In a major victory for student right, the Supreme Court has ruled that the strip search of a 13-year-old middle school student was unconstitutional. The Court ruled 8-1 with only Justice Clarence Thomas voting with the school in the case. For an earlier column on the case, click here. However, the justices also voted to protect individual school officials from such lawsuits.
Continue reading “Supreme Court Rules Strip Search of Middle School Student Illegal”
Category: Congress
The respected newspaper Stars and Stripes has raised the alarm of censorship against the military. Stripes receives federal funding for the coverage of the military, but has long earned the respect of journalists for its independent reporting. An editorial raises a very disturbing incident involving the U.S. Army’s 1st Cavalry Division.
Continue reading “Newspaper Charges Military With Censorship Over Critical Reporting From Iraq”
A federal commission on prison rape has called for reforms and safeguards to combat prison rape, which involves an estimated 60,000 victims each year among the prison population.
Continue reading “Report: More than 60,000 Inmates are Raped Each Year”
U.S. Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor has resigned from the all-women Belizean Grove club — waiting for Friday to try to bury the announcement in the weekend news. Sotomayor did not express any personal concerns or regrets about joining an exclusive club and only stated that she did not want it to be a “distraction” from her record.
Continue reading “Sonia Sotomayor Resigns From Female-Only Club”
Gentleman assume your couches! Happy Father’s Day to all of the Turley bloggers.
The now imprisoned U.S. District Court Samuel B. Kent has been openly bilking the government for salary and benefits by refusing to resign. His lawyer even acknowledged that his promise to resign in a year was due to his calculation that the Congress could not move any faster toward a Senate trial. It was a curious legal strategy since it virtually dared the Congress to expedite the matter, which it did. Kent has now been impeached in a fast track proceeding.
Continue reading “Judge Kent Impeached in Expedited Process”
Ron Paul has challenged democrats for what he views as their hypocrisy in voting against the war funding during the Bush Administration while now voting for same legislation under the Obama Administration.
Continue reading “Ron Paul Challenges Democrats Who Support an Obama War Over a Bush War”
In a split 5-4 decision, Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr. ruled that an individual cannot demanded access or testing to DNA material after his conviction becomes final in District Attorney’s Office v. Osborne (08-6).
Continue reading “Supreme Court Rules Against Constitutional Right to Access to DNA Testing”
Attorney General Eric Holder left little question in anyone’s mind this week that the Obama Administration will not allow a prosecution of unlawful surveillance during the Bush Administration. As with the torture program, the Administration has been avoiding questions about its failure to prosecute the illegal surveillance program. Now, Holder has refused to call the program “illegal” and would only refer to it as “unwise.” I intent to use this as my main defense in my next criminal case: my client’s robbery of a bank was merely “unwise” and a lack of wisdom does not justify prosecution.
Continue reading “Holder: Warrantless Surveillance was “Unwise” Rather than “Illegal””
President Obama has already adopted or expanded many of the most controversial Bush policies on executive privilege, detainee treatment, termination of privacy lawsuit, and other matters. Now, he has adopted the identical position of Vice President Dick Cheney in seeking to withhold visitor logs to the White House.
Continue reading “Obama Adopts Cheney Policy and Opposes Release of White House Logs”
Sen. Dick Durbin, the second most senior democrat in the Senate, cashed out his stock the day after meeting with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke. Durbin took the money and invested much of the $115,000 in Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc.
Continue reading “Senatorial Privilege? Sen. Dick Durbin Cashed Out His Stocks and Shares After Meeting With Paulson and Bernanke on Economic Crisis”
U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White has cleared the way for Jose Padilla to sue University of California Professor John Yoo for the violation of his rights due to his physical abuse as a detainee. It is a relatively novel ruling that holds that government lawyers must be treated as other officials in participating in illegal programs or policies.
Continue reading “Judge Rules that Jose Padilla Can Sue John Yoo”
Civil libertarians have been outraged by President Barack Obama’s adoption of extreme Bush policies on secrecy and executive privilege, including his effort to dismiss public interest lawsuits and his Administration’s refusal to investigate war crimes committed by the Bush Administration. Now, Obama has filed to dismiss the case of Arthur Smelt and Christopher Hammer, who are challenging the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which blocks same-sex couples from securing Social Security spousal benefits, filing joint taxes and enjoying other federal rights of marriage.
It comes to all of us with age. As hairlines recede and waistlines expand, cosmetic surgery becomes more attractive. While this blog is just around 2 years old, in human-to-blog years that is almost middle aged. In the last few weeks, various regulars have suggested that the site needs work to handle the large number of visitors and entries. This is an attempt to see what you would like to do with the site. I view this site as belonging to all of the regulars and I would like to solicit your thoughts on changes that you would like to see from different cosmetic touches to different structure. This entry will also allow discussion of those things (not people) that you least like.
Continue reading “DOES TURLEY BLOG NEED A NIP AND TUCK?”
Among the material release this week by the White House is the disclosure that Judge Sonia Sotomayor belong to a private women’s-only group. The membership raises an interesting question given the controversies in the past over nominees who belong to men-only club. Should the standard be different for women or should exclusive club membership no longer be an issue in nominations?
Continue reading “Sotomayor Belongs to All-Female Club”