Ice cream and military recruiters

Local governments around the United States are fingerprinting people who drive ice cream trucks for no good reason (they think they're perverts), which I wrote about for VICE.

Military recruiters are also dishonest creeps who have data on millions of Americans, which I also wrote about for VICE.

Connecticut Democrats kill student privacy bill

Last month, a measure that would have barred schools in Connecticut from sharing student test results with military recruiters easily passed the state Education Committee. Today, that legislation died.

In an email, Rep. Jack Hennessy, a Democrat, told me that “the Veterans’ Affairs Committee met this morning and killed the bill.” Hennessy is the chairman of that committee. He did not say why.

The legislation, which would have stopped schools from sharing with recruiters data collected as part of the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB) — advertised to high school students as a career aptitude exam — was opposed by the Pentagon, which I suppose is all the explanation we need.
Democrats control 120 out of 187 seats in the state legislature, as well as the governor’s office.

UPDATE: I wrote about the bill's failure for VICE.

Money for war, but can't feed the poor

Liberals and conservatives are both wrong about taxes, I argue in a piece for VICE which notes that when some people learn the truth about what the IRS does with their money, they never pay their taxes again.

You say you want a revolution

My latest piece for VICE tells the tale of how one FBI agent infiltrated a left-wing activist group and tried to get a bunch of people thrown behind bars for talking about revolution. Read and share with your lovers and/or loved ones.