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Why the SEC Won’t Hunt Big Dogs

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - Oct. 26 (Opinion) - After years of lengthy investigations into collateralized debt obligations, the mortgage securities at the heart of the financial crisis, the S.E.C. has brought civil actions against only two small-time bankers.

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Pastors who illegally endorse from pulpit face few consequences

Sat, 08 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - Oct. 08 (News) -

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Justice Department Filing Casts Doubt on Guilt of Bruce Ivins, Accused in Anthrax Case

Tue, 19 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - By by Mike Wiser, PBS FRONTLINE, Greg Gordon, McClatchy Newspapers, Stephen Engelberg, ProPublica This story was co-published with PBS FRONTLINE, McClatchy. WA - Jul. 19 (News Report) - The Justice Department has called into question a key pillar of the FBI's case against Bruce Ivins, the Army scientist accused of mailing the anthrax-laced letters that killed five people and terrorized Congress a decade ago. Shortly after Ivins committed suicide in 2008, federal investigators announced that they had identified him as the mass murderer who sent the letters to members of Congress and the media. The case was circumstantial, with federal officials arguing that the scientist had the means, motive and opportunity to make the deadly powder at a U.S. Army research facility at Fort Detrick, in Frederick, Md. On July 15, however, Justice Department lawyers acknowledged in court papers that the sealed area in Ivins' lab -- the so-called hot suite -- did not contain the equipment needed to turn liquid anthrax into the refined powder that floated through congressional buildings and post offices in the fall of 2001. The government said it continues to believe that Ivins was “more likely than not” the killer. But the filing in a Florida court did not explain where or how Ivins could have made the powder, saying only that the lab “did not have the specialized equipment’’ in Ivins' secure lab “that would be required to prepare the dried spore preparations that were used in the letters.” The government’s statements deepen the questions about the case against Ivins, who killed himself before he was charged with a crime. Searches of his car and home in 2007 found no anthrax spores, and the FBI’s eight-year, $100 million investigation never proved he mailed the letters or identified another location where he might have secretly dried the anthrax into an easily inhaled powder. Earlier this year, a report by the National Academy of Science questioned the genetic analysis that had linked a flask of anthrax stored in Ivins’ office to the anthrax contained in the letters. The court papers were uncovered by a reporter for the PBS program FRONTLINE which is working on a forthcoming documentary on the case with McClatchy Newspapers and ProPublica, the investigative newsroom. They were filed by lawyers in the Justice Department’s Civil Division who are defending the government against a wrongful death suit brought by the family of Robert Stevens, a photo editor at the Sun. Stevens was the first to die from a tainted letter and his family has accused federal officials of lax procedures that allowed someone to make a germ weapon using anthrax from a government laboratory. In asserting that Ivins was culprit, criminal investigators pointed to his access to the specialized equipment at the laboratory. Officials drew up elaborate charts showing that Ivins’ time in the hot suites spiked in the weeks before the letters were mailed. But Ivins’ colleagues have said in depositions for the Stevens case that the powder could not have been made in the lab without sickening lab technicians and others who had not been vaccinated against anthrax. A Justice Department spokesman Monday shed little light on the seeming shift in positions, saying that investigators still believe Ivins produced the anthrax at Fort Detrick and are unaware of evidence that he did so elsewhere. The Justice Department filed the papers in federal court in West Palm Beach, Fla., last week. The lawyers were attempting to counter allegations by the Stevens family of negligence at Fort Detrick, including inadequate controls over anthrax controls, by arguing that the anthrax in the letters wasn't produced there. Dean Boyd, a Justice Department spokesman, said Monday that the court filing did not contradict the government’s conclusion that Ivins sent the letters. Rather, he said, the lawyers merely argued that “Ivins’ actions were not foreseeable to his supervisors’’ because he did not have equipment to dry the spores in his containment laboratory. Boyd said this meant the United States should not be held liable for his actions.” “To clarify, this statement was intended to relate to the specific containment laboratory” where Ivins kept a flask of liquid anthrax with genetic markers similar to those found in the letters, Boyd said. In excerpts from one of more than a dozen depositions made public in the case last week, the current chief of of the Bacteriology Division at the Army laboratory, Patricia Worsham, said it lacked the facilities in 2001 to make the kind of spores in the letters. Two of the five letters, those sent to Democratic U.S. Sens. Patrick Leahy of Vermont and Thomas Daschle of South Dakota, were especially deadly, because they were so buoyant as to float with the slightest wisp of air. Worsham said that the lab’s equipment for drying the spores, a machine the size of a refrigerator, was not in containment. “If someone had used that to dry down that preparation, I would have expected that area to be very, very contaminated, and we had non-immunized personnel in that area, and I would have expected some of them to become ill,” she said. In its statement of facts, the government lawyers also said that producing the volume of anthrax in the letters would have required 2.8 to 53 liters of the solution used to grow the spores or 463 to 1,250 Petri dishes. Colleagues of Ivins at the lab have asserted that he couldn’t have grown all that anthrax without their noticing it. The government’s own summary of the case against Ivins, released early last year when the Justice Department formally closed its investigation, noted that “drying anthrax is expressly forbidden by various treaties,” and “overt use of any of these methods, if noticed, would have raised considerable alarm and scrutiny.’’ Paul Kemp, Ivins’ lead defense attorney, said Monday that the department’s concession that the equipment wasn’t available “is at direct variance to the assertions of the government on July 29, 2008,” the day Ivins died, thus “invalidating one of the chief theories of their prosecution case.” Kemp said that government officials told him and a colleague, Tom DeGonia, that the FBI could “prove that Dr. Ivins manufactured the dried spores used in the anthrax attacks, and would prove this by the records of his presence in the hot suites in August and September. Anthrax is one of the deadliest biological weapons. Once inhaled, the tiny spores germinate inside the human body, producing rapidly multiplying, highly toxic bacteria that, if untreated, typically kill a person within days. The anthrax mailings came as a second shock to the nation just weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks. Beginning Sept. 18, 2001, the perpetrator sent at least five letters containing anthrax powder to three media outlets and to the offices of Sens. Leahy and Daschle. Two postal workers, a nurse and an elderly woman in Connecticut also died, some 32,000 congressional and postal employees took long-term antibiotic treatments and teams wearing moon suits spent months cleansing a Senate office building and large postal facility of the deadly spores.

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How Murdoch Reporters’ Bribes Violate U.S. Law

Wed, 13 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

AlterNet - Jul. 13 (News Analysis) - If you're entirely honest in the company's internal books and enter the payment as a "bribe," you've just created an irrefutable piece of evidence that can be used against you and your company in a prosecution by the Justice Department for violating U.S. statutes against overseas bribery. If, as is more likely, you file an expense account which refers to the cash payment as "taxis” or "office supplies," you stand a chance of being pursued by the Securities and Exchange Commission for keeping fake records.

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TSA Airport Scanners Wouldn’t Catch an Implant Bomber

Wed, 06 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - By Michael Grabell - Jul. 06 (Special Report) - A number of news outlets are reporting today on the bizarre-sounding story of terrorist groups considering how to implant explosive devices into humans to blow up a passenger jet. A U.S. security official confirmed the story for ProPublica, and the Transportation Security Administration released a statement that it had recently briefed domestic and foreign airlines. The agency said that passengers flying to the United States may notice additional security measures, such as more interaction from TSA officers, pat-downs and the use of “enhanced tools and technologies.”

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Some States Still Leave Low-Income Students Behind; Others Make Surprising Gains

Thu, 30 Jun 2011 08:36:28 -0700

ProPublica - Jun. 30 - by Sharona Coutts and Jennifer LaFleur Florida is a state of stark contrasts. Travel a few miles from the opulent mansions of Miami Beach and you reach desperately poor neighborhoods. There’s the grinding poverty of sugar cane country and the growing middle class of Jacksonville. All told, half the public-school students in Florida qualify for subsidized lunches. Many are the first in their families to speak English or contemplate attending college. In many states, those economic differences are reflected in the classroom, with students in wealthy schools taking many more advanced courses. p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 15.0px Arial} span.s1 {text-decoration: underline ; color: #0d2099} But not in Florida. A ProPublica analysis of previously unreleased federal data shows that Florida leads the nation in the percentage of high-school students enrolled in high-level classes—Advanced Placement and advanced math. That holds true across rich and poor districts. Studies repeatedly have shown that students who take advanced classes have greater chances of attending and succeeding in college. Our analysis identifies several states that, like Florida, have leveled the field and now offer rich and poor students roughly equal access to high-level courses. In Kansas, Maryland and Oklahoma, by contrast, such opportunities are far less available in districts with poorer families. That disparity is part of what experts call the “opportunity gap.” “The opportunity to learn—the necessary resources, the curriculum opportunities, the quality teachers—that affluent students have, is what determines what people can do in life,” said Linda Darling-Hammond, a professor of education at Stanford University. Our analysis offers the first nationwide picture of exactly which advanced courses are being taken at which schools and districts across the country. Previous studies and surveys have tracked some of these courses, but never with so many variables and covering so many schools. (More than three-quarters of all public-school children are represented in our analysis. Check out our methodology.) We have also created an interactive feature so you can search for your school and see how it compares, for example, with poorer and wealthier schools nearby. It also shows the percentage of inexperienced teachers in schools. Here’s Beverly Hills High compared to a much poorer school in Southern California. And here’s a stark example from New Jersey. The analysis was drawn from a nationwide survey by the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, which collected school-by-school reports on a range of offerings, including physics, chemistry and Advanced Placement courses in high schools. The department did the survey to assess whether states and other localities are discriminating by race, gender or disability. State and local education administrators, of course, are responsible for most funding and policy decisions. We compared the survey results to poverty levels. (We measured that by looking at the percentage of students who receive free- or reduced-price lunch—which the government offers to students from low-income families.) While our analysis found a link between race and lack of access, poverty was the predominant factor in determining the proportion of students in a school or district who were enrolled in higher-level instruction. The department plans to make public additional data in the coming months on graduation rates and test scores for these schools. When it does so, we will publish additional stories pinpointing the states in which equal access has achieved the desired results and where it has not. From the data released so far, Florida stands out. Its results follow a decade-long initiative to broaden educational opportunity launched by then-governor Jeb Bush and his Education Commissioner, and now fellow former governor, Charlie Crist. “The fact that some states have eliminated these disparities proves that if we make this a priority of policy it can be done,” said Pedro A. Noguera, an education professor at New York University. Other states show just how complex the problem is. While Maryland has been celebrated for the high percentage of students taking advanced classes, our analysis shows enrollment in such classes at high-poverty schools is much lower. Or take Mississippi: Richer and poorer schools there provide roughly equal access, but that masks the reality that very few students are enrolled in the classes overall. A Maryland official said enrollment of low-income students has been increasing recently, while a spokesman from Mississippi’s department of education was not immediately available for comment. While most experts agree about the value of giving students expanded opportunities, many caution that offering advanced classes is not a solution on its own to deeper-rooted gaps in preparation and achievement. They say students often need additional support. “We’re making AP a reform strategy in and of itself,” said Kristin Klopfenstein, director of the Education Innovation Institute at the University of Northern Colorado. “When it comes to a struggling turnaround school, why in the world would you think that somehow plunking down an AP program would improve that school?” But with the right support, even the most disadvantaged students can thrive, according to Jose Huerta, the principal at Garfield High School in East Los Angeles. The school was the basis for the 1980’s classic, Stand and Deliver, the story of a determined high-school math teacher, Jaime Escalante, whose single-minded conviction that kids from poor and minority backgrounds could succeed, led to many of his students passing the demanding Advanced Placement calculus exam. Garfield still provides many rigorous courses—with extra help for some students. And Huerta said that this year his students are heading to colleges such as Yale, Brown and Harvard. “This is an extremely poor area. These are kids whose parents can’t speak the language, and they’re going to the top college in the country,” said Huerta. “We raise the bar and our kids are going above it.” How Did Florida Do It? Florida’s schools once mirrored the inequalities seen in many other states. In 2003, the NAACP sued the state, arguing that it had an “unequal education system.” “A decade ago, few minority students were taking PSAT/PLAN tests of AP courses, and even fewer were going to college,” said former Gov. Jeb Bush, via email, referring to testing programs that have been used to predict which students will succeed in AP courses. “Florida schools and teachers were not incentivized to provide or teach AP courses—particularly in low-performing schools,” he said. Bush introduced a combination of measures to foster AP courses, including a partnership with the College Board, the national nonprofit group that manages AP courses and exams. The partnership kicked off in 2000 and was later written into state law. Its stated goal was to “prepare, inspire, and connect students to postsecondary success and opportunity, with a particular focus on minority students and students who are underrepresented in postsecondary education.” As part of the program, the College Board is now focusing on schools in rural districts, such as Okeechobee in central Florida, where students are often the first members of their families to seriously contemplate attending college, according to Toni Wiersma, principal of Okeechobee High School. “We fight against the old perception that some people are just not college material,” said Wiersma. “We want to make sure that every student is prepared to do what they want to do.” The question remains: Have these changes improved student performance? While measuring outcomes in education is notoriously difficult, data show that the numbers of high-school seniors from poor families who pass at least one AP exam have surged. In 2006, students from low-income families made up 10 percent of all seniors who passed an exam. By 2010, that percentage had doubled. Florida students still perform below the national average on standardized tests. Still, other government studies show that Florida has made greater strides in closing the achievement gap between white and minority students than many other states. Florida, Bush said, is setting an example for other states. “If Florida ... can do it, every state can.” Kansas’ Long History of Unequal Access to Education Continues Kansas has also tried to improve, but it still has some of the largest opportunity gaps in the nation. Few states have as deep a history with educational inequality as Kansas. The state was the birthplace of the landmark civil rights decision Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that segregated schools were inherently discriminatory and that states must make education “available to all on equal terms.” Nearly 60 years later, Kansas still has a deeply unequal educational system, according to the data. High-poverty schools still tend to have fewer students enrolled in AP courses, advanced math, chemistry and physics. Like AP, these courses have been linked to later academic success. “When people in middle America look at this input data and realize that we’re never giving kids a shot in the first place, that American value of fundamental fairness starts kicking in,” said Russlynn Ali, head of the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights, which conducted the survey. Officials from the Kansas Department of Education disputed the finding that the state is giving unequal treatment to poorer children. They pointed out that the state has set aside extra funds for schools with high numbers of students from low-income households. “The funding gives additional weighting to every child that qualifies for free lunches,” said Brad Neuenswander, deputy commissioner at the Kansas State Department of Education. “The poorer your district, the more financial resources you receive.” College Board data show that these efforts may have had some effect. The percentage of AP test-takers who are from poor families has doubled over the past four years. However, the numbers are still low. Neuenswander said many districts choose to send students into community colleges, rather than enrolling them in advanced placement courses, particularly those students who were more interested in pursuing a trade. “We’re a rural state, but more than that, we are heavy agriculture as well as air manufacturing and technology,” he said. Several major companies, such as Boeing and Sprint, have locations in Kansas, which offer employment opportunities to local students, Neuenswander said. “A lot of our students don’t go on to a regent university. They go on to vocational and technical colleges, because of the good jobs here that require skills and trades.” But nearly 60 years after Brown v. Board of Education, another lawsuit is winding its way through the Kansas court system, claiming that inadequate funding is having a disproportionate effect on the state’s neediest students. It follows at least six previous cases in the state that have made similar claims. The plaintiffs in the new case include children across the state who need extra support, said Alan L. Rupe, the lead attorney in the class action suit and an expert in education funding litigation. “Kids with special needs—whether they’re English-second-language, disabled kids, immigrants or minorities—those kids cost more to educate,” Rupe said. “When funding is reduced, those kids are hurt the most.” Rupe said one of the most glaring inequalities between rich and poor districts was the ability to attract and retain talented and experienced teachers. “If you’re a teacher making $35,000 in Kansas City, in a classroom that’s got 90 percent free and reduced-price lunch, and you have the opportunity to drive 10 miles to teach at a brand new school in a neighboring county, to teach in a smaller class, to earn more money, you’re going to do it every time,” said Rupe. “And they do it every time.” ProPublica intern Sergio Hernandez contributed reporting to this story.

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The Hardest Cases: When Children Die, Justice Can Be Elusive

Tue, 28 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - By A.C. Thompson, Chisun Lee, Joe Shapiro, Sandra Bartlet - Jun. 28 (Investigative Report) - If Lopez is ultimately exonerated, his case will not be unique. An investigation by ProPublica, PBS "Frontline" and NPR has found that medical examiners and coroners have repeatedly mishandled cases of infant and child deaths, helping to put innocent people behind bars.

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Bank Errors Continue to Cause Wrongful Foreclosures - ProPublica

Fri, 24 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - By by Paul Kiel - Jun. 24 (Special Report) - by Paul Kiel Four years into the foreclosure crisis, banks say they've made major improvements in how they handle struggling homeowners. They've promised, for example, not to foreclose on homeowners who are being considered for mortgage modifications. But that's still happening. Consider the cases of Laurie Pinkerton and Lisa Peterson. The two women, both Californians and Bank of America customers, had been assured by the bank that they wouldn't lose their homes before they'd been evaluated for a possible modification. Both had their homes sold last month. Such cases are particularly senseless, because simply modifying the mortgage by reducing the monthly payment might be in the interest not only of the homeowner, but also of the investor who owns the mortgage. Both Pinkerton and Peterson said their homes were sold after foreclosure for far less than they're worth. Regulators have done little to stop the practice, and the "problem appears to be getting worse," said Kevin Stein, associate director of the nonprofit California Reinvestment Coalition. Last month, the coalition surveyed 55 foreclosure-avoidance counselors throughout the state. Collectively they serve thousands of borrowers every month. Almost all of the counselors, 94 percent, reported having worked with clients who'd lost their homes while under review for a modification. About half of the counselors reported this happened "often." This year's totals, which are due to be publicly released next week, are higher than those in the group's survey last year. Regulators have acknowledged the problem but have so far stopped short of solving it, say borrower advocates. More than a year ago, ProPublica reported extensively on how the banks' inadequate systems were causing wrongful foreclosures. This past April, the federal banking regulators released "consent orders" with 14 of the largest banks requiring various improvements in their handling of mortgages and foreclosures. Prior to the orders, the regulators had not had clear rules on how the banks should handle modification applications. Among the new requirements, banks will now be forbidden from actually selling a home before a final decision is made on a modification. Also, if a homeowner is approved for a modification, the foreclosure process is supposed to stop. The new requirements will go into effect later this summer. While those are necessary requirements, regulators took a "huge step backward" by not explicitly forbidding banks from pursuing foreclosure at all until a final decision has been made on a mortgage modification application, said Alys Cohen of the National Consumer Law Center. The administration's mortgage modification program, which offers incentives to encourage modifications, has that requirement. But that program is voluntary for the banks and has been hobbled by lax oversight. What's more, over two-thirds of modifications occur outside of the program. Federal regulators have the power to require all banks to make a decision on a modification application before moving to foreclose, but they've simply chosen not to. Allowing the banks to pursue foreclosure while the modification process plays out hurts homeowners in multiple ways. First and foremost, there's the hazard of actually losing the home to foreclosure because of bank error. The two homeowners featured in this story show that this continues to be a real danger, especially in states like California where the bank doesn't need to go to court to foreclose. It's also just confusing and unnecessarily stressful for homeowners. Finally, in a foreclosure homeowners actually get billed for bank costs, such as paying for a bank's lawyers. Instead of outright forbidding banks from pursuing foreclosure while they're considering homeowners for a modification, regulators have asked the banks to explore whether it's a problem. The orders ask the banks to "conduct a review to determine whether processes involving past due mortgage loans or foreclosures overlap in such a way that they may impair or impede a borrower's efforts to effectively pursue a loan modification." The primary regulator for the biggest banks is the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, which has been much criticized for failing to crack down on banks' foreclosure failures. Bryan Hubbard, a spokesman for the OCC, said that the orders addressed the "situations that were most confusing to the borrower" and that the issue would be revisited at a later time when regulators draft new, comprehensive standards for the industry. When asked whether regulators were deferring to the banks on the issue, he said they were not deferring, because regulators would have to approve whatever conclusion the banks came to. Two homeowners' tales Although Pinkerton and Peterson live about 450 miles apart, they've had strikingly similar experiences with Bank of America. Both contacted the bank before even missing a payment to see what steps to take, because they'd taken a hit to their income. Both say Bank of America employees told them they'd have to fall at least three months behind to be considered for a modification (advice that is both inaccurate and frequently given). Reluctantly, both did so. As a result of missing payments, both soon found themselves facing foreclosure. But at least the modification process had begun, too. Of course, it went slowly. Like millions of other homeowners, they waited months and months for an answer on their modification applications and sent in the same documents over and over again. Despite sending in those documents, both were told at one point that they'd been denied because they hadn't sent in the required documents (another extremely common problem). Finally, last month, both had their homes sold at a foreclosure auction, despite the assurances of Bank of America employees that that wouldn't happen until they'd received a final answer on their application for a modification. "The next thing I know, a guy is knocking on my door saying his boss is at the courthouse buying our house," said Peterson. What makes foreclosure particularly unnecessary in both cases is that Pinkerton and Peterson had made a point of telling the bank they had the means to bring the loan current even if they didn't get a modification. And unlike many Californians, both had the option of selling the home to pay off the mortgage because their homes are worth more than they owe on their mortgage. "I never received any letter saying you're denied," said Pinkerton. "If that would have been the case, I would have borrowed the money and went and paid it current." Her family had offered to help, she said. Both errors are particularly hard to undo because Bank of America can't simply give the houses back: The bank sold both homes to others. In order to get the homes back, the bank would have to essentially convince the new owner to sell the home back. In a case we reported on last year, JPMorgan Chase paid about $20,000 above the purchase price to the buyer of a property the bank had mistakenly sold. At this point in the two stories, the homeowners' paths diverge. After complaining to everyone she could think of, Pinkerton was contacted by a Bank of America employee who said he worked in the bank's office of the president. He told her he'd work to get the sale reversed. Regardless, Pinkerton was evicted from her home last week. "I've spent thousands of dollars moving that I didn't have," she said. As recently as Wednesday, the Bank of America employee told her he's still working on her case. Bank of America spokesman Rick Simon said the bank was researching whether a mistake had been made. "To the extent it is determined that mistakes in the process contributed to the mortgage reaching foreclosure, the bank will work with Ms. Pinkerton to explore viable and appropriate considerations, which may include rescission." Simon also noted that Pinkerton had been sent letters in March and April saying that she'd canceled her application for a modification. Pinkerton said she'd never asked to cancel her application, and when she called Bank of America to ask about the letters, she was told to disregard them. She did once reject a modification offer, but that was because it would have significantly raised her monthly payments. She says a Bank of America employee told her to appeal the offer because it had erroneously calculated her income at twice its actual level. Peterson has been more successful. After the foreclosure sale, she made a number of frantic calls and finally got a bank employee to admit there'd been a mistake, she says. But nothing could be done about it, she was told. After being contacted by various employees who said they'd been assigned to help resolve the matter, but who then couldn't be reached, she eventually hired an attorney. Earlier this month, Bank of America rescinded the sale and returned the title to Peterson. It's unclear whether the bank paid a premium to the buyer of Peterson's property in order to get it back. Bank of America's Simon said, "We continue to work on resolution of remaining third-party issues." In general, Simon said such mistaken foreclosures "have been relatively rare, compared to the volume of defaults and foreclosure activity in today's economy." Across the country, about 4 million mortgages are currently more than three months delinquent. "Any problem in this regard is of tremendous concern, and we have put additional checks and practices in place to further limit the possibilities," he added. To Peterson, the lesson from her experience is clear. "This system is broken," she said. "You can't trust what the bank tells you."

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What Exactly is the War Powers Act and is Obama Really Violating it? - ProPublica

Fri, 17 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - By by Marian Wang - Jun. 17 (News Report) - by Marian Wang President Obama is facing a swell of bipartisan criticism for continuing military engagement in Libya without Congressional approval. Even supporters of the Libya intervention have complained that the administration is flouting the law. So, is it? Well, the president is certainly sidestepping the controversial law known as the War Powers Act, but in doing so he’s following a well-worn path. The Vietnam-era law requires the president to seek approval from Congress after 60 days of military engagement. The law was passed in 1973 after presidents fought the Korean and Vietnam war without actually declaring war. But it’s always been controversial. (President Nixon actually vetoed the law, but Congress overrode him.) According to a 2004 Congressional Research Service report, “every President since the enactment of the War Powers Resolution has taken the position that it is an unconstitutional infringement on the President’s authority as Commander-in-Chief.” President Obama, in defending the legitimacy of the Libyan operation, hasn’t actually made that argument. On Wednesday, he submitted a report to Congress arguing that his administration isn’t in violation of the act at all, despite the fact that the 60-day deadline for congressional approval of Libya operations came and went in May. White House spokesman Jay Carney has argued that the United States’ “constrained and limited operations” in Libya “do not amount to hostilities” because the U.S. doesn’t have or intend to place soldiers on the ground and has not sustained the casualties typical of such hostilities. The U.S. in April pulled its cruise missiles and attack planes out of combat in the NATO-led Libyan mission, though it still has them on standby. It’s currently providing support such as aerial refueling, surveillance, and reconnaissance, according to the AP. Speaker of the House John Boehner has said the White House’s stance “doesn’t pass the straight-face test.” President Obama is far from alone in finding creative ways around the War Powers Act. As the New York Times has noted, the Clinton administration continued the bombing campaign in Kosovo past the 60-day deadline, arguing that Congress had implicitly approved the mission when it approved funding for it. (The Act specifically says that funding doesn’t constitute authorization, the Times notes. And Obama wouldn’t be able to use that reasoning anyway—the administration is using existing funds for the Libya mission.) Clinton’s successor, President George W. Bush, did request—and receive—a resolution of support from Congress for the Iraq war, but Bush also made clear that his compliance with the War Powers Act didn’t mean he agreed with the act’s constitutionality. Here’s what he said [PDF], as quoted in a Congressional Research Service report: As I made clear to congressional leaders at the outset, my request for congressional support did not, and my signing this resolution does not, constitute any change in the long-standing positions of the executive branch on either the President’s constitutional authority to use the Armed Forces to defend vital U.S. interests or the constitutionality of the War Powers Resolution. While presidents have long inveighed against the Act, lawmakers have just as frequently invoked it, often as a political weapon. This week, a bipartisan group of 10 House members—a combination of Republicans and anti-war Democrats—sued the Obama administration this week over the War Powers Act. But the move may be little more than symbolic. As NPR notes, lawmakers have never successfully used the War Powers Act to end any military mission, and in 2000, the Supreme Court refused to touch the issue when lawmakers complained about Kosovo. It’s also worth keeping in mind that many of Obama’s critics seem a bit conflicted about the legitimacy of the Act. As Politico has reported, Boehner—who sent a confrontational letter to the president this week—actually voted to repeal the law in 1995. In 1999, he called it “constitutionally suspect.” Boehner’s spokesman said the speaker has an obligation to honor existing law “regardless of his personal views.” But Boehner’s also been unclear about whether Obama is even violating the act. Two weeks ago, Boehner said that “technically,” he wasn’t: “Legally, they’ve met their requirements [under] the War Powers Act,” he said of the administration. (On Libya, Boehner has said that the U.S. “has a moral obligation to stand with those who seek freedom from oppression and self-government for their people” and called Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi’s actions “unacceptable and outrageous.”) As the House ups the ante on the War Powers Act, Sens. John Kerry and John McCain are advancing a bipartisan resolution to support the U.S. role in the Libya. (McCain, a Republican, has criticized Obama administration’s reasoning as “a confusing breach of common sense.”) As we’ve noted, the Obama administration has sought to downplay its role in the Libya conflict since it began in March—though there’s been some mission creep: The Obama administration originally said that the goal of the intervention was not regime change in Libya, but has since suggested that its measure for success will be Qaddafi’s departure.

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Stricter Regulation of Formaldehyde Remains Uncertain Despite Carcinogen Ruling

Tue, 14 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - By by Joaquin Sapien - Jun. 14 (Investigative Report) - by Joaquin Sapien Late last week, the Department of Health and Human Services classified formaldehyde as "a known carcinogen," adding its verdict to two similar reports released by key agencies since 2009. But despite the growing scientific consensus about how formaldehyde can affect human health, it remains to be seen if the studies will lead to tighter U.S. formaldehyde regulations. As we've previously reported, the Environmental Protection Agency has been trying to update its chemical risk assessment for formaldehyde since 1998, but has been stalled repeatedly by the chemical manufacturing industry. EPA assessments are the country's gold standard for how dangerous a chemical is. The formaldehyde assessment would undoubtedly influence the stringency of a rule the EPA is developing on how much of the chemical can safely be released from construction materials that contain it In 2009, Sen. David Vitter, R-La., maneuvered successfully to delay the assessment by putting a hold on the nomination of a key EPA appointee and forcing the agency to send its draft to the National Academy of Sciences for review. Vitter has received substantial campaign contributions from the nation's largest formaldehyde manufacturers and users. After the EPA agreed to send its assessment to the NAS, a top industry lobbyist, Charles Grizzle, threw Vitter a fundraising party, requesting donations of $1,000 a plate. The NAS finished reviewing the EPA assessment in April, sending back a long list of questions and advising the EPA not to finalize the document until it could show exactly how formaldehyde causes cancer, a biological mechanism known as the "mode of action." Dr. Peter Infante, a former director of the Office of Carcinogen Identification and Classification at the Occupational Trailers supplied by FEMA to Katrina survivors were found to have harmful levels of formaldehyde in them. Last week, the Department of Health and Human Services classified the chemical as 'a known carcinogen

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Use Our Coverage to Understand Pakistan’s Terror Connections and the 2008 Mumbai Attacks - ProPublica

Tue, 07 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - Jun. 07 (Investigative Report) - CBC.caUse Our Coverage to Understand Pakistan's Terror Connections and the 2008 ...ProPublica(Uriel Sinai/Getty Images) ProPublica's Sebastian Rotella has spent more than a year investigating suspected links between Pakistan's intelligence service and terrorist groups as well as the failure of the US government to detect the growing threat ...Headley asked ISI to help Rana get back to Pak: FBIEconomic TimesMumbai terror trial defense done after 2 witnessesDanbury News Timesin depthCanadian's terror trial reveals Pakistan military linksCBC.caMangalorean.com -Chicago Tribuneall 248 news articles »

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Foreclosure Contractors Face New Scrutiny From States - ProPublica

Thu, 26 May 2011 12:26:53 -0700

www.propublica.org - May. 26 (Special Report) - by Marian Wang While federal and state officials investigating flawed foreclosures have largely focused on holding the banks accountable and bringing relief to wronged homeowners, officials in a few states have begun targeting the more obscure middlemen of the foreclosure scandal. Prosecutors in California and Illinois have sent subpoenas to Lender Processing Services, one of the largest firms that processed mortgage documents for the banks. (Read more about LPS in our guide to who’s who of the foreclosure scandal.) As we’ve noted, the firm—which helps handle more than half of all U.S. mortgages—has been accused of using the same “robo-signing” practices as the major banks, such as signing and notarizing documents that appeared inaccurate or invalid. Bank employees have testified under oath that they relied on LPS to vet the information in foreclosure documents. LPS has had its share of legal troubles over its mortgage processing. Michigan's attorney general announced an investigation last month into potentially fraudulent mortgage documents processed by an LPS subsidiary. (LPS has said that it discontinued the practices used by the subsidiary.) Along with the big banks, the firm recently received an order from federal regulators to correct problems with its processing of mortgage documents. (Read that consent order.) Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan also sent a subpoena to Nationwide Title Clearing, another firm contracted to provide mortgage services to banks. As we’ve noted, Nationwide Title Clearing employees have testified to robo-signing thousands of mortgage documents—known as assignments—that establish the ownership of a mortgage loan and are key to establishing who has the right to foreclose on a homeowner. Nationwide Title Clearing said in a statement that its procedures have been “thoroughly audited and examined for accuracy” and that it would cooperate with any investigation. LPS declined to comment. The latest actions on foreclosure problems as an attempted comprehensive settlement by all 50 state attorneys general has hit a few roadblocks. As we noted in our cheat sheet on bank investigations, the negotiations have been hampered by disagreement with the banks over the size of penalties as well as some disagreement among the attorneys general—at least eight of whom have opposed any settlement that would require banks to cut borrowers’ mortgage debt. Bloomberg reports today that Bank of America has also received independent scrutiny from the attorneys general of Utah and Connecticut accusing the firm of invalid foreclosures and insufficient loan modifications. Utah warned that it would sue.

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Scientists Cast Doubt on TSA Tests of Full-Body Scanners

Mon, 16 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - By by Michael Grabell - May. 16 (News Report) - "There's no real data on these machines, and in fact, the best guess of the dose is much, much higher than certainly what the public thinks," said John Sedat, a professor emeritus in biochemistry and biophysics at UCSF and the primary author of the letter.

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Discovery of Bin Laden Hideout Spotlights Concerns About Pakistan's Intelligence Service

Mon, 02 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - By Sebastian Rotella - May. 02 (News Analysis) - The killing of Osama bin Laden in a Pakistani city dominated by the military has spotlighted a conundrum that Western counterterror agencies have grappled with for years: Is Pakistan's powerful intelligence service an ally, an enemy or a mix of both? This time the debate is likely to take place in public, not behind the closed doors of national security outposts in Washington. In fact, White House homeland security adviser John Brennan seemed to confront the issue head-on Monday when he said that the presence of the world's most wanted man in a fortress-like compound near the homes of retired generals and a military academy raises questions that the Pakistani government must answer. The Obama administration took the extraordinary step of keeping Sunday's commando raid secret from Islamabad. Although Obama cited "counterterrorism cooperation with Pakistan" as a factor in the successful hunt for bin Laden, U.S. officials have not given details on the extent and nature of that Pakistani assistance. The ISI has been suspected of playing a double game in previous cases: the murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in 2002, the mysterious escape from Pakistani custody in 2007 of an al-Qaida operative accused in the London transport bombings and a plot to bomb U.S.-bound commercial flights, charges of ISI involvement in the 2008 Mumbai attack and recent allegations by top military brass that the ISI supports militant networks fighting U.S. troops in Afghanistan.

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Gulf oil spill: 'The monster under the water'

Tue, 19 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

BBC News - By Melanie Burford - Apr. 19 (Special Report) - A year on from the Deepwater Horizon disaster, fishermen on Louisiana's Delacroix Island face an uncertain future, as Melanie Burford reports, with support from ProPublica. The community was already in decline - hurricanes, erosion, the intrusion of mode

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U.S. Nuclear Regulator Lets Industry Help With the Fine Print

Thu, 14 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - By John Sullivan - Apr. 14 (Investigative Report) - “The problem with inviting the industry in is that they tend to dominate the process,” he said. “The NRC has a problem distinguishing between the public they serve and the industry they regulate. “

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U.S. Stays Mum as Bahrain Unleashes Brutal Crackdown

Wed, 13 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - Apr. 13 (News Report) - by Marian Wang “No leniency.” That was the warning from Bahrain’s crown prince last week as government forces continued cracking down on protesters, activists, journalists and doctors. It was issued alongside yet another promise of reform by the Bahraini government. The warning was also met with silence from the United States. The U.S., which has long considered Bahrain a key ally in the region, condemned the violence in mid-March, and two weeks later noted that arresting bloggers “doesn’t help” promote an inclusive national dialogue. But so far this month—as reports of increasing intimidation, censorship and brutality emerge—the U.S. doesn’t seem to have had a public response. In one of the State Department's last statements, spokesman Mark Toner told reporters on March 22, “Our position towards Bahrain is crystal clear. We’re going to continue to work with the Bahraini Government.” We called the State Department to ask why the violence in Bahrain hadn't been broached in recent press briefings. "We respond to reporters' questions," a State Department spokesman told me, noting that "there's a lot going on throughout the entire Middle East." Human rights groups have reported that at least 26 people have been killed since the Bahraini government declared martial law in mid-March. At least three activists have also died in police custody. More than 400 have been detained and dozens are missing. One of those missing people is a human rights activist, Abdulhadi Alkhawaja. His daughter, Zainab Alkhawaja, witnessed her father being dragged down a flight of stairs and “beaten unconscious in front of me” by masked men. She described the incident yesterday in an open letter to President Obama, posted to her blog. “Tyrants, with US support, can live happily ever after,” she wrote on Twitter. In the annual human rights report released on Friday, the State Department noted that Bahrain's government had previously been accused of torture and the arbitrary arrest and abduction of Shia men, particularly around the elections last fall. In recent days, however, the U.S. has focused its condemnation on events in Yemen, Syria, and the Ivory Coast while continuing its military involvement in Libya. National Security Advisor Tom Donilon is currently traveling to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain’s Gulf neighbors. Journalists in Bahrain, meanwhile, have been deported and questioned by prosecutors. Accused of torture, the government has said that photos of the body of one dead activist—bearing bruises and multiple cuts—was fabricated. (CNN reported that most of the activists and bloggers it had arranged to interview for a documentary had disappeared, and CNN crew was also detained and questioned by masked gunmen and released after six hours.) Police and security forces have also entered hospitals and beaten patients and Shiite doctors, according to Reuters. Doctors Without Borders has alleged that the Bahraini government is using hospitals as “bait to identify and arrest” protesters seeking treatment. Several doctors have disappeared. Similar reports have been coming out of Egypt as well. Egypt's military leadership announced over the weekend that they were prepared to use force to end the continuing protests, and they made good on those threats. When a core group of protesters reoccupied Cairo’s central square to protest the rule of leaders who they see as being no different than Mubarak, the army cracked down, attacking protesters with live ammunition and electric batons. An Egyptian military court also sentenced a blogger to three years in prison for criticizing the military—“a dangerous precedent,” according to Human Rights Watch. The U.S. Embassy in Cairo issued a statement acknowledging “the disturbing reports of the use of excessive force” and said it was “looking into the situation.” It urged Egypt’s military leaders to conduct an investigation, presumably to hold its own soldiers accountable.

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Unraveling the Spin on the Fight Over Hidden Debit Card Fees

Mon, 11 Apr 2011 13:45:25 -0700

ProPublica - By Marian Wang - Apr. 11 (News Report) - by Marian Wang We’ve noted that the Federal Reserve and the banking industry have made opposing claims about whether debit interchange fees—the fees that merchants pass on to banks whenever a customer uses a debit card to pay—are on the rise. The Fed has proposed capping the fees for big banks. But to hear the banks explain it, the rules aren’t needed because fee rates have barely risen. Each side has trotted out numbers supporting its stance. Lawmakers are on the verge of voting on legislation that would delay the rules for further study. But what are the facts? Here’s our attempt to cut through the spin. Are debit interchange fee rates rising? Yes. Banks, payment networks and the Federal Reserve all acknowledge that debit interchange fee rates have risen. That’s partly why the banks’ claim that “merchant fee rates are not going up” is so misleading—you have to read carefully and realize that “merchant” fees don’t refer to either debit interchange fees or credit interchange fees alone, but blended together. As we’ve noted, both credit and debit interchange fee rates have been rising—it’s just a question of how much. OK, so how much are they rising? Fee rates have stayed fairly level for transactions in which debit cards are used sort of like credit cards—where you sign for a transaction rather than enter your PIN. Called signature debit, the fees for this transaction rose in the early 2000s and dipped briefly in 2003 when Visa and MasterCard settled an antitrust lawsuit with the Justice Department on interchange fees. Rates are slightly higher now than they were in 1996. But debit fees for transactions where you enter your PIN number have risen much more. Those fees have increased dramatically from the mid-90s until about 2005, after which they rose more incrementally. (Figure 2 in a 2009 Fed paper [PDF] shows PIN and signature debit transactions both growing, with PIN transactions accounting for just over a third of debit transactions in 2007.) Data from the Kansas City Federal Reserve, for instance, show that the interchange fee for a $50 PIN-debit transaction at a small retailer tripled from 2000 to 2010 for Visa, going from 20 cents to 67.5 cents. It quadrupled in the same time period for MasterCard, going from 9.5 cents to 60 cents. Take a look at the graphic below: Interchange Fees for a $50 Transaction at a Small Retailer Source: Kansas City Federal Reserve Where does the spin come in? Both sides have used data to argue their cases. The Federal Reserve takes the long view when it points out that interchange fees rates are rising. Others look just at the rate trends for just the past few years. Take Visa’s debit interchange fact sheet, which points out that “between 2006 and 2010, the average debit interchange rate grew less than 1.6%.” The American Bankers Association takes a similar view. When I asked spokesman Peter Garuccio last week about some of the ABA’s interchange claims, he said that debit interchange fees rates had not “dramatically risen.” “The changes you get really depend upon what period of time you want to look at,” said David Evans, a former Visa adviser who currently runs a consulting firmcatering to the financial services industry. “If you want to look at it from mid-90s, the story is that PIN debit rates went up. If you want to talk about what’s happened in last 5, 6 years, that’s a different story.” So, if fees haven’t risen that dramatically in the past few years, why are merchants kicking up a fuss? Merchants are upset because of the debit interchange rate increases, it’s true. But especially as debit cards grow in popularity, increased debit use—compounded with rising rates—means they’re handing over more and more in fees to the banks. This cuts into their profit margins and/or forces them to raise prices. No one—not the banks, not the payment networks, not the Fed—disputes this. Garuccio of the American Bankers Association takes issue with the disproportionate focus on how the changes in interchange fees affect small retailers, when most transactions take place at large retailers that typically pay lower rates. But according to proponents of interchange regulation, that’s exactly the point. “The smallest retailers pay the highest fees,” a spokesman for the National Association of Convenience Stores told the Washington Post. What’s the case for and against regulation? Experts such as Adam Levitin of Georgetown Law have noted that interchange rates in the United States are “much, much higher than anywhere else in the developed world.” As Bloomberg has reported, the Fed’s plan would bring U.S. debit interchange rates closer to the rates in other countries, including Australia and members of the European Union. In Europe, both MasterCard and Visa agreed to cap debit interchange fees at 0.2 percent last year—almost six times the average rate in the United States. But those opposing the Fed’s proposed regulation of debit interchange fees have touted the ways merchants have benefitted from debit cards, such as more efficient transactions and fraud protection. “The rates are certainly not unreasonable for what the merchants are getting out of it,” said Evans, the former Visa adviser. “What they want is all the benefits of the debit card without having to pay for it.” So, are there going to be caps on the fees, or not? It’s looking increasingly likely that the proposed caps will be put on the backburner. Merchants and banks have continued lobbying fiercely about the proposed regulation. Hundreds of retailers who favor the interchange cap have flown to Washington to meet with lawmakers, the New York Times reported. Meanwhile, banks—as well as conservative and libertarian groups—have flooded the Fed with letters and lobbied lawmakers to pass legislation that would delay the rules for further study. This effort seems to be gaining traction, as Rep. Barney Frank—who sponsored the financial reform law that mandates the interchange rules—announced last week that he supports delaying it. Lawmakers have said they believe they have the votes to pass legislation for a delay. As Simon Johnson, former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund, noted, that doesn’t bode well for the future of such regulation: “In Washington, the best way to kill something is to study it further,” he wrote on the Times’ Economix blog. Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke has acknowledged that the Fed would miss the deadline mandated by Dodd-Frank for finalizing the rules, though he said the agency aims to meet its July deadline for implementing them.

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Madoff Calls Big Investors ‘Complicit’ in Jailhouse Interview - ProPublica

Mon, 11 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - By Jake Bernstein - Apr. 11 (News Report) - by Jake Bernstein A recent jailhouse interview conducted by the Financial Times with Ponzi mastermind Bernard Madoff could shed light on one of the enduring mysteries of his multibillion-dollar scheme. Who else was involved? The Feds have already charged a number of former Madoff employees. The trustee, Irving Picard, tasked with recovering money for Madoff victims, has cast a wide net, filing lawsuits that level accusations against the banks that facilitated the scheme and a number of investors who benefited from it. Last June, ProPublica looked at several of the investors and money managers singled out in federal and civil filings. Now, in his interview with the FT, Madoff says that several of his oldest clients knew "something was amiss."" In particular, Madoff names Jeffry Picower, Stanley Chais, Carl Shapiro and Norman Levy, his four largest investors. At the outset, Madoff insists that one of the ground rules for the interview is that "nothing that I say should be taken as an excuse" for his behavior. Yet later, he paints himself almost as a victim of Picower, Chais, Shapiro and Levy. "I was at their mercy," he says. Madoff describes how he started managing money for the men in the 1960s. After the 1987 market crash, he says, he found himself locked into investment positions that his four stalwarts refused to close out. In order to keep the business going, they referred other investors to him. Madoff says that by 1992 it had become a Ponzi scheme and his big clients knew. "They were complicit, all of them," Madoff says. Of course, Madoff has been sentenced to 150 years in prison for orchestrating one of the biggest scams of all time, swindling investors out of more than $20 billion. None of the men he accuses in the interview have been convicted of crimes. Chais and Levy are dead. The latter's estate settled with the trustee for $220 million without admitting wrongdoing. Chais' survivors have contested allegations made by the trustee and the SEC. Picower, the scheme's biggest beneficiary, also has died. His wife has pledged to return all $7.2 billion that her husband reaped from Madoff and says he did not know the business was a Ponzi scheme. Shapiro also has settled with the trustee for $625 million while denying any wrongdoing.

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U.S. Health Care System Unprepared for Major Nuclear Emergency

Thu, 07 Apr 2011 11:24:14 -0700

ProPublica - Apr. 07 - by Sheri Fink, Special to ProPublica U.S. officials say the nation's health system is ill-prepared to cope with a catastrophic release of radiation, despite years of focus on the possibility of a terrorist "dirty bomb" or an improvised nuclear device attack. A blunt assessment circulating among American officials says "Current capabilities can only handle a few radiation injuries at any one time." That assessment, prepared by the Department of Homeland Security in 2010 and stamped "for official use only," says "there is no strategy for notifying the public in real time of recommendations on shelter or evacuation priorities." The Homeland Security report, plus several other reports and interviews with almost two dozen experts inside and outside the government, reveal other gaps that may increase the risks posed by a nuclear accident or terrorist attack. One example: The U.S. Strategic National Stockpile stopped purchasing the best-known agent to counter radioactive iodine-induced thyroid cancer in young people, potassium iodide, about two years ago and designated the limited remaining quantities "excess," according to information provided by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to ProPublica. Despite this, the CDC website still lists potassium iodide as one of only four drugs in the stockpile specifically for use in radiation emergencies. The drug is most effective when administered before or within hours of exposure. The decision to stop stockpiling it was made, in part, because distribution could take too long in a fast-moving emergency, one official involved in the discussions said. The interagency group that governs the stockpile decided that "other preparedness measures were more suitable to mitigate potential exposures to radioactive iodine that would result from a release at a nuclear reactor," a CDC spokesperson said in an email to ProPublica. Japan's ongoing nuclear crisis may prompt officials to revisit that conclusion. With radiation levels higher than expected outside the evacuation zones in some areas, the Japanese government recently asked the United States for potassium iodide. The federal government agreed to send some of its dwindling stockpile of the liquid version used in children or adults, which is due to reach its expiration date within about a year. The government is currently "finalizing the paperwork," according to an official with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Another example: While hospitals near nuclear power plants often drill for radiological emergencies, few hospitals outside of that area practice such drills. Most medical personnel are untrained and unfamiliar with the level of risk posed by radiation, whether it is released from a nuclear power plant, a "dirty" bomb laced with radioactive material, or the explosion of an improvised nuclear weapon. Many states don't have a basic radiation emergency plan for communicating with the public or responding to the health risks. Even something as fundamental as the importance of sheltering inside sturdy buildings to avoid exposure to radioactive fallout from a nuclear explosion -- which experts say could determine whether huge numbers of people live or die -- hasn't been communicated to the public. Recently the White House and other federal officials concerned about deficiencies in public readiness met with experts to explore what might be done to make nuclear events more survivable. "The bottom line is that the citizenry are not prepared at all," said Michael McDonald, president of Global Health Initiatives, who participated in White House and congressional briefings. The Department of Homeland Security report acknowledges that officials are poorly prepared to communicate with the public and that the current organization of medical care "does not support the anticipated magnitude of the requirements" following an attack with an improvised nuclear device. It says the United States has "limited" treatment options for radiation exposure and notes that staff and materials aren't in place to carry out mass evacuations after a large-scale release of radiation. "The requirements to monitor, track, and decontaminate large numbers of people have not been identified," the report said. Underlying the preparedness problems is the need for additional research. It isn't known, for example, how a nuclear blast and electromagnetic pulse would affect modern communications infrastructure, or to what extent modern buildings can protect people from nuclear blast, heat and radiation effects. A report prepared last year by the Council on State and Territorial Epidemiologists was equally pessimistic about U.S. readiness. Based on surveys of public health officials in 38 states, it concluded that "In almost every measure of public health capacity and capability, the public health system remains poorly prepared to adequately respond to a major radiation emergency incident." Forty-five percent of the states surveyed had no radiation plan at all for areas outside federally mandated nuclear power plant emergency zones. Almost 85 percent of the officials said their states couldn't properly respond to a radiation incident because of inadequate planning, resources, staffing and partnerships. More troubling was the fact that the situation hasn't improved since a similar survey was taken in 2003. "Most of those comparisons appear to indicate either the same poor level of preparedness and planning or a decline in capacity," the report said. The nation's investment in emergency preparedness seems likely to decrease rather than increase, experts say, because of massive federal and state deficits. President Obama's proposed budget would cut funding for a federal hospital preparedness program by about 10 percent. The release of proposed federal regulations that would require hospitals to meet emergency management standards has been delayed. "If the public isn't demanding that we be better prepared, the politicians won't put the money in for us to be better prepared and the regulators" won't require it, said Dr. Arthur Cooper, a professor of surgery at Columbia University and director of trauma and pediatric surgical services at Harlem Hospital Center. "It all begins with the public knowing this is a problem that's got to be solved and it's worth spending some money and effort to try to be prepared in a real way." Hospital Preparedness In the days after nuclear fuel at Japan's Fukushima power plant began to overheat, the greatest threat to one hospital within 50 miles of the plant wasn't radiation, but fear. Many staff members had fled, and government emergency workers hadn't delivered food and medicine needed for the 120 patients. Dr. Masaru Nakayama, director of Kashima Hospital in Iwaki, Japan, said it took time to convince people that the area around the hospital was in fact safe. Yet in national surveys, U.S. hospital workers have expressed fears similar to those of Dr. Nakayama's staff, saying they would be less willing to report to work for a radiological or nuclear incident than for other types of emergencies. They also said they feel unprepared for the work they would be required to do, even though the risk of radiation exposure from treating contaminated patients outside the danger zone is considered negligible when workers are properly trained and wear protective equipment. "The level of education for disasters across the board in American hospitals is really pretty terrible," said Dr. Cooper. "People don't have a good sense of how to focus on any disaster, let alone a radiation disaster. Radiation adds a level of complexity that most folks aren't prepared to face." Cooper said hospital drills have improved in recent years, "but they occur far too seldom and they end far too quickly and they're far too superficial to really prepare a hospital for a major disaster." "Shutting down part of the hospital's work for a period of time to conduct a full-scale exercise, that's daunting for a hospital," he said. "Trying to ‘do the right thing' and provide employees with in-depth disaster education across the board is not something they're going to do unless it becomes a major regulatory mandate." Dr. William Fales, an associate professor of emergency medicine at Michigan State University and a regional medical director in southwest Michigan, said he has yet to see a hospital outside of a nuclear reactor's emergency planning zone conduct a drill for a nuclear or radiological emergency. In the courses Fales teaches for medical professionals, he has seen firsthand what little baseline knowledge many of them have. In one exercise they are treating mock bombing victims when they are suddenly told that the explosive was a dirty bomb packed with radioactive material. Typically they drop everything, run the patients outside and decontaminate them. But that reflects a lack of knowledge of a basic principle—that medical workers should treat a patient's life-threatening traumatic injuries from a bomb blast before worrying about radiological decontamination. "It's amazing," Fales said. "It's a kneejerk reaction because they hear the word ‘radiation.' … Imagine what would happen if, God forbid, we had a real terrorist bombing and a rumor started on TV that it was a dirty bomb. How many potentially salvageable trauma patients would be compromised by that reaction?" Health workers made a different mistake at a recent radiation emergency conference sponsored by the CDC. When a workshop leader in a white decontamination suit asked nurses to practice cutting the garments off a mock contamination patient, one volunteer slid the scissors quickly from ankle to torso. That could send radioactive debris flying, the leader warned. The more careful approach took about two minutes—a long time if hundreds are awaiting assistance. Knowing when a patient has been contaminated versus exposed to radiation is an important distinction that is acquired with simple training. "If you put a chicken in a microwave and cook it, it comes out a rubbery chicken, but it doesn't come out contaminated," Fales said. "It's been irradiated, but it's not radioactive." Fales said few participants in his training courses think about doing a quick survey with a radiation detector to verify the existence of contamination. At many hospitals, most workers don't even know where the Geiger-Müller counter is kept. Facing a Worst Case Emergency The American Medical Association devoted the March issue of its journal, Disaster Medicine and Public Health Preparedness, to the No. 1 scenario on the federal government's list of 15 planning scenarios for emergency preparedness—a nuclear explosion equivalent to the force of a 10-kiloton trinitrotoluene (TNT) blast on a major population center. Using Washington, D.C. as an example, one study estimated that 180,000 hospital beds could be needed after such a detonation and that 61,000 of those patients could require intensive care. But Washington typically has only about 1,000 vacant beds—and there are only about 9,400 vacant intensive care unit beds in the entire United States. After a nuclear blast, hospitals would likely fill with trauma patients. Later, others would arrive with acute radiation syndrome, which can take days to manifest and affects multiple organ systems. Without supportive care, about 50 percent of people exposed to 3.5 Gray, a measure of radiation dose, would die. Proper care would almost double the exposure level at which 50 percent would survive, but only a small fraction of American medical professionals have training and expertise in treating radiation injury. Given that not enough beds would be available, hospitals and first responders would have to choose which patients to save. Authors of the journal articles recommend basing those decisions in part on how much radiation exposure patients have received and treating only those with a reasonable chance of surviving. "It's very hard to turn someone away who needs medical care who comes to your hospital," Cooper said. "I don't think any American hospital is prepared to do this kind of triage." The staff would be hampered by a shortage of the laboratory equipment needed to help evaluate so many patients, a lack of approved devices to rapidly quantify the level of radiation exposure, and a lack of approved medicines to counter the cellular effects of radiation. About $200 million in federal funding has been invested since 2008 to develop diagnostics and treatments, but HHS officials say most are still years away from approval. Even getting the protective measures that do exist, including potassium iodide, where they are needed is a challenge. Michigan has developed a round-the-clock dispatch system with ready-to-go medical packs designed for a range of emergencies and stored at 16 sites around the state. Four of those sites stock radiological countermeasures. "We think we're one of the few states that's really designed a statewide system that can deliver these countermeasures," Fales said. In the case of one particularly expensive drug provided by the federal government, "my sense is in a lot of states it's sitting in a warehouse in the state capital, hopefully secure and warm. On a Saturday night if something goes boom in a location on another side of the state, how long will it take to get it to where it's needed?" Improving Future Response One of the top priorities in preparing for a major nuclear disaster is readying ordinary citizens for the role they will have to play. "The common misperception is any nuclear blast means everybody's vaporized," McDonald said. "That's just wrong." But experts say the government has done little to educate the public about its responsibilities. When police and fire departments have run nuclear exercises in conjunction with federal authorities, "they haven't included the public," McDonald said. "They've basically treated it like a classified event." The motivation may be to safeguard the public from fear and panic, McDonald said, but "it does almost no good for the federal government to be talking about this with the top officers and not have the public understand what to do." Although government websites including ready.gov and cdc.gov contain useful preparedness information, there is no single website the public can turn to for up-to-the-minute public health information in disasters. One of the crucial things the public must know is when to evacuate and when to shelter underground or in a heavily constructed building. Yet making decisions on sheltering and evacuation and communicating those decisions to the public is precisely what the Homeland Security report found government agencies aren't inadequately prepared to do. Sheltering in place could make a major difference in how many people live or die, because the danger of fallout decreases rapidly as radioactive elements decay and debris is dispersed. The dose rate drops 90 percent every seven hours. "You can't wait until the event to put out this information," said Dr. James James, director of the American Medical Association's Center for Public Health Preparedness and Disaster Response. Many experts predict that without more education, people would likely flee as many are doing in Tokyo and as many Americans did after the Three Mile Island nuclear accident in 1979. An estimated 144,000 people—many times more than the number advised to do so—needlessly left the area due to fear and inadequate information. "Such an exodus would extend panic and devastation far beyond the locus of the event, draining food, water, medicines, gasoline, and other resources from surrounding communities and potentially causing gridlock that would severely compromise many elements of the official disaster response," according to a modeling study published by University of Chicago researcher Michael Meit and colleagues in the same issue of the journal. Not knowing what to do would be especially harmful to those who are least likely to be able get out of harm's way: children and the elderly, people with disabilities, and patients with chronic illnesses requiring regular treatment. The federal government enacted a number of reforms after elderly and disabled people died after Hurricane Katrina. But those reforms aren't necessarily reflected in critical front-line emergency plans. A federal court in California recently found the city of Los Angeles violated the Americans with Disabilities Act and other laws for failing to consider the needs of the disabled in its emergency response plans. Dr. Eric Toner, a senior associate at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center's Center for Biosecurity in Baltimore, said the key to protecting as many people as possible during an emergency is offering them frank communication about what is known and unknown. "Nature abhors a vacuum. If credible officials aren't out there constantly, that void will get filled with people who don't know what they're talking about or have different agendas." Still, there is no guarantee the public will act on information once they get it. Several years ago Michigan, like many other states, sent vouchers for potassium iodide to people living within a 10-mile radius of a nuclear power plant. The goal was to give them the medication free of charge from local pharmacies, so they wouldn't risk their lives searching for the drug in an emergency, when they should be sheltering in place or evacuating. But only about 6 percent of the residents picked up their allotted supply, said Fales, the Michigan regional medical director, a rate that's similar to some other states. "So much for pre-event planning," he concluded. ProPublica's Sasha Chavkin contributed to this report.

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Southwest Airlines Incident Highlights Cracks in Federal Oversight

Tue, 05 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - By by Marian Wang - Apr. 05 (News Report) - by Marian Wang The five-foot tear in the roof of a Southwest 737 last week has not only brought renewed attention to the problem of aging planes, but also to problems in oversight of the airline industry. In a report that received limited attention when it was released in December, the Transportation Department’s inspector general raised questions about the Federal Aviation Administration’s safety checks of airliners. According to the report, the agency had failed to perform on-time inspections of the major airlines in more than 300 instances [PDF] between fiscal years 2005 and 2009. Its record was the worst with Southwest: "The Southwest Airlines inspection office missed the most inspections at the required time intervals,” the report said. The FAA said in a statement at the time that it had made several changes to its inspection program and "is confident in its ability to oversee the National Aerospace System." In 2008, the FAA faced criticism from investigators for acting too cozy with the airline industry. In particular, its relationship with Southwest had been described by the inspector general as an "overly collaborative relationship." That conclusion came after two former FAA inspectors-turned-whistleblowers exposed a number of problems with the agency's oversight of Southwest. Among them: The agency had allowed Southwest to operate Boeing 737s that had not undergone mandatory inspections to detect cracks. Six of those planes were later found to have them, and the company settled with the FAA for $7.5 million. A 2008 government report also found FAA oversight lagging as major airlines increasingly outsourced maintenance work to contractors in a drive to lower costs. Cracks in the fuselage, or the body of the plane, are believed to have caused Friday's emergency aboard Flight 812. The National Transportation Safety Board is still investigating but has said that the 15-year-old aircraft had "pre-existing fatigue" along the entire length of the tear. A former member of the NTSB told the Wall Street Journal that existing inspection procedures "weren't adequate to uncover" the problems. The FAA is issuing an emergency directive today requiring airlines to conduct safety inspections on older models of the 737 after inspections over the weekend detected cracks on three more Southwest 737s. It has issued a number of directives over the years aimed at addressing concerns about cracks in aging Boeing 737s. Most of the U.S.-registered planes to which the latest directive applies are operated by Southwest. Southwest has said that the particular cracks on Flight 812 are “a new and unknown issue." The company said the plane involved in Friday’s incident had undergone all required inspections. It also shifted the focus to Boeing: "This is a Boeing-designed airplane. This is a Boeing-produced airplane," a Southwest spokeswoman told the AP. "It's obviously concerning to us that we're finding skin-fatigue issues." Boeing did not comment to the AP. Agence France Presse reported yesterday that Qantas, an Australian airline, is putting its aging Boeing 737s up for sale, intending to replace them with a newer model.

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5 Ways GE Plays the Tax Game

Mon, 04 Apr 2011 07:07:50 -0700

ProPublica - Apr. 04 -

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While Nuclear Waste Piles up in U.S., Billions in Fund to Handle It Sit Unused

Sat, 02 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - By Joaquin Sapien - Apr. 02 (Special Report) - While the nuclear crisis in Japan has focused attention on the risks of spent fuel piling up at the U.S.'s reactors, one curious fact has gone largely unnoted: There is $24 billion sitting in a "nuclear waste fund" that can't actually be used to pay for a safer way to store the waste at reactors. In 1982, Congress passed the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, and the federal government effectively struck a deal with the nuclear industry: Reactor operators and their customers would pay a tax on the waste they produced, and the government would use the money to create a safe place to store it for generations. The idea at the time was to build a repository inside volcanic rock on Yucca Mountain, about 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. That plan proved to be wildly controversial and was eventually abandoned by the Obama administration in 2010. After 29 years, there are billions of dollars in the fund and no plan for the waste. To compound the problem, the 1982 law only allows the money to be spent on a permanent solution, such as Yucca, and it can't be used for what many experts say is the best interim solution: taking spent fuel out of increasingly crowded cooling pools and encasing them in concrete and steel. So, nuclear companies have begun doing that themselves -- and have been suing the government for not holding up its side of the bargain. The companies have filed dozens of lawsuits, for $6.4 billion in total claims, according to figures maintained by the Department of Justice. The government has already paid out $956 million. It's also spent nearly $170 million simply defending itself against the claims. "Basically lawyers are getting rich and nobody is really better off, as far as I can tell. That seems to be the bottom line," Allison MacFarlane, a professor at George Mason University, said at a February meeting of the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future, a federal advisory committee on which she sits. Department of Energy statistics show that new lawsuits and other costs could eventually push the government's legal liability to $16.2 billion. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., who opposes storing waste at Yucca Mountain in his home state, introduced legislation in 2007 to amend the law so the fund could be used for interim waste storage. But the bill never came to the floor for a vote. Reid's office didn't respond to questions about whether he intends to re-introduce the bill. "The whole story is a black mark on the system," said Jay Silberg, a Washington, D.C.-based attorney who has been representing utilities in these cases for more than a decade. "It's bad for society, bad for taxpayers, bad for ratepayers and bad for the government." Spent fuel is contained in zirconium-clad rods that remain highly radioactive for years after they've been heated inside a reactor core to produce energy. In order to cool, the rods first have to be immersed in large pools of water. There is about 70,000 tons of spent fuel stored at reactor sites around the country. Three-quarters of the material sits in cooling pools. Reactor operators have been re-racking the rods so they can fit more of them in the pools -- a practice that makes the pools more radioactive and potentially more dangerous in the event of an accident. The pools in the United States have been criticized by nuclear industry watchdogs who say they are too crowded and in some cases have been known to leak low levels of radioactive water. Some reactor operators have begun building large tomb-like structures called dry casks to contain the waste after the rods have cooled for five years or more in the pools. The dry casks are considered a safer way to store the rods. But the industry has been reluctant to use dry casks on a large scale because it's extremely expensive to transfer the radioactive rods. A 2003 study by a former Energy Department official and a team of nuclear experts concluded it would cost at least $3.5 billion to move all rods that had been in pools for over five years. Critics of the industry have urged the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to require reactor operators to begin moving all spent fuel that has cooled for five years or more into dry casks, because the pools are more vulnerable to terrorist attacks and the loss of a small amount of water could cause a radiation field to grow large enough to prevent emergency workers from mitigating a full-blown meltdown in the pool. But the NRC has argued that the safety risks of keeping the fuel in pools aren't severe enough to warrant the amount of money it would cost to move the rods into dry storage.

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Leaked Emails Show Fracking Inspectors Authority Dangerously Reduced

Thu, 31 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

readersupportednews.org - By Abrahm Lustgarten - Mar. 31 (News Report) - Oil and gas inspectors policing Marcellus Shale development in Pennsylvania will no longer be able to issue violations to the drilling companies they regulate without first getting the approval of top officials. That’s according to a directive laid out in a series of emails received by the Department of Environmental Protection staff last week and leaked to ProPublica.

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Aftershock: The Blast That Shook Psycho Platoon

Sun, 27 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

ProPublica - By T. Christian Miller, Daniel Zwerdling - Mar. 27 (Investigative Report) - "Shock waves from roadside bombs can ripple through soldiers’ brains, causing damage that sometimes leaves no visible scars but may cause lasting mental and physical harm. "

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