Slashdot Mirror

Found here.

This bill rejects an amendment to rule 41 (Search and Seizure) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure adopted by the U.S. Supreme Court and transmitted to Congress for review on April 28, 2016. (The amendment allows a federal magistrate judge to issue a warrant to use remote access to search computers and seize electronically stored information located inside or outside that judge's district in specific circumstances.)

And do you know what those "specific circumstances" are?

If "(A) the district where the media or information is located has been concealed through technical means;"

Shocking! Terrible! Life-threatening! A magistrate can issue a warrant against a computer that HE DOESN'T KNOW THE LOCATION OF!
That is totally the same as hacking without a warrant, or unlimited spying. /sarc

Here's the current Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure Rule 41, and here is the proposed revised version.

This bill rejects an amendment to rule 41 (Search and Seizure) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure adopted by the U.S. Supreme Court and transmitted to Congress for review on April 28, 2016. (The amendment allows a federal magistrate judge to issue a warrant to use remote access to search computers and seize electronically stored information located inside or outside that judge's district in specific circumstances.)

Interesting. Though your wiki link states that Ukraine, Moldova, and Georgia are proposed members. I don't see that the language has ever actually passed in H.R.5782 - Ukraine Freedom Support Act of 2014 or other similarly named bills. Do you have a reference?

That's right, it did not pass, but have you seen HR5607, which did pass?
www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-bill/5607/text

Particularly:

SEC. 5. Improving anti-terror finance monitoring of funds transfers.
SEC. 6. Sense of Congress
SEC. 7. Unified electronic stream.
SEC. 8. Adding the Secretary of the Treasury to the National Security Council

Not nearly as bad, but you can clearly see the direction they (congress) are intending to go. It will be the same as HR 5606, but it will, as is their usual M.O., implemented as a series of regulations requiring reporting to uncle Sam on various "suspicious" actions by you and me. Ultimately they will add regs to requires freezing bank accounts, credit lines, etc on any activity they wish. All of this will be the same result, but congress get to say they did not do any of it, as it will be done through regulations implemented by various fed. and state agencies like the SEC, the Treasury, the IRS, etc.

We will all be just as screwed and this way it will never make the 6 o'clock news

All of the bills introduced in congress are posted same-day on https://www.congress.gov/. I don't know about the 5 days thing, but I think it is quite rare for bills to be introduced, passed and signed that quick. I looked at a few of the bills on there and none of them were passed in less than a month after they were introduced, and none of them were signed in fewer than a few weeks after they were passed.

If they weren't signed within 10 days, they become law automatically. So, no, I doubt they were all posted for a few weeks before being signed.

All of the bills introduced in congress are posted same-day on https://www.congress.gov/. I don't know about the 5 days thing, but I think it is quite rare for bills to be introduced, passed and signed that quick. I looked at a few of the bills on there and none of them were passed in less than a month after they were introduced, and none of them were signed in fewer than a few weeks after they were passed.

So other than the 16 cosponsors and 1 sponsor, which 58 sacks of shit voted for this.

Let's do be honest. Here are the three laws she sponsored, according to congress.gov:

https://www.congress.gov/membe..."bill-status"%3A"law"%2C"sponsorship"%3A"sponsored"%7D

As you pointed out, there were also bills that were sponsored by another senator which she later signed on as co-sponsor.

For the record, she can rot in jail. But at least be honest: https://www.congress.gov/membe...

You mean several courts have divergent opinions and rulings, and the Supreme Court has yet to take it up.

Heck the big one in the 6th Circuit says the exact opposite of what you claim. I mean seriously if your going to say something is settled you might want to look up some evidence to support your opinion.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/...
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/J...

Maybe the Senate will take up https://www.congress.gov/bill/... and we can resolve this once and for all.

Well the last idiot that got voted in (not once but twice) ended up starting an illegal and unjustified war in Iraq, the results of which the we and the rest of the developed world are still cleaning up after.

It's debatable whether or not action against Iraq was unjustified, but you can't seriously claim it was illegal. The Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002 passed both the House (296 - 133) and Senate (77 - 23) with bi-partisan support.

Typically American, to look only at your own country's law.

"The then United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in September 2004 that: "From our point of view and the UN Charter point of view, it [the war] was illegal."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

So no, it was illegal.

Well the last idiot that got voted in (not once but twice) ended up starting an illegal and unjustified war in Iraq, the results of which the we and the rest of the developed world are still cleaning up after.

It's debatable whether or not action against Iraq was unjustified, but you can't seriously claim it was illegal. The Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002 passed both the House (296 - 133) and Senate (77 - 23) with bi-partisan support.

Oh, I agree entirely.
Argument over transgender rights has killed a major spending bill in Congress

The rancorous political debate over sexual identity unexpectedly prompted the Republican-controlled House of Representatives to rejected an energy and water spending bill on Thursday after Democrats attached an amendment to protect the rights of transgender people

However, your point is not applicable in this case because the so-called "snuck in provision" is part of the Senate's INTELLIGENCE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2016 and is related to the FBI's counterintelligence duties which falls under purview of national security.

Unlike some monstrosities, the text of the bill is short enough that you can read it and form your own opinion.

Here's the main part:
Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the Federal Communications Commission may not regulate the rates charged for broadband Internet access service.

Here are the exceptions:
Nothing in this Act shall be construed to affect the authority of the Commission to—
(1) condition receipt of universal service support under section 254 of the Communications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 254) by a provider of broadband Internet access service on the regulation of the rates charged by such provider for the supported service;
(2) enforce subpart Y of part 64 of title 47, Code of Federal Regulations (relating to truth-in-billing requirements); or
(3) enforce section 8.9 of title 47, Code of Federal Regulations (relating to paid prioritization).

So basically, it ensures the FCC can't attack things like free service offerings and doesn't price-fix services to prevent competition.

Sounds like a great bill, whose only flaw is that is doesn't go far enough to prevent the FCC from regulating the internet, but it's a good start.

Co-sponsored by 6 Republicans and 3 Democrats. Plenty of blame to go around.
https://www.congress.gov/bill/...

Except there is no such thing as H1B immigration. H1B visas are temporary work visas. They are not immigrating here. It doesn't let them stay unless they're working and has a company sponsor them. There's hoops the company has to perform to justify importing workers, which apparently can be abused for profit.

AND, everyone with a (legit) H1B visa would here LEGALLY.

Finally, that bill did a LOT of stuff to reform immigration.

It is now HR 4528

The Senate amended that bill to remove the ban.
Though I'm guessing this law and any more recent laws are what really mattered in the end.

As an aside, I really wish the government used something more like git (or at least actual patch files) and showed commits/diffs/tags github style.

It's really hard to grok what changes with their current methodology. First you look at a change (ex. "beginning on page 590, strike line 11 and all that follows through page 595, line 7, and insert the following") and so you have to find a pdf with page numbers.
Then you hunt down what some bill is editing and it's editing the text of what's effectively another patch file on some version of U.S. code and figuring out what the file law would be for just that change is near impossible.

Maybe some day we'll get to have gitlaw

It was BMG versus Cox, where BMG+Rightscorp were trying to prove that Cox was willfully negligent in their handling of DMCA complaints. So all of this stuff about IP address, hacked computers and modems, etc - doesn't matter.

Except that the DMCA says that ISPs have no liability regarding copyright infringement by their users, provided they are not actively involved in the infringement and do not modify the data passing through their network:

``Sec. 512. Limitations on liability relating to material online

``(a) Transitory Digital Network Communications.--A service provider
shall not be liable for monetary relief, or, except as provided in
subsection ( j), for injunctive or other equitable relief,
for infringement of copyright by reason of the provider's transmitting,
routing, or providing connections for, material through a system or
network controlled or operated by or for the service provider, or by
reason of the intermediate and transient storage of that material in the
course of such transmitting, routing, or providing connections, if--
``(1) the transmission of the material was initiated by or
at the direction of a person other than the service provider;
``(2) the transmission, routing, provision of connections,
or storage is carried out through an automatic technical process
without selection of the material by the service provider;
``(3) the service provider does not select the recipients of
the material except as an automatic response to the request of
another person;
``(4) no copy of the material made by the service provider
in the course of such intermediate or transient storage is
maintained on the system or network in a manner ordinarily
accessible to anyone other than anticipated recipients, and no
such copy is maintained on the system or network in a manner
ordinarily accessible to such anticipated recipients for a
longer period than is reasonably necessary for the transmission,
routing, or provision of connections; and
``(5) the material is transmitted through the system or
network without modification of its content.

So on what basis was a takedown notice filed against Cox as an ISP? Takedown notices are for services hosting user-provided content. Cox isn't hosting any of the supposedly infringing content, so there is nothing for them to take down. Someone is trying to misapply the rules for content-hosting services to a non-hosting service provider.

Subsection (j) does allow for injunctions to be issued prohibiting an ISP from providing service to a particular user, but only with a court order—not merely a notice of infringement from the copyright holder.

My question was how do they deal with the constant change? Do they have a standard way to review what has changed from revision to revision?

Yes, you can view the entire legislative history of H.R. 2029, the original bill here, with a list of 215 actions and 83 proposed amendments. All of this happened BEFORE the current amendment incorporating CISA.

If so, then the word "hidden" is beyond shady. If not, then why not? With the way the process seems to work, it seems strictly necessary to not have to start from scratch each time the document is changed.

Except that's basically what they did in this case. There was a 2000-page document just added as a giant omnibus "amendment" to this pre-existing H.R. 2029. You can see its summary, contents, and 18 proposed Amendments to this Amendment here (technically amendments to amendments to amendments to H.R.2029).

Now, of course, the big question I think you have is "But how do we know who inserted Section (N) -- CISA -- into this 2000-page amendment on an amendment on an amendment." And there you'd run into problems, because these omnibus spending bills are often deliberately obfuscated in deliberation and then proposed en masse. That's the whole point of "budget negotiations" and a "last-minute" deal -- they spend months working out the kinks and then slam down a 2000-page (relatively) final document on the table.

Now that the Amendment is officially introduced, any further alterations will be tracked (on those links I gave above). But the whole thing was thrown together first as part of some deal before it was formally presented as a 2000-page omnibus bill. Since the actual writing and compilation of this legislation prior to its formal presentation happened "behind closed doors," we don't have a record of how it all came together.

And if the "problem" as described doesn't really exist and dealing with the differences and voting on them is straightforward and well understood, how does crap like this make it through on unrelated bills?

Easy -- the House leadership clearly wants it there, or at least approves of it. Thus it became part of this "deal" that went into drafting the 2000-page document. There are probably hundreds of little things in there that came about from various compromises -- and now the House Rules Committee presents the whole package together with the hopes that everyone will just vote it up.

And, by the way, before you start complaining about how this is "unrelated" legislation -- this is THE budget omnibus bill of 2016. By definition, the omnibus appropriations bill every year will incorporate at least a dozen different fundamental (and not directly related) things to authorize appropriations for the whole government. It almost always contains hundreds of pages of random other crap that went into the negotiation process.

The point is that Congress in this case doesn't want you to see the "sausage being made". They just want to present the 2000-page thing and get the whole House to vote "yea" or "nay" because presumably they have already secured enough agreement in negotiations to ensure its passage before they officially submitted it.

When something bad happens, we normally look for the guilty party or at least a scapegoat. Now we get "was hidden". Who hid it?

The House Rules Committee.

What individual inserted CISA into the budget bill?

This looks like an action that was undertaken by the committee, so you're unlikely to find a single person named for that particular section.

Why don't all the major news outlets say "Rep. Smith inserted CISA into the budget bill"?

Because it doesn't always work that way. See, this bill used to be H.R. 2029, which was a military appropriations bill. It went through the House a few months ago, then the Senate made a bunch of modifications last month where it passed unanimously. You can read all the sundry details of its history at the link.

What appears to have happened is that the House Appropriations Committee decided they needed a "vehicle" to pass the omnibus spending packages for next year, so they got the Rules Committee to propose a 2000-page amendment. (Actually, there are two amendments; the second is much shorter.)

So, technically, this is a giant amendment proposed by a committee to a bill that had already passed the House and then was amended by the Senate and passed by them.

Anyhow, what generally happens with these huge slates of amendments is that the Chair of the Committee (in this case, the Rules Committee) will just introduce the whole group of amendments, which will then be voted on by the House. Sometimes you can find the details of who exactly proposed which amendments by digging through Committee reports, but in this case with a giant single amendment (with only Section (N) dealing with CISA), it's doubtful that there's going to be anything in the official record to track to a specific individual, other than perhaps the Committee Chair who may officially present it on behalf of the Committee.

If you think this is overly complex and sounds crazy, you'd be right. Welcome to the bureaucratic nightmare that is Congressional legislative practice.

No, no, no. Its OK, as long as the land was stolen first. Then you can build whatever you want on it. That's how we do property rights in the USA...

The recent Commercial Space Bill mandates that NASA maintains the ISS as a "viable and productive facility capable of potential U.S. utilization through at least 30 September 2024".

Moving on is hard to do sometimes.

Wrong as usual... The depreciation is $500,000 and only on assets above $2 million - and must be for business purposes. It also covers expenses by teachers, mortgages, and other assets which can be depreciated if used in a business venture. Like a racing team - car or horse - would consider their "transportation" a needed component of the business. So a bit different than what you're trying to paint (yet again) Ratzo.

Or are we talking about a different congressional record?

It does seem presumptuous but I think they are only talking about stuff brought back from space to the US .

Quoting the act:

Any asteroid resources obtained in outer space are the property of the entity that obtained them, which shall be entitled to all property rights to them, consistent with applicable federal law and existing international obligations.

That also indicates that, if somebody finds an asteroid made of crack, they can't keep it.

I want every item in every bill to have a person's name on it. Let them continue to be as evil and un-American as they want with their laws, but let's stop allowing them to be irresponsibly anonymous when they do it.

It appears to have been introduced by Hal Rogers (R-Kentucky). I can't find reference to it anywhere else in the Congressional Record.

Actually it doesn't appear to have passed the house yet. I know the house has passed some related bills but hasn't passed this one yet. So while not on the way to the presidents desk at the moment it likely will be shortly. I fully expect my hawkish, freedom hating, former nuclear football carrying in the Regan administration, representative to support this. Then again he called me about USA FREEDOM act which he cosponsored as he didn't like how I was representing the bill and him weeks after it passed. When I stated why I was opposed to it using the exact language in the bill he stated that the law didn't say that. At that point I asked him if he was really that illiterate or just retarded and told him I had read him the exact language in the bill. Interestingly shortly there after he announce that he wasn't going to be running again so maybe I was the reason, or at least I would like to think so.

Actually it doesn't appear to have passed the house yet. I know the house has passed some related bills but hasn't passed this one yet. So while not on the way to the presidents desk at the moment it likely will be shortly. I fully expect my hawkish, freedom hating, former nuclear football carrying in the Regan administration, representative to support this. Then again he called me about USA FREEDOM act which he cosponsored as he didn't like how I was representing the bill and him weeks after it passed. When I stated why I was opposed to it using the exact language in the bill he stated that the law didn't say that. At that point I asked him if he was really that illiterate or just retarded and told him I had read him the exact language in the bill. Interestingly shortly there after he announce that he wasn't going to be running again so maybe I was the reason, or at least I would like to think so.

Actually it doesn't appear to have passed the house yet. I know the house has passed some related bills but hasn't passed this one yet. So while not on the way to the presidents desk at the moment it likely will be shortly. I fully expect my hawkish, freedom hating, former nuclear football carrying in the Regan administration, representative to support this. Then again he called me about USA FREEDOM act which he cosponsored as he didn't like how I was representing the bill and him weeks after it passed. When I stated why I was opposed to it using the exact language in the bill he stated that the law didn't say that. At that point I asked him if he was really that illiterate or just retarded and told him I had read him the exact language in the bill. Interestingly shortly there after he announce that he wasn't going to be running again so maybe I was the reason, or at least I would like to think so.

For those who don't need a third party to read something for them this is a link to the actual bill. The bill itself is a lot less reading than all of the articles on it.

I just gisted the bill, it looks like one of these fait accomplis that follow this disturbing pattern we see of aligning the laws of Echelon (5 eyes, sigint or whatever other names it is know by) countries within the bounds of their beleaguered constitutions. Almost a year ago to the day laws with the same intent were passed in Australia under the NSL 2014.

If I may share my interpretation the bill, the main purpose appears to be to align the legal structures for government agencies to share information. Its up for interpretation and the more eyes reading this the better. I'll need a good read to really get it.

Of specific interest was that the law is beating a pretty fast drum for the Federal agencies to comply with a 60-180 day time frame for them to develop policy. I'm going to guess that they want to allocate budget spending to implement the policy withing the next 12 months. Of particular concern in the US version the bill allows for Federal agencies to spy on state, local and individuals (sec 2.8).

If the pattern is followed we can expect the UK and Canada to be next as these legal frameworks have already been passed in Australia and NZ - both political parties supported it there as well.

Why the governments of our countries are so intent on harassing their population is anyone's guess. What would be really great is if these bills were posted to /. *before* they passed. At least then the outrage could be channeled into constructive action.

The American Service-Members' Protection Act (ASPA, Title 2 of Pub.L. 107–206, H.R. 4775, 116 Stat. 820, enacted August 2, 2002) is a United States federal law that aims "to protect United States military personnel and other elected and appointed officials of the United States government against criminal prosecution by an international criminal court to which the United States is not party." Introduced by U.S. Senator Jesse Helms (R-NC) and U.S. Representative Tom DeLay (R-TX) it was an amendment to the 2002 Supplemental Appropriations Act for Further Recovery From and Response to Terrorist Attacks on the United States (H.R. 4775). The bill was signed into law by U.S. President George W. Bush on August 2, 2002.

Full text here, search for "American Service"

Title II: American Servicemembers' Protection Act - American Servicemembers' Protection Act of 2002 - Prohibits U.S. cooperation with the International Criminal Court. Specifies restrictions on: (1) participation by covered U.S. persons in United Nations (UN) peacekeeping and peace enforcement operations; (2) transfer to the Court of U.S. classified national security and law enforcement information; and (3) the provision of U.S. military assistance, with specified exceptions, to the government of a country that is a party to the Court.

(Sec. 2003) Prescribes conditions for a presidential waiver of the prohibitions and requirements of this Act.

(Sec. 2004) Declares that the requirements of this Act shall not prohibit: (1) any action authorized by the President to bring about the release from captivity of any U.S. military personnel (covered U.S. persons) and certain other persons (covered allied persons) who are being detained or imprisoned against their will by or on behalf of the Court; or (2) communication by the United States of its policy with respect to a matter.

(Sec. 2008) Authorizes the President to use all means necessary (including the provision of legal assistance) to bring about the release of covered U.S. persons and covered allied persons held captive by, on behalf, or at the request of the Court.

(Sec. 2009) Urges the President to report to appropriate congressional committees on the degree to which: (1) each military alliance to which the United States is a party may place U.S. armed forces under foreign control subject to the Court's jurisdiction; and (2) U.S. armed forces engaged in military operations pursuant to such alliance may be exposed to greater risks as a result of being placed under such foreign control.

(Sec. 2010) Authorizes funds withheld from the U.S. share of assessments to the UN or other international organizations pursuant to the Admiral James W. Nance and Meg Donovan Foreign Relations Authorization Act, Fiscal Years 2000 and 2001 to be transferred to the Embassy Security, Construction and Maintenance Account of the Department of State.

(Sec. 2011) Sets forth the relationship between the President's exercise of his constitutional authority as Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces, this Act, and actions taken with respect to a specific matter involving the Court, requiring congressional notification as specified.

(Sec. 2014) Amends the Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2002 to repeal the limitation on use of division A funds to provide assistance to the International Criminal Court or its prosecutorial activity.

(Sec. 2015) Permits the United States to continue rendering assistance to international efforts to bring to justice Saddam Hussein, Slobodan Milosevic, Osama bin Laden, other members of Al Qaeda, leaders of Islamic Jihad, and other foreign nationals accused of genocide, war crimes, or crimes against humanity.

I am getting very tired of this argument being trotted out like you know anything about the records retention laws. They have been around a VERY long time.

So I guess you never heard of this.

Obamacare did originate in the House as HR 3590. (HR meaning House of Representatives.) It was a "shell bill" that was gutted and stuffed with Obamacare to get around the rule. It's not a novel approach either, and the courts took no issue with it.

HR 3590 passed the House first as required, went to the Senate which altered it into Obamacare and then congress "resolved the differences" between the House and Senate versions passed before sending it to the president.

https://www.congress.gov/bill/...

The rational behind starting tax bills in the HR is that it's "closer to the electorate" - or was before Senators were elected by popular vote. Now, the differences between the two as far as being held to the will of the people is lessened.

The Act provides that “[e]ach State shall, not later than January 1, 2014, establish an American Health Benefit Exchange (referred to in this title as an ‘Ex-change’) for the State.” 42 U.S.C. 18031(b)(1). But the Act affords “State flexibility” in the fulfillment of that requirement. 42 U.S.C. 18041. A State may “elect[]” to set up the Exchange for itself. 42 U.S.C. 18041(b). Alternatively, if a State does not elect to create the Exchange itself, or if the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) determines that the State will not have the “required Exchangeopera-tiona l by January 1, 2014,” then HHS “shall establish and operate such Exchange within the State.” 42 U.S.C. 18041(c)(1).

An Exchange operated by HHS is known as a “[f]ederally-facilitated Exchange.” 45 C.F.R. 155.20. Though run by HHS, each federally-facilitated Ex-change is the same state-specific Exchange the State otherwise would have established.

see http://sblog.s3.amazonaws.com/...
You are right in that is is not tacit...is is explicit, the federal exchange is the established [and operated] exchange within a state.

According to the summary of the proposed Cybersecurity Act of 2012, the law would have put DHS and OPM in charge of overseeing federal "cybersecurity" operations and personnel (respectively). Physician, heal thyself...

What they're doing is legal. It's spelled out in plain English in the PATRIOT act.

This represents "plain English" to you? Seems to me that the Fourth Amendment is written in much plainer English than the PATRIOT act.

Go to the Wikipedia page right now and read it top to bottom. It's simplified there, and it cites the legal document itself.

All anyone has to read is the last word of "UNITING AND STRENGTHENING AMERICA BY PROVIDING APPROPRIATE TOOLS REQUIRED TO INTERCEPT AND OBSTRUCT TERRORISM". Unless you believe that the FBI's use of these planes is solely for thwarting terrorists, these activities require judicial oversight.

In any case, just because some dipshit congressmen passed some opportunistic legislation in a time of crisis doesn't mean that their legislation passes constitutional muster.

If people making $30,000 a year knew they paid over $1000 a month in taxes, the US government wouldn't have the resources to be so overweening.

Believe me every time I look at my W-2's I want to cry. Even though prosperity through hard work is a corner stone of American ideals the unfortunate truth is that income tax only punishes people for doing that hard work meanwhile some spoiled rich kid with a bunch of lawyers can evade our convoluted tax code and there are also those who game the welfare system that are rewarded for not working at all (Though I'll note that I'm not against welfare as some people do genuinely need it but there are those who abuse it).

The ideal solution would be to move to an all consumption tax that removes the punishment for working hard and saving into a tax on being a consumer and this works out perfectly because then it guarantees rich people will pay their fair share since they naturally spend far more in a month than most people will ever make in their life times. Well that's the theory anyway and I'm doubtful that we'll ever seen any major tax code reform enacted because the current system lends itself very well to corruption, discrimination and abuse by the very same people who would enact such an extensive reform.

Have you actually read the text of the bill? The bulk collection of phone data is not only still allowed, they give legal protections and guidelines for monetary compensation to the businesses they order to collect the data.

Oh yeah, and at the very bottom of the bill? They reauthorize another section of the Patriot Act.

With a name like "Obfuscant" I'd lean towards the former.

And now your argument is pure ad hominem.

As far as I can tell, the actual bill requires all data to be reproducible.

You tell wrong. Are you making it up out of whole cloth? It requires data to be available online in a form that anyone who wishes to verify or reproduce it can. It makes no requirement of reproducibility. Some people even lie and say that this law requires the EPA to reproduce it.

That means the raw data used by a study has to be available publicly (and probably on the internet) or it's "secret science" and can't be used by the EPA.

Close. You could read it for yourself if you want. It says nothing about all raw data, only "all scientific and technical information relied on to support such covered action". The raw data leads to results, the results are the scientific and technical information that are relied on.

In fact most sources I've seen actually say that even including difficult to reproduce data bans the EPA from using the study.

They lie. There is no such language in the law. Read it for yourself. It is even shorter than the FCC net neutrality rules.

Several say flat-out that private data of all types is banned.

They lie. The data isn't banned, but use of data that isn't available "in a manner that is sufficient for independent analysis and substantial reproduction of research results" cannot be used in formulation of EPA regulations.

But what about private medical data? Doesn't have to be made available. "Nothing in the subsection shall be construed as requiring the public dissemination of information the disclosure of which is prohibited by law." If your private medical data is covered by HIPAA, it doesn't have to be made available -- but it doesn't have to be made available anyway, only the results used to support regulatory actions. If you've signed away your legal protections to that data, well, you should have gotten legal advice prior to signing.

The Amendment that would have fixed this would have given peer-reviewed articles a free pass on the point, and it was voted down by the committee.

The process of peer-review is prior to publication. If it is published, then put it online and the law is satisfied. People here seem quite enamored with Open Access publishing, so any law that furthers the cause should be greeted with open arms. But here we have opposition to law, so keeping science private is somehow good.

So please, tell me how you could use a private database in your study and still get it used by the EPA.

That depends on what the "private database" contains, but I'd say that if you want public regulations then you should provide support for your desire and not just "because I say so". If your entire study is based on someone's private database then you have reproducibility and validity issues from the get-go and that means you aren't really doing science, you're trolling for data to support whatever conclusion you're looking for. That's the kind of science this law would stop, and I think that's just fine.

Wasn't this H. R. 2818 of the 113th Congress, introduced on 24 July 2013 and referred to the Subcommittee on Workforce Protections on 13 Sept. 2013 to quietly die?

Look, I support this bill as much as the next AC, but this is the dirty little secret of Washington, DC: when Congress wants to look like they are addressing an issue but in reality want the issue to just quietly go away, they announce bipartisan support for a "new" bill. With bipartisan support, there is no argument, no debate, nothing for the 24 hour news to talk about. So no one ever does.

Here is the text of the law in question. Parts that interest me (ianalbirp):

1) Formalization of 'Covenant Not to Sue.'
2) Makes it harder to sue the customer when the manufacturer commits a patent violation.
3) Commissions various interesting studies on the effectiveness (or on the negative effects) of patents.

There might be more but I only have so much tolerance for reading legalese......

Arg, link fail. I intended to link to the text of H.R. 4681 so you can read section 309 yourself.

https://www.congress.gov/bill/...

In other words, the only issue he has with this bill is that it acknowledges an Executive Order is in place. It doesn't even particularly bless it. Nothing is changing other than a slightly-less tacet approval of an order that has been around for decades. It's not a terribly long bill, check it out yourself

I believe the bill in question is S. 2685, as found at Congress.gov or GovTrack.us.

It was a little trickier than usual because there are now several bills called "USA FREEDOM" in various permutations (H.R. 3361 as well as the S. 1599 that you found). The backronyms vary a bit.

Just wondering, I can't seem to find them.

I found this, but the last action mentioned was when it was introduced on 10/29/2013.
https://www.congress.gov/bill/...

Seems like the right link, I'm guessing it hasn't been updated.

The act does not mention the NSA anywhere in the bill. The only organization that is mentioned is the FBI, which means really business as usual. The FBI restrictions are non-existent with the fact that we have "fusion" centers that all of the other people can dump data into without any restriction.

USA FREEDOM Act - Title I: FISA Business Records Reforms - (Sec. 101) Amends the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (FISA) to establish a new process to be followed when the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) submits an application to a FISA court for an order requiring the production of tangible things (commonly referred to as business records, including books, records, papers, documents, and other items) for an investigation to obtain foreign intelligence information not concerning a U.S. person or to protect against international terrorism or clandestine intelligence activities.

Emphasis mine. Nowhere does the bill mention that the amount of data is going to be reduced or curtailed. Everything being collected illegally today will still be illegally collected even if this bill passes and becomes law. The bill is a waste of time and provides zero reform.

https://www.congress.gov/bill/...

I like that she is speaking out on this, but I wish she would say something about the attempt to repeal the free speech/press part of the first amendment that the Democrats are working on. https://beta.congress.gov/bill...

``Section 1. To advance democratic self-government and political equality, and to protect the integrity of government and the electoral process, Congress and the States may regulate and set reasonable limits on the raising and spending of money by candidates and others to influence elections.
``Section 2. Congress and the States shall have power to implement and enforce this article by appropriate legislation, and may distinguish between natural persons and corporations or other artificial entities created by law, including by prohibiting such entities from spending money to influence elections.
``Section 3. Nothing in this article shall be construed to grant Congress or the States the power to abridge the freedom of the press.''.

For clarification, Section 1 will be interpreted as "for any purpose we say 'protects the integrity of government" no matter how far-fetched a regular person would think it is. (see Wickard v. Filburn).
"by candidates and others" will be interpreted as "by anyone and/or everyone"
" reasonable limits" means "however much the party in power decides"
"and may distinguish between natural persons and corporations" means whichever party in power can choose to limit corporations but not individuals, and they can also choose to limit individuals but not corporations. It's unclear to me if it also means they can choose which people to limit (though they'll surely figure out a way to do so).
" Nothing in this article shall be construed to grant Congress or the States the power to abridge the freedom of the press." Given that a straightforward interpretation of this statement would negate the entirety of the amendment, the Court will have to conclude that it doesn't mean what is says and that it does indeed grant Congress the power to abridge the freedom of the press (since you'll need money to buy ink).