Tag: news

While Toronto Mayor Rob Ford has survived his crack-smoking
controversy (at least for now), Rep. Trey Radel of Florida
has resigned
from Congress after being caught
buying cocaine from an undercover federal agent in
October. “It is my belief that professionally I cannot fully and
effectively serve as a United States Representative,” said Radel
in his resignation letter. If he was concerned about losing the
support of his constituents, he had good reason. 

The December Reason-Rupe poll found that
85 percent of Americans would no longer support a politician they
had previously supported if he/she occasionally used cocaine. Only
13 percent of poll respondents said they would still support a
politician who used cocaine occasionally.

Americans are much more forgiving on marijuana use. The same
Reason-Rupe poll found that
a majority of Americans, 52 percent, would continue to support a
politician if he or she occasionally used marijuana in his or her
personal time while 43 percent would withdraw their support.

The percentage of Americans who would still support an elected
official who occasionally used marijuana is roughly the same as
those who support legalizing the drug (49 percent). Given that few
Americans favor legalizing cocaine, their reaction to Trey Radel is
hardly surprising.  Although it’s worth pointing out that
while 13 percent said they’d continue to support their elected
official if they smoked cocaine, only 4
percent say the drug should be legalized.

The public’s lack of tolerance for cocaine use by their elected
officials cuts across party lines but partisan differences emerge
when the drug in question is marijuana. Majorities of Democrats (58
percent) and independents (54 percent) would continue to support a
politician whom they previously supported if he/she used marijuana
occasionally while only 41 percent of Republicans would do the
same. Instead, 54 percent of Republicans would retract their
support if they discovered their favored politician was caught
using marijuana.

As previous Reason-Rupe poll results haveshown,
younger Americans are considerably more tolerant of drug use in
general, so not surprisingly they are more likely than older
Americans to say they would continue to support a politician whom
they previously endorsed if he or she used marijuana occasionally.
For instance, 73 percent of 18-24 year olds would continue to
support their favored politicians caught with pot, compared to 35
percent of seniors.

Similarly, those with higher levels of education also are more
likely to continue supporting their favored politicians who smoke
marijuana. While 48 percent of those with high school diplomas or
less would continue to support their favored candidate, nearly
two-thirds of post-graduates would do the same.

However, even young people and post-grads make a sharp
distinction between marijuana and cocaine. For instance, 65 percent
of those under 35 would continue to support a politician who used
marijuana from time to time while just 18 percent would continue to
support a politician who used cocaine. By comparison, 44 percent of
Americans ages 55 and over would continue to support an official
who used marijuana while just six percent would continue to support
a politician who used cocaine. Similarly for education, while 64
percent of post grads would continue to endorse marijuana-smoking
politicians, only 14 percent would do the same for a cocaine
user.

Nationwide telephone poll conducted Dec 4-8 2013 interviewed
1011 adults on both mobile (506) and landline (505) phones, with a
margin of error +/- 3.7%. Princeton Survey Research Associates
International executed the nationwide Reason-Rupe survey. Columns
may not add up to 100% due to rounding. Full poll results,
detailed tables, and methodology found here. Sign
up for notifications of new releases of the Reason-Rupe
poll here.

Court documents released last week reveal that
the FBI “incidentally” seized all
emails from service TorMail in an investigation of a company with a
reputation for facilitating child pornography. Before closing down
in August 2013, TorMail had a reputation for privacy. It shielded a
motley of journalists, activists, dissidents—and a fair share of
criminals. Former TorMail users had some pressing reason for using
the email service they believed to be untappable and secure.
 They should be either outraged at the potential breach of
privacy or shaking in their seats over potential criminal
busts.

The FBI’s acquisition came to light during a Florida court case,
demonstrating that its new stash of emails has been used in at
least one investigation unrelated to Freedom Hosting. The FBI used
a man’s emails to gather evidence of his execution of credit card
fraud. The email linked to the man’s credit card forgery scheme had
a “tormail.net” suffix. Once they obtained a warrant they needed
only turn to their vast trove of TorMail emails.

TorMail is a Tor Hidden Service that is used in conjunction with
the Tor anonymity network. The Guardian explains in its

Tor Beginner’s Guide:

[Tor] offers a technology that bounces internet users’
and websites’ traffic through “relays” run by thousands of
volunteers around the world, making it extremely hard for anyone to
identify the source of the information or the location of the
user.

TorMail’s fall in August 2013 was tied to Freedom Hosting’s, a
company that hosted untraceable .onion websites only available over
the Tor anonymity network. Eric Eoin Marques, Freedom Hosting’s
founder, was arrested in July 2013 with charges of facilitating
child pornography. TorMail shut down shortly after.

Just because TorMail was seized doesn’t mean journalists,
dissidents, and privacy-conscious people should give up on email
privacy. But they should be careful. Email security is tricky. When
using an intermediary like TorMail there is always the risk that it
will broken in from the top, but there are other, slightly
trickier, ways to secure emails. According to
The Daily Dot, the only foolproof way is to use
software like PGP, which is “virtually unbreakable” and only takes
a 15 minutes to master.

When it comes to online anonymity tools, the government is
understandably concerned about the strains of criminal activity:
the pedophiles, the drug dealers, the fraudsters, etc. But
journalists, whistleblowers, and human rights groups with nobler
motivations for seeking privacy are now caught in the FBI’s net
too.

The FBI’s activities re-enforces a question that emerged in
parallel with Edward Snowden’s leaks: What the heck have government
agencies been up to behind our backs? It looks like the National
Security Agency isn’t the only agency opaquely collecting bulk
data. 

State of the Union addresses are sometimes
described as laundry lists, but President Obama’s speech last year
was more of a wish list — a series of hopeful ideas, most of which
had little to no chance of ever going anywhere.

The Washington Post’s Glenn Kessler
looked back at the litany of proposals from last year’s big
presidential address to Congress and found that almost no action
was taken on any of them: Just four of the 23 proposals in the
speech resulted in any completed actions. (Those that did tended to
be pretty basic stuff: the passage of a budget, the completion of a
bipartisan commission report on the voting experience in America,
etc.) 

Another way to put it is that last year’s State of the Union was
mostly meaningless — a grab bag of ideas that never took.
 

That’s the good news.

The bad news is that President Obama has decided to look for
ways to go around Congress instead. With his own approval numbers
sagging, and a midterm election on the way that’s likely to favor
the GOP, he knows that his legislative agenda will probably remain
as stagnant this year as it was last.

So he’s putting together a to-do list of executive actions for
the coming year. “We’re not just going to be waiting for
legislation” he
said earlier this month. “I’ve got a pen and I’ve got a phone.”
And he plans to wield them both.

But first he’ll wield the power of the pulpit. This year’s
address to the joint Congress is widely expected to be built around
the theme of inequality. “Obama’s message “will place any
discussion of inequality in the broader context of shrinking
economic opportunity,” White House advisers
tell The Washington Post. “He will seek to make his
economic policy more easily relatable to ordinary Americans,
focusing on college affordability, retirement security,
infrastructure, health care and other issues.”

In other words, another grab bag. At least we can take solace in
the hope that most of it won’t matter. 

That and a tasty beverage. Reason staffers
will be live Tweeting and live-drinking the speech. For those
who want to play along, the rules (guidelines, really) are below.
 

Take a drink, and click a link, any time President Obama…

• Mentions inequality.
  Take another if, in the same sentence, he refers to “the wealthiest
  Americans.” Chug the rest of the bottle if he mentions “the 1
  percent.” 
• Describes government spending as an investment. 
• Talks about economic mobility without noting that mobility
  
  has not changed in fifty years. 
• 
  Forgets to apologize for
  lying when he said that people who liked their doctors and
  their health plans could keep them under Obamacare.
• Says the words “nation
  building at home.”
• 
  Falsely insists that there’s no evidence of any abuses of power
  at the National Security Agency.
• Grudgingly admits that the surveillance state may have gone too
  far—but calls for weak reforms that
  won’t rein in its power.
• Credits Obamacare for its Medicaid enrollment, despite the fact
  that
  we have no idea how many Medicaid enrollees since October are
  for people who are newly eligible under the law.
• Mentions Syria, which Obama
  wanted to bomb, and then (thank goodness!) didn’t.
• Says
  anything interesting about foreign policy.
• Falsely presents something as a
  false choice.
• Starts any sentence with the words, “Let me be clear.” Double
  shot if it’s an ad-lib not in the prepared text.

Finally, take a drink any time the cameras cut away to Chad
Henderson, the Obamacare poster boy who told reporters he was among
the first to sign up under the law but hadn’t
actually enrolled in health insurance.
He says he’ll be there, as a guest of Texas GOP Rep. Steve
Stockman. 

As always, Reason encourages drinking responsibly. How
else will you know when a politician is trying to pull one over on
you?