NATO Secretary General and Prime Minister of Slovenia – Joint Press Point, 11 NOV 2014 – Video

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NATO Secretary General and Prime Minister of Slovenia - Joint Press Point, 11 NOV 2014
Joint press point with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg and Prime Minister of Slovenia Miro Cerar - Opening remarks by the Secretary General, 11 November 2014. Transcript: ...

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NATO Secretary General and Prime Minister of Slovenia - Joint Press Point, 11 NOV 2014 - Video

Ukraine Crisis: NATO Says Russian Troops, Military Equipment Crossed Border! – Video

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Ukraine Crisis: NATO Says Russian Troops, Military Equipment Crossed Border!
http://www.undergroundworldnews.com Nato officials have seen Russian military equipment and Russian combat troops entering Ukraine this week, its top commander says. "Russian tanks, Russian...

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Ukraine Crisis: NATO Says Russian Troops, Military Equipment Crossed Border! - Video

NATO operations have ended in Afghanistan. What and where should its next role be? – the network – Video

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NATO operations have ended in Afghanistan. What and where should its next role be? - the network
Thirteen years after Western allies defeated the Taliban, NATO ended its operations in Afghanistan in December. But the Taliban are taking back territory. NATO faces new crises, with questions...

By: euronews (in English)

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NATO operations have ended in Afghanistan. What and where should its next role be? - the network - Video

NATO says insurgents shoot dead service member in northern Afghanistan amid coming withdrawal

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Published November 14, 2014

A U.S. soldier inspects the site of a suicide attack targeting a foreign convey in Behsood district of Jalalabad east of Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, Nov. 13, 2014. An Afghan civilian was killed and another injured but causing no casualties among foreign troops, officials said. (AP Photo)(The Associated Press)

KABUL, Afghanistan NATO says one its service members has been shot and killed by insurgents in northern Afghanistan.

A statement Saturday by the U.S.-led coalition says the shooting happened Friday. It provided no other details about the attack nor the nationality of the service member.

The slaying brings to 61 the number of coalition deaths so far this year in Afghanistan, 45 of them U.S. troops.

Insurgents have intensified their attacks against both Afghan and NATO security forces across the country following a fierce summer of fighting. There have been a number of unsuccessful attacks against coalition convoys in recent days.

The attacks also come as most international combat forces prepare to withdraw from the country by the end of the year.

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NATO says insurgents shoot dead service member in northern Afghanistan amid coming withdrawal

Mark Udall, Leading Senate Voice on NSA Surveillance and Environment, Ousted in – Video

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Mark Udall, Leading Senate Voice on NSA Surveillance and Environment, Ousted in
http://www.democracynow.org - The Republican gains in a majority of the midterms #39; tightly contested Senate races included Colorado, where Cory Gardner ousted Sen. Mark Udall, a leading Senate...

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Mark Udall, Leading Senate Voice on NSA Surveillance and Environment, Ousted in - Video

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First on CNN: Rand Paul to oppose Senate NSA reform bill, aide says

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By Ashley Killough, CNN

updated 8:52 AM EST, Fri November 14, 2014

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

(CNN) -- Sen. Rand Paul, a fierce critic of the National Security Agency's domestic surveillance programs, will oppose the NSA reform bill in the Senate in large part because it includes an extension of the Patriot Act, a senior Paul aide said Friday.

Known as the USA Freedom Act and proposed by Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont, the bill bans bulk collection of Americans' phone records by placing narrower limitations on government searches.

Read the bill's text | Supporters

The legislation also extends the Patriot Act's sunset from June 2015 to December 2017.

The Senate will vote probably next Tuesday whether to take up and begin debate on the bill. It's unclear if they'll have the votes to move forward, but with Paul's opposition, it will make it that much tougher to clear that procedural hurdle.

Paul "strongly favors reforming the NSA" and while he may have been expected to support the current bill, a senior aide said the Kentucky Republican won't back the legislation.

"Due to significant problems with the bill, at this point he will oppose the Leahy bill," the aide told CNN. The aide pointed out the extension of the Patriot Act as a key issue, but declined to name other "significant problems."

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First on CNN: Rand Paul to oppose Senate NSA reform bill, aide says

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Facebook, Microsoft, Apple Make Year-End Lobbying Push to Curb NSA Spying

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Trade groups representing Facebook Inc. (FB), Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) and Apple Inc. (AAPL) are pushing the Senate to pass legislation limiting National Security Agency spying before the Republican majority takes control of the chamber.

A coalition of Internet and technology companies, which also include Google Inc. (GOOG) and Twitter Inc. (TWTR), support a bill the Senate plans to vote on Nov. 18 to prohibit the NSA from bulk collection of their subscribers e-mails and other electronic communications. Many of the companies opposed a Republican-backed bill the House passed in May, saying a loophole would allow bulk collection of Internet user data.

Members of the Consumer Electronics Association have already lost contracts with foreign governments worth millions of dollars, in response to revelations about U.S. spying, Gary Shapiro, president and chief executive officer of the group that represents Apple, Google and Microsoft, wrote in a letter sent to all senators on Nov. 13.

The clock is ticking. If a final bill isnt reached this year, the process for passing legislation would begin over in January under a new Congress controlled by Republicans, many of whom support government surveillance programs.

U.S. Internet and technology companies are confronting a domestic and international backlash against government spying that may cost them as much as $180 billion in lost business, according to Forrester Research Inc. (FORR)

The issue emerged in June 2013 when former NSA contractor Edward Snowden revealed a program under which the U.S. uses court orders to compel companies to turn over data about their users. Documents divulged by Snowden also uncovered NSA hacking of fiber-optic cables abroad and installation of surveillance tools into routers, servers and other network equipment.

The NSA's Gigantic Haystack

Apple and Google have retaliated by offering stronger security, including on new smartphones, that will automatically shield photos, contact lists and other documents from the government. That, in turn, has heightened tensions with law enforcement agencies that want access to the data for criminal investigations.

The Senate bill, S. 2685, would end one of the NSAs most controversial domestic spy programs, through which it collects and stores the phone records of millions of people not suspected of any wrongdoing. In addition to curbing data collection, the legislation would allow companies to publicly reveal the number and types of orders they receive from the government to hand over user data.

Instead, the NSA would be required to get court orders to obtain the records, such as numbers dialed and call durations from Verizon Communications Inc. (VZ) and other carriers. The phone records dont include the content of communications, and the carriers would be given liability protection and compensation under the bill.

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Facebook, Microsoft, Apple Make Year-End Lobbying Push to Curb NSA Spying

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Suit says CA public utilities commission violated 5th Amendment

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Last evening (November 13), attorneys Mike Aguirre and Maria Severson filed a suit in federal court saying that the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) and Southern California Edison took 17.4 million ratepayers' property (money) by charging them $3.7 billion for electricity while the San Onofre nuclear plant was shut down, beginning in early 2012.

The theory is that the regulatory body and Edison were taking customers' private property without just compensation. That is banned by the Fifth Amendment.

Also named in the suit are Michael Peevey, president of the commission, and Mike Florio, one of the commissioners.

The only way that the California Public Utilities Commission could force customers to pay for failed generators at San Onofre would have been to show that Edison acted reasonably in obtaining the generators, according to the suit.

However, Edison deployed the steam generators without a safety license amendment from the Nuclear Regulator Commission. The decision came from the top of Edison, says the suit. Edison has admitted there were design errors causing steam generators to fail. A nuclear scientist was hired to do a study, but when he reported there had been errors, the CPUC obstructed his investigation, thus thwarting any determination of whether Edison was responsible for the failure, according to the suit, which notes that Peevey is a former president of Edison.

San Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E) owns 20 percent of the now-shuttered San Onofre, but is not named in the suit because it had opposed Edison's plans for replacing the old steam generators with four new ones.

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Suit says CA public utilities commission violated 5th Amendment

2ND AMENDMENT FIGHT Buffalo to seize guns days after owners' deaths

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FILE 2012: Buffalo police confiscated nine illegal handguns in connection with a gun trafficking operation that stretched from the Decatur, Georgia area to Buffalo. The city has been focused on reducing the number of illegal guns on the street.(Buffalo Police Department)

A plan by police in Buffalo, N.Y., to begin confiscating the firearms of legal gun owners within days of their deaths is drawing fire from Second Amendment advocates.

The plan is legal under a longstanding, but rarely enforced state law, but gun rights advocates say, with apologies to onetime NRA spokesman Charlton Heston, it is tantamount to prying firearms - some of which may have substantial monetary or sentimental value - from the cold, dead hands of law-abiding citizens.

"They're quick to say they're going to take the guns," said Tom King, president of the New York State Rifle & Pistol Association. "But they don't tell you the law doesn't apply to long guns, or that these families can sell [their loved one's] pistol or apply to keep it."

King said enforcing the state law is the latest example of authorities targeting law-abiding gun owners, while doing little to secure the streets.

- Tom King, president of the New York State Rifle & Pistol Association

Buffalo Police Commissioner Daniel Derrenda said at a press conference last week that the department will be sending people to collect guns that belong to pistol permit holders who had died so "they don't end up in the wrong hands." The department will cross reference pistol permit holders with death records and the guns will be collected when possible, he said.

Derrenda said guns pose a threat if their owner is no longer alive to safeguard them, especially if a recently-deceased gun owner's home is burglarized.

"At times they lay out there and the family is not aware of them and they end up just out on the street," he said, according to WGRZ.com.

The state law says that if the permit holder dies, the estate has 15 days to dispose of the guns or turn them in to authorities, who can hold the weapons up to two years. LoHud.com reported that violation of the law by survivors is a misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail and a fine.

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2ND AMENDMENT FIGHT Buffalo to seize guns days after owners' deaths