After weeks of speculation we have new audio from ISIS’ leader Al Baghdadi calling for attacks in Saudi Arabia & we make the case that it’s still all about the oil. Plus the latest in the Net Neutrality debate, and our follow up thoughts.

Then we take a critical look at the attempts to scare kids in schools & the twists and turns for legal cannabis.

Direct Download:

Video | MP3 Audio | OGG Audio | Torrent | YouTube

RSS Feeds:

Video Feed | MP3 Feed | OGG Feed | HD Torrent | Mobile Torrent | iTunes

Become an Unfilter supporter on Patreon:

— Show Notes —

News

Cops Decide Running Surprise School Shooter Drill During Class At A Middle School Is A Great Idea | Techdirt

We’re going to have to go over this again: if your drills to prevent school tragedy actually leave school children traumatized, then don’t do those damned drills. What began with terrorism drills on school buses and then devolved into unannounced school-shooting drills is getting to be so full-on crazy that I sort of can’t believe that _anyone _thinks any of this is a good idea. The latest story involves police running an unannounced “active shooter drill” at a local middle school while classes were in session. As a part of this insane exercise, police officers went around bursting into classrooms filled with terrified students, weapons out, as they acted out their fun little thespian experience of horror. And, to add insult to injury, school officials notified parents of the drill long after unknowing students were informing their parents that an actual shooting was taking place at the school.

According to Fox affiliate WTVT, officials at Jewett Middle Academy e-mailed parents to inform them of the drill, after it took place. By that point, WTVT reports, cellphones were already filling up with texts from frightened students, who thought there was a real shooter in the school.

US Senate falls two votes short of shutting down NSA phone spying | Ars Technica

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) in 2013. Rubio was first to speak against the USA Freedom Act in today’s debate, saying it could slow the government from disrupting an ISIL cell.

The US Senate voted against reining in the NSA’s spying powers tonight, shooting down a proposal that was supported not just by intelligence reform groups, but by the director of the NSA himself.

The USA Freedom Act needed 60 Senate votes to pass its key procedural vote, and it failed to get them. The bill got 58 yes votes and 42 no votes.

The bill would have stopped the government from engaging in bulk phone surveillance. Instead, Americans’ phone information would have remained with the phone companies and could only be searched by request, with specific selection terms.

It would have also provided for a privacy advocate at the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which approves such surveillance. Reformers hoped that would provide for a less one-sided debate at that court.

Congress Is Irrelevant on Mass Surveillance. Here’s What Matters Instead. – The Intercept

The “debate” among the Senators that preceded the vote was darkly funny and deeply boring, in equal measure. The black humor was due to the way one GOP senator after the next—led by ranking intelligence committee member Saxby Chambliss of Georgia (pictured above)—stood up and literally screeched about 9/11 and ISIS over and over and over, and then sat down as though they had made a point. Their scary script had been unveiled earlier that morning by a _Wall Street Journal _op-ed by former Bush Attorney General Mike Mukasey and former CIA and NSA Director Mike Hayden warning that NSA reform would make the terrorists kill you; it appeared under this Onion-like headline:

There is a real question about whether the defeat of this bill is good, bad, or irrelevant. To begin with, it sought to change only one small sliver of NSA mass surveillance (domestic bulk collection of phone records under section 215 of the Patriot Act) while leaving completely unchanged the primary means of NSA mass surveillance, which takes place under section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act, based on the lovely and quintessentially American theory that all that matters are the privacy rights of Americans (and not the 95 percent of the planet called “non-Americans”).

There were some mildly positive provisions in the USA Freedom Act: the placement of “public advocates” at the FISA court to contest the claims of the government; the prohibition on the NSA holding Americans’ phone records, requiring instead that they obtain FISA court approval before seeking specific records from the telecoms (which already hold those records for at least 18 months); and reducing the agency’s “contact chaining” analysis from three hops to two.

Net Neutrality

David Cameron Says People Aren’t Radicalized By Poverty Or Foreign Policy, But By Free Speech Online, So ISPs Agree To Censor Button | Techdirt

A few years ago, we mocked then Senator Joe Lieberman’s request that internet companies put “report this content as terrorist content” buttons on various types of online content. The plan went nowhere, because it’s a really bad idea, prone to massive abuse. Yet, over in the UK, some apparently think it’s such a grand idea that they’re actually moving forward with it. This isn’t a huge surprise — the current UK government has been going on for quite some time about banning “extremist” content, and just recently ramped up such efforts.

And now it appears that a bunch of big UK broadband access providers have agreed to play along:

The UK’s major Internet service providers — BT, Virgin, Sky and Talk Talk — have this week committed to host a public reporting button for terrorist material online, similar to the reporting button which allows the public to report child sexual exploitation.

They have also agreed to ensure that terrorist and extremist material is captured by their filters to prevent children and young people coming across radicalising material.

ISIS / ISIL / IS / CIA

ISIS: Baghdadi Is Alive and Saudi Arabia Is Our Next Target

After roughly a week of speculation over the fate of its leader, the Islamic State (ISIS) released what it says is a speech from Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi today in which the head of the makeshift caliphate calls for attacks against Saudi Arabia, among other things.

“There will be no security, no rest for Al-Salul,” the ISIS leader purportedly says, referring to the ruling family of Saudi Arabia. “Draw your swords.”

In the 16-minute speech, which ISIS also translated into English and made available online, Baghdadi allegedly calls on his followers to first attack Shiites, then proceed to combat Saudi Arabia and the U.S., which has military bases on the Arabian Peninsula.

Can Saudi Arabia keep ISIS out? – CBS News

The U.S. military said Monday coalition forces conducted more than 30 airstrikes against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) since Friday. That coalition includes Saudi Arabia.

The Saudis are desperate to keep what’s happening in Iraq from happening in their country. CBS News was given an extraordinary look at what they’re doing.

We flew over the Arabian Desert to see the new, 600-mile long border fence that’s protecting Saudi Arabia from ISIS. On the other side is the chaos of Iraq, where ISIS is waging a brutal war.

The Saudis are using radar and infrared cameras to make sure it doesn’t spill across the frontier.

Saudi Funding of ISIS – The Washington Institute for Near East Policy

Today, Saudi citizens continue to represent a significant funding source for Sunni groups operating in Syria. Arab Gulf donors as a whole — of which Saudis are believed to be the most charitable — have funneled hundreds of millions of dollars to Syria in recent years, including to ISIS and other groups. There is support for ISIS in Saudi Arabia, and the group directly targets Saudis with fundraising campaigns

• America’s Allies Are Funding ISIS – The Daily Beast

• Who’s Funding ISIS? Wealthy Gulf ‘Angel Investors,’ Officials Say – NBC News.com

• Qatar and Saudi Arabia ‘have ignited time bomb by funding global spread of radical Islam’ – Telegraph

Video: Who is Jihadi John? – in 60 seconds – Telegraph

“Jihadi John”, the masked Isil executioner and alleged British national,
known for his role in the beheadings of hostages by the Islamic State has
become one of the world’s most wanted men

• Jihadi John – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Second French suspect in Isis beheading video – The Local

A second Frenchman who appeared among Islamic State jihadists in a grisly execution video has been identified as a 22-year-old man from an eastern suburb of Paris, a source close to the case said Wednesday.

President Francois Hollande earlier confirmed a second Frenchman was spotted in the video showing the beheading of Syrian prisoners, who the source said went by the name Abu Othman.

The two Frenchmen are seen in the brutal clip released by the IS group on Sunday which features the killing of 18 Syrian prisoners and a US aid worker.

High Note

First pot auction held in Washington state

History was made Saturday on a tiny farm outside Prosser. For the first time, marijuana was sold at an auction.

Those in the retail pot business say it’s a sign supply is slowly starting to meet demand.

Most of the U.S. could never do what Randy Williams and his Fireweed Farms pulled off – 500 pounds of pot were on sale.

Why Congress Probably Won’t Block Marijuana Legalization In Washington, D.C.

Initiative 71 cannot take effect until after D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson submits it to Congress for review, which he is expected to do when the new Congress is seated in January. “I will treat Initiative 71 in the same manner as I would any measure passed by the Council and transmit it to Congress without delay,” he said last week. Although Mayor-elect Bowser indicated that she would like to wait until the D.C. Council has approved legislation authorizing the licensing of commercial growers and retailers, the timing is up to Mendelson.

Once Mendelson submits the initiative, Congress has 30 legislative days to pass a resolution overriding it. If a resolution is not enacted by the end of that period, the initiative automatically becomes law. Getting a bill through both chambers in that amount of time will be a challenge, even with Republicans taking control of the Senate and expanding their majority in the House. And that’s assuming Republicans—who, as Rohrabacher noted, often talk about the virtues of federalism and local control—think nullifying a policy endorsed by 69 percent of D.C. voters should be one of their first acts in the new Congress.

“I think a resolution of disapproval is unlikely,” says Bill Piper, director of national affairs at the Drug Policy Alliance. “Overturning a ballot measure passed by 70 percent of the voters doesn’t really look good for the incoming Republican Congress. If the council transmits [the initiative] in January, I think that pretty much reduces or eliminates the chance that Congress will overturn it outright. It just doesn’t fit with what they’re talking about doing, which is rebranding themselves as not being obstructionists.”