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Lion, Tiger and Bear Make for Odd, Yet Happy Family at Ga. Sanctuary By Steve OsunsamiABC News Apr 10, 2013 6:50pm See article for video: http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2013/04/lion-tiger-and-bear-make-for-odd-yet-happy-family-at-ga-sanctuary/ At Noah’s Ark, a wild-animal rescue center in Georgia, the “BLT” are an unlikely trio that even “Oz’s” Dorothy would find hard to fear. “It’s a lion, a tiger and a bear — oh my!” said Allison Hedgecoth of Noah’s Ark. “They live together and they don’t see their differences. They don’t see their color differences.” In a small pen, Baloo (an American black bear), Leo (the lion) and Shere Kahn (a Bengal tiger) cuddle, play ball, chase each other around, eat cookies daily and seem to have forged a friendship for life. Image credit: ABC News “It’s kind of unusual because black bears and tigers would be solitary as adults,” said Rebecca Snyder, a curator of animals at Atlanta’s zoo. The three predators were rescued as cubs 12 years ago from drug dealers who’d abused and neglected them. “All of them had issues,” Hedgecoth said. “Leo, the lion, had a big raw spot on his nose. Baloo, the bear, had an ingrown harness where his owners hadn’t lengthened it as he grew, so it actually grew into the skin and it had to be surgically removed. … They have recovered more than 100 percent.” But when trainers tried to separate the animals, they acted out. For years, trainers said they worried and waited for fights but had witnessed nothing but peace among the three. Hedgecoth said she didn’t know how the trio had managed to get along together so well and for so long. “I think that the ordeal they went through as youngsters really bonded them together,” she told ABC News. “That’s all that they had. They only had each other for comfort.” She said separating them now, after more than a decade together, would be “cruel.” “There definitely is something special going on between the three of them,” she said. “That is definitely a lesson.” http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2013/04/lion-tiger-and-bear-make-for-odd-yet-happy-family-at-ga-sanctuary/

Evelyn Mills Moore Allegedly Beats Woman With The Bible Evelyn Mills Moore, 57, has been charged with two counts of assault. Police say she was a real Bible-thumper. Evelyn Mills Moore, of Kings Mountain, N.C., was arrested Saturday after allegedly beating another woman with the Bible, the Associated Press reported. The 57-year-old hit her victim "numerous times about her body with a closed fist" before smacking her on the arm with the Good Book, according to an arrest warrant obtained by the Gaston Gazette. It left the woman with abrasions on her face, arms and head, She then allegedly punched a man, causing him serious injury. Moore was charged with two counts of assault and one count of burglary and is being held on $105,000 bond, according to the Cleveland County Sheriff's Office. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/14/evelyn-mills-moore-bible-beats-woman_n_3272708.html?utm_hp_ref=weird-news

The Guardian's house civil-libertarian dissects the latest outrage from the Obama admin: Justice Department's pursuit of AP's phone records is both extreme and dangerous The claimed legal basis for these actions is unknown, but the threats they pose to a free press and the newsgathering process are clear Glenn Greenwald guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 14 May 2013 10.21 EDT Attorney General Eric Holder was required by DOJ regulations to personally approve efforts to obtain phone records for AP journalists. Photograph: Mark Wilson/Getty Images (updated below)Associated Press on Monday revealed that the Department of Justice (DOJ) "secretly obtained two months of telephone records of [its] reporters and editors", denouncing it as a "massive and unprecedented intrusion" into the news gathering process. In a letter sent yesterday to Attorney General Eric Holder, AP's President, Gary Pruitt, detailed that the phone records cover more than 20 telephone lines used by AP journalists, including their homes, offices and cell phones. He said the phones for which the DOJ obtained records also include ones at the AP bureaus in New York City, Washington DC, Hartford, and at the House of Representatives. Pruitt wrote that "we regard this action by the Department of Justice as a serious interference with AP's constitutional rights to gather and report the news." He added that while AP is "evaluating its options", he "urgently request[ed]" that the DOJ "immediately return to the AP the telephone toll records" obtained by the DOJ "and destroy all copies." AP learned of the DOJ's acquisition of these records only after the fact, and thus had no opportunity to raise legal and constitutional objections nor attempt to negotiate to narrow the scope of the records to be sought. Pruitt's letter uses some inflammatory language as it is designed to advance the AP's case and to generate public anger, but that's entirely appropriate. The phone records reveal, at a minimum, all of the telephone numbers called by those AP journalists over the course of two months. The ACLU last night condemned the DOJ's acts as "press intimidation" and said it constitutes "an unacceptable abuse of power". The Electronic Frontier Foundation denounced it as "a terrible blow against the freedom of the press and the ability of reporters to investigate and report the news". The New York Times' Editorial Page Editor Andy Rosenthal called the DOJ's actions "outrageous" while Washington Post Executive Editor Marty Baron said they were "shocking" and "disturbing". Even Democratic Sen. Pat Leahy, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said: "I am very troubled by these allegations and want to hear the government's explanation." Numerous media reports convincingly speculated that the DOJ's actions arise out of a 2012 AP article that contained leaked information about CIA activity in Yemen, and the DOJ is motivated, in part, by a desire to uncover the identity of AP's sources. That 2012 AP story revealed that the CIA was able to "thwart" a planned bombing by the al-Qaida "affiliate" in that country of a US jetliner. AP had learned of the CIA actions a week earlier but "agreed to White House and CIA requests not to publish it immediately because the sensitive intelligence operation was still under way." AP revealed little that the US government itself was not planning to reveal and that would not have been obvious once the plot was successfully thwarted, as it explained in its story: "once those concerns were allayed, the AP decided to disclose the plot Monday despite requests from the Obama administration to wait for an official announcement Tuesday." The legality of the DOJ's actions is impossible to assess because it is not even known what legal authority it claims nor the legal process it invoked to obtain these records. Particularly in the post-9/11 era, the DOJ's power to obtain phone records is, as I've detailed many times, dangerously broad. It often has the power to obtain those records without the person's knowledge (as happened here) and for a wildly broad scope of time (as also happened here). There are numerous instruments that have been vested in the DOJ to obtain phone records, many of which do not require court approval, including administrative subpoenas and "national security letters" (issued without judicial review); indeed, the Obama DOJ has previously claimed it has the power to obtain journalists' phone records without subpoeans using NSLs, and in its relentless pursuit to learn the identity of the source for one of New York Times' James Risen's stories, the Obama DOJ has actually claimed that journalists have no shield protections whatsoever in the national security context. It's also quite possible that they obtained the records through a Grand Jury subpoena, as part of yet another criminal investigation to uncover and punish leakers. None of those processes for obtaining these invasive records requires a demonstration of probable cause or anything close to it. Instead, the DOJ must simply assert that the records "relate to" a pending investigation: a standard so broad that virtually every DOJ desire will fulfill it. Even if a court were involved in the acquisition of these records - and that's unlikely here - it typically does little more than act as rubber-stamping functionary, just as it does when secretly approving the DOJ's requests for FISA warrants. This is what is reaped from continuously vesting the US government with greater and greater surveillance powers in the name of Terrorism and other fears. There has long been concern about the DOJ's snooping into the communications which journalists have with their sources precisely because the DOJ's power to obtain phone data and other sensitive records in secret is now so sweeping. Attempts to enact legislation to protect journalists from this type of concealed investigative intrusion into their source communications have been defeated in part due to the DOJ's insistence that it exercises this power responsibly and only in the most extreme cases. Indeed, the DOJ has adopted its own binding regulations that impose constraints on its ability to obtain the phone records of journalists. Those regulations require that "all reasonable attempts should be made to obtain information from alternative sources" before subpoeans are issued; that "negotiations with the media shall be pursued in all cases in which a subpoena to a member of the news media is contemplated" unless the DOJ determines that such negotiations would "pose a substantial threat to the integrity of the investigation in connection with which the records are sought"; and that "no subpoena may be issued . . . for the telephone toll records of any member of the news media without the express authorization of the Attorney General". The White House has denied involvement in the acquisition of AP's phone records, but presumably, Attorney General Eric Holder personally approved (Esquire's Charles Pierce, in calling for the resignation of Holder, expresses skepticism about White House denials, but I'm neutral at this point on that specific question). What makes the DOJ's actions so stunning here is its breadth. It's the opposite of a narrowly tailored and limited scope. It's a massive, sweeping, boundless invasion which enables the US government to learn the identity of every person whom multiple AP journalists and editors have called for a two-month period. Some of the AP journalists involved in the Yemen/CIA story and whose phone records were presumably obtained - including Adam Goldman and Matt Apuzzo - are among the nation's best and most serious investigative journalists; those two won the Pulitzer Prize last year for their superb work exposing the NYPD's surveillance program aimed at American Muslim communities. For the DOJ to obtain all of their phone records and those of their editors for a period of two months is just staggering. It's the very opposite of what the DOJ has long claimed its guidelines protect. EFF details how the DOJ's actions "violated its own regulations for subpoenas to the news media." AP's Pruitt explained: AP letter He added: AP letter The key point is that all of this takes place in the ongoing War on Whistleblowers waged by the Obama administration. If you talk to any real investigative journalist, they will tell you that an unprecedented climate of fear has emerged in which their sources are petrified to talk to them. That the Obama administration has prosecuted double the number of whistleblowers under espionage statutes as all previous administrations combined has already severely chilled the news gathering process. Imagine what message this latest behavior sends to journalists and their sources: that at any moment, the phone records of even the nation's most establishment journalists can be secretly obtained by the DOJ, which has no compunction about doing so even in the most extreme and invasive manner. The all-too-familiar axis that has enabled massive civil liberties assaults by the Obama administration - blindly partisan progressive media outlets and particularly obsequious self-styled neutral journalists - instantly sprung into action here and wasted no time jumping to the defense of the US government. TPM's Josh Marshall, while saying "there's still a very live question of whether this was a prudent action on the part of the DOJ", actually published an anonymous letter depicting the Obama DOJ as the victim here, saying AP "seeks to smear Justice" (in the annals of lowly journalistic behavior, printing anonymous emails defending the US government's surveillance actions and attacking targeted journalists is way down in the sewer, but that's the government-defending Josh Marshall in the Age of Obama). Similarly: before most people had even learned of the story, Think Progress purported to explain "Why The Department Of Justice Is Going After The Associated Press' Records" and, of course, offered the most benign and generous interpretation possible: they only did it to find out who is responsible for an "unauthorized and dangerous disclosure of classified information", quoting CIA Director John Brennan (offering instant "explainers" for even the most dubious of Obama administration actions is its typical tactic). Some progressives actually tried to blame Republicans for the Obama DOJ's conduct because the GOP largely voted against the codification of some added protections for journalists from DOJ record-gathering in a proposed "shield law". But Obama, who supported those protections when he was in the Senate, "reversed course" when he was president - that could easily be the motto of his presidency - and it was his opposition that helped kill that bill. Meanwhile, CNN's Wolf Blitzer, showing off the tough adversarial journalistic spirit for which he's so rightly celebrated, actually went on the air and said this: Although if you look it from the other side, if there was a serious leak about an al-Qaida operation or whatever, they're trying to find out who may be leaking this information to the news media, do they occasionally have the right to secretly monitor our phone calls?" Can you imagine what it's like to be an Obama official and - in the wake of these revelations - sit back and watch one of the nation's most celebrated journalists instantly suggest that the perhaps the US government should be monitoring his phone calls with his sources? Or watch progressives who spent the Bush years shrieking and convulsing at every story of secret Bush surveillance actions instantly attempt to justify what you've done before you've even done so yourself? And can you imagine the personality attributes that cause someone to read a story about a massive intrusion into journalists' communications with their sources and have your first instinct be to attack the targeted journalists and defend the US government? That is why this is permitted to happen. During the Bush years, there were several similar reports of DOJ acquisition of journalists' phone records: I'll wager anything that not a single progressive site or prominent Democrat ever defended any of that or offered neutral "explainers" to provide justifying rationale. And it's hard to express how lame the justifying rationale is. The Obama administration does not mind leaks of classified national security information; to the contrary, they love such leaks and are the most prolific exploiters of them. What they dislike are leaks that they don't approve and/or which don't glorify the president. Their unprecedented attacks on whistleblowers ensures that only the White House but nobody else can disclose classified information to the public, which is another way of saying that they seek to seize the ultimate propaganda model whereby the president and he alone controls the flow of information to the public. That's what their very selective and self-serving war on leaks achieves. It is true, as Kevin Drum suggests, that the DOJ has been obtaining phone records for quite some time in this manner, and that the angry reactions to this story are accounted for by the fact that, in this case, the targets are establishment journalists rather than marginalized Muslims or dissident groups. But there are unique dangers from having the government intrude into journalists' communications with their sources, which is what happens when they obtain their phone records in such a sweeping manner. At this point, leaks from government sources are the primary way we learn about what the government does, and the more that process is targeted and the more those involved are intimidated, the less it will happen. That, of course, is the point. Despite how stunning the breadth of this invasion is, none of it is really surprising. But it does underscore just how extreme of a climate of fear has been deliberately imposed by the Obama administration on the news gathering process. As the New Yorker's Jane Mayer told whistleblower advocate Jesselyn Radack last year: "When our sources are prosecuted, the news-gathering process is criminalized, so it's incumbent upon all journalists to speak up."What the Obama DOJ is doing in all of these cases is not just an attack on investigative journalists and their sources, though it is that. It is, first and foremost, an attack on you: specifically on your ability to know what government officials are doing in the dark. Q-and-A Using a great new tool developed by the Guardian, I'll be hosting a Q-and-A session tomorrow in this column, from 2:00 to 4:00 pm EST, to discuss this story and others I've written about over the past few weeks. You can leave your questions here. In a very timely development, the filmmaker Robert Greenwald (no relation) is about to release his outstanding documentary "War on Whistleblowers", detailing the Obama administration's targeting of whistleblowers. I'm briefly interviewed for it, as are numerous investigative journalists, news executives, and others. The trailer can be seen here: UPDATE Holder today said that he recused himself from the AP investigation early on, citing the fact that he himself had been interviewed by the FBI about the leaks. As a result, he said, it was the Deputy Attorney General, James Cole, who signed off on the acquisition of the AP phone records. Meanwhile, the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press wrote a scathing letter to Holder today about these actions, explaining: "In the thirty years since the Department issued guidelines governing its subpoena practice as it relates to phone records from journalists, none of us can remember an instance where such an overreaching dragnet for news gathering materials was deployed by the Department, particularly without notice to the affected reporters or an opportunity to seek judicial review."The scope of this action calls into question the very integrity of Department of Justice policies toward the press and its ability to balance, on its own, its police powers against the First Amendment rights of the news media and the public's interest in reporting on all manner of government conduct, including matters touching on national security which lie at the heart of this case." As for Holder, he - needless to say - claimed that this investigation was necessary for "national security"; AP's president responds to that assertion here. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/may/14/justice-department-ap-phone-records-whistleblowers?guni=Network%20front:network-front%20main-4%20Pixies:Pixies:Position3

I think the "male" answer is Depend. If we live long enough likely we all shall be wearing them or similar. As for bacon, I enjoy a little bit of it but Francis is my favorite. Best regards, RA1

One has to work very hard to become an excellent sexual harasser. I think only one course would not be sufficient. Are there not advanced courses in S&M, bondage, necrophilia and others? When you have a master's degree in each, let me know. Yes, master. Best regards, RA1

Noah had enough problems with all his family, in laws and outlaws on board without having to deal with mistreated animals. Best regards, RA1

LTC insurance is difficult to obtain IF you have any sort of health issues that contrast with a company's strict underwriting policies. There are three main benefits to LTC insurance. One obviously being the money the insurance provides for one's care. Two being that the total benefit (in dollars) becomes protected from Medicaid. In other words, if you have a two year contract at $300 a day, the $219,000 in total benefits prevents the state from forcing you to spend that amount from your savings or investments. The way that Medicaid works is that you have to spend all of your assets before the state kicks in with the above mentioned exception. Three being many care facilities will not accept anyone who cannot demonstrate the ability to pay for continued care. That can mean big assets or it can mean insurance. In other words you likely can get into a "better" facility than you might otherwise afford IF you have insurance. One kicker is that state law will prevent the facility from putting you out the door, once admitted. This may be the "best" benefit to LTC insurance. Best regards, RA1

As citylaw and others have said, long-term care insurance is a very good idea for anyone still in position to put it in place. My 84yo mother has a policy (not near needing to use it yet, thank the Lord) that provides a 2-year benefit period for premium of $1350/yr.

OK, I can no longer confine my babble over NBC's coming 'Ironside' revival to my hijack of EXPAT's 'Dracula' thread. In trolling memory lane, just found this entry on the original 'Ironside' in the treasure house that is tvtropes.org: Series: Ironside Ironside is a 1967-1975 Crime and Punishment Series whose main character is wheelchair-bound chief detective Robert T. Ironside, played by Raymond Burr.Seasons 1-3 are currently available on Hulu. A remake was recently announced that will air on NBC in fall 2013. Tropes featured include: Awesome McCoolname: Detective Robert T. Ironside. Banana in the Tailpipe: Used to fill the car with carbon monoxide and knock out its inhabitants. Does Not Like Shoes: "The Man Who Believed" and "Once More for Joey" both feature Ironside investigating the mysterious deaths of hippie musicians who were known for going barefoot. Foot Focus: There are closeups of both hippie characters' bare feet. Exotic Detective: Ironside. Genius Cripple: Ironside himself. Hey, It's That Guy!: Bruce Lee appeared in a first season episode. Also, an assortment of familiar character actors throughout the series. And, of course, Perry Mason as Ironside. The Generation Gap: Considering that the series takes place in San Francisco during The Sixties and The Seventies, this trope is inevitable. Pilot Movie Poorly Disguised Pilot: Two in a row at the end of the seventh season - "Riddle At 24,000" (about a crime-solving doctor played by Desi Arnaz) and the two-parter "Amy Prentiss: AKA The Chief" (revolving around San Francisco's first female police chief, played by Jessica Walter). Dr. Durango (the name of the propsed series) didn't sell, but Amy Prentiss joined the lineup for The NBC Mystery Movie the following season. San Francisco: The series' setting. Syndication Title: It was syndicated as The Raymond Burr Show. http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Series/Ironside

Now there was an actor who was gay and I would have liked to have known it at the time (Raymond Burr). Perhaps everyone except me knew it. I enjoyed Perry Mason and the characters thereon. I also remember William Talman doing a stop smoking ad while he was dying from lung cancer. Do as I say, not as I have done. Best regards, RA1

Actually my mother moved into a retirement community at age 65 so she would have help with her mother who was living with her. She unfailingly called this facility the old folks home. They promised, for a fee, to take care of her for the rest of her life which they did. But, of course, they were not perfect. Most of the time my mother was happy in the general community, living in her own apartment with two meals furnished and plenty of activities and amenities. There was enough variety and a large community so that I think it was easy enough to deal with minor inconveniences. Of course the maintenance fees went up every year and had more than doubled after the 27 years she lived there. When her health began to decline and she fell a few times, first she went to rehab and then to the long term care which most of us call a nursing home. All co-located. Here one finds the meat and potatoes of such a facility. In my case, I have few complaints about the care and caring of the staff. Basically they gave good care and were caring. I even have good things to say about the "middle" supervisors but not so much good to say about the upper management. As I and others have observed in the past, no one likes their landlord. They did deliver what they promised but it could have been done with less acrimony and, where have you heard this before, more transparency. As it turned out, I did not know all the rules and ramifications thereof until too late to make them work better for me and us. Before signing any agreement or contract with any facility I highly recommend reading through the literature and contract. Any questions you can ask to improve your understanding thereof will pay benefits in the long run. Peace of mind is imperative and sometimes the least found commodity. Best regards, RA1

Everyone's journey with their aging parents is different but often share certain commonalities, as we see in this thread. From experience I can tell you that you will need to try different things to see what works best for you and your father. It will also require some ongoing changes as things progress through stages. The one thing that is critical, as I and others have mentioned, is to take time for yourself and to take care of yourself. That can't be said enough. For my mom, we have someone from an agency (the same person for familiarity) come in every day for the morning to be with her and take care of hygiene, so that allows me to do what I need to do. My mom had the foresight years ago to get a long term care insurance policy so that has kicked in to help take care of those expenses. A lesson for many who don't have someone they can depend on should we ever have similar experiences. For caregivers without that type of insurance, the Alzheimer's Association does have programs that provides respite assistance. Build that support network. Both for yourself and for your dad. It can be family, friends, agencies, associations, church group, city services, etc. See what you think would work for your situation. There are often adult day care centers that he may be able to go to in the area. Our community offers daily lunches for seniors at the community center, transportation services as well as meals on wheels for daily dinner deliveries. The Alzheimer's Association can provide details of many resources in your area. You and other caregivers for your father may find value in support groups that meet regularly in your community or online groups. As far as your father's feeling of losing control and possibly purpose, there may be things to try to help him. While it may be easier and more convenient for us to do things ourselves, it may not always be the best for our parent. Letting them do as much as they used to do as possible is good as long as they don't get too frustrated. You may often have to redo whatever they do but still give them the chance to keep as much of their routine as possible. My mom was quite the housekeeper and loves her garden and plants. So she still will wash the dishes in the sink (and I wash them again in the dishwasher), dusts and sweeps everyday (even though I have someone come in weekly to clean the house top to bottom), and waters her plants (even though half of it ends up on the floor and I have to clean it up). Although she no longer cooks, she can help in the kitchen preparing meals with help and direction. As weather permits, she is outside raking the lawn (even if very little to rake) or picking up sticks, weeds, etc. All these things are beneficial both in keeping their sense of normal routine along with giving them important exercise. With bills and such, while still able to focus on them, we did them together (using her system). So my suggestion is don't take things away from him until absolutely necessary but find some way to allow him to continue as much as possible for as long as possible doing things with help. Include him as much as possible rather than exclude him from those activities he is used to do. The exception is often those things that are safety issues (like driving and using stoves, knives, matches, etc). Speaking of safety, that is a whole other topic and one worth looking into sooner than later. A survey of the house to deal with potential safety issues is useful if you haven't already done that. It can be related to loose rugs or exposed chords that can be tripping hazards, cleaning fluids in secure place (some can get confused and drink them), etc. It is, in effect, an exercise to "child proof" the home, for lack of a better phrase. Depending on circumstances, medical alert systems should be considered. Also, at some point you may have an issue with "wandering" where your father suddenly has the need to go somewhere and will go out by himself. Many elderly get confused easily and get lost. There are systems in place to help with that situation and worth looking into. For my mom, we have focused the mornings (her best time of day) on pleasant events. As she loves flowers, we take her to the garden center to look at flowers. We set up bird and squirrel feeders in her back yard and she enjoys sitting on the porch watching them. Finding such things for your father will be at some point a useful distraction for him. One thing that has worked very well for us is that we got mom a rescue dog recently. She never had a dog before but has taken to her like one of her children and loves to spoil her. It adds more work for me but on balance it is worth it. Sorry to be so long winded and likely you have thought about many of these things but it is a topic close to my heart. I am still learning, being proactive and trying new things. Some work and some don't. The best thing that your father has going for him is a loving son who is motivated to do what is best for his dad. Just remember that you don't have to go through this alone.

I am not much on road kill, no matter how well prepared. However, I have eaten reindeer and elk + some, no doubt, rare delicacies during a holiday feast in Iceland but I have no idea what they were as I don't speak Norse all that well. Probably Hagaar the Horrible could have enlightened me but I think he was away sacking, pillaging and causing mischief elsewhere during the holidays. Best regards, RA1

Right on schedule!

Are all telephone calls recorded and accessible to the US government? A former FBI counterterrorism agent claims on CNN that this is the case Glenn Greenwald guardian.co.uk, Saturday 4 May 2013 08.22 EDT Former FBI counterterrorism agent Tim Clemente, on CNN, discussing government's surveillance capabilities Photograph: CNN screegrab The real capabilities and behavior of the US surveillance state are almost entirely unknown to the American public because, like most things of significance done by the US government, it operates behind an impenetrable wall of secrecy. But a seemingly spontaneous admission this week by a former FBI counterterrorism agent provides a rather startling acknowledgment of just how vast and invasive these surveillance activities are. Over the past couple days, cable news tabloid shows such as CNN's Out Front with Erin Burnett have been excitingly focused on the possible involvement in the Boston Marathon attack of Katherine Russell, the 24-year-old American widow of the deceased suspect, Tamerlan Tsarnaev. As part of their relentless stream of leaks uncritically disseminated by our Adversarial Press Corps, anonymous government officials are claiming that they are now focused on telephone calls between Russell and Tsarnaev that took place both before and after the attack to determine if she had prior knowledge of the plot or participated in any way. On Wednesday night, Burnett interviewed Tim Clemente, a former FBI counterterrorism agent, about whether the FBI would be able to discover the contents of past telephone conversations between the two. He quite clearly insisted that they could: BURNETT: Tim, is there any way, obviously, there is a voice mail they can try to get the phone companies to give that up at this point. It's not a voice mail. It's just a conversation. There's no way they actually can find out what happened, right, unless she tells them? CLEMENTE: "No, there is a way. We certainly have ways in national security investigations to find out exactly what was said in that conversation. It's not necessarily something that the FBI is going to want to present in court, but it may help lead the investigation and/or lead to questioning of her. We certainly can find that out. BURNETT: "So they can actually get that? People are saying, look, that is incredible. CLEMENTE: "No, welcome to America. All of that stuff is being captured as we speak whether we know it or like it or not." "All of that stuff" - meaning every telephone conversation Americans have with one another on US soil, with or without a search warrant - "is being captured as we speak". On Thursday night, Clemente again appeared on CNN, this time with host Carol Costello, and she asked him about those remarks. He reiterated what he said the night before but added expressly that "all digital communications in the past" are recorded and stored: Let's repeat that last part: "no digital communication is secure", by which he means not that any communication is susceptible to government interception as it happens (although that is true), but far beyond that: all digital communications - meaning telephone calls, emails, online chats and the like - are automatically recorded and stored and accessible to the government after the fact. To describe that is to define what a ubiquitous, limitless Surveillance State is. There have been some previous indications that this is true. Former AT&T engineer Mark Klein revealed that AT&T and other telecoms had built a special network that allowed the National Security Agency full and unfettered access to data about the telephone calls and the content of email communications for all of their customers. Specifically, Klein explained "that the NSA set up a system that vacuumed up Internet and phone-call data from ordinary Americans with the cooperation of AT&T" and that "contrary to the government's depiction of its surveillance program as aimed at overseas terrorists . . . much of the data sent through AT&T to the NSA was purely domestic." But his amazing revelations were mostly ignored and, when Congress retroactively immunized the nation's telecom giants for their participation in the illegal Bush spying programs, Klein's claims (by design) were prevented from being adjudicated in court. That every single telephone call is recorded and stored would also explain this extraordinary revelation by the Washington Post in 2010: Every day, collection systems at the National Security Agency intercept and store 1.7 billion e-mails, phone calls and other types of communications. It would also help explain the revelations of former NSA official William Binney, who resigned from the agency in protest over its systemic spying on the domestic communications of US citizens, that the US government has "assembled on the order of 20 trillion transactions about US citizens with other US citizens" (which counts only communications transactions and not financial and other transactions), and that "the data that's being assembled is about everybody. And from that data, then they can target anyone they want." Despite the extreme secrecy behind which these surveillance programs operate, there have been periodic reports of serious abuse. Two Democratic Senators, Ron Wyden and Mark Udall, have been warning for years that Americans would be "stunned" to learn what the US government is doing in terms of secret surveillance. Strangely, back in 2002 - when hysteria over the 9/11 attacks (and thus acquiescence to government power) was at its peak - the Pentagon's attempt to implement what it called the "Total Information Awareness" program (TIA) sparked so much public controversy that it had to be official scrapped. But it has been incrementally re-instituted - without the creepy (though honest) name and all-seeing-eye logo - with little controversy or even notice. Back in 2010, worldwide controversy erupted when the governments of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates banned the use of Blackberries because some communications were inaccessible to government intelligence agencies, and that could not be tolerated. The Obama administration condemned this move on the ground that it threatened core freedoms, only to turn around six weeks later and demand that all forms of digital communications allow the US government backdoor access to intercept them. Put another way, the US government embraced exactly the same rationale invoked by the UAE and Saudi agencies: that no communications can be off limits. Indeed, the UAE, when responding to condemnations from the Obama administration, noted that it was simply doing exactly that which the US government does: "'In fact, the UAE is exercising its sovereign right and is asking for exactly the same regulatory compliance - and with the same principles of judicial and regulatory oversight - that Blackberry grants the US and other governments and nothing more,' [uAE Ambassador to the US Yousef Al] Otaiba said. 'Importantly, the UAE requires the same compliance as the US for the very same reasons: to protect national security and to assist in law enforcement.'" That no human communications can be allowed to take place without the scrutinizing eye of the US government is indeed the animating principle of the US Surveillance State. Still, this revelation, made in passing on CNN, that every single telephone call made by and among Americans is recorded and stored is something which most people undoubtedly do not know, even if the small group of people who focus on surveillance issues believed it to be true (clearly, both Burnett and Costello were shocked to hear this). Some new polling suggests that Americans, even after the Boston attack, are growing increasingly concerned about erosions of civil liberties in the name of Terrorism. Even those people who claim it does not matter instinctively understand the value of personal privacy: they put locks on their bedroom doors and vigilantly safeguard their email passwords. That's why the US government so desperately maintains a wall of secrecy around their surveillance capabilities: because they fear that people will find their behavior unacceptably intrusive and threatening, as they did even back in 2002 when John Poindexter's TIA was unveiled. Mass surveillance is the hallmark of a tyrannical political culture. But whatever one's views on that, the more that is known about what the US government and its surveillance agencies are doing, the better. This admission by this former FBI agent on CNN gives a very good sense for just how limitless these activities are. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/may/04/telephone-calls-recorded-fbi-boston

Do these snide remarks fulfill your aspirations in life or are you just a bitter old queen? Is that a distinction without a difference?

If you do choose to visit Bonsucesso and take a ride on the "teleferico", make a point of carving out a bit more time and climb or take the funicular up the hill to the Igreja da Penha. It is just about due east from the international airport at Galeao, historic and an incredible view from up on top.

John invited his mother over for dinner. During the meal, his mother couldn't help noticing how handsome John's roommate was. She had long been suspicious of Johns' sexual orientation and this only made her more curious. Over the course of the evening, while watching the two interact, she started to wonder if there was more between John and the roommate than met the eye. Reading his mom's thoughts, John volunteered, "I know what you must be thinking, but I assure you, Mark and I are just roommates." About a week later, Mark came to John and said, "Ever since your mother came to dinner, I've been unable to find the beautiful silver gravy ladle. You don't suppose she took it, do you?" John said, "Well, I doubt it, but I'll write her a letter just to be sure." So he sat down and wrote: "Dear Mother, I'm not saying you 'did' take a gravy ladle from my house, and I'm not saying you 'did not' take a gravy ladle. But the fact remains that one has been missing ever since you were here for dinner." Several days later, John received a letter from his mother which read: "Dear Son, I'm not saying that you 'do' sleep with Mark, and I'm not saying that you 'do not' sleep with Mark. But the fact remains that if he was sleeping in his own bed, he would have found the gravy ladle by now. Love, Mom"