Facing off in last week’s foreign policy debate, Mitt Romney nodded in agreement with much of what President Obama has done with his powers as chief executive — including a full-on embrace of the president’s claim to sole authority to expand drone strikes to kill terrorist suspects. - The Republican presidential nominee has reserved the right to deploy U.S. military power to world hot spots, as Mr. Obama did in Libya, and to greenlight unilateral action against Iran. To the dismay of civil liberties activists, he has shifted his position on indefinite detention, agreeing with the president that U.S. citizens deemed “enemy combatants” are not entitled to habeas corpus.

Daily Caller: Obama executive order expands Homeland Security reach into local law enforcement

Iran risked Israeli military retaliation Monday with the dispatch of a naval task force to Sudan just days after a widely reported airstrike by the Jewish state against a missile base run by Tehran in Khartoum. - Sudanese state media said that a docking ceremony was staged in Port Sudan to receive the convoy led by an Iranian naval frigate and corvette warship. Commanders of the Iranian flotilla reportedly met Sudanese navy chiefs as a gesture of "peace and friendship". But Israel sees the increasingly close military links between Iran and Sudan as a credible threat. It fears Iran is building missiles to supply Hizbollah and the Syrian regime.

ICH: Israeli Jets Bomb Sudan "Missile Site" in Dry Run for Iran attack

Interior ministry order is latest effort to counter anti-government uprising in which [at least] 50 people have died since early last year. - [The illegitimate] Bahrain regime banned all protest gatherings on Tuesday and threatened legal action against groups said to be backing escalating demonstrations and clashes. The interior ministry order is the most sweeping attempt to quash the anti-government uprising in the Sunni-ruled kingdom since martial law was imposed during the early months of unrest last year. It sharply increases pressure on political groups from Bahrain's Shia majority, which has led the protests in support of a greater political voice.

Firefighters used a boat to rescue 25 people from a huge fire in Queens, New York on Monday. At least five buildings were burning on the heavily flooded street. (Oct. 30)

Monster Storm Sandy slammed into the East Coast Monday, killing at least 16 people, hurling a record-breaking 13-foot surge of seawater at New York City and knocking out power to over 6 million people. - The massive storm was downgraded from a hurricane after it barged ashore in southern New Jersey, bringing more than 85-mph winds and a roiling wall of seawater as it moved through New York City. It sent water surging into two major commuter tunnels and into subway stations and tracks. It was unclear how much water had come in. The 16 deaths were reported in New Jersey, New York, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Connecticut. Some of the victims were killed by falling trees. Police in Toronto said a woman was killed by a falling sign as high winds closed in on Canada's largest city. The power was out for hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers and an estimated 6.2 million people altogether across the East, with the full extent of the storm's damage across the region unclear and unlikely to be known until daybreak.

LiveOilPrices: Brent oil price up over $109 as Hurricane Sandy threatens partial operation shutdown
Business Insider: While Almost Everyone Else Is Dark, The Lights Are Still Shining At Goldman Sachs
Yahoo: Nation's oldest nuclear plant on alert
The Guardian: Sandy hits US east coast causing flooding and power cuts - live updates
The Independent: 13 killed, New York flooded and in darkness and 6 million without power as superstorm Sandy throws a 4-metre wall of water at US

In the early 1970s, the prison population in the United States was small and was steadily falling relative to the size of the population. Experts imagined that in a few decades, the prison system as we know it could be successfully dismantled, but that began to change after President Nixon began the War on Drugs in 1971, resulting in a huge influx of convicts. The massive increase in prisoners has given rise to what some call the Prison Industrial Complex. Like its cousin, the Military Industrial Complex, government policy and spending continues to make private involvement in the prison system very lucrative. Taxpayer money is transferred to corporations to satisfy the increasing number of prisoners as a result of the drug war. As these corporations become bigger and more powerful, they can lobby for policies that will increase their business. Their business is to see you behind bars. More prisoners means more profit, which means more influence. It’s a continuing cycle that has reached a tipping point. Like all big businesses, private prisons invest heavily in government lobbying to ensure an ever increasing supply of new customers, in this case prisoners. Currently, private prison companies are negotiating with states to buy and manage public prisons, if in exchange the state can promise occupancy rates remain above 90 percent for at least 20 years. This of course only adds to incentivize the states to prosecute more citizens for more crimes.

A vessel with a nine-person crew and 700 tons of gold ore onboard has gone missing in stormy seas off Russia’s Pacific Coast. - The ship sent a distress call on Sunday as it was sailing from the coastal town of Neran to Feklistov Island in the Sea of Okhotsk. The vessel, hired by mining company Polymetal, was carrying 700 tons of gold ore from one deposit to another where it was to be processed. Gold ore is the material from which gold is extracted and contains only a small percentage of the precious metal. Polymetal’s spokesman on Monday would not estimate the value of the cargo. The company said it has shipped ore via that route before, and there was nothing unusual in shipping it by the sea.

Andrew Haldane said protestors were correct to focus on inequality as the chief reason for 2008 economic crash. - The Occupy Movement has found an unlikely ally in a senior Bank of England official, Andrew Haldane, who has praised protesters for their role in triggering an overhaul of the financial services sector. Haldane, who oversees the City for the central bank, said Occupy acted as a lever on policymakers despite criticism that its aims were too vague. He said the protest movement was right to focus on inequality as the chief reason for the 2008 crash, following studies that showed the accumulation of huge wealth funded by debt was directly responsible for the domino-like collapse of the banking sector in 2008. Speaking at a debate held by the Occupy Movement in central London, Haldane said regulations limiting credit use would undermine attempts by individuals to accumulate huge property and financial wealth at the expense of other members of society. Allowing banks to lend on a massive scale also drained funding from other industries, adding to the negative impact that unregulated banks had on the economy, he said.

Daily Bell: Now Central Bankers Directly Boost Occupy Movement
The Independent: Top Bank of England director admits Occupy movement had a point

Are you made uneasy by the soaring number of surveillance cameras being installed in big cities across the US? If so, don’t take solace in your sedan: cops are using cameras to collect intelligence on cars, even when no crimes are being committed.

License plate scanners are nothing new for law enforcement, but more and more agencies across the US are relying on the technology as equipment becomes more affordable. As the cost of being able to catch a glimpse at every automobile in town drops day by day, though, the odds of being surveilled for simply riding around town is doing just the opposite. A recent post published on the PrivacySOS.org blog directs viewers to a YouTube video produced by PIPS Technology, the self-described world leader in automated license plate recognition, or ALPR, technology. PIPS’ devices are deployed in police cruisers across the US, and in Little Rock, Arkansas, for example, cops say the equipment is well worth the $18,000-per-unit price tag. But while PIPS may be touting their product as something of a must-have for police agencies, the manufacturer is staying silent when it comes to discussing the blatant privacy violations it commits every second its in use. "(It) can scan the mall parking lot in a matter of minutes," Sergeant Brian Dedrick, of the North Little Rock Police Department tells Arkansas Matters of his ALPR scanner. "We couldn't even do that three years go."

Polish investigators found traces of explosives on the wreckage of the government jet that crashed in Russia two years ago, killing Poland's president and 95 others, daily Rzeczpospolita reported on Tuesday. - Without citing sources, the newspaper said prosecutors and explosive experts who examined the remains of the plane in Russia found signs of TNT and nitroglycerin on the wings and in the cabin, including on 30 seats. Traces of explosives were also found in the area where the Tu-154 crashed during its approach to a small airport near the Russian city of Smolensk on April 10, 2010, the daily reported. Poland's military prosecutor's office plans to respond to the report later on Tuesday, its spokesman said. Russian investigators had blamed the Polish crew for trying to land in heavy fog, while their Polish counterparts also said the airport controllers should not have allowed the plane to attempt an approach. Some rightist groups in Poland, including main opposition party Law and Justice, had rejected the findings and suggested the crash could have been an assassination of President Lech Kaczynski and political and military leaders who flew with him.

Zuma first sued for about $500,000, then cut his demand to a much lower amount and an apology, and after the cartoonist laughed at that offer Zuma finally quit the suit and agreed to pay a portion of the respondent’s legal fees. The cartoon, by satirist “Zapiro” aka Jonathan Shapiro, was published in 2008 before Zuma became president but after he was acquitted of rape and while he was up on corruption charges (he was acquitted). Cartoon is below. As to why the cartooned Zuma has a showerhead protruding from his skull: explanation here.