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They are in recess after opening statements and initial rounds of questions. Here are some of the Attorney General's whoppers so far: 1. The "tragic shooting" at Ft. Hood. What happened at Ft. Hood was a jihadist massacre — a terrorist act, not a tragedy. 2. The civilian justice system has been handling terrorism cases successfully for years. No mention of Mamdouh Salim, the al-Qaeda founder who was never brought to trial for 1998 U.S. embassy bombings because he maimed a Bureau of Prisons guard in an escape attempt during which he attempted to kidnap is taxpayer-funded defense lawyers.

CONTINGENCY OPERATING BASE BASRA, Iraq, Nov. 17, 2009 – Through a coordinated effort to improve relationships between Iraqi police and judges, the provincial reconstruction team in Iraq’s Basra province and the 17th Fires Brigade legal team set up a conference Nov. 7. Chief Judge Khazal Dabol Qasim and Iraqi Police Brig. Gen. Eedan talk during a law-enforcement community conference in Iraq’s Basra province, Nov. 7, 2009. U.S. Army photo by Spc. Maurice A. Galloway  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. The four-hour conference covered topics such as the responsibilities of their respective investigation officers and the state of the facilities...

NORMAN, Okla. -- An Oklahoma state senator plans to offer a bill in the spring legislative session that would give the state of Oklahoma the power to opt out of federal requirements for carrying out the newly amended hate crimes law. State Sen. Steve Russell, R-Oklahoma City, said the newly passed Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, which extends hate crimes law protections to include actual or perceived gender, sexual orientation, gender identity and disability, oversteps the bounds of the federal government and hinders free speech and religious freedom. “The federal government should not be creating...

Abstract: This paper questions criminal law's strong presumption of free will. Part I assesses the ways in which environment, nurture, and society influence human action. Part II briefly surveys studies from the fields of genetics and neuroscience which call into question strong assumptions of free will and suggest explanations for propensities toward criminal activity. Part III discusses other "causes" of criminal activity including addiction, economic deprivation, gender, and culture. In light of Parts I through III, Part IV assesses criminal responsibility and the legitimacy of punishment. Part V considers the the possibility of determining propensity from criminal activity based on...

The New York newspaperman says our founding document is especially vital today, in an age of expanding state power. Seth Lipsky has a knack for seeing the bright side of things. A nearly 20-year veteran of this newspaper, including its editorial page, he cheerfully acknowledges the obvious: This is far from a golden age of free-market conservatism. Of President Obama, he tells me over lunch, "I sense that he has a very leftist, socialist-oriented worldview." Yet this makes Mr. Lipsky anything but grim: "I for one find this very exciting. . . . We're just at a great moment." Why?...

What if Nancy Pelosi passed a Health Care Law and nobody complied? What if doctors leave the profession in droves and work on the black market? What if private citizens buy their health care under the table for cash, as is done in all socialist countries? What if Catholic hospitals, opposed to mandated abortion services, acting alone or as a group, refused to comply with the Pelosi / Reid take over of the US Health Care System? How would the Federal Government respond to this defiance? I am not talking about civil disobedience. When groups of people get together and...

It is too hard for me to swallow the fact that a properly passed law in Maine was repealed in a public referendum. This just seems wrong. The proper course of action was to throw out the bums who passed the law in the first place and then have a subsequent legislature / Governer repeal the law. While the "outcome" in this case was favorable to conservative point of view, it is impossible for me to see how it benefits the conservative movement in the long run. Remember, gay marriage was made legal in Maine by the elected government -...

Assume the statutory speed limit of 70 MPH; the tendency of the local constabulary to ignore violations up to 5 MPH over; A stream of traffic in the right-hand lane averaging 68-72 MPH; and a certain sense of scofflawry and haste on my part that may rise to the level of a ticket without tipping over into the “reckless” category; and the fact that I am therefore in the continuous process of "passing on the left" all of those law-abiding drivers in the right lane. A question: exactly how fast must I be going before I must make way for...

The Indiana law disallows those convicted of sexual offenses, the ability to live beyond a 1000 feet from a school or public park. California's law only allows....

The archdiocese that covers our nation's capitol, has warned of new a new proposal that could cause the end of faith institutions. The proposed "Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage....

I thought I read this somewhere about a year or two ago. Any help on this?

A resolution pending in the United Nations in one form or another since 1999 is being pushed again by the Islamic nations that originally proposed the plan they called "Defamation of Islam," which would ban criticism of the beliefs of Muhammad worldwide...

It's time to change the tune of this song. It's time to say NO! to politicians at all levels and those who support them. No more will we pay your taxes. No more will we buy the products or use the services of those who support you. No more will we obey your laws. No more will we convict people for doing this either. You do not listen to us when we say we don't want these laws and tax bills so we no longer listen to you. We will not assist you in anyway shape or form. We are...

Hello and welcome to another edition of the White Horse Inn as we are thinking through what is means to be Christians in a post-Christian culture. You know, every time a debate comes up on homosexual marriage or on war, a whole host of topics; on one hand conservatives sometimes invoke the theocratic promises, commands, and threats of the old covenant as if they could just be lifted from the context of Israel's covenant with God and apply to any modern country. While liberals and secularists simply dismiss these Old Testament passages as morally offensive "texts of terror." But there...

Perhaps critical events of the third century may offer a few answers. Secular historical data, backed by biblical writings suggests that up to this point every religious institution honored the Seventh Day Sabbath – except Roman and Hellenistic Pagans. During the mid to latter part of the third century the Christian movement was spreading rapidly across the Roman Empire and Christians began to out number Pagans forcing certain pagan rituals, temples, and synagogues to become obsolete putting them in jeopardy of being destroyed. It was at this critical juncture that The Roman Emperor Constantine The Great, converted from Paganism to...

Luckily, that book was not required reading in my constitutional law classes. Had it been, I strongly suspect that I would have failed the Florida bar exam “with flying colors”. Representative Steny Hoyer (D. Md.) was recently asked a series of questions by CNSNews about the constitutionality of the proposed mandate that all Americans purchase health insurance or pay a tax. His answers are more than a little revealing, particularly coming from a graduate of Georgetown Law School.

Note: The following text is a quote: THE BRIEFING ROOM THE WHITE HOUSE Office of the Press Secretary ___________________________________________________________________________ For Immediate Release October 21, 2009 STATEMENT BY THE PRESS SECRETARY On Wednesday, October 21, 2009, the President signed into law: H.R. 2997, the "Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2010," which provides FY 2010 appropriations for the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Health and Human Services, and other related agencies.

According to law, the State of Hawaii must now disclose how it came to the decision that is found in Director Fukino’s July 27th Press Release that was approved by the State’s Attorney General. Haw. Rev. Stat. 28-4 states very clearly that formal opinions of the Attorney general must be made public. Further, The Hawaiian Office of Information Practices in 1991 formally set out the requirements that informal opinions of the AG must also be made available for public inspection. According to Donofrio, under the Uniform Rules of Evidence (Rule 510): “when the conclusions of an informal Attorney General opinion...

Last month, a new effort to reconnect the populace with its public servants was launched: Contract From America. This consultation exercise aims to gather ideas from the public on laws they would like to see passed or eliminated. The ideas will be boiled down to three in each policy area by a panel of tea party activists from all over the nation and then submitted to political leaders. Considering the arrogance displayed by many members of Congress towards their constituents and their wishes, this project intends to make them aware of just how driven people are to see a change...

Needed: A 'clean line' to determine lawfulness"You don't need to know. You can't know." That's what Kathy Norris, a 60-year-old grandmother of eight, was told when she tried to ask court officials why, the day before, federal agents had subjected her home to a furious search. The agents who spent half a day ransacking Mrs. Norris' longtime home in Spring, Texas, answered no questions while they emptied file cabinets, pulled books off shelves, rifled through drawers and closets, and threw the contents on the floor. The six agents, wearing SWAT gear and carrying weapons, were with - get this- the...

We Freepers routinely complain about our overly litigious society. I thought it might be a good time to describe events that happened in our lives when we didn't sue, but a liberal/socialist/amoral opportunist might have. That way, instead of saying, we are too litigious, we can point to all of the stories (true ones only, please)of needless litigation avoided because Freepers aren't jerks. I will start with two examples. 1. My 90 year-old grandmother had stomach pains. Hospital diagnoses stomach cancer in this tough old Polish-American warhorse. In fact, her 90 year-old appendix was about to rupture. It did after...

Following the Heller decision, folks in municipalities all over the country began to challenge local restrictions on gun rights. One of the most prominent bans in the country is right here in Chicago. That is about to get a full hearing in front of the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court agreed Wednesday to decide whether strict local and state gun control laws violate the Second Amendment, ensuring another high-profile battle over the rights of gun owners. The court said it will review a lower court ruling that upheld a handgun ban in Chicago. Gun rights supporters challenged gun laws in...

Taking on a major new constitutional dispute over gun rights, the Supreme Court agreed on Wednesday to decide whether to apply the Second Amendment to state, county, and city government laws. In another major case among ten new grants, the Court said it will rule on the constitutionality of one of the government’s most-used legal weapons in the “war on terrorism” — a law that outlaws “material support” to terrorist groups. The Court had three cases from which to choose on the Second Amendment issue — two cases involving a Chicago gun ban, and one case on a New York...

According to a recent New York Slimes Piece, several states across the nation are passing laws and resolutions outlawing the proposed government mandate requiring all citizens to have health insurance. The Slimes piece, of course, takes a swipe at the efforts as mostly symbolic and posing little chance of success, but in reality, these laws could set the stage for a major battle over state sovereignty and state’s rights. It is likely that the state laws will not be upheld (the states cannot regulate the Federal Government). However, there are other constitutional questions to consider. In an op-ed in the...

The government is prosecuting only about one out of four of those charged in connection with terrorism, according to a study that suggests federal agencies don't agree on who is a terrorist. People charged with terrorism often go free because the evidence wasn't strong enough to bring them to trial, says the study by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a data research group at Syracuse University. Since 2002, the percentage of terrorism cases that federal prosecutors declined to pursue has grown from 31 percent to 73 percent, the TRAC study found.

In just a few days, bills that were signed by Governor Brewer back in July will become law. The following are a few key pro-rights bills that will become effective after midnight on September 30, 2009. Defensive Display – Clarifies and codifies the defensive display of a firearm, such as: - exposing or displaying a firearm in a manner that a reasonable person would understand was meant to protect the person against another's use or attempted use of unlawful or deadly physical force - verbally informing another person that the person possesses or has available a firearm - placing the...

WASHINGTON -- In her maiden Supreme Court appearance last week, Justice Sonia Sotomayor made a provocative comment that probed the foundations of corporate law. During arguments in a campaign-finance case, the court's majority conservatives seemed persuaded that corporations have broad First Amendment rights and that recent precedents upholding limits on corporate political spending should be overruled. But Justice Sotomayor suggested the majority might have it all wrong -- and that instead the court should reconsider the 19th century rulings that first afforded corporations the same rights flesh-and-blood people have. Judges "created corporations as persons, gave birth to corporations as persons,"...

"If" by chance, the lady who admitted on todays ACORN video to setting up and then killing her husband, If she really did kill and then get off on an abuse defense .. Can they retry the case? What about the double jeopardy law? Just curious. Thanks

First, I generally like Howard Kurtz. He's nowhere near my favorite pundits but more often than not, he's fairly thoughtful. He's certainly near the top of the so called MSM, of which he is a part of. That said, his latest piece is pure nonsense. Kurtz attempts to tackle the totally manufactured controversy that some are opposing the President because they are racist.

In the playground, the folks at ACORN would be the ones challenging all the other kids that looked at them funny to a fight. In this playground, they simply sue. Those workers were subsequently fired, and the U.S. Census Bureau severed ties with ACORN in the wake of the controversy. But ACORN chief organizer Bertha Lewis issued a written statement Saturday saying that while she cannot defend the actions of the workers who were terminated, O'Keefe may have committed a "felony" with his operation. She also threatened legal action against FOX News, which aired the videos but did not produce...

Frank Considers Cramdown LawRep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., said slow progress in assisting troubled homeowners could lead to a new push to change bankruptcy laws. By United Press International September 10, 2009 WASHINGTON, Sept. 10 (UPI) -- Influential congressman Barney Frank, D-Mass., said slow progress in assisting troubled homeowners could lead to a new push to change bankruptcy laws. Frank, chairman of the House Committee on Financial Services, said Congress should revisit the issue of allowing bankruptcy judges to modify mortgages if the banking industry does not increase the pace of its help to homeowners, The Washington Post reported Thursday. The...

Monkey-Masked Driver Eludes 37 Traffic Tickets; Claims Unfair Speed Tax. Watch video: http://www.cardealerreviews.org/?p=118376

Joy Brighton, MBA, Shariah Islamic Banking specialist, and ACT! for America Fellow, exposes the link between banks who offer Shariah Finance and Radical Islam, Iran, Sept 11th, oppression of Muslim women , global human rights abuses and the funding of Jihad. Is the withholding of this information to American bank customers and shareholders Security and Consumer Fraud?

Last month, a judge ordered Chris Brown to stay away from ex-girlfriend Rihanna for the next five years following his February attack on the R&B singer, but Brown and Rihanna allegedly have found a way to work around the court-imposed separation. According to a report in Britain’s Star, the pair plans to have an extended meeting outside the court’s jurisdiction. “(Brown and Rihanna) spoke to their lawyers to see what was allowed, and are now planning two weeks in Mexico,” a source revealed to the magazine. “They want to spend some quality time together and know they have a lot...

Link to Video

Members of the Iraqi Security Forces examine a villager's paperwork during operation "Enforce the Law VI" in the Rashaad Valley of Kirkuk province, Sept. 2. Photo by Pfc. Justin Naylor, Multi-National Corps – Iraq. KIRKUK — A joint security operation between the Iraqi Army (IA) and Iraqi Police (IP) dubbed "Enforce the Law VI" was carried out in the Rashaad Valley, Sept. 2. This was the first mission entirely planned and conducted by IP and IA in the Rashaad Valley, said Capt. Jesse Prince, commander of Troop A, 4th Squadron, 9th Cavalry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division."All...

inspired by the DHS Report, and angry Townhall Mobs.

Could a form of martial law be imminent? Obama appears ready to cross the Rubicon, and all he needs is a killer virus. Let’s connect some dots. Remember President Obama’s Executive Order basing 80,000 active troops at home for the first time in the history of the peacetime military establishment to “help with civil unrest and crowd control or to deal with potentially horrific scenarios such as massive poisoning and chaos in response to a chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear or high-yield explosive, or CBRNE, attack….” Now connect that information to the recent announcement that the military has established regional deployment...

THERE were angry clashes in a city centre today as right-wing protesters fought with anti-fascist campaigners in a busy shopping street. A planned demonstration by The English Defence League in central Birmingham descended into violence as the group charged along New Street, close to the city's main train station. One onlooker said: "There were about 250 people in total, fighting and throwing bottles at each other." The disorder spilled onto the adjoining Bennetts Hill, a street lined with a number of pubs, popular with shoppers. Dozens of riot police worked to contain the disturbance and a police helicopter hovered overhead....

On December 16th, 1773,"radicals" from Marlborough, Massachusetts, threw 342 chests of tea from three British East India Company ships into Boston Harbor in protest of oppressive taxation and tyrannical rule. They wrote of their actions, "A free-born people are not required by the religion of Christ to submit to tyranny, but may make use of such power as God has given them to recover and support their ... liberties." That event, of course, was the Boston Tea Party. On April 19th, 1775, Paul Revere departed Charlestown (near Boston), for Lexington and Concord, in order to warn John Hancock, Samuel Adams...

The Canadian Human Rights Tribunal has ruled that Section 13, Canada's much-criticized human rights hate speech law, is an unconstitutional violation of the Charter right to free expression because of its penalty provisions. The decision released Wednesday morning by tribunal chair Athanasios Hadjis appears to strip the Canadian Human Rights Commission of its controversial legal mandate to pursue hate on the Internet, which it has strenuously defended against complaints of censorship. It also marks the first major failure of Section 13(1) of the Canadian Human Rights Act, an anti-hate law that was conceived in the 1960s to target racist telephone...

With President Obama’s nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court of the United States, many speculated whether or not she would survive the vetting process and how her confirmation could affect the makeup of the court. Everyone nominated to serve on the Supreme Court should be carefully vetted because, like it or not, Supreme Court decisions have the potential to affect a large segment of the population even though the legislature is the branch of government charged to enact legislation and is therefore held accountable to the public for policy decisions.

SOMERVILLE, N.J. — Attorneys for Jayson Williams say the retired NBA star's convictions related to a fatal shooting should be thrown out because those who prosecuted him were racially biased. Williams was convicted of four counts of covering up the shooting of a hired driver at his central New Jersey mansion more than seven years ago.

In the wake of the Fatah Conference which recently took place, one very important item has deliberately not been reported on or covered by the biased media:And that is Fatah's "official endorsement" of the Al-aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a U.S. recognized foreign terrorist organization as the "military wing" of Fatah.The Palestinian Authority is run by Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah Party. In January of 2006 candidates representing Hamas, another U.S. recognized terrorist organization, won a majority of seats in the Palestinian Authority elections.This resulted in Congress immediately reacting by adaption of legislation to prohibit any further funding of the PA, as such funding would...

Former schoolteacher Evelyn Miller doesn't plan to retire from the anti-illegal immigration movement any time soon. She's too busy organizing petitions, blasting e-mails, faxes and letters, and threatening politicians who are up for re-election. The 76-year-old member of the California Coalition for Immigration Reform says she is driven by her belief that those in the country illegally are taking jobs and taxpayer services from Americans. "We're soldiers in the foxhole," Miller said from her dining room in Irvine, which doubles as a home office

There is some debate on places that find such questions interesting. Is it even constitutional to mandate that someone have health insurance under the penalty of a tax? First, there is no cut and dry answer to this question? Second, the way you view this says a lot about the way you view our government and constitution.

In December 1917 Bolshevik Russian leaders, including one of the founders of Socialist thuggery Vladimir Lenin, established the Cheka—Russia’s first political secret police. With almost unlimited power, the Cheka implemented “campaigns of terror” against the wealthy, land owners and those who opposed Lenin and Bolshevism. !n 1922, once most of Russia’s opposition to their new absolute rulers had lessened, the Cheka was disbanded. However, under the singularly oppressive Josef Stalin, Cheka was reinstated and ultimately renamed “The People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs” (NKVD) and what would be known as Stalin’s “Great Terror of the 1930s began. The NKVD was used...

While this gives the state's budget a reprieve in the short term, it does nothing to solve the plethora of structural problems that have afflicted the state to put into this position. A movement is growing in the state that will attempt to tackle that problem. That movement is the movement for a Constitutional Convention. This movement is a coalition of activists and think tanks that include the New America Foundation, the Bay Area Council, and Common Cause among a coalition of groups that includes conservatives, liberals, business leaders, and localities. The current California Constitution is nearly two hundred years...

DUBLIN -- The Irish government plans to bring into force a new law in October that critics say is a return to medieval justice. The legislation, aimed at providing judges with clear direction on the 1937 Constitution's blasphemy prohibition, imposes a fine of up to 25,000 euros -- about $39,000 -- for anyone who "publishes or utters matter that is [intentionally meant to be] grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters held sacred by any religion, thereby causing outrage among a substantial number of the adherents of that religion."

The Obama doublespeak brigade appears to be sewing confusion as to the issues discussed in my previous post regarding exemptions for POTUS in EO 12968. As stated in the previous article, POTUS and VP are exempt from security clearance examinations for receiving classified information listed in EO 12968. However, Sections 5.2(5)(d) and (e) make it clear that if the agency head in charge of such classified info determines that the procedures listed within the EO cannot be invoked without risk to national security – then such provisions do not limit the agency head’s power to deny release of classified information....