RUTHFULLY YOURS

The government argues that the new powers—intended to prevent British jihadists from fighting abroad and to stop them from returning if they do—are necessary to keep Britain safe.

Civil liberties groups counter that the measures are “draconian” in scope and represent a dramatic expansion of government surveillance powers, ones that are ripe for misuse if they are not matched by strong safeguards.

A key provision of the new law would authorize the government to seize the passports of terror suspects traveling to Iraq, Syria and other jihadist battlegrounds.

The British government has unveiled sweeping new counter-terrorism measures which—if approved by Parliament—would give the United Kingdom some of the “toughest powers in the world” to fight Islamic terrorism.

The government argues that the new powers—intended to prevent British jihadists from fighting abroad and to stop them from returning if they do—are necessary to keep Britain safe.

Civil liberties groups counter that the measures are “draconian” in scope and represent a dramatic expansion of government surveillance powers, ones that are ripe for misuse if they are not matched by strong safeguards.

The Counter Terrorism and Security Bill was introduced to the House of Commons (the lower house of Parliament) by Home Secretary Theresa May on November 26. The bill is being fast-tracked through Parliament and could become law as early as the beginning of 2015.

A key provision of the new law would authorize the government to seize the passports of terror suspects traveling to Iraq, Syria and other jihadist battlegrounds.

A loophole touted as a way for employers to wiggle out of the Affordable Care Act’s insurance mandate has been closed. What happened?
Officials got wind that some employers planned to bypass the mandate by giving their workers bonuses, asking them to decline company-sponsored insurance and sending them to the Obamacare marketplaces to buy subsidized policies. Nudging sick workers, in particular, onto the exchanges could save employers’ health plans money and shift the cost onto publicly subsidized plans. The Labor Department published new guidelines in November to explicitly forbid that practice.

Why did employers think they could get out of a federal mandate?
“Brokers were running around selling this idea that employers could give everybody a raise and say, ‘Go, get the tax credit, knock yourselves out,’ and they wouldn’t pay a penalty. Go figure—the IRS got wise to that,” says Keith McMurdy, a partner in the employee benefit division at Fox Rothschild, a law firm in New York City.

Hasn’t there been confusion around the employer mandate in general?
That probably hasn’t helped. Under the Affordable Care Act, so-called large employers—those with more than 50 employees—were supposed to offer insurance or pay penalties starting this year. But the Obama administration pushed that deadline back repeatedly after the bungled rollout of health insurance exchanges in late 2013. In fact, those delays are being challenged in the Republicans’ recent lawsuit against the administration.

Here’s a little-told success story: Israeli Arabs, women in particular, have made huge strides over the past decade at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, better known as Israel’s answer to MIT. Among both men and women, Arabs’ share of the Technion student body is now equal to their share of the overall population, an impressive achievement considering that more than half of Israeli Arab children live below the nation’s official poverty line.

I spoke today with Yosef Jabareen, an Arab professor of urban planning who spearheads the Technion’s effort to recruit and graduate Arab students. He shared a recently updated report he’s done and explained what he called “a dramatic change” in outcomes for Arab students. “For me, as an Arab professor, it’s fantastic,” said Jabareen. He earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees at the Technion, completed his education in the U.S. with a master’s from Harvard and a Ph.D. from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (America’s answer to the Technion), then returned to his alma mater and five years ago was named assistant to the senior vice president for minorities.In 2001, as this slide shows, Arabs accounted for only 11 percent of undergraduates at the Technion. The percentage rose steadily to 18 percent last year and jumped three percentage points more to 21 percent this year, which is the same as Arabs’ share of the population of Israel (not counting the West Bank or Gaza, of course). Jabareen says that in 1990 Arabs’ share of the student body was only 5 percent to 7 percent. So it’s at least tripled in a quarter-century.