify identity keys using QR codes:
If you’re using Android:
    To be verified, tap the barcode icon in the top-right of the verification screen and select “Display your QR code” (you may be prompted to install the Barcode Scanner app the first time you do this; it is safe to install).
    To verify someone else, tap the barcode icon on the verification screen and choose “Scan contact’s QR code,” and then point your camera at the contact’s QR code.

If you’re using an iPhone:
    To be verified, tap the QR code icon on the verification screen.
    To verify someone else, tap the camera icon on the verification screen, and then point the iPhone camera at the person’s QR code.
When you successfully verify a contact, Signal should pop up a message that says, “Verified!”
Verifying a Text Contact Remotely
If you can’t meet up in person, you can still verify that you have the right identity key by comparing fingerprints — however, it’s kind of annoying.
You need to share your fingerprint with your contact using some out-of-band communication channel — that is, don’t share it in a Signal message. Instead, share it in a Facebook message, Twitter direct message, email, or phone call. You could also choose to share it using some other encrypted messaging app, such as WhatsApp or iMessage. (If you’re feeling paranoid, a phone call is a good option; it would be challenging for an attacker to pretend to be your contact if you recognize their voice.)
Once your contact gets your fingerprint, they need to navigate to the verification screen and compare, character by character, what you sent them with what they see. If they match, your conversation is secure.
Your contact should share their fingerprint with you in the same way, and you should confirm that what they sent you matches what’s on your verification screen as well.
If you’re using Android, unfortunately there’s no way to copy your own fingerprint to your phone’s clipboard to paste into another app. If you want to share it using another app on your phone, you’ll have to manually type it.
If you’re using an iPhone, you can copy your own fingerprint to your phone’s clipboard like this: Open the Signal app and click the gear icon in the top-left to get to Signal’s settings. Tap Privacy, then tap Fingerprint.
Verifying a Text Contact Who Gets a New Phone
From time to time, you might see a warning in a Signal conversation that says “Identity key changed. Tap to verify new key.” This can only mean one of two things:
    Your Signal contact switched to a new installation of Signal, most likely because they bought a new phone, or,
    An attacker is trying to insert themselves into your Signal conversations.
The latter is less likely, but the only way to rule it out completely is to again go through one of the verification processes for text contacts described above.
Archive and Delete Messages
After Juliet sends a message to Romeo using Signal, copies of this message exist in only two locations: on Juliet’s phone and on Romeo’s phone. Unlike other messaging apps, Signal doesn’t store a copy of your messages on internet servers (“in the cloud”). Still, if you have a sensitive conversation, it may be a good idea to delete it when you no longer need it.
You can also archive conversations that you want to keep around but don’t want cluttering your Signal app. Here’s how to delete and archive Signal conversations.
When you open the Signal app, you will see a list of your conversations — your inbox, essentially. You can swipe a conversation to the right to archive it, which moves it out of your inbox and into an “archived conversations” list. Deleting a message or conversation varies depending emplon your phone’s operating system:

If you’re using Android:
To delete a message, open the conversation, pick the message you’d like to delete, and long-touch it. This will select the message and give you the option to delete it. Similarly, to delete a conversation, pick a conversation from your inbox and long-touch it. This will select the conversation and give you the option to delete it.

If you’re using an iPhone:
To delete a message, open the conversation, pick the message you’d like to delete, long-touch it, and choose “Delete.” To delete a conversation, pick the conversation you’d like to delete from your inbox and swipe to the left to delete it.
Deleting messages is permanent. If you delete a message from your Signal app, and the person you’re talking to deletes it from their Signal app, the message will be completely gone.
6. TRUMP U -
Over and Out! - When is an endorsement a BIG WET Thank You
TALLAHASSEE
Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi on Monday became the first big-name Republican official in the state to endorse Donald Trump for president.
At a rally in her hometown of Tampa, the state’s top legal officer — the woman Trump called “the most popular person in Florida, by far” — praised the Republican frontrunner as an outsider who will keep Americans safe.
“Donald and I have been friends for many years,” Bondi said, “and I can tell you some things about Donald that I have seen first-hand,” alluding to how nicely he treats his family.
The endorsement, however, dredged up a nearly three-year-old question from the last time Bondi and Trump made headlines together: Why didn’t the Florida attorney general’s office investigate fraud complaints against Trump University?
Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/election/article65995972.html#storylink=cpy
In the fall of 2013, Bondi was preparing for a re-election bid and a for-profit college called Trump University had just been sued by New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman. The lawsuit alleged that Trump University had “scammed” more than 5,000 people out of more than $40 million by falsely promising to teach them the tools to Trump’s real estate success.
With media scrutiny mounting, the Donald J. Trump Foundation that September contributed $25,000 to And Justice for All, a political committee controlled by Bondi.
Florida never followed New York’s lead. Although there were complaints in Florida, the state never opened an investigation.
Charles Jacobson of Bradenton was one of the people who filed a Trump University complaint with Bondi’s office. In 2011, he wrote that he “lost more than $26,000” to the college and had “since declared personal bankruptcy because of it.”
“The determination was rightfully made that that complaint would be addressed in the ongoing lawsuit in New York,” said Whitney Ray, spokesman for the attorney general’s office.
That decision didn’t involve Bondi directly, Ray said.
“Absolutely not,” he said. “It didn’t rise to her level.”
Jacobson’s was the only complaint about Trump University Bondi’s office received from the time she took office in January 2011 until September 2013, Ray said. Lawsuits allege that as many as 20 complaints about various Trump events and seminars were “reviewed” by the state while the previous attorney general, Bill McCollum, was in office from 2007-11.
But in the aftermath of media attention toward the for-profit college in 2013, two more people contacted Bondi’s office with similar stories.
Neither of those cases was ever investigated, either.
The Trump presidential campaign did not respond to questions Monday.
In 2013, he wouldn’t answer Herald/Times questions about why he was contributing to an attorney general’s race in Florida. But he did release a statement calling Bondi “a fabulous representative of the people” and Schneiderman “a political hack.”
As for Bondi, she praised Trump on Monday for bringing new voters into the political arena. He’s an outsider who has never run for office before, she said, just like she was in 2010 when she first ran for attorney general after working as a prosecutor in Tampa.
“I felt Florida needed to be changed,” Bondi said. “Now, our country and our world need someone who is going to protect our security like never before, and that’s why I support Donald.”
Times/Herald Tallahassee Bureau reporter Kristen M. Clark contributed.
Contact Michael Auslen at mauslen@tampabay.com. Follow @MichaelAuslen.
Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/election/article65995972.html#storylink=cpy

7. “Truly unsettling” discovery at Fukushima… problem “far greater than previously thought” — Boss reveals 600 tons of fuel melted, can’t find it — Top Official: “Nobody really knows where fuel is”…
The task of neutralising and retrieving hundreds of tonnes of melted nuclear fuel turns out to be far greater than previously thought. So too might be the eventual cost, as well as the time that will be required to remedy the site –that is, if it can ever be fully remedied.
There’s no playbook – they’re making it up as they go along. – former US chief nuclear watchdog Gregory Jaczko
Mark Willacy interviews Naoto Kan, Japan’s Prime Minister at the time of the crisis. He is a convert to the anti-nuclear cause and – along with Gregory Jaczko - a sceptic about whether the clean-up will succeed.
There was a risk that half or all of Japan could have been destroyed. So in a way the accident took us to the brink of destruction. – Naoto Kan
ABC Australia, May 24, 2016: Fukushima clean-up chief still hunting for 600 tonnes of melted radioactive fuel… [TEPCO] has revealed that 600 tonnes of reactor fuel melted during the disaster, and that the exact location of the highly radioactive blobs remains a mystery… [C]hief of decommissioning at Fukushima, Naohiro Masuda, said the company hoped to… begin removing it from 2021… “But unfortunately, we don’t know exactly where (the fuel) is” [said Masuda]. [Gregory Jaczko, Chairman of the US NRC] at the time of the meltdowns at Fukushima doubts the fuel can be retrieved… “Nobody really knows where the fuel is… It may be possible that we’re never able to remove the fuel. You may just have to wind up leaving it there and somehow entomb it as it is.”… For the first time, TEPCO has revealed just how much of the mostly uranium fuel melted down… [Masuda said] “about 600 tonnes of melted debris fuel and a mixture of concrete and other metals are likely to be there.”
RT, May 24, 2016: 600 tons of melted radioactive Fukushima fuel still not found, clean-up chief reveals… [The fuel] burnt through the respective reactor pressure vessels, concentrating somewhere on the lower levels of the station… fuel from Reactor 1 poured out completely… the exact location of the highly radioactive “runaway” fuel remains mystery for TEPCO. The absolutely uncontrollable fission of the melted nuclear fuel assemblies continue somewhere under the remains of the station… [TEPCO's] plan for Fukushima nuclear power plant implies a 30-40 year period… Yet experts doubt the present state of technology is sufficient to deal with the unprecedented technical task.
8. SAILORS DYING from CleanUp
Kyodo, May 19, 2016: Former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has thrown his support behind a group of former U.S. sailors suing the operator of the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant… Speaking at a news conference Tuesday in Carlsbad, California, with some of the plaintiffs, Koizumi said, “Those who gave their all to assist Japan are now suffering from serious illness… I learned that the number of sick people is still increasing, and their symptoms are worsening,” he told the news conference… According to lawyers for the group, seven of its members have died so far, including some from leukemia [Three deaths had been reported as of last July]
Asahi Shimbun, May 19, 2016: Former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi broke down in tears as he made an emotional plea of support for U.S. Navy sailors beset by health problems… More than 400 veterans who were part of a mission called Operation Tomodachi… filed a mass lawsuit in California against [TEPCO]. They are seeking compensation and an explanation for their health problems… Koizumi said: “U.S. military personnel who did their utmost in providing relief are now suffering from serious illnesses. We cannot ignore the situation.” Apparently overcome with emotion, Koizumi started crying… Theodore Holcomb [was] diagnosed with synovial sarcoma, a rare form of cancer. He died in 2014 at age 35. The Department of Veterans Affairs later cut off a study into the causal relationship between his exposure to radiation and his illness… Ron Wright, 26, worked on the deck [and] developed a swelling of the testicles and underwent surgery four times… A military doctor told him there was no relationship between his illness and exposure to radiation.
CBS San Diego, May 18, 2016: Sick sailors meet with Japan’s former prime minister… The USS Reagan sailed through a nuclear plume and crews had to spend hours decontaminating the vessel. Sailors now say they are suffering from radiation exposure. “Honestly, I just want to feel better,” said Chad Holt, who served on the USS Ronald Reagan… “A lot of people, they can’t physically see something wrong with you. They think there is nothing wrong with you. That is not the case what we are living with on a daily basis,” said Daniel Hair, who is now retired from the Navy… “I realized this is something that can’t be skipped over, can’t be ignored any longer. The three claims of being safe, cheap and clean were all lies,” [Koizumi] said.
NBC San Diego, May 18, 2016: Many of the sailors say doctors refused to connect their illnesses with the radiation exposure. “You have to experience it,” said William Zeller. “You have to experience the doctor telling you to your face. You have to experience the years of pain when everyone tells you ‘You know you’re fine.’”… “I realize this is not something that can be just skipped over and can’t be ignored any longer,” [Koizumi] said. “Everyone played a role in not shedding more light on this problem…” Koizumi said… The sailors’ attorney said they have won their case against Tokyo Electric Power Company twice, however the company has appealed the judge’s decisions. It is still unclear how exactly the sailors will be compensated…
San Diego Union Tribune, May 17, 2016: Koizumi [said] he believes the service members’ illnesses, reported to include leukemia and tumors, were caused by the 2011 exposure, despite U.S. government findings to the contrary… Koizumi said the Japanese government and [TEPCO] should support the radiation-exposed U.S troops financially and “across the board.”
9.What just because it continues to leak, could it effect us? But we're Americans
    Now, strontium-90 [Sr-90] has been leaking from Fukushima into the ocean, so it will eventually reach the United States, especially the west coast. This much we are sure of… it is the masses of people who need to realize the impact of the contamination on them. In the case of the Fukushima disaster, for example, they need to be aware that some radioactive material is reaching the North American coast, and the prevailing westerly winds will carry anything released into the atmosphere to the US…
    While we are not really sure [how much radioactive material has leaked from Fukushima] we do know that a portion of this material will ride the prevailing winds across the Pacific Ocean. On the other hand, closer to the ground, the winds will be east, south, and north, and therefore this other portion will fall on Japan―and we can investigate the actual levels here: how much fell on this town, on this prefecture? Adding these up, it seems to be only 2.4 PBq. Which is to say of the total fifteen PBq, 2.4, or roughly only 16%, fell on Japanese soil. If the totals are higher, still a smaller share of the total contamination will have fallen on Japan compared with the Pacific, with the largest portion falling on the west coast of the United States.
    So why don’t we hear complaints from the US? Why are there no calls for compensation? Whenever someone asks me this, I simply say that there just aren’t any such complaints. Why is this so? Well the levels released by the US during the atmospheric testing were tens of times greater than Fukushima. They are the criminals, so they cannot ask for compensation from Japan. The U.S. government does not want to have to reflect on its own past, and I think they are eager to completely avoid bringing up anything like that conversation.
10.  ANTI-FACT ATTACK
To most people chancing upon the videos, the two clips would seem incongruous and pointless.
But the Vine channel belongs to CoreNews.org — a website that is the public facing arm of a new politically-motivated attack on environmentalists and climate change campaigners operated by well connected political advisers and researchers.
Lasting only a few seconds, the videos were an attempt to put a shot across the bows of McKibben and his supporters, of which there are many. A promise made weeks earlier by Republican Party activists to follow him around with a video camera — wherever he might go — had apparently begun.
The videos were taken by so-called “trackers” working for America Rising Squared (AR2), an operation that has sprung from the new wave of attacks on climate activists that has become a mainstay of the US political machinery.
AR2 staffers have so far identified three key targets — billionaire investor and climate action advocate Tom Steyer, McKibben and environmental activists generally.
Brian Rogers, AR2 executive director, has said his group will “hold Steyer and the Environmentalist Left accountable for their epic hypocrisy and extreme positions which threaten America’s future prosperity.”
One early contribution of ARsquared.org was a slick video accusing Tom Steyer of hypocrisy over previous fossil fuel investments.
Steyer told The New Yorker’s Jane Mayer the accusations were “complete and utter nonsense” because, Mayer wrote, his investments were held in trusts where profits were transferred to a charity.
“They have to know they’re lying. It’s completely dishonest, unethical, and pitiful. And it’s creepy,” Steyer said, adding while the attacks would not deter him, he was concerned they could put others off climate activism.
McKibben told DeSmog: “I think it's pretty clear that they want to talk about anything other than climate change.”
AR2 has launched a new website, Core News, to push its partisan talking points into the public space. The site is accompanied by a YouTube channel, Vine account, Twitter feed and Facebook page.
AR2 has its origins in the spring 2013 launch of America Rising PAC — the political action committee created by Republicans to carry out so-called “opposition research” into Democrat opponents. The PAC’s prime target is Hillary Clinton.
America Rising PAC employs trackers to follow candidates’ every move in the hope of capturing a potentially embarrassing slip-up or hypocritical statement while researchers dig into their histories for anything that might put them in a bad light.
In a submission last week, America Rising said it had filed “almost 2000” FOIA requests as part of its work.
America Rising’s research and tracking material is pushed to the public domain through branded channels, media briefings or paid advertising.
America Rising was reportedly a direct response to the Democrat’s own opposition research group, American Bridge (remember the now former Republican Senator Todd Akin’s ‘legitimate rape’ remarks came from an American Bridge tracker).
At the same time as the PAC was launched, a for-profit company America Rising LLC was also formed to carry out paid work on behalf of its allies in the Republican movement.
Joining the PAC, the LLC and AR2 is a fourth group — the private company Definers Public Affairs — that shares the politically-linked leadership of America Rising and several staff members with the other groups.
For example, AR2's executive director Brian Rogers is also a Senior Vice President at Definers. Rogers is a former senior adviser to Republican Senator John McCain and held key roles in McCain's run for the US presidency in 2008. As reported on Huffington Post, Rogers also had a short stint working for Al Gore's Alliance for Climate Protection.
AR2’s communications director is Jeremy Adler, who moved straight out of the offices of Marco Rubio’s failed campaign for the Republican nomination. Before that stint, Adler was a research analyst at America Rising LLC and a “war room” researcher for Republicans.
Natalie Gillam, another former Republican party researcher for the RNC and NRSC, is now AR2’s deputy communications director.
Definers Public Affairs:
Private Political Operatives For Corporate Hire
The well-connected political operatives at Definers are offering to do for corporations what they have been doing for their friends in politics — dig for dirt and track their opponents.
According to the Definers website, the company will “build and influence media narratives, move public opinion and provide powerful ammunition for your public relations and government affairs efforts.”
Matt Rhoades, the founder of Definers, was Mitt Romney’s campaign manager when the former Massachusetts governor ran for president in 2012.
Definers president Joe Pounder, who co-founded America Rising LLC, is also a veteran of Marco Rubio’s campaign and a former research director at the Republican National Committee.
According to Politico, Pounder and Rhoades have been working to try and discredit investigative journalist and author Jane Mayer.
The New Yorker’s Mayer has become a target over her detailed reporting of the oil billionaire Koch brothers and their outsized influence on the US political right.
AR2 has been registered with the IRS as a not-for-profit 501(c)4 “social welfare” organisation – meaning it does not have to disclose its funders but is generally allowed to spend up to half its cash on political activity.
The funders of AR2 are not known and 501(c)4 groups do not have to declare them.
But it seems likely that supporters of AR2 will be drawn from a similar pool of donors to America Rising’s political action committee (PAC).
According to America Rising PAC’s filings, compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics, donors in this electoral cycle include so called “vulture capitalist” Paul Singer, who gave $250,000. Singer has also donated to the work of Danish political scientist Bjorn Lomborg, who holds contrarian views on climate science and says the world’s poorest countries need to burn vast quantities of fossil fuels.
Another recent America Rising donor is Brian France, the CEO of auto racing association NASCAR, who gave $15,000.  France has endorsed Donald Trump for president.
In a statement responding to the new attack strategy, McKibben says: “I’m of course flattered that our work has exposed the fossil fuel industry enough that they feel the need for this kind of personal attack — but as usual, the real news is the lengths they will go to avoid talking about the greatest issue of our time, their ongoing wreckage of the planet’s climate, and in the process so many of its people.”