JTjaden's blog

There they go again

The GOP says Goodwin Liu, Obama's 9th Circuit nominee, is 'beyond the mainstream.' Of course, they just mean he's the choice of a Democratic president.

Republicans in the Senate are gunning for Goodwin Liu, the 39-year-old UC Berkeley law professor President Obama has named to the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. Liu, who supports affirmative action and has theorized about whether welfare benefits can be considered a constitutional right, is “beyond the mainstream,” according to Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama, the ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee.

I had first read a version of this essay at Black Agenda Report, and planned to post it here, but then Tomgram picked it up and gave an introduction that relates to the California prison crisis that I thought personalizes the issue for those of us here in California. Please click the header and read the entire essay. Also click the picture for a youtube of a British quiz show talking about the U.S. prison system

Tomgram: Michelle Alexander, The Age of Obama as a Racial Nightmare

California is, as the time-worn adage has it, our nation's bellwether, and nowhere is that truer than in the Golden State’s prison crisis. California’s inmate population is among the highest in the nation. Its complex of prisons spills over with tens of thousands of inmates housed in every available inch of space and sleep-stacked three-high. So overcrowded are California’s prisons that the state penal system has been successfully sued for violating the constitutional rights of inmates -- essentially by subjecting them to a public-health crisis. That its inmates consistently resort to violence in prison should come as no surprise.

The dire state of California’s prisons can, in part, be traced to its draconian “three-strikes law,” which throws three-time felons behind bars for a mandatory 25 years. Overflowing prison populations have, in turn, contributed to that state’s bleak economic future, helping consign California to a perpetual budget deficit, annual financial crises, and repeated deep cuts in education and social funding. The state currently spends a staggering 10% of its annual operating budget, or $10.8 billion, on its prison system and its nearly 170,000 prisoners -- more than it spends on the University of California system, once the jewel in the crown of American public higher education.

Reinhardt Stands Alone on 9th Circuit's Pledge of Allegiance 'Under God' Ruling

Stephen Reinhardt and Dorothy Nelson have been simpatico on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for 30 years. One former Reinhardt clerk says they have a good personal relationship.

But Nelson handed Reinhardt a bitter defeat by siding with conservative Judge Carlos Bea in an opinion upholding the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance. The ruling, handed down Thursday, is the latest episode in a case that has brought scorn on the 9th Circuit from across the country, and has highlighted Reinhardt as an unapologetic -- yet increasingly solitary -- iconoclast.

In a 132-page dissent, Reinhardt said he doubts the constitutional protections at stake will evoke much concern in the political world.

"Instead, to the joy or relief, as the case may be, of the two members of the majority, this court's willingness to abandon its constitutional responsibilities will be praised as patriotic,"

Click for video

'Terrorist Intent' Detector Set for Demo Next Year

(Feb. 25) -- New security technology at airports around the country is creating a furor over concerns that the screening devices can "see" beneath people's clothes. Now, the Department of Homeland Security is set to take technology one step further with a screening system that would, in a sense, peek inside your head.

The Future Attribute Screening Technology, or FAST, is designed to spot terrorists, or more specifically, people who are thinking about carrying out terrorist acts.

"The theory we're looking at here is [whether] there's a way to look at you, and only you, in a specific situation, and based on your presentation, make an assessment that you're showing indicators of what we call malintent," Robert Burns, the deputy director of the Homeland Security Advanced Research Projects Agency, told AOL News. "Malintent, as defined by the problem, is the intention or desire to cause harm."

[...]

http://www.aolnews.com/nation/article/homeland-security-set-to-demonstra...

There are just a few problems with this, for instance ...

Chief Judge Alex Kozinski writes scathing dissent in Fourth Amendment case

When a judge called for United States v. Lemus to be reheard en banc, the majority of judges in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals did not vote to rehear the case. Chief Judge Alex Kozinski wrote an absolutely blistering dissent to that denial. With Judge Paez joining in the dissent, he wrote:
.
This is an extraordinary case: Our court approves, without blinking, a police sweep of a person’s home without a warrant, without probable cause, without reasonable suspicion and without exigency—in other words, with nothing at all to support the entry except the curiosity police always have about what they might find if they go rummaging around a suspect’s home. Once inside, the police managed to turn up a gun “in plain view”—stuck between two cushions of the living room couch—and we reward them by upholding the search.

Did I mention that this was an entry into somebody’s home, the place where the protections of the Fourth Amendment are supposedly at their zenith? The place where the “government bears a heavy burden of demonstrating that exceptional circumstances justif[y] departure from the warrant requirement.” United States v. Licata, 761 F.2d 537, 543 (9th Cir. 1985). The place where warrantless searches are deemed “presumptively unreasonable.” Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 586 (1980).

Epic Fail in Congress: USA PATRIOT Act Renewed Without Any New Civil Liberties Protections

News Update by Kevin Bankston

Yesterday evening, the U.S. House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly to renew three expiring provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act, after the Senate abandoned the PATRIOT reform effort and approved the extension by a voice vote on Wednesday night.

Disappointingly, the government's dangerously broad authority to conduct roving wiretaps of unspecified or "John Doe" targets, to secretly wiretap of persons without any connection to terrorists or spies under the so-called "lone wolf" provision, and to secretly access a wide range of private business records without warrants under PATRIOT Section 215 were all renewed without any new checks and balances to prevent abuse. Despite months of vigorous debate, when PATRIOT renewal bills providing for greater oversight and accountability were approved by the Judiciary Committees of both the House and the Senate, Democratic leaders' push for reform fizzled in the face of staunch Republican opposition buoyed by recent hot-button events such as the attempted bombing of an airliner on Christmas Day and the shooting at Fort Hood.

Why the 'Don't ask, don't tell' policy is doomed

By David B. Rivkin Jr. and Lee A. Casey
Saturday, February 13, 2010; A21

When the Pentagon's top brass announced last week that they no longer believe military unit cohesion suffers from the presence of openly gay men or women in the ranks, they effectively transformed a policy question into a legal one, to which the answer is clear: Congress can no longer mandate discrimination in the armed forces on the basis of sexual orientation.

In the 2003 case Lawrence v. Texas, the Supreme Court struck down a Texas law criminalizing same-gender sexual relations, reasoning that such conduct was part of a constitutionally protected liberty interest. The court also suggested that the Texas statute was vulnerable to challenge as a denial of equal protection of the laws. And it is application of the equal protection doctrine to the military's professional assessment of the impact that openly gay service members have on combat effectiveness that is likely to be the end of "don't ask, don't tell."

Related? Cyber War-Game scheduled for Feb. 16
________________

.. the KB971033 update is scheduled to deploy to the manual downloading "Genuine Microsoft Software" site on February 16, and start pushing out automatically through the Windows Update environment on February 23.

Who Owns Your PC? New Anti-Piracy Windows 7 Update "Phones Home" to Microsoft Every 90 Days

Greetings. Sometimes a seemingly small software update can usher in a whole new world. When Microsoft shortly pushes out a Windows 7 update with the reportedly innocuous title "Update for Microsoft Windows (KB971033)" -- it will be taking your Windows 7 system where it has never been before.

And it may not be a place where you want to go.

California Court Slams Wardens for Illegally Stopping Motorists Over Lobsters

California Court of Appeal smacks down Department of Fish and Game for stopping and searching cars without authority.

The California Court of Appeal for the Fourth District on Tuesday ruled that a state agency may not pull over and search a motorist on a mere hunch that a lobster might be hidden in the vehicle. The court considered the case of Bounh Maikhio, a motorist stopped by Department of Fish and Game Warden Erik Fleet on August 19, 2007 at 11pm. That evening, Fleet had been spying through a telescope on the Ocean Beach pier in San Diego when he saw Maikhio put something into his bag.

All twelve links will open in this window, so be sure to click the back button to come back

Taser abuse videos

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=police+taser+abuse&search_ty...
________________________

Federal appellate court limits cops' use of Tasers

A federal appeals court on Monday issued one of the most comprehensive rulings yet limiting police use of Tasers against low-level offenders who seem to pose little threat and may be mentally ill.

In a case out of San Diego County, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals criticized an officer who, without warning, shot an emotionally troubled man with a Taser when he was unarmed, yards away, and neither fleeing nor advancing on the officer.

Sold as a nonlethal alternative to guns, Tasers deliver an electrical jolt meant to subdue a subject. The stun guns have become a common and increasingly controversial tool used by law enforcement.

There have been at least nine Taser-related fatalities in the Sacramento region, including the death earlier this month of Paul Martinez Jr., an inmate shot with a stun gun while allegedly resisting officers at the Roseville jail.

http://www.sacbee.com/topstories/story/2425481.html
_________________________

Sacramento Sheriff McGinness defends Taser use after ruling

http://www.sacbee.com/crime/story/2427227.html
_________________________

Why Are Cops Tasering Grandmothers, Pregnant Women and Kids?

http://www.aclusac.org/node/196
_________________________

Death reignites Taser debate

Over the weekend, a Sacramento man joined the growing tally of people who have died after police attempted to subdue them with Tasers.