Tech giants like Facebook, Google and Yahoo have had a rough year, battling with the government over privacy issues.---

Top of the Alty World

“How the NSA Almost Killed the Internet”--Wired

In a major shift, Medicare seeks the authority to ban physicians and other providers who engage in abusive prescribing to their patients.--ProPublica

A look at the “teenage misfit” who would become the Wikileaks mole.--Rolling Stone

Investigative reporter Nick Turse examines why U.S. Special forces are deployed in over 100 countries across the globe.--The Nation

Top of Alty Utah

The U.S. Supreme Court has put a stay on Utah's same-sex marriages.--Salt Lake City Weekly

Following a stay on same-sex marriages in the state from the U.S. Supreme Court, Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes says same-sex couples in a kind of “legal limbo.”--Q Salt Lake

Researchers have found that the landslide at the Kennecott mine actually caused two small earthquakes.--KUER

A Utah lawmaker will try again this session to pass a bill to limit the influence of anonymous campaign donations.--Utah Political Capitol

Rantosphere

Rolling Stone's Matt Taibi reacts to the “Yuppie Prohibition League” that have recently came out to denounce legal marijuana in states like Colorado.

“I think all of us who have smoked marijuana will admit that it's a drug that doesn't bring out one's inner Einstein. That said, nobody is dumber, or, for that matter, more dangerous than a drunk, and we long ago realized that we had to make alcohol legal. That's because the legalization question, whether about pot or alcohol, is never really a referendum on the drugs in question. It's much more a referendum on prohibition, which didn't work with an extremely dangerous, addictive and destructive drug like alcohol, and makes even less sense with marijuana.”--Rolling Stone

The Long View

A survey of rape cases in Salt Lake County has found a shocking lack of prosecutions.

“The key information the survey sought was the most disturbing: 94 percent of the 270 cases in the survey did not result in prosecutions. Of the 6 percent of cases that were prosecuted, 1 in 6 resulted in a conviction at trial; the rest saw the defendant plead guilty or plea-bargain out. Collateral information from the survey also raised red flags: Initial responding officers or detectives closed two-thirds of the 270 rape cases without first screening with a prosecutor to see if charges could be filed. In the 130 cases where detectives cited reasons for closing cases, the victim either didn’t want to pursue the case, “didn’t want to cooperate,” couldn’t be located, or the suspect was unknown. Of the third that actually made it to the DA, prosecutors declined to file charges on 75.5 percent.”--Salt Lake City Weekly