Paul Michel Posts

In a surprise ruling, a federal court will not dismiss a case contesting the constitutionality of the "no fly" list. Even more astounding is that the court forbade the administration from using the ubiquitous "state secrets" argument to get the suit thrown out.

Dark money has a white knight: the MayDay Political Action Committee. LinkedIn Co-Founder Reid Hoffman just made a $1M donation to the organization who's end goal is self-annihilation.

Dark money has a white knight: the MayDay Political Action Committee. LinkedIn Co-Founder Reid Hoffman just made a $1M donation to the organization who's end goal is self-annihilation.

Dark money has a white knight: the MayDay Political Action Committee. LinkedIn Co-Founder Reid Hoffman just made a $1M donation to the organization who's end goal is self-annihilation.

The NSA is spying on us. We knew that already. But the breadth and depth of their operations is staggering, and newly released leaked documents have outlined just a bit more of the picture.

The UN has acknowledged the need for governments to have some capability in accessing the troves of data its citizens produce, but in a new report condemns the current privacy violations many European, but especially the US, governments have perpetrated.

Off-the-grid social networks are gaining in popularity, and have been useful in Hong Kong's recent Umbrella Revolution. But what are they? And are they safe from the prying eyes of Chinese censors?

Texting is efficient. And efficiency is king. That's why so many offices, public and private, communicate with it. It becomes a problem, though, when it abuts the Freedom of Information Act. Where do those messages go?

Possibly the biggest reason not to go to war with the militant Islamic group ISIS is quite simply because they want us to.

Enter the "Shadow Lobbyist" – wielding outsized influence with those in power, but never having to register themselves to the public. A new bill, though, would close the loophole that allows this to continue.

The House GOP is pushing for an exemption that would allow big corporations to forgo publishing financial information – a huge setback for advocates of open data and transparency.

New government accountability sites are cropping up that use information gleaned off the web and put together in a user-friendly manner to track how and where the US government spends the taxpayers' money.

After public outcry, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has again made information on hospital mistakes public. They had quietly stopped providing information last month, but researchers and patients would have none of it.

A loophole in the fines Bank of America are forced to pay out could have homeowners hit with a hefty tax burden – all while the bank that defrauded them gets to write off its criminal behavior.

Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests are notoriously laborious and time-consuming, but the federal government's own (and fairly new) IT development department, 18F, is introducing an application to streamline the process.

New mapping technology is helping Austin combat a growing youth obesity problem.

Vaping is being sold as a risk-free alternative to traditional smoking. But the relatively new technology carries risks all its own.

US Senator Tim Kaine, along with a host of other lawmakers and women's health organizations, quickly responded to the Supreme Court's Hobby Lobby decision with legislation designed to secure birth control access for all women regardless of their employer's religious whims.

David Brat shocked everyone with his upset in the Virginia primaries against House Majority Leader Eric Cantor. What isn't shocking are the far-right screeds Brat's 23-year old campaign manager posted on his Facebook page.

An upcoming lawsuit by the Kentucky Teachers Retirement System (KTRS) claims Kentucky Governor Steve Bashear and his right wing friends in the General Assembly are starving the state's teachers' pensions. The most recent state budget has about half of what the KTRS asked for to keep the pensions solvent.