ECOMINOES

There Is Legal Recourse For 4th Amendment Violations

2013-06-18T23:23:00.000-04:00

In my last article, I demonstrated that 1) the federal government uses an autonomous, constitutionally-questionable court system to justify its invasive domestic surveillance policies, and 2) ordinary citizens who supposedly have "nothing to hide" should nonetheless be concerned about how said policies can adversely impact their lives. Today, I'd like to present a real-life scenario in which someone who supposedly had "nothing to hide" was badly harmed by an invasive federal domestic spying program. Exonerated, this person then brought a successful suit against the federal employees who disrupted his life.

A defense lawyer friend of mine once represented a man whose computer had been hacked and made part of an international botnet that distributed ch#$d por%. (I'm refraining from spelling out the term so I don't get put on a watch list myself.) This person was nabbed by the FBI and thrown in jail, his name and mugshot publicized. As a result, the man lost his job, his wife, and his house. His case was eventually tossed (it was determined that federal agents improperly seized evidence), but the damage had already been done: overzealous federal law enforcement used a domestic spying program to ruin a man's life.

Some time later, the man sought damages from the government. His attorney (not my defense lawyer friend) brought a Bivens Action against the law enforcement personnel who hacked his computer looking for illicit media. Government lawyers, fearing the court would rule that the federal employees did indeed violate the man's 4th Amendment protections, negotiated a settlement.

There are several takeaways from this man's story in the context of invasive federal domestic spying programs:

1) Federal law enforcement personnel who utilize such programs to violate Americans' 4th Amendment protections have good reason to fear legal recourse.

2) Even though suing the government itself is difficult, it can be done successfully against federal law enforcement personnel acting on behalf of the government.

3) The Supreme Court has pierced the government's veil of sovereign immunity. It's now possible to sue federal law enforcement personnel working in their official capacities as if they were ordinary citizens. Futhermore, SCOTUS has recently ruled that a federal law enforcement agent's legal authority can also waive his sovereign immunity. In other words, lower-ranking agents (the ones who are often tasked with violating Americans' 4th Amendment protections) have a lesser chance of being granted sovereign immunity than higher-ranking officials with special clearances.

The size and scope of federal domestic spying programs should be of concern to every American, even those who have "nothing to hide". Fortunately for us, there is legal recourse for some of the 4th Amendment violations these programs facilitate.

NSA, Section 215, And The Endangered 4th Amendment

2013-06-17T10:22:00.000-04:00

In light of the continuously-developing NSA spying story, it's important to look at how substantial the government's legal justification is for its overreaching domestic surveillance policy, and how said policy can impact the lives of ordinary citizens who supposedly have "nothing to hide".

First, let's look at government's legal argument. Earlier this month, the Guardian released the NSA order which compels Verizon to deliver customers' call information to the agency on an "ongoing, daily basis". Since that time, a plethora of additional information has come to light which demonstrates that the size and scope of federal domestic spying policy goes far beyond the NSA and Verizon. Nevertheless, the NSA Verizon order demonstrates how the government uses Section 215 of the Patriot Act to trounce the Constitution. Indeed, the order references the highly-controversial section in the very first line.

The ACLU has come to the conclusion that Section 215 of the Patriot Act is the specific legal order that authorizes the federal government to surveil the electronic communications of ordinary Americans. This section, according to the organization, enables the government to apply to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court--which NPR's Dina Temple-Raston calls a domestic spying "rubber stamp"--to obtain legal clearance to circumvent 4th Amendment protections. In other words, the feds are granted permission to violate Americans' civil liberties as per the rulings of an autonomous, opaque court system that justified the existence of Section 215 in the first place! The section, according to the ACLU:

...authorizes the government to obtain "any tangible thing" relevant to a terrorism investigation, even if there is no showing that the "thing" pertains to suspected terrorists or terrorist activities. This provision is contrary to traditional notions of search and seizure, which require the government to show reasonable suspicion or probable cause before undertaking an investigation that infringes upon a person's privacy.

"Any tangible thing", ladies and gentlemen, means ANY form of Americans' electronic communication, domestic or international. That should be extremely concerning to everyone, irrespective of ideology and if one has "nothing to hide".

So, why, then, should someone who supposedly has nothing to hide be concerned about Section 215 or federal domestic spying at all?

"Nothing to hide" is a myth that's built on certain false assumptions that are rarely--if ever-- considered when draconian surveillance measures are being pushed. Toby Stevens of Computer Weekly characterizes these assumptions as continuity, context, control, and consistency:

Continuity: When a large data gathering exercise is started, the lifespan of the system will almost always be greater than that of its instigators. The most benign and caring government, authority or private company is inevitably subject to a change of management, and if the new executive does not share their moral stance, then data can be reused for very dangerous purposes. Those who provided data believing they had nothing to fear may find that data is misused in the future.

So, change of management--continuity--means that draconian laws can be abused by future regimes. I guarantee that some enterprising government bureaucrats already use sensitive data gathered in the name of the "War on Terror" to further political agendas. While such abuse may be isolated today, it could become official policy in the future.

Context: Those who use the NTHNTF argument most commonly use it in the context of government collecting information about individuals. In the information age, the idea of a single entity holding that information does not hold true. The massive pressures to share information within and beyond government mean that information is constantly on the move. Sooner or later, information held by the government will be shared across the government and with the private sector.

Sensitive data gathered in the name of the "War on Terror" may remain within the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI today, but, eventually, it could be accessed by other government agencies such as the IRS. Furthermore, it could eventually leak out to private sector organizations that have the ability to disrupt ordinary citizens' lives: credit bureaus, current or potential employers, etc.

Control: Whether through a sharing agreement, aggregation of databases or simply leaving a memory stick in a pub car park, information is always shared sooner or later. Information security professionals always assume a system to be insecure, and plan for when - not if - data is lost or corrupted.

Sensitive data gathered in the name of the "War on Terror" could also be accessed by hackers, who could sell it or use it to intimidate or blackmail.

Consistency: The most important issue is that of consistent use of accurate information across all authorities and all individuals.

The recent IRS scandal demonstrates that some enterprising government bureaucrats can-- and will--use sensitive data inconsistently based on political agenda. Again, while such abuse may be isolated today, it may become official policy upon regime change.

The government's legal justification for its overreaching domestic surveillance policy and how said policy can impact the lives of ordinary Americans are, outside of the destruction of the U.S. economy at the hands of the Federal Reserve, two of the most important issues of our time. These issues must be addressed by ordinary citizens such as you and me: demanding that our elected officials to rethink the existence of the FISA court and revise Section 215 of the Patriot Act, and compelling the government to expunge sensitive information gathered in the name of the "War on Terror". And if the government refuses to comply with our demands, it's our duty to replace said government with one that will.

ECOMINOES Radio Live @ 4 ET: Let's Get Spirited On The Sabbath!

2013-06-09T15:16:00.001-04:00

Didn't get to do the show Friday due to studio flooding, but I have A LOT of important, anger-provoking news to discuss this Sunday afternoon. So let's get spirited on the Sabbath! Don't miss it live right here from 4-6 ET, and don't forget to check out past episodes in the archives.

Obama Is The New Bush

2013-06-07T13:08:00.000-04:00

It's ironic that the first (half) black president would show so little concern for civil liberties, and it's even more ironic that liberals who thought of Bush as a war criminal fail to criticize Obama for overseeing so many civil liberty-eroding federal programs. Obama is the new Bush in terms of "War on Terror" overreach, but few liberals have come out and publicly admonished the president.

First, let's demonstrate with a timeline of civil liberty-eroding federal programs that Obama is indeed the new Bush (click to enlarge):

So-called CIA "black sites" (secret detention centers) have supposedly been shuttered, but anyone who knows anything about the CIA knows that they don't play by the rules. Dollars to donuts they still operate such sites without the public's knowledge. Same thing with so-called "enhanced interrogation". Waterboarding, etc. might not be official policy any more, but it's not unreasonable to believe that it continues unbeknownst to the general public.

But even if these 2 affronts to civil liberties have been terminated, Obama still oversees a number of controversial "War on Terror" programs that are--in effect--extensions of Bush-era programs. And, yet, we hear little from the Left about them. Andrew Kirell wrote an excellent op-ed on the subject for Mediaite:

The news that the Obama administration’s National Security Agency is collecting the telephone records of millions of US Verizon customers via a top secret court order is astonishing and appalling on many levels. But there is one thing it is not: Surprising.

In the post-9/11 world, the US government has increasingly found ways to expand its surveillance capabilities through secretive court orders, malleable standards, and blanket laws — seemingly without restraint. This latest NSA news, as broken by the venerable Glenn Greenwald, only serves to confirm what civil libertarians have long suspected: the NSA has repeatedly engaged in massive surveillance of domestic communications of millions of Americans, regardless of whether they are suspected of a crime.

Libertarians who struggled through the Bush years will recall how the NSA had been secretly collecting the phone records of millions of Americans, with the help of telecommunications giants like AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth. “The NSA program reaches into homes and businesses across the nation by amassing information about the calls of ordinary Americans — most of whom aren’t suspected of any crime,” USA Today reported in 2006, several years after Bush initiated the secretive program.

Given Greenwald’s report, this all sounds eerily familiar. We now have confirmation that Obama has continued, if not expanded, that exact sort of egregious surveillance program. In fact, as Cato Institute’s Julian Sanchez told Greenwald, this Obama incident perhaps goes further with an “extraordinary repudiation of any pretence of constraint or particularized suspicion.”

This latest example of Obama overreach is sure to rankle the feathers of conservatives already rightfully disturbed by the DOJ’s extensive snooping on journalists and the IRS’s intentional targeting of tea party organizations. While many of these same conservatives were rah-rah’ing the expansion of the NSA and United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court during the Bush years, it is a pleasant change to see them finally care about FISA. Welcome aboard.

Now it’s up to the liberals who lauded Obama as the “anti-Bush” civil liberties champion in 2008 to swallow their pride as well and take a stand against this administration’s overreach, despite what they might see as partisan opportunism coming from the right.

As the last 13 years have proven, regardless of who is in the White House the security state will continue to expand. And it will take some hypocrisy on both sides to finally end it.

"Now it’s up to the liberals who lauded Obama as the 'anti-Bush' civil liberties champion in 2008 to swallow their pride as well and take a stand against this administration’s overreach." I couldn't have said it better myself.

Lindsey Graham Is The Defense Industry's Man

2013-06-06T20:35:00.003-04:00

South Carolina's senior senator, Lindsey Graham, just loves the "War on Terror". He told Fox and Friends this morning that he's "glad" Verizon is turning over phone records of average Americans to the NSA:

I’m glad the NSA is trying to find out what the terrorists are up to overseas and in our country...I’m a Verizon customer. I don’t mind Verizon turning over records to the government if the government is going to make sure that they try to match up a known terrorist phone with somebody in the United States. I don’t think you’re talking to the terrorists. I know you’re not. I know I’m not. So we don’t have anything to worry about.

Senator Graham vehemently defends his favorite war. After learning that Rand Paul called the Verizon/NSA partnership a "an astounding assault on the Constitution", Senator Graham took to attacking libertarians:

Sen. Rand Paul, he's a libertarian, and in Rand Paul's world you have almost no defenses against terrorists...I see the threat to our nation differently

Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2013/06/06/4277167/sen-graham-dismisses-verizon-surveillance.html#storylink=cpy

Indeed he does. Graham continues to support nearly every federal "War on Terror" initiative--no matter how invasive--, even though the erosion of civil liberties has become a "hot topic" among conservatives. To understand why the increasingly unpopular senator is such a strong advocate of controversial defense programs, one only need look at his top campaign contributors. From OpenSecrets:

4 of Graham's top 5 contributors from 2007 to 2012 have profited greatly from the senator's favorite war. SCANA is a major Department of Defense supplier, Nelson Mullins, et al. is a law firm that specializes in DoD procurement contracts, Motley Rice, LLC is a law firm that specializes in "War on Terror" litigation, and Boeing is one of the nation's largest DoD vendors. No surprise there.

Reddit Moderator Bias Creating Opportunity For Competitors

2013-06-05T15:37:00.001-04:00

In a previous article, I detailed how moderators of the widely-popular social news aggregation site Reddit have absolute power to remove links to articles they disagree with, and even permanently block links to sites they dislike. I noted that the popularity of links posted on Reddit can't override the unilateral actions moderators take, and several popular bloggers (including me) have had articles pulled that accumulated hundreds of "up votes" from users of the site.

Yesterday, ECOMINOES was permanently banned from Reddit at the sole discretion of a single moderator. As a result, traffic to the blog has been cut in half. Long-time ECOMINOES readers know that my articles are well-researched, well-written, and provide valuable information to those concerned about the erosion of economic and civil liberties in this country. Long-time readers also know that I'm an honest, level-headed guy, and I would never do anything to provoke an outright ban from any website, apart from publishing content that some people disagree with. A great many people would therefore agree that the ban was unwarranted.

Dozens of bloggers have written about the absolute power Reddit moderators wield. I noted in my previous article on the subject that, unless the site changes its moderation policy, someone will eventually come along and create a site that does what Reddit does, but without problematic moderator bias. Social news aggregation is an easily-replicable concept; Reddit enjoys its massive popularity solely because it was the first site of its kind.

MySpace was also the first site of its kind, and, once-upon-a-time, tech industry analysts were saying that that site would forever reign as the king of social media. Then, along came Facebook, and the rest is history. Reddit risks MySpace's fate unless it takes the simple step of allowing links to stand or be automatically removed based upon the aggregate number of "up votes", as opposed to the whims of one person.

Fortunately, a number of new social news aggregation sites have been created. It remains to be seen if one of them will rise to prominence and dethrone Reddit--or if an entirely new site will come along and take the niche by storm--, but the next generation of social news aggregation is full of promise. Here are a few sites that have caught my eye. From MoreOfIt.com:

Metafilter

Community blog to which anyone can contribute a link or comment.

Newsvine

News service which, as well as reporting the latest news, allows users to comment and chat about every article, write their own columns, and point readers to other stories.

digg

Community driven news and link aggregation. Users vote to keep news items and links.

Author's note: Digg isn't new, and it's structured slightly differently than Reddit. However, this social news aggregation site is tremendously popular and has a tremendous opportunity to siphon off disillusioned Reddit readers and content providers.

Chime.in

News, photo, and video sharing (formerly Mixx).

Reddit could easily avoid disaster by changing its moderation policy. However, the site's fundamental flaw has been ongoing for years and has been well-documented by the blogging community since at least 2010. Reddit moderator bias is common knowledge, but the site's managers have demonstrated no interest in addressing the problem, even after their site was acquired by Condé Nast. The opportunity to dethrone Reddit is as great today as it was when the site was first created.

The New Housing Bubble Visualized: Investment Dollars

2013-06-04T23:15:00.000-04:00

The media are cheering the recent rise in home prices, insinuating that it's a sign the economy is improving. Those of us who actually look behind the numbers know better: it's a function of investors throwing cheap, low-risk, Fed-provided dollars at the housing market, just like they did in the mid 2000s. It's part of the "mother of all bubbles" the Fed is inflating--as Nouriel Roubini is calling it--, and it will eventually lead to another economic calamity.

But until the new bubble bursts, it's fast times in the housing market. Home prices are once again shooting for the stars, and, not surprisingly, the markets that are rising the quickest are the markets in which investors are throwing the most capital. From Forbes:

Institutional investors have been targeting specific markets and then accelerating purchases of REOs in those markets, driving down distressed inventories and leading to notable increases in REO prices that have in turn led to larger market upticks.

Institutional investors have focused buying efforts strongly on south and southwestern cities that were hit hardest by the foreclosure crisis. The cities where investors activity has been particularly robust in the past year are Atlanta, Ga., Detroit, Mich., Las Vegas, Nev., Phoenix, Ariz., and Calif.’s Los Angeles.

Note that 5 of the 6 fastest-rising markets are markets in which investor activity has been "particularly robust", as per Forbes:

It's 2005 all over again. It will be 2008 again in just a few short years.

Tremendous Opportunity For Libertarian Talk Radio

2013-06-03T22:41:00.000-04:00

I previously noted that the demand for libertarian terrestrial talk radio is increasing, and the supply of libertarian hosts on terrestrial talk radio is far lower than demand. Today, I've come across additional data that suggest that libertarian talk radio has great potential.

Terrestrial music radio is hemorrhaging listeners, and many under-performing music stations are switching to the relatively-more popular news/talk format. In other words, the demand for news/talk programming is increasing.

While demand for news/talk programming is increasing, terrestrial news/talk radio as a whole, which is currently dominated by conservative hosts, is losing listeners. According to RadioInsights, more than half of news/talk stations lost market share in each of the last 3 years. News/talk listenership has been flat for years: the format has approximately the same number of listeners today as it had in 2007.

The conservative-dominated terrestrial news/talk format also has a less-than-optimal distribution of listeners by age group. According to Arbitron, listeners of the format are getting older, and the majority already age out of the key 25-54 demographic:

The majority of libertarians, on the other hand, are young--and therefore more valuable--to advertisers.

Libertarian talk has great potential in the online format as well as on terrestrial radio. While terrestrial radio is losing listeners, Internet radio is rapidly gaining listeners, and the number of listeners of online radio is expected to equal that of terrestrial radio by 2015. The online talk radio format is better suited to libertarians than conservatives, as the former tend to be younger and more tech-savvy than the latter. Most current libertarian-oriented online shows are amateurish, but quality will likely increase as advertisers take notice of the burgeoning format.

Shameless plug: My Internet-based talk show airs live Fridays from 3 to 5 ET on KineticHifi. Past shows can be heard here. I'm an amateur refining his skill, but I'm particularly proud of the episodes from 04/19 to 05/17.

Long-Term Unemployment Creating Mental Health Crisis

2013-06-02T21:30:00.000-04:00

It makes me so angry that the perpetrators of this 5+ year economic depression and subsequent "jobless recovery"--primarily the Federal Reserve, who inflated the mid 2000s housing bubble, and certain government officials, who forced lenders and the secondary mortgage markets to assume "subprime" loans--haven't had to answer to the enormous economic disaster and countless human tragedies they created. Five years after the fall of Lehman, few heads have rolled, Ben Bernanke remains Fed chairman, and Barney Frank and Chris Dodd are living the high life after having retired from Congress. (In fact, the latter is currently making money hand-over-fist as CEO of the Motion Picture Association.)

But while those who caused this mess continue to prosper without fear of reprisal, a great many of those they harmed continue to languish. Facing rampant employment discrimination and a perennially awful job market, the overwhelming majority of the millions of Americans who fell into the trap of long-term unemployment and underemployment during this depression remain there today. And, tragically, a great many of those who remain in the long-term unemployment/underemployment trap have developed mental health problems. Indeed, according to the CDC, the percentage of Americans who are clinically depressed has barely budged since reaching an all-time high in 2010.

One of the insidious aspects of this economic depression is that it's created a surge in the demand for mental health care while 1) those who need the care the most are less capable of affording it, and 2) mental health care facilities' budgets have been slashed. As a consequence, psychiatric facilities are operating under tremendous pressure, many reaching "crisis levels". This crisis was recently chronicled by the Post and Courier (Charleston, SC):

Hospitals have seen a spike in people suffering “episodic” mental health disorders such as major depression and suicide risks following job losses, long-term unemployment and other traumatic events. Meanwhile, funding cuts have filtered down to local mental health centers.

“More people are competing for already very limited resources that are shrinking,” said Eileen McLaughlin, senior social worker at MUSC’s Institute of Psychiatry.

The S.C. Hospital Association has declared it a “hidden crisis.”

Several other media organizations, including NBC News, McClatchy newspapers, and CNN, have also recently noted the mental heath care crisis.

So what's the answer? Clearly, a recovery of the job market and subsequent decrease in the demand for mental health care would be optimal. However, levels of unemployment and underemployment remain stubbornly high, and, contrary to the beliefs of central bankers and government bureaucrats, the economy can't be centrally-controlled. Therefore, the solution to this crisis must come in the form of an increase in the supply of mental health care.

As a fiscally-conservative libertarian, I believe that federal, state, and local governments should be as small and frugal as possible. However, I'm also a strong advocate of public assistance and mental health care for those who have been seriously harmed by the economy. I therefore strongly believe that budgets for the mental health care system should be increased despite the recent lull in government revenues, even if that means decreasing spending in other areas. I also believe that those who have developed mental health issues as a result of this economic depression would feel somewhat better if those responsible for the financial ruin of millions of Americans were finally held accountable.

ECOMINOES Radio Talks Deflation With Karl Denninger

2013-05-31T14:01:00.001-04:00

Especially exciting show this week! I'll lead off with a conversation with financial guru Karl Denninger about the state of the economy, and then I'll talk about religion in the context of liberty with Kinetic HiFi owner Boyd Stough. Don't miss this show! Listen live here from 3-5 ET, and never forget that you can listen to past episodes in the archives.

FairTax "Prebate" An Answer To The Welfare State

2013-05-31T13:34:00.001-04:00

The Free Enterprise Foundation and The Citadel have recently been hosting public showings and discussions of the Milton Friedman television series "Free to Choose". Last night's episode was entitled "Cradle to Grave", which took a look at the welfare system in the United States. Although the episode was filmed in 1980, many of the topics covered in the show remain relevant today.

Among several points I made in the discussion following the film, I noted that, while I'm a small "l" libertarian and I believe the free market system usually provides the best remedies for social problems, I've also experienced unemployment and underemployment since earning my M.B.A. during the fall of Lehman, and I therefore understand the need for public assistance of some kind. In the episode, Friedman stated that, in 1980, only 70% of money the federal government allocated to public assistance programs actually reached the people it was intended to help. The other 30% was consumed by the federal bureaucracy. As the government has grown to several times the size it was in 1980, it's likely that the percentage eaten by federal administrative costs is even higher today.

Friedman's solution to the problem of inefficient federal public assistance programs was to implement a "negative income tax", in which public welfare agencies would be replaced by direct monetary disbursements to people who don't meet certain income requirements. Under this plan, every American would have a guaranteed minimum income, and nearly 100% of federal dollars allocated to assisting the public would reach its intended recipients.

I agree with Dr. Friedman that guaranteeing a minimum income for every American would be a good idea. However, I believe that the "prebate" (.pdf) of the FairTax would be even better solution to the inefficiencies of public assistance programs than the negative income tax.

The prebate--like the negative income tax--would be a direct monetary disbursement to Americans who don't meet certain income requirements. However, unlike the NIT, the FairTax would capture everyone who spends money in the United States. (It's a consumption tax that would replace the income tax.) Therefore, those who derive the majority of the incomes from the black market--but would still qualify for the negative income tax because they show little or no legal earnings (drug dealers, prostitutes, etc.)--would still contribute to the tax base. In other words, the FairTax would all but ELIMINATE public assistance fraud, which currently costs the government nearly a half trillion dollars annually. (This number includes all public assistance programs, including, but not limited to welfare, Medicaid, Social Security disability, and unemployment benefits.)

I don't care what the libertarian and conservative purists say. There's a need for federal public assistance in this country, especially in this "New Normal" economy. But the system is in need of radical reform, and the FairTax prebate is one of the answers. The current prebate amounts are too low to completely replace help provided by public assistance agencies, but the concept is terrific, and those amounts can be increased.

ECOMINOES Status Update

2013-05-31T01:47:00.000-04:00

I've been extremely busy as of late, and I simply haven't had much time to devote to the blog or the radio show. I hope to return to a more manageable schedule shortly. In the meantime, feel free to peruse the hundreds of articles in the blog archive, which are listed in chronological order in the side menu to the right. Archives of the show can be accessed here. See you soon!

The Fed As The 4th Branch Of Government Visualized

2013-05-29T10:27:00.001-04:00

As you can see from the following chart, the Fed owns 30% of all Treasury Bonds (federal government debt), and the percentage of T-bonds held by the Fed has been steadily increasing since QE1. (Because the term "QE" has developed such a negative connotation and the general public now understands that the term is just a fancy way of saying "money printing", the Fed now calls QE "LSAP" and "MEP". Don't worry what the acronyms stand for; the former is just another fancy way of saying money printing, and the latter is a fancy way of saying the maintenance of the printing program.)

As this chart clearly demonstrates, the Fed has been enabling profligate Keynesian spending throughout this economic depression. As with all parabolic trends, this trend is unsustainable. However, keep in mind that China is buying less of our debt and Japan, which is devaluing its currency, won't be able to continue to make up the difference. Therefore, unless Uncle Sam significantly cuts spending (which he won't), the Fed will have to purchase an even larger percentage of his debt, even though the Fed wants to cease its "easing programs". So what will happen if the Fed monetizes even more debt, even if it doesn't want to? High inflation.

ECOMINOES Radio Live @ 3:30 ET

2013-05-17T14:24:00.000-04:00

Join me live at 3:30 ET as I discuss the sad state of our nation's economy, the sad state of our nation's political system, and a unique analysis of Obama's recent scandals. Tune in live here, and don't forget to check out past episodes in the archives.

Death Of The American Worker In 10 Charts

2013-05-17T13:42:00.000-04:00

I find myself balancing a concerted effort to remain positive despite the economic hardship I've experienced since 2008 and revealing the hidden inconvenient truths regarding the U.S. economy. The truth is that the state of the economy is much worse than the MSM has been reporting, and America's unfortunate economic reality has been papered-over by a false sense of prosperity that has resulted from unprecedented liquidity pumping by the Fed. For an accurate gauge of how the economy is faring, one need only look at how the average American worker has been faring. From Michael Snyder of The Economic Collapse Blog:

The following are 10 amazing charts that demonstrate the slow, agonizing death of the American worker...

#1 Wages And Salaries As A Percentage Of GDP

As you can see, wages as a percentage of GDP are hovering near an all-time record low. That means that American workers are bringing home a smaller share of the economic pie than ever before.

#2 Average Annual Hours Worked Per Employed Person In The United States

We are an economy that is rapidly trading good paying full-time jobs for low paying part-time jobs. The decline in average annual hours worked that we have witnessed represents the equivalent of losing millions of jobs. There has been an explosion of "the working poor" in the United States, and this trend is probably only going to accelerate in the years to come.

#3 Manufacturing Employment

As you can see, there are less Americans working in manufacturing today than there was in 1950 even though the population of the country has more than doubled since then. The United States has lost more than 56,000 manufacturing facilities since 2001, and yet our politicians stand around and do nothing about it.

#4 Employment-Population Ratio

This is one of my favorite charts. It shows that there has been absolutely no employment recovery at all since the end of the last recession. The percentage of working age Americans that have a job has stayed under 59 percent for 44 months in a row. How much worse will things get when the next major economic downturn strikes?

#5 Labor Force Participation Rate

This is how the Obama administration is getting the "unemployment rate" to magically go down. They are pretending that millions upon millions of Americans simply do not want to work anymore. As you will notice, the decline of the labor force participation rate has accelerated greatly since Barack Obama entered the White House.

#6 Duration Of Unemployment

The average amount of time that it takes an unemployed worker to find a new job has declined slightly, but it is still far above normal historical levels. It is a crying shame that it takes the average unemployed worker two-thirds of a year to find a new job, but this is the new economic reality that we are all living in.

#7 Delinquency Rate On Residential Mortgages

Since there are not enough jobs for all of us, and since our wages are not rising as rapidly as the cost of living is, a whole bunch of us are falling behind on our mortgages. As you can see, the mortgage delinquency rate has only dropped slightly and is still way, way above typical levels.

#8 New Homes Sold

American workers also don't have enough money to go out and buy new homes either. Yes, new home sales have rebounded slightly this year, but we are nowhere near where we used to be.

Note from ECOMINOES: Investors are responsible for 32% of new home sales. The rebound in housing hasn't been because more young Americans are doing well enough to become first-time home buyers. To the contrary, the housing market has been rebounding because the Fed has provided cheap money for investors to throw around, just as it did during the first housing bubble.

#9 Consumer Credit

Millions of American families continue to resort to going into debt in a desperate attempt to make ends meet. After a slight interruption during the last recession, consumer credit once again is growing at a frightening pace.

#10 Self-Employment At A Record Low

Since there aren't enough jobs for everyone, why aren't more Americans trying to start their own businesses? Well, the reality of the matter is that the government has made it exceedingly difficult to start your own business today. Taxes, rules, regulations and red tape are choking the life out of millions of small businesses in the United States. As a result, the percentage of self-employed Americans is at a record low.

Note from ECOMINOES: Loans to small businesses have been scarce during this economic depression. I'd say that access to capital is a bigger barrier to entry than government regulations.

As all of these long-term trends continue, the middle class will continue to shrink, poverty in America will continue to explode and government dependence will continue to rise.

The numbers don't lie. Today, the number of Americans on Social Security Disability now exceeds the entire population of Greece, and the number of Americans on food stamps now exceeds the entire population of Spain.

We are in the midst of a horrifying economic collapse, and the next major wave of that collapse is rapidly approaching.

I don't dispute Micheal's last point. When the Fed's "mother of all bubbles" bursts, we're going to have a 2008 redux...or worse.

Welcome To Job Market Hell, Class Of 2013!

2013-05-15T23:29:00.001-04:00

A recent Pacific Standard article echos what I've been saying all along: there has been no recovery in the job market. 5 years into this economic depression, the rate of job growth remains woefully insufficient, the majority of jobs created continues to be menial in nature, and, as the Standard notes, graduates of the class of 2013 face the same scarcity of opportunity my graduating class faced in 2008. (I earned my M.B.A. at the worst possible time: during the fall of Lehman.) As I have noted and this article confirms, younger Americans, whose careers have been derailed from the get-go, risk a lifetime of limited upward mobility:

Stacey Kalivas should be celebrating her graduation from college later this week. Instead, the 22 year-old is getting ready to move back home with broken dreams and in debt. Kalivas is a member of the class of 2013, the fifth successive wave of students to enter into a stubbornly weak U.S. labor market—marked by high unemployment, a large number of part-time workers, and many who have given up the hunt for jobs. “It’s kind of tough to be graduating and not having anything,” said Kalivas. The finance major will graduate from Bryant University in Smithfield, Rhode Island, on May 18.

It has been nearly four years since the end of the worst U.S. economic downturn since the Great Depression, but the recovery has been too spotty to patch up the deep scars. Growth has struggled to rise much above two percent on a yearly basis, with quarters of relatively strong expansion typically followed by lulls. Employers have been reluctant to ramp-up hiring, leaving unemployment at 7.5 percent—nearly three percentage points above its pre-recession level. Employers plan to hire only 2.1 percent more new college graduates this year than in 2012, according to a survey from the National Association of Colleges and Employers. Last fall they thought the increase would be 13 percent.

A separate survey by staffing firm Adecco found that about 58 percent of 500 hiring managers across the country have no plans to hire new graduates. Of those hiring, more than two thirds said they would take only one or two candidates. These grim statistics resonate with Kalivas. In her search for a job as a financial analyst, she has applied for seven positions. “It’s frustrating because I feel like I will be more than qualified for the job description, but I am not even making it past the first stage,” she said.

Similar tales are recounted by other students.

“Nobody is hiring or accepting interns,” said Brian Dobson, who recently graduated from the University of New Hampshire with a degree in political science. The 29-year-old Iraq war veteran has submitted resumes to 15 companies hoping to find employment in either public affairs, marketing, or as a lobbyist. All have been met with rejections.

HIGH GRADUATE UNDEREMPLOYMENT

The Class of 2013 is competing with four other groups of graduates going back to 2009, many of whom are still struggling to get a job or find full-time work.

Brian Hackett graduated in 2010 with a political science and public policy degree. “I am working part-time at a research company, but it’s not enough hours, it’s not enough pay and it’s not my career path. That’s the type of rut a lot of people like myself are falling in,” said Hackett.

In April, unemployment among workers under the age of 25 was at 16.1 percent, more than double the national rate.

While the unemployment rate for young college graduates between the ages of 21-24 who are not enrolled in further schooling is 8.8 percent, the underemployment rate, a gauge of those only working part time or who want a job but have given up looking, is at 18.3 percent. The jobless rate for this group was 5.7 percent in 2007; the underemployment rate was 9.9 percent.

“In addition to the substantial share who are officially unemployed, a large swath of these young, highly educated workers have either a job but cannot attain the hours they need or want a job but have given up looking for work,” said Heidi Shierholz, a senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) in Washington. The tough labor market is forcing college graduates to settle for jobs that do not require a degree, a trend economists refer to as cyclical downgrading.

Lauren Hughes, a double major in theater and English, is heading in that direction. After graduating from Hillsdale College in Hillsdale, Michigan, she will work as a waitress in her home town of Huntley, Illinois. But she hopes it will be only for a few months. Hughes will make about $4.95 an hour, but with tips she figures she can take home between $45 and $110 a day—money she will save for a job hunt in New York’s theaters in the fall. Hughes is also looking at secretarial work, copy editing, and teaching as a back stop. “I am not very optimistic,” she said.

Emily Savage is looking to go the same route after a frustrating search for jobs in the fields of conservation biology, genetics, and molecular biology. “It’s kind of disappointing. I am probably going to get a job that’s not in my field to survive for the next six months and apply to grad school,” said the Penn State University biology major. “A minimum wage job might be my only option.”

Dobson, who did two tours in Iraq between 2003 and 2006, is not far behind. He and his wife moved in with his parents when he enrolled in college after four years of active duty in the Army. He has tried jobs that give veterans preference. “I need to get back into the workforce. My plan is to find any employment that is possible, whether it is at Applebee’s or Lowe’s, whoever is hiring,” he said.

A study by the EPI found that 52 percent of employed college graduates under the age of 24 were working in jobs that did not require a degree last year. That was up from 47 percent in 2007.

In the fight for jobs, the young graduates are also up against a large group of older Americans forced to work beyond their retirement age to rebuild nest eggs shattered during the recession. The share of Americans aged 65 years and older with either a job or looking for one is at a 51-year high.

LIFETIME OF LOW WAGES

The combination of unemployment and menial jobs puts young workers on course for a life of low wages and earnings. “For the young who are getting out of school, studies show a lot of their earnings growth comes in the first 10 years after they get out of school,” said Keith Hall, a senior research fellow at George Mason University’s Mercatus Center.

According to the EPI, young college graduates with full-time jobs earned an average hourly wage of $16.60 last year, roughly $34,500 a year. That is down 7.6 percent from 2007. Benefits are also a problem. Between 2000 and 2011, the share of young graduates whose jobs provide for retirement plans dropped to 27.2 percent from 41.5 percent, EPI said. The trend is troubling given that most students are graduating from college with huge debts.

Dobson is fortunate. The government took care of his tuition costs through the Post-9/11 GI-Bill, which provides financial support to service personnel. But Kalivas and Savage are not so lucky. Each owes about $30,000 in student debt. According to the New York Federal Reserve Bank, the share of 25-year-olds with student loan debt has risen to more than 40 percent from about 25 percent in 2004. The non-profit Institute for College Access & Success says students who graduated last year had average debts of $26,600.

“The next generation will find it hard to buy their first home or finance other large purchases,” said Julia Coronado, chief North America economist at BNP Paribas in New York.

Kalivas, the would-be financial analyst, will take a break from her job search for a month after graduating. “A lot of companies have been telling us to look for positions opening up in the second and third quarter. They are starting to advertise some positions,” said Kalivas. “I am going to move back with my parents, unfortunately, but I do plan on getting out as quickly as possible,” she said, with a laugh.

Japan's Inflation Time Bomb, Worldwide Fallout Confirmed

2013-05-14T14:52:00.003-04:00

As I noted in a previous article, Japan, whose economy has been floundering since the 1990s, has begun an unprecedented foray into liquidity pumping in a "Hail Mary" attempt to revive its economy. Anyone with a modicum of understanding of economics, however, understands that central banks can't "pump" or "print" a country into prosperity. Here in America, this is exemplified by the deep recession following the bursting of the late 90s tech bubble and the ongoing depression and jobless "recovery" that has followed the bursting of the mid-2000s housing bubble. But central bankers are alchemists with great hubris, and the Bank of Japan will try in vain to "pump to prosperity".

Liquidity pumping does indeed temporarily juice an economy (the late 90s were "boom times" for America), and BOJ's experiment in hyper-pumping will lead to a fleeting period of false prosperity in Japan. But this will come at a terrible price: hyperinflation. I use the term "hyperinflation" loosely, and I'm not referring to inflation in the billions of percent, as it was in Zimbabwe several years ago. But I am talking inflation on a scale that hasn't been seen in the developed world since WWII.

Japan's historic inflation will be problematic for us, as we've been relying on the Japanese to buy more of our debt now that China has begun to buy less of it. The Eurozone, whose economies have been imploding one after another since 2008, faces the same problem, as evidenced by the following chart:

Of course, central banks around the world have denied the prospect of high Japanese inflation as a result of BOJ's hyper-pumping strategy. They claim that Japan will be able to soak up with a magic sponge the tremendous amount of excess liquidity the strategy will create. As the following chart from Goldman Sachs--who provides decent research in addition to being the most evil publicly-traded company on Wall Street--shows, however, inflation is already ramping up in Japan, the trendline steepening with every BOJ easing:

Notice that Japan's inflation trendline has gone from a 30 degree angle to a 60 degree angle in a very short period of time. It's important to note that a former key adviser to George Soros has gone on record saying that the Japan's historic liquidity pumping will send the country to default, which will force Japan to reduce its holdings of American and European debt, which will increase inflationary pressures here and in the Eurozone, as I have argued.

Obama Admin More Nixonian Than Nixon's

2013-05-13T21:59:00.001-04:00

The Obama administration, which claims a "commitment to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government" is in fact less transparent and more "nixonian" than Richard Nixon's administration was. The evidence just keeps piling up:

Today, we learned that the Justice Department has secretly obtained 2 months of telephone records of reporters and editors for The Associated Press.
A few days ago, we learned that the IRS has been targeting conservative groups for audit.
The Bengazi cover-up is ongoing.
Last fall, the Justice Department decided to not pursue criminal charges against money laundering mega-bank HSBC.
Last summer, the Labor Department attempted to force the press to use government-issued computers when reporting federal affairs.
In 2012, it was revealed that the administration has an enemies list.
The Fast and Furious scandal unfolded in 2012.
Also in 2012, it was revealed that the Obama administration has not been following its legal obligation to address Freedom of Information Act requests.
Obama quietly signed of the über-controversial NDAA on New Years Eve 2011.
The Solyndra scandal unfolded in 2011.
In winter 2011, Obama issued an executive order unilaterally authorizing war in Libya.
In 2011, the Justice Department attempted to force a New York Times reporter to reveal his confidential sources.
In 2009, Obama sought to block the release of photographs depicting detainee abuse in American military prisons.
In 2009, the Justice Department decided not to pursue criminal charges against voter intimidating New Black Panthers members.

Keep in mind that the above list isn't comprehensive. Will Obama "outnixon" Nixon in impeachment, too?

Leonard Pitts: Everyone On Right A "Gun Nut"

2013-05-12T22:56:00.004-04:00

Syndicated liberal columnist Leonard Pitts wrote a doozy of a column today, even for him. In less than 500 words, Pitts amazingly managed to lump libertarians, Tea Party members, social conservatives, 2nd Amendment advocates, and anarchist extremists into a monolithic group...of "gun nuts". And, he managed to insult war veterans to boot!

It should’ve been the shot heard around the world. Chances are, you didn’t hear it.

An ominous sort of history was made last week near Austin, Texas, but it seems to have largely escaped notice. There was some media coverage, yes, but less than, say, Lindsay Lohan’s latest stint in rehab, certainly less than you’d think for something whose ramifications will likely shadow us for years.

On May 2nd, you see, a group called Defense Distributed, led by law student and self-described anarchist Cody Wilson, accomplished what was apparently the first successful firing of a gun “printed” entirely by a 3-D printer. According to Forbes reporter Andy Greenberg, who witnessed the test, the gun is made almost entirely of plastic, the only metal in it being the nail that served as a firing pin and the bullet it fired.

A 3-D printer, for the benefit of those who remember when the mimeograph machine was the cutting edge of duplication technology, is a device which can download computer blueprints and use them to manufacture complex physical objects right on your desktop.

The one Defense Distributed used is said to have cost $8000. Amazon has one listed for $1,299.

So we now have technology, largely unregulated, with the potential to turn every desktop into an armory. Forbes reports that, in just two days, 100,00 blueprints were downloaded.

Hold that thought as you ponder another recent headline. It seems one Adam Kokesh, an Iraq War veteran and activist, is organizing an armed march on Washington for Independence Day. Participants— he claims 2,500 so far — with loaded rifles slung across their backs plan to march into the nation’s capital to protest the “tyranny” of the federal government.

Huh? What does Adam Kokesh, a libertarian extremist, have to do with 3D-printed guns? Kokesh planned his march months before Homeland Security unilaterally banned 3D-printed gun technology. Furthermore, he doesn't represent the average person who disagrees with the ban, much less everyone who disagrees with it. And what does Kokesh's status as an Iraq war vet have to do with anything? Isn't pointing out that he's a vet of an unpopular war the equivalent of unnecessarily calling the president Barack HUSSEIN Obama?

While D.C. residents are allowed to have registered firearms on their property, they are not allowed to carry them in public. Police Chief Cathy Lanier has said marchers will be met at the border and if they break that law, “we’ll take action.”

Kokesh, apparently delusional, promises to turn back peacefully if confronted, but says it is his hope the city will suspend the law for him and even provide his group a police escort.

You will not be surprised to learn that, by “tyranny,” Kokesh means the duly elected (not a hanging chad in sight) president of the United States going about his job. Thing is, if you don’t like the way he does his job, you get a chance every four years to make a change. People in North Korea would doubtless love to live under that kind of “tyranny.”
Because it isn’t.

Kokesh’s march is just the latest product of the great American panic machine, the mechanism by which the extreme right works itself into spasms of apoplectic terror over threats that don’t exist.

“We’re going to be under sharia law!”
Except, we’re not.
“We’ve become a socialist country!”
Except we haven’t.
“There’s a War on Christmas!”
Except there isn’t.
“They’re trying to take our guns away!”

Again, Kokesh is a libertarian extremist. He doesn't fear sharia law, and he certainly doesn't fear a supposed "War on Christmas." What does social conservatism have to do with 3D-printed gun technology anyway?

Except that it is now theoretically possible for a mental patient to manufacture his own gun in the comfort of his aluminum foil-lined basement. That’s a sobering development with far reaching implications barely considered, much less addressed, by lawmakers though this technology has existed for over a decade. Since Wilson’s test, there’s been a flurry of calls for legislation. On Friday, the federal government ordered Wilson to remove the blueprints from his website. All of which is the very epitome of locking the garage after the Hyundai has been hot-wired.

It’s a pity some of the energy that has gone into fighting imaginary tyranny did not go into pondering this real and eminently predictable threat. But, then, we are unserious people in a very serious age.

And therein lies the danger of the panic machine. We spend so much time fighting threats that do not exist, we are left ill-prepared for the ones that do.

In Mr. Pitts's world, everyone on the right side of the political spectrum is one and the same, everyone right side of the political spectrum advocates 3D-printed gun technology, and everyone who advocates 3D-printed gun technology is a tin foil hat-wearing militant. Therefore, according to Pitts, everyone on the right is a tin foil hat-wearing militant. Hard to believe that this guy has been a nationally-syndicated columnist for years. But then again, newspapers are a dying industry...

ead more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/05/11/3391536/on-guns-and-the-great-american.html#storylink=cpy

ECOMINOES Radio Live @ 3ET

2013-05-10T14:12:00.000-04:00

Didn't have a show last week, so I have a ton of material at my disposal for today's show. Going to cover the stories of the week as well as the top stories from last week. Don't miss the excitement! Listen live here, and don't forget to check out the archives.

The 3D Gun/Cannabis Ban Parallel

2013-05-10T13:10:00.001-04:00

Homeland Security has unilaterally banned 3D-printed guns and the technology used to create them, which comes at no surprise given the federal government's intention of ensuring that the state remains better armed than the populace. But the ban brings to light another issue: the expansion of the list of federal victimless crimes by possession.

Guns, like cannabis and "drug paraphernalia", are objects that are innocuous in and of themselves. Also like cannabis, guns are typically used in a responsible manner, and, when misused, harm a very small percentage of the population. There are over 100 million gun owners and nearly 300 million guns in the United States, yet this country sees less than 1 million gun-related crimes and less than 10,000 gun-related homicides annually.

There's no reason to believe that 3D-printed guns would be used for harm at a rate higher than that of guns manufactured by licensed firearm companies. Therefore, it would seem that Washington would have ulterior motives for banning them and the technology used to create them, just like it has ulterior motives for banning marijuana. In addition to limiting the public's relative firepower, the federal government has likely been pressured by business interests to prevent the populace from manufacturing its own firearms.

Anyone with a modicum of understanding of federal marijuana prohibition knows that Washington continues to ban the possession of the innocuous cannabis plant at the behest of "Big Pharma". It would therefore stand to reason that the federal government has banned the possession of the innocuous 3D printed gun and the technology used to manufacture it at the behest of "Big Firearm". After all, the American firearm industry, like the American pharmaceutical industry, is worth several tens of billions of dollars and has a very power lobbying presence in Washington.

Fortunately, circumventing this ban will be as easy as circumventing Uncle Sam's prohibition of pot. 3D-printed firearm technology--and thus 3D-printed guns--will remain as ready-accessible as marijuana and the tools used to consume it. In fact, in less than a day, you could locate and download the software, pick up the printer and media from the local office supply store, and print yourself an illegal firearm. Washington's ban of the innocuous 3-D printed gun will as prove futile as its ban of the innocuous cannabis plant.

Uncle Sam Is Reading Your Emails

2013-05-09T13:15:00.000-04:00

On its official blog, the ACLU reported yesterday that the group has received a series of government documents suggesting that some federal agencies--including the FBI and the criminal investigative arm of the IRS--read Americans’ emails without a warrant. In response, the ACLU is urging citizens to press Congress to reform the Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986, the law that enables the government to violate our 4th Amendment protections:

New documents from the FBI and U.S. Attorneys’ offices paint a troubling picture of the government’s email surveillance practices. Not only does the FBI claim it can read emails and other electronic communications without a warrant—even after a federal appeals court ruled that doing so violates the Fourth Amendment—but the documents strongly suggest that different U.S. Attorneys’ offices around the country are applying conflicting standards to access communications content (you can see the documents here).

Last month, in response to a Freedom of Information Act request, the ACLU received IRS documents indicating that the agency’s criminal investigative arm doesn’t always get a warrant to read Americans’ emails. Today we are releasing these additional documents from other federal law enforcement agencies, reinforcing the urgent need for Congress to protect our privacy by updating the laws that cover electronic communications.

The FBI and Electronic Communications: Where’s the Warrant?

The documents we received from the FBI don’t flat out tell us whether FBI agents always get warrants, but they strongly suggest that they don’t.

In 2010, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals decided in United States v. Warshak that the government must obtain a probable cause warrant before compelling email providers to turn over messages to law enforcement. But that decision only applies in the four states covered by the Sixth Circuit, so we filed our FOIA request to find out whether the FBI and other agencies are taking advantage of a loophole in the outdated Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) that allows access to some electronic communications without a warrant. Distressingly, the FBI appears to think the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement doesn’t always apply.

The FBI provided the ACLU with excerpts from two versions of its Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide (DIOG), from 2008 and 2012. One of the Guides is from before Warshak was decided and the other one is from after, but they say the same thing: FBI agents only need a warrant for emails or other electronic communications that are unopened and less than 180 days old. The 2012 Guide contains no mention of Warshak, and no suggestion that the Fourth Amendment might require a warrant for all emails. In fact, the 2012 Guide states:

In enacting the ECPA, Congress concluded that customers may not retain a “reasonable expectation of privacy” in information sent to network providers. . . [I]f the contents of an unopened message are kept beyond six months or stored on behalf of the customer after the e-mail has been received or opened, it should be treated the same as a business record in the hands of a third party, such as an accountant or attorney. In that case, the government may subpoena the records from the third party without running afoul of either the Fourth or Fifth Amendment.
Versions of the Guide from 2008 and 2011 are available on the FBI website, but the 2012 edition has not previously been made public. We would have thought that by 2012, the FBI would have updated its policy to require a warrant for all private electronic communications. Our FOIA request was the FBI’s chance to produce any policy documents, manuals, or other guidance stating that a warrant is always required, but they failed to do so. Instead, the documents we received strongly suggest that the FBI doesn’t always get a warrant.

In fact, confirmation that the FBI is reading some emails without a warrant can be found in a recent opinion issued by a federal magistrate judge in Texas. Most of the opinion concerns whether the FBI is allowed to surreptitiously infect a computer with spyware (the judge refused to grant the FBI a warrant to do so). But tucked inside the opinion is this revelation: “the Government also sought and obtained an order under 18 U.S.C. § 2703 directing the Internet service provider to turn over all records related to the counterfeit email account, including the contents of stored communications.” Amazingly, as recently as March of this year, the FBI went after emails without a warrant. This is an affront to the Fourth Amendment.

A Patchwork of Policies

In addition to the FBI documents, the ACLU also received records from six U.S. Attorneys’ offices (in California, Florida, Illinois, Michigan, and New York), and from the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, which provides legal advice to federal prosecutors and law enforcement agencies. The Criminal Division withheld far more documents than it released. The U.S. Attorneys’ office documents reveal some information, but paint a confusing picture of federal policy. We received two paragraphs from the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York—part of an unidentified document stating that law enforcement can obtain “opened electronic communications or extremely old unopened email” without a warrant. Perplexingly, the agency has not released the cover page or other contextual information from this document, so we don’t know whether it reflects the current policy of that office.

Excerpts from an October 2012 document released by the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois show that at least one part of the government understands that the Fourth Amendment protects private electronic communications. The document, a chart titled “Procedures for Obtaining Certain Forms of Electronic Surveillance and Related Evidence,” contains entries setting out the procedures for obtaining text messages, voicemails, and emails stored by internet service providers, as well as stored communications on Facebook and “private tweets” on Twitter. The document says a warrant is required for each of these forms of communication. It even explains that “The Sixth Circuit in Warshak held that the non-warrant methods of obtaining stored emails to be [sic] unconstitutional.” Again, because the document lacks a cover page or other explanatory information we don’t know whether it constitutes binding policy for prosecutors or how broadly it applies. This lack of context is frustrating, but at least the document gets the law right.

The six U.S. Attorneys’ offices also told us in this email that since Warshak, they have not authorized a request to a court for access to the contents of electronic communications without a warrant. But according to the recent Texas magistrate judge’s opinion, one U.S. Attorney’s office apparently authorized such a request this year. Even with today’s documents, the government’s actual position is far from clear.

Time for Reform

If nothing else, these records show that federal policy around access to the contents of our electronic communications is in a state of chaos. The FBI, the Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys, and DOJ Criminal Division should clarify whether they believe warrants are required across the board when accessing people’s email. It has been clear since 1877 that the government needs a warrant to read letters sent via postal mail. The government should formally amend its policies to require law enforcement agents to obtain warrants when seeking the contents of all emails too.

Get Involved

More importantly, Congress also needs to reform ECPA to make clear that a warrant is required for access to all electronic communications. Reform legislation is making its way through the Senate now, and the documents released by the U.S. Attorney in Illinois illustrate that the law can be fixed without harming law enforcement goals. If you agree that your email and other electronic communications should be private, you can urge Congress to take action here.

The Solution To The Broken American Hiring Paradigm

2013-05-07T23:31:00.000-04:00

In my last article, I described the broken American hiring paradigm: company leaders delegating the all-important task of staffing to people who are far disconnected from the company goal-setting process. Today, I offer a revolutionary--yet feasible--solution to this problem.

As I argued in the previous article, congruence with company goals is a far better measure of candidate value than years of experience in a particular role. Under the current American hiring paradigm, however, most company recruiters rely on years of experience as a baseline for candidate value. They do this because they have no choice but to use experience as a baseline: 1) they aren't part of the company goal-setting process, and 2) even if they were included in such discussions, they often lack the unique attributes and personality of a business leader.

A company is only as good as its employees, and business leaders should therefore take a greater role in the staffing process. However, busy executives will always have to delegate the unglamorous--yet monumentally-important--tasks of candidate aggregation and initial applicant screening. What if, instead of delegating these tasks to "HR professionals", company leaders delegated them to real businesspeople, recruiters who could participate in the company goal-setting process and approach hiring from a business mindset? This country has an abundant supply of underutilized, readily-available talented businesspeople who would salivate at such an opportunity.

Competent businesspeople have the intuition and grasp of human psychology of "HR professionals" as well as something that the majority of HR professionals can never have: the ability to select candidates based on congruence with company goals. Furthermore, they can quickly learn the nuances of--and tools utilized in--the recruitment process. And, long-term unemployed or underemployed competent businesspeople already know the recruiting process like the backs of their hands.

Company leaders might be hesitant to employ businesspeople as recruiters out of fear of that these "nontraditional" HR hires will move on to bigger, better things when the economy improves. This is the old "overqualified" argument, an argument that became invalid in 2008. A job is sacred in this "new normal" economy, and any competent businessperson who has experienced the suffering that is long-term unemployment/underemployment--as I have--would cherish the opportunity.

The American Hiring Paradigm Is Broken

2013-05-05T22:10:00.002-04:00

Central banking has made a mess of the economy, and increasingly onerous jobs-killing federal legislation has impeded hiring and thus has impeded economic recovery. But the Fed and Washington aren't the only culprits in the nation's continued economic malaise. The American hiring paradigm is also to blame.

As a perennial job seeker, I frequently respond to job posts. I've noticed that--with the exception of small numbers of listings posted by entrepreneurs--listings by American companies almost always outline desired amounts of applicant experience as opposed to what's far more important: congruence with company goals. Lou Adler, entrepreneur and best-selling author, best summarized this phenomenon in an article he recently published on LinkedIn:

“Successful candidate will develop a new approach for reducing water usage by 50%,” is a lot better than saying “Must have 5-10 years of environmental engineering background including 3-5 years of wastewater management."

Indeed. Before the economy crashed, I was able to grow a local Spanish-language newspaper into a regional Spanish-language entertainment magazine published throughout 2 states. My company enjoyed such robust growth primarily because I staffed it with great people who contributed to specific company goals. I found these great employees not by seeking applicants with X years of experience in Y roles, but rather by seeking applicants who made the best case that they could contribute to the objectives I outlined. With this approach to talent acquisition, sifting through resumes was easy: I just looked for accomplishments.

As both an employer and a job-seeker, I can say with certainty that the common American approach to talent acquisition--valuing years of experience over capability--creates tremendous opportunity costs for the company, and therefore retards economic recovery. (This is evidenced by the automatic rejection of the long-term unemployed.) This unfortunate approach to hiring is almost certainly a function of the increasing trend of management delegating the all-important task of staffing to people who are not only far disconnected from the development of company goals, but aren't businesspeople at all. These people--call them recruiters or HR professionals or whatever you wish--use years of experience as a baseline for applicant value because they have little frame of reference as to who could best contribute to company goals. And they can never have this frame of reference because 1) they aren't part of the company goal-setting process and, 2) even if they were included in such discussions, they often lack the unique attributes and personality of a business leader. As Adler puts it, "only a thinker can determine what to look for in a thinker."

The solution to this problem is simple: American company leaders should play a greater part in the hiring process. This begins with creating jobs listings outlining specific company goals and ends with taking the lead in determining which applicant(s) could best contribute to achieving said goals.

Obviously, company leaders can't be tasked with filling low-level positions. But when it comes to filling positions that directly affect the company's bottom line, they should absolutely take charge.

Apologies For No Live ECOMINOES Radio Today

2013-05-03T16:41:00.002-04:00

Due to some crossed wires, there was no live show this afternoon. If you tuned in, you heard an archive of one of the first episodes, back when the show wasn't quite as polished. For this, I apologize. I was particularly looking forward to picking apart the April jobs report, but such as life. I hope you'll tune in next week from 3-5 ET on KineticHifi, where I'll cover new top stories as well as the top stories from this week. In the meantime, don't forget to catch up with the new episodes in the archives.