---

---

Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features blues guitarist Dave Specter. Enjoy!

^{Dave Specter & Jimmy Johnson - You Don't Love Me}

“There's the scarlet thread of murder running through the colourless skein of life, and our duty is to unravel it, and isolate it, and expose every inch of it.”

-- Arthur Conan Doyle

---

News and Opinion

A New Snowden? Whistleblower Leaks Trove of Documents on Drones & Obama’s Assassination Program

Whomp! The Intercept has obtained a library of (classified) documentation about Bush/Obama's drone assassination program. This is big. Check it out.

The Assassination Complex

Drones are a tool, not a policy. The policy is assassination. While every president since Gerald Ford has upheld an executive order banning assassinations by U.S. personnel, Congress has avoided legislating the issue or even defining the word “assassination.” This has allowed proponents of the drone wars to rebrand assassinations with more palatable characterizations, such as the term du jour, “targeted killings.”

When the Obama administration has discussed drone strikes publicly, it has offered assurances that such operations are a more precise alternative to boots on the ground and are authorized only when an “imminent” threat is present and there is “near certainty” that the intended target will be eliminated. Those terms, however, appear to have been bluntly redefined to bear almost no resemblance to their commonly understood meanings. ...

The Intercept has obtained a cache of secret slides that provides a window into the inner workings of the U.S. military’s kill/capture operations at a key time in the evolution of the drone wars — between 2011 and 2013. The documents, which also outline the internal views of special operations forces on the shortcomings and flaws of the drone program, were provided by a source within the intelligence community who worked on the types of operations and programs described in the slides. ... The source said he decided to provide these documents to The Intercept because he believes the public has a right to understand the process by which people are placed on kill lists and ultimately assassinated on orders from the highest echelons of the U.S. government. “This outrageous explosion of watchlisting — of monitoring people and racking and stacking them on lists, assigning them numbers, assigning them ‘baseball cards,’ assigning them death sentences without notice, on a worldwide battlefield — it was, from the very first instance, wrong,” the source said. ...

Taken together, the secret documents lead to the conclusion that Washington’s 14-year high-value targeting campaign suffers from an overreliance on signals intelligence, an apparently incalculable civilian toll, and — due to a preference for assassination rather than capture — an inability to extract potentially valuable intelligence from terror suspects. They also highlight the futility of the war in Afghanistan by showing how the U.S. has poured vast resources into killing local insurgents, in the process exacerbating the very threat the U.S. is seeking to confront. ...

The “find, fix, finish” doctrine that has fueled America’s post-9/11 borderless war is being refined and institutionalized. Whether through the use of drones, night raids, or new platforms yet to be unleashed, these documents lay bare the normalization of assassination as a central component of U.S. counterterrorism policy.

[Here are links to the other seven in a series of eight articles that The Intercept has posted on the topic. - js]

Decoding the language of covert warfare

The Kill Chain

Find, Fix, Finish

Manhunting in the Hindu Kush

Firing Blind

The Life and Death of Objective Peckham

Target Africa

Hey looky! Obama's found another country that he wants to bomb!

US Sends Ground Troops, Drones to Cameroon

Open-Ended Mission to Stop 'Anti-Colonial Movement'

Invoking the War Powers Act, President Obama informed Congress today that he is deploying 300 ground troops and drones to the West African nation of Cameroon on a mission aimed at helping governments tamp down a “regional Muslim anti-colonial movement.”

The White House says the deployment is going to be part of “a broader regional effort” and that the mission is totally open-ended, with the troops to remain until they are “no longer needed” in the country, though as usual they declined to lay out what this situation would look like. ...

The War Powers Act requires the president to inform Congress and seek an authorization for the use of military force whenever he sends troops abroad like this. Though today’s statement informed Congress, there is as yet no indication a vote is forthcoming on this latest overseas adventure. This may ultimately not be a problem for the administration, however, as President Obama has repeatedly spurned this requirement in recent wars, and Congress has not made any serious effort to enforce the law.

Oh, lovely. Why the hell are we still in Afghanistan when, by just about all accounts there is no significant al-Qaeda presence there - and for that matter the US is arguably partnering with al-Qaeda in nearby Syria? Hasn't the excuse for a war run out yet?

Obama Is Now Halting US Troop Withdrawal from Afghanistan

President Barack Obama is set to announce on Thursday that he will slow plans to draw down US troops from Afghanistan and instead keep the current force of 9,800 through most of 2016 before beginning to trim levels, senior administration officials said.

Obama had aimed to withdraw all but a small US-embassy based force at Kabul before leaving office in January 2017. Under the new plan, troops will be drawn down to 5,500 starting sometime in 2017 and based at four locations — Kabul, Bagram, Jalalabad, and Kandahar.

The decision comes after months of deliberations between Obama, Afghan leaders, Pentagon officials, commanders in the field, and White House advisers about how best to continue to support Afghan forces, senior US administration officials said.

Confusion as Pentagon Arms Syrian ‘Arab Groups’

Officials Refuse to Say Who They're Actually Arming

After ditching the $500 million “train-and-equip” program, the Obama Administration rapidly started making high-profile pronouncements about new arms shipments to assorted rebel factions. Dubbed “Arab groups” in Pentagon statements, the program is creating a lot of confusion, primarily over who they’re arming. ...

The Pentagon doesn’t seem to be really specific about anything involving this new program. Yesterday, they insisted that the rebels don’t need to be vetted because they’re fighting ISIS, but today they assured al-Jazeera that the unnamed leaders of these unnamed groups were vetted. ...

In the meantime, however, the US airdrops remain shrouded in mystery, with assurances that whoever the US intended to arm was armed, and expectations that those factions, whoever they are, are going to do something at some point.

FM: Russia Supporting Iraq in Fight Against ISIS

Iraq Confirms New Intel-Sharing Program Used for Recent Strikes

Speaking today at a conference in Finland, Russian FM Sergey Lavrov confirmed his nation is supporting Iraq’s central government and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in their fight against ISIS, saying all involvement is being done at the request of the Iraqis.

Iraqi officials confirmed this, with Defense Committee head Hakim Zamili reporting that the newly established Baghdad information center was the source of intelligence used in recent airstrikes against ISIS, including one Iraq says hit numerous ISIS leaders.

US defense chief: we will deter Russia's 'malign and destabilizing influence'

The US defense chief has vowed to take “all necessary steps” against a resurgent Russia which is challenging a frustrated Washington in eastern Europe and the Middle East.

Ash Carter, the US defense secretary, said the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, had wrapped his country in a “shroud of isolation” which only a drastic change in policy could reverse.

“We will take all necessary steps to deter Russia’s malign and destabilising influence, coercion and aggression,” Carter said, attacking Russian military intervention in Ukraine and Syria.

The speech at a US army convention on Wednesday included some of the strongest language yet by the Obama administration, which came into office determined to “reset” relations with Russia and move them in a more cooperative direction.

Carter said that as long as Russia pursued a “misguided strategy” in Syria to bolster its client Bashar al-Assad, “we have not, and will not, agree to cooperate with Russia”.

Meanwhile, Russia claimed that the United States snubbed its overtures for high-level consultations on Syria, refusing to send a delegation to Moscow or receive a high-ranking Russian delegation.

What US strike numbers look like when they really want to vanquish an enemy

Iran Ratifies Nuclear Deal After Approval by Guardian Council

Iran’s Guardian Council has approved the nuclear deal today, the last obstacle to the deal’s ratification by the Islamic Republic. This sets the agreement on the fast track to being implemented by them and the rest of the participants, the P5+1. ...

Several nations in the P5+1 are keen to fast track implementation of the deal, with countries like Germany seeing potentially enormous trade implications, as the easing of sanctions sets the stage for huge contracts modernizing Iranian infrastructure.

Ankara bombings: 10 more people arrested 'suspected of Isis and PKK links'

Authorities investigating the twin suicide attacks on a peace rally in Ankara on Saturday have detained 10 more people suspected of having links to Kurdish rebels and Islamic State, said the Turkish prime minister, Ahmet Davutoğlu.

Some detentions were linked to two suspected members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) who allegedly posted tweets hinting at a possible bombing in the Turkish capital hours before the explosions.

Some analysts are skeptical about claims of Kurdish rebel involvement because many Kurdish activists attended Saturday’s rally, and some were among the dead and injured.

Turkey has banned reporting on the investigation, an action media groups have criticised as censorship.

The detentions follow Turkish police naming the brother of a suspected Isis suicide bomber as one of two men who carried out the attack.

Yunus Emre Alagöz was the older brother of Sheikh Abdurrahman Alagöz, a suspected Isis member who in July killed 33 Kurdish and Turkish activists in a suicide bomb attack in Suruç, a town on the Turkish-Syrian border.

Gideon Levy: U.S. Criticizes Settlements While Giving Israel "Carte Blanche" to Continue Occupation

State Dept: Credible Reports Israel Using Excessive Force on Protesters

After days of often self-contradictory back and forth with reporters during daily briefings, always punctuated by assurances that they’re definitely not blaming Israel for anything Israel is doing, spokesman John Kirby confirmed there are “credible reports” Israel is using excessive force against Palestinian protesters. ...

Today’s comments came after a protracted exchange the previous day at the State Department in which reporters wondered whether reports that officials were pressing both sides to find ways to deescalate the situation meant they were suggesting Israel was doing anything short of a perfect job, something the spokesman for that day, Mark Toner, desperately tried to deny.

And while it took almost a whole week, the State Department finally conceded that a Dimona incident in which an Israeli Jew stabbed four Arabs was in fact “terrorism.” This was a controversial issue they were asked several times about, and had previously ducked the question, while affirming that all incidents of Arabs stabbing Jews in the country were definitely terrorism. The officials appeared to be puzzled as to why this was being asked so often, until they finally came around to an answer.

Stabbed Israeli Jew mistaken for Arab criticises violence

An Israeli Jew stabbed by a Jewish man who believed he was an Arab has criticised the recent violence from his hospital bed.

Uri Rezken was stacking shelves in a Haifa suburb on Tuesday when he was stabbed in the back, the latest in a series of suspected vigilante attacks.

“We are all human beings, we are all equal,” the supermarket worker told Israeli TV. “It does not matter if an Arab stabbed me or a Jew stabbed me, a religious, orthodox or secular person. I have no words to describe this hate crime.” ...

The attack is the third time in just over a week that Israeli Jews have sought to attack Palestinians. On Friday, a 17-year-old from Dimona stabbed four Palestinians. His lawyer claimed his client had psychological problems and was not competent to stand trial.

Abdel al-Kader Jamal, an Israeli citizen of Kalansua, was beaten and chased by about 30 Jewish men in the coastal city of Netanya on Thursday last week. A Jewish Israeli, Mimon Himy, threw himself on Jamal to protect him from the mob and said he believes the man would have died had he not intervened.

Vladimir Putin's visit to Japan postponed indefinitely

Vladimir Putin’s highly anticipated visit to Japan has been postponed indefinitely, amid anger in Tokyo at Moscow’s stance on a long-running territorial dispute and concern about Russia’s involvement in the Syrian conflict.

The Russian president was to have visited Tokyo by the end of the year to hold talks with Japan’s prime minister, Shinzo Abe, on the Northern Territories, a group of four islands seized from Japan by the Soviet Union towards the end of the second world war.

The dispute over the islands has prevented the two countries from signing a postwar peace treaty and soured ties between successive administrations.

Japan has accused Russia of frustrating negotiations over the islands, known as the Kurils in Russia, by approving recent visits by senior politicians, including the prime minister, Dmitry Medvedev, in August. ...

Japan and Russia have failed to make progress on the sovereignty dispute despite numerous rounds of talks. Japan insists that all four islands should be returned, while Russia cites a 1956 agreement under which it would return the two smaller, less developed islands, but only after the countries sign a peace treaty.

Breaking Silence, Wife of Jailed CIA Whistleblower Jeffrey Sterling Seeks Presidential Pardon

House Bill Lets Bureaucrats Read Your Email Without A Warrant

A bill before Congress that politicians on both sides of the aisle in Washington praise for strengthening civil liberties may actually protect Internet giants like Google and hand federal bureaucrats the power to subpoena every American’s email without first getting a judge’s approval.

Republican Rep. Ted Poe championed the proposed update of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) in a Fox News op-ed Wednesday, saying, “the reforms introduced in the House and Senate would restore ECPA’s original purpose, and protect our privacy in the ways we live, communicate, learn, transact business and recreate today.”

But others who have read the bill closely point out that, while the text requires a judge-issued warrant to obtain content of emails from Fortune 500 IT firms such as Google, the text also authorizes government agencies to use administrative subpoenas. These subpoenas don’t require prior approval of a judge to get other email details from providers and to secure email content directly from an email “originator, addressee, or intended recipient.”

Mark Fitzgibbons, a Northern Virginia lawyer who defends individuals and businesses against federal agencies, said Poe is flat-out wrong on the ECPA. The ECPA and a similar House bill “actually authorize and encourage hundreds of federal and state agencies to violate the Fourth Amendment with respect to the actual content of private emails,” he wrote.

The bill also allows government entities to collect a person’s phone call details — like name, address and bank account number — from providers without a warrant and keep customers or subscribers in the dark.

Eric Garner and Tamir Rice among those missing from FBI record of police killings

Killings by police that unleashed a new protest movement around the US in 2014, including those of Eric Garner, Tamir Rice and John Crawford, are missing from the federal government’s official record of homicides by officers because most departments refuse to submit data.

Only 224 of 18,000 law enforcement agencies around the US reported a fatal shooting by their officers to the FBI last year, according to previously unpublished data obtained by the Guardian, which sheds new light on flaws in official systems for counting the use of deadly force by police.

Stephen Fischer, a spokesman for the FBI, said exclusions were inevitable because the program remained voluntary. “We have no way of knowing how many incidents may have been omitted,” Fischer said in an email. ...

Erica Garner, Garner’s daughter, said she was “outraged but not shocked” by the omission. “It’s just another part of the cover-up and erasing of his murder from the record,” Garner said. “It says to the NYPD and the city and state of New York that my father’s life doesn’t matter.”

Pendulum Swings Left in the Democratic Debate

The Occupy movement made Sanders' public critique of capitalism (weak as it is) possible. Sanders' campaign has brought the topic into mainstream electoral discussion. Regardless of Sanders' electoral fate, this seems to be a very good thing.

Thanks to Sanders, Democratic Party Just Debated Merits of Capitalism

Breaking the usual parameters of election season discourse, Democratic presidential hopefuls Tuesday night debated the merits of capitalism on the national stage—a development that many attribute to the candidacy of self-described socialist U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders and rising inequality and discontent.

When CNN's Anderson Cooper asked Sanders whether he considers himself a capitalist, the Vermont Senator replied: "Do I consider myself part of the casino capitalist process by which so few have so much and so many have so little, by which Wall Street's greed and recklessness wrecked this economy? No, I don't."

"I believe in a society where all people do well," he continued, "not just a handful of billionaires."

Cooper then asked the panel: "Is there anybody else on the stage who is not a capitalist?"

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton responded with a vague defense of the capitalist system. ...

While direct criticism of capitalism in mainstream politics is not unheard of in U.S. history, it is unusual for modern times. ...

Some critics of capitalism who do not share Sanders' specific political vision argue that there is value in openly discussing alternative systems.

"Even if it’s not the definition of socialism that I’d prefer, in this country, with its history, it still feels significant," wrote labor reporter Sarah Jaffe in the wake of Tuesday night's debate.

Meanwhile, there are signs that among younger people and communities of color in the U.S., capitalism is falling out of favor.

A Pew Research Center poll from 2011 found that a plurality of young people (49-43 percent) have a positive view of socialism and a negative view of capitalism (47-46 percent). For African Americans, these numbers were more dramatic, with a majority (55-36 percent) holding a positive view of socialism and negative view of capitalism (51-41 percent).

The Vampire Squid falls short!

Goldman Sachs blames global market fears as third-quarter earnings fall short

Goldman Sachs announced quarterly earnings that fell short of expectations on Thursday, blaming “renewed concerns” about global growth for the shortfall.

Revenues fell to $6.86bn from $8.39bn a year ago. The bank had been expected to announce $7.13bn in revenue, according to consensus estimates from Thomson Reuters.

Goldman is the latest US giant to announce disappointing results in this earnings season. Yesterday Walmart, the world’s largest retailer, also released results that fell short of expectations. It blamed rising wage costs and online competition for the shortfall.

Goldman’s results came as Citigroup too released its latest results. The bank also reported a slowdown in trading but profits jumped 50% to $4.29bn compared to the same quarter last year as its legal bills dropped sharply. Legal and associated costs for the quarter were $376m, down from $1.55bn a year ago, when the bank was preparing for an eventual $5.7bn fine for the manipulation of foreign-exchange rates.

The UK appears to be entering into competition with the US government in weakening its regulations on banksters. The US has quite a lead, given the performance of corporate flunkies like Ben Bernanke, Eric Holder, Lanny Breuer and a cast of thousands at both so-called "regulatory agencies" and the Ministry of Justice "Department of Justice," but the UK has a good chance in this race to the bottom.

The UK's Bankers Will No Longer Be 'Guilty Until Proven Innocent'

Britain on Thursday announced it was scrapping plans that would treat senior bankers as "guilty until proven innocent," in a move likely to concern regulators but ease industry fears that tough new rules will scare top talent away from London. ...

Under the new plans the ministry has dropped a requirement for top bankers to prove they were unaware or had taken action to prevent misconduct at their institutions — known as "reverse burden of proof" — and instead introduce a less onerous "duty of responsibility" on such employees.

The new duty of responsibility will still require senior managers to take appropriate steps to prevent a regulatory breach from occurring.

But it will now be for the regulators, rather than the senior manager, to prove that reasonable steps to prevent breaches were not taken. ...

The original plan's reverse burden of proof element had provoked concern at banks who feared it would make it much harder to hire top bankers.

Ditching it will be a blow for the Bank of England and the Financial Conduct Authority, the two bodies that regulate banks in Britain.

Both have adopted hardline approaches to supervision after regulators were found wanting in the run-up to the financial crisis, arguing that a tough new regime is needed to make it easier to pin blame for misconduct on individuals.

---

---

What Did Clinton Mean When She Said Snowden Files Fell Into the “Wrong Hands” ?

Hillary Clinton asserted at Tuesday night’s Democratic presidential debate that NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden “stole very important information that has unfortunately fallen into a lot of the wrong hands.”

@froomkin @Snowden Maybe she means the public?

— Ben Wizner (@benwizner) October 14, 2015

She seemed to be darkly intimating that the information Snowden gave to journalists in Hong Kong before he was granted asylum in Moscow also ended up with the Chinese and/or Russian governments.

But that conclusion is entirely unsupported by the evidence; it’s a political smear that even the most alarmist Obama administration intelligence officials have not asserted as fact. ...

Vermont senator Bernie Sanders said during the debate that “Snowden played a very important role in educating the American people to the degree in which our civil liberties and our constitutional rights are being undermined.”

Sanders said Snowden should face a penalty, but that “what he did in educating us should be taken into consideration.” (That is also Snowden’s position.)

Sanders also said he would immediately shut down the warrantless domestic surveillance program that Snowden exposed. “I’d shut down what exists right now is that virtually every telephone call in this country ends up in a file at the NSA. That is unacceptable to me.”

Clinton worried about Snowden info falling into wrong hands? What about your emails, Hillary? #DemDebate

— Michael Brown (@MichaelBrownUSA) October 14, 2015

Norman Solomon: Clinton’s Debate Comments on Snowden "Give Hypocrisy a Bad Name"

Pundits Thought Clinton Beat Sanders–but Did Viewers?

The Times quoted National Journal columnist Ron Fournier (“Hillary Clinton won,” 10/13/15), Slate writer Fred Kaplan (“She crushed it,” 10/14/15), New Yorker staffer Ryan Lizza (“Hillary Clinton won because all of her opponents are terrible,” Twitter, 10/13/15), Red State blogger Leon Wolf (“Hillary was (astonishingly) much more likable and personable than everyone’s favorite crazy socialist uncle,” 10/13/15), pollster John Zogby (“Mrs. Clinton was just commanding tonight,” Forbes, 10/13/15) and conservative radio host Erick Erickson (“I’m still amazed the other four candidates made Hillary Clinton come off as the likable, reasonable, responsible Democrat,” Twitter, 10/13/15). If these so-called “opinion shapers in the political world” declare Hillary the winner, then Hillary must be the winner, according to the Times.

What the Times and these pundits failed to mention is the fact that every online poll we could find asking web visitors who won the debate cast Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders as the winner—and not just by a small margins, but by rather enormous ones.

Although these polls only represent the views of these sites’ visitors who volunteered to participate, the consistently high share saying that Sanders prevailed in the debate, across a range of websites with wildly varying audiences, is striking.

Adam Johnson, associate editor at AlterNet and frequent FAIR.org contributor, pointed out (AlterNet, 10/14/15) that not only had Sanders won every online poll “by at least an 18-point margin,” he also was picked as the winner by various media-convened focus groups: “Sanders won the CNN focus group, the Fusion focus group and the Fox News focus group; in the latter, he even converted several Hillary supporters.”

Another, more rigorous gauge of Sanders’ debate performance came from an analysis of Google searches. According to Google, Sanders was the most-searched candidate for almost the entire debate. After the debate was over, he was the most-searched candidate in all 50 states.

Hillary Defends Her Failed War in Libya

Using contested intelligence, a powerful adviser urges a president to wage a war of choice against a dictator; makes a bellicose joke when he is killed; declares the operation a success; fails to plan for a power vacuum; and watches Islamists gain power. That describes Dick Cheney and the Iraq War—and Hillary Clinton and the war in Libya.

At Tuesday’s primary debate, Clinton was criticized not just for the Iraq War vote that cost her the 2008 election, but also for the undeclared 2011 war that she urged in Libya. The Obama Administration waged that war of choice in violation of the War Powers Resolution and despite the official opposition of the U.S. Congress. “Governor Webb has said that he would never have used military force in Libya and that the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi was inevitable,” Anderson Cooper told the former Secretary of State. “Should you have seen that attack coming?”

Her answer included a broad defense of the war in Libya. ... Yet the answer didn’t hurt the Democratic frontrunner. That’s because neither CNN moderators nor prospective Clinton supporters understand the magnitude of the catastrophe that occurred amid the predictable power vacuum that followed Ghadafi’s ouster. “Libya today—in spite of the expectations we had at the time of the revolution—it’s much, much worse,” Karim Mezran, senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East, told Frontline. “Criminality is skyrocketing. Insecurity is pervasive. There are no jobs. It’s hard to get food and electricity. There’s fighting, there’s fear … I see very few bright spots.”

Democrats ought to conclude that she hasn’t learned enough from her decision to support the Iraq War, and that a Clinton administration would likely pursue more wars of choice with poor judgment and insufficient planning. It is difficult to imagine a more consequential leadership flaw. And yet, the issue remains an afterthought in the campaign, even as multiple Clinton rivals criticize her hawkishness and pledge to be more wary of involving America in wars of choice. Neoconservatives could hardly orchestrate a Democratic primary more to their liking.

---

---

Sounds like those Canadian Liberals enjoy pay-to-play politics, too and want to make sure that they get their payoff.

Leading in the Polls, Liberal Campaign Tells Canadian Oil Company How to Lobby

If the pipeline company behind the Energy East and Keystone XL proposals wants to shape the next Canadian government's energy policy, they had better start lobbying them immediately after the election.

That's the advice the national campaign co-chair of the Liberals gave to TransCanada on Monday, according to an email obtained by the Canadian Press. The email was sent as the centre-left Liberal party enjoyed a recent surge in the polls, with less than a week to go before the Canadian election on October 19.

If the Liberals get a minority, or if the NDP form government, TransCanada should try to gain an "early entry point" if either party decides to change how the National Energy Board (NEB) operates, the campaign co-chair Dan Gagnier wrote in an email, CP reported. This type of lobbying is needed to ensure projects like Energy East are completed on time, Gagnier said. ...

The NDP has said they would completely revamp the NEB, which advises the federal government on all pipeline projects in Canada, and the Liberals have said they want the NEB to go back to the way it was before the Conservatives came to power.

The Liberals responded to reports Wednesday by saying Gagnier was a volunteer with the campaign, and he did not break any ethical guidelines by sending the email.

Volkswagen's 2016 Diesel Models Might Also Have Emissions Cheating Software

Volkswagen's 2016 models of its diesel vehicles are equipped with software that could skew the results of government emissions tests, making the company's engines appear cleaner than they are, according to an admission by the company to regulators. ...

After a study on emissions discrepancies uncovered suspicious data on Volkswagen diesel vehicles, the EPA issued a notice of violation against the company in September. The company subsequently admitted that illegal software had been installed on its 2009-2015 diesel models, which enabled the cars to pass US emissions tests but dump excessive nitrogen oxide emissions during real-world driving. Such emissions can damage human health; the vehicles in question were emitting them at a rate up to 40 percent higher than was legally permitted.

Jeanine Ginivan, a Volkswagen spokesperson, told the Associated Press that the use of this "auxiliary emissions control device" differs in function from the cheating software that sparked a major scandal last month, though it could potentially be used inappropriately. Volkswagen informed the US Environmental Protection Agency and regulators in California that the software in newer models might have the same effect of the other defeat devices in making the car run cleaner during emissions testing.

Want Babies? Maybe Move Away From Fracking Country, New Studies Suggest

Research 'may have implications for the fertility of men living in regions with dense oil and/or natural gas production'

From decreased sperm count to messed up hormones to premature births, exposure to fracking chemicals could lead to long-term reproductive health consequences, according to a pair of studies published this month.

Research that appears Thursday in the journal Endocrinology shows that "23 commonly used oil and natural gas operation chemicals can activate or inhibit the estrogen, androgen, glucocorticoid, progesterone, and/or thyroid receptors, and mixtures of these chemicals can behave synergistically, additively, or antagonistically in vitro."

Furthermore, prenatal exposure among males to those 23 endocrine-disrupting chemicals, or EDCs, "caused decreased sperm counts and increased testes, body, heart, and thymus weights and increased serum T in male mice, suggesting multiple organ system impacts," according to the study, which was conducted on mice with wastewater samples from fracking sites in Garfield County, Colorado.

In other words, said the study's senior author, Susan Nagel of the University of Missouri: "It is clear EDCs used in fracking can act alone or in combination with other chemicals to interfere with the body's hormone function." Those hormones, in turn, regulate the activity of cells and biological processes such as metabolism, reproduction, growth, and digestion.

---

Also of Interest

Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.

Cable News Edits Out Rousing Sanders Attack on Vapid Media Coverage

Juvenile Lifers: Will Supreme Court Act Before They Die?

Stephen Harper: master manipulator

What Clinton left out about her history with Gadhafi

Former CIA employee Anderson Cooper: Opposing Illegal CIA Wars Is Unelectable

---

A Little Night Music

Dave Specter - Speculatin'

Dave Specter and Jimmy Johnson - Feel So Bad

Dave Specter - The Hollywood Park Shuffle

Dave Specter + Barkin' Bill - Railroad Station Blues

Dave Specter with Jimmy Johnson & Buddy Guy - Somebody Done Hoodooed the Hoodoo Man

Dave Specter - This Time I'm Gone For Good

Dave Specter & Sharon Lewis - In Too Deep

Dave Specter & Sharon Lewis - Every Goodbye Ain't Gone

Dave Specter - Texas Top

Dave Specter and Steve Freund - Is What It Is

Dave Specter + Barkin' Bill - Bluebird Blues

Dave Specter and Tad Robinson - What Love Did To Me

Dave Specter - Soul Serenade

Floyd McDaniel with Dave Specter and the Bluebirds: St. Louis Blues

---