Day: 05/06/2015

Frequent Aspirin Use Tied to Lower Cervical Ca Risk

http://www.medpagetoday.com/

A comparison of established risk factors for cervical cancer showed that women who developed cervical cancer were more likely to be current smokers, smoke more cigarettes per day, and smoke for more years than women who did not develop cervical cancer. They were also more likely to become pregnant before the age of 21, have more than five children, and report long-term use of oral contraceptives than women who did not develop cervical cancer.

Cases were also more likely than controls to be white, obese, and lack a high school diploma.
The study had some limitations, most notably that patients were enrolled from 1982-1998 and use of aspirin and NSAIDs has increased significantly since then so the results may not apply to current patient populations…

“Moreover, our findings are similar to those of randomized trials,” the authors added. “Based on our findings related to aspirin, coupled with its low cost and wide availability globally, we encourage future research on the role of daily, long-term use of aspirin and acetaminophen as cervical cancer chemopreventive agents and enhancement to standard treatment strategies post-diagnosis.”

Warrants not required for police to get your cell phone cell-site records

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/05/warrants-not-required-for-police-to-get-your-cell-phone-cell-site-records/

The majority ruling by Judge Frank Hull is a big boost to the government. Warrantless cell-site tracking has become among the government’s preferred methods of electronically tracking suspects in the wake of a 2012 Supreme Court ruling that the authorities generally needed a warrant to attach GPS devices onto vehicles and track their every move…

But what a different a larger panel of judges makes when it comes to deciding the constitutionality of so-called § 2703(d) orders:

The stored telephone records produced in this case, and in many other criminal cases, serve compelling governmental interests. Historical cell tower location records are routinely used to investigate the full gamut of state and federal crimes…

Such evidence is particularly valuable during the early stages of an investigation, when the police lack probable cause…

DEA to traveler: Thanks, I’ll take that cash

http://www.pharmaciststeve.com/?p=10289

All the money – $16,000 in cash – that Joseph Rivers said he had saved and relatives had given him to launch his dream in Hollywood is gone, seized during his trip out West not by thieves but by Drug Enforcement Administration agents during a stop at the Amtrak train station in Albuquerque… Rivers, 22, wasn’t detained and has not been charged with any crime since his money was taken last month.

That doesn’t matter. Under a federal law enforcement tool called civil asset forfeiture, he need never be arrested or convicted of a crime for the government to take away his cash, cars or property – and keep it. Agencies like the DEA can confiscate money or property if they have a hunch, a suspicion, a notion that maybe, possibly, perhaps the items are connected with narcotics. Or something else illegal. Or maybe the fact that the person holding a bunch of cash is a young black man is good enough…

A DEA agent boarded the train at the Albuquerque Amtrak station and began asking various passengers, including Rivers, where they were going and why. When Rivers replied that he was headed to LA to make a music video, the agent asked to search his bags. Rivers complied. Rivers was the only passenger singled out for a search by DEA agents – and the only black person on his portion of the train, Pancer said…

“I even allowed him to call my mother, a military veteran and (hospital) coordinator, to corroborate my story,” Rivers said. “Even with all of this, the officers decided to take my money because he stated that he believed that the money was involved in some type of narcotic activity.” 

Rivers was left penniless, his dream deferred. “These officers took everything that I had worked so hard to save and even money that was given to me by family that believed in me,” Rivers said in his email. “I told (the DEA agents) I had no money and no means to survive in Los Angeles if they took my money. They informed me that it was my responsibility to figure out how I was going to do that.” …

DEA agents may choose to ask the person whether his or her possessions can be searched in what is called a “consensual encounter.” If the subject refuses, the bags – but not the person – can be held until a search warrant is obtained, he said. Waite said that he could not provide exact figures on how often seizures occur in Albuquerque but that last week the DEA had five “consensual encounters” that resulted in seizures…

Whatever is seized is held during an internal administrative process (read: not public) while a case is made to connect the property to narcotics. Subjects can file a claim to have the items returned – and then they wait, sometimes forever.

While travelers like Rivers still have to worry about DEA agents, state and local law enforcement in New Mexico no longer has these virtually unlimited seizure powers. Five days before Rivers’ encounter in Albuquerque, Gov. Susana Martinez signed into law a bill that bars state and local law enforcement from seizing money or property under civil asset forfeiture. The law takes effect in July.

But the new state law won’t supersede the federal law, meaning federal agencies such as the DEA are still free to take your cash on arguably the flimsiest of legal grounds…

Prince To Perform In Baltimore In Wake Of Freddie Gray’s Death

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/06/prince-to-perform-in-balt_n_7219114.html

The Grammy award-winning musician will hold his “Rally 4 Peace” show on Mother’s Day along with his backing band 3RDEYEGIRL, Royal Farms Arena said in a statement on Tuesday night. The statement added that “superstar guests” were also expected to attend.

“Wear something gray,” reads a promotional image for the concert, seemingly to reference Freddie Gray, who died last month after a week in the hospital following his April 12 arrest…

Escaping from the Dark

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/matthew-cooke/escaping-from-the-dark_b_7174720.html

By:  Matthew Cooke and Adrian Grenier
How To Make Money Selling Drugs

As many already know, we are in the final months of a new documentary feature film called The Survivors Guide to Prison– an investigative report on the world’s largest “corrections” system…

On Saturday April 18th we joined forces with our partner Bryn Mooser of RYOT.org and unveiled a Virtual Reality experience of what it’s like to be in solitary confinement aka “the hole” at Tribeca Interactive in NYC.

People who paid to see the latest in entertainment media got to do something I never thought I’d see in my lifetime. We put on a pair of VR goggles on people’s heads and transported them into a scary-as-hell 7 x 9 foot cell with no windows, a concrete slab for a bed and no way out for 23 hours a day.

There in that virtual reality people found out that over 80,000 Americans — some as young as 13 years old are also here in “the hole.” There are no rules for this. You could just piss off a guard, fail a drug test or be in danger of getting beaten up — you could do literally anything or nothing and find yourself in the hole…

Having experienced this little taste, nobody was surprised that spending time in the hole leads to massive mental health issues, increases the likelihood you will commit suicide by 500 percent and most useless of all — that you’re actually more likely to commit a crime (whether or not you ever committed one in the first place) after you’ve been thrown in solitary…

Racial Profiling in Colorado

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/06/aclu-racial-profiling-bla_n_7224530.html

The video recorded by passenger Ryan Brown begins by showing footage of the driver of the car, his brother Benjamin Brown, being placed in handcuffs after a March 25 traffic stop in Colorado Springs. The ACLU said the incident took place within a block of the brothers’ home and began over an apparent cracked windshield…

Benjamin Brown was ordered by police to exit the vehicle at Taser-point, immediately handcuffed, searched, held in the back of a police car, and finally issued a citation for an obstructed view, the ACLU’s Colorado chapter said.

Ryan Brown, the passenger, was dragged from the car, held at gunpoint, and now faces a criminal charge for “interfering with official police duties,” the group said…

Spaceport America spending skyrockets, complex mostly vacant

http://krqe.com/2015/05/05/spaceport-america-spending-out-of-this-world/

Spaceport officials constructed a runway, launch pads, a terminal building and mission control. They promised to send astronauts into sub-orbit, create jobs, boost tourism, lift the economy and earn a ton of money. The grand opening was celebrated in 2011. However, the promises made years ago turned out to be sky high. Today, other than a few dozen vertical rocket launches the spaceport sits mostly vacant.

The Spaceport cost $219,000,000 to build. It now loses about $500,000 each year. Due to a slew of delays and technical setbacks, Spaceport America depends on taxpayers to keep its operation afloat…

Framed

“Life is a canvas of many strokes where shades from different palettes meet into a picture so concrete that some forget it is their own, so become framed themselves.”  Vanna Bonta

“We can have a World War, I see absolutely no reason why we shouldn’t have a World Party.” Vanna Bonta

Roadside Assistance

I’ve told myself on more than one occasion that I should learn more about cars.  You know, how they work, why they don’t.  And yet, I never have.  It’s hard to learn about a subject you have no interest in.

Car owners like me pay extra for roadside assistance, which I’ve never used… until I moved to New Mexico. Three times in two years isn’t that bad, is it?  It’s not like I’m using my car insurance for anything else.

I spent a lot of money on my poor old Toyota before I drove from Texas to New Mexico — had it checked out, worked on… again, much money was spent.  But my car only has 30,000 miles on it, even though it’s 11 years old, and I didn’t think I would have to spend more money on it this soon.  I mean, it’s a Toyota, not a Ford.

My first use of roadside assistance didn’t work out very well:

http://forum.nmcannabisreview.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=176

The second time was for a jump, and that guy used a metal file to clean the top of the battery connections.  But the charge held fine (for the next month). This guy from roadside assistance ran late, but nice guy, worked out fine.

Then I made the wrong decision of having the battery cables cleaned, an extra $30 at Jiffy Lube I really didn’t need to spend.  The guy at Jiffy Lube said the battery was charging fine, even though it was 6 years old.  I got that workhorse at Walmart, which is probably where I should have gotten this one, too.  A month after the battery was cleaned, it stalled again, so off I went, back to Jiffy Lube, to get a replacement.  (See above photo.)

When the mechanic took the tops of the battery cables off, a wire (or something) was so fragile it broke and had to be replaced.  Well, now I’m wondering if that was the problem, not the battery. Not that it matters, as I’ve obviously got to replace the battery.  Whatever.  But Jiffy Lube confused me on another issue about emissions testing, causing me to spend more money than I needed to, and I don’t know if they’re doing it on purpose or not.  It’s obvious that I know nothing about cars, have to believe whatever they tell me, and don’t know what they’re not telling me. (And by the way, you can only use one coupon at a time at Jiffy Lube.)

But I digress… 🙂

I was talking about roadside assistance, which for this latest cartastrophe was just like that saying, the third time’s a charm.  Nice guy, gave me a jump, no problem.

Since I don’t have a lot of money, I usually reward those who help me with some chocolate or a piece of the last dessert I made.  I had neither of these, so I offered this guy five bucks.  I said something like, I know they don’t pay you very much for this job, you’ve got this nice rig to take care of, so just take this, okay?

But he wouldn’t take it.  He smiled and said, “No, they don’t pay me very much, but don’t worry about it, I was just around the corner, anyway.”

At that moment, I looked down and saw that one of his work boots was coming apart on the top. So I said, yeah, but you need some new boots.  And he said, yeah, but I’m getting new boots tomorrow when I get paid, and you need a new battery.

And that’s how you win an argument with me. 🙂

What a nice guy, right?

Los Angeles sues Wells Fargo

https://www.consumeraffairs.com/news/los-angeles-sues-wells-fargo-for-unfair-unlawful-and-fraudulent-conduct-050515.html

L.A. Prosecutor Mike Feuer filed the suit in state court on Monday, alleging that, among other things, employees would misuse customers’ confidential information, open accounts in customers’ names without authorization, often failed to close those accounts when the customers demanded it, and sometimes even took money out of authorized client accounts to pay for those unauthorized fees…

The lawsuit also claims that Wells Fargo bankers engaged in a practice known as “gaming” — opening unauthorized accounts in customers’ names, making unauthorized withdrawals from customers’ authorized accounts to pay the fees on the unauthorized ones, and reporting customers to collections and/or posting “derogatory information” in the customers’ credit reports…

Yet many consumers — from all over the country, not just California — have written reviews that sound remarkably similar to some of the allegations mentioned in Feuer’s lawsuit…

Under comments:

Frank Cole said:  The banks may not like to admit it, but these kind of sales goals are a part of the daily lives of their employees. That’s why some employees took action, through petitions, during April in Minneapolis to let Wells Fargo know it’s time to change.

Today’s front-line bank workers—tellers, loan interviewers, and customer-service reps—earn far too little money to be considered “bankers” in the traditional sense of the word. And though they still collect and dispense money, their main job involves hawking credit cards and loans you probably don’t need.

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/04/banks-forcing-low-wage-tellers-sell-financial-products

Based on union organizer interviews with hundreds of workers in the industry, Sen found that front-line bank workers often face quotas for hawking potentially exploitive financial products, often to low-income customers, even though the workers themselves barely qualify as middle class. “We can definitely see bank workers as part of the same continuum of issues facing all low-wage workers,” she says… 

One HSBC bank employee, according to the study, reported that workers who failed to meet their sales goals had the difference taken out of their paychecks… A recent University of California-Berkeley study found that 31 percent of bank tellers’ families rely on public assistance at an annual cost of $900 million to taxpayers…

Banks are just another Walmart, Target, Walgreens, CVS…

NYPD Officer Brian Moore dies of gunshot wound to the head

https://www.newsday.com/long-island/nassau/brian-moore-dead-nypd-says-officer-who-was-shot-in-the-head-was-from-massapequa-1.10379772

Monday night at a news conference at NYPD headquarters, Chief of Detectives Robert Boyce said investigators recovered a Taurus model 85 revolver in a backyard not far from where the shooting took place in Queens Village. The handgun was found underneath a box near a barbecue grill, Boyce said.

Investigators have traced the weapon to a Georgia bait and tackle shop, where it was among 23 firearms stolen on Oct. 3, 2011, Boyce said…

The officer was working plainclothes on an anti-crime initiative Saturday night at the time of the shooting, police said. He was driving an unmarked car with his partner, Erik Jansen, 30, when they encountered Blackwell at about 6:15 p.m. near the intersection of 212th Street and 104th Road in Queens Village, authorities said.

Moore and Jansen saw Blackwell tugging at his waist and sensing he had a gun, asked him: “What are you carrying?”

Blackwell, authorities said, immediately fired three shots. The recovered gun had three spent rounds and two live rounds in the chamber, Boyce said…