Story 1: Remember The 20-30 Million American Citizens Searching For A Full Time Permanent Job and The Professional Soldiers Who Made The Ultimate Sacrifice — D-Day June 6, 1944 — Videos
D-Day Remembered
Operation Overlord & Neptune (D-Day documentary)
Normandy-Surviving D-Day(full )HD Documentary
D-Day in Colour (FULL)
Saving Private Ryan opening cemetery scene
Normandy Speech: Ceremony Commemorating the 40th Anniversary of the Normandy Invasion, D-Day 6/6/84
Is Jobs Data Truly Good News About U.S. Economy?
El-Erian: Jobs Report Points to a Healing Labor Market
Rep. Cole on BLS Jobs Report: “Still have underutilization of the labor force”
Rep. Cole: “We have unique fiscal challenges that transcend our predecessors”
Weekly Market Wrap Up – June 5th, 21015
Nonfarm payrolls total 280,000; unemployment rate at 5.5%
Jeff Cox | @JeffCoxCNBCcom
The U.S. economy created 280,000 jobs in May, better than expected and likely confirming hopes that growth is back on track after a slow start to the year.
The headline unemployment rate increased slightly to 5.5 percent as the labor force participation rate ticked higher to 62.9 percent. (Tweet This) A separate measure that counts those working part time for economic reasons and the unemployed who have not looked for work in the past month held steady at 10.8 percent.
Wages also showed growth, rising 8 cents an hour, equating to an annualized increase of 2.3 percent.
Economists had been expecting a gain of 225,000 positions and the unemployment rate holding steady at 5.4 percent.
“Today’s report showed the U.S. labor market has tremendous momentum. All those factors that parked a weak jobs number in March were short-term,” said Andrew Chamberlain, chief economist at job search site Glassdoor. “All those factors are looking more like a late-winter sniffle than a lingering illness.”
The jobs numbers are critical in that they will go a long way toward determining policy from the Federal Reserve. The hot jobs report sent U.S. government bond yields surging as the wage increase indicates inflation is pushing toward the Fed’s target. Stock futures also indicated a lower open for Wall Street, though the move in the equity market was far less pronounced than in bonds.
After keeping short-term interest rates near zero for 6½ years, the U.S. central bank is looking for a liftoff point that would be confirmed not only by job creation but also by wage growth, which would indicate inflation is on a positive trajectory.
“I think (the jobs number) puts September more firmly on track” for a rate hike, said Jim Caron, portfolio manager of global fixed income at Morgan Stanley Investment Management. “As of yesterday it was probably closer to a 50-50 bet. Today, I think it’s more in lines of a 75 percent probability. It moves the needle in terms of expectations and gives air cover to the Fed.”
Trader bets on the date for a rate hike pushed it forward this week, with the latest trends showing a 33 percent chance of a September hike (up from 26 percent earlier in the week), a 52 percent chance in October (from 44 percent) and a 70 percent likelihood for December (from 61 percent).
While many market participants expect a rate increase this year, the Fed got a stunning jolt Thursday from the International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde, who took the unprecedented step of advising the Fed to wait until 2016 until the inflation picture is clearer.
“This number effectively flies in the face of what the IMF recommended yesterday that the Fed take a pause,” Caron said.
Service industries led the way for May, adding 63,000 positions, while leisure and hospitality grew by 57,000. Health care increased by 47,000, retail added 31,000 and construction moved higher by 17,000. Mining was a dark spot on the report, contracting by 17,000, bringing the decline to 68,000 in 2015.
The average work week was unchanged at 34.5 hours.
The number of full-time workers grew by 630,000, while the part-time rolls fell by 232,000.
Previous months showed minor changes, with March’s disappointing count getting pushed higher to 119,000 from 85,000 and April edging lower from 223,000 to 221,000.
“Overall, at this stage this evident strength in the labor market probably isn’t enough to persuade the Fed to hike rates by July, but it definitely makes a rate cut by September probable,” said Paul Ashworth, chief U.S. economist at Capital Economics. “Only 24 hours later, the IMF’s suggestion that the Fed should wait until 2016 looks very dated.”
Transmission of material in this release is embargoed until USDL-15-1057
8:30 a.m. (EDT) Friday, June 5, 2015
Technical information:
Household data: (202) 691-6378 • cpsinfo@bls.gov • www.bls.gov/cps
Establishment data: (202) 691-6555 • cesinfo@bls.gov • www.bls.gov/ces
Media contact: (202) 691-5902 • PressOffice@bls.gov
THE EMPLOYMENT SITUATION -- MAY 2015
Total nonfarm payroll employment increased by 280,000 in May, and the
unemployment rate was essentially unchanged at 5.5 percent, the U.S.
Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Job gains occurred in
professional and business services, leisure and hospitality, and health
care. Mining employment continued to decline.
Household Survey Data
In May, both the unemployment rate (5.5 percent) and the number of
unemployed persons (8.7 million) were essentially unchanged. Both
measures have shown little movement since February. (See table A-1.)
Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rates for adult men
(5.0 percent), adult women (5.0 percent), teenagers (17.9 percent),
whites (4.7 percent), blacks (10.2 percent), Asians (4.1 percent),
and Hispanics (6.7 percent) showed little or no change in May. (See
tables A-1, A-2, and A-3.)
The number of unemployed new entrants edged up by 103,000 in May but
is about unchanged over the year. Unemployed new entrants are those
who never previously worked. (See table A-11.)
The number of persons unemployed for less than 5 weeks decreased by
311,000 to 2.4 million in May, following an increase in April. The
number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more)
held at 2.5 million in May and accounted for 28.6 percent of the
unemployed. Over the past 12 months, the number of long-term
unemployed is down by 849,000. (See table A-12.)
In May, the civilian labor force rose by 397,000, and the labor force
participation rate was little changed at 62.9 percent. Since April
2014, the participation rate has remained within a narrow range of
62.7 percent to 62.9 percent. The employment-population ratio, at
59.4 percent, was essentially unchanged in May. (See table A-1.)
The number of persons employed part time for economic reasons (sometimes
referred to as involuntary part-time workers) was about unchanged at
6.7 million in May and has shown little movement in recent months.
These individuals, who would have preferred full-time employment, were
working part time because their hours had been cut back or because
they were unable to find a full-time job. (See table A-8.)
In May, 1.9 million persons were marginally attached to the labor force,
down by 268,000 from a year earlier. (The data are not seasonally
adjusted.) These individuals were not in the labor force, wanted and
were available for work, and had looked for a job sometime in the
prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed because they
had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey. (See
table A-16.)
Among the marginally attached, there were 563,000 discouraged workers
in May, down by 134,000 from a year earlier. (The data are not seasonally
adjusted.) Discouraged workers are persons not currently looking for work
because they believe no jobs are available for them. The remaining 1.3
million persons marginally attached to the labor force in May had not
searched for work for reasons such as school attendance or family
responsibilities. (See table A-16.)
Establishment Survey Data
Total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 280,000 in May, compared with
an average monthly gain of 251,000 over the prior 12 months. In May,
job gains occurred in professional and business services, leisure
and hospitality, and health care. Employment in mining continued to
decline. (See table B-1.)
Professional and business services added 63,000 jobs in May and
671,000 jobs over the year. In May, employment increased in computer
systems design and related services (+10,000). Employment continued
to trend up in temporary help services (+20,000), in management and
technical consulting services (+7,000), and in architectural and
engineering services (+5,000).
Employment in leisure and hospitality increased by 57,000 in May,
following little change in the prior 2 months. In May, employment
edged up in arts, entertainment, and recreation (+29,000). Employment
in food services and drinking places has shown little net change over
the past 3 months.
Health care added 47,000 jobs in May. Within the industry, employment
in ambulatory care services (which includes home health care services
and outpatient care centers) rose by 28,000. Hospitals added 16,000
jobs over the month. Over the past year, health care has added 408,000
jobs.
Employment in retail trade edged up in May (+31,000). Over the prior
12 months, the industry had added an average of 24,000 jobs per month.
Within retail trade, automobile dealers added 8,000 jobs in May.
Construction employment continued to trend up over the month (+17,000)
and has increased by 273,000 over the past year.
In May, employment continued on an upward trend in transportation and
warehousing (+13,000). Truck transportation added 9,000 jobs over the
month.
In May, employment continued to trend up in financial activities (+13,000).
Over the past 12 months, the industry has added 160,000 jobs, with
about half of the gain in insurance carriers and related activities.
Employment in mining fell for the fifth month in a row, with a decline
of 17,000 in May. The loss was in support activities for mining.
Employment in mining has decreased by 68,000 thus far this year, after
increasing by 41,000 in 2014.
Employment in other major industries, including manufacturing, wholesale
trade, information, and government, showed little change over the month.
The average workweek for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls
remained at 34.5 hours in May. The manufacturing workweek was unchanged
at 40.7 hours, and factory overtime remained at 3.3 hours. The average
workweek for production and nonsupervisory employees on private nonfarm
payrolls edged up by 0.1 hour to 33.7 hours. (See tables B-2 and B-7.)
In May, average hourly earnings for all employees on private nonfarm
payrolls rose by 8 cents to $24.96. Over the year, average hourly
earnings have risen by 2.3 percent. Average hourly earnings of private-
sector production and nonsupervisory employees rose by 6 cents to $20.97
in May. (See tables B-3 and B-8.)
The change in total nonfarm payroll employment for March was revised
from +85,000 to +119,000, and the change for April was revised from
+223,000 to +221,000. With these revisions, employment gains in March
and April combined were 32,000 more than previously reported. Over the
past 3 months, job gains have averaged 207,000 per month.
_____________
The Employment Situation for June is scheduled to be released on
Thursday, July 2, 2015, at 8:30 a.m. (EDT).
Employment Situation Summary Table A. Household data, seasonally adjusted
HOUSEHOLD DATA
Summary table A. Household data, seasonally adjusted
[Numbers in thousands]
Category
May
2014
Mar.
2015
Apr.
2015
May
2015
Change from:
Apr.
2015-
May
2015
Employment status
Civilian noninstitutional population
247,622
250,080
250,266
250,455
189
Civilian labor force
155,629
156,906
157,072
157,469
397
Participation rate
62.8
62.7
62.8
62.9
0.1
Employed
145,868
148,331
148,523
148,795
272
Employment-population ratio
58.9
59.3
59.3
59.4
0.1
Unemployed
9,761
8,575
8,549
8,674
125
Unemployment rate
6.3
5.5
5.4
5.5
0.1
Not in labor force
91,993
93,175
93,194
92,986
-208
Unemployment rates
Total, 16 years and over
6.3
5.5
5.4
5.5
0.1
Adult men (20 years and over)
5.9
5.1
5.0
5.0
0.0
Adult women (20 years and over)
5.7
4.9
4.9
5.0
0.1
Teenagers (16 to 19 years)
19.2
17.5
17.1
17.9
0.8
White
5.4
4.7
4.7
4.7
0.0
Black or African American
11.4
10.1
9.6
10.2
0.6
Asian
5.6
3.2
4.4
4.1
-0.3
Hispanic or Latino ethnicity
7.7
6.8
6.9
6.7
-0.2
Total, 25 years and over
5.2
4.4
4.5
4.5
0.0
Less than a high school diploma
9.2
8.6
8.6
8.6
0.0
High school graduates, no college
6.5
5.3
5.4
5.8
0.4
Some college or associate degree
5.5
4.8
4.7
4.4
-0.3
Bachelor’s degree and higher
3.2
2.5
2.7
2.7
0.0
Reason for unemployment
Job losers and persons who completed temporary jobs
4,959
4,189
4,136
4,267
131
Job leavers
872
875
828
829
1
Reentrants
2,869
2,689
2,685
2,615
-70
New entrants
1,063
815
868
971
103
Duration of unemployment
Less than 5 weeks
2,553
2,488
2,729
2,418
-311
5 to 14 weeks
2,401
2,312
2,307
2,532
225
15 to 26 weeks
1,451
1,253
1,139
1,293
154
27 weeks and over
3,351
2,563
2,525
2,502
-23
Employed persons at work part time
Part time for economic reasons
7,268
6,705
6,580
6,652
72
Slack work or business conditions
4,404
4,069
3,885
3,891
6
Could only find part-time work
2,558
2,337
2,374
2,390
16
Part time for noneconomic reasons
19,149
19,733
20,056
19,961
-95
Persons not in the labor force (not seasonally adjusted)
Marginally attached to the labor force
2,130
2,055
2,115
1,862
–
Discouraged workers
697
738
756
563
–
– Over-the-month changes are not displayed for not seasonally adjusted data.
NOTE: Persons whose ethnicity is identified as Hispanic or Latino may be of any race. Detail for the seasonally adjusted data shown in this table will not necessarily add to totals because of the independent seasonal adjustment of the various series. Updated population controls are introduced annually with the release of January data.
Employment Situation Summary Table B. Establishment data, seasonally adjusted
ESTABLISHMENT DATA
Summary table B. Establishment data, seasonally adjusted
Footnotes (1) Includes other industries, not shown separately. (2) Data relate to production employees in mining and logging and manufacturing, construction employees in construction, and nonsupervisory employees in the service-providing industries. (3) The indexes of aggregate weekly hours are calculated by dividing the current month’s estimates of aggregate hours by the corresponding annual average aggregate hours. (4) The indexes of aggregate weekly payrolls are calculated by dividing the current month’s estimates of aggregate weekly payrolls by the corresponding annual average aggregate weekly payrolls. (5) Figures are the percent of industries with employment increasing plus one-half of the industries with unchanged employment, where 50 percent indicates an equal balance between industries with increasing and decreasing employment. (p) Preliminary
NOTE: Data have been revised to reflect March 2014 benchmark levels and updated seasonal adjustment factors.
Story 1: Rick Perry Announces His Candidacy For President in 2016 — Enters A Very Crowded Candidate Field — Run Rick Run — Big Interventionist Government Statist (BIGS) Cheerleader — Voters Beware of Identity Politics Videos
Rick Perry Announces Running For President in 2016 | Presidential Bid | FULL SPEECH
Rick Perry Announces Running For President in 2016 | Presidential Bid | FULL SPEECH
Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry told a crowd at an airport hangar outside Dallas today that he would seek the presidency a second time, saying he was running because “it’s time for a reset, time to reset the relationship between government and citizen.”
“We have the power to make things new again, to project America’s strength again, and to get our economy going again,” Perry, 65, told those gathered at a public airfield in Addison, Texas, to hear the longtime politician formally announce his campaign. “That is exactly why today I’m running for the presidency of the United States of America.”
Five Things You Might Not Know About Gov. Rick Perry
Perry Poses For Mugshot, Treats Himself To Ice Cream Cone
Perry, whose more than 14 years in office made him the longest-serving governor in Texas history, joins a stronger presidential field than he faced four years ago. Already, nine other Republicans have formally announced presidential candidacies, and at least half a dozen more are expected to jump into the 2016 race.
His speech, the plane he stood in front of and the prominent veterans joining him onstage highlighted his credentials as one of just a few 2016 presidential contenders who have served in the military. He flew planes while in the Air Force for five years in the 1970s.
“I was proud to wear the uniform of our country as an Air Force officer,” Perry said, praising his father, a World War II veteran, and even George Washington’s selflessness. Perry rose to the rank of captain during his time in the military.
Taya Kyle, the widow of Chris Kyle, who inspired the movie “American Sniper,” appeared onstage with Perry along with several other notable veterans, including Marcus Luttrell, a retired Navy SEAL whose book “Lone Survivor” was made into a feature film.
Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry made it official on Thursday, joining the already-crowded field of candidates for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination.
Perry, whose infamous “Oops” moment during the last GOP primary derailed what had been a promising start to his 2012 campaign, announced his latest bid at a rally inside a hot airplane hanger north of Dallas.
“We’re at the end of an era of failed leadership,” Perry told supporters. “We are a resilient country. We’ve been through a civil war, two world wars, the Great Depression — we even made it through Jimmy Carter. We will make it through the Obama years.”
Perry was joined onstage by Taya Kyle, widow of “American Sniper” author Chris Kyle, and retired U.S. Navy SEAL Marcus Luttrell, author of “Lone Survivor.”
Rick Perry, the former Texas governor whose 2012 campaign for the White House turned into a political disaster that humbled and weakened the most powerful Republican in the state, announced Thursday that he will run for president again in 2016.
Mr. Perry is the latest candidate to officially enter a crowded field of Republican presidential contenders, declared and undeclared, several of whom have Texas ties and have overshadowed him in recent months, including Senator Ted Cruz and Jeb Bush, the brother of former President George W. Bush, Mr. Perry’s predecessor in the governor’s mansion.
“We will make it through the Obama years,” he told a cheering crowd at a small municipal airport here in Addison, a northern suburb of downtown Dallas. Saying, “It’s time,” he declared in an impassioned speech, ”I am running for the presidency of the United States of America.”
The location had to do with his giant stage prop – a C-130 plane, the type he flew serving in the United States Air Force in the 1970s.
The plane – parked behind the stage and emblazoned with “Perry for President” – illustrated one of the ways Mr. Perry plans to distinguish himself from the other Republican candidates, by emphasizing his service in the military and his support from veterans, several of whom joined him on stage, including Marcus Luttrell, the former Navy SEAL whose memoir inspired the movie “Lone Survivor.”
In his speech, Mr. Perry also sought to separate himself from other Republican contenders by casting himself as a leader who has done the work rather than a politician who talks about doing it, pointing to his handling of natural disasters and crisises at the border and his 14-year tenure as governor of a state with the 12th-largest economy in the world.
Rick Perry announces his run for President
Rick Perry announces presidential run
Rick Perry Talks Immigration
14 Reasons Why Rick Perry Would Be A Really, Really Bad President – Alex Jones Tv
Rick Perry’s Border Solution is A Bait and Switch
NAFTA Superhighway Update
Rick Perry Betrays Texas on ‘Superhighway’ Deal with Spain
Rick Perry “very strong” in opposition to border wall
Rick Perry: a border wall is “ludicrous”
More Video: Rick Perry: Border Fence is “Nonsense”
14 REASONS WHY RICK PERRY WOULD BE A REALLY, REALLY BAD PRESIDENT
Bilderberg favorite Perry
Supporters of Texas Governor Rick Perry are not going to like this article at all. Right now, Republicans all over the United States are touting Rick Perry as the “Republican messiah” that is going to come charging in to save America from the presidency of Barack Obama. Many believe that if Rick Perry enters the race, he will instantly become the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012. Perry certainly looks the part and he knows how to give a good speech, but when ordinary Americans all over the country take a hard look at his record, they may not like what they see. The truth is that Rick Perry is a big-time globalist, he has raised taxes and fees in Texas numerous times, he has massively increased the size of government spending and government debt in Texas, he has been trying to ram the Trans-Texas Corridor down the throats of the Texas people and he tried to force young women all over Texas to be injected with the Gardasil vaccine. No, Rick Perry is not going to save America. In fact, he would likely be very, very similar to both Bush and Obama in a lot of ways.
Right now, Rick Perry is trying to portray himself as a “good conservative” so that if he enters the race he will be accepted by Christian conservatives. If Rick Perry did win the Republican nomination, he would have a great chance of winning the general election because he would very much be an “establishment” candidate.
But before Republicans get too excited about Rick Perry, there are a whole lot of things that they should know about him.
The following are 14 reasons why Rick Perry would be a really, really bad president….
#1 Rick Perry is a “big government” politician. When Rick Perry became the governor of Texas in 2000, the total spending by the Texas state government was approximately $49 billion. Ten years later it was approximately $90 billion. That is not exactly reducing the size of government.
#2 The debt of the state of Texas is out of control. According to usdebtclock.org, the debt to GDP ratio in Texas is 22.9% and the debt per citizen is $10,645. In California (a total financial basket case), the debt to GDP ratio is just 18.7% and the debt per citizen is only $9932. If Rick Perry runs for president these are numbers he will want to keep well hidden.
#3 The total debt of the Texas government has more than doubled since Rick Perry became governor. So what would the U.S. national debt look like after four (or eight) years of Rick Perry?
#4 Rick Perry has spearheaded the effort to lease roads in Texas to foreign companies, to turn roads that are already free to drive on into toll roads, and to develop the Trans-Texas Corridor which would be part of the planned NAFTA superhighway system. If you really do deep research on this whole Trans-Texas Corridor nonsense you will see why no American should ever cast a single vote for Rick Perry.
#5 Rick Perry claims that he has a “track record” of not raising taxes. That is a false claim. Rick Perry has repeatedly raised taxes and fees while he has been governor. Today, Texans are faced with significantly higher taxes and fees than they were before Rick Perry was elected.
#6 Even with the oil boom in Texas, 23 states have a lower unemployment rate than Texas does.
#7 Back in 1988, Rick Perry supported Al Gore for president. In fact, Rick Perry actually served as Al Gore’s campaign chairman in the state of Texas that year.
#8 Between December 2007 and April 2011, weekly wages in the U.S. increased by about 5 percent. In the state of Texas they increased by just 0.6% over that same time period.
#9 Texas now has one of the worst education systems in the nation. The following is from an opinion piece that was actually authored by Barbara Bush earlier this year….
• We rank 36th in the nation in high school graduation rates. An estimated 3.8 million Texans do not have a high school diploma.
• We rank 49th in verbal SAT scores, 47th in literacy and 46th in average math SAT scores.
• We rank 33rd in the nation on teacher salaries.
#10 Rick Perry attended the Bilderberg Group meetings in 2007. Associating himself with that organization should be a red flag for all American voters.
#11 Texas has the highest percentage of workers making minimum wage out of all 50 states.
#12 Rick Perry often gives speeches about illegal immigration, but when you look at the facts, he has been incredibly soft on the issue. If Rick Perry does not plan to secure the border, then he should not be president because illegal immigration is absolutely devastating many areas of the southwest United States.
#13 In 2007, 221,000 residents of Texas were making minimum wage or less. By 2010, that number had risen to 550,000.
#14 Rick Perry actually issued an executive order in 2007 that would have forced almost every single girl in the state of Texas to receive the Gardasil vaccine before entering the sixth grade. Perry would have put parents in a position where they would have had to fill out an application and beg the government not to inject their child with an untested and unproven vaccine. Since then, very serious safety issues regarding this vaccine have come to light. Fortunately, lawmakers in Texas blocked what Perry was trying to do. According to Wikipedia, many were troubled when “apparent financial connections between Merck and Perry were reported by news outlets, such as a $6,000 campaign contribution and Merck’s hiring of former Perry Chief of Staff Mike Toomey to handle its Texas lobbying work.”
Rick Perry has a record that should make all Republicans, Democrats, Libertarians and Independents cringe.
He is not the “conservative Republican” that he is trying to claim that he is. He is simply another in a long line of “RINOs” (Republicans in name only).
If Rick Perry becomes president, he will probably be very similar to George W. Bush. He will explode the size of the U.S. government and U.S. government debt, he will find sneaky ways to raise taxes, he will do nothing about the Federal Reserve or corruption in our financial system and he will push the agenda of the globalists at every turn.
Look, the truth is that another four years of Barack Obama would be a complete and total nightmare.
But so would four years of Rick Perry.
America deserves better than the “lesser of two evils”.
Unfortunately, the American people have been dead asleep and have been sending incompetents, con men and charlatans to Washington D.C. for decades.
Is Pence still considering a 2016 presidential run?
Perry launches 2016 bid for White House
Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry announced his 2016 presidential campaign Thursday, hoping the second time’s the charm after his 2012 bid fizzled following a debate gaffe and other challenges.
The three-term Republican governor, who has spent months traveling and studying policy issues in preparation for another run, made it official at an event in Addison, Texas.
“Today, I am running for the presidency of the United States of America,” Perry said.
Perry railed against the economic and foreign policy record of the Obama administration, calling the former a result of tax-and-regulatory policies. On foreign policy, Perry faulted leaders of both parties for making “grave mistakes” in Iraq but said President Obama “failed to secure the peace,” with the Islamic State now seizing cities American troops fought for.
“The truth is we are at the end of an era of failed leadership,” Perry said.
His campaign is likely to run heavily on Perry’s economic record as governor. A “Perry for President” website, which went live Thursday morning ahead of his announcement, includes stats highlighting tax cuts and other policies from his lengthy term. The campaign also released an announcement video.
More on this…
Perry: Americans don’t have to settle or apologize
He’s also one of the few military veterans in the field. Parked next to the small stage Thursday was a hulking C-130 the cargo plane, like one he flew for the Air Force.
Perry, though, becomes the 10th Republican to enter the race — and one of several current or former governors in the mix. Underscoring the competition he will face to stand out, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush’s team confirmed hours before Perry’s announcement that Bush would announce his campaign plans June 15.
Perry, in preparation, has made several visits to the early voting states of Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina, and will look to erase the memories of his 2012 campaign.
When Perry entered the Republican race last cycle, he was considered to be among the front-runners. Then, at a November 2011 debate in Michigan, he forgot the name of the third federal agency he said he would close if he was elected, then muttered “Oops.” In that moment, he went from powerhouse to punchline and gradually faded from contention.
However, Perry still has the policy record that made him an early force last time.
Perry left office in January after a record 14 years as governor of Texas. Under him, the state generated more than a third of America’s new private-sector jobs since 2001.
While an oil and gas boom fueled much of that economic growth, Perry credits lower taxes, restrained regulation and limits on civil litigation damages. He also pushed offering economic incentives to lure top employers to Texas and repeatedly visited states with Democratic governors to poach jobs.
Perry was thought to be a cinch for four more years as governor in 2014, but instead turned back to White House ambitions. His effort may be complicated this time by a felony indictment on abuse of power and coercion charges, from when he threatened — then carried out — a veto of state funding for public corruption prosecutors. That came when the unit’s Democratic head rebuffed Perry’s demands that she resign following a drunken driving conviction.
Perry calls the case against him a political “witch hunt,” but his repeated efforts to get it tossed on constitutional grounds have so far proved unsuccessful. That raises the prospect he’ll have to leave the campaign trail to head to court in Texas.
Perry blamed lingering pain from back surgery in the summer of 2011 for part of the reason he performed poorly in the 2012 campaign. He has ditched his trademark cowboy boots for more comfortable footwear and wears glasses that give him a serious look.
Perry also traveled extensively overseas and studied policy with experts and economists at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. Lately, Perry has traveled to Iowa, which kicks off presidential nomination voting, more than any GOP White House candidate.
“People realize that what the governor did in the high-profile debate, stumble, everyone has done at some point in their lives,” said Ray Sullivan, Perry’s chief of staff as governor and communications director for his 2012 presidential bid. “I think he’s already earned a second look, particular in Iowa.”
One thing Perry hopes to emulate from 2012 is his fundraising, when he amassed $18 million in the first six weeks.
Indiana Gov. Mike Pence won’t run for president
By JONATHAN TOPAZ 5/19/15 5:13 PM EDT
Indiana Gov. Mike Pence won’t run for president in 2016, a spokeswoman confirmed Tuesday.
The Republican governor said Monday that he would run for a second term next year, which he will likely officially announce at the Indiana Republican Party’s Spring Dinner next month. Indiana law disallows candidates from running for two offices on the same ballot — and a legislative effort to allow Pence to run both for the White House and governor hasn’t gone anywhere.
Asked whether there is now no scenario in which Pence will run for president in 2016, spokeswoman Christy Denault replied: “Correct.”
Pence told POLITICO in February that he was still considering a bid, but that he couldn’t run for both offices. “Indiana law, in terms of a federal office and a state office, doesn’t permit that,” he said.
The governor, 55, spent more than a decade in Congress, at one point serving as chairman of the Republican Study Committee.
President Barack Obama is shown. | AP
For a time, Pence was seen as a strong 2016 contender. An evangelical governor who often touted his balanced budgets and job-creation record, he was considered by some in the party as a candidate who could bring together the establishment and social conservative wings of the party. Many of his former staffers have assumed top roles with GOP mega-donors Charles and David Koch, and the brothers’ Americans for Prosperity political group supported his efforts in office.
But Pence recently suffered a series of missteps, most notably his support for a state Religious Freedom Restoration Act, a bill that earned national attention following major criticism from the business and gay rights communities. Pence declared in a defensive interview on ABC’s “This Week” that he wouldn’t change the law, which critics argued would allow for businesses to refuse service to gay and lesbian individuals.
Under mounting national pressure — including Apple CEO Tim Cook pledging to boycott Indiana and Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy calling Pence a “bigot” — Pence oversaw a change in the law to ensure it didn’t allow for discrimination. The governor’s approval rating subsequently dropped nearly 20 points in the state.
Pence also earned ridicule for planning to launch a state-run news service funded by taxpayers, a plan his administration quickly scrapped after it was roundly criticized. And Pence’s prospects suffered due to the sudden rise of another Midwestern Republican — Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who has quickly emerged as a front-runner embraced by top donors including the Koch brothers and conservative activists.
An elderly supporter of US Republican presidential hopeful John McCain displays her voting choice.
The 2016 gubernatorial election may be a rematch of the close 2012 race between Pence and former Indiana House Speaker John Gregg, who has already declared his candidacy. Former Indiana Democratic Gov. Evan Bayh, who also served two terms in the Senate, said he won’t run in 2016.
Indiana GOP chairman Jeff Cardwell praised Pence’s decision to run for reelection in a statement Monday. “Gov. Mike Pence is a conservative leader and dedicated public servant who always puts Indiana first … We are excited the governor will formally announce his plans to seek re-election during our annual Spring Dinner,” he said.
A new ad from Ron Paul says Rick Perry was Al Gore’s “Texas cheerleader.” We dig into the legend of Perry and Gore and find that while Perry supported Gore, he was not chairman of the campaign, as many have claimed.
It’s a legend of Texas politics and a hatchet for foes of Gov. Rick Perry, front-running candidate for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination. The story goes that as a Democratic legislator, Perry chaired Democrat Al Gore’s presidential campaign in Texas.
The legend has been aired routinely for more than 13 years, originally by a Democratic opponent of Perry’s, and in news reports—all but unchallenged by Perry. Even we at PolitiFact Texas repeated the story as fact.
Of late, there’s a July 16, 2011, reference to Perry chairing the Gore effort in Timemagazine, and an Aug. 29, 2011, item in The New Yorker magazine saying Perry “became a Republican after shouldering the thankless task of running Al Gore’s 1988 Presidential campaign in Texas.”
This week, U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, likewise bidding for president, premiered an advertisement calling Perry “Al Gore’s Texas cheerleader.”
Cheerleader, maybe.
But interviews with political players in Texas and Tennessee and news articles from 1988 have convinced us that, although Perry endorsed Gore, he was not his Texas chairman.
Ray Sullivan, a spokesman for Perry’s presidential campaign, recently told us by email: “We have no record or recollection of any leadership position” for Perry in Gore’s 1988 campaign.
Asked why Perry did not say as much when a 1998 opponent repeatedly lofted such claims, Sullivan replied: “We did not (have) access to information about the Gore ’88 campaign organization and therefore 10 years later could not definitively say one way or the other.”
Perry says he voted for Republican George H.W. Bush in November 1988, Sullivan said.
Political journalist R.G. Ratcliffe of Texas, who also reports for the Austin American-Statesman, recently declared in a blog post that Perry did not chair the Gore campaign in Texas. That prompted us to take a closer look at the Perry-Gore connection.
Austin consultant George Shipley, who advised Gore’s 1988 campaign, told us in an interview that Perry “made, to my knowledge, one, possibly two press tours, but he was not what I would call that active in the campaign.”
Sherman lawyer Bob Slagle, who supported Gore while chairing the state’s Democratic Party, told us in an interview that Perry “may have been chairman for some area around Haskell County,” Perry’s home county, but he was no more than that.
Similarly, two staff members in Gore’s 1988 effort said Perry was not its Texas chief.
Tennessee lawyer Tom Jurkovich, Gore’s Texas director, told us by email that “we may have named (Perry) to a ‘steering committee’ or as one of several campaign ‘co-chairs,’ typically honorific titles with no real role … (Perry) wasn’t highly involved in the campaign, however, and had zero operational responsibility.”
Mike Kopp of Nashville, who did press outreach for Gore, was more emphatic, saying in an interview: “We didn’t have a chairman in Texas; we didn’t have co-chairs,” either. “We weren’t that organized; we didn’t have that strong a ground game.”
Perry, who switched to the Republican Party in 1989 before winning his first statewide office in 1990, has since said he realized around that time that Gore was not his man. Still, he did not— could not—deny he’d come aboard with 27 fellow Texas House Democrats who endorsed Gore at a Jan. 5, 1988, Texas Capitol press conference.
Perry and the other legislators saw Gore as the best conservative Democrat in a field that included Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis, Missouri U.S. Rep. Richard Gephardt and the Rev. Jesse Jackson.
A Jan. 7, 1988, news article in the Abilene Reporter-News quotes Dusty Garison, Perry’s district aide, saying: “Rick thinks it’s important that conservative Texans who have traditionally voted in the Democratic Party not vote in the Republican Party simply because they want to vote for a conservative presidential candidate.” Gore, Garison said, appears to be a candidate who can bring the party back to “mainstream America.”
But Gore’s candidacy faded after he fared poorly in Southern primaries. He wound up third in the March 1988 Texas primary, trailing Dukakis and Jackson.
Garison recently told us in an interview he doesn’t remember Perry having an official position in Gore’s campaign.
Perry’s “chairmanship” appears to have originated as a campaign attack that stuck after it was seemingly confirmed by Perry himself. Sprinkle in Nexis fever—the tendency of journalists to echo news clips they find using the Nexis database—and the legend abides.
A review of news articles archived by the Legislative Reference Library shows that Democrat John Sharp made the charge about Perry’s leadership role in the Gore campaign when Sharp faced Perry in the 1998 race for lieutenant governor.
In March 1998, Perry’s camp pressed Sharp to say whom he’d support in that year’s governor’s race between Gov. George W. Bush and Democrat Garry Mauro. Sullivan was quoted in a March 15, 1998, Dallas Morning News article as saying that while Perry would back Bush, Sharp had “supported Mike Dukakis in 1988, Bill Clinton in 1992, (Democratic Gov.) Ann Richards in 1994 and was preparing to run against Gov. Bush in 1997. In 1998, will John Sharp continue his long opposition to the Bush family in Texas or change his position for political gain?”
“Texans deserve a straight and honest answer,” Sullivan said.
The newspaper reported Sharp’s campaign then claiming that Perry served as a state vice chairman for Gore’s 1988 presidential campaign in the state. In an April 1998 debate with Perry, Sharp charged Perry with being Gore’s “co-campaign manager,” the Fort Worth Star-Telegram then reported.
In a Sept. 15, 1998, Dallas Morning News article, Sharp is quoted making the “co-chairman” claim again. Perry acknowledged that, the story says, but said there was a “push to get a conservative Southerner” elected president.
“Going through that was part of what started me through the process of changing parties in 1989,” he told the newspaper. “I came to my senses.”
It was Perry’s September 1998 acknowledgment that fed our conclusion in a January 2010 fact check that there was some truth to Republican gubernatorial candidate Debra Medina’s claim that Perry had been Gore’s “campaign manager.” We again leaned on the 1998 article in rating Mostly True a similar claim by Rep. Ron Paul.
Sharp now acknowledges he was making a charge he could not prove.
Sharp, who lost a second bid for lieutenant governor in 2002, later helped devise a business tax overhaul at Perry’s behest. He’s poised to become chancellor of the Texas A&M University System.
He recently agreed Perry wasn’t chairman of Gore’s 1988 Texas campaign. When reminded that he said things otherwise on the hustings, Sharp said: “Never could prove it.”
We couldn’t prove it either. We failed to find campaign-related documents potentially listing titles, if any, given to the Texas legislators who came out for Gore.
Interviews suggest campaign leadership titles may have been casually shared.
Hugo Berlanga, a former legislator who was then speaker pro tempore of the Texas House, said in an interview that the members committing to Gore, who was then a U.S. senator, were going to be his Texas co-chairs. “The bottom line, whether he was a coordinator or co chair, (Perry) was involved,” Berlanga said.
Bobby Aikin, also among legislators then for Gore, said in an interview: “I think each one of us claimed to be a co-chair or coordinator or some-such like that.”
So, say so long to the “Chairman Perry” legend?
Sure, barring contradictory evidence.
Finally, we’re re-rating our fact checks that echoed the chairman description.
Story 1: Hillary Clinton Should Be Indicted Not Nominated! — Bribery In The Form of Charitable Contributions For State Department Inaction or Action — They Have No Shame — American People Do Not Trust Her or Bill — Hillary Must Win or Face A Possible Prison Sentence — Videos
Hillary Clinton Exchanged Favors to Sweden for $26 Million Donation • 5/28/15 •Donation
May 28th, 2015 • Peter Schweizer explains how 26 million dollars in donations from Sweden to the Clinton’s immediately resulted in favorable actions by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on behalf of telecom giant Ericsson and other Swedish companies.
Bill and Hillary Clinton: Merchants of Power | True News
• CNN • Clinton Foundation Scandals Affecting Hillary’s Prospects • 5/31/15 •
Mitt Romney on Clinton foundation uranium payments: “It looks like bribery”
Clinton Fdn raised $26 mn in Sweden as gov’t lobbied Hillary on Iran sanctions – report
The Clinton Foundation raised $26 million in Sweden while the Scandinavian country’s government was lobbying US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to forgo sanctions that threatened business dealings with Iran, according to the Washington Times.
The Clinton Foundation’s Swedish organization was called the “William J. Clinton Foundation Insamlingsstiftelse” and had never been cleared with State Department ethics officials, according to the Times.
When Hillary Clinton became Secretary of State in 2009, she agreed to implement a transparent review system of her husband’s fundraising and speaking engagements; one which would scrutinize them for potential ties to foreign nations dealing with the US government. However, the Times reported that some activities were not known to the State Department.
The foundation’s Swedish division escaped the notice of regulators because its incorporation papers were filed in Stockholm. Additionally, the identities of its donors were included in disclosure reports of the US-based charity, making it difficult to tell how the two separate entities differed.
The Swedish fundraising arm was set up at the same time the Swedish government was worrying about new penalties and sanctions being levied against Iran over its nuclear program, the Times stated. State Department cables released by Wikileaks show that many Swedish companies – including Volvo, Ericsson and ABB – were against tighter financial sanctions.
“Sweden does not support implementing tighter financial sanctions on Iran” and believes “more stringent financial standards could hurt Swedish exports,” reads one cable sent to the State Department.
At the time, Iran was Sweden’s second-largest export market in the Middle East after Saudi Arabia, according the Times. Ericsson was Iran’s second-largest cellular provider.
Ericsson itself didn’t make any contributions to the Swedish Clinton Foundation group, but it did pay the former president $750,000 for a speech in Hong Kong in November 2011, just weeks after Secretary of State Hillary Clinton released the first sanctions list for Iran that excluded Ericsson and Volvo.
The Clinton Foundation told the Times the Swedish branch of her foundation was established in 2011 to collect donations from lotteries in Sweden and take advantage of changes in Swedish law that allowed some of the country’s lotteries to send money abroad. In this case, the Clinton Foundation received cash for causes such as fighting climate change, AIDS in Africa and cholera in Haiti.
“The Clinton Foundation is a philanthropy, period. We’ve voluntarily disclosed our more than 300,000 donors on our website, including those from Sweden,”said Clinton Foundation spokesman Craig Minassian to the newspaper.
Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential declined to comment on the matter.
Why candidates O’Malley and Sanders will make it a race
It should be noted that Martin O’Malley, the former governor of Maryland, got off the first sledgehammer line of the 2016 Democratic primary campaign when he announced his can-didacy on May 30: “Recently the CEO of Goldman Sachs”—the huge investment bank—”let his employees know that he’d be just fine with either Bush or Clinton.” And here O’Malley paused for effect. “I bet he would!” He went on, as a ripple of laughter and cheers swept the crowd, “Well, I’ve got news for the bullies of Wall Street. The presidency of the United States is not a crown to be passed back and forth, by you, between two royal families.”
The zinger captured the current 2016 campaign zeitgeist on several levels. There is a yeasty popu-lism rising in both parties. Among the Democrats, it’s anti-Big Business; for the Republicans, it is anti-Big Government (and labor). There is also a rising discomfort with the aforementioned royalist candidates, Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton. Bush’s relatively moderate conservatism separates him from the pack temperamentally, but he is hardly the front runner at this point. No one is. Clinton is very much the presumptive Democrat, but not a very dynamic or compelling one. Indeed, the entry of O’Malley and Vermont’s Bernie Sanders into the race during the last week of May produced something of an energy jolt among Democrats, who have a preternatural need for a horse race, even when the horses are lame, and a long-festering desire for an ideological fight between left and center.
It should come as no surprise that Sanders seems to be catching fire among the leftish faithful, drawing big crowds and scoring double digits in an Iowa poll. He is a recognizable Democratic type–the prophet scorned, gushing rumpled authenticity. Usually, this phenomenon occurs when Democrats find themselves enmeshed in a foolish war: Eugene McCarthy in 1968, George McGovern in 1972, Howard Dean in 2004. Sanders’ distinction is that he is an economic Jeremiah, pitchforking the depredations of Wall Street. This is fertile turf. It is a fight that has been coming since moderate Democrats began courting Wall Street donors in the mid-1980s. Bill and Hillary Clinton’s wanton sloshing about in the plutocratic pigpen of their foundation makes it a particularly fat target this time. Sanders flies commercial.
But the populist case against the Clinton-Obama economic policies has real substance as well. It is no coincidence that the fundamental distortion of the American economy, with the deck stacked to benefit the financial sector, also dates back 30 years, when Democratic Congresses began to slip pro-bank provisions into the tax code, reaching a peak during the Clinton Administration with the demolition of the wall between commercial and investment banking and the flagrant refusal to regulate exotic derivative financial instruments—which, in turn, led to the Great Recession.
Both Sanders and O’Malley would take specific action against the Wall Street giants. They would break up the too-big-to-fail banks; they would reinstate the Glass-Steagall rules that used to separate legitimate banking from casino gambling. And if O’Malley got off the best zinger of the early campaign, Sanders has the best policy proposal: a tax on Wall Street transactions, tiny enough to impact only the computer-driven churning that makes the markets more volatile than they should be. He would spend some of the proceeds on a $1 trillion infrastructure-improvement program that would create, Sanders estimates, 13 million jobs—another good idea.
This should be a bright line in the primary, the most important substantive issue facing Hillary Clinton: How would she reform the tax and regulatory codes that unduly favor the financial sector?
I went to an O’Malley house party in Gilford, N.H., on the last day of May and met Johan Anderson, 68, who had been a successful sales executive but is now working two minimum-wage jobs to augment his Social Security. He had been a Republican and a town official in Stamford, Conn., “back in the days when you could be a Republican and a human being”—that is, before the party’s rightward lurch. Now he was engaged in the ancient New Hampshire pursuit of candidate shopping. “I really respect Hillary Clinton,” he said. “She’s obviously very smart and experienced. But I wonder about her leadership abilities. She made a mess of her health care plan [in 1994], and she didn’t organize her last campaign very well [in 2008]. My heart is with Bernie Sanders. I’d love to vote for him, but can he win? O’Malley is young [52] and brings a real freshness and energy to the race.”
I’m not sure how many people like Anderson are out there: perhaps enough to make Clinton a better candidate, perhaps enough to give her a scare. But there will definitely be a Democratic primary.
Story 1: National Security Agency Is Still Massively Collecting All Your Communications — The USA Freedom Act Is At Best A Baby Step Towards Restoring Your Fourth Amendment Constitutional Rights — Fire Your Representatives For Betraying Their Oath Of Office — NSA Turnkey Tyranny Totalitarian Targeting of American People — Videos
USA Freedom Act passed by Senate and signed by President Obama, limiting NSA surveillance
Freedom Act Changes NSA Rules For Data Collection
Senate Passes USA Freedom Act, Stops NSA Phone Data Gathering Special Report 1st Segment
Bill Binney: We Are A Gov’t With A Country
Freedom Act: Edward Snowden speaks out on surveillance reform
Politics Panel: Cowards! The Freedom Act is Passed
William Binney’s Heartfelt Plea to the American People
Operation “Toto” Pulling Back The Curtain: Full NSA Interview
William Binney Tells RT That USA Freedom Act is a Farce
NSA Whistleblower William Binney: The Future of FREEDOM
Bill Binney: ‘21 recommendations on fixing NSA sent to US president last year’
NSA Whistleblower: Everyone in US under virtual surveillance, all info stored, no matter the post
Rand Paul Causes A Vicious Senate Cat Fight Over Patriot Act
Rand Paul’s Freedom Act Filibuster
Senate Approves USA Freedom Act, Obama Signs It, After Amendments Fail
BILL CHAPPELL
The Senate has approved the USA Freedom Act, which will alter the way U.S. agencies conduct surveillance and gather data. A final vote on the bill came late Tuesday afternoon, after amendments to the bill failed.
Update at 9:30 p.m. ET: Obama’s Signature
Following an expedited enrollment process, President Obama signed the bill into law late Tuesday.
Enactment of this legislation will strengthen civil liberty safeguards and provide greater public confidence in these programs,” Obama said in a statement after the vote. “I am gratified that Congress has finally moved forward with this sensible reform legislation.”
Update at 4:30 p.m. ET: The Bill Has Passed
In the final tally of the vote, 67 senators were in favor of the measure and 32 against. The legislation needed a simple majority to pass.
Last November, the Freedom Act failed in the Senate after not receiving enough support to avoid a filibuster. Its critics say the act doesn’t go far enough to curtail surveillance programs that can access huge databases of information about Americans.
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., voted against the measure today, as he did last fall. Also voting against the bill Tuesday was independent Sen. Bernie Sanders, who is seeking the Democratic presidential nomination.
The lead sponsor of the bill in the House, Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., promises it will “rein in the dragnet collection of data” by the NSA and others, and “increase transparency of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.”
Calling today’s passage “a milestone,” ACLU Deputy Legal Director Jameel Jaffer says, “This is the most important surveillance reform bill since 1978, and its passage is an indication that Americans are no longer willing to give the intelligence agencies a blank check.”
Our original post continues:
The vote comes two days after controversial provisions of the Patriot Act expired because the Senate was unable to “overcome parliamentary maneuvers by Sen. Rand Paul,” as Eyder reported Sunday night, “and let three controversial provisions of the Patriot Act expire at midnight.”
The House of Representatives approved the Freedom Act on May 13. The legislation would remain in effect until Dec. 15, 2019.
“We worked for two years across the aisle and across the Capitol,” said Sen. Patrick Leahy, a champion of the bill. He said it would bring much-needed reform to America’s intelligence-gathering.
Leahy and his chief ally on the bill, Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, spent their Tuesday in the Senate fighting against amendments to the USA Freedom Act that were put forth — and defeated.
Tuesday’s vote on the Freedom Act comes less than a month after a federal appeals court ruled that the National Security Agency’s practice of collecting bulk data about Americans’ phone calls violates the Constitution.
Before the vote, a displeased Majority Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell criticized the policies of President Obama and said that the Freedom Act weakens America’s ability to protect itself. He also cited an AP article that called the turn of events in the surveillance and spying field as “a victory for Edward Snowden,” the former NSA contractor who released secret information about U.S. spying in June of 2013 (Snowden discussed the Patriot Act Tuesday).
After McConnell spoke, Minority Leader Sen. Harry Reid responded by saying that if McConnell is worried about making America look weaker, “he should look in the mirror.”
Reid accused the majority leader of trying to deploy distractions from the real issues and said that McConnell had also implicitly criticized the House of Representatives.
“I don’t think any of us,” Reid said, “need a lecture on why we’re less secure today.”
With or Without the Patriot Act, Here’s How the NSA Can Still Spy on Americans
June 1, 2015,Jason M. Breslow
While it may only be temporary, the National Security Agency on Monday lost its authority to collect Americans’ phone records in bulk after the Senate failed to extend provisions of the Patriot Act authorizing the controversial domestic surveillance program.
For now, the stall in the Senate means the NSA can’t collect any newly created telephone records. Under the now-lapsed Section 215 of the Patriot Act, the NSA gathered metadata such as who called whom, the time the call was placed and how long the conversation lasted.
Also lapsed are provisions of the law that allowed for wiretap orders on “lone wolf” terrorism suspects; that permitted roving wiretaps that follow suspects from device to device as they change phones; and that compelled businesses to turn over records deemed relevant to a national security investigation.
Under an entirely separate law, the 2008 FISA Amendments Act, the government still has the authority to access the communications of users of popular Internet sites such as Facebook, Google, Microsoft and Yahoo. Section 702 of the law, which does not expire until 2017, gives the government the ability to collect the content of an Internet user’s actual communications — not just metadata.
The law is geared towards non-citizens outside of the U.S., but as privacy advocates argue, it is inevitable that the communications of U.S. citizens and those of non-citizens lawfully living in the U.S. are swept up by the program.
“The phone records program under Section 215 is really just one piece of a much larger puzzle,” said Stephen Vladeck, a professor of law at the American University Washington College of Law. “They’re targeted at non-citizens but the way the technology works there is just no way for the vacuum cleaner to distinguish between the particles of dirt.”
An even older and more obscure Regan-era law, Executive Order No. 12333, provides U.S. intelligence with nearly identical surveillance capabilities to intercept overseas communications, Vladeck said, with the same implications for privacy.
“The way the government is intercepting communications under these authorities,” said Vladeck, referring to Section 702 and Executive Order 123333, “it cannot tell at the point of collection whether the actual sender or recipient is or is not a U.S. citizen.”
Also unaffected by the sunset of Section 215 is the use of National Security Letters, which since 9/11 have helped to dramatically expand the government’s ability to collect information about Americans directly from phone companies and Internet providers. Any FBI office can issue one, without a court’s review and with a gag order. In the past 10 years, more than 300,000 National Security Letters have been issued, according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and until 2013, no major Internet or phone company is known to have questioned the constitutionality of one.
Meanwhile, it’s not clear that all surveillance conducted under the Patriot Act has officially come to a close. As The New York Times noted, all three aspects of the law that expired Monday “contained a so-called grandfather clause that permits their authority to continue indefinitely for any investigation that had begun before June 1.”
Of course, by the end of the week, that may not matter. After having failed to extend the expiring Patriot Act provisions on Sunday, the Senate appears poised to pass a House bill, the USA Freedom Act, that would restore the lapsed Patriot Act powers into law. The one critical difference in the new law is that bulk phone records would stay in the hands of phone companies, rather than with the government.
In this two-part, Peabody Award-winning series, FRONTLINE explores how the U.S. government came to monitor and collect the communications of millions of people around the world — and here at home — and the lengths to which officials tried hide the massive surveillance from the public.
Uniting and Strengthening America by Fulfilling Rights and Ending Eavesdropping, Dragnet-Collection, and Online Monitoring Act
Full title
To reform the authorities of the Federal Government to require the production of certain business records, conduct electronic surveillance, use pen registers and trap and trace devices, and use other forms of information gathering for foreign intelligence, counterterrorism, and criminal purposes, and for other purposes.
Acronym
USA Freedom Act, a backronym for “Uniting and Strengthening America by FulfillingRights and Ending Eavesdropping,Dragnet-collection and Online Monitoring Act“
The USA Freedom Act is a law which was originally introduced in both houses of the U.S. Congress on October 29, 2013. Following the expiration of several provisions of the Patriot Act, the act was passed on June 2, 2015.[3][4] The title of the act is a ten-letter backronym (USA FREEDOM) that stands for “Uniting and Strengthening America by Fulfilling Rights and Ending Eavesdropping, Dragnet-collection and OnlineMonitoring Act.”
When the bill was re-introduced in the 114th Congress (2015-2016), it was described by the bill sponsors as “a balanced approach”[5] while being questioned for extending the Patriot Act through the end of 2019.[6]Supporters of the bill said that the House Intelligence Committee and House leadership[7] would insist on reauthorizing all Patriot Act powers except bulk collection under Section 215 of the Patriot Act[8]. Critics assert that mass surveillance of the content of Americans’ communication will continue under Section 702 of FISA which does not expire until 2017[9][10] and Executive Order 12333[9][11] due to the “unstoppable surveillance-industrial complex”[12] despite the fact that a bipartisan majority of the House had previously voted to close backdoor mass surveillance.[7]
Purpose
According to supporters of the USA Freedom Act, the USA Freedom Act[13][full citation needed] was meant to end the bulk collection of Americans’ metadata by the NSA, end the secret laws created by the FISA court, and introduce a “Special Advocate” to represent public and privacy matters.[14][15][16] However, the USA Freedom Act does allow the bulk collection of Americans’ metadata by phone companies, which is then accessible by the NSA; it also does not address other laws which have purportedly challenged Americans’Fourth Amendment rights.[17] Other proposed changes included limits to programs like PRISM, which retains Americans’ Internet data,[18] and greater transparency by allowing companies such as Google andFacebook to disclose information about government requests for information.[19]
The bill comprised several titles: FISA business records reforms, FISA pen register and trap and trace device reforms, FISA acquisitions targeting persons outside the United States reforms, Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court reforms, Office of the Special Advocate, National Security Letter reforms, FISA and National Security Letter transparency reforms, and Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board subpoena authority.[27]
Purpose
Representative Jim Sensenbrenner, who introduced the bill, stated that its purpose was:
To rein in the dragnet collection of data by the National Security Agency (NSA) and other government agencies, increase transparency of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), provide businesses the ability to release information regarding FISA requests, and create an independent constitutional advocate to argue cases before the FISC.[14][28]
According to the bill’s sponsors, their legislation would have amended Section 215 of the Patriot Act to ensure that any phone records obtained by the government were essential in an investigation that involved terrorism or espionage, thereby ending bulk collection,[8] while preserving “the intelligence community’s ability to gather information in a more focused way.”[29]
Background
Many members of Congress believed that in the wake of the Snowden disclosures, restoration of public trust would require legislative changes.[30] More than 20 bills have been written since the disclosures began with the goal of clarifying government surveillance powers.[18]
Sensenbrenner, who introduced the USA PATRIOT Act (H.R. 3162) in 2001 following the September 11 terrorist attacks to give more power to US intelligence agencies, and who has described himself as “author of the Patriot Act,”[31] declared that it was time to put the NSA’s “metadata program out of business.” With its bulk collection of Americans’ phone data, Sensenbrenner asserted that the intelligence community “misused those powers,” had gone “far beyond” the original intent of the legislation, and had “overstepped its authority.”[30][32]
An opinion piece by Leahy and Sensenbrenner, published in Politico, described the impetus for proposed changes,[33]saying:
The intelligence community has failed to justify its expansive use of [the FISA and Patriot Act] laws. It is simply not accurate to say that the bulk collection of phone records has prevented dozens of terrorist plots. The most senior NSA officials have acknowledged as much in congressional testimony. We also know that the FISA court has admonished the government for making a series of substantial misrepresentations to the court regarding these programs. As a result, the intelligence community now faces a trust deficit with the American public that compromises its ability to do its job. It is not enough to just make minor tweaks around the edges. It is time for real, substantive reform.[29]
Markup in House Judiciary Committee
In May 2014, the U.S. House Judiciary Committee posted a “Manager’s Amendment” on its website. Title VII of the Amendment read “Section 102(b)(1) of the USA Patriot Improvement and Reauthorization Act of 2005 (50 U.S.C. 1805 note) is amended by striking “June 1, 2015” and inserting “December 31, 2017,” extending the controversial USA PATRIOT Act through the end of 2017.[34] The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) has criticized the Patriot Act as unconstitutional, especially when “the private communications of law-abiding American citizens might be intercepted incidentally”.[35] James Dempsey, of the CDT, believes that the Patriot Act unnecessarily overlooks the importance of notice under the Fourth Amendment and under a Title III wiretap,[36] while the American Library Associationbecame so concerned that they formed a resolution condemning the USA PATRIOT Act, and which urged members to defend free speech and protect patrons’ privacy against the Act.[37]
The Guardian wrote “civil libertarians on the Judiciary Committee had to compromise in order to gain support for the act. Significantly, the government will still be able to collect phone data on Americans, pending a judge’s individualized order based on ‘reasonable articulable suspicion‘ – a standard preferred by the NSA – of wrongdoing, and can collect call records two degrees or ‘hops’ of separation from the individual suspected.”[23] Kara Brandeisky of ProPublica said, “some worry that the bill does not unequivocally ban bulk collection of American records. Again, a lot depends on how the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court interprets the statute.”[38]
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) stated it remained “concerned that this bill omits important transparency provisions found in the (original 2013) USA FREEDOM Act, which are necessary to shed light on surveillance abuses”. In addition, the EFF said it believed “this bill should do more to address mass surveillance under Section 702 of Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Amendments Act, a section of law used to collect the communications of users worldwide.”[40]The Open Technology Institute commented “several other key reforms—such as provisions allowing Internet and phone companies to publish more information about the demands they receive, which OTI and a coalition of companies and organizations have been pressing for since last summer—have been removed, while the bill also provides for a new type of court order that the President has requested, allowing for continuous collection by the government of specified telephone records.”[41]
Despite the criticism from civil liberties groups, Mike Rogers, a defender of the NSA‘s surveillance practices and the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, praised the amendments. Rogers, who had his own bill which would codify the NSA’s surveillance practices in to law, called the proposed amendments a “huge improvement.” Foreign Policy wrote “any compromise to the Judiciary bill risks an insurrection from civil libertarians in Congress. Michigan Republican Justin Amashled such a revolt last year when he offered an NSA amendment to a defense appropriations bill that would have stripped funding for the NSA’s collection program.” “Just a weakened bill or worse than status quo? I’ll find out,” Representative Amash said.[42]
After the marked up bill passed the House Judiciary Committee USA Freedom Act co-author and Senate Committee on the Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahycommented that he “remain concerned that the legislation approved today does not include some of the important reforms related to national security letters, a strong special advocate at the FISA Court, and greater transparency. I will continue to push for those reforms when the Senate Judiciary Committee considers the USA Freedom Act this summer.”[25]
Passage in House of Representatives
The House of Representatives passed on May 22, 2014 the USA Freedom act by 303 votes to 121.[43] Because the House version was weakened by lawmakers loyal to the intelligence establishment it lost support of important House Judiciary members like Republicans Darrell Issa, Ted Poe and Raul Labrador and Democrat Zoe Lofgren who previously voted for the act.[44] “The result is a bill that will actually not end bulk collection, regrettably,” said Rep. Zoe Lofgren who voted against the bill.[45] The act would shift responsibility for retaining telephonic metadata from the government to telephone companies. Providers like AT&T and Verizon would be required to maintain the records and let the NSA search them in terrorism investigations when the agency obtains a judicial order or in certain emergency situations.[46] The USA Freedom Act demands that the NSA get approval for a search from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court before demanding that the telecoms hand over metadata. However, no “probable-cause” Fourth Amendment standard is required to access the database[45] While an allowable search under the original USA Freedom Act was defined as “a term used to uniquely describe a person, entity, or account”, but under the House version a database search inquiry is now allowed if it is “a discrete term, such as a term specifically identifying a person, entity, account, address, or device.”[45] Provisions that were dropped from the bill included requirements to estimate the number of Americans whose records were captured under the program, and the creation of a public advocate to challenge the government’s legal arguments before the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.[47][48]
The passed House version[49] was criticised by U.S. senators, tech firms like Google, Apple, Microsoft, Facebook and Twitter, as well as civil liberties groups.[44][45][46][47][50] Senator Sen. Patrick Leahy, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee and lead Democratic author of the Freedom Act, criticized the House version by saying in a statement: “Today’s action in the House continues the bipartisan effort to restore Americans’ civil liberties. But I was disappointed that the legislation passed today does not include some of the meaningful reforms contained in the original USA Freedom Act. I will continue to push for these important reforms when the Senate judiciary committee considers the USA Freedom Act next month.”[50] And Senator Ron Wyden stated he was “gravely concerned that the changes that have been made to the House version of this bill have watered it down so far that it fails to protect Americans from suspicionless mass surveillance.”[50]Major U.S. tech firms like Google, Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, and Twitter joined together in the Reform Government Surveillance coalition which called the House version a move in the wrong direction. The Reform Government Surveillance released a statement on June 5, stating: “The latest draft opens up an unacceptable loophole that could enable the bulk collection of Internet users’ data … While it makes important progress, we cannot support this bill as currently drafted and urge Congress to close this loophole to ensure meaningful reform.”[51] Mark Jaycox, a legislative analyst with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, said: “The bill is littered with loopholes. The problem right now, especially after multiple revisions, is that it doesn’t effectively end mass surveillance.”[44][44] Zeke Johnson, director ofAmnesty International USA’s security and human rights program, accusing the House for failing to deliver serious surveillance reform said: “People inside and outside the U.S. would remain at risk of dragnet surveillance. The Senate should pass much stronger reforms ensuring greater transparency, robust judicial review, equal rights for non-U.S. persons, and a clear, unambiguous ban on mass spying. President Obama need not wait. He can and should implement such safeguards today.” The White House however endorsed the bill. “The Administration strongly supports House passage of H.R. 3361, the USA Freedom Act. … The Administration applauds and appreciates the strong bipartisan effort that led to the formulation of this bill, which heeds the President’s call on this important issue,” the White House said in a statement.[51] “The bill ensures our intelligence and law enforcement professionals have the authorities they need to protect the Nation, while further ensuring that individuals’ privacy is appropriately protected when these authorities are employed. Among other provisions, the bill prohibits bulk collection through the use of Section 215, FISA pen registers, and National Security Letters.”[46][52]
Civil rights groups and scholars said the new language allowing the NSA to search meta data handed over from telephone companies was vague and perhaps would allow the NSA to ensnare the metadata of broad swaths of innocent people in violation of their constitutional rights. “In particular, while the previous bill would have required any request for records to be tied to a clearly defined set of ‘specific selection terms,’ the bill that just passed leaves the definition of ‘specific selection terms’ open. This could allow for an overly broad and creative interpretation, which is something we’ve certainly seen from the executive branch and the FISA Court before,” said Elizabeth Goitein, a co-director of the Brennan Center’s Liberty and National Security Program.[45] “The new definition is incredibly more expansive than previous definitions … The new version not only adds the undefined words “address” and “device,” but makes the list of potential selection terms open-ended by using the term “such as.” Congress has been clear that it wishes to end bulk collection, but given the government’s history of twisted legal interpretations, this language can’t be relied on to protect our freedoms,” said the Electronic Frontier Foundation in a press release.[51][53]
Defeat in the Senate
Negotiations among intelligence agencies, the White House, lawmakers and their aides, and privacy advocates in the summer of 2014 led to a modified bill (S. S.2685)[54] in the U.S. Senate. This bill version addressed most privacy concerns regarding the NSA program that collects records of Americans’ phone calls in bulk and other issues.[55]
Under the bill the NSA would no longer collect those phone records. Instead, most of the records would have stayed in the hands of the phone companies, which would not have been required to hold them any longer than they already do for normal business purposes, which in some cases is 18 months. The bill would require the NSA to request specific data from phone companies under specified limits i.e. the NSA would need to show it had reasonable, articulable suspicion that the number it is interested in is tied to a foreign terrorist organization or individual. The proposed legislation would still have allowed analysts to perform so-called contact chaining in which they trace a suspect’s network of acquaintances, but they would been required to use a new kind of court order to swiftly obtain only those records that were linked, up to two layers away, to a suspect — even when held by different phone companies. It would also require the federal surveillance court to appoint a panel of public advocates to advance legal positions in support of privacy and civil liberties, and would expand company reporting to the public on the scope of government requests for customers’ data. This USA Freedom Act version thus gained the support of the Obama Administration, including the director of national intelligence and attorney general, as well as many tech companies including Apple, Google, Microsoft and Yahoo as well as a diverse range of groups, including the National Rifle Association and the American Civil Liberties Union.[26][55]
Following the 2014 Congressional elections, the Senate voted on November 18, 2014, to block further debate of the measure during the 113th United States Congress. Fifty-four Democrats and four Republicans who supported consideration failed to muster the 60 votes required.[56] Senator Patrick Leahy, who drafted the bill, blamed its defeat on what he called fear-mongering by opponents, saying, “Fomenting fear stifles serious debate and constructive solutions.” Senator Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader, argued that the NSA’s bulk collection of Americans’ metadata was a vital tool in the fight against terrorism. “This is the worst possible time to be tying our hands behind our backs,” he said.[26]
114th Congress (2015-2016)
The USA Freedom Act was re-introduced in the House Judiciary Committee and Senate Judiciary Committee in late April 2015 based upon a modified version of the one which failed in the Senate in the 113th Congress.
The 2015 USA Freedom Act[57] version is described by its sponsors as “a balanced approach that would ensure the NSA maintains an ability to obtain the data it needs to detect terrorist plots without infringing on Americans’ right to privacy.”[5] Human rights groups believed the bill’s transparency and court oversight provisions are less robust than would have been required in a previous version of the bill, with more limited reporting requirements and a more narrowly defined role for external court advocates.[58]
The bill received a mixture of reaction, ranging from support from national security and computer trade groups, skepticism or moderate objection from civil liberties groups, to outright opposition from former NSA whistle blowers. The editorial board of the New York Times ran an editorial against the bill which “will be weakened further in the Senate by the majority leader” and advised readers to “get used to the protections of your civil liberties being minimally viable”.[59]
Passage out of House Judiciary Committee
The bill passed out of the House Judiciary Committee on April 30, 2015.[60] The proposed bill would end the NSA’s bulk collection under Section 215 by requiring the government to seek records from companies using a “specific selection term” that identifies a specific person, account or address and “is used to limit . . . the scope” of records sought. The term may not be a phone or Internet company.[5]
Amendments to strengthen the bill were voted down during Committee markup. One would have offered a constitutional advocate and failed by voice vote,[61] while another would have offered protection for whistle blower complaints.[62] Representative Jordan unsuccessfully argued for another amendment with the following dialog, “It’s not a vote to blow up the deal. It’s a vote for the Fourth Amendment. Plain and simple. All the Gentleman says in his amendment is, if you’re going to get information from an American citizen, you need a warrant.”[63] The bill ultimately received 25 votes in support (64%), 12 abstentions (31%), and 2 in opposition (5%).[64]
House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte said “the USA Freedom Act reforms our nation’s intelligence-gathering programs to ensure they operate in a manner that reflects core American values … We urge both the House and Senate to move expeditiously on this legislation so that we rein in government overreach and rebuild trust with the American people”.[65]
Representative Ted Poe was one member to vote against the bill. “Between the Committee vote and the House floor the bill was changed and it now confused what should have been clarified. The version of the USA Freedom Act that passed the House today leaves room for different interpretations, potentially giving NSA the ability to continue to act outside the intent of Congress and the Constitution. I could not support a bill that may allow abuses of the fourth amendment to continue,” he said.[66]
Reaction
National security and trade groups
The Center for National Security supports the USA Freedom Act introduced on April 28, 2015 to end bulk collection of Americans’ telephone metadata under the so-called “section 215” program.[67]
The Software Alliance sponsored the legislation saying “in reforming government surveillance practices, it is critical that legislation strikes the right balance between securing our nation and its citizens and improving privacy protections for the public. The FISA reforms in the USA FREEDOM Act will help restore trust in both the US government and the US technology sector.”[68]
The ITIC said “the USA Freedom Act, H.R. 2048, builds on the foundation laid by the House Judiciary Committee last Congress and the result is a bill that strengthens privacy protections while maintaining the interests of national security.”[69]
Civil liberties advocates
The final USA Freedom Act is perceived as containing several concessions to pro-surveillance legislators meant to facilitate its passage.[6][70] The watered down version of the USA Freedom Act that passed the House of Representatives in 2015 has been widely criticized by civil liberties advocates and its original supporters amongst house members for extending the Patriot Act Mass surveillance programs without meaningful restraints, undermining the original purpose of the bill. [71]
“This bill would make only incremental improvements, and at least one provision-the material-support provision-would represent a significant step backwards,” ACLU deputy legal director Jameel Jaffer said in a statement. “The disclosures of the last two years make clear that we need wholesale reform.” Jaffer wants Congress to let Section 215 sunset completely and wait for a better reform package than endorse something half-baked[72], saying that “unless that bill is strengthened, sunset would be the better course.”[73] The ACLU had previously written of the 2013 version that “although the USA Freedom Act does not fix every problem with the government’s surveillance authorities and programs, it is an important first step and it deserves broad support.”[74][75]
Representative Justin Amash, author of the narrowly defeated Amash Amendment, a proposal that would have de-funded the NSA bulk-collection program, backed the 2013 legislation, but not the final 2015 version[76]. “It’s getting out of control,” he commented. “[Courts are issuing] general warrants without specific cause…and you have one agency that’s essentially having superpowers to pass information onto others”.[32]
According to Deputy Attorney General James Cole, even if the Freedom Act becomes law, the NSA could continue its bulk collection of American’s phone records. He explained that “it’s going to depend on how the [FISA] court interprets any number of the provisions” contained within the legislation.[8]Jennifer Granick, Director of Civil Liberties at Stanford Law School, stated:
The Administration and the intelligence community believe they can do whatever they want, regardless of the laws Congress passes, so long they can convince one of the judges appointed to the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) to agree. This isn’t the rule of law. This is a coup d’etat.[8]
International human rights groups remain somewhat skeptical of specific provisions of the bill. For example, Human Rights Watch expressed its concern that the “bill would do little to increase protections for the right to privacy for people outside the United States, a key problem that plagues U.S. surveillance activities. Nor would the bill address mass surveillance or bulk collection practices that may be occurring under other laws or regulations, such as Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act or Executive Order 12333. These practices affect many more people and include the collection of the actual content of internet communications and phone calls, not just metadata”.[77] Zeke Johnson, Director of Amnesty International‘s Security and Human Rights Program, agreed that “any proposal that fails to ban mass surveillance, end blanket secrecy, or stop discrimination against people outside the U.S. will be a false fix”.[11]
Members of the anti-surveillance Civil Liberties Coalition are dismissing the USA Freedom Act in support of the Surveillance State Repeal Act, a far more comprehensive piece of legislation in the House that completely repeals the Patriot Act, as well as 2008’s FISA Amendments Act.[72] A group of 60 organizations called Congress to not stop at ending the NSA’s bulk collection of telephone information under the USA PATRIOT Act, but to also end the FISA Amendments Act and Executive Order 12333 mass surveillance programs and restore accountability for bad actors in the Intelligence Community.[9]
The Center for Democracy and Technology endorses the bill, but it points out that it doesn’t limit data retention for information collected on people who turn out to have no connection to a suspect or target, and emphasizes that this is not an omnibus solution.[72] The group argued the bill had to be supported because “the Senate will weaken the USA FREEDOM Act right before the sunset deadline, forcing the House to accept a weaker bill”.[78]
“This bill purports to ban certain acts under narrow authorities, but it doesn’t ban those behaviors outright. Nor does it increase meaningful oversight of the NSA,” said David Segal, executive director of Demand Progress, who wants Section 215 to expire. The group said “a vote for a bill that does not end mass surveillance is a vote in support of mass surveillance.”[79]
“Companies are provided monetary incentive to spy and share that information with the government and blanket liability once they do under USA Freedom — even if that breaks that law,” said Sascha Meinrath, the director of X-lab, an independent tech policy institute previously associated with New America. “Once companies receive that, they’ll have almost no reason to weigh in on meaningful surveillance reform.”[79] “In a way, it’s kind of like PRISM,” the program revealed by Snowden where major tech companies turned over the content of online communications to the NSA, said longtime independent surveillance researcher Marcy Wheeler. “It pushes things to providers: Everyone gets immunity, but it doesn’t add to the privacy.”[79]
“We think of the USA Freedom Act as yesterday’s news,” said Shahid Buttar of the Bill of Rights Defense Committee, “and we’re interested in forcing the [intelligence] agencies into a future where they comply with constitutional limits.” “If passed, it’ll be the only step,” predicted Patrick Eddington of the Cato Institute, a former House staffer, since the next expiration date for a major piece of surveillance legislation is 31 December 2017.[80]
Following the law’s passage on June 2, 2015, ACLU deputy legal director Jameel Jaffer claimed that “This is the most important surveillance reform bill since 1978, and its passage is an indication that Americans are no longer willing to give the intelligence agencies a blank check.”[81]
Former whistleblowers
Former NSA crypto-mathematician William Binney, who worked three decades at the agency, says the Freedom Act – widely seen as having the best chance of any surveillance-limiting proposal – “won’t do anything” if it passes. “Why do you think NSA [and other intelligence agencies] support it?” he says.[12][12]
Drake, a former NSA senior executive prosecuted unsuccessfully under the Espionage Act before pleading guilty to a misdemeanor in 2011, calls the bill the “Free-dumb Act 2.0,” and says he sees it as a ploy by government officials “to keep the status quo in place.” He also says the fixation on the call record program in public debate is unfortunate, because NSA Internet surveillance is far broader and more invasive. “It’s a shiny, shiny bright spot, [but] there’s a whole lot more being collected,” he says, including a “staggering” amount of American communications. Drake believes support from the Obama administration for the Freedom Act is motivated in part by a desire to hobble lawsuits against the call record program, three of which are pending with appeals courts and may lay the groundwork for a major Supreme Court privacy ruling.[12]
Wiebe, formerly a senior analyst at the NSA, says the anticipated Freedom Act likely will be “more of the same” and is “not going to change anything” in a meaningful way. Like Drake, he has no hope for meaningful reform and doesn’t believe efforts to lobby Congress would work. “We’ve tried,” he says. “It makes no difference.” He believes well-funded government contractors and powerful, “co-opted” lawmakers who lead key committees make up a virtually unstoppable surveillance-industrial complex.[12]
House Passage
The USA Freedom Act passed the U.S. House of Representatives on May 13, 2015.[82] The bill received broad support in the House, with 338 votes for the bill and 88 against it. It was passed without any amendments to the House Judiciary version because the House Rules Committee prohibited consideration of any amendment to the USA Freedom Act, claiming that any changes to the legislation would have weakened its chances of passage.[83] The bill had the support of the White House, Attorney General Eric Holder and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. While civil liberties groups were divided over the support of the bill, lawmakers opposed to the Bill stated it will handicap the NSA and allow terrorist groups to prosper.[84]
Passage in Senate
The USA Freedom Act was not passed by the U.S. Senate on May 22, 2015. By a vote of 57-42, the Senate did not pass the bill that would have required 60 votes to move forward, which means that the NSA must start winding down its domestic mass surveillance program this week. The Senate also rejected, by 54-45, also short of the necessary 60 votes, a two-month extension for the key provision in the Patriot Act that has been used to justify NSA spying, which is set to expire on June 1, 2015.[85][86][87]
However, on May 31, 2015, the Senate voted 77-17 to limit debate on the act. Senate rules will allow it to be passed after the mass surveillance programs have expired.[88] Richard Burr, chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, had three amendments he planned to offer to the bill which were likely to further increase opposition to the bill.[89] While several amendments which would strengthen the bill were not allowed to be considered, three amendments to weaken the bill, considered “poison pills”, were allowed to be considered but ultimately rejected.[90]
The bill ultimately passed the Senate 67-32 on June 2, 2015 and was signed into law.[91] “After a needless delay and inexcusable lapse in important national security authorities, my administration will work expeditiously to ensure our national security professionals again have the full set of vital tools they need to continue protecting the country,” Obama said.[92]
Remember The 20-30 Million American Citizens Searching For A Full Time Permanent Job and The Professional Soldiers Who Made The Ultimate Sacrifice — D-Day June 6, 1944 — Videos
Posted on June 12, 2015. Filed under: American History, Articles, Banking, Blogroll, College, Communications, Documentary, Economics, Education, Employment, Federal Government Budget, Fiscal Policy, Freedom, Heroes, history, Macroeconomics, media, Monetary Policy, People, Philosophy, Politics, Rants, Raves, Strategy, Talk Radio, Tax Policy, Taxation, Taxes, Unemployment, Video, War, Wealth, Weather, Welfare, Wisdom, Writing | Tags: 000, 5 June 2015, America, articles, Audio, BLS, Breaking News, Broadcasting, capitalism, Cartoons, Charity, Citizenship, Clarity, Classical Liberalism, Collectivism, Commentary, Commitment, Communicate, Communication, Concise, Convincing, Courage, Culture, Current Affairs, Current Events, D-Day, D-Day Remembered, economic growth, economic policy, Economics, Education, Employment Level, Evil, Experience, Faith, Family, First, fiscal policy, free enterprise, freedom, freedom of speech, Friends, Give It A Listen, God, Good, Goodwill, Growth, Hope, Individualism, Jobs Report, Knowledge, Labor Participation Rate, liberty, Life, Love, Lovers of Liberty, monetary policy, MPEG3, Near Full Employment, News, Nonfarm payrolls total 280, Operation Overlord & Neptune (D-Day documentary), Opinions, Peace, Photos, Podcasts, Political Philosophy, Politics, prosperity, Radio, Raymond Thomas Pronk, Representative Republic, Republic, Resources, Respect, rule of law, Rule of Men, Show Notes, Talk Radio, The Pronk Pops Show, The Pronk Pops Show 429, Truth, Tyranny, U-3 Unemployment Rate, U.S. Constitution, Ultimate Sacrifice, Unemployment Report, United States of America, Videos, Virtue, War, Wisdom |
The Pronk Pops Show Podcasts
Pronk Pops Show 479 June 5, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 478 June 4, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 477 June 3, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 476 June 2, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 475 June 1, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 474 May 29, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 473 May 28, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 472 May 27, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 471 May 26, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 470 May 22, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 469 May 21, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 468 May 20, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 467 May 19, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 466 May 18, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 465 May 15, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 464 May 14, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 463 May 13, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 462 May 8, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 461 May 7, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 460 May 6, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 459 May 4, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 458 May 1, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 457 April 30, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 456: April 29, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 455: April 28, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 454: April 27, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 453: April 24, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 452: April 23, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 451: April 22, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 450: April 21, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 449: April 20, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 448: April 17, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 447: April 16, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 446: April 15, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 445: April 14, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 444: April 13, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 443: April 9, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 442: April 8, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 441: April 6, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 440: April 2, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 439: April 1, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 438: March 31, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 437: March 30, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 436: March 27, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 435: March 26, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 434: March 25, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 433: March 24, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 432: March 23, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 431: March 20, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 430: March 19, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 429: March 18, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 428: March 17, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 427: March 16, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 426: March 6, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 425: March 4, 2015
Pronk Pops Show 424: March 2, 2015
Story 1: Remember The 20-30 Million American Citizens Searching For A Full Time Permanent Job and The Professional Soldiers Who Made The Ultimate Sacrifice — D-Day June 6, 1944 — Videos
D-Day Remembered
Operation Overlord & Neptune (D-Day documentary)
Normandy-Surviving D-Day(full )HD Documentary
D-Day in Colour (FULL)
Saving Private Ryan opening cemetery scene
Normandy Speech: Ceremony Commemorating the 40th Anniversary of the Normandy Invasion, D-Day 6/6/84
Is Jobs Data Truly Good News About U.S. Economy?
El-Erian: Jobs Report Points to a Healing Labor Market
Rep. Cole on BLS Jobs Report: “Still have underutilization of the labor force”
Rep. Cole: “We have unique fiscal challenges that transcend our predecessors”
Weekly Market Wrap Up – June 5th, 21015
Nonfarm payrolls total 280,000; unemployment rate at 5.5%
Jeff Cox | @JeffCoxCNBCcom
The U.S. economy created 280,000 jobs in May, better than expected and likely confirming hopes that growth is back on track after a slow start to the year.
The headline unemployment rate increased slightly to 5.5 percent as the labor force participation rate ticked higher to 62.9 percent. ( Tweet This ) A separate measure that counts those working part time for economic reasons and the unemployed who have not looked for work in the past month held steady at 10.8 percent.
Wages also showed growth, rising 8 cents an hour, equating to an annualized increase of 2.3 percent.
Economists had been expecting a gain of 225,000 positions and the unemployment rate holding steady at 5.4 percent.
“Today’s report showed the U.S. labor market has tremendous momentum. All those factors that parked a weak jobs number in March were short-term,” said Andrew Chamberlain, chief economist at job search site Glassdoor. “All those factors are looking more like a late-winter sniffle than a lingering illness.”
The jobs numbers are critical in that they will go a long way toward determining policy from the Federal Reserve. The hot jobs report sent U.S. government bond yields surging as the wage increase indicates inflation is pushing toward the Fed’s target. Stock futures also indicated a lower open for Wall Street, though the move in the equity market was far less pronounced than in bonds.
Get the market reaction here
After keeping short-term interest rates near zero for 6½ years, the U.S. central bank is looking for a liftoff point that would be confirmed not only by job creation but also by wage growth, which would indicate inflation is on a positive trajectory.
“I think (the jobs number) puts September more firmly on track” for a rate hike, said Jim Caron, portfolio manager of global fixed income at Morgan Stanley Investment Management. “As of yesterday it was probably closer to a 50-50 bet. Today, I think it’s more in lines of a 75 percent probability. It moves the needle in terms of expectations and gives air cover to the Fed.”
Trader bets on the date for a rate hike pushed it forward this week, with the latest trends showing a 33 percent chance of a September hike (up from 26 percent earlier in the week), a 52 percent chance in October (from 44 percent) and a 70 percent likelihood for December (from 61 percent).
While many market participants expect a rate increase this year, the Fed got a stunning jolt Thursday from the International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde, who took the unprecedented step of advising the Fed to wait until 2016 until the inflation picture is clearer.
“This number effectively flies in the face of what the IMF recommended yesterday that the Fed take a pause,” Caron said.
Service industries led the way for May, adding 63,000 positions, while leisure and hospitality grew by 57,000. Health care increased by 47,000, retail added 31,000 and construction moved higher by 17,000. Mining was a dark spot on the report, contracting by 17,000, bringing the decline to 68,000 in 2015.
The average work week was unchanged at 34.5 hours.
The number of full-time workers grew by 630,000, while the part-time rolls fell by 232,000.
Previous months showed minor changes, with March’s disappointing count getting pushed higher to 119,000 from 85,000 and April edging lower from 223,000 to 221,000.
“Overall, at this stage this evident strength in the labor market probably isn’t enough to persuade the Fed to hike rates by July, but it definitely makes a rate cut by September probable,” said Paul Ashworth, chief U.S. economist at Capital Economics. “Only 24 hours later, the IMF’s suggestion that the Fed should wait until 2016 looks very dated.”
http://www.cnbc.com/id/102736075
Employment Situation Summary
Employment Situation Summary Table A. Household data, seasonally adjusted
Summary table A. Household data, seasonally adjusted
2014
2015
2015
2015
Apr.
2015-
May
2015
Employment status
Civilian noninstitutional population
Civilian labor force
Participation rate
Employed
Employment-population ratio
Unemployed
Unemployment rate
Not in labor force
Unemployment rates
Total, 16 years and over
Adult men (20 years and over)
Adult women (20 years and over)
Teenagers (16 to 19 years)
White
Black or African American
Asian
Hispanic or Latino ethnicity
Total, 25 years and over
Less than a high school diploma
High school graduates, no college
Some college or associate degree
Bachelor’s degree and higher
Reason for unemployment
Job losers and persons who completed temporary jobs
Job leavers
Reentrants
New entrants
Duration of unemployment
Less than 5 weeks
5 to 14 weeks
15 to 26 weeks
27 weeks and over
Employed persons at work part time
Part time for economic reasons
Slack work or business conditions
Could only find part-time work
Part time for noneconomic reasons
Persons not in the labor force (not seasonally adjusted)
Marginally attached to the labor force
Discouraged workers
– Over-the-month changes are not displayed for not seasonally adjusted data.
NOTE: Persons whose ethnicity is identified as Hispanic or Latino may be of any race. Detail for the seasonally adjusted data shown in this table will not necessarily add to totals because of the independent seasonal adjustment of the various series. Updated population controls are introduced annually with the release of January data.
Employment Situation Summary Table B. Establishment data, seasonally adjusted
Summary table B. Establishment data, seasonally adjusted
2014
2015
2015(p)
2015(p)
EMPLOYMENT BY SELECTED INDUSTRY
(Over-the-month change, in thousands)
Total nonfarm
Total private
Goods-producing
Mining and logging
Construction
Manufacturing
Durable goods(1)
Motor vehicles and parts
Nondurable goods
Private service-providing
Wholesale trade
Retail trade
Transportation and warehousing
Utilities
Information
Financial activities
Professional and business services(1)
Temporary help services
Education and health services(1)
Health care and social assistance
Leisure and hospitality
Other services
Government
(3-month average change, in thousands)
Total nonfarm
Total private
WOMEN AND PRODUCTION AND NONSUPERVISORY EMPLOYEES
AS A PERCENT OF ALL EMPLOYEES(2)
Total nonfarm women employees
Total private women employees
Total private production and nonsupervisory employees
HOURS AND EARNINGS
ALL EMPLOYEES
Total private
Average weekly hours
Average hourly earnings
Average weekly earnings
Index of aggregate weekly hours (2007=100)(3)
Over-the-month percent change
Index of aggregate weekly payrolls (2007=100)(4)
Over-the-month percent change
DIFFUSION INDEX
(Over 1-month span)(5)
Total private (263 industries)
Manufacturing (80 industries)
Footnotes
(1) Includes other industries, not shown separately.
(2) Data relate to production employees in mining and logging and manufacturing, construction employees in construction, and nonsupervisory employees in the service-providing industries.
(3) The indexes of aggregate weekly hours are calculated by dividing the current month’s estimates of aggregate hours by the corresponding annual average aggregate hours.
(4) The indexes of aggregate weekly payrolls are calculated by dividing the current month’s estimates of aggregate weekly payrolls by the corresponding annual average aggregate weekly payrolls.
(5) Figures are the percent of industries with employment increasing plus one-half of the industries with unchanged employment, where 50 percent indicates an equal balance between industries with increasing and decreasing employment.
(p) Preliminary
NOTE: Data have been revised to reflect March 2014 benchmark levels and updated seasonal adjustment factors.
The Pronk Pops Show Podcasts Portfolio
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 473-479
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 464-472
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 455-463
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 447-454
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 439-446
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 431-438
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 422-430
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 414-421
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 408-413
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 400-407
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 391-399
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 383-390
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 376-382
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 369-375
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 360-368
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 354-359
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 346-353
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 338-345
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 328-337
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 319-327
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 307-318
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 296-306
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 287-295
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 277-286
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 264-276
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 250-263
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 236-249
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 222-235
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 211-221
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 202-210
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 194-201
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 184-193
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 174-183
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 165-173
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 158-164
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 151-157
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 143-150
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 135-142
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 131-134
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 124-130
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 121-123
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 118-120
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 113 -117
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Show 112
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 108-111
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 106-108
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 104-105
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 101-103
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 98-100
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 94-97
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 93
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 92
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 91
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 88-90
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 84-87
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 79-83
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 74-78
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 71-73
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 68-70
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 65-67
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 62-64
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 58-61
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 55-57
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 52-54
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 49-51
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 45-48
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 41-44
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 38-40
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 34-37
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 30-33
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 27-29
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 17-26
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 16-22
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 10-15
Listen To Pronk Pops Podcast or Download Shows 01-09
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( None so far )