Majority Leader Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., blasted the American Bar Association over its mixed evaluation of Gloria Navarro, his nominee to the United States District Court. Reid, who has previously relied on ABA ratings in opposing or supporting nominees, told the ABA to “get a new life.”
Continue reading “Reid Blasts ABA Over Nevadan Nominee”
Category: Courts
United States District Judge Robert Gettleman in Chicago has held infomercial pitchman Kevin Trudeau in contempt after Trudeau encouraged fans to write and call his chambers. The result was clogging the court’s email and phone system. Trudeau is the author of “The Weight Loss Cure ‘They’ Don’t Want You to Know About.”
Continue reading “Bad Pitch: Weight-Loss Pitchman Trudeau Held In Criminal Contempt”
The Obama Administration has taken the rare step of criticizing a British court. Why? Because the court released a few paragraphs of a report that confirmed our abuse and torture of detainees. Spokesman Ben LaBolt denounced the release of the information and threatened to cut off access of the British to classified information in the future. Note these paragraphs do not appear to reveal any new classified technique, but rather confirm our violations of international law — evidence that the Obama Administration has been refusing to release.
Continue reading “Obama Administration Blasts British Court For Disclosing Abuses at Guantanamo Bay”
Republican Iowa legislator Jason Schultz has introduced legislation to rid the state courts of the scourge of . . . precedent.
Continue reading “Iowa Legislator Seeks To Bar Courts From Using Precedent or Case Law”
This month, members of Congress have introduced an amendment to the Constitution to reverse a recent ruling by the Supreme Court to allow Congress to regulate corporation engaged in political speech. Constitutional reform is no simple task. However, if we are finally ready to amend the Constitution to achieve political reform, why not make some real changes to our system? The proposed amendment would do little but return us to the status quo before the decision in Citizens United which (in case you have a short memory) was hardly a period of celebrated good government. To paraphrase the Beatles’ song, if “you say you want a revolution,” this is not it but there is a way.
Before we can change the system, we have to change our attitude passivity and collectively declare “enough.” While our leaders control the political branches, they do not control the political process itself. That is controlled by the Constitution, which remains in control of the people, in our control. It is not too much speech or too much money that is draining the life from this Republic. It is a lack of faith in ourselves to force change without the approval or support of our leaders. If we are going to go through the constitutional amendment process, then let’s make it worth our while and achieve real political change in this country.
Below is today’s column on fundamental reforms that could change not just Congress but our political system. I discussed the column on this segment on National Public Radio.
Continue reading ““You Say You Want A Revolution”: How To Reform Our Political System”
After her husband former Prime Minister Tony Blair declared secularists to be an equal or greater danger than terrorists (here), his wife Cherie Booth is under fire for granting leniency to a man accused of criminal assault because he is religious. Her statement in court would suggest that, if the man were an atheist or agnostic, such leniency might not be appropriate.
Continue reading “The Good Faith Defense: Cherie Booth (Wife of Tony Blair) Under Fire For Sparing Man Due to the Fact That He is Religious”
Saudi Arabia and Bangladesh seem to be vying for which country is the most repressive in the application of Islamic Sharia law. The Saudi courts have ordered a Filipino woman to be lashed 100 times after she was raped. The Bangladesh courts outdid their Saudi counterparts and ordered a girl lashed 101 times for being raped. At what point does the Obama Administration publicly denounce these countries for systemic human rights violations against women?
Associate Justice Clarence Thomas appeared to take on President Obama this week in discussing the ruling in Citizens United — contradicting the President’s portrayal in the State of the Union. In my view, the President did overstate the holding (not unheard of in the halls of Congress), but I continue to despair over the increasing public role played by justices (here). In my view, Thomas should not be engaging in such a public debate and should allow these decisions to speak for themselves.
Continue reading “Clarence Thomas Defends Recent Ruling on Campaign Finance”
Harris County criminal Court-at-Law Judge Reagan Helm has resigned after protests over his allegedly taunting remarks to victims of domestic violence. Helm, 68, reportedly admitted to suffering from dementia and having “medical issues.” He was accused of extreme bias against women in these cases. In one instance, Helm told men accused of domestic abuse that these women have them “by the balls.”
Continue reading “Houston Judge Resigns After Claims of Bias Against Domestic Abuse Victims”
Conservative filmmaker James O’Keefe has gone public with what is likely to be his defense at trial to the felony charge that he entered federal property with “false pretenses for the purpose of committing a felony.”
Continue reading “O’Keefe Goes Public With Defense on Landrieu Controversy”
It appears that conservative filmmaker James O’Keefe is continuing to comment on his case. Raw Story and other sites are reporting that O’Keefe tweeted shortly around midnight last night that “Govt official concedes no attempt to wiretap.” In the meantime, it appears that the stunt in New Orleans may have been an effort to cut off the telephones or film their operation as opposed to wiretapping calls. I discussed this story on Hardball and Rachel Maddow.
Continue reading “Filmmaker O’Keefe Tweets on Pending Charges”
In a breach of protocol, Associate Justice Sam Alito was filmed during the State of the Union address last night shaking his head and mouthing “not true” in response to the President’s criticism of the Citizens United ruling on corporate campaign finance limits. Ironically, Rep. Joe Wilson promised to restrain himself during this speech and not scream “you lie” again during the President’s speech. For a justice, this breach (shown below) is no less remarkable. It is, in a word, injudicious.
Former Chinese Supreme Court Justice Huang Songyou, 52, has been sentenced to life imprisonment for corruption after being convicted of taking more than 3.9 million yuan ($570,000) in bribes from four lawyers in return for favorable rulings. He was also convicted of embezzling 1.2 million yuan of government funds in 1997 when he was president of a city-level court in Guang-dong Province.
Continue reading “Chinese Supreme Court Justice Sentenced to Life Imprisonment for Corruption”
Pennsylvania Judge C. Joseph Rehkamp, 61, has turned himself in to the police to be charged with domestic abuse after allegedly choking his wife, according the ABA Journal.
Continue reading “Pennsylvania Judge Arrested for Allegedly Choking Wife”
In a rare rebuke to a trial judge, the Supreme Court voted 5-4 to block the planned telecasting of the trial over the constitutionality of Proposition 8 (the ban on same-sex marriage). The vote broke down along ideological line with the five conservatives ruling that Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker, presiding over the trial, had not given the public enough time to comment on the telecasting before issuing his order. The ruling came in Hollingsworth vs. Perry, 09A648.
Continue reading “Supreme Court Votes To Ban Telecasting of Same-Sex Trial”