Editors’ Picks for Feb 23
How Washington Elites Enjoy Spending Taxpayers’ Money, Army Forbids Chelsea Manning from Reading Electronic Frontier Foundation, Scalia’s Zombie Vote, and More Picks
PICKS are stories from many sources, selected by our editors or recommended by our readers because they are important, surprising, troubling, enlightening, inspiring, or amusing. They appear on our site and in our daily newsletter. Please send suggested articles, videos, podcasts, etc. to picks@whowhatwhy.org.
Scalia Got a Free Trip to a Texas Resort. He’s Hardly Alone (Trevin)
A 2014 Center for Public Integrity “evaluation of disclosure requirements for Supreme Court judges” failed forty-two states and the District of Columbia. One Arkansas justice got a $50K trip to Italy. It’s worse than you might think, have a look.
Army Blocks Chelsea Manning From Reading EFF Posts (Trevin)
Ironically, most of the posts printed out from the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s website had to do with prison censorship.
Apple, Americans, and Security vs. FBI (Trevin)
Speaking of the EFF, they do a great job explaining — despite the FBI framing the issues as impacting only a single phone — how last week’s judicial order could affect “device platform security, individual privacy, and international human rights.”
US-South Korea’s ‘Warning to Pyongyang’ (Dan)
In March the US and South Korea will display the largest-to-date flexing of military might against North Korea and its leaders in Pyongyang. ‘Key Resolve’ and ‘Foal Eagle’ will involve 15,000 US troops (double that of previous years) and 290,000 South Korean special forces (again, more than double of previous years). The military maneuvers, which involve personnel from the air, sea, and land, will last for a little over a month. This aggressive display of force is largely a response to North Korea’s fifth underground nuclear test. Nothing like fighting power with even more power, is there?
Scalia’s Vote from Beyond the Grave (Dan)
“There’s no Ouija board required to figure out how Justice Scalia would vote on these things, he’s already voted”, explains Kory Langhofer, an attorney from Arizona. While this is probably true, one can only imagine the barrage of bipartisan complaints that would erupt from such a procedure.
