Back on 2 April, U.S. Senator Angus King (I-Maine) introduced S. 2207 The Real Time Transparency Act of 2014. The bill, written in response to the the U.S. Supreme Court decision in McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission, which abolished caps on an individual’s total donations to federal candidates, parties and some political committees, Sen. King’s bill would require that all contributions of $1000 or more be filed with the Federal Election Commission within 48-hours of deposit.

In the age of electronic funds transfers and the Internet, there is no possible practical reason why all political contributions should not be posted online in real time. King’s senate bill (and H.R. 4442 below) are good first steps, but 48-hours and $1,000 dollars are artificial limits that have no real meaning in the 21st century.

The goal must be all money, the nano-second the funds become available to the depositor. Full stop.

113th CONGRESS
2d Session
S. 2207

To amend the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 to require all political committees to notify the Federal Election Commission within 48 hours of receiving cumulative contributions of $1,000 or more from any contributor during a calendar year, and for other purposes.

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

April 3, 2014

Mr. King introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Rules and Administration

A BILL

To amend the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 to require all political committees to notify the Federal Election Commission within 48 hours of receiving cumulative contributions of $1,000 or more from any contributor during a calendar year, and for other purposes.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. 48-hour notification required for all political committees receiving cumulative contributions of $1,000 or more during a year from any contributor.

(a) Notification.—Section 304(a)(6)(A) of the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 (2 U.S.C. 434(a)(6)(A)) is amended to read as follows:

“(A)(i) If a political committee receives an aggregate amount of contributions equal to or greater than $1,000 from any contributor during a calendar year, the committee shall submit a notification to the Commission containing the name of the committee (and, in the case of an authorized committee of a candidate, the name of the candidate and the office sought by the candidate), the identification of the contributor, and the date of receipt and amount of the contributions involved.

“(ii) If, at any time after a political committee is required to submit a notification under this subparagraph with respect to a contributor during a calendar year, the political committee receives additional contributions from that contributor during that year, the committee shall submit an additional notification under clause (i) with respect to such contributor each time the aggregate amount of the additional contributions received from the contributor during the year equals or exceeds $1,000 (excluding the amount of any contribution for which information is required to be included in a previous notification under this subparagraph).

“(iii) The political committee shall submit the notification required under this subparagraph with respect to a contributor—

“(I) in the case of a notification described in clause (i), not later than 48 hours after the date on which the aggregate amount of contributions received from the contributor during the calendar year first equals or exceeds $1,000; or

“(II) in the case of an additional notification described in clause (ii), not later than 48 hours after the date on which the aggregate amount of contributions received from the contributor during the calendar year for which information was not already included in a notification under this subparagraph first equals or exceeds $1,000.

“(iv) For purposes of this subparagraph, any amount transferred by a joint fundraising committee which is established by an authorized committee of a candidate to any other authorized committee of that candidate shall be treated as a contribution by the joint fundraising committee to such authorized committee.”.

(b) Effective Date.—The amendment made by subsection (a) shall apply with respect to contributions received by a political committee under the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 during 2014 or any succeeding year, except that nothing in such amendment may be construed to require a political committee which does not receive contributions during the portion of 2014 which occurs after the date of the enactment of this Act to meet the requirements of section 304(a)(6)(A) of the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971, as amended by subsection (a).

SEC. 2. Filing by Senate candidates with Federal Election Commission.

(a) Mandatory Filing with FEC.—Section 302(g) of the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 (2 U.S.C. 432(g)) is amended to read as follows:

“(g) Filing With the Commission.—All designations, statements, and reports required to be filed under this Act shall be filed with the Commission.”.

(b) Effective Date.—The amendment made by subsection (a) shall apply with respect to materials filed on or after the date of the enactment of this Act.

As near as I can tell, S. 2207 (along with the bill’s House twin H.R. 4397 has languished in committee since 3 April. A second House bill—H.R. 4442—was introduced and referred to committee on 9 April.

I’m presently doing a side-by-side comparison of H.R. 4397 and H.R. 4442 to discern the differences. These documents are brief—686/681 words for S. 2207/H.R. 4397 and 698 words for H.R. 4442–but given what I’ve learned about how a single word can have tremendous effect on legislation, I very curious as to what that 17-word difference between S. 2207/H.R. 4397 and H.R. 4442 might be.

These worthless feckin’ waste of human genome are not just driving poorly tuned diesel trucks, they’re intentionally spewing toxic wastes as they drive. At a minimum, they should lose their driving licenses for life.

Conservatives who detest President Barack Obama and EPA clean air regulations are modifying their vehicles to purposefully spew black smoke into the atmosphere.

So-called “coal rollers” install smoke stacks and special equipment in their diesel trucks that makes the engine think that it needs more fuel, resulting in plumes of black smoke.

According to Slate’s Dave Weigel, [Below, JH] the phenomenon is not new, but it is becoming more popular among conservatives who want to protest the president and his efforts to clean up the environment.

David Edwards writing in Rolling Coal: Conservatives ‘screw’ Obama by modifying trucks to spew toxic black smoke.

This is Weigel’s lede for Rolling Coal.

Forty-five second YouTube clips don’t come any more American than “Prius Repellent.” It starts with a camera angled from the passenger side window of a truck, pointed at the namesake Japanese hybrid car. After 12 establishing seconds, the cameraman moves and points out the back window, where viewers can read the ominous decals:

⇦ PRIUS REPELLENT ⇨

At 23 seconds, the engine revs and the viewer finally learns what the arrows were pointing at. Smoke pours out of dual stacks, right in the path of the Prius, which retreats into the rear view. The truck’s passengers share a well-earned chortle.

Words I’d love to hear: We’re from the United States Environmental Protection Agency and we’re here to confiscate your truck.

Today’s headlines include:

Local News

Fenton Auction
$650,000 bond in July 4th shooting
Homeowners, farmers carry school tax load
Trail users asked to watch out for each other
Around Town

Top Headlines Poll: Did you go see the American Queen when it was in town?

What’s going on here…

Previously…

There are many varieties of nerd, but only two real species—the serious and the nonserious—and shelves are a pretty good indication of who is which. “To expose a bookshelf,” Harvard professor Leah Price writes in Unpacking My Library, a recent collection of interviews with writers about the books they own, “is to compose a self.” In Sontag’s case, a very rigorous self. And, of course, that’s just the sort of self someone anxious about his aspirations might shy away from. “A self without a shelf remains cryptic,” Price notes. It’s like the straight-A student who says he hasn’t studied for finals: if you haven’t confessed to caring, no one can consider you to have failed.

Francesca Mari writing in Shelf-Conscious for The Paris Review.

• Bookshelf saved 876 days ago.
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• Unpacking My Library: Writers and Their Books saved 872 days ago.
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• Carved Book Landscapes by Guy Laramee saved 872 days ago.
• Adding a sense of drama to the living room. saved 871 days ago.
• Shelf-Conscious saved 871 days ago.
• Bret Victor – Inventing on Principle saved 871 days ago.
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• The 20 Most Beautiful Bookstores in the World saved 869 days ago.

This is my exercise in shoveling out the blogpile…

Rule No. 6 – Avoid Foods That Contain More Than Five Ingredients.

From Food Rules, an eater’s manual by Michael Pollan

Previously…

Found in my electronic chapbook. See also Eating Mindfully by Jan Chozen Bey.

Humans are complicated and ultimately individually unique. Each of us is a singular serious of adjectives that begins with Human and ends with me.

As a wise woman once told me, Once you’ve met a person who is x then you know one person who is x. All of our personal Venn diagrams look like multitudinously pedaled flowers that are contained within the great circle that is labeled human.

Relationships are never stable, stability is for the deceased. Hell, as William Faulkner suggested, they’re not even stable then.

Via Pharyngula where the comments are well worth the read…

A U.S. Navy veteran filed a civil rights lawsuit Monday after the Idaho State Veterans Cemetery refused to allow her to be buried with the ashes of her late wife.

Seventy-four-year-old Madelynn Taylor filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Boise after she tried to make advance arrangements last year to have her ashes interred with Jean Mixner, whom she met on a blind date in 1995 and married in California in 2008 when gay marriage was briefly legal.

Though federal veterans cemeteries allow the spouses of gay veterans to be interred with their loved ones, Taylor said she was surprised to find the Idaho cemetery — which is owned and operated by the state — does not.

Taylor’s situation is “among the most extreme examples of the harm caused by state laws that deny respect to the marriages of same-sex couples,” said Christopher Stoll, a senior attorney with the National Center for Lesbian Rights, which is representing Taylor. “Denying these important protections to committed couples is not simply unjust, it is needlessly cruel.”

From The Associated Press: Vet sues after burial with gay partner is denied

I thought Stroll’s quote was the best I’ve seen on the issue of equal protection for all Americans. When we allow particular religious superstitions to justify ignorance, prejudice, bigotry and hatred we are demonstrating just how cruel humans can be.

A tradition in my mother’s family says that our ancestor, Parker Adkins (1725-1792), was on friendly terms with the Shawnee Indians, and may have sired a daughter by “Bluesky,” a daughter of the famous chief “Cornstalk” (“Keigh-tugh-qua”). However, when (due to the murder by whites of the entire family of the Mingo Indian leader John Logan) war became unavoidable, he joined the Virginia army of Colonel Andrew Lewis and participated in the October 10, 1774 Battle of Point Pleasant—an engagement West Virginians like to call “The First Battle of the American Revolution” because it involved British prohibitions against settlement in the Ohio Valley (one of the many complaints that led to the outbreak of rebellion six-months later at Lexington and Concord) and because the Virginians felt that the Royal Governor, Lord Dunmore, had betrayed them by not coming to their aid at the mouth of the Kanawha. Parker Adkins’ name is inscribed on the Battle Monument at Tu-Endie-Wei Park in Point Pleasant, W.Va.

Although he and his warriors fought valiantly, Cornstalk lost the 1774 battle. Three years later, he and another Indian named “Red Hawk” arrived at Fort Randolph (built near the site of the previous battle) to warn settlers that the British were inciting the younger Shawnees to attack American settlements. He even drew maps for the Americans to help them in the coming conflict. Later he was joined by his young son, Ellinipisco, and all were detained at the fort for interrogation. On November 10, 1777, when a member of a hunting party was found dead and scalped across the Kanawha, an angry mob of Rockbridge County militiamen (who had a long-standing grudge against Cornstalk for alleged 1763 massacres in their area), overruled Captains Arbuckle and Stuart and stormed the cabin where the Indians were kept and shot them down in cold blood. In a conversation a few years ago with a DAR lady at the Point Pleasant museum, I was told that the chief’s daughter, “Bluesky,” after hearing of the deaths of her father and brother, committed suicide, and that Parker Adkins (who had served in the Montgomery County militia) took his nine-year-old daughter back to his farm in southwestern Virginia where she was welcomed into his family and became my great-great-great-great aunt Charity Adkins. This is why our people are more than familiar with the story of “Cornstalk’s Curse!”

This popular bit of folklore alleges that, sometime during his captivity at Fort Randolph, Cornstalk realizing that death was a hand, made a speech that went something like this:

I came to your house as a friend, and you have murdered me. You kill my young son, Ellinipisico. For this may the curse of the Great Spirit rest upon this spot. May it be cursed by nature. May it’s hopes be forever blighted.” He further stated that the White Man would conquer the Valley, but his unlimited greed would cause the land to become uninhabitable, the water undrinkable, and the air unbreathable.

During the century following Cornstalk’s death, the town was plagued by floods, fires, and other natural disasters. On July 21, 1909, the crane that was to be used to set up the Battle Monument in Tu-Endie-Wei Park was struck by lightning and the dedication ceremony was postponed. On July 4, 1921, the Monument itself was damaged by another lightning strike. The second century brought disaster to the entire Ohio-Kanawha Valley region. Most of these disasters were not caused by Mother Nature (or Gitchee-Manitou) but by human beings in their pursuit of land and profit.

These include the December, 1907 Monongah Mine Disaster that killed 310 miners in the Kanawha Valley (the worst mine disaster in American history); the pollution of large areas around Point Pleasant by munitions-manufacturing between World Wars I and II; a 1953 barge explosion that killed 6 men at Point Pleasant; the Silver Bridge collapse that killed 46 motorists the week before Christmas in 1967 (James G. Jones, Professor Emeritus of History at Glenville State College alleged in his 1979 book “Haunted Valley” that the “winged creature” reported at the time of the disaster may not have been a “mothman”, but the totem-spirit of Cornstalk’s murdered companion “Red Hawk”); the November 14, 1970 plane crash in Charleston that took the lives of the entire football team of Marshall University; the 1970 bombing of the Mason County Courthouse that claimed four lives; the February, 1972 Buffalo Creek dam collapse up the Kanawha Valley from Point Pleasant; the January, 1978 derailment of a freight train carrying toxic chemicals that permanently damaged all Point Pleasant water wells; and the 1978 Willow Island Disaster at St. Mary’s, W.Va. that killed 51 workers.

In the second century after Cornstalk’s murder, the effects of the “curse” may have intensified with the 1994 Shell Chemical explosion at Belpre, Ohio that killed three workers, the 2006 Sago Mine disaster that killed 13 miners, a 2007 barge accident downriver near Kentucky that dumped 8000 gallons of toxic fuel into the Ohio, the April 5, 2010 Upper Big Branch Mine Disaster that claimed 29 lives, and last (but not least) the January 9, 2014 Elk River chemical spill that cut off water supplies to 300,000 residents of nine counties in West Virginia and remains unresolved to the present day.

We might also add to this list the numerous recent accidents connected with the hydraulic-fracturing process. These would include numerous fires, explosions, and unexplained “accidents” (often dismissed or downplayed by authorities) connected with drilling for shale-gas or the transportation and injection of toxic waste-materials. In the latter category, we might include the 4.0 magnitude earthquake on January 31, 2011 near Youngstown, Ohio; the 2.6 magnitude quake that rocked Marietta, Ohio on September 4, 2011; or the 3.5 magnitude tremor on November 20, 2013 that shook Athens County. Or can we omit the May, 2014 toxic-waste spill at a Morgan County well-site, or the two most-recent June, 2014 explosions in Belpre and upriver in Monroe County?

Or should we just regard “Cornstalk’s Curse” as silly, superstitious nonsense brought about by “collective guilt” over our treatment of Native Americans. As a confirmed skeptic of such nonsense, I tend to believe that Shakespeare was correct in saying that “The fault, dear Brutus is not in our stars, but in ourselves.”

Fred O’Neill writing in Cornstalk’s curse and other area legends for The Marietta Times.

[Update at 0942 on 31 July—rainyonthebeach This guy attacked one of the owners of a tattoo shop he did damage to and trashed today in Walmart at Vienna WV. This guy sounds like a piece of crap.

Update at 0843 on 11 July—One blank comment from rainyonthebeach has returned.

Update at 0754 on 11 July—I’m not at all surprised to discover that all five comments on the Roger Mason story, but not the story itself, have been taken down. Interestingly enough, however, due, I’m sure, to a computer glitch, the story, now with no comments, is still showing up as the top hot story on the Marietta Times home page.

Why a three-day delay?]

So, The Marietta Times sends a reporter out to write a human-interest piece about an artist in Devola who creates stone cairns he describes as geometry in motion. The story begins:

When 38-year-old artist Roger Mason first saw a series of cairns—gravity-defying rock pilings—while hiking as a child at Mt. Shasta in California, he knew some day he had to try the art for himself.

Then the fun begins in the comments:

inksanity1—this needs to b out there evryone should know what he dose like it or nt he will turn on you

rainyonthebeach—Beware of Rawger Brian Mason!!! Check out this name on facebook one in the same. This guy is a great artist and smart but there is a side to him that you need to know. He has been in this area for awhile gaining the trust of people then destroying it by his criminal actions. This guy also goes by Bones and has stole and trashed two tattoo shops in Parkersburg. Holdfast Tattoo Shop in Florida fell victim to him as well. Hoping the Café on Front Street thinks again before they become a victim as well.

inksanity1—this is what he dose to the ones who helps him out for more info come by InkSanity Tattoos in Parkersbugr wv

holdfast—The others in the comments above are correct, we are a tattoo studio in Florida who had cash drops stolen by Roger (all caught on surveillance video). This was discovered after he fled after being confronted about skimming cash. After his flight, we were contacted by shops and individuals from different states that he ripped off prior to us and have recently been contacted by shops and individuals that he ripped off since leaving us 2 years ago. Do not trust or believe Roger Mason in any way unless you want to be used or ripped off. (AKA Dr. Satan, Misttur Bones, Rawger Mason, Roger Brian Mason, Joe Scar, Dr.S8tan). He is a pro con man 100%!

Caspiansynn—TWIMC, This is not the proper venue to vent your accusations.

Today’s headlines include:

Local News

Queen visit
Parma man charged with shooting parents
GM dealers awaiting recall instructions
Newport home a safety concern
O’Neill Center is like family to ‘Grandma Betty’

Top Headlines Poll: Did you go see the American Queen when it was in town?

What’s going on here…

Previously…

Among the most valuable contents — which The Post will not describe in detail, to avoid interfering with ongoing operations — are fresh revelations about a secret overseas nuclear project, double-dealing by an ostensible ally, a military calamity that befell an unfriendly power, and the identities of aggressive intruders into U.S. computer networks.

A breakdown of the cache of NSA-intercepted communications provided to the Washington Post by Edward Snowden

Months of tracking communications across more than 50 alias accounts, the files show, led directly to the 2011 capture in Abbottabad of Muhammad Tahir Shahzad, a Pakistan-based bomb builder, and Umar Patek, a suspect in a 2002 terrorist bombing on the Indonesian island of Bali. At the request of CIA officials, The Post is withholding other examples that officials said would compromise ongoing operations.

Many other files, described as useless by the analysts but nonetheless retained, have a startlingly intimate, even voyeuristic quality. They tell stories of love and heartbreak, illicit sexual liaisons, mental-health crises, political and religious conversions, financial anxieties and disappointed hopes. The daily lives of more than 10,000 account holders who were not targeted are catalogued and recorded nevertheless

Barton Gellman, Julie Tate and Ashkan Soltani writing in In NSA-intercepted data, those not targeted far outnumber the foreigners who are for The Washington Post.

OK, so I’ll give The Post the double-dealing by an ostensible ally because that’s pretty much all our allies and the identities of aggressive intruders into U.S. computer networks, again because the number has to be huge. What possible legitimate national security reasons could there be for not reporting on a military calamity that befell an unfriendly power? (Yes, I get that the source of the news may be so unique as to reveal the source, but how many military calamities have happened to unfriendly powers in the last decade?)

The big story of course is the secret overseas nuclear project (what does that even mean?) Any such project (yellow cake anyone?), however, has now been put on notice so why not just publish the details already? Could it be because the story is so lame (or so weak) as to be yet another example of tax dollars thrown to the wind in the name of allowing our government to terrorize us even more?

Last week, for the first time in memory, the wholesale price of electricity in Queensland fell into negative territory – in the middle of the day.

For several days the price, normally around $40-$50 a megawatt hour, hovered in and around zero. Prices were deflated throughout the week, largely because of the influence of one of the newest, biggest power stations in the state – rooftop solar.

“Negative pricing” moves, as they are known, are not uncommon. But they are only supposed to happen at night, when most of the population is mostly asleep, demand is down, and operators of coal fired generators are reluctant to switch off. So they pay others to pick up their output.

That’s not supposed to happen at lunchtime. Daytime prices are supposed to reflect higher demand, when people are awake, office building are in use, factories are in production. That’s when fossil fuel generators would normally be making most of their money.

The influx of rooftop solar has turned this model on its head. There is 1,100MW of it on more than 350,000 buildings in Queensland alone (3,400MW on 1.2m buildings across the country). It is producing electricity just at the time that coal generators used to make hay (while the sun shines).

The impact has been so profound, and wholesale prices pushed down so low, that few coal generators in Australia made a profit last year. Hardly any are making a profit this year. State-owned generators like Stanwell are specifically blaming rooftop solar.

Giles Parkinson writing in Solar has won. Even if coal were free to burn, power stations couldn’t compete for The Guardian.

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This is my exercise in shoveling out the blogpile…

Rule No. 5 – Avoid Foods That Have Some Form of Sugar (or Sweetener) Listed Among the Top Three Ingredients.

From Food Rules, an eater’s manual by Michael Pollan

Previously…

Found in my electronic chapbook. See also Eating Mindfully by Jan Chozen Bey.

Via Shedworking…

When Edward Snowden met journalists in his cramped room in Hong Kong’s Mira hotel in June, his mission was ambitious. Amid the clutter of laundry, meal trays and his four laptops, he wanted to start a debate about mass surveillance.

He succeeded beyond anything the journalists or Snowden himself ever imagined. His disclosures about the NSA resonated with Americans from day one. But they also exploded round the world.

The lede for NSA Files: Decoded—What the revelations mean for you from The Guardian.

“We are seeing an increase in walled gardens created by giants like Facebook and Apple,” said one of 1,400 respondents in a depressing new survey from Pew on the future of online liberty. “Commercialization of the internet, paradoxically, is the biggest challenge to the growth of the internet.”

To me, it feels deeply wrong to support that, so I’ve made a series of adjustments to become more technologically independent. And the alternatives are getting better all the time, so my little war against the monopolies feels like a personal victory with every log-in. On my Independence Day weekend for 2014, maybe these everyday tweaks will give you some ideas:

1. No Facebook: making the unavoidable colossus avoidable again;
2. No iMac: discovering the intuitive power of Linux;
3. No iPhone: out of the dictatorial ecosystem and into the open;
4. No Google: searches without a repository of your every move; and
5. No in-the-clear Internet: encrypt what you do online.

Dan Gilmore writing in No Facebook, no iPhone, no problem: how I declared my digital independence for The Guardian.

Previously…

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This is my exercise in shoveling out the blogpile…