Los Angeles Times, July 30, 2010 by Michael Hiltzik
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hiltzik-20100730,0,1032270.column
“I’m waiting to see that happens with the investigation,” he says. “The oil spill is tragic and clearly negligent, but that alone shouldn’t be enough to cause us to revoke the partnership. But if we’re getting into serious criminal negligence, deliberate indifference to environmental or health risks, then the university needs to think about who it’s working with.”
San Francisco Chronicle, July 30, 2010 by James Temple
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/07/30/MNEE1EM0EF.DTL
The fact that the contract was worth hundreds of millions of dollars could propel potential damages toward the upper range seen in these cases, said Eric Talley…. Hundreds of False Claims Act cases are filed each year, but the government tends to throw its full weight behind only the most promising ones, Talley said. “The (Justice Department) has determined this to be meritorious enough to put their own efforts forward, rather than sit on the sidelines,” he said.
KTVU-TV, July 30, 2010 by Debora Villalon
http://www.ktvu.com/news/24460964/detail.html
Historically considered a left leaning court, that’s gradually eased, and in this first appeal stage, only three judges hear arguments. “It all depends on who the three judges are, they’re certainly not short of some very conservative judges,” said Choper.
San Francisco Chronicle, July 29, 2010 by Bobbie Stein and Rachel Lederman
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/07/28/EDV91EKR9F.DTL
When Oakland police brass meet this week to review what went wrong after the July 8 Johannes Mehserle verdict, they should not overlook their own crowd control policy. Had the department followed this policy, it could have minimized property damage and also avoided police-inflicted injuries and wrongful arrests of demonstrators.
KALW, Your Call, July 29, 2010 Host Rose Aguilar
http://bit.ly/dtfnVu
These laws are going to have a real impact on policing. In these communities, immigrants are not going to be willing to trust law enforcement because they know that part of law enforcement’s mandate is to try and root out undocumented immigrants. And so if you’ve got a crime and you’ve got a witness, who might be lawful themselves, but they’re living with someone who’s undocumented, they may be unwilling to come forward as witness.
The Nation, July 29, 2010 by Robin Templeton
http://www.thenation.com/article/38035/baby-baiting
“The new laws effectively sentence people to a ten-year separation from their families if they try to go through the application process,” says Blanco. “When you read the statistics about how the undocumented population has increased, you have to realize how much of that is the direct result of blocking people from gaining legal status who, before, legitimately could.”
-Bloomberg, July 26, 2010 by Todd Shields and Adam Satariano
http://bit.ly/cHQldK
Apple may also use other laws to keep iPhones from being modified, said Jason Schultz, co-director of the Samuelson Law Technology and Public Policy Clinic…. “Having the copyright office side with the jailbreakers doesn’t look good in court for Apple,” Schultz said in an interview. “They will have to explain why the copyright office is wrong.”
-CNET News, July 27, 2010 by Erica Ogg and Declan McCullagh
http://news.cnet.com/8301-31021_3-20011702-260.html
“It is an uphill battle now for Apple. What this does is kind of shifts things in favor of users,” said Schultz. “If Apple goes to court they have to explain to a judge why the copyright office is wrong (in this case) or why other laws should trump copyright laws.”
-San Francisco Chronicle, July 27, 2010 by Benny Evangelista
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/07/27/BUMV1EK31O.DTL
“This ruling is quite important because we’re seeing more and more of these kinds of embedded systems,” Schultz said. “It opens the way to more competition and more innovation. It’s a groundbreaking ruling from the U.S. Copyright Office, which has not always been as permissive.” He said the ruling could also spur “a whole business ecosystem formed around jailbreaking.”
ABC7, Beyond the Headlines, July 25, 2010 Host Cheryl Jennings
http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=resources/lifestyle_community/community&id=7576739
”I think that increasingly we’re seeing that young people who get involved in violence have themselves been victims or witnesses of violence in their homes. So to the extent that we have serious and sustained problems of child abuse and domestic violence, that feeds this problem. Unemployment creates this as well. Certainly gangs have a major influence in terms of propelling young people towards violent behavior.”
CNN, State of the Union, July 25, 2010 Host Candy Crowley
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1007/25/sotu.01.html
”I think there are actually three stories here. One is about political mismanagement on the part of the administration and mismanagement in journalism. The second is about race. And the third is about the interaction of the two. And what we’ve seen is that the likelihood of mismanagement goes up if race is involved and the stakes go up as well.”
-The Huffington Post, July 24, 2010 by Robin McDowell
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20100724/as-khmer-rouge-healing/
”I have found in my research at other tribunals that some victim-witnesses experience a boost immediately after testifying,” he said. ”But I always caution on proclaiming that testifying necessarily will have long-term benefits. Other events in their life—loss of a loved one, a job, for instance—could re-trigger past trauma.”
-PBS NewsHour, July 26, 2010 by Fred de Sam Lazaro
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/asia/july-dec10/cambodia_07-26.html
”People will have basic needs and need to be attended to, but if you are going to have real progress, you also put in the infrastructure for democracy, infrastructure for the rule of law, infrastructure that will support human rights, because, without that, you will always be in an uphill battle.”
The Washington Independent, July 23, 2010 by Elise Foley
http://washingtonindependent.com/92374/kyl-pushes-for-expansion-of-operation-streamline
Aarti Kohli, immigration policy director at Berkeley Law’s Warren Institute, told me Operation Streamline should be reevaluated, not expanded. “It’s being used to spend large amounts [to criminally prosecute] the lowest level of offender,” she said. “The big question about Operation Streamline is whether it’s really effective.”
The Wall Street Journal, Vital Signs, July 22, 2010 by Cari Tuna
http://bit.ly/cI3jHG
Violent crime across the Bay Area is declining even though unemployment remains high, mirroring a national trend that has confounded criminologists. The region’s four most-populous cities—San Jose, San Francisco, Oakland and Fremont—each reported fewer violent crimes such as murders and aggravated assault in 2009 than in 2008, says the Federal Bureau of Investigation. That’s counterintuitive because people expect felonies such as armed robberies to increase as more workers lose their jobs, says University of California, Berkeley, law professor Franklin Zimring.
Bloomberg, July 21, 2010 Host Margaret Brennan
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/video/2010/07/21/VI2010072103171.html
“Every year, the states receive hundreds of billions of dollars in payments from the federal government—in Medicaid, in highway spending, in housing, in community development and a score of other programs…. So the idea is very simple: give an advance to states. Let them elect to borrow from the Treasury…. As we come out of the Recession, as the states are in better shape, the Treasury can simply deduct the amount from the funds that would otherwise be going to the state. So it’s a guaranteed repayment, plus interest.”
-Contra Costa Times, July 21, 2010 by Steven Harmon
http://www.contracostatimes.com/ci_15570014?nclick_check=1
“Presidential power is really designed to expand during periods of crisis brought on by foreign threats and national security concerns,” Yoo said.
-San Francisco Chronicle, Politics Blog, July 21, 2010 by Justin Ho
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/nov05election/detail?entry_id=68428
[Yoo] said it will take 20 to 25 years to get a sense of where Bush will rank among the presidents. “But I also think people will not think of him as the worst president that you hear about all the time now. They have access to the archives, and they’ll see the kinds of context that there was around the decisions he had to make.”
-The Sacramento Bee, July 22, 2010 by Gina Kim
http://www.sacbee.com/2010/07/22/2906839/bush-administration-torture-memo.html#ixzz0uR8oqGEr
“It’s a wartime policy question,” Yoo said. “American presidents, when they know the threats the country is under, it’s no surprise they made the choices they did.”
The Chronicle of Higher Education, July 20, 2010 by Mary Ann Mason
http://chronicle.com/article/E-Mail-the-Third-Shift/66312/
Many academics have a love-hate relationship with e-mail. We know it has made communicating … far easier. But we are also aware that e-mail is devouring a great deal of our time.… Shouldn’t it be routine university policy to promote clear guidelines about the use of e-mail between faculty members and students? That would benefit not only parents, of course, but, particularly for mothers, limiting the third shift may make the difference between academic survival and burnout.
-Patently-O Blog, Parts I-III July 19-21, 2010 by Robert Merges, Pamela Samuelson, and Ted Sichelman
http://bit.ly/dc4GOo
The 2008 Berkeley Patent Survey has found that startups are patenting more than previous studies have suggested; that patents are being sought for a variety of reasons, the most prominent of which is to prevent copying of the innovation; and that there are considerable differences among startups in the perceived significance of patents for attaining competitive advantage, with biotech companies rating them as the most important strategy and software companies rating them least important.
http://bit.ly/bmJ4nB
Our fourth major result is that our respondents—particularly software companies—find the high costs of patenting and enforcing their patents deter them from filing for patents on their innovations. Given the reported importance of patents to startups not only in the financing process, but also for strategic reasons—especially for increasing bargaining power—these cost barriers are worrisome.
http://bit.ly/blIB2W
The data, however, present an interesting paradox: If executives believe that patents provide relatively weak incentives to innovate, why are so many startup firms seeking them? Our first post indicated that securing financing was a reason why many firms reported seeking patents…. Raising money, rather than invention itself, may be the key.
-O’Reilly Radar, July 21, 2010 by Pamela Samuelson
http://radar.oreilly.com/2010/07/why-software-startups-decide-t.html
The initial findings reported here and in the larger article suggest that software entrepreneurs do not find persuasive the canonical story that patents provide strong incentives to invest in technology innovation.
-Technology Review, Feld Thoughts Blog, July 28, 2010 by Brad Feld
http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/post.aspx?bid=358&bpid=25540
The juiciest conclusion is about halfway through the essay and is “One of the most striking findings of our study is that software firms ranked patents dead last among seven strategies for attaining competitive advantage identified by the survey.” Another one was “We were surprised to discover that the software respondents reported that patents provide only weak incentives for engaging in core activities, such as invention of new products (.96) and commercialization (.93).”
The New York Times, July 19, 2010 by Jesse McKinley
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/20/us/20pot.html?_r=2&pagewanted=1
“The arrest statistics are disproportionate with respect to African-Americans and disproportionate with respect to use,” said Mr. MacCoun. “And that’s very hard to justify in any way.” And while Mr. MacCoun said he was not certain that a ballot measure was the way to address that inequity, he said the positioning of Proposition 19 as a civil rights issue could be a potent selling point. “I don’t think it’s decisive for all voters,” Mr. MacCoun said. “But I think it’s an important argument, and I think it’s going to carry weight with some people.”
-Investor’s Business Daily, July 19, 2010 by Jed Graham
http://bit.ly/bTznlV
Alan Auerbach argues that debt levels are still manageable enough that it makes sense to give the economy more running room to solidify the recovery before embracing austerity. “I think the best strategy—which is not one that is politically likely—is to not worry so much about the short-term debt accumulation, but to take very forceful action” to address long-term deficits tied to health care spending and Social Security,” Auerbach said.
-The Wall Street Journal, Real Time Economics Blog, July 24, 2010 by Mark Whitehouse
http://bit.ly/dbCMvG
Messrs. Auerbach and Gale estimate that the government needs to increase tax revenues or cut spending by as much as 9% of economic output to put its finances on a sustainable trajectory.
-San Francisco Chronicle, July 18, 2010 by Christopher Edley, Jr.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/07/18/INMJ1EDUFJ.DTL
If successful, I hope the university will embrace large-scale online instruction—not to replace the on-campus experience, but to enrich it. More urgently, online learning would enable us to serve the growing number of qualified students for whom there will be no room on campus or for whom a residential full-time program won’t work…. Our purpose is to advance knowledge while democratizing excellence. To do that, we must innovate.
-San Francisco Chronicle, July 18, 2010 Editorial
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/07/18/ED4S1EDLBO.DTL
“Our inability to move quickly is creating a gap in the marketplace that these other institutions are running to fill,” Edley said in a recent meeting with the editorial board.
-The Sacramento Bee, July 27, 2010 by Laurel Rosenhall
http://www.sacbee.com/2010/07/27/2916588/uc-professors-raise-doubts-about.html#ixzz0uu4C69Cf
“How do we provide access to UC quality when the state is not there for us and the student demand is growing? We need an alternative to the bricks-and-mortar model, and this may be it,” said Edley.
KPCC, Southern California Public Radio, July 15, 2010 Host Larry Mantle
http://www.scpr.org/programs/airtalk/2010/07/15/happy-birthday-social-security-near-retirees-keep-/
The overall federal budget is unsustainable by almost all projections. Social security is the single largest budget item. Essentially you can think of the federal budget as being social security, medicare, the military, interest payments on the debt, and a little bit of other stuff. You could cut everything else but those items, and, over the medium term, those budgets are still not sustainable.