TV News LIES

Siding with security needs over privacy rights, the Supreme Court ruled Monday that jailers may subject people arrested for minor offenses to invasive strip searches.

By a 5-4 vote, the court rejected a challenge from a New Jersey man who argued it's unconstitutional to force everyone to strip down for inspection. Albert Florence was arrested by a state trooper because of an error in the state's records that mistakenly said he was wanted on an outstanding warrant for an unpaid fine. Even if the warrant had been valid, failure to pay a fine is not a crime in New Jersey.

Republican Governor Mitch Daniels has signed Senate Enrolled Act 1 into law in Indiana. The new law allows citizens to use deadly force against police officers they think are illegally entering their homes. Earlier this month, Addicting Info reported  that the bill had passed the Senate. Republicans say the bill is designed to keep police safe, but Democrats say the bill will lead to the wanton killing of police officers.

FBI documents the ACLU is releasing today reveal that from 2004 through at least 2008, the San Francisco FBI conducted a "mosque outreach" program through which it compiled intelligence on American Muslim religious organizations and their leaders' and congregants' constitutionally protected beliefs and activities, without any suspicion of wrongdoing.

The ACLU previously disclosed that the FBI turned its "community outreach" programs into a secret and systematic domestic intelligence-gathering initiative. Now, FBI documents obtained by the ACLU of Northern California, the Asian Law Caucus, and the San Francisco Bay Guardian through a Freedom of Information act lawsuit show that the FBI used the similar guise of "mosque outreach" to gather intelligence on mosques and Muslim religious organizations.

Dinosaurs are banned because they supposedly might offend people who do not believe in evolution, yet this makes little to no sense given that even the most fundamentalist creationists seem to realize that there were, indeed dinosaurs.

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There are some 50 words which are officially banned from being used on tests given to students by the city, the banning of which is outright absurd.

It seemed Friday morning as if Facebook came out with guns blazing, aiming for employers who required applicants or employees to surrender their log-in information. Now there's a softening of that position, a clarification.

Privacy chief Erin Egan originally wrote, toward the end of her statement: "We’ll take action to protect the privacy and security of our users, whether by engaging policymakers or, where appropriate, by initiating legal action, including by shutting down applications that abuse their privileges."

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It’s been widely reported today that the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), the shadowy corporate front group that unites state lawmakers with corporations to pass state laws favorable to corporate interests, helped pass the law that might allow Trayvon Martin’s killer, George Zimmerman, to escape prosecution.

Florida’s “Stand Your Ground,” the law that might help Zimmerman to claim self-defense (despite evidence to the contrary) is just one of many state laws that is nearly identical to ALEC’s model Castle Doctrine Act. The Florida senator who introduced the law, Durell Peadon, was also a member of ALEC. The law passed in 2005.