Monthly Archives: July 2017

Court Strikes Down Unconstitutional Ban on Concealed Carry – NRA ILA

Posted: July 26, 2017 at 12:58 am

FAIRFAX, Va. The right to self-defense scored an important victory on Tuesday when the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit struck down Washington D.Cs unconstitutional restrictions on issuing concealed carry permits. Today's ruling in Grace v. District of Columbiabuilds on the landmark Supreme Court case, District of Columbia v. Heller, which held that the Second Amendment guarantees the individual right to keep and bear arms for self-defense.

The Second Amendment protects the fundamental, individual right of Americans to not only keep arms, but also to bear arms. D.C. residents have suffered under a near total ban on their right to carry a firearm for self-defense, said Chris W. Cox, executive director, National Rifle Association Institute for Legislative Action. Todays ruling is an important step toward protecting the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens.

The decision overturns D.C.s requirement that citizens prove they have a good reason to obtain a concealed carry permit. For the overwhelming majority of permit applicants, this results in ade factoprohibition on their right to carry a firearm for self-defense.

In the majority decision, Judge Thomas Griffith wrote At the Second Amendment's core lies the right of responsible citizens to carry firearms for personal self-defense beyond the home", and that "The good-reason law is necessarily a total ban on most D.C. residents right to carry a gun in the face of ordinary self-defense needs.

Governments should not be allowed to take constitutional rights away from law-abiding citizens, Cox concluded. This decision demonstrates that the right to carry a firearm outside the home for self-defense is clearly protected by the Second Amendment.

Established in 1871, the National Rifle Association is America's oldest civil rights and sportsmen's group. More than five million members strong, NRA continues to uphold the Second Amendment and advocates enforcement of existing laws against violent offenders to reduce crime. The Association remains the nation's leader in firearm education and training for law-abiding gun owners, law enforcement and the armed services. Be sure to follow the NRA on Facebook at NRA on Facebook and Twitter @NRA.

View post:
Court Strikes Down Unconstitutional Ban on Concealed Carry - NRA ILA

Posted in Second Amendment | Comments Off on Court Strikes Down Unconstitutional Ban on Concealed Carry – NRA ILA

THE BIGGER PICTURE: First Amendment issues – Finger Lakes Times

Posted: at 12:58 am

I recently took the photo that accompanies todays column on Swick Road off Route 89 in Romulus.

A woman contacted the Finger Lakes Times about the property. She found it offensive and thought it might even be illegal in New York. She says the resident claims to be a deer hunter. She has reported it to the town of Romulus and Seneca County officials.

It is likely not illegal, that is, unless it is regarded as a hate crime or hate speech against blacks being a reference to approval of lynching by the KKK. Then it is not just an ordinary rope.

If we give the home owner the benefit of the doubt, then the question is why keep the nooses hanging year-round knowing they might connote negative impressions to others?

For me, its just another instance of a pervasive attitude that seems to be taking shape culturally all over, where people just are going to do what they want regardless of right, wrong or political correctness.

Some might argue that this type of social and political climate is the result of Novembers presidential election. But the reality is what happens locally more often has a greater affect on peoples lives than anything nationally. And that includes politically.

The photo certainly raises First Amendment issues on both sides of the coin.

Briefly the First Amendment says: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

For me the First Amendment has very much become a focal point for things happening in the Finger Lakes region.

Lets take a look at the Geneva City Council. Not too long ago Mayor Alcock tried to move the public comment portion of the monthly meeting from the beginning of the session to the end. Since no ones knows how long each council meeting takes, often hours, I feel it was a clever way to stifle the voice of the public.

It was ultimately decided, however, to allow comments at the end and at the beginning with strict time limits imposed.

But that is nothing compared to what the Council did a couple of months ago. Its hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that a new rule was put into place that does not allow members of the public to address council members by name with their issues or complaints.

One of the guidelines from the current Rules and Procedures for Geneva City Council requires that All remarks shall be addressed to City Council as a whole and not to any individual member thereof.

I remind everyone it is 2017.

What may be a great example of political hypocrisy happened at a fairly recent meeting. Councilman Paul DAmico raised his concerns and was critical of city resident Jim Meaney and his website Geneva Believer, which often challenges the actions of Geneva city government. This when Meaney, who was at the meeting, was unable to directly address DAmico.

For a more detailed look at this issue go to genevabeliever.wordpress.com/author/geneva believer.

Now lets look at Seneca Falls Town Board meetings. Not only are signs banned from being brought into the meetings but if someone has a visual aid to show at the podium during their allotted time they are prevented from presenting it.

As a way to further restrict the publics right to free expression, they are holding the latest meetings in a room that only fits 80 people.

I have gone to several of the board meetings regarding the landfill issue. People certainly are passionate about the issue but never did I find it out of control nor inappropriate. Since the space in the new municipal building can only hold 80 people why not move the meetings to a larger venue that can accommodate more people if there is that much interest in an issue?

In a move that I feel is solely about control, a new rule also is now in place in Seneca Falls that does not allow anyone to stand unless speaking at the podium.

Again, I remind everyone it is 2017.

In Yates County the race for district attorney is once again getting down and dirty. Free speech is one thing but when one opponent distributes what are being considered false allegations against his opponent is another thing all together. That same candidate filed sworn statements under oath that his residency is at one address, and the petitions he filed state he lives at a completely different address a big no-no.

I cant leave Wayne County out. Even though New York State guidelines clearly state in Article 3 Election Officials, Statewide Provisions that local election officials are to establish rules allowing the admission of news media representatives to the area of the polling place where the canvass of ballots cast can be directly observed, the county Board of Elections has banned photographers from polling places the past few election days.

Once again, I remind everyone it is 2017.

See the article here:
THE BIGGER PICTURE: First Amendment issues - Finger Lakes Times

Posted in First Amendment | Comments Off on THE BIGGER PICTURE: First Amendment issues – Finger Lakes Times

Gays Love The First Amendment Except When They Don’t – The Daily Caller

Posted: at 12:58 am

Many LGBT people who run in leftie circles were pleased with last months ejection of women carrying Star of David pride flags from Chicagos Dyke March. Seeing the intersectionality between lesbian equality and Palestinian rights, they didnt want any hint of support for Israel at their event, even if only vaguely via symbols carried by Jewish women.

Though that clash appeared spontaneous, the coordinators of a Slut Walk in Chicago next month have Tweeted their intention to follow suit: We still stand behind Dyke March Chicagos decision to remove the Zionist contingent from their event, & we wont allow Zionist displays at ours.

These radical lesbian and feminist organizers insist that in a free country they have the right to control their message and theyre correct. Constitutional jurisprudence on this the freedom of association and assembly is clear: any organization has the right to exclude groups and even whole classes of people from its membership and its events if it feels welcoming them would dilute its message.

The irony, though, is that the Dyke March would not have the freedom to expel people it considers Zionists without two important Supreme Court cases from twenty years ago in which get this the people suing for the right to participate were gay themselves.

In 1995, the Supreme Court unanimously decided in Hurley v. Irish-American Gay, Lesbian, & Bisexual Group of Boston that St. Patricks Day officials had the right to exclude gay and lesbian contingents if they felt including them would change their message. Since the organizers were overwhelmingly pre-Pope Francis Catholics, practitioners of a lifestyle they considered sinful were not welcome.

Writing on behalf of all his colleagues, Justice David Souter wrote One important manifestation of the principle of free speech is that one who chooses to speak may also decide what not to say.

The gay groups couldnt cry discrimination. Free expression was more important.

Five years later, in Boy Scouts of America et al. v. Dale, a sharply divided Court found that the First Amendment allowed private organizations like the Boy Scouts to exclude a gay person if the presence of that person affects in a significant way the groups ability to advocate public or private viewpoints.

Again, the Supreme Court found that gay would-be Scouts and Scoutmasters could not hide behind allegations of discrimination in forcing an organization to accept them.

Which bring us back to Chicagos Dyke March. Had those two Court decisions gone the other way, the Jewish lesbians booted from the event could have sued for the right to participate.

Theres been a long-term war between discrimination claims and First Amendment freedoms. Because the gay community lost two battles at the turn of the millennium, LGBT groups are now free to tailor their messages by excluding outsiders.

Heres hoping theyll lose the next battle, too. The Supreme Court is about to consider a third clash between non-discrimination laws and the First Amendment (this time, both free expression and the free exercise of religion). Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission will determine whether the government can force people who service weddings to use their creative endeavors in a way that treats all marriages equally.

As were seeing in Chicago, our civil liberties dont change when the parties switch sides. As the LGBT community ponders its stance on the wedding cake controversy, it might remember that freedoms funny. You never know when youre going to need it.

David Benkof is a columnist for the Daily Caller. Follow him on Twitter (@DavidBenkof) and Muckrack.com/DavidBenkof, or E-mail him at [emailprotected].

Go here to read the rest:
Gays Love The First Amendment Except When They Don't - The Daily Caller

Posted in First Amendment | Comments Off on Gays Love The First Amendment Except When They Don’t – The Daily Caller

Don’t blame online anonymity for dark web drug deals. – Slate Magazine (blog)

Posted: at 12:56 am

MDMA, aka ecstasy, aka molly, is popular on dark web drug marketplaces.

Noel Celis/AFP/Getty Images

Last Thursday, the Justice Department announced that it had worked with European authorities to shutter two of the largest destinations on the dark web to buy and sell illegal drugs, AlphaBay and Hansa.

The shutdown followed reports from earlier in the month that AlphaBay, the larger of the two, had mysteriously stopped working, causing users to flock to Hansa. But it turns out that Hansa had been taken over by the Dutch national police, who were collecting information on people using the site to traffic drugs.

European and American law enforcement collaborated to quietly arrest AlphaBays alleged founder Alexandre Cazes in Thailand on July 5. The 25-year-old Cazes later committed suicide in a Thai jail, according to the New York Times.

These dark web drug marketplaces are accessed using a service called Tor, which allows users to browse the internet anonymously. With Tor, you can circumvent law enforcement surveillance as well as internet censorship filters, which are often installed by governments or companies to restrict where people go online. Tor also allows for the creation of anonymously hosted websites or servers that can only be accessed via the Tor Browser. AlphaBay and Hansa were both hosted anonymously on Tor.

Though AlphaBay, Hansa, and, most famously, Silk Road depended on Tor to run their illegal operations, the Tor Project, the nonprofit that maintains the anonymous browser and hosting service, says that only 2 percent of Tor traffic has to do with anonymously hosted websites. The vast majority of Tor traffic is used for browsing the web anonymously. More than 1.5 million people use Tor every day, according to a spokesperson.

The U.S. government has a rather complicated relationship with Tor. On the one hand, documents revealed by Edward Snowden revealed how the National Security Agency had been trying to break Tor for years, searching for security vulnerabilities in browsers that would allow law enforcement to crack the online anonymity service. The Department of Defense has also invested in trying to crack Tor. During the 2016 trial of one of the administrators of Silk Road 2.0, another shuttered dark web drug-trafficking site, it was revealed that DoD hired researchers from Carnegie Mellon University to try to break Tors encryption in 2014.

Yet Tor also wouldnt exist without the U.S. governmentit was originally built as a project out of the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory. The State Department continues to fund Tor (at least someone has told Rex Tillerson about it, presumably) because internet users around the world rely on the anonymity tool to access information and communicate safely online, particularly in countries where the internet is heavily monitored or censored by the government, like in China with its national firewall, or in Thailand, where its illegal to criticize the royal family online.

Cazes, the AlphaBay ring leader, was caught thanks to investigative work, not a break in Tors encryption. Cazes had sent password recovery emails to his email address, which investigators used to find his LinkedIn profile and other identifiers. (And no, the FBI did not dig up an email from Cazes asking to join his professional network on LinkedIn. According to The Verge, Cazes used the same address on a French technology troubleshooting website, which listed his full name, leading investigators to find a LinkedIn profile where he boasted cryptography and web hosting skills, as well as involvement in a drug front.)

And thats good news for the vast majority of Tor users who arent interested in scoring molly. In 2015, a report from the U.N. declared that anonymity tools provide the privacy and security necessary for the exercise of the right to freedom of opinion and expression in the digital age."

Anonymity tools, like so many technologies, have both good and bad applications. And in the same way cellphones arent evil just because some people use them to make drug deals, its important to not malign anonymity tools just because some people use them to sell drugs, too. If the U.S. government is ever successful in finding a way to disable Tors encryption to find criminals, it could put hundreds of thousands of people who depend on Tor at risk, too.

More here:
Don't blame online anonymity for dark web drug deals. - Slate Magazine (blog)

Posted in Tor Browser | Comments Off on Don’t blame online anonymity for dark web drug deals. – Slate Magazine (blog)

Some Bitcoin Backers Are Defecting to Create a Rival Currency – New York Times

Posted: at 12:54 am

Bitcoin Cash could easily dissolve into irrelevance the level of support for it is still unclear but the concrete plans to move forward have underscored, once again, how hard it is to govern a decentralized, open-source technology like Bitcoin with no single set of leaders or ownership.

In the long run it will be forced to develop some real political structure to take these kinds of decisions, but it just isnt there yet, so the result has been chaos, said Joseph Bonneau, who has studied Bitcoin and is a fellow at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which describes itself as a nonprofit defending digital privacy, free speech and innovation.

The Bitcoin divide is part of a wider splintering of the world that has sprung up around virtual currencies.

Many people who initially got excited about the unique technology behind Bitcoin have taken advantage of the public, open-source nature of the technology and created their own new virtual currencies, like Ethereum, Ripple and Litecoin. These other systems run according to different rules than Bitcoin, with some emphasizing more speed and complexity, and some more focused on anonymity and security.

The divisions have, if anything, increased the excitement and the value of all the virtual currencies in the world and banks and governments have announced their own projects to harness the technology.

The price of Bitcoin has recently been at record highs, near $3,000, and several other coins have grown to be worth billions of dollars on their own. A whole class of companies have raised money in recent months by creating and selling their own new digital tokens.

Until now, though, Bitcoin has remained the most valuable digital token of them all, and it has kept its followers united by a single set of rules, despite all the warring behind the scenes.

The divisions, though, appear to have grown too stark to keep everyone on the same blockchain, as the ledger of all Bitcoin transactions is known.

Mr. Ver has been one of the leaders of a contingent that has long wanted to change the rules governing the Bitcoin network so that it can handle more transactions and compete with the likes of PayPal and Visa.

Bitcoin Cash is set to increase the limit on the number of transactions that can be processed by the Bitcoin network every 10 minutes. Currently, the network can process only blocks of transactions that are smaller than one megabyte, which allows for roughly five transactions in a second.

The move to increase the size of the so-called blocks, though, has run up against intense opposition from the programmers who maintain the Bitcoin software.

These programmers, known as the core developers, have said that increasing the amount of data included in each block of transactions would make it harder for individual users to process the blocks and easier for a small number of companies to take control of the Bitcoin network.

It destroys the Bitcoin ethos, which is open and permissionless, where nobody is telling you what to do, said Samson Mow, the chief strategy officer at Blockstream, a company that employs some of the most prominent core developers.

The core developers have come up with their own solution to increase the number of transactions flowing through the system with software known as Segregated Witness, or SegWit. Mr. Ver and others, though, have said SegWit does not expand Bitcoin fast enough to keep up with its recent growth in popularity.

The arguments have given way to vicious mudslinging and hacking attacks against the leaders on both sides, leading some prominent developers to leave the project.

Proponents of increasing the block size, like Mr. Ver, have put forward proposals in the past that have failed to garner majority support in the community, in part because of concerns about the sophistication of the programmers working on the projects.

But the big block camp has not, until now, announced a definite plan to split off from the rest of Bitcoin.

While Bitcoin Cash will not exist until next week, a small number of exchanges have begun trading futures contracts, tied to the expected price of Bitcoin Cash. On Tuesday, it was trading around $450, or a fraction of the $2,600 value of an ordinary Bitcoin.

As recently as last week, it appeared that the major Bitcoin players had found a compromise that would avert a split in the network, or a fork as it is known in Bitcoin world.

Many of the largest Bitcoin companies agreed in May that they would install the SegWit software the core developers created, while also moving toward a doubling of the size of each block of transactions, to two megabytes, in November.

The largest Bitcoin processors had signaled last week that they intended to begin running the new software on Aug. 1. But the developers have suggested that they do not intend to move forward with any increase in the size of the blocks in the coming months.

One of Mr. Vers many investment holdings, Bitcoin.com, announced on Tuesday that it would put all of its resources behind Bitcoin Cash if the block size has not been doubled by November.

To gain traction more broadly, Bitcoin Cash will have to win backing from the broader community of so-called Bitcoin miners.

Bitcoin miners are best known for using specialized computers to unlock, or mine, new Bitcoins. But miners also process Bitcoin transactions and have voting power over any changes to the Bitcoin network in direct proportion to the amount of computing power they dedicate to the network.

Most of the largest mining operations are now in China, thanks to the availability of cheap hardware and electricity.

One significant Chinese mining operation, ViaBTC, has been an outspoken supporter of Bitcoin Cash and has said it will begin backing the system next week.

The largest Bitcoin mining operator in the world, a company known as Bitmain, is a primary investor in ViaBTC. That has led many in the Bitcoin world to expect that Bitmain will also provide backing to Bitcoin Cash. But Bitmain has so far said only that it does not rule out supporting Bitcoin Cash.

When Bitcoin Cash comes into existence, every current holder of Bitcoins will have access to an equivalent amount of Bitcoin Cash, but from that point forward the two systems will diverge.

In the coming weeks, Bitcoin enthusiasts on all sides of the debate will be watching closely to see which big Bitcoin companies offer support for people who want to hold, trade and mine Bitcoin Cash.

A version of this article appears in print on July 26, 2017, on Page B1 of the New York edition with the headline: Some Bitcoin Backers Defect To Create a Rival Currency.

Read more:
Some Bitcoin Backers Are Defecting to Create a Rival Currency - New York Times

Posted in Bitcoin | Comments Off on Some Bitcoin Backers Are Defecting to Create a Rival Currency – New York Times

This is what it will take for bitcoin to become a legit currency – MarketWatch

Posted: at 12:54 am

Bitcoin still has a lot to prove.

As the debate rages on whether bitcoin is a legitimate currency or just imaginary money, one Wall Street analyst stripped down the argument to three simple parameters safety, liquidity and return.

These attributes are the hallmarks of reserve currencies like the U.S. dollar, the euro or gold, according to Bank of America Merrill Lynchs head of global commodities and derivatives research, Francisco Blanch.

For now, bitcoin BTCUSD, -2.13% falls short in making the cut even though it is gaining in popularity among a certain class of investors who believe the cryptocurrency will soon come out of the shadows and claim its rightful place as a legal tender.

See story: SEC concludes initial coin offerings are securities

Safety

Of the three criteria, safety remains the biggest problem as the absence of a central governing authority not only makes the digital currency more vulnerable to chaos but also susceptible to hacking, identity theft and fraud, according to Blanch.

Other issues more specific to the functioning of cryptocurrencies, such as finding an agreement regarding the adoption of certain protocols, are also worth mentioning. For example, should bitcoin split into two digital tokens because miners cannot find common ground, a collapse in confidence and value could follow, writes Blanch.

Bitcoins value nose-dived earlier in July on fears that a possible split could result in multiple versions. That event was averted last week, but investors are now bracing for what is known as a hard fork, which will lead to a splinter blockchain.

Read: Bitcoin, digital currencies retreat from records

The volatile nature of the cryptocurrency also undermines its credibility.

Volatility is the key parameter to understand the concept of safety in a reserve currency, in our view, he said. In that regard, bitcoins score has improved in recent years as volatility has continued to drop.

Even compared to emerging market currencies, bitcoin is viewed as extremely volatile. Some of that, according to Blanch, may be due to the fact that many of these countries China, Malaysia, Pakistan, Philippines and India have repressive capital controls in place.

Nonetheless, as the chart shows, on at least two occasions last year, bitcoins volatility fell below silver, which was for some 400 years the worlds currency.

Liquidity

Interest in digital currencies has soared recently with daily trading volume in the cryptomarket jumping to $2 billion today from $400 million in 2012.

For a digital token to become a currency, it must build to a certain scale, said Blanch. In some ways, this is exactly what has been happening in recent quarters, with the total market value of digital tokens growing exponentially from $1.5 billion to around $87 billion at present. Put differently, cryptocurrencies have built scale rapidly and are now accepted as a means of payment by some corporations and individuals.

At last check, companies like Microsoft Corp. MSFT, +0.80% Expedia Inc. EXPE, -0.03% and CVS Health Corp. CVS, +2.35% are among companies accepting bitcoin.

Returns

Unlike reserve currencies, bitcoin does not have an interest rate that is set by a central bank so it is difficult to quantify its returns. It also does not offer much in the way of diversification given its lack of correlation to other major currencies, precious metals, bonds or equities.

Still, bitcoin has offered phenomenal returns in terms of absolute value that few assets can come close to matching.

But exceptional returns do not make for a fiat currency and bitcoins ultimate test will be whether banks will capitulate and accept it as collateral.

Most regulated financial institutions allow their clients to borrow against financial or physical assets, but we are not aware of any major institution that takes cryptocurrency as collateral at the moment. Thus, in our view, a key step for bitcoin would be for it to become pledgeable collateral, said Blanch.

In other words, bitcoin still has a long way to go.

Continued here:
This is what it will take for bitcoin to become a legit currency - MarketWatch

Posted in Bitcoin | Comments Off on This is what it will take for bitcoin to become a legit currency – MarketWatch

Major Wall Street analyst: Here’s what needs to happen for the bitcoin boom to keep going – CNBC

Posted: at 12:54 am

Amid the emergence of new currencies, gold has long been a benchmark for international measures of value. The precious metal backed the U.S. dollar for decades, marking a peg for global currencies. But in 1971, President Richard Nixon suspended the ability for the dollar to be converted into the precious metal.

Cryptocurrencies arose during the financial crisis and have demonstrated "a few advantages" over major world currencies, such as the ability to cheaply and instantaneously transfer money around the world, and record all transactions through a digital accounting system known as a blockchain, Blanch said.

In expectation of this potential, many have called bitcoin "digital gold" despite the lack of businesses that accept bitcoin and the often high transaction fees.

Gold itself has stagnated in the last several years. The precious metal leaped from several hundred dollars in the early 2000s to near $2,000 in 2011, and has traded between $1,000 and $1,400 in the last two years.

Fundstrat's Tom Lee said in a report on bitcoin in early July that buyers' shift from gold into cryptocurrencies is a reason why the digital currency's price could rise into the tens of thousands.

Due to higher bitcoin mining costs and a surge of interest, the digital currency's price has climbed in "a pattern similar to gold" and "over a much more compressed time period," Blanch said.

Bitcoin (years in parentheses) vs. gold

Source: Bank of America Merrill Lynch Global Research

To be sure, short-term appearances of similarities among bitcoin, gold and the development of historical currencies don't imply that bitcoin is here to stay.

"There is no certainty that that [similarity to gold] will continue and, most certainly, no way to predict it," Blanch said. "In our view, cryptocurrency returns will mostly depend on the faith placed by individuals, corporations, and financial institutions on this emerging technology."

Read the original:
Major Wall Street analyst: Here's what needs to happen for the bitcoin boom to keep going - CNBC

Posted in Bitcoin | Comments Off on Major Wall Street analyst: Here’s what needs to happen for the bitcoin boom to keep going – CNBC

Ground Control to Major Google: Space Station Street View Is Here – Scientific American

Posted: at 12:53 am

Forget views of side streets and poorly parked cars why not explore the International Space Station (ISS) instead? Earlier this week Google Maps released its first-ever Street View in space, and now, Earthlings can virtually navigate through astronauts home away from home. Because no one could drive a van and camera around the ISS, Thomas Pesquet, a European Space Agency astronaut, collaborated with NASA and Google to take images with DSLR cameras already aboard the craft. The tunnel-like interior is filled with wall-to-wall cables and equipment, so navigation is trickier than on Earth. But a scattering of helpful tags identify locations and equipment that people unfamiliar with astronaut life might not recognize. Yours truly ended up in a bathroom on one of her first navigational clicks, but maybe you will have better luck.

If the blurbs of information only increase your curiosity about daily life on the ISS, NASA astronaut Suni Williams explains all about sleeping, eating and manipulating that strange toilet in this video from 2014, below. Pair her explanations with the immersive Street View and maybe you will feel like an astronaut yourself.

Continued here:
Ground Control to Major Google: Space Station Street View Is Here - Scientific American

Posted in Space Station | Comments Off on Ground Control to Major Google: Space Station Street View Is Here – Scientific American

Wednesday evening is a good opportunity to watch the International Space Station over Richmond – Richmond.com

Posted: at 12:53 am

Wednesday evening should be the best time of the week for getting a look at the International Space Station over Richmond.

The station should be visible starting at 8:56 p.m. as a bright dot above the west-southwest horizon, between Jupiter and the setting crescent moon. It will peak three minutes later as it crosses through the Ursa Major constellation, or Big Dipper, and set in the northeast sky by 9:02 p.m.

Though the sky may feature a few clouds, it ought to be clear enough to catch the bright reflection of the sun by then, slightly below our horizon off the stations solar panels.

There are a few other opportunities to spot the station this week, but this one will be the highest and brightest for our area until the middle of August.

See original here:
Wednesday evening is a good opportunity to watch the International Space Station over Richmond - Richmond.com

Posted in Space Station | Comments Off on Wednesday evening is a good opportunity to watch the International Space Station over Richmond – Richmond.com

Tell the media bipartisanship’s alive and well in DC – Orlando Sentinel

Posted: at 12:53 am

I have heard the same theme over and over from the media, both locally and in Washington: Bipartisanship is dead. The truth is bipartisanship and partisanship occur daily in Washington, but the prior acts rarely get covered.

Case in point: We in Congress passed our last budget bill (omnibus) several months ago with vast bipartisan support, and with the usual horse-trading compromises made. Yet it made little difference to the partisanship narrative. We passed a reauthorization bill for NASA, including futuristic goals of going to Mars and even potential Mars colonization. This will inspire millions of Americans and be a major boost to Central Florida's economy. But only Florida Today in Brevard County covered it extensively.

Kristie Boyd,U.S. House Office of Photography /

U.S. Rep. Darren Soto is a Democrat from Orlando.

U.S. Rep. Darren Soto is a Democrat from Orlando. (Kristie Boyd,U.S. House Office of Photography /)

We also made America safer without major local coverage. We passed the National Defense Authorization Act out of the House with Democrats and Republicans from Florida passing several bipartisan amendments. The measure is now before the Senate. As a freshman Democrat in a GOP-majority Congress, I sponsored five amendments that passed. Among them were amendments relating to World War II and Korean veterans; assisting military doctors transition to employment for the VA Hospital; reporting on global nuclear threats through space-based detection; and focusing our federal simulation-and-training policy and increasing readiness.

Another victory for bipartisan majorities included thwarting anti-climate-change and anti-LGBT amendments to this defense package. Again, this major bill was supported by the majority of both parties.

In addition, we in Congress just passed our Department of Homeland Security reauthorization with overwhelming bipartisan support. And, we will likely pass an upcoming debt-ceiling bill with the help of a bipartisan majority.

Daily, we pass basic bills to keep the federal government running. Of course, major issues are fiercely debated, like how to boost our economy, the push to repeal the Affordable Care Act, the Trump-Russia investigation, President Trumps accountability, environmental policy, constitutional rights, immigration and tax reform. However, intense debate is a sign of a robust democracy at work, not the end of one.

This bipartisanship is especially significant considering that the Congresses of yore we're compared to were populated almost exclusively by rich white men with strong common backgrounds, regardless of party. It was easier for them to identify with and understand each other. This bipartisan history may have worked for them, but not so much for women, minorities and our LGBT community prior to the 1960s. Our diversity gives historic context to this partisanship debate; yet we still work together often.

So, for everyone from undying optimists to constant naysayers in the media, please continue your critiques. The Fourth Estate is critical to a thriving democracy. I understand that sensationalizing conflict attracts internet clicks and readers interests and pays the bills. I only ask the media to consider covering bipartisan efforts with even a margin of the vigor that these partisan conflicts are covered.

Who knows? People may actually read them and be inspired.

See the original post:
Tell the media bipartisanship's alive and well in DC - Orlando Sentinel

Posted in Mars Colonization | Comments Off on Tell the media bipartisanship’s alive and well in DC – Orlando Sentinel