The Ridgewood News All-Suburban Tennis Team
Friday, July 26, 2013
BY JIM MCCONVILLE
CORRESPONDENT
The Ridgewood News
JASON LINKER & GREG MASLAK, Ridgewood — These seniors were a tandem at the junior varsity level two years ago and reunited this year to give the Maroons a second straight Bergen Groups 3-4 championship at first doubles — the school’s fifth since 1988. Maslak was a second doubles county champion last year, while Linker played third singles, and it took them a bit of time to jell, as both missed an early week of the season while traveling.
Once they got it together, they won 12 of their last 13 matches (the loss coming in the North 1, Group 4 state team tournament) to finish 13-4 on the season, including a win over Shawn Diniz and James Yoon when the Northern Highlands pairing had to default for injury. Linker still dabbled at singles, winning his three dual matches, and had a win with another doubles partner, and Maslak was 1-2 as a singles player.
Feds tell Web firms to turn over user account passwords
Secret demands mark escalation in Internet surveillance by the federal government through gaining access to user passwords, which are typically stored in encrypted form.
by Declan McCullagh
July 25, 2013 11:26 AM PDT
The U.S. government has demanded that major Internet companies divulge users’ stored passwords, according to two industry sources familiar with these orders, which represent an escalation in surveillance techniques that has not previously been disclosed.
If the government is able to determine a person’s password, which is typically stored in encrypted form, the credential could be used to log in to an account to peruse confidential correspondence or even impersonate the user. Obtaining it also would aid in deciphering encrypted devices in situations where passwords are reused.
“I’ve certainly seen them ask for passwords,” said one Internet industry source who spoke on condition of anonymity. “We push back.”
Poll: Obama’s job approval plunges; Congress, especially GOP, still unpopular
By David Lightman | McClatchy Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON — Stung by Americans’ persistent worries about the economy and a capital gripped by controversy and gridlock, President Barack Obama is suffering his lowest job approval numbers in nearly two years, according to a new McClatchy-Marist poll.
The plummeting numbers – still higher than those of Congress – come after weeks of rising gasoline prices, revelations about domestic spying and turmoil in the Middle East.
The disappointing results come as the White House this week looks to turn the national conversation back to the economy. Obama will deliver the first of a series of speeches Wednesday aimed at offering his vision for boosting economic growth, even as the new poll found that just 37 percent of the respondents approved of his handling of the economy, while 56 percent disapproved.
Overall, the poll found Obama’s job approval at 41 percent last week, a sharp drop from April’s 50 percent and his worst showing in the poll since 39 percent in September 2011. Forty-eight percent disapproved in the latest poll, up from April’s 46 percent.
Rochester, N.Y. — She says she had no warning that someone was going to search her car after she left to catch her flight. So the woman contacted News10NBC.
We found out it happened to her because she valet parked her car. Those are the only cars that get inspected.
So if security feels it is necessary to search some cars in the name of safety, why not search all of them?
Laurie Iacuzza walked to her waiting car at the Greater Rochester International Airport after returning from a trip and that’s when she found it — a notice saying her car was inspected after she left for her flight. She said, “I was furious. They never mentioned it to me when I booked the valet or when I picked up the car or when I dropped it off.”
Iacuzza’s car was inspected by valet attendants on orders from the TSA. But why only valet parked cars? That’s what News10NBC wanted to ask the TSA director about. We reached him by phone.
Berkeley Brean asked, “Are the cars in the short term lots and long term lots getting searched as well?”
John McCaffery, TSA, said, “No, those vehicles that are in the garage, short term long term parking, even if they carry pretty large amounts of explosives, they would not cause damage to the front of the airport. But for those who use the valet, the car could be there for a half hour or an hour so there is a vulnerability.”
News10NBC went to the valet parking and one of the attendants showed us the notice they put in the cars.
We asked, “You’re required, they tell you, you have to search the car?” Valet Parking Attendant Frank Dettorre said, “I have to do it.”
We also noticed a large sign that alerts customers that their vehicle will be inspected. The sign is on the kiosk window. Iacuzza says it was not there when she dropped off her car. “I think the public should be aware of the fact that if their car is going to be searched, they should be informed of it.”
Iacuzza said she doesn’t mind the security measure. She just wants to be told if her car is getting searched.
News10NBC asked the owner of the company that runs the valet parking when they put up the sign but he wouldn’t answer.
TSA says this is part of its overall security plan and that it’s a proactive move. The attendants said they’ve only been doing it for about a month.
Mood shifting, Congress may move to limit NSA spying
By David Lightman, Kate Irby and Ben Kamisar | McClatchy Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON — Congress is growing increasingly wary of controversial National Security Agency domestic surveillance programs, a concern likely to erupt during legislative debate _ and perhaps prod legislative action _ as early as next week.
Skepticism has been slowly building since last month’s disclosures that the super-secret NSA conducted programs that collected Americans’ telephone data. Dozens of lawmakers are introducing measures to make those programs less secret, and there’s talk of denying funding and refusing to continue authority for the snooping.
The anxiety is a sharp contrast to June’s wait-and-see attitude after Edward Snowden, a government contract worker, leaked highly classified data to the media. The Guardian newspaper of Britain reported one program involved cellphone records. The Guardian, along with The Washington Post, also said another program allowed the government access to the online activity of users at nine Internet companies.
FBI records: agents found no evidence that Zimmerman was racist
Frances Robles and Scott Hiaason | Miami Herald
After interviewing nearly three dozen people in the George Zimmerman murder case, the FBI found no evidence that racial bias was a motivating factor in the shooting of Trayvon Martin, records released Thursday show.
Even the lead detective in the case, Sanford Det. Chris Serino, told agents that he thought Zimmerman profiled Trayvon because of his attire and the circumstances — but not his race.
Serino saw Zimmerman as “having little hero complex, but not as a racist.”
The Duval County State Attorney released another collection of evidence in the Zimmerman murder case Thursday, including reports from FBI agents who investigated whether any racial bias was involved in Trayvon’s Feb. 26 killing.
The evidence includes bank surveillance videos from the day of the killing, crime scene photos and memos from prosecutors.
Among the documents is a note from the prosecutor who said one of the witnesses said her son, a minor, had felt pressured by investigators to say the injured man he saw was wearing a red top. The boy’s testimony had been considered key, because it backed up Zimmerman’s allegation that he — wearing red — was being pummeled.
Linchpin for Obama’s plan to predict future leakers unproven, isn’t likely to work, experts say
By Jonathan S. Landay and Marisa Taylor | McClatchy Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON — In an initiative aimed at rooting out future leakers and other security violators, President Barack Obama has ordered federal employees to report suspicious actions of their colleagues based on behavioral profiling techniques that are not scientifically proven to work, according to experts and government documents.
The techniques are a key pillar of the Insider Threat Program, an unprecedented government-wide crackdown under which millions of federal bureaucrats and contractors must watch out for “high-risk persons or behaviors” among co-workers. Those who fail to report them could face penalties, including criminal charges.
Obama mandated the program in an October 2011 executive order after Army Pfc. Bradley Manning downloaded hundreds of thousands of documents from a classified computer network and gave them to WikiLeaks, the anti-government secrecy group. The order covers virtually every federal department and agency, including the Peace Corps, the Department of Education and others not directly involved in national security.
“I don’t know. I’d have to look at it closely,” said Senator Bob Casey of Pennsylvania. “I just haven’t read it that closely to know.”
68 Senators Vote to Create Incentive for Employers to Hire Amnestied Immigrants Over U.S. Citizens
9:49 AM, Jun 28, 2013 • By JOHN MCCORMACK
The immigration bill passed by the Senate Thursday afternoon would give some employers a financial incentive to employ “registered provisional immigrants” (illegal immigrants granted legal status) instead of U.S. citizens.
As the Washington Examiner’s Philip Klein recently reported: “Under Obamacare, businesses with over 50 workers that employ American citizens without offering them qualifying health insurance could be subject to fines of up to $3,000 per worker. But because newly legalized immigrants wouldn’t be eligible for subsidies on the Obamacare exchanges until after they become citizens – at least 13 years under the Senate bill – businesses could avoid such fines by hiring the new immigrants instead.”
On Tuesday, THE WEEKLY STANDARD asked five U.S. senators about this problem, and none of them knew if it was a problem. “We’re trying to solve that right now. I don’t know if that’s been solved,” Senator Max Baucus of Montana (chief author of Obamacare) told THE WEEKLY STANDARD.
Government could use metadata to map your every move
By Lindsay Wise and Jonathan S. Landay | McClatchy Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON — If you tweet a picture from your living room using your smartphone, you’re sharing far more than your new hairdo or the color of the wallpaper. You’re potentially revealing the exact coordinates of your house to anyone on the Internet.
The GPS location information embedded in a digital photo is an example of so-called metadata, a once-obscure technical term that’s become one of Washington’s hottest new buzzwords.
The word first sprang from the lips of pundits and politicians earlier this month, after reports disclosed that the government has been secretly accessing the telephone metadata of Verizon customers, as well as online videos, emails, photos and other data collected by nine Internet companies. President Barack Obama hastened to reassure Americans that “nobody is listening to your phone calls,” while other government officials likened the collection of metadata to reading information on the outside of an envelope, which doesn’t require a warrant.
But privacy experts warn that to those who know how to mine it, metadata discloses much more about us and our daily lives than the content of our communications.
So what is metadata? Simply put, it’s data about data. An early example is the Dewey Decimal System card catalogs that libraries use to organize books by title, author, genre and other information. In the digital age, metadata is coded into our electronic transmissions.
Read more here: https://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/06/20/194505/government-could-use-metadata.html#.UcVkp9j-r8k#storylink=cpy
Super Bowl warning: Towns told not to violate NFL license
Friday, June 14, 2013 Last updated: Friday June 14, 2013, 9:29 AM
BY JOHN BRENNAN
STAFF WRITER
The Record
The committee in charge of the 2014 Meadowlands Super Bowl has sent a letter to all 565 municipalities in New Jersey encouraging them to participate in a statewide celebration of the Super Bowl coming to MetLife Stadium on Feb. 2.
But the letter — a copy of which was obtained by The Record — also warns the towns very specifically to make sure they don’t violate the National Football League’s licensing rules while promoting their events.
The New York/New Jersey Super Bowl Host Committee “is extremely sensitive to events that are sponsored by or connected with products or companies that are competitors to the Host Committee or NFL sponsors,” according to the letter.
The caution provides a lesson in the big business that is the NFL, and in particular how zealously it guards the branding of the “Super Bowl,” its premier annual event. NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy said that companies that use the phrase without authorization can expect “a simple phone call or letter” alerting them to the violation. Failing swift cooperation, companies can expect more pressure from NFL attorneys.
– See more at: https://www.northjersey.com/sports/211515061_Towns_warned_not_to_violate_NFL_license.html#sthash.zul4oFXD.dpuf
What you spend. Where you eat. Who you call. Where you travel. What you Google. What you give to charity.
Recent reports of government access to records from phone companies, Internet providers and credit card companies raise anew questions of just how much other people can know about you, especially in the age of the Internet and high technology.
They watch from the air, from cameras, from computers. And you help them, volunteering vast amounts of information about yourself in the magnetic stripe on the back of your credit card, the SIM card in your phone, the sites you visit on the Internet.
The government has access to some of it. And might have access to more from the vast corporations that compile it.
Read more here: https://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/06/13/193487/the-government-is-watching.html#.UbrVPNgvwuc#storylink=cpy
IRS may have targeted conservatives more broadly
By David Lightman and Kevin G. Hall | McClatchy Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON A group of anti-abortion activists in Iowa had to promise the Internal Revenue Service it wouldn’t picket in front of Planned Parenthood.
Catherine Engelbrecht’s family and business in Texas were audited by the government after her voting-rights group sought tax-exempt status from the IRS.
Retired military veteran Mark Drabik of Nebraska became active in and donated to conservative causes, then found the IRS challenging his church donations.
While the developing scandal over the targeting of conservatives by the tax agency has largely focused to date on its scrutiny of groups with words such as “tea party” or “patriot” in their names, these examples suggest the government was looking at a broader array of conservative groups and perhaps individuals. Their collective experiences at a minimum could spread skepticism about the fairness of a powerful agency that should be above reproach and at worst could point to a secret political vendetta within the government against conservatives.
The emerging stories from real people raise questions about whether the IRS scrutiny extended beyond applicants for tax-exempt status and whether individuals who donated to these tax-exempt organizations or to conservative causes also were targeted.
Salute to WW11 Vets
May 31,2013
ROBERT PAOLI
12:14 PM
Ridgewood NJ, Saturday, June 1st 2013 at Legionnaire Jack McCooe house at 12 noon American Legion Post 53 will honor 10 WW11 veterans. Some are legionnaires and others are from the community.
Kathleen Donovans office will be present for a special citation to each of them The ceremony will take place at Sean and Rosie McCooe house at 70 Walthery Ave in Ridgewood.
“Real Housewives of New Jersey” “Joe” Giudice will go on trial July 15 on charges he posed as his brother to get a driver’s license
Tuesday, May 28, 2013 Last updated: Tuesday May 28, 2013, 6:21 PM
BY JOHN PETRICK
STAFF WRITE
Giudice in April rejected a plea deal that would have gotten him four years in state prison. The prosecution has maintained that that is its final offer.
The trial date was scheduled during a status conference on the case by state Judge Greta Gooden Brown in Paterson. Miles Feinstein, the defense lawyer for Giudice, and Jay McCann, a Passaic County assistant prosecutor, said in court that a mid-July start would give them reasonable time to prepare.
“We are happy that a trial date has been set and we look forward to Joe being exonerated,” Feinstein said following the brief hearing Monday, in which Giudice attended with his mother. Both declined comment.
The Dangers of “Common Core Education”
The Eagle,TPATH May 24, 2013
Nicholas Purpura
Nicholas Purpura’s commentary is thorough and convincing pointing out the dangers in “Common Core Education ” and the direct threat it poses to the kin of quality education Ridgewood expects from its schools.
“Education has become a national security issue, and what has your establishment incumbent said or done about it – absolutely nothing! I remind the reader that the infamous tyrant, Adolph Hitler, said: “When an opponent declares, ‘I will not come over to your side,’ I calmly say, ‘your child belongs to us already…. What are you? You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing else out of this new community.
The GOP establishment in New Jersey is no better. If they were, they would have stood by the Republican National Committee’s Resolution against “Common Core Education.” Then it might have been a different picture. Instead they’re what I’ve been saying is “Democrat-lite” and are going along as good progressives normally do, disregarding that it will destroy the education of children in the government indoctrination centers called “public schools”.
There is a light at the end of the tunnel. Candidates from both parties have joined Team New Jersey condemning “Common Core Education,” and will do everything in their power to rid New Jersey of this indoctrination program that will dumb them down and turn them into one-world globalist.
The candidates listed below are against Common Core, or federalizing of the curriculum, which is the newest way to dumb down our children.
Senate Candidate: LD-13 Leigh-Ann Bellew
Assembly Candidates: LD-4, John Lockhart (Incumbent) LD-7, Connie Hare Murry and Joe Siano LD-8, Scott Fay and Gary Jacques Assembly LD-13, Steve Boracchia and Edna Walsh LD-36, Aharon Cohn and Sam Krause (Two more patriots joining TeamNJ)
And please don’t neglect those running for Freeholders and GOP Committee – it’s time to clean house.
Freeholders:
(Incumbent) Scott Rumana, LD 40 JoeMcDevitt, (Atlantic Co.) LanceSilver, Burl.Co. BarbaraEames, (Whippany, Morris Cty. Lance Silver, (Burl.) Ed Pekarsky, LD 13 Brian Largey, LD 13
GOP State Committee: Bill Haney & Ashley Cameron, Burlington Rae Rinaldi, Steve Moss, Bergen Pat Rivera, Jim Gasko, Passaic Bader Qarmount, Rick Shaftan, Deborah Deluca, Sussex Vikki Jennsen, Union Catherine McCulloch, Morris Carol Gallentine, Essex Ron Giordano, Joanne Cooper, Salem Eric Dixon, Hudson
Parental control is what is truly needed. School choice where your children attend – whether private, religious, or charter – the need for a universal voucher system is long overdue. The public education system is a total failure, and must be dismantled if our children are to be able to compete in this world economy. Remember, the fed’s gave us Outcome-based Education, Goals 2000, School-to-work, and now Common Core. It’s the same garbage repackaged over and over again, and it is designed to dumb down our children and take away the local control of boards of education.
Much worse “Common Core” effectively removes educational choice. What’s more the government will collect personal student’s data for non-educational purpose without parental written consent. You may ask how these reprobates can get away with this. Let me point to one instance that will sicken you.
The enlightened progressives at the NEA have decided that advancing sensitivity and tolerance of other life styles is of the utmost importance. But, in truth, their objective is to change public opinion on homosexuality, starting with the youngest generation. On the internet, according to a former chairman of the NEA, Ex-Gay Educators Caucus, and many other critics, the NEA promotes a gay rights agenda especially following the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals see Field’s v. Palmdale School District, in which the Court held:
“parents’ fundamental right to control the upbringing of their children “does not extend beyond the threshold of the school door,” and that a public school has the right to provide its students with “whatever information it wishes to provide, sexual or otherwise.”
So you think it’s just the fed’s shoving “Common Core” down our throats? Coming to you straight from the mental midgets at the Department of Education in New Jersey this September is another program titled “Student Growth Objectives” pre- and post-testing, which is measuring and testing all year long. Ask yourselves, when the heck are they going to teach? Our teachers are now going to teach according to what will be on the tests so the school gets a good rating. In truth, if anyone needs testing it’s those posing as teachers so we get the best educators for our students and tell the Department of Education and unions to go take a hike.
We as Americans must never let those in the teachers unions and Department of Education now controlled by Marxists, Socialists, Atheists, Sodomites, and one-world advocates to usurp our parental rights any longer while repeatedly degrading our culture and history.
If we ever hope to restore our heritage and traditional values we must no longer allow the government, to tell our children what is acceptable moral behavior by indoctrinating them into ill moral sexual behavior now prevalent in grade school to higher educational institutions. No authority exists in the Constitution granting the federal government the authority to create the Department of Education, especially an unconstitutional department that partners itself with Marxists teachers unions and the UN that is determined to destroy the United States culture and heritage by mandating indoctrination into a one-world order. Orwell said it best, “those that control the language control the thinking.”
Also, I know of nowhere in the Constitution that requires parents to surrender their children to the “State” or “Teachers Unions” to undergo sexual indoctrination. Renowned educational analyst, Samuel Blumenfeld reported in his book “The Leaning Tower of Babel” that school programs are intended:
“to discard the values and religious beliefs of their families and create new sets of values reflecting their own personal desires and leanings, particularly those regarding sex.” …been encouraged by values clarification to reject the traditional Judeo-Christian prohibitions against sexual perversion and adopt an open and assertive homosexual lifestyle.”Funded with your tax dollars and teachers dues, these draconian programs were co-sponsored by none other than Department of Education, National Education Association, (NEA) and American Federation of Teachers (AFT). The UN’s arm UNESCO made no attempt to disguise their Socialist and Marxist goals let their own words be a warning:
“It follows from the essence of the socialist structure of the state in countries concerned… that their educational system is centralized. This creates an extremely favorable situation for central state measures designed to modernize education. The socialist state possesses the means necessary for education…. From the point of view of the development of education technology the socialist countries are also in a favorable position because of the fact that television, school television, radio and school radio are operated centrally….”
