Watercooler Sensation

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Bad News: You’re Sick. Worse News: You’re Not The Only You Anymore.

• Someone, it seems, stole a laptop from NIH. And now a couple thousand patients are at risk for identity theft. [Washington Post]
• On the laptop: seven years-worth of sensitive info on 2,500 patients who’d been involved in a clinical trial. Names. Medical diagnoses. Heart scans. The works.
• Oh, and in violation of government policy, none of the info was encrypted.
• NIH officials found out about the theft a month ago but decided not to tell any of the affected patients of the security breach because they didn’t want to alarm anyone.
• Sound familiar? Almost the exact same thing happened when the laptop was stolen from the car of a VA official a couple of years ago, putting thousands of veterans at risk of ID theft.
• In fact, there’s a string of these security breaches in government offices. A Government Accountability Office study this month found that out of 24 federal agencies reviewed, at least 19 had left American personal info at risk of being stolen.
• The Treasury Dept. reported the most incidents (340 incidents), followed by the Commerce Dept (295 incidents). In one case, an IRS employee reported a missing computer drive a month after he had last seen it. [Washington Post]
• In January, for example, the Transportation Security Administration put up a website for passengers mistakenly placed on the No-Fly List to petition to get their names off. The site wasn’t encrypted, nor was it on a safe government domain. [CRN]
• And in 2006, a computer hacker was able to steal data on 1,500 people from the Department of Energy’s Nuclear Weapons Program. Nuclear. Weapons. Program. Stolen: Names. Social security numbers. Oh, and security codes. [MSNBC]

Keep this in mind the next time the government says “yeah...trust us...” and wants to read your e-mails or record your phone calls.

Even The Strangest Economic Indicators Point To Recession

• Unemployment numbers...payrolls...stock prices...all these typical indicators are signaling bad news for the United States economy.
• Here are some other quirkier signs that the economy is sicker than a leper in a plague village: [AP]
• Necessities eat up more income: “By the end of 2007, 36 percent of consumers’ disposable income went to food, energy and medical care, a bigger chunk of income than at any time since records were first kept in 1960, according to Merrill Lynch.”
• People treat themselves less often: “The National Restaurant Association says 54 percent of restaurants reported declining traffic in January, and the government says eating at home increased last year for the first time since 2001.”
• Kids are moving back home: “Financial planners say that more than ever, parents are calling for advice on how to deal with grown children who have moved back in with Mom and Dad after losing a job or just to save money.”
• Less trash: “Less trash is being set on the curbs of Mesa, Ariz., where surging home foreclosures are leaving more houses empty...William Black, the city’s solid-waste management director, says people aren’t throwing out as many appliances and bulk items, like furniture. They’re sticking with what they have.”
• According to the Chicago Federal Reserve Bank’s National Activity Index, which is a “weighted average of 85 national indicators of economic activity"— both weird and mundane — a recession “has probably begun in the US.” [Forbes]
• John McCain’s brilliant plan to save the economy? Double Bush’s tax cuts, leave federal programs starved for funds, and shift the tax burden onto the backs of working class families. Needless to say, we’re skeptical... [MicCheck]

We feel a tingle in our economic nose.

This Is Afghanistan On Drugs

• Opium cultivation in Afghanistan has made news for as long as President Bush has lauded the country’s embattled government as a foreign policy “success.”
• Production of the drug has skyrocketed in recent years, and has served to fund the Taliban’s resurgence. [Mic Check]
• And now, things are just getting worse. Farmers cultivated a record 477,000 acres of opium in 2007, a 14% increase over the previous year. Total production, spurred by unusually high rainfall, increased even further, by 34%, the U.N. has said. [AP]
• Last year, only 13 of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces were poppy-free.
• Meanwhile, eradicating the poppy problem is becoming harder and harder. Some 100 police officers on Afghanistan’s poppy eradication force were killed in the line of duty over the last year, an official said Monday.
• 90% of the country’s poppies are grown in dangerous regions where insurgents hold sway and the government has little reach.

And get this: Many farmers in poppy-free provinces have started planting marijuana.

By the Numbers

Yesterday, the Justice Department finally agreed to let the Sirius/XM satellite radio merger go down. Here are a few things you’ll need to know when talking about it. Our favorite bit of trivia, of course, is that the National Association of Broadcasters paid former Attorney General John Ashcroft a nice chunk of change to fight against the deal for them, which he did by writing stirring letters to the Justice Department arguing the merger was a terrible, horrible idea. Before signing on with NAB, however, he called XM and offered to write stirring letters to the Justice Department arguing the merger was a wonderful, fantastic idea. It wasn’t until XM said they didn’t want his help (or his astronomical fee) that he switched sides.[WSJ] [Washington Post]

$4.22 billion

The amount Sirius will pay to acquire XM. They say they’ll save hundreds of millions in operating costs with the merger.

$12.95

The monthly subscription rate for Sirius or XM radio. Critics fear the merger will drive the cost up. The radio stations say customers can save money by choosing stations ala carte.

14 million

The number of subscribers the new superstation will have after a merger. XM has 6.9 million subscribers. Sirius, 4.7 million.

And now, the differences

Baseball

XM

Football

Sirius

Bubba the Love Sponge

Sirius

Ron & Fez

XM

All-Gay Channel

Sirius

All Black Talk

XM

Celebrities: Unfiltered

“I love Africa in general — South Africa and West Africa, they are both great countries.”

— Wise words from Paris Hilton, who thinks geography is hot. [The Sun]

Speed Round

$1,350

The selling price for an Illinois-shaped cornflake on eBay. In other news, we’re in the wrong line of work. [AP]

FUN WITH HEADLINES

“Man declared dead feels ‘pretty good’” [AP]

PETS DO THE DARNDEST THINGS

Chihuahua prays at a Zen temple. Meanwhile, our dog licks itself. [AP]

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

Leave it to the French to use re-marriage as a tool of domestic warfare. Ex-wife of French President Nicolas Sarkozy tied the knot at the famed Rainbow Room in New York’s Rockefeller Center...a mere month after her ex-husband got remarried to a singer slash model. [AP]

CONGRATULATIONS!

Everyone take a shot of tequila: Mexico is now the second-fattest country...losing to the United States. [McClatchy]

FRANKLY SMOKING

On HBO’s “Real Time,” Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) said he plans to file a bill to legalize “small amounts” of marijuana (AP).

$200,000

Amount of cash superstar Justin Timberlake gave in two $100,000 checks to music foundations in his hometown of Memphis. Create your own “Sexy Back” vs. “Giving Back” joke here. [US Magazine]

YOUR HUSBAND IS SOOOOOOOO UGLY

Drop the Hero and get with the Zero! Ladies, scientists say if you want to be happy for the rest of your life, you’d better marry a guy who’s uglier than you are. [Fox News]

TO DO LIST...IN SPACE

The crew of the space shuttle Endeavor, which launched March 11th, is working through their own version of March Madness. So far they’ve “muscled through a daunting to-do list, including five spacewalks to build a giant robot and install the first segment of a Japanese lab.” [AP]

WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM THEIR FRIENDS

Neil Aspinell, the childhood friend of Paul McCartney who became the Beatle’s first road manager and head of the group’s “Apple Corps” business, is dead at 66. [AP]

SNAKES...IN YOUR LUGGAGE

A man is bitten by a rattlesnake that stowed away in his luggage while he vacationed in North Carolina...but officials want you to stay calm: “We don’t want people to think this is a common thing and that they have to be afraid every time they unpack their bags,” says Kay Speerstra of the Animal Welfare League. [Washington Post]