Daily Links #118: US bishops praise LGBTQ discrimination bill

• US Conference of Catholic Bishops praises a Senate bill that would legalize anti-LGBTQ discrimination nationwide, because of course they do.
  (via Joe.My.God.)

• A Buffalo, NY bishop names 42 priests accused of child sexual abuse, many of whom were previously unidentified, because … wait, that’s actually surprising.
  (via Joe.My.God.)

• Meanwhile, Michigan police raided the Saginaw Catholic Diocese and a bishop’s home, citing their lack of cooperation in a sexual abuse investigation.
  (via Joe.My.God.)

• ICE contractor says it doesn’t use solitary confinement, and also, please ignore the testimony and photos of its isolation cells that prove they use solitary confinement.

• The sun continues to set on the northern white rhinoceros as Sudan, the species’ last living male, dies. Two females survive, which conservationists hope to impregnate using IVF.

• Security theater: The Parkland, Florida high school where the February shooting occurred now requires that students wear clear backpacks, which I’m sure will make it impossible to bring guns into schools and would totally have prevented those shootings carried out with rifles that don’t fit in backpacks anyway.
  (via @adamconover)

• Finally, Tennessee’s Republican-controlled legislature passes a bill, sure to be signed by Gov. Bill Haslam (R), requiring public schools to display “In God We Trust” in a “prominent location”, which is guaranteed to fix every problem forever.

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Links #110: Seriously, please sign that petition to prevent censorship of Canada’s Internet

Oy, Canadians! Have you signed that petition to save our Internet from censorship yet? The deadline is tonight.

Once you’ve done that, here’s your news dump.

• US Supreme Court refuses to review a lower court ruling blocking Trump’s attempt to end DACA.

• More good judicial news: A federal court rules that the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibits anti-LGBTQ workplace discrimination, rebuking the Trump admin. which argued the contrary.
  (via Joe.My.God.)

• In reaction to the Larry Nassar sex abuse scandal, Michigan lawmakers want to greatly extend the statute of limitations for sex crime victims. For some reason, the Catholic Church isn’t happy with this.

• Florida Republicans advance two bills to put more guns in classrooms, because when you reject all sensible solutions, cartoonish ones are all that’s left.
  (via Joe.My.God.)

• Finally, Ed Brayton at Dispatches From the Culture Wars addresses the terrible, tribalistic defenses of Lawrence Krauss against his sexual harassment allegations. You know it’s bad when the pro-Krauss arguments are the same used by Roy Moore’s supporters.

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Pope sends Vatican “sex crimes expert” to handle abuse claims

Pope Francis

Pope Francis made a stir recently when he topped off his South American tour by accusing clerical child abuse victims of “slandering” a bishop they say covered up their rapey priest’s crimes. He then gave a non-apology, which for some reason didn’t seem to assuage anyone.

Well, he’s determined to make it right, and he’s got just the solution:

After coming under excoriating public criticism, Pope Francis has decided to send the Vatican's most respected sex crimes expert to Chile to investigate a bishop accused by victims of covering up for the country's most notorious pedophile priest.

The Vatican said Tuesday that Maltese Archbishop Charles Scicluna would travel to Chile "to listen to those who have expressed the desire to provide elements" about the case of Bishop Juan Barros.

In other news, Madam Palm at Miss Rosy’s Whorehouse has launched an investigation into claims that her employees are having sex for money.

Daily Links: 01/21/18 – Pope undermines child-abuse apology tour

Pope Francis

• Whoops, there goes Pope Francis, obliterating whatever credibility his clerical child abuse repentance tour may have gotten him by standing with an accused bishop and accusing victims of lying.

• The State of Tennessee works diligently to protect citizens from the scourge of barbers who don’t have high school diplomas.
  (via @radleybalko)

• It’s one thing for Christians to say that all animals are God’s little creatures, but it’s another for an Oklahoma Republican to try and make it law.
  (via Pharyngula)

• Montréal, Québec officially abolishes the city’s much-hated traffic and parking ticket quotas … after years of officials claiming no such quotas existed.

• Finally, the United Kingdom officially starts pushing pro-copyright, anti-piracy “education” on grade-schoolers and it’s nuts:

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Links: 01/11/18 – House Democrats help Republicans give Trump mass surveillance powers

• Key House Democrats join hands with Republicans to give Trump & co. the right to spy on basically everyone, pending a likely passage in the Senate.

• In better news, a federal judge put a temporary block on the Trump administration’s plan to end DACA.

• Examining the far-too-many US prosecutors who not only hinder justice, but actively work against it to keep proven innocents in prison.
  (via @radleybalko)

• Now Brazil wants to censor the Internet and “punish” speech it doesn’t like in the name of stopping “fake news”.

• Trump is yapping again about loosening the US’s libel laws to make it easier to sue people who say things he doesn’t like. First Amendment attorney Ken “Popehat” White already explained why, as worrying as this attitude is from the sitting President, it’s not likely to lead to any policy changes.

• Finally, professional Catholic Church apologist Bill Donohue is still saying that no institution in the world deals with sexual abuse better than the global religious syndicate that multiple investigations have found still covers up child molestation cases to this day.

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Links: 12/20/17 – The problems with “drug-free zones”

Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN)

• The Myth of the Playground Pusher: How “drug-free zones” are less about protecting children and a lot more about drug-warrior politicians who want to burnish their creds with tougher sentences, innocence be damned.
  (via @radleybalko)

• Rep. Marsha Blackburn ^[pictured] (R-TN), noted telecom shill who understands nothing about net neutrality, introduces a bill that would codify the FCC’s anti-net-neutrality position into law.

• Law firm Appleby, whose leaked documents were the basis for the Paradise Papers, sues The Guardian and the BBC over their reporting, claiming “there was no public interest in the stories”.
  (via @KyellGold)

• Speaking of bad lawsuits: Password manager company Keeper is suing an Ars Technica reporter who wrote about a security flaw that has since been fixed. Considering that security firms’ credibility rests largely on their transparency regarding security flaws, this mostly ensures that no-one will trust Keeper again.
  (via @normative; RT: @Popehat)

• More data, this time from Las Vegas, shows that police body cameras reduce the number of complaints and use-of-force incidents.

• Ding dong, the child-molestation-enabling cardinal is dead. Naturally, he’ll get a full Vatican funeral with Pope Francis’s blessing.

• Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) sets his resignation date for January 2, 2018.
  (via Joe.My.God.)

• Finally, it’s a victory against breed-specific legislation as Montréal, Québec strikes down its pit bull ban.

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Links: 12/15/17 – Trump court-blocked on contraception law

• It’s Federal Judge Blocks Trump Law time! Today’s target: Trump’s rule allowing employers not to provide contraception coverage.

• Canadian federal government bans intelligence agencies from using or sharing information obtained from torture … unless it’s “absolutely necessary” because of terrorism or something. I’m sure that’ll never be abused.

• Oh, look, it’s another high-profile Christian official arrested for diddling children.
  (via Joe.My.God.)

• Australian government introduces new laws to punish people who leak or report on classified documents with up to 20 years in prison.

• German court is the latest to rule that mass communications surveillance is illegal.
  (via @Snowden)

• Meanwhile, the US official in charge of protecting whistleblowers from retaliation was kicked out of his office. But keep talking about those “proper channels” whistleblowers are supposed to use.
  (via @Snowden)

• The Trump admin. bans the CDC from using terms like “fetus”, “transgender” and “diversity” – as well as “evidence-based” and “science-based” – in their official budget documents. The censorious pettiness and sheer stupidity of this is hard to put into words.
  (via @sarahjeong; RT: @Popehat)

• Kudos to the RCMP (the Canadian equivalent of the FBI) for deciding to review 25,000 closed sexual assault cases from 2016 after identifying problems with previous investigations.

• Finally, fresh off smashing their own expensive coffee machines, Trumpinos are now triggering the libs by giving Starbucks their money to make baristas call out “TRUMP MAGA DECAFF CAPP”. I swear, if these people didn’t exist I’d have to invent them.
  (via @fark)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Links: 12/07/17 – Australian Catholic Church embroiled in child abuse scandal

• It’s another Catholic Church child sex abuse scandal in … *slot machine sound* … Australia.

• Last Week Tonight host John Oliver goes off-script at a movie screening to grill Dustin Hoffman about the sexual harassment accusations against him. As writer Kirsty Strickland notes: Given how uncomfortable Oliver was during this as a fellow powerful man, imagine how much harder it is for women.
  (via @donttrythis)

• MSNBC reverses their decision to fire contributor Sam Seder after originally falling for manufactured outrage led by fringe-Right rape apologist and conspiracy theorist Mike Cernovich.

• Former cop Michael Slager, who murdered unarmed Black man Walter Scott as he was running away, gets sentenced to 20 years in prison.

• The NRA and Roy Moore are in bed together. Don’t worry; they insist it’s no homo.

• Finally, you know how Trump has a huge chip on his shoulder about Obama? And how everyone considers Trump the King of Twitter? Well, get ready for the raging tweets once he hears about this.
  (via Joe.My.God.)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Links: 11/15/17 – New Brunswick buried under clerical child sex abuse lawsuits

• New Brunswick, Canada courts currently hold 56 lawsuits alleging clerical child sex abuse, including 32 against the same priest.

• Louisiana man exonerated and freed after spending 45 years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit. His conviction hinged on a single eyewitness who wasn’t certain it was him. The prosecutor was known for withholding exculpatory evidence.
  (via @davidminpdx; RT: @radleybalko)

• Meanwhile, a New Orleans, LA man walks free after sitting in jail for nearly 8 years waiting for his trial, which never came.
  (via @ethanbrown72; RT: @radleybalko)

• The Worth County, Georgia sheriff’s office that conducted a borderline-rapey body search of 900 schoolchildren (and found no drugs) gets slapped with a $3 million settlement.
  (via @CBHessick; RT: @Popehat)

• The monkey selfie saga: the never-ending court case where both sides are idiots who don’t understand the law.

• Finally, Brazil is today’s proof that the best (and only workable) way to combat piracy is to provide good and affordable legal options.

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Links: Today’s clerical child sex abuse case

Pastor Garry Evans

Spent all day having a buggy DVR replaced, so have a quick links dump.

• Indiana pastor ^[pictured] charged with luring little girls with candy and molesting them. News at 11.
  (via Joe.My.God.)

• Not a joke: ICE attacks California sheriff’s office for debunking ICE’s lies about how the wildfires were caused by an undocumented immigrant.
  (via @fark)

• Another crime lab scandal: Staff withheld exculpatory evidence in thousands of drunk-driving cases.

• After protests, New Mexico reverses decision to remove basic education from its schools.

• Finally, Dana Loesch and the NRA are too deranged to even pass for satire anymore:
  (via Right Wing Watch)

“We are witnesses to the most ruthless attack on a president & the people who voted for him...in American history." -@DLoesch #NRA pic.twitter.com/rcPAKMVJI0

— NRATV (@NRATV) October 20, 2017

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Links: Study blames clerical child abuse on mandatory celibacy and homophobia

• Major new study concludes the Catholic Church’s mandatory celibacy requirement and deeply homophobic culture are prime contributors to its perennial child sex abuse problem.

• Speaking of which, another “high-ranking priest” is charged with child porn possession. So of course the Vatican turned him in recalled him to safety in the Vatican.
  (via Joe.My.God.)

• Ex-Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s lawyer threatens to sue a Harvard Law professor over his criticism published in The Boston Globe. The professor schools him hard.
  (via @adamsteinbaugh; RT: @Popehat)

• “This is why we have racism”: Christians react to a Virginia school superintendent’s decision to take down a prayer plaque to avoid a lawsuit.

• Finally, London’s Science Museum and Natural History Museum are duking it out on Twitter and it’s a wonderful time to be alive.

If you have any story suggestions, you can leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Links: 08/04/17 – Enter the Mueller grand jury

Robert Mueller

• Special Counsel Robert Mueller ^[pictured] officially launches a grand jury, giving him new powers to investigate Trump & co.’s ties to Russia. Attorney Ken “Popehat” White breaks down what this means. Basically: Things are about to get interesting.
  (via @ggreenwald)

• This man proves you don’t have to be a real priest to get arrested for acting like one.

• These transcripts of Trump’s calls with the leaders of Mexico and Australia should be required reading for anyone who still buys the Donald’s tough-guy act. What a singularly feckless leader.
  (via @fark)

• Speaking of which, his call with Australian Prime Minister Turnbull is particularly enlightening – especially to Turnbull, who tangibly realizes he’s speaking to a complete imbecile.
  (via @radleybalko)

• Until July 31, Louisiana had a law that allowed police to charge people who threaten to report them for misconduct.
  (via The Watch)

• House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) loves NSA surveillance … except when it spies on his own team.

• Has your password been pwned? This handy tool checks a database of over 300 million stolen passwords to see if yours is included. (I can confirm that it works.)
  (via @SpiderOak)

• Kim Davis’s terrible lawyer (in every sense) wants you to know it’s not her fault that Kentucky taxpayers owe more than $220,000 in legal fees because she refused to do her job and got fired and then sued and inevitably lost in court.

• And finally, to be fair, I think this guy was just trying to get his ticket’s worth.
  (via Lan)

If you have any story suggestions, you can leave them in the comments or send them in.