CISPA - For crying out loud, take it down!

Legacy: "Once upon a time there was a bill called SOPA .  Some evil trolls who worked and conducted meetings in a big domed building in Washington DC tried to make a wicked law to allow them to close people’s internet-based businesses and websites whenever they wanted, for the silliest of reasons, much to the delight of the head ogre who lived in a big White House. The people of the land all stood up angrily and complained to fight against the law, and through their efforts, defeated the trolls and the head ogre.  The laws of the internet remained fair, the trolls were duly chastened, the ogre pretended benevolence and the people lived happily ever after, internet freedoms intact….. Well…..until the dragon CISPA reared it’s ugly head."



Meet CISPA, the lovely little law that congress is now trying to pass, which is a nightmare-ish combination of SOPA, PIPA, and ACTA. With this bill, the government will be able to censure not only our internet, to shut down site after site for whatever reason they deem it "a security threat", but they can do the same to our phones. Imagine a government agent following you around night and day, reading every text, listening to every phone call, and watching over your shoulder at every site you visit. THAT'S CISPA. This is a law just waiting to be abused, it's worded so vaguely that ANYTHING could be seen as a "threat". Read some of these uses of CISPA.



CYBER THREAT INTELLIGENCE ~ “information pertaining to protecting a system or network from—(A) efforts to degrade, disrupt, or destroy such system or network; or (B) theft or misappropriation of private or government information, intellectual property, or personally identifiable information.”
SELF-PROTECTED ENTITY ~ “an entity, other than an individual, that provides goods or services for cyber security purposes to itself.”
PROTECTED ENTITY ~ “‘protected entity’ means an entity, other than an individual, that contracts with a cybersecurity provider for goods or services to be used for cybersecurity purposes.”



Also note that “Cybersecurity” is not actually defined in the document.



Look at the words I underlined, can you see how easily those could be abused? If CISPA gets out, anything we hear about the government could very well be censured. They would be able to so easily cover their tracks! Please, make your friends aware, we need to bring down this CISPA.

http://www.infowars.com/cispa-congress-takes-another-run-at-the-internet/

Driver's Ed taught us wrong??

Good news to all those lazy teens that, like me, who tend to ignore that "10 o clock, 2 o clock" rule when no one is looking. Your Ed teacher has taught you wrong! Recent studies have found that that old rule actually now puts you in danger of various injuries from airbag deployment. The new rule is now "9 o clock, 3 o clock". This will place your hands in the safest place on the wheel in the event that the airbag deploys. For me at least, my hands have always preferred this position anyways, and now that she knows about this study, I won't get badgered for it any longer as well! Save driving everyone. :)

2012 Maine Caucus. Ron Paul in the front?

Mitt Romney won the lightly-attended Maine Republican caucuses Saturday, reclaiming the momentum that he lost when Rick Santorum swept three states on Tuesday.

"I thank the voters of Maine for their support," Romney said in a statement. "I'm committed to turning around America. And I'm heartened to have the support of so many good people in this great state."

Romney won 39 percent of the vote, with 2,190 votes. He narrowly edged out the other candidate who seriously contested the Maine caucuses, Ron Paul, who won 36 percent of the vote with 1,996 votes.

There were 972,181 registered voters in Maine as of November 8 of last year, including 269,604 Republicans.
Paul, who is focused on small caucuses states like Maine, is the only candidate in the race who has yet to win a state. Romney and Santorum have now each won four states, while Newt Gingrich has won one.

In remarks following the announcement of Romney's victory, Paul noted that not every caucus had taken place, saying there was one in particular that he expected to win that had yet to occur.

"It's almost like we could call it a tie, but anyway," said Paul.

At the stroke of midnight of February 12, 84 percent of the votes in Maine have been turned in, and the results are being spoken as if printed in stone, even though that 16% still hangs in the balance. In a somewhat rare event, Ron Paul is in second place, a scant 3% behind Romney. While the media states Romney as the winner, there is a heated debate by people that this is a wrong conclusion, and that Ron Paul will either be the winner of Maine, or he will draw with Romney. The remaining counties will be finished by March 30th, but by then Maine will be old news to the media world. 

http://www.2012presidentialelectionnews.com/2012/02/romney-wins-maine-caucus-and-cpac-straw-poll/

2012 Iowa Caucus: Santorum storms forward to meet Romney head on.

“It shatters that one,” Chuck Laudner, a former Iowa GOP leader who backed Santorum, said of the senator’s meteoric rise from single-digit polling in December to a photo finish that saw Romney win by a scant eight-vote margin.

“The Huckabee thing will be quickly forgotten. Years and years from now they’ll be talking about the Santorum surge rather than the Huckaboom,” Laudner noted. “It eclipses that. Huckabee was growing for more than a month and that became a two-way race. Huckabee came back from second place to beat Mitt Romney. Santorum came from dead last. It’s an incredible feat.”

Santorum has risen from the back of the pack of the pack in a memorable sweeping of Iowa,  gaining favor in every small county and dominating the map. While Santorum is backed by 64.8% of Iowa's map, hit's all by the lowest populated counties. Romney, who has only 17.7%  backing on the map, has favor in the largest of counties, and he and Santorum are tied at 35% favor of Iowa. 

http://apgovcb.blogspot.com/2012/01/11-iowa-caucus-2012-results-vote.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/03/map-iowa-caucus-2012-results_n_1182233.html

10-4-11

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/44660296#44660270

The main thing that stuck with me in this report was the unemployment rates of the differently educated fractions of the population. Whilst I have generally had a low opinion about getting a job in this economy, the numbers do make it easier to make a decision on where to go after high-school. According to the charts, people who have graduated high-school have a 9 percent chance of being unemployed, where as people who have graduated collage have 4 percent higher chance of being employed.

Another big subject was about what we need to do to rejuvenate the school systems and cut back on drop-out rates. I highly agree with them that we have a blame and recrimination nation, not a inspiration nation, that we need to inspire kids and teens to get an education, and parents to care enough to help their children learn. I also agree with them that politics are getting in the way. what matters most is helping students want to learn, not teaching them to pass the test. As quoted "It's a will problem, not a skill problem". If these points could make it to where they truly influence schools, we'd see a major change for the better in schools.