Pirates and Patriots Award to Italian Soldier on Trial for Saving a Dying Mother Kitty, via the Guardian Dec. 22, 2013

Today's Pirates and Patriots Award goes to Italian "Lieutenant Barbara Balanzoni, a reservist who has since returned to her civilian job as an anaesthetist in Tuscany, is charged with gross insubordination. She committed the alleged offence while serving as medical officer at a Nato base in Kosovo."
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/22/italian-army-reservist-prosecuted-cat-life

"She said she found that the cat had been unable to deliver the last of her kittens, which was stillborn, and was certain to die. "If the cat had died, the entire area would have had to be disinfected. What is more, the surviving kittens could not have been fed. So they too would have died and created an even greater public health problem.""

The Italian government has time for this absurd trial on February 7, 2014.

Klayman et al., v. Obama et al. Judge Leon Attacks NSA "Orwellian" Dragnet of US and World Citizens

Today Pirates and Patriots are supporting US District Court Judge Richard Leon, who ruled against the NSA collection of everyone's phone and email records. The ruling is stayed for the NSA response.

"Leon wrote that James Madison, the architect of the US Constitution, would be "aghast" at the scope of the NSA's collection on Americans' communications data.
He also expressed doubt about the central rationale for the program cited by the NSA: that it is necessary for preventing terrorist attacks. “The government does not cite a single case in which analysis of the NSA’s bulk metadata collection actually stopped an imminent terrorist attack,” wrote Leon, a US district judge in the District of Columbia."

• Dragnet 'likely' in breach of fourth amendment
• Judge describes scope of program as 'Orwellian'
• Ruling relates to collection of Americans' metadata
• Read the full ruling here

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/16/nsa-phone-surveillance-likely-unconstitutional-judge

Account from The Slatest.
Judge Rules NSA Phone Program Likely Unconstitutional. By Josh Voorhees. December 16, 2013.
"U.S. District Court Judge Richard Leon found that the program appears to run afoul of the Fourth Amendment prohibition on unreasonable searches and seizures. He also said the Justice Department had failed to demonstrate that collecting the so-called metadata had helped to head off terrorist attacks. ..."
http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2013/12/16/nsa_unconstitutional_judge_richard_leon_rules_phone_spying_program_likely.html

A city bus in Washington displays a wraparound advertisement sponsored by the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund. Jim Lo Scalzo/European Pressphoto Agency

http://www.justiceonline.org/thank-you-edward-snowden/say-thank-you.html

By CHARLIE SAVAGE 

Published: December 16, 2013    http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/17/us/politics/federal-judge-rules-against-nsa-phone-data-program.html?_r=0

Arms from Arts : A Listing of Players and Their Arms

For those with historical, cultural, or artistic interest in the use of arms in films and other entertainment venues, the website internet movie fire arms data base offers a thorough selection of arms details. Whether the data base is correct is beyond the scope of this post. It seems thorough.
The website offers details such as the weapons used by Elizabeth Swann in The Pirates of the Caribbean.

According to the website, in The Curse of the Black Pearl, Elizabeth used a Brown Bess Flintlock Musket.
In Dead Man's Chest and At World's End, Elizabeth fired Flintlock Pistols.

http://www.imfdb.org/wiki/Keira_Knightley