The government's most controversial drone program will be exempt from the drone "rulebook" being written by the Obama Administration. More Info: →

shortformblog:

The Obama administration is nearing completion of a detailed counterterrorism manual that is designed to establish clear rules for targeted-killing operations but leaves open a major exemption for the CIA’s campaign of drone strikes in Pakistan, U.S. officials said.

The carve-out would allow the CIA to continue pounding al-Qaeda and Taliban targets for a year or more before the agency is forced to comply with more stringent rules spelled out in a classified document that officials have described as a counterterrorism “playbook.”

Maybe it’s just us, but creating a rulebook which fails to address the incredibly low accountability of a program that many believe should be held to the highest standards (if continued at all) seems kind of pointless. Thoughts?

"There has also been a trend over the last 20 years or so toward laws that don’t require prosecutors to show criminal intent. This means you can be prosecuted for crimes you had no idea you were breaking — even laws you actively tried not to break. A 2010 study co-authored by the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the Heritage Foundation found that in its rush to criminalize more and more behavior, Congress has been passing poorly-drafted laws that increasingly lack any requirement at all to show intent. Even when intent is included, the study found, it tends to be vague and open to interpretation (which also means open to abuse) by prosecutors."

Radley Balko (via letterstomycountry)

Nebraska Jews Recall Senator Chuck Hagel as "Unfriendly" and "Unmovable" on Israel, "Didn't Give a Damn About the Jewish Community" →

kohenari:

It seems natural for me to wade into the swamp of accusations about Chuck Hagel’s feelings toward “the Jews,” given that I write a fair amount about anti-Semitism and because I’m a Jew living in Nebraska.

Still, I hesitated.

In no small part, my hesitation was due to a desire not to offend friends and also because I’m quite sure there’s a great deal about Hagel that I — as someone who only moved to Nebraska in August 2007 — simply don’t know.

Still, I have to say something because it’s been weighing on me. So here’s the thing that I’ll say:

All of the allegations against Hagel that I have seen have to do with his position on America’s relationship with Israel and there is a general mistake that people — including Jews — are prone to make, namely that one’s position on Israel equates with one’s position on Jews.

That this is a mistake should be clear and obvious: There are plenty of Christians who insist on American support for Israel not because they like or support Jews but because they understand the existence of Israel to have some important role to play in the end of the world. And there are plenty of people around the world who don’t particularly like the direction in which the government of Israel has been moving (with regard to the peace process, to immigrants, to the role of religion in the public sphere, and so on) who nonetheles very much like and support Jews.

But we will continue to make this mistake as long as it’s considered inappropriate to ask questions about the bellicosity of Israel’s current government, about the seeming lack of interest in peace with the Palestinians, or about the way in which the United States traditionally supports Israeli policies virtually without question.

That Chuck Hagel doesn’t see eye-to-eye with some Jews in Nebraska and with the GOP more broadly on the question of America’s blank check relationship with Israel does not make him an anti-Semite.

There might be other reasons to believe that he is, but I have not seen them. Since I have many friends and colleagues here in Nebraska who read this blog — including many Jews from Lincoln and Omaha — I’m very hopeful to start a conversation on this topic, to hear from you some of your experiences with Hagel over the years, and to learn whether or not my diagnosis of this issue — controversial though it might be — is accurate.

On Why You Should Not Suddenly Start Flipping Off Police At Your Leisure

letterstomycountry:

As shortformblog & kateopolis note, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit recently held that flipping off a police officer does not give the officer reasonable suspicion to suspect you of criminal activity, and thus to detain you.  While I am quite happy about this ruling, this case nonetheless warrants further comment.  I fear that some people (particular young people) may feel emboldened by this ruling, and in the process of exercising their “constitutional right” to flip off a police officer, will end up just getting themselves into trouble.

Back in 2009, Harvey Silvergate published a book called Three Felonies a Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent.  Silvergate attempts to demonstrate that the average American, on any given day, is predisposed to commit three federal felonies a day without even realizing it.  This is due to a combination of vaguely defined laws and outdated criminal statutory language that doesn’t always keep pace with technology.  This allows law enforcement officials considerable leeway in deciding what constitutes criminal conduct, and whether to arrest and/or charge someone with a crime.

Silvergate’s argument about the ever-more encompassing state of American criminal law has long been recognized by legal commentators.  Judge Posner, dissenting in the Seventh Circuit in 1998, noted the sorry state of the criminal law, discussing the thousands of “ridiculously obscure” criminal prohibitions in the federal law that most people are not even aware of.  Two years prior, in an infamous case called Whren v. United States, the defendants argued, inter alia, that there were so many traffic ordinances on the books in the District of Columbia that the city’s police officers could essentially pull anyone over at any time for any reason.  In other words, there were so many laws on the books (traffic laws in particular) that it was nearly impossible to obey all of them at all times.  This did not move the Supreme Court, who addressed the argument as follows:

Petitioners urge as an extraordinary factor in this case that the “multitude of applicable traffic and equipment regulations” is so large and so difficult to obey perfectly that virtually everyone is guilty of violation, permitting the police to single out almost whomever they wish for a stop. Butwe are aware of no principle that would allow us to decide at what point a code of law becomes so expansive and so commonly violated that infraction itself can no longer be the ordinary measure of the lawfulness of enforcement. And even if we could identify such exorbitant codes, we do not know by what standard (or what right) we would decide, as petitioners would have us do, which particular provisions are sufficiently important to merit enforcement.

In other words, the fact that there are so many laws on the books that they are difficult to obey simultaneously is not relevant to whether an officer can detain you for violating one of them.  More importantly, the Supreme Court, in the bolded passage above, implicitly leaves it up to law enforcement officials “which particular provisions are sufficiently important to merit enforcement.”  This gives police full discretion to decide which of a jurisdiction’s obscurest laws they actually want to enforce—and when they want to enforce them.

And this is why you should not suddenly begin flipping off police officers.  There are a number of perfectly legal ways in which law enforcement officials can harass you if you decide to antagonize them.  The Second Circuit held that flipping off a police officer is not a criminal act, nor does it imply one is underway—but what the ruling does not prevent is the ability of law enforcement officials to pay extra close attention to you, until they catch you violating one of the above-mentioned myriad of obscure laws.  And at that point, they’ll nail for something that they might have simply ignored otherwise.

Is this unfair?  Absolutely.  The Whren decision has been roundly criticized by legal commentators since its inception.  Posner’s 1998 dissent, which lamented the decline of the fundamental concept of criminal law known as Mens Rea—the idea thatyou must sufficiently intend to violate a law before you can be charged with violating the same—is shared by many legal commentators as well.  

But these criticisms do not change the state of the law at present.  And the state of the law is this: flipping off a police officer is, practically speaking, still more likely to result in you being sanctioned for unwitting violations of obscure and/or under-enforced laws than mere material satisfaction of a new-found constitutional right.  Note also that this decision is limited to the 2nd Circuit: meaning that the decision is only binding authority in Connecticut, New York, and Vermont.  So what little protection the decision gives is not even binding outside of those three states.

Nonetheless, if you’re going to flip off the cops, do so with care.  If the officer in question is committed to retaliating against you, in most cases, they’ll be able to find a way to do so that is perfectly legal, thanks to the current state of the criminal law in America.

"I think she has a traditional way of thinking about America’s role in the world, more Jeffersonian than Teddy Roosevelt — that the shining light of America ought to mean something in the world, be an example and model, but it shouldn’t be a heavy hand to force people to follow our model[.]"

Retired Lt. Gen. Gregory Newbold, on Michele Flournoy, who is on the shortlist of appointments for Secretary of Defense in the Obama administration’s 2nd term cabinet.  Flournoy would be the first female U.S. Secretary of Defense if she is appointed. (via letterstomycountry)

reuters:

A look at how much the National Rifleman’s Association spent on lobbyists compared to other gun control lobbyists in 2011.

crisisgroup:

10 Conflicts to Watch in 2013 | Foreign Policy

By Louise Arbour, Crisis Group’s President and CEO

Every year, around the world, old conflicts worsen, new ones emerge and, occasionally, some situations improve. There is no shortage of storm clouds looming over 2013: Once again, hotspots old and new will present a challenge to the security of people across the globe.

FULL ARTICLE (Foreign Policy)

Photo: IHH Humanitarian Relief Foundation/Flickr

Big Bottled Water, Ctd.

letterstomycountry:

jgrassound:

letterstomycountry:

Concord, Massachusetts Becomes First City To Ban Bottled Water

This was passed back in September, and the law took effect yesterday.  It seems to me to be an unworkable ordinance at first, but my attention to that particular detail was lost when I learned that there is apparently an International Bottled Water Association.  

Seriously?  Big Bottled Water has its own special interest group?  You’d expect beverage giants like Pepsi and Coke to mobilize against this one; but apparently there’s a transnational NGO devoted specifically to bottled water.  You learn something new everyday.

Big Bottled Water is even “Bigger” in other parts of the world.  Belize about a decade ago had a micro revolution because the government was worrying more about Big Water than it was it’s citizens.

Water is the next crisis point people, start paying attention, in the next 25 years, wars will be fought over it[.]

LTMC: reblogged for informative purposes.  Indeed, it appears that Belize passed the Water Industry Act in 2001 (link to consolidated 2003 bill) in the midst of public pressures related to the management of Belize’s water resources.  The long title to the bill states as follows:

An Act to make new provision with respect to the supply and control of water and sewerage services in Belize; to promote the conservation and proper use of water resources; to provide for the issue of licences to water supply companies; to provide for the vesting of the assets and liabilities of the Water and Sewerage Authority in the company or companies licensed by the Public Utilities Commission; to repeal the Water and Sewerage Act, Chapter 185 of the Laws of Belize; and to provide for matters connected therewith or incidental thereto.

More info about Belize’s water management system here.

House GOP blocks Violence Against Women Act →

kohenari:

If you’re a little peeved that Congress didn’t get around to dealing with disaster relief for victims of Hurricane Sandy, you might also want to take a moment to consider this other little thing that Congress didn’t get done:

Congress had a lengthy to-do list as the end of the year approached, with a series of measures that needed action before 2013 began. Some of the items passed (a fiscal agreement, a temporary farm bill), while others didn’t (relief funding for victims of Hurricane Sandy).

And then there’s the Violence Against Women Act, which was supposed to be one of the year’s easy ones. It wasn’t.

Back in April, the Senate approved VAWA reauthorization fairly easily, with a 68 to 31 vote. The bill was co-written by a liberal Democrat (Vermont’s Pat Leahy) and a conservative Republican (Idaho’s Mike Crapo), and seemed on track to be reauthorized without much of a fuss, just as it was in 2000 and 2005.

But House Republicans insisted the bill is too supportive of immigrants, the LGBT community, and Native Americans — and they’d rather let the law expire than approve a slightly expanded proposal. Vice President Biden, who helped write the original law, tried to persuade House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) to keep the law alive, but the efforts didn’t go anywhere.

And so, for the first time since 1994, the Violence Against Women Act is no more.

kohenari:

The stupidity of it all really hurts my brain.

(Source: brooklynmutt)