ABFFE Joins Campaign Against NSA Surveillance

The American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (ABFFE) has joined a number of other civil liberties organizations, including the ACLU, to protest the National Security Administration's surveillance of Americans' Internet activity and phone records. The recently revealed news of the NSA's actions spurred ABFFE and the other groups to write an open letter to members of Congress.

The letter says that the type of "blanket" spying the NSA has done "strikes at bedrock American values of freedom and privacy." For booksellers and librarians in particular, the NSA's actions recall their fight against Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act. 

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Authorities 'use analytics tool that recognises sarcasm'

Zoe Kleinman Technology reports for BBC News:

French company Spotter has developed an analytics tool that claims to be able to identify sarcastic comments posted online.
Spotter says its clients include the Home Office, EU Commission and Dubai Courts.
The algorithm-based analytics software generates reputation reports based on social and traditional media material.
However some experts say such tools are often inadequate because of the nuance of language.
A spokeswoman for the Home Office said she should not comment at this time.
Spotter's UK sales director Richard May said the company monitored material that was "publicly available".
Its proprietary software uses a combination of linguistics, semantics and heuristics to create algorithms that generate reports about online reputation. It says it is able to identify sentiment with up to an 80% accuracy rate.

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Federal Judge Parades Her Ignorance, Approves Torture of Guantanamo Prisoners

A U.S. District Judge not only doesn't know what torture is, she doesn't know her own history.
Judge Rosemary M. Collyer doesn't know what people have known for decades, if not centuries: force-feeding is torture. Force-feeding is torture. In fact, Judge Collyer wouldn't be sitting where she is today if dozens of American (and British) women hadn't been tortured in this way in their fight for the right to vote. Women were maimed and died because of force-feeding.

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Catch up on Circle of 13 posts

On Facebook.

Military Industry Employee 'Throws Down Rifle' for 'Good of the World'

A five-year employee at private defense contracting corporation General Dynamics publicly resigned Tuesday in protest of the company's arming of US-led wars, declaring: "I have always believed that if every foot soldier threw down his rifle war would end. I hereby throw mine down." 
Brandon Toy's General Dynamics employee badge (Photo: Brandon Toy)

Brandon Toy sent his resignation letter in an email to his immediate supervisors, coworkers, and the corporate chain of command, as well as to Common Dreams, who published the statement Tuesday.
The letter has since gone viral, racketing tens of thousands of views on social media sites as attention continues to climb.
Toy—who penned the letter in May and sat on it for months—says that when he pressed send and walked out of his office, he felt that a "giant weight had been lifted from [his] shoulders."
"I feel fantastic," he told Common Dreams. "I did the right thing. I am a little concerned about what I will do for work, but I know I will be working for the good of the world."

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