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From the Los Angeles Times

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L.A. County ordinance cracks down on 'puppy mill' abuses

The law's stiffest requirements cover breeding facilities with more than 50 dogs, subjecting them to more frequent inspections and increased minimum hours of staffing.

March 18, 2011

"Puppy mills" are the factory farms of dog breeding — big and, all too often, neglectful and cruel. Female dogs are frequently overbred in back-to-back heat cycles to the point that their bones break and their teeth fall out. Hundreds, even thousands, of breeding dogs and puppies can end up crammed into filthy cages, according to animal welfare advocates, who have made numerous undercover videos of some of the worst abusers across the country.

But like factory farms, puppy mills are perfectly legal. They are subject to Animal Welfare Act standards so minimal that even the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which enforces them and licenses facilities, urges operators to exceed the standards. Shutting them down is difficult. In Missouri, where there are more commercial dog breeding facilities than anywhere else in the country, a ballot proposition that limited facilities to 50 breeding dogs was approved by voters last year but is now in danger of being dismantled by the state's Legislature. A California bill calling for similar size restrictions passed both houses of the Legislature but was vetoed by then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2009. (He said that although he decried animal abuse, the bill went too far.)

If governments are having difficulty capping the number of animals a facility can handle, lawmakers can at least tighten oversight. That's what the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors did this week when it approved an ordinance, championed by Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich, that will more closely regulate anyone — breeders, groomers, operators of boarding kennels — housing more than just a few pets.

But the law's stiffest requirements cover breeding facilities with more than 50 dogs, subjecting them to more frequent inspections by animal control officers, an extensive annual veterinary exam for each dog over 1 year old and increased minimum hours of staffing. (Facilities must be staffed 18 hours a day.) The law bans breeding of females under 1 year old. Three days before a dog gives birth, it must be separated from other adult dogs, provided with a nesting area to nurse and housed alone with its litter.

All animal facilities, no matter how big, must have working smoke detectors and fire suppression equipment. And all animals for sale must be microchipped or tattooed before they are sold or at 4 months old. "If we see sick animals, we want to be able to trace them back," said Marcia Mayeda, the head of the county's Department of Animal Care and Control, which is charged with enforcing the ordinance.

The new law is still not as strong as some animal welfare organizations would like. Dale Bartlett of the Humane Society of the United States notes that it doesn't require that dogs rest between breeding cycles, though he says it is still a good and important ordinance.

The new regulations cover only unincorporated parts of Los Angeles County, an area that is not exactly a center of puppy mills. However, it was the discovery in 2008 of bad conditions, including severe overcrowding, at a facility in the Antelope Valley that spurred the creation of the county ordinance. There are currently six commercial facilities in rural areas, each with somewhere between 90 and 245 breeding females — and all of their puppies. So the number of animals affected is significant.

It's doubtful that anyone intends to buy a puppy from a puppy mill when they go into a pet store, but animal welfare advocates contend that that is what happens. For the moment, it rests with local governments to tighten controls on large-scale commercial breeders. "Down the line we're hoping that county legislators will look at this ordinance and say, 'We can make this stronger,' " said Elizabeth Oreck, who runs the puppy mill initiative for Best Friends Animal Society.

For now, the county's new law is a good move toward identifying and reforming neglectful breeding.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-dogs-20110318,0,2646910,print.story

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From the New York Times

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Pornography Sites Will Be Allowed to Use .XXX Addresses

SAN FRANCISCO — The agency governing Internet addresses on Friday approved the creation of a new red-light district on the Web, but the decision may not end years of fighting over the contentious plan.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers authorized the creation of an .xxx suffix for pornography Web sites. The decision was immediately slammed by some of the sex industry's biggest names.

Industry members say they fear they could be subject to arbitrary censorship by governments and even by a new board overseeing the dot-xxx domain. They also say the plan would unfairly force existing pornography sites to register their sister domain names ending in xxx to prevent other businesses from using the names.

“Our industry is unanimously opposed,” said Diane Duke, executive director of the Free Speech Coalition, a trade association representing more than 1,000 pornography businesses. Ms. Duke said that she expected the association's members, which include companies like Hustler and Adam & Eve, to continue to use dot-com addresses. She also said the association was considering its legal options.

The dot-xxx registry was also opposed by some religious groups, who feared that the new domain would lead to the further spread of pornography on the Internet.

The decision is a big win for ICM Registry, a Florida-based company that first applied for the dot-xxx domain in 2004. ICM will oversee the domain and profit from it. Its chief executive, Stuart Lawley, dismissed his detractors.

“The opposition has been very small and very vocal,” he said. “It has been completely overblown.”

He said sites in the dot-xxx domains would be scanned daily for viruses and would be offered a payment-processing system that customers would be able to trust.

“Everybody wins,” said Mr. Lawley. “The consumer of adult sites wins. The providers will benefit because more people will become paying customers. And those who don't want to go there will win as well, because the sites will be easier to filter.”

Mr. Lawley said tens of thousands of businesses had already reserved some 200,000 dot-xxx domains. Each registration will cost $60 a year.

Peter Dengate Thrush, the chairman of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers board, said in an interview that the vote vindicated the accountability of his organization. The corporation had originally opposed the application by ICM Registry in 2007. But after ICM appealed, the organization tentatively reversed that vote in June, and said that its decision to give the project a green light was made purely on technical grounds.

“This is a test of our accountability mechanisms,” Mr. Thrush said. “In the end, I think the system was able to cope with a contentious matter. We are trying to build a self-regulating industry, and this is self-regulation at work.”

Mr. Thrush said that some established Web sites probably opposed the new dot-xxx domains for business reasons.

“We heard from a number of them that they didn't want it,” Mr. Thrush said. “The board wasn't persuaded by their arguments. They are incumbents, and they are trying to oppose a new entrant.”

Nine board members voted to approve the registry, and three voted against it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/19/technology/19domain.html?pagewanted=print

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U.S. Pledges Rights Improvements

The United States disavowed torture on Friday and pledged to treat terrorism suspects humanely, but rejected calls to drop the death penalty, as the United Nations carried out its first review of Washington's human rights record.

At the Human Rights Council in Geneva, the American envoy, Harold Koh, said the United States would agree to improvements in areas including civil rights, national security and immigration, and would not tolerate torture or the inhumane treatment of suspects at the Guantánamo Bay detention facility in Cuba.

But he said the United States would not change its policy on the death penalty, which critics say is inhumane and unfairly applied. Mr. Koh said capital punishment was permitted under international law.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/19/world/19briefs-ART-Nations.html?ref=world&pagewanted=print

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American Official Warns That Qaddafi May Lash Out With New Terrorist Attacks

The United States is bracing for possible Libyan-backed terrorist attacks, President Obama's top counterterrorism official said on Friday.

The official, John O. Brennan, said that the military attacks on civilians ordered in recent days by Libya's leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, coupled with his track record as a sponsor of terrorism, had heightened worries within the administration as an international coalition threatens military action against Libya.

Asked if American officials feared whether Colonel Qaddafi could open a new terrorism front, Mr. Brennan said: “Qaddafi has the penchant to do things of a very concerning nature. We have to anticipate and be prepared for things he might try to do to flout the will of the international community.”

Among the threats the United States is focusing on is Libya's stockpile of deadly mustard gas, he said.

Mr. Brennan spoke to reporters after addressing the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University Law School in Manhattan. The center is named for Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan Jr., who died in 1997 and was no relation to Mr. Brennan.

After renouncing its nascent nuclear weapons program in 2003, and enjoying a brief interlude as Washington's partner in combating Al Qaeda's branch in North Africa, Libya has reverted to its status as a pariah government whose intelligence operatives blew up Pan Am Flight 103 above Scotland in 1988.

Mr. Brennan acknowledged that the political turmoil in the Middle East in the past three months had breached or weakened counterterrorism cooperation among some Arab countries. But he added that the United States had taken unspecified steps in recent months to offset its losses in that area. Among those steps may be more electronic eavesdropping, spy satellite coverage and more informants on the ground, independent intelligence specialists said.

“We've been able to weather some of these storms, but clearly there have been effects,” he said. “We need to work hard to ensure that the cooperation that existed before with certain countries continues.”

Mr. Brennan declined to provide details of what the United States was doing or which countries it was focusing on, but it is no secret that American spy agencies have worked closely with counterparts in countries like Egypt, Tunisia and Yemen.

“When politics change, frequently security and intelligence services that are dedicated to thwarting transnational terrorist groups, they remain largely unaffected because their focus is on those elements that are trying to undermine the security and stability of the country,” Mr. Brennan said.

He said American spy services and law enforcement agencies had worked with some Arab counterparts in recent weeks to disrupt terrorist plots that allied officials had been tracking even before the political tumult in the region boiled over. He said a number of jailed terrorism suspects or sympathizers in those countries who had been released or escaped in the recent chaos had been “rounded up and brought back.”

But not all. Egypt's governing military council released the younger brother of Ayman al-Zawahri , Al Qaeda's second in command, from prison on Thursday after holding him for a decade on charges of conspiracy to overthrow the government.

Asked about the release of this prominent prisoner, Mr. Brennan barely disguised his frustration with Egyptian military officials. “I'm concerned if any individual who is involved in terrorism is released either intentionally or as a result of the lack of security,” he said.

Any terrorism threat from Colonel Qaddafi would join a regional roster that includes affiliates of Al Qaeda in Yemen and North Africa, which may seek to carve out a safe haven in Libya's south. “Al Qaeda has a demonstrated track record of trying to exploit political vacuums, political change or uncertainty in a number of countries,” Mr. Brennan said. “The situation in Libya now will be no exception.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/19/world/africa/19terror.html?ref=us&pagewanted=print

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A Price Too High?

Catastrophes happen.

No one thought the Interstate 35W bridge across the Mississippi River in Minneapolis would collapse. No one thought the Gulf of Mexico would be fouled to the horrible extent that it was by the BP oil spill. The awful convergence of disasters in Japan — a 9.0 earthquake followed by a tsunami and a devastating nuclear power emergency — seemed almost unimaginable.

Worst-case scenarios unfold more frequently than we'd like to believe, which leads to two major questions regarding nuclear power that Americans have an obligation to answer.

First, can a disaster comparable to the one in Japan happen here? The answer, of course, is yes — whether caused by an earthquake or some other event or series of events. Nature is unpredictable and human beings are fallible. It could happen.

So the second question is whether it makes sense to follow through on plans to increase our reliance on nuclear power, thus heightening the risk of a terrible problem occurring here in the United States. Is that a risk worth taking?

Concern over global warming has increased the appeal of nuclear power, which does not produce the high levels of greenhouse gases that come from fossil fuels. But there has been a persistent tendency to ignore the toughest questions posed by nuclear power: What should be done with the waste? What are the consequences of a catastrophic accident in a populated area? How safe are the plants, really? Why would taxpayers have to shoulder so much of the financial risk of expanding the nation's nuclear power capacity, an effort that would be wildly expensive?

A big part of the problem at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi power station are the highly radioactive spent fuel rods kept in storage pools at the plant. What to do, ultimately, with such dangerous waste material is the nuclear power question without an answer. Nuclear advocates and public officials don't talk about it much. Denial is the default position when it comes to nuclear waste.

In New York, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said again this week that the 40-year-old Indian Point nuclear power plant in Westchester County, 35 miles north of New York City, should be closed. Try to imagine the difficulty, in the event of an emergency, of evacuating such an area with its millions of residents. “This plant in this proximity to New York City was never a good risk,” said the governor.

There are, blessedly, very few catastrophic accidents at nuclear power plants. And there have not been many deaths associated with them. The rarity of such accidents provides a comfort zone. We can look at the low probabilities and declare, “It can't happen here.”

But what if it did happen here? What would the consequences be? If Indian Point blew, how wide an area and how many people would be affected, and what would the cleanup costs be? Rigorously answering such questions is the only way to determine whether the potential risk to life and property is worthwhile.

The 104 commercial nuclear plants in the U.S. are getting old, and many have had serious problems over the years. There have been dozens of instances since 1979, the year of the Three Mile Island accident, in which nuclear reactors have had to be shut down for more than a year for safety reasons.

Building new plants, which the Obama administration favors, can be breathtakingly expensive and requires government loan guarantees. Banks are not lining up to lend money on their own for construction of the newest generation of Indian Points.

In addition to the inherent risks with regard to safety and security, the nuclear industry has long been notorious for sky-high construction costs, feverish cost-overruns and projects that eventually are abandoned. The Union of Concerned Scientists, in a 2009 analysis of the costs associated with nuclear plant construction, said that once a plant came online it usually led to significant rate increases for customers:

“Ratepayers bore well over $200 billion (in today's dollars) in cost overruns for completed nuclear plants. In the 1990s, legislators and regulators also allowed utilities to recover most ‘stranded costs' — the difference between utilities' remaining investments in nuclear plants and the market value of those plants — as states issued billions of dollars in bonds backed by ratepayer charges to pay for utilities' above-market investments.”

The refrain here is familiar: “The total cost to ratepayers, taxpayers and shareholders stemming from cost overruns, canceled plants and stranded costs exceeded $300 billion in today's dollars.”

Nuclear power is hardly the pristine, economical, unambiguous answer to the nation's energy needs and global warming concerns. It offers benefits and big-time shortcomings. Ultimately, the price may be much too high.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/19/opinion/19herbert.html?ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

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EDITORIAL

A New Internet Privacy Law?

Considering how much information we entrust to the Internet every day, it is hard to believe there is no general law to protect people's privacy online. Companies harvest data about people as they surf the Net, assemble it into detailed profiles and sell it to advertisers or others without ever asking permission.

So it is good to see a groundswell of support emerging for minimum standards of privacy, online and off. This week, the Obama administration called for legislation to protect consumers' privacy. In the Senate, John Kerry is trying to draft a privacy bill of rights with the across-the-aisle support of John McCain.

Microsoft, which runs one of the biggest Internet advertising networks, said it supports a broad-based privacy law. It has just introduced a version of its Explorer browser that allows surfers to block some tools advertisers use to track consumers' activities online.

It is crucial that lawmakers get this right. There is strong pressure from the advertising industry to water down rules aimed at limiting the data companies can collect and what they can do with it.

Most oppose a sensible proposal by the Federal Trade Commission for a do-not-track option — likely embedded in Web browsers. They have proposed self-regulation instead, and we applaud their desire to do that, but the zeal to self-regulate tends to wane when it is not backed by government rules and enforcement.

Senator Kerry has not yet proposed specific legislation, but he has laid out sound principles. Companies that track people's activities online must obtain people's consent first. They must specify what data they are collecting and how they will use it. They need consumers' go-ahead to use data for any new purpose. They are responsible for the data's integrity. And consumers should have the right to sever their relationship with data collectors and ask for their file to be deleted.

But there are potential areas of concern. Senator Kerry so far has not called for a do-not-track option. He would allow companies to write their own privacy plans and submit them to the F.T.C. for approval.

That would give companies flexibility to adapt their solutions as technology evolved, but it lacks the simplicity and universality of a do-not-track feature. It could yield a dizzying array of solutions that would confuse consumers about their rights and options and make it more difficult to enforce clear standards. Moreover, it would make it tougher for consumers to keep track of how their information is used and to whom it is sold.

Advertising firms still argue that privacy protections could undermine the free Internet, depriving it of ad revenue by reducing advertisers' ability to target consumers. This is overstated. Advertisers will still need to advertise. If many people opt out of behavioral targeting, the firms will find other ways to do it.

Privacy protections are long overdue. We hope the swell of support will lead to significant legislation.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/19/opinion/19sat2.html?ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

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From Google News

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Arizona, Bowing to Business, Softens Stand on Immigration

Arizona established itself over the past year as the most aggressive state in cracking down on illegal immigrants, gaining so much momentum with its efforts that several other states vowed to follow suit. But now the harsh realities of economics appear to have intruded, and Arizona may be looking to shed the image of hard-line anti- immigration pioneer.

In an abrupt change of course, Arizona lawmakers rejected new anti-immigration measures on Thursday, in what was widely seen as capitulation to pressure from business executives and an admission that the state's tough stance had resulted in a chilling of the normally robust tourism and convention industry.

The State Senate voted down five bills that among other things sought to require hospitals to inform law enforcement officials when treating patients suspected of being in the country illegally and to prod the Supreme Court to rule against automatic citizenship for American-born children of illegal immigrants.

The Senate move was a victory for the Arizona business lobby, which on many issues is more moderate than state lawmakers. And it was a rebuke for the State Senate president, Russell Pearce, a Republican and the driving force behind tough immigration measures, including the law passed last April requiring police to question the status of anyone they stop if they have a “reasonable suspicion” that the person might be an illegal immigrant.

Opponents of the five bills said that the state's image had been hit hard, and that it did not make sense to pass new measures while the state had already put itself so far out in front of other states and the federal government on the issue — at a cost to tourism and other industries.

They said that previous immigration bills were still being reviewed by the courts, and that it was not smart to pass new legislation that plainly conflicted with the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.

“I don't believe that anyone, including myself, foresaw the national and international reaction” to April's bill, said Glenn Hamer, chief executive of the Arizona Chamber of Commerce and Industry, who said estimates of lost tourism business ranged from $15 million to $150 million. “Now we have that experience under our belts. We know these measures can cause economic damage; it's just a matter of degree.”

A letter signed by 60 state business leaders this week blamed last year's bill for boycotts, canceled contracts, declining sales and other economic setbacks.

“Arizona's lawmakers and citizens are right to be concerned about illegal immigration,” the letter said. “But we must acknowledge that when Arizona goes it alone on this issue, unintended consequences inevitably occur.”

While Mr. Hamer said he doubted the bills could have been defeated on Thursday without broad-based business opposition, he cautioned that support for tighter restrictions on immigration remained strong in a number of quarters. But, he added, “Our hope is that these types of measures have crested and we could spend our time on efforts that could rebuild our economy.”

Indeed, state politicians and other officials interviewed after the bills' defeat said it was too soon to tell whether the turnabout represented a long-term change, or merely a breather until the economy rebounds. Concerns about illegal immigration remain a significant issue, and many state leaders are angry with what they describe as the federal government's unwillingness to take firm action.

But for now, “enough is enough,” said State Senator John McComish, a Republican who voted no on all five bills.

Gov. Jan Brewer, a Republican, did not take a position on the five bills that were voted down Thursday — her normal practice on legislation that has not reached her desk, a spokesman said on Friday.

An aide said Senator Pearce was unavailable for comment.

Crucial to changing the discussion was a clearly articulated and executed strategy by the state business lobby, which made concerns over negative economic effects a far more significant factor than in the debate last year.

State Senator Kyrsten Sinema, a Democrat, said business opposition — in contrast to what she called the tepid and delayed efforts of its leaders last year — gave Republicans the political protection they needed to vote no.

“They have been working since January to provide people cover against these bills,” Senator Sinema said. Twenty-one of 30 state senators are Republicans, and none of the bills would have been defeated without many of them voting in opposition.

The effect on the state's convention and tourism industry after the April vote was immediate. Convention bookings plunged in Phoenix, one of the top destinations in the United States, with large organizations citing the immigration bill when canceling their reservations.

“It was definitely a drastic decline,” said Kristen Jarnagin, vice president of communications for the Arizona Hotel and Lodging Association. She and other business officials pointed to data on bookings showing Phoenix's ranking, on some measures, had dropped from the top four destinations nationwide to 23rd.

So far, Arizona-style anti-immigration bills have not lived up to their advance billing in other states, which despite strengthened Republican legislative majorities have failed to pass any identical bills. Similar proposals are still advancing in some states, but they, too, have encountered strong business opposition.

“Our legislature and our state are suffering from immigration fatigue,” Senator McComish said. “We've been at the forefront of this issue, and I think it is time for a timeout.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/19/us/19immigration.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss&pagewanted=print

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