CLibertyC

NSA Phone Snooping Cannot Be Challenged in Court, Feds Say

"The Obama administration for the first time responded to a Spygate lawsuit, telling a federal judge the wholesale vacuuming up of all phone-call metadata in the United States is in the 'public interest,' does not breach the constitutional rights of Americans and cannot be challenged in a court of law. The administration’s filing sets the stage for what is to be a lengthy legal odyssey — one likely to outlive the Obama presidency — that will define the privacy rights of Americans for years to come." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingNSA Phone Snooping Cannot Be Challenged in Court, Feds Say

Judge ‘Troubled’ by DOJ Position in Drone Strike Case

"A Washington federal judge today said she was 'troubled' by the U.S. Department of Justice's position that the courts are powerless to hear a challenge of the government's ability to target and kill U.S. citizens abroad. Deputy Assistant Attorney General Brian Hauck argued there was a difference between having a constitutional right—which he said could be protected by the executive and legislative branches—and being able to make constitutional claims in court. Collyer countered that not being able to access the courts would deprive citizens of the ability to enforce their rights." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingJudge ‘Troubled’ by DOJ Position in Drone Strike Case

Shock report into FBI errors cast doubt on 27 death penalty convictions

"The FBI is reviewing 2,000 cases convicted on hair samples after it has emerged that there has been widespread errors in forensic testing and how the evidence was portrayed in court. As many as 27 prisoners facing the death penalty may have been wrongfully convicted along with potentially thousands of others across the country. Since the 1980s, hundreds of convictions have been overturned on improper forensic science - which includes bite marks, blood analysis and shoe prints along with hair samples. Forensic testing has never been proved 100 per cent accurate by science - but at times, was presented by experts in court as if conclusive." Continue reading →

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A Citizen Can Be Handcuffed And Driven To A Different Location But Still Not Be “Under Arrest”

"The Portland police and City Attorney are making an argument in federal court this month that gives another glimpse into the increasing claims of authority of police in our society. Scott Miller was stopped for jaywalking by Officer Dean Halley in 2010 and admitted that he committed the common violation of pedestrians. The officer however proceeded to handcuff him, tell him 'you’re under arrest,' throw him into the back of a cruiser and then drove him a block away. He was in custody for about 30 minutes, but Deputy City Attorney William Manlove is arguing that citizens cannot sue because such acts do not constitute an actual arrest." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingA Citizen Can Be Handcuffed And Driven To A Different Location But Still Not Be “Under Arrest”

‘Sorry is not enough’: Bolivia demands EU find culprits behind aerial hijack

"EU apologies for the aerial blockade that forced the Bolivian president’s plane to land are 'not enough,' said Bolivia’s foreign minister. The presidential plane was grounded amid suspicions that NSA leaker Edward Snowden had stowed away onboard. The Bolivian Foreign Minister, David Choquehuanca, confirmed on Tuesday that Bolivia had received official apologies from Italy and Portugal, adding to those of Spain and France. However, Choquehuanca stressed that the apologies were not enough and the four countries “must identify those responsible and punish them in an exemplary fashion so that such an incident does not happen again.” Continue reading →

Continue Reading‘Sorry is not enough’: Bolivia demands EU find culprits behind aerial hijack

Chris Becker on South Africa, Gold and the Ludwig von Mises Institute

"We've seen huge growth in private education, private security and private medical industries in recent years, without which we would have seen rapidly declining living standards of South Africans. In a micro sense this inefficient and disorganized state leaves the space for quite a lot of personal liberty and allows people to get on with things outside of government control. With this strong central planning and regulatory ethos, if the government could actually follow through with its grand plans, South Africa would be a very unfree place. I call it 'dangerous efficiency.'" Continue reading →

Continue ReadingChris Becker on South Africa, Gold and the Ludwig von Mises Institute

With Gold, Don’t Miss the Top

"Zero Hour is the moment the price of physical gold starts to run away from the ‘paper price’ you see on CNBC’s ticker. The most likely catalyst is a chain of events that goes like this: Western central banks have leased their gold to commercial banks like JPMorgan Chase at an interest rate of less than 1%. The commercial banks have sold that metal and ploughed the proceeds into assets that earn more than 1%. The chain of custody on gold bars has become so cloudy that a major exchange like the Comex in New York is liable to ‘default’ on a gold contract – settling in cash, instead of metal. A rush for real metal would then be underway." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingWith Gold, Don’t Miss the Top

The Bull Within the Bear

"The reason it's important to look at the entire picture of investment demand is because an investor might draw an erroneous conclusion if they read just the headlines. For example, China and other Asian nations represent well over half of all global investment demand, while North America is just 9%. Is this bigger source of demand experiencing a lot of selling, too? Let's look at the bigger picture of investment demand for gold this year. In the following chart, we compare GLD outflows to Chinese imports through Hong Kong, as well as other sources of demand for physical metal. Here are the data through last month." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingThe Bull Within the Bear

A Dozen Things I’ve Learned From Michael Mauboussin About Investing

"1. 'The only certainty is that there is no certainty… With uncertainty, the underlying distribution of outcomes is undefined, while with risk we know what that distribution looks like. Corporate undulation is uncertain; roulette is risky…' There is no single number which can be used to predict the future price of an investment because the future is not only risky (like roulette) but uncertain (unknown unknowns). There are known future states for which probability is unknown and future states that are unknown for which probability is not computable." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingA Dozen Things I’ve Learned From Michael Mauboussin About Investing

It’s a Sound-Money Alternative to the Dollar

"It should be no surprise to any student of economics that when government has a monopoly on money, it will be mismanaged. A better approach would be a free market in money: currency competition among entrepreneurs. Bitcoin is one of the opening salvos in this battle. In some respects it is very promising as an alternative currency and as a possible wholesale replacement for a national currency. In other respects it falls short. Bitcoin is a fiat currency that has achieved popularity and value without the mandate of a government legal tender law. On the contrary, the government strongly discourages bitcoin use and has used regulations to frustrate its adoption." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingIt’s a Sound-Money Alternative to the Dollar