The John Roberts-Anthony Kennedy Smackdown
There are several fascinating details in Jan Crawford's confirmation that John Roberts did, indeed, flip his vote on ObamaCare.
Most interesting is Crawford's description of the desperate efforts on the part of Roberts and Anthony Kennedy…
John Roberts Fails to Dictate Another Presidential Outcome, John Yoo Cries
In this post, I suggested the reason Republicans are so angry that John Roberts apparently flipped his vote (note, Barton Gellman reminded today that Ramesh Ponnuru said at Princeton reunion this year that Roberts had flipped before June 1)…
Fat Al Gore Determined to Strike in US
Already, at least ten people were killed in yesterday's "derecho"--the massive, violent thunderstorm that traveled from Illinois to DC. That's before the 3 million people who lost power now trying to cope with today's 100+ degree weather. Reported…
Pakistani Drone Strikes! Now, with 10% More Enemies!
A few weeks ago, I noted a Pew poll that showed the rest of the world doesn't like our drone strikes (and that there's a big gender gap between men and women over drone strikes). I noted that Pew was holding off their results from Pakistan.
Maybe…
It Was All Going Swimmingly Until Morsi Committed to Freeing the Blind Sheikh
This is the kind of international landmine that I've been fearing could influence November's elections.
In his first public speech addressing tens of thousands of mostly Islamist supporters, [Egyptian President-elect Mohammed] Morsi promised…
Chief Justice Roberts, Flipped Votes, and the Naked Partisans
Yesterday Barack Obama discovered the one high-rankng Republican in the country who would help him raise taxes: John Roberts.
While the political (how will yesterday's ruling affect both the Presidential and lower ticket races in November)…
Black Holes and Mock Burial
The other day, I posted on black holes in Bagram and Somalia. This important story, describes the plight of Tanzanian fisherman Suleiman Abdallah, who was kidnapped and sold for bounty in Mogadishu then rendered to three different American prisons,…
The Next Honduras
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While I was off gallivanting in England, Paraguay had a coup.
Mind you, the oligarchs who staged the coup against populist Fernando Lugo cloaked it in legalistic niceties--though they're about as convincing…
The SCOTUS Healthcare Decision Cometh
[UPDATE:Okay, from the SCOTUSBlog "The entire ACA is upheld, with exception that federal government's power to terminate states' Medicaid funds is narrowly read." Key language from the decision on the mandate:
The money quote from the…
Our Other Assassination Program: Mafia Hitmen Hidden from Congress
As part of my not-yet exhausted obsession with the government's effort to obscure its drone assassination program, I re-read these two posts describing the assassination squads Dick Cheney set up but kept hidden from Congress. When Leon Panetta…
Bagram: Still a Black Hole; Somalia: Increasingly a Black Hole
An Afghan named Zia-ur-Rahman held in Bagram petitioned for habeas corpus. And while District Court Judge James Gwin recognized "certain inconsistencies about--and the unsettled nature of--the Untied State's intentions from Bagram, he still…
Why Is DOJ Deliberately Hiding Information Responsive to ACLU's Anwar al-Awlaki FOIA?
As part of its strategy to not respond to the Anwar al-Awlaki FOIAs, the government seems to have decided to bury the NYT and ACLU under declarations. It submitted declarations and exhibits from 3 departments in DOJ, CIA, DOD, and DIA. Each…
The NSC's May 2011 "Draft" Legal Analysis and the Continued Stonewalling of Ron Wyden
I'm ultimately going to get around to arguing that the reason the government response to the ACLU targeted killing FOIA is so funky is because (mind you, this is a wildarsed guess) the CIA didn't rely on the OLC memo authorizing Anwar al-Awlaki's…
Is There a Pre-2001 OLC Opinion Authorizing Targeted Killing of US Citizen Terrorists?
Update: I realize now this can't be the explanation. I've just referred back to the original request and the ACLU actually did time-limit their general requests to records created after September 11, 2001. So maybe the issue relates to non-al…
James Clapper's Anti-Leak Efforts Will Increase Information Asymmetry
As Charlie Savage and others report, Director of National Security James Clapper has instituted new efforts to crack down on leaks. The plan has two aspects. First, those agencies within the IC that have mandatory lie detector tests will add…
Did Obama Screw Himself on SB1070 with Secure Communities?
As the press is reporting, SCOTUS largely overturned AZ's "Papers Please" law. It left just one part--but the most important part--in place for further court review: the part that required cops to check the status of people they stop and require…
Pro-Drone Leaks from the Leak Witch Hunt Committees
There are several interesting details in this story describing the claimed attention with which the Intelligence Committees oversee drone killing.
But let's start with the fact that it largely relies on anonymous staffers from the Intelligence…
SEC versus Pac-12 Throw Down Trash Talk
That's right, IT IS ON MOFO'S. Grudge match between the Jim White Hats and the Bmaz Black Hats. Since before the college baseball season started, we were pimping and poking each other about which conference and whose team was better. And here…
Science Wins Out: Studies NSABB Attempted to Censor Published, Fears Unfounded
Back in December, a US government panel took the highly controversial position of calling for the censoring of scientific work aimed at an understanding of how the H5N1 "bird flu" virus can change to become directly transmissible between…
Anwar al-Awlaki FOIA: The CIA Speech the CIA Did Not Mention
John Brennan and Eric Holder gave speeches--the government says--and therefore the CIA admits it has documents pertaining to targeted killing, but cannot say any more about those documents.
As I noted yesterday, the government explained its…