By Charles Ornstein/ProPublica

An internal review by the University of Illinois has found that an advertisement in which a university surgical team endorsed a pricey surgical robot violated school policies.
Though the team acted “in good faith,” the review concluded, the episode pointed to the need for clearer rules and stronger enforcement.
The review by the university system’s vice president of research followed criticism of the ad for the da Vinci surgical robot that ran in the New York Times Magazine in January. It featured a dozen members of the surgery team at the University of Illinois Hospital and Health Sciences System above the headline “We believe in da Vinci surgery because our patients benefit.”

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Posted on March 20, 2014

By Steve Rhodes

“First-time candidate Bruce Rauner eked out a surprisingly narrow victory over state Sen. Kirk Dillard for the Republican governor nomination in Tuesday’s primary as Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn launched an early TV attack ad against his wealthy challenger,” the Tribune reports.
Surprising only to those who believed the polls. For example, the Beachwood Bookmaking Bureau never wavered from placing Dillard atop the leader board – though we certainly should have downgraded the sliding Bill Brady had we updated the board since its last, Feb. 28 posting.
In fact, one has to wonder how much the polls showing Rauner with a 20-point lead affected the race. Were potential Dillard voters discouraged? Were wavering voters persuaded to “go with the winner?” What about the impact of the cynical punditry that kept insisting the election was a lock? And what about the overall media performance that delivered Rauner gobs of attention – not all of it positive, to be sure – while the other campaigns were left begging?
As I’ve said before, Rauner’s money didn’t just buy saturating advertising, but saturating reporting. And yet, we’re left with a candidate who was allowed to dodge just about every issue and outright dodge reporters – even on Election Night.
When the pundits do their analyses of what happened and why, I’m sure they’ll leave themselves out of the equation. But we all know media coverage impacts campaigns. If it doesn’t, why bother?

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Posted on March 19, 2014

By Steve Rhodes

Those of you who are longtime Beachwood readers know I won’t be voting today because I don’t believe journalists should participate in the internal activities of political parties. And that’s what a primary is: The parties are deciding their nominees for the fall.
That doesn’t mean there aren’t some folks I’m pulling for – Will Guzzardi and Jay Travis come to mind.
But I’m not a Democrat, so those choices aren’t mine to make.
Those of you who are longtime Beachwood readers also know that I don’t believe voting is the end-all, be-all of democracy. In fact, it’s nothing more than fig leaf on the real, anti-democratic machinery that wants you to think you chose your political representatives when in fact your political leaders gamed the system to leave you with few real choices – especially in Chicago, Illinois.

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Posted on March 18, 2014

By The Chicago Headline Club

In honor of Sunshine Week, Citizen Watchdog is asking citizens to join a nation-wide audit of local government websites. Go to watchdogwire.com for more information.
Can you access budgets on your county website, or find contact information for all public officials? Are meeting minutes available? Is there a database of all public spending?
It’s surprisingly easy to audit your city or county website – here’s how you get started:

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Posted on March 17, 2014

By The Electronic Frontier Foundation

Representing a large group of top computer science experts and professors, the Electronic Frontier Foundation on Thursday submitted a brief to a federal appeals court supporting the American Civil Liberties Union’s lawsuit over the NSA’s mass call records collection program. At the core of the brief is the argument that metadata matters.
Intelligence officials have often downplayed privacy concerns over the NSA’s interpretation of Section 215 of the Patriot Act by stating that the agency does not collect the “content” of calls, but only the metadata – who a person called, when, how long the conversation lasted and other information.
EFF’s brief begins with the line “It is not just metadata,” and goes on to explain how metadata collected on a massive scale can often reveal more personal information about an individual than content. The brief outlines how metadata can show patterns of behavior, political and religious affiliations, and other personal details, especially when combined with other data sources.

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Posted on March 14, 2014

By The Electronic Frontier Foundation

The Electronic Frontier Foundation asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday to set limits on warrantless searches of cell phones, arguing in two cases before the court that changing technology demands new guidelines for when the data on someone’s phone can be accessed and reviewed by investigators.
The amicus briefs were filed in Riley v. California and U.S. v. Wurie. In both cases, after arresting a suspect, law enforcement officers searched the arrestee’s cell phone without obtaining a warrant from a judge. Historically, police have been allowed some searches “incident to arrest” in order to protect officers’ safety and to preserve evidence. However, in the briefs filed Monday, EFF argues that once a cell phone has been seized, the police should be required to get a search warrant to look through the data on the phone.

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Posted on March 13, 2014

By Steve Rhodes

In preparation for a Sun-Times event with David Axelrod, the paper’s political reporter, Natasha Korecki, put out a call over Twitter for questions readers would like to see asked.
I responded. In vain, predictably.
Here’s the Sun-Times’s own write-up of the content-free night of gladhanding. Buttons and bullshit.
Now, here are the questions I suggested:

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Posted on March 12, 2014

By Steve Rhodes

This was the second debate in two nights and the third in a week – and it showed. Piling on the debates at the end of a campaign isn’t very constructive, and often sets up counter-productive dynamics.
For example, when there is a clear frontrunner, as there is in the case of Bruce Rauner, the dynamic becomes “attack the frontrunner.” And then the media equation becomes “did anyone land a knockout blow” and by that time we’ve drifted far from reality because the veracity of the attacks matter little when a sense of inevitability sets in.
So here’s an idea: Schedule debates at the beginning, middle and end of the campaign. You’re welcome!

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Posted on March 6, 2014

By Steve Rhodes

This was easily a better affair than last week’s ABC7 debate, and the main reason for that was moderator Carol Marin, who asked a combination of fresh questions and old questions wrapped in fresh formulations. She also actually listened to the candidates’ answers and wasn’t afraid to follow-up on their claims.
Let’s take a look.

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Posted on March 5, 2014

President Talks Pretty, Acts Ugly

“Monday afternoon, Robert Duncan [reported] to Mendota Federal Prison in Fresno, Calif., to begin a two-year prison sentence,” Reason notes.
“His crime? Working for a medical marijuana business that was legal under California state law. Not owning it; not profiting from illegal sales. Merely for being employed by the business.
“The collective of dispensaries Duncan worked for, known as MediZen, was raided by federal authorities in 2011 during a crackdown on medical marijuana providers by the Obama administration.”
Here’s Duncan discussing his case with HuffPost Live.

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Posted on March 4, 2014