Wired is one of the few publications that acts as a watchdog on civil liberties and freedom of information issues, and I'm glad they do. The federal government far too often overreaches - and this looks like it's one of those times. Go read the whole thing:

(WIRED) -- An anarchist social worker raided by the feds wants his computers, manuscripts and pick axes back. He argues that authorities violated the U.S. Constitution and the rights of his mentally ill clients while searching for evidence that he broke an anti-rioting law on Twitter.

In a guns-drawn raid on October 1, FBI agents and police seized boxes of dubious "evidence" from the Queens, New York, home of Elliott Madison. A U.S. District Judge in Brooklyn has set a Monday deadline to rule on the legality of the search, and in the meantime has ordered the government to refrain from examining the material taken in the 6 a.m. search.

Madison, who counsels more than 100 severely mentally ill patients in New York, seems to have first drawn attention from the authorities at September's G-20 gathering of world leaders in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. There he was arrested on September 24 at a motel room for allegedly listening to a police scanner and relaying information on Twitter to help protesters avoid heavily-armed cops -- an activity the State Department lauded when it happened in Iran.

A week later, the Joint Terrorism Task Force, armed with a search warrant and backed by a federal grand jury investigation, raided Madison's house, which he shares with his wife of 13 years and several roommates. The squad seized his computers, camera memory cards, books, air-filtration masks, bumper stickers and political posters -- all purportedly evidence that the 41-year old social worker had broken a federal anti-rioting law that carries up to five years in prison.

But a closer look at the court documents leaves the unmistakable impression that Elliott Madison is yet another casualty of the government's nasty, post-9/11 habit of considering political dissidents as threats to national security.

Madison, his wife and his lawyer Martin Stolar say the search violates the Constitution's protections against general searches and prosecution for political speech. The police also seized mobile phones, citizen emergency kits, manuscripts, posters and even the couple's marriage license.

In a motion to throw out the search, Stolar called the search unconstitutional:

In this day and age, federally authorized agents entered the private home of a writer and urban planner and seized their books and writings. The warrant's vagueness and lack of specificity encouraged the agents to use their own discretion and their own views of the political universe to seize, or not to seize, items which they thought were evidence of a violation of the federal anti-riot statute. The law and the Constitution do not allow this. If there really is a grand jury investigation with possible future prosecution under [a federal anti-rioting law], the use of this statute as applied to demonstrations, demonstrators, and their supporters has profound 1st Amendment implications.

If Madison were an Iranian using Twitter to coordinate government protests, he'd likely be considered a hero in the West. Instead, the self-identified anarchist -- who volunteered in Louisiana after Katrina -- is now facing up to five years in prison for each count a grand jury cares to indict him on.

What decade are these people living in, anyway?

A Louisiana justice of the peace said he refused to issue a marriage license to an interracial couple out of concern for any children the couple might have.

Keith Bardwell, justice of the peace in Tangipahoa Parish, says it is his experience that most interracial marriages do not last long.

Neither Bardwell nor the couple immediately returned phone calls from The Associated Press. But Bardwell told the Daily Star of Hammond that he was not a racist.

"I do ceremonies for black couples right here in my house," Bardwell said. "My main concern is for the children."

Bardwell said he has discussed the topic with blacks and whites, along with witnessing some interracial marriages. He came to the conclusion that most of black society does not readily accept offspring of such relationships, and neither does white society, he said.

"I don't do interracial marriages because I don't want to put children in a situation they didn't bring on themselves," Bardwell said. "In my heart, I feel the children will later suffer."

If he does an interracial marriage for one couple, he must do the same for all, he said.

"I try to treat everyone equally," he said.

Yeah, he's a regular humanitarian. Not sure if this guy is up on his history or legal precedents but Loving v. Virginia made this kind of government interference illegal in 1967.

He might think he's not racist, but he sure as hell is being bigoted and needs to step down. As you might expect, the ACLU has picked up this case and will pursue it for the couple.

This is certainly good news. I don't know if it has a snowball's chance in hell of passing, but you never know:

Senators Chris Dodd (D-CT), Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Russ Feingold (D-WI), and Jeff Merkley (D-OR) announced today that they will introduce the Retroactive Immunity Repeal Act, which eliminates retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies that allegedly participated in President Bush’s warrantless wiretapping program.

“I believe we best defend America when we also defend its founding principles,” said Dodd. “We make our nation safer when we eliminate the false choice between liberty and security. But by granting retroactive immunity to the telecommunications companies who may have participated in warrantless wiretapping of American citizens, the Congress violated the protection of our citizen’s privacy and due process right and we must not allow that to stand.”

Senator Leahy, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee said, “Last year, I opposed legislation that stripped Americans of their right to seek accountability for the Bush administration’s decision to illegally wiretap American citizens without a warrant. Today, I am pleased to join Senator Dodd to introduce the Retroactive Immunity Repeal Act. We can strengthen national security while protecting Americans’ privacy and civil liberties. Restoring Americans’ access to the courts is the first step toward bringing some measure of accountability for the Bush-Cheney administration’s decision to conduct warrantless surveillance in violation of our laws.”

“Granting retroactive immunity to companies that went along with the illegal warrantless wiretapping program was unjustified and undermined the rule of law,” Feingold said. “Congress should not have short-circuited the courts’ constitutional role in assessing the legality of the program. This bill is about ensuring that the law is followed and providing accountability for the American people.”

All I know is months ago it was conventional wisdom in D.C. that the Democrats couldn't take the House, that candidates shouldn't talk about the war, and that the best way to try to win 15 seats was to throw all your money into about 18 of them, and hope for the best. In the end, that's not how it played out.

- Duncan Black, better known as Atrios, in November 2006.

Who boosted Howard Dean into the chairman's spot at the DNC, bringing his successful 50-state policy to fruition in last year's presidential race? The netroots did. And in 2006, who showed Rahm Emanuel that yes, we really could take control of Congress? We did.

Whose fundraising pushed the Democrats over the top in the 2008 Senate races? Ours did. Whose activist base drove the publicity, turnout and dollars in last year's presidential primaries and general election?

Duh.

So what have we accomplished? The war goes on and we've even expanded our presence in Afghanistan. The Bush-era encroachments on civil liberties have not only been embraced by a Democratic president, the Democratic Congress gives him their blessing. And with the goal of universal healthcare within tantalizing reach, we have Blue Dog Democrats - Democrats! trying to obstruct it.

Enough of kicking the Blue Dogs. What can we do to be more effective? Where did we go wrong?

Continue reading »

Spencer was at a Senate hearing and this is very disturbing.

Defense Department General Counsel Jeh Johnson moved the Obama administration into new territory from a civil liberties perspective. Asked by Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) the politically difficult but entirely fair question about whether terrorism detainees acquitted in courts could be released in the United States, Johnson said that “as a matter of legal authority,” the administration’s powers to detain someone under the law of war don’t expire for a detainee after he’s acquitted in court. “If you have authority under the law of war to detain someone” under the Supreme Court’s Hamdi ruling, “that is true irrespective of what happens on the prosecution side.”

Martinez looked surprised. “So the prosecution is moot?” he asked.

“No, no, not in my judgment,” Johnson said. But the scenario he outlined strongly suggested it is. If an administration review panel “determines this person is a security threat” and “for some reason is not convicted of a lengthy prison sentence, I think we have the authority to continue to detain someone” under “law of war authority” as granted by the September 2001 Authorization to Use Military Force, Johnson said. And beyond that source of authority “we have the authority in the first place.” I’m no lawyer, but that sounds a lot like Johnson is claiming inherent presidential authority from the Constitution to detain someone after he’s been acquitted in court if the president believes that person to be a security threat. [Update: I think I'm wrong about that. Johnson is claiming authority from the law-of-war construct for such detentions, and that doesn't stem from any constitutional interpretation of inherent power. Apologies.]

Oh, and Johnson also suggested that the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay might remain open after January 2010, since “you can’t prosecute some significant subset of 220 people before January.” He said the administration will continue to detain some of those Guantanamo detainees, “whether at Guantanamo or somewhere else.”

Glenn Greenwald has much more about the "Unjustice system."

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My longtime friend and colleague Chip Berlet of Political Research Associates was interviewed on NPR's Fresh Air earlier this week, talking about right-wing extremism (a term he actually loathes). It's a fascinating discussion and an enlightening listen, as it often is with Chip.

The focus of the discussion was a new paper Berlet wrote for PRA: "Toxic to Democracy: Conspiracy Theories, Demonization, and Scapegoating". [The main PDF is here.]

Berlet bounced off the paper for Huffington Post in discussing the Holocaust Museum shooting, and sums up his argument concisely:

People who believe conspiracist allegations sometimes act on those irrational beliefs, and this has concrete consequences in the real world. The shooting today is a prime example of why it is a mistake to ignore bigoted conspiracy theories. Law enforcement needs to enforce laws against criminal behavior. Vicious bigoted speech, however, is often protected by the First Amendment. We do not need new laws or to encourage government agencies to further erode civil liberties. We need to stand up as moral people and speak out against the spread of bigoted conspiracy theories. That's not a police problem, that's our problem as people responsible for defending a free society.

... Apocalyptic aggression is fueled by right-wing pundits who demonize scapegoated groups and individuals in our society, implying that it is urgent to stop them from wrecking the nation. Some angry people already believe conspiracy theories in which the same scapegoats are portrayed as subversive, destructive, or evil. Add in aggressive apocalyptic ideas that suggest time is running out and quick action mandatory and you have a perfect storm of mobilized resentment threatening to rain bigotry and violence across the United States.

Now the only question is: Will Bill O'Reilly send one of his ambush crews after Chip now?

You know, if I hadn't been a reporter and didn't know how heavily politicized (and blind to actual justice) most prosecutors are, I might actually swallow this horse hooey:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Supreme Court has overturned a long-standing ruling that stops police from initiating questions unless a defendant's lawyer is present, a move that will make it easier for prosecutors to interrogate suspects.

The high court, in a 5-4 ruling, overturned the 1986 Michigan v. Jackson ruling, which said police may not initiate questioning of a defendant who has a lawyer or has asked for one unless the attorney is present.

The Michigan ruling applied even to defendants who agree to talk to the authorities without their lawyers.

There's a good reason for this. In case you haven't noticed, criminals are rarely intelligent and they're often easily coerced. You know that bit on cop shows where they use a copy machine as a "lie detector"? Some cops actually do that.

The court's conservatives overturned that opinion Tuesday, with Justice Antonin Scalia saying "it was poorly reasoned, has created no significant reliance interests and (as we have described) is ultimately unworkable."

Scalia, who read the opinion from the bench, said their decision will have a "minimal" effects on criminal defendants. "Because of the protections created by this court in Miranda and related cases, there is little if any chance that a defendant will be badgered into waiving his right to have counsel present during interrogation," Scalia said.

I don't know where Scalia grew up, but apparently his life experience is very different from mine! I knew too many kids who got arrested and coerced into confessions to give this much credence.

The Michigan v. Jackson opinion was written by Justice John Paul Stevens, the only current justice who was on the court at the time. He dissented from the ruling, and in an unusual move read his dissent aloud from the bench. It was the first time this term a justice had read a dissent aloud.

"The police interrogation in this case clearly violated petitioner's Sixth Amendment right to counsel," Stevens said. Overruling the Jackson case, he said, "can only diminish the public's confidence in the reliability and fairness of our system of justice."

Don't worry, Justice Stevens. We lost confidence in the "reliability and fairness of our system of justice" a long time ago!

The air all around is percolating with the sounds of impeaching Jay Bybee, author of a torture memo. Rep. Jerry Nadler is calling for it now.

Rep. Jerry Nadler, a senior Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, called Monday for the impeachment of federal judge Jay Bybee, one of the principal authors of the torture memos released last week by the Obama administration.

"He ought to be impeached," Nadler said in an interview with the Huffington Post. "It was not an honest legal memo. It was an instruction manual on how to break the law."

Nadler, a New York congressman, is chairman of Judiciary's Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties Subcommittee. Bybee is currently serving a lifetime term on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, appointed in 2003 and confirmed before it was publicly known that he had authorized the torture of detainees.

Nadler is meeting with Attorney General Eric Holder on Tuesday to argue that the release of the torture memos further buttresses a call he had made earlier for a special prosecutor on torture.

Digby finds that Bybee has retained legal council because so far, President Obama has been mum on him:

Anything could happen:

The Obama Administration assured CIA employees Thursday that they would not be prosecuted, but the White House has offered no cover to Bybee or other government lawyers.

So for now, Bybee is on his own. The good news, however, he’s got a nationally recognized lawyer on his side, Latham & Watkins’s Maureen Mahoney, who’s handling the case pro bono. In an e-mail Thursday, Mahoney said Bybee has recused himself from Latham cases, but offered no further comment on his case.

Of course Rahm said yesterday that Obama didn't want to prosecute any former officials. But it's not really Obama's decision and it certainly isn't Rahm's. And the fact that they are out there saying it is --- for political reasons no less ("national unity" etc) --- means it behooves Holder to appoint a special prosecutor.

Bybee certainly seems to understand that he's got some issues if he has one of the top conservative lawyers in the country as his defense lawyer. He's smarter than he seems.

You can sign the petition to have the California Democratic Party Convention vote to impeach Bybee, here.

Please sing the petition. Holder was appoint a special prosecutor not named Starr to investigate.

Link:

The Obama administration on Thursday released controversial memos outlining the legal rationale for interrogation techniques the Central Intelligence Agency used against terror suspects apprehended overseas, and vowed not to prosecute those that carried out what the administration described as "torture."

"It would be unfair to prosecute dedicated men and women working to protect America for conduct that was sanctioned in advance by the Justice Department," Attorney General Eric Holder said.

Thursday's developments underscore a quandary of sorts the administration finds itself in -- even as President Barack Obama is to be commended for his transparency in his bid to distance himself from the policies of the Bush administration.

Even as the new president has renounced those Bush administration practices, Justice Department lawyers are defending the previous administration's top officials already accused of authorizing and carrying out those policies.

Bruce Fein, former deputy attorney general under Reagan and frequent critic of Bush policies:

President Obama has embraced the national security psychology of the Bush-Cheney duumvirate not only in matters of secrecy, but the entire range of civil liberties abuses justified by a purported global and endless war against international terrorism.

Indeed, Obama has invoked state secrets in litigation to conceal torture, extraordinary rendition, illegal surveillance, or arbitrary detentions that have given rise to private damages litigation against former government officials. He has claimed that Bagram prison in Afghanistan is a sanctuary for United States lawlessness. He has asserted that the entire world is a battlefield against terrorism; thus, drones can be fired without a judicial warrant to kill persons suspected of Al Qaeda membership on the President's say-so alone.

Like President Bush, he has issued a presidential signing statement claiming plenary power over the use of the American military. He has claimed authority to detain United States citizens as "enemy combatants" indefinitely without accusation or trial.

In sum, on national security and the war on terrorism, Obama has shown that the more things change, the more they stay the same, despite his adept semantical juggleries.

Glenn Greenwald has a far more generous reading:

I'll have more details as soon as these memos are available. One can certainly criticize Obama for vowing that no CIA officials will be prosecuted if they followed DOJ memos (though that vow, notably, does not extend to Bush officials), but -- assuming the reports about redactions are correct -- there is no grounds for criticizing Obama here and substantial grounds for praising him.

dday has more at Hullabaloo.

This is why we have to fight every single encroachment on our civil liberties - they invariably get used for other purposes, simply because they can:

Reporting from Los Angeles and Oklahoma City -- Tamera Jo Freeman was on a Frontier Airlines flight to Denver in 2007 when her two children began to quarrel over the window shade and then spilled a Bloody Mary into her lap.

She spanked each of them on the thigh with three swats. It was a small incident, but one that in the heightened anxiety after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks would eventually have enormous ramifications for Freeman and her children.

A flight attendant confronted Freeman, who responded by hurling a few profanities and throwing what remained of a can of tomato juice on the floor.

The incident aboard the Frontier flight ultimately led to Freeman's arrest and conviction for a federal felony defined as an act of terrorism under the Patriot Act, the controversial federal law enacted after the 2001 attacks in New York and Washington.

"I had no idea I was breaking the law," said Freeman, 40, who spent three months in jail before pleading guilty.

Freeman is one of at least 200 people on flights who have been convicted under the amended law. In most of the cases, there was no evidence that the passengers had attempted to hijack the airplane or physically attack any of the flight crew. Many have simply involved raised voices, foul language and drunken behavior.

Some security experts say the use of the law by airlines and their employees has run amok, criminalizing incidents that did not start out as a threat to public safety, much less an act of terrorism.

In one case, a couple was arrested after an argument with a flight attendant, who claimed the couple was engaged in "overt sexual activity" -- an FBI affidavit said the two were "embracing, kissing and acting in a manner that made other passengers uncomfortable."

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Glenn Greenwald talked with Bill Moyers Friday night about the rule of law and how it was perverted by the Bush administration:

BILL MOYERS: To be fair, you make a strong case in here that we have to stand up to extremism but that we have to protect our own constitutional principles while we do. And as I read both of these books, it is the sense that out of this Manichean view there came this whole notion that you say is alien to America, this unitary executive powers of the presidency. Have I stated that right?

GLENN GREENWALD: You have. Let’s just quickly describe in the most dispassionate terms, as few of euphemisms, as possible, where we are and what has happened over the last eight years. We have a law in place that says it is a felony offense punishable by five years in prison or a $10,000 fine to eavesdrop on American citizens without warrants. We have laws in place that say that it is a felony punishable by decades in prison to subject detainees in our custody to treatment that violates the Geneva Conventions or that is inhumane or coercive.

We know that the president and his top aides have violated these laws. The facts are indisputable that they’ve done so. And yet as a country, as a political class, we’re deciding basically in unison that the president and our highest political officials are free to break the most serious laws that we have, that our citizens have enacted, with complete impunity, without consequences, without being held accountable under the law.

And when you juxtapose that with the fact that we are a country that has probably the most merciless criminal justice system on the planet when it comes to ordinary Americans. We imprison more of our population than any country in the world. We have less than five percent of the world’s population. And yet 25 percent almost of prisoners worldwide are inside the United States.

What you have is a two-tiered system of justice where ordinary Americans are subjected to the most merciless criminal justice system in the world. They break the law. The full weight of the criminal justice system comes crashing down upon them. But our political class, the same elites who have imposed that incredibly harsh framework on ordinary Americans, have essentially exempted themselves and the leaders of that political class from the law.

They have license to break the law. That’s what we’re deciding now as we say George Bush and his top advisors shouldn’t be investigated let alone prosecuted for the laws that we know that they’ve broken. And I can’t think of anything more damaging to our country because the rule of law is the lynchpin of everything we have.

Those darn gays and their desire to treated like any other American couple...they've forced James Dobson's Focus on the Family to announce layoffs of approximately 20% of their work force, or 202 employees, due in no small part to the more than $500,000 spent on the Yes on 8 campaign. Colorado Independent:

Focus on the Family announced yesterday afternoon that 202 jobs will be cut companywide — an estimated 20 percent of its workforce. Initial reports bring the total number of remaining employees to around 950.

Focus on the Family is poised to announce major layoffs to its Colorado Springs-based ministry and media empire today. The cutbacks come just weeks after the group pumped more than half a million dollars into the successful effort to pass a gay-marriage ban in California.

Critics are holding up the layoffs, which come just two months after the organization’s last round of dismissals, as a sad commentary on the true priorities of the ministry.

“If I were their membership I would be appalled,” said Mark Lewis, a longtime Colorado Springs activist who helped organize a Proposition 8 protest in Colorado Springs on Saturday. “That [Focus on the Family] would spend any money on anything that’s obviously going to get blocked in the courts is just sad. [Prop. 8] is guaranteed to lose, in the long run it doesn’t have a chance — it’s just a waste of money.”

In all, Focus pumped $539,000 in cash and another $83,000 worth of non-monetary support into the measure to overturn a California Supreme Court ruling that allowed gays and lesbians to marry in that state. The group was the seventh-largest donor to the effort in the country. The cash contributions are equal to the salaries of 19 Coloradans earning the 2008 per capita income of $29,133.

In addition Elsa Prince, the auto parts heiress and longtime funder of conservative social causes who sits on the Focus on the Family board, contributed another $450,000 to Prop. 8.[..]

Lewis, the Colorado Springs activist, wonders whether the families who donate to the nonprofit ministry, realize where their funds really end up.

“Seriously, I would imagine their supporters have got to be asking the question about whether their church is really practicing their theology.”

Frankly, I've been questioning that long before they started laying off employees. More importantly, the California Supreme Court has agreed to hear the appeal on Prop. 8, and it appears it is on the question of legality of revising the state Constitution as opposed to amending it.

And if you really want to get conspiracy-minded (meaning an area that the Supreme Court would never actually touch), Mark Crispin Miller wants to know why the exit polls show that Prop. 8 was defeated, by the same ratio it was eventually passed. Remember, discrepancy in results like that were exactly the justification we gave for overturning and demanding a new election in the Ukraine.

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The CBS affiliate in San Diego is reporting that businesses that have contributed money to oppose the a ban on gay marriage in California are being blackmailed to contribute to a group that is fighting for the ban.

A threatening letter has sparked a new controversy here in San Diego surrounding the gay marriage debate. Donors who gave money to the No on Prop 8 campaign say they received blackmail letters demanding money, and the Yes on 8 campaign now says the letters were sent by their employees.

The letter from Yes on 8 came by certified mail, demanding at least $10,000. Jim Abbot knows exactly why he's being targeted - his business gave $10,000 to a group called Equality California, which supports No on Prop 9.

The letter says if Jim doesn't give an equal donation to Yes on 8, the name of his company will be published. It reads in part, "It is only fair for Proposition 8 supporters to know which companies and organizations oppose traditional marriage.

'I feel like it's blackmail, and as you can imagine, real estate business has been tough lately and to have someone come at you like this... it's very distressing,' he said.

Rocky Mountain News: 

Planned Parenthood is suddenly a lot richer because of Sarah Palin.

And the Republican vice presidential nominee will soon be receiving tens of thousands of thank-you notes.

A three-week-old Internet campaign is asking abortion-rights activists to send donations to Planned Parenthood in honor of the Alaska governor.[..]

One e-mail making the rounds on the Internet says: "Instead of (actually, in addition to) all of us all sending more e-mails about how absolutely horrible she is, let's all make a donation to Planned Parenthood in Sarah Palin's name."

Katie Groke Ellis, field manager for the Planned Parenthood of the Rockies Action Fund, predicts that the five-state chapter of the group alone could draw $100,000 in donations.[..]

Planned Parenthood sends a handwritten thank-you card to the donor. If a donation is made in someone's name, he or she gets one, too.

In this case, the Palin cards will go to Republican presidential nominee John McCain's national headquarters.

Never thought I'd say this, but thank goodness for Sarah Palin!

Mike mentioned this in his Round Up, but it definitely merits its own post. Denver Post:

Hundreds of police, firefighters, paramedics and even utility workers have been trained and recently dispatched as "Terrorism Liaison Officers" in Colorado and a handful of other states to hunt for "suspicious activity" - and are reporting their findings into secret government databases.

It's a tactic intended to feed better data into terrorism early-warning systems and uncover intelligence that could help fight anti-U.S. forces. But the vague nature of the TLOs' mission, and their focus on reporting both legal and illegal activity, has generated objections from privacy advocates and civil libertarians.

"Suspicious activity" is broadly defined in TLO training as behavior that could lead to terrorism: taking photos of no apparent aesthetic value, making measurements or notes, espousing extremist beliefs or conversing in code, according to a draft Department of Justice/Major Cities Chiefs Association document.

All this is anathema to opponents of domestic surveillance.

Yet U.S. intelligence and homeland security officials say they support the widening use of TLOs - state-run under federal agreements - as part of a necessary integrated network for preventing attacks.

"We're simply providing information on crime-related issues or suspicious circumstances," said Denver police Lt. Tony Lopez, commander of Denver's intelligence unit and one of 181 individual TLOs deployed across Colorado.

"We don't snoop into private citizens' lives. We aren't living in a communist state."

No, just sliding more and more inexorably into a fascist state.