Die, Already! Sheesh!

That's right: Senate GOP whip hopes to act on cyber bill in early August.

What you need to know:

• CISPA is Back! "CIS(P)A is coming back soon for the fifth time. And this time Obama says he’ll sign it." Obama, no!! "The bill gives legal immunity to companies that share personal data with the government in the name of cyber security. In reality, the government would use the data they receive under the bill in a scheme to justify warrantless mass surveillance of domestic Internet traffic. It’s purely a surveillance bill -- nothing in it is actually designed to improve security.  The NSA and members of Congress want to pass CISA so badly, they’re using the recent hack of the Office of Personnel Management as justification for bringing this back up and rushing it through. In reality, the OPM hack just shows that the government is not a good steward of sensitive data. The truth is that CISA could not have prevented the OPM hack, and no Senator could explain how it could have. Congress and the NSA are using irrational hysteria to try to end privacy on the Internet."
• What ever it is, CISA isn't cybersecurity "This is a bad police-state thing. It will do little to prevent attacks, but do a lot to increase mass surveillance.[...] Private industry already has exactly the information sharing the bill proposes, and it doesn't prevent cyber attacks as CISA claims. On the other side, because of the false-positive problem, CISA does far more to invade privacy than even privacy advocates realize, doing a form of mass surveillance. Even if it could work and privacy could be protected, CISA creates a corrupt system for the politically connected. This is a typical bad police state bill, and not one that anybody should take seriously as something that would stop hackers."
• Stop the "Cyber" Bills "Don't let Congress fool you: cybersecurity bills aren't about 'information sharing,' they're about surveillance.[...] Last year, tens of thousands of concerned individuals spoke out against overbroad and ineffective cybersecurity proposals. Together, we substantially changed the debate around cybersecurity in the U.S. Say no to the cybersecurity surveillance bills today."

Links!

• Libraries, Books, Writers, & Suchlike
• Wounded teachers hailed as heroes during Lafayette theater shooting as one shielded friend, who pulled fire alarm  Jena Meaux, a high school librarian, shielded her friend Ali Martin, an English teacher, from gunfire; Martin, injured, managed to drag herself to the fire alarm and pull it, which probably saved more lives. Both were shot in the leg, but it appears both will be fine. 
• Ebook Vendors Anticipate Big Five Licensing Terms Becoming More Flexible 
• Literature from Librarians: Great Reads Written by the Experts A list of recommended books, all written by librarians or library staff! 
• No, Charlie Hebdo Has Not Stopped Printing Mohammed Cartoons 
• Birmingham Qur'an manuscript dated among the oldest in the world 
• Employee Held in Paris National Library Theft 
• Writers Reflect on a Free to Read Childhood 
• Bookmobile Temporarily Banned from North Carolina Apartment Complex Craziness... "Last week, an apartment complex in West Raleigh, North Carolina, set in motion a plan to ban a Lacy Elementary School’s bookmobile from entering and distributing books on its premises. Their reason: Company policy prohibits any events that are not initially sponsored by the corporate owner of the complex, Landmark Apartment Trust. What this means for children in the complex is a summer without reading and, as some parents fear, a risk to their educational development." 
• Net & Tech
• 16 trends that will define the future of video games 
• Hackers Remotely Kill a Jeep on the Highway - With Me in It Related: After Jeep Hack, Chrysler Recalls 1.4M Vehicles for Bug Fix 
• Health & Science
• Americans Are Finally Eating Less "In the most striking shift, the amount of full-calorie soda drunk by the average American has dropped 25 percent since the late 1990s."
• Louisiana
• Remembering New Orleans' Overlooked Ties To Slavery "When Franklin retired from slave trading, he was the wealthiest man in the South. He bought six plantations near New Orleans, where today stands one of the most notorious prisons in the country, Angola State Penitentiary, built on land profited from the slave trade." And that right there says an awful lot.
• ‘Why did he come here?': Police searching for motive in deadly La. theater shooting Related: Jindal suspends presidential campaign after shooting 
• Authority Issues
• Criminal Justice Professionals Review the Sandra Bland Arrest 
• Arizona woman sues cops after being arrested naked "An Arizona woman is suing two Chandler police officers after they entered her home illegally and arrested her while she was naked. Cops handcuffed Esmeralda Rossi moments after she stepped out of the shower, and her daughter shot video of the arrest.  'I felt like nothing. I felt unhuman. I felt like I didn't matter. I felt like I had no value to these people,' Rossi said.[...] In the investigation, Rose told Sgt. Chris Cooper he arrested Rossi for disorderly conduct and domestic violence because she was 'extremely uncooperative.'" If cops illegally entered my house and tried to cuff me while I was naked, I might be "extremely uncooperative," too. 
• Other (Serious Stuff)
• Warehousing Our Children: South Carolina laws hide child abuse inside group homes "South Carolina isn't the only state faced with these problems. Published reports across the country detail a litany of horror stories in which children and teenagers in group homes have been overmedicated for mild behavioral issues, raped by their peers and lured into prostitution while their temporary guardians aren't watching."
• Why Disability And Poverty Still Go Hand In Hand 25 Years After Landmark Law "If you have a disability in the U.S., you're twice as likely to be poor as someone without a disability. You're also far more likely to be unemployed. And that gap has widened in the 25 years since the landmark Americans with Disabilities Act was enacted."
• Texas Fights Suit After Denying Birth Certificates To Children Of Illegal Immigrants "The issue here is not whether or not these children are U.S. citizens. They are and that's made plain by the 14th Amendment of the Constitution, which says anyone born in the U.S. is automatically a citizen.  The issue in this case is what kinds of identification Texas can demand of their undocumented immigrant parents to issue a birth certificate."
• 'Doesn't make any fiscal sense' to keep Guantanamo open, Homeland Security chief says "President Obama has sought since he took office in 2009 to empty the controversial detention facility, which was set up after the 2001 terrorist attacks. But fierce resistance in Congress, where lawmakers say the facility safeguards Americans, shows no sign of abating."
• Police arrest suspects in burning of homeless man with fireworks "Albuquerque police arrested two suspects Wednesday who are accused of burning a Native American homeless man with fireworks on July 11. The two suspects have been identified as 31-year-old Joshua Benavidez and 31-year-old Irene Enriquez. Both are being held on $100,000 cash or surety bonds at this time. They are both charged with three counts of child abuse, two counts of contributing to the delinquency of a minor, aggravated battery with great bodily harm, tampering with evidence and conspiracy." So, yeah, apparently this couple were driving along with their kids in the back seat, saw a homeless guy sleeping by the side of the road, and thought it'd be hilarious to throw fireworks on him. He's now in the hospital with serious burns. Their defense? "It was just a prank!" What is wrong with people? 
• Other (Randomness)
• Everyone Likes Red and Pink Candies Best Neat!