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Amazon’s Disturbing Plan to Add Face Surveillance to Your Front Door

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By Jacob Snow, Technology & Civil Liberties Attorney, ACLU of Northern California / ACLU Speak Freely

Recently, a patent application from Amazon became public that would pair face surveillance — like Rekognition, the product that the company is aggressively marketing to police and Immigration and Customs Enforcement — with Ring, a doorbell camera company that Amazon bought earlier this year.

While the details are sketchy, the application describes a system that the police can use to match the faces of people walking by a doorbell camera with a photo database of persons they deem “suspicious.” Likewise, homeowners can also add photos of “suspicious” people into the system and then the doorbell’s facial recognition program will scan anyone passing their home. In either case, if a match occurs, the person’s face can be automatically sent to law enforcement, and the police could arrive in minutes.

As a former patent litigator, I’ve spent a lot of time reading patents. It’s rare for patent applications to lay out, in such nightmarish detail, the world a company wants to bring about. Amazon is dreaming of a dangerous future, with its technology at the center of a massive decentralized surveillance network, running real-time facial recognition on members of the public using cameras installed in people’s doorbells.   [Read more…]

Paul Ryan’s Cowardly Act On Yemen | Video Worth Watching

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Chris Hayes of MSNBC’s All In reports that one of the last acts of the current Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, has been to block any vote on the U.S. involvement in Yemen by inserting a rule into the farm bill with language that achieves that purpose. The HuffPost notes that five Democrats joined Republicans in adding that language to the farm bill. The U.S. currently provides many support functions for the Saudi War in Yemen which has starved tens of thousands and threatens to starve 14 million people.   [Read more…]

Obama Once Again Getting the Word Out on Health Insurance Enrollment and This Year’s Deadline of December 15 | Video Worth Watching

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The deadline this year for enrolling in an ACA health plan is December 15th. President Barack Obama is back to remind potential enrollees of the need to sign up for health insurance coverage at HealthCare.gov by that date.   [Read more…]

Saudi Arabia – Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj | More Video Worth Watching

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Still looking for a good explanation of the current dynamics of the U.S. relationship with Saudi Arabia? Hasan Minhaj has you covered; facts and biting humor make it real. [NSFW: language]   [Read more…]

We Were Not Here | 1968

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This year we have looked back on the U.S. of 1968, including the assassinations of Dr. King and presidential candidate Bobby Kennedy. However, for hundreds of thousands of U.S. troops overseas or on the seas, we were not here. Those of us trained for combat were serving in the major duty areas of Vietnam, Germany, and South Korea for 12-month assignments or longer.

The lack of the internet, cell phones, or even U.S. television disconnected us from these events. We were immersed in military life, which was and is very structured, with defined duties and daily accountability to one’s superiors and fellow soldiers. 1968 was the height of the Vietnam War and there was a military machine operating 24/7 with equipment to run, planes to fly, ships to sail, communications to process and with millions of people coming in, being trained, getting out.   [Read more…]

McClellan-Palomar Airport: FAA Grant Enforcement?

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Did county’s Palomar landfills violate FAA grant requirements?

The Issues

For nearly two years, we have been waiting for the FAA to explain:

  • Trash Dumping. Did the FAA consent in writing to the County of San Diego dumping about 800,000 cubic yards of trash in 30 acres of McClellan-Palomar Airport canyons over a 14-year period?
  • Trash Dumping Interim Safety Risks. If so, on what basis since dumping trash both (i) endangered Palomar Airport runway operations by attracting birds to the trash heaps just 1,000 feet away from aircraft using the airport and (ii) violated the FAA Grant conditions that preclude use of airports for non-airport purposes without written Secretary of Transportation permission.
  • Trash Dumping Extraordinary Costs and Permanent Safety Risks. Why would the County of San Diego be eligible for future FAA grants to extend its 4,900-foot runway up to 800 feet over the now closed landfill when by dumping trash, county has (i) increased the cost of extending the runway by more than 1,000 percent, (ii) created a safety hazard by exposing increasingly larger aircraft to the landfill methane gas collection system that lies 4 to 7 feet below the Palmar runway east end, and (iii) violated the FAA grant conditions?
  • IPERA. How is the FAA complying with the federal Improper Payments Elimination and Recovery Act when the County of San Diego applies for future FAA grants to extend and/or relocate the Palomar runway?

  [Read more…]

Review and Preview of Tony Thurmond vs. Marshall Tuck

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By Thomas Ultican / Ultican

This year’s biggest election win in California was for the down-ballot office, Superintendent of Public Instruction (SPI). Tony Thurmond defeated Marshall Tuck in a proxy battle between billionaires supporting public school privatization and teachers’ unions fighting for democratically run neighborhood schools. More than $61,000,000 was spent on the SPI office doubling the previous $30,000,000 spending record set in 2014 when Tuck lost to Tom Torlakson.

Director of research at California Target Book, Rob Pyers, reported this year’s total election spending in California realized a new level. Target Book publisher Darry Sragow commented, “If blowing through the billion-dollar campaign spending ceiling in California doesn’t give pause to everyone in politics, I don’t know what will.”

Of the eight state-wide constitutional offices on the ballot, the governor’s race topped spending at $108,221,028 and the SPI race came in second totaling $61,170,451. Spending in the governor’s race was also heavily impacted by billionaires supporting the charter school industry. California has an open primary in which the top two vote getters reach the general election ballot regardless of party. Before June’s voting, billionaires lavished Anthony Villaraigosa’s campaign unprecedented independent expenditure money trying to get him to the November ballot.   [Read more…]

Mayor’s Office Confirms Sale of Liberty Station Leases by McMillin – But Questions Remain

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After the Times of San Diego story of the sale of Liberty Station leases by McMillin Company to a Michigan company broke on Wednesday, there have been further developments in the unwinding of just what and when it all happened.

To recap briefly, it was reported that McMillin sold leases to Seligman Group on Wednesday, but nobody in city government appeared to have heard about it. The city is supposed to monitor and approve any sales of the leases at Liberty Station by terms of its agreement with McMillin. Especially of concern is the fate of the North Chapel at Liberty Station.

But by the next day, things had changed. Thursday afternoon, as the Times of SD reported, Christina Chadwick, a spokeswoman for Mayor Kevin Faulconer, had confirmed the deal. She added an operator has been found by the new owner, who would continue to allow religious worship at the chapel.   [Read more…]

Memo to Democratic ‘Giga-Majority’ in Sacramento: Don’t Forget Who Sent You There

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November’s Blue Wave gives California’s Democratic legislature the opportunity to do more than simply resist the Trumpian agenda.

If they move wisely, the Golden State will serve as an example of what’s possible in an era when good governance serving the needs of all the people takes precedence over schemes designed to line the pockets of the few at the expense of the many.

Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon has a “gigamajority,” with 60 of the 80 seats in that chamber affiliated with his party. Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins shares a party affiliation with 29 of the 40 members in her chamber.   [Read more…]

Why Would Anyone Want to Flee Beautiful Honduras?

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As thousands of Honduras camp outside the border of San Diego, their desperation is clearly evident. We’re told they are fleeing their country because of the harsh conditions there.

But isn’t Honduras a tropical paradise somewhere out there in Central America? Don’t they have a lot of neat old Spanish churches and stuff? And all those crazy and wonderful Mayan ruins. Why would anyone want to flee beautiful Honduras?

So, we have to wonder why any person would travel by foot thousands of miles through jungle, desert, towns, large cities and wilderness to reach our borders when they have plenty of nice beaches there.   [Read more…]

McClellan-Palomar Airport: The Truth?

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On October 10, 2018, the county Board of Supervisors (BOS) adopted a 20-year plan for McClellan-Palomar (Palomar) Airport in Carlsbad and certified an EIR.

A month later, the citizens group Citizens for a Friendly Airport (see c4fa.org) filed suit challenging the county decision. A suit verdict is likely in mid or late 2019. Issues the court may have to wrestle with include:

  • Accuracy of County Project Description. In public presentations, county staff repeatedly said the purpose of extending the Palomar runway up to 800 feet was to increase aircraft safety, not to attract more aircraft. Yet several supervisors approving the Palomar Master Plan (PMP) glowingly noted Palomar’s ability to act as a “reliever” airport for overflow Lindbergh traffic.

One question for the court would be: Did the county engage in a “bait and switch” – analyzing low levels of Palomar use in the EIR, while encouraging higher use levels with Lindbergh diversions?

  [Read more…]

After Their Traumatizing Journey, Asylum-Seeking Families Should Not Be Abandoned to Suffer On Our Streets

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By Edward Sifuentes / ACLU of San Diego & Imperial Counties

One night in late October, volunteers with the San Diego Rapid Response Network received the first of many reports of asylum-seeking migrant families being released on the streets of San Diego by immigration authorities.

Many of the families, which included women and small children, were disoriented, hungry and penniless. Most knew no one in our region. They were literally strangers in a strange land.

These new arrivals – primarily from Central America and from as far away as Africa – are being abandoned on our streets because the Trump administration discontinued the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) program that helps asylum-seekers to coordinate their travel to loved ones throughout the United States. ICE says it no longer has room to hold migrant families long enough to finalize travel arrangements.

Consequently, ICE is now releasing asylum-seeking families into our communities without food, transportation or shelter – and without coordinating or even communicating with local governments or nonprofit agencies who want to help them.   [Read more…]

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